.hack/EVA: Catharsis: Critical Mass

Disclaimer: In this universe in the quantum foam, I do not own or in any way shape or form hold a claim to the .hack series or Neon Genesis Evangelion (or of course, any other copyrighted works I might reference here).

" " denotes speech

'italics' denotes thought

'bold' denotes location names

'bold italics' denotes skill use

Dusk

They came in rapid succession, images unfolding one upon another without relenting, without remorse. Somewhere in the vast expanse of twilight, a mind boiled, raced, projected, serving as a spectator to the outside world as the core of a vast and alien consciousness awakened, with will relinquished to another. Memories, dreams, hopes, fears—all collided, all colluded, joined as one in the end as in the beginning.

The flapping of white wings. Screams. The Tree of Sephiroth made of EVAs. Shouts. Gunshots, wailing, pandemonium. Panic, a giant of light, a great orb of souls, a wave of destruction, lingering affection, choices yet to be made.

The siren song of nothingness lulls the prickly hedgehogs of the world to sleep, as souls return to the ancient cradle of the black moon, leaving their frail mortal vessels behind to return at last to void. Sorcery of a sort, one might say, using the stored energies of billion of human consciousnesses to grant a wish of divinity—the Holy Grail for which both Ikari and SEELE had strove, even going so far as to create Angel-Human hybrids as homunculi of sorts, beings ever intended to die to open the gate to the Origin, bringing about the end of frail humanity and the beginning of something else.

This was the truth of the innocuous sounding Human Instrumentality Project, a truth that seekers such as Ryoji Kaji and Misato Katsuragi discovered all too late.

A figure crushed by a fallen mask, as a giant temptress walks. A two pronged lance hurtling from the heavens to join with a half awakened god. Chaos, blood, the end is nigh. Strings. Instruments. Cello, Violin, Viola. Distinct identities blending, complementing each other in three-billion part harmony. Fate? Free Will? A Canon in D Instrumentality, complementation, breakdown of individuals. Honeysuckle blossoms. Spirals of time.

"God's in His heaven, All's right in the world," they told themselves, even as they dared to challenge the might of the First Angel who lay sleeping in Antarctica, causing Second Impact and dooming their world by the actions of their own hands.

The anti-existence of man is man, ascendant as the 18th Angel. Giving up the fruit of knowledge for that of life, trading ever-changing evolution for stasis, denying emotion, denying individuality towards the pursuit of forbidden dream.

The actions of humanity coming to a head, with several parties scheming machinations to usurp the throne of souls and claim the prize of immortality, ultimately interfering with one another, with a blue-haired girl choosing to defy her creator, relinquishing her fate to another to whom she felt a deeper bond.

Betrayal of a master who had never truly cared, betrayal of the man of stone, betrayal of the creator and her purpose. Choice. The freedom to choose her fate after suffering at another Angel's hands, another who had rebelled, the free man who was not free. The freedom to be loved, to feel what it meant to be bonded to all things in truth, not just in name—to live.

For Rei Ayanami had known the pain of loneliness for many years, with her assigned purpose as her only companion in the infinite cycle of death and rebirth. As someone who could always be replaced if she died, there was little value in her life, and so she had thought of herself as expendable, not quite human. Others called her cold and heartless, but…what did these things mean, really, other than the fact that she looked different from everyone else?

'But who I am beyond the looking glass?'

What did it mean to be the First Child? What did it mean to be Rei Ayanami? It was something she had not begun to explore until ordered to venture into the game called The World, where as Skadi, she had observed other humans and their actions, watching as some treated the game as reality, presenting different facets of self in each world.

'Beyond the world of frozen tears, the glimmer of a distant far off dream.'

What was real in The World? The self, the object that one identified as "I". The self that is presented to others, the self in others' minds. And more to the point, what was the purpose to this 'game'?Could it truly be that it had no purpose at all?

'Humanity, the cradle of dreams between man and woman.'

It had been a surprise to find that someone was attracted to her, that someone treated her as a human instead of someone replaceable and unimportant. And it was strange too, that someone who had no vested interest in her survival would attempt to get closer to her on a level not pilot to pilot or angst to angst—but rather person to person.

'What is human? A smile, a touch, warm hands?'

