Of course the train wasn't on time.

Leave it to Misato to spend the entire week packing her things and worrying about making a good impression, only to be an hour late to the meeting with the poor guy they'd sent to pick her up. Her father had sent her a notification letter summoning her to his research lab in Tokyo-3, and he'd attached the profile of the employee she was supposed to meet with; that Ikari Shinji seemed like quite the serious type, if his uniform-clad photo ID was anything to go by, and she'd hate to inconvenience him on her very first day.

The train doors finally opened, letting a flood of passengers out at once, and Misato stepped out last, suitcase at hand, waiting for the crowd to dissolve a bit so she could start looking for her pickup to NERV headquarters. She eventually spotted him, standing just outside the gated exit and looking nearly as lost as she did, and she waved at him, hoping she had the right guy; he waved back, and a wave of relief washed over her as she made her way out of the station.

"Major Ikari Shinji," he introduced himself, leading the way to the parking lot. "And you're Katsuragi Misato, right? Commander Katsuragi's daughter."

"That's me." She followed him on the run-down street, kicking up gravel with her sneakers and the wheels of her trolley. "Ikari-san, I'm sorry I made you wait here so long, the train was late–"

He cut her apology short with a noncommittal wave, and took her suitcase to load it in the trunk of a steel-gray car. "Just Shinji's fine, Ikari-san just sounds like my father," he chuckled, opening the door for her before getting in from his side and revving up the engine. "Don't worry about the wait either, by the way, the railroad around here is always under maintenance for one reason or the other."

She got in the car, a vintage-looking BMW with leather seats and a somewhat ill-fitting digital interface on the dashboard, entirely too modern for its illusion of old age. "I like your car," she commented, and he made a shy smile.

"This old thing?" He gestured at it, his arm on the back of the seat as he moved out of the parking lot with practiced effortlessness. "It was a gift from an old friend, she got it for me in Germany."

"You must have very good friends for them to gift you a BMW, Shinji-san," she quipped, getting a chuckle out of him. She turned towards him as he was driving, taking in his near-military posture and the mechanical way his hands gripped the steering wheel; his eyes were fixed on the road, but they seemed clouded with thought, and she wondered what was stirring inside his head.

He seemed to light up as he remembered what he was supposed to ask her. "Your father sent you your summons, right?" She nodded, pulling out the letter from her backpack; he took a glance at it when the road was clear, careful not to get distracted, and handed her an ID card with her picture and information on it and a thick pamphlet, which carried the words NERV – Classified information and the United Nations logo on its front. "Here, have a look at this in the meantime: it's just a summary of our activity here at NERV, but it should suffice before you get the full rundown."

The booklet was laden with jargon, and Misato was barely able to get through the first few pages before abandoning any hopes of understanding it on her own. "Shinji-san, are you sure I'm meant to be reading this? It all sounds a bit… incomprehensible, so to say."

He let out a laugh, and gave her a sympathetic look. "Incomprehensible, huh? Don't worry, I get it, I was practically raised around NERV and I still needed to have someone explain to me what all of that meant when I got hired."

He made a sharp turn into a corner street that made Misato hold on to the edge of her seat, and a steel-coated tunnel opened before them, its gates marked with the same red leaf logo that appeared as part of the NERV insignia in all the documents she'd been shown so far. "In short, NERV was created after Second Impact as an organization tasked with researching its causes and preventing a Third Impact from ever happening; it's what all of Commander Katsuragi's work is aimed towards, and what we're going to need you for as well, if you're still willing to help."

She nodded along with the explanation, but her expression soured at the mention of the man who shared her surname. "My father–" The word stirred in her mouth like a bitter medicine she couldn't swallow. "Are we going to meet him?" It was pointless to assume otherwise, but she didn't know if she could bear to face him again, not when the last time they'd seen each other had been at her mother's funeral, all those years ago.

