+++++ Ikari Manor. Saturday, +18.

Taking a walk along the shores of Ashi with Verðandy and Holy Bell, Shinji explained everything that happened in his brief fight against Ma'at. The blue-blonde Norn held his arm lovingly, listening and murmuring where appropriate, helping him push his way through the confusing or anger-inducing portions without as much stress. Capping off the tale before he and Washu spent time in one another's arms, he blew out a long sigh. "I just…nothing she was saying made sense. She was talking about order like it's alive, a female, I just don't get it."

"So, a proper noun instead of a common one," she asked helpfully.

He knew that he should know the difference, but he wasn't able to point it out to save his soul. "A…what?"

"It is ok," she smoothed her hand along his arm, "I am not upset. A proper noun is one that is used for an individual entity. Such as Shinji, or Verðandy, or Holy Bell. It is identified as distinct from others like it. You would not say 'human' and expect it to be specific, but you could say Humanity and expect it to be specific when compared against your average Juraian. So it isn't just for individual people, but sometimes for organizations, such as Japan, United Nations, or the Junes place Nanako enjoys."

"So…Order, instead of order," he placed heavy emphasis on the word, trying to imply importance. "But how can a concept be alive?"

Holy Bell, from her spot atop his head, dipped down into view upside-down and tapped her chest. Using the odd crystalline language that was her birthright, she attempted to explain that concepts could in fact be given life if important enough.

The scary part for Shinji, was he understood much of what she'd just said. "W-wait…wait, I can…." Reaching up and gently removing her from his head, he cradled her in his hands. "I can understand you."

"Of course you can," Holy Bell declared with a heartfelt joy. "You always understood me, it just took you time to adjust to my voice." The tiny blonde angel sat sideways in his cupped hands, patting his thumb in time with the shared song in their mind. "I have been speaking with you ever since you first awakened to your duty, hoping that you would be calmed by knowing that someone was watching over you. I hadn't expected you to be able to touch me, but as you can see I'm overjoyed that you can."

Shinji nodded in time with both her touch and the music in his head, "The song…that's you? When I'm in Unit-01, you're with me?"

Arching one eyebrow, she looked at him seriously. "Would you abandon the ones you love just because they had to fight a war?"

She couldn't have said anything. He couldn't understand her at the time, and thrusting her out in public would have ended terribly. The Juraians weren't thrilled about their presence to begin with, and the thought of her influencing him while behind the controls of a machine that even they would struggle to defeat…. "Thank you."

"Thank you for proving what a good man you are," she replied with a happy cheer. Standing up, she floated back up above his head and dropped down onto his hair. "Take one step to the right, if you would be so kind."

Shinji did as asked, and barely avoided being struck by the same woman that nearly tackled Verðandy. A younger, black-haired, woman with similar markings to the Norn he loved had her arms around the taller Norn. The sniffling cry of joy that suffused the young woman stopped his anxiety from climbing through his skull, as did Holy Bell's gentle pat-pat of his forehead.

"This is Skuld, Verðandy's younger sister." A light tug on his hair encouraged him to give them space. "Let us go sit on the shore, and let sisters be sisters."

Seeing the surprise and happiness on Verðandy's face further improved his mood, and with a nod of understanding to the woman he loved he turned and made his way over to a larger stone to sit upon. "So, if you think order is important it becomes alive?"

"Not exactly." Rolling forward off his head, she increased in size enough that she could lounge in his lap with her back against his front. "Take, as an example, a balloon." She summoned a balloon into being before them, deflated and no larger than his thumb. "This balloon might be incredibly important to you, it might have been a gift from someone you love deeply. To others, though, it's a bit of rubber and rather pointless because it isn't inflated at all."

"Ok…so it takes more than a few people thinking so highly of it."

"A lot more than a few." Dissolving the balloon, she created an hourglass. "What does this represent to you?"

"Time."

She changed it to a digital clock. "And this?"

"…Still time."

She then shifted it to a calendar. "This?"

