Observers: A Study of the beings known as Children

Chapter four: Day in , day out.

***

60:00:00 Subjects converse in hushed tones.

It has been roughly seventeen hours since the last unknown was introduced, and with little more than twelve hours remaining for the Children I have decided to initiate the single remaining unknown variable. Observations will now be made every three hours exactly. The verbal violence shown by the Second should interact with the new variable most interestingly.

Rei had become familiar with her new surroundings and was about as comfortable in them as she was anywhere else. What made her question not only herself, but the manner in which she carried herself was the Third Child attempting to get her and the Second Child to interact more efficiently. She could have easily explained to Ikari that it was rather futile, seeing as Rei embodied the very thing Asuka had seen as a symbol of her mother's abandonment. Yet, she did not. This was for two reasons, one being she did not know if Ikari knew about the Second's mother or if he was even cleared to know such information if the event ever occurred. Secondly Rei was interested in the reasons Ikari gave her as to why she should be more open to Asuka. Rei categorized each reason and deduced a simple logical explanation of how it would be nearly impossible, and then she listened more to the Third try to scrape around the fact that he cared for the Second a great deal and was hurt when they did not get along. This was all a matter of logic, Rei had long ago decided, and was easy enough to figure out when you had the right combinations. Ikari was stuck in a bind, so to speak, caring for both girls, but wishing something more from one than the other. It was no secret he wished more from Soryou, and Rei had long ago decided she did not much care. It must be noted that she did care for Shinji, but not of the still embryonic relationship that might one day be born. It was of no matter, Ikari would be safe and she could still pilot Eva and fulfill her purpose whether or not the Second and the Third were in 'love'

"... And also, if you think about it you and Asuka would, well, learn a lot from each other." The Third was saying. Rei could not deny that fact, as the Second was more learned of society than herself, but doubted she had anything to teach the other girl beyond how to pilot her Eva and complete her missions. It was a doomed friendship. And still she did not interject or point out the flaws in his ideas.

"I...just would like it if you gave it a try." Gave it a try; Ikari had said that to her once before, to try and smile. She did smile, she smiled like she did when in the presence of the Commander. She thought of her logic then. Try smiling? She thought. What for? Then she began to understand; she smiled when with Commander Ikari because she was near him. Is that...happiness? Was she happy when around he Commander? Apparently so if she smiled when he was near. So she was...happy when the Third was near. That was true. However, there was no point to being friends with Soryou. She had said once a while back that she would if ordered to, and thus far she had not been, so she was not. But now Ikari was asking her, and while not an order, it was a request from someone who made her happy. Is this called commitment? No, she knew commitment. Commitment was how she has spent her lifetime learning to pilot Eva and understand one small part of her that longed to be joined with its Mother. What she was experiencing was not an emotion she could describe, it was an ethereal feeling almost of repayment. He made her happy so she did as he requested.

"I will try."

The Third's eyes opened wide. "Really? You will Ayanami?" Rei had already answered his appeal to be...friends (a term she would not herself use on the relationship she was being asked to form) with Soryou, and did not make a move to answer again. Her eyes settled on the lightly sleeping form of the Second, noting the fact that when she slept she often softly cried out. Her eyes tracked across the wall, where the line from Shinji's Tokyo-3 lake formed a bay and noticed that there in the corner of the north and east wall was a small box. It lay in the boundaries declared restricted to her by the Second. It was roughly fourteen by ten inches across and was a pale blue color. On its topmost surface was what seemed like a photograph of a piece of cardboard with even squares etched across its surface. Small white stones decorated the squares in rows. Three people on the left side seemed to be smiling with great joy, for what reason Rei could not discern. And since it was in the restricted area, Rei noted the size, shape, time of occurrence and turned her attention toward something else. Something far beyond the walls of their cell, and about 16,000,000 miles away far outside the orbit of the Earth.

Asuka woke once more, and noted with some annoyance that the Other Two (as she now referred to them as) were wide awake. She yawned and stood, her left ankle immediately popping, making her stumble for a second and regain her balance by supporting her weight on the east wall. While looking down at the offending ankle and waiting for the spots in her eyes and the dizziness in her head to go away she saw a box. It was a very familiar box, and she had remembered unwrapping at least three of them that were identical at different birthday parties. It was a game, a board game. Scrabble.

