9. The New Norm
The next several days passed slowly. Major Greene worked Shinji and Asuka hard. Many times Shinji thought Asuka would break and fall, or snap and attack the Major. Her hostile behavior sunk into the background, and radiated in everything she did. Rei remained distant to everything around her, and only rarely spoke to Shinji. After these brief conversations though, Shinji always had something new to think about.
The second day Shinji and Asuka reported to the yard, Rei had walked in to the kitchen in the morning, as Shinji was simmering rice in butter (being certain that this would stay down, if MREs did not), and asked him if his Eva had ever spoke to him. Shinji had replied, with growing uncertainty of Rei's mental state, that he had not. Rei had sat at the table and spoke of a dream that recurred with her frequently. She spoke of a city with towering structures built of steel and glass. Here there was no wind, she said. Here, people walked around beneath the Sun. And then she described the Sun as being more brilliant then the Source, more… and then she had been at a loss for words. She continued that Shinji, Asuka, and herself had all been present, but they had been different people.
She had described Shinji with brown hair and blue eyes, whereas she had hair the color of the sky.
She had begun to describe Asuka when their chronos beeped. Shinji had turned off the stove and covered the rice, then went with Rei to the yard for morning exercise. He did not wonder until later why Rei had mentioned this dream, and why she had asked if his Eva ever spoke to him. It suddenly did not seem like a crazy question, and Shinji wondered when Doctor Akagi would be giving him the instruction Misato had described the day before.
Asuka could barely tolerate the sight of Shinji by the third day. The Third Child had absolutely no idea what he was doing to make her mad, and had done everything he could to avoid her. Attempting to placate her would only make things worse, he was certain.
The fourth day after their training with Major Greene had begun, after a very long and painful session, the Lieutenant had announced that she was going to be leaving the Geo-Front for six days. She then said that Shinji and Asuka were both adults, and she was not expecting any "funny business" while she was gone. At this comment, Asuka declared that the Third Child could not be trusted, and she wanted him staying on his side of the apartment until Misato returned. Misato looked to Shinji in askance, and the boy simply shrugged. He had little interest in spending any of his anemic free time being around Asuka.
So Misato had the a maintenance crew restore the exterior door to Shinji's half of the apartment, and Asuka fiddled with the computerized lock on the door connecting the two sections until it wouldn't open for anyone. Shinji finally had time and purpose to explore his quarters. He pulled the plastic sheeting off the furniture in his living room, and explored the other rooms and closets. It had totally escaped him that he had his own washer and dryer, and he found clothes in the closet of the second bedroom that must have been left by a previous occupant. He also found some books and some old compact disks and a player. These he dusted off, but did not use.
Time not spent in the Sixth Training Yard was meager; it took Shinji two days to properly investigate his apartment. He did not revel in his newfound freedom, it just left him lonely. The sessions with Major Greene were exhausting, but never as intense as the first day, and Shinji often came back with only minor aches and pains. Between arriving at his home - and it was a home now, it felt lived in – and his chrono black-facing, Shinji did his laundry and pursued recipes on the television in the living room, which could also be used to access what was labeled "cached internet", which had, among other things, recipes for any component ingredients Shinji could find in the Kitchen's cupboard. By the time this was done, his chrono would normally be black. If not, Shinji would watch some or listen to some selection from the repository of videos, music, and miscellany NERV had stored in their database.
Once, the night after Misato had left, Shinji heard a crash in the neighboring apartment. He had gone to the broken door and tentatively knocked, and Asuka had screamed abuse at him.
Shinji was beginning to think the Second Child was legitimately insane.
The fourth day after
Misato had left, Shinji came back home and found the phone in the
living room was winking red at him. He had barely noticed the phone,
and had never received a call before. Phones were not commonplace in
any shelter he had seen before the Geo-Front, and besides, he had no
one to call. Shinji picked up the receiver and heard the dial tone.
He pressed a few random buttons, and waited for something to happen.
Then he noticed one a small blue button apart from the numeric keypad
with a little sideways triangle on it.
The message was from Doctor
Akagi. She said that he was to be excused at 1200 the following day
to report to her office, where he would begin training with test
equipment. She gave him some simple instruction on how to locate her,
and ended the message.
Rei's odd question came back to Shinji as he went to bed that "night". How could an Eva possibly speak, they were just machines, right? And what could he possibly say in return?
The next day, Major Greene celebrated Shinji's half-session by making him run three miles, do weight training, then, what the hell, run three miles again. By lunch Shinji was exhausted.
After a quick shower, he stopped by the Kitchen and spooned up some rice he had cooked that morning. He knew Rei ate it too, but had never seen Asuka eat anything, she always made everyone in the Kitchen leave whenever she used it.