He opened his mouth, then realized the point she was trying to make. "Time is a concept that everyone uses, it's so common that we have different means of measuring it."

"But those means, and the measurements of it, are all very different." She placed a Juraian calendar next to a Gregorian calendar. "Each of these is for what you would consider a month. You see how the number of what you consider days aren't the same? Each is for the first month of what you consider a year. That month to you is thirty-one days, for them it's forty-two. That makes comparing 'months' far different mentally for each of you. A lot of people understand that 'time' is the orderly measurement of existence, and that it is broken into easily measured cycles. The day-night cycle, the time it takes the moon to change phases, the changing seasons. It all comes back to the same endpoint, time."

"Is there…err, Time," he once more put emphasis on the word, hoping she understood him.

"No. For precisely the same reason as there isn't Balloon." The tiny blonde looked up at him meaningfully. "There is no unified importance of their nature. Time is not uniform, it isn't so simple that it can be universally applied. Time is not time is not Time. Order, on the other hand…might very well be universally applicable. Everyone understands when something is in order, regardless of how it is ordered. They understand that, at its heart, order is the absence of chaos. Order has a reason for things, it has meaning, and when it is present it is known to be present."

Shinji nodded slowly. "When it's absent, you know it's absent. If time stopped, we couldn't be aware of it because we wouldn't be there to notice. But if you remove order, the stone we're sitting on could turn into a fish, the water could become nitrogen, the air could turn pink. Time doesn't have an opposite. Is that part of it?"

"Possibly. Time being its own opposite could very well give it a lack of counterforce. Order opposes Chaos, Law opposes Anarchy, Justice opposes Vengeance. There are concepts, and then there are Concepts…for a Concept to become animated and develop a will of its own, it might require an antagonistic catalyst." She sighed, took his hands and set them on her belly contentedly. "I was not around when the universe was created, I am simply attempting to understand the forces that surround me."

There was a warmth in Holy Bell's presence that couldn't be described in simple terms, either. With her on his lap, there was no anxiety, no fear, no anger. With her wings laid against his torso, trailing down his sides, she protected him just as he sheltered her. Slowly, carefully, he leaned his head forward and kissed her crown. "Thank you for being there for me."

Snuggling closer, Holy Bell hummed happily. "The more you love us, the more we will be a part of everything you do. Love, my dear, dear man, in all its many forms. The love of a friend, the love of a man, the love of a human, the love of the righteous, on and on…all love, all more powerful than you can ever know."

"Us?"

"Two souls, one heart. That is how the pairing of an Angel and a Goddess is typically explained to those who have not yet bonded with one. If you would love her more fully, you should love me in kind. If you would love me more deeply, you should love her as much." Reaching up and softly stroking his chin, she basked in his aura. "I love Verðandy more than words could ever hope to say, and until I saw you I doubted any could love her as much." There was a happy pause. "I have never been so fortunate to be so wrong."

Her words lifted his spirits higher. "I hope you don't mind when I say that you're going to have to help me learn how to show you the love you deserve, then. I'm doing my best, but I have to be making mistakes left, right, and center."

"You are doing far better than you think," she assured him. "I will guide you, as you wish, so long as you trust me when I ask you to do things that might not make much sense."

"Oh, you mean like living in a house with a bunch of women? All of whom are more than happy to…well…."

Laughing out loud, Holy Bell clapped her hands together. "Yes, things like that." Taking in a deep breath, she sighed out in joy once more. "Trust is a form of love, as well. Your heart sings out with your trust in me…it makes me feel glorious."

"Hard not to trust someone so…open." And he did trust her, far more than he trusted anyone else. "You don't wear clothing, you're that honest about who and what you are."

"Lies serve no purpose, except to hurt oneself." Her tone grew sad for a moment, "I wish Verðandy would stop lying to herself so often."

"Shinji?" Verðandy's voice prevented his follow-on question to Holy Bell, the Norn of the Present moving around to stand in front of the two with her sister beside her. "I would like you to meet Skuld, my little sister."

