OEDIPUS: O Zeus, what hast thou willed to do with me!
JOCASTA: What is it, Oedipus, that moves thee so?
OEDIPUS: Ask me not yet; tell me the build and height
Of Laius? Was he still in manhood's prime?
JOCASTA: Tall was he, and his hair was lightly strewn
With silver; and not unlike thee in form.
OEDIPUS: O woe is me! Mehtinks unwittingly
I laid but now a dread curse on myself.
- Sophocles, Oedipus the King
Chapter Ten: A Measure Of Understanding
"What happened to Ikari?"
Kouzou smiled faintly. He stood in a black space lit only by overhead sprays of various colors, each illuminating the silhouette of numbered man. SEELE's paranoia never ceased to amuse him, as though they truly believed he and Gendo had not known the identity of each member already. Not that any but Kiel himself were of paramount importance, but the others could hardly be dismissed.
"Gendo Ikari," he explained finally, "has suffered an Eva-related accident during our most recent tests. His condition is critical, and he is being treated in NERV's own facilities."
"An Eva-related accident," repeated Three's voice doubtfully. "Another berserker incident? You must not be so lax with your tools, Fuyutsuki."
"Something like that," he nodded, feeling the smile fade from his face. "The full report is still pending. I will, of course, keep the Committee informed."
"See that you do, Fuyutsuki," rumbled Eleven. "We will not tolerate any more deviations from the plan at this stage."
Kouzou folded hands behind his back, keeping his new white gloves concealed. "I helped write the plan," he noted plainly. "I will keep to it."
"Not your plan," growled Kiel. "Our plan."
"There is no reason to worry," he assured firmly, his voice echoing faintly in the office. "Everything will proceed as we have discussed. You will not even notice the difference."
A brief silence met his words. "You are taking control, then, during Ikari's recovery?" wondered Six.
"I am," he confirmed.
"We are watching you," warned Kiel dangerously, "so do not disappoint us. Commander." The lights and the figures winked out, replaced by the more familiar setting of Ikari's office. Now Kouzou's own office.
He smiled briefly to himself. He doubted he'd fooled any of them, but without proof, they would be too cautious to call him out. Though, he reflected, even with proof they likely wouldn't care; they hadn't held much affection for Gendo anyway, and if one part in the machine burnt out, you replaced it with another. Gears and circuits did not have names.
Sighing, he seated himself in the chair, idly flexing the fingers on his right hand. The palm still burned like he held a live coal, and it occurred now to him that the pain would probably never diminish. A little late to worry about that now, he decided ruefully.
With a shake of his head he brought up the console and keyed in a few commands, searching the building for Shinji Ikari. Quickly he found the boy; apparently Section Two was holding him in one of the lower cells.
Feeling his brow furrow, Kouzou leaned thoughtfully back in the chair. His words to the Instrumentality Committee notwithstanding, he was not at all certain that the plan would proceed as anticipated. With Gendo gone, he had his doubts that Rei would want to participate at all anymore, but even if she did, part of the motivation was now gone; a dead man could not be reunited with his wife in Instrumentality. Still, a world without pain, without war, would be a beautiful thing. Yui wanted it, he reminded himself. It's worth it.
Tapping the console back to idleness, he rose and headed for the door. There were things he needed to do first.
In the silent darkness, there was little to do but think.
I'm a killer, thought Shinji blankly for the thousandth time. I killed somebody. Lifting his hands, he peered through the inky blackness as though he could see them at all, as though seeing them could provide some measure of understanding of what had happened, some wordless insight.
I killed. I took a life. Whenever he closed his eyes, and sometimes when they were still open, he could see blood. Sprays of blood on the smooth office floor, cracked and dry blood on his hands and face, in his clothes. An almost-unbroken film of blood on the body, ejected from messy entrance wounds. Blood he'd had no right to take, the blood of his own kind.
That blood had belong in the body of a man. The tiny bits of skull and worse among the blood had likewise belonged in a man's head, the Commander's head. The human body had defenses again simple tumbles, against illness and fatigue and heat; those were things one simply got over with and forgot. But there were no defenses against thirteen gunshots to the face and chest. No defense against screaming lead and the satiated smell of gunpowder.
