III. Descent
Asuka descended to NERV for the first time in a month. They hadn't needed her all that time, her Eva was still being repaired. It was a miracle no angels came considering their timetable up until now.
As she rode the main elevator down, Asuka wondered to herself why she was doing this. There was no promise that the apparition Asuka witnessed was in fact Shinji. It may have been an Angel messing with her head, telling her what to believe.
That didn't feel right though. An Angel would have appeared as Kaji, someone far more agreeable than some idiot like Shinji.
And what to do about this claim that he liked her, no matter how sound his reasons for hesitation were?
One way or another she'd sort it out. She had something to do now, instead of sitting around in that trashed apartment waiting for someone to put her out of her misery.
The elevator announced it was in the base limits now, soon she'd be at the end of the line. She winced as she glared at the floor indicator.
"Okay Shinji." She uttered as the elevator clicked down into the depths of the earth. "I'm coming, hero."
Misato had watched the lines, cables, and connections attached to unit 01 grow more complicated over time. She had hoped with the complexity there would be more understanding of the stakes of recovering Shinji. That moment never came, leaving her isolated among the staffers trying to figure out the problem.
But it was better than going home to face an angry teenager that hated her. After her sole attempt to reach Asuka was flatly rejected, the woman stopped trying, mostly out of a sense of powerlessness. She had no idea how to reach Asuka, as if there was anything to the connection before she and Kaji hooked up again. The only consolation Misato had over the month on the base was the cheap beer stocked in some of the break rooms.
Misato looked out of the windows of the management office for this cage and down upon Evangelion 01. The entry plug had been ejected, anticipating a new recovery effort to reconstitute Shinji within the plug and into his plugsuit adrift in the capsule.
Ritsuko said from behind her then as the doctor worked at a console, "Seeing it through to the end, huh?"
"Something like that." Misato said.
Ritsuko said nothing else, keeping followup comments to herself. Maya interrupted her thinking just then. "Doctor? Fluctuations on the RRS charts are increasing."
Ritsuko wheeled her chair over to Maya's desk. "That's the third one. Put a track on it."
Misato asked over her shoulder, "Does that mean anything?"
"No." Ritsuko said. "It's a side effect of the S2 organ. We've been documenting it as it occurs, but otherwise it doesn't mean anything."
Misato didn't believe that answer, but she stayed quiet. Arms crossed she looked back out at the Evangelion and had to do a double take. "Asuka?"
The redhead, in her plugsuit, was walking along the nape gantry in front of the unit. Misato's first thought was wondering how she got through security, but she dismissed it as she remembered security was lifted days ago when the unit was proven dormant.
Her next thought was to wonder what Asuka was doing there.
Asuka stopped just beneath the jaw of the Evangelion. The last time she was this close to Shinji's unit was when the two of them crash landed after the synchronous dance. She didn't care much for the gaudy mask that adorned the face. Being this close though, unsettled her.
Hands on hips, she said to it, "All right Shinji, I'm here. Now what?"
The unit sat mute, staring down at her. Asuka glared back, waiting for some kind of sign. She grunted then and scratched her head. "Figures," she uttered, "I go stick my neck out for him and he leaves me hanging. What am I doing?"
Misato's voice carried down the gantry. "Asuka!" The redhead turned her head Misato approached. "What are you doing?"
Asuka turned to face Misato. Hundreds of excuses piled up behind her tongue were ready for launch; she wanted to gloat, she wanted to see Shinji's unit, she wanted to see this all for herself. Coming this far, though, she decided to skip any excuses and plough the truth as far as she could take it. "I'm here to rescue Shinji."
Misato cocked an eyebrow. She slowly crossed her arms, "Okay, and just how do you propose to do this? Go in there and get him?"
That thought hadn't occurred to Asuka, and was one she found repellant. Enter his unit? Debase herself on another Evangelion? But somehow the more she considered it, the more strange sense it made. She would have to go and get him. That meant following him.
She had to sell this idea to Misato since it seemed Asuka was Shinji's only hope. "That's exactly what I need to do. Is the entry plug ready?"
Misato blinked and shook her disbelieving head. "What makes you think you can just walk in here and take charge? Ritsuko has been working for a month to recover Shinji. Now you think you can do it? By yourself?"
Confidence, Asuka the girl thought. "Exactly. Put me in his Eva."
Misato laughed once. "What? No! This has gone far enough Asuka. Maybe being stuck in that apartment has driven you-"
She stopped then because alarms started to ring in the cages. Misato and Asuka looked around and saw technicians- and Ritsuko- running across the gantry to the back of the unit.
