Nothing Will Ever Change That
Chapter 79: New Discoveries
A/N- This chapter was proof-read by Frost-Eva-00. Thanks for the help man! And a few of the fighting moments were inspired by AsukaLangleySouryu ReiAyanami, so thanks with that too.
Same Place
"Get your ass back here!" it sounded like Karsten… but I could understand him. I get up to see an Eva exactly like this one, only red, holding up a fist, obviously what knocked me down, "Give me back my dummy plug!" a small screen pops up with his face on it. Karsten was piloting the Eva! Asuka gets an enraged look on her face as she stares at the screen.
Karsten's face had suffered badly from my beating. He has a large eye-patch over the right eye where I had caved it in. His jaw was literally made of metal. Screws held the shaped metal to his face. It looked like a normal jaw, just metal. It was – to say the least – creepy. A few cuts still remained on his face.
How was I going to fight him? I only had one hand, and that means one fist. I look down at Asuka, now staring at me. She gives me a warm smile and takes hold of the other control stick. Was she planning on piloting too? She nods slightly as a sign for me to fight.
"Fine, just let Asuka go!" he smiles a little.
"Stupid little boy… Asuka IS the dummy plug! What did you think was happening? Look at her eyes, her eyes tell it all. That red isn't there for decoration, that red shows that she's ready to become an Eva. We were just about to take her out when you came and stole her. Now if you don't mind, I believe you have my property." Like hell she was property!
"You're not taking Asuka again! She's staying with me!" I throw a punch, but he kicks my hand away.
"Don't you want to help the world? Isn't that why you pilot Eva? She will allow normal people to pilot, like me for instance. I was the first untrained man to enter an Eva and be able to pilot it, and it's all thanks to my little girl," she still had that look on her face.
"I don't care about the world!" I lunge at him and tackle him to the ground, "I only care about Asuka!" I see a knife where it normally would be on my Eva and grab it. I shove it into the open mouth of his Eva, pinning it to the ground. Blood starts to leak from the gash. I get up and stare down at him, "Just like last time, isn't it?" I give him a wicked smile. He still kept his emotionless face staring into my eyes, "Only this time… I will kill you."
"You can't do it. You don't have the guts to kill another human. You had the chance and passed it up, coward." I widen my smile and widen my eyes into his.
"You willing to bet on that?" I slam my foot on his throat, sending a scream through the city. We've already destroyed so many buildings, and I tried my best to avoid much more, but I also had to beat him, "Are you?"
"Y-Yes…" he grabs my foot and throws me across the city. I get up and look back over at him still on the ground. He reaches up and tears out the knife in his throat, sending blood flying, "Because you're just a kid," he raises his hands high in the air and slams them on the ground, thrusting him to his feet, "And you can't stand to stare death in the eyes." I once again charge at him and our hands lock in a vice grip. Now our Evas stared at each other with those open mouths. The faces were just yards apart from each other as we struggled for control. Asuka was struggling to hold the Eva's arm in place as we did this. Her arm began to shake. I knew she couldn't hold it much longer, I had to end this.
"I've done it before…" I smile again, "And you're doing it right now… you're staring at a monster!" I swipe my leg under him, sending him falling to the ground, "You're staring at a killer!" I slam my foot onto his stomach over and over, slowly making a crater in the earth. He grunted with each pounding, and after the fourth stomp, he catches my foot in mid-air.
"Hey Asuka! You want to know a secret about your little boyfriend?" he twists my foot, sending a cracking sound through the city and a scream from me, "He killed Dietlinde when you were away! He left her alone again, and she suffocated under the sheets!" Asuka's eyes went wide as she looked up at me, "He didn't love her! He doesn't even love you!" her jaw hung open as she stared at me.
"S-Shin… ji…?" I see a tear form in her eye, and then quickly disappear in the LCL. I'm balancing on one foot as Karsten held me up.