Holy Bell shrank down and floated back up to his head, freeing him to stand up and bow appropriately to the family of one he loved. "It is a pleasure to meet you Sakk…Sukur…."

"Call me 'Subeki'," the younger Norn asserted with a dry laugh. "I'm sure with enough practice you can manage my real name, but for now let's go with one you're more primed to say without choking." Extending her hand, she looked him square in the eyes. "It's nice to meet you."

Having seen the strange tradition enough to know what it was, Shinji took her hand and shook it firmly. "I apologize, Subeki-san. I have enough difficulty with my own language, I do not mean to mangle your name."

"Normally I'd thump you for it," Skuld grinned deviously, "but since you're cute I'll let it slide."

"Skuld, don't tease him," Verðandy chided her younger sister. "He has had a very trying few weeks, and he wasn't expecting company."

The last thing Shinji wanted to induce was a conflict between the two sisters. "It's-"

"Considering I'm here at His request to present myself for consideration, I think it'd be best that I show him who I actually am, Sis." Skuld side-eyed Shinji. "Have to admit, I was a lot angry when I first heard what was going on…but the more I see of Shinji the more I'm starting to feel as if I wasn't told the truth."

"Consideration?" Shinji lifted both hands carefully, begging for them to slow down. "You mean…part of the treaty, consideration?"

Seemingly of an age with him, the young Norn turned to face him fully with her hands balled into fists and on her hips. "Yeah, that part of the treaty."

"It wasn't his idea," Verðandy interjected, growing irritated. "Don't blame him for-"

"I know it wasn't his idea, sis!" Snapping her head to look at Verðandy, she traced a finger around the runes on her face. "Norn of the Future? Ring a bell? Once I saw him, I knew we were going to have this conversation, and I knew I was going to get angry and say something that wasn't true, and I knew I was going to owe him favors for that. Instead of doing that, I want to know why he isn't anything like what we've been told back home."

Shinji's open hands clenched into fists, his restraint being stressed to breaking. "Stop. Yelling." He could feel Holy Bell pushing down against his skull, her love and joy radiating outward to try and slow his wrath. It helped, if barely. "What are they saying about me that's not true?"

"That you're demonic in nature, that you tied yourself to Yggdrasil, that if we don't establish diplomatic relations with you we risk you siding with Niflheim." She scoffed at what she'd just said. "You're about as demonic as my bra, you were forced into Yggdrasil's mainframe, and you're not the least bit interested in diplomacy with anyone, let alone Niflheim."

"I…am supposedly a Hellknight, according to Hild," he offered without much conviction, gently handing Holy Bell back to Verðandy.

"Yeah, good luck with that." Stepping forward, she forced him to stand taller as she analyzed his features. "I can't see very far into your future…maybe ten, fifteen minutes?" Taking his chin, she moved it side to side, looking at his temples, cheeks, and forehead. "You…should have markings. Something, and I'm not saying I have the faintest clue as to what, is…blocking? Maybe? Definitely should have markings, though." Brown eyes searched blue for another few seconds. "I would like to stay at my sister's side. She was the only person who ever treated me like I was sane, and it was only because she was so kind to me that I made it as far as I have as a Goddess. I see a great deal of pain when I look at you, but none of it is caused by you. Let me stay, take me in, and we'll both benefit. I get to be with my sister, you get my support, we learn to love one another."

More than slightly concerned, Verðandy went to protest, "Skuld, I-" Cutting herself off when Shinji lifted a hand to ask her to not speak, she clasped her hands together.

"I am not thrilled with what your father is doing. I don't like the thought of even Ðandy being forced to be what has become of her, as much as I love her. If you wis…want to stay here, I am more than happy to let you do so without tying yourself to me." He lowered his hand, never taking his eyes off of Skuld. "You are free to do what you want, and as you are her sister I will do whatever I can to support you as she does."

Her eyes narrowed. "I can do what I want?"

"I understand that's not common where you're from, but here I'm…really determined to let people live their own lives within the rules the household itself agrees on."

"What are those rules?"

