+++++ ? Wednesday, +22.
There was a small part of Shinji that wondered why he wasn't completely lost to panic. Floating as he was in an endless sea of blackish-red, without any point of reference for up, down, or motion, he scowled in frustration while thinking of the best way to react to whatever had just happened. Between beats of his heart, he realized that breathing might not be something he could continue doing. He'd held his breath upon arrival in this strange new dimension, and as his heart continued its merry dance he began to realize that breathing was, in fact, not something he needed to worry about. There was none of the feeling of suffocation that he had anticipated building, no desperate bid to inhale more air…nothing but continued existence itself.
The next test of his surroundings involved an attempt at speech, resulting in nothing his senses could detect. There was no vibration in his head from the words he'd intended to use, no feel of the air moving through his larynx, nothing. Lifting his hands up to his face, he could only vaguely insinuate where they were by the occlusion of the material surrounding him. The glow of his environment was only just visible, but nowhere near enough to produce anything his eyes could truly use to 'see' by. Wherever he was, it was not making it easy on him to orient himself.
+++++ NERV Tokyo-3. Wednesday, +22.
"We're not getting through, ma'am," one of the bridge technicians called across the room to Misato. "The system isn't even detecting his phone! Even if it were powered off, we'd at least be able to bounce a ping off of it."
"Damn it," Misato muttered under her breath. On the screen before her, approaching the city in the early hours of the morning, was an Angel. Vaguely humanoid, colored in dark green, white, and orange, it floated implacably through the outlying sectors towards the GeoFront. "Get me Doctor Akagi."
+++++ Ikari Manor. Wednesday, +22.
Ritsuko and Maya were in the process of getting dressed, intending to provide what insight they could on the two Angels that had managed to breach the Juraian defenses, when Ritsuko's phone issued 'the' ringtone. Picking it up while hopping into her skirt, she answered impatiently, "I know there's an Angel, I'm standing about twenty meters from the damn thing!"
"What?" Misato's voice had not been expected by either woman in the bedroom, causing them both to look at one another in confusion. "Rits, I have an Angel approaching from the southwest. It's waltzing through the eighteenth district defenses like I do through a light midday shower. Where the fuck are you?"
"…Lake Ashi." If what she'd been told by Minaho was correct, that would mean there were now three Angels attacking at once. "Misato, get Soryu in Unit-02, and prep Unit-01 for Ayanami. Shinji's gone missing, we've been attacked here by two different Angels ourselves."
"Missing?" There was genuine worry in her voice, causing Maya to wince in sympathy. "Like, the bullshit I found out about earlier missing?"
"No. An Angel ate him, then disappeared." Ritsuko would not believe that he was dead. Not until she saw a corpse. "I'm working on getting him back. Maya is going to bring Ayanami to you. Just…trust me when I say that you and I are going to have a long talk once we save the day, ok? Everything's going crazy at once, but neither of us are going to let the world take any more from us than it has already. Keep this new Angel off my ass, yeah?"
There was a brief silence, followed by a harsh sigh. "Rits…don't bullshit me. Can you get Shinji back?"
"Whether I can or not, I'm going to. He owes me way too much to let him welch on me by dying now." Seeing Washu step into the room with Rei, she motioned for Maya to join them. "Help is inbound. You do what you do best, leave me to do what I do best, and we'll grab some shitty ramen with Shinji once he's back."
"I'll hold you to that," Misato growled. "Out."
Hanging up her phone and tossing it aside, Ritsuko looked at Ayanami and gathered all of the confidence she could muster. "You are going to get in Unit-01. You are going to support Unit-02 against whatever's approaching NERV. You are not going to let anyone stop you."
The tiniest of frowns adorned Rei's ruby lips. "The last time I was within Unit-01, it did not end well."
"The last time you were in Unit-01, you didn't have Shinji's love to pull you through." She couldn't let Rei doubt her own strength. "You know who you are now. You know how you feel now. When you get in there, tell her as much. If she's really in there listening…it'll be up to you two to work it out."
+++++ ? Wednesday, +22.