It was not as though she wasn't eating something, though. Asuka's previously emaciate frame had fleshed out, and she grew more capable by the day. The Major had stopped giving her whatever it was he had been giving her on the fourth day. Shinji had seen the scabs are her arms, and figured Asuka had been getting shot-up with something to build up her muscles. It had certainly worked.
Shinji put the rice on the table, then went back to the counter and sliced three slivers from a dill pickle he had thawed out. He put these on his rice and ate.
He ducked onto the catwalk after his meal just long enough to see the Major chasing Rei and Asuka around the track, blowing a whistle at them whenever one lagged behind.
Shinji hoped the Major wouldn't take out his absence on the others. There was nothing he could do about it either way.
Doctor Akagi's instructions turned out to be much more reliable then Misato's. The woman worked in one of the buildings in the Middle Sector. Shinji enjoyed the walk to her office.
On the outside, Doctor Akagi appeared to work in a multi-leveled gray building. Each story to the building had windows running around it, but as Shinji drew close it became obvious that all the windows were boarded up or painted black. With some trepidation, he made his way to the building's entrance.
The interior of the building was gone. Instead there was a large pool of red liquid that extended down, past where the building's foundation should be and beyond Shinji's sight. Around the pool, which was much larger then any body of liquid Shinji had ever seen before in his life, there were cranes and objects with a purpose he could only guess at. There appeared to be rails running up one side of the building, which extended down into the pool. The only things vaguely recognizable were a series of large, narrow, tapered cylinders that rested half-in the red liquid and a shallow angle. Shinji had crawled in to such a device. That was Eva's cockpit. The voice that had described the various stages of the Evangelion's launch had called it an "entry plug".
Several people were attending to the various machines around the pool. None appeared to be Doctor Akagi. A few waved at Shinji, a wave he warily returned.
There were several obvious exits from the pool other then the entrance Shinji had just used. No one door seemed more likely to contain Doctor Akagi than any other.
He wandered the edge of the pool for a while, trying to see the bottom and watching the doors in the hope that Doctor Akagi would make herself known. Eventually, one of the technicians pointed him to a stairwell set against the side of the chamber he had failed to notice.
Thirty feet down was a door with the placard "Dr. Ritsuko Akagi". Shinji was now so far below the chamber's entrance level that, though the stairwell had no cover and he could see the building's roof, everything around him was dim. There were several lights in place, but none were turned on. Perhaps they were broke.
Shinji knocked on the door, which was solid and made of metal. Then he noticed a small button next to the door, and pressed it. He waited.
After a few minutes, the extinguished lights flickered on, and several seconds later Doctor Akagi opened the door.
She was wearing a lab coat, and beneath that a blue blouse and a short black skirt that hugged her thighs. For the past several days, Shinji had found himself growing increasingly fascinated with what the women around him wore, or chose not to. Since seeing Misato in a bikini top, he had found himself thinking certain thoughts that made him feel uneasy. From Misato's breasts beneath her brief swimsuit, moist and swollen, to the way Rei and Asuka looked in their exercise clothes.
It was an embarrassing problem, and he did not know what to do about it. So he tried to not think about it at all. Lately, that strategy had not been enough to deal with any of his problems.
Doctor Akagi cleared her throat. Shinji snapped up to face level and knew she'd caught him staring.
/Um… sorry ma'am/ Shinji began, a bit sheepish. He tried to look at her face, but his gaze kept traveling downward, so he looked at the light next to the door instead. /I had trouble findi - /
/Yes yes, just like you couldn't find Major Greene/ the woman rolled her eyes. /Better late then never./
She led him into a room of indeterminate size. It was dim and everywhere Shinji looked, equipment faded in to blackness. Ritsuko's "office" was the only area well-lit. There was a desk and a couch and several bookshelves. Computer equipment was scattered over all of this. Against the wall was a whiteboard, on which was drawn figures the meaning of which Shinji could only guess at.
/This way, now./ the woman said, gesturing into the blackness, and a walkway lit up before them. Shinji glanced to either side and discovered they were actually close to the ceiling of a large room, possibly larger then the pool chamber. Where the light grew faint, Shinji saw banks and banks of what he guessed were computer equipment.
Ritsuko led him down some stairs that branched off the catwalk, and then touched a device set in to a column that supported the walkway. Bright lights flickered on, and Shinji saw they were in a lab, or what he imagined a lab must look like. There was a bank of computers, a large device connected to several tanks, a workbench with several electrical components in various stages of disassembly, and a cylinder that went from ceiling to floor. It was thicker and the top and bottom, thinning out in the middle. It had a vaguely organic look, and reminded Shinji of a rock formation.
