Author: KK
Title: Until the End
Pairing: mainly Kaworu/Shinji
Rating: PG-13
Disclaimer: NOT MINE
Summary: Who the hell reads summaries anyway..?
Chapter 2: Whisper in the darkness//Hope
Please read the Author's Notes.
******
Akari was glad she wasn't one of those girls who were scared of darkness.
Well, not too much scared... but there was something spine-chilling in those gloomy corridors. Something that made her skin crawl.
The hallway was almost empty and the girl could hear the echo of her own footsteps. It sounded much like a heartbeat of some bloodthirsty creature, hidden in shadows and waiting to sink its teeth in a human flesh.
A shiver ran through Akari's body.
Oblivious to the younger girl discomfiture, Misato hastened her pace, praying the tests wouldn't take too much time. A hot shower, a cold beer and an insomnia-free night were sounding more than appealing after a long day of work. However, a little sinister voice in Misato's head was telling her very firmly that she could forget about having a peaceful night.
Misato told it just as firmly to bugger off.
It didn't.
Katsuragi's instincts were rarely wrong. Her infrequent blunders usually had something to do with a few (or more) cans of beer (different brands of alcohol would do the trick as well). But at that time Misato was sober as a newborn baby. She was on duty, after all. Such a pity. She wouldn't say no to a little booze-induced, false sense of comfort.
After all, false comfort was better than none at all, right..?
'A little session of self-pity is just what I needed tonight,' thought Misato bitterly. 'If I don't be careful, I'll end sobbing my sorrows out in a front of Commander's eyes. Not the best way to earn a pay rise, I'm sure.'
Shaking the depressing thoughts away, Misato turned her attention to Shinji's ex-classmate. The dark haired girl had already changed into her green plug suit and looked even more nervous than before. Misato couldn't blame her. Probably there was no child in a sane state of mind who would fancy a ride inside this. thing. Well, there was always that nerd Aida, but Misato doubted if he could have ever been considered sane.
But he hasn't been the only one. The First and the Fifth Child. Nor Ayanami, nor that Nagisa boy have ever seemed particularly afraid as well.
But they weren't exactly normal children, were they..? Nagisa. no, Tabris, the seventeenth Angel, had the appearance of a human, but he lacked one of the most important factors of human psyche; a will to live.
And Ayanami. He existence was still a mystery for Misato.
'Why she had been resurrected..? She couldn't even be a pilot anymore; her Eva, had overcome Henflick's Limit. It could no longer be repaired.'
Misato's dilemma was interrupted by a loud cough. She looked up, startled, and realized that she had almost walked straight into Subcommander Fuyutsuki.
"I'm so sorry, Subcommander," she stammered, bowing down slightly. Fuyutsuki interrupted her again.
"Don't be sorry, Major. You're not only one who has trouble with keeping their eyes opened." Fuyutsuki obviously thought that her clumsiness was caused by a severe lack of sleep. Misato had to admit he had a point.
"Ikari-kun is waiting for us. Let's not get him bored. And this is our pilot-in-the-making..?" the Subcommander asked, finally noticing Akari.
The girl bowed down respectfully.
"I'm honored to meet you, Subcommander," she said. Misato was about to make a teasing comment about the girl's impeccable manners when someone almost bumped into her. It seemed that Fuyutsuki had been right being skeptic about his subordinates' current physical state.
"I'm sorry, Major," Maya rubbed her eyes hastily and heroically suppressed the urge to yawn.
"Don't be." Misato restrained herself from quoting Professor Fuyutsuki. "You'll better show our new pilot the way to Eva 02's cage. I'm dying for a hot shower, and the sooner the tests are over, the better."
Maya nodded and smiled to Akari.
"Come on, I'll show you the way," she said. "The tests aren't so bad, once you get used to them..."
Maya tried to be reassuring, but then she remembered the children who had piloted the Evas before and her voice faltered.
One of the Children was catatonic. The second - emotionally unstable, the third became an invalid for the rest of his life, and the last one. was dead. Maya shuddered, but tried to hide her loss of composure. She didn't want to scare the young girl any further.
"I didn't tell you my name, how rude of me," she said instead. "I'm Maya Ibuki."
"Akari Obata," the girl finally smiled back. "Nice to meet you."
***
Just one more boring test.
That's probably what people from Nerv's personnel thought. Just one more boring test, one of those 'put-the-kid-inside-the-entry-plug-and-we-will- see-what-happens'. Nothing serious, really, just a few hours of staring at the screen.
Unfortunately, life proved that it can be a bitch sometimes.
Just as the new child, dressed already in her plug suit, was about to enter the plug everything went black. Only Maya, Hyuuga and Shigeru's computers were still working, but they had lost the connection with Magi.
For a few seconds everyone was silent. Then Misato's instincts squealed in delight. They loved when they were right. Misato didn't.
She cursed.
"A power failure..?" she inquired, finally. "What is going on..?"
Frankly, no one had any idea. Lieutenant Maya gulped nervously. She looked at the screen of her computer. "The Main power supply is non-operational. Voltage reads zero. I'm trying to switch the power to another supply."
Three seconds passed and with a soft buzz the connection with Magi was restored and the lights in the Central Combat Operation Room lit up again. Misato let out a tiny sigh of relief.
Hyuuga corrected his glasses and cleared his throat. "There's no track of human nor Angel presence in Magi's records."
Just as he was saying those words, everything went black again. Including the computers.
"What had happened..?" Shigeru started, but Fuyutsuki interrupted him.
"There's a high possibility that the black-out is caused by damages made during the attack of Zeruel and Tabris."
"Can you restart the system, cut off the connection with Magi and try again..?" asked Misato finally, looking in Maya's general direction.
"I. can't see anything," Maya stated the obvious.
"I think I have a lighter in my pocket," muttered Shigeru. He pulled the lighter out and lit it on.
His face, illuminated by the lighter's glow, looked a bit disturbing. It made Misato remember about the bad horror movies she used to watch when she was younger. She almost smiled. Making use of the little light they had, Maya and Makoto managed to switch manually the power to the emergency supply. The lights lit up once more. Maya didn't even try to restore the connection with Magi again, in the case the problem was laying in the Magi itself.
Commander Ikari looked at Eva-02. The red humanoid had been repaired just before the Sixth Child arrival. "Abort the experiment," he said dryly. "Send technicians to find and fix the cause of blackout."
"Yes, sir." replied Misato. "Shall we put Eva-01 on stand-by? We cannot be sure whether or not the blackout was caused by Angels. It could be a human work."
Gendou looked at her. "If the HQ was infiltrated by human, Eva won't be of any use. It would completely destroy the HQ before it could find the human." he paused for a while, then rose from his seat. "However, there are... other possibilities. Put Eva on stand-by, use Rei as the pilot."
Misato bit her lip. Of course, Shinji wouldn't be able to pilot the Eva right now. Or anytime soon, for that matter. But using Rei as a pilot for Unit 01 would be risky as well... Last time they had tried that trick the Eva refused to accept both Ayanami and Dummy System. Apparently the Eva had manners just as good as the person who had created it.
"How about Eva-02?" asked Major Katsuragi at last.
It was Fuyutsuki who give her a reply. "Pilot isn't ready yet. We don't know how long it will take her to synchronize completely with Unit 02. Send her back to pilot quarters for now. Resume the sync tests as soon as main power supply is operational again."
Misato sighed. Oh yes, giving orders was such an easy thing.
******
Shinji was wandering around Kaworu's quarters. He wanted to go to see Asuka at first, but people in the hospital had said that visiting hours were long over.
He wanted to go back to the seashore where he met Kaworu - but it was so dark he couldn't even find the place. For some reason street lamps were turned off.
So he had decided to go to Kaworu's place.
Unfortunately, when he got there he found out that he wasn't the only one human there; a lot of people from Nerv apparently couldn't sleep as well. Or maybe they just had too much free time.
He couldn't go inside Nagisa's room; a group of Nerv scientists informed him that he wasn't allowed to go there. They were wearing funny suits; they looked just like Misato when she was trying to stop Jet Alone.
Shinji thought it was pretty hilarious; did they think that being an Angel was contagious..?