I'm so screwed, he groaned silently, placing his face in his shaking hands. Fear and horror still swirled in his belly, the same sensation he used to have on waking up with the realization that he'd forgotten to do some vital piece of homework. But this is serious, he lamented. I'll get something worse than extra cleanup duty for this. Prison. Maybe death. Would they kill a pilot? The only one who could still pilot Unit-01? Which would be worse, he wondered, to be placed in front of a firing squad to suffer the same death he'd inflicted on another, or just to be left in solitary confinement until he died in the smothering darkness? Or maybe they'll make me pilot, still. That's like a death sentence in itself. I'll fight Angel after Angel until one finally tears me apart.
He drew a quaking breath. But does it matter? Without Rei, I don't even care. I'm already dead. Rubbing his eyes, he slumped where he sat.
A short time later he swayed with a silent chuckle. The one thing that did not bother him, he reflected, was that it had been his father whom he'd killed. I wonder if anyone will be the funeral. Or if there will even be one.
He paused. I wonder what Mother would think.
Sudden noise outside the cell preceded a scraping sound, and a rectangle of blinding white light appeared in place of the door. Shinji held up a blood-caked hand, squinting in pain against the tall silhouette that stepped inside.
"Shinji Ikari," began a low voice he knew. "How do you feel?"
"Cold," he whispered at the floor. So bright. "Tired."
"As an old man, I know exactly how you feel," murmured the Subcommander. Though by now he was probably just the new Commander.
Shinji nodded once, waiting. Fuyutsuki had not come just to chat.
"You look rather grim, still," observed the older man's shadow. "I recommend cleaning up and finding new clothes before you head home."
Too weary to laugh, Shinji shook his head. "Home? After what I did?"
Fuyutsuki spread his hands. "What did you do?"
Are you kidding me? "I killed the Commander."
"No," disagreed the other man mildly. "Gendo Ikari died in a mishap during a test of the Evangelion units. As the only witness, you were unfairly accused and placed in a holding cell for eleven hours."
Lifting his head against the glare of the hallway outside, Shinji scowled at the Subcommander, or whatever he was now. "What are you talking about?"
Fuyutsuki seemed to hesitate, but shortly he shuffled forward, deeper into the darkness, and squatted on his heels. "Shinji, listen to me," he implored gravely, his voice low. "As far as the world outside is concerned, NERV is a black box; money and materials go in, Evangelions come out and Angels die. The inner workings of the box are unknown and unimportant. Do you understand?"
Shinji shook his head once more. Do I care?
"So what happens in the box," continued the older man, "ultimately does not matter, so long as the box continues to function. NERV is a very serious organization, Shinji; there is a chain of command starting at the top and running all the way down to the fellow who cleans the elevator buttons. If one Commander dies -- or disappears -- there is another to take his place, and so on, until there are simply too few people for it to matter at all anymore.
"Pilots, however," he sighed, "are another matter. You are irreplaceable. Though it is true that, in theory, another pilot could be located and trained to take your place, Unit-01 no longer works for any but yourself. So what would you have us do? You are a criminal -- a murderer -- but it would serve humanity rather poorly to imprison you, and then have everyone die in the next Angel attack as a result."
Shinji swallowed. "So... what? I can just walk out of here?" Am I dreaming this?
Fuyutsuki grunted, standing back to his full height. "Yes. Like I said, I would first clean up. And be aware that, due to your apparent instability, there will now be rather heavy surveillance of everything you do."
"I always figured there was anyway," sighed Shinji. "Subcommander?"
"Commander."
"Commander... how is Rei?" He chewed a lip. She probably hates me now.
"She is grieving," answered Fuyutsuki. "She is upset, of course -- almost everyone is -- but she has taken it badly. I would speak with her, if I were you."
Warmth, nearly dead, stirred in Shinji's heart. "I... I can see her again? Did you tell her that?"
"Shinji, I am not going to restrict either of your activities in that respect." The new Commander sounded tired. "I think you understand now what kind of responsibilities you have, and how badly things can fail, so... don't do anything stupid. Just make certain to ask her about where she came from."
"Fine. I can do that." He waited, confused, wondering if he just ought to stand and walk past the other man and to his freedom.
Without answering Fuyutsuki turned and stepped out of the cell. "Escort him to the pilot lockers and call a taxi."
"Sir," acknowledged a male voice. Fuyutsuki disappeared into the hallway.
Holding up a hand against the light, Shinji climbed unsteadily to his feet, feeling his body sway wearily; if he'd really been in there for eleven hours, he reflected, it was the middle of the night now. As his eyes grew accustomed to the light, he shuffled out of the cell.
