AN: yeah... this is late I know but I've been busy. Besides, the way I had it this whole chapter was like 130 pages long before I went over it and realised I couldn't turn it all in. I didn't even think about page lengthsuntilrecently. Anyway...Chapter 5willcome in there parts and I'm still working on part 3
I you feel I haven'tkept Shinji in character, TELL ME! I need to know before I move on to the next chapters.
/Priest/
/0.5: on the run Part 1/
The night sky was gloomier than usual, making the alleyway's shadows that much more darker, the moonlight playing tricks with the light, casting sinister figures in the murky gloom, but it didn't matter. He needed the darkness, he trusted it to mask his get away, even though he knew the ones after him would probably not be effected by anything so mundane as the simple absence of proper lighting.
He had seen what they were capable of and so, held no reservations as to what they couldn't do.
None the less, he ran on, snaking along the twist and turns of the city's less finer thoroughfares with only the night sky as his cover, mainly because he had no choice. Escape was his only option.
Trying to take the enemy head on was suicidal and he couldn't afford to die yet. There were too many things left undone, too many questions unanswered, too many souls unsaved.
And apparently... only he could save them.
The heaven's must have been laughing their asses off.
In any case time was not on his side, but of course, then again, time had never been on his side. He had no clue how he was to accomplish the daunting task that he had been burdened with, even as the full weight of the knowledge of his fate and that of the world's threatened to bury his thin frame.
Silently he questioned the heavens, wondering as to how things could have ended up the way they had. This was not the path that his life had been heading down before, it was not the life he had wanted. The whole savoir bit was not his to take. There had to have been a mistake, a mis-punch, a typo somewhere in the paperwork... somewhere.
It also wasn't every day someone came up to you and said 'Hey, you're here to save the world' twice, 'Oh and even though the odds are stacked against you, we probably can't help you, but there's no one else who can get it done so... good luck.'
What do you say to that? How are you supposed to react?
And save it from what?' There were too many sides, too many dangers. So much had happened and it had happened so fast, and he hadn't had time to think. And then the enemy had appeared to break up their little orientation and all hell had broken lose, or was it heaven?
Who knew?
The non descript pistol he carried was on its last clip, the others having been wasted early on during the initial gun fight.
The night air blew harder as the young man threw back a quick sarcastic, damn near desperate bark of a laugh that sounded more like a high pitched squeak at the thought of him in a gun fight. Guns were not his thing. Truthfully, shooting someone was something that he had never thought he would ever have to experience.
Not him, he wasn't a soldier, not really. Hell he wasn't even a fighter, but with the current circumstances he would just have to do what was necessary to survive.
Whatever that meant?
There was another path up ahead at the next bind. And just as he made the turn, pieces of the brink wall beside his head exploded from the flying death that man had labeled as a bullet, which had him as its intended target.
Apparently the enemy had caught up to him. There was even less time now than there had been before. Not wasting another second he ran on, harder and faster, desperately trying to escape.
Objectively, he fancied why he didn't just take the blue pill and fall into blissfully oblivion. The agents didn't even give him a chance to take the red one, yet they were still chasing him.
Bastards.
It was still in his breast pocket even now and he briefly thought of tossing it, but that wouldn't have solved anything. That little red capsule was most likely the only help he would get. No... he couldn't get rid of it that easy, at least not yet.
The young boy couldn't help but feel like he was on a roller coaster, a carnival ride gone terribly wrong, one that had gone up for a upside down spin and while the tram had continued on its safe track, he had been left behind, far behind, falling to the ground on his own... all alone.
Always alone.
05: set me free Part 1
I ducked inside a nick in the wall of an old office building somewhere in old Tokyo that looked as if it should have been condemned a decade ago, hidden behind a pair of dumpsters in another dark and dank alleyway.
There had been so many, blurring in and out of my vision that I had forgotten which way I had come. They all looked so similar, but everything looked that way in the dark. And it wasn't as if I had actually been paying special attention to which one I had ran down in my haphazard flight.
Only the motivation that I needed to get away and that if I didn't get a chance to catch my breath soon I would die of suffocation rather than a well placed bullet in the back, drove me.