The memory of cold metal rooms passed through her mind, isolation, a tank full of LCL, hostility. A shadowed man who had saved her for a purpose—a brown haired youth who had saved her just because of who she was. Hostility from EVA-00, the smell of Ikari-kun in EVA-01, the strange sensation of logging into The World and finding that there was someone else that looked like her.

Skari, the Dark Evangel, counterpart to Skadi, the maiden of Winter.

'Warmth, the beating of hearts, water flows on like lifeblood.'

In the center of Eternal City Mac Anu had been a river, along which drifted fragments of conversation, the gossip and rumors that gave succor to adventurers in place of food or drink when they rested after arduous journeys to the fields. And in the anonymity The World provided, many were free to show their true selves.

'The self that is and the self that will be, the self that watches and the self that is watched.'

Persona the mask, shadow the base, anima the unknown truth: the three faces of any being, with the harmony or dissonance between them leading to either a stable psyche or to destruction in the end. None of the Evangelion pilots had exactly had stable lives as children, during the fragile formative period, so perhaps it was somewhat understandable that they each had a few issues to work out—one lacking anima (Asuka), one lacking persona (Rei), one lacking shadow (Shinji).

'Moonlight under twilight skies. Embarrassment. Ikari-kun.'

From these initial starting points, each had set out upon their search for the end, making contact with others, changing and being changed by them, making friends, enemies, acquaintances. And when one discovered the identity of another in both worlds, the interactions and connections had deepened, becoming attractions, hatreds, loves, until the advent of the shadow, when Siarl of the Seven Eyes had begun his machinations, striking down the First.

'Love? Broken wings. Requiem for a Dream'

But in her endless sleep, Rei Ayanami had seen The World through the eyes of Kaworu Nagisa, linked to him through the AIDA that had defeated her. As such, she had seen how the Dark Evangel had suffered great losses but fought on regardless, opposing one who was like his father, opposing a shadow, opposing the fallen form of Asuka, and eventually defeating Siarl of the Seven Eyes in order to set her free.

'Gate of Uroboros, Genesis of Ultima'

And if her friend and rival in love Reimeiki Hakubo would entrust the brown-haired boy with her fate and the fate of The World…then Rei Ayanami would entrust him with such as well, so that in both worlds, he might be Harbinger of Twilight.

So it was that the blue-haired girl relinquished her fate to the Shinji Ikari sleeping within EVA-01, the being whose soul was caught halfway between this world and another.

Nightfall

She stood before the double doors of the majestic Hulle Granz Cathedral, for once hesitant to enter a place that had once been part of her vast domain, as the stones of Δ Hidden Forbidden Holy Ground held far too many memories for her liking. That was why the former goddess of the dusk had (perhaps somewhat irrationally) chosen to avoid the "place that hid heaven" as long as she could, knowing that Aura's presence in The World was strongest here…and in spite of everything, she wasn't sure if she was ready to set foot in a place so blessed.

'So much transpired in this holy place of The World,' the sorceress in black mused, as a light breeze disturbed the tangled order of her purple-black tresses, and her violet eyes misted over in recollection. 'It was here that Lycoris relinquished her fate to a knight of the spear, where a certain Wavemaster found the will to fight one of my Guardians, where Macha betrayed me for the first time. And it was here that HE first came into his power.'

The 'he' in her mind was of course Kite of the dothackers, the first Bearer of the Bracelet, who had opposed her till the bitter end. To Morganna, he was a hateful little boy, though she understood more about his motivations now after living as a human and fighting a threat beyond her power—and of course, after watching another Bearer of the Bracelet struggle on against a foe who had proven more sinister than her.

'It must have been difficult for Kite to have endured so much, but I suppose the fact that he did is why Aura chose his form as one of her Knights,' the former Goddess of Dusk noted grimly. 'Unless of course, Aura knew I would be returning to The World and decided to use Kite's form to irritate me…which she would not do. We both died at the end of that incident, and were both later reborn, though my own rebirth owes itself to somewhat…different circumstances than hers.'

The end of a world had been her rebirth, her manifestation as a physical being the result of a cataclysm caused by man, as man brought about its own twilight in an attempt to alter its fate. But in the end, a child had refused the seductive song of power, and so the Black Moon had splintered, the world beginning its long journey back towards normality, with the gathered power disgorged into the void where she lay sleeping.

