Creation began on 12-08-14
Creation ended on 12-16-14
Neon Genesis Evangelion
Different from You: Loss
"…No offense, Major Katsuragi," went Maya Ibuki to the purple-haired woman, "but after what happened three hours ago, most of the personnel don't want anything to do with Commander Ikari's son and granddaughter, including finding them."
"I don't blame them," Misato expressed her opinion. "NERV made a bad choice, going after a young parent that wants nothing to do with fighting the Angels after the initial attack. He's not a pilot, hardly a child himself, and he hates the majority of his family, all save for his daughter. I wouldn't be surprised if it was discovered that he fears women after what happened."
"So, his child's the only exception to this fear?" Hyuga questioned. "He must've been going crazy after he found out his rapist had his child."
"He injured over two dozen of the personnel down here when he was looking for his daughter. Whatever thoughts were running through his head, they probably didn't compare to his paternal instincts." Misato uttered; she couldn't truly understand Shinji's mental capacity, but she could tell that when both parent and child were separated, the parent went to extremes to find her, even willing to harm people if they came between them. "You can't fathom the desperation a person can feel when someone they love is taken from them. They get angry, they get confused, start doing things they never did in order to fix situations they find themselves in. That's what he did: He fixed a situation he found them in."
-x-
"…Surely, you could've handled this acquisition of the Third Child…a little more properly, Ikari," said SEELE 04 during the meeting between Gendo and SEELE.
"The Third Child refused to cooperate," Gendo expressed. "Certain actions had to be taken."
"Like hunting him down and endangering a little girl that you withheld the fact that she's his daughter?" SEELE 10 questioned. "Your strategy put several of NERV's personnel in the hospital, some of them have considered resigning, and you have nothing to show for it! You're beginning to show incompetency, which is intolerable."
"NERV underestimated his predictability," Gendo tried to pass this situation off as a series of unfortunate events. "Everything that transpired after he got loose was nothing more than a series of accidents. His refusal to cooperate caused the injuries of everyone he got near."
"Be sure that the next time you try to recruit the Third Child, Ikari, the methods used are less than unfavorable," said SEELE 01 to him. "And the next time you try to hide secrets like this, the consequences will be severe."
When the meeting ended, Gendo was left alone in the room and fuming. He knew that there was no way the Third Child could escape his restraints when he was left in the trauma ward, so that meant that someone had to have let him out of the cuffs. Whoever did so caused this measure of damage to the personnel and the lost of an adequate resource for the Eva program, and they would pay dearly for this when they were found out.
-x-
"Urgh!" Shinji groaned, as the surgical pliers in his shoulder removed the bullet from his body.
"That was a close call for you," an elderly man told him, putting the bullet in a nearby tray as he began to stitch up the wound. "We didn't expect to see you in Japan after you left the next day last year."
"I didn't expect for us to be back in Japan, either," Shinji told him, looking across the room at his sleeping daughter. "We have a good life in the States…or had a good life in the States…until that man came and sent his lackeys after the both of us."
The ajar door to the room opened up to reveal an elderly woman with receding, gray hair and carrying a tray holding two bowls of soup.
"And how is our patient with the GSW to the shoulder?" She asked kindly.
"Doing quite well with very little anesthesia," the man told her, sealing up the wound and placing a bandage over the disinfected area. "He does need to be careful not to tear his wound open, however."
Shinji leaned up off the table and replaced his shirt with one the elderly woman brought him earlier.
"Thank you again for your help," he praised them.
"It's always a pleasure to help those that are looking to get away and start over," the woman responded, setting the soup down on the table. "And as I've said before the first time I met you last year, you've done an excellent job raising your daughter."
"Thank you."
It was about a day after they left Tokyo-3 the previous year that they were found on the road by the elderly couple and offered a ride to their house for a hot meal. The man was a retired physician while his wife was a homemaker. When they discovered that Shado was Shinji's daughter (and not his little sister or cousin, as they initially thought) and that they had no home to go back to (not that Shinji would ever call anyplace that his father, aunt or uncle lived home after the way they treated the young father and his daughter), they helped them get on a boat departing to the USA to a contact that would help them get on their feet. When they hadn't heard from them, all they could assume was that the father and daughter had managed to move on and live a life in minor obscurity; a pair of nobodies don't get much attention, being just a bunch of faces in the crowd. It was a surprise to find that they had returned to Japan against their will.
