Malfunction
Written by: Advantage
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Gendo Ikari was alone in his office. The time didn't matter, only it was in the late-night when most of the staff was asleep. There were no security cameras in his room, nor were there any recording devices outside Gendo's control. The man had dominated every corner of this space, from the single desk to the windows to the unusual patterns on the floor. He controlled everything in this space- right down to the air.
He was finishing his latest report to his superiors on this newest enigma. The most unusual had happened, and had nobody been there on the south pole that morning when the artifact had been uncovered there would have been no understanding to what Shinji Ikari had reported when he made contact with the mysterious object in Earth orbit.
The object had mysteriously vanished seconds after contacting Eva one, and before that Eva one had disappeared almost instantaneously before appearing in the Geo front, still in it's space armor. There was no rational explanation into how these things happened- and wisely NERV and SEELE were covering up what information they had about the entire operation. Eva one simply 'returned', and this was the explanation given to the Chinese and Russians. Even now, Eva 02 and 00 were still in orbit and preparing to return to Earth. Shinji was under medical observation and Eva 01 was locked up in the cages for it's own observation and testing.
Gendo didn't notice the object appear before him, just like the first time he had encountered the mysterious artifact.
A monolith was standing two meters before his desk and defied his control over the room. Indeed, it had appeared completely without Gendo noticing. The door was also locked, but Gendo already knew that. The monolith could traverse any sort of matter instantaneously.
Also, this wasn't one of SEELE's monoliths- the copy of the source of power that had long ago started the dream of the human instrumentality project. Those Monoliths were obviously artificial, with blood-red printed lettering on the front, usually speaking SOUND ONLY for the protection of the voices behind them. This Monolith was the monolith, for no reflection whatsoever shined off it's surface. Light drained into it's facings to some unknown place and time beyond the understanding of humankind.
Even SEELE and NERV, with all their impressive knowledge of the mysterious and paranormal had no explanation for this. The monolith was simply the monolith, and what it had to say was usually very important.
Like a primitive ape seeing fire for the first time Gendo stood up slowly, his eyes scanning the surface of the ebony slab while it stood in defiance of the light. He had seen the Monolith before, a long time ago, and in the wastes of a destroyed land. Like then, he was startled at it's sudden appearance.
But this time he had knowledge of things that had happened- and a glimpse into secret plans and inner workings. He didn't expect the monolith to give him any surprises this time.
He rounded his desk and addressed the monolith, "Why have you come here? What do you want?"
"You know that answer." Replied an indescribable voice, but it was of the same tone and flatness as the vision that appeared to Shinji Ikari in the fraction of a second.
"No," Replied Gendo and adjusted his glasses, "though I can guess. You have come to give us a warning."
"Yes."
"And I suppose," Gendo asked, waving his hand as if he was addressing a crazy man, "That because of our actions there will be disastrous consequences."
"No."
Gendo replaced his glasses and looked at the monolith, "Then why have you come then?"
"To address you."
Gendo didn't expect that, "Oh," He asked, "And what for?"
"You were the first and only person to know of the nature of our appearance. You also were responsible for the knowledge that what would follow meant no harm. You ignored this warning."
"Yes, I did." Gendo replied, "And?"
"And because of this results, the life on Earth has an expectancy shorter of what was intended."
"So you say." Gendo replied, "But how do we know it is not for a greater good? And haven't you learned not to meddle in other's affairs? Leave me be." Gendo turned around and walked for his seat to his desk, "I have no further business with you."
"It was because of our intervention on your planet that life formed here."
"And your job is done." Said Gendo as he took his seat, "Now go."
"We are responsible for your entire race. You alone are too small to dismiss the importance of the situation."
"I am in full comprehension of the situation." Gendo replied, "You underestimate me."
"And you underestimate us."
"So I suppose you are going to cause some form of disaster as punishment for this action?" Asked Gendo.
"You think too small of our perception and understanding of your race."
"Oh really? Well, no doubt you will arrange a punishment best suited for humanity, like your first punishment that almost destroyed the planet."
"You think too small of our perception and understanding of you."
This made Gendo look up and ask, "Of me? Why."
"We gave you the warning. We entrusted you with the gift. Your selfish actions of you and your masters seem to have given good reason for concern of your race. Naturally, this fault must be corrected.
"Since you cannot carry the warning, we must entrust another to carry the message. Your punishment will be given in full."
Gendo looked at the monolith with unblinking eyes, and when he did blink it was gone, just as mysteriously as it had come.
There was a different feeling in the room from the indifferent quiet of a moment ago. In it's place was an uncertain silence, an overhanging feeling of anxiety. This was also lost inside Gendo, who never knew fear.
-------------------------
The quietness of space had a relaxing effect on some people. Granted, if one were to stay in space for too long health would be a great concern, mostly in the sense that the bones would decalcify and muscles would be out of tone.
As for the psychological aspects of an orbital mission, those weren't of real concern as long as the Earth was in sight. And the general idea that one could return to it was ever prominent.
Asuka was sleeping at the moment, and exhausted from day three in orbit. They were still preparing to find the right date to bring the Evangelions down from their orbital homes, and so far nothing appeared preferable. Fatigue nevertheless swept Asuka and made her have a new sense of how alone she was. Perhaps this might leave a mark on her personality when she returned to earth, and home.
Rei was still awake, sleeping only when she needed to in her suit. It was already filled with LCL despite the dangers, and Rei had to feed herself from the rations they had on-board.
She was still perched atop the unmanned Russian shuttle Buran. Soon they may be passing the American Space shuttle Discovery launched only yesterday from the US's new launch pads in California's new Edwards base. They still lacked the advanced facilities needed to treat the shuttle, but for now it was enough to get some critical components up to the orbiting Evangelions to use for the de-orbit.
A great shield used by Evangelion zero had been used as a shuttle's heat shield, and now it was ironic to think that one such spacecraft would be floating within an arm's reach of the Eva.
But that was hours away. For the moment, Rei was alone up in her orbiting space trip, seated in the Evangelion and her second home.
She glanced at the glowing neon display screen hovering before her as she checked the calculations over again. If timed right, her Evangelion would be able to enter the atmosphere without incinerating, and she would land somewhere off Japan's coast to be picked up by another Super carrier and it's fleet- assuming the Eva didn't sink first. With all the extra space gear attached to the Evangelion it was hard to assume anything. Even riding Buran or Discovery was a risky option- as both craft were fragile and smaller than the total size of the Eva. Their last option was to abandon the Evas in orbit and return the pilots to Earth to rescue the floating bio-machines at a later date.
Rei put her head away from the calculations for a moment, out of no particular reason. She blinked, and then turned her head to look out of the side of the Eva's vision at a distant white orb shining out at her from an incredible distance.
Strange, she had never taken the time to examine the moon before. It was a very simple spherical shape of rock without any real special features other than the solid, great seas. Mountains and craters also pitted it's surface and had remained for over a thousand years without any significant change. Humanity had endlessly speculated about it, and even landed there. But they never returned...
Stranger...she started humming a tune. She even started to sing, "Fly me to the moon....and let me play, among the stars...." Rei stopped herself and blinked. What was wrong? Where did that motivation come from?
She pulled herself away from the moon and focused back on her calculations. Thinking, she also looked up around the cockpit but didn't see any warning lights. The still-lit display on orbital calculations was still there, so power wasn't prohibiting the alarms...
Something felt different about the place. Her hands....so slender...so white...
She closed the gloves of her suit. When did she ever consider that?! Why was she getting angry? Emotions were only a distraction!
She returned to her calculations with a better vigor, starting anew and re-trying the sequence again. She already had the answer, it didn't matter what she did. Hopefully this exercise would be able to calm her down...
She breathed.
What did Shinji look like with glasses on?
She stopped herself-
What would it feel like to have him kiss her?
She coughed in the LCL. What was going on?
How would it feel-
"No, Stop!" She squirmed in her cockpit, passing through the display of calculations and clutching her head. She started breathing and focused only on breathing, calming herself down...
And then she was fine.
She looked left and right for warning signs. There wasn't any measure or degree of warning in her cockpit.
But something was amiss....
She turned back to her calculations and started over again, but in the back of her mind she was feeling that something was wrong...
-------------------
Shinji was once more in a hospital bed.
He had been here before, the first day after his battle with the first enemy. Were they angels?
That... thing, whatever it was, called them 'manifestations of the mind meant to combat us'. If that was the case, then what were they fighting? What were these things that his father called angels? Were they biblical or just misinterpreted aliens? Or, as the monolith suggested, manifestations of our own minds created by ourselves...
What did he fear the most....?
No, best not to ask that. He had enough fears as it was- he shouldn't unsettle the dust to identify them. They were there, he had fought them and hid from them. He never fought them they were too strong. He was too weak.
Or was he?
Lying in the hospital bed made him think. The room was quiet, and the moonlight penetrated the windows to peek into the bed and over the sheets- into his thoughts.
He was Shinji Ikari. One of three chosen people to pilot the bio-organic robot known as Evangelion. This robot was unmatched by any power on the planet save the power of a nuclear bomb. He had fought and destroyed with Eva, and with it he had unimaginable power. There was only one leash, the auto cut-out dummy plug, but if he were to apply himself not even this could stop him. Ambition was just around the corner. He was smart, he could do it. There was no limit to what he could do.
Shinji sat up.
The confidence was here, when none had existed previously. What is this...?
He looked at his hand again and closed it when he made a realization.
The Monolith. It was proof that there was life somewhere out there beyond Earth's small sphere. Whatever it was, and whatever that space he had been, was all an example of some godly power beyond the solar system and comprehension of humankind.
It was also a warning. To 'Be careful of what is asked of you'. It was too late for that to be of piloting Eva, otherwise the Monolith would have probably come to Earth long ago. It was for some other reason...