I had taken all of three deep gulps of air before two darkly dressed men who looked fresh out of the office cubicles, burst down the alley, bumping the two heavy industrial made dumpsters a bit and sending them skidding down the opposite end of the path to slam into the nearby wall with little difficulty.
Neither seemed to care much about that though, and they didn't seem hurt at all. I knew that nothing that simple would put them down. One of them had been hit by a car during the beginning of our merry little chase and it didn't phase them one bit. But at that particular moment the dumpsters were the farthest thing from my mind.
Truthfully, keeping my racing heart from beating too loudly and alerting the demons to my presence was my all consuming mission in life as my mind thought up all kinds of strategies to hold my breath and keep those bastard from noticing me.
The weight of the gun in my waist was a burden that I didn't want but one that was beginning to oppress me with its function. Briefly I thought of pulling it out and using it for it's intended purpose, but I struggled hard to keep my hands as far away form it as possible.
It would only give away my position.
Cloop
Cloop
Cloop
Cloop
The steady beat of the heel of their tailored shoes hitting the pavement, still wet from the moody storm clouds hanging precariously above almost as if they were threatening to pour forth their wares once more if provoked, sang throughout the alley, ringing in triple time to my frantic heart beat.
Cloop
Cloop
Cloop
Cloop
They were close now, their fierce gazes peering deep into the ebony cloak of my quickly found hiding spot's barely concealing shadows as their shades caught the faint shimmer of the city's lights, adding a heady gleam to their already dangerous look.
Cloop
Cloop
Cloop
Cloop
They were very close now, close enough that I could practically smell the acrid scent of the grease in their perfectly manicured hair, the heavy starch that was used on their impossibly pressed suits and the almost stoic yet corporate malevolence of their presence coming off in waves, hanging over them like a musty cologne that threatened to overwhelm my sense.
No, a mere bullets would do nothing to my enemy, not unless they were blessed by God or something, ordained to smite down with heavenly vengeance upon this nondescript villainy that stalked the streets of Tokyo 3.
I briefly thought of the irony of me asking help from god. 'Would he even offer me any if I did ask? What would that mean for the Angel slayer to get help from the Angel's Master, was that not blasphemy?'
The dark skies above offered no answers and the enemy still stood, their evil undiscovered by God's eyes.
It had to have been only a few seconds truthfully from the time it took them to come into the alley, take a look around and then continue on their murderous way, but you know how time gets when you're in those type of situations, it felt like hours since I had drawn a breath.
And right when I went to do as such, the last of the trio showed up and damn near made me piss myself as I franticly wrapped my hands over my mouth in an attempt to keep myself from expelling that last bit of air that would herald the demise of my mortality.
But luckily a car passed by the entrance of the alley, splashing water in its wake, just as the barest of squeaks was able to escape my hated orifice, eclipsing the sound.
The Agent, having found no sign of me, headed off to join his compatriots, his heavy foot steps echoing behind as it went on its way. I gave it a full five minutes before I took another step out and then headed back the way the Agent had come. Heading forward again would be death, that was as sure as Asuka bragging about her pilot skills and Rei not liking meat.
And as I made my way to any destination away from the enemy I had to wonder what had led me down this path.
/WRW/three nights before / Maya Ibuki's apartment
There hadn't been a back door to get out of Miss Ibuki's apartment and for a second there I figured we were done for while I listened to the enemy coming through the front, their footsteps were as loud as my heartbeat, but out of the corner of my eye I noticed a slightly opened window.
There was no time for hesitation as I pulled the wounded girl with me up to it, but when I tried to open it, the damn thing decided that it preferred its current position. That didn't last long and after a few well placed, frustrated bangs, the thing let up and we were out in the wind.
Luckily we were on the first floor, so there was no trouble concerning that case, even though I had pushed the girl out head first and her loud umpf alerted me to the situation right before my own head made contact with the ground.
This time it was my companion who pulled me up while I shook the stars out of my head. 'That blow must have woken her up.' I thought as we made our escape, the enemy not far behind.
For some time my world was only a series of twists and turns, side streets and alleyways, all blurring together along with the frequent gun shots filtering around us and the sound of our heavy breathing as the rain still poured down on our unprotected heads.
One particular shot had come just a bit too close as we made one of our latest turns, running full speed for the opening out into the street, right into the waiting claws of an ominous black colored sedan that just happened to stop right in front of us to block our path.