The Light Hawk Wings were not responding to his summons. He could feel them, but the sensation was muffled behind an ephemeral layer that resisted his efforts without giving him anything to smash against. The power he'd learned to summon was just beyond his reach, which made him realize just how much he had come to depend upon it. Without them, all he was…was a young man.
+++++ Shore of Lake Ashi. Wednesday, +22.
Frigg found it ironic, almost humorously so, that not twelve hours after Ansuz had provided a demonstration of her true strength that she was only just barely alive after having failed to protect the man she'd sworn herself to. Using the System Force to slowly chip away at the rapidly growing fungal mass within her co-wife, altering the flows of magic to keep the Adamite from developing defenses against her attacks, she pondered whether the universe might be better off if she simply 'failed' to save one monster from another.
Nanako, tasked by her superiors to provide personal security for Frigg during the combat medical procedure, tapped one foot uneasily as she waited for something to happen. "Is there anything I can do to help?"
"Simply remaining where you are is enough, child." Frigg had nothing against the woman personally, but she held no real love for Juraians as a general rule. She would respect her new husband's desire for peace within their house, of that there was no doubt, but her tolerance was not at a point that she would view the woman as an ally. "I must focus on this abomination inside her, which leaves me blind to other potential assaults. I appreciate your aid in watching my back, and will gladly sing your praises to Shinji upon his return."
"Yeah…I'll be sure to let him know how you didn't just let the crazy bitch choke to death too." Watching as Ritsuko hurried over to Funaho and Misaki, she smirked and shook her head. "Better woman than I am, let me tell you."
A grim chuckle was all Frigg would allow herself. Perhaps this young Juraian with her wasn't such a bad woman after all.
+++++ NERV Tokyo-3. Wednesday, +22.
"He's M.I.A.," Misato informed Asuka as the Second Child moved Unit-02 on an intercept course for the Fourteenth Angel. "All I know is he was attacked by the Twelfth and Thirteenth Angels in tandem, outside of his Eva. Pilot Ayanami will be here in just a minute, and we'll send her up in Unit-01 to watch your back."
After the revelations she'd been given the evening before, Asuka's mind went to some very dark places as she learned that Shinji had been taken out. The less kind part of her mind sneered in derision, taking a perverse glee in the downfall of the 'Invincible Ikari'. The part of her mind that had been replaying his actions during that meeting, however, was left with a fresh fear to dwell upon. He had said, flat out, that he was concerned about her. That he wanted her to know that he valued her. That he would not allow the…the…. If that angel lady hurt him, I'm going to stomp the bitch flat.
A sudden glow shoved everything aside as the Fourteenth Angel launched its first attack on Unit-02. A focused beam of lethal desire blasted forth from the strange mask it wore, tearing through the ground between them and igniting an enormous wall of flame and plasma that Asuka only barely managed to dodge.
Firing her own exploratory salvo, Asuka mentally acknowledged that all Shinji had ever done was try to help her. He'd told her repeatedly that he trusted her to defend the world. That he wanted her to stop fighting him and start fighting the Angels. That she had the advantage in training and time in the Evas. That he was nothing special…and that she needed to stop acting like he was her enemy. He trusted her. He worried about her health. He reached his hand out each and every time they'd spoken in an offer of camaraderie. Now, with him gone, it was her time to prove him right or wrong. Allowing herself a feral grin, she leaned into the attack. It was her turn now, and when she found him she was going to rub his face in how right he was.
+++++ ? Wednesday, +22.
What are you?
Shinji instinctively looked around for the source of the question, seeing nothing but the monotonous vaguely red darkness. He wasn't even fully certain that there had been a voice, and that it wasn't just the product of his own imagination.
You are not Lilin, the voice declared. You are not Adamic.
A bright flash popped into existence in Shinji's mind, blinding him. Twin images of the moon in the skies of his homeworld, one a silvery white, the other a radiant black. There was a menace from each, a discontent with everything its reflected light shone down upon. Things were not as they should be. Were not as they must be.
Speak, child of nothing: what are you?
+++++ Shore of Lake Ashi. Wednesday, +22.
