AN: Mea culpa, mea culpa, mea culpa maxima.
This chapter did not come off easily, and without steadfast support from Cheerful_Clatter, 24karatDVNO, and Arwen_Hermione from over at A03 it might well take weeks longer yet. As it is, I am as close to happy with it as I am probably ever going to be. So here it is.
I may take more than two weeks coming with the next main story chapter, as I am currently taking stock of what is written and shaping the main narrative going forward, somewhere in the madness there is a plan to it, but I have to take a stock of it. But as I have ideas for the companion story that do not require any big decisions to write. You should consider checking Shinji Ikari Dokumentation Project if you get bored waiting and/or also enjoy stories that come closer to canon.
Many thanks for sticking with the story so far, and I hope you will continue enjoying this chapter and the chapters to come.
Lastly, there is a reason for Asuka calling herself inquisitor in the previous chapter, as ever I try to not be needlessly heavy on horror like details, but I can not guarantee I did a good enough job for everybody.
That being out of way, dig in, Enjoy, and leave a comment if you feel like it any CC will be heartily appreciated.
Suite No.5,02 Guess Who's Coming to Dinner
Ritsuko realised something was very, very wrong with her invite to a dinner at Katsuragi's when, instead of a prepared dinner table, she found all three pilots. Her senses went 'Wrong, wrong, wrong!' at that.
But nowhere near enough.
And nowhere near as much as when she saw Ayanami's medication instead of a dinner and a notepad with a few pens laying around.
And when Sohryu closed and locked the door, Ritsuko realised she probably should have left while she had the choice. 'But I'll be damned if I end up being ordered around by three teenagers!' she thought before turning directly to Shinji.
"What is the meaning of this, Shinji? If it's Misato's idea of a joke, it's even worse than the jokes she pulled in college!"
-x-
Forty minutes later
-x-
Shinji's head hurt - a lot. They had tried to be civil about it at first, but all that civility had gotten them was scalding remarks and promises of punishment once Misato and Commander Ikari heard about this.
Then Asuka told Ritsuko to shut up, she put the selection of chilli peppers on the kitchen table and started going over them in order of spiciness.
"And see this? This is the chocolate habanero, probably the last one here that counts as a seasoning and not a bioweapon." She smiled, or bared her teeth, really - not even Shinji would call that a smile.
Ritsuko scoffed. "Are you going to feed that to me?" She was trying really hard to sound undisturbed, and was almost succeeding at it. She was almost sure that, between Shinji having the backbone of a limp noodle in a wet towel and Rei being conditioned for a decade to obey her every order, she should still have a few aces up her sleeve - but the way Asuka refused to care so far unnerved her.
Asuka shook her head. "No, that's what Misato usually adds to her curry. We improved it - so care to talk, or care to eat?"
Ritsuko cared for neither - this had to stop, and one person in the room could make it stop. This insubordination from Pilot Sohryu could be dealt with later… as displeased as Commander Ikari would likely be to have to ground one of his best fighters.
She turned to Rei. "Ayanami, I am leaving, so open the bloody door, now!" she announced and got up.
She felt her jaw drop when Rei refused to move from where she was leaning against the door ever since Asuka had locked it. "Ayanami, I gave you an order!" she almost managed in an even voice.
Rei looked at her and gave a slight nod. Even that little gesture felt wrong to Ritsuko now, since Rei did not do body language. 'But she would sure as hell acknowledge the order verbally and open the bloody door!'
Ritsuko made a few steps towards the door and yelped as something, a beak of all things, a damn sharp one too, hit her knee. She almost kicked the penguin on reflex but stopped before making any sudden moves. Right now she was not in a position to afford to kick any of Misato's pets, be they penguins or pilots…
And as if to hammer that point home, Rei said: "I heard and acknowledged your order, doctor. But you are not the one who has authority here, Major Katsuragi is, followed by her pilot Ikari, followed by pilot Sohryu, me, and Pen-Pen." She explained it as if the head scientist at NERV, number three in the entire chain of command, being outranked by a crested penguin was the most natural thing in the world.
Getting nowhere with this, Ritsuko tried Shinji's better nature next: "Shinji, this is wrong, you know that!" She thought to remind him of Misato, but Misato must have agreed to at least some of this, even if most of it had to be Asuka's doing.