His father? Perhaps he should know. But Shinji never had the courage to ask him...maybe now he did....
No motivation to do so stirred within him. When he looked for a reason none was there to respond to him. He did not want to see his father.
But what about the-
No. It could wait. He couldn't find any answers with his father.
As he realized this he lay back down in the bed and asked himself where these thoughts came from.
Yes, that connection, the Monolith. That's probably where it came from, the personification of the intelligence past the unknown. Somehow that huge black slab and the mysterious ambassador had given him something, a power he didn't have within himself.
But it's use...
No, he didn't want it. He wanted to be weak and helpless, he wanted-!
He curled up in his bed, shivering at the power within him. In man's capacity, he remembered, was the capability for good and evil. Shinji wanted to do no evil, nor could he be sure he could do any good if he embarked on attempting it. He was afraid to try because he was unsure of what he could do.
What could he do? Anything. Anything in his power he could do. From this day on in history he could walk out of that room and become anything he wished. He could be the lowest form of human being, or ascend to become the greatest mind that ever lived if he applied himself.
Yes, but where to start?
And where to end, the feelings were overwhelming. Power flowed inside his veins as he realized he could do anything he wished.
The power of choice; man's gift- or punishment- from whatever powers that created it. And yet, he didn't know where to start.
Shinji blinked again.
All this, where did it come from? He must stay focused...
The monolith. Yes, it had something to do with this- the burst of energy and confidence. Somehow he had been given a gift... But for what purpose? What was going to happen, what did it know that he didn't?
------------------------
It is time.
Rei awoke with a start. Time for what? Re-entry?
No. It was still two hours away... the timer was set for a half-hour before the big burn.
Discovery came and left, and gave them both oversized parachute packages that were bolted to the backs of Eva zero and Eva two. The original plan for re-entry had been modified, and instead of attempting to ride Buran back down to orbit she would be using Shinji's drifting power pod for her own use as an atmospheric shield. When the time came she and Asuka would release their loads and deploy their parachutes on battery power and glide down to the carrier's landing deck. Asuka was even pleased to hear it, as she would be gunning to make a perfect landing on the carrier's flight deck.
For Rei it didn't matter. She would land either way, or so she hoped.
That thing, whatever it was, had invaded her dreams too. She had been forming primitive fantasies about a life she couldn't possibly have had- or would have. She was devoted to duty and Commander Ikari, nothing else.
And yet, she was showing symptoms of having her own desires. The feeling of want had entered her mind, and her imagination had tripled. As she thought about it, she could feel the changes inside of her skull... !!!!!!
She reached up to grab her cranium as her skull tickled from the inside. What was happening!?!?!
In a panic she threw off the helmet and started hyperventilating. Ground control monitors and systems would no doubt be judging this sudden reaction as her heart rate jumped somewhat. She was thrown into an exited panic...
Desires and feelings swept before her like a reel of film. Images of what she wanted and what she needed filtered by at lightning speeds, stopping only momentarily to taunt Rei with the new feelings. She panted still, her eyes remaining open as the wanted feelings and emotions swept through her cranium-
And then one particular fantasy hit her hard in the face. She imagined herself under Shinji's impressed kiss, and the warmth of-
She clutched her mouth and made a panicked yelp behind it. Why did she want this? And with Shinji?! Oh, she was calling him by his first name now!
And exclamation! She had never been so hysterical in her life-
But when did that start?
Care had been discarded. She was in a flushed panic, and didn't know if she would pull this off anymore. They were out of radio contact from Tokyo-3, so she couldn't call to abandon anything. It was now or never.
She started to prepare for the descent, new changes squirming within her mind.
---------------
"Hey Rei," Asked Asuka in a casual voice.
What?
She corrected herself, "Wondergirl, are you set?"
"Think-so....uhh...."
Asuka blinked and asked, "Something wrong over there?"
"No...ahahaaa.....I'm fine...." She answered at the end in a raising tone.
Asuka heard a pleasurable squeal from Rei and arched an eyebrow. "Right," She shook her head and reached out, "I don't want to hear it..."
She touched the radio and clicked it off just as an ethereal sound started to crackle over it.
The radio was off, but the sound remained.
-------------------
If Gendo had any doubts about anything, they were gone the next morning when it came to oversee the recovery of Evangelion 00 and 02.
He was out on the super carrier Dream catcher, and was scanning the skies from the bridge. He turned back to the operations center and listened for the reports being made.
Also on the ship, but standing on the flight deck, was Shinji Ikari. He had been granted permission to come here to see the women land, but all the while he had a strange look on his face, as if he was concentrating on something far away...
Only NERV staff were permitted on this trip, so Shinji's friends were not to be seen anywhere on the carrier. Beneath him in the ship's modified CIC, Ritsuko had been studying Rei's status charts. Misato on the other hand was also scanning the skies from the carrier's bridge.
"Rei, this is Dr. Akagi, are you all right?" Asked Ritsuko after a moment of looking at the status charts.
"Yes." Answered Rei's flat voice.
Ritsuko cocked an eyebrow at the very steady lines of status. Normal, perfected and...
Synthetic.
It was hard to make out at first, but when Ritsuko watched the screen for a moment the patterns were too repetitive. There would have been some differences here and there, but on Rei's status chart the lines were as close to normal as possible. That, and Rei only said 'Yes' as an answer to any question Ritsuko asked, also in the same tone as the last.
Normally this wouldn't have distracted Ritsuko, but she had an unusual feeling that what was being represented in the status display was not Rei Ayanami. Rather instead it was something fake, an echo instead of a person. If this was the case, where was the real Rei Ayanami?
"Commander Ikari, Would you come to the command center please?" Ritsuko asked a moment later.
---------------------------
Rei was quite unsure of what was going on.
Among other things her radio was dead for some reason. Not that it would have mattered, she was too concerned about the re-entry and her own sanity.
In the past hour she had been unwittingly forced into some unusual ranges of feelings, emotions, and thoughts that were not entirely her own. Embarrassment was one of them, and she was still feeling it now for the sexual outburst that raked her when Asuka asked what was going on. It was caused by Shinji, oddly enough, and the thoughts about him.
More emotions had raged through her, scaling from soft pleasure and peace to severe anger, agitation, and hatred. She had been through the extremes of pressure and the release of ease.
Also, she had been subjected to bombardments of the mind. Ideas and thoughts accompanied the emotions, sometimes as a trigger and sometimes alone. This in turn brought another string of thought. Sometimes she had been laid out a problem in front of her in her head and she worked to solve it in her thoughts. She was also forced to sing, laugh, smile, and cry.
Rei didn't have any idea of what was going on, and her report to Commander Ikari would be most strange indeed...she didn't even know what was going on.
Reluctance was another feeling flowing through her now. She clasped her arms together and looked out across the African plains. She didn't want to report to commander Ikari.
Why? He was her superior...even...
No. It was all a deception.
Rei didn't know what to feel or think. She had given herself into the alien presence that had manipulated her for what she was; a doll.
Rei gave a small gasp in the cockpit. Yes, a doll. Those thoughts never occurred to her.
She started to question her memories as she remained inside that cockpit- her throne to the soul. Where was she born? Who were her parents? Where did she grow up, did she have any sisters or brothers? Why was she chosen to be like this? Who were her friends?
To many of the questions she asked, only a monotone response of a librarian returned to her. Her head was like a library, filled with instructional books on knowledge and wisdom- but no insight. In the volumes of words, numbers, and drawings not one colorful picture of art was inside of them. She had no feelings or emotions, no driving ambition outside of the will of Gendo Ikari.
Another thought, finally coming from the small imagination Rei had.
It was of a reflection of herself, revealed in the light. Strings ran from her body up to the unlit ceiling out of her vision. Her eyes were unblinking and unmoving, only painted on the surface of her face. There was no need for a smile, that wasn't important. Her mouth only opened and closed to eat and talk, never to laugh.
Then it was if Rei's vision had become that of the doll's, and when her head lulled back the open eyes stared up into a pair of lit glass lenses, ominously staring down at her with a grin growing across her face....
Rei snapped out of it and made an explosion of sound from her throat, clasping her head and shivering uncontrollably. What...how? Why was she feeling this way!?
She screamed again, and once more.
Rei didn't realize it, but she was starting to evolve. In days long past, human beings had been also manipulated in this way before to become the progeny they were now. For Rei, she was making a similar step like the ancestors of humanity long ago. Only Rei's path was different from that of man-ape; she was turning from doll to human being.
In the deep of space her evolution was being watched over with a precision unseen since man made his first kill with a bone club. Yes, they would remold this creature into what she should have been.
And so the earth continued to roll beneath them.
-----------------------------------
For Asuka it was different.
When the radio silence died, there was a passive sound that Asuka couldn't identify. She shrugged it off with the moment's passage, probably instrumentation.
But it wouldn't go away.
Asuka clutched a fist and hammered at the radio but the sound remained.
"Stupid-!"
She raised her fist but it froze in the LCL when she spotted something.
It was...a void.
Something was shifting across space. Stars disappeared across a small field...
She watched it for a time, until it grew closer and closer.
When she finally realized what it was, her eyes rolled into her head as an unconscious feeling fluttered inside of her.
She made a soft sigh as her eyes closed shut in sleep.
Her dreams were only the beginning.
She was standing- or seated, she couldn't tell- in a school house room. It didn't take her long to remember this was a school house room in Germany... She couldn't remember the town. It was when she was very little...
Yes, she was seated, and now she stood up and looked around.
The room was bathed in a white glow- not blinding, but enough for her to not make out the details of the place. She looked down at herself, and she was in her school uniform from Tokyo-3...
Asuka turned to one of the windows she remembered in the school room and walked across it. She hesitated and looked down at her feet- which weren't making the 'Clap-clap' of normal shoes on normal tile. It was as if she couldn't hear...