The boy fought an urge to go back there and ask them to let him go inside... "I'm sorry, but I think I left my SDAT player there when I was sleeping with the Fifth Child, could I please have it back?" He almost laughed there, but then he thought that he would have liked much more to have his friends and Kaworu back - and he choked on a sob.
No, I don't want to think about it again!
But he couldn't help thinking - and he felt a hot tear running down his cheek again.
And then he heard quiet footsteps just behind him.
******
The girl squeezed her hand lightly around the object she was holding.
She looked at the item in disgust.
It was a gun, a Heckler & Koch P8 to be more specific. An updated version of the P7, a bit smaller, a bit lighter. Easy to use, even for a girl.
Akari looked in a mirror. For a second she was shocked to see a foreign face, then she smiled a bit. In her opinion, long, dark hair suited her nicely.
She considered changing back into her normal clothes, then decided against it. She had no time to waste, and the plug suit was more comfortable than most of her outfits.
She hesitated for a second, then came to a decision that taking her jacket would be a wise thing to do. The jacket was green, just like her plug-suit, so she wouldn't look too weird, and, more importantly, she could hide the gun in one of the pockets.
She looked at her bag. It was too heavy to carry it around with her, it had to stay here. She could go back for it later.
She glanced out of the window. The street was empty. It was time to go.
***
'God, where did this kid go again..?' thought the girl.
Searching for him had been hard enough but when she finally found him, fear of being noticed by the Nerv scientist kept her from coming closer to the boy.
'Just what the hell is he thinking, walking around in a middle of the night?'
Suddenly the boy startled and looked in her general direction. He stood up and started to walk away. The girl noticed something glistening on his cheek. Was he crying..? And did he notice her?
Well, it didn't matter. It was even better that he was walking away from Nerv scientists. She could catch up with him and have a nice midnight talk.
******
"Ikari!" called the girl when she was sure that the people from Nerv wouldn't be able to hear her. The boy stopped, but didn't turn around.
Wherever they were, it was pretty dark there, so she wasn't able to tell for sure what kind of place it was. She could smell something weird in the air, though - salt water? Not to mention the air wasn't as hot as it was in the city.
Then she heard soft sound of waves hitting the shore.
Seashore, then. Well, it was as good place as any other.
"I want to talk to you." the girl called, wishing that Ikari at least had the decency to face her.
Apparently, he hadn't. The girl gritted her teeth. Well, she had tried being nice. It was time for a drastic measures. She stepped closer to him, taking his arm, almost gently.
Then she pressed a gun to his ribs.
"Let's go," she hissed. The boy recoiled, but didn't comply. He was still staring somewhere, and even in the darkness the girl could tell that he seemed pretty depressed...
...or rather, completely broken down. His eyes were scary, lifeless and glassed over, like eyes of a deceased.
"Are you listening to me?" She felt a pang of guilt; threatening someone who already looked like a kicked puppy just wasn't her style. But this was a job. So, she just pressed the gun harder in the boy's ribs.
"GO," she whispered menacingly.
The girl had practically to drag the boy inside the pilots' quarters. He wasn't fighting, no, he just wasn't cooperating in the slightest. Akari had to yank him after her like some god damned doll.
God, what was going inside this child's head..?
After a short walk they went inside a large building. Marie's room was on the first floor. It wasn't any different from Kaworu's quarter; it was just as small and dull-looking. Marie opened the doors and went inside, then she pulled a bag from under the bed. The bag was quite big and it looked heavy. The black haired girl sighed and tangled her hand in her hair - and suddenly she wasn't black haired anymore. Her hairs were now short and blonde.
"Phew. That thing sure was uncomfortable," she murmured, hiding the wig inside the bag. Then she took her laptop out.
"Give me your ID card," she ordered. Ikari didn't even look at her. She sighed and took the card out of his pocket. "Here, was it so hard..? Just behave and I'll let you go."
That statement hadn't been entirely true; the girl couldn't let him go, not until she was done with her job.
Locking him in her room would probably be the best idea. The people from Nerv would let him out in a day or so, when everything would be over.
Akari sighed once again and looked at the card. She wished she could get a hold of another one but she was aware that she wouldn't be able to steal the card from any adult. Ikari was an easy prey, defenseless and barely even showing up in Geofront anymore, but the perspective of trying to steal the ID card from Major Katsuragi or Subcommander Fuyutsuki was sending chills down Akari's spine.
'Well, for now this one would have to do,' she thought. She had some tricks up her sleeve to fool the security system. She could only hope that the security system wouldn't end up making a fool out of her.
She checked the time, just in case. It was almost 10.09 a.m.
'I have about twenty minutes. it should be enough.'
From 10.30 PM to 8.00 AM the nearest entrance to Geofront was being guarded by the people from Nerv's security. Of course, civilians wouldn't be able to use the elevator even when the entrance wasn't being watched over. Only the people with the Nerv ID card could get through the gate. But the locks weren't an obstacle for the blond-haired girl (in most of the cases, at least; there were a few accidents Akari would like to erase from her curriculum vitae, but hell, no one's perfect.)
The plug suit clad girl decided to have an another look at the Geofront's map. She sighed for an umpteenth time that day and sat down in front of her laptop. It took her only a few seconds to open the connection with GeNet - a military network consisted of Magi-alike computers. None of them could be considered equal with Magi, but when used together they theoretically could outdo the Nerv's supercomputer. Theoretically being the keyword. The girl lazily typed a few commands. The computer prompted her for the password; then, finally, the girl was able to gain access to the data.
*User Marie_Date logged in.*
A familiar logo appeared on the screen, the Seele's Coat of Arms with the inscription over it.
The Nagisa Project.
The girl - Marie - couldn't help a smile from spreading over her face when she saw the logo; Nagisa had gotten bored once and colored the eyes in Seele's Coat of Arms, picking a different color for every eye. After the correction the eyes had the colors of a rainbow. Nagisa had said it was symbolic; Marie thought it was just plain ridiculous.
The girl sighed and started memorizing (or, at least, trying to) the Geofront's map. Just when she decided she'd had enough and was about to turn the laptop off, she heard quiet, careful footsteps just outside her room. She froze.
The sound of the footsteps ceased, but instead a sound of a quiet talk filled the room. Marie could not understand a word, the strangers' voice was too quiet, but she had a vague feeling that staying in her quarters and letting herself be caught wasn't exactly the greatest idea.
She turned off her laptop and closed the lid as quiet as possible. She hid it in her bag, then prepared to escape using the emergency exit.
Then she realized she had overlooked something, or, more specifically, someone.
'Ikari!' the blonde girl felt like smashing herself across the head with a laptop. Maybe that would help her memory work better.
The young Ikari had been so quiet before that Marie had almost forgotten about the boy. She was tempted for a second to just leave him in the room, but she shook the urge away. That would be too risky. Ikari himself didn't seem particularly dangerous, but if he was spotted inside the new pilot's quarters by someone form Nerv, he would be asked questions. And Marie was pretty sure that whoever was standing outside her room, it wasn't a civilian. After the fight with the Sixteenth Angel there weren't any civilians left in the city.
'It's someone from Nerv,' thought the girl. 'Have they already found the cause of the blackout..? No, it's impossible. They must be searching for the Third Child, then. Crap,' swore the unfortunate spy. 'I'd better get him out of there, they will be searching for us, but not as frantically as they would be if they knew that I've threatened the kid with a gun.' Marie grasped the boy's arm and pulled him out of the room, thankful for Ikari's quietness.
'I'll get rid of him near the elevator,' she decided.
She didn't.
The walk to the elevator took her more time that she'd expected. She couldn't walk too fast, not with the heavy bag that was slowing down her every step and with necessity to drag Ikari after her. When she finally reached her destination, tired, panting and livid with anger, she saw that she wasn't the only one fancying a ride.
A tall, brown-haired man with a bored expression on his pointy face was apparently feeling an irresistible urge to visit the Geofront as well, because he was making a beeline for the entrance to the elevator. He was still good fifty yards away when Marie, shocked by his sudden appearance, pulled Ikari inside the elevator.
The doors closed after them and the elevator started its ride down.
The girl moaned, leaned against the wall and slowly slid down to the floor.
'What the hell have I gotten myself into..?'
***** ------------------- Few days ago. -------------------
The girl was sitting in her room when the telephone rang.