Shinji nodded but made no move for the door. "It is, Doctor, but is it really any worse than what you and Commander did to Rei?"
Ritsuko scrambled to throw back a remark, but she found she had nothing. 'No, this is not worse… not yet,' she thought, slowly making her way back to the table and sitting down.
She would have to drag this out as long as she could without giving the real important intel, Ritsuko realised. She would have to hold her ground until a sane person - or, in absence of that, Misato - showed up and ended this. She took out her cigarettes and was about to light one when two things happened in very quick succession.
Rei frowned. 'Since when does she-' Ritsuko never finished the thought, because the cigarette got snatched from her mouth by Shinji. He gave her a hard disapproving stare that had more than a little of the scathing quality his father could bring out at a mere whim.
Asuka sneered: "Asserting dominance, or are you already nervous, Doctor?" The redhead leaned across the table and looked at Ritsuko like she herself would look at a particularly interesting sample of Angel tissue.
Ritsuko tried to match her sneer like for like and snarled, "Do your worst, kids!"
Asuka reclined in her chair and nodded. "Unless you start talking, we will!" She turned to Shinji: "Practical Ikari, bring her the curry, and make sure it is hot."
Shinji leapt up and made for the stove to bring the pot. Ritsuko almost rolled her eyes at the title. "Playing at inquisitors? You have too many good teeth for that to work."
She could not help but shudder when Asuka placed eating sticks in front of her and said: "We have the whole night and a whole pot of Trinidad Scorpion curry to find out."
When Shinji brought the curry and a bottle of milk with a glass, Asuka served Ritsuko a proper portion of the curry and pushed the bowl to her.
"So here are the rules: We ask, you answer, if you don't, you eat, if you don't eat, we feed you, and if you lie about something we already know, you eat a whole pepper, fresh… All 1,400,000 SCU of it."
'She is serious, and mad, just like her blasted mother!' Ritsuko realised she was scared as she watched Asuka take out a bottle with green pills at random and read the instructions: "Half a pill twice a day with evening meal and with breakfast, do not eat for an hour afterwards." She stuck the etiquette in front of Ritsuko. "Content? Strength? Purpose? Now!" she barked.
-x-
two hours later
-x-
Rei pushed a glass half full of milk towards the doctor. "Drink!" she said curtly. She was seated with the others around the table as it was clear Ritsuko wouldn't be hightailing it any time soon given the state she was in.
Dr Akagi did so, taking her time now, savouring the milk and sighing as it took the worst burning pain away.
The glass got snatched from her hand before she could finish drinking and she tried, with pitiful results, to glare at the thief - only to be surprised it was Shinji this time. Before that, Asuka had always been the one to snatch the relief away and ask further questions.
"Why was Rei staying in that place?" he asked in a tone that Ritsuko recognised from hearing him talking in battles against Angels. She cursed herself, not for the first time, for asking him to deliver the renewed ID.
But that was not her call, it was the Commander's… in fact, the more she thought about it, in the rare pauses between the incessant burning and incessant questions, the more of her current predicament was the result of her following Gendo's orders to the letter. Even now, she was giving out his secrets as slowly and as unhelpfully as she could. But she was, and she shuddered when she thought of her one attempt to give a piece of made-up information.
If Gendo had a problem with that, tough. He did not force-feed her Chilli Peppers from Hell, but he might as well have. 'He sure as hell isn't here to sweep in and save my ass!'
She was brought out of her contemplation by a fist hitting the table. "Practical Ikari asked a question, Akagi! Use your mouth for talking, or use it for eating!" snarled Asuka, taking another pepper out of the whole sack of them that was laying on the table.
"Commander's Orders!" almost yelled out Ritsuko, eyeing Asuka as she cut the pepper into neat bite-sized slices.
"Do you always follow the Commander's orders without question, Akagi?" Asuka cocked her eyebrow. They had already established that that was not the case.
Ritsuko spat: "I followed that one without a question because I did not give a fuck about where he stores Ayanami! Happy now, Inquisitor?"
