"Eva launch!" Misato cried out, her voice booming over the Command Bridge, her hand outstretched in a most dramatic manner. Behind her, scientists, bridge bunnies and even a few technicians wandered about the three-tiered command structure, each working to provide Misato the most accurate data they could. The future of the human race was on the line here.
"Lt. Ibuki!" The Captain snapped, her gaze moving over to the twenty something brown-haired woman who, for the most part, did her best to hide in her chair as she handled the brain-wave data on Shinji. At the beck of her voice, said young woman jumped, before looking over at Misato.
"A-all reading normal, Ma'am." She recited, her eyes watching the eight multicolored lines that made up the whole of her council, her fingers flying over the keyboard as she brought up several skip-note diagnostics. "EEG and EKG are both normal, Ma'am. He seems to have an abnormally high amount of dopamine in his upper sub-dermal A10 cavity, but with his high synch ratio, it's not abnormal."
Misato looked back towards the main screen, which depicted both giants, the first, the Angel, looking at the boy in a most curious manner, and Shinji having just been released from the gantry restraints, took his first step towards the black and white creature. His second was also sure, and then…
Then the Angel raised it's arm in preparation for… something.
"Energy buildup in the Angel's left hand! It's getting ready to fire!" Cried Lt. Hyuuga, his hands pounding the keys at his station's keyboard, the clacking of each individual strike echoing through the room.
"Shinji! Move! It's about to…!" The raven-haired woman was cut off as she watched, almost helplessly, as Unit-01 crouched and dived, tackling the massive angel in a full-body impact that left the two lying in a crater of cement and rubble. The shot had gone wide, hitting nothing but sky.
"Ma'am! Shinji's heart rate and adrenal levels are increasing!" Lt. Aoba called from his central council, working feverishly to bring up the next set of skip-note diagnostics. "There's been a release of endorphins in his system as well, and we're getting some strange readings from his left shoulder. It may be a pre-existing injury!"
That brought a frown to Misato's lips as she thought back to earlier that day, when they'd been caught in that N2 blast. She'd noticed he was favoring his right arm a bit more than he should have, and that he kept rubbing his left. She wouldn't be too surprised if he was feeling it, considering that last hit.
"Damn it!" Shinji's voice came over the receiver, and Misato's breath caught in her throat. She could only watch as Unit-01 was tossed off of the Angel and pinned, the creature in question charging up another blast of energy. Hyuuga's analysis cinched it.
"Get up Shinji!" She cried out, but her voice was lost in a burst of static, even as Unit-01 reversed the pin, barely managing to shift the Angel's focus off to the side. Over the receiver, Shinji's strangled cry of pain echoed through the Command Bridge.
"Ma'am! We're getting some strange readings on Shinji's neuronet!" At these words, Dr. Akagi rushed over to Maya's command council, all but pushing the brown-haired woman out of her chair before sitting down at the system itself. Her hands flashed over the keyboard, her experienced eyes looking through the dozen or so anomalies that had popped up as Unit-01 went flying across the battlefield from a charged blast to the chest.
Misato glanced over to the blond, a question as to what was going on leaving her mouth in a hurried cry before going back to calling out operational commands through her mic. Aoba glanced out, towards Misato, half his attention on the screens before him as he tried to interpret the readouts in front of him.
"Ma'am," his voice pulled her attention to him as she tried to watch the fight. "I'm reading a major increase in the stress-points on his body! His breathing and heartbeat are erratic and the chem.-screen just came back. He's pumping enough adrenaline through his system that it's a miracle his heart hasn't exploded yet!"
"Captain, his brainwaves are going off the charts! The A10 link dampeners can't handle the load, his synch ratio is too high! He's getting full feedback from the Evangelion!" Ritsuko's tone was something of a mix between shock and fear, and it silenced the chatter on the Command Bridge for all of a moment.
"That means…" Misato began, only to have Ritsuko finish her statement for her.
"That his mind can't differentiate between the damage being dealt to his Eva as something outside of his own body. In all likelihood, he's suffering from a type six stigmata anomaly. His body is killing itself with every hit he takes!"
The words struck everyone on the Bridge. Misato could only look numbly back at the screen, watching the fight begin to enter it's climax. The image of Unit-01 flying through the air, it's Prog Knife gripped in it's hand. Over the receivers they could hear Shinji's primal rage making itself known as the biomachine dived down on top of the Angel. The blade met the core in a screeching whine that echoed through the world above and below the battlefield.
Misato's eyes widened when she say the Angel grip the Eva's face, a wicked energy beam sliding out from the elbow of the arm in question.
"Cut the A10 connection!" There was a tone of almost desperate pleading in her voice as it carried over the whole of the Command Bridge, Ritsuko frantically working to disconnect the link between Shinji and Unit-01. Her eyes were wide, and growing wider as she hammered on the keyboard.
"It's not accepting the disconnect order! The system won't take the release command!" The first slam of that massive energy pylon echoed over the whole of facility. Misato could barely stand to look at the main screen as Shinji's cry burned through the speakers, even as the blade retracted again, before slamming cleanly into Unit-01's head.
"The pilot's body is flooded with adrenaline! He's not feeling anything! His pain receptors aren't firing!" Aoba called over from his computer, his hands sending a list of commands to the A10 receptors in on Shinji's head to forcibly cut the boy's flow of adrenaline.
"The system's been routed! Cutting connection now!" Ritsuko's hand slammed on the command enter button, causing the system to bypass Shinji and deactivate his link to Unit-01, just as he blade managed to punch through Unit-01's brain case, the purple blade hanging out of the back of the Eva's head as the Angel gave a dying cry, before detonating and sending Unit-01 tumbling into an empty munitions building.
"SHINJI!" The shrill scream of the Captain echoed through the whole of NERV Central.
"Systems are reading erratically! His heartbeat is wild and he's registering some mild hemorrhaging in his brain! We need to get a team out there now! He'll be dead soon unless we can relieve the pressure!" Aoba's words were sobering.
"Go, GO! Rapid Response Team Four, what's your status?" Misato all but cried into her headset, her hands shaking with every passing second as the green of the rescue VTOL flew over the orange wireframe that represented Tokyo-3, towards the fallen form of Unit-01.
