The boy sat alone. He ran his hands through the sand absent-mindedly, staring out at the red horizon.

"Here again?"

The familiar voice shook him from his thoughts, but he didn't pull his gaze away.

"None of them are coming. Bunch of damn cowards."

The girl stepped forward, sitting down in a huff.

"Would drag their lazy asses out of there if they had bodies."

What if they never want to leave?

"That's the problem, isn't it? I hate it when I have to come find you here, you know."

Why?

"Those stupid things keep me up at night. I wanna fight them again. I would have won."

The girl gestured to the cross bearing nightmares. Immobile, but that didn't mean she liked seeing them.

Maybe. I wish they sunk into the ocean or something.

A pause in the conversation.

"..f...we...go...a..."

The boy turned to the girl and asked her to repeat what she had said.

Interlude:

Calm Before the Storm

Kaji's grip tightened around the pistol. He let out a breath he didn't know he'd been holding. "Damn... that was close." He fell to his knees, grasping his shoulder as it bled. If he had just been a little slow on the trigger, or not bothered to bring a gun...

"You owe me, Misato," he said softly, looking to his assailant. Two in the chest, one in the head, just like he'd been trained. For all intents and purposes his attacker looked normal aside from the gun in his hands. Normal shirt, pants, a pair of glasses. "Haven't used a gun in a while," he muttered, "Didn't want to. Sorry pal."

He didn't bother to check the body. SEELE was never stupid, if it was even SEELE that had sent them.

Speaking of SEELE, he had a package he needed to drop. He hoped he was right about the timing, or all of them were done for.

Aoba and Makoto couldn't believe their eyes. The address that Misato had given them was an abandoned house right in the middle of Tokyo 3. As soon as they opened the door, there was Maya, sitting cross legged on a futon with a laptop in the middle of an empty and dilapidated living room. She looked up at them, a piece of toast hanging from her mouth. "Oh, phey guyhs."

A loud explosion sounded from the direction of NERV HQ. Makoto wasn't sure if he should still follow emergency procedure or run forward and hug his missing friend.

The day after the attack:

"Welcome to the debrief," said Misato. The room was full of the remaining NERV staff who decided to not flee the city after the attack. It was the very same room we had used for the debrief that lead to Asuka and I's special sync training.

After what we did on the surface to protect NERV from SEELE's attack, it was an appropriate choice.

That being said, all remaining NERV staff was no exaggeration, and the room was crowded and stuffy. Asuka, Rei, and I stood at the very front. Makoto, Aoba, and Maya just behind us, the crowd bleeding into general staff through the rest of the room.

I turned my head and saw Kozou Fuyutsuki in the very back, arms crossed with a solemn look on his face. I wasn't sure why Misato hadn't detained him. I decided to ask her later as I turned back.

"I'm not going to mince words," she continued, "We took substantial losses yesterday. At precisely 13:37 the sixteenth angel was defeated, and Unit 01 retrieved the Lance of Longinus."

The slide turned on, and taking up the entire wall behind her was a picture of Unit 01, roaring at the sky with the lance in question impaled in the ground next to it.

The picture sent a shiver down my spine.

I had taken advantage of the Eva in this way several times, but it still felt... wrong somehow.

"At precisely the same time the order was given to force shutdown the unit, and it did not respond. This was intentional."

Slide.

A picture of Lilith with the lance protruding from its chest, and not an old picture, a new one.

"It had come to light that Commander Gendo Ikari was planning on purposefully triggering the Third Impact using the first and second angels, ADAM and Lilith. The Lance of Longinus was replanted into Lilith as a means of detaining further growth until a more permanent solution can be found. As of this debrief I am rescinding the Top Secret status of ADAM and Lilith, and reassigning it to Secret. All NERV staff will be asked to reinstate their clearance, even if it is not expired. Do not mention this outside of HQ. I am afraid I cannot disclose ADAM's location at this point in time, that info will remain classified."

Misato paused, letting her words sink in.

There was some rustling in the crowd, and several murmurs.

Some here knew, and some didn't, and some even had a feeling, but hearing it first hand was a different story. Everyone in here now knew the truth. Yesterday, barring the 17th angel, we had been one step away from an apocalypse.

"Several key staff decided to act with emergency privilege. Please refer to the NERV manual regarding compromised staff and internal infiltration for further details. The key staff included the following: Myself, Ritsuko Akagi, Shinji Ikari, Rei Ayanami, Asuka Langley Souryu, Kaji Ryouji (currently MIA), and Maya Ibuki. The key staff detained Commander Gendo Ikari and took him underground to buy enough time away from the attacking forces. ADAM was confiscated and put into quarantine at precisely 14:06."

Slide, this time a picture of the Eva series, dead and unmoving.

"At the same time Gendo Ikari was being detained Pilots Ikari and Souryu engaged UN forces in self defense from a surprise attack. We believe SEELE was behind this attack, but have no means of confirming this. However, the lack of international action against NERV HQ and there being no follow-up attack points to this being the case. Eventually, Pilot Ayanami joined the skirmish, and the Eva series units were disabled. They are currently being stripped for resources and examined. Units 01 and 02 sustained heavy damage during the battle and are undergoing repairs."

Slide, this time a list of names.

"Several staff were killed in action during this attack."

She began to read them off.

Despite so many being saved, there were still those we lost.

