'And the cherub stands before God' is another Ode to Joy line.

"This is my last request, and if you care for me at all, you'll grant it… Like the cat," Kaworu said, and smiled at the thought of dying. Of being put out of his misery, put to sleep, all those euphemisms but what he wanted Shinji to do was kill him when he floated there, not resisting. The smile was a little bitter, but that was because he doubted Shinji cared about him enough to actually do it. He hadn't intended to hurt anyone from the beginning, he'd just pretended to go after Adam to lure Shinji here so they could have this talk? That was so unfair, but it wasn't like Shinji had wanted to talk to him. Not when he kept saying such weird and disturbing things.

It made a little more sense now that he knew Kaworu was an angel. All of them took weird and disturbing forms and none of them had ever talked to humanity, said why they were attacking in the first place. So Shinji guessed Kaworu was the least weird angel? Not only wasn't he trying to kill everyone, he was explaining all of this to Shinji.

The kitten had been starving to death, without a mother or anyone to take care of it, Shinji remembered. Kaworu had said that no one would come to take care of it once they left, so they were the only ones who could save it, and if Shinji refused to take it with him…

That. That was it. That was what he could do to get out of this, to save this idiot who he didn't, couldn't hate.

Shinji wrapped his fingers around Kaworu now. "Like the cat. The cat was going to die because I wouldn't save it, right? But what if I saved you? Protected you?"

He'd succeeded in shocking Kaworu, breaking him out of the melancholy that had gripped him even as they came down here, smiles over the certainty of death, at the knowledge he was going to die and that was all he had to look forward to. "Shinji… You can't," Kaworu said, but his eyes were wide and almost pleading. Not for Shinji's sake, no. For Shinji to say Kaworu was wrong, or that he'd risk it anyway. "The old men… They'll crush you. There's no way you could keep me safe. Misato certainly won't let you take me home with you, not when she hates angels. Your father will send his men and then the First Child, if I protect you with my AT field. I can't survive without the medications that keep my Lilim and angel cells from attacking each other enough to kill me, there's nowhere we could run… You would just be throwing your life away."

But Kaworu wanted it, Shinji could see that. Just like Kaworu had wanted Shinji to say he could see him as a friend now that Kaworu was going to die soon. "Didn't I say that I didn't want to lose any more people, Kaworu? Why am I fighting, if not to protect them?" What had the world ever done for Shinji? "I tried not to let you be my friend, but you gave me a place to stay after Rei died, and I… I do care about you, Kaworu. I can't just let you die, not after watching Rei…" Shinji gulped, unable to say it.

"Shin, Shinji," Kaworu said, and raised a hand to his face before wrapping his arms around the thumb of Shinji's Eva and clinging. "You, you aren't just saying this so that you don't have to kill me?" Not just to get out of fulfilling Kaworu's request?

"No, I wouldn't do that. I don't hate you, especially not that much." Not enough to break someone's heart by tricking them and abandoning them like Gendo, and Kaworu wasn't heartless. Not if he could cry like this, not if Shinji simply not wanting him to die meant so much to him. "They're not monitoring us, right? I can't just give up. You're the one with angel powers: can't you merge with the Eva or something? There has to be some way for you to hide, so they can't kill you. And the medicines, there were tons just lying around Rei's apartment. If she doesn't remember before, she won't know if some went missing, or maybe you can find where Ritsuko keeps them, or…" Shinji kept talking, somewhere between embarrassed for Kaworu's sake and horrified that Kaworu was sobbing now, like a little kid. Like Shinji when Gendo abandoned him.

These old men: were they the ones who raised Kaworu and sent him? Did angels really have family? But Ritsuko said their DNA was human, so… he awkwardly patted Kaworu on the head with a single finger of his other hand as Kaworu leaned his head on the giant thumb he clung to, baring that neck and it would be so easy to kill him now, right? This definitely couldn't be a trick, Kaworu was too blunt. He'd come out and say weird and disturbing things all the time: this had to be real, there was no way he could pretend like this.

Shinji was terrible at dealing with people, but Kaworu was even worse.

Kaworu and Misato were all he had left, unless Asuka could regain her mind somehow or Rei her memories, but when she was in an entirely new body? Unless Ritsuko had been lying and it wasn't Rei's soul in the new one. If all the bodies there had been people, just as real as the Rei Shinji'd known, and she'd murdered them in front of him? He'd failed to protect them, too.

The new Rei followed his father around like the doll Asuka called her. If she could get better Kaworu could, right? Just like his Rei had.

Thinking of Kaworu as like Rei just made it worse. "I can't let you die. Help me think of something," Shinji asked, because he didn't know how much time they had. He saw that head turn and barely felt it, like a butterfly's kiss, but he still blushed furiously. Yes, this was definitely Kaworu and doing weird things like kissing his hand and looking so grateful, like he was happy enough he could just die even without Shinji doing anything to him. "Come on, hurry up and get inside my Eva." Like the angel that infected Touji's Eva. Even though that killed Touji, even if Kaworu was an angel, Shinji didn't want to lose anyone else! Even if he wanted to say 'Stop kissing my thumb when you're so small compared to me! Or ever!'