"We're at the Eva! Opening the primary plug hatch now!" On the main screen, the Bridge crew watched with bated breath as the hovering ship dropped a team onto the shoulders of the Evangelion, which in turn activated the manual hatch release. The plug shot halfway out of the opened socket, spraying out its LCL payload before the team used the Jaws of Life to rip open the pilot's hatch.
Seconds later, the pilot, Shinji, had been loaded into a gurney trebuchet and hoisted up into the ship, along with the paramedic team. The ship took off at top speed towards the nearest hospital, the team doing everything they could to keep the boy alive in transit. Misato had already sprinted off the Command Bridge, the clacking of her boots ratcheting through the hallways of NERV as she made her way to a high speed surface elevator.
000
Shinji's eyes shot open, the world around him painted in dull, flat colors under a blue, cloudless sky. All around him, he could see nothing but rubble. Rubble and cement and a single, solitary figure, sitting in an area of pavement cut off by yellow cautionary tape, strung from four staffs of rebar planted into the ground.
The boy had seen this before, so long ago, such a long time ago, in a world where everything had gone wrong and it was all his fault.
He shook his head, as if clearing it. That wasn't right, was it? He didn't know. How could he know? It was the Angel that did it, that caused her such anguish. It wasn't his fault. Not at all.
It couldn't be.
Shinji…
His eyes shot up, focusing on the back of the Second, and he'd always known she was, shortly after the battle with Arael, sitting there, all curled up and weeping miserably, her mind, what was left of it, broken and scattered. With Unit-01 in lockdown and unable to act, Shinji had been left unable to save her.
Shinji…
With every step, she became clearer, while the world around her slowly began to change. The sky turned a sickly red, like a rotting piece of meat, while the buildings slowly, but surely began to take a much more sinister appearance. In the distance, they crumbled away to reveal the crucified bodies of the three Evangelion units while the sun warped into the giggling, twisted visage of Rei.
Shinji…
He reached the barrier that stood between himself and Asuka, his mouth unable to form the words he meant to say, he needed to say. Frozen in time, he stared at the back of her head, his eyes wide with unshed tears.
And slowly, ever so slowly, her head began to turn. Like a sickening top, it slowly spun, the breaking of her neck and the ripping of her spine echoing through the dead world as her head continued to pivot towards him. It was then, only then, that Shinji was able to look upon her face. Where her left eye had resided, a massive, gaping hole existed, blood dripping down the opening like an unending river of tears. Her face was gaunt, starved, her right eye cracked and dry, staring ahead into the distance as her hair became matted and unkempt, and her lips, her mouth, opened to form one, single word, her rotted and yellowed teeth gleaming under the red-hued sky.
Shinji…
"Grah!" The boy cried, shooting up in bed, before falling back, his body awash with pain. His head was throbbing, and his back was on fire. He could feel the rough, scratchiness of the bandages on his body, and the soft feel of the cotton gauze pressed against his face. Beyond that, as he slowly began to focus, he noticed that he could only see half of his face, half of everything.
His right hand drifted up unto his face, the fingers tracing the bandage that covered almost all of the right side of his face. His room stank of antiseptic, and around him, he quickly began to realize, were countless machines, each monitoring his health and status. Connected to his left arm hung an I.V., along with what look suspiciously like a morphine drip.
"Hell…" he groaned, his hands falling back to his sides. He couldn't feel much of anything, outside of those few initial touches, and even then, they were far more subdued than he thought they would be. The only thing that really stood out was the Pain.
"Finally awake, I see." Came a voice from right. The boy slowly began turning his head, only to find Misato standing there, looking more unkempt then he had ever remembered her being. Her face was awash with concern and… guilt? The boy reached his hand out towards her. She took it, and squeezed it.
"Yeah… I… hurt…" he squeezed out. His chest felt heavy, painfully so. Misato's face fell, and she looked away. Her hands tightened their grip on his. There was a moment of pregnant silence, the machines around the two beeping and humming quietly as the woman gathered herself up.
"I'm sorry." She finally blurted out, finally. Her eyes refused to meet his, and he gripped her hand. The sensation brought her back to herself.
"I'm sorry, for everything. I suspected that they wanted you to pilot. I really did. I…" She was interrupted by a wheezing cough. Shinji shifted in his bed, just enough to lay his other hand on hers, and he smiled at her, with his most, open, honest smile.
"It was… my choice… Misato. You… did your… job…" he wheezed out, before falling back, spent. Misato frowned, and looked like she wanted to contest that, but a look from Shinji's good eye stopped her, and she deflated a bit.
The older woman looked as if she wanted to say more, but was suddenly interrupted by Ritsuko, along with a medical team, all of whom had made their way into the room. The Magi had alerted both the Doctor and the medical staff the moment Shinji had awoken. Ritsuko looked on at the boy, who was wrapped in bandages, and sighed before scribbling on the clipboard in her hands.
"You're a very lucky boy, Mr. Ikari. Very lucky indeed, though I doubt you're feeling that way." Her gaze drifted over his body, examining it, before flipping through the pages of her clipboard. "Very lucky indeed. When we pulled you out of that plug, you'd already gone into shock from a cerebral hemorrhage in your superior orbital lobe. A very small hemorrhage, yes, but still more than enough to kill you. We had to drill into your skull to relieve the pressure, which is part of why your head is throbbing. But, as luck would have it, you're alive and well on your way to recovery."
"That's… good…" Shinji sighed, his hand drifting to his face, and the fingers going over his bandaged eye once more.
"However… I'm afraid that there were some… complications during surgery." Those words caught the ear of Misato, who was currently hovering in the background. She glanced over at the Doctor, whom had turned away from the bandaged boy.
Ritsuko wandered over to the machinery that the medical staff had been maintaining, and quietly told them to leave. The action was something that set both the boy's nerves on edge, as well as the Captain's. A pit formed in the stomach of Shinji, his hands gripping the sheets tightly.
"What… what… happened?" Shinji whispered, his voice barely picking up over the machinery. Ritsuko waited a moment, letting the rest of the staff leave before continuing on.