"Yes, who knows, we might even catch him in his office today," he replied, quickly picking up on her mood and furrowing his brow. "I gather you two don't have the best relationship, if I'm not overstepping."

She looked down and fidgeted with her hands, black hair falling on her face like a curtain between her and the rest of the world. "I haven't seen him since I ran away from home, and that was some four years ago," she muttered, bracing herself for the usual appalled reaction that the thought of a ten-year-old running away tended to give to most people.

The reaction didn't come; Misato glanced up from her lap to see him nodding, and even in the darkness of the tunnel she was able to make out the slightest of smiles on his face. "I see," was all he said, before going quiet for a bit. "I ran away too, you know, when I was about the age you are now."

Her eyes grew wide, and she leaned back against the car seat, brushing the hair away from her face as she tried to picture Shinji at her age, turning his back on his childhood home. She had felt something resembling kinship to him before, but now that went even deeper: to know that they had shared that experience, no matter the reason or the context, only made her feel closer to him, though she'd only known him for what, an hour? All she hoped was that she would see him again, and that he wasn't just a lackey sent by her father to pick her up and then leave – not that she was anything but used to people leaving her unexpectedly. Heat rose to her cheeks. "Oh," she said, unwilling or incapable to express what that simple revelation meant to her. "It's nice to have that in common with someone, I guess."

Shinji's footsteps echoed loudly as he navigated the metal labyrinth of hallways inside the underground facility, Misato tagging close behind. Now that they were in his territory, he carried himself with a sort of placid assuredness that made her instinctively put her trust in him, reminded her of going up to the lab with her father as a child, back when he still cared enough to show her around.

The hallway ended abruptly, two glass doors separating it from what looked like an indoor swimming pool. Misato walked in after Shinji, marveling at the large hall where glass panes let in a cascade of light that would have seemed natural if it hadn't been underground; she vaguely remembered going to the ocean with her family on her father's rare days off and being taught how to swim, though she hadn't had the chance to do it since, but the pool seemed almost enticing.

The water's surface was rippled, as if someone had only recently come out of it; the door to an attached changing room creaked open, and out came a woman with damp-looking short hair and a towel in her hand. She tossed it inside a duffel bag and took a lab coat from the hanger, buttoning it up to cover her clothes before turning towards them inquisitively.

As she stepped closer to them with feather-light footsteps, Misato took notice of the odd colour of her hair, a periwinkle shade between light blue and purple; though it couldn't possibly be natural, she had almost perceived it as normal at first, with how nonchalantly the woman seemed to wear it. It suited her pale skin well, giving her an otherworldly appearance only accentuated by the stark white of the lab coat and her large crimson eyes.

"Ikari-kun, good to see you," she greeted him, and though her frame was much smaller than his he seemed to almost disappear, shrink himself to a fraction of his height in her presence. No emotion transpired through the woman's face, her gaze fixed on Shinji's, who was looking off to the side in a desperate attempt to avoid eye contact.

"Ayanami, this is the Child," Shinji said, his voice stilted. "Misato, this is the head researcher of our science department, Dr. Ayanami; she will be spending quite some time with you from now on, she is a vital part of our project."

Misato made a small bow, a courtesy smile on her lips. "It's a pleasure to meet you, Dr. Ayanami, I'm Katsuragi Misato," she introduced herself, and the woman looked down at her, tilting her head sideways with an analytical look on her face.

"The pleasure is mine, I have wanted to meet the long-awaited Third Child for a while now; Dr. Katsuragi is very happy to have you here, Misato." Her voice was soft and just polite enough to seem rehearsed, and it carried with it some new information: people had been awaiting her arrival; she was something called the Third Child, which implied the existence of two other Children employed at the facility; most importantly, her father was happy to have her around, and her heart skipped a beat at the thought.

"Commander Katsuragi," Shinji muttered under his breath, and Dr. Ayanami paid no attention to him. "Misato, I will need to take you for a physical exam, so we can evaluate what your starting levels are at rest before any formal testing begins; your father has an apartment assigned to your name, and Ikari-kun can take you there as soon as we are finished, which should not be too long."

