Lunchtime.
The topic of conversation is dominated by the Shinji-Malik incident. It's still fresh in the minds of its witnesses, having occurred only one period ago, and it's spreading like wildfire.
"Heard he's in the hospital."
"Nine stitches? Brutal man."
"Looks like Ikari stepped up in a big way."
"Supposedly wasted a locker too in the morning."
"Can I just say something?" Kensuke Aida asked as he adjusted his glasses. He and Toji Suzuhara were in the cafeteria line and Toji was busy stuffing his tray as usual.
"Shoot." Toji answered. He was currently juggling two trays, one piled high with plates of green Jell-o, and was seriously considering going back for a third.
"I seriously wish Misato would point a gun at me and order me around."
Toji's hand stopped in mid-air. "Can we pretend that you did not just say that?"
Kensuke sighed and plunked a juice carton on his tray. "Shinji's got to be the luckiest guy in the world."
"He's a marked man when Malik comes back," then, dropping his voice down to a whisper, "I'm not saying that Malik didn't deserve it of course. It's just...you know. People aren't supposed to do things like that."
"There's an empty table over there." Aida pointed out.
"I wanna sit with Hikari."
"Shinji's got two girls, you've got Hikari, why the heck don't I get Misato?" whined Kensuke, perhaps a bit too loudly, causing several heads to turn in his direction.
"I so do not know you." Toji muttered as he sat down.
"Hi Toji, Kensuke," Hikari greeted them. "You guys must feel like celebrities. So many people must be asking you for what happened, since you guys were right there when the fight broke out. You even tried to pull him off Malik right?"
The two exchanged blank looks.
"Er..."
"Ah..."
"Hikari, actually..."
"No one's asked us anything." Kensuke muttered, suddenly finding his meal extremely fascinating.
"Oh...oops." Hikari said, her face red with embarrassment.
"But we did really try to pull Shinji off Malik!" Toji pointed out, trying to save face.
"Yeah! He nearly bit me, man!" Kensuke chimed in, pointing to a spot on his arm.
"You really should have been there, I mean, it was something to see," said Toji.
Hikari raised her eyebrows, her mouth full of sandwich.
"Uh, you know...in a car crash kind of sense...I'll shut up now."
After swallowing, Hikari asked, "Hey! Asuka has gym with you guys right? What was her reaction?"
Toji snorted and began demolishing his pile of Jell-o. "Ha! She was just standing there like a frightened..."
WHACK!
Asuka dropped her tray onto the table with a resounding crash. Her eyes were blazingly intense and her face frozen in quiet, barely hidden anger. "I was standing there like a what, Osaka boy?"
The table fell into an audible silence, as did the two tables nearby. Asuka's gaze burned a smoldering hole into Toji, and Kensuke, although he hadn't done anything, felt like disappearing. Even Hikari suddenly looked very uncomfortable as she scooted to the side to give Asuka a place to sit. Asuka never dropped her stare as she sat down slowly. Toji was practically albino with fear.
"I said you were standing there like a...super-model." Toji muttered, very slowly and carefully, enunciating every syllable.
"When I want groveling, I'll ask for it next time." Asuka shot back. Her red hair was pulled back into a long ponytail, causing many male students to stop and ponder the value of their lives, weighing it against the possibility of getting caught staring. Beside her tray lay the school- prescribed Chemistry book. Clocking in at an impressive 900 pages, it was an impressive weapon in anyone's hands, made more dangerous by the fact that Asuka's copy was hardbound and that at this point, almost anything in her hands could be classified as a weapon of mass destruction.
"We were talking about...what Misato did." Hikari put forward, trying to change the subject.
"Yeah! I was telling Toji earlier that..." Aida was interrupted by Toji planting a hand over his mouth. "Can it sicko." Toji ordered him.
Asuka violently shoved the half-finished plate of food back, patted her mouth with a napkin, and then ripped it cleanly in to two. "It was plastic you morons. Armed with blanks too, most likely. No, certainly."
Toji nearly choked on jell-o.
Kensuke's mouth dropped open.
Hikari started and asked Asuka, "You're sure?"
"Of course I am! I've been around enough weapons to be sure. Besides, Misato's childish but she's not stupid. You think she'd fire a real weapon in the middle of a schoolyard?" She stopped and looked at the table's occupants and at some of the people who had gathered nearby, drawn to her words. "Oh come on, what's wrong with you people? Even if that was a loaded gun, she doesn't strike me as the sort that could hit an Evangelion point-blank."
She turned to Kensuke and smirked at his reaction. "Oh what's wrong? Did I just shatter your nasty little masochistic fantasies? Tough."
At that point, Hikari and Toji desperately shifted to the topic to something safe, finding a newly released monster movie to be a safe choice. But Asuka had already zoned out, withdrawing into herself as she tried to ignore the sheer noise that filled the cafeteria.
