Disclaimer; I don't own Eva, and I used a semicolon this time.
Author's Note: Go back and read chapters 1 and 2, PLEASE. I've edited in a few scenes so that part of this chapter—and pretty much the rest of the plot—makes a little more sense. So, if you haven't already, go read the NEW chapters ONE and TWO!
CHAPTER iii: AMIDST THE WATER, A MOVEMENT SILENCED BY TIME
A cloud drifted idly overhead, taking all the time in the world to cross the finite dome expanse of the bright cerulean sky. The shadow passed over a uniquely unremarkable building, constructed a deceptively short time ago—the post-impact architecture a complete reproduction of the pre-impact buildings now underwater. Not surprising, one could assume, since the impact did little to faze the architectural style of utilitarian buildings like schools or government offices.
The roof, for instance, still had a rather hideous rusting railing that prevented occupants of the building from accidentally throwing themselves off, reminiscent of the pre-impact school buildings of fifteen, twenty, thirty years before.
When set against the locale of Tokyo-3, it looked as if Second Impact had never even happened.
The cloud drifted onward, its shadow slowly but steadily creeping up the sides of the grotesque, urban, rotting building, until the shadow crept its way up to the roof. It merged with another shadow.
"Ikari! Man, it's been a little while, hasn't it?" The wind tousled the Third Child's hair as he leaned his weight on the railing, his upper torso suspended out above the three-or-four story drop. He didn't bother to turn around to see who it was. He already knew.
"Mm." A noncommittal sigh. It was the same thing he did last time.
Kensuke was taken aback—again. "That's it? Just 'mm'? Even after we bonded out in the wilderness a couple weeks ago? Hah—I tell ya, Toji gave me an earful after he heard that I let you just get swiped by those NERV guys. Whatta trip."
Shinji watched the flower petals from the cherry tree below sway in the breeze. Funny, that wasn't there before, was it? Maybe he just never noticed.
"Kensuke?"
Kensuke joined him, leaning his elbows on the rusted railing. "What's up?"
"What's today's date?" A petal came loose from the flower, and found itself rushing skyward in a sudden updraft.
"It's…um," Kensuke's eyebrows knitted in thought. "You know, I'm not really sure." He laughed. "I just know that it's Tuesday. I can never remember the date—and anyway, who cares? Oh—" he just remembered something. "Toji's on his way up, by the way. He's finally come around since he saw you take down that angel. 'Wants to apologize, or something."
"No, it's fine. I…" he trailed off. The flower petal floated up to his face.
"Shinji?"
It was beautiful.
His hand waded through the air. Kensuke ceased to exist. The railing vanished. The blue in the sky engulfed his being as his fingers closed around the miniscule petal, and the world became a cushion of simplicity.
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The girl named Misato grinned at him from across the cafeteria table. What perfect teeth…
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He opened his eyes and blinked, then groaned and cursed loudly. The soft hum of a computer fan droned in the background, accompanied by the unending sound of the ventilation, and the ever present tick of the clock on his desk. It said that he needed a smoke break. Too bad he was fresh out of cigarettes.
He pulled his head off of the keyboard, and gazed at the screen tiredly. Jumbles of text mashed together incoherently for pages, interjected by random symbols of punctuation. He cursed again. Why was he so goddamn tired all the time?
He sat back in the chair and stretched, groaning softly as he did so. What was he supposed to be doing, again?
Maybe some coffee would nudge his brain.
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He stared into the cup. The aimless pool of sludge washed around at the bottom.
"You shouldn't spend so much time staring into cups, Ryoji." The Sub Commander stalked into the break room. "The coffee here is never very hot to begin with—shame if it gets any colder."
Kaji blinked over at the older man. He almost replied in jest, but an immense feeling of déjà vu hit him. It made him pause.
Fuyutsuki noticed. "What is it?"
"Nothing…." He blinked again. "Nothing at all."
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The rain hadn't let up yet. If anything, it had gotten harder. The auditorium was starting to flood—three inches of water in some places, five at the deepest. Drops still fell from the ceiling.
Rei observed the flooding from her vantage point on stage. Ikari slouched in one of the seats near the back. Since the floor sloped towards the stage, the back wasn't in danger of being flooded too soon.
"It seems that we're the only people here, Ayanami." His voice distant. It always was.
"…"
"We're—I couldn't get to a phone. 'Looks like we're just going to have to ride this storm out."
The clock on the wall measured the silence with its hands. Minutes passed. Neither of them spoke.
Rei peered into the flood of water that had accumulated at the base of the stage, staring into her soul.
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He ran his bow across the strings, his fingers lightly tapping the appropriate spots on the higher two strings to resonate the A harmonic. The D was a little flat. He adjusted the fine tuners appropriately.
Why were the stage lights always on? That one over to the left was in his face. Maybe he could adjust the music stand to block it—there.
He tuned the other strings accordingly. It was one of the few euphorias of life: the perfectly tuned instrument. He let a small smile escape, before pondering his music selection.
BACH
He flipped through the pages of the manuscript, his eyes dancing across each page as he dissected the melodies and rhythms of each piece, before settling on a uniquely obscure one.
UNACCOMPANIED CELLO SUITE No. 5
IN C Minor
PRELUDE
He took it very slow.