"You would have to ask one of the Juraians," he spread his hands helplessly, "because I don't understand them myself. I know that I'm not at risk of breaking them, which means that so long as I am who I am I'm safe."

A brief frown towards the main house was followed by a knowing nod. "Ok, I can live with that." Looking him in the eyes, she set her hand on his chest. "I can do what I want, within those rules?"

"I would like to think of Ðandy as family, and I would like to know that those I consider family will do whatever they can to help family. You are welcome to live here, so long as you obey the rules."

"Done." For a brief second, she gave him a pitying look. A glowing grey aura flared around her, and by extension him, followed by the sound of a lock clicking shut. "Thank you for your hospitality…husband."

Much like he could feel Hild's and Verðandy's presence, he now was keenly aware of Skuld's. His head grew thick, his body unstable, and before he knew it Skuld had caught him and was helping him sit down on the stone he'd recently vacated. "I…what…husband?"

Grabbing her sister and throwing her several dozen meters out into Lake Ashi, Verðandy hushed Shinji and focused on stabilizing his sudden increase in power. "It's ok, Shinji, it's ok. Just focus on me, ok? You love me, right?"

"Y-yeah, I…yes," he couldn't think straight. He couldn't think. Owlishly blinking at one of the women he cherished, he hoped she understood whatever answer he'd given her.

"You want me to stay with you forever, right?" She despised what she was going to have to do, but her sister had forced her hand.

"Uh huh." The pretty woman had to stay, if she wanted to stay, but he'd like her to stay…but only if she wanted to.

"Then I pray you forgive me." Much as a greyish aura had surrounded Skuld, a pale blue aura washed over Verðandy and Shinji. "Breathe with me, my husband. Find calm within the raging winds and tempestuous seas."

The sky above darkening was quickly followed by the appearance of a thoroughly displeased Funaho. Both Empress and woman glared daggers at Verðandy before asking, "What have you done?"

"Betrayed my father, abandoned my home, and married the man I love," Verðandy shot back. "Without ceremony or dignity, without the comfort of friends or family, I have given myself fully to Shinji because my sister forced my hand. Now would you please help me stop him from tearing apart his homeworld?"

"Mercy save me," Funaho growled out. Two more steps put her behind Shinji, her fingertips set on either side of his forehead. "He was not ready for this."

A very soggy Skuld stomped back up onto the shore, wringing her hair out. "He was never going to be. The whole point was to keep him off balance, stop him from becoming what he was meant to." With a tiny curtsey, she greeted Funaho, "Your Majesty."

Unlike with Verðandy, Funaho had no patience for Skuld. The child had not earned her patience and had just ostensibly done something that would lead to a man she loved once more dying due to the actions of the other side of their Cold War. "You had best pray that when I stabilize him, you are nowhere within my reach."

"I doubt very seriously you're going to risk angering our husband," she scoffed. "None of you were operating with a full deck here. Just standing in one place, letting life happen. If any of you had the faintest inkling of what he is connected to, you would have tied him down the instant you met him."

"You said you couldn't read his future," Verðandy gasped. "Did you lie to us?"

"Technically, no." Hild manifested herself, apologetically stepping up alongside Funaho to add her own touch to calming Shinji's out of control power. "She can't read his future, but she can read the future of people around him, which includes certain facts that stem from him." As everyone else had, she gave Skuld a disapproving glare. "A Triplet was dangerous enough. Turning this into a Quartet without warning was ill-advised, child. Your father taught you better."

"Yeah, well daddy dearest hasn't been himself lately so I'm not really reading from his manual anymore." Giving up on her hair, she reached into a pocket dimension and pulled a few scraps of strange metal out. "Our first charge as Goddesses is to not allow harm to come to someone owed a favor by the System Force. By letting him remain unattached from Yggdrasil's perspective, we were inviting some other woman to come and claim him through marriage rites. If the Juraians had married him, the problem would at least have been delayed, since Yggdrasil doesn't recognize their marriages as valid but would recognize his intention to act as a husband." With some folding and tinkering, she created an armlet. "Get pissed at me if you want to, I just saved this reality." Walking over and clasping the armlet on Shinji, she felt the immediate decrease in magical pressure. "There, that should do it." With a strange screwdriver, she began making a few minor adjustments. "I was going to do this before you tossed me in the lake, sis."

