+++++ NERV Tokyo-3. Saturday, +4.

Kozo Fuyutsuki had been through much in his life. He'd spent time in active warzones trying to save lives. He'd spent time in hospitals trying to bring hope to parents as their children died from incurable diseases. He'd helped bring forth an abomination against both science and nature into the world. He'd dealt with the single-minded drive of the Commander of NERV's Tokyo-3 branch, and been grilled by thirteen of the most powerful men and women on Earth over the particulars of a single bolt. He had believed himself difficult to disturb anymore. Trying to make sense of how it had come to be that two non-human women had been given complete access to their systems by the people that ran the entire world was simply a bridge too far for him. With Gendo away from the base on a mission to what remained of the Antarctic, it fell to him to stand next to those two women that simply chose not to introduce themselves beyond presenting their credentials directly from SEELE-01 himself. He had attempted to offer refreshment, and was ignored. He had asked if they would like seats, and was ignored. He asked if they would like an explanation of the process Unit-01 used to activate, and was ignored. While he wished fervently that he had simply remained retired when Gendo approached him with the insane plan to play god, he stood silently by and asked where life had managed to take such a strange and drastic turn.

The power needed to fracture this Adamite's shielding would devastate the atmosphere of this world. We would expose no less than half the remaining population to a direct vacuum, and most of the rest to the ionizing radiation of their native star. Where did this threat come from? Misaki's thoughts, while idle and directed towards her own curiosity, still included Minaho. These are not the Adamites we faced centuries ago.

I have no idea, grandmother. Minaho winced as Shinji screamed in agony, the Fourth Angel's tentacle wrapping around one of Unit-01's legs and upending the Evangelion. The energy field they project is the same as the one Shinji projects when inside the abomination.

We will need to study it. Misaki watched as Shinji dumped an entire magazine while off-balance from his sidearm directly into the bulbous red core of the squid-like monster to no effect. He has a natural sense of aim. That is encouraging. Her eyes trailed over to the woman that had been introduced as nominally in charge of tactical matters, noting that Misato wasn't saying anything at all to either direct or encourage her pilot. This organization was not set up to succeed, merely delay.

"What are children doing outside the shelters?!" Maya's cry of disbelief drew most eyes towards a portion of the screen she amplified, showing Toji Suzuhara and Kensuke Aida standing on a hill that was far too close to the combat zone for comfort. "Is he recording this?!"

I believe Yasuji is going to murder his son, Misaki mused idly.

"NO." Shinji's voice suddenly boomed out over the two-way communications array. Ignoring the pain it caused, he set Unit-01 to grabbing one of the Angel's tentacles that threatened to crush his classmates. With teeth grit hard, he used his grip as leverage to roll the Angel onto its back and get Unit-01's knees locked into a full mount. Freeing his other hand, he grabbed his prog-knife and hacked the tentacle free of the Angel's body before tossing it where it would land harmlessly on the forest floor. Another of the Angel's limbs slapped the knife out of his hand, earning a short curse of pain and a sighting of something heretofore unseen: rage.

Between heartbeats, the luminous green highlights of the purple Eva shifted to a gory red. The restraints on Unit-01's mouth shattered, and the beast within roared its hate directly into the face of its foe. The hills for kilometers in every direction were washed with the blast of pressure unleashed, uprooting trees and sending boulders rolling away from the vulgar display of power. Drawing one fist back, the enormous abomination against nature proceeded to begin physically smashing away at both the A.T. Field and the source of the Angel's existence within the mortal realm. There was no grace, no discipline, in the act to be found. There was no dignity, no honor, shown or asked for. Both Evangelion and human pilot were in unison, and after several gory minutes of inhuman viscera and blood showering the hill, the Adamite's life faded.

Breathing heavily, Shinji's face gradually dropped the darker emotions within. In kind, the Evangelion's coloration returned to normal as his heartrate stabilized. Slumping back in his seat, sending Unit-01 sitting back onto its heels, he looked off to his left and asked, "I can't see…did they get hurt?"