In a grim steel hallway, a pair of men had been set to guard him, menacing figures in black body armor and carrying assault rifles. He addressed the nearest one. "I'm... ready, I guess."
The soldier nodded, slinging the gun over his shoulder. "This way, Pilot Ikari."
Rei's eyes flickered open in the bright sunlight. Her blank ceiling stared back at her.
Tiredly she led her eyelids slide back closed. I'm still here, she sighed. The Commander still is not.
Without him, she was... lost. Without purpose. Fuyutsuki wished to go ahead with the plan anyway, and she had agreed, if only because the Commander -- her Commander -- had wanted it. Even so, she felt empty, rudderless, adrift. Moving mechanically through the motions of living, all the empty waiting.
Why? she wondered bleakly. Why did Shinji do that? Just days ago, she could remember feeling angry at the Commander, perhaps hating him, but now the man was dead. Her anger, with nowhere to flow, had since settled into stagnant pools somewhere inside her, filming over, contained.
Shinji. A knife-twist of pain slashed through her heart at the thought, both her own pain and his. First the Commander, and now Shinji; men she had trusted with everything had hurt her in ways she had not even dreamed were possible. The Commander, in retrospect, had been a ruthless personality, cruel to nearly everyone but her, so perhaps it was not so surprising from him, but to have Shinji do so as well had shocked her, had broken her as thoroughly as a beating in a shadowy alley.
Even so, she could not blame him. She knew why he'd done it. Fuyutsuki had explained things politely, stating that since the office was perhaps the one place in NERV that was not the target of surveillance electronics, there was no way to tell what the two Ikari men had been discussing, if anything, but Rei knew. Fuyutsuki knew also, she suspected. They'd been arguing about her. Nothing else could possibly have driven Shinji to do what he had done.
Oh, Shinji. How much must the breakup have hurt him? Rei could not imagine the agony it would take to drive her to murder over such a thing. Guilt flared a line up through her middle from the knowledge that she herself had inflicted that pain on him, though it had been at the Commander's order. So, she frowned, if the Commander made me break up with Shinji, and the breakup made Shinji murder the Commander... does that mean the Commander effectively killed himself? She sighed, pondering that, face tight. No, of course not. That would absolve Shinji and me. We are guilty too.
Another uncomfortable thought simmered somewhere deep inside. If he is hurting now, how much will he hurt later? Rei had no way of knowing, but imagined it would be a great deal. The Commander, in his last conversation with her, had explained his reasoning, her origins.
She had known a fraction of it before, had known about the clones, the replacements. What she had not known was the identity of the woman from whom her DNA had largely come. The Commander had spoken the name in a tone of heavy gravity, as though it would stun her, but it had simply confused her. She understood that people's romantic and family relations typically did not overlap, but not why that might be. Will Shinji even care? she wondered. I did not give birth to him. Perhaps... perhaps it is unimportant. I will find out, one day.
Squeezing her eyes more tightly shut, she rolled to her stomach, turning her face away from the window's warmth. School would be starting soon, if it had not already, but she could hardly make herself care. She suspected there would not be school for much longer in any case, not if the plan was really nearing completion.
Some time later, a knock at the door stirred her from a sweaty, uncomfortable slumber. Lifting her head from the pillow, she blinked.
The knock sounded again. "Rei?" asked a soft, uncertain voice. "Are you there?"
Shinji? she wondered, horrified. He's out already? The last she had heard, he'd been locked up somewhere deep underground. She had not expected to have to face him again so soon.
"Rei?"
Sliding tiredly from the bed, she shuffled to the door, feeling pain curl her fingers with every step. With her hand on the knob she paused, trying to calm her pounding heart, before finally opening it.
Shinji stood in the hall, one elbow on the doorframe as he leaned there, his posture shouting weariness. He lifted his head as the door opened, staring at her with wide, haunted eyes. His face was as pale as she'd ever seen it. "Rei," he whispered. "We need to talk. If you'll see me," he added helplessly.
Numbly she backed off, allowing him room to enter. He did so, shutting the door quietly behind him, not meeting her gaze.
"Rei," he began again after a moment of silence. "I don't..."
"Why did you do it?" she asked flatly, stepping closer, making him look her in the eye. "Why did you kill him?"
"It was an accident," he answered, swallowing, tearing his gaze away. "I didn't mean..."
"You emptied the cartridge in Major Katsuragi's pistol," she explained, hearing her voice rise. "That was not an accident."