"Even though we managed to alleviate the pressure in your brain, there was still some… significant… damage to your sensory nerves. We're not sure as to the extent of the damage, but a preliminary biopsy has indicated that it's rather severe. We do know for certain that your ability to see with your right eye has been mostly compromised, however, we were able to save it, Unfortunately most of the visual nerves, rods and cones have been all but burnt out. Altogether, we estimate your ability to see with your right eye is down by nearly eighty percent. Coupled with that, there was rather severe burn damage done to your right cheek which, even with modern antibiotics and coagulants, will leave a… notable… degree of scarring. The good news is that the rest of your injuries seem to be fairly mild. You managed to rip up your back rather nicely, but it's nothing worth any major concern." The woman finished out, her voice casual, as if she were delivering the weather. Shinji… looked shocked.
"H-how?" he stammered out. In his time as a pilot, he'd never been so injured. Yes, he'd hurt, he'd felt the pain of injury with every hit his Eva took, but it never… it never actually hurt him. It never left him wounded, at least… not physically…
And her lips, her mouth, opened to form one, single word, her rotted and yellowed teeth gleaming under the red-hued sky.
Shinji…
"Ngh…" There was pain, horrible, burning pain in his right eye. It felt like nothing he'd ever suffered before, and he could feel his back arch in seizure, the muscles tensing as his hands clawed at the air, his exposed eye screwed shut and his mouth gasping for words as the torment blinded him to everything else.
He felt hands on him, their touch leaving streaks of flame as he flailed. In mute shock, Misato found herself pushed out of the room, barely managing to garner a glance back at the boy. The bandages covering the right side of his face were stained with a fresh crimson coat, the splatter growing from where his eye sat hidden.
"What's happening!?" She cried out, even as Ritsuko pushed the Captain from the room, before the door shut behind her. Through the observation window, Misato could only look on helplessly as four nurses aids pinned he boy down before Ritsuko was able to jam a needle of sedative into his arm, slowing his thrashing.
Minutes passed as Ritsuko ordered a brace of tests on the now-sedate Shinji, whom had been summarily strapped to his bed. The group took all of ten minutes to finally get everything in order, including a change for Shinji's facial bandages.
Once finished, the doctors and nurses all went about fulfilling the commands of the blond scientist, and Misato managed to push her way back into Shinji's room. Her hands immediately flew to Ritsuko's shoulders, her eyes awash with worry and her heart heavy with more than a bit of guilt.
"What happened?" The Captain's voice was harsh, angry, but not at Ritsuko. She was raging at herself, for letting such a thing happen to a boy barely in the beginnings of puberty. The doctor sighed, and pulled away from her upset friend.
"I don't know. It looked like he had a seizure, but it's too early to tell right now. I've got a brace of tests lined up to try and find out the cause, but I don't know. We can't be sure of anything as far as Shinji's mental status goes. The damage done to him in the plug could be far more reaching than we'd originally thought." The woman replied, her eyes going over the varying charts before her.
"I thought we had dampeners that were supposed to prevent this kind of thing! How the hell did we let this happen!?" Misato snapped, her hands slamming on the end-table of Shinji's bed as she leaned forward.
Ritsuko sighed as she leaned back against the far wall, her eyes distant as she looked out the windows and over the city beyond. "Do you remember how high his synch ratio was? Ninety-eight point eight percent. The A10 dampeners weren't built to handle such high initial values. In fact, we didn't even think it was possible to synch up with such a high ratio. Even then, his neuronet was off the charts, far beyond our estimated numbers." She began, before hoisting herself off of the wall ad moving to leave the room. She motioned for Misato to follow her.
As the two began making their way through the ICU hallway in Tokyo-3 General, Ritsuko continued, her hands scribbling notes on her clipboard while they made their way to a NERV elevator terminal. "Within the first two minutes of combat, the dampeners were already fried. With them down, Shinji's brain wasn't able to interpret the difference between his own body and the Eva's, which caused the type-6 stigmata phenomenon, in which his brain actually inflicted the damage onto his body in the same way that the Eva was injured."
"I see… are we doing something to fix this? I mean, you do know how to prevent this from happening again, right?" The raven-haired woman asked after a moment's time. In the lonely hallway, only the footsteps of the two could be heard as silence wafted over them.
"There… have been some ideas as to how to prevent this from happening again. Using Shinji's numbers, we were able to set down some preliminary values for a new class of dampeners. They won't be as compact as the A10 connectors, but, in theory the next time he gets into Unit-01, he won't have to worry about his eyes exploding or his brain hemorrhaging." Ritsuko finished, standing before the elevator terminal. Her hand reached out and hit the down button as her words sank into the Captain's mind.
"What makes you think there'll be a next time?" She asked quietly. "He almost died this time. He's already been badly injured, and it's just been his first battle. He's just a boy. It's too much of us to ask this of him."
The doors opened, and Ritsuko stepped in. She turned back to the Captain, and said but three words. "We aren't asking." And the doors shut. Misato stood there, mouth agape, before heading back down towards Shinji's room, her eyes narrowed and her mind racing.
Would they really make him pilot again? Even if it means him ending up like this again? She asked herself, and for the first time, felt a pang of doubt about NERV and how it operates. She didn't need an answer. She already knew what it would be, and it did nothing to assuage either her doubts, or her guilt.
As Misato made herself comfortable once again in Shinji's room, Ritsuko made her way to the Commander's, her eyes gleaming with a dark ambition. In her hands sat a number of reports, all of which concerned only one topic. The Third Child.
There had been many tests run on the boy in question, many more than Misato had been made aware of. Beyond the brain biopsy, which hadn't been at all necessary for diagnosing Shinji, nor the MRIs, the bone and organ biopsies, blood tests and spinal taps. All of it had been done for another reason. She wanted to know why.
Why were his values so high? Why did his synch so well? Why did he fight like an experienced pilot? Why did he know about the Angel's energy attack? How was it possible? It made no sense, not at first, but once she presented the facts to the Commanders, they both consented to a full brace of tests on the boy, right own to a molecular reconstruction of his basic biology.
The results had been… interesting.
As the doors to Commander Ikari's office, the massive edifice that it was, icy cold, dry and dark, with the Tree of Life painted on both the floor and ceiling leading up to his desk, Ritsuko mentally prepped herself for the upcoming meeting. The Commander himself, flanked by his lackey Kozo Fuyutsuki, looked… agitated, though the term was used only loosely. The man, to her memory, never looked anything short of pissed most of the time, and the rest of the time… well…
"Doctor." Said the man in question, his voice colder than the room he was in. Ritsuko's eyes snapped to attention. "Your report?"