"Not yet, they haven't," Ritsuko replied darkly. "They are going to be arrested, however. Can you get Unit-01 to this location, Shinji-kun?" She set a waypoint on his HUD. "It's a larger lift, so if you need to sit down there you can while we bring you back home."

"Roger." Hefting himself upright, Shinji set Unit-01 walking towards his destination.

"Thank you. You did a fantastic job, Shinji-kun. Another day of life earned for everyone. You let me know what you want in celebration, and I'll do what I can to get it for you."

Misaki considered both the words Ritsuko used and the tone of honesty she used them with. Interesting. It appears that not everyone here is singing from the same sheet of music. "Excuse me," taking a few steps towards Ritsuko, she waited for the blonde to turn around and recognize her approach, "I had a few questions, if you don't mind?"

+++++ NERV Tokyo-3. Saturday, +4.

Leaning over the gantry's railing, Shinji vomited up everything he'd taken in for the day. LCL, food, oxygen, it all exited his mouth to fall unceremoniously into the waste runoff far below. Once there was nothing more to offer, he slumped down to his knees and rolled over into a seated position, shivering and sweating as the post-adrenaline crash struck hard. With his head lolling forward, he didn't see the empathetic looks the engineers offered, or the way that they carefully avoided crowding him. His mind, too focused on the knowledge that Sakura's brother had been in grave danger, remained both hyper-focused and hyper-aroused. Had he moved too slowly? Should he have seen them before Maya brought them to his attention? Was there something different, something better he could have done besides grab at the one tentacle that had drifted towards them? "I should have done better. I have to do better. I mustn't fail them. I mustn't fail them. I mustn't fail them."

"Shh, shh, shh," Minaho's voice reached past his fears, her hands pulling him into a warm embrace, "you won. You defended your people, you defeated your enemy. You cannot control everything, you should not control everything."

"She's right, Shinji-kun," Maya's voice joined Minaho's. The Bridge Bunny crouched before him, smiling reassuringly at the young man that was clearly hurting. "Those two made their choice to do what they did. They're not your responsibility, and you did everything you could do to save them."

Minaho watched Shinji's face scroll through a variety of emotional responses, the evident conclusion that he still needed time to adjust to what life was throwing out him clear even from that surface reading. "Ibuki-san, do you happen to have a wheelchair around? I would rather that he not walk for the moment, though I understand the good Doctor wishes for those samples."

"Here, ma'am." A gentle masculine voice spoke from nearby. One of the engineers stood at a respectful distance and gestured towards a wheelchair he'd stored near Unit-01 in case of another injury to an Eva pilot. "I'll keep a firm grip on this while you get Pilot Ikari aboard."

"Thank you," Maya nodded to her colleague, "I'll take this side, ma'am?"

"On three," Minaho agreed.

After a deliberate three count, Shinji was hoisted into the air and deposited in the chair without difficulty. Following a friendly grip on his shoulder, he looked up into a sympathetic face in the engineer that brought the wheelchair over for him. "Th-thank you, sir."

"Thank you, sir." He waved off any gratitude for his actions. "You go out there and save our lives, leave the little stuff like this to us. Engineering has your back." Stepping clear and motioning for the ladies to get moving, he stopped any disagreement before it could begin. "We'll have Unit-01 ready by the end of the day, Lieutenant. Keep him safe."

The chair's motion set Shinji's head flopping to the side, then back against Minaho's toned stomach. He was tired. He was hungry. He was confused. He was alive. "Ibuki-san?"

"Just Maya, Shinji-kun. Just Maya." The mousy technician kept pace easily with the chair, setting their course and letting Minaho set the pace. "What can I do for you?"

"Where was my father?"

"The Commander was at the South Pole. The UN sub-department that's responsible for our funding and direction, SEELE, sent him there on short notice last night. I'm not sure of more than that, though." Disguising her concern well, she asked, "Did you have anything you wanted to say to him?"

Shinji snorted out with dark amusement. "I have a lot I want to say to him…I guess I was just hoping to rub his face in the fact that there are people who care about me more than he ever did."

+++++ Kajishima Park. Saturday, +4.