"The first shot was," he protested. "I mean... I don't know. He kept calling me by name, after I told him not to. Kept saying it was for my own good, that he knew something about you that I didn't."
Ignoring the implicit question in his words, Rei clenched her teeth as the old anger swirled again. "It was not an accident."
Shinji rubbed a trembling hand over his face. "No," he agreed weakly. "I guess it wasn't."
"Why?" she asked again, more loudly, her voice sounding almost shrill to her own ears. "Why? Did you really think a gun would make him change his mind?" Moving of its own accord, her right hand balled into a fist and struck him in the chest. Hot tears blurred her vision. "Did you think I'd just forget about it if you killed him? Did you think I wouldn't care? He was your own father, Shinji! Why didn't you just try to talk to him? We could have been friends, at least, or..." She trailed off, choking and sniffling. She was pummeling him, she realized, fists flailing without reason or control.
Shinji backed away under the onslaught, arms held protectively before him. "Friends?" he repeated incredulously. "Rei, you couldn't even bring yourself to look at me! What was I supposed to think?"
"I was afraid," she snapped, scrubbing a hand across her face to glare at him. "I knew what would happen if I let myself see you."
In the momentary respite, he reached out to grab her upper arms, the feel of his warm fingers on her skin reminding her that she was wearing only the underwear she'd worn to bed. He held his arms stiffly, slightly bent, as though uncertain whether he should be trying to pull her closer or push her farther away. "Why didn't you say anything?" he whispered, pain audible in his voice. "I thought you were gone forever. I didn't know what to do. I needed you so badly."
His words dragged a sob out of her throat. Struggling free from his grasp, Rei turned and ran to the bed, curling into a ball and pulling the sheets around herself like a cloak. Shuddering, she placed the back of a linen-clad hand against her mouth to stifle the wordless keening she could no longer keep silent.
Shinji followed slowly, head down. "I don't think there's anything I could say," he sighed, his voice a hopeless monotone. "I'm a killer, and you're right to hate me. I just needed to talk to you one last time."
She shivered, burying her face in her arms. "Shinji, don't talk like that," she pleaded, groaning.
"Why not?" he countered tersely. "I don't deserve someone like you anymore. I probably never did." His footsteps shuffled to a halt a pace away.
Wiping her face on the sheets, Rei glanced up at him helplessly. "Shinji, I don't..."
Dead blue eyes met her own. "You don't what?"
"I don't want you to go," she admitted hoarsely, swallowing. "You know I hate to see you like this. Please, just... just... let me talk to you. Let me help."
He hesitated, visibly uncertain. "Do you mean that?" he whispered. "After... after everything?"
"Shinji, I... hurt. A lot." She paused, deciding how to explain it. "But you hurt too, and your pain hurts me even more."
A peculiar expression crossed his face, one she could not identify; though she had expected him to relax, he still seemed tense, almost guarded. "Fuyutsuki told me to ask you about yourself," he recalled quietly. "Why did he do that, Rei?"
Dread boiled in her stomach. "What do you mean?"
"I mean... where did you come from?" He looked as nervous as she felt. "What is there about you that I need to know?"
She lowered her gaze to the floor; there could be no secrets between them. Exhaling heavily, she began her explanation.
When Rei finished talking, Shinji barely noticed. Black horror raged inside, clawing at his sanity, stealing his senses. My... my mother? How?
"Shinji?" Her soft voice barely registered in his awareness.
Something bumped into his back, and he vaguely realized he'd backed across the room and into the opposite wall, near the door. Rei was staring at him from the bed, he saw, her face torn between concern and embarrassment. "What?" he managed, licking his lips.
"Are you well?" She chewed an uncertain lip. "Is this...? This must be a problem?"
"A problem?" he repeated, bewildered. "You... you don't get it, do you?"
"No," she answered, frustration audible in her voice, eyes tight in hurt. "I don't understand. Why does it bother you?" As though cold, she hugged the sheets tighter around herself, sheets on which they'd sweated so often, doing things that had seemed exciting at the time, but which now struck him as filthy and unspeakable.
"Shinji, I am not your mother," she continued softly. "I only share her DNA." Hesitating, she sniffled absently, then unwrapped her arms from herself, holding them out, offering an embrace. "Shinji. Please talk to me."
The sight of her, arms out, head a fuzzy silhouette in the brightness of the window behind her, struck his core, drawing images out from wherever they lay tucked. Some were recent; some not.