Ritsuko gulped, an action that was wholly unintentional, but not lost on the man seated before her. He smiled, slightly, behind his folded hands, his eyes hidden behind his dark glasses.
"Well?" he all but snapped, and took such pleasure in watching the proud woman squirm.
"Preliminary reports have confirmed my hypothesis, as far as my submitted theory as to why his synch ratio is so high. Testing confirms that he has almost five times the average amount of dopamine and tetracyclomine in the A10 region in his brain. Coupled with that, it appears that his brain chemistry is mostly consistent of triklamines and thetameines, as compared to the more normal combination of cyclophospates and neurophospates. Altogether, it makes his brain more efficient, and therefore, increases the strength of his ability to synch with Unit-01." She began, her eyes drifting over her test results. Gendo interrupted her before she could finish, to her annoyance, though she wouldn't dare voice it as such.
"I understand that the subject suffered some form of brain damage from the last… incident. How will this play into his ability to synchronize with the Eva?" Ikari asked, and Fuyutsuki winced at the man's cold reference to his own son.
"As far as I can tell, it may have been more beneficial for us. None of the glands that produced the necessary chemicals were damaged. Only his sensory nerves and his endorphin glands were subject to the feedback shock. It's caused him to lose much of his sense of touch and taste, but at the same time, it's also caused him to suffer from deadened pain reception as well. A double-edged sword, to be sure, but one that fell in out favor. I'm sorry to say that his right eye may not be good for much any more, but there are… ways… around that." The woman finished. Gendo paused for a moment, considering his next question.
"Are cybernetics needed?" He finally asked, his tone curious. Ritsuko shook her head in the negative.
"No, as it is now, replacing his eye with an artificial one would be more detrimental than beneficial. It would require some rewiring of the brain, and as it stands, I couldn't guarantee his ability to continue piloting at his current level." She finished out. Gendo nodded, before motioning for her to continue.
"As far as the bone and organ biopsies go, I can't tell you anything specific, other than the fact that he's unusually saturated with LCL. The amount and the density is too great for it to be from his first dip. If you want my opinion, he's been in it before, multiple times, for at least a year, if not more. Nothing else could explain it." She said, her voice lacking inflection.
"I see. Thank you for your report. Leave us, Doctor." The tone left no room for argument, and Ritsuko all but ran out of the room afterwards. Gendo looked to Fuyutsuki for a moment, before speaking.
"This is distinctly disconcerting. I've looked over the results myself, and I agree with Dr. Akagi's diagnosis" said the Commander. He dropped his hands to his desk and opened a nearby drawer, pulling out a notepad and jotting something down.
"Do you think that SEELE might have something to do with that? Don't forget, he was generally out of our sight until just recently." Kozo pondered, before taking the note Gendo had written him, and pocketing it for later thought.
"I don't believe he's a spy, no. I don't think SEELE had much of anything to do with this, at all. It's too direct, too obvious." Gendo countered, putting away the notepad and again crossing his hands.
"Then what do you think, Gendo?" The man in question looked over at his advisor and subordinate, before replying.
"We watch him. Carefully. Something is going on, and my errant son is at the center of it. So we will watch, and we will learn."
"Yes sir." Kozo replied, before all fell silent in the Commander's office.
000
It was another week before Shinji was released. The cause of his seizure was a big unknown, but with its lack of reoccurrence, the medical staff (Dr. Akagi) had cleared him for a return to his life outside of NERV. He'd been healing nicely, as far as everything went, but… Misato could tell something was wrong. Shinji had bags under his eyes, big ones. He wasn't sleeping, much to the older woman's ire. She had spoken to Ritsuko earlier about putting him on some kind of sleep aid, but even then, the boy had refused them, claiming to be alright.
I had taken very little for her to have his living quarters transferred over to hers, once she found out that he'd be otherwise living in the NERV barracks. His father had no interest in living with the boy, and Shinji had no objection either. The ride home had been… quiet, with Shinji lost in his thoughts, face still bandaged. He was smiling though, seemingly at peace. Relaxed seemed to be a good word, but it didn't fit. He was… peacefully tense.
"Shinji?" The older woman asked, her eyes drifting from the road to him and back again. His face was open to her, the bandages that covered half of his head on the side of the windows.
"Hm? Yes Misato?" Came the reply, his one good eye turning to look at her, his distant gaze focusing the raven-haired woman. She smiled at him with a grin that didn't quite reach her eyes.
"What'cha thinking about?" She questioned, her eyes on the road, but her posture leaning towards him. He put a finger to his chin for a moment, ponderingly, before replying.
"Everything." The answer was a bit… cryptic, really. Misato raised an eye towards him, as if she expected more. The boy only gave her another of his small smiles before looking back out the window. There was a moment of silence between the two, and then Shinji continued on.
"I'm just… thinking about how beautiful everything is." The boy said, quietly. He propped himself up on one of his hands, letting silence drift over the two once more. Misato found herself at a loss as to how to respond to that statement. He sounded wistful, as if lost in a dream.
"How so?" She asked, finally. The silence was catching up to them, and on some level, that was bothering her. The boy was quiet, but not in a strange or off-putting kind of way. He just… always seemed lost in thought. He'd been like that since she'd met him, and hadn't changed any throughout his two weeks in the hospital. Granted, one of those weeks was spent in a state of absolute unconsciousness and the other under fairly heavy sedation.
"It's… I'm not sure how to explain it really. I'm looking out across the buildings and the grass and the hills and the trees, and it all seems so… vibrant. New, almost. Like it's the first time I've ever seen it all so… alive, you know?" The boy replied, looking at her, before giving her as full a smile as he could, before looking back over the city proper as they drove along, the setting sun leaving the world around them in a golden halo.
As if it were on fire, don't you think? Wouldn't it be a sight to watch it all burn.
Shinji's undamaged eye shot open, his mouth closing with a snap. Misato heard the click, and turned to look at him, only to gasp. Her foot slammed onto the brake, causing the two of them to skid to a halt.