"I can't: that would cause Third Impact," Kaworu said regretfully, squeezing Shinji's finger. "But…" he said next, thoughtfully, "You could let me inside your body?"

Shinji restrained the urge to demand, 'What?!' because Kaworu obviously meant encroaching or whatever. "Like the last angel did with Rei? And you too. Won't it be obvious?" They'd had huge bulging veins, and so had his Eva's chainsaw when it tried to infect him too.

Kaworu shook his head, cheek nuzzling Shinji's hand, and it was impossible not to know that Kaworu wasn't just being weird, he really was in love with Shinji, somehow. Shinji didn't think he was worthy of it, and Kaworu was a guy even if he was an angel, but there wasn't time to argue about that. At least if Kaworu was hiding he wouldn't be able to be embarrassingly grateful? "I'll abandon this body, so they can see that I'm dead. If we can't get some of my medicine you'll have a fever, but I don't mind if your body attacks my cells." He'd survive that. Shinji wanted him to survive. Shinji wanted him to live, and amazed gratitude overwhelmed him. "Is that alright?" he asked hesitantly.

"It's fine," Shinji said, because as long as it worked? He was already putting his life on the line piloting Eva, so it was fine if he ran the risk of Ritsuko trying to cut him open to get Kaworu out, right?

At least there was a chance to save Kaworu, and he owed this to Rei, he owed this to Touji and Asuka, all the people he couldn't save. Even if Kaworu was obviously taking it the wrong way, Shinji thought as he felt something warm making its way up his (the Eva's) arm, Kaworu's body growing even more limp in his hand, and he was glad those eyes were closed since otherwise the empty staring would be creepy and he didn't need to be reminded of the floating Reis and how they died.

Shinji gasped when he finally felt it-Kaworu-flow into him, the encroachment reach his brain. This wasn't a lukewarm, queasy feeling like Kaworu described feeling Rei's emotions at all. This was… warm. Like basking in the sun, or sitting by the side of a fire. It felt so good he found his whole body arching, toes curling and mouth opening in a soundless cry.

This wasn't a feeling of hopeless love for someone else. This was someone else's love for him that he was feeling. Kaworu really did love him, adore him, almost worship him for this, and as unworthy of it as Shinji felt because he wasn't (quite) doing this for Kaworu, it felt so good.

To be loved absolutely, to know that someone loved him and not have to doubt it. To feel it, wrapping around the core of him. So happy to bask in the light of his soul. Kaworu was so happy just to be here, with Shinji. To be welcome, and he really was welcome. While he was here, Shinji would never have to be alone again. He could feel like this all the time.

He wanted that, and Kaworu felt his want, felt that Shinji really did want him here, and the sheer happiness and relief, enough to make even Kaworu cry? Shinji felt it the moment when he fell in love with Kaworu, because how could he not love someone who loved him so much? Without any hidden motives, just because Shinji had been so kind to him now, as kind as he'd been to Rei, and he could feel how Kaworu wished to embrace him, to touch him, to adore him more and more if that was what Shinji wanted. He'd do anything Shinji wanted.

"They had the power of life and death over me my entire life, and now I've given myself into your keeping. The moment of my death, my one true choice, is yours, my soul is yours and my body, every last drop of my power is yours," Kaworu said, felt, entangled with pure gratitude and worship and happiness to be kept by someone who cared. Relief that he didn't have to fear doing weird things anymore, not when he could feel what Shinji wanted instead of being unable to understand the Lilim.

It was too, too much, too perfect and right and everything Shinji's heart had longed for, and he felt himself breathing faster and faster, about to faint again until Kaworu did something, taking control of Shinji's breathing and helping him calm down, sending a soothing feeling through his body that matched Kaworu's desire to soothe him, to reassure Shinji that Kaworu was his always, that there was no need to rejoice in this while it lasted. "Yours," the angel said with perfect joy like a cherub standing before the throne of God. "Yours." My heart my soul my everything: offered onto you. "Yours, not theirs." He was free, truly free of SEELE. He could live, and live with someone who wanted him to live, wanted him to exist in this world. It was Shinji he would be drawn towards now, as the other angels longed to reunite with Adam or Lilith.

Kaworu was home, and the bliss of it was echoed in Shinji, because knowing that he'd made someone feel this happy? It was only as Kaworu began to settle himself in to sleep, knowing that while he was awake this feedback loop would make it impossible for Shinji to act natural that Shinji noticed that he'd crushed that fragile human-seeming body in one of his spasms and hadn't even noticed it, no more than he'd noticed falling to the ground.

Maybe he should just lie here, he thought. Make it seem like there had been something like a battle, or whatever… But no, he should go back up, get talking to them over with. He'd want to get out of this Eva, out of this plugsuit, after killing another friend.