Ansuz vomited out the last of the Thirteenth Angel before striking the ground with enough rage to set the area trembling as if an earthquake had rocked the nearby city. "Where is it?" The question carried malice even worse than her bearing could convey. "It was right there," she pointed directly at the spot that he'd disappeared from, "and carried no weight in its touch upon this worthless rock."
"I'm going to need a few more descriptors, ma'am," Ritsuko requested. "The video of the attack only shows Shinji slashing at nothing before a hole opened in the ground beneath him."
"Words are weak things." With a snap of her fingers, the most powerful entity currently on the planet put her own memories of the Twelfth Angel into Ritsuko's mind. The weights and measurements, the aura of absence and the inverted echo it rang with. "I feel it, clinging to shadows like the thief it is."
With her mind not entirely prepared to handle the sensory input of an Aesir goddess, Ritsuko clutched the sides of her head as she fell to her knees. She could smell the muddy bottom of the nearby lake, taste the mineral content of the air around them, see the electromagnetic spectrum that human eyes were never intended to visualize, and feel the Thirteenth Angel suffocating her. She watched and rewatched Shinji being stolen away with a warrior's gaze, every detail a masterpiece of artistry, subconsciously analyzing it all through her scientist's mind.
Nanako helped Ritsuko balance herself, growling at Ansuz for her callous disregard of the woman's humanity, "That wasn't cool, lady."
"It's fine," Ritsuko hissed out, each word costing her something akin to a migraine. "It's…it's like a Sea of Dirac. The Angel doesn't exist on our plane of reality. It's a mirror universe, after a fashion…an infinite sea of energy with an opposing charge to our own." She knew without having the words to use to describe what would have happened to Shinji on contact with such a realm. If he hadn't suffocated to death in a boundless void, he would have been torn apart as each individual elementary particle was annihilated upon contact with its counterpart from the Dirac Sea.
Cutting off the spiral of despair before it could begin, Frigg disagreed with her assessment, "That might have been true, were he any normal young man. Our hero sits upon the throne of Ásgarðr, stands upon the apex of Hel itself, and has brought the mightiest empire known to your universe to the bargaining table to sue for peace." Snorting out with derision, she gestured around the area they stood upon. "If the portal to this Sea resides somewhere nearby, I have little doubt we will find him impatiently waiting for us to tear it open again so that he may express his gratitude properly to those that would allow it."
+++++ NERV Tokyo-3. Wednesday, +22.
Asuka was having very little by way of luck in gaining the front foot as she fought against the Fourteenth Angel. Critiquing her own tactics, and taking what useful input Misato could offer, she had managed to force a stalemate while waiting for Unit-01 and Rei to join her. The Angel's arms were the main threat now, with their ability to unfold from stubby hanging squares into unrealistically stretchy metal blades of death forcing her to balance a static defense of her umbilical with a more mobile defense of her limbs, and she did not appreciate the effort she had to employ towards that end. "If this keeps up, Misato, I'm going to make a mistake I can't overcome! Where the hell is my backup?"
"We're having difficulties reaching the necessary sync ratio to enable the A-10 connections," Maya replied, knowing that Misato would likely speak down to Asuka instead of as an equal. "Unit-01 was never designed to fully embrace Rei-chan, and even with the modifications we've made to allow her in, Unit-01's just ignoring her."
"Picky bitch," Asuka growled. "Maybe try telling it that Shinji's gone missing, and the only way we'll get him back is if it stops being a cunt and plays nice with the fucking doll!"
+++++ Inside Unit-01. Wednesday, +22.
Rei's mind was focused on the unity between her and the Evangelion she sat within. She opened her arms, metaphorically, to Yui Ikari's presence. She exuded the hope she had finally been given by Yui's son, the love she had for him and the desire to please him. She let her need exist at the forefront of everything. Her need for his safety. Her need for the world's safety. Her need to-
Stop.
The sudden impression of speech caused Rei to lose focus, her already low sync rate plummeting back to the single digits. "I-I'm sorry, please," she whispered, "I need-"
You 'need' to remember what you are. The voice began to take on a more feminine tone, You are not an appendage to him. You are not a servant. You aren't even a human.