"Shinji! You're bleeding!" Her voice was distant to the boy, though, as if she were speaking to him under water. His body has seized up, a cold chill drifting over him, sinking into him, making him numb. It wasn't until Misato's hand gripped his shoulders that he was shaken out of it, his focus finding hers. His hand drifted up, slowly, to find her arm, her hand, as it pressed a gauze pad against his face, over his bandaged eye.
"W-what…?" The boy asked, numbly, his fingers drifting over hers, his cloudy face clearing for just a moment.
"Keep that pressed against your eye, Shinji. We're going back to the hospital to get you checked out" she said, her voice thick with concern. Shinji paused for a moment, her words sinking in, before he gently placed a hand on hers as it rested on the wheel. She looked back at him, and he gave her the surest smile he could, which, admittedly, wasn't very sure at all.
"No, Misato. Please. I've spent the last god knows how long cooped up in there. I… I'd like to go home. Really." His words were soft, trapped between assurance and fear, and yet… she found herself hard-pressed to say no to him. She was worried about his injuries, yes, but… he didn't seize up like last time.
"I'm not… I mean…" Misato said, her voice a mix of doubt and worry, but when the boy tightened his grip on her hand, she felt… at ease. Something about his voice, something about it all made her resolve wither.
"Look, if it gets any worse, we can go back and get it checked out in the morning. I may have just agitated it, you know? Really, please." And that broke Misato. Who was she to deny him anything? His state and condition was HER fault, after all. And deep down, she knew that he would be suffering much worse as time went by. The attacks had only just begun, and Ritsuko had told her, on no uncertain terms, that Shinji wasn't going to be allowed to leave.
"Alright, Shinji." She sighed out, her gaze drifting back to the road as she started up the car again, this time taking them back to her apartment. Shinji kept the pad pressed against his eye, though the bleeding seemed to have stopped.
That night, as the two settled in, Shinji found that very little had changed with his stalwart guardian. She was still as messy as ever, still couldn't cook, and still drank more than a fish. But these things didn't bother him, not at all. It was Misato, and he wouldn't want her to be anything but. The only thing, he found, was that she seemed a bit more… subdued, than he remembered. She wasn't as loud, nor as boisterous, and that did bother him.
Shortly after arriving home, Misato had helped Shinji change his bandages. The sight was far from pretty, but it would still be a few weeks before he would be able to safely leave the bandages off. He didn't mind all that much. As long as everything worked right, for the most part, he could survive it. He didn't need to be pretty to pilot.
Afterwards, Shinji took to the shower while Misato relaxed in the kitchen. Lost in her thoughts, she almost missed Pen Pen wandering his was out of the hallway, a confused look on the bird's face (as about confused as a bird can look, anyway) but just wrote it off as nothing. Lost in her thoughts about her young charge, she took little notice of the bird.
Who is he? She could only wonder. It was strange. She may not have been the best judge of character, but she usually had some idea as to the people she deal with. But… in all the time she'd spent with the Third Child, she hadn't managed to glean anything about him. He always seemed so serene, so philosophical. Always looking out, into the sun, into the clouds, lost in thought. He never spoke up, never took any of the hints she dropped him. Conversations between the two were often short, and almost dismissing, and if she didn't know better, she would almost swear the boy didn't like her. But then… he seemed to genuinely enjoy her presence. He always seemed to smile at her with that little half-smile of his, a sense of appreciation, of happiness, wafting through them both when they she spent time with him.
It was strange. He was so much unlike his father, and yet, almost a replica of the cold man. He was invitingly distant. Friendly, but mysterious. It was something that bothered her, more than a little. He didn't let her in, not in the least. She knew there was something wrong with him, something on his mind that left her wondering just what had left the boy so… quiet.
She knew he wasn't sleeping. She knew that he'd had some rather bad nightmares during his stay in the hospital ward, and when she tried to ask him about it, the question was generally brushed off. She had seen the distant look in his eye, the underlying guilt and anger and rage, and it scared her. It was like looking into a cloudy lake, seemingly serene on the surface, but absolute turmoil in the depths, and that bothered her more than she let on.
She reached into her purse, once more, pulling out the file on the boy, hoping that there might be some clue to why he was like he was, all while knowing there wasn't anything there. Still, the action helped, it made her feel like she was doing something, even if it was only in her own mind.
Her eyes drifted to his picture, hanging on the file by a small paperclip. He was such a pretty boy, just on the verge of growing up into what she didn't doubt would be a very handsome young man. All that was gone now. She knew she was responsible, at least partly, for his injuries. She had brought him there, with at least some understanding of what he would be asked to do, and now, because of her, he was stuck piloting. She knew the Commander wouldn't accept any reasoning behind dismissing the boy. He was too valuable. Even the Second Child was nowhere near Shinji's level of ability, and with Unit-02 still almost three months away from completion, they didn't really have a lot of options.
She shut her eyes a moment, and then downed the rest of her beer, before hunting up another and drinking much of it. For fifteen years they'd been planning and plotting and preparing for the Angels. Over a decade of work went into the Geofront and the Evangelions, all to ensure that humanity would have a future, and the best that they, as a collective whole, had accomplished was a machine that sent children into war.
How ironic. She thought bitterly, before finishing off the rest of her second beer and finding a third. Shinji would have to fight, and probably die, at her behest, as would Rei and even Asuka, if it came to that. She would sacrifice them willingly to the jaws of the Eva, and deep down, she knew this. She was as bad as Gendo, if not worse. At least he didn't lie about being a bastard. She smiled, and laughed and joked, and she sent children into the breech as she did so.
Because it was necessary.
Because it was survival.
And sometimes, it felt so hollow.
"Misato?" asked the boy in question as he wandered back into the apartment's kitchenette. His hair was wet from the bath, but he was otherwise no different from when he had gone in. She had long since drifted off into her thoughts and hadn't noticed him join her at the table. Several seconds passed as the woman stared at the ceiling, a half-empty beer sitting in front of her before she finally managed to drop her head back down, to finally acknowledge his presence.
"Hey Shinji." She said, or rather, muttered, her cheeks flushed from the alcohol but her attitude subdued. He smiled at her, as best as he could and greeted her warmly. She returned his smile with a small, sad smirk of her own, before dipping back into her beer. Something was wrong. Shinji could feel it, deep down. The woman whom he had come to see as so vibrant, so alive, looked so small, sitting there, nursing her drink and wallowing. It was… disconcerting.