It was almost an afterthought to jump the car's hood.
And yes... I did say jump its hood. I'm not sure what came over me, but there had been no time and room as my companion made a rolling dive over the thing, that had to have killed her wounded arm and with me running in time with her, waiting for my turn would have earned me that bullet in the back I had so feared.
So, I jumped it. Clean over too. I would have taken a second to marinate on that fact if not for the girls quick tug that saved me from the fist about to impact with my face, but it couldn't stop the other one that exploded in my gut and sent me flying.
The pain had been intense, rivaled only be my time within EVA. A few tears threatened to brake free but they never got the chance as I was hauled to my feet by my hair, distracting my mind from its previous pain with the new agony my scalp was receiving.
I didn't even feel the hit. One second my brain was screaming at me to do 'SOMETHING' to get myself out of the bastard who held me's grasp, but the next time I could open my eyes, more like sqint, I was stuck in a wall.
And yes, again, I didn't stutter, there was no mistake, no mistype. I was stuck in a wall. My body had in fact been wedged into the brick from the impact, but because of the amazing force of the blow, gravity had been too afraid to allow me to fall. It obviously had seen what the enemy had done and it wanted no parts of that kind of trouble.
My aching back could sympathize, so I didn't blame it for running like a scared bitch. I was starting to understand what Maya had been talking about, concerning the Matrix and being able to break the rules. What the suited man had just done to me clearly went against a few of Newton's Laws.
More peculiar abstract thoughts, this had been a day for them. A day for strange thoughts and strange dealings, my current position a testament to that.
But sadly, because of my position I had a perfect vantage point to witness the thrashing of my newly acquired and soon to be deceased compatriot as the bastards ganged up on her. Beating away half heartedly at her tired and weaken punches. Still, with my vision, hazy from the impossible pain from my back and the steady decline of any rational thought, I could tell that things were racing down hill for us and fast
Yet, even with the rain pouring down on her, soaking her clothes and being seriously out numbered and injured, the girl fought on, her mind still trying to survive in the bizarre contest the not so normal men had turned their fight into.
Every defense she put up was broken through, every punch she threw was blocked, and every kick avoided, so when she went for an uppercut, I was positively waiting for them to catch her even as I was silently rooting for her through the tears clouding my eyes and the agony in my side, but my forlorn misgivings were mistaken as the Suit backed away from the blow and made ready to take her down, but she had other plans as she immediately dropped to the ground, sweeping his feet out from under him and laying the bastard low.
She had time for only one good blow, a quick kick to the man's ribs before the others were on to her. There must have been some serious emotion behind that kick or that the girl new more about breaking the rules than I did because that quick rib check of hers sent the enemy skidding into the nearest concrete wall, putting a good size dent in its foundation.
Either I was going delusional or the girl just had skill, but skill just wasn't enough in this case as the other two reached her, one grabbing her arms while his co-part rained down punches on her at impossible speeds only to back hand her into the other waiting darkly dressed form, who had made an amazing recovery from his visit from the wall, for a well placed kick that sent her hard to her knees as I watched, helpless, from the sideline.
I had never gotten a good look at them at Maya's place, so I could never make a guess as to their numbers, but the three business men just didn't seem like they would have the strength to do what they had just done to me and the way they held the girl up as if they were about to ...
"No!" My horse scream stopped them in their tracks as they each turned those blank shaded gazes my way and off of the young women they held over their heads preparing to break her back. I had no doubts that her spine would snap instantly like a helpless technician's will while trying to explain to the Commander why Unit 01 wouldn't be ready in time for the next Angel attack.
"I won't let you harm her! I won't let you hurt anyone again!"
I must have looked a sorry sight stuck up there on that wall, blood flowing freely on my lips, dust coating my wet clothes, screaming down defiance's like I could actually do anything to stop them from killing her and then starting in on me.
But I was to be damned if I was just going to just sit there... stick... or whatever and just do nothing. 'At least I can give her time to get away.' I thought as the men tossed the girl to the street corner with all the enthusiasm of a garbage man tossing a bag of rubbish into the truck.
Personally, I believed the garbage man would have done it with a bit more feeling than the almost lifeless demons that were stalking toward my way had.
"The other is one of the rebels."