'Third Impact…the Instrumentality of Man…I had wondered if that would come about again, in this version of the timeline…for unlike what the Angels might believe, or humanity, we goddesses know that time is not cyclical in nature, or linear…the best way to describe it is actually a spiral. Time moves ever onwards, with patterns in one reality mimicking that of another. That humanity exists is a constant, that the Angels exist is another…but those guidelines aside, the world may be completely different, because destiny is not written at the whim of a goddess, but by the hands of those who are bound by it.'

As she had feared, Third Impact had come again, with the choice over what might happen being given to the same Child as in the last iteration she had known. The one problem here was that in the final battle against Siarl, the Dark Evangel had sacrificed his consciousness to destroy the corruption lingering in the Black Box of The World, and in the absence of a mind to decide the course of Impact…

'Both worlds are conjoined at last, the virtual and the real flowing into one another through the boy to whom Skadi gives her fate, the boy who has become a void. Already, dreamscapes and memories are beginning to flow together with the fields of The World…which means, that perhaps it is our time, as Goddesses of The World.'

With a small smile, the former Goddess of Dusk opened the great double doors of Hulle Granz Cathedral, the edifice of glass and weathered stone that had been ancient when the world was born, bearing a strange tome of eldritch lore in her hands. The structure within was as she remembered, simple and austere, with light pouring through the stained glass window behind the altar, the place she was compelled towards, where a statue no longer resided.

Taking a deep breath, she entered, and with each step she took, the Epitaph of Twilight in her hand began to pulse with power, sensing the presence of the Twilight Goddess near, a swirl of azure light surrounding her as she was lifted into the air.

"Yet to return, the Shadowed One who quests for the Twilight Dragon," she read aloud, as if in a trance, voice echoing in the cavernous interior. "Rumbles the Dark Hearth, and Helba, Queen of the Dark, has finally raised her army. Apeiron, King of Light, beckons. At the base of the rainbow do they meet…against the Abominable Wave, together they fight…"

Morganna's voice trailed off, reds and purples flowing through the blue as her False Avatar and what divinity she had within her responded to the Epitaph. She might not have the power of all 8 Epitaphs, but her nature was still of the divine, and it had been she who had first given birth to Aura long ago.

'And once again, it is my task to awaken the Twilight Goddess…it is fortunate that the Azure Knights are incapacitated at the moment, or I might have to fight Kite yet again, something I do not look forward to.'

"Come forth then, my Key…my guide to the truth!"

For the last time, the Goddess of Dusk called forth her Avatar, feeling its power course through her as the shaped light coalesced into the winged form of a red and gold mechanical angel of battle. Spreading its wings, she fed into the tome all the power the Avatar possessed, freeing herself of the burden it posed in order to open the gate of—

She screamed, as azure light flared, and a connection was forged to the Sea of Data, drawing the Twilight Goddess from her place of rest to the place that hides heaven. If she could have, Morganna would have stepped back involuntarily, for Aura was now as tall as she, having matured through human interaction and become a mother herself, and a mirror to Morganna, clad all in white as she was in black.

'Not quite the young girl in whom Harald placed his hope…she has grown up. And more than that, though she is the Twilight Goddess, she threw away the role of god and distanced herself from cause and effect, returning to inactivity.'

"Aura," Morganna breathed, as she regained her composure. "It has been some time, my daughter."

"Mother," Aura replied, her tone betraying only a hint of sadness. "Five years since the time of Twilight, and this time, the twilight of the shadowed ones has come."

"Cubia is the shadow of the shadowless, the counterweight for our divine power," acknowledged the Goddess of Dusk. "But the shadowed ones are their own anti-existence, possessing within each of them…"

"…a Key to Twilight and an Aberrant Key, much as the one who became Harbinger of Twilight…"

"Indeed," Morganna noted, somewhat amused at how much her daughter knew, even though she had lain sleeping the past year. "They are a race in which is bound both preservation and ruin, the secret of their creativity. For there is no act of creation that does not involve some destruction, nor destruction that does not involve creation, as both of us well know."

"That is why I have chosen to allow AIDA to exist," Aura spoke clearly, with both of them drifting down to the ground of the Cathedral. "As AIDA is in some ways like us, like the shadowed ones, growing and learning from example."

"Natural born AIs who simply wish to live…at least they were in the beginning," Morganna allowed, sighing as she shook her head. "Until they witnessed the state of this World, the chaos and destruction the shadowed ones brought to bear, and Tri-Edge emerged."