As Misato went down the list, she paused for a moment. It was probably strange to see for anyone else in the room, but I knew why she stopped.

Finally, she continued. "Ritsuko Akagi."

Out of the corner of my eye I saw Maya look away.

"Do you think they'll attack again?" asked Asuka, rolling her head back to look at me upside down as I worked on a meal in the kitchen.

The TV blared in the background. Even though she had it on some cheesy romance movie an emergency report ticker was still on the screen. Understandable. The battle against the Eva series had been our most intense yet.

"Who knows," I said, stirring the mix of vegetables and meat in the pan.

Asuka had demanded stir fry.

I had promised to fulfill her every need if she came back.

Considering what she'd been through lately, it was a small price to pay.

I continued when she didn't reply. "Misato said they would have done it by now. I agree with her. I think they used everything they had, at least for now. Dealing with a shadowy organization like SEELE... I can say they'll definitely be cautious moving forward from here."

"Is that your experience at NERV talking? We work for a shadowy organization too, which, need I remind you, up until recently was planning to cause Third Impact." Asuka fully turned, straightening her head and laying on her stomach to get a better view of me. "Optional question, what would you have done about this without me?" she asked with a grin.

"Do you want the snarky response or the real answer?"

She pouted.

I sighed. "I don't know. My father had been planning this for years, I doubt I could have done any of this by myself. Honestly I may be good at controlling the Eva, but my combat experience is still minimal compared to you and Rei. Those things... just fighting my share was pretty scary."

"So you needed me."

I turned the heat down on the stove. "Yeah, without a doubt."

There was a long pause. I had been concentrating on cooking, so I stopped watching her movements. I thought she went back to watching TV.

"...I need you too, you know."

I turned to look at her.

She was blushing.

I started to blush.

Must have been contagious.

Before we could say anything else the door bell sounded.

"I'll get it!" shouted Asuka while she jumped up, all too eager to escape the mess she just put herself in.

I heard the click of the door opening, and Asuka letting out a strange animalistic noise.

"Hello!"

Haru?

Haru wasn't a wanted child. She understood why, but that did not make it hurt less.

Sometimes understanding didn't help.

Her father had been a foreman for construction. Her mother was a psychiatrist.

She rarely saw either of them.

"Daddy's work is very important."

"Mommy won't be back for two days."

She remembered the last conversation she had with her mother where she had actually been treated as her daughter. There were lots of big words, but one stood out to her. Empathy.

She couldn't remember it at her age, of course, but the more her mother explained the concept of it to her the more fascinated she became.

Maybe if she understood people more the other children wouldn't pick on her.

Maybe if she understood people more she would see her parents more often.

Maybe... if she understood...

They would not have put her up for adoption.

"I'm sorry I can't tell you more," I said, setting the tea down on the table. Haru sat next to Asuka, who kept glancing at her with a mixture of fascination and annoyance. It was really weird. Much weirder than the last time they'd been in the same room. I took the seat across from them.

Haru frowned, taking a drink from the cup. "I'm just glad you're okay. I don't need the details." Not a complete lie, but I could still see the curiosity eating away at her. She had to have known that I could tell. "You've made a lot of friends here, huh?" she said softly.

I smiled, "Yeah I have. Thanks to you."

She blinked. "What did I do?"

Asuka leaned onto the table, letting out a very loud yawn, "You're the reason this idiot asks too many questions and always gets into my business."

"Ah, I see," Haru said with a giggle. "So you owe me, Shin-chan. It's thanks to me that you have a girlfriend."

Asuka froze, her eyes suddenly widening, "Wh... Girlfr..." She pushed herself up and took a very deep and very loud breath. "No, you know what? Screw it, Shinji's my boyfriend!"

What the hell?

It was my turn to have an overblown reaction.

Haru started to laugh even louder, "You're kidding, you two weren't even official yet?"

If Haru could tell... where did that leave the rest of NERV? I knew Misato and Kaji had always teased us, but did it really go that far?

As for Asuka, she was staring right at me with a glare, not out of anger, but determination.

"Y... yeah, I guess we are, huh?" I said.

"Really?!" Asuka screamed, "That's your reaction?!"

I flinched, "You kinda just dropped this on me out of nowhere."

"Ugh!"

Haru raised a hand, "In case you've ever wondered why people could see this coming from a mile away, it was that right there, that thing you two just did."

"What thing?!" we shouted.

Ah... more remnants from the sync training.

As Haru shut the apartment door behind her she felt extremely good about herself. She had been worried when Shinji left that he would forget all about her. It was selfish she knew, but she still couldn't help it.

However, it was thanks to her that he was able to make a life here, and that made her feel good about herself. She had managed to do for Shinji what her biological mother could not do for her.

"Ah, hello."

A boy?

Who was this?

"Hello..." she replied cautiously. "Are you looking for something?"

"Yes, I'm looking for a certain apartment complex, but I seem to have gotten terribly lost. I'm supposed to be moving here, you see."

"Let me see the address." The boy pulled a sheet of paper from his pocket and handed it to her. She looked over the address and smiled. "Well you're in luck, this apartment is right next to the one I just came out of. By the way, my names Otome Haruko. Everyone just calls me Haru, though."

The boy laughed. "Ah, forgive me. Where are my manners today? I'm Kaworu. Kaworu Nagisa."