Misato and Asuka exchanged glances before running up to join them.
On the load platform, just under the heavily connected entry plug, Shinji's plugsuit floated on a stream of LCL. Misato and Ritsuko, along with the other technicians, watched in surprise and dismay as their work was undone.
But Asuka just stared at the plug, fists clenched, her mind made up. She was going to go get Shinji.
"Put me in there." She said and walked to the entry plug where Shinji was last seen.
It was surreal to board a Evangelion that wasn't her own. She could feel it, from the handholds to the seat pad to the surrounding walls. She told herself it was because this was a prototype. A Japanese unit. An inferior model.
But hers wasn't the Evangelion to eat an angel.
She swallowed her nervousness down as she sat in Shinji's chair and the plug hatch closed over her. Ritsuko had given hesitant approval for this operation only because there was literally nothing left. Expelling the original LCL obliterated the one operation plan she had on pilot recovery at this stage. And considering the Evangelion reacted to Asuka's presence and suggestion, they went along with it.
Asuka didn't know what she was doing, but she chose to be here when offered. Now she had to take whatever came at her. "Ready." She breathed in the plug.
Misato's voice said after a moment, "Good luck, Asuka."
The redhead adjusted her posture. She felt the familiar sensation of boarding an Eva- the entry plug ramming into the Evangelion and the LCL filling up. As it did she could smell Shinji's stink; the particular, nervous body odor she picked up from him even as far back as standing beside him on the carrier bridge. And now she was doing to rescue that confusing idiot.
"Prepare start-up sequence." Ritusko's voice said in her ears. "Begin."
Asuka clenched the handles. She had heard about the cross-synchronization tests, but was relieved to know she wouldn't be considered for them, and neither Shinji nor first would be put into her Evangelion. She had heard from Shinji that the two successfully cross-synched, but she always wondered- in spite of denying any interest- how she would have done. She was about to find out.
"Beginning phase 3 connections," Ritsuko said, "interlinking A10 connectors."
Asuka blinked and suddenly the world was dark. She was floating in the air, a soundless void surrounded her. She looked at the backs of her hands, spun them to the front. She moved, coming out of the reclined position to stand in… wherever this was.
"Misato?" She asked the void. "Doctor Akagi?"
Nothing. Only a quiet just of distant wind answered her. She clenched her fists. "Okay, Shinji. I'm here. Where are you?"
Asuka found herself again standing over First, in that fleeting chance to befriend Rei on her own terms at school. It felt like a dream… but a dream where she was aware, conscious.
As Rei stared at her book, she asked, "Who are you?"
"Asuka Soryu Langley, Second children." Asuka replied as she stood above her. "Now where's Shinji? I'm here to bring him back."
"How did you imagine you would accomplish that?" Rei replied. She turned a page, "Did you think you would be a hero by coming here to save him all by yourself? Why are you really here?"
Asuka blinked, back in her plugsuit and in the void. "What other reason do I need? That idiot got himself stuck here and said he needed my help. So I'm here to get him."
Rei, in her plugsuit, said, "You're really here to learn if his feelings were sincere when he confessed to you."
Asuka flinched. "What difference does that make?" She blasted defensively. "Either way I'm here to bring him out. Are you going to help me, or not?"
Asuka was sitting in a train, now, in the deep evening. She was looking into the almost setting sun on the horizon. Someone sat opposite of her, about half her size. A girl with ribbons holding up big pigtails. A vision of her when she found mama.
The girl asked, "Why do you want to help him? He's done so much to hurt you. He's taken away so much. Your dignity. Your sync ratio. Your first kiss. What has he offered you in return?"
"I don't know," Asuka said, averting her eyes. These were all very valid reasons to abandon Shinji.., but… she didn't want to. And that's not why she was here. "He cooks and cleans the apartment without me asking."
"Because I told him to do it." An image of Misato said, off-frame. "He does everything he's told to do. It's how he survives."
Asuka stared. "Misato didn't order him those other times."
Evangelion 01's arm plunged downward to seize Asuka in the lava.
She roused the other morning to find herself on his cot and Shinji sleeping a distance away. Her first thought was surprise she was there. The next was gratitude that the dork hadn't taken advantage of her during the night.
"I like you."
The little girl said, "He has disappointed you so many times though."
The door closed to Misato's room. Asuka's lips were pressed against his, waiting for something. Anything. She leaned in close, keenly aware that one zipper pull was all that was needed to free her breasts for him. He did nothing.
The little girl said, "So why do you help him? Why are you here? What does he mean to you?"
