Chapter Three
The forest did indeed have various streams running through it- from which Asuka drank eagerly and bathed gratefully. They would have found food, too, if they had known how to look.
And the trees were merciful, blocking out the harsh red sky (which had begun to fade anyway) and bringing the releif of semidarkness. The variety, too, of the close trees and plants was wonderful.
They didn't speak to each other at all, and Shinji always seemed completely unaware of his surroundings. Asuka grew tired of wondering (never worrying, of course) about him and decided to ignore him as he was doing her.
She just wanted to find someone. If she could just know that they weren't the only ones, then maybe she could begin to feel something or at least start to think properly, then maybe something could make sense for once.
* * *
After a while, the two wanderers bagan to pick up a sense of day and night. The dense wood was always dark, but sometimes seemed darker than others.
One (dare we say it?) day, Asuka woke up to something at first utterly unfamiliar. She lay motionless for a while, trying to decipher the sound that so sweetly and faintly filled her conciousness. Finally, she recognized it- birdsong! She almost laughed out loud. She had only heard birds sing but a few times in her life, and never in her childhood.
There were birds here.
How beautiful!
* * *
As they pressed on, eventually the forest began to thin. Day and night were clearly distinguishable now, the sky had lost its crimson hue, and one night Asuka even thought she saw a star winking ever so palely on the horizon.
The red sea, however, remained in her ears, though she knew they must be a world and about a hundred kilometers away by now.
* * *