"Yes, but she is not the original target."
"No, she is irrelevant."
"Only the target matters."
"Only his destruction matters."
"Only if he does not comply."
"He will be made to comply."
"He is after all..."
"... only human."
Hearing that little bit of commentary didn't really help my nerves as I struggled to get down and at least try to put up a fight this time. I wasn't even able to think of hitting them before, but I wouldn't stand idly this round and take their hits. I wasn't anyone's little toy to be played with.
Strange words coming from me, I know, but truthfully I was fed up with being used and abused by others. Even though I didn't show it, the strain of taking everyones crap weighed heavily on my conscious, the pressure building and building until unleashed, resulting in a brief and I stress brief, appearance of my assumed non-existent spine.
This was one of those instances.
What was even more strange was that in the face of my 'destruction' as one of the Agents had so eloquently put, I wasn't sure which one cause they all looked so similar, so uniform, like manufactured devils, something that Maya had said back at her place kept repeating itself in my head, blocking out the staggering fear boiling in my gut as my anger tried to replace it and the stabbing misery, the throbbing ache of my wound.
the Matrix itself is only there to bind us, restrict us...
It's a cage Shinji, the Matrix is a trap to imprison us behind daily routines, confined hours and convenient social beliefs. Its a prison for our minds."
'Bind me, restrict me... like father and Nerv, like this wall.'
If we knew what the Matrix was, we'd figure out how to use it, how to go beyond such heavy boundaries as oh.. I don't know, say gravity.
'Gravity...?'
"Gravity?" I said out loud, which only earned me a few weird looks from my soon to be tormentors. "Ah... yes. Gravity."
I'm not sure how it happened, or how it started, it just... did. But while I was there, stuck up there, alone and doomed, I began to see things... feel ... things that I shouldn't have been able to.
The code.
It kept flashing before my eyes, like someone flicking a light switch on and off in my head, changing my perception each time, connecting me deeper and deeper into the green tinged world that had driven me to the brink of insanity and was about to led me to my death.
But every time it flashed, I could feel more of my surroundings, more of my world... that moment was the first time that I began to think of the Matrix as 'My world, My domain.' There was power in those brief moments when the world turned into a computer programmers wet dream and any sane person's nightmare, a power that threatened to overwhelm me.
I had long since forgotten about the suited men. My entire being was lost in the unseen world that only I could see. And while I was there, I learned one thing. And it was simple. So very simple.
I didn't have to be bound.
I didn't have to be restricted.
I didn't have to be held back by anyone, for any reason, any longer.
And I... believed it.
The suits must have felt it, or seen it in my eyes. I wasn't sure, but truthfully, I really didn't care right then.
"Gravity..." it was all around, its code filtered around the walls, the street, the men, the girl... it framed my own code as well. The code, I had once tried to explain it to Maya before back at her place but it was too complex and I didn't really know where to began. So like I said early, I didn't know what the symbols meant, but I did understand them and if just barely, I knew that I could control it somehow.
The images in my head were very sure on that, if not clear as to how, though. But it didn't matter. I would just have to... improvise.
"Gravity..." I said again, and the force that had abandoned me earlier came back with tremendous power and swept the suits away and much of the wall that had held me with them.
Three heavy bodies slammed into the side of a black sedan that didn't seem so ominous anymore. That blow would have floored any normal person, but I knew those men were far from normal. Their code... their cold, lifeless, sterile ciphers, it disgusted me. Very little of it resembled anything close to being human and it showed in the way the spoke, in the way the moved, in the way acted. They were abominations and their continued existence was bothering the hell out of me.
So... I proceeded with the systematic 'destruction' of their souls... if they even had souls.
/WRW/
The flash of the thunder clouds drew me back to the present. My mind must have been on auto mode because I hadn't even realized how far I had gone since my brief lapse into the past. I was going to have to watch that if I was going to survive.
'Can't be caught in a daze like that again, Ikari. It could be the end of us.'
Us... I had been subconsciously speaking that way for sometime now unknowingly. What bothered me about it was that, there were times when the words in my head, were spoken in another voice other than my own, one that seemed hauntingly familiar that I just couldn't place. Maybe because it didn't just seem like one voice, but more of a collection of entities who were all of the same whole.