It was a very strange room indeed, certainly not the one you would expect to find occupied by a teenage girl. The computers were a rare luxury in private houses after the Second Impact, but the girl owned three of them; two workstations and one seemingly old laptop. The room was crowded with CDs, floppies, sheets of paper covered with notes, empty cans and other stuff, generally regarded as 'junk'.
In other words, the room was terribly messy.
When the phone rang, the girl looked up startled, as if amazed that someone still bothered to use that prehistoric device, instead of simply sending her an e-mail. She recovered quickly and started to search for the cell phone, because she just kept forgetting the location of anything that wasn't related with computers or her job.
The girl found the phone fairly quickly, safely hidden under a layer of clothes, mostly bras. She yawned and pressed the receiver to her ear.
"Hello?" she said without interest, scratching her head and trying to suppress another yawn.
The expression on her face changed instantly after hearing the reply. She kept listening carefully, nodding from time to time.
"Yes, sir," she said finally. "I'll be there."
She put the receiver back and ran a hand through her hair. Then she collapsed on the bed with a sigh,
"So," she mused, "that idiot Nagisa got himself killed again."
*****
The people from laboratory were looking at her curiously when she was walking past them without a second glance. They weren't used to her yet, she had arrived to Japan just a few days ago. For those scientists she was just a little girl, an intruder in their clinically white world of vials, pills, Guinea pigs, and God knows what else. She wasn't paying attention to them, but even she couldn't help noticing that everyone in the laboratory seemed more than a little nervous.
The girl had the feeling that she knew the cause of the distress of the personnel. She sighed, then looked around. She was searching for Professor Furuhata, the one who had called her there. The blonde girl spotted him soon; the man was sitting in his favorite chair and sipping coffee.
"Sir," said Marie. The man looked up.
"Oh, finally," groaned Professor. He seemed more than a little tired. Actually, the phrase "completely spent" would be a huge understatement in his case. "I was waiting for you, I had been asked to escort you to the conference room, and you can see for yourself that we have a bit of pandemonium here."
Marie looked up, curious. Conference room..?
When she entered the room, it was completely dark. She gulped, realizing what was about to happen.
And, sure enough, after a few seconds the visitor appeared. The monolith glowed lightly in otherwise dark room. Marie bowed down instantly. She would have felt silly for bowing before a hologram if she hadn't been so anxious.
"Iruka," said the voice from nowhere. The girl looked up.
"Yes, sir." Marie wondered why the hell she, of all the people, had been considered worthy of having a talk with Keel Lorenz.
"You've heard the news about Tabris, I expect."
Marie nodded. Keel was silent for a good few seconds and the girl realized she should said something.
"Yes, sir." She coughed quietly, then looked down. She had a feeling that she was being scrutinized by the old man. It was unnerving her.
Keel seemed to consider something.
"He didn't came back yet," the man said finally.
He didn't came back. The girl's brain immediately offered her a vision of a huge container filled with LCL and a dozen of pale bodies, floating in the yellowish liquid. Marie shuddered.
She knew Kaworu's origins. She had seen him floating in the air, she had watched him shielding himself with an AT Field, she had seen him coming back from dead.
She knew the truth behind Angel's attacks. She knew why they have never attacked in groups, she knew that they had no soul on their own, that their soul in reality was the soul of Adam, the Giant of Light, and she knew that all Angels wanted to merge with Adam, because Adam's soul wanted to unite with its body.
She knew that Nagisa was the last one of the Angels, and she knew that that gave him the ability to come back from death.
She did not knew why she had been called by Keel Lorenz and why exactly Keel thought that Kaworu's sudden decease was Marie's business.
"We are deeply concerned by this fact," Keel's voice turned bitter. "For that reason, I have a favor to ask."
'A favor?' Marie looked at the monolith with a glint of interest in her eyes. 'That means /a job/.'
"We think.," started again Keel. "..that Nerv is keeping his body somewhere in their laboratories. If they allowed his body to partially regenerate, but shielded him with an Anti-AT Field his soul will be trying to come back to its old body. "
Marie felt that the monolith was looking at her, piercing her with its scrutinizing glare. Which was ridiculous, because, technically speaking, the monolith lacked anything that could be considered as eyes.
"We want you to sneak inside Geofront and destroy Nagisa's corpse," Keel said at last. Marie choked. She had to restrain herself from letting out a panicked scream. For a moment the girl was sure that her superior must have lost his marbles.
"It's impossible!" the blonde girl shrieked out finally.
The monolith suddenly shifted in the air, floating in Marie's direction. It stopped just in front of her nose.
"Not if you use your brains," Keel's voice was almost soft. "Their genius Doctor is currently imprisoned, nobody would be smart enough to notice if you, for that matter, caused a blackout in the Nerv's HQ."
Marie gulped and the monolith shifted away.
"I wish you good luck," said Keel, and the girl got the impression that the old man had to be grinning.
The statue disappeared.
Marie collapsed on the floor.
*****
Marie was cursing her sorry fate. Why, of all the people, she had to risk her young life to bring that idiot back to life..?
It's not that she had forgotten Nagisa. She hadn't forgotten him; after all, they used to be almost friends, even if she couldn't bring herself to trust him. They have been working together, traveling together from country to country, laughing together and dancing with death together. She thought about him sometimes, she had dreamed about him more often but she wasn't exactly grief-stricken after his death. Since the beginning she has felt that he didn't belong to this world.
Before they met she had been she hoped for a better future. She had her life planned in tiniest details; she had wanted to become the greatest soldier working for the Committee, make a lot of money, and then have fun for the rest of her life.
How naive she had been.
She had realized soon that working for Seele wasn't a part-time job. And then she met him, Seele's Prodigy, and she had learned to hate.
It was a strange hate, without the ferocity and maliciousness usually associated with hatred. It was a hate born from fear and misunderstanding, fuelled by the fact that Nagisa barely even noticed her existence. But she has never wished anything bad to happen to him. And when he had disappeared after the accident with Eva 04 she had felt. strangely empty.
The girl chuckled bitterly, noticing the irony, no, impossibility of the situation. Here she was, trying to resurrect her so-called friend.
It seemed impossible even to Marie.
Even though she has already seen Nagisa coming back to life.
******
Misato almost choked on her coffee.
"What did you say?!"
Two young, dark-haired men from Nerv's Section Two bowed their heads down looking guilty.
"I don't have any excuse," they said simultaneously.
"I asked you to keep an eye on the Third Child and you dare to say you've lost him?!" Misato rubbed her temples. Why was she being forced to work with those idiots? "What do you mean, you've lost him? Had he turned invisible?!"
"No, ma'am." The man swallowed nervously. "Just after the blackout started he was talking with a girl."
"What they were talking about?"
"I've no idea, ma'am. I was asked to keep an eye on the kid, not to spy on him." The man tried desperately to hide the fact that he had looked away to give the Third Child some privacy, because he had thought that the girl was Ikari's date. Or something like that.
Misato gritted her teeth. "And then?"
"And then they went inside the pilots' quarters. They must have used different exit, because I couldn't find them afterwards."
Misato swore under her breath. "Search for them. Find them. Bring them back."
"Yes, ma'am."
Giving orders was easy, but even Misato knew that finding two children in Tokyo-3, or maybe even inside Geofront, wouldn't be easy during the blackout. What the hell were those kids plotting? What was Commander Ikari plotting? She knew one thing; he wasn't going to be pleased when he would find out about the pilots' disappearance.
He wasn't going to be pleased at all.
******
They were walking downstairs. Most of the elevators were still dysfunctional and Marie didn't want to waste her time and raise suspicions in Nerv's staff by turning on the power supply. The further they got, the hotter the air was becoming. After all, when Marie turned off the power in the whole complex, she turned off the air conditioners as well. Only security and life support systems were still working. Sometimes Shinji's ID card wasn't enough to make the doors let them through; and Marie had to pull the keyboard from her bag, connect it with the ID Card, put the whole thing into the socket and hope that the program she had wrote earlier would be able to break the code. It hasn't ever failed, but always there is a first time for everything.
Marie's mood improved a good deal; it seemed that her ill luck decided to torment someone else for a change. The hallways were empty, Ikari was a burden, but at least he was quiet, and, generally speaking, life was as good as it might be.