But wait, she could. Outside were the muttered sounds of children at play. She leaned closer to the window and looked outside the glass at the many little kids at play and enjoying themselves. It was after the second impact, but these children knew nothing except their worlds of play.
Asuka relaxed, wondering what happened to some of these blurred faces and muttered names. She never knew or remembered anyone from that long ago and never even bothered. She was soon out of this place, for more than one reason...
She turned around and walked (Floated?) for the door. It opened soundlessly into the empty hallway, and Asuka abandoned her schoolroom to explore. She tried another door and found it locked. Oh, right, she had never been in that room before...
What was the point of all this? She asked herself angrily, what happened? Why was she here and how did she get here?
She recounted nothing of the past hour or so. It was a far-off detached memory.
A glance at the clock showed it was recess hour. That would explain why the kids were out, and as for the date....
She whirled and looked down the hall at the door to her classroom. She remembered today with clarity, and the fuzzy images of this realm would personify the memories she had within herself.
She also remembered exactly where she was at that time and place...
Her pace quickened as she ran through the hallways she had once passed through as a child. She found the door to the one room and it opened easily.
Her gaze immediately found what she was looking for, seated beside the little red head that sat in the chair.
Asuka smiled, and called, "Mommy!"
The woman beside Asuka didn't look up. Out of all the figures- other than herself- this one was the most detailed. The soft figure of her mother looked more like a rapid pencil sketch than a vague blur and shadow. The face was of an anime cartoon- not real like flesh and blood. There wasn't any skin texture or minor detail other than the blue irises of her eyes.
Asuka stopped in front of the two. No, her mother couldn't hear her. She had become an angel of the past...
But yet Asuka remembered this day with a pleasing radiance. Yes...yes, the little Asuka seated in that chair was just getting over crying, a scraped knee and bruised shoulder. She had been in a fight during recess and her mother had come to get her. Her father...well...was elsewhere.
But mother was there, and she was just the way Asuka remembered her before...
No.
Instead Asuka turned back to this pleasing sight and memory before her, giving a glance at what...thing had turned her away.
It didn't matter. She saw her mother hug the little Asuka in warming reassurance.
How could she have forgotten this? This, and a host of some smaller memories before...
The Abyss.
She was surrounded in darkness suddenly, the shapes and shadows coming around her. Through the darkness she could make out some shapes and forms.
At one point, four eyes gleamed back at her. Startled by the sudden appertain, it took her a moment to realize the patterns as the lens lights on her own Evangelion.
A soft light was playing from above, somewhere. For on the ground she could make out the NERV logo illuminated on the light. She had seen it many times before, but never bothered to read the words along the bottom. Those were blurred out.
She looked up and couldn't see any light...
What was going on? What is this place?
Then she heard a door opening behind her.
Asuka whirled and at once saw the center of all her nightmares.
In the haze was a hanging body, and blood on the floor.
The bear that had dropped on the floor seemed to burst by mysterious circumstances- but perhaps also a symbol of childhood gone in a flash.
The smaller Asuka was standing there, the smile frozen on her lips for a second. She had expected something else.
"Mom-ah?" Asked the little Asuka, not understanding the cold reality of death.
Behind her and still trapped in this ethereal nightmare was Asuka Langly, age fifteen. Now she was standing in her plugsuit, feeling the grip of the suit along her skin. The electrodes in her hair were also still there, warmed metal plates against her scalp.
Now she was also staring at the body of her mother there, turned away for her convenience. The figure was an incomprehensible blur- as if it was some other vague person in her memory and not the caring and loving mother she had seen only moments ago.
The little Asuka was clearly frightened right now, and the older one was collapsing to her knees and making noises, "No, no please...please not this PLEASE!!!!"
But it could be shut out. Whatever had brought her here allowed her to shut this out. She closed her eyes and tried to think of something else...of happiness...
She felt something reach out to her and take her shoulder. Asuka lifted her head and saw a scared little girl looking up into her face. Ribbons had replaced the electrodes, but it was still the same Asuka at a younger age- and the same one that had seen the nightmare.
The fifteen year old Asuka, at that point, knew what she wanted to do. She had wanted this from someone else, too. But there hadn't been anyone there to do it.
She reached out and grasped her younger form in a loving hug, squeezing herself tight in an understanding grip and whispering soothing German words to the crying girl.
A brief glance up at the door saw the figure gone and the door closing. All around the shadows were still lurking, and the NERV insignia had turned to blood and was oozing about the room- but somehow avoiding her and her charge.
There was also another spot on the floor those flows specifically avoided. Asuka didn't realize it until her and her counterpart turned to see it.
It stood as ominously as the sky, and unmovable as the earth. But it was completely alien, and soon Asuka could just make out the outlines of what it was...
The unmoving, unsettling, and unreflecting surface of the ebony black monolith stood as an island of sanctuary which the blood turned to avoid.
Feeling in Asuka drained as she looked into the ebony surface of the monolith. Slowly, her grasp eased around her equally confused counterpart, already outside the loop of all her imagination.
Both parties stood in silence as they stared back at one another. The shifting shadows and the trickling blood remained, however, and NERV's logo was clearly unrecognizable.
Asuka the older shouted to the monolith, while the younger recounted in fear, "What do you want!? Why are you torturing me!? What....do you want..." Her eyes were staring to come to tears, and her younger self started to cry with her.
The monolith had no reply.
The little girl was shivering and Asuka noticed that her plugsuit was uncomfortably cool...she was starting to shiver.
But the electrodes in her hair had already cooled to beyond comfort, and she just realized the searing pain of hypothermia enough to rip the electrodes out of her hair and tossed the headset.
It splashed across the blood before coming to rest a little distance away, then evaporated into blood.
Asuka also wanted to take off the plugsuit, but for chastity's sake she kept it on and bared the cold to take a hold of the younger Asuka and carry her across the blood to the untouched monolith surface.
The large slab had allowed her into the island of safety, and Asuka let down the little girl to examine the slab for herself.
She reached out with a hand to touch the surface, but encountered a featureless resistance to it. Yet...it was like moving a hand across a glass plate but there was no friction to reduce her fingers. So her hands...seemed to pass along air...
The monolith then shifted. The glow at it's base had expanded upward to resolve into a figure.
Asuka's eyes widened as she identified the form resolving.
"Momma?" She asked.
Ms. Langly's form and body appeared in the reflection of the Monolith. She was just a little over Asuka's height, and much to the redhead's surprise appeared the age she would be if she hadn't died.
Asuka's eyes welled into tears, and her younger self gave an outcry of discomfort and rushed towards the monolith.
Asuka wanted to stop her from running into the invisible barrier but was shocked to see the girl run through it and into the monolith to stand beside her mother.
The Asuka of age fifteen looked with a disappointed face at the reunion, wishing to be every part of it...
The mother and child looked up at Asuka once more, the girl waving as Asuka watched.
Asuka gave a small wave back and looked at her mother, mouthing a desperate question.
The lips moved on the mother in answer, and Asuka's eyes widened.
"Mother...MOTHER!!!!" She screamed and beat on the screen, "MOTHER!!!!!!"
The pair were falling away, towards a distant light that was sweeping around from the monolith's faces.
Asuka was blasted by a strong gale and moved a hand to cover herself. Her eyes saw the blood start to run away from the source of the wind, and the shadowy figures exploded into ash. One of them was indeed Eva two, which also collapsed into ash trying to dig it's claws into Asuka.
Her plugsuit started to rip away, also, leaving her exposed....
And the Monolith fell away, leaving her to awaken by herself-
--------------------------------
Almost immediately the alarms in both Evangelion units shrieked.
Time had come, and if they didn't go now it would be another long orbit.
Asuka snapped out of her dream too quickly to start remembering and looked around inside her helmet, "What!?! What's going on!?!?!"
Rei was in even more of a panic, reaching out to grab one of the hilts as she managed to grumble, "Re-Entry..."
"What's wrong over there!?" Asked Asuka, "What's happen-"
She turned to look up at the thing that had been there before, the blackness in the stars.
But it had gone as mysteriously as it had appeared- and lingered only in Asuka's mind.
---------------
Gendo Ikari had been studying both of the status displays- which Ritsuko had pronounced faulty.
"Both of them seem to be too fine, if you understand my meaning." Ritsuko said, "All these displays are as close to model as you can get."
Gendo nodded slowly and asked, "Radio contact was turned aside?"
Ritsuko shook her head and responded, "Both of them responded a flat 'yes' to any question I had to ask-"
Alarms shrilled suddenly and the status displays went rapid.
"What happened?" Asked Gendo suddenly.
Ritsuko sprung to a panel and studied it, "The displays are back to normal...both Evangelion units are beginning their descents...we'll loose Radio contact in thirty seconds."
"Are they on a stable trajectory?"
"Yes...but..."
Ritsuko decided to let the radio explain to a staring Gendo and the sounds from both Evas were heard;
"OH MY GOD!! AHHHH!!!!"
"HELP....UNNNNN....."
"REI!" Screamed Gendo as he approached the radio pickup, "Rei, are you all right?"
"Get away from me GO AWAY!!!!"
Ritsuko was developing shock as she studied the display and shrilled, "Her brainwave patterns are off the scale! So is Asuka, what's happened to them!?"
Gendo's fear was growing as things were connecting. Rei was....
"MOTHER!!!!" Screamed one of them before the radio burst into silence.
One of the operators shook her head, "No use! Radio blackout! We have three minutes!"
Gendo was staring wide-eyed at the display in total fear. Yes, the utter disaster was coming true, and because of it he may very well loose any hope of recovering Rei Ayanami and all the dreams he had put into her.
-------------------------
Rei on the other hand was shuddering uncontrollably in her cockpit.
Not just from riding the large heat shield as she roared down into the atmosphere, but also from her own feelings.
