Rebirth

"Kaji…" a voice spoke softly, "Are you there? I… I have tried this many times but… please… come back to me. I need you" a voice spoke, a familiar voice….

When he opened his eyes, it would be like he'd not opened them in years, light would blind him, sounds harsh. Someone was standing over him.

"I can't believe it…" a new voice spoke, the quiet beep of a monitor.

"Love…" the first voice spoke, the first face he'd see as the blurriness cleared.

"Kaji…" Asuka smiled down at him, she looked different, her hair longer, the black eye patch over her eye…the strange plug suit she wore and the leather jacket over it.

"You're… alive" she began to cry but only from her visible eye.

Kaji was rushed with life, light and sound as if a big bang happened and he was there to witness it all at once from the void of nothingness. A deep breath entered his lungs as if he had not taken one in so long. His ears where also able to separate sound after a few moments and he could hear Asuka voice. Was he dead and this was the place known as heaven from all the myth's man had spoken of for the length of man history.

"A...Aa..Asuka..." He muttered as his head turned and he could see Asuka as his eyes begun to focus. She did look a little different. He raised his right hand slowly to wipe the tear from her face as he took another deep breath before speaking.

"Here I was thinking I was in heaven with you." Slowly sitting up his body washed over in pain. It was as if he was in some kind of stasis.

"What happened? The Third Impact... Did we stop it?" His mind rushed to all the things he was thinking, feeling and experiencing right before everything went black. As happy as he was to see Asuka standing before him, he wondered who all else survived this?

"Third impact happened" A new voice spoke, Misato leaned over and smiled at him for a moment, she looked older, much older than she used to, while Asuka looked barely changed.

"I'll leave him to you Asuka" she told her and left, looking back with a sad smile.

Asuka was left alone in the room, she was wearing a black leather jacket on top of her plug suit.

"Yea, we didn't stop it" she explained, "Third Impact wiped out about..." she looked up in thought. "About 75% of mankind. The ones who are left, we call ourselves 'The Fallen'" she laughed softly to herself.

"Misato is the head of a military Unit. I think you know the name." she added and took his hand, clasping it tightly in both of her hands.

"Kaji. I… I've got something to tell you…" Biting her lip, she took a breath to steady herself.

"You've… been… gone… for… 15 years…" she spoke each word slowly.

"Remember the fight? I… barely do anymore… our last fight? Well… the scientists said I had become one with the EVA. The LCL we were in, I was absorbed; I dont remember what happened, all I remember is waking up and you were gone but, I felt you around me, I felt you there… I knew… you were there." She sat on a chair by his bed.

"I kept that LCL. We contained it inside a sealed container, we didn't know how to do anything with it, until some scientists cracked it; to bring people back from the LCL, only… those in the mass around the world, they were to far spread, you though… I had you… all of you." She grinned at him, the old fiery grin.

"They called me crazy for keeping the container but, we filled a capsule with it and waited.. for two years we tried, but nothing…"

Asuka sighed and then teared up again. "So I was giving up, I was going to kill myself. So I came to say goodbye to you. I was going to drown myself in the LCL, or do something. I think I had a gun." she added quietly.

"I wished you to be with me and then you were there, in my arms, inside the LCL. I rushed you to here and well, you're awake." Asuka looked up at him with her single eye.

"Alive… and… with me again" She looked around. "Fifteen years and your with me again." she put her head down on his hand and cried on it, tears only falling from her un-eye-patched eye.

"Third impact…" The words left Kaji's mouth in shock after hearing the much more matured and colder voice of a life long friend. Sitting there in almost in shock with the news. With Misato leaving Kaji with Asuka he listened to her as she spoke of the aftermath. Fifteen years passed. He almost did not recognise Misato after all this time. It was still like yesterday they fought for their lives in the N.E.R.V. headquarters when SEELE attacked to him.

Listening silently as she spoke of him, herself, the LCL and her feelings through all of this. These long fifteen years she had had to suffer and fight on without him. The hope she had that this day would come was touching to him, but just as painful that she thought of ending her own life without him; it hurt him deeply.

Feeling the tears upon his hands his left one turned to caress her neck as it slid across her skin. Kaji did not have much for words for this moment. Pulling Asuka close to him his right hand wrapping around her waist holding her in a tight embrace. Kaji knew it was sudden but he locked his lips with hers. Kissing her with a deep desire and passion he had missed for fifteen years as if he was making up for all this lost time right now.

After a few moments he let his grip and kiss fade as he whispered softly to Asuka. "Fifteen years and here we are. We have so much left to do in this life. My love there may be another day that we have to move forward if one of us where to fall. We should then live on in loving memory of the others. For all the ones we have lost. For everyone SEELE and Nerv and the Angels took from us. For every normal moment we missed these last fifteen years."

Smiling softly as he places another kiss to Asuka's forehead. "When we get done here is there a place to grab a meal and a date?"

When she was simply touched, Asuka leaned close and smiled up at him, the tears still falling down her face, but only on the side without the eye-patch. She felt him pull her close and this caused her to come up onto the bed, almost straddling him as she felt him kiss her forehead.

"Fifteen years I waited… for this and… I dont know…what to do" she laughed softly to herself.

"There is a few places, ration restrictions are in place, but if you pay well enough, you can get an okay meal." She admitted, biting her lip she looked around.

"You will have to be careful, many want to steal meals." she explained nervously "And I'm not that well liked Even though I fight the Angels and the EVA's" she explained. "There is something I will have to tell you" Asuka admitted.

His hands gripped at Asuka plug suit pulling her up into his lap when he witnessed her bite her lip. Kaji wanted Asuka so close as he leaned in tugging at the earlobe and whispered softly into her ear.

"Fifteen years is a long time to wait for someone. To taste their lips, to feel their touch and to feel the passion you once shared." His left hand rubbing up along Asuka's ribs before caressing softly over her breast travelling slowly up to the side of her neck.

Placing a kiss right below Asuka earlobe Kaji leaned back to look her in her one eye with a soft smile. Still whispering as his left hand caresses her cheek with a soft touch.

"You have never been one to easily get along with many. What happened to bring such dislike? Either way we have each other, even though I don't know how much money I would have being either missing in action or dead for fifteen years."

Locking his lips with Asuka's for a quick but meaning filled kiss he took a deep breath, "Thing is I am here now. Dreams from space have a chance to come true. That is if you want the guy you brought back, that is?"

"I know but, there are things you dont know about me. Since you left…" she sighed and blushed again when he began to flirt and kiss her neck. She'd missed this.. real love. Leaving what she was about to say to be forgotten, Asuka smiled at him.

"I do, I want you so much" she grabbed him closer and hugged him tightly.