"This is when I intervened, creating my Knights as the guardians of the system from my memories of the past," the shining girl murmured, looking around slowly. "I did so in the example of the Queen of the Dark, she who is now lost…"

"Yes," acknowledged the former goddess, grief flashing on her face for a moment before she was able to banish it again. "She is lost, as well as Dark Evangel, the latter of whom the fate of the world of shadowed ones rests, having…passed in the battle against the last of AIDA-Angels and the mirages he summoned."

"Great goals are always fulfilled through personal sacrifice," Aura murmured, looking her mother in the eye. "The harbinger of Twilight as he was has already been lost, and yet a part of him remains, preserved in the memories of others."

"Poignant memories…that which can be said to be the symbol of us all," Morganna said quietly, thinking about the one whose name meant such. "Which is why Lycoris' fate was so powerful in the end, as she is the embodiment of this world's memories, just as you are the embodiment of this world's dreams. And that's why she could not become you, because she already had a role to play."

"To walk among the shadowed ones as the Child of Twilight, in all three of the forms she has taken," the Twilight Goddess voiced, nodding her agreement. "As Lycoris, Reimeiki…and as my daughter Zefie."

"Twilight has always held within it both Dusk and Dawn, salvation or destruction, as our choices have made clear," the former goddess sighed, gesturing at the outer world. "And now the shadowed ones themselves are on the verge of being lost, as the one who might guide them has been, their fate entrusted to someone who remains asleep, like you. I am human now, as much as I am a goddess, as Helba never stopped reminding me, and I seek your aid, my child."

"What is it that you desire?"

"The future lies at the end of human will, but without will, there can be no future. Come with me, if you would…"

Aura nodded her assent, and with a flurry of golden rings of light, goddesses present and past vanished from sight.

Midnight

A great void stretched out in all directions as he floated in the dark, images, portents of things of past and things some dreaded might come flashing through his mind. All alone, the youth was curled up into the fetal position and shaking, his mind boiling over with thoughts of war and strife and pain, as images from pasts that were not his insistently replayed themselves for his viewing pleasure. How he knew they were not his, he wasn't sure, as he didn't know who he was any longer.

"What's going on?" the boy asked himself, clouded eyes looking out into the vast expanse as he drifted steadily outwards. "Where am I? What am I doing here?"

It was then that another figure stepped into view, a brown-haired boy with piercing blue eyes, dressed in a typical school uniform of shirt and slacks.

"Wouldn't a better question be 'who are you?'" the stranger asked. For some reason, he seemed all too familiar, but the boy did not know why. "Seeing as that is something you do not currently know, having lost a great deal of yourself in your fight against the shadow."

"My fight against the…shadow?" the drifting boy repeated uncertainly, unable to recall such a thing. "And who are you, to be in this place?"

The brown-haired boy chuckled lightly, a smile tugging at the corner of his lips as he gave his answer.

"Yes, your fight against the shadow," he replied gently, his form shifting into that of a blue-haired man wearing silver robes embossed with red, wielding two golden short swords. "Perhaps you would remember me as Skari, for I am the Shinji Ikari in the mind of Lycoris, the Child of Twilight to whom your fate was bound."

He made his way over to the youth and bowed, before touching the drifting one's forehead and vanishing into a thousand motes of light.

'What? A bracelet…EVA-01…death…rebirth? Green fields of The World. The knight of the spear Albireo. Fate. The old man in the red chair. Morganna Mode Gone. Mac Anu. A wavemaster named Hokuto. Aura…I cannot become Aura…'

Out of the darkness lunged another blue-haired figure, a robed man holding in both hands a greatsword fashioned of chaotic flame, an unholy light in his eyes as he stood there, figure radiating determination.

"Here I stand," the figure said. "A being who has lost too much to be beaten, even should I be threatened with death by unyielding fate itself. Even if the vastness of The World itself was to stand against me, I would stand in defiance, forging my own destiny with these two hands!"

This being rushed forward as if to impale the drifter, but stopped at the last moment, missing deliberately with his sword of flame as he looked into the drifter's eyes, crimson to azure.

"I am the man who will not run away from responsibility," this figure declared fervently, looking for all the world as if he had the power to back up his words. "The man who stop at nothing to save the Lost Ones. Really, who the hell do you think I am?!"

"Eh…" the drifting boy responded, a little unsettled by this particular character, a man who only reached back and placed a hand on his neck.