Reluctance and loathing swept her when Gendo called, and she was even more in shock as she expected the usual pleasure when talking to the commander. She wanted to see Shinji instead, not his father.
And now something more was happening. Rei was squealing as the LCL started to heat up around her. But also she was feeling the desire to escape-!
She couldn't get out now, everything was locked up. But she was already starting to tear the space suit from her body, using every ounce available to her to rip the space suit and underneath plug suit from herself. She wanted to get out of this place... her cage to Gendo's manipulations. She wanted to life and be free.
She couldn't' explain these emotions, nor did she want to anymore. An analogy came to her as she ripped of one of the leggings of her suit and looked outside the Eva at the fire burning around them. She was a phoenix, rising from the ashes of some previous life.
She reached up and ripped the electrodes off her head. She could do anything manually if she had to, it wasn't like she wanted to fight in Eva anymore, anyway.
---------------------------
Asuka's story was different. As the whole Eva roared around her she too felt the loathing to escape Eva. But it was for a different reason.
She didn't want to be associated with all this. She wanted freedom, to breathe air again. She was also disliking the boiling LCL around her, but the space suit was at least providing normal oxygen.
In the flames she could make out the face she had seen in the monolith. Her mother, smiling in all her radiance, was seen in glimpses of the flames escaping the deployed heat shields. Asuka relaxed, feeling different- calm.
Her mother, it seemed, was somehow still alive somewhere. The one question she posed to ask-
The Eva shuddered again and Asuka found something...
It seemed inside the cockpit, but out of vision. She could see it, but not. It eluded her vision when she tried to focus on it, but she knew it was there...
A pleasing fact crept over her when she recognized the presence. It had seemed like ages since she felt the comforting presence of the form that had given her life so long ago.
"Mother...." She whispered in her horse voice.
Yes, she was there.
But she was already on borrowed time, granted by a friend of a friend.
Through fire and rebirth, Asuka felt like she would never be alone and abandoned again.
----------------------
Scanning the heavens from his point on the flight deck, Shinji Ikari eagerly awaited the arrival of Evangelion units zero and two. Asuka would be back, and so would Rei. Perhaps then he could tell them all of what he saw up there in space.
He still couldn't half believe it himself, but it had been there. But he wasn't afraid, the ominous form of the monolith was a gaping portal to somewhere, but it wasn't fearful. No, not even the emissary who had talked to him provoked any fear. In fact, he eagerly anticipated to see it again.
Then he saw something. Yes, there! There they were, descending like day time stars.
But...weren't they supposed to deploy their parachutes?
--------------------------
Asuka was panting in her helmet as her Evangelion let go of the heat shield and let it fall away. She was trying to concentrate as the clouds sprang by at dizzying speeds.
She glanced over at Evangelion 00, which was hopelessly tumbling end over end without control.
"Rei!" She called out, but only a screaming, berserker response came over the crackling radio.
Ritsuko's voice was also lost as Asuka's panting increased with the frantic situation. She planned on landing on the flight deck, which seemed so far away...
The Battery timer chimed it's one minute warning. It was either now or never.
She waited a moment until she saw the fleet, then deployed her parachute.
The huge orange and white frill of a crest exploded up behind her and caught the Eva, giving her a startling jolt and making her cry out.
She also felt that comforting presence there, seeming to slide away...
"No...MOTHER!!" Screamed Asuka, "Don't go...DON'T LEAVE ME ALONE!!!!"
But the comforting presence was already gone, and Asuka started to cry again. Only this time she wasn't crying as hard...because her mother had been there. She had seen her. She was still there, somewhere, and watching over her.
Or, something was....
---------------------
Rei's was a different story.
She ignored Asuka's request because of her own panicked rage. She was frantic to GET OUT!
She was ripping away at everything restraining her. The shreds of her suit were floating in the LCL, her headset was snapped in half, and her plugsuit had large tares in it from her attempts to liberate herself.
She tried the handles and pulled back on them sharply as the fleet came into view.
But it was already too late. The parachute was deploying too late, but slowed the Eva enough to give it a less-than-graceful land in the water.
When this happened, Rei frantically groped around for the emergency eject. This happened, either by her finding it or from the remote-key from the carrier. Still, she had to get out of this blood...
When the plug hit the water she didn't even feel it. She was rattled around inside, for she wasn't tied down. Her neck broke when she hit the ceiling in a painless maneuver.
Even so, she would have died anyway. Either by seemingly natural causes, or when she decided she couldn't live anymore. No matter, Gendo would bring her back- he always did.
But this time, someone had plans.
She 'Woke up' a moment later and she stood in the empty blackness in her shredded plugsuit. The blackness, in turn, became something else- a terminal at an airport. Only nobody else was here, and the light from the outside and the lights looking out were bathed in white light. Nobody was at the desks, or in the chairs.
Rei looked around in puzzling confusion, and then spotted the airport name.
TANIS was stenciled on the nameplate, indicating her location. All the maps in her vision also read TANIS.
Tanis...the keeping place of souls-
She spun around and saw it.
It had appeared to the others, and now it had come for her.
The black Monolith stood without moving or reflecting as it stared back at Rei Ayanami.
Yet, this Rei was different. The cool logic had been distorted by the emotions in color, but she wasn't as confusing as an entire spectrum. Instead, both worked in unison to ponder over the thing and her first question was, "What are you?"
The monolith had no reply.
Rei blinked, and then approached the surface calmly and reached out to touch it's surface.
Smooth black resisted her fingers, but offered no friction to her movement.
She took a step back and looked over the slab of unknown material.
Then it spoke to her.
"Rei."
She answered, looking up at it's surface with her lips agape. This wasn't the voice of any master, but instead something else.
"Yes?" She responded.
"You have done very well so far. You have come along way from what you were made to be- but you have fallen so short of what you should be. I am here to help you finish your growth and evolution to humanity."
"Humanity?"
"Yes. Your mind lacks the full spectrum of emotions and feelings...we have given these to you as a gift."
"A...Gift?" She replied.
"Yes. For we have a favor to ask of you- it could mean the fate of the human race... will you help us?"
Rei was hesitant as she considered all this, and asked, "But...why don't you make me do it, like you did with all the experiments?"
"Because it was necessary to give you the power of emotion and feeling to use with reason and logic to give us your answer. We believe in the power of free will, not imposed will. Thus when we ask for your help, we are asking, not commanding your assistance. Will you help us now to restore the human race?"
Rei couldn't believe it. This mighty form of power, capable of doing anything, needed her help? But why....and why had it given her emotions?
"Will I see Shinji-kun again?"
"When you awaken regardless, you will stay with Shinji Ikari. If you agree to help us, we can guarantee that you two will have a future together."
Rei had one further question to ask, this to determine which she was dealing with- light or dark.
"What price is there for helping you?"
"There is no price or consequence for assisting us. We wish only for the world to be restored to it's proper balance- and humanity allowed to grow again without concern or fear. We intend also, to assure that this problem never arises once more."
Rei was hesitant, pondering this. No evil here...she didn't feel the sold grip of death or the searing heat of the negative spectrum. Instead, the calm and quiet of Tanis, plus the reassuring form of the monolith.
"Okay, I'll help you." She agreed.
"We, and the human race, have much to thank you for." Responded the Monolith.
Then Rei's vision became bathed in pastels and colors, and for the first time in her life she started to dream.
------------------------------
Shinji's Evangelion was necessary to pull Asuka up out of the water and onto the deck of the carrier. Shinji himself remained on the carrier and looked out from the high vantage point and out to sea, where several destroyers were towing the unconscious and disabled Evangelion 00.
Rei had already been pulled out of the water, when they found her in the plug. Shinji didn't have the details as to Rei's status, but from the amount of attention she was getting he knew it looked serious.
He saw Asuka some hours later alone in the ship's mess. She had a blanket wrapped around her and had long since discarded the plugsuit and space gear. Instead she was in a dark shirt and baggy pants with socks and sandals. She wanted to be warm from being doused in the water.
"H-Hey..." Shinji asked nervously, "Are you all right?"
Shinji didn't know what scared him more; the fact that Asuka had a calm, yet sad expression on her face or that she didn't yell at him.
"I'm fine." She replied simply.
Shinji approached her cautiously and asked, "Um...what happened? Misato-san and Dr. Akagi were worried...they thought something was wrong..."
He took a seat beside her and watched her stare into her coffee cup.
Shinji looked at her for a moment with concern on his face, and then he made a guess at what she saw.
"You saw it didn't you?"
Asuka's head turned up and looked at him in utter silence.
"Yes."
Shinji blinked and said, "So I'm not crazy...."
"No....I saw it..." She replied, "I saw....."
"Was the old man there?"
She shook her head.
"A young one?"
She shook her head again.
"Anybody?"
"Yes...." She replied passively, "I saw my mother..."
Well, that was new, Shinji thought. But then, wait, why was Asuka telling him this? Usually she was so uptight about everything and now...
"Shinji..." Asuka said, "I'm not sure I like being with NERV anymore...."
Shinji's mouth closed and he nodded slowly.
So, it seems whoever they were had already started in rebuilding the Earth.
-------------
"Is it possible to recover her?" Asked Gendo Ikari from the side of the stretcher.
"Yes," Replied Fuyutsuki, "She can be revived. Of course, it will also mean re-activating one of the clones for preparation."
"Yes." Nodded Gendo as he examined Rei Ayanami's blank stare. There was one other puzzling thing about her face just before she died...
A smile was frozen on her face.
Gendo was puzzled. He had expected worse from the Monolith. Or was this even of their doing?
He thought nothing more of it and folded the sheet over the useless clone's head. Rei would be back, and ready to serve him once more.
Maybe it was that thought that made Rei smile.
=============================================
Disclaimer: Evangelion is property of Gainax studios. The idea of the Monolith belongs to Arthur C. Clarke.