Asuka shook her head. "That's none of your business! That's between me and him!"
Rei, clad in the plugsuit, stared at her.
Now Asuka was sitting at the table in Misato's apartment. It was October.
Her fingers tapped on the table, idly. "Hey, Shinji," she said, "Do you want to kiss?"
Shinji looked up from his manga. Then he pulled his ear buds out to be certain he had heard her right. "What?"
"A kiss. A kiss! You've never kissed, right?" She asked, leaning up in the seat at the dining table.
Shinji shook his head in answer to her question. "No."
"Then let's kiss." Asuka said.
"Why?" He asked her.
"Because I'm bored." She replied.
He looked at her skeptically. "That's a terrible reason to kiss."
Asuka leaned back in the chair. "Not like theres anything else to do." She smirked wickedly, "or are you saying you're scared to kiss a pretty girl like me?"
"Im not scared!" He said and came to his feet, "Come on, pucker up!"
Asuka stood from the chair to join him. "Did you brush your teeth?"
"Yeah I did." Shinji said and came closer. "Are you ready?" He asked.
Standing less than a meter apart, she hesitated at his uncharacteristic boldness. "Okay, just a kiss, all right?"
"Do you want this or not?" Shinji replied, exasperated.
"Just setting the limits, Third!"
"Now whose scared?"
"Shut up and let's do it!"
Laughing, Shinji said, "Okay." And leaned in to grab her by the hips. Asuka swallowed as his face leaned in closer.
"Wait," she said, hesitating further. "S-Stop breathing through your nose, it tickles…"
"Stop giving excuses." Shinji uttered, then rammed his lips into hers. Asuka squirmed against the intrusion, and grunted again as his tongue breached her lips. She writes against him, hands coming up to his chest to gently push against him, but he only pulled her in further.
The scene froze. The lights clicked out, except for one spotlight illuminating the frozen couple, and one light illuminating Asuka in her plugsuit. "That's not Shinji. No way Shinji's that assertive, that's an imposter!"
Another spotlight clicked on. Rei, in her plugsuit. "This is the Shinji that you wanted that night in October. This is how that event would have begun with the Shinji you desired."
"No way! Shinji is more considerate! Gentle! I don't want this kind of Shinji!"
Rei smirked, "But you are unhappy with Shinji as he is in your life. What is it you want from him?"
Waves crashing on the beach, a placid scene.
"Is..is it so much to ask that the idiot be honest for once? Why does he have to be so indecisive? I want a straight answer for once about what HE wants! How does he see ME?"
Shinji, in his plain school outfit in the void, said, "I told you, I like you."
"And I've been flirting with you from day one, idiot! And you never did anything!" Asuka replied, "So now that you're on death's door, do you really want me, or are you just saying that to tell me what I want to hear so I can remember you fondly?"
Shinji blinked, astonished.
Rei, naked, winced as she frowned with disapproval.
Night, Misato's apartment. Asuka collapses into the cot. Shinji's eyes peek, then blast open at seeing Asuka face to face with him. Asuka frowned at him and stared angrily into his eyes as they lay there.
The SDAT player clicked complete.
Asuka took a breath, "How do I need to make it clearer to you, third, that I like you? You want a handmade invitation? A pat on the head? What do I need to get an honest answer out of you?"
His eyes stared at her with no expression. "Just be nice to me." He said.
"I am nice to you." She replied, and winced, "You think I dress the way I do at home for just anyone? You think I trust just anyone with my laundry or my meals? Why won't you read between the lines, Third?"
His eyes averted from hers. "Why couldn't you just… talk to me? Why do you have to be so abrasive and contradictory?"
"Idiot," Asuka said, "You realize half the time I'm angry is because of something you said? Go ahead and offer me one of those insincere apologies again. I know you don't actually mean them. If you did, you'd actually try to make things better." Her eyes moved away from his, "You'd show me you cared."
"...I do care… but… it's like I said, I don't want to mess up. I don't want you to be angry with me. I'd do… anything to keep you from being angry with me."
Shinji blinked. He was on the back of his Evangelion now with the entry plug ejected. It was a clear day, he was wearing his plugsuit.
The phone rang.
He opened the hatch and pulled out the phone. Before he could even speak, Asuka's voice blasted through, "Idiot! You're so afraid of failing at all that you won't try even once?!"
He looked around, and saw Asuka on the back of her unit. She spoke as her hologram did. "I can't count the number of times you've shot me down, but I keep trying because I'm dumb enough to believe you're interested in me when you tried to kiss me in the middle of the night! I almost gave up when you ignored me kissing you, but then you pulled this stunt!"
