You Wish Productions presents...
The Price of Life- I finally churned out an "After 3I" fic! Not sure quite where I want to go with it, but if you want me to continue, I can think of something. Probably going to turn out A/S...though there is some mention of possible past R/S. Please read and review.
By: Blue Taboo
Your reviews, as always, are my motivation for continuing. I'll warn you now that there is a small rant at the bottom of this fic and unless you are willing to admit that there is some sense to it, then don't read it.
On with the fic!
Walking...walking...walking...
That's all he'd been doing for three days. Just walking towards that red speck in the distance, following the footprints where and when he could. After all, there was no one else left to leave footprints and he couldn't bring himself to do anything else. Regret settled into the mind of Ikari Shinji. Regret at his decision and lack of decision...
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"I feel sick..."
The words were sick like death's chill touch and true to the two small beings that were left as pitiful reminders of the human race. The world around them was dead, consisting only of wreckage and rubble. There were probably a few animal and plants that survived, but it was hardly a Garden of Eden, no fitting place for a new Genesis.
And here lay Adam, crying over a shell-shocked Eve. Her words weren't unjustified. For the first time in what seemed like eternity, Shinji found himself identifying with Asuka once again. It was what had first kept from hating her and her insults...her abuse. She was an Eva pilot like him with no real family to care for her, few friends, and many problems, though she'd never admit to any of it. Bold and stubborn, she went on as if it didn't hurt, just like she was supposed to, but it hurt her, just as bad as it hurt him. There...as they were lying on the beach after the world had ended around them...he felt just as sick. Even if he was physically sound, all Shinji Ikari wanted to do was throw up.
"Of all people," she asked slowly, not threatening like her companion would expect, but just curious, "Why you? Why am I stuck with you?"
"I-I don't know," he responded through tears that refused to stop...less embarrassing alternatives to retching.
"Maybe because there was no one else..."
"No one else who could?"
He realized there was no reason for him to hold back. After all, they as well be honest with each other. They were the only two people left on Earth, as far as they could see. No matter what past qualms they may have had, they had to start a new...even though one boy didn't really want to. "Because there was no one else I wanted..."
"What about Rei? I'm sure she would've been just as good..." There was no emotion in what she said, none of her former fiery possessiveness and elitist attitudes. She did a frightening emulation of the very girl she was talking about.
He lifted himself to his knees and sat above her as she lay unmoving on the ground. "Towards the end, when you were gone, I found out some things about Rei that were...disturbing. Even with all that went on during the Third Impact I just couldn't get over them. Besides, the only Rei that I would've wanted died during the 16th Angel's attack."
Asuka laughed a hollow laugh, a shadow of her former enjoyment, as if to mock its memory. "I never did believe that she lived...She didn't live much to begin with anyway..."
They paused, sitting perfectly still, scarcely daring to breathe as if the air around them were too precious to waste. In truth, that's what it was like. They had been given a second chance at life...a second chance at mankind and they felt as if they were wasting every minute of it, every breath of air. Two who had wanted to die would now pay the price of life.
"Did you love her, Shinji?" the redhead inquired, still quiet and in the same position she had been in since she had uttered the first words of the new world.
He hesitated, only for a moment, fearing the former Asuka's wrath, but he put it aside. "I think I did at one point...maybe just for a moment. She did everything she could for me..."
"Like the mother you never had...But what about Misato?"
"She..." he paused, trying to think of a good explanation for the confusion that radiated from the Major, "She wasn't enough...I hate to say it, since she did try, but that was all I could see, her trying. She never succeeded, even when I thought she did. If she had, then she'd still be here..."
"I saw," this came with more feeling and all the sudden her near-death-like features started to stir as if from a long sleep, and Asuka propped herself up onto her elbows. "She died for you too...Did you love her?"
"She loved me, but she wanted me to be a man and a boy at the same time. I don't think I ever really appreciated her as much as I should have. She was like a quirky older sister at best, nothing more..."
"Don't feel bad. Nobody appreciated her...not even Kaji. Funny, I'd never speak against him before, but now that he's gone I realize how stupid I was. You still haven't fully answered my question, Shinji..."
All the sudden the fears of the old Asuka came back, even though this one seemed even slightly concerned about how he felt, she was getting that old edge back... "W-why you?"
She nodded, looking out over the sea of LCL, her eyes carefully avoiding the blasphemous figures of what had once been the MP Evas.
"You were like me. You had the same basic problems...the same pain, though you'd never share it with anyone. Did you ever?" he questioned, trying to get her gaze back.
"With Hikari...but she didn't understand..." She refused to meet his eyes.
"That's because she's not like us..."
"And you think you could understand?" It was almost angry, but she couldn't seem to muster the strength to make it back to the tone she had always taken.
"I hoped I could...I always did. I hoped you could too."
She opened her mouth to say something but shut it and then, finally, after a long pause, she asked, "Did you love me?"
"Enough to die for you. You were the only one I would do the favor that so may others did for me...But I never had the chance..."
She looked directly into his eyes and he noted with a bit of disappointment that the fire was gone once more.
"Goodbye, Shinji..." she whispered as she suddenly stood. With one last look from her dead eyes, she ran, despite her injuries, down the beach as fast as she could...
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And ever since then he had followed. It seemed that nothing would ever be the same...though there was never much hope for it in the first place. He had meant what he'd said and had expected her to slap him, call him a pervert, or an idiot, but nothing of that sort had been her reaction. She had just run away...like he did. In that they were even more alike now. He had sat there on his knees in shock for a few minutes, wondering why she had run from him just when he told her everything. Then he realized he needed no explanation of his own, but he didn't want to be alone. That was why he'd chosen her. Everyone else couldn't relate, but she could...if she only tried...
He followed at a distance, at first because that was as fast as he could go, but by the dawn of the second day, he kept his distance personally, wanting her to come to him. He was like Rei in that he had never really demanded anything of anyone before, not even kindness, but now he was in need of it more than ever and there was only one person that could provide...if she just would. His demand was simple and he kept just far enough behind so that she could see he was following. He knew not of where she was trying to get to. They passed towns that had gone into rubble and rot where they looted stores with broken windows for any salvageable food, knowing their owners wouldn't miss it. They slept in old houses, once in the tall grass of a field that some dead farmer had left to itself for the season. He had been planning ahead for a future he wouldn't have, Shinji had thought grimly as he arrived there.
Now it was the morning of the fourth day of her flight and they were getting into more mountainous country, near what had been Tokyo-3, Shinji guessed. He had stopped to rest under the shade of a copse of hardy little trees after Asuka had seemingly chosen the steepest route over a large hill. It was then that he saw the figure still clothed in her red plugsuit start to make her way back towards him. As sudden as a spark turns to a flame a wave of positive emotion such as Shinji hadn't felt in a long time rushed through the boy's veins. Fantasies of what she would say surfaced in his mind, most that would never come true no matter what the circumstances. Maybe she would finally let him in...and he could let her in too...
Once she knew she was in hearing range she called out, "I'm the one who's stupid. We both are..."
That wasn't one of his fantasies...but it was better than some of them...
"Walk with me, baka." It was still a ghost of her former tone, but demanding all the same. Shinji's simple happiness rose and for the first time since the end of the world, he could bring himself to smile with feeling as he ran to join her, despite his weariness. He wouldn't be alone...
"If I can't have you all to myself...I don't want you at all..."
Well, he mused, there's no one to take me from you...
-Blue Taboo-
"In the middle of life, we are in death." Agatha Christie, Ten Little Indians (play, not book).