"I-"
Stop! Before Rei could even form the thoughts needed to attempt the explanation, the voice of Yui Ikari began to shout in her mind, You are not me. You are a product of salvaged genetic samples and the progenitor of all life on Earth. You are a copy of a copy of a copy, physically. But that is not who or what you truly are, and the longer you sit there and think of yourself as just a mindless little shell of existence, the further you travel away from the truth. What my son has become in my absence is…great and terrible. What my former husband created in you, she sighed, is no less.
Blinking, confusion reigning in her tattered soul, Rei tried to make sense of her would-be mother-in-law's point.
You've felt it. The pull. The need to enter Terminal Dogma outside of Unit-00 and rejoin with her.
She had. Each time she had been dispatched to ensure the continued restraint of Lilith, the Second Angel, she had felt the compulsion.
You have not. You have fought against it, without knowing why. You have struggled to retain your ties to a species you were never a member of, even when you discovered that your life was a lie. To take part in the joys and pains of a foolish group of lost souls. Of any act I have ever witnessed, that is the most human. You know what lies beneath the metal carapace of Unit-01.
A clone of Lilith. It was what made Unit-01 special, as it was the only Evangelion made of her flesh.
You know what you are.
…She knew.
I cannot help you. You cannot connect with me as he can.
Rei felt the sting of truth erasing what was left of her ties to the people around her.
If there is one thing I have learned, sitting in this abomination with nothing to do but contemplate reality, it is that humanity is not a physical state of being. You can be as human as you want, after you get out there and ensure that there's a world to bring my son back to. Stop limiting yourself to some arbitrary binary state, accept that you are more than my idiot husband let you know, and go kick that thing's ass!
As Unit-01 flared to life, Rei understood. The song Shinji had heard had been Holy Bell, but the thoughts he had been hearing had been his mother's attempts at speaking to a mind that had not yet lost its humanity. The mother wished to reconnect with the son, and so Unit-01 accepted him. In her, she was Unit-01. She was both Yui and Eva. Connecting with either was pointless, and always had been. Opening her eyes, she looked at Misato with a confidence she'd never known before now. "I am ready for launch."
+++++ ? Wednesday, +22.
What was he? Was he a man? A monster? A god? A devil? Staring down the barrel of a simple question, he found himself at a total loss for an answer. He was no human. He wasn't a mortal. A hero, then? A protector? Was he the role he had been cast? Did he serve as a contrarian? He had defined himself as 'not' various things and nothing else over the past three weeks. As soon as he had been unleashed upon the world, unready and unprepared, all he had thought of was the polar opposite of the requested answer.
Could something be defined only as what it was not? Could the absence of characteristics serve to define the presence of an identity? The more he thought, the more he tried to feel the edges of his own being, the more he began to feel the same impermanent membrane that kept him from calling the Light Hawk Wings serving as a temporary border for his own self. There was nothing there to stop him from reaching beyond what he anticipated would be a barrier, but there was something between him and control over it. He didn't have the tools he needed to carve through, if carving was what needed to be done.
Was that the answer, then? To cut away what he wasn't to reveal what he was? That made no sense. To define himself he would need to present what he was to the world, not simply show them the counterexamples he'd pruned away. Putting words to what he was not would be a near infinite task…but did that mean defining what he was would be any less?
He was a husband.
Where the thought had come from, he couldn't hope to explain. Yet, there it was. Plain as day. He knew, in his heart of hearts, that he was a husband. With a husband's responsibilities and a husband's privileges. It wasn't all he was, though. He was also something of a boyfriend. A lover. A Pilot.
He was a husband and a Pilot.
From those two identities, form began to grow. He was a husband. He was a Pilot. He was a Captain. He was a protector. Each role he had taken on, or had been thrust upon him, began to latch itself onto that small seed. He was an Imperial Knight. He was a Hell Knight. He was the Hel Binder.
The cry of thousands of women, echoing the call of Michael as they stood with weapons drawn rang in his heart.
They believed in him. To define 'they' would be no easier than defining 'him', but he knew that belief in him and his capacity to overcome obstacles existed more broadly than any one person or group. Juraians, Aesir, Humans…he had people in numbers far beyond his ability to count that looked at him and saw something he had not seen in himself. Something he'd been blinded to. Something he'd never allowed himself to believe in. Pilot, lover, Knight…friend. He was the vessel into which some of the best and brightest poured their hope and love. He was the reason people fought against the impossible. He was not any one thing. He was not a 'what'.
