Creation began on 10-19-18
Creation ended on 03-19-19
Neon Genesis Evangelion
The Living Alchemist: Peer Through
A/N: For those that think there's more to come for Asuka and Rei.
A solid month had passed since the Geo-Front had been repurposed to serve as a testing ground for the archeological find labeled simply as the Gate, and so far, all former NERV personnel present, along with the Chinese that found the Gate, had made sure to copy the detailed inscriptions on its sides and the doors that were the only part of it that didn't move every now and then. The difficult part was trying to understand what the inscribed characters all said because they looked ancient and belonging to a culture that didn't exist anywhere on the planet. And then, there was the confirmation of hearing what sounded like voices from within the doors; nobody could understand what they were on account of them being incoherent whispers.
"So, uh, Aja," went Misato to the Chinese woman in charge of the team tasked with translating the inscriptions during lunchtime in the cafeteria, "how goes the translation of the Gate?"
"Found some comparisons on some of the inscriptions, but they weren't characters to read," the woman, brownish hair tied in a ponytail with green eyes, explained. "They were star constellations, like the Big Dipper, Ursa Minor and the Four Symbols of Chinese astronomy."
"Were they ancient like the Gate, or recent?"
"Oh, they were ancient, too, just like the rest of the Gate. We're probably looking at it too hard because I can't understand even the simplest of the characters on it. At first, I thought some of it was a form of Cuneiform, but then I suspected that there was some degree of Egyptian or Arabic or some simple Greek. It's all mixed up."
"Everything's mixed up."
"What's got your panties in a twist?"
"You know about the boy that was killed earlier this year?"
"I don't know his name, only that his father was one of the people responsible for killing him."
"His name was Shinji…and yeah, his father was one of the people responsible. I was his guardian during the time he was with NERV."
"That's rough."
"You have no idea."
-x-
"…You're spending a lot of time at the library, Living," went Roy Mustang to Shinji as the boy carried a trio of books with him down the street. "How goes your research?"
"Steady as it goes, Flame," he responded; he couldn't let himself get distracted from his recent obligation by anyone, not even his superior.
"And what about Shou Tucker's daughter, how is she doing?"
"You mean Nina, and she's doing fine. She's staying with the Rockbells in Resembool."
"You think her father will try to fight you over this?"
At that, Shinji turned around to face the Flame Alchemist and uttered, "If he wants to challenge me over this, he's free to do so as he wishes. I will question his reasons…and his conviction. If both are within the realm of reasonability, I'll stand aside, but if he can't find morality in either, he needs to strengthen his resolve…or walk away."
"Barely a State Alchemist and you've already dealt a serious blow to the Sewing-Life Alchemist. Be careful, some believe that you could be trying to surpass everyone within the military."
"Why would I want that? I'm just a simple person with a simple goal."
When he turned to leave, Roy still got the feeling that he had struck a personal nerve within the Living Alchemist…but hadn't gotten any closer to the truth about him.
What are you up to? He wondered.
-x-
"…What'd you find on Xenotime, Al?" Ed asked his brother as they were looking up the location of the desert town Shinji mentioned.
"It used to be known for its reputed goldsmiths," Alphonse explained, "but then their gold rush ruined the top soil and destroyed the greenery. Apparently, there was a belief that the town was named after a mineral that once existed there, but it was so long ago, nobody's sure, anymore. What did you find out about it?"
"Pretty much the same as you did. I still can't see why Shinji would want to go there. Even if there were minerals of value to alchemy there, there probably wouldn't be much."
"He didn't say there were just minerals there. There are people there, too. Maybe he just believes there's something there that other alchemists have overlooked. He is older than we are, so he might know things we have yet to understand for ourselves."
"Yeah, maybe… You think he had something to do with what happened with Nina?"
Alphonse looked up from his book and responded at Ed, "I can't answer to that, Brother. To think he had something to do with that horrible act Tucker committed or its aftermath is to question whether we trust him or not. Leave it alone for now."
But Ed didn't want to leave it be just yet; if Shinji had something to do with Nina being restored to normal, he just wanted to know how he was able to do so…and why he didn't tell them.
-x-
Asuka stood in front of the Gate, just examining the structure and wondering what possessed whoever had made it to make it look the way it did. Nothing about it made any sense and she couldn't hear any voices coming from it.
"You don't really look special," she expressed towards the Gate. "You're old, practically an antique that belongs in a museum somewhere gathering dust until the end of time. That or someone's underground club for the sadomasochistic crowd, because you depict a lot of agony on your sides and front."
"You know, if you're trying to get a reaction from the Gate, it's pointless," she heard Misato say to her as she stood a good distance away. "It just stands there and shifts the figures every now and then, like it's nobody's business."
Asuka turned to face her, but then saw Rei present beside her on the right, sporting a sling around her left arm; her right leg had recovered enough for her to walk unaided by crutches.
"It's not like I have anything else to do," she told them. "Is there anything new on this thing that we don't know about yet?"