Marie started to hope that her job would prove to be easier than she expected. If she had known how the night will end, she probably would have turned around and fled, screaming her head off and alarming all people who were still left in Geofront.
And Shinji? Most likely he would have hastened his pace. After all, he had nothing to lose.
******
What was strange, the closer they get to their goal, the safer Marie felt. Or maybe that wasn't so strange; after all, on the upper Geofront levels it was easier to run into a group of technicians or scientists. The lower levels were almost empty. Their only enemy was a security system, which wasn't even controlled by Magi. She could deal with that.
Little did she know that they weren't alone in the dark maze of Geofront undergrounds. There was one more person, hidden in Terminal Dogma.
She wasn't worried about the blackout. After all, if she wanted to get out from this place, she wouldn't need to use the elevator.
However, she had no reason to leave.
She was waiting.
******
"Well. That's it." Marie stopped in front of the large doors. Shinji looked at the doors with a blank expression on his face. The girl sighed and pulled out her laptop again. She needed something more that Shinji's ID card to open this door.
Within a few seconds, the floor was covered with the cables and the air was filled with the blonde girl's loud swearing.
******
The sun was going down.
During the sunset Tokyo-3 seemed to be a deserted place. After the battle with Almisael and the self-destruction of Eva 00 all the civilians had been evacuated, or, to be more specific, all civilians who had been still alive. Even Nerv's staff and technicians weren't thrilled at the idea of going out of Geofront. Perhaps some of them were afraid of the possibility that the next Angel could attack when they were still on surface, helpless and unable to hide in the seemingly safe undergrounds. Or perhaps people just couldn't stand the view of the destroyed city, because it reminded them of their hopes and dreams, and of the friends that had lost their lives while trying to save the world.
But, if you looked closely enough, you could see that Tokyo-3 wasn't empty that night. At the edge of the city, on the seashore which seemed gold under the last rays of sunshine, two boys were talking quietly; one of them had unusually silver hair and crimson eyes, the other one was dark-haired and his eyes had a color of the summer night's sky.
They were sitting on the ground; the gray-haired boy was leaning against a rock, the other one had his chin supported against his knees. He was talking quietly, stuttering a bit, as if he hadn't been used to talking for so long.
"I'm thinking sometimes... that I shouldn't have come here. To Nerv." the boy's voice was strained, filled with a shade of pain.
The older boy looked at him with mild curiosity. "Why, Shinji-kun? If you hadn't been a pilot, you wouldn't have met your friends."
"...That's why." Shinji tightened his hold around his knees. "Maybe it would have been better if I hadn't made any friends. Maybe it would be better to be alone. Before... before I arrived here I haven't had any friends. Nobody cared for me, but I didn't care for anybody as well. I wasn't happy, but I wasn't unhappy, either. I was... " he hadn't finished his sentence, because the other boy interrupted him.
"Are you sure that nobody cared for you?"
"Why should they?" said Shinji. His voice was bitter and he was careful not to look Kaworu in the eyes.
"I can think of many reasons," said the silver-haired boy quietly. When Shinji turned his face to look at him, their eyes finally met. The younger boy turned away quickly and the red color bloomed in two small patches on his cheeks. He wasn't used to be the object of someone's attention.
"I cannot think of any," he started again. "I couldn't think of any back then. But it didn't bother me. I didn't care. It was as if my feelings were asleep... and when I arrived there, the people whom I met woke them up again."
"Shouldn't you be grateful, then?"
Shinji was silent for a long while. "Maybe."
"You said you weren't happy when you were at your uncle's place. Were you happy here, with your friends?"
Another long moment of silence. "Yes. Yes, I was."
Kaworu closed his eyes, seemingly lost in his thoughts. "Isn't being happy, if only for a short time, better than not being happy at all?"
"No." The answer had been so quick and firm, that even Shinji was surprised. Kaworu's eyes snapped open and the gray-haired pilot looked at his companion with new interest.
"Why?"
Shinji was tracing patterns in the sand with his finger for a short while, as if trying to distract himself from things he didn't want to remember, but Kaworu caught his hand and held it in place firmly. Shinji sighed and turned his hand, so they were palm to palm.
"Because... now I know how much I have missed in my life... It's... It's like an addiction; when you've been happy once you cannot go back to the life you had led before, because you'd always remember. I wish I could forget, just forget it all. But there is no way I could. I'm afraid to even close my eyes, because I can see my friends looking at me, accusing me of being a coward. And I always dream about them, in my happiest dreams and in my most terrible nightmares."
Shinji was trying to calm himself, but he failed and choked on a sob, squeezing Kaworu's hand almost to the point of pain. "I don't know... I don't know what to do. I've been trying so much to make everything right, but in the end I couldn't change anything... And the only thing I could do was to run away..."
For the first time in his life Kaworu couldn't find any words to say.
So he just pulled Shinji into a hug, stroking younger boy's back lightly, with a vague feeling that instead of making things better he was making them worse.
******
The sky was becoming darker and darker as we were sitting together, lost in thoughts.
I'll die tomorrow. It seemed to be such a good option, but now I'm not so sure anymore. But do I have a choice? I don't want to make Shinji loose another friend; but Seele won't be happy if I send them the message saying that I'm sorry, but I quite like world the way it is now, no Third Impact for me, thank you very much.
For a moment I wonder if I could stop Seele by myself - after all, what could they do to fight me? They think I'm loyal to them, but I still remember the accident with Eva 04. I'll never forget.
I'm tired of being their puppet.
But the fact that I could blast Geofront into smithereens doesn't change anything. It won't change the fact that I'm not a human, and if Shinji-kun finds out about it, he'll feel betrayed. He'll be scared of me, just like everyone else, like Marie, people in laboratory, technicians, and even Seele. They fear me even if they know that I don't have any intentions to harm them; they fear me because I'm different, because I have red, pupil less eyes, because I can open doors without touching them, and because I can fly.
No matter what I do, Shinji-kun will lose another friend because of me. So, dying might be a better option. It will be cruel, it will be much like an amputation, but it will let him live.
"Let's go home."
His soft voice startles me out of my thoughts and I look down at him, and God, he's smiling. And then he grabs my hand and pulls me into general direction of my 'apartment', and I follow him, leaving behind my fear and anxiety, just for that one night.
And I wonder, have I had the chance, would I have acted differently? If we hadn't become friends, it wouldn't be so hard to die...
...But no, I don't think I would have changed anything. Maybe it's selfish, but I want to be happy as well. Just this one time.
I look back at the seashore where we've met. When I look at the rock I was sitting on the day before, its shape shifts. It looks just like an angel now... with broken wing and his head ripped off.
A cold shudder runs through my body.
There is no turning back.
******
Gendou looked at the silent Unit 01.
'Soon,' he said to himself. He looked impatiently at the technicians, who were running around the Geofront trying to find and fix the cause of the blackout. Their work certainly wasn't easy, the damages caused by Angels still hasn't been removed, and it was hard to tell which one could cause the failure of the main power supply. That was unacceptable.
Gendou swore quietly. He couldn't even get to Terminal Dogma, because elevators weren't working - well, he still could jump down the main shaft and hope that all gates would be opened, and that he would fall into LCL. That was unacceptable.
He prayed to heavens that Seele didn't attack now; but the old men seemed strangely quiet lately. Were they plotting something again? Who knew, Keel Lorenz was a smart man. He could still have some cards up his sleeve. That was unacceptable.
'Unacceptable' was becoming one of the most frequently used words in Gendou's vocabulary.
He looked at the team of panicked technicians and swore. There was something wrong with this blackout. Technicians might say what they wanted, but it hadn't been caused by damages inflicted by the Angels. No, there was something else going on there. But what? Did the old men want to start their Project sooner? No, that was impossible, they couldn't start it before the next day. But they might try. no, they will try to interfere. At first Gendou wanted to use Evangelions as his private 'army'. They could stop Seele if they were trying to attack Geofront. But now, Evas were useless. Without the pilots they were nothing more than just giant puppets. Security still couldn't find the kids. Damn it all! If only he could get to Terminal Dogma..!
Suddenly, his lips curled in a wry smile.
'Well, I still have a chance.'
