Chapter 2

A/N: Concerning the source of material, this will mostly be based on the TV episodes, but I might draw on the manga (no pun intended) for inspiration. There are a few things that I thought the manga did better than the series in portraying (number one example would be the end result of Shinji's fight with the 13th Angel, I won't spoil it for those who haven't read the manga)

This was the third time Shinji woke up in his hospital bed after the accident with the 12th Angel (i.e. falling flat on his Eva's face from a quarter of a mile in the air). He was about to open his eyes when he remembered a nightmare; He was in the hospital in bed and there had been people there to see him. One of the visitors, who Shinji remembered as Rei, had nearly strangled him to death. "Was she actually trying to smother me or was it a hug?" Shinji contemplated, "She had to be trying to kill me because it would be more likely for Rei Ayanami to try to kill me than to hug me." Even though it was a dream, he remembered that himself waking up prompted the murder attempt by Rei, so he slowly opened one of his eyes.

Shinji's blood was suddenly flooded with ice cold adrenaline; looking away from the subject of his terror he could see visually what he felt, his heart monitor was climbing at an astounding rate. Looking back at the blue haired girl he slowly gulped. Rei sat in the chair next to the bed, beaming at the sight of the now conscious Shinji. Shinji noticed she was literally shaking, like she was about to explode, as she managed to squeak, "Good Morning, Shinji!"

Shinji fearfully managed to let out a "Good morning," in return. They continued to stare at each other, Shinji leering at Rei like she was about to pounce on him; Rei gazing at Shinji like she wanted to pounce on him. Finally Rei broke the silence by leaning closer to Shinji and saying "I'm so glad you're all right Shinji. When the angel swallowed you up, I thought I'd never see you again. I was so worried, everyone was; Misato, Asuka, Gendo." Not surprised in hearing Misato's name, Shinji's ears perked when he heard Asuka's but he nearly choked on his tongue when he heard his father's. Rei didn't notice Shinji gagging and continued, "But then you fell out of the sky, which was weird, but I don't care because you're back!"

Shinji continued to watch Rei, as she was still shaking with even more vigor. He finally couldn't take it when she looked like she was in the middle of an epileptic seizure. "Are you alright Rei?" he cautiously asked. Rei who had finally noticed the tremors of her body, replied, "Oh this, it's just that I want to give you a hug," the heart monitor began to beep loudly, "but after my last one the doctors said it wouldn't be a good idea."

Shinji attempting to be polite said, "At least they trusted you enough to let you see me alone."

Rei lowered her head a bit and Shinji noticed her cheeks turn a deep scarlet color. Although Rei had been acting very strange lately, seeing Rei turn this red was mind boggling. In fact, if you could see the place where Shinji kept things he thought he would never see in his brain, there would be the remnants of a mushroom cloud spreading radioactive particles to other parts of the brain that included control of his speech production and control of the jaw muscle ((A/N: 20 bonus points to the first one who can tell me the name of the actual part of the brain that controls speech production)). He had made her blush in the past, but she could never be described as a tomato in those instances. "Not exactly," she answered as she pointed towards the door. Shinji saw a burley orderly standing in the hallway holding a straight jacket. I'm surprised there is only one; it took three of them to drag me of you." At this statement (much to Shinji's astonishment) Rei turned an even deeper red. Shinji glanced back at the orderly who had noticed the attention he had received from the crazy girl and nervously prepared a syringe.

Although Shinji was too perturbed by Rei's behavior to question her about it, he didn't want to see her "medicated" against her will, so he sighed and made her an offer, "You can hold my hand if you want." Rei's face transformed from disheartened to ecstatic, nearly leapt from her chair and grabbed his closest hand with both of hers. Shinji saw the orderly flinch from the sudden movement and prick himself with syringe. The unfortunate soul gave a panicked look around before suddenly becoming more relaxed, so relaxed in fact that he that he fell over so half of his body was not visible in the door way. Shinji refocused on Rei, who had her eyes closed and had stopped vibrating. Shinji, still weirded out, gave a small smile. He wasn't sure if he liked how Rei was acting. While his discomfort about Rei's current actions stemmed from his utter surprise, he was positive that her former behavior of not showing any emotions put him off. And he definitely found her physically attractive. And with this thought, his mind began to wander, until a "certain anatomy" began to rise to attention. In a single instant, Shinji realized two things: 1) he was holding hands with Rei Ayanami and 2) he had some morning wood without it being morning. He almost let out a scream of horror (and knowing Shinji, it would have been a girly, high pitched scream). Luckily, Rei had not noticed the silent gasp of horror, the terrified look on his face, or the tent that was pitched in-between his legs. Quickly repositioning his legs, Shinji as calmly as he could, tried to divert his hentai mind to a new topic; he found one in remembering the memory he had originally thought was a dream. Rei hadn't been the only person in the room, although he figured the fact he remembered at all was a testament to his cognitive skills under extreme duress.