Weird... I know, but it was just like with the code before, I just didn't think about it for fear I would lose what little sanity I had left, a number that seemed to be getting exponentially smaller everyday now.
There was a flash and soon thunder sounded over the city as I strove to keep my internal rants just that... internal.
Currently I was on the roof of a series of buildings, a strip of some sort. I dimly remember traveling this way for some time after the alleyways had ended in nothing but wide open streets. There was no one out, it being so late as it was, but that was that. I'm not sure how I got on the roof, but the roof is where I ended up, but it was nothing more than a hazy memory now and parts of it seemed as if it belonged to someone else.
That was starting to get on my nerves. Not only did I have to deal with weirdos like the Agents after me but the continued onslaught of barely understood memories from a past that I never lived. I may be Asian but I didn't believe in reincarnation, so for those 'Zion' people to go and tell me that I'm some hero reborn again here to save to the world was completely out there.
It must have been those pills they kept taking. The blue ones no doubt and who the hell knew what the red one did.
Whatever. I had to get home. It had been two days since I ran out searching for Miss Ibuki and Misato was going to kick my ass back and forth around the apartment when she got her hands on me. I had seen her mad before and that was just because Pen Pen had stolen all of her beer that one time, even though the penguin was merely getting payback for that impromptu pinching session my purple haired Mistress had initiated. If she'd lose it over a few beer cans, what would she do about a missing pilot who hasn't been home in nearly three nights without a word.
Even after what I had just gone through, facing an angry Major Katsuragi was not something that I really wanted to get involved in.
But first, I needed to get off of this stupid roof.
The girl from before ... what was her name? Devine, I think it was. She had said that I could leap across buildings and I thought I heard someone say something about dodging bullets, but that had to have been a joke, I mean, come on... dodging bullets. That's crazy talk.
Then again, if I could jump buildings, why couldn't I dodge bullets.
That lady Trinity had nodded when I looked to her during all of that I guess in answer to my wordless question.
'Trinity... ' my thoughts on her were a bit jumbled and disjointed. I kept finding myself staring at her at odd times, but it was the feelings of love I got when I looked at her that got to me. I mean... I don't even know that word, love. It's like some fictional tale or a faint dream that makes no sense when you wake up, but whatever the reason I needed none of it.
And if it wasn't for that other thing... But I'm not going into that.
'That lady freaks me out a bit and she reminds me of my father. So cold, well, except to Devine, but she was her daughter after all. Still, that's got to be one strange family, but who am I to talk.' All thoughts of family died with that, any mention of father always had that effect.
The wind blew its delicate caresses against my pale skin, reminding me of the time. I needed to be off. But my mind continued to focus on the events of the past few days, their significance still heavily in my thoughts.
'Devine... she reminds me of Rei. And that girl Mana... what was her problem? At first she's all smiles and giggles but then she's like a viper snapping in my face. I swear between Asuka and her who needs enemies. The Angels can just sit back and watch.'
But enemies I did have. I had taken the Agents on before, but I wondered if I could do so again, or if that night had just been a fluke.
/WRW/ three nights prior
They were in the way. I didn't know what they were called then, only that they were the enemy and that they had to be taken care of or I would never get my life back.
I was back on that street corner, with the girl Devine. I didn't know her name then either, but that didn't matter. I was more focused on the suited men steadily rising from the ruins of their car.
'We always seem to attract the impossible enemies don't we. Angels, Agents... Asuka. I swear man.'
One of them, dusted himself off, as if being blown into a motor vehicle was just another part of his day's work. I took it as a lesson.
'These are not normal men. They will not go down easily. I should treat them like any Angel who's powers I don't know. Come on Ikari, lets make Misato proud and use what we've learned from our other battles. Sure they aren't 40 stories tall and can't level whole cities alone, but they are just as evil and they are definitely creatures from another world.' I thought to myself as I mentally prepared for the coming fight.
The rain had not stopped it's steady downpour since I had gotten off of the train to Maya's. Lightning flashed in the back as thunder screamed in its echo as the storm let its fury out onto Tokyo 3. Its plentiful droplets gaining weight and numbers while they began to fall heavily onto what men called the fortress city, seeming to cast the world into a fog of mist and shadow.
A perfect setting for a terrible night that the Agents seemed all to eager to exploit.