"You took his name without so much as asking him," Verðandy hissed. "You forced me to take his name! He has given everything he can to offer freedom to as many as he can, and you turn that charity around and spit on it. Tossing you in the lake is mild compared to what I want to do to you, you little…." Instead of hurling an invective, she simply growled out her anger and turned back to Shinji. "You will be ok, beloved…I will not let it be otherwise."

Shinji's head was being supported by Funaho, his gaze unfocused. The sky slowly returning to the sunny midafternoon hue it had before everything, clearing just as his mind regained lucidity. "Do you remember…when I begged you not to harm Ðandy?" His head lolled forward, and with a violent twist he swept his way clear of everyone to stumble away. "Or when I begged for peace?" Staggering back a few steps, he turned and glared at everyone. "I'm starting to get a clearer picture of what I want for my wish now. Stay away from me…because I don't know if I'm capable of keeping myself from voicing it."

Forced to watch as her new husband staggered away, Verðandy broke down and began to cry in earnest. It had all gone so wrong.

+++++ Jishin. Saturday, +18.

It took Shinji half of an hour to reach the tree, his gait slowly steadying the more distance he put between himself and the nexus of trouble behind him. After laying his forehead against the trunk for a time, he hoped that he wasn't about to do something that would hurt her. "Jishin? Is there…a room, or something, I can sit in for a while?"

A brief hum, followed by the sound of wood stretching, led to an opening in the mammoth tree just to his left. A spiral set of stairs, with a solid handrail, offered assistance in him reaching his destination. Once he was inside, the portal sealed shut which ignited a bioluminescence along the interior of the tree that gave him more than enough to see by. It was a slow journey up the stairs, owing to exhaustion, but at the top there was a comfortable looking bed and a warm bath waiting for him to choose between.

Ripping the tattered remains of his clothing off, save for the armlet that was keeping him and everyone around him safe, he crawled into the tub and enjoyed a perfectly hot soak. "Thank you, Jishin. I hope you're not in pain, yourself. I don't know how this works."

The physical manifestation of his tree walked out of a nearby wall, approaching with a stool and several towels. Her skin was the same color as the trunk of the tree nearest the branches, her hair the same motley riot of hues it always was, and her smile was both tender and full of sorrow. "My heart hurts for you, but it is an emotional ache and not physical. So many unions," setting the towels on the ground, she sat on the stool she'd brought and laid her arms along the lip of the tub to put her face on a level with his own, "and yet none of them given the time and care you yearn to give them. Your heart burns with moral indignation, but we both know that it is not your friends and allies who lit that spark."

Hefting one arm out of the water, he set his hand atop her head and laced his fingers into her hair. "Why is this happening? Why can't I just…enjoy the good?"

Joining Jishin, Ashi flowed into existence at the foot of the tub, her feet dangling in the water and her smile sad. "It is the way that life is for great people. Much like water seeks to reach an equilibrium, so too does power. I believe that you are far stronger than you know, and have been given limitations by someone outside of our visibility…which means that until you find balance within yourself there will be none around you to cling to."

"But we're here," Jishin grinned happily at him, nuzzling his hand, "and we're not going anywhere. Nothing can enter here, unless I let it, so you can sit in here and calm your heart as long as you need to."

Tilting her head to the side a touch, Ashi asked, "Would you like company, or would you prefer to be alone?"

The part of his heart that had become accustomed to company begged him to not send the two away. They had no part in his anger, and everything they had done 'wrong' had been twisted that way due to outside interference. They hadn't connived against him, they hadn't held back secrets or hidden daggers. "…I like hugs."