"We'll get in contact with Serizawa and see if it's safe to send you back to the States," the elderly man told Shinji.
"Maybe you should put off doing that for a while," Shinji suggested. "My father wouldn't hesitate to assume Shado and I have returned to New York. He'd send in his lackeys again…and again…and again, unwilling to leave us alone."
"Then, maybe you two should stay here a while," the lady suggested. "You're more than welcome to."
"Thank you."
-x-
Shado awoke to the fading smell of something warm and delicious, and opened her eyes to a bowl of soup…and her father asleep in a nearby chair. There was a bowl on a stand near him that was half-empty of the same soup that was in the bowl near her. As she got up, she picked up the spoon and began to eat. And when she was finished, she went over to her father, who looked as though where and how he slept right now was uncomfortable, as most chairs were when they were used to sleep on.
As she had slept, a part of her had been hoping that what had happened to them was nothing more than an outrageous dream, that they hadn't been kidnapped, brought back to Japan, or that her father had been forced to hurt people to keep her safe or escape from where they had been. It pained her heart to see her father having to endure so much pain for her, to suffer in order to keep her safe. She hardly seemed worth everything he did, but he smiled at her happiness, cared more about her than he could've for himself or someone else.
Grumble! She felt her stomach rumble as she felt the need to use the bathroom, so she stepped out of the room and walked down the hallway of the elderly couple's home they been in the previous year.
"…Why would his father try to have him brought back to Japan against his will if he knew that he was trying to build a better life for his own family in the USA?" She heard a man's voice in a different room as she found the bathroom.
"Does any cruel-hearted father have to have a reason for being awful to their children and their children, dear?" A woman responded. "Gendo Ikari isn't exactly known for being a gentleman or a model parent. But if he had to have a reason, some could say that it was jealousy that drove him to do what he did."
"Jealousy? Because his son has a child that is being raised by him instead of being placed in some orphanage or group home? I've seen the fire in the young father's eyes and could tell that Shinji could never part away from his daughter, regardless of what other people say or think. The only way he would stop being a parent to his daughter…is if something disastrous happened to him that left him incapable of caring for her."
Shado then stepped into the bathroom and closed the door.
-x-
The sight of her in a fearful state was a clear sign that her husband had changed in the time since the Contact Experiment with Unit-01. She saw Shado frightened by the people chasing her, by Gendo trying to use her and her father, but the sight of Shinji, her hero, coming to her rescue lifted her spirits as they both left. This left Yui wondering how much change had occurred since she became the soul of the Evangelion to ensure a bright future for Shinji, who had changed and matured in order to ensure a better future for his own child. But the fact that Gendo had deliberately harmed both children was a sign that nothing was going well for Shinji or his daughter.
-x-
After she washed her hands and left out the bathroom, Shado returned to the room her father was in, but stopped by the window in the hall, looking up at the sky. She saw something bright and moving across the night sky.
A shooting star? She thought, seeing it disappear beyond the other stars that twinkled in the night.
Quickly, she went back to the room and closed the door. She sat on her legs in front of the small cot and pressed her hands together.
Unbeknownst to her, the closing of the door awoke Shinji, who looked at her and could only assume that she was praying to the deities.
"Hello, deities of the sky," he heard her say, "it's me again. Shado Ikari. My father was hurt saving me, and I'm worried that he may not be able to protect either of us again, even if he wants to, because he has his limits. I believe we need someone that can look out for the both of us, someone to be a watcher or protector, that can't be hurt like we can, that won't leave us in danger. I saw a shooting star, so I believe that I can wish for one such hope to happen. Perhaps you could send us a pair of angels to look after us."
A tear escaped Shinji's left eye, hearing this prayer/wish his daughter made to the gods above.
"The strongest and nicest angels you can spare," she finished.
-x-
In the vastness of space, a bright light shined like a supernova, and something shot out of it, heading toward the Milky Way Galaxy. Much of the light, like scales or plates, shed away from the main body of the construct, revealing a pair of large, wing-like shapes.
"Aaaaaiieeeeeeee!" The object shrieked.
To be continued…