=============================================
Written by: Advantage
====================================
Gendo Ikari was alone in his office. The time didn't matter, only it was in the late-night when most of the staff was asleep. There were no security cameras in his room, nor were there any recording devices outside Gendo's control. The man had dominated every corner of this space, from the single desk to the windows to the unusual patterns on the floor. He controlled everything in this space- right down to the air.
He was finishing his latest report to his superiors on this newest enigma. The most unusual had happened, and had nobody been there on the south pole that morning when the artifact had been uncovered there would have been no understanding to what Shinji Ikari had reported when he made contact with the mysterious object in Earth orbit.
The object had mysteriously vanished seconds after contacting Eva one, and before that Eva one had disappeared almost instantaneously before appearing in the Geo front, still in it's space armor. There was no rational explanation into how these things happened- and wisely NERV and SEELE were covering up what information they had about the entire operation. Eva one simply 'returned', and this was the explanation given to the Chinese and Russians. Even now, Eva 02 and 00 were still in orbit and preparing to return to Earth. Shinji was under medical observation and Eva 01 was locked up in the cages for it's own observation and testing.
Gendo didn't notice the object appear before him, just like the first time he had encountered the mysterious artifact.
A monolith was standing two meters before his desk and defied his control over the room. Indeed, it had appeared completely without Gendo noticing. The door was also locked, but Gendo already knew that. The monolith could traverse any sort of matter instantaneously.
Also, this wasn't one of SEELE's monoliths- the copy of the source of power that had long ago started the dream of the human instrumentality project. Those Monoliths were obviously artificial, with blood-red printed lettering on the front, usually speaking SOUND ONLY for the protection of the voices behind them. This Monolith was the monolith, for no reflection whatsoever shined off it's surface. Light drained into it's facings to some unknown place and time beyond the understanding of humankind.
Even SEELE and NERV, with all their impressive knowledge of the mysterious and paranormal had no explanation for this. The monolith was simply the monolith, and what it had to say was usually very important.
Like a primitive ape seeing fire for the first time Gendo stood up slowly, his eyes scanning the surface of the ebony slab while it stood in defiance of the light. He had seen the Monolith before, a long time ago, and in the wastes of a destroyed land. Like then, he was startled at it's sudden appearance.
But this time he had knowledge of things that had happened- and a glimpse into secret plans and inner workings. He didn't expect the monolith to give him any surprises this time.
He rounded his desk and addressed the monolith, "Why have you come here? What do you want?"
"You know that answer." Replied an indescribable voice, but it was of the same tone and flatness as the vision that appeared to Shinji Ikari in the fraction of a second.
"No," Replied Gendo and adjusted his glasses, "though I can guess. You have come to give us a warning."
"Yes."
"And I suppose," Gendo asked, waving his hand as if he was addressing a crazy man, "That because of our actions there will be disastrous consequences."
"No."
Gendo replaced his glasses and looked at the monolith, "Then why have you come then?"
"To address you."
Gendo didn't expect that, "Oh," He asked, "And what for?"
"You were the first and only person to know of the nature of our appearance. You also were responsible for the knowledge that what would follow meant no harm. You ignored this warning."
"Yes, I did." Gendo replied, "And?"
"And because of this results, the life on Earth has an expectancy shorter of what was intended."
"So you say." Gendo replied, "But how do we know it is not for a greater good? And haven't you learned not to meddle in other's affairs? Leave me be." Gendo turned around and walked for his seat to his desk, "I have no further business with you."
"It was because of our intervention on your planet that life formed here."
"And your job is done." Said Gendo as he took his seat, "Now go."
"We are responsible for your entire race. You alone are too small to dismiss the importance of the situation."
"I am in full comprehension of the situation." Gendo replied, "You underestimate me."
"And you underestimate us."
"So I suppose you are going to cause some form of disaster as punishment for this action?" Asked Gendo.
"You think too small of our perception and understanding of your race."
"Oh really? Well, no doubt you will arrange a punishment best suited for humanity, like your first punishment that almost destroyed the planet."
"You think too small of our perception and understanding of you."
This made Gendo look up and ask, "Of me? Why."
"We gave you the warning. We entrusted you with the gift. Your selfish actions of you and your masters seem to have given good reason for concern of your race. Naturally, this fault must be corrected.
"Since you cannot carry the warning, we must entrust another to carry the message. Your punishment will be given in full."
Gendo looked at the monolith with unblinking eyes, and when he did blink it was gone, just as mysteriously as it had come.
There was a different feeling in the room from the indifferent quiet of a moment ago. In it's place was an uncertain silence, an overhanging feeling of anxiety. This was also lost inside Gendo, who never knew fear.
-------------------------
The quietness of space had a relaxing effect on some people. Granted, if one were to stay in space for too long health would be a great concern, mostly in the sense that the bones would decalcify and muscles would be out of tone.
As for the psychological aspects of an orbital mission, those weren't of real concern as long as the Earth was in sight. And the general idea that one could return to it was ever prominent.
Asuka was sleeping at the moment, and exhausted from day three in orbit. They were still preparing to find the right date to bring the Evangelions down from their orbital homes, and so far nothing appeared preferable. Fatigue nevertheless swept Asuka and made her have a new sense of how alone she was. Perhaps this might leave a mark on her personality when she returned to earth, and home.
Rei was still awake, sleeping only when she needed to in her suit. It was already filled with LCL despite the dangers, and Rei had to feed herself from the rations they had on-board.
She was still perched atop the unmanned Russian shuttle Buran. Soon they may be passing the American Space shuttle Discovery launched only yesterday from the US's new launch pads in California's new Edwards base. They still lacked the advanced facilities needed to treat the shuttle, but for now it was enough to get some critical components up to the orbiting Evangelions to use for the de-orbit.
A great shield used by Evangelion zero had been used as a shuttle's heat shield, and now it was ironic to think that one such spacecraft would be floating within an arm's reach of the Eva.
But that was hours away. For the moment, Rei was alone up in her orbiting space trip, seated in the Evangelion and her second home.
She glanced at the glowing neon display screen hovering before her as she checked the calculations over again. If timed right, her Evangelion would be able to enter the atmosphere without incinerating, and she would land somewhere off Japan's coast to be picked up by another Super carrier and it's fleet- assuming the Eva didn't sink first. With all the extra space gear attached to the Evangelion it was hard to assume anything. Even riding Buran or Discovery was a risky option- as both craft were fragile and smaller than the total size of the Eva. Their last option was to abandon the Evas in orbit and return the pilots to Earth to rescue the floating bio-machines at a later date.
Rei put her head away from the calculations for a moment, out of no particular reason. She blinked, and then turned her head to look out of the side of the Eva's vision at a distant white orb shining out at her from an incredible distance.
Strange, she had never taken the time to examine the moon before. It was a very simple spherical shape of rock without any real special features other than the solid, great seas. Mountains and craters also pitted it's surface and had remained for over a thousand years without any significant change. Humanity had endlessly speculated about it, and even landed there. But they never returned...
Stranger...she started humming a tune. She even started to sing, "Fly me to the moon....and let me play, among the stars...." Rei stopped herself and blinked. What was wrong? Where did that motivation come from?
She pulled herself away from the moon and focused back on her calculations. Thinking, she also looked up around the cockpit but didn't see any warning lights. The still-lit display on orbital calculations was still there, so power wasn't prohibiting the alarms...
Something felt different about the place. Her hands....so slender...so white...
She closed the gloves of her suit. When did she ever consider that?! Why was she getting angry? Emotions were only a distraction!
She returned to her calculations with a better vigor, starting anew and re-trying the sequence again. She already had the answer, it didn't matter what she did. Hopefully this exercise would be able to calm her down...
She breathed.
What did Shinji look like with glasses on?
She stopped herself-
What would it feel like to have him kiss her?
She coughed in the LCL. What was going on?
How would it feel-
"No, Stop!" She squirmed in her cockpit, passing through the display of calculations and clutching her head. She started breathing and focused only on breathing, calming herself down...
And then she was fine.
She looked left and right for warning signs. There wasn't any measure or degree of warning in her cockpit.
But something was amiss....
She turned back to her calculations and started over again, but in the back of her mind she was feeling that something was wrong...
-------------------
Shinji was once more in a hospital bed.
He had been here before, the first day after his battle with the first enemy. Were they angels?
That... thing, whatever it was, called them 'manifestations of the mind meant to combat us'. If that was the case, then what were they fighting? What were these things that his father called angels? Were they biblical or just misinterpreted aliens? Or, as the monolith suggested, manifestations of our own minds created by ourselves...
What did he fear the most....?
No, best not to ask that. He had enough fears as it was- he shouldn't unsettle the dust to identify them. They were there, he had fought them and hid from them. He never fought them they were too strong. He was too weak.
Or was he?
Lying in the hospital bed made him think. The room was quiet, and the moonlight penetrated the windows to peek into the bed and over the sheets- into his thoughts.
He was Shinji Ikari. One of three chosen people to pilot the bio-organic robot known as Evangelion. This robot was unmatched by any power on the planet save the power of a nuclear bomb. He had fought and destroyed with Eva, and with it he had unimaginable power. There was only one leash, the auto cut-out dummy plug, but if he were to apply himself not even this could stop him. Ambition was just around the corner. He was smart, he could do it. There was no limit to what he could do.
Shinji sat up.
The confidence was here, when none had existed previously. What is this...?
He looked at his hand again and closed it when he made a realization.
The Monolith. It was proof that there was life somewhere out there beyond Earth's small sphere. Whatever it was, and whatever that space he had been, was all an example of some godly power beyond the solar system and comprehension of humankind.
It was also a warning. To 'Be careful of what is asked of you'. It was too late for that to be of piloting Eva, otherwise the Monolith would have probably come to Earth long ago. It was for some other reason...