The air was heavy in this place, wherever it was. Though he focused on the sheet in front of him, he could scarcely see anything other than the plain yellow boarding of the small plain stage. It cut off to his left, heralding a drop—probably four or five feet—to the pit and the audience's rows of seats. To his right, it disappeared behind a colossal beige curtain. The curtain ran the length of the stage, blocking the secret hovels of the backstage.
The song echoed off of the far reaches of the shadowed auditorium. The humidity would probably mess up his instrument—he'd no doubt have to retune after the prelude.
A drop of water pulled his thoughts out of the music. It fell, unannounced, from the ceiling, sailing downwards through the air, landing, uninvited, on the sheet of music in front of him. It made a loud, wet sound.
The echoes in the key of C Minor stopped immediately.
The notes on the page began to run and blur together, the ends of the pages bending inwards from the stress of the weighted music. They melted together, dripping, oozing; the pages pooled off the edges of the stands and dripped like blood onto the floor, running in between the cracks of the cheap, lacquered, yellow boards.
Shinji leapt back in alarm, the cello disturbingly ripped from his grip. It fell into the stage, engulfed entirely by the ocean of indistinguishable grey gunk.
The bow in his right hand shook violently, morphing, curving, elongating until he stood on the precipice of its hair, caught in the web-like stickiness of the individual strands, panicked, confused—
"Ikari."
She was perched on the stage, her legs dangling off the edge, her reflection in the pool of water at its base interrupted by staccatos of raindrops from the ceiling.
"Aya—Ayanami?"
He realized that his cello was nowhere to be found. Neither was the sheet music or stand. Or chair.
He clenched his left hand out of nervousness.
"What are you doing?" Her quiet tone was discordant against the intensity of her eyes.
He blinked. This was—this was the real Ayanami, wasn't it? This girl couldn't be the same girl he kept catching off of the stretcher—unless, the first time really did happen—but that just proved that—wait—unless—but that just—
He opened his mouth to speak as he caught a glimpse of the incomprehensible truth that suddenly dawned on him.
"I—"
But it was too late, because he woke up on the verge of epiphany.
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"—…"
The silence was trapped in his room. A thin layer of dust had settled over everything; his cello, his desk, even portions of the floor. Cobwebs had formed in the dark, shadowed corners.
His alarm clock hadn't gone off yet. He still had a few more hours until that happened.
He wandered into the living room, where the television flickered lifeless images of all the angel battles, one after another in synchronized order. Giants of light with invisible force fields destroyed buildings with flashes of epiphany, biomechanical behemoths struggled against colossal beasts, talking heads barked out orders to other talking heads. The volume was nearly silent.
Misato was curled up on the couch, asleep. Shinji didn't want to wake her.
He slid out onto the patio. The air was stagnant and heavy, humid beyond words. The night was heavily overcast, and even the sound of the cicadas was muffled by the dense heat. Everything pointed to a storm.
He stared across the barren landscape. He saw the bustling city of Dis before him, perfectly set against the backdrop of an inevitable wave of the future. In his mind, he envisioned it; the battle, the endless troops, the weapons, the last final attempt to steal more power, Man's last jealousy. In his mind, he envisioned the apocalypse as planned by his father, as carried out by his own hands.
He blinked.
He could almost see the wings of Unit-01 sprouting on the horizon.
Shinji turned around, refusing to look at his reflection in the glass door. As he stepped inside, he ignored the television set that had finally been turned off, the sleeping form of Misato that had finally sauntered off to her own bed. He walked past the door to his room, stopping at the next one down. It was closed.
She wouldn't be there, but it was closed anyhow. Habit.
He opened it.
He stepped inside.
He curled up on the spare bed, and clutched the pillow close to his chest.
"Help me, Asuka." He clutched the pillow tighter.
Even though he couldn't hear himself above the relentless din of time, he subconsciously knew that he spoke the words.
"Just—anyone, please… help me."
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She wandered the halls of the school building. She had tried numerous doors, but found all of them to be locked. The exterior poured harder and harder with each passing stroke of the long hand, the meaningless hours ticking away past thought.
She stopped in front of an interior door. Its standard stainless steel knob stood out from the rest of its ordinary, brown-lacquered façade. The vertical grain of the wood was surprisingly dark.
She recognized the door—she passed by it every morning she had attended the school. She had never known what was behind it.
It was an odd sensation.
She reached toward the knob, grasping it in the palm of her hand, and gave it a gentle twist, but a soft click prevented any further movement.
Locked.
"Ayanami,"
Ikari was behind her. She didn't hear him approach. Nevertheless, she turned to greet him.
"Yes?"
His brows knitted into concern. "What were you doing?"
"I was curious." Her voice fell flat against the corridor's emptiness. "That's all."
Her uniform swayed as she left the spot, the soft ruffling of the fabric the only foreign sound in the whole building.
The rain continued to fall.
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The one named Sohryu stood alone in the subway station. Another train ran by, strands of her red hair filtered through her vision; ends whishing past her face and following the last car, sucked in by the vacuum created by the train's rush.
This train was on the express line; nonstop to nowhere. It never stopped here.
She sighed and crossed her arms across her chest, scuffling over to a bench and crossing her legs. It didn't stop this time, but she could wait a little longer.