Case 14- Haunt(Freighten)ing.
Halloween Special (END)
A phone rings, but Asuka shivers at the sound of the rusty phone on a dirty counter. They were in a dim orange lobby with a receptionist desk, and tons of chairs flipped over. Rei awaited beside her quietly. "Should I get it?" Rei asked.
"No. I can." Acting the brave superior, Asuka put the phone to her ear, and heard nothing. "Hello?"
"Ah, yes hello miss. You scheduled an appointment?" The voice asked which sounded like a young woman talking through a fan.
"No, who are you? Are you inside this place?" Asuka tried to reason.
"Here, there, nowhere. I'm Leliel. Glad to meet you. So honey, what is the reason of your appointment? Health problems? Dental? Job placement? Depression?" The woman said softly.
"I didn't come here for anything! Now where are you?"
"I don't know, but your the first patient I wanted to see! Next Ikari, and then Ayanami! So, please, do step into my office, no need to feel insecure." A wall fell off revealing a chrome metallic room with bloody sheets on gurneys to the left side of the long rectangular room. A faceless mannequin wore a black robe and doctors gloves sitting in a brown leather seat with one leg on top of it's other. "Please, tell me your problems."
"Asuka, I wouldn't advise this..."
"I'll be fine." She walked into the room and sat across from the oddity.
...
"You look at an old photo." Holds up a sepia tone picture of a child. "How do you feel." The voice warped on the word feel. Going High and Low on tone.
"Sad." Asuka said the first thing that came to mind.
"Now I know you're into the studies of the Human Psyche, so you can't fool me. I am not a human. So how do you feel looking at this? This." The mannequin held up the picture, and Asuka's eyes began to water.
"Hate."
"Good, good. You see a WOUNDED dog. What do you do?" The thing's hands morphed together.
"Shove it aside."
"How about a wounded girl? What would you do then Asuka?"
(Why am I answering these questions?) "Probably comfort her. Then let her be."
"A redeemable quality. What if it was a random boy?"
"Call for help."
"I said you can't fool me. Now this is three times you lied to me. The first was saying you were sad looking at a melancholy photo. But you hate seeing old memories recorded. Now shoving a dog aside is true in your case. But if you saw a girl hurt, you'd probably ignore her. Just like you did Rukira. My brother smashed her along the freeway, and you ignored your comrades plead for help, and your guilt is rising over your selfish nature. Now the boy was a 3rd lie... Why did you lie again?" A siren grew in the hospital, echoing through the halls, making her feel cold.
"Because I don't feel I should be honest with you."
"Do you hear my war cry? I've been using it since those bombs dropped in Hiroshima back in World War II. Why is it such a haunting sound to hear do you wonder?" The room started to warm up.
"Asuka! I hear something falling." Rei yelled mono toned.
"Well Asuka. Why is a siren so eerie?" The mannequin started to melt.
"It signals the falling bombs. It is a warning of death."
(SSSSSSSWIP) The room caught on fire, and Asuka fell out of the chair, in a daze. The mannequin was no longer there, and Rei was dragging her into the main hallway. Phones were ringing and falling off their lines, with a multitude of voices sounding warped.
"Immediate Evacuation. Breakdown imminent." The voices grew slower and slower.
"Psycho...Analysis...Failure...Break...Down...Immin...ent..."
"I- I can't move Rei... Carry me or sumtin..." Asuka had sweat dripping from her forehead, and her clothes were oily.
"Al-Alright..." Rei bent over, but she threw up right beside Asuka. "I feel sick... And pale... My skin hurts..."
"Wha-WHAAA?!" Asuka touched her skin. "AAAAAAHH!" She cried. "I feel like I'm rotting away..."
"Is this radiation? Are we... being poisoned..." Rei coughed.
"I can't move Rei... I'm rotting."
"Damnit."
...