Doctor Akagi powered up the bank of computers, and then walked over to the organic-looking cylinder and tapped on the keypad set into its side.
/Okay/ she said/come over here./
Shinji approached, and Doctor Akagi stopped him with a wave. Then she looked down at the floor and depressed something with the tip of her shoe. A metal panel shot out of the ground, and rose to Shinji's chest. This panel now separated Shinji and the cylinder from Doctor Akagi, who reached over and pressed a few more buttons on the cylinder's keypad. The column split along seams Shinji had not noticed.
Doctor Akagi went back to the bank of computers. The metal plate was still between them.
/Okay Mister Ikari, disrobe now/ she said, bored.
Shinji looked around the lab. It was enclosed on three sides, the open side looking out into the massive darkened room they had passed through. The fact that this blackness was to his left and unshielded made him slightly uncomfortable, but he took off his clothes anyway. He stopped at his undershorts.
/Eh…/ he began/every-/
/Everything, Mister Ikari/ The blonde was getting impatient.
Shinji stripped the underpants off.
/O..okay/ he called over the metal partition, now ducking to hide his face.
/Now enter the cylinder. Just stand on the pad in the middle and grip the handlebars, this should only take a minute or so./
Shinji crawled inside the cylinder and stood as instructed. The chamber closed around him, and a bright, narrow beam of light traveled up the length of his body, starting at his feet and ending at his neck. Where the light passed, his skin felt warm. Then something like a vacuum opened up in the floor and recycled the air. Then a liquid began to fill the chamber, red as the liquid in the pool, but much thicker. When it got past he waist, Shinji got worried. This worry increased when he found he could not move his legs, and by the time he started to panic his hands and arms were encased as well. He thought about screaming, that perhaps there had been a mistake and the equipment was malfunctioning, but just as he was drawing breath to shriek out in total terror, the liquid stopped rising. It was at neck level, as far up as the light had traveled.
There was a buzzing in both his ears, and suddenly the mold down to his waist split apart and was pulled away by hooks embedded in its surface. Shinji looked down, and saw on either side of his body a blue point of light. As he watched, the liquid-solid his lower body was encased in seemed to boil away to nothing, in a very narrow cut. He could feel the stuff boiling against his skin, but it did not seem that hot. He could not feel the laser, or whatever it was, at all. The lower section split apart and was pulled away. Then something clamped down on Shinji's head and face and squeezed.
Then he did scream, or try to. He could feel mechanisms working around him, tried not to imagine the horrible ways this could end, and then just like that, the whole thing was over. The instrument on his head relaxed and retracted into the ceiling, and the cylinder door opened.
/Okay, you can put your underpants on, now/ Doctor Akagi called in.
Shinji hopped out of the cylinder and had his pants on just as the metal partition lowered. Doctor Akagi brushed past him, hardly sparing him a glance, and went over to the device at the other side of the lab.
She tapped something in to the machine's console, and it hummed to life. Then she went over to the bench with disassembled electronics, turned on an overhead light, picked up a tool, and started worrying over something small.
Shinji looked around the lab and suddenly had to use the bathroom.
/Um…/ he began.
/Go outside and walk to the left/ the Doctor replied without missing a beat. Then she turned and looked at him. /Sorry, everyone needs to after a molding./ She went back to work.
When Shinji got back from the restroom, the device in the corner had stopped humming, and the Doctor had pulled something out of it.
/Come over here/ the doctor said without turning.
She was holding a suit. It was blue and white and black, and had no design Shinji could work out. The Doctor turned the suit over, and Shinji saw that the back was bare.
She handed the suit to Shinji and told him to put it on.
The material, which did not feel exactly like plastic, was still warm, like clothes fresh from a dryer. The suit had feet, and there the material was thicker, coiling around his foot and toes like a shoe. The sole looked to be made of tough, treaded rubber. Shinji pulled the suit on like a pair on pants, yanking at the legs to get his feet into place, then slipped into the arms and finally zipped himself up in front. The wrists of the suit bulged outward, and Shinji could see that several buttons and a chrono screen were built in, though the screen appeared to be un-powered.
/Fit well/ Akagi asked from the workbench.
/I… yeah, I guess…/ Shinji walked around a bit. He'd never worn anything this comfortable. It is almost like wearing nothing at all, he thought. Then, the suit became a bit less comfortable.
/Okay, come over here, I'm almost done/ the Doctor said. /Sorry, I was busy with this when you got here. Damn thing…/ she pushed something into place/shorted out on me last night! …there we go./
She turned to face him, and was holding something that looked like a backpack. /Turn around/ she ordered.
Shinji turned around. The Doctor dropped something over his head, a white device which rested on his lower chest and went all the way up to his neck. The device slid into grooves in the suit Shinji had thought were just cosmetic. The top of the device hugged the front of his neck.