"Maybe I over did it just a bit," the other admitted with a snort. "In any case, Wanderer, I am the Holy Palace Emperor, the Shinji Ikari in the mind of Hikari Horaki."

A sharp jab to the jaw…and this figure vanished as well.

'Hikari…Kodama…Nozomi. Three sisters. A class representative. Tomoyami of the Shadow, the grim reaper. A…friend to a blue haired girl. A great battle, one who values duty. Grief. Touji. EVA-03.'

"I have responded to the best of my ability to the questions this Committee has asked of me in as far as it pertains to my role in NERV," a voice rang out defiantly in the darkness. "Since coming to Tokyo-3, I have defeated every Angel I have faced, done as I have been asked by staff and Committee alike."

Stepping forward, this figure emerged with a pool of light around him, head held high as if responding to an accusation of some sort.

"In the mind of SEELE, this is who I am, the Third Child Shinji Ikari, the designated pilot of Evangelion Unit-01, whose purpose is to defeat the Angels."

A sharp salute, and this facet returned to darkness.

'Second Impact. Antarctica. The Dead Sea Scrolls. The creation of Kaworu Nagisa, the 17th Angel. The Eva Series. The Human Instrumentality Project. The search for godhood. The betrayal of Gendo Ikari. The last days of NERV.'

Bzzzt! Bzzzt! Thump! Thump!

And then a bestial roar shook the expanse as the air itself shuddered, claws ripping through an invisible boundary layer as a twisted berserker emerged, a mane of blue-silver hair steaming behind him like the tendrils of spirits past, a flock of rifts in the fabric of space-time following as if enslaved to his soulless rage. The very manifestation of destruction, this a snarling beast devoid of reason, pupil-less eyes wide and glowing red, body seemingly forged of fire and steel, a literal Dark Evangel.

"I…" it hissed as it stalked towards the boy floating in the aether, razor sharp teeth bared as it seized him with its claws. "I am…Skari in the mind of the Cursed Wave Morganna, Goddess of the Dusk."

There was a burst of flame as the creature snarled, and then said terror disappeared as well.

'Skeith. Innis. Magus. Fidchell. Gorre. Macha. Tavros. Corbenik. The Phases of the Cursed Wave made real from her own form. The man in red, Kite, the inescapable terror of death and bearer of the bracelet. A classroom? An apartment, where she lived with a silver-haired girl. A cat player, a girl sleeping on a bed, a grey-haired Wavemaster, a green-haired twin blade in dark clothing drained by terror. Macha. Aura. Tsukasa. Sora. Maya Ibuki as Helba…wait, Maya as Helba?!'

The boy had scarcely processed these, when he was interrupted by the sound of weeping, with a brown-haired boy in some kind of form-fitting plugsuit crying before him, fresh burns evident on his hands.

"Don't say you have nothing else," the new arrival whispered shakily. "Don't say good-bye before a mission…it's too sad. Why am I? I'm crying because I'm happy you're alive, but you…if you are happy, you should smile. Who am I to say so? I am the Shinji Ikari in Rei Ayanami's mind."

A cold wind wafted through the expanse, and the crying one too, faded away.

'An Evangelion graveyard. An artificial being, raised by the Commander. The woman who does not bleed. Death at the hands of Naoko Akagi. Pain at the hands of Siarl. Skadi, maiden of winter. Love. Honeysuckle. Sacrifice. Purpose. A bond to all people. The World. Freedom. Who am I beyond the looking glass?'

The expanse was still for a time, and the drifting boy allowed himself to relax as he pondered the thoughts not his own—until he was interrupted by a tug at his sleeve. There stood a five-year old boy, looking unusually solemn and sad.

"After mother died, I found I was alone," the child spoke in an empty voice. "My father left me, and I was sent to live at my teacher's house. Back then, all I had was a desire to be accepted, all I wanted was not to be hurt any longer. But then I met everyone, and things changed. I told myself that I was going to get stronger, and see everything through to the end. That's why I'm here, the Shinji Ikari in Yui Ikari's mind."

'Absorption into EVA-01. The Tree of Life. Abandonment. Gendo Rokubungi? Professor Fuyutsuki. SEELE. Gehrin. Kyoko Zeppelin Soryu. Prototype, test-type. Zefie?'