DISTRICT 666
"High temperature rising in children One and Two. Nerve damage imitation, hallucinations rapid, and losing consciousness. At this rate, it'd be better to come and distract the angel once all of the kids have passed out. Do you have all the men ready to lure Leliel away? Well Captain?" Ritsugo approached Misato.
"We're ready and waiting... Just give me the word once her guards down. We'll get those four back from that BITCH!"
...
"Say Shinji."
"Yeah?" Jeremy was in a cold sweat when Shinji replied back.
"You're voice sounds weird. I just wanted to make sure I wasn't going crazy." The two boys sat in a dining room table, with heavy rain pouring outside with thunder cracking loudly. The chandelier above them was blue, and the house was lit like a regular calm blue sky.
"It's been like that for me... My dreams are always like this." Shinji swirled his finger around an empty table plate.
"Your dreams? So you kind of understand what's going on? We're just dreaming? How do you know?"
"Because the situation we're in feels familiar to me. I'm going to stand up, and walk to the door, but it'll be locked, and everything will turn orange... We'll hear the sounds of a boat revving outside, and we'll be stuck in here. I only hear downpour right now though."
"A boat? Why's that Shinji?"
"Childhood." Was all Shinji replied.
"So, you hear a boat? What happened?" Jeremy looked to the window, but heard no boat.
"My father. I believe when I was young he tried to leave me alone to sink on a boat when I was a small child so my old guardian likes to say. So I usually have nightmares on a boat... Or even train."
"I understand why a train would be another place. You... like to run away from your problems?" Jeremy guessed.
"Y-Yeah. I do a lot. Well I mean I used to, but recently, I've been forced to confront all the problems I face, so... My life's going better I believe." Shinji believed.
"Aren't you scared of what might happen while we're in here?"
"No, I'm going to the door to try to open it, and it will be locked I bet you. So we'll probably just have to stay here until somebody comes for us." Shinji stood up from the rich wood table, and turned the locked knob by the front entrance that was shrouded behind an orange light, and wet chains hanging from the ceiling. It was locked. "Told you."
"Oh man. T-This is scaring me."
"Why?" Shinji wondered.
"W-What do you mean? Doesn't- THAT- Creep you out!?" He pointed to the corner of the room.
"Oh... A mannequin?" Shinji wasn't cautious of it.
"I-It's moving Shinji!"
"IT- IT IS!" Shinji looked surprised, but not frightened.
"Are you two experiencing fear right now? Or is that just you Jeremy?" The blank figure stared at the german boy.
"I'm scared, yes. You're an angel. Aren't you?" Jeremy backed away.
"You think that's the angel?" Shinji looked at the mannequin. "No way."
"If you really think so..." The figure took one simple step toward Jeremy and he fell on his behind, cowering under the table.
"W-What the hell are you?" Jeremy cried.
"Now Ikari." He stepped towards Shinji, and his vision blurred as the room around Shinji filled with water. It was orange, and the roar of an engine echoed above the surface. "You're all too familiar with this setting?"
Shinji kept calm, and ignored the feeling he had. He just pretended he was back in his nature chamber. "This is more of what we call a nightmare. It won't work on me." Bubbles came from Shinji's mouth.
"Such a troubled, irregular teen. You really are fragile. Fragile like glass. I'm sure he met you and said the same. That saint who likes Ode to Joy. I'm sure he likes you a whole lot." Bubbled whirled around the figure's blank face. "Maybe I should have gone easy on your loved ones on the other side now. I should call them dead ones I suppose."
Shinji grew unpredictable as his body shook. "W-What?!" Shinji's Iris grew.
"That sad, tortured German girl lied about her personality, and couldn't handle the truth. So that abomination along with her, keeled over from simulated radiation poisoning. And they died. Rotting in their own consciousness. So maybe news of this could do the same? Can you drown in your own tears Ikari?"
"I used to think I could." Shinji replied, and the rain outside stopped.
"What?" The figure asked.