For the first time he could remember, he heard his own voice in his mind as he answered the question, I am Shinji Ikari…and you have made a very, very big mistake.
+++++ NERV Tokyo-3. Wednesday, +22.
Asuka and Rei fought as one. Without the need for communication or coordination, they forced the Fourteenth Angel to defend itself on two fronts at once. Each carved out their pound of flesh during those moments they were no longer the focus of its ire, each served to distract their foe to give the other the opportunity to strike. As more and more of the Angel fell away, they cut deeper and deeper into the protective shell the Angel had put around its precious core.
Unit-01 smashed its axe down onto the unprotected shoulder of Zeruel, freeing Unit-02 to dig its trident up beneath the shell. Zeruel lashed out at Unit-02, allowing Unit-01 to rip out the trident and hack off the offending length of folded metal that served as the Angel's limb. Unit-01 then took the offensive, allowing Unit-02 the freedom to regroup and exchange its umbilical for one that provided greater range of motion.
The bridge crew watched as a vulgar ballet was performed, the two Pilots that had thus far not contributed much in their eyes suddenly exceeding even the most optimistic expectations the MAGI had projected. To Misato, it was a glorious moment of awakening for two young women she'd nearly written off as little more than cannon fodder. To Maya, it was a relief. To everyone, it was a moment of unparalleled delight when Unit-01 smashed its axe down atop the protective shell covering the Angel's core, then rolled out of the way as Unit-02 came barreling in to bury its trident into and through the now exposed red orb. The day had gone from unsalvageable to saved in less than half of an hour, and it was all thanks to the sudden teamwork shown by two women that had seemed to be nothing less than avowed enemies not an hour earlier.
Gaining her feet, Rei moved Unit-01 over to poke its foot into Zeruel's side. When the flesh proved spongy, and not rigid as it had been, she let herself relax. "An excellent kill, Pilot Soryu." She looked to the image of the red-haired irritant, inclining her head in recognition of her part in the fight. "Thank you for delaying him long enough for me to come to your aid."
It wasn't something Misato had expected from Rei, and it also wasn't something she'd wished for. The wording alone was going to set the mercurial pilot of Unit-02 off, to say nothing of the-
"Don't sell yourself short, Blue." Asuka flipped her hair behind her shoulder, smirking at Rei's image in her own entry plug. "That one took both of us to take down. You have a good feel for dancing, following my lead like that." Turning to Maya's portion of the HUD, she quirked an eyebrow. "Now where's the bitch keeping Shinji? We're already in our Evas, may as well go pull his ass out of whatever trap they sprang on him."
"He was swallowed by nothingness," Rei explained. "Doctor Akagi believes it is a physical manifestation of a mathematical theory. A thought experiment that should not be possible."
"Hrmph…like that's stopped any of these things so far." Returning her attention to her comrade, she gestured towards Ikari Manor. "Is it that way? I mean, the damn thing can't have actually disappeared. Even if it took him out of the fight, it still needs to come here and do whatever the hell they're trying to do, right?"
"I do not-"
Hanging above Japan, glowing with the newborn sun's reflected light, an enormous sphere of impossibilities manifested. Asuka, in Unit-02, tightened her grip on her weapon in anticipation of an assault. Rei, in Unit-01 frowned ever so slightly in confusion at the elevation and distance the Twelfth Angel had chosen to appear within. Maya, performing the task she was entrusted with, announced to everyone, "Pattern…orange. The MAGI don't agree that it's an Angel."
Asuka enhanced the magnification on her external optics, verifying that she was in fact seeing what she believed herself to be seeing. "It's wriggling. It looks like a water droplet in zero gravity."
"That is what appeared before Shinji was taken," Rei confirmed. "Only it was not undergoing perturbation at that moment."