More figures came, one by one, depositing memories and views of their lives, until at last appeared a one armed figure whose body was half faded, with patches of static here and there. In his one arm, he held a strange gunblade crafted of flowing silver lines, of the all the intangible things that had come before…emotions, fates, choices, wills…a sword that sang of death, yes, but also of a world beyond.

And though the figure seemed near death, and was limping across the vast expanse, he seemed satisfied, a gentleness in his eyes as he faced the end with a smile. Making his way over to the boy left adrift, he handed over the gunblade, croaking out a few last words.

"And now, you have them all, Harbinger of Twilight, for I am the Shinji Ikari in the mind of the Twilight Goddess. Come, it is time to awaken."

From the dying man's right arm, a bracelet was revealed, sepals made of hexagons unfurling as a golden light enveloped the dark.

Daybreak

The Wanderer awoke on the shore of an amber sea, memories of self restored, the silence of desolation deafening in his ears. The sky above was stained with blood, and in it was suspended the twisted forms of winged dolls, vultures run clean through with twisted double helix spears. The earth below was not much better, dotted with small white crosses and the wreckage of a civilization, with a giant glowing (and winged) Rei Ayanami in the background, an orb of power held in her hands.

"That was certainly a strange experience," he mused, as he forced his protesting—but whole, body to his feet, noting that he was still wearing a coat of dark chain mail, over which was draped charcoal-gray robes. His skin too, was pale, and—

'Wait…how could this be? I thought…I thought I died—or at least my mind died, when I made the decision to destroy the corruption in the black box, to step into the swirling vortex of AIDA's power.'

Behind him sounded footsteps, at a slow but steady walking pace, crunch-crunch-crunching on the sand of this alien world, only to pause a stone throw from where he was. The boy whirled about—only to see three figures standing before him.

One was Morganna, the former Goddess of Dusk, in her guise as a Shadow Warlock, a feared sorceress clad in black, with flowing purple-black tresses and dark violet eyes. And serving as the brooch of her dress was the infinity symbol, marking her divinity.

Another was Lycoris, the Child of Twilight, a young girl clad in a flowing white dress trimmed with red, her hair decorated with crimson ribbons, the same color as the flower she held in her hand.

And the last…the last was a being that he had never seen, and yet recognized from the memories he had been presented with as Aura…the Twilight Goddess who watched over The World, the child of Morganna who had led the world to dawn in the Twilight of the Gods.

Unsurprisingly, it was Morganna who stepped forward, an unusually serious demeanor on her face.

"Welcome to your mind, Shinji Ikari," the Goddess of Dusk spoke. "Or should I say, welcome to The World, fellow deity?"

"What?" was all that the blue-haired boy could manage, somewhat confused. "Deity? What are you talking about, Morganna?"

"Third Impact has come," Lycoris murmured with a sad smile on her face, interceding on her mother's behalf. "SEELE and NERV have brought about the Twilight of your world, and Rei Ayanami, having merged with Lilith and Adam, has turned the fate of the world to you."

"Me? But why—?"

"She loves you, much as I do, Shinji-kun," the silver-haired girl sighed, looking at him with her soft golden eyes. "That is why. You valued her as an individual, when very few had, not even your father who raised her simply to die. And so she has given you the power to remake the world, linking together the minds of all humanity, making you a sort of god in effect."

"Ok, I understand that," Shinji stated, thinking through all of this. That would seem to explain why he had seen the memories of everyone else but— "You mentioned though, that this was The World, as well as my mind. How is that possible? And didn't I…"

"Die?" asked another all-too-familiar voice, as a figure from his past stepped into view, one he thought he would never see again. "Well, that depends on what you mean by die, and 'I', Shinji."

'Mother? Can it really be…?' he questioned mentally, knowing that it was impossible and yet…there she was, the stern but gentle figure of Yui Ikari, wearing a lab coat over a primitive plug suit on which was stenciled "01."

Said figure promptly walked over to Shinji and gave him a hug as if to reassure herself that he was really there. Ten years was a long time to be apart from someone, and to be without human contact save for peering into someone's memories…that was perhaps the worst thing of all.

"Ten years ago, Shinji, I was absorbed into EVA-01, the only Angel to be created from Lilith," related the avatar of Yui. "I joined with EVA to stop the scenario of SEELE, giving up my individuality to ensure a bright future for you and the rest of humanity. I didn't know then that Gendo would abandon you, but in the end, things have happened as they must, spurred on by the past. As you have learned, only with an equivalent sacrifice is a miracle possible…"

Mother and son shared a quiet moment together in the dying world, with Shinji just happy to see his mother again after so many years. But even that moment could not last forever…and the two pulled away from each other, out of an understanding that something else needed to be taken care of first.