...Rei's face, smiling, loving...
...chestnut-brown hair, brown eyes, smiling down at him, loving; tiny hands patting at her face, trying to grasp the essence of this warm and shining person...
...a soft voice murmuring comfort, gentle lips kissing his ear, the sheets thick with the intoxicating scent of lust...
...warm fingers stroking his hair, soothing away his hungry tears; something familiar against his lips, a source of nourishment...
...warm fingers stroking his hair, a reassuring whisper, melting the last of his problems; her breath catching as his playful tongue flickered across a nipple...
"Shinji?"
He blinked, focusing on Rei still sitting there, still hoping to hug away his problems. The sheets had fallen slightly, allowing him a view of her simple bra, of the soft valley between her breasts; even now, the sight aroused him as much as it had before, a realization which sickened him, bringing bitter bile into his throat.
Swallowing, feeling sweat beading on his face, he reached blindly behind him for the doorknob. I have to get out of here. His hand settled over the knob, twisted and pulled it.
"Shinji?" A note of alarm entered her voice, and she unfolded herself to follow him. "Shinji, please don't go." In Rei's haste her foot got tangled in the sheets, making her stumble. Still in her underwear, face glistening with tears, she reached a helpless, beseeching hand out to him.
Shinji backed into the hallway and slammed the door. Heart thundering so hard he could feel it in his hands, he turned and sprinted, running as fast as he could to the nearest stairwell. He took the steps three at a time, shoes skidding on the landings and switchbacks. Once outside he continued to run until the apartment was safely out of sight. Only then did he stumble to a halt, planting hands on his knees, breathing heavily. Rei would not follow him, he knew, not without dressing first; he had time.
I can't believe this, he groaned, squeezing his eyes shut. How is it even possible? Shouldn't I have known? Shouldn't I have... felt something? The bile rose again, fierce bitterness in his throat.
Staggering to one side, he fell to his knees and vomited into the grass next to the sidewalk, stomach clenching again and again in protest of the horror his mind could barely address. Long moments passed before he finally fell back, wiping a shuddering hand over his mouth. This is so messed up. How am I going to...?
A sudden siren interrupted his thoughts, shattered the warm midday silence. Loudspeakers all over the city blared to life. "As of now, a special state of emergency has been declared over the Tokai region. Residents are advised to..."
Shinji shifted his startled gaze to the heavens, but could see nothing but bulbous clouds and patches of blue sky. After a moment he slumped. Shit.
Asuka breathed deeply, composing herself as her Eva's groundward launch pressed her firmly against the seat, the pressure tangible even through the cushioning of the LCL. Don't screw this one up, she commanded herself firmly. We've all seen the way they look at you; Ritsuko would be all too happy for an excuse to send you packing. This is your last chance, Asuka.
In short order she reached the the surface. Leaping out of the lift, she brought to bear the rifle they'd given her, a heavy thing they hoped would be able to reach orbit. A heavy rain had moved in since the Angel was sighted, and rivulets of water flowed down her Eva's crimson armor, but she felt none of it; she was not synchronizing well enough to notice such subtle stimuli. Fuck the sync rate, she decided, aiming the rifle skyward and waiting for the targeting electronics to do their work. I'll show them I can do this without...
A sudden flare of white light appeared in the rifle's sights. What the hell?
Light. Pain. Pressure, everywhere. She
hey
fought it instinctively, grinding teeth in effort as she resisted what seemed like an invisible fist closing
let me in
over the boundaries her mind. Grunting, she fired the rifle, only vaguely aware of the beam veering harmlessly off into the sky. "Damn it," she rasped, reaching for
i'm coming in
another weapon, anything else. The pallet rifle was useless at this range, but she hefted it anyway, squeezing off round after futile round at nothing in particular.
Discarding the gun without a second thought, she paused to evaluate her options, but something reached inside her, dug through the hard-packed clay of her mind to unearth memories she had thought long since buried. Shuddering pain racked her body at this sense of violation, at this most base and intimate theft. Forgotten images flickered in her eyes, obscuring what already lay in her vision.
...a hospital...
...a doll...
...a rope...
...Asuka...
She screamed.
The tactical network carried Asuka's increasingly-panicked shrieks clearly to the command center. Every now and then she seemed to gasp a word, a no or a stop or some such.
That's a little distressing, frowned Kouzou. Like this it can disable every pilot we through at it, without ever having to come close enough to get hurt. He had not anticipated such an attack.
