Creation began on 01-28-20
Creation ended on 02-15-20
Neon Genesis Evangelion
Modern Day Legend of a Rage-filled Anchor: Quelling of the Rage
It felt like a long time had passed since he recognized the comfort of his own futon as Shinji laid back on it.
"Ah…oh, yeah," he sighed as he relaxed his limbs.
"You were only in the hospital for a week," Rei reminded him.
"Yeah, but it was a long week. I was on the mend, but it just feels good to be back here."
Rei nodded in agreement with his belief…and then looked down at the floor where the scorch mark had resided to this very day. She had been in this room once before, but hadn't bothered to ask about that particular aspect of this room to anyone here. Not Asuka, Yui or Anzu.
"Is that…" She spoke, pointing to the mark on the floor.
Shinji looked and nodded.
"Yeah," he answered her. "That's where he left this world."
Rei walked over to the mark and lowered to place her left hand on it. To know this was where the Shinji she had known sparingly had committed suicide to keep from harming Asuka any further, it was like a knife had pierced through her own heart.
"Do you…know how he felt when he did it?" She asked out of curiosity. "How he felt when he had to stop himself from harming my sister?"
"He felt… He felt relieved…but very angry…and sad."
"He was relieved, angry and sad?"
"Relieved because he was able to keep from hurting Asuka, angry because he took his own life in order to keep from potentially taking hers…and sad because he would never see her again. But…I don't believe his suffering is to be eternal. Suicide is a sin, that is true, but he didn't commit it out of some sort of depression or because he felt hopeless. His only concern was not killing Asuka in that moment where rage with no sense took hold of him during his happiest of times with the love of his life. He didn't want what he felt was like a curse at the time to cost him the one person he didn't feel he could live without."
"Ending your own life to protect the one you love… I don't believe I've ever heard of anyone willing to do that. But…to throw your life away for another person so they can keep going on, to let them continue experiencing the passage of time you can no longer experience, to enable them to go through the seasons you can no longer enjoy… Nobody should have to make that sacrifice when there's always another way…even when we think there isn't."
Back then, Shinji heard his deceased counterpart's voice, I didn't believe there was another way due the rage. It was either stop the unexplainable rage that had taken hold of me at that time, in that moment…or I lose Asuka because of it.
Rei then got up from the scorch mark and looked at Shinji.
"I say this not to disrespect either of you, but because I care," she said to him. "Don't do anything suicidal as time passes by. You might be from another universe where it's constantly summertime in your Japan and you were drafted into a merciless conflict by your father's arrogance and inhumanity, but that doesn't mean you should echo actions committed in the past. As people would say, those that fail to learn from history…are condemned to repeat it."
She's right, his deceased self added in agreement. But you can't echo my past mistakes. Your soul isn't as hardened as mine. You're a lot stronger than I was.
Not as strong as you were…and still are, Shinji told him. You didn't have to…pilot something dangerous to your mental health or have a lack of understanding with your father.
My father died in a drunken stupor, murdered by my grandfather because he beat our mother during his intoxication. Thinking about it now, I don't think we could've ever been close, let alone understand one another. But your father…is just a bitter person who doesn't want to admit his own failures as a man and a parent. Mine couldn't fail me because we never met and therefore have no relationship that was established, but your father failed you because he lacks the desire to mend the fences between the two of you. His only interest in you…is what you could inherit from Frenzia in the future. But he can't have what isn't his to possess, so he'll try to stop you from possessing it, like manipulating one's last will and testament to fit their liking, except he can't manipulate Frenzia. He can't manipulate anyone we know any more than we decide how we're going to help any one of them. And even if I don't inherit her mana, I still want to stop Kagami before he hurts anyone else with his goal of creating a new race of people to replace the ones that already exist on the planet. We might have our flaws, take things and people for granted, even look the other way sometimes when other people suffer, but we're still worth believing in, that we can strive to be better than those that came before us…that we can change.
Shinji nodded to Rei that he wouldn't echo what his deceased self had done in the past.
-x-
"…Aw, damn," went Anzu in the kitchen as she looked in the pantry. "I forgot to get more canned soup."
Asuka, who was helping her around the kitchen, uttered, "How many cans do you need?"