******
TBC.
Title: Until the End
Pairing: mainly Kaworu/Shinji
Rating: PG-13
Disclaimer: NOT MINE
Summary: Who the hell reads summaries anyway..?
Chapter 2: Whisper in the darkness//Hope
Please read the Author's Notes.
******
Akari was glad she wasn't one of those girls who were scared of darkness.
Well, not too much scared... but there was something spine-chilling in those gloomy corridors. Something that made her skin crawl.
The hallway was almost empty and the girl could hear the echo of her own footsteps. It sounded much like a heartbeat of some bloodthirsty creature, hidden in shadows and waiting to sink its teeth in a human flesh.
A shiver ran through Akari's body.
Oblivious to the younger girl discomfiture, Misato hastened her pace, praying the tests wouldn't take too much time. A hot shower, a cold beer and an insomnia-free night were sounding more than appealing after a long day of work. However, a little sinister voice in Misato's head was telling her very firmly that she could forget about having a peaceful night.
Misato told it just as firmly to bugger off.
It didn't.
Katsuragi's instincts were rarely wrong. Her infrequent blunders usually had something to do with a few (or more) cans of beer (different brands of alcohol would do the trick as well). But at that time Misato was sober as a newborn baby. She was on duty, after all. Such a pity. She wouldn't say no to a little booze-induced, false sense of comfort.
After all, false comfort was better than none at all, right..?
'A little session of self-pity is just what I needed tonight,' thought Misato bitterly. 'If I don't be careful, I'll end sobbing my sorrows out in a front of Commander's eyes. Not the best way to earn a pay rise, I'm sure.'
Shaking the depressing thoughts away, Misato turned her attention to Shinji's ex-classmate. The dark haired girl had already changed into her green plug suit and looked even more nervous than before. Misato couldn't blame her. Probably there was no child in a sane state of mind who would fancy a ride inside this. thing. Well, there was always that nerd Aida, but Misato doubted if he could have ever been considered sane.
But he hasn't been the only one. The First and the Fifth Child. Nor Ayanami, nor that Nagisa boy have ever seemed particularly afraid as well.
But they weren't exactly normal children, were they..? Nagisa. no, Tabris, the seventeenth Angel, had the appearance of a human, but he lacked one of the most important factors of human psyche; a will to live.
And Ayanami. He existence was still a mystery for Misato.
'Why she had been resurrected..? She couldn't even be a pilot anymore; her Eva, had overcome Henflick's Limit. It could no longer be repaired.'
Misato's dilemma was interrupted by a loud cough. She looked up, startled, and realized that she had almost walked straight into Subcommander Fuyutsuki.
"I'm so sorry, Subcommander," she stammered, bowing down slightly. Fuyutsuki interrupted her again.
"Don't be sorry, Major. You're not only one who has trouble with keeping their eyes opened." Fuyutsuki obviously thought that her clumsiness was caused by a severe lack of sleep. Misato had to admit he had a point.
"Ikari-kun is waiting for us. Let's not get him bored. And this is our pilot-in-the-making..?" the Subcommander asked, finally noticing Akari.
The girl bowed down respectfully.
"I'm honored to meet you, Subcommander," she said. Misato was about to make a teasing comment about the girl's impeccable manners when someone almost bumped into her. It seemed that Fuyutsuki had been right being skeptic about his subordinates' current physical state.
"I'm sorry, Major," Maya rubbed her eyes hastily and heroically suppressed the urge to yawn.
"Don't be." Misato restrained herself from quoting Professor Fuyutsuki. "You'll better show our new pilot the way to Eva 02's cage. I'm dying for a hot shower, and the sooner the tests are over, the better."
Maya nodded and smiled to Akari.
"Come on, I'll show you the way," she said. "The tests aren't so bad, once you get used to them..."
Maya tried to be reassuring, but then she remembered the children who had piloted the Evas before and her voice faltered.
One of the Children was catatonic. The second - emotionally unstable, the third became an invalid for the rest of his life, and the last one. was dead. Maya shuddered, but tried to hide her loss of composure. She didn't want to scare the young girl any further.
"I didn't tell you my name, how rude of me," she said instead. "I'm Maya Ibuki."
"Akari Obata," the girl finally smiled back. "Nice to meet you."
***
Just one more boring test.
That's probably what people from Nerv's personnel thought. Just one more boring test, one of those 'put-the-kid-inside-the-entry-plug-and-we-will- see-what-happens'. Nothing serious, really, just a few hours of staring at the screen.
Unfortunately, life proved that it can be a bitch sometimes.
Just as the new child, dressed already in her plug suit, was about to enter the plug everything went black. Only Maya, Hyuuga and Shigeru's computers were still working, but they had lost the connection with Magi.
For a few seconds everyone was silent. Then Misato's instincts squealed in delight. They loved when they were right. Misato didn't.
She cursed.
"A power failure..?" she inquired, finally. "What is going on..?"
Frankly, no one had any idea. Lieutenant Maya gulped nervously. She looked at the screen of her computer. "The Main power supply is non-operational. Voltage reads zero. I'm trying to switch the power to another supply."
Three seconds passed and with a soft buzz the connection with Magi was restored and the lights in the Central Combat Operation Room lit up again. Misato let out a tiny sigh of relief.
Hyuuga corrected his glasses and cleared his throat. "There's no track of human nor Angel presence in Magi's records."
Just as he was saying those words, everything went black again. Including the computers.
"What had happened..?" Shigeru started, but Fuyutsuki interrupted him.
"There's a high possibility that the black-out is caused by damages made during the attack of Zeruel and Tabris."
"Can you restart the system, cut off the connection with Magi and try again..?" asked Misato finally, looking in Maya's general direction.
"I. can't see anything," Maya stated the obvious.
"I think I have a lighter in my pocket," muttered Shigeru. He pulled the lighter out and lit it on.
His face, illuminated by the lighter's glow, looked a bit disturbing. It made Misato remember about the bad horror movies she used to watch when she was younger. She almost smiled. Making use of the little light they had, Maya and Makoto managed to switch manually the power to the emergency supply. The lights lit up once more. Maya didn't even try to restore the connection with Magi again, in the case the problem was laying in the Magi itself.
Commander Ikari looked at Eva-02. The red humanoid had been repaired just before the Sixth Child arrival. "Abort the experiment," he said dryly. "Send technicians to find and fix the cause of blackout."
"Yes, sir." replied Misato. "Shall we put Eva-01 on stand-by? We cannot be sure whether or not the blackout was caused by Angels. It could be a human work."
Gendou looked at her. "If the HQ was infiltrated by human, Eva won't be of any use. It would completely destroy the HQ before it could find the human." he paused for a while, then rose from his seat. "However, there are... other possibilities. Put Eva on stand-by, use Rei as the pilot."
Misato bit her lip. Of course, Shinji wouldn't be able to pilot the Eva right now. Or anytime soon, for that matter. But using Rei as a pilot for Unit 01 would be risky as well... Last time they had tried that trick the Eva refused to accept both Ayanami and Dummy System. Apparently the Eva had manners just as good as the person who had created it.
"How about Eva-02?" asked Major Katsuragi at last.
It was Fuyutsuki who give her a reply. "Pilot isn't ready yet. We don't know how long it will take her to synchronize completely with Unit 02. Send her back to pilot quarters for now. Resume the sync tests as soon as main power supply is operational again."
Misato sighed. Oh yes, giving orders was such an easy thing.
******
Shinji was wandering around Kaworu's quarters. He wanted to go to see Asuka at first, but people in the hospital had said that visiting hours were long over.
He wanted to go back to the seashore where he met Kaworu - but it was so dark he couldn't even find the place. For some reason street lamps were turned off.
So he had decided to go to Kaworu's place.
Unfortunately, when he got there he found out that he wasn't the only one human there; a lot of people from Nerv apparently couldn't sleep as well. Or maybe they just had too much free time.
He couldn't go inside Nagisa's room; a group of Nerv scientists informed him that he wasn't allowed to go there. They were wearing funny suits; they looked just like Misato when she was trying to stop Jet Alone.
Shinji thought it was pretty hilarious; did they think that being an Angel was contagious..?