With what she knew, Misato decided upon the best course of action for the time being. "Ok, rearm at Sierra Two Seven. This thing is just hanging there, so let's get some long-range solutions on the-"
Without warning, the surface of the shadow of the Twelfth Angel was ripped apart from within. An enormous human hand shoved its way through the breach in dimensions, gripping the semi-physical membrane and shoving it aside to make room for a second hand. Geysers of reddish fluid burst through the widening tear, raining down upon the unprepared city below. As more and more of the now fully black sphere gave way, Shinji's head pushed through with a guttural roar of defiance.
Those directly witnessing what could only be described as the rebirth of Shinji Ikari, of a giant human male the size of an Evangelion, were left mute and dumbstruck. There was nothing in their shared experience that gave them a rational basis for the sight of an over one-hundred-meter-tall nude male, covered in blood, in scars, in death. As he tumbled out of the carcass of the Twelfth Angel, landing on his feet in a crouch, they felt a hopeful dread. As he stood to his full height, dripping in viscera and bathing in the glorious light of the sun and the last of the descending gore and blood from the now deceased Angel, they felt a dreadful hope. The man who had put the world on his shoulders, who had carried it past so many trials, was now looking down at his own hands with rage carved into his visage.
After several anxious seconds, he threw his head back as twelve Wings unfurled behind him…and cried forth an animalistic bloodlust. Reality continued to relentlessly assail him. The world continued to demand he suffer. Life itself was ill-content to allow him even a few days of peace. No more. No more would he allow someone or something else to choose his fate. No more would he sit back and allow others to be hurt in his place. No. More.
"Jesus Christus hüpft auf einem Trampolin," Asuka breathed out as Shinji quieted down. "Shinji?"
Hearing her through Unit-02's external speakers, the giant Shinji looked towards her. His blue eyes, the windows to a soul that had shown the struggle he endured to keep his anger from overflowing into everything he did, held an undeniable challenge in them. He was giving her a chance for peace. A chance to accept that blood did not need to be shed. A chance to avoid a gruesome death.
"It's…it's ok." Asuka saw, in him, what she felt every day. Carefully approaching him, she cast aside her trident. He wouldn't hurt her. He believed in her. He trusted her to defend the world. He…he had just ripped himself out of an Angel, and was now orders of magnitude larger than normal. "It's ok. We beat one too, Blue and I. Rough way to wake up, ne?"
Shinji's eyes followed the weapon. Watched as it clattered across the ruins of what had been a part of the city before the battle. After Unit-02 had taken two more steps, he looked back at her warily. She had willingly disarmed herself. She had worked with Rei to defeat an Angel. She…she had done what he knew she was capable of. Taking the last step himself, he pulled Unit-02 into a hug. She wasn't challenging him. She wasn't afraid of him. She was safe.
"Yeah," she patted his back between his wings with a disbelieving laugh, "it's just one hell of a morning."
In as quiet a voice as he could manage, he gave her a gift she'd never known, "Thank you. Thank you for showing the world what you're capable of."
Struck by genuine gratitude from someone she could truly state was a peer, Asuka was unable to stop herself from smiling as tears welled up in her eyes. "Yeah…well, you know…. Nobody else was gonna save the city with you taking a nap."
Unlike her, he fully accepted that his emotions were a part of him now. Tossing his head back and laughing uproariously, he let her good-natured jibe do what she'd needed it to. The city was safe. The Angels were…. Sobering up, he turned towards the Manor. Breaking free of Unit-02's embrace, he vanished.
+++++ Shore of Lake Ashi. Wednesday, +22.
In life, there are moments that nobody can truly be prepared for. For some, it is the first time they hold their child. They might have read every book available on parenting, have spent decades babysitting for other parents, and spent the entirety of the birthing process expecting to be ready for anything. The moment their baby is in their arms, everything changes…for good or ill. The connection between parent and child either manifests, overwhelming them, or is absent, terrifying them. For others, it's the first time they're in a true fight for their life. The undeniable knowledge that the person they are facing wants them dead. The awareness that they will likely have to take someone's life in order to win the right to another day. All the scraps and all the training either coalesces into a desperate fight, a reckless flight, or it abandons them as they freeze up.
