"Whenever I look into the eyes of a child, I don't see a young boy or girl anymore. Now there is only an adult, forced to grow up much too fast. That bothers me." Princeps Horatius Aurelian.

XXXVII

They'd lead him from the cages by the arms, that much he could remember. Everything had seemed to pass in a haze as armour was removed, questions were asked, a shower had, and he was eventually left in the changing rooms to "wait for the Director." Toji and Kensuke, who'd come around in time to see him cry, were lead off by armed security the moment the plug's hatch had cracked open, so he sat alone.

Shinji wasn't sure if he'd blinked. He'd hunched over on the bench, hands fiddling together as he still felt so wet and sticky with gore. The stench of meat and death clogged his nostrils. His jaw burned.

It's just sympathetic. It-it's all phantom. Your jaw hasn't really been cut off. You aren't actually covered in…blood…

But what he'd seen had been real enough. And the cruel slaughter danced before Shinji's eyes as phantom screams and a malicious chuckle echoed through his mind.

My fault…

He ran his hands over his face. Salty moisture covered his palms.

My stupid fucking fault.

The sound of the door sliding open cut his introspection short. Shinji stared into the floor as footsteps, light but firm, drew nearer. A shadow loomed over him, one he recognised as a woman's.

Oh. Hello Misato.

She took a deep, shaky, sigh. Shinji tried to detect feeling from it. Was it anger, or exhaustion? He couldn't tell.

"Your old man wants me to chew you out for insubordination." She said, quietly. "Disobeying a direct order, all that kind of crap. On all accounts I should…only problem is, I'd have done the same in your position."

At that, Misato gently eased herself down onto the bench. She sat closely, but not too closely.

"I…I can't imagine, what's going through your mind right now."

Shinji said nothing. He chose to further fiddle with his hands instead. It took every ounce of his strength not to shy away.

"You should know you're not alone." Out of the corner of Shinji's eye, he noted Misato reach for the cross around her neck and clasp it. At that he promptly dismissed any notion of her not knowing what he was going through.

"I don't think anyone in Nerv is going to be sleeping well tonight. Least of all you." She went on. "But that does bring me to my point, and I'm sorry that I have to make it, Shinji-kun. I really am."

She took a deep breath. "You saw what that thing did today. How many it killed. That's why we cannot afford to lose you. You were a damn hero today in my books, but if you'd gotten yourself killed?"

Misato let the question hand for a moment before continuing. "It would have been the end for us. For all of us."

There it was. The only reason she was deigning to have this conversation with him. He was the spare, the only thing they had thanks to accident. And once his father's pet had fully recovered its health, he'd be thrown aside.

He involuntarily snorted a laugh at that.

"Something funny?" Misato said.

"That's the only reason my death would matter, isn't it? That I pilot that thing badly." Shinji felt the words come even though he didn't want them.

"…Shinji-kun…"

"Don't bullshit me!" Shinji snarled. "That's the only reason we're having this talk, right!?" He stood up abruptly, running a hand through hair he wanted to rip out as he paced. "I mean, why the fuck would you care otherwise? Why would anyone care? I'm a stranger, a spiteful, bitter, selfish, stranger that just got all those people killed. That's all I'm good at!"

He slammed his fist into a locker, ignoring the metal denting from the impact. Shinji breathed heavily before he continued.

"So, don't bother lying anymore, Katsuragi-san. Chew me out, discipline me, tell me what a callous pile of shit I am. Tell me what you really think of me. Just be honest. I'll pilot Unit 01 and hurt more people until Ayanami-san's better, don't worry about that. I'm good at that."

Finally, he turned back to look at Misato, expecting to see the mask fall and a cold expression to cut into him. She might even hit him to press his uselessness home, but he'd deserve it.

But he didn't see any coldness in those brown eyes. Instead, he saw something else that rocked him to his core.

"…is that what you think?" Misato's face fell. Finally, Shinji grasped the sheer gravity of his mistake. She looked genuinely hurt, to the point that she shied away a little.