"The hell?" She took a cautious step forward and picked the strange game up. Shinji, who noticed her awakening watched with curiosity as Asuka turned the box over and over in her hands.

"What is it, Asuka?"

Asuka grimaced. "What does it look like, stupid? It's a game of scrabble." Shinji raised an eyebrow and joined her in the northeast corner.

"It is." He looked at the ceiling and the joints of the wall and floor, still no hole, hatchway, sliding mechanism, nothing.

"Of course, you think it was a helicopter or something?" Shinji shrugged and looked back over to Rei, who was still in her original position, staring off into space.

"Well, come on, let's play." Shinji faced Asuka again.

"What?"

She turned her nose up at him. "If you aren't to afraid of me beating you miserably."

"I am not!" He sat. "Come on, Ayanami, want to play?" He looked over his shoulder.

As if wakened from a trance Rei looked at him in question. "What would be the point?"

"I don't know...I guess it could expand your vocabulary some." He shrugged and then mouthed 'friends.' Rei understood what he said, she just did not see how playing a board game would help solve the differences between the two girls. "It'll be fun."

"Fun?" Rei understood that fun was what people had when they activities they found pleasurable. She did not see how laying letters onto a board was going to be pleasurable. However, Ikari would be playing also, and she was happy when she was near him. That said Rei must have found being with the Third pleasurable, thus, fun.

"Fine." She stood and moved to sit on the third side of the board that Asuka had been busy setting up. The side that was still in her parameters of movement.

"Okay, I'll go first, Shinji second and Rei can go third." She pulled an assortment of random letter-blocks and set them on her stand.

"Shouldn't we go in order? Rei First, you Second, me Third?" Shinji asked as he put his own letters on his stand.

"That would be stupid. We're going counter clockwise. Me, you, her." The look on her face made it clear she would not have it any other way.

"Okay, okay...." He made some quick adjustments to his letters and looked up. "Go."

"I'm going, give me a second." Asuka pulled seven letters from her stash and set them on the board.

Stymied, they read.

"How much did you score with that one?" Shinji looked over the rules pamphlet.

Asuka smiled. "It was on a triple score word box, and I used three vowels, so I get 99. Your turn."

"Ah, okay." Shinji selected nine words and set them carefully on the board. His said 'confluent'.

Rei studied her letters. She had already discovered she could make three words with the letters she currently had- J, A, B, R, N, U, L, O- and two other words using Shinji and Asuka's pieces. She chose which would give her the maximum amount of points and placed them on the board. She picked Asuka's 'stymied' and turned it into her own 'nebula' for a score of 85.

***

60:30:00 Subjects play provided board game.

I was almost surprised to see subject 2B accept the invitation to play the game. From what I have observed thus far, it would seem she would decline, as she almost did. I am speculating that the Third Child is a strong influence on her thinking and growing into a human being.

"Ready." Shinji set his letters across the 'a' in the last word played by Asuka. In watching the two he had come to the conclusion that both possessed an amazingly expanse vocabulary, and put it to good use. He, on the other hand, was forced into using everyday words and a few scientific terms he'd remembered from school. The important thing, however, was that all three of them were sitting in close proximity and there was not a word of 'doll' or other such insults thrown. He dared not speak of the peace for fear that it might shatter if he thought about it too much, much less mentioned it.

"I'll use your 'r' and make...cormophyte." Asuka told Rei as she added her points.

"Usage." Shinji said as he used three of his own letters and two from Asuka's last word.

Rei looked over the board, noting the most profitable squares to play, and made her move.

"Pyrrihic." She said, using Shinji's own 'y'. Asuka laughed, she'd never heard of the word before, but did not doubt its existence, what made her laugh was she could use the 'h' and make-

"Dystrophy."

"Radioactive."

"Meliorism"

"Podiatry."

"Polar."

"Fluvial."

The game came to a close, Asuka in the lead, Rei second, and Shinji trailing by over twenty points.

"Well that was a waste of forty-five good minutes." Asuka said and slide the box across the room after Shinji had placed all the pieces back inside. It hit the wall and sat. Shinji followed its trail and sighed. When he looked back Asuka had a bowl of ramen in her hands and was about to slurp some down when Shinji tapped her on the shoulder.