"Seven or eight, at least, chicken and vegetable."
"I can go get them."
"Thank you, Asuka."
As she left the kitchen to go outside, she nearly bumped into Yui, dressed in sweatpants and a halter with her hair unkept.
"Whoa," Asuka reacted; she had seen Yui many times in the past up to the here and now, but this was the first time she'd seen her in an improper state.
"Yeah, I know," Yui explained to her, "somewhat of my only tomboyish aspects from my younger years. I haven't had my coffee yet, so this is how I am sometimes."
"I almost didn't recognize because you usually wear blouses and skirts."
"I didn't always."
Asuka bowed her head and then left out the house.
"Where's she off to at this time of the day?" Yui asked her mother.
"The store for canned soup," she answered.
-x-
"Today seems quieter than usual," Chidori told Yuuhi as they, the Mikage twins, Toya and Q-Chan left out the hotel and made their way towards the Ikari house.
"Yeah, it is quiet out," Yuuhi agreed with her.
Aya and Aki had also noticed this and had wondered how a town like this didn't have at least a little drama playing someplace on the streets.
"Maybe this place is just naturally void of violence," suggested Q-Chan to them.
"Except violence is everywhere," Aki came to accept as the truth. "It doesn't matter what it is, an explosion, an earthquake, even just a purse being stolen, anything to cause a little problems."
"I thought I was the only one to have noticed," they turned to the side of the street and saw a jogger stretching his legs against a streetlight. "It's been like this for less than twenty years, and I can't explain why there hasn't been so much as a car accident."
"For less than twenty years…and there's been no violence of any sort?" Yuuhi questioned.
"I knew a guy that once had this crazy idea that the town's got some dark secret that nobody wants to talk about, but the only thing this place is well-known for are these magatama-shaped rocks that are scattered around. There was even a woman that had these violent thoughts in her head, but then eleven years ago, those thoughts just stopped out of the blue…and she couldn't explain why she no longer felt the need to act on them."
That's when Aya recalled a brief explanation on how Shinji's Rage-filled Anchor had seemed to serve as a means to siphon off the negative emotions of people around him, but at a cost of how the total sum of emotions had caused him suffering by making him act in ways that were unlike what he'd normally act. But neither she nor any of the others that had met Shinji had seen him exhibit these actions since that time at the hospital with Ceres' spouse and later with the return of Ceres' hagoromo. It seemed as though…whenever Shinji demonstrated his own anger or was placed in danger that forced him to react, it seemed the Rage-filled Anchor…served no purpose beyond the emotional negativity siphoning. She was starting to wonder if that had anything to do with why Magatama Town was so quiet and currently devoid of violence.
The jogger than resumed his jog and left the group alone on the sidewalk.
"Say, Aya," went Toya to his love, "you don't think that…Shinji is the reason the town is like this, do you? I mean, it sounds like he could…without meaning to."
"It's not so far-fetched," she responded. "He… Both of them, in fact, were blessed and cursed with the Rage-filled Anchor. It was probably active before they turned eleven, and even after the one from this world died, it was still around. And then our Shinji showed up and it made itself known again."
-x-
Strapped to a gurney now and being monitored was now Gendo's current state on this ship in the water just away from the coastline of Japan. While much of his body had recovered from the defeat he was dealt by Shinji and that Soryu girl with red eyes, he could barely move his legs due to the muscle fatigue that still affected him. His DNA was informed to be as human as it should've been after losing Adam, but it was suspected that he was paying a price for having it grafted onto him and then having it forcibly removed from his body that had yet to recover fully from the imperfect fusion.
It was one of the few things about Gendo that Kagami and Alec were mildly disgusted by; they never met a man, especially one that claimed they were from another universe and had deliberately damaged their own DNA.
"You should be pleased to know that his DNA has repaired itself," said Alec to Kagami as the latter man observed Gendo from an observation deck above the room the man was left in.
"To know that his DNA has recovered is a relief," Kagami explained to Alec, "meaning he will not be a threat…it does not please me. This man is meaningless to the future of the human race. His son, on the other hand, is invaluable. And he nearly killed him to obtain what wouldn't be his. He nearly jeopardized everything…for something that not even the boy has possession of."