"Katsuragi-san…I…I…" He turned away and stewed in his own self-hatred. "Like I said, all I'm good at is hurting people. It really is for the best that I'm gone soon."

"Shinji-kun, that isn't true-"

"Yes it is!" He snapped. "It really should have all sunk in by now! Teacher did his best to beat it into me and I still didn't get it until today."

The rage finally ebbed, and he slumped against the wall. Exhaustion, grief and horror reasserted their control. He dropped his gaze again and allowed the tears to flow.

"I can't get anything right…I…I can't…I'm cursed. Death just follows me everywhere I go."

Shinji didn't need to look up to see the helplessness in Misato's eyes.

"Y-You know I've been in something like that before?" The words started to flow like a river, utterly beyond Shinji's control as he tried to rub the phantom blood off his skin. "Covered in blood and bodies. Back at Fukuyama I had to hide under a corpse pile so the Chinese couldn't find me…I-I don't know how long I was there…but I can still feel it all around me…"

Silence hung like the heaviest lead carpet.

He didn't see the blood drain from Misato's face, nor her mouth hesitantly open and close. But he knew. The compassion of good people was a happily predictable thing.

Shinji heard her stand up and her footsteps echo as she walked towards him. After a moment's pause, she got down on one knee, to be on his height. She attempted to reach out a hand, but paused and retracted it.

"I-I can't stand dirt and the smell of it…" Shinji furiously rubbed his face. "But I'm covered in it all the same. Wherever I go. I'm awful. I reek of it."

"That isn't true-"

"Yes it is! Why else would father just throw me away after mother died…why would he leave me with…" His hands covered his eyes as his body shook.

Misato reached out a hand to touch his shoulder, but he shook it off.

"Don't. Don't bother. I'll only hurt you. Just let me cry this out for a while…"

At that, he looked upwards but not at the ceiling, as if he looked beyond, and drew a deep, shuddering breath.

"Everyone who's nice to me always ends up…" At that he choked up completely. "Oh Gods…Ryusaki-san…" Intelligible Japanese melted away into tears.

Misato put her arms around him.

The energy had gone out of Shinji in its entirety, to the point where he couldn't have pulled away even if he wanted to, so he cried instead.

He cried and cried and cried, ugly sobs wrenching themselves free from his throat. The teenage boy, full of anger and bitterness, had melted away with only the little boy who couldn't do anything right remaining.

Misato just held him, gentle and free of judgement. There were no more questions. Although they were in Levav Base's beating heart she wasn't a superior officer at that moment.

She was his guardian.

She was a friend.

And she cared.

"It's like a hole in your soul, isn't it?" Her voice had become soft. "No matter what you do, it follows you around. And your stupid brain thinks you should feel guilty about it. That you're the bad one for still being here."

The light of thought flickered in Shinji's grief-stricken mind. This was no mere guess as to how he felt, but the intuition of one who understood.

You know…don't you? You've been through it.

At that Shinji cursed himself.

Of course she does you fucking incompetent. She lived through the Eruption.

"It's not your fault, Shinji. Not at all. The Chinese butchered those people in Fukuyama, as the Seraph did today. You survived, and that's no crime."

"But…but…teacher…" He mumbled on impulse.

"Teacher sounded like a vicious piece of shit who is very lucky he's dead." A faint bit of danger etched itself into Misato's tone, but it faded as quickly as it came. All for the better, as Shinji had suddenly got the impression he was being held by an angry bear.

"Now, the doctors always said, whenever I felt like this, to have a cup of tea before doing anything else. That's what we're going to do, if that's alright?" Misato said.

He managed a nod.

"Then we'll go back to my place, and we won't think about this just for the rest of today. Will that do?"

He nodded again.

"Good." She gently helped him to his feet. "You can be a difficult ass sometimes, Shinji-kun. But you aren't a burden to me. It's an honour to have you in my home."

Somehow that meant all the world to him.