He wouldn't lose Kaworu now, Shinji realized. As long as Kaworu stayed inside him, to kill Kaworu someone would have to go through Shinji. He wouldn't have to outlive Kaworu, not as long as he kept the angel safe in his heart. As long as Shinji lived, Kaworu would live. "They won't detect you somehow?" he asked Kaworu as he made his way back to the lift.

The angel, his angel now, stopped working on connecting into Shinji's nervous system so he'd know if Shinji was in danger fast enough to protect him long enough to say, "No, not as long as I am within the area protected by the light of your soul." Shinji's own Absolute Territory. "Not unless I use my own light," and he wouldn't do that unless Shinji was in danger.

Shinji knew he couldn't ask Kaworu not to protect Shinji, that that was the one thing Kaworu wouldn't obey him in, because Kaworu wanted Shinji to be safe so, so much, and he didn't even try. He just tried not to have to wipe his eyes clean of tears again, because being loved like this? To have someone want him, Shinji, to live this much?

"Not just me," Kaworu reminded him. "The First Child died for you, not the world." And Kaworu would do the same now, because he'd been wrong: it wasn't a stupid thing to do. "You are worthy of this, Shinji. Infinitely worthy."

The one who reached out to befriend her, the one who wanted him to live: Shinji was so kind to them both, even though they were angels, even though Rei slapped him and Kaworu disturbed him.

By the time he reached the surface Kaworu's contentment was only a purr in the back of his own mind, so he was able to be somber and listless. It did help that what happened was overwhelming, and it was still hard to believe that it was real, that he really could deserve this.

It didn't even occur to him that he was doing a good job pretending he was depressed when he lay in bed all day the next day, not even getting out to eat until Misato said that he really needed to and Kaworu got worried for him, afraid of losing the person who wanted him to live. Shinji wouldn't have bothered for his own sake, but now that someone wanted him to live?

It was warm, like a perfect bath, relaxing every muscle in his body and soothing an ache that had been there since he was born, only made worse by losing his mother, being abandoned by Gendo, Touji's death, Asuka, Rei… He couldn't care that Kaworu was male, an angel or just plain weird, not next to this.

"You protected what needed to be protected," Misato told him, and she had no idea. It was hard not to smile, and he wanted to laugh for the first time in a long time.

"This is what SEELE thinks instrumentality would be like,"Kaworu said in their dream as Shinji slept. "But it wouldn't be like this at all. Everyone's self would be destroyed." All their precious people would be dead. "It's true that we won't have misunderstandings anymore, since you've let me in so deeply I can feel your heart, but you can't let everyone in like this." So other people could still hurt Shinji, he could still lose them. This wasn't a solution to all life's problems the way SEELE thought.

Shinji shook his head. "I wouldn't want that anyway. Just knowing that someone can care about me like this: I won't lose hope now. I won't give up on reaching out to Rei, because I know it's possible for someone to really love me now. And even if you left and had your own body again, I'd still remember. That it's possible to be understood, that it's possible for someone to say they love me and mean it."

Kaworu ducked his head, because Shinji didn't like to see him cry. "So this is what it's like to be loved by something like you." So, so perfect, and he would have died just to defy SEELE. He would die, no, he would live for Shinji, for this happiness, and they both could feel it. "I haven't harmed your body at all, and it isn't rejecting me. I've managed to mimic some of your symbiotes, and your own cells."

"That's good," Shinji said, taking Kaworu's hands because it felt strange now for them not to be connected, even if they could only talk here because they were. "I don't want to hurt you, Kaworu. I know what you mean now, by saying Rei was stupid to blow herself up." He'd been unable to understand how Rei could just leave someone she loved like that, when she had a real chance at Shinji's heart.

"Would you share this with her?" Kaworu asked. "Not permanently, but once? She's the reason I knew what love was, the reason I…" The reason he had this now, the reason he was alive and with Shinji. "And I'm trying to figure out Armisael's memories of how to shapeshift: I was contaminated by her as well as Rei. That's how I knew how to enter your body. I'll make myself a female body when I leave." So it wouldn't be weird for him to want to be with Shinji, so Shinji wouldn't have a problem with them both being guys.

"I don't care about that anymore," Shinji told him. Not when he now knew this was real. "You're Kaworu. I don't care what you look like, even if you looked like one of the other angels."

Kaworu was pretty when he blushed, so overwhelmed and not bitter at all, forgetting all about the old men and thinking only of Shinji, only of now, only of being held and wanted. Of being saved.

Just knowing that Shinji could make someone this happy? It was incredible.

"It's not just that, but… anyway, there's another way it's like instrumentality too, you know," Kaworu said, managing to sound more like his usual self. "You have the power of a Seed of Life now. I did say you could have the power of my soul, remember? There's so much you could do with it, you're the most powerful being on the planet now. You won't need an Eva to crush armies. Just… keep that in mind, ok?"