"And that has been left in a standstill due to no attempts being made to reacquire the boy, but we still have his blood samples and the research I've done confirms that he is worth more than what we had initially suspected of him. Even if he didn't survive, we'd at least have to obtain his body for his genetic material that could still be salvaged."
"What do you mean, Alec?"
"I tried exposing his blood to different disease cultures…and every test showed the disease burning itself out, leaving the blood intact."
"Are you saying that Shinji Ikari is immune to certain diseases?"
"I'm saying that his blood may improve the immune system of people against the disease cultures I've tried it on, which were several of the kind people are afraid of catching, such as HIV, influenza, hepatitis, TB… I've even exposed the blood to cultured inactive neurons belonging to an anonymous Alzheimer's patient. I've heard of lightning in a bottle once, but I never thought I'd see inactive brain matter fire neurons in an effort to think."
"How long since you started exposing his blood to these cultured diseases and neurons?"
"Over a week since we last saw him."
Kagami was impressed by this. While the potential abilities of the C-Genomes were unlimited, this discovery that the Tennyo blood in Shinji Ikari was forcing the cultured diseases to burn themselves out and still remain untainted, despite being exposed to them. He had once read and memorized the questionable phrase of how a remedy could eventually be worse than the disease it was meant to treat for or against, but he had his doubts that any cure of this sort could be worse than the biggest disease of them all: All the current members of humanity that were poisoning the world with disorder.
"And the blood samples are still viable?"
"Yes, sir."
Kagami went from being impressed…to being very impressed. While he still sought Shinji to be invaluable for his celestial powers like the C-Genome women, his blood, most likely enhanced by his celestial heritage, none of the other C-Genomes came close to what he was demonstrating, even though he wasn't physically present.
"What about the blood samples taken from the women before we let them go?" He asked Alec. "Did you try testing their blood like you did with Shinji's?"
"Yes, and unfortunately, their blood samples paled in comparison to Shinji's," Alec explained. "Although they boast a high immunity to lesser diseases, they couldn't outlast or fight back against the ones that Shinji's blood has burned through. I'm saddened to say, not even Aya's blood sample stood up to a rare cancer culture I exposed it to…and when I tried seeing how well her blood matched up with Shinji's…it wasn't even close to a mutual standstill between them. Her blood cells were consumed by the cells in his own…as if his blood fed off hers."
"Like some sort of parasite?"
"No…more like a dominant/submissive symbiosis. Like a lion needing a mouse to pull a thorn out of its paw because it can't do it itself."
All the while, Gendo was trying to think of a way to escape from here, to find Shinji and then take from him what was his to possess. He started to think about the hagoromo that Kagami had in his keeping, how it was just there for the taking when he met with Shinji before having to brutally torture him for being a stubborn brat. If he could gain possession of that hagoromo, then maybe he'd be strong enough to take the one that Shinji was trying to get from Frenzia. One way or another, he had to try; there was no way he could let Shinji possess something as significant as the power of a celestial being when it was better for himself to receive such a resource.
-x-
It was quite a picture that Shinji found in his room, just laying under the bedside counter. And from the memories of his deceased counterpart, it was a photograph that brought back heightened feelings of joyful acceptance. In the picture, Shinji saw himself (or rather, his deceased self) with Asuka at the beach, posing for the camera; he suspected that it was a long while before Asuka could take the picture because they both had what looked to be mildly-strained smiles.
"Is it clicking yet?" He recalled his counterpart asking her through his bared teeth.
"Almost got it," she had responded, guessing her phone didn't have the feature that allowed for selfies to be taken. "Got it!"
"Eh-heh-heh!" Shinji laughed, as though it had actually happened to him, and then he sighed as he placed the picture on the countertop. Why does it feel weird to laugh like this? To smile for no reason…or just to feel like everything might be okay?
That's your humanity, Shinji, he heard his counterpart tell him. People are supposed to laugh when they're happy, cry when they're said, show emotion when they feel either elated or depressed about something. We wouldn't feel human if we didn't feel the way we do. And what you feel is weird for you to be doing is to feel hopeful of the future, that no matter what, things will turn out okay in the end.
Is there such a thing as a human being that demonstrates no humanity?
