"I don't think I'll ever understand...how you can be so smart and so...fucking stupid at the same time."
Rei's vision blurred tremendously as she opened her eyes. She could see Asuka, though her visage was murky, frayed with black and white lines. For a moment even Asuka blurred, making it appear as though she had two doppelgangers. It seemed so ridiculous that she wanted to laugh, but the pain in her ribs made that an impossibility. She opened her mouth to speak, but even that proved to be an effort.
"What the hell is wrong with you? Do you want to get killed?!" Asuka was near hysterics, her frantic breath visible in the cold air. Rei noticed that she wasn't even out of her plugsuit. They, along with Shinji, had been fighting off an angel together. At one point the thing had latched on to both 01 and 02 Evas. Rei had moved in and attacked, and as a result the angel took its full on wrath upon her Eva. After that, she couldn't remember much. Where was 00? Had she been ejected? That made the most sense. But why was Asuka here, and where was Shinji? And the angel, what became of it?
All these questions made her head reel, literally in fact. Her head rolled back and she felt her eyes closing again. A sudden jolt of pain shocked her back to consciousness. Asuka had just slapped her. "Oh no you don't. You do not get to die on me, do you understand?!"
Rei managed to blink away some fatigue. She wanted to speak, lest Asuka lose her temper even more. "I wanted...to..f-fight it off...you and..Shinji were-"
Asuka cut her off, screaming. "We were fine, damn you! You were ordered to stay back, ordered! Why didn't you do what you were told, you stupid doll?"
"Not...a doll," Rei said almost immediately, coughing as she did. Even that was painful.
"Why...why then..." Asuka gripped Rei by the front of her suit and gave her two hard shakes. "Why did you go out of line like that?!"
With effort, Rei brought one hand up to rest on Asuka's, who in turned loosened her grip. "Ikari and...you..are my friends. Friends...help each other...correct?"
Asuka was stunned into silence. After a long moment she uttered "You and me...when did you decide-"
She was interrupted by a crackling noise and the familiar voice of Ritsuko. "Pilot Sohryu, did you recover Unit 00's pilot? Come in, Asuka."
Asuka pressed her headset closer to her ear as a gust of wind swept the clearing. She was wearing a red jacket over her plugsuit, probably to keep her warm while she had been searching. "Yeah, I...found her. I think her..one of her ribs might be broken." Asuka said, running a hand through her hair distractedly.
"Understood. We've dispatched a team to your location to retrieve you both, medical personnel included. Stand by, pilots."
"Be quick about it, dammit!" Asuka yelled into the device before it switched off. The two were silent again save for Rei's labored breathing. Asuka sat in her thoughts for a while before speaking. "Look...if we're friends...maybe you'll do something for me. Don't put yourself in danger like that again, alright?"
Rei closed her eyes for a long blink. "If that's an order...I may consider it." She involuntarily shuddered. It was cold and she had lost a good amount of blood. It was surprising that she wasn't passed out by now.
Asuka rolled her eyes. "You will if you know what's good for you." She shrugged off her coat and instead put in on Rei, propping her up slightly so that it would rest over her shoulders.
"Don't. You're...going to get.." Rei stopped as another cough racked through her "...blood on your coat."
Asuka blew a lock of hair out of her face that the wind had mussed. "I'm a big girl, Rei, I think I'll live. Besides, what are..friends for?"
What a foreign concept, Asuka thought. But..a promising one.