"D-does that mean you do like me too?" He asked hesitantly.
"God! Damnit! Yes Third-" her holo smacked him in the head, "I do like you too, okay!? I can't believe it's taken following you into a hallucinated reality for you to understand that!"
In her plugsuit within the void, she said, "I'll make it easy for you." She reached down and gradually picked up the futon mattress off the ground in front of an astonished Shinji, and carried it into Misato's room. There she dropped it ceremoniously, then closed the door behind her with a foot.
She took off the bra she had been wearing, then dropped to the futon on all fours and opened the door. Her stolen yellow shirt hung loose as it did before. Then she slid open the door,
She said to him, "if you want my help getting out of the Eva, do something you should have done the right way a long time ago. No hesitation, no more chances. I'll have all of you, or nothing at all. Either stay there, or open this door and come to me."
She slammed Misato's door shut and waited. Her head held up for a moment, then bowed as she took a breath and thought about what could happen.
She said it.
Coming here she hadn't realized the extent of her feelings for Shinji, but she couldn't deny her zeal in pushing for him to reveal his, and the emotion she felt when he confessed in the apartment. Now she had come all this way, and in spite of what she said earlier, Asuka couldn't deny how she felt. She DID want the sincerity of his feelings. It made her anxious to know the answer.
She took another breath, about to give up, when the door cracked open and light bled into the room. Hesitantly, Shinji stepped into the room, one foot after the other, and stood just inside the doorway. She looked up at him. He looked down at her.
She shifted on the bed and lay on her back, scooting on to the cot that she had laid down. "Well, come in." She said softly.
Shinji swallowed and closed the door behind him. In the dark he came down onto the cot, where Asuka pulled him on top of her. He was shivering slightly. "Nerves?" She asked him.
"S-s-sorry." He uttered.
"Just don't talk." She replied gently, wrapping both arms and legs around him to pin him to her.
His hand in hers, she took steps in the darkness in the direction she thought she needed to go. She glanced back and saw Shinji there, also in his plugsuit, eyes bouncing upward from her back to her own eyes. He smiled a little. She smiled back, a rarity for a moment like this, but one that gave him some reassurance.
FEHLER FEHLER FEHLER FEHLER FEHLER FEHLER FEHLER FEHLER
Both of them were in the red plugsuits, inside unit 02 for the first time again.
Shinji, confused, asked, "W-What's happening?"
Asuka blinked twice, but leaned into where she was and what was happening. She re-gripped the handles. "Hell if I know. My guess is your Eva isn't going to let you go without a fight. Didn't you say something about your mother wanting you to join her?"
Shinji blinked, confused, "Did…did I say that? I can't remember…"
"Nevermind!" Asuka replied, "If this is what we're given, let's do what we did before. Evangelion, launch!"
As before in the real world, the massive red Evangelion punched through the flimsy yellow tarp which protected it on the deck of the Othello. Through the water, the streak of the attacking angel snaked towards the transport.
Evangelion 02 jumped out of the boat just before it was destroyed. Asuka hopscotched through the fleet, landing again on the deck of the Over the Rainbow and causing jets and planes to fall off the deck.
Asuka was hitching the power cable to the Evangelion as the radio announced from Misato, "Target closing in fast!"
Shinji, coming up beside her in the cockpit seat, asked, "Are you really sure that's my mother out there? Why… would would she…?"
"No time!" Asuka replied and deployed the Progressive knife. The red blade hummed in the hands of the Evangelion as Asuka waited for the Angel- presumably the thing they had to defeat- to appear.
Only it wasn't the fish Angel to emerge from the water. Instead, to the astonishment and horror of both of them, an oversized demonic form of Evangelion 01 breached the water. "What!?" Both kids asked as a massive, sinewy red arm seized unit 02.
The monstrous form brought the insignificant red Evangelion up to its jaws, then the jaws quickly snapped over it, biting down on the Evangelion's chest and head. The kids screamed as the demonic Eva bit down hard, shaking both of them in the cockpit.
Asuka uttered over Shinji's torso, "This is great. Now what? If this is a metaphor, how do we fight it?"
Shinji was serious in the cockpit. "She has to let me go."
"Well, duh." Asuka replied, "How do we get her to do that?"
Shinji hesitated, then said, "I need to do it."
"You do? Then what did I come all this way for?"
Shinji, beneath her but sharing the control hand-holds, uttered, "I couldn't do this without you here. It's… It's easier." Shinji couldn't see Asuka blushing, but he did notice her lack of a retort. Shifting his gloved hands under hers on the handles, he said, "Mother, let me go!"