Misato nodded, still unsure what sort of testing NERV needed her for; she hoped she could ask Dr. Ayanami about it during the examination, and that she would be as well-disposed to answering her as she was in greeting her. She led the way to the lab, Misato and Shinji trailing behind her along the underground maze of the headquarters; finally, the group halted in front of a large metal door at the dead end of a hallway, and she unlocked it with a swipe of her badge and a passcode.

Dr. Ayanami led Misato inside and closed the door on Shinji with a few words, leaving him to wait outside. The lab was spacious, a room larger than what seemed possible from the outside, with a small area to the side for what seemed like medical necessities and a lot more space dedicated to large machinery Misato couldn't recognize; it reminded her of her father's lab when he used to bring her over to see him hard at work, the lab where her mother had died, and she wondered if it still looked the same as that day, if he'd wanted to cut ties with his past to the point of changing anything about it.

She sat on the examination bed, kicking her legs back and forth as Dr. Ayanami took her vitals. "So, what sort of testing is being run here? Neither the convocation letter nor Shinji-san were able to give me much of an answer," she asked, looking around at the high ceilings and the unnervingly tall windows, which opened over a pitch black room.

Dr. Ayanami had her back turned to her as she replied, typing something up into a machine. "The purpose of our studies here is to research human neural pathways and how they translate to biomechanics," she explained, as if she'd had to repeat that sentence a thousand times before. "I'm a biologist, so that is where my focus lies, but you will find that our departments here are in strong cooperation, as we all need each other to further our goals."

She turned towards her, a small smile on her lips, and attached a few electrodes to her temples. "You and the other Children are instrumental to our latest project, studying the power of the human mind to control an automated object; of course, your selection was not quite random, Dr. Katsuragi actually requested that you be chosen among the list of available candidates."

Misato blinked a few times. First Dr. Ayanami had said her father was happy to have her there, then that he had chosen her to come specifically? This was the same man who had never taken any interest in her life or her accomplishments, the same man who had let her mother die before his eyes, the same man who hadn't batted an eyelash when she'd run away from home at ten years old. She had tried so hard to please him her whole life, hanging on by the scraps of acknowledgement he tossed her way every so often, and now he had called her back for his personal use – and she had shown up too, like a lapdog with no self-respect! She had shown up and she knew she would stay there, would submit herself to his scrutiny, would let him kill her like he'd killed–

No, she told herself. She wasn't her mother, she would sooner die than let her father turn her as desperate as she had been; she would be stronger than her, stronger than that, she would prove her worth to her father and make him regret ever ignoring her the way he did. She owed it to herself, she owed it to her mother: if she ran away now like she had four years ago, all would be in vain, and she'd never have the opportunity to prove herself to her father again.

Dr. Ayanami's fingertips were cold when she detached the electrodes from her head and took a few scribbly notes on a loose piece of paper. "Very well, we should be all done for today, unless there is anything you would like to ask," she informed her as she started putting her equipment back in place, a questioning lilt in her voice, and Misato's mind went straight to the two Children who preceded her in denomination. If it was her father who had chosen her, where had they found the others? "Who are the other Children, how were they chosen?"

"We work with the Marduk Institute, which selects the possible candidates for a given position, but we usually make the call on which one of them will be chosen based on background and physical parameters," she explained, as Misato tied her shoes. "You're probably familiar with the First Child, too – I'm sure you know a certain Ritsuko Akagi?"

A surprised grin widened on her face. "Ritsuko's here too?" She lit up when she heard that, sure as she was that they would never see each other again. They'd been the best of friends when they were kids, the only children in their age range among the research facility's employees, playing together with a bored intern watching over them while their parents were busy with their work, but they'd lost all contact years before, part of the fallout from their mothers' deaths.

