Risa and Tashi came back as I cut the last long piece of my hair off. By that time, I had sunk to the bathroom floor, in tears as each handful fell away. So I sat on the cold floor, surrounded by uneven chunks of my hair and the scissors lying beside me.
"Mei!!" Tashi called, though it was largely unecessary. Risa was the one who found me, leaning against a wall with my arms wrapped around my chest, head down and crying almost hysterically. She rushed to my side and hugged me to her, rocking back and forth and singing softly. "It's alright, Mei," she whispered. "It's okay. We're here for you."
Tashi stood just inside the door, staring at us as though he didn't know us. Then he slowly bent down and picked up one of the pieces of my hair. "Your hair..." he said softly.
Risa ran her hands over my head. Then she pushed me into a sitting position, brushing the hair back from my face. "I like it," she said. "It suits you. Here, let me straighten it out a bit." She reached for the scissors, but I stopped her.
"Don't," I whispered. "It's fine."
She stared at me. "Alright. That's the way you want it..."
"It is..." My eyes came to rest on Tashi's feet. I couldn't look up at him. I just couldn't. I was afraid of seeing that look on his face again, since I was almost at the same level as I had been yesterday when he had rescued me. "Tell me you didn't kill him," I whispered then.
"Huh?" was their response.
I got to my feet slowly, wincing with pain. Tashi had grown a lot in the last year. I didn't even come to his shoulder anymore. "Tell me you didn't kill him," I repeated, more forcefully.
Tashi looked at the floor. "I didn't," he replied sullenly. "I wanted to...but I couldn't. He's in a locked room right now. I want one of the Units to take him far, far away from here." He looked up at me then, raising his eyes only enough to meet mine. I backed away, taken with a sudden, uncontrollable fear.
"I can't do it, Mei," he said softly, almost so soft that I didn't hear him. "I can't be anything like him..."
I ran from the room, dodging past Tashi and running down the hall as fast as I could.
I didn't know where I would go. NERV was so big. I remembered the bottom level of the complex, but I wasn't sure I wanted to go there. I looked down at my skirt and loose tunic. Tears gathered in my eyes.
Why couldn't I see it? I asked myself as the tears slipped out, leaving trails of hot water down my cheeks. Why couldn't I see him for what he was?
I didn't have an answer, and maybe I didn't want one.
Instead, I found a tiny hole in the skirt, dug my fingers in to make it bigger and tore the skirt off all around, so that it was nearly half as long. Now, it hung raggedly at mid-thigh, rather than below-the-knee. I tore the sleeves off the shirt and tucked it into the waistband. I found a lamp nearby in a supply closet that we had left there in case of an emergency and one of us was stuck there; the battery was low, but it would last for an hour or three. I set off down the hall towards the stairs that would take me down.
The lower level was black. Only a single beam of light weakly illuminated a cross. A figure was nailed to it. Without thinking, I walked down the last steps, and heard the splash of liquid before I felt it.
I turned my lamp on; the liquid was the same yellow colour as LCL. I bent down and was overpowered by the smell. The smell of blood.
I straightened and thought for a moment. Wiping tears angrily from my eyes, I continued down into the LCL-filled room.
It was hard. The ceiling was high; higher than my lamp light could reach. I sensed that at one time, this room had been filled, floor to ceiling, with LCL. Now, it was about maybe half full, which was still a lot. I had absolutely no sense of dimensions in this room. Even so, the floor soon disappeared beneath my feet and I had to swim my way around. I was glad the light was waterproof, or at least as waterproof as we could make it.
It didn't help. The battery soon flickered and died. Whether it was from the liquid or it just ran out, I never knew. I let the lamp fall from my hand and swam towards the shaft of light.
I got close enough to see that the figure on the cross was faceless. Seven eyes were tattooed on a dark surface in green, all connected by a triangle. A spear shot out from it's chest, piercing the location of the heart, if it even had one.
**Who enters my domain?**
I stopped dead, almost sinking beneath the surface of the liquid. "I do," I replied defiantly, somehow knowing that weakness or fear would be a bad thing to show.