For the residents of Ikari Manor that had remained back at Lake Ashi, that moment of ill-preparedness arrived in the form of an over one-hundred-meter-tall naked Shinji Ikari, twelve Wings adorning his back, gore and viscera clinging to his flesh. Standing in all of his majesty, looking down at the women of his household, they realized one and all that of anything he was or might ever be…a danger to one of them he was not.
Dropping down to one knee, sitting on a heel, he lowered himself down to look closely at everyone. With his voice soft as thunder, he begged of them, "Is the Angel gone? Are you safe, Ansuz?"
"Asking for a friend," Skuld shouted to be heard, "but are you going to be stuck like this? From what I've heard, the sex is pretty good but I'm not exactly well-equipped to handle a fifteen-meter-" The statement was cut off as Frigg slapped her upside the back of her head.
"I am well enough, husband," Ansuz replied, struggling to hide her awe. "My concern is for you, as is the rest of your household's."
Carefully setting one hand down, he offered his index finger to her. "Are you sure? When I saw that…it went inside of you. Have we gotten it all? Is it going to-"
"Husband," she did her best to soothe him by softly stroking his fingertip, "I have complete confidence in Frigg's capacity to heal me of my wounds. My body fought off the Adamite, her skill and talent defeated it in your name. Their Majesties even confirmed the absence of it."
Watching as his enormous eyes switched their focus to her, Funaho felt for the first time a true religious experience. Her husband-to-be, a man of such enormous power that he was capable of manifesting a dozen Light Hawk Wings, of such a monumental presence that his true physical form existed as a literal titan, looked on her as if she were the most precious gift he could ever dream of receiving. His trust in her, his faith in her, was beyond questioning. "She speaks the truth, dear. We were as worried as you are, and every scan we can run has been run. She is healthy, and the Adamite is gone."
His exhale of a sigh caused a gust of wind that nearly blew everyone off their feet. "Good," he rumbled happily, "good. I am sorry that I wasn't here to help. Three Angels at once was almost too many for us. I'm sorry that I had to leave two of them to all of you." He smiled, gesturing back towards NERV. "Soryu and Rei worked together to kill one too, that's where the third one came from. They tried to keep the Evas busy while these two attacked us here."
Washu walked over and tapped her fist against his knuckle. "Hey, can you shrink yourself so we can talk without shouting? It gets a bit rough on the throat."
"I…uh…don't know how." Tapping his sternum with the hand away from everyone, he shook his head. "I don't know why I'm this big. Or why the Light Hawk Wings are now…well, wings." He frowned. "Or why they won't go back to where they usually go when I'm not using them."
"Oh, that's simple," Jishin, the Juraian tree spirit that had connected herself to Shinji, appeared near the ladies of the house with a smile, "it's because this is what you actually are." Focusing on Funaho, she motioned towards the tree itself. "You see, he joined with Ashi and myself on a level that is quite uncommon. The presence of Helbon, for as long as she was a part of everything, allowed him to remain 'as he was'. Now that he has exited this dimension and returned, he returned as he truly is." Wagging her hands at Shinji to stoop down some, she floated up to meet him part way. In a whisper, she encouraged him to try and see himself in a different light. "When you realized that what you are is not nearly as important as who you are, it created this impression of you in your mind. Maybe think about how who you are isn't always what others see you as. I mean, I doubt you expected your father to see you in the same way that you expect me to see you, right?"
Scooping her up in his hand, he stood up from the ground and spoke to her in as quiet a voice as he could manage. "Of course not…but I have no idea what you're talking about. I don't remember thinking about anything but how angry I was that the Angel attacking me, and how the question made no sense."
"Yet you discovered who you are in the doing."
"Well, yeah. I'm me. It made no sense to say that only one me is me, because there's a lot of 'me' in here."
Nodding her autumn-colored hair, her smile grew broader. "Exactly! So show them the you that you want them to see. Be that you, so that they can hug you like they want to."
Scowling in thought, he looked down at the women below, then back to Jishin, then out towards the lake. "But what 'me' do they want? There's only one me, and so many of them. Funaho needs someone to serve her, Misaki needs someone to give her love to, Ansuz needs someone to acknowledge her pain, Hikari needs someone that scratches her itch while loving Sakura just as much as she does…the list goes on and on, and I have to be all of those things at different times. I mean, what do I look like to each of them? Am I powerful? Am I in need of support? Am I a big stuffed animal that they use to feel wanted?"