Dr. Ayanami nodded, an actual, genuine smile forming on her otherwise expressionless face for the first time. "She was the first to be selected, a bit like you: after all, her mother was one of our most valuable scientists, and when she died it was my husband and I who happened to take her in, so when she was listed among the candidates it was natural that we would choose her."

Misato stood up, climbing off the examination bed. "So you took Ritsuko in," she commented, more to herself than to the woman. "I always wondered where she ended up, but I guess I'll see her soon now."

"You certainly will." She unlatched the door, and there stood Shinji leaning against a wall, sorting through some documents; he looked up at the noise, relief painted on his face when he saw Misato come out of the lab unscathed. "Oh, there you are," he muttered, and looked down at the papers in his hands again. "Ayanami, I looked over Misato's papers here, but I think there's been a mistake – look here, her listed residence is different from her father's."

"Yes, I believe Dr. Katsuragi arranged for his daughter to live in separate quarters from him," Dr. Ayanami chimed in, stepping closer to take a better look. Misato's face betrayed no surprise; she was used to living on her own, with her aunt seldom being home, and even if she weren't, her father had never made an attempt to raise her in the first place, once she'd stopped being a fascinating subject for him to study.

Shinji's eyebrows shot up. "Commander Katsuragi doesn't want his own child living with him?"

"I'm sure you can sympathize with the situation," Dr. Ayanami replied, the slightest trace of irony in her voice. Shinji's face dropped, and he almost stumbled on his feet as he took a half step backwards away from her. "How can you pretend this is even close to the same thing? What reason would the Commander have to let his fourteen-year-old daughter and pilot live alone, and in this city of all places?"

Misato coughed, turning the attention of the two adults back to her. "It's fine, really," she interjected, "I'm used to taking care of myself, I can handle living alone."

The look in Shinji's eyes allowed no replies, and his voice was set in stone. "I'm sorry, Misato, that is out of the question – if your father has no intention of taking you in, we'll find someone to do it."

Dr. Ayanami sighed, clicking her pen and writing something down on a document. "It is nice to see you take the initiative, Ikari-kun," she replied, handing him back his files. "There, you will be Misato's assigned caretaker from now on."

Shinji turned pale in the face. "Why me?" The question escaped his lips before he had time to think, though he hurriedly turned to Misato and assured her he would be happy to live with her. Misato increasingly felt like that conversation wasn't for her to witness, but rather amounted to a single quarrel in a long line of petty fights. "Because every Child has a caretaker, and both you and Misato happen to have none," Dr. Ayanami answered, her voice barely more than a whisper. "It was this way for Soryu-san and the Second as well, if you recall, and you know how well that match works. Now, I believe you should talk to Dr. Katsuragi about this, you might catch him in his office if you hurry."

"Thanks for the advice," he muttered, voice thick with irony. Dr. Ayanami slipped back into her lab, glad to have found a way to end the conversation, and Misato followed Shinji down the hallway and to the nearest elevator. The animosity between the two was palpable, even to Misato's inexpert eyes; she wondered what lay beneath it, and what would happen if she poked at its root.

"Shinji-san, what's the deal with Dr. Ayanami?" She asked, voice as candid as she could. Shinji froze in the middle of pressing the elevator button, gave her a look she couldn't quite decipher. "No offense, of course, but you two don't quite seem to get along together, you know."

He sighed, glad to step into the elevator when it arrived on their floor. "It's… a complicated story, and even that's an understatement. Yeah, we don't exactly get along personally, but even I can admit that she's the most competent researcher in any of our facilities, so you Children have nothing to worry about, you're in excellent hands."

Misato nodded politely, looking around as the elevator slowly made its way to the surface. "And why is it that you two don't get along?" Shinji went quiet, and Misato winced, hoping she hadn't crossed too big of a line.