"For now," said Asuka, picking one of the few remaining bottles. "For pain, use only as necessary - but I don't need you to identify that one; I know Vicodin when I see it. Pray tell, Doktor: why would a healthy teen need that high a dosage of Vic in the last month alone?!" She flung herself forward and slapped Ritsuko hard enough that she would have fallen off her chair if not for Rei catching her. At the same time, Ritsuko realised that nobody had called her a doctor since they started really working on her, not even Rei.
She almost spat: "Because this cocktail nearly shot her liver, heart, and whatnot - I thought she would not enjoy horrific pain!" But she stopped herself.
First, that might push Asuka over even the few remaining restraints she so far showed to her. Second, if she was completely frank with herself, she prescribed the opiate so Rei would not complain about the pain until it was time for her to be replaced by Rei III. Third, if she told them that, she might just as well go straight to her office, pull up the gun from the drawer and blow her amazing brain out!
"I would also like to ask about the reason for the pain I am experiencing in recent weeks, Doctor. I have not been wounded or sick since the third Angel attack."
The change from Practical Ayanami back to Patient Ayanami derailed Ritsuko. For a moment, she thought about what she should tell the young pilot, none of her seminars included: "How do you tell a clone that their current body is ceasing operations and you have to technically kill them in a few months?"
She was not getting away without an answer and she was not chewing another of those hellish things. But if she told them, she was signing her own death warrant…
Asuka pushed the cutting board across the table. "Last Chance, Akagi. Talk or eat, and we WILL feed you if you refuse." Then she leaned in and whispered: "And we will learn what this combo of pills does to a human - you can tell us, that's the simplest, but not the only way."
Ritsuko did not need her vivid imagination to think of at least two ways Asuka could do that - and to Ritsuko, the only difference between the first and the second was that if Rei's medication turned up for analysis in an independent lab she might possibly die in less pain than if Asuka mixed her the Ayanami cocktail. She would never persuade Gendo that the leak did not come from her office. Dr Ritsuko Akagi realised that her death warrant was already as good as sealed. But, sure as hell, she was not going down alone…
-x-
Friday, close to Midnight, Katsuragi household
-x-
Misato did not know what to expect when she got home that night - she just hoped for no dead bodies and at least some answers. She stepped over the threshold and tossed her jacket on the rack, quickly taking the stock of the place as she did so.
'One doctor, alive, three pilots, alive, a penguin, alive,' she counted and let out a breath she did not know she was holding. She looked her friend in the eyes: despite being furious with Ritsuko over her secrets, it still stung to see her this hurt.
She caught Ritsuko's eyes and saw fury and betrayal, but also hope, mixed in one expression. "Took the hard way?" she asked.
"The hard way?" Ritsuko said with disbelief "How could you let that little banshee do this to me?" It came out less as an accusation and more like pleading, but she still got up and crossed the room, putting Misato between Asuka and herself.
Misato turned to her: "How could you treat a child like that? Even if you only neglected your responsibilities, you realise one reason why I never dig into where Rei lives is that I thought you were taking care of her?" Ritsuko took an unwilling step back and did not quite meet Misato's stare.
Her best friend crossed the distance between them and got a hold of Ritsuko's hand: "You are lucky, in very many ways, that I failed my duty too, and that you have not hurt Shinji and Asuka at all. You have earned this and I have earned that; I feel like an absolute piece of shit about orchestrating this and even more so about my role in all that," she finished, pointing to the pills on the table.
"So should we all just form a circular firing squad because there is enough guilt to damn us all?" asked the scientist with a trace of her usual wit.
Misato nodded, and handed the scientist a beer: "We could do that, or you can help me to unfuck this whole mess. As much as we can, and I can forget about your part in it when this goes to court." She could almost physically feel Asuka and Shinji's stares in the back of her head as she sighed and leaned against the wall.
She vividly recalled the previous day's discussion and how Asuka went ballistic after she laid down the law that Ritsuko must not be seriously hurt, whatever they happened to learn.
-x-
Thursday evening, Katsuragi household
-x-
"You can't be serious about that, that bitch doktor!" Asuka had at least the decency to stop for a moment when Misato gave her a hard stare. "Sorry… that witch doktor treats Rei like that for years, and you want to give her a second chance?!"
Misato massaged her temple, nursing the migraine she had fought for the last week: "Yes, first she did not decide it, and second, if she hadn't done it, someone else would - possibly someone incompetent who might actually kill Rei by accident, damnit! Third, she is our current best lead to the people who decided it, the Commander and the rest, and trust me: when we get to them, they won't get to make a deal!"