"They're going to try using a laser on it to open it in a few hours."
"Why not use a winch on it instead?"
"They don't want to damage it too much."
Rei walked over to the Gate and placed her right hand on the door, feeling its texture. It felt old and rough, unlike the wooden doors of modern buildings.
"I wouldn't touch it, you don't know what that thing could do later on," Asuka told her.
"Doors can't harm people," Rei responded, removing her hand from the Gate. "Hmm?"
She then pressed her head to the Gate, hoping to hear something with her right ear.
"Did you hear something from it, Rei?" Misato asked her as she came over.
Rei pulled her head back and faced Misato.
"I thought I heard his voice for a moment," she explained.
"I think you're going crazy," Asuka told her.
"Equivalence," Asuka then heard a voice that sounded just like Shinji's in her head.
"Did he say anything, like a word or a sentence?" She asked Rei.
"He said, 'Equivalence'."
-x-
Xenotime was within reach now within the span of three days spent traveling towards it. The first thing any of the three State Alchemists saw that made it unlike what they were originally expecting…was that the town seemed similar to an oasis, due to the fact that it was a functioning town setup in the desert terrain. While there was some greenery, it seemed to lack the type of feel that made it more so than a simple town.
"We're here," Edward expressed as they set foot within the grounds of the town. "What to look for?"
"Anything you can find that's worth an interest," Shinji told him. "It can be anything, even just regular coal used for burning things."
They split up and agreed to meet at the bell tower they saw.
Shinji, staying closer to the tower, sat at an open diner to get a drink.
"You're a State Alchemist, aren't you?" The guy that served him a cup of lemonade asked him.
"Yes, why do you ask?" He responded.
"Any chance you specialize in making gold?"
"Sorry, but no, I prefer the unexplored field of medical alchemy. There are some things that money can't buy, even if we wanted it to."
The guy then had to cover his mouth and turn away as he coughed.
"Forget I asked," he told Shinji, but the Living Alchemist was concerned about his condition…and became curious.
"How long have you had that cough, sir?" He asked him.
"Just a few weeks," he answered.
Shinji then looked around them at the few people that were outside…and noticed some were wearing small masks to cover their mouths and had varying degrees of coughing.
"Have a lot of people been coughing more than usual?"
"Yeah, or much worse than just coughing, but the thing of it is, nobody knows why. There hasn't been an epidemic or a plague in years. Not since…"
"What? Not since what, sir?"
The man thought about it and said, "This guy came back a few years ago after spending time in Central. Nash Tringham. Everyone thought he could use alchemy to revitalize the goldsmith industry here, but after he came back, nothing happened. Hurgh!"
The man coughed again and Shinji climbed over the counter and helped him to a nearby chair.
"I'm sorry, sir," he apologized to him.
ZAP! Suddenly, Shinji felt like he knew what was ailing the man, like he had an epiphany or something, seeing an image of the guy's outline, but then watched as it began to show an x-ray of his lungs and heart.
"Sir, I… I think you were exposed to something hazardous to people," he told him.
"Hazardous? What do you mean?"
Then, noticing a few straws near them, Shinji asked the man to let him help him.
-x-
"…How long have they been near the Gate, Ms. Katsuragi?" Fuyutsuki asked Misato, noticing that Rei and Asuka were sitting by the Gate in the chamber.
"Ever since they both thought they heard Shinji's voice come from it," she explained to him. "It's been three hours since then."
"What do you think? Is it denial…or something else?"
"I honestly don't know what to think. If it was something else, I'd want to believe that it's possible to bring back the dead, but then, there's the grief resetting itself if it weren't possible."
Suddenly, they saw Asuka jump up and back away from the Gate.
Rei calmly got up and walked out of the chamber.
"Is something wrong, Rei?" Misato asked her.
"Pilot Soryu and I…" Rei uttered in somewhat of disbelief. "We heard Ikari-Kun's voice from within the Gate again."
"Did he say anything?" Fuyutsuki asked.
"He said, 'I will stop you'."
"'I will stop you'?" Misato repeated. "Stop who?"
"Someone," said Fuyutsuki, just as confused.
"Probably someone that's fearful of him," they heard Asuka say. "Someone that's fearful."
Misato turned her gaze towards the Gate and pondered if she could hear anything from it from herself.
-x-
"…Oh, my God, Shinji, what did you do?" Alphonse asked as he and Ed found Shinji at a diner where it looked like he had just cut into a man's chest…with a straw or two.
"It's okay," the man expressed, feeling a little better now. "I can breathe easy."
The man had a pair of straws poking out of his exposed chest, just under his neck. It looked as though he had lost some blood, but was otherwise fine.
The blood itself was inside a cup on the counter, but it looked less red and darker.
"It's only a temporary fix until I can close your chest tubes up," said Shinji, looking at the cup of blood. "Somehow, you came into contact with a liquid substance that wound up inside you and you couldn't cope with it."