"She's… quite similar to your father, is the easiest way I can put it: she's a perfectly fine person, but she's not very adept at living outside of her work." Misato looked down to the floor and the beat-up sneakers on her feet, unable to reconcile her father with the nice, if cold, woman who had formally introduced her to NERV. Shinji drummed his fingers on his thigh, desperately searching his brains for anything that might break the awkwardness. "They actually used to get along well when they were colleagues, before –"

The elevator arrived on the floor with a ding!, and the door slid open to reveal a tall man in a dark commander's uniform, jet black hair in a widow's peak combed back to frame a stark face. Misato's heart sank a little; her father looked no different than when she'd last seen him, and he seemed to pay just as little attention to her now as he had then. He looked up and down at the pair, an unimpressed look on his face. "Ikari-kun, I see you brought Misato here already," he said.

Shinji nodded, his head bowed. "Yes, Commander," he replied, somewhere between a soldier taking orders and a student addressing his teacher. "Misato has already seen Dr. Ayanami, who said testing would begin as soon as possible."

"Excellent, I was just on my way to see her." His lips tilted upwards in a slight smile, a sight so foreign to Misato she discreetly pinched her arm to make sure she wasn't dreaming.

"Commander, I meant to ask you about Misato's accommodation–" Shinji began, before her father cut him off.

"She's been provided with an apartment of her own close to the facilities, I believe."

"Yes, all on her own." Shinji straightened his back, in an attempt to seem more assertive. "Commander Katsuragi, Dr. Ayanami and I would like to request for Misato to be transferred with me, to my apartment."

Her father's eyebrows shot up in surprise. "You'd like to be Misato's assigned caretaker?" Misato didn't have to imagine the perplexity in his voice, curious as to what sort of fool could possibly want to take care of the daughter he'd always kept at an arm's length. She gritted her teeth, rendered invisible and powerless once more, as if the question of who she was to live with had no point including her.

"Yes, sir, Dr. Ayanami's already changed the address on her documents accordingly." Shinji had his arms behind his back, and Misato could see him reflexively balling and flexing his hands.

"I see you've gone behind my back already," her father replied with a chuckle, and Shinji laughed nervously, as though unsure whether that was a joke or an accusation. "Permission granted, Ikari-kun; having you as Misato's guardian would be quite convenient for the whole operation, I suppose."

He nodded again, a courtesy smile on his lips. "Thank you, sir." He stepped outside the elevator, Misato trailing behind him, and as her father stepped in she felt his burning gaze on her. She turned around to face him, meeting his eyes for a brief moment before the elevator doors closed between them, and she stood still, almost transfixed. She had come all the way there for him, and that was all she would get from him, a glance without acknowledgement, a silent judgement from those eyes as similar as hers?

"Misato?" Shinji called her when he noticed she hadn't moved, and that was enough to startle her back to reality. "Sorry, I…"

He waved her off with a hand gesture, and they began making their way back to the parking lot. "So, what was it like, seeing your father again after so long?"

She shrugged, hurrying to catch up with his longer stride. "It was fine, I guess," she opted to lie, though she was certain that her nonchalance was a glass pane to read through for him. "Shinji-san, I wanted to thank you for taking me in, you really didn't need to."

"Of course I did," he said, his eyes clouded with shadows from the dark halls. He looked almost mysterious in that light, and she caught herself wondering what secrets hid behind those same eyes. "When you know what it's like to live alone so young, you know it's cruel to inflict that on a child."

"Yes, but–" The kindness Shinji had shown her in the brief time since they'd met was more than what anyone else had spared for her in the years following her mother's death, and she had done nothing to earn it; if anything, she'd trapped him into taking care of her, without any idea what he'd gotten himself into.

"No buts, I won't have it," he tutted in a mock-serious tone, as they got back inside the car. "So, since it seems like you're my new roommate, what would you like to have for dinner?"

He turned towards her with a grin as he revved up the engine, and her heart swelled as she smiled in return. She was going to be good for him, she was really going to try this time; it was what he deserved, and the least she could do to show him her gratitude.

"Dinner, huh? How about ramen?"

"Sounds great! let's go pick up the ingredients."