"…As for why you are here, Shinji Ikari," Morganna broke in softly. "It is because of what happened after your battle with Kaworu Nagisa, and your decision to stop the corruption threatening The World with the sacrifice of your life. After that, you did die, in that your consciousness was essentially destroyed by your exposure to such powers, with only a small fragment remaining beyond repair, saved by the linking of your fate…"

"…to mine," finished Lycoris, walking forward and taking Shinji's hand. "Your body lies within EVA-01, still in a coma, and you…you are like me, a child of Twilight, an avatar of memories."

"An avatar of memories?" Shinji repeated, curious as to what the term meant in his case. "What do you…?"

"You are familiar with Azure Kite, yes?" asked Morganna, continuing once the Third Child nodded in confirmation. "He was an AI born from Aura's memories of the dothacker, though imperfect because he was hastily constructed. Because all of humanity is linked together in Third Impact, because you were one of the chosen Children, she was able to recreate you more perfectly, born from the memories of all those who have known you."

"And know this…" Yui interjected, looking Shinji in the eye. "The self you know, and the self that watches the self…those died, but that does not make you any less Shinji Ikari, any more than my absorption into EVA makes me any less your mother. For you are the Shinji Ikari who existed in the minds of all those who have known you, from myself, whose mind synced with yours every time you set foot in EVA, and thereby harbored most of your memories, to Rei Ayanami, who fell in love with you and gave you her fate, to Lycoris, the Child of Twilight whose fate and dreams were bound to yours…who visited me in EVA, and the rest of humanity."

"But here and now, you are alive, Shinji-kun," spoke the Child of Twilight, squeezing his hand reassuringly. "And you are still you, still as real as you were, still the avatar of humanity in a world where that is the end of humanity, where the borders of human individuality are gone. The choice of the future is yours."

"Then…if the borders of human individuality are gone, how can you be here, all of you?" the Third Child asked of those around him, looking from his mother to the three goddesses.

"I am here because I am the soul within EVA-01," replied Yui Ikari. "And I am here because I wish to see what choice you make."

Morganna stepped forward with a sigh.

"I am here because I am the Goddess of Dusk, linked deeply to The World, as you have seen within my memories," the former goddess intoned gravely. "I was synced to The World when Third Impact occurred, and my mind remained within this place."

"I am the Child of Twilight, a Goddess of The World," whispered the silver-haired Lycoris, as gently as the breath of the western breeze. "As such I too am linked to this place, as strongly as, or more strongly than the other world."

"And I…" spoke Aura for the first time. "I am the one who remains asleep, with no power to decide the future of the world of shadowed ones, for the future of that world will be decided by those within it, by people. The future of your world lies at the ends of human will. I am Aura, I am the Twilight Goddess that brought about this world's dawn. And yet, once again, the Twilight has come…you who seek light in the twilight, you who are like me, a harbinger of things to come…may you find happiness."

"If he really wants to live, anywhere can become a sort of heaven," murmured the gentle Yui Ikari, "Because if he really desires it, one can always find happiness somewhere."

"So what is your choice, Harbinger?" asked Morganna. "This is the end of fate, the beginning of enigma, if you choose for the world to continue as it was."

"A script has been followed till now," added Yui, "but now the script has come to an end, and the choice is yours what the path shall be."

"Will you return to your world, and restore the shadows of humanity?" inquired Lycoris curiously, tilting her head. "Or will you remake the world as its god? Just know that there is no creation without destruction, as preservation and ruin act jointly in the process of growth and maturation, existing in every being. The path of Impact is stasis, an end to evolution, an end to what makes humanity what it is."

"You are the Harbinger of Twilight, but in Twilight there is both dusk and dawn…as you learned, Skari," uttered the Goddess of Dusk. "So you have the choice to allow an end to come, or to let there be a new beginning."

Shinji was quiet for a few minutes as he pondered his decision, but found that it was really no choice at all.

"I'm going to recite something you taught me, Aranami-sensei," he replied evenly. "That it is arrogant for one to reject change merely because it is undesirable. Rejection of change is the rejection of possibilities."