Only those that demonstrate the negatives of what people do to each other, like inflicting pain on those that don't deserve it, or hating someone without a justifiable excuse…or anything else that doesn't show the light inside a person, only their darkness.
Both young men were suddenly reminded of the man that was Gendo Ikari, probably the only person besides Kagami Mikage, whom they barely knew, except from what the Mikage twins informed of him, who demonstrated the worst aspects of being a human without any sense of humanity, willing to harm his own son to the point of nearly killing him. That would've enraged any other person, but for Shinji, the one that still lived and breathed the breath of life, as much as he felt he should vent his frustrations of nearly being killed by his father, he let the rage toward that be quelled by something much more meaningful than the sense of hate…and that was the miracle of being surrounded by those that encouraged him to live on, to see the next day, to…break away from the chains that kept him tied down to his past and to grasp the future he wanted to be full of happiness. If he could do that, he could break from the rage that lingered deep within his heart.
"Bury the anger that holds you back," he expressed.
And leave it behind, his counterpart added.
-x-
Asuka didn't mind the quietness of the morning hours as she walked down the sidewalk towards the Ikari house, carrying two bags of canned soup. The sounds of the waves crashing against the beach sand gave off some tranquility that you couldn't get from a city park. She stopped for a moment to gaze out at the ocean, wondering just what it really was that existed beyond that vastness of water and sky that the seagulls flew toward each day.
"Would you like a hand in carrying those, Asuka?" She heard Shinji's voice and looked back towards the sidewalk, seeing him standing a few feet in front of her.
"Shinji, I, uh… Yes… Yes, please." She expressed, offering the bag in her left hand. "I thought you'd be resting more."
Accepting the bag and walking beside her down the street towards the house, Shinji felt the need to ask her something, but wasn't sure how to go about it.
Asuka looked at him and got the feeling that he was different from the previous day.
"You seem different from before," she told him.
"I just…found a picture in my room from a long time ago," he explained. "You were posing for a selfie and it seemed like your smiles were straining from posing for a while."
"Yeah, that was a bright day. It was Valentine's Day. I wanted to do a selfie, but my phone wasn't designed to do camera flips."
"Heh-heh! You must've had a challenging time wanting to get the best shot."
"Three times, three failures. It was only with the fourth attempt did the shot turn out right."
"Red and pink, the colors of love."
Yet Asuka got the feeling that there was something more going on with Shinji because he just seemed…so calm, so in tune with his surroundings or something else altogether different than from before when they first met. It was different than it had been with her Shinji because of the anger and lack of stability, but it was feeling like everything could've progressed to right here.
"How do you feel right now, Shinji?" She asked him.
"Calm," he answered, "rested, and…full of…I don't know what the right word is, but I want to use 'conviction'. What word would you use to describe a sense of…feeling like you can do something about something else and seeing a good thing coming about it?"
"Words like 'determined', 'assured', and 'hopeful'. Words that exhibit a degree of confidence in what one wants to do or is currently doing."
"I don't think I'll ever know how it is so you could be the smartest person I know right now."
"Please, there are a multitude of people much smarter than I'll ever be…and big brains don't always have an answer for any questions that one seeks to have answered that don't revolve around personal lives or a desire for what they really want. What do you want, Shinji? What do you really want?"
There she went again asking him about what it was that he wanted, which opposed what others wanted him to do or be. He liked that about her, how she could be so easy to communicate with, how she would say what was bothering her or something else altogether whenever she could.
"By knowing the difference between being who you know you are meant to be…and being what others want you to be, you will achieve the feat of possessing my mana," he remembered Frenzia's revelation of how he could inherit her greatest personal possession.
Despite the time that had passed since Mikage International, his father's wrath, his own injuries and hospitalization and recovery, Shinji hadn't the faintest idea of how to solve that obstacle. He could've asked Frenzia for more of a hint, but this was a test that only he could deal with, and to be dependent upon his celestial ancestress for every answer would just prove that he was unworthy of inheriting her power…and undeserving of a future if he continued to cling to the past by looking to those from the past that weren't supposed to show him the easy way.
Sighing, he looked at the vast ocean and expressed, "I just want for all of us to be happy when the suffering ceases. I don't want for there to be just large calms between the storms of any situation we face… I want the storms to stop raging completely. That…would be a future I could be content with…if we could all move on towards the future without the hurt following us."