The boy fought an urge to go back there and ask them to let him go inside... "I'm sorry, but I think I left my SDAT player there when I was sleeping with the Fifth Child, could I please have it back?" He almost laughed there, but then he thought that he would have liked much more to have his friends and Kaworu back - and he choked on a sob.
No, I don't want to think about it again!
But he couldn't help thinking - and he felt a hot tear running down his cheek again.
And then he heard quiet footsteps just behind him.
******
The girl squeezed her hand lightly around the object she was holding.
She looked at the item in disgust.
It was a gun, a Heckler & Koch P8 to be more specific. An updated version of the P7, a bit smaller, a bit lighter. Easy to use, even for a girl.
Akari looked in a mirror. For a second she was shocked to see a foreign face, then she smiled a bit. In her opinion, long, dark hair suited her nicely.
She considered changing back into her normal clothes, then decided against it. She had no time to waste, and the plug suit was more comfortable than most of her outfits.
She hesitated for a second, then came to a decision that taking her jacket would be a wise thing to do. The jacket was green, just like her plug-suit, so she wouldn't look too weird, and, more importantly, she could hide the gun in one of the pockets.
She looked at her bag. It was too heavy to carry it around with her, it had to stay here. She could go back for it later.
She glanced out of the window. The street was empty. It was time to go.
***
'God, where did this kid go again..?' thought the girl.
Searching for him had been hard enough but when she finally found him, fear of being noticed by the Nerv scientist kept her from coming closer to the boy.
'Just what the hell is he thinking, walking around in a middle of the night?'
Suddenly the boy startled and looked in her general direction. He stood up and started to walk away. The girl noticed something glistening on his cheek. Was he crying..? And did he notice her?
Well, it didn't matter. It was even better that he was walking away from Nerv scientists. She could catch up with him and have a nice midnight talk.
******
"Ikari!" called the girl when she was sure that the people from Nerv wouldn't be able to hear her. The boy stopped, but didn't turn around.
Wherever they were, it was pretty dark there, so she wasn't able to tell for sure what kind of place it was. She could smell something weird in the air, though - salt water? Not to mention the air wasn't as hot as it was in the city.
Then she heard soft sound of waves hitting the shore.
Seashore, then. Well, it was as good place as any other.
"I want to talk to you." the girl called, wishing that Ikari at least had the decency to face her.
Apparently, he hadn't. The girl gritted her teeth. Well, she had tried being nice. It was time for a drastic measures. She stepped closer to him, taking his arm, almost gently.
Then she pressed a gun to his ribs.
"Let's go," she hissed. The boy recoiled, but didn't comply. He was still staring somewhere, and even in the darkness the girl could tell that he seemed pretty depressed...
...or rather, completely broken down. His eyes were scary, lifeless and glassed over, like eyes of a deceased.
"Are you listening to me?" She felt a pang of guilt; threatening someone who already looked like a kicked puppy just wasn't her style. But this was a job. So, she just pressed the gun harder in the boy's ribs.
"GO," she whispered menacingly.
The girl had practically to drag the boy inside the pilots' quarters. He wasn't fighting, no, he just wasn't cooperating in the slightest. Akari had to yank him after her like some god damned doll.
God, what was going inside this child's head..?
After a short walk they went inside a large building. Marie's room was on the first floor. It wasn't any different from Kaworu's quarter; it was just as small and dull-looking. Marie opened the doors and went inside, then she pulled a bag from under the bed. The bag was quite big and it looked heavy. The black haired girl sighed and tangled her hand in her hair - and suddenly she wasn't black haired anymore. Her hairs were now short and blonde.
"Phew. That thing sure was uncomfortable," she murmured, hiding the wig inside the bag. Then she took her laptop out.
"Give me your ID card," she ordered. Ikari didn't even look at her. She sighed and took the card out of his pocket. "Here, was it so hard..? Just behave and I'll let you go."
That statement hadn't been entirely true; the girl couldn't let him go, not until she was done with her job.
Locking him in her room would probably be the best idea. The people from Nerv would let him out in a day or so, when everything would be over.
Akari sighed once again and looked at the card. She wished she could get a hold of another one but she was aware that she wouldn't be able to steal the card from any adult. Ikari was an easy prey, defenseless and barely even showing up in Geofront anymore, but the perspective of trying to steal the ID card from Major Katsuragi or Subcommander Fuyutsuki was sending chills down Akari's spine.
'Well, for now this one would have to do,' she thought. She had some tricks up her sleeve to fool the security system. She could only hope that the security system wouldn't end up making a fool out of her.
She checked the time, just in case. It was almost 10.09 a.m.
'I have about twenty minutes. it should be enough.'
From 10.30 PM to 8.00 AM the nearest entrance to Geofront was being guarded by the people from Nerv's security. Of course, civilians wouldn't be able to use the elevator even when the entrance wasn't being watched over. Only the people with the Nerv ID card could get through the gate. But the locks weren't an obstacle for the blond-haired girl (in most of the cases, at least; there were a few accidents Akari would like to erase from her curriculum vitae, but hell, no one's perfect.)
The plug suit clad girl decided to have an another look at the Geofront's map. She sighed for an umpteenth time that day and sat down in front of her laptop. It took her only a few seconds to open the connection with GeNet - a military network consisted of Magi-alike computers. None of them could be considered equal with Magi, but when used together they theoretically could outdo the Nerv's supercomputer. Theoretically being the keyword. The girl lazily typed a few commands. The computer prompted her for the password; then, finally, the girl was able to gain access to the data.
*User Marie_Date logged in.*
A familiar logo appeared on the screen, the Seele's Coat of Arms with the inscription over it.
The Nagisa Project.
The girl - Marie - couldn't help a smile from spreading over her face when she saw the logo; Nagisa had gotten bored once and colored the eyes in Seele's Coat of Arms, picking a different color for every eye. After the correction the eyes had the colors of a rainbow. Nagisa had said it was symbolic; Marie thought it was just plain ridiculous.
The girl sighed and started memorizing (or, at least, trying to) the Geofront's map. Just when she decided she'd had enough and was about to turn the laptop off, she heard quiet, careful footsteps just outside her room. She froze.
The sound of the footsteps ceased, but instead a sound of a quiet talk filled the room. Marie could not understand a word, the strangers' voice was too quiet, but she had a vague feeling that staying in her quarters and letting herself be caught wasn't exactly the greatest idea.
She turned off her laptop and closed the lid as quiet as possible. She hid it in her bag, then prepared to escape using the emergency exit.
Then she realized she had overlooked something, or, more specifically, someone.
'Ikari!' the blonde girl felt like smashing herself across the head with a laptop. Maybe that would help her memory work better.
The young Ikari had been so quiet before that Marie had almost forgotten about the boy. She was tempted for a second to just leave him in the room, but she shook the urge away. That would be too risky. Ikari himself didn't seem particularly dangerous, but if he was spotted inside the new pilot's quarters by someone form Nerv, he would be asked questions. And Marie was pretty sure that whoever was standing outside her room, it wasn't a civilian. After the fight with the Sixteenth Angel there weren't any civilians left in the city.
'It's someone from Nerv,' thought the girl. 'Have they already found the cause of the blackout..? No, it's impossible. They must be searching for the Third Child, then. Crap,' swore the unfortunate spy. 'I'd better get him out of there, they will be searching for us, but not as frantically as they would be if they knew that I've threatened the kid with a gun.' Marie grasped the boy's arm and pulled him out of the room, thankful for Ikari's quietness.
'I'll get rid of him near the elevator,' she decided.
She didn't.
The walk to the elevator took her more time that she'd expected. She couldn't walk too fast, not with the heavy bag that was slowing down her every step and with necessity to drag Ikari after her. When she finally reached her destination, tired, panting and livid with anger, she saw that she wasn't the only one fancying a ride.
A tall, brown-haired man with a bored expression on his pointy face was apparently feeling an irresistible urge to visit the Geofront as well, because he was making a beeline for the entrance to the elevator. He was still good fifty yards away when Marie, shocked by his sudden appearance, pulled Ikari inside the elevator.
The doors closed after them and the elevator started its ride down.
The girl moaned, leaned against the wall and slowly slid down to the floor.
'What the hell have I gotten myself into..?'
***** ------------------- Few days ago. -------------------
The girl was sitting in her room when the telephone rang.