After they had straighten themselves out, their soaked clothes of no concern, they began to stalk back toward me, their dark shades boring hard into my core as they calmly prepared to take me on.
But I was calm as well. I might have thought it bizarre, but I held no fear toward those men, not then. Later perhaps, but not then. Right at that moment with the raging downpour beating against my unprotected self standing rebellious and bold in the face of my foe, I was the Invincible Shinji Ikari, designated pilot of Unit 01 and I was fully planning on showing the enemy what an Angel Slayer could do as I got into a readied stance that I half remembered from my brief episode in combat training so long ago along with some other barely remembered poses from the obscure sea of memories lost in my head.
The scene most have looked like one of those action movies that Kensuke and Toji had always dragged me to see, the hero standing defiantly against his many enemies as they circled about him, closing in for the kill.
It was the one to the right who started the whole mess. His slightly greased brown hair was the only significant difference I could discern him from the others as he threw a punch that served as a signal for the others to initiate their own attacks.
Dodging the brown haired man's punch was my first action, but out of the corner of my eye I saw the one to the left come in a for jab at my ribs while his friend in the middle was trying to kick my feet out from under me.
Time was an issue and I didn't have enough of it to dodge all of their blows individually, so I improvised by ducking the first punch while spinning off to the right around the brown guys fist, effectively getting out of range of the other's hits and giving me a chance for my own as I struck the fool who swung at me with a elbow to the back and gave the punk in the middle a sweeping kick to the face.
I didn't even know my leg could reach that high. This wasn't like with Eva and I could just imagine the mecha doing what I wanted it to do, this was my body and I was pretty sure that it had limits. That roundhouse to the other man's face and the speed of which I threw the four, no, five was it?... hits I gave to him before he was out of range were part of those limits.
It was almost as if it wasn't me fighting them, but the men didn't give me time to ponder that out as they came back harder as if my blows hadn't effected them. I was able to block three, I wasn't sure who's they were because of the seven or eight that did make it through and the fact that I was lying right next the girl from before some ways away from where I should have been took the chance to find out away from me.
Dimly I saw her skim away, dragging one of her legs along. It must have been injured, but the man lifting me off of the ground held most of my attention.
There was something about those shades of his that were bothering me. I didn't know what it was at the time, but I suspect it was that they reminded me of father or someone from my past about a similar man with dark shades, an ear piece and a sinister smirk, saying something about how I had 'set him free'
Whatever it was sparked a lose wire and a part of me from deep inside struck out against it. My knee shattering his grill, shades, cheek and jaw bones alike.
I had said that there was a power in the Matrix, and I meant every word. Gravity was my friend and I was going to use him to my best advantage.
The others were coming so just as my feet hit the pavement I clipped the man who held me's feet out from under him and did this amazing move that I'm still surprised about.
'Gravity.'
As the other two came in to press their attack and while I was still in the motion of finishing my clipping move I... I guess you could say I defied gravity or the Matrix... no... the real world. One minute I was on the ground the next I was in the air doing this spinning kick move at an odd angle at about half of the Agents height. . Now these were grown men and they were more than twice my height, like somewhere near 5.8, so I knew that actually jumping that high and at the angle the way I did it and the speed at which I did it was clearly impossible, but I didn't really care right then.
The fool in front was the first to catch one of my soaking sneakers in the face and a second in the chest. I must have given the blow an extra bit of force because it sent him and his friend who didn't have time to dodge out of the way right back into that battered car of theirs.
Right as they crashed through the side doors I landed just like that action hero from that movie. In my own green shaded world I felt the one behind me getting up, but I didn't give him time to as I did a sweeping back kick to his face that lifted him up, right in the path of my second roundhouse of the day.
His body flew in the opposite direction as his friends but with equal or more power as he impacted with the street while leaving a trail behind him, tearing deep furrows in the ground as asphalt caved in under the pressure of his passing.
I probably would have continued after them if the girl hadn't grabbed my arm and pulled me away at a lurching run.
"You can not beat them, even as you are now." Her soft voice was horse as she spoke, but her fierce glare told me not to argue as she lead me away.
"You sure about that. I'm pretty sure that they aren't going to get up for awhile." It was a cocky thing to say, considering who I was and who those men were. But I was new to all of this. I didn't know what an Agent was or what they were capable of. I wonder how I would have fared knowing that they had been seriously holding back in an attempt to capture me.