Right then and there, Asuka would've just dropped her bag and jumped this young man to the ground and kiss him until her lips were certain to burn off from the friction, but she kept her emotions in check and simply gave him a reassuring nod of positivity. It didn't seem so selfish of him at all to want for every one of them to enjoy a happy future without the hurt. She had seen him hurt before, even when they had never met until that day he showed up in town, back when he was in Tokyo-3, deprived of a happy past and uncertain of where his future was even going, if it was going anywhere positive at all. This feud with the Angels, his lack of stable relationships that stemmed from his involvement with NERV, his world's version of herself with the attitude and ego and her sister's counterpart that was just vacant of any semblance of an identity or individuality, many of which couldn't have amounted to even a semblance of a life.
"It probably seems impossible when you hear it out loud," he suggested.
"No, it doesn't," she told him. "It never seems impossible. It's only impossible…when we don't do something to make it possible. So…let's make the impossible possible, Shinji."
-x-
Despite the insistence of them returning to their homes, Misato, Asuka and Rei returned to the room where the mirror resided and resumed observing what they could of Shinji in this other dimension where he found alternates of people from this one that were unaffected by anything relating to a devastation that never occurred.
Misato picked up the mirror and watched as the glass rippled to reflect not Shinji or the alternate version of herself, but showing the visage of a rather-extremely unpleasant Gendo Ikari, being carted away on the ship he was prisoner on, looking the way he did before he started turning into a grotesque version of himself that injured Shinji to the point of almost killing him.
"Ugh," she groaned, turning her face away. "It looks like he's doing better."
Asuka looked at the mirror and saw Gendo, wondering when the mirror would show Shinji instead of his father. But then she noticed the way his face seemed deep in thought, as though he were already cooking up a new plan that was worse than what he did to Shinji…but would include continuing to hurt the boy in some way.
"He looks like he's up to something again," she expressed her opinion.
"He always does," Misato stated.
Rei looked at the mirror and saw Gendo being wheeled off into a room and then left alone in there, still strapped to the gurney. Then the mirror rippled again to show Shinji with the alternates of herself and the Second Child, sitting in the gazebo, looking like they were just talking to each other.
What could Ikari-Kun be saying to them? She wondered, noticing that Shinji had raised his right hand up and balled it into a fist for a moment, but then opened it up again; there was no indication that Shinji was exhibiting any measure of unnecessary violence in the conversation.
"…So…you haven't felt any anger about anything or anyone?" They heard Rei's alternate speak to Shinji.
"No," he answered her. "For a while, I thought it was just going to happen whenever it happens, so I didn't want to say anything to jinx how I was feeling. But…I haven't felt the Rage-filled Anchor's influence on me ever since…when we were at the hospital for the first time. I just kept hoping it wouldn't act up again…and during the time Asuka and I had encountered my father…and even after that time, the rage didn't take over me. For a short while, it might've tried to when I jumped him, but I ended up knocking myself out in the process of knocking him out. And still…I do worry that it will take over, but I don't want it to. I don't want to hurt any of you."
They watched as Asuka's alternate, who was sitting away from Shinji, got up and approached him, taking his right hand and placing its palm against her face.
"When I decided I was going to spend the rest of my life with him, I swore to accept him for all that he was, accursed rage and all, because I truly loved him," they heard her say to him, possibly referring to Shinji's dead alternate. "So here I am, swearing the same promise to you, Shinji, that I will accept you for all that you are, no matter what…because I do love you."
Then they saw Rei reach for Shinji's left hand and place it on her face.
"I'll add on to that promise," they heard her say to them. "Rage or no, I must accept you for all that you are, Shinji, even if that means I'll risk receiving undue pain in the process."
Shinji looked as though he were going to cry in front of these two young ladies, something Asuka would've expressed made him somewhat of a wimp for doing so instead of a man.
"Why must it always feel like a serious risk when it shouldn't be?" He questioned, sounding as though he wanted to feel relief over concern.
Yeah, these two are taking a serious risk with someone that can be possessed by rage with no clarity or direction at any time, including right now, Misato realized as she was concerned for all three of them, not just Shinji.