Something was pressed against his bare back, clicking into place with the suit and the device on his chest. There was a dull sensation as the Doctor touched things in the device on his back, and then the suit came to life. There was a hiss of fans somewhere behind him, and the chrono on his wrist glowed and showed the time, 1305.
/Hmm… good/ the Doctor muttered, walking in front of Shinji, hand posed thoughtfully. /Walk around in it, please./
Shinji walked around a moment, and found it was not much different from before, though his center of weight had shifted upward.
/It feels… nice, I guess/ he said.
/Okay, good enough. Press the red button on your wrist to unhinge it, then take it off and get dressed. /
Shinji pressed the red button, and the front and back devices split apart around his neck and shoulders. He unzipped the front and stepped out of the thing.
He dressed quickly. Doctor Akagi had appeared to have lost interest in him, she was looking at computer screens, some which showed a rotating doll figure, others which were displaying vitals.
/Okay Shinji/ the Doctor looked up from the screens /your plug-suit works. This is what you will wear when you are inside the entry plug. It allows us to monitor you remotely and should help with synchronization. It also has a basic life-support system./
She looked at the suit, which was in a heap on the floor, then she looked at Shinji, annoyed. /We're done, you can leave./
When Shinji got back to his apartment, his chrono had turned black. Apparently they did not want him wandering around, even if they gave him part of the day off. Rather go straight to bed, Shinji followed his normal routine, then sat down in the extra bedroom and flipped through some of the CDs he had found there. Most were in English and called things like "Credence Clearwater Revival", "Willie Nelson's Greatest Hits", and something from a band called "Boa".
Seeing nothing of interest, Shinji left the CDs by the old player. With little else to do, he took a shower, and absently poked through his kitchenette. There was only an old and moldy box of crackers under the sink. Just as well, he wasn't supposed to eat food not from the Kitchen at the training yard. Funny rule.
He was about to go to bed out of boredom when someone knocked on the door. Shinji opened it, expecting Asuka, fresh from the training session and mad as hell about something, but instead met a girl he had never seen before.
"Um… hello sir…" the girl began, voice a little shaky. She was dressed in worker's coveralls, had to be about Shinji's age. Her brown hair was tied back in two pigtails, and her face was covered in freckles.
Shinji realized he was staring. Again.
"Uh… hello," he said. The girl just looked at him, then leaned away from the door and looked to her left.
"Is this… uh... 18E?" The girl asked.
Shinji turned and looked at the number on his door, which was clearly "17E".
"No, I think you want next door," Shinji indicated Asuka's side of the apartment. "And she won't be home for probably another few hours."
The girl had started to blush after Shinji had corrected her, the blush didn't go away.
"Um… do you know… her?" the girl stammered.
"Yeah, I do… did you want something from her?"
The girl was clasping her hands now, twisting them and kneading them. Shinji looked down, then behind him. He wasn't underdressed, and there was nothing creeping up behind him. What was this girl's problem?
"Could you… could you please tell her…" the girl began, then closed her eyes and shuddered. Her head cocked to one side, like she was listening to something, or remembering listening to something.
"Could you please tell her to stop it? I live downstairs… with my family," she quickly added the last part. "And we… can't stand it anymore. We can't stand the screams, we can't stand the… the… it is like there is something in the walls… a skittering, a panting… could you please tell her to… please… stop?"
The girl was crying now. Shinji was at a loss. He had no idea what the girl was talking about. Aside from that one time he had heard a crash in the apartment next door, Asuka had been quiet.
"Um… when did you hear this?" Shinji asked, trying to look for a reasonable explanation.
"At night… after 2100, I mean. Always at night," the girl was sobbing.
What do you do in a situation like this? Shinji wondered. He drew a blank.
"I'll be sure to pass… that all along," he finally said.
The girl wiped her eyes and nose. "Thanks a lot," she murmured.
Then she just stood there, so Shinji, without anything else to do, closed the door.
Shinji did not confront Asuka about her noise problem. He heard her open and close her door, the walls were that thin. It did not seem likely that she could produce enough noise to traumatize a young woman, and do it without waking him up. He glanced at his black-faced chrono, and pressed a knob on its face, so it showed him the time. 1750. He sat down in the living room, turned on the television, and waited.
By the time 2100 hours came around, Shinji was asleep on the couch, television muted. Weariness had suddenly overtaken him, and since he had not heard a sound from Asuka all day, he decided it would be safe to close his eyes for a while. Surely he would hear whatever she was doing from the living room.
He slept, and next door, a terrible din rose. Something screeched and clawed at the broken door connecting the two apartments. A long way off, someone was screaming.
Shinji dreamed of terrible things.