Interlude: Compound Fracture

Kyoko Soryu Zeppelin stood in the void that was Unit-02's core. For a while, she had been alone after her contact experiment. After all, she had been exchanging letters with Yui about synchronizing with the Evangelions. At the time, Project E had extended to Germany, and she had taken the lead on it.

However, Yui was absorbed by the Eva she was testing on, so Kyoko had the notes copied and sent to her, to see if she could do it and have better results.

She wanted to do it for her Asuka. Yui had a son, who was now presumably in the care of Gendo. She had nothing against the man, but Yui was more of the caring type, especially with children. Kyoko felt her and her husband had a similar dynamic, and wanted to develop Unit-02 while still being there for her daughter. Her husband was adept, but not the greatest in terms of child-care.

After months of R&D and modifying Yui's notes and observations, Kyoko took on an activation test of her own.

One thing she kept in mind was that Yui's sync rate, as it had come to be known, had spiked at 400%. When that happened, Unit-01 absorbed her. Kyoko developed limiters to prevent her sync rate from exceeding 100%, a number she deemed anything above dangerous.

Reviewing the notes and footage of the incident, Unit-02's contact experiment was set up much in the same way. Kyoko brought herself closer and closer to the core, until an alarm started to sound and she could hear shouting.

The last thing she saw was the empty catwalk, and the whole time she thought about Asuka.

Everything had gone white, and the next thing she knew, she came to exist in this void, which felt like a lucid dream that never ended.

Kyoko began to get used to it, until The Other showed up some time later. Was it years? Months? Kyoko had no concept of time where she was.

The Other resembled Kyoko exactly, but instead of her blonde hair, labcoat and proud posture, she wore a hospital gown and had messy dark-red hair that was sloppily chopped to shoulder-length, and her features sat differently.

The Other also had a deranged smile and seemed to stare at a doll in her hand, whispering sweet nothings to it.

Kyoko used her logic and reasoning to determine that The Other was an extension of her soul. Since her entry into Unit-02, she felt overwhelming care and a need to protect Asuka. Her heart felt full of love for the little girl, and it seemed more prominent than before, with no capacity for hatred within her.

The Other would talk to her, but constantly expressed malicious words, threats, and even suicidal tendencies. Her only repose was that doll. That red-haired and blue-eyed doll. The Other would never keep the doll further from arm's length, and always referred to is as her sweet Asuka.

These facts led Kyoko to the conclusion that contact with Unit-02 had split her soul, and something happened to The Other to being her here as well.

Both were Kyoko, just two halves of a fractured soul.

One nice thing about being within an Eva's core is that since it's your own mind, you can manifest anything.

She had manifested a simple room, reminiscent of her apartment in Berlin, where she lived with Asuka and her husband, which The Other seemed to get agitated about whenever he was brought up.

One day, a seat, reminiscent of the seat from the entry plug, appeared in the room, with Asuka sitting in it, looking older than she did the last time Kyoko saw her.

At first, she was elated. She saw her daughter there, with a focused expression and her eyes closed. She tried talking to her, but got no response. She would try touching her on the back, holding her face, even embracing her until she disappeared, but nothing seemed to get the girl's attention. She would disappear and reappear as time went on, and every time she was looking older. Right in front of her, she watched the girl grow, but could never get through to her.

Asuka would occasionally mutter "c'mon, stupid doll..." in an attempt to synchronize with the Eva, but seemed completely unaware of her mother's presence. Not that The Other was any help. She would often times just stand and stare. One time, Kyoko watched her attempt to get close, but she kept whispering "die with me" over and over, so she forbade her from ever attempting. From that point on, any time Asuka appeared, Kyoko would come close and attempt to get through to her while periodically throwing The Other a warning glance.

Today, or whatever encompassed 'Today,' Asuka appeared again, but something was different. For one, her eyes were open and she was talking, but not to Kyoko.

This time, she was sharing her pilot's seat with a young boy?

Kyoko got a close look at the young man. Brown hair, blue eyes, and a sincere expression she had seen before. After thinking back to where she had seen such mannerisms and facial features, she remembered seeing them on her old friend Yui Ikari. Therefore, this had to have been Yui's boy, who was a baby the last time she had seen him. He had grown into a good-looking boy, with gentle features from his mother and some more subtle ones from his father.

Asuka and the young man appeared to be in a combat situation of some kind, as they were shouting back and forth and the seat was being moved around noticeably.

Kyoko threw caution to the wind and put a hand on Asuka's back. Nothing. She then tried with the boy, and actually got somewhere. When she touched his back, he jolted in the seat and began to look around, mumbling "someone's here..." with his eyes scanning a room that wasn't there. She noticed that Asuka responded to the other things the boy was saying, but not this. It was as if he had said nothing at all.

He knows of my presence, Kyoko thought to herself. Interesting...

Kyoko was so focused on the kids in front of her that she failed to keep The Other in check. While she was trying to see the extent of the boy's synchronization, her doppelgänger crept up behind and put a hand on her shoulder, roughly caressing the side of her neck.

"He can die with us, too..." she said in a breathy voice. It startled Kyoko, who pushed The Other away forcefully. She stumbled back, dropping her doll, and quickly scrambling to retrieve it.

She turned back to the kids, putting a hand on each shoulder. She thought of memories her and Yui shared. Even though they were at different branches of NERV, they were friends in university and formed a bond that was nearly-sisterly. Even after graduation, they had become pen-pals. She held these thoughts and focused on them for around 7 seconds, but it took a lot of energy out of her.

The combat Asuka and the boy were engaging in seemed to come to a head when they both screamed about one final push, then shouted some more. After that, they both nearly collapsed from exhaustion as they disappeared, exchanging some quips before fading away for the time being. Kyoko took some time to think. The angels must have returned, like Yui had been predicting. She would only talk about it in person, and. Asuka seems to be fighting and piloting with that boy. What was his name...? Sho... Shinji! That's it! Little Shinji! Kyoko remembered how, as a baby, he shared a similar smile to his mother.

Shinji appeared to be looking for something when synchronizing. Perhaps he understands how this works a little better than Asuka, Kyoko reasoned.

Next time he's here, I'll try to get through to him fully, maybe he can help her.

I need to talk to my Asuka.

A/N: I wanted to put this in for a couple reasons: Additional context for how I envision the inside of the Eva cores, and also what happened to Kyoko. I've seen a handful of interpretations and how her soul being split makes her a kind of split personality. One night the other week, I had the idea of "Motherly" Kyoko and "Die with me" Kyoko being two women in the core, with each of them even having their own appearance.

As for the chapter title, a compound fracture is when a bone breaks and pokes through the skin. In this case, I'm applying that to Kyoko's soul.

Review responses to the last chapter and this will be in the next chapter. See you guys next week!