"…Kaworu…" Shinji said, taking his hands away and folding his arms, because that was so far beyond suspicious.

"The old men will move now. They still want instrumentality. Then there's your father. You know whose soul is in your Eva: you might not be able to count on her, but I will always help you, Shinji." There wasn't anyone Kaworu loved but him, because no one else had ever even pretended to love Kaworu. "You aren't helpless." He had Kaworu's help. "I am the most powerful of the angels: you don't have to use my power," although Kaworu would like it if he did, "because Misato hates angels, but just remember that. Your wish to protect your precious people is important to me because I'm one of them. So don't hesitate." To crush anyone who tried to make Shinji unhappy by hurting Misato or Asuka. Perhaps Shinji would even crush the old men who had dared to dictate Kaworu's life? Would he do it in Kaworu's name or the world's?

Shinji felt Kaworu's eagerness, how he almost wanted to try to cajole Shinji into flying over to Germany and blowing things up, but not right now. Misato'd said they had to go to NERV and start staying there all the time tomorrow, and Kaworu himself had just admitted that it was about to start. "Tell me everything," he told Kaworu instead, taking the angel's hands again and holding his eyes. "I need to know what's really going on if I'm going to stop it. If they trigger instrumentality we'll both die." And Shinji wasn't going to let that happen, not when he now knew the real reasons to live.

Kaworu nodded. "I'll show you everything I know that would help, Shinji." For Shinji. And to crush the old men and their dreams the way they'd choked off Kaworu's. "I'm beginning to inherit Armisael's memories: that's how all the angels learned what worked and what didn't from those who came before them. So I should have more power to help you with."

"Goddammit!" Shinji yelled, kicking one of the tanks hard enough to send it flying into a battleship. "Giving an order to kill civilians, too?" And Asuka? Rei, well, to be fair he could kind of understand Rei, since she could cause Third Impact and this Rei didn't know any better than to follow Gendo's orders, but that didn't mean he had to let it happen.

He'd fought angels all this time, and now some stupid old men were sending humans to kill his friends. "Do you know how many times I saved all your lives, you ungrateful bastards?" he demanded, lifting another tank and throwing it into the pile he was trying to create to block one of the passes that they were taking to get into the ruined Tokyo-3. There wasn't much he could do about the foot troops, but with Misato in charge the Bakelite was mostly holding them back, and as long as Shinji kept them too busy to drain the lake or fire depth charges Asuka was safe in her Eva. If things got too bad inside NERV he could send Kaworu, who had an AT field and could actually fit in there, but he could feel that Kaworu was worried that so far, this was too damn easy. Conventional troops? Against an Eva?

If they weren't trying to kill himself, Rei, Asuka and Misato Shinji would have felt very sorry for them, but they were throwing their lives away when they didn't have to, since Gendo aside, it wasn't NERV that would cause Third Impact but SEELE and… this was just so. Damn. Stupid.

He was just glad Kensuke was out of the city already. Although he could probably name all the hardware Shinji was reducing to scrap, soccer balls & a makeshift barricade in hopes they'd take the damn hint. Since Unit 01 had an S2 engine, they couldn't aim for his power cord, and with Kaworu here coaching him in how to use the AT field instead of Shinji just having to do stuff and hoped it worked the military didn't have much chance of getting lucky, although Shinji supposed they didn't know that.

It wasn't like killing Kaworu when he wasn't going to cause Third Impact and wasn't fighting back: in fact, he'd basically surrendered to Shinji before asking Shinji to kill him. These people were trying to kill everyone because they'd let themselves be yanked around by a conspiracy and used to attack people from their own country, so Shinji felt much less bad about it. It helped that he was just really pissed at having his time wasted with this sideshow, and it was better for them anyway if they were out of here as soon as possible, before SEELE deployed whatever they were doing with Kaworu clones like Rei's.

It was almost a relief to look up and see oh, it was just Evas. Kaworu had started to worry they'd actually done something clever.

"Don't you dare get hurt," Kaworu told him as the cells that currently made up his body left Shinji's Eva, heading for one of the crater lakes.

Shinji snorted. "By these toy soldiers?" Kensuke might have said that this was like knights trying to fight a tank: utterly outclassed. He was just angry.

Suddenly, from the perspective of everyone but Shinji, the surface of one of the crater lakes erupted into a great fountain of LCl as Maya reported, "I'm detecting an AT field, pattern blue! It's…!"

Kaworu hovered there and smirked up at the descending Evas, ugly fusions between lizards and birds of prey. "Children of Adam and servants of the Lilim, obey me," he said, hijacking the military and NERV's radio frequencies because he felt like gloating.

"The Twelfth Angel!"

"Nagisa? It can't be!" Misato said, grabbing the back of Maya's chair. "Shinji killed him!"

"Evas without souls, controlled using mindless clones of me: you should have made sure I was dead, you pathetic old men!" He'd been able to control Unit 02 when it had a soul because that soul was asleep: these Evas he could merge with, gaining multiple bodies the way Israfel had come against NERV in two vessels. "The instrumentality you'd destroy your own race for is nothing but death!"