It was a very strange room indeed, certainly not the one you would expect to find occupied by a teenage girl. The computers were a rare luxury in private houses after the Second Impact, but the girl owned three of them; two workstations and one seemingly old laptop. The room was crowded with CDs, floppies, sheets of paper covered with notes, empty cans and other stuff, generally regarded as 'junk'.
In other words, the room was terribly messy.
When the phone rang, the girl looked up startled, as if amazed that someone still bothered to use that prehistoric device, instead of simply sending her an e-mail. She recovered quickly and started to search for the cell phone, because she just kept forgetting the location of anything that wasn't related with computers or her job.
The girl found the phone fairly quickly, safely hidden under a layer of clothes, mostly bras. She yawned and pressed the receiver to her ear.
"Hello?" she said without interest, scratching her head and trying to suppress another yawn.
The expression on her face changed instantly after hearing the reply. She kept listening carefully, nodding from time to time.
"Yes, sir," she said finally. "I'll be there."
She put the receiver back and ran a hand through her hair. Then she collapsed on the bed with a sigh,
"So," she mused, "that idiot Nagisa got himself killed again."
*****
The people from laboratory were looking at her curiously when she was walking past them without a second glance. They weren't used to her yet, she had arrived to Japan just a few days ago. For those scientists she was just a little girl, an intruder in their clinically white world of vials, pills, Guinea pigs, and God knows what else. She wasn't paying attention to them, but even she couldn't help noticing that everyone in the laboratory seemed more than a little nervous.
The girl had the feeling that she knew the cause of the distress of the personnel. She sighed, then looked around. She was searching for Professor Furuhata, the one who had called her there. The blonde girl spotted him soon; the man was sitting in his favorite chair and sipping coffee.
"Sir," said Marie. The man looked up.
"Oh, finally," groaned Professor. He seemed more than a little tired. Actually, the phrase "completely spent" would be a huge understatement in his case. "I was waiting for you, I had been asked to escort you to the conference room, and you can see for yourself that we have a bit of pandemonium here."
Marie looked up, curious. Conference room..?
When she entered the room, it was completely dark. She gulped, realizing what was about to happen.
And, sure enough, after a few seconds the visitor appeared. The monolith glowed lightly in otherwise dark room. Marie bowed down instantly. She would have felt silly for bowing before a hologram if she hadn't been so anxious.
"Iruka," said the voice from nowhere. The girl looked up.
"Yes, sir." Marie wondered why the hell she, of all the people, had been considered worthy of having a talk with Keel Lorenz.
"You've heard the news about Tabris, I expect."
Marie nodded. Keel was silent for a good few seconds and the girl realized she should said something.
"Yes, sir." She coughed quietly, then looked down. She had a feeling that she was being scrutinized by the old man. It was unnerving her.
Keel seemed to consider something.
"He didn't came back yet," the man said finally.
He didn't came back. The girl's brain immediately offered her a vision of a huge container filled with LCL and a dozen of pale bodies, floating in the yellowish liquid. Marie shuddered.
She knew Kaworu's origins. She had seen him floating in the air, she had watched him shielding himself with an AT Field, she had seen him coming back from dead.
She knew the truth behind Angel's attacks. She knew why they have never attacked in groups, she knew that they had no soul on their own, that their soul in reality was the soul of Adam, the Giant of Light, and she knew that all Angels wanted to merge with Adam, because Adam's soul wanted to unite with its body.
She knew that Nagisa was the last one of the Angels, and she knew that that gave him the ability to come back from death.
She did not knew why she had been called by Keel Lorenz and why exactly Keel thought that Kaworu's sudden decease was Marie's business.
"We are deeply concerned by this fact," Keel's voice turned bitter. "For that reason, I have a favor to ask."
'A favor?' Marie looked at the monolith with a glint of interest in her eyes. 'That means /a job/.'
"We think.," started again Keel. "..that Nerv is keeping his body somewhere in their laboratories. If they allowed his body to partially regenerate, but shielded him with an Anti-AT Field his soul will be trying to come back to its old body. "
Marie felt that the monolith was looking at her, piercing her with its scrutinizing glare. Which was ridiculous, because, technically speaking, the monolith lacked anything that could be considered as eyes.
"We want you to sneak inside Geofront and destroy Nagisa's corpse," Keel said at last. Marie choked. She had to restrain herself from letting out a panicked scream. For a moment the girl was sure that her superior must have lost his marbles.
"It's impossible!" the blonde girl shrieked out finally.
The monolith suddenly shifted in the air, floating in Marie's direction. It stopped just in front of her nose.
"Not if you use your brains," Keel's voice was almost soft. "Their genius Doctor is currently imprisoned, nobody would be smart enough to notice if you, for that matter, caused a blackout in the Nerv's HQ."
Marie gulped and the monolith shifted away.
"I wish you good luck," said Keel, and the girl got the impression that the old man had to be grinning.
The statue disappeared.
Marie collapsed on the floor.
*****
Marie was cursing her sorry fate. Why, of all the people, she had to risk her young life to bring that idiot back to life..?
It's not that she had forgotten Nagisa. She hadn't forgotten him; after all, they used to be almost friends, even if she couldn't bring herself to trust him. They have been working together, traveling together from country to country, laughing together and dancing with death together. She thought about him sometimes, she had dreamed about him more often but she wasn't exactly grief-stricken after his death. Since the beginning she has felt that he didn't belong to this world.
Before they met she had been she hoped for a better future. She had her life planned in tiniest details; she had wanted to become the greatest soldier working for the Committee, make a lot of money, and then have fun for the rest of her life.
How naive she had been.
She had realized soon that working for Seele wasn't a part-time job. And then she met him, Seele's Prodigy, and she had learned to hate.
It was a strange hate, without the ferocity and maliciousness usually associated with hatred. It was a hate born from fear and misunderstanding, fuelled by the fact that Nagisa barely even noticed her existence. But she has never wished anything bad to happen to him. And when he had disappeared after the accident with Eva 04 she had felt. strangely empty.
The girl chuckled bitterly, noticing the irony, no, impossibility of the situation. Here she was, trying to resurrect her so-called friend.
It seemed impossible even to Marie.
Even though she has already seen Nagisa coming back to life.
******
Misato almost choked on her coffee.
"What did you say?!"
Two young, dark-haired men from Nerv's Section Two bowed their heads down looking guilty.
"I don't have any excuse," they said simultaneously.
"I asked you to keep an eye on the Third Child and you dare to say you've lost him?!" Misato rubbed her temples. Why was she being forced to work with those idiots? "What do you mean, you've lost him? Had he turned invisible?!"
"No, ma'am." The man swallowed nervously. "Just after the blackout started he was talking with a girl."
"What they were talking about?"
"I've no idea, ma'am. I was asked to keep an eye on the kid, not to spy on him." The man tried desperately to hide the fact that he had looked away to give the Third Child some privacy, because he had thought that the girl was Ikari's date. Or something like that.
Misato gritted her teeth. "And then?"
"And then they went inside the pilots' quarters. They must have used different exit, because I couldn't find them afterwards."
Misato swore under her breath. "Search for them. Find them. Bring them back."
"Yes, ma'am."
Giving orders was easy, but even Misato knew that finding two children in Tokyo-3, or maybe even inside Geofront, wouldn't be easy during the blackout. What the hell were those kids plotting? What was Commander Ikari plotting? She knew one thing; he wasn't going to be pleased when he would find out about the pilots' disappearance.
He wasn't going to be pleased at all.
******
They were walking downstairs. Most of the elevators were still dysfunctional and Marie didn't want to waste her time and raise suspicions in Nerv's staff by turning on the power supply. The further they got, the hotter the air was becoming. After all, when Marie turned off the power in the whole complex, she turned off the air conditioners as well. Only security and life support systems were still working. Sometimes Shinji's ID card wasn't enough to make the doors let them through; and Marie had to pull the keyboard from her bag, connect it with the ID Card, put the whole thing into the socket and hope that the program she had wrote earlier would be able to break the code. It hasn't ever failed, but always there is a first time for everything.
Marie's mood improved a good deal; it seemed that her ill luck decided to torment someone else for a change. The hallways were empty, Ikari was a burden, but at least he was quiet, and, generally speaking, life was as good as it might be.