"Asuka!" shouted Misato. "Retreat!"
"No!" growled the girl back. "I'd rather die here!"
"Well, if that's what she wants," shrugged Ritsuko suggestively, quiet enough not to reach the network pickups.
"No," decided Kouzou. Things might be different if Asuka hadn't fired off the particle rifle before it had gotten a fix on the target, but now there was a weapon up there capable of reaching the Angel, but without a pilot to use it. "Begin charging the rifle again," he commanded. "Sortie Unit-01 to the surface. Shinji will attack the Angel when the gun is ready."
Ritsuko frowned at him. "Unit-01 is in combat lock."
"Not anymore," he shrugged.
"Don't do this," urged the blonde quietly, shuffling closer to where he stood. "We cannot afford to have it breached by an Angel."
"This Angel is not an encroachment-type," he countered, just as softly. "There is no danger of contamination from way up in orbit."
"Not of the Eva," agreed Ritsuko. "But what about Shinji?"
Kouzou raised an eyebrow, skeptical of this sudden display of concern. "We have to defeat it somehow," he pointed out. "Shinji knows what he is about. Do it," he added more loudly, to Misato.
The major nodded. "Shinji, we're launching you! Grab the rifle that's up there, target the Angel, and shoot when the display says it's ready! Maya!"
No, willed Shinji silently as the lift propelled his Eva upward. Not now. The LCL in the entry plug did not make the sour vomit in his mouth taste any better.
All too soon he reached the surface. The still, hunched form of Unit-02 stood in what looked like an overpowered spotlight next to the discarded rifle he was supposed to use. Teeth bared in a frightened snarl, he tried not to listen to Asuka's whimpering cries as he scrambled to retrieve the weapon.
Lifting it to his shoulder, he trained the thing up towards the Angel, but a blinking timer made him swear out loud. Fourteen seconds remained. Fourteen seconds to stand there, to listen to...
"No," whispered Asuka, her voice high and small like a little girl's. "No. Go away. Please..."
Is she talking to me? "Asuka?"
"No, I don't want to see this," she groaned, seemingly on the edge of tears. "I can't take... no, please, just get out of me..."
He swallowed, keeping his eyes on the countdown. "Asuka, hold on."
"Please, I'm so... Shinji? Where... are you here?" She was barely whispering now. "Get away, Shinji. Don't get anywhere near this thing. It's not worth it."
"Keep fighting it, Asuka," he pleaded. Whatever it is. As the timer reached zero in the display, he squeezed the trigger, watched as the beam lanced, straight as an arrow, into the heavens... and scattered against an AT field. Shit.
"No," moaned Asuka weakly. "Mother, don't... I'll be good. You don't have to... no, don't..."
Shinji dropped the useless rifle to the street below, then gazed at the motionless Unit-02 beside him, his eyes burning. No one should have to go through that, he decided. Except maybe me.
Screaming, he shoved the other Evangelion out of the way and placed himself in front of the Angel's attack. Agony seared into him, a jumble of thoughts and images that quickly resolved into the face of pain.
"Shinji's dropped the gun!" announced Aoba. "He's in the beam now!"
Kouzou rubbed his eyes. He felt like a child again, trying to get a ball out of a tree by throwing another ball at it, only to lose a half-dozen balls in the branches and still be stuck empty-handed. "Rei," he called.
"Yes," acknowledged the girl flatly over the network.
He sighed. This was something he had hoped to avoid at all costs, but all their other weapons were useless against an enemy so high in space. "Go to Terminal Dogma," he commanded. "Get the Lance and use it against the Angel." SEELE won't be happy. But then, when are they?
"Yes."
The crippling pain and inky shame that had come to define existence took some time to subside, and even so afterimages still strobed across her mind, scenes of humiliating defeat, spikes of raw emotion in her mind. Eventually vision returned hazily, showing her the interior of a red-tinted cylinder.
The entry plug, recognized Asuka vaguely. I'm still in the Eva? What happened to the Angel? Did we... did I defeat--
"No!" screamed Shinji from somewhere nearby, a clawing panic evident in his voice. "No! Father!"
Shaking her head to clear it, Asuka managed to uncurl herself from the ball she'd been in, then glanced at the monitors. Something was shining on Shinji from above, a glowing parody of divine attention. "Shinji?"