Hell, I probably would have shit my pants.
...sigh.
But the only answer I got from the mysterious girl was another frosty stare that effectively shut me up as we made or way to some unknown destination that she refused to tell.
/WRW/ the present
Misato's...
I thought about ringing the door bell, but that was probably a bad idea. Evidently, I had made it home, but just as before, I remembered none of it. The past had held my thoughts tightly in its grasp the whole trip there.
The steady downpour outside set the backdrop for the scene, playing an ancient tune that would continue on through the ages unchanged... if the world survived the war that is.
I stood there for some time, just trying to gather the courage to open the door. Even given what I had been through, I could not shake the feeling of dread the cold door held over me.
This was the first real home that I had ever known. To lose it would be a tremendous tragedy that I doubted I would ever be able to come back from. What would I do without Misato, Rei, and Hikari, Toji and Ken?
What would I do without Asuka?
'Asuka...'
It was my motto not to think about the brash German girl. Her enigma was just too strong for me. Every time I thought I understood a little about her, like quick sliver, she up'd and changed, usually leaving me stunned and dazed in a corner trying to figure out what just happened.
My feelings for her were just as jumbled and nearly as treacherous. There were times when I hated her and the very air she breathed and other times... I ... sigh. I didn't know what to think about with Asuka, so keeping her out of my thoughts had become standard procedure. Didn't always work, but well, it was my only defense.
Rei on the other hand had always been a stable mystery, a secure ambiguity with an acute vagueness that I had no hope of penetrating except for those brief moments when she would open up to give me a glimpse into her scarlet eyes and the almost innocent heart beneath.
Ayanami and Sohryu, two names that were, as far as I was concerned, synonymous with headaches, confusion, extreme blushes and trouble. But companionship followed, along with duty and understanding as well.
We each knew so very little about each other, yet somehow we were the only ones who 'could' understand one another.
No one every said the Matrix made sense. And it seemed the Real World was no different.
Yet in the end I was still stumped as my hand twitched, clinching and unclenching in time to my inward debate.
'I'm here aren't I. I might as well go in. It's not like I can run forever.'
'Yeah, but she's going to kill me. It's been two days since she's heard from us. Two days!'
'Who cares. If I don't go in now, when will I ever go in? And it's not like I can stay out here forever. Those Agents will find me eventually?'
'All the more reason to stay as far away as possible. What if they come for us while Asuka and Misato are home?'
'What if they do it while I'm not? Will it matter?'
My subconscious had no answer to that one. If I stayed, the girls might be in danger and if I left they could still be in danger and there would be no way for them to fight off the Agents. But maybe if I hung around, I could... could...
'What protect them? Ha! you can barely protect yourself, Ikari. And you're supposed to be special.'
...sigh.
Asuka and Misato they were special in their own right, but they weren't like me, they couldn't fight this evil and they knew not a thing about the Matrix. I knew barely anything at all but at least it was something.
I had to stay.
I had to...
"You going to stand there all night, or are you going in." a voice said from my left, shaking me out of my little reverie, but the quick glance to my left nearly gave me a heart attack.
"What! Aghh... M-Misato!" She was still in her Nerv uniform and looked bone tired, but the look in her eyes was anything but asleep.
"Well, well, well, you actually remember my name. I'm surprised seeing as I haven't seen you in a while. I would have thought we were strangers or something the way you've been acting of late, Mr. Ikari."
"It's not like that Misa..."
"No! You don't have the right to call me that anymore, Pilot! For here on out it's Major Katsuragi to you, do you understand?"
Slowly, I nodded my assent. The moment she called me pilot broke my heart, but another quick glance showed that Misato shared my pain. It must have hurt her, my leaving and all, without a phone call in the two whole days that I was away.
You'd think I'd been away for weeks on end from the way she was acting, but then again, you could say figuratively the way I had been so closed up in the past, I 'had' been away weeks on end.
...sigh.
There was nothing to do but go in and Misato... I mean the Major followed. She may have been mad at me, but it didn't matter in the larger scheme of things. I had to stay or else something worse might happen to them. And I couldn't let that happen. So I had to stay.
I had to...