"There's three of us, remember? We have to ration it." Asuka glared at him, her eyes suggesting she might be hurt and handed the bowl over.

"Whatever, it's not like there's any reason to."

"What do you mean by that, Asuka?" Shinji pulled out a portion of the noodles for himself and gave the bowl to Rei, who did likewise.

"We're never getting out of here, they're going to keep us locked up forever and you know it." She leaned against the wall and shuddered a bit. "Just keep us locked up until we crack."

"Come on, Asuka. They'll let us out, I mean, why would they just keep us locked in here with all these new things popping up out of nowhere?"

"I told you, Shinji. People are weird. They'll probably keep giving us- the monkeys- toys to keep them entertained and then forget about us."

"But...but then why..." Shinji's mouth opened and closed, working on some question he knew no one could answer.

"You look surprised, like you really thought we'd just be in and out." She sank to the ground and hugged her knees. He looked at her angry blue eyes and blinked rapidly, trying to digest what she was trying to get at.

"But...."

"I figured it out a while back, Shinji. This is just someone's sick idea of entertainment. Soon it will get old and no more ramen for the Children." Scorn filled her voice. "And all the while little Shinji thought it was all a big trick his daddy made up." Her mocking laughter filled the tinny cell. "You figured it out, didn't you Wondergirl? I know you did, I can see it."

"I do not understand what you mean."

"Bullshit. You know as well as I do we're going to die down here."

Rei had already accepted that as an option, after all, there was not much she could do. She did not hope for a door to open or any other savior, because she barely grasped what hope really was. No, she only waited.

"It is a possibility."

"Of course it is! And we will. We'll rot away and no one will care, or even notice, for that matter."

The three of them lapsed into silence while they thought about what that meant. Shinji had long ago retreated to his corner and both girls where in their own respective sides of the cell, each thinking completely different thoughts.

***

61:00:00 Subjects sit in silence. Life signs indicate subject 1A and 2A are sleeping.

With the sudden prophecy by the Second I am concerned to think that the isolation and variables have taken their toll on the Children's minds. Deterioration was inevitable with the nature of the experiment, yet this is premature. I assume it is due to the Children's stressful upbringings that have sped up the rate of decline.

Shinji had thought he'd covered all points of his life he wished to reflect on. He had thought this until wakening and finding himself in a rather embarrassing situation. As his mind raced to think of baseball scores and other distractions he'd realized his love life left much to be desired, if he could even say he had a love life. Three more minutes later and he'd calmed enough to think this path of thought out completely. It was true he was only fourteen, but he'd heard stories of children his age already losing their virginity. He cursed himself, premarital sex was something he'd been taught early on was wrong. He could not say he didn't have the chance, because just before moving to Tokyo-3 he'd known a girl by the name of Ryoko. She'd been pretty, a nice round face and dark hair. The only vice that the other boys found in her was she did not sport the shapely figure of the other girls in her class. Shinji never thought of her as fat, of even marginally overweight, but to others and herself she was a cow. The entire semester Shinji was friends with Ryoko, and even going so far as to visit her house and meet her parents. Despite what Asuka said, Shinji was not dense as lead, and he was well aware of the affection the girl displayed towards him. Two days before he left she had approached him, and asked to study at her house that night. He'd not even answered, pretending his class' late bell made him hurry off.

Shinji could not say if he regretted it or not, he did not want to have sex with a girl whom he did not love, but what kind of person might he be now if he had? Would Asuka still call him a wuss? Would his father still think of him as a tool? Would he blush madly every time Misato teased him about Asuka? He didn't know for sure, but he did know he'd be a rotten human being if he had done it.

"At least," He said, looking at Asuka. "we won't have to pilot the Eva any longer."

Asuka stirred in her sleep, rolling from her left side to her right, and reaching out with her arm for something. If it was for something to hold onto, or maybe just to stretch it, Shinji didn't know. But he did reach out with his own hand and lightly grasp hers. "And at least," He thought sadly to himself, "We're all together."

From the opposite corner of the room Ayanami watched on in what some might call her form of fascination. From where she sat Ikari had apparently come to accept that he might die in the cell just as she had, except, Ikari seemed somehow more fulfilled and less hollow than herself.

Continued....