His father? Perhaps he should know. But Shinji never had the courage to ask him...maybe now he did....
No motivation to do so stirred within him. When he looked for a reason none was there to respond to him. He did not want to see his father.
But what about the-
No. It could wait. He couldn't find any answers with his father.
As he realized this he lay back down in the bed and asked himself where these thoughts came from.
Yes, that connection, the Monolith. That's probably where it came from, the personification of the intelligence past the unknown. Somehow that huge black slab and the mysterious ambassador had given him something, a power he didn't have within himself.
But it's use...
No, he didn't want it. He wanted to be weak and helpless, he wanted-!
He curled up in his bed, shivering at the power within him. In man's capacity, he remembered, was the capability for good and evil. Shinji wanted to do no evil, nor could he be sure he could do any good if he embarked on attempting it. He was afraid to try because he was unsure of what he could do.
What could he do? Anything. Anything in his power he could do. From this day on in history he could walk out of that room and become anything he wished. He could be the lowest form of human being, or ascend to become the greatest mind that ever lived if he applied himself.
Yes, but where to start?
And where to end, the feelings were overwhelming. Power flowed inside his veins as he realized he could do anything he wished.
The power of choice; man's gift- or punishment- from whatever powers that created it. And yet, he didn't know where to start.
Shinji blinked again.
All this, where did it come from? He must stay focused...
The monolith. Yes, it had something to do with this- the burst of energy and confidence. Somehow he had been given a gift... But for what purpose? What was going to happen, what did it know that he didn't?
------------------------
It is time.
Rei awoke with a start. Time for what? Re-entry?
No. It was still two hours away... the timer was set for a half-hour before the big burn.
Discovery came and left, and gave them both oversized parachute packages that were bolted to the backs of Eva zero and Eva two. The original plan for re-entry had been modified, and instead of attempting to ride Buran back down to orbit she would be using Shinji's drifting power pod for her own use as an atmospheric shield. When the time came she and Asuka would release their loads and deploy their parachutes on battery power and glide down to the carrier's landing deck. Asuka was even pleased to hear it, as she would be gunning to make a perfect landing on the carrier's flight deck.
For Rei it didn't matter. She would land either way, or so she hoped.
That thing, whatever it was, had invaded her dreams too. She had been forming primitive fantasies about a life she couldn't possibly have had- or would have. She was devoted to duty and Commander Ikari, nothing else.
And yet, she was showing symptoms of having her own desires. The feeling of want had entered her mind, and her imagination had tripled. As she thought about it, she could feel the changes inside of her skull... !!!!!!
She reached up to grab her cranium as her skull tickled from the inside. What was happening!?!?!
In a panic she threw off the helmet and started hyperventilating. Ground control monitors and systems would no doubt be judging this sudden reaction as her heart rate jumped somewhat. She was thrown into an exited panic...
Desires and feelings swept before her like a reel of film. Images of what she wanted and what she needed filtered by at lightning speeds, stopping only momentarily to taunt Rei with the new feelings. She panted still, her eyes remaining open as the wanted feelings and emotions swept through her cranium-
And then one particular fantasy hit her hard in the face. She imagined herself under Shinji's impressed kiss, and the warmth of-
She clutched her mouth and made a panicked yelp behind it. Why did she want this? And with Shinji?! Oh, she was calling him by his first name now!
And exclamation! She had never been so hysterical in her life-
But when did that start?
Care had been discarded. She was in a flushed panic, and didn't know if she would pull this off anymore. They were out of radio contact from Tokyo-3, so she couldn't call to abandon anything. It was now or never.
She started to prepare for the descent, new changes squirming within her mind.
---------------
"Hey Rei," Asked Asuka in a casual voice.
What?
She corrected herself, "Wondergirl, are you set?"
"Think-so....uhh...."
Asuka blinked and asked, "Something wrong over there?"
"No...ahahaaa.....I'm fine...." She answered at the end in a raising tone.
Asuka heard a pleasurable squeal from Rei and arched an eyebrow. "Right," She shook her head and reached out, "I don't want to hear it..."
She touched the radio and clicked it off just as an ethereal sound started to crackle over it.
The radio was off, but the sound remained.
-------------------
If Gendo had any doubts about anything, they were gone the next morning when it came to oversee the recovery of Evangelion 00 and 02.
He was out on the super carrier Dream catcher, and was scanning the skies from the bridge. He turned back to the operations center and listened for the reports being made.
Also on the ship, but standing on the flight deck, was Shinji Ikari. He had been granted permission to come here to see the women land, but all the while he had a strange look on his face, as if he was concentrating on something far away...
Only NERV staff were permitted on this trip, so Shinji's friends were not to be seen anywhere on the carrier. Beneath him in the ship's modified CIC, Ritsuko had been studying Rei's status charts. Misato on the other hand was also scanning the skies from the carrier's bridge.
"Rei, this is Dr. Akagi, are you all right?" Asked Ritsuko after a moment of looking at the status charts.
"Yes." Answered Rei's flat voice.
Ritsuko cocked an eyebrow at the very steady lines of status. Normal, perfected and...
Synthetic.
It was hard to make out at first, but when Ritsuko watched the screen for a moment the patterns were too repetitive. There would have been some differences here and there, but on Rei's status chart the lines were as close to normal as possible. That, and Rei only said 'Yes' as an answer to any question Ritsuko asked, also in the same tone as the last.
Normally this wouldn't have distracted Ritsuko, but she had an unusual feeling that what was being represented in the status display was not Rei Ayanami. Rather instead it was something fake, an echo instead of a person. If this was the case, where was the real Rei Ayanami?
"Commander Ikari, Would you come to the command center please?" Ritsuko asked a moment later.
---------------------------
Rei was quite unsure of what was going on.
Among other things her radio was dead for some reason. Not that it would have mattered, she was too concerned about the re-entry and her own sanity.
In the past hour she had been unwittingly forced into some unusual ranges of feelings, emotions, and thoughts that were not entirely her own. Embarrassment was one of them, and she was still feeling it now for the sexual outburst that raked her when Asuka asked what was going on. It was caused by Shinji, oddly enough, and the thoughts about him.
More emotions had raged through her, scaling from soft pleasure and peace to severe anger, agitation, and hatred. She had been through the extremes of pressure and the release of ease.
Also, she had been subjected to bombardments of the mind. Ideas and thoughts accompanied the emotions, sometimes as a trigger and sometimes alone. This in turn brought another string of thought. Sometimes she had been laid out a problem in front of her in her head and she worked to solve it in her thoughts. She was also forced to sing, laugh, smile, and cry.
Rei didn't have any idea of what was going on, and her report to Commander Ikari would be most strange indeed...she didn't even know what was going on.
Reluctance was another feeling flowing through her now. She clasped her arms together and looked out across the African plains. She didn't want to report to commander Ikari.
Why? He was her superior...even...
No. It was all a deception.
Rei didn't know what to feel or think. She had given herself into the alien presence that had manipulated her for what she was; a doll.
Rei gave a small gasp in the cockpit. Yes, a doll. Those thoughts never occurred to her.
She started to question her memories as she remained inside that cockpit- her throne to the soul. Where was she born? Who were her parents? Where did she grow up, did she have any sisters or brothers? Why was she chosen to be like this? Who were her friends?
To many of the questions she asked, only a monotone response of a librarian returned to her. Her head was like a library, filled with instructional books on knowledge and wisdom- but no insight. In the volumes of words, numbers, and drawings not one colorful picture of art was inside of them. She had no feelings or emotions, no driving ambition outside of the will of Gendo Ikari.
Another thought, finally coming from the small imagination Rei had.
It was of a reflection of herself, revealed in the light. Strings ran from her body up to the unlit ceiling out of her vision. Her eyes were unblinking and unmoving, only painted on the surface of her face. There was no need for a smile, that wasn't important. Her mouth only opened and closed to eat and talk, never to laugh.
Then it was if Rei's vision had become that of the doll's, and when her head lulled back the open eyes stared up into a pair of lit glass lenses, ominously staring down at her with a grin growing across her face....
Rei snapped out of it and made an explosion of sound from her throat, clasping her head and shivering uncontrollably. What...how? Why was she feeling this way!?
She screamed again, and once more.
Rei didn't realize it, but she was starting to evolve. In days long past, human beings had been also manipulated in this way before to become the progeny they were now. For Rei, she was making a similar step like the ancestors of humanity long ago. Only Rei's path was different from that of man-ape; she was turning from doll to human being.
In the deep of space her evolution was being watched over with a precision unseen since man made his first kill with a bone club. Yes, they would remold this creature into what she should have been.
And so the earth continued to roll beneath them.
-----------------------------------
For Asuka it was different.
When the radio silence died, there was a passive sound that Asuka couldn't identify. She shrugged it off with the moment's passage, probably instrumentation.
But it wouldn't go away.
Asuka clutched a fist and hammered at the radio but the sound remained.
"Stupid-!"
She raised her fist but it froze in the LCL when she spotted something.
It was...a void.
Something was shifting across space. Stars disappeared across a small field...
She watched it for a time, until it grew closer and closer.
When she finally realized what it was, her eyes rolled into her head as an unconscious feeling fluttered inside of her.
She made a soft sigh as her eyes closed shut in sleep.
Her dreams were only the beginning.
She was standing- or seated, she couldn't tell- in a school house room. It didn't take her long to remember this was a school house room in Germany... She couldn't remember the town. It was when she was very little...
Yes, she was seated, and now she stood up and looked around.
The room was bathed in a white glow- not blinding, but enough for her to not make out the details of the place. She looked down at herself, and she was in her school uniform from Tokyo-3...
Asuka turned to one of the windows she remembered in the school room and walked across it. She hesitated and looked down at her feet- which weren't making the 'Clap-clap' of normal shoes on normal tile. It was as if she couldn't hear...