**Do you have a name, mortal?** The voice was not quite internal, like the Unit was, and it wasn't quite external either, like Tashi or Risa would be. It was just a part of the room, female-sounding, yet overlapped by many. many other voices, all slightly out with one another to create a dragging effect.
"I do," I stated, floating lazily in the LCL. I offered no more.
A long silence and then the voice laughed. **You are strong, mortal,** the voice said. **Yes, you are one worthy of the Children I have Created. But do not underestimate my other Children. I feel Them coming, even now. They will be here soon.**
I felt then, the presence of others in the liquid. I stayed absolutely still, letting their minds touch mine. How many there were, I couldn't tell. They all flowed one right after the other, each one feeling only slightly different than the last.
It happened suddenly. I started to choke with the overwhelming smell of the LCL, it burned against my skin, and I felt like I was about to sink. I didn't know how far down the floor was, and it was so dark...
I struggled my way back to the entrance. The only reference I had was to look over my shoulder from time to time and make sure that the shaft of light was still directly at my back.
I got out finally, ran up the stairs and ran away. I didn't stop until I had reached a hallway I knew off by heart.
The hall leading to the Eva bay.
Did I really want to go there? I asked myself. I knew I couldn't handle the smell and feel of the LCL in the plug, and I didn't have my thought sensors anyway. My feet started carrying me there anyway, even though I walked with a jerky half limp.
Unit-01's entry plug was open and ready to go. No one was in sight. I climbed up to it awkwardly, tears in my eyes from the pain, got in and shut the door. I didn't want to activate it, just sit in the plug and be alone.
"How could that have happened?" I whispered to myself as more tears came, and not from pain. Memories now...even visual flashes against my closed eyes. "What did I do to deserve that?"
A weak ripple of anger ran over my mind, and it was not my own. I thought then that it had to be a pretty strong ripple of anger, if I felt it without my thought sensors.
Before I had much of a chance to ponder over that, there was a soft tap at the plug door. "Mei?" came Tashi's voice. "Mei...could you at least open the door for a moment?"
I wiped at my eyes with the back of my hand, knowing that it would be obvious that I had been crying. I got out of the seat and opened the door, though I didn't get out.
"Here," he said, tossing my thought sensors at me one at time; I caught them both. "I thought you might want those," he said, his eyes holding mine.
I couldn't answer. Instead, I only returned his gaze for a moment, then nodded once to acknowledge the gift, and retreated back inside, closing the door tightly.
I affixed the sensors to my head slowly, trying to find the best place on my head with my new haircut. I ran my hand over my hair, still damp as it was with LCL and only one sensor attached. With a small shake of my head, I reached up and put the other sensor on.
Where is he? I'll kill him! the Unit roared in my head. I had to grab my temples to brace my thoughts against the force of it. I barely realized that the Unit had repeated what Tashi had said.
"He's...elsewhere," I replied when I could, my head pounding with a sudden headache. "Tashi wants one of us to take him far far away, and I'd rather not do it." I could barely think.
I'm hurting you! I didn't understand, but a few moments later, the headache dulled into a barely noticable throb just behind my eyes. Is that better?
"Yes," I said, grateful.
There was a long moment of silence. It's not your fault, Mei, he said.
"Huh?"
Your mind is very open right now -- oh there it goes. It's not your fault Mei. You did nothing to warrant that kind of attack.
"What if I did?" I cried, leaning forward in the seat and wrapping my arms around my chest, wincing as I pressed a little too hard on the wounds. "I could have..."
No, he disagreed vehemently. Believe me, I would have been the first to know.
"What do you mean?" My voice was very quiet through the tears I was forcing down.
First, let Tashi inside. You need to release.
I didn't listen. I did open the door, and Tashi was waiting on the other side, but I ran past him back to my room, where I locked the door, sat on my bed and held my knees to my chest, crying until I felt sick.
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Characters & concept: © 1997-2002 Katsura /\ Evangelion © Gainax