Shinji winced: Kaworu wasn't very good at getting himself across. Maybe Shinji shouldn't have killed all that time in Kaworu's room watching cheesy movies, or maybe it was SEELE that Kaworu was imitating. Badly, since he didn't know enough about humans even now.

"What kind of idiot would you have to be to think that getting your selves destroyed would make you Lilim better off, forget making yourselves immortal? Like hell I'd let Adam or Lilith have my soul on your say-so, damn dirty old bastards! You're no better than Ikari and his thing for making underage clones of his wife obey him! Screw you and your prophecies; you don't know what the hell you're talking about!" Kaworu declared, grinning up at the eyes in the sky like he should have fangs as the Evas he'd taken possession of circled around him. "Call me the Angel of Free Will, and you still think I'll dance to your tune? Go fuck Adam, again, and see if that one will believe in your bullshit!"

Kaworu did smug well, Shinji thought, like the expression on his face when he'd stopped Shinji's knife with his AT field. It would work much better if he'd shut up and just show them why they were screwed, but Shinji knew he'd like to curse out his old man.

Well, it seemed Kaworu realized that too, since he snapped his fingers and the Mass Production Evas took off in various directions. Bringing the Spear of Longinius back and resealing Lilith would keep them from doing anything with her, just in case. Most of the others were off to destroy the facilities that made them. And the facility where Kaworu and his clones had been kept.

One of them landed here. Not too near Shinji, but "Sending these people to kill their own kind, when Shinji and the others saved them all so many times? Using them to kill children and civilians? I won't let your pawns murder the ones I fought beside and the one I love just because you're upset Gendo wants to kill everyone slightly differently." Which was fucking ridiculous.

The Ikari in question was hiding behind his poker face as some of the bridge staff looked up at him, gauging their expressions. So, Katsuragi already knew something, probably because of Kaji. No matter.

"I'm not your toy, I've taken the Evas away from you and I'm going to smash the rest of your damn experiments! If you think lying down and dying is such a great idea, do it yourselves! Some of us are trying to survive here! As for you, Ikari? First, what you did is just gross, and second, even if swallowing what's left of Adam after the old men fucked with it makes you a Seed of Life, we're not that kind of god. Even if we are world-creators, your wife's idea of floating around in space eternally is dumb and she is a selfish bastard who never gave a damn about you except for the fact you were desperate for someone to like you and that made you easy."

Gendo's fists slammed down on the table now, hard.

"Don't believe me? You should already have the nerve connections for it now: try syncing to Unit 01 yourself and see what she really thinks when she's not pretending to be sweet, innocent and motherly. How the hell the two of you produced Shinji I don't know: he's a selfish bastard sometimes too but at least he cares about the people around him. She doesn't love him any more than she loves you: she was just using you like you used the Akagis, and you're desperate enough to get her back you'll annihilate her soul as well as everyone else's? You're as pathetic as my old men, so afraid of death they'll kill everyone including themselves! Speaking of parents, Kiel, don't think I don't know whose genes were used to make me! Making a god in your image, that's even more pathetic than Ikari!" He said, shaking his fist at them as more LCL spiraled up into the air around him, turning into silver wing-spokes. "As for you military bastards, if you can't be bothered to find out what the hell is really going on before you accept orders to kill unarmed civilians and a hero like Shinji, stay out of this!" The wings began to glow, charging up. "Sleep!" Pure notes radiated from them like struck tuning forks.

Shinji's Eva protected him and the sheer mass of the Geofront protected those inside from the signal, but everyone else in range fell asleep. Fuyutsuki, one of the few people old enough to remember old-style antennae, still waited a moment before taking his fingers out of his ears. "So the Twelfth Angel took a page from that one's book…" He'd guessed correctly that it would be some kind of broadcast attack, even if it wasn't anything as elaborate as brainwaves this time. "And spent enough time observing us to understand psychological warfare," he said, not just to bolster Gendo's position but to defend Yui's honor to the other bridge staff.

"So, the pilot failed to terminate the angel," Gendo said, eyes glaring behind his yellow sunglasses.

"I didn't fail, it was a lot of work not to kill him." Shinji said, raising an eyebrow. "Kaworu didn't want to cause Third Impact, he just knew that when he refused SEELE would have him killed and he'd rather have me do it. I told him that was a stupid idea and he should try to figure out a way to live, especially if an ancient conspiracy would be trying to cause Third Impact next and I could use the help. Speaking of which, Father, I knew you were sick, but…"

"You'd believe an angel over your own father?" Misato asked.