A moment later, the substance within the cup hardened and Shinji turned the cup over to empty it out onto the counter. It was shaped like a small disc, but looked as though it were made of a sort of gelatin substance instead of a pure liquid.
"Shinji, I think that's similar to something I read before coming here," said Ed to him. "It might be the Red Water."
"Red Water?" The man questioned. "A couple of months ago, our water sources flowed red. They said it was just a temporary leak, but nothing harmful."
"If this is indeed Red Water, it's anything but harmless," Shinji stated. "This stuff is alchemical in nature, but it's toxic to anything that can't regulate it, and that includes people."
"Red Water has alchemical properties?" Al spoke. "What could it do for an alchemist that knows how it works if they used it?"
"Based on some old research that didn't pan out, Red Water is the primary resource needed to create the Red Stone," Ed explained to his brother. "You take a refined version of Red Water, put it under a few tons of pressure until it solidifies and becomes stone-like."
"Like a Philosopher's Stone?"
"No," went Shinji, "more like an imperfect imitation. A Red Stone isn't as powerful as the fabled Philosopher's Stone is claimed to be, but would have applications for alchemic research. It's a kind of roulette at best, a gamble at worse. But this wasn't refined under pressure."
Shinji picked up the stone-like object and immediately felt repulsed by how it came to be.
"Sir, as the person this was harvested from, I should give it back to you," he told the man, "but as a State Alchemist, I fear this will be more trouble than it's worth if someone else got ahold of it and had less than good intentions on using it."
"Right now, I'd say that a State Alchemist having that would be like giving a gun to a small child," the man responded, "but to the young man that may have just saved my life…take it with you. Maybe it'll do you some good."
Shinji then took something out of his bag and put the stone into a container.
"Who said that this water leak was harmless to you and where can we find them?" Shinji asked him.
"Men that work for Mugear Baron, the landowner and scientist that lives on the mountain further downtown," he explained and pointed up towards the mountain obscured by some trees.
"Mugear Baron?" Ed went. "Is he an alchemist?"
"No, he's just a scientist and landowner."
But to Shinji, it felt like this Mugear Baron had something really bad to hide. And it was something that could spell disastrous for the people of Xenotime if it was allowed to continue without any regard towards their safety.
"You have a bad feeling about this, don't you, Shinji?" Al asked.
"I'll be honest, but part of my reason for wanting to come here was because the Red Water," he told the brothers. "But I didn't expect this. Not any of this."
"Who would?" Ed uttered. "But how can Red Water be dangerous to people?"
"We find an unfiltered source…I'll find the reason and reveal it to all."
-x-
"…What do you mean, there's someone else that might be able to make the stone better than him?" Mugear had asked the woman in front of him near the spring of Red Water.
The woman, none other than Lust, responded, "A State Alchemist with a goal that won't serve this one if Mr. Tringham ends up dead. Hide him if you have to, but if he ends up dead, you might as well consider the aid of the alchemist himself wishful thinking."
"Is he that important to our goal?"
"He may be invaluable if he can make use of the Red Water in a way that benefits both of us. He's in Xenotime right this minute, looking for information. Try to appeal to his little ambition, but don't oversell it."
Lust intended to uphold her side of the pact Shinji made with in exchange for his aid in crafting a semblance of the Philosopher's Stone to turn her back into a human in return for information on her benefactor and allies. Unfortunately for her master, this meant that she would have to limit her involvement with former contacts that were motivated by other ambitions that they believed the stone could fulfill in order to obtain it later. For someone called the Living Alchemist, she took it to mean that he respected life above all else, and that any loss of life would cause drawbacks.
"If there's more than one of you that answers to someone, then you must learn to compartmentalize," she remembered Shinji telling her. "Keep this between us for now. Don't let anyone else know. You can't spill your secrets because you don't know all of them yet. All I know so far is that you're the only homunculus that longs to be human again. If the means I'm comfortable with using exist to fulfill your desire, they can be implemented. But until then, every life, even a tiny life on the verge of death, is sacred and must be held to a higher status. You stay out of trouble, Yokubo, and your existence itself is held to and by a higher status by me. So long as we both cooperate on opposite ends, we will both benefit from this agreement. That…is the deal."
She wanted to believe that the master would fulfill her one desire, but after seeing this young boy that she started to suspect was a lot more powerful than other alchemists that existed in Amestris (maybe even more powerful than the master), Lust dared to believe that the Living Alchemist could do it, too.
"And if he can't?" Mugear asked her, concerned that this alchemist had ambitions that were more to their liking over the ideas of wealth and power.
"As I suggested," she repeated, "try and appeal to his little ambition, but don't oversell it."
Walking away, the female homunculus had to do the impractical, and hope that the Living Alchemist was greater than the desires of wealth, power, recognition, and world domination.
Why is he called the Living Alchemist? Why is he really called the Living Alchemist? She wondered.
To be continued…
A/N: Watching the premiere of The Village, and I hope to get inspiration from it to help in future chapters of many stories. Peace.