Washu announced to those present the good news, "He's alive, the Adamite is not." Allowing for the subdued celebrations from the Juraians present, she added, "It seems that Misaki has discovered a few new wrinkles, some good…some not so good."

"Let us focus on the good, for the moment," Funaho declared calmly. "I would discuss the bad with you in private, first."

"Fair enough." Washu shrugged. "It seems that not everyone in this 'NERV' is a raging cockwaffle. There are some good people that are trying to keep Shinji alive and sane, some normal people that are in over their head or are operating under orders that seem contrary to sound military principles, and some very confused people who are doing their best despite having no clue what that means. Also, our new bestie is a crack shot and natural killer. He's raw, but it seems he impressed Misaki enough that she wants to test him herself."

Toshiro grunted, leaving unspoken the rest of his thoughts on the matter. Both Gen and Nanako agreed with his thoughts, and both agreed that speaking them aloud in front of Funaho or Sasami was not the right play to make. Fortunately, none of them needed to worry that it would remain unheard as Hikari blithely asked, "I thought we wanted to keep him alive for the foreseeable future? How is throwing him to Her Majesty going to aid in that pursuit?"

"My wife does have the ability to be gentle, child," Funaho responded with clear amusement. "She's taken with him, and while that may put him in danger…it does not put him in harm's way."

"I'll brush up on my first aid training," Hikari sighed out. "Thank you, Your Majesty."

"Is there anything else good that came out of this?" Nanako, seated on the box that Yasuji had brought, idly kicked her heels against it. "Or is the rest bad?"

"Shinji has motivation to fight." Washu smiled tightly, looking around the room at Sasami, Hikari, Nanako, and Funaho. "He wants to do better, for us."

+++++ NERV Tokyo-3. Saturday, +4.

"Maya…." Laying on the gurney, being washed gently by Minaho as the Bridge Bunny took the various samples she'd been ordered to collect, Shinji pondered something that he'd noticed but couldn't understand. "When I'm fighting the…uhm…."

Looking back over her shoulder, Maya helpfully offered, "Angels?"

"Y-yeah, them." Holding one hand up, his palm flat towards the ceiling, he traced the inside of an imaginary sphere. "There's this…shimmer. Whenever I'm close enough to hit them, it shows up. It's like…like fuzzy hexagons made of rainbows."

"That's an A.T. Field. Your mother, Doctor Ikari, pioneered a lot of the research into it." Reaching over and tapping a few buttons, she pulled up the basic theory on a nearby monitor. "We're still not fully certain what allows the Angels and the Evas to project these fields, but during times of extreme stress they seem to naturally emit them. Although, as I'm sure you've noticed, it's very draining."

"Yes." Looking at the monitor, he focused on the words 'Doctor Yui Ikari'. Even in death, my mother protects me. That's…comforting. "I, uhm…I tore? Maybe, I'm not sure if you can tear something that's not physically there…."

"Put simply," Ritsuko declared, walking into the room with both Misaki and Misato on her heels, "when two A.T. Fields come into conflict, meaning they attempt to assume dominance within the same spacetime coordinates, one of three things can happen." Typing out some commands on a nearby terminal, she changed what was displayed on the screen. "First, the Fields can cohabitate." She showed an oscilloscope, with waveforms moving against one another and forming a new unified waveform with the characteristics of both previous waveforms. "Second, the Fields can reject one another." She showed a new oscilloscope reading, where two waves failed to harmonize and struggled to become coherent independent of the other. "Or third, one Field becomes dominant." This time, one of the two waveforms grew stronger and muted the second entirely. The second, absorbed, wave no longer displayed at all. "Considering you are attempting to describe imparting a three-dimensional action upon a higher-dimensional phenomenon, 'tearing' is as accurate a verb as any you could choose. Your waveform dominated the Angel's waveform, or put your way, you tore the Angel's waveform apart."

Misato walked around Shinji's other side, opposite Minaho, and offered him a warm, hopeful, grin. "You tore it apart, Shinji-kun. I don't speak egghead either, so we'll stick to speaking grunt to one another, ok?" Tipping her head towards Misaki, she asked, "General Masaki had a few questions she wanted you present for, are you feeling up to it?"