Shinji leaned forward in his seat and gaped at her. "Are you kidding? I'd believe Pen Pen over that lying, manipulative bastard! You've spent more time with him than I have, Misato: you should know he doesn't care how many people he fucks over as long as he gets what he wants. I'm his own son, and I'm one of the people he threw away the instant he didn't need them, and then he was arrogant enough to just have me summoned to Tokyo-3 when he had a use for me! Isn't Ritsuko your best friend? And he was screwing her and her mother in order to manipulate them and those were mental images I did not need, just like the big tank full of naked mindless clones of Rei and my mom! That was just disgusting! And someone had Kaji killed, and it shouldn't have taken that long to find Asuka before she almost died! Rei was my friend, she died to save me, and that bastard just replaced her and since then he's made the new one follow him around! I don't know whether he's really doing it for Mother or he's just in it to become an angel himself, but there's one thing I don't agree with Kaworu about: I'm not surprised at all that the Prime Minister believed SEELE when they said my father was trying to cause Third Impact and they had to act fast in order to stop him! You'd have to be an idiot not to know he's up to something with the dummy system and everything, and knowing him, there's no way he's up to anything good!"

Nervous looks were exchanged among Maya and the rest: No one in NERV's command staff could really argue with that.

"So, father?" Shinji asked, snarling. "Want to tell us why you didn't just do what the government said and hand over the Evas and Adam when the last angel was gone? What did you need them for that was worth getting Misato, Asuka and everyone else here, everyone stupid enough to trust you killed? Worth ordering me out here to kill human beings that are just trying to stop you and your evil plans? And you guys wondered why I didn't want to pilot for this bastard! Defending humanity out of the goodness of his heart? What heart? He's been keeping everyone else in the dark all along, experimenting on Rei and letting that happen to Asuka? Why would he do all that without a reason? And what reason could there possibly be except what all this is about in the first place: Third Impact! It's not like it's hard to figure out! I understand Ritsuko going along with it because he tricked her into loving him but come on, Misato, either you've been deliberately blind this whole time or you want to help him finish what SEELE started by setting off Second Impact!

"As for the Committee for Human Instrumentality, did you or did you not see those Evas just now, huh? Where the hell were they when Rei died? When that angel got inside Asuka's head, and we could have used Evas that didn't need pilots? If I'd had help, I could have pinned that angel down and rescued Touji, but no, my father would rather take over the Eva while I'm trapped in here and make me feel what it's like to kill a friend, the sadistic bastard! Why the hell were the people who let someone like him control NERV in the first place holding out on us like this, when the human race came that close to being wiped out that many times, unless there was something more important to the Committee than the survival of humanity! None of what has happened makes any fucking sense unless they're trying not to save the human race! Whose brilliant idea was it to put a kid with no idea what the hell an Eva was, forget how to pilot, into one? I know that people can do some really dumb things sometimes, I've done enough of them, but this?" Shinji waved at the surroundings, at the unnecessary military attack, at the Eva Kaworu left them because Kaworu actually gave a damn about the defense of NERV, at the angel SEELE sent them undercover as a pilot. "Take a look around! We've been screwed over, no, sabotaged way too damn many times! Once is coincidence, twice is happenstance, three times is my father and SEELE are trying to set off Third Impact the way they did Second Impact!"

In the silence after he stopped talking, Shinji's rapid, furious breaths were the only sound in NERV's command chamber.

"Shinji, you're hyperventilating again," Kaworu said, alarmed.

Shinji clasped his hands over his mouth to restrict the amount of oxygen he could get so he didn't faint again, since the alternative was probably Kaworu getting in here somehow to kiss him since it would take too long to find a bag, and he didn't need to have to deal with everyone seeing that right now, too. Sheer fury made it hard to calm down: his body wanted the extra oxygen to fuel crushing them all with his bare hands!

Once he could speak again, much less maintain some semblance of calm, he said, "If any of you in there care about what we've been fighting for all this time, you will shoot that bastard right now, before Kaworu's the only one that can handle him. Evas can fight angels, but an ordinary angel isn't strong enough to kill a Seed of Life, and that's what he's turning into."

Silence in the control room, as Maya stared down at her hands, at the gun she didn't want, at the way they shook and the way the gun was slowly lifting up, because Ritsuko…

As she watched herself in horrified amazement, conscious mind shoved back as some long-repressed, animal part of herself fought for enough control to destroy the one who did that to Ritsuko, Misato turned and fired.

Gendo only smirked. "Too late, boy," he said, reaching for his chest and taking out the bullet that had lodged there in the cloth, managing to push in a little ways but not enough to break the skin. "You've always been useless. If the Last Messenger has the power to fight me now that I have Adam's power, that means he's a Seed, and that means I don't need Lilith's broken heart. If I'd known that, I'd never have bothered with Rei. But now I do." Thanks to Shinji's pathetic attempts to stop him. "So that's how youwere able to stop him from merging with Lilith: he wasn't even trying. I should have known you wouldn't be able to break through an AT field like that without Yui taking over and doing it herself."