"Rei, when I woke up before, when you 'hugged' me," at the mention of the incident, Rei blushed again, "who was in the room with you?" Before Rei could answer, Shinji saw a doctor run up to the orderly in the hallway, check his pulse and then look into the room occupied by the two Eva pilots. Seeing the blue haired girl prompted the doctor to read his clipboard, and when he got half way through, his face turned a sickly greenish gray. The doctor then looked down at the unconscious orderly with a pool of drool under his face, then quickly back to Rei. He shifted his eyes to Shinji and clearly made the signal that he was going to call for help. Shinji shook his head, but the doctor ran off.

Rei gave a confused look to Shinji. Shinji quickly said, "Oh sorry, I was feeling a little disoriented, but I'm okay now."

"Okay," Rei shrugged as she said, "Yeah, the Major was with me as well as Asuka." Two thoughts went racing through Shinji's head. One was surprisingly that Asuka had come to see him and the other was the doctor he saw was probably coming with an army of orderlies with enough tranquilizers to take down a bull elephant. The latter thought was the more urgent one, not only because he didn't want Rei knocked out, but also the all out brawl would take place in his proximity. As he began to contemplate how to avoid the upcoming pain, Rei unknowingly came up with the solution. "Oh Asuka, I forgot! She wanted to know when you woke up. She was just as worried as I was; the river of tears we produced could have flooded the city. In fact I think she was even more worried than me, if I didn't know any better I'd said she had a thing for you. I should go get her, but I don't want to leave you alone."

Although what Rei had just said should have bewildered Shinji into mumbling gibberish, he got a grip on himself, remembered the alarmed doctor and said, "It's alright Rei, I'll be fine."

"Are you sure?" Rei asked with a tone of worry.

"Oh sure, I'm feeling fine," Shinji replied with his voice cracking in the middle of his sentence when he thought he heard panicked yelling, "I'll be okay, I'm sure of it."

"Okay," she said cheerfully as she rose from the chair. She trotted happily until she reached the orderly. Shinji assumed she would at least look at him, but no, she just skipped over his comatose body. Shinji let a sigh of relief as she turned around the corner. This day was turning into the strangest day of his life since first seeing the Evangelion.

Shinji's mind returned to what Rei had said about Asuka. First of all he was flabbergasted that she was giving him relationship advice; in terms of romance Rei made Shinji look like Casanova. And secondly, she had said Asuka had a thing for him. He scoffed at the idea, the way she treated him alone was all the evidence he needed to disprove the theory. The constant derisions, the physical abuse were clear signs that Asuka hated him. He sighed at this thought, and then moved his mind to earlier that day. How had she reacted to his cheeky remark about "combat being a man's job? " "Chauvinistic piglet" was the exact phrase she had used. That was the last thing he remembered hearing from her before…

"The angel?!" What had happened to the angel? Rei's behavior had distracted him from so many things.

Speaking of distractions, at that moment the doctor returned by sticking his head in the door. Urgently he asked, Have you seen the pilot of Unit 00, she is very unstable at the moment. Which way did she go?" Shinji shrugged. The doctor gave an exasperated sigh and gave a signal. Several orderlies as well as few Section 2 agents carrying what Shinji hoped were tranquilizer guns ran past the doctor, luckily for Rei, in the wrong direction.

As Shinji gave a sigh, his thoughts returned to the day's events. He hadn't even given a single thought to the angel since waking up. He didn't even know if it was destroyed or not. But Shinji's mind couldn't focus solely on the angel. What had happened after he had been, as Rei put it, "swallowed up?" The white void had been bizarre enough. A white infinity, Shinji shivered thinking about it. As Shinji continued to recollect the day's events he brought up the strangest occurrence (other than Rei giving him a hug) to happen; seeing Eva Unit 01 soar by him, when he himself was in Unit 01. He didn't know why, but he knew for a fact that he hadn't seen himself. The direction it came from was a completely different than the direction he felt his own Unit 01 was rocketing in. And when his own Eva was only a few feet away he had gotten the weirdest feeling; weirder than anything he had felt in the Eva. His whole body had tingled like he was electrified.

His thoughts were interrupted by the sound of footsteps, before looking up he thought it could be Asuka and Rei; but no, it was one person and the footsteps were too heavy to be a 14 year old girl. "It must be that damn doctor," Shinji thought, "Listen, I haven't seen her," he continued, but stopped when he looked up. Shinji's body tensed to the point where his fingernails painfully dug into his palms. The man before him, the uniform, the glasses, the only one on the Earth Shinji truly hated.

A/N: That's where I decided to end it. I could have done a little bit more but I think this more dramatic. Today after my classes I had the combination of a lot of free time and a burst of inspiration, so that is why I updated so quickly. Don't expect me to produce chapters this quickly on a regular basis (especially with finals coming up)

Also, I know Rei is and the others will be, but is Shinji OOC. I'm not sure if he is or not. If you write a review, please address this, thanks.

And finally, in writing this chapter I listened to a wide selection of music. It ranged from Franz Von Suppe's Light Calvary Overture to The Beastie Boy's Brass Monkey. Wow, I'm crazy or what!