He opened his mouth, as if to say something, but he was interrupted by Misato quickly rising up out of her chair. Silently, he watched her as she wandered to the "beer fridge" as he'd come to call it, all while downing what was left of her last can and digging out her next. She hung there, a moment, unopened can in hand, before sighing and stretching. When she turned, all the exhaustion in her face vanished and she proceeded to send him a beamingly fake smile.
"How do you like it here, Shinji?" The woman asked innocently, swaggering back to her seat as she asked. He boy paused for a moment. The question, the tone, felt so… artificial, so fake, after seeing her from before.
She's lying to you, Shinji.
The voice ripped through his thoughts like a knife through rice paper. Suddenly, the whole world felt so cold, so strange. He shivered slightly, as the Misato in his mind slowly took shape, her eyes tired, old, while… while…
While she kissed him, her lifeblood pouring out through the wounds in her back…
"Are you alright, Shinji?" The voice shook him, and he blinked, once, twice, before focusing back onto Misato. She had risen and come to his aid, her hands on his shoulders, gently shaking him, concern prevalent in her eyes. The boy shuddered, before looking away, putting a hand to his head as he slowly shook off the sense of fear, the sense of anger, that had gripped him moments ago.
"I… I'm just… tired…" He pushed out, looking back at her as she slowly pulled back. The boy shuddered slightly, once more taking a deep breath, trying to clear his mind. Misato seemed to accept the answer readily enough, even though both knew it was a lie. He wasn't willing to share and she wasn't willing to ask, and that was how the two left it.
"Alright. Yeah, it has been a pretty busy day for you, huh?" The woman said, her tone almost motherly. She stretched, and looked away for a moment before continuing. "You should probably get some sleep, then. We need to get you started on your training regime tomorrow, and you'll be starting school soon, too."
The boy nodded, not really listening. Misato helped her charge up, out of his chair, and towards his room, which had been labeled as "Shinji's Lovely Suite" some time before. He grinned, glad that some things didn't change.
"Thank you Misato. I've been kind of out of it all day." The boy said weakly, before she gently ushered him in.
"It's not a problem, Shinji." The woman replied in kind, before stepping back out into the hallway. Shinji had made his way over to the bed when Misato spoke again, this time her tone quieter, more restrained than before. "You did really well out there Shinji. It was very brave of you to go out and fight. I'm very proud of you."
There was a moment of pause, before the boy responded.
"Thank you, Misato. I won't let you down." The woman smiled as she walked back towards the kitchenette. She was already out of earshot when the boy added, moments later, "Not again." The words were muttered, a silent promise to Misato, to all of them, before he finally let himself fall to his bed, exhaustion taking him.
Wake up…
Shinji shot up, his eyes wide with fear as a sense of panic filled him, jolting him from his restful slumber. He sat, gasping for air, his chest heaving harshly as he tried to focus, his mind going in a thousand directions at once. His heart hammered in his chest as he sat in his bed, covers resting in his lap, her eyes wandering the dark room with a sense of… of…
Fear.
The echoing word rang through the small home, causing the boy to fall out of his bed, stumbling away from the comfort of the covers. His body was covered in sweat, even though he felt nothing but icy cold around him.
Shinji…
The boy all but dove towards the far wall, where the light switch lay. There was something here, something wrong, something…
The light flickered on, bathing the world around him in blessed, blinding light. He was safe. He was… His heart began to thud, it's rhythm matching the beeping sounds of the cardiogram resting on the far wall of the hospital room. Before him, he saw Asuka, body exposed to him, laying there, helpless and catatonic.
His hand was sticky, warm. He glanced down, and shuddered, his face twisting into disgust as he felt the echoes of his orgasm still thundering though his body. And she just lay there, oblivious to it all. He stared at her, sickened by his own actions, when she looked at him.
Her lips twisted, her smile rotted and broken as her one-eyed gaze drifted to meet his. Her left eye was gone, replaced by that still empty, bleeding hole. She reached out for him, her lips forming his name as her hand began to split ever so cleanly down the center, dripping crimson with white, gleaming bone exposed, and she still reached for him.
He fell back, slamming into the automatic door, his nails scratching against the polished linoleum. Slowly, she fell out of her bed, dragging herself across the floor, leaving a trail of blood as her intestines began to fall out and drag themselves behind her.
The door opened, and he dived through, leaving the girl behind, hearing her wail his name through her broken lips as the door shut behind him.
It was then that he found himself lying in the empty hallways of NERV Central, the walls coated a rusty red. The door behind him was gone, sealed away behind a wall of rubble. In it, he could see the remains of crushed bodies dripping their lifeblood onto the floor, forming a weaving river that gathered under him.
He stood, shakily, his world bathed in flashing yellow emergency lights as they flickered around him. He gasped, and felt his gorge well up, turning his stomach as he ran through the open hallway, stumblingly, with his hand dragging against the wall, balancing him even as he tried to ignore the sticky feel of… of…
Misato…
He tripped over her, over her dead body, propped up against the wall before him, her eyes staring blankly outwards, her hands limp at her sides. Her mouth hung open, shocked, scared, as the puddle of blood below her began to widen. Her chest was riddled with holes, with one final one placed between her beautiful brown eyes.
She looked at him, her head slowly turning to him, her eyes full of pleading fear. Her mouth formed five words, though no sound came out.
Why didn't you save me?
Shinji fell to his knees, his fingers gripping his face, his nails digging into his flesh as he fell away from the dead woman. Sinking into the darkness, he saw her, mouthing those same five words, over and over again, her eyes glaring at him accusingly as he drowned in the shadows around him.
He shut his eyes, tears dripping down his cheeks as he felt his own blood begin to trickle down his forehead from where his nails dug into it. Light flooded him, forcing his eyes open once more, and he found himself kneeling on the Evangelion gantry. His heart was twisting as he stared at the empty eyes of Unit-01, it's gaze drilling into his, endlessly, as if it were going to consume him.
Shinji…
He glanced to his right, and found Asuka standing there, stomach ripped out and broken mouth grinning, her severed hand hanging at her side as she slowly shuffled forward…
Shinji…
He glanced to his left, and saw Misato, her bullet riddled body standing there, her dull eyes glaring at him as she reached for him, dragging her feet across he gantry, her shoes leaving a terrible screeching sound in their wake.