Shinji tilted his head back, seeing Misaki's impassive scan of the room and everything in it. When she looked on him, her face briefly gained a layer of pleasure which caused him to smile back in kind. "I'm ok with it. I owe her for the ride here. I don't know if I could have run the entire way myself."

Approaching his head, Misaki laid her fingertips on his forehead soothingly. "You would have performed your best, which is exactly what I saw of you today, Pilot." Casting her thoughts into his mind, she cautioned him, I am not harming them by giving their minds reassurances that I belong here. Remember to keep safe our secret, if you would, so that I do not have to press harder upon them. "The interface between Pilot and machine. I noticed that he doesn't much use the array of buttons, switches, or levers present. Is that a lack of training, or a lack of necessity?"

"A little of both, actually." Misato waggled her hand side to side. "From what I have read, and what I have seen, most of the piloting interface is mental. He thinks, the Eva does. The control yoke is there to give him a more tangible connection in his own mind. That he is 'steering' it, so to speak. There are uses for the various buttons, including emergency overrides so that he can exit the Eva himself if we lose connection, but he hasn't been trained on how to use those owing to the recent accidents. Most of them are for the non-pilots that are responsible for maintenance and testing. They can't synchronize with the Eva, so they have to have a method of ensuring that connections are properly seated by compelling it with a more mechanical solution."

"I see." Misaki gestured to the waveform display. "Is that an inherent skill for the machine? Does it do it automatically in a conflict, or does the pilot play some role?"

"It's all Shinji-kun," Maya answered the more technical question. "The Eva amplifies the Pilot's A.T. Field. We all have one, but only the Children can successfully cohabitate with the Evangelions."

"A machine cannot have a soul, Lieutenant." She noted that Ritsuko's mind began to rebel harder against the compulsion to calmly cooperate, and switched the topic to one more agreeable to everyone. "Regarding Pilot Ikari, I hope that he will be given access to his medical records soon? Our concern regarding the civil suit against his former caretaker is what led us to come here and ensure that he was being treated appropriately, after all."

Blinking a few times, Ritsuko clearly shifted her focus along with the questioning. "Yes, I've documented everything I saw on his arrival, as well as what we've discovered in the few days he's been here. He'll have a copy of all of that, notarized and verified, by tomorrow evening. I'm glad that we had the chance to discuss it, General. Poor Shinji deserves far better than he's received, and I'm glad to see that the UNOIG is actively pursuing this issue."

"Excellent. Then, if you have what you need, I would like Pilot Ikari to get dressed so I can visit his quarters. We'll get out of your hair, and let you get back to the excellent work you've been doing."

Shinji sat up slowly, still tired, but was met by a hug from Ritsuko. It took him a second before returning it, but when he did he felt her clutch him tighter. "Thank you, Ritsuko-sensei."

"Anything you want, Shinji, you come talk to me." Breaking the hug and running a thumb along his cheek to brush a stray hair that had fallen from her head onto him away, she pressed her point, "Ok? Twice now you've won us another day. Let's work on getting you to where you want to go."

"Or me," Misato gently bumped Ritsuko with her shoulder to show that they were united on Shinji, "I'm also available any time to help. We've won twice, and that's the goal, but you aren't wrong when you say we can do better. Work with me, and I'll put everything I have at your disposal to meet your goals."

"Here's his phone, Colonel." Maya handed Minaho a smartphone, and a bag of accessories. "I've programmed my number, Captain Katsuragi's number, and Doctor Akagi's number in already." She then set some spare scrubs on Shinji's lap, patting them and eyeing him firmly. "I am also available, if you need or want someone to talk to. I don't have the pull some others might, but I do have time to give you if you need a shoulder to lean on."

The warmth in Shinji's heart continued to swell, hearing the sincerity of the offers and knowing that he was even less alone now than he had been before. "Th-thank you. I'll do my best to get better at piloting."

"You're not just a pilot, Shinji." Ritsuko urged everyone out of the room so he could get dressed in private. "You're a human being, first and foremost."