Rei stood before them in her plugsuit. "You cannot change what is now preordained. Evangelion 01 will be used for the ritual. Your place is here in this Evangelion, ready to intercept SEELE when they attempt to launch instrumentality."
Shinji was standing in front, Asuka just behind him. His balled fists were at his sides. "But I want to see everyone again! I want to exist, be in the world! Try again!"
Rei said, "Your father will have you in chains for what you have done." Her head lowered, "You will no longer be free. You will be a tool for his use, when the time is right." A naked Rei now smiled, "You are safer here. With me. Together we can prepare to thwart SEELE and your father. Together we can save the world."
Shinji didn't answer immediately, but his fists shook some. Asuka looked at him as he said, "My… My father? What does my father have planned?"
"He is taking a big risk with instrumentality for a selfish outcome." Rei replied, "He is preparing to upset my plans."
Asuka stepped forward then. "Wait, your plans? Who are you?"
In the blink of an eye, Ayanami was replaced with a tall woman- clearly now, a much older version of Rei. She wore a white labcoat and purple turtleneck. Both teenagers were agape at the appearance of the woman. Shinji uttered, "M-Mother…"
"Shinji." The woman said, "If you leave, I will no longer be able to protect you. The S2 gives me tremendous power, but it is too easily used for the wrong reasons. Instrumentality now has the trigger. All that remains are the last of the Angels to die, and the conditions will be ready for Instrumentality." Her eyes narrowed, "If it is is not launched perfectly, the human race will die. If I cannot save all of them, the least I can do is save you."
Shinji shook his head a little. "W-What about Asuka? And Misato and… everyone else?"
"Asuka can remain here." Yui said without looking at the redhead, "But everyone else I cannot save. You cannot save them, either. Your only choice is to remain here with me, where it's safe. Where I can protect you."
Shinji didn't answer for a moment, only quietly uttered, "Is… is this true…?"
Asuka looked between the boy and his mother. She didn't understand what was going on, but that didn't matter. "No." She said, coming around Shinji, "He's coming with me."
Yui's eyes went from Shinji to the girl. The gaze was cold. "And what makes you think you have any power of decision here?"
Asuka blinked, swallowed, and took two breaths before she said, "Because I want him. I want him to come back with me."
Yui shook her head slowly. "You're making just as selfish of a decision as the commander is. You would steal the life of one boy and condemn millions? This is the only way to ensure instrumentality is foiled." She winced, "Or were you not listening just now?"
"Then we'll find some way to stop it." Asuka said, "Or change it. Or do something. But he can't do any good stuck in the eva unit. He comes with me, and we have a chance to change things."
Yui winced. "You have even less power than Shinji does." her face raised a degree, "You barely amount to any significance for what is to come. You were always the spare pilot wuth the spare Evangelion. The first to fall if needed."
"Well, fuck you too." Asuka replied, "Because this 'spare' is leaving with Shinji. And that's final."
Shinji sputtered from behind her, "U-Um… can't we at least think about this?"
"No. This isn't something for debate." Asuka replied and whirled to Shinji. Her eyes locked on his. "When I told you I'll have all of you, it meant no compromises with anyone else." She crossed her arms, "If YOU want to stay, that's different. But I thought you already decided to come with me when you crossed that door."
Shinji's face crunched with conflicted feelings. After a couple of seconds, he realized what Asuka was saying, and resolve dawned on his face. He looked up at her. "I… I'm leaving."
Asuka smiled. Yui frowned, then took in a breath and sighed, "This is the last time I'll be able to see you, Shinji. You'll be on your own."
Shinji took a couple of steps to stand beside Asuka. "I… I think that's okay mother. I think… I think… I think I want to try. I think I'm ready to try."
Yui stared at her son for a moment more. Then she smiled a little. "We'll see." She looked at Asuka then, and said, "Be kind to him."
The neck door on Evangelion 01 opened and the Entry Plug ejected. It rolled out of the purple body, came to a stop, and the top door popped open. LCL gushed out of it for the second time, spilling out all over the deck.
Sirens and alarms were ringing and the deck hands swarmed towards the plug. Misato and Ritsuko were in that number, coming up next to the white entry plug and slowing to a stop.
Asuka braced a foot against rim of the door and heaved, half-carrying a plugsuit-clad Shinji out of the entry plug. They both landed on the deck, before Asuka bowed down to land on a knee. The technicians were on them quickly.
Misato let out a long held breath, and uttered, "I can't believe it, she did it. She got him."