But wait, she could. Outside were the muttered sounds of children at play. She leaned closer to the window and looked outside the glass at the many little kids at play and enjoying themselves. It was after the second impact, but these children knew nothing except their worlds of play.
Asuka relaxed, wondering what happened to some of these blurred faces and muttered names. She never knew or remembered anyone from that long ago and never even bothered. She was soon out of this place, for more than one reason...
She turned around and walked (Floated?) for the door. It opened soundlessly into the empty hallway, and Asuka abandoned her schoolroom to explore. She tried another door and found it locked. Oh, right, she had never been in that room before...
What was the point of all this? She asked herself angrily, what happened? Why was she here and how did she get here?
She recounted nothing of the past hour or so. It was a far-off detached memory.
A glance at the clock showed it was recess hour. That would explain why the kids were out, and as for the date....
She whirled and looked down the hall at the door to her classroom. She remembered today with clarity, and the fuzzy images of this realm would personify the memories she had within herself.
She also remembered exactly where she was at that time and place...
Her pace quickened as she ran through the hallways she had once passed through as a child. She found the door to the one room and it opened easily.
Her gaze immediately found what she was looking for, seated beside the little red head that sat in the chair.
Asuka smiled, and called, "Mommy!"
The woman beside Asuka didn't look up. Out of all the figures- other than herself- this one was the most detailed. The soft figure of her mother looked more like a rapid pencil sketch than a vague blur and shadow. The face was of an anime cartoon- not real like flesh and blood. There wasn't any skin texture or minor detail other than the blue irises of her eyes.
Asuka stopped in front of the two. No, her mother couldn't hear her. She had become an angel of the past...
But yet Asuka remembered this day with a pleasing radiance. Yes...yes, the little Asuka seated in that chair was just getting over crying, a scraped knee and bruised shoulder. She had been in a fight during recess and her mother had come to get her. Her father...well...was elsewhere.
But mother was there, and she was just the way Asuka remembered her before...
No.
Instead Asuka turned back to this pleasing sight and memory before her, giving a glance at what...thing had turned her away.
It didn't matter. She saw her mother hug the little Asuka in warming reassurance.
How could she have forgotten this? This, and a host of some smaller memories before...
The Abyss.
She was surrounded in darkness suddenly, the shapes and shadows coming around her. Through the darkness she could make out some shapes and forms.
At one point, four eyes gleamed back at her. Startled by the sudden appertain, it took her a moment to realize the patterns as the lens lights on her own Evangelion.
A soft light was playing from above, somewhere. For on the ground she could make out the NERV logo illuminated on the light. She had seen it many times before, but never bothered to read the words along the bottom. Those were blurred out.
She looked up and couldn't see any light...
What was going on? What is this place?
Then she heard a door opening behind her.
Asuka whirled and at once saw the center of all her nightmares.
In the haze was a hanging body, and blood on the floor.
The bear that had dropped on the floor seemed to burst by mysterious circumstances- but perhaps also a symbol of childhood gone in a flash.
The smaller Asuka was standing there, the smile frozen on her lips for a second. She had expected something else.
"Mom-ah?" Asked the little Asuka, not understanding the cold reality of death.
Behind her and still trapped in this ethereal nightmare was Asuka Langly, age fifteen. Now she was standing in her plugsuit, feeling the grip of the suit along her skin. The electrodes in her hair were also still there, warmed metal plates against her scalp.
Now she was also staring at the body of her mother there, turned away for her convenience. The figure was an incomprehensible blur- as if it was some other vague person in her memory and not the caring and loving mother she had seen only moments ago.
The little Asuka was clearly frightened right now, and the older one was collapsing to her knees and making noises, "No, no please...please not this PLEASE!!!!"
But it could be shut out. Whatever had brought her here allowed her to shut this out. She closed her eyes and tried to think of something else...of happiness...
She felt something reach out to her and take her shoulder. Asuka lifted her head and saw a scared little girl looking up into her face. Ribbons had replaced the electrodes, but it was still the same Asuka at a younger age- and the same one that had seen the nightmare.
The fifteen year old Asuka, at that point, knew what she wanted to do. She had wanted this from someone else, too. But there hadn't been anyone there to do it.
She reached out and grasped her younger form in a loving hug, squeezing herself tight in an understanding grip and whispering soothing German words to the crying girl.
A brief glance up at the door saw the figure gone and the door closing. All around the shadows were still lurking, and the NERV insignia had turned to blood and was oozing about the room- but somehow avoiding her and her charge.
There was also another spot on the floor those flows specifically avoided. Asuka didn't realize it until her and her counterpart turned to see it.
It stood as ominously as the sky, and unmovable as the earth. But it was completely alien, and soon Asuka could just make out the outlines of what it was...
The unmoving, unsettling, and unreflecting surface of the ebony black monolith stood as an island of sanctuary which the blood turned to avoid.
Feeling in Asuka drained as she looked into the ebony surface of the monolith. Slowly, her grasp eased around her equally confused counterpart, already outside the loop of all her imagination.
Both parties stood in silence as they stared back at one another. The shifting shadows and the trickling blood remained, however, and NERV's logo was clearly unrecognizable.
Asuka the older shouted to the monolith, while the younger recounted in fear, "What do you want!? Why are you torturing me!? What....do you want..." Her eyes were staring to come to tears, and her younger self started to cry with her.
The monolith had no reply.
The little girl was shivering and Asuka noticed that her plugsuit was uncomfortably cool...she was starting to shiver.
But the electrodes in her hair had already cooled to beyond comfort, and she just realized the searing pain of hypothermia enough to rip the electrodes out of her hair and tossed the headset.
It splashed across the blood before coming to rest a little distance away, then evaporated into blood.
Asuka also wanted to take off the plugsuit, but for chastity's sake she kept it on and bared the cold to take a hold of the younger Asuka and carry her across the blood to the untouched monolith surface.
The large slab had allowed her into the island of safety, and Asuka let down the little girl to examine the slab for herself.
She reached out with a hand to touch the surface, but encountered a featureless resistance to it. Yet...it was like moving a hand across a glass plate but there was no friction to reduce her fingers. So her hands...seemed to pass along air...
The monolith then shifted. The glow at it's base had expanded upward to resolve into a figure.
Asuka's eyes widened as she identified the form resolving.
"Momma?" She asked.
Ms. Langly's form and body appeared in the reflection of the Monolith. She was just a little over Asuka's height, and much to the redhead's surprise appeared the age she would be if she hadn't died.
Asuka's eyes welled into tears, and her younger self gave an outcry of discomfort and rushed towards the monolith.
Asuka wanted to stop her from running into the invisible barrier but was shocked to see the girl run through it and into the monolith to stand beside her mother.
The Asuka of age fifteen looked with a disappointed face at the reunion, wishing to be every part of it...
The mother and child looked up at Asuka once more, the girl waving as Asuka watched.
Asuka gave a small wave back and looked at her mother, mouthing a desperate question.
The lips moved on the mother in answer, and Asuka's eyes widened.
"Mother...MOTHER!!!!" She screamed and beat on the screen, "MOTHER!!!!!!"
The pair were falling away, towards a distant light that was sweeping around from the monolith's faces.
Asuka was blasted by a strong gale and moved a hand to cover herself. Her eyes saw the blood start to run away from the source of the wind, and the shadowy figures exploded into ash. One of them was indeed Eva two, which also collapsed into ash trying to dig it's claws into Asuka.
Her plugsuit started to rip away, also, leaving her exposed....
And the Monolith fell away, leaving her to awaken by herself-
--------------------------------
Almost immediately the alarms in both Evangelion units shrieked.
Time had come, and if they didn't go now it would be another long orbit.
Asuka snapped out of her dream too quickly to start remembering and looked around inside her helmet, "What!?! What's going on!?!?!"
Rei was in even more of a panic, reaching out to grab one of the hilts as she managed to grumble, "Re-Entry..."
"What's wrong over there!?" Asked Asuka, "What's happen-"
She turned to look up at the thing that had been there before, the blackness in the stars.
But it had gone as mysteriously as it had appeared- and lingered only in Asuka's mind.
---------------
Gendo Ikari had been studying both of the status displays- which Ritsuko had pronounced faulty.
"Both of them seem to be too fine, if you understand my meaning." Ritsuko said, "All these displays are as close to model as you can get."
Gendo nodded slowly and asked, "Radio contact was turned aside?"
Ritsuko shook her head and responded, "Both of them responded a flat 'yes' to any question I had to ask-"
Alarms shrilled suddenly and the status displays went rapid.
"What happened?" Asked Gendo suddenly.
Ritsuko sprung to a panel and studied it, "The displays are back to normal...both Evangelion units are beginning their descents...we'll loose Radio contact in thirty seconds."
"Are they on a stable trajectory?"
"Yes...but..."
Ritsuko decided to let the radio explain to a staring Gendo and the sounds from both Evas were heard;
"OH MY GOD!! AHHHH!!!!"
"HELP....UNNNNN....."
"REI!" Screamed Gendo as he approached the radio pickup, "Rei, are you all right?"
"Get away from me GO AWAY!!!!"
Ritsuko was developing shock as she studied the display and shrilled, "Her brainwave patterns are off the scale! So is Asuka, what's happened to them!?"
Gendo's fear was growing as things were connecting. Rei was....
"MOTHER!!!!" Screamed one of them before the radio burst into silence.
One of the operators shook her head, "No use! Radio blackout! We have three minutes!"
Gendo was staring wide-eyed at the display in total fear. Yes, the utter disaster was coming true, and because of it he may very well loose any hope of recovering Rei Ayanami and all the dreams he had put into her.
-------------------------
Rei on the other hand was shuddering uncontrollably in her cockpit.
Not just from riding the large heat shield as she roared down into the atmosphere, but also from her own feelings.
