Creation began on 07-18-15
Creation ended on 03-04-16
Neon Genesis Evangelion
Reversal of Misfortune: Promise
A/N: Due to the extended patience of yours truly, this chapter, also a shorty, will be meant to fill in some of the use of forgotten memories to reshape the future by not making the same mistakes.
GASP! Yui awoke from the same, horrid nightmare again. It was the same one she had been experiencing recently, filled with the same measure of terror she couldn't understand completely, no matter what she did.
There were these nine, giant harpies without eyes, feasting on a girl with red hair, a little boy driven to the edge of insanity by abandonment, a giant of a woman cradling a black sphere whilst a cyclone of red crystals were sucked into her palms, and the center of it all, the very boy that had been left alone by everyone, crouched in a dark corner, whimpering in despair as a giant, purple behemoth hovered under him.
As she got out of bed, she checked the time and date. It was Wednesday, April of Two-Thousand-One, and nearly seven months since Gendo had been murdered in a gang-related incident. She had been to his funeral and everything, and he never knew he was going to be a father prior to his death.
"Shinji…Ikari," she uttered, getting herself a cup of water. "Rei…Ayanami… Asuka…Langley…Soryu… Who are they?"
Consuming the cool drink, she felt better.
-x-
Meanwhile, on the other side of the planet, somewhere in Germany, another woman of intellectual prowess had climbed into bed after another harrowing day of trying to be civil with her husband after their bitter decision to separate for the time being, having found herself unable to deal with his absence from home and waking up to his empty space in bed.
He's probably with some other woman that strokes his ego, she thought, then wondering what would happen if she had to handle her future as a single mother, since she found out she was recently pregnant. My mother always said that he seemed to fear the majority of commitment.
This was what the current situation was right now for Kyoko Zeppelin Soryu.
"I'm a chosen being, a special person," she suddenly heard a female voice that sounded so obnoxious and egotistical that she couldn't even picture the girl that owned that voice. "I'd rather die than do it with you!"
Then, after closing her eyes, she saw someone, a girl of thirteen-fourteen years of age, with long, red hair and blue eyes…and a personality unfitting of her, assaulting a boy of similar age, for no apparent reason. She reopened them and expressed some disgust over the mild hallucination of the girl.
Yikes, she sighed, looking out her window as the sun began to go down. Who would raise their daughter to be such an…overzealous and prideful firestorm like her?
Then she started to wonder if having this child was the best thing for her right now. Recently separated from her husband, working such long hours in a research project dedicated to the advancement of alternate energies, and not to mention that she was sent a letter by this group called SEELE, who seemed interested in the work her team was invested in. Also, there was her strange dreams she'd been having for a year now, involving a giant covered in red armor and facing this legion of white harpies to the death, and things didn't look good for the red giant.
-x-
Yui recalled when Fuyutsuki had asked her about her future once before she started dating Gendo, and her intention to have a family of her own was on her mind, and then she found herself in front of him again, wondering what she was going to do in the future.
"…I know that bio-engineering and metaphysical biology are two different subjects and everything," he said to her a few days later, having invited her out to lunch and to discuss her plans, "but you've been very distant lately, and I'm worried about your wellbeing, Ms. Ikari."
"It's okay," she told him, taking a sip of her orange juice. "I've spoken with my Father, and he says he's going to help me out with the baby until I can balance out my future without Gendo. I've also taken up a new subject: Nanomedicine."
"Nanomedicine? I thought that was still in the early stages of development."
"It is, but I believe I can contribute to the world of medical treatment."
"But why? Out of curiosity, I mean."
Yui set down her orange juice and thought of the proper reason to go down this road.
"I guess…after losing Gendo…I just want to ensure that my child won't have to suffer in the years to come," she explained to him. "Is that wrong?"
"No, of course not," he agreed with her.
-x-
"…This new, geothermal reactor prototype is turning out better than anticipated, Soryu," a man told Kyoko a few weeks later.
"It's only until we get the prototype of the plasma reactor completed," she explained to him.
"Still, so long as it's functional, this whole building should be independent of the power grid for quite a while."
"At least a year or so. This should allow us to accelerate the development by cutting three years off the program."
"Say, what did you say to that guy that represented that SEELE bunch?"
"They wanted me to join them in a project based on cellular regeneration, but I turned them down. I'm more interested in this project to make nuclear energy obsolete."
-x-
Some people just assumed that she was suffering from a mild case of postpartum depression, but that wasn't true. The new mother that was Yui Ikari was just thinking heavily on her son's future as she looked at him through the safety glass of the maternity ward.
She had a nightmare shortly an hour after her son was born last night, and it made her more cautious about her son's life. It was the same dream, which included the same, horned giant, a pyramid made of glass and steel, a moon-sized, black sphere that resembled the moon itself in a way, and the legion of white harpies. And in the center of the mayhem that was occurring in the dream was that same boy she was left to conclude was her son, driven to the brink of insanity due to being left alone.