Marie started to hope that her job would prove to be easier than she expected. If she had known how the night will end, she probably would have turned around and fled, screaming her head off and alarming all people who were still left in Geofront.
And Shinji? Most likely he would have hastened his pace. After all, he had nothing to lose.
******
What was strange, the closer they get to their goal, the safer Marie felt. Or maybe that wasn't so strange; after all, on the upper Geofront levels it was easier to run into a group of technicians or scientists. The lower levels were almost empty. Their only enemy was a security system, which wasn't even controlled by Magi. She could deal with that.
Little did she know that they weren't alone in the dark maze of Geofront undergrounds. There was one more person, hidden in Terminal Dogma.
She wasn't worried about the blackout. After all, if she wanted to get out from this place, she wouldn't need to use the elevator.
However, she had no reason to leave.
She was waiting.
******
"Well. That's it." Marie stopped in front of the large doors. Shinji looked at the doors with a blank expression on his face. The girl sighed and pulled out her laptop again. She needed something more that Shinji's ID card to open this door.
Within a few seconds, the floor was covered with the cables and the air was filled with the blonde girl's loud swearing.
******
The sun was going down.
During the sunset Tokyo-3 seemed to be a deserted place. After the battle with Almisael and the self-destruction of Eva 00 all the civilians had been evacuated, or, to be more specific, all civilians who had been still alive. Even Nerv's staff and technicians weren't thrilled at the idea of going out of Geofront. Perhaps some of them were afraid of the possibility that the next Angel could attack when they were still on surface, helpless and unable to hide in the seemingly safe undergrounds. Or perhaps people just couldn't stand the view of the destroyed city, because it reminded them of their hopes and dreams, and of the friends that had lost their lives while trying to save the world.
But, if you looked closely enough, you could see that Tokyo-3 wasn't empty that night. At the edge of the city, on the seashore which seemed gold under the last rays of sunshine, two boys were talking quietly; one of them had unusually silver hair and crimson eyes, the other one was dark-haired and his eyes had a color of the summer night's sky.
They were sitting on the ground; the gray-haired boy was leaning against a rock, the other one had his chin supported against his knees. He was talking quietly, stuttering a bit, as if he hadn't been used to talking for so long.
"I'm thinking sometimes... that I shouldn't have come here. To Nerv." the boy's voice was strained, filled with a shade of pain.
The older boy looked at him with mild curiosity. "Why, Shinji-kun? If you hadn't been a pilot, you wouldn't have met your friends."
"...That's why." Shinji tightened his hold around his knees. "Maybe it would have been better if I hadn't made any friends. Maybe it would be better to be alone. Before... before I arrived here I haven't had any friends. Nobody cared for me, but I didn't care for anybody as well. I wasn't happy, but I wasn't unhappy, either. I was... " he hadn't finished his sentence, because the other boy interrupted him.
"Are you sure that nobody cared for you?"
"Why should they?" said Shinji. His voice was bitter and he was careful not to look Kaworu in the eyes.
"I can think of many reasons," said the silver-haired boy quietly. When Shinji turned his face to look at him, their eyes finally met. The younger boy turned away quickly and the red color bloomed in two small patches on his cheeks. He wasn't used to be the object of someone's attention.
"I cannot think of any," he started again. "I couldn't think of any back then. But it didn't bother me. I didn't care. It was as if my feelings were asleep... and when I arrived there, the people whom I met woke them up again."
"Shouldn't you be grateful, then?"
Shinji was silent for a long while. "Maybe."
"You said you weren't happy when you were at your uncle's place. Were you happy here, with your friends?"
Another long moment of silence. "Yes. Yes, I was."
Kaworu closed his eyes, seemingly lost in his thoughts. "Isn't being happy, if only for a short time, better than not being happy at all?"
"No." The answer had been so quick and firm, that even Shinji was surprised. Kaworu's eyes snapped open and the gray-haired pilot looked at his companion with new interest.
"Why?"
Shinji was tracing patterns in the sand with his finger for a short while, as if trying to distract himself from things he didn't want to remember, but Kaworu caught his hand and held it in place firmly. Shinji sighed and turned his hand, so they were palm to palm.
"Because... now I know how much I have missed in my life... It's... It's like an addiction; when you've been happy once you cannot go back to the life you had led before, because you'd always remember. I wish I could forget, just forget it all. But there is no way I could. I'm afraid to even close my eyes, because I can see my friends looking at me, accusing me of being a coward. And I always dream about them, in my happiest dreams and in my most terrible nightmares."
Shinji was trying to calm himself, but he failed and choked on a sob, squeezing Kaworu's hand almost to the point of pain. "I don't know... I don't know what to do. I've been trying so much to make everything right, but in the end I couldn't change anything... And the only thing I could do was to run away..."
For the first time in his life Kaworu couldn't find any words to say.
So he just pulled Shinji into a hug, stroking younger boy's back lightly, with a vague feeling that instead of making things better he was making them worse.
******
The sky was becoming darker and darker as we were sitting together, lost in thoughts.
I'll die tomorrow. It seemed to be such a good option, but now I'm not so sure anymore. But do I have a choice? I don't want to make Shinji loose another friend; but Seele won't be happy if I send them the message saying that I'm sorry, but I quite like world the way it is now, no Third Impact for me, thank you very much.
For a moment I wonder if I could stop Seele by myself - after all, what could they do to fight me? They think I'm loyal to them, but I still remember the accident with Eva 04. I'll never forget.
I'm tired of being their puppet.
But the fact that I could blast Geofront into smithereens doesn't change anything. It won't change the fact that I'm not a human, and if Shinji-kun finds out about it, he'll feel betrayed. He'll be scared of me, just like everyone else, like Marie, people in laboratory, technicians, and even Seele. They fear me even if they know that I don't have any intentions to harm them; they fear me because I'm different, because I have red, pupil less eyes, because I can open doors without touching them, and because I can fly.
No matter what I do, Shinji-kun will lose another friend because of me. So, dying might be a better option. It will be cruel, it will be much like an amputation, but it will let him live.
"Let's go home."
His soft voice startles me out of my thoughts and I look down at him, and God, he's smiling. And then he grabs my hand and pulls me into general direction of my 'apartment', and I follow him, leaving behind my fear and anxiety, just for that one night.
And I wonder, have I had the chance, would I have acted differently? If we hadn't become friends, it wouldn't be so hard to die...
...But no, I don't think I would have changed anything. Maybe it's selfish, but I want to be happy as well. Just this one time.
I look back at the seashore where we've met. When I look at the rock I was sitting on the day before, its shape shifts. It looks just like an angel now... with broken wing and his head ripped off.
A cold shudder runs through my body.
There is no turning back.
******
Gendou looked at the silent Unit 01.
'Soon,' he said to himself. He looked impatiently at the technicians, who were running around the Geofront trying to find and fix the cause of the blackout. Their work certainly wasn't easy, the damages caused by Angels still hasn't been removed, and it was hard to tell which one could cause the failure of the main power supply. That was unacceptable.
Gendou swore quietly. He couldn't even get to Terminal Dogma, because elevators weren't working - well, he still could jump down the main shaft and hope that all gates would be opened, and that he would fall into LCL. That was unacceptable.
He prayed to heavens that Seele didn't attack now; but the old men seemed strangely quiet lately. Were they plotting something again? Who knew, Keel Lorenz was a smart man. He could still have some cards up his sleeve. That was unacceptable.
'Unacceptable' was becoming one of the most frequently used words in Gendou's vocabulary.
He looked at the team of panicked technicians and swore. There was something wrong with this blackout. Technicians might say what they wanted, but it hadn't been caused by damages inflicted by the Angels. No, there was something else going on there. But what? Did the old men want to start their Project sooner? No, that was impossible, they couldn't start it before the next day. But they might try. no, they will try to interfere. At first Gendou wanted to use Evangelions as his private 'army'. They could stop Seele if they were trying to attack Geofront. But now, Evas were useless. Without the pilots they were nothing more than just giant puppets. Security still couldn't find the kids. Damn it all! If only he could get to Terminal Dogma..!
Suddenly, his lips curled in a wry smile.
'Well, I still have a chance.'
******
TBC.