"With everything you went through back in your world, and with everything that has happened here…along with what has yet to happen…or even what will not happen because we changed the future with what we know," they heard the red-eyed Asuka say to him, "it's not so much a risk as it seems to be."
"It seems more like…a promise," the blue-eyed Rei expressed.
-x-
In the solace of the part of Shinji's mind where they took up residence, the deceased Shinji Ikari and the celestial Frenzia had noticed a change in the environment. While a subtle change was being represented in the lack of fog or mist that would've normally been present around them in the wood, it did give them an indication that something was amiss in the present. Or at least felt amiss to the deceased boy as he looked at his ancestress, seeing a look of curiosity on her face.
"There used to be fog or mist here," he told her, "but now, it's as clear as the air we once breathed. Do you know why?"
"Something has changed within the present…for both of you," she expressed, confusing him. "The obscurity of her environment represented a sense of doubt, of dread…and silent fury which would not explain the source of any measure of hate."
"Like the Rage-filled Anchor?"
"Yes…and something has happened to dispel its strength, quiet its indirection."
"You mean…it's gone?"
"Not gone…but held in check now, like a wild animal left alone to calm down."
The deceased boy looked around their surroundings, but was confused by what could've happened to his alternate self in the living realm that would've caused something like this to happen in the small space they occupied within him.
"I don't understand how the rage could've been quelled," he admitted his inability to comprehend the current situation.
"It's okay to not know how or why," Frenzia told him, and then sat down on the large rock that now possessed a layer of moss on its top. "Every method of trying to handle the Rage-filled Anchor is different in each generation it manifests in. Some choose to fight against it while others choose to try and put an end to it. There's no blame to hold against those that can't see past living with it."
"I couldn't see past living with it if it meant hurting Asuka. Ever since I met her and ended up being in love with her, she became my reason for wanting to live, to enjoy life, no matter what. But then I received that vision of killing her…and I couldn't go through living without her, knowing that I would kill her if I did, no matter how much I wanted to fight against that fate."
"But after you found yourself brought back in spirit, because another shade of yourself from another lifetime ended up displaced here, you still had the fear, even broadcasting it to him, to me, to Asuka, that you hadn't prevented that future from happening, despite the measure you took to ensuring that it wouldn't. But does the fear still linger within you?"
Leaning against a tree nearby, the dead Shinji admitted, "I used to fear her still dying, despite my own death…but after everything that happened with Shinji and Asuka at Mikage International, preventing that future where he saw his father kill her, and her helping to defeat his father, I don't have that fear, anymore. I'm not fearful of her life being endangered by anyone…and I'm not as angry with myself for having to kill myself to keep her safe as I used to be."
"Your soul has quelled in its fury for quite some time now. How do you feel right now?"
"Calmer than I've ever felt since I died, grateful of my living doppelgänger changing the fates of many people…and relieved of my previous fears."
"Then…that must be a sign that your soul, regardless of the circumstances that led to your death, is not beyond the embrace of redemption. I believe your living alternate believes such is possible. If so, then there must be hope for you like there is for everyone else."
Shinji wanted to disbelieve Frenzia due to his death being of his own doing. Because he was a suicide (and he knew enough about suicide being the most unforgivable of sins), he would never know peace, even though it was protect the one he loved the most from himself. He had been prepared for his damnation ever since he set himself ablaze and reduced his body to a charred spot in his room by his bed…only what he had expected to be the beginning of his eternal agony…never came…and he felt like he had waited for a long time before he met his living incarnation from another universe. And then…he got to see Asuka again, even receive a proper parting with her because of his doppelgänger, but he still dwelled within his soul with Frenzia, helping whenever he could.
"Shinji," he heard Frenzia say to him, "surely, you must know that deep down…you want to believe in there being salvation for you…even when you believe you don't deserve any."
He nodded that he wanted to believe.
-x-
"…Shinji?" Rei spoke, noticing that a tear had escaped the boy's left eye. "What's with the tear falling from your eye?"
Shinji reached up to his cheek and felt the tear that had fallen from his eye and responded, "I don't know."
To be continued…
A/N: I had planned to finish this on Valentine's Day, but I was distracted by everything else. Still, I hope you enjoy this chapter.