Disappearing into the wooden structure of the tub, Jishin reappeared behind him, holding him close with his back against her front. Ashi too disappeared into the water, reforming atop him to hug him from the other side front to front. "We enjoy the touch of another as much," the stout water spirit declared with restrained joy. "Let us share our heart with one another, then. So that we may grow stronger, our roots deeper, our spirits ever closer."

His head rested next to Jishin's, Ashi's head on his chest. He was in the embrace of nature itself, his dark mood being leeched away by the guileless allure of…of concepts made flesh. Letting his eyes close, he repeated himself with a lighter heart, "I like hugs."

+++++ NERV. Saturday, +18.

"Until further notice, there will be a strictly enforced no-fly zone over the majority of Japan. All NERV air transport will have to pre-coordinate with Lieutenant Colonel Masaki, or risk being shot down. Checkpoints have been established throughout the immediate fifty kilometers surrounding Tokyo-3, and any non-official travel has been curtailed for the duration of the crisis." Misaki Masaki Jurai, currently a transcendentally enraged woman, was delivering the news to both Gendo and Kozo in person. "Your remaining security forces are being folded into my command. Your research and development team has been made subordinate to me as well. So as not to interfere with what has been a functional defense against the Angels, the structure of your combat team will remain mostly the same for the time being."

Kozo, noting that Gendo was sitting next to him with glassy eyes, asked what he felt was the more important question, "Mostly, ma'am?"

"I have recently been given information that suggests that a number of members of the Human Instrumentality Committee have been operating a black book organization they call 'SEELE'. Keel Lorenz," she set a photograph of the former head of the HIC showing him a head shorter than he had been down on Gendo's desk, "and a number of other members of this…cabal, have been found dead after an investigation was opened. There are currently two missing members of this 'SEELE', and several others that were acting on their behalf have yet to be located." Her eyebrow arched, and she waited quietly for a response.

"I…was aware of their presence, ma'am." Kozo hadn't seen his career ending this way, but he'd known the dangers involved and had acted anyway.

"Indeed." The admission had saved his life. "I am authorized to offer you retirement, instead of liquidation, should you agree to certain conditions. I will leave the choice up to you, in gratitude for your honest attempt at inspiring Captain Ikari to reach beyond the shell of a man next to you."

Surprised that he wasn't going to die, Kozo inclined his head politely. "A generous offer. What are the conditions?"

"You will remain as head of NERV Tokyo-3 for the duration of the emergency. You will not interfere with those elements under my command. You will continue to encourage Captain Ikari to strive for success." She laid down the most important condition. "You will destroy any and all clones of Pilot Ayanami, as well as any and all records regarding her existence. You will not, under any circumstances, discuss Pilot Ayanami's history, genealogy, or medical status. You will destroy all 'Dummy Plugs', as well as the research data into same." Taking out a contract, the terms all clearly spelled out, she offered it to him. "Sign."

After a brief glance to see if there was anything else snuck in, Kozo put his name down on the paper. "Understood. It will take me…roughly forty-eight hours to accomplish everything. I presume you want it done properly?"

"Acceptable. You are dismissed." Misaki picked the paper back up, sliding it into the folder she had carried. After waiting for Kozo to leave the room, she snapped her fingers and disabled all of the electronic monitoring devices hidden in walls and panels. "You were given what is possibly the most precious gift anyone can ever receive." Setting the folder down, she walked slowly around the desk to where Gendo was blankly staring at nothing. "A child, born from your love with your wife. Healthy, happy, capable of almost limitless potential." Grabbing him by the hair, she slammed his face against the desk so hard that the surface cracked. "And in your petty vanity, you destroyed his spirit."

With his forehead bleeding, Gendo flopped backwards and slumped out of the chair to the ground. Too far gone to even register the pain, all of his plans and desires turned to ash around him, his own spirit now fully broken.

"We do not often give punishments that would be considered…extreme," she continued, bending down and picking him up by the front of his shirt. "In your case, however…I believe that neither death nor unending imprisonment are sufficient to recompense the living for what you have done." Opening a portal to the brig on Funaho-no-ki, she tossed him into a private cell with a grim smile. "I do have such wonderful things I am going to show you."