"Finally, if you want to help Rei, then you need Ritsuko. She has been working with Rei for a decade. Even if you got another scientist of her calibre to do it, they would start from nothing and without ever getting access to most of what they would need to help Rei properly. How likely is she to help if she knows we will turn her in, to the law, or worse?"
Misato switched her gaze between Asuka and Shinji: one was just a hair short of going ballistic, while the other rigidly set with their shoulders squared - and no guesses who was doing which. It was not the first time she had seen Shinji in his battle trance, but it was the first time she was not on the other side of the live camera feed and locked safely in a Pribnow box. He almost scared her more than Asuka did.
"And one last thing: I owe it to Ritsuko to hear her out before I make my decision about what to do with her. No Asuka, I do not care, you can hate her, Shinji can hate her, Rei can too. But she has been my best friend for a decade." Misato almost curled on the couch. 'I need to take a painkiller, go to bed and wake up into a world where my boss is not a Bond villain, and my best friend is not his pet mad scientist,' she thought as she looked Shinji in the eyes.
She smiled a tiny bit when she saw him brushing his fingers over Asuka's in a way he must have thought inconspicuous - on a happier day she would tease them mercilessly, but this was not a happier day.
Eventually, Shinji gave her a nod. Asuka flung her hair in exasperation, but conceded the point: "You make sense, I guess, but don't expect me to cut her any slack, any more slack, on that count!"
That was good enough for Misato, good enough to push forward one hour at a time.
-x-
Saturday, Two AM, NERV apartment complex, underground garages
-x-
"So after all this, you just drive me home because I am not in a state to go home by myself after what your pet Gestapo did?" Ritsuko asked suspiciously after they had boarded Misato's Alpine and Misato started the engine.
She gave a non-committal answer and negotiated the passage out before speeding off from the complex.
Ritsuko grew more nervous with each turn that brought them further away from her apartment building and closer to that place. She managed to hide that behind her sheer will, and the knowledge that Misato could not hurt her if she was at all serious about helping Ayanami.
Instead, when Misato pulled over at Rei's place, Ritsuko said: "Charming, don't leave anything in the car, and pray you'll find at least the stripped body in the morning."
When Misato got out, Ritsuko reluctantly followed. She shuddered, and it was not only from the cold air around. Instinctively, she kept close to Misato: she might be in her bad books right now, but at least Misato was not going to murder her or worse for the content of her purse. She tried several times to ask what was this all about, but the only thing Misato would say was to follow her and that Ritsuko was perfectly safe.
They made their way in almost perfect silence and Ritsuko realised that they were on the way to Rei's storage - no, she could not call it an apartment after seeing the pictures.
As for just what Misato was about to do, barring the outlandish option that she had been "taken out for a ride" after all, she had no idea. Not until they got into the apartment and Misato barred the door with a heavy beam before lighting the room.
Ritsuko spotted a pair of sleeping bags, some reassuringly bland-looking fast food and two six-packs of beer.
Misato sat on one sleeping bag and opened a can, offering it to Ritsuko. "So why are we here?" she asked while she popped open a second can for herself. "Because I wanted you to get a feel for how Rei was living. It is still nothing like what she did, it is only for a day, you'll get better food, and you are safe because I am here. But it is something."
Ritsuko drank the beer eagerly; it failed to entirely splash the burning from her mouth, but it was better than nothing. She nodded, being honestly too fucking tired, too fucking sore, and too fucking pissed for conversation if she did not have to speak.
"And also because I swept the place from the bugs, so we can talk about how we fix this. But first: Ritsuko, this is not an apology. I don't think you deserve one, yet. And Rei absolutely needed you to talk. But I regret it had to come to this; if I knew a better way..."
Ritsuko was half a heartbeat from scoffing, "you could have asked," but then she realised that she would not have voluntarily told Misato a third of what Asuka extracted from her.
Ritsuko sat on the remaining sleeping bag and finished her beer. "And I regret keeping you in the dark. Me having reasons for that, and trust me I have my reasons, is not the same as it being right" It surprised Ritsuko that she really felt that way. 'Sisters before misters, right Rits?' she thought with a wry smile.