Minaho stayed behind, unseen, and when the door closed behind the others she pulled the sheet down that had been hiding his modesty and offered her hands to balance on so he could stand. "Be cautious, my dear. It seems that you're in danger of having friends."

"Does…uhm, does that bother you?"

"Only if they hurt you pointlessly." Booping him on the nose, she handed him his pants. "Ibuki seems like a lovely young woman. Akagi seems very earnest in her designs and desires." She hesitated. "Katsuragi has some rather significant issues to work through, but that is true of many people."

There was no chance of him disagreeing with that statement. He knew he had more than enough things that would drag him down in people's minds. Cinching the drawstring on his pants, he rubbed his stomach and frowned. "I…uhm…."

"We're going to get something to eat, don't worry." Slipping the shirt over his head, she kissed him once his face popped out the other side. "I'm not going to let you starve anymore."

+++++ Horaki house. Saturday, +4.

Shinji, each time he attempted to get up and help in some way, was politely redirected before he could even leave his seat. With Sakura Suzuhara on his right, Misaki Masaki Jurai to his left, and Funaho Masaki Jurai directly across from him, he was starting to max out his ability to both keep up with a conversation and prevent himself from crawling under the table to hide.

Sasami, Hikari, and Minaho floated around to the various empty bits of table the 'family' had gathered at, keeping drinks, platters, and pitchers full. The latter two would pause, from time to time, at Shinji's side and idly rub the base of his neck while joining in on the current conversational topic. The former, without overtly drawing attention to it, kept herself well away from him and his immediate orbit.

At one point, Shinji's attention was drawn completely away from Sasami, who was then bundled out of the room by Nanako. Shoving her into the kitchen, well out of earshot of anyone else, the protective agent eyed the princess with irritation. "Ok, what gives?"

With a huff, Sasami tried to move around her friend. "Don't start with me, Nana-chan."

"Don't you Nana-chan me, Princess." Pressing Sasami back again, she made it clear the conversation wasn't going to be avoided. "I've been protecting you since you were in diapers. What gives?"

"We're putting him in very, very big danger. Huge danger. Worst danger of all time danger," Sasami spat out in a terse whisper. "Everywhere I look, I see more and more things crawling into his life! That abysmal machine is trying to eat his soul, my mother is trying to drag him into interplanetary politics, the universe is positioning him by drawing people into his orbit, his own father is using him as a pawn for…something! He's cute. He's nice. He would be a prize on any market you put him on after he's had some food and exercise to build on his frame. Why would I want to help kill him by dragging him further into this?"

"Who says you'd help kill him?" Nanako scoffed. "If you haven't noticed, Minaho and Hikari are building up his defenses. Washu has been monitoring his exertions. Your mother is recognizing both the practical and personal in what she's doing, so am I! That machine of his won't work without him, which means that our best option is to help him see that not every problem requires a kinetic solution."

Sasami shook her head. "No, you don't get it. The more involved I get, the more…I see him dying." Her youthful teenage beauty briefly flickered to a more mature elegance that was her deathright, before switching back. "I'm not exactly thrilled that I shouldn't keep gently pulling on the leash he's offering me, but I'm not so interested in coming to love him that I'd risk a repeat of what happened to my father."

"…Have you told Her Majesty?" Nanako frowned back out to the gathering, where a joke had caused a clamor of laughter. "Either of them?"

While not the optimal response, she allowed her biting sarcasm a little room to help her, "Hey mom, you know that goddess you're really angry at for making the decision to swallow your daughter's soul? Yeah, she's giving me flashes of warning that something truly terrible is going to happen if you push her into an arranged marriage with a young man you're increasingly interested in. Don't worry, trust me, she's not controlling my mind or actions yet."

"…Fuck."

+++++ Tokyo-3 Intercontinental. Sunday, +5.