"Oh come on! Are you really going to believe him? Dietlinde is with Akagi!" I kick him away and land on my injured foot, "Ah! Damn it!" I clench my eyes shut in pain. I fall to the ground as I see him get up and walk over to me.
"It's true… your daughter's dead!" he slams a foot on my chest.
"No… she's not…" I pass out in pain.
---
"Where… am I?" I can't see anything, just blackness. I'm on the ground and I find it impossible to get up, "Where the hell is Asuka!" I'm thrashing to get up, but I can't.
"Calm down… I'm here…" I see a small glow in front of my face.
"What the hell are you? Let me up!" a human form begins to take shape from the glow.
"Shhh… just calm down…" it's a woman… her voice is so calming… it's like a sedative for me. I see color start to take shape on her. A face is also coming into view, "I'm here…"
"Who… are you?" she puts her hands on my face as her face finishes taking form.
"Mommy's here…" it was my mother! It was Yui! This was a trick… she's dead… Karsten was doing this! I struggle under the image's soft touch. I finally get a hand free and try to push her off of me, but my hand goes right through her, "So much hate Shinji… what happened?"
"Let go of me! You're not my mother!" I feel tears staring to form in my eyes.
"Shinji Ikari! Stop it!" her face gets serious, "You need to calm down! Do you want to save Asuka or not?" my eyes shoot open and I look into her eyes, "There…"
"But… how are you…" I suddenly believed her… this was my mother…
"What Gendo said was true… with one exception. I was in Unit 01 after the accident, but I entered you when you first started the Eva. I have been with you in every one of your fights," that means… she saw me…
"What are you doing here? Why are you here now?" she gives me a warm smile.
"To help save my child… and his wife…" she slowly sinks into my body and eventually disappears completely. I suddenly feel warm, and oddly, unafraid. The blackness starts to fade into a white, then into actual colors. The colors arrange themselves into an organized blur, and then the blur turns into my entry plug.
"Shinji… wake up…!" I look down to see Asuka in my lap again crying as she looked up at me. I look back up to see Karsten still hovering over me, about to land another stomp.
"I'm up!" I grab his foot in mid-air and throw him aside. I bring my knees to my chest and kick myself to my feet. I was able to stand! What about my ankle? Did she…? Karsten was up too, and staring at me.
"So, you're not dead, huh? I'll fix that!" he charges at me and I suddenly feel powerful. With his fist aiming at my head, he charges and eventually gets to me, where I catch it in my palm with ease. Asuka continues to hold the controls as she looks up at me. I suddenly feel warmth in my dead hand… I felt with my hand… it begins to glow a brilliant white and I feel a pulse start in it. I rise to my face and slowly clench my fingers into a fist. Asuka stared at this the whole time. I give him a wicked smile once more as I held his fist in place.
"Guess what I can do!" Asuka removes her hand from the controls and I grab a hold of it. My hand was still glowing a bright white as I threw a punch at his head. He caught this, ending with the two of us in a stalemate. I start to knee him over and over in the stomach, but he didn't let up.
"And guess what I can do!" the Eva's eyes turn dark red as he shoots the Eva's mouth even further open. He swings down his head onto my neck and bites deeply.
"AH! What… the HELL!" he was latched onto my neck, slowly sinking his teeth deeper and deeper into my flesh. I pull away from him, making a huge chunk of muscle and flesh leaves my body. Blood pours onto the city below as I back up, "You sick bastard!" the Eva swallows the chunk and actually smiles.
"What are you going to do about it?" I run over to him and as he saw this coming, he prepares to catch a fist or foot; instead I plant a hand on his head and flip over him, ending with me facing his back. He let out a small cry as I side-kicked him into a large building, making it fall onto his head. Without hesitation, I charge into the smoke and grab a hold of his neck. I raise him high above my head and make him look down on me.
