"Eva-01, Lift off"
With the same words as always, Misato reluctantly gave the order to launch Rei outside.
"Listen Rei, the first part of the mission is to retrieve Kaworu and Unit-06. We will regroup and come up with a plan then"
Misato tried to gave those instruction to Rei, hoping to have a mean to avoid having the girl fighting the eleventh once again, a voice from above cut through Misato words, overwriting her orders.
"Rei, you must attack the angel."
"Chief, are you ordering a suicide attack?"
"Calm down Katsuragi, I'm not ordering Rei to go on a suicide mission. I'm just analyzing the facts. Now is the best time to attack the enemy. Look behind its back. The rose is growing back slowly, we do not know what the rose's explosion does, but if we can attack in while the rose's growing we won't need to consider it."
Not leaving his serious stance, Gendo replied to Misato.
"Katsuragi, I understand you wanting to save the two pilots, but should I remind you the priorities? If we cannot attack now we could lose the possibility to. Angels can adapt faster than we anticipate, we have to take every occasion"
"You're right chief"
With only those words, Misato turned around. Gendo's standpoint made sense, but that only added fuel to Misato's frustration.
"It's always like this. He always make sense, but lacks the compassion to back it up" thought Misato.
Misato lost herself in her thoughts for a moment, failing to notice that Gendo whispered something at the end of his phrase. Only Fuyustuki could hear what the chief had to say. But those words were better listened by someone else, as Fuyustuki already knew Gendo, and having the confirmation of it's true self was nothing new for him.
In the confusion, Misato also failed to notice how Rei responded to the order, and was now running towards the Angel. She ran with her giant Evangelion for some kilometers, her connection with 01 was unprecedented, she felt like she was controlling her own body, but on a much larger scale. She jumped over the smaller houses on the outskirts, over the electrical cables hanging all around the city and finally arrived near the Angel. Being outside of the city, she obviously didn't have alimentation for her EVA, so she now had left only 3 minutes to kill the eleventh.
Rei unleashed the Eva-01 knife and attacked the angel, her way of handling the knife backwards was different from Shinji's, preferring a more defensive approach instead of the boy's often desperate attacks. This attitude helped Rei, as the Angel counterattacked. With an extended arm, similiar to the ones the Tenth used, the Angel tried to catch the 01, but the knife cut through the arm, and Rei could continue to run towards him. When Rei was at her melee's range, the Angel shifted.
The rose that was growing on its back broke off its body and the angel itself lost his own form, becoming like a long, faceless snake. And like a snake the Angel enveloped the Eva-01, trying to disable all of the Evangelion's movements. Rei cut the Angel a lot of times, his body was not that resilient, but after every cut, the Angel could regenerate itself.
"I need to hit the core, someone sees it?"
Rei asked help from the command room, the cameras with which the team was watching over her were used to look at the angel, but no core was seen. At that moment Misato had an intuition.
"The flower Rei, the core it's probably there"
Getting near the flower was not gonna be easy, with the Angel that had every intention of getting in her way. Rei tried to run directly to the blooming flower, that was nearing its blooming stage. She had little time because of both the flower and the battery of the EVA running out. But dashing to the flower was a mistake. The superior speed of the Angel brought forth Rei's defeat. The Angel enveloped her and stopped her movement.
"Rei get behind something"
Misato tried shouting to the girl, but she couldn't do anything. The flower exploded once again in a divine like light.
Unit-01 fell to the ground, seeming lifeless.
The command room tried to reach Rei, but like with Kaworu, the effort were to no avail.
Misato stood there, watching at the screen.
The flower light was reminiscent of the Second Impact.
She had many flashbacks in the back of her mind, but those were all stopped by a simple thought.
A thought she almost buried under her life experience, but that was now surfacing once again.
"That light, wasn't that supposed to represent hope?"
—
Rei opened her eyes, she was watching toward the ceiling.
Another unknown ceiling.
This time, it wasn't the hospital one.
The grey, metal which composed the ceiling was brimming with the red of a twilight, while the faint noise of the railroads accompanied Rei's awakening.
"A…train?"
Rei questioned the place she found herself in, before being interrupted by a boy
"A train"
Rei watched in the direction of the voice, and saw Shinji.
"Shinji?"
"That's me"
Rei felt a strange sensation, she should be happy after finding Shinji. But something felt off, both in her heart and in the situation they found themselves with.
"Why are we on a train?"
" This is the train of destiny"
"What?"
"I don't get it myself."
The two stood there, watching outside the windows of the train. The outset didn't really seem strange. It seemed like a normal city setting, not the Tokyo-3 one, but something on a much smaller scale in Japan.
"Hey Rei"
Shinji broke the silence
"Are you alive?"
Rei watched Shinji, she was confused by the boy's words.
"Yes, you saved me back there. Don't you remember?"
"No, that's not it. I know I saved you, it's written on the ticket. I was asking…do you feel alive?"
Ignoring the ticket part, Rei focused on the second half of Shinji's phrase.
"I…"
She didn't really find the words to express herself
"You know…I found you really difficult to approach. You…didn't seem really alive. You behaved like a doll. But then after the battle with Ramiel…I thought something changed in you. Both your words before the battle and the smile you directed toward me at the end. I don't know how to describe it…those felt genuine."
Rei felt a warming feeling in her heart. She never actually stopped to process her feelings, but that was probably the first time she felt something towards Shinji.
"But then…you ran in a suicide attack against the Tenth Angel. Why did you do it. It's so incoherent. I…I just lost Asuka and then you also were going to die in your plans. If that attack succeded, even killing the Angel in the process, what would have happened?
"Another one would have taken my place"
"And you wanted that?"
"I…I had to execute the orders. I wanted to save humanity, as humans are not replaceable. But I am, so I'm not that valuable"
"You really think this?"
"Yes, I was born to be a Children, But if I die, another Rei will replace me. I have no value, I don't need to hold value, as I was not created to"
"Is the reason why you were created the only thing that decides what you are? We do not know what created us, is our life meaningless because of it?"
Rei didn't know how to answer, not because she didn't know the answer she believed in, but because she was too afraid to say it. In that moment the train stopped. No voice announced the station, but the doors opened.
"This is your stop, Rei"
Shinji pointed to the door
"You must exit this place, and live on"
"Are you not coming?"
Rei took Shinji's arm and pulled it, that left a sincere smile on Shinji's face.
"You know where is this train headed?"
"How should I?"
"When I'm alone on the train, the signal turns on and says that the train is directed to a place called the promised station"
"What does it matter? We can jump off now"
"No, I think that's the place when I have to go. Anyway, I cannot exit. Only those with a ticket can, and I don't have one"
Shinji held a ticket, but he handed it over to Rei.
"This is yours. I'm sorry but it's not directed to the promised station, it's just a ticket to survive"
"Use it yourself and jump off"
"I can't, this is your ticket. Those are nominal. And my ticket is over there"
Shinji pointed to a place farther ahead, on the train. In the distance, Rei could see another boy, sit in its place, with a ticket in his hand. Rei tried to go and take the ticket, but a wall of air blocked her way
"I think I have to wait a little more. He actually said that to me. That he was here to bring me happiness. But it seems like he still can't."
Shinji reached to Rei and hold her hand.
"Thank you, Rei. Please live on, it's heavy to persist, I gave up so many times, so I may not be the best example. But let me ask this favor, live on."
In that moment, Rei felt something other than Shinji's hand, it was the ticket. The moment she touched the ticket she found herself outside the train, powerlessly watching it go away.
Rei watched the sun and wondered.
Who was the boy who promised to make Shinji happy?
Who was the boy with the train ticket?