Kaworu smirked, dismissing the wing framework. "The true nature of the AT field is the light of the soul, and I have it on good authority that you're soulless as well as brainless, stupid old man. You may be turning into a copy of Adam's body, but your soul is a Lilim's soul: humans are just ordinary angels, not Seeds. Insulting Shinji, when he's worth a hundred of you? No, a hundred times nothing is still nothing. You're not Kiel, but I'm going to enjoy this." Because Shinji would enjoy seeing someone beat the crap out of Gendo. "Come, try to take me, you pathetic excuse for a human! I'll make you regret everything you've ever said about Shinji!" He grinned with psychotic delight that would have worried Shinji before (oh crap, he's going to do something weird again) but now it was, well, kind of nice. That someone wanted to hurt Gendo on Shinji's behalf? No, that was more than just kind of nice.

…Waaait. The way Kaworu had been talking about it? Seeds and trees and if angels were related to people, then people merging together… which then produced a new world full of offspring… And what would drive the angels to fight the Evas in order to merge with Adam? Shinji's eyes widened as he had a horrible thought. Why did that evil bastard Gendo keep doing this to him? "I did not need that mental image… You'd better not lose, Kaworu!"

"True, a Child of the Black Seed normally wouldn't be able to subdue a White Seed, but you're barely an infant and you're contaminated with the blood of the Black Seed," Gendo reminded Kaworu, smirking and ignoring Shinji. "I don't need a powerful soul, not when I'll have yours!"

Shinji hid his face in his hands and groaned. "You mean this whole time… Like deer?" Like bucks in spring, like the way Asuka kept trying to provoke him and Touji? "Seriously?" As Gendo blasted through the roof of NERV, not caring about the injuries he caused or the direct path to the command center he was leaving the invading soldiers, Shinji said "And he was going to go after Rei instead?" and shuddered. "That's just sick. I don't care if the other angels were Adam's children and they were trying to… 'reach' Adam, that's just wrong." Ew. Ew ew ew. Shinji couldn't help shuddering again. "Misato, where's Rei?" He started running back towards the Geofront. "Get her out here!"

"Why?" Misato said, coughing as Hyuga came out from under his desk where he'd taken shelter.

"Because he might change his mind and go after Rei again if he doesn't have enough power to beat Kaworu and force him to merge on his own! And this Rei doesn't know what he's really like yet: she'd probably let him do that to her!" Shinji had to protect Rei! According to Ritsuko she might not remember loving him, but she still had the same soul, and he couldn't just let Gendo do what he wanted with her! Not when they'd promised to survive! "I can't use the Eva to protect her when she's inside the building! Help me bring her into my entry plug!"

Misato blinked, then blanched. "Wait, are you saying…" That merging and causing Third Impact was the angels trying to mate, and Gendo was trying to do that to Kaworu now to get his power?

"That's why Kaworu didn't know why the others would even want to merge with Adam when it means they'll lose who they are: my father just said he's not old enough yet!" And thank goodness, because Shinji didn't want either him or Kaworu to die even if it might be the angel version of sex. "Humans have AT fields too, that's why my mother's soul can generate one inside the Eva! We just use them to protect our minds, but humans are angels: we come from Lilith, right? Adam and Lilith are Seeds, and all the other angels were drawn to them, so what else could it be?"

"Two sets of genes combining into one." Ritsuko's lips twisted, bitter and angry. "The term for seeding other planets with life is panspermia, after all, but if the sperm and ova have to be sentient in order to generate the necessary AT fields, merging means they would no longer be what or who they were before, just a unified entity. That's why there aren't any angels of Lilith except for us: there was a victor, and that's what fertilized the Black Seed." Intelligent. Create various offspring, and whichever was best suited to the new world would merge with the seed, creating the new species.

"Kaworu said his old men were talking how Lilith wants to bear the Black Fruit, and that was what Yui Ikari wanted, for everyone's minds to merge and send out another Black Seed with all the knowledge of everyone alive. They're also called Seeds of Wisdom. I guess the Seeds of Life try to create more powerful life forms?" Shinji shrugged. "But they have to be cross-fertile, if SEELE could create Kaworu. He's half human, well, our kind of human I mean." Although was it really as simple as the pea plants and all that stuff in science class? "Wait, if Lilith is still the seed, and we're Lilith's angels, then it's the human that merges with Lilith that creates the Black Fruit? So Mother was trying to do the same thing as the an-as all the other angels?"

But if the Seeds were so much more powerful than the rest of the angels, and normally it would be the Seeds who fought the angels (since Adam's angels hadn't fought each other and normally there would only be one set of angels on a planet), then didn't they let the angel merge if they were strong enough to be worthy instead of just if they could beat the Seed? Or was it possible for the angel to win if they were smart enough?

Gendo was a bastard, but he was good at manipulating people, and if Kaworu had been desperate enough to decide he loved Shinji? No, he only liked Shinji because of Rei, right? And Rei had liked Gendo.

What if instinct or something overrode good taste, or Kaworu had a weird moment and let Gendo… urgh. The thought was disgusting.

Kaworu had better win, because Shinji didn't want to be one with Gendo. Really didn't want.