Placing her left hand on the window, Yui swore on Gendo's grave and to herself that she would do right by their son. Whatever that nightmare was about, she took it as a warning of things to come in the future.
I promise you, Shinji, she thought to herself, I won't leave you alone.
-x-
"Aargh!" Kyoko groaned as she bore down again.
"It's a girl," the doctor announced, holding up the newborn.
It was that announcement that made Kyoko worry about the future. It was only the previous night before her water broke that she had another nightmare. She had seen that same girl with the red hair, the same ego, shoving others aside and being left alone in an empty life. She didn't want that for her child.
It was three hours later that Kyoko was recovering from the birth of her daughter, who was laying in a bassinet over by the wall.
"…Keep it brief," she heard a female voice speak out to someone outside the room. "This is most irregular."
"Thank you," she heard a responding male voice.
A scuffling of footsteps came into the room and Kyoko saw her husband enter. He seemed quiet and cautious.
"Hey," he greeted her. "How have you been?"
"I've been alright," she answered him. "You?"
"I've been managing."
He then looked over at the bassinet and pointed to the child sleeping in it.
"Is that her?" He asked her.
"Yeah," she responded. "That's Asuka. That's your daughter."
A small smile formed on his face, and he returned to her gaze.
"I came to apologize to you for what happened between us," he revealed his reason for coming to see her.
"It's okay. It's in the past."
"But…I don't want for our relationship to be past tense, Kyoko. I don't expect you to right away, but I will ask that you give me a chance to make it all up to you. I want you in my life again. You and Asuka…if you'll have me again."
-x-
In the hidden chamber, miles underneath the land that was Hakone, the decomposing body of a giant, humanoid being had fallen off a large, red, metallic crucifix and into a large pool of its own fluids, sinking to the bottom.
In front of the fallen giant, several scientists were left to ponder what to do with the remaining samples they had harvested from the giant prior to its decomposing status, as they weren't enough to last for over ten years. They may have been good for two years, but not for the research they were aiming for later on.
"The Committee will not be pleased to know that the other giant has degenerated beyond our capacity to maintain," a female scientist expressed.
"They weren't happy to know that the first one rotted away," responded a male scientist to her. "Not even the research eased their anger."
"So, what now?" Another male scientist questioned.
"We do what we can with what we have to work with."
-x-
Years later
"Shinji," called Yui from the kitchen as she was preparing dinner, "please, come down."
An eleven-year-old Shinji came running into the kitchen, doing something on his iPad that he received on his birthday this year.
"Yes?" He asked her, sitting at the table and setting the tablet down.
"I got a call for your principal today, and he says you were trying to break up a fight again. Is this true?"
"Yes, it is. Toji Suzuhara was trying to shake down Togusa Aoi for his lunch money again, and I tried to stop him before he injured Togusa."
"Have you ever tried not trying to fight someone that spends most of their time at the gym?"
"Mother, he's the type of person that answers situations with his fists, not his brains. Even Kensuke thinks he's a brawler."
As she placed his plate of food in front of him, Yui sat on the opposite side of the table and uttered, "One of these days, Shinji, you're going to have to find an alternative way to deal with bullies without having to fight against them."
-x-
"…But why Japan, Mother?" An eleven-year-old Asuka asked Kyoko, being informed that her mother would be on a flight to Japan to assist in the project to oversee the construction and completion of the alternative energy reactor that would be meant for Tokyo. "They use nuclear power plants for their energy needs."
"That's why I'm going there, sweetie," Kyoko told her. "Research on clean energy has progressed considerably in the last few years. Germany, Europe, France and parts of the U.S. have converted to the use of plasma energy, adding to the use of hydroelectric, geothermal and solar energy sources. If this goes on, nuclear energy will become obsolete. We won't have to rely heavily on a dangerous power that is poisonous."
"You left out the reduction in fossil fuels, dear," Kyoko's husband expressed from within the bathroom as he shaved away his beard and mustache. "The research into plasma-powered vehicles is beginning to bear fruit, too."
Asuka, however, was just throwing a fit because she didn't want her mother to go across the world just to oversee an alternate energy project. She was still at the age where she clung to her mother and could rarely get through the week with just her father around. And the fact that her parents were scientists that specialized in alternate energy and cybernetics was meaningless to her at the time of her coming of age.
"I shouldn't be gone too long," Kyoko told her. "A month at the most. Just thirty days, and then I'll be back. You'll see."
"You promise?" Asuka questioned.
"I promise, Asuka."
To be continued…
A/N: I thought about cutting the part where Lilith decomposes and ending this chapter here, but then I decided that it was better to leave it off at where a promise is made and needs to be kept.