Shinji…
And slowly, he turned back the face of Unit-01, but it wasn't Unit-01 any more. Before him, floating in the water, was the severed, half-head of Rei, grinning at him with her half-lips and staring into him with her lone eye.
She opened her mouth, and with Asuka and Misato, they all said one singular word.
Shinji…
The boy fell back, off the gantry, towards the LCL below, from which a thousand severed hands reached up and pulled him in, dragging him down, slowly… slowly…
Shinji's eyes opened, his body covered in a cold sweat. In his hands lay the blankets, crushed under his unrelenting grip. He shuddered, his breathing ragged as the memories of his dream assaulted him. The images were so vivid, so alive. He was afraid to shut his eyes, afraid to see those sights again, those broken lips and accusing eyes.
Almost afraid to blink, he slowly turned his head, finding the alarm clock. It was barely after two in the morning, the sun still several hours from rising. Minutes passed as he lay there, staring at the digital readout, taking solace in the crimson light of the numbers. He could feel his heart beating, it's thrumming against his chest as he lay there, his breathing slowly returning to normal.
It was then that he heard the roll of thunder, with a flash of lightning that followed. At the corner of his eye, he saw something, like a child, standing there looking at him, but… he couldn't see it, couldn't focus. It left him feeling terrified, afraid to get up, to rise and meet that phantom. Instead he simply lay there, while his ghost looked on with gleeful eyes and a twisted smirk.
Too afraid to go back to sleep, and too scared to move, he simply lay there as the patter of rain began accosting their home, the quiet randomness leaving him with nothing but the silent stare of his nightmare staring back at him as he bore his gaze into those empty, glowing numbers.
Shinji didn't go back to sleep that night, as the rain and the thunder and the lightning made its way across the skies. He simply waited, feeling exhausted but unable to sleep. It was just like when he was in the hospital, lying there at night, staring at the ceiling. The same dreams, the same echoes, ones that he had hoped wouldn't follow him home.
But there isn't any escape, is there? He asked silently into the night, his empty stare burning into the clock before him.
No… The shadows answered, and then, with the faint roll of rain on his window, he imagined that he could hear the most insidious laughter on the wind as the answer was whispered to him.
In the morning, when the sun had finally risen and the boy slipped from bed, he found himself alone in the apartment, as Misato was still blissfully unconscious and Pen Pen doing whatever he did in the early hours. Shinji, on the other hand, found himself sitting a the table, in one of those wooden chairs, his eyes burning with sleepiness but his mind too awake to allow him to drift, the memories of his latest nightmare still echoing through his head.
He felt… so weak, so exhausted. His lay his arms upon the table, and in the morning light, let his head droop down to rest against the table. He was just… so tired…
His eyes began to droop again, in the eve of the morning light. It was so peaceful, so… very… quiet…
Go back to sleep.
The boy's head shot up, and from the momentum, caused the chair to tip back, and then over. There was a loud smack as his skull rattled off the floor, and for a time, he simply lay there. He didn't think, didn't focus. He just… drifted along, watching the slowly turning ceiling fan.
Moments passed before he finally dragged himself up. He knew that Misato had nothing for him to cook, and beyond coffee, he doubted he'd find anything but beer and ramen in the cupboards. Before, he'd never let Misato do the grocery shopping. He always was the one who bought the vegetables and meats and soup stock. With his injury and subsequent hospitalization, he hadn't had the time nor the chance to stock the shelves.
But… coffee and ramen really wasn't that bad an option, at this point. He wasn't sure he'd be able to cook anything more complicated, and the black liquid, while scalding, bland and grainy, was enough to bring him to coherence. He thought about his nightmares. They'd been haunting him ever since he'd awakened in that hospital room almost a week prior. They kept him from sleeping, whispering the song of his failures into his mind like the specters they were.
But he didn't hate them, no. They didn't let him forget. He couldn't forget. Never, because if he did, he'd make the same mistakes, and fail them all over again.
He looked at his hand, clenched into a fist, his mind filled with the failures of his past life, of the things he should have done, could have done, and failed to do. He had the blood of a planet on his hands, of friends and family and acquaintances and strangers. He could have saved them, and he didn't.
You failed. You let them die, Shinji. You let her die. The words were haunting, like the darkest of whispers, even as he recalled the empty look in her eyes, the lost, hopeless feeling that he'd had when he thought of her. He'd failed her. He couldn't fail her again.
But you will, Shinji. The voice chuckled. The boy slammed his coffee cup down onto the table, splashing his hand with the hot liquid, but he paid it no mind.
"Shut up." He muttered, ignoring the pain as it covered his hand. The coffee wasn't hot enough to burn him, and so, he dismissed it as he forcefully silenced the voice in his head.
It was an hour later before Misato awoke, and then went through her morning routine. Shinji had heard her wandering around, well before she ever made it to the kitchen, and had already cleaned up the spilt coffee while having prepared her her own bowl of instant noodles, along with her morning beer.
Misato, looking somewhat better than the night before, happily accepted her meal (if it could indeed be called that), before laying out Shinji's schedule for the upcoming week. It went pretty much as he'd expected it to, with the bulk of his time spent in training and synch testing, along with more than a few medical checkups just to make sure his face was healing appropriately, followed by more training and testing. Shinji expected no less, considering the fact that he'd already been three weeks inundated with NERV protocol the last time around, where as now he was just walking into the operation in the eyes of the Commanders thanks to his stint in the hospital.
He'd yet to even meet Rei, although he knew to be important that he at least try to build some kind of working relationship with her. By the time he'd awakened for the first time, she was already out of the ICU and had been sent home. And while Misato had told him that she would be sending him to school some time in the next few weeks, his Eva training held the priority as of right now.
The morning went by far too slowly for Shinji's taste. Misato had been warmer to him than she had been the night before, but the boy could still feel that sense of… something between the two of them. He would smile, and she would back, in that half-smile way that she did, and they would exchange a few words, but nothing of consequence, and then go back to ignoring one another.
It had to change. Shinji couldn't take this coldness between the two of them. As they walked out to the car, Shinji couldn't help but notice the scent of the fresh rain that wafted through the air. He paused for a moment, his exposed eye drifting to the cloudless sky and sighed as the rains had already passed some time last night.