"Where is Ikari now?"
"Suspended for a week at least."
"Wonder who he's going after next?"
"Mailk's parents are diplomats right? The dude's gonna be so screwed when the rents' here bout' this."
Kensuke nearly fell off the bench when he heard the low, guttural growl coming out of Asuka's mouth. "Ah...You alright Soryu?"
"Fine, dammit." She growled back. Asuka stood up and began to stomp through the path being cleared for her by confused and rightly scared students.
"Jeez, what's her premenstrual syndrome?" Toji asked in utter bewilderment, earning him a quick elbow from Hikari. "Oof! What I say?"
"I better go after her," Hikari sighed.
--------------------------------------------
"Asuka! Asuka wait up!" Hikari called out as she ran after her friend.
"Asuka we need to talk," she said when she finally caught up with her.
The redhead seemed to mull it over for a few seconds before saying, "Fine, but not here. Somewhere private."
Hikari nodded and pulled her into an empty stairwell. "What's wrong? You're acting as if the whole world wronged you."
"It's...it's all this, okay?"
"The whole Shinji-Malik thing?"
"Yes! God that entire, stupid, pointless ordeal! Shinji picked a fight, big deal! It's normal for teenagers like us to pick fights! We're irresponsible, immature even! I am so sick of looking at Ikari like he's some stupid, worthless worm. When he finally emerges from whatever fantasy world he's been living in for god-knows-how-long, what do we do? We look at him like he's a freak! Hell we begin feeling sorry for Malik. We begin feeling sorry for that thug? What's wrong with us? Why the heck are we all tripping about Shinji finally acting like a normal teen?"
"...Asuka, he's not normal."
Asuka drew back as if preparing to strike Hikari but Hikari stepped back and continued, "It's true. He's an EVA pilot, so are you. You're both not normal teens like me or Toji. We don't go out and save the world and hope to be home in time for chores. You, Shinji, Rei, you're all special. Do you see?"
Hikari's words seemed to calm Asuka down and so she plowed on. "No one's saying Malik couldn't use some humbling, but what Shinji did was wrong and out of character for him. Of course we're surprised; personally I thought Shinji knew better. I'm sure a lot of people thought he knew better. A guy like Shinji who saves the world on a regular basis and is still as self-conscious and humble as him, well, you have to admire him for it. So when goes and does this..." She reached out and gave Asuka's hand a reassuring squeeze. "I could just be blabbing here. Am I making sense?"
Asuka nodded back slowly.
"Good, because we both know that's not what's really bothering you is it?" Hikari asked gently.
"I...I have to go to the bathroom." Asuka muttered as she pulled her hand free from Hikari's grasp. Her friend could only shake her head in pity as she watched her run off.
--------------------------------------------
Luckily for Asuka, the bathroom was empty. She went to the first sink and turned the water on to full. By that time the tears in her eyes were starting to flow and she tried to hide them by splashing her face with the cold water.
She did this again and again, attempting to stop the crying, somehow hoping that the cold water would numb her tear ducts.
It was working, sort of.
As she looked up at herself in the mirror, she let out a small gasp when she saw the blue-haired Rei Ayanami standing right beside her.
"How long was she standing there? Did she see me crying?"
"What do you want Ayanami?" Asuka asked, trying hard to choke back sobs.
"You were there when Shinji fought Malik?" she asked without a hint of emotion.
Asuka ripped a piece of tissue paper off the dispenser and began to wipe her face furiously. "Yeah I was, so what?"
"Nothing. I just wish I was there. That is all."
"Oh really? And just what would you have done if you were there? Stood around all emotionless and doll-like? I'm sure Shinji would really have appreciated that."
Asuka didn't think Rei could sound any colder than she normally sounded, but she proved her wrong when she replied, "Perhaps. But then, I heard that's what you did. Stood around and did nothing. Like a doll, as you said."
Asuka Langley Soryu felt her cheeks burn first, and then a split-second later, the tears returned, this time with such force that she had to blind herself with the crumpled up tissue in an attempt to hide from Ayanami.
"Damn her! Damn her for saying that!"
"...Damn her...for being right..."
She let out a loud sob and threw the wadded up tissue ball in Rei's direction, but when she opened her eyes, Rei was gone, and the tissue had hit nothing but air. Asuka began to swear, first it was a litany of "baka" followed by every curse she knew, an eclectic group comprised mostly of German words, but which also included Latin, French, English, and Spanish. When she felt her lungs begin to burn, Asuka reached out and in one smooth motion, struck the mirror at full-force, shattering it to pieces.
Her legs gave out and she fell to the floor. There, she crawled to one of the many empty cubicles and locked herself within. With her back leaning against the toilet, she managed to pull her cellphone out of its cloth case and began to dial.
The number began to ring and she braced herself, using every ounce of her will power to stop crying for just a minute.
"Shinji? It's Asuka."