"I blocked my emotions this time, but I won't be able to every time. I knew she'd might die someday, just today was unexpected. But Jeremy here can't handle all this I suppose. But why couldn't he? He's strong isn't he?"
"Oh how you are quite a devil Ikari. You want to know more about him? Of all the things to ask in this situation, you want that? You don't want to be sure about those girls deaths? What about what time it is? What day? If you're alive? If you're dreaming? You'd really ask something so selfish? Why I wonder since you can only tell."
"I'm just curious about him. If Asuka dies, then that's that..."
...
OUTSIDE
"We're tracing their whereabouts as we speak Captain. Our megaphone team is loud and ready whenever you are!" Maya was on a Segway with caution lights atop of it and a stereo system attached to the behind.
"Alright! We're really close! It's tracing to..." Misato was turning the signal knob on a ham radio with a sound radar atop of it, and put her ear close to a headphone, listening for something.
"Fine, if-"
"-not! She never would!"
"I am-your barriers."
"Because-but a liar!"
"-DIE-"
"(Shinji?) WEST SIDE! READY!"
"READY!"
Loud noises blared... sirens, cars honking, glass breaking, crowds booing, guns shooting, it was all just a calamity of random noised to the ear.
...
"Ah, you're friends have come to look for you."
"You think?" Shinji thought back to Asuka, and felt sick. "I guess. But, it's too late now..."
"You said you knew it would have happened anyway? You are actually saddened by her fate?"
"Yes. I just don't need to show it." Shinji looked out the window, and then back to Jeremy who had started to crawl from underneath the table.
"Fine, then all of you can live to see god's warmth another day." The figure slouched over and smashed it's palm into it's plain white face. "May the sun rise again for you four." Sun broke through the darkness in the sky, and the mannequin lit on fire.
"Did he just let us go?" Jeremy asked, wiping the tears from his eyes.
"I don't know. But I'd rather we leave quickly." Shinji had felt a feeling he had never felt before and felt like throwing up. "Asuka, and Rei. They're... Dead."
"M-Maybe not Shinji." Jeremy's lips shook.
"But he said the four of us Shinji. He wants all of us to see the sun again Shinji. We can't give up on them." Jeremy slouched over to the front door made of wood that was now a rusty burnt door. He slammed his shoulder into the frame slouchily. He fell on his face, and warm dust kicked up in the alley they were in. All sorts of noises grew stronger around them, along with a familiar voice calling out to the teens.
"Shinji! Asuka! Rei! J-JERRY! Where are you?! SHINJI! ASUKA! REI! J-JEFFREY!"
"She doesn't know my name yet. Heh." Jeremy got from off the ground and pat the dust off of him.
"That's her alright. Probably got drunk before she came looking for us." Shinji smiled and went for the broken door ahead of them, and stepped into the corridors of the abandoned building. "She'll collapse in my arms, and she'll be left weeping in front of everybody. Asuka will get jealous, and Rei will look at the scene in awe. You might laugh with Mr. Kaji... and we'll be together again. We weren't apart long, but it feels like forever."
"You happy to be out of there?" Jeremy smiled and thought of all the reactions he would get from the staff at NERV trying to explain their experience with an Angel.
"I am. Really glad." Shinji slowed his speech speed, and looked towards a long hallway with broken mirrors, and burnt, moldy medical flags were laid about everywhere.
"Glad... I can't wait to..." He looked ahead and saw the two girls beside each other with pale skin, and wrinkly skin. "Oh man." Jeremy hid his eyes. "H-Hey! I'll be back!" Jeremy ran out of the building calling for help, as loud as he could. But Shinji couldn't keep his gaze off the two girls.
"And they died. Rotting in their own consciousness."
Shinji's knees buckled.
"And they died. Rotting in their own consciousness."
Shinji felt something rise quickly from his stomach.
"And they died. Rotting in their own consciousness."
"Asuka, R-Rei."
"Can you drown in your own tears Ikari?"
An eerie wind passed through the room, sounding like a ghost howling in the distance. "I can cry now."