Shinji ended up crouching over NERV headquarters, trying to shield it from the explosions as Gendo and Kaworu fought, until one of the Evas Kaworu controlled got back with the lance. Then Gendo started running, Kaworu chasing him as well as the Eva so that Gendo wouldn't be able to outwit the Eva and take the lance.

Kaworu looked extremely pleased with himself when they got back, Gendo's mutating body speared like a cancerous fish, frozen in the process of transforming into something that probably looked more like Lilith's marshmallow-like body. He already looked grossly fat, and Shinji hoped those weren't supposed to be breasts, but when the angels came from Adam, wasn't Adam the same gender of Lilith? Since the DNA of angels could be sequenced, like the sample Ritsuko got from that one angel, wouldn't both the Seeds show X chromosomes?

So was Kaworu really female, human form aside? It wasn't that Shinji really cared, but still, that would be good to know.

Maybe Ritsuko would want to look at his genes anyway, since he was an angel? And Shinji could just ask in a 'by the way…' kind of way?

That was when he noticed that Kaworu was looking pleased with himself in an 'I have done well and have earned praise' sort of way, which meant that Kaworu might do something weird again unless Shinji did something first. Like at least give him a hug, or something, even if they were in public. Shinji definitely didn't want to be like Gendo.

And… how pathetic would he have to be, to start withdrawing from Kaworu as soon as he couldn't read Kaworu's mind anymore? He knew what Kaworu was like: he didn't have to be afraid of him, even if he was weird. It would be wrong to act like they weren't even friends when they were… Was there even a word?

"Shinji, what are you doing?" Misato asked as he ejected the entry plug so he could get out, once Kaworu's Eva had lowered Gendo and the lance onto the waiting truck so he could be put into some kind of containment.

"He's still Kaworu, Misato." Then Shinji remembered what his opinion of Kaworu used to be, so he added. "He's not really a bad guy." Now that Shinji knew him.

Red eyes lit up once Kaworu saw that Shinji had gotten out onto his Eva's shoulder and was waving at him. The angel landed next to him, and knowing that he was young by angel standards, well, it explained a lot. He probably hadn't spent a lot of time living as a human either, as opposed to being in a tank like the Reis. Shinji should probably show him around and teach Kaworu not to be weird, otherwise he'd keep doing weird stuff and it would be Shinji's fault.

Kaworu returned the embrace when Shinji hugged him, saying, "I already miss being inside you."

…Doing weird stuff like saying stuff like that.

"Being inside Ikari-kun?" Rei asked, since she'd followed Shinji out of the entry plug.

Kaworu nodded. "He let me hide there." Even though Shinji had been so unwilling to let him close before. "It felt amazing."

Shinji winced, because Kaworu had made it sound non-weird, well, if you knew that angels could do that, until he added the other part.

"You should try it: Shinji said you could," Kaworu said, taking her hands now. "You're the one who made me feel these things for Shinji, so I owe you."

"I don't remember," Rei reminded him.

"I'll show you," Kaworu said, putting his hands on either side of her head and then kissing her.

Shinji sputtered, because wait, what and dammit, Kaworu! Then he wondered who wasn't allowed to kiss who, exactly who Shinji had just gotten territorial over. Wait, maybe it was reasonable of him to not want them to touch each other. "You aren't going to merge or anything, are you?" Because if Rei was (sort of) Lilith?

Two pairs of red eyes blinked at him as they turned to face him, Kaworu not removing his hands. "No," he said as though it was a stupid question. "If every time angels touched they merged like that, I wouldn't be able to touch you." And that would suck.

"Loneliness is a very painful thing," Rei said in agreement. "Shinji-kun, I want to be inside you as well."

And now Kaworu was making Rei do it? And why were tentacles growing from Rei's palms as she reached towards him? At least they didn't have Reis at the ends like Armisael's, but Shinji still couldn't do anything but back away slowly.

If Armisael can have tentacle-Reis, Rei can grow tentacles. She is an angel, after all. They're more properly mental tendrils for nervous system connection, but whatever.

Mostly the character of Titus Pullo in Rome annoyed the hell out of me because he's that Adam Sandler character type (dumb wish-fulfillment Gary Stu as though dumb is a good thing to be), but he was right about how the heads of one's beloved's enemies are a great courting gift. So very thoughtful indeed, heh.

In the End of Eva movies, Shinji decided to return to life despite the fact that it is pain because of what Rei and Kaworu represent to him: the knowledge that it is possible for people to grow to understand each other and 'the words I love you.' Understanding Kaworu now via neural link when before he was the most incomprehensible person would prove the first, and now Shinji knows what it's really like to be loved. So no, I don't think he'd be desperate to keep Kaworu within him, and I do think it would give him a great strength to defy fate.

Manga Kaworu with actual inner peace starts to act a bit more like the anime version, but I tried to keep it from going too far. Then he started acting like a teenager, so I figure it works out.