Reluctance and loathing swept her when Gendo called, and she was even more in shock as she expected the usual pleasure when talking to the commander. She wanted to see Shinji instead, not his father.
And now something more was happening. Rei was squealing as the LCL started to heat up around her. But also she was feeling the desire to escape-!
She couldn't get out now, everything was locked up. But she was already starting to tear the space suit from her body, using every ounce available to her to rip the space suit and underneath plug suit from herself. She wanted to get out of this place... her cage to Gendo's manipulations. She wanted to life and be free.
She couldn't' explain these emotions, nor did she want to anymore. An analogy came to her as she ripped of one of the leggings of her suit and looked outside the Eva at the fire burning around them. She was a phoenix, rising from the ashes of some previous life.
She reached up and ripped the electrodes off her head. She could do anything manually if she had to, it wasn't like she wanted to fight in Eva anymore, anyway.
---------------------------
Asuka's story was different. As the whole Eva roared around her she too felt the loathing to escape Eva. But it was for a different reason.
She didn't want to be associated with all this. She wanted freedom, to breathe air again. She was also disliking the boiling LCL around her, but the space suit was at least providing normal oxygen.
In the flames she could make out the face she had seen in the monolith. Her mother, smiling in all her radiance, was seen in glimpses of the flames escaping the deployed heat shields. Asuka relaxed, feeling different- calm.
Her mother, it seemed, was somehow still alive somewhere. The one question she posed to ask-
The Eva shuddered again and Asuka found something...
It seemed inside the cockpit, but out of vision. She could see it, but not. It eluded her vision when she tried to focus on it, but she knew it was there...
A pleasing fact crept over her when she recognized the presence. It had seemed like ages since she felt the comforting presence of the form that had given her life so long ago.
"Mother...." She whispered in her horse voice.
Yes, she was there.
But she was already on borrowed time, granted by a friend of a friend.
Through fire and rebirth, Asuka felt like she would never be alone and abandoned again.
----------------------
Scanning the heavens from his point on the flight deck, Shinji Ikari eagerly awaited the arrival of Evangelion units zero and two. Asuka would be back, and so would Rei. Perhaps then he could tell them all of what he saw up there in space.
He still couldn't half believe it himself, but it had been there. But he wasn't afraid, the ominous form of the monolith was a gaping portal to somewhere, but it wasn't fearful. No, not even the emissary who had talked to him provoked any fear. In fact, he eagerly anticipated to see it again.
Then he saw something. Yes, there! There they were, descending like day time stars.
But...weren't they supposed to deploy their parachutes?
--------------------------
Asuka was panting in her helmet as her Evangelion let go of the heat shield and let it fall away. She was trying to concentrate as the clouds sprang by at dizzying speeds.
She glanced over at Evangelion 00, which was hopelessly tumbling end over end without control.
"Rei!" She called out, but only a screaming, berserker response came over the crackling radio.
Ritsuko's voice was also lost as Asuka's panting increased with the frantic situation. She planned on landing on the flight deck, which seemed so far away...
The Battery timer chimed it's one minute warning. It was either now or never.
She waited a moment until she saw the fleet, then deployed her parachute.
The huge orange and white frill of a crest exploded up behind her and caught the Eva, giving her a startling jolt and making her cry out.
She also felt that comforting presence there, seeming to slide away...
"No...MOTHER!!" Screamed Asuka, "Don't go...DON'T LEAVE ME ALONE!!!!"
But the comforting presence was already gone, and Asuka started to cry again. Only this time she wasn't crying as hard...because her mother had been there. She had seen her. She was still there, somewhere, and watching over her.
Or, something was....
---------------------
Rei's was a different story.
She ignored Asuka's request because of her own panicked rage. She was frantic to GET OUT!
She was ripping away at everything restraining her. The shreds of her suit were floating in the LCL, her headset was snapped in half, and her plugsuit had large tares in it from her attempts to liberate herself.
She tried the handles and pulled back on them sharply as the fleet came into view.
But it was already too late. The parachute was deploying too late, but slowed the Eva enough to give it a less-than-graceful land in the water.
When this happened, Rei frantically groped around for the emergency eject. This happened, either by her finding it or from the remote-key from the carrier. Still, she had to get out of this blood...
When the plug hit the water she didn't even feel it. She was rattled around inside, for she wasn't tied down. Her neck broke when she hit the ceiling in a painless maneuver.
Even so, she would have died anyway. Either by seemingly natural causes, or when she decided she couldn't live anymore. No matter, Gendo would bring her back- he always did.
But this time, someone had plans.
She 'Woke up' a moment later and she stood in the empty blackness in her shredded plugsuit. The blackness, in turn, became something else- a terminal at an airport. Only nobody else was here, and the light from the outside and the lights looking out were bathed in white light. Nobody was at the desks, or in the chairs.
Rei looked around in puzzling confusion, and then spotted the airport name.
TANIS was stenciled on the nameplate, indicating her location. All the maps in her vision also read TANIS.
Tanis...the keeping place of souls-
She spun around and saw it.
It had appeared to the others, and now it had come for her.
The black Monolith stood without moving or reflecting as it stared back at Rei Ayanami.
Yet, this Rei was different. The cool logic had been distorted by the emotions in color, but she wasn't as confusing as an entire spectrum. Instead, both worked in unison to ponder over the thing and her first question was, "What are you?"
The monolith had no reply.
Rei blinked, and then approached the surface calmly and reached out to touch it's surface.
Smooth black resisted her fingers, but offered no friction to her movement.
She took a step back and looked over the slab of unknown material.
Then it spoke to her.
"Rei."
She answered, looking up at it's surface with her lips agape. This wasn't the voice of any master, but instead something else.
"Yes?" She responded.
"You have done very well so far. You have come along way from what you were made to be- but you have fallen so short of what you should be. I am here to help you finish your growth and evolution to humanity."
"Humanity?"
"Yes. Your mind lacks the full spectrum of emotions and feelings...we have given these to you as a gift."
"A...Gift?" She replied.
"Yes. For we have a favor to ask of you- it could mean the fate of the human race... will you help us?"
Rei was hesitant as she considered all this, and asked, "But...why don't you make me do it, like you did with all the experiments?"
"Because it was necessary to give you the power of emotion and feeling to use with reason and logic to give us your answer. We believe in the power of free will, not imposed will. Thus when we ask for your help, we are asking, not commanding your assistance. Will you help us now to restore the human race?"
Rei couldn't believe it. This mighty form of power, capable of doing anything, needed her help? But why....and why had it given her emotions?
"Will I see Shinji-kun again?"
"When you awaken regardless, you will stay with Shinji Ikari. If you agree to help us, we can guarantee that you two will have a future together."
Rei had one further question to ask, this to determine which she was dealing with- light or dark.
"What price is there for helping you?"
"There is no price or consequence for assisting us. We wish only for the world to be restored to it's proper balance- and humanity allowed to grow again without concern or fear. We intend also, to assure that this problem never arises once more."
Rei was hesitant, pondering this. No evil here...she didn't feel the sold grip of death or the searing heat of the negative spectrum. Instead, the calm and quiet of Tanis, plus the reassuring form of the monolith.
"Okay, I'll help you." She agreed.
"We, and the human race, have much to thank you for." Responded the Monolith.
Then Rei's vision became bathed in pastels and colors, and for the first time in her life she started to dream.
------------------------------
Shinji's Evangelion was necessary to pull Asuka up out of the water and onto the deck of the carrier. Shinji himself remained on the carrier and looked out from the high vantage point and out to sea, where several destroyers were towing the unconscious and disabled Evangelion 00.
Rei had already been pulled out of the water, when they found her in the plug. Shinji didn't have the details as to Rei's status, but from the amount of attention she was getting he knew it looked serious.
He saw Asuka some hours later alone in the ship's mess. She had a blanket wrapped around her and had long since discarded the plugsuit and space gear. Instead she was in a dark shirt and baggy pants with socks and sandals. She wanted to be warm from being doused in the water.
"H-Hey..." Shinji asked nervously, "Are you all right?"
Shinji didn't know what scared him more; the fact that Asuka had a calm, yet sad expression on her face or that she didn't yell at him.
"I'm fine." She replied simply.
Shinji approached her cautiously and asked, "Um...what happened? Misato-san and Dr. Akagi were worried...they thought something was wrong..."
He took a seat beside her and watched her stare into her coffee cup.
Shinji looked at her for a moment with concern on his face, and then he made a guess at what she saw.
"You saw it didn't you?"
Asuka's head turned up and looked at him in utter silence.
"Yes."
Shinji blinked and said, "So I'm not crazy...."
"No....I saw it..." She replied, "I saw....."
"Was the old man there?"
She shook her head.
"A young one?"
She shook her head again.
"Anybody?"
"Yes...." She replied passively, "I saw my mother..."
Well, that was new, Shinji thought. But then, wait, why was Asuka telling him this? Usually she was so uptight about everything and now...
"Shinji..." Asuka said, "I'm not sure I like being with NERV anymore...."
Shinji's mouth closed and he nodded slowly.
So, it seems whoever they were had already started in rebuilding the Earth.
-------------
"Is it possible to recover her?" Asked Gendo Ikari from the side of the stretcher.
"Yes," Replied Fuyutsuki, "She can be revived. Of course, it will also mean re-activating one of the clones for preparation."
"Yes." Nodded Gendo as he examined Rei Ayanami's blank stare. There was one other puzzling thing about her face just before she died...
A smile was frozen on her face.
Gendo was puzzled. He had expected worse from the Monolith. Or was this even of their doing?
He thought nothing more of it and folded the sheet over the useless clone's head. Rei would be back, and ready to serve him once more.
Maybe it was that thought that made Rei smile.
=============================================
Disclaimer: Evangelion is property of Gainax studios. The idea of the Monolith belongs to Arthur C. Clarke.
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