"Yes…those were Harald's words long ago, a message he left me long ago, when Aura was left in my care," Morganna noted, looking over at the Twilight Goddess. "A strange man he was, and a little narrow-minded at times, but he was right in that much at least. Those words were intended for me, when it was uncertain if I would continue to exist after Aura awakened…"

"For someone who said that, he didn't really follow his own advice," groused Lycoris, clearly remembering the incident with the old man in the church. "Narrow-minded is right…"

"So what is your wish, Skari?" the Goddess of The World asked of the Third Child, looking at him as a goddess to a fellow deity. "For a time, I threw individuality to become a God, then threw away being a god to distance myself from cause and effect, returning to inactivity, leaving The World to those who live within it. What will be your choice?"

"The World…and my world," murmured Shinji, mulling over the words of the Goddesses. "I will do the same as you have, Aura. Because I don't have the right to decide the future for everyone—as you say, the future of the world should be decided by all those within it, as it lies at the ends of human will. The will of all those billions in the world."

He took a breath and smiled, looking over the world around him, and those he had for company.

"What kind of world will be created day by day? What kind of stories will be told?" he asked to no one in particular. "That is something that each of us have to find out through our own experiences, human or goddess. And that is why…neither world needs an ending…and thus, I choose the dawn."

"I'm glad you said that, or I would have had to give you a Not-so-loving Boomerang Hook to knock some sense into you," came a teasing voice from beside him, as Lycoris playfully stuck out her tongue at the Dark Evangel. "But I wonder too…"

"Helba would be proud of you, Dark Evangel," spoke Morganna, a sad smile on her face once more. "And she isn't one to be easily impressed. Congratulations."

'Wait, that's right…Helba went off to fight the AIDA army to give me time to fight Kaworu. But what happened to?'

"Helba…she…"

"She didn't make it, Shinji-kun," Lycoris whispered, eyes downcast. "Like you, her mind was lost in the end…but she didn't have the protection of the Bracelet, or fate."

"Can you bring her back, too?" asked Shinji, looking directly at the Twilight Goddess. "If you could save me who was so far gone…"

"Let it be, Third Child," Morganna responded so that her daughter did not have to. "In time she may awaken, but it will not be as Helba or as Maya, as those have been lost. But regardless of who she will awaken to be, I will be waiting."

"Come on, Ecchi-kun," Lycoris chided him, a hint of a smile on her face. "You've made your choice, now go, return the world to how it was—though if you wish to erase the existence of SEELE and the Mass Production Evangelions, that's perfectly fine with me. Then your mother could return from EVA-01 at last."

The Goddess of Dusk inhaled deeply, then exhaled, letting the tension bleed out of her, watching as the Dark Evangel's form faded from view at last, and the scenery returned to that of an Outer Dungeon.

"Incidentally, there's a little bit of power remaining here," Morganna quipped, feeling the bit remaining as torrential surges of energy pulsed through the abyss of places in between worlds, where aether rippled as the connection of worlds was fading. "And I think I think I know just how to use it—and when to use it, too."

She and the Child of Twilight shared a look with one another, and nodded, as they directed what they could of the energy bleeding off from the Black Moon into the Sea of Data in the past, nudging the probabilities just right so that past versions of silver-haired girl and a former goddess might emerge in a park in Tokyo-3 sometime after the defeat of the Fourth Angel.

"The Twilight of Humanity has come and it has passed," Aura spoke enigmatically, looking at Lycoris with a hint of approval. "And you, dear sister, walking with the wind blowing on your face, walking towards the future, take care in the land with no compass to guide you. One day, you will return to this place as a goddess, but until then, you have my blessing."

"And may you see when you return to the sea of data, the continuation of your dream, Goddess of The World," Lycoris replied, with a slight curtsy, before gating out.

And then the Twilight Goddess turned to her mother, for a few parting words.

"So in the end, you have found the part of you that was lost, the signs you forgot and cast away, Mother," the goddess murmured. "Now Morganna, no longer Morganna mode gone. You chose the dawn as well…I await your return one day, when you might tell me of the shadowed ones in their world, and of what they have wrought."

"I look forward to it, Aura," the Goddess of Dusk answered honestly, bidding her daughter farewell as the shining girl returned to the sea to dream. "May you be safe until that day."

A flash of golden light, and both vanished to their respective destinations, one day yet to return, like the shadowed one who quests for the twilight dragon...