Unit-01 doubled over, clutching its head. "I'm so sick of you!" gasped Shinji's voice over the network. "I'm not afraid of you anymore! Do you hear me?"
What is he doing there? wondered Asuka, frowning. Why did he do that to me? "You idiot, get out of the beam," she snapped, but he did not respond except to release a low groan. "Shinji, move! This is my fight!"
"Father," he whispered. "You're dead; you can't... no, don't do... no! Come back!"
"Whatever," she muttered. "Two can play this game." Gripping the controls, she willed the Eva to stand, but nothing happened.
"Please," pleaded Shinji in a broken whisper. "I know what she is. Don't make me... no... please, no..."
What? Asuka blinked at the screens in Unit-02, trying to determine what was wrong. Am I out of power? No, I'm still plugged in. "Move!" she commanded, shaking the controls angrily. "Get up!"
Shinji coughed a ragged sob, his voice barely audible. "No," he begged. "No. No more." His words quickly blended together into a constant moan.
"Get up!" snarled Asuka at the unmoving Eva. "Get up, you stupid doll! What's wrong with you? Why won't you...?" She trailed off, belatedly noticing how her entire body was quaking, fingers and toes clenched, teeth bared. Is it the Eva, she wondered distantly, or is it me? Her body remembered the pain of the rape-beam viscerally, she realized, and would not go back into it, not for Shinji, not for anyone. His voice, highlighting her weakness, was now just a whimpering cry, begging for help.
Her eyes burned as she attacked the controls with renewed fury. "Get up," she commanded in a whisper. "Get up! You stupid thing; I hate you so much! Move! Move! Move!" Unit-02 did not comply.
Slumping, defeated, Asuka bit back a sob. I'm so pathetic, she lamented. Can't even get my Eva to stand. Can't take a hit for someone else. I'm a coward, just like stupid Shinji.
Sudden comprehension dawned, and she gasped, wide-eyed. With the realization of her weakness, she could understand some of what motivated him. He'd heard her cries before jumping into the beam, she knew; he'd known it was going to be painful beyond imagining. Someone who identified himself as weak wouldn't have rescued another that way for show, for bragging rights, for praise from his superiors.
No. He'd done it just because he hadn't wanted her to be in pain.
"Shinji," she whispered, feeling tears leak into the surrounding LCL. "Please get out of there. Please."
When he didn't reply, she turned her attention back to her own Eva. "Move," she begged anew, punctuating the word by pounding the controls helplessly with her fists. "Move! Damn it, move! Move..."
As Rei stepped out of the lift, heavy Lance in Unit-00's hands, Shinji had already fallen silent. Stepping past the motionless forms of the other two Evangelion units nearly tore her heart in two -- she wanted to do what Shinji had done, to tackle him out of harm's way and suffer in his place -- but her orders were to take up position and be ready to throw. It would not take the MAGI long to compute a trajectory for the Lance.
Shinji, she wept, turning around; his audio feed now carried only his haggard breathing. Hefting the Lance like an ancient javelin, she blinked tears from her eyes. Shinji. I hope you are unconscious.
"Almost there, Rei!" encouraged Misato over the network. "Just a few more seconds!"
Rain continued to fall, dripping cleanly into the street in this oddly bloodless battle. What had been spilled instead, however, was infinitely worse, the suffering of brutal indignity, the wrenching theft of sanity. She'd heard Ritsuko murmuring moments back, wondering idly if Shinji would even have a mind left when this was done. I hope so. I... I would have liked to talk to him, just once more.
"Here it is, Rei!" called Misato triumphantly. "Go!" Numbers and figures began scrolling across her screens rapidly.
Taking a moment to commit the calculations to memory, Rei shuffled a few steps forward, then threw with all her might. The Lance streaked heavenward, crackling into a sleek new shape before piercing a hole in the grey clouds. A moment later, the beam winked out.
Shinji groaned audibly. Unit-01 collapsed into a disorganized heap.
Biting her lips, she rushed to help him, to get him out of the Eva. She wasn't certain what good it would do, but at least breathing normal air might provide some slight comfort.
"Rei, stop!" called Misato's voice over the network. "Don't touch either of the other Evas until we can be sure they're not contaminated in any way."
"Yes," she acknowledged hoarsely. Unit-00's hands paused, hovering a meter above Unit-01's entry plug. Shinji... I can't help you. I'm sorry. As the rain continued, she stood in place, able neither to reach closer nor to back off. Unmoving, helpless, she wept.