He looked back at Misato, and not for the first time, realized that he didn't really get to know her as well as he had thought. She always seemed so… solid, like a rock or a pillar. He'd needed that strength when he was starting out, but, after everything that had happened between the two, everything that he'd seen, felt, between he and Misato… it wasn't real. He'd seen her as this savior that could make everything right, but… she wasn't. He just wanted her to be. It was almost… stupid.
"Is this even real?" He asked himself, looking into that endless blue abyss. Misato, taking a moment to start up the car, looked over to the boy, and saw… she didn't know what. It looked like regret, but… not. Resignation, maybe, or the realization as to his obligation with the Eva.
"Hey," She began, her tone softer than usual. Shinji looked over at her, his gaze tired and, for the first time, lined with dark rings of a sleepless night. The woman all but winced, but the boy simply smiled at her in the way he did. "Are you up for this?" She asked after a moment, and the boy nodded.
He stepped into her car, quietly, before shutting the door and buckling his seatbelt. The started the car, and the two drove off, headed towards one of the closer NERV terminals. The woman looked at him, at his tired, wistful gaze, and felt a great sense of regret. She opened her mouth to speak, before closing it and looking away.
"What's wrong, Misato?" The question came as a surprise to her. The boy wasn't even looking at her, but his tone was focused at her. She cleared her throat, and glanced at him, plastering a fake smirk onto her face.
"Nothing, Shinji…" She began to wave him off, but his face shifted to meet hers and he uttered a single word.
"Liar." And that caused her to stop. Literally. The blue Alpine skidded slightly as she gaped at him, the car screeching to a halt in the middle of the street.
"Now look here-" She began, her tone indignant. Guilty or not, she wasn't going to put up with him sassing her.
"Why are you so sad, Misato?" He asked, his tone still soft, his focus on her, and just by looking at him, she felt the weight of it all come crashing down onto her shoulders, sucking away her anger and leaving nothing but regret. She couldn't stand to meet his gaze, her face turning away from the boy. She muttered something nearly unintelligible, but the boy just smiled at her.
"Why do you feel guilty?" He asked, catching her off guard. She tried not to look at him, really tried, and could only fail miserably.
"It's my fault." She whispered, and Shinji didn't need to guess as to what she was talking about. While he wasn't the most observant of people, he knew that there was very little she would be faulting herself over, especially when it concerned him. He placed a hand on her shoulder, and looked her squarely in the eye.
"I forgive you." He said, as earnestly as he could. She looked at him with some astonishment, and shook her head.
"But… but it's my fault, Shinji! I sent you out there, I made you pilot, I got you hu-" He cut her off with a look, and she fell silent as he took a deep breath.
"I chose to pilot. It was my decision, Misato. I could have run away, but if I did, what would have happened?" Shinji asked her. He didn't giver her a chance to answer, cutting her off before she even began. "What were the chances of you UN pushing back or killing the Angel? How many people would have died? I made the choice to get in, to pilot that damned machine. I went out there on my own."
"But-" She began, her voice tired. He raised a hand and she stopped talking. She didn't know why, but there was… something about Shinji that made her want to hear him out.
"You did the best you could. You tried to help me, and that's all you did. If we don't fight these things, then we all die, Misato. Don't second guess yourself, not now, not about this. You didn't do this to me." He motioned towards his bandaged face. "The Angel did. It hurt me, but we beat it. That's what matters."
Shinji sighed, pulling himself up in his seat, finally glancing away from the woman. "We've only known each other for a few days, Misato, but I like to think we're friends." he said, turning back to her, his single eye staring into hers, "And as your friend, I'm telling you that you have nothing to feel bad about. I forgive you of anything you might have done to hurt me."
Misato sat there, her mouth a tight line as her eyes stared into his, looking for any hint of dishonesty. She found none. She took a shuddering breath, her chest heaving slightly as she took in the weight of his words.
"You really mean it, don't you." It wasn't a question. Shinji only smiled and nodded, before taking her hands in his.
"We're a team, Misato. You're the brains and I'm the muscle, and together we can take on anything. Right?" He asked, his tone much more relaxed. She smiled back at him, openly, and agreed.
"Right." And with that, she started up the car again, taking them back towards the Geofront. She looked over at Shinji as they drove, and he looked back to her with a smile.
You really are a funny guy, Shinji Ikari. Misato thought, feeling so much lighter than before. Strange, mysterious, and kinda odd, but… And her mind left it at that. She still didn't really know him, but maybe, just maybe, she was starting to figure the boy out.
Shinji, on the other hand…
What a lovely speech, Shinji. You almost believed it yourself. A dark part of his mind chuckled, causing him to grip his seat tightly. He felt that he'd settled whatever was between he and Misato, but there was still so much to do, and he knew he was running out of time. The Fourth was coming, and he knew, deep down, that he had only days, not weeks, to prepare.
~End Chapter 2~
Author's Note: Well, that's chapter 2. I can honestly say that it was a pleasure writing (as my editor tells me that I've managed to write one of the more disturbing scenes of my career) and I hope you all enjoyed it! I know, it was a bit more of a filler chapter, but don't you worry! We'll get some more angel killing action come next chapter thanks to the giant, floating di-I mean Shamshel, so stay tuned! Also, a big thanks to all of my readers who reviewed, as I can honestly say that I love hearing from you guys and gals and whatever else you might be out there. Keep 'em coming!
Originally I didn't think that I'd get this chapter out so quickly. I set myself a two week window to get it all done and my muse just went into overdrive. Again, I'll set myself that two week window from here on and see about getting the next chapter done on time as well, so cross your fingers and pray the Battlefield 2142 angel doesn't visit me again, hehe.
Oh, and for those of you who don't know him, check out Mister Cynical. He writes the good shit. Seriously. A lot of his general writing style's influenced my own, and I gotta say, the man weaves a good yarn, so check him out if you have the time.
Until next time! Ja ne~
J. Finch
Musical Inspiration
The Outsider/Strangers/Weak and Powerless/Suicidal Imbeciles -- A Perfect Circle
Dijurido -- Cowboy Bebop OST
Is it Real --Yoko Kanno
Various NGE A.M.V.s on Youtube. (So sue me, I'm lazy)