The hotel room he'd been given had proven fortuitous, as Shinji was now playing 'host' for the Empresses. When they had returned from Hikari's house the prior evening, Shinji immediately ceded the bedroom and all of its amenities to the two women…or, at least he'd tried to. Running against both the brains and the brawn of the Juraian Empire, he'd stood little chance at either exceeding their manners, outwitting their arguments, or overcoming their strength. Left 'alone', as he had been when Minaho had been called away by Washu and Nanako, he'd been pushed into a shower with Funaho and Misaki, pulled into a bath with them, then thrown into the bed with both flanking him.

It had been three hours since he'd realized that struggling had only caused Misaki to squeeze him harder, and the clock had drifted into the next day by the time he'd relaxed enough for her to relax in kind. Moving was out of the question, he knew that much, but now at least he could see something other than her contented grin and cleavage. Letting his eyes roll away from both beautiful sights, he saw Funaho's tight frown of worry…and cleavage. Swallowing a sigh, he tried to will himself to sleep and found that there was something in the way of blessed unconsciousness.

Since he wasn't going anywhere until he received permission, he decided to pick at the logical problems presented to him in the past week. The world wasn't what he'd thought it was. Following the instructions on the signs between him and Tokyo-3 had been difficult, but doable. Attempting to contact Misato Katsuragi had been impossible, no matter how he'd tried he either received a busy signal or a message regarding the state of emergency. Ritsuko Akagi's argument that life only held value if you pursued it had grown more and more compelling as he spent time with those people who'd appeared in his life. Each day he won a chance to do what he wanted to, and what he wanted was to find people who made him feel like…like the non-humans had. A substratum of thought began to coalesce, that the most 'humane' treatment he'd ever received was at the hands of people who weren't, by definition, human.

Aliens, though quite human in appearance, were the ones who saw him suffering and tried to prevent it with more than tepid discussion. He had pieced together, after some thought, that Toshiro was responsible for his apartment collapsing. That the reason he'd been given this hotel room was because they wouldn't put up with him being treated like a dog. But why? The only answers he'd come up with were that one, Washu and Minaho held an outsized role in Juraian decisions, or two, and far more likely…they needed Unit-01. Without him fighting, Earth wouldn't survive. Without Earth, was there something that would threaten them? Were the Adamites now a serious threat?

The former argument seemed too simplistic, and the latter too complex. He'd been told, flat out, that the woman cuddling him happily could destroy the entire solar system with a yawn. He was laying between the joint rulers of an intergalactic empire. He'd been encouraged to find both joy and warmth in the arms of someone important to all of them. They weren't treating him like a peasant, or like a colleague…they were treating him like family. Would that gain them anything to balance out the scandal that would follow? He didn't even own the Eva they wanted him to pilot. With their advanced technology, they could just take it and find a way to pilot it without him, couldn't they?

We could, yes. But that would go against everything my late husband believed in. Funaho's voice flowed soothingly through his mind, and he looked over to see her sadly smiling at him. Beyond that, my human half would only prove the prejudice right if I used muscle to steal what your parents created.

A sense of shame grew in his gut, coloring his face and lowering his eyes.

No, no…I am not chiding you. If one were to play the odds, it would be foolish to not look at this situation as a trap waiting to be sprung. With two fingers, she lifted his face back up to hers. It is a good thing, in fact, that you are not walking around with a blindfold on. Our empire would have no use for anyone so gullible as to believe in free rides, and my family would deserve the abuse we would receive for encouraging that lack of skepticism.

Trying, without speaking, to ask what it was that they wanted, he wound up with her hand cupping his cheek.

I will not tell you, right now. There are trials that must pass first, or it would all be meaningless. Running the pad of her thumb under his eye, she winked. I have faith in your capacity for greatness. Trust that should you succeed, your reward will be well beyond your imagining. Leaning forward, she placed a soft kiss on his forehead. Now sleep.

Before he could explain that he had been having troubles doing just that, sleep claimed him completely.

+++++ Author's Note.

Dragonlord001: RE: Spoiling Shinji.

That is, more or less, the entire point of the story. I said at the end of the last story that I felt I needed to write something a bit more warm and fuzzy to balance out the bleak nihilism I'd created, and who better to bring warm and fuzzy than a series based entirely around the trials of a good man with a good heart who wins the love and affection of a host of...well, more a mixed bag of women?