"I told you… I'm a monster…" I put my other hand on his neck. In an attempt to escape, he grabs onto my hands, but with no leverage to the ground, it did nothing. As he screamed, I slowly began to twist the Eva's neck, "Let me inform you about the Evas…" he continued to scream, "You have what's called a synchronization score… which basically means you feel what the Eva feels… do you feel this?" I knee him in the groin, "Do you?" his eyes were closed and his head was held up high in pain, "That's what I thought!" I take away a hand and punch him continuously in the chest, slowly making the armor fall off, "You also have an entry plug, that's where you are right now…" I punch at the bare flesh of the Eva, slowly taking out chunks of flesh, "You could think of it as your safe haven…" I eventually find his entry plug and rip it out, leaving his Eva to fall back onto the rubble, "That is until someone – me in this case – finds it…" he opens his eyes, no longer in pain.
"Like I said, you can't do it…" I held his plug in my right hand.
"Let me finish… if one were to find it, one could end the fight right there. Meaning killing his opponent, but in this case…" I crack the plug in half carefully a pour him and the LCL onto my hand, "I think I'll make you suffer." He looks up at me with those uncaring eyes. I look at his face, he was talking. I could make out a few words. Apparently, he DID know Japanese; he was just being a jerk before.
"Do your worst!" I turn on the external microphone.
"Do my worst? Okay… how strong are you?" he just stands there, "How much can you lift? Seriously, you look like a strong man, tell me!" he mouths his words again.
"Three-fifty… benching…" I chuckle a little.
"I knew it! You are strong! So… since you're so strong… hold this up for as long as you can…" I put my other hand above his head and he trusts up his arms in an attempt to not get crushed. I actually had to look down on him to make sure he was still holding it up; it was no effort at all for me. His face begins to turn red and beads of sweat appear on his forehead, "Not bad… I wonder what a little more pressure will do…" I slightly push on the controls and he falls to one knee, still trying to hold it up. Soon, his other knee falls, "So, now you're on your knees… tell me, is this getting heavy?" I put a little more pressure and with a scream from him, I see his shoulder-blades cave into his lower back. Now all that was left of his arms were little stubs of fingers. He fell to the ground creaming in pain, "Awww… was that too much? Here, I'll make it all better," I throw his body into a nearby lake and watch the bubbles stop.
"S-Shinji…?" I look down at Asuka talking, "How… could you…?"
"He was going to kill us! I had to kill him!" he shook her head as tears fell into the LCL.
"How… could you… make him suffer…? You… tortured him…!" her eyes were angry.
"He deserved it! After all he did, would you want him to have a quick death? He almost killed you, he killed my father, he destroyed my hand, and he constantly hit you, I wasn't going to let that go!" her eyes went scared.
"Y-Your… face… so much… hate…" my eyes go wide. I had changed. Now even Asuka knew it.
"Sorry… how do we get home…?" I just wanted to change the subject; I didn't want to talk about this right now.
"C-Coward…" she reaches behind her and flips another switch. The Eva begins to lift up and I see that it had flames shooting from its feet. I guide it forward and soon it was shooting across the sky. The ocean passed under us within a few seconds. I didn't even really have to guide it too much; it somehow knew to go to Japan. With a few minutes, we were landing at the Japanese NERV. People gathered outside of the new Eva and stared with aw. I eject the plug and we safely land only a few yards from the Eva aside from miles away. Yet another feature this new Unit had. I opened the hatch to reveal Akagi standing in front of it.
"I knew you'd get her back!" neither I nor Asuka were smiling. I start to pick her up, but she pushes away from my arms.
"I… can walk… on my own…" she still couldn't speak right, even after all this time. She crawls out of the plug and slowly walks to her room.
"Shinji… what happened to her?" Akagi stood there wide eyed staring at her walking away. I finish crawling out of the LCL and begin to walk myself.
"She saw me…" that was all I said as I made my way away from Unit 06.
A/N- Ouch! Shinji must be hurting after what Asuka said! Do you think she will forgive and forget? How do you think this will be resolved? Find out in the next chapter; Overburdened, until then, keep on keepin' on!