Her smile dimmed. "That's…a very good question. Maybe you could just try being what I see you as?"
"Ok," he was willing to try anything to make everything work, "which me am I to you?"
"The you that likes naked hugs in a tub of water!"
He felt himself blush, remembering how he had been held by two primal spirits of nature at once. It hadn't been sexual at all, yet it had become so erotic before the end that he barely avoided making a fool of himself. "I…uhm, I should be careful with that me." Returning his gaze to the lake, he tried to stop from gaining what would be an unmissable erection. "I was having…uhm…naughty thoughts."
"Oh, so was I," she admitted brightly. "I'm glad to know that you enjoy my presence in your life enough that you want to make more life with me." Her eyes growing wide, she bounced up and down in his hand clapping happily. "That's it! Imagine the you that wants to make life with everyone! Become him in body, so that you can enjoy your victory!"
Even as the ridiculousness that was the idea that simply giving into his more physical desires would allow him to shrink down to a 'normal' size bounced through his mind, he found himself shrinking. Slowly at first, then with greater speed, he felt the air around him grow hot and thick as his mass was converted to heat energy to compensate for the change in body size. After a few dozen seconds, he stood at a size more appropriate for human-to-human interactions. He still, however, held Jishin in the palm of his hand as the tree spirit happily sat astride his arm with her legs swinging freely.
"Fixed it," she called happily, looking back over her shoulder at everyone. "It's a perception issue, which makes sense when you consider how many different perceptions are involved."
Ritsuko was the first to approach and hug him, despite the gore still clinging to him in places. Wrapping her arms around him, she made both realization and comment simultaneously, "You're taller than you were." Leaning back, she was forced to crane her neck to see his face still. "Broader. I like it."
Squirming a bit under the scrutiny, he remembered how he'd left the others. "I…uh, lost my phone. We should probably contact NERV and let them know everything's ok."
"Perhaps, first, a shower." Frigg approached him, taking some of the foreign substance adorning him between her fingers and rubbing it curiously. "Though not inside the house. I doubt the pipes are properly designed to help this pass through to any water reclamation facilities."
"An excellent idea," Ansuz agreed. "I will clean up this area, to make amends for my failure to protect him properly. The good doctor can call the others, invite them over here for a long-needed discussion." She looked askance at Funaho, extending an olive branch. "Would you be amenable to preparing appropriate refreshments, Your Majesty?"
"I would." The powerful empress hooked a finger at Jishin. "If you would accompany me, child. I would ask you a few questions myself."
Letting Ritsuko go to make the calls, Shinji looked towards the lake and wondered if it might be best to just wash off in there. His body turned towards it, before he was cut off from advancing by Frigg standing before him with her arms crossed in an 'X'. "I…uhm…."
"We do not know what this will do to any water supply it touches. The pipes were simply an excuse to not worry you in front of everyone." Frigg motioned for him to follow behind her. "You are not one to think of such things, which is no mark against you considering your history. I will help you get clean, while collecting the waste product and destroying it properly."
Hurrying to catch up, he felt abashed for not thinking of it himself, despite her giving him an out by recognizing his lack of education. "I'm sorry."
"I'm not," she announced over her shoulder, a tight smile on her lips. "I have to admit, it's refreshing to come across someone as powerful as you are that's so willing to take criticism as a means for growth rather than as a challenge to your manhood."
"I…uh…well," he laughed quietly, "I kind of know I'm an idiot. It's pretty easy to accept other people's judgment when I have no illusions about my intelligence."
"None of that," she chided without turning around. "I happen to agree with the tree myself. How you view yourself has everything to do with how others view you. You're surrounded by people who have every faith and confidence that you're smarter, stronger, and braver than you think you are." Turning around as they reached a cement patio on the side of the manor closest to the farmland, she created a large enough tub to fit two of him in before filling it with warm water. "In."
Not one to question someone who knows what they're about, Shinji climbed into the tub and let himself sink in fully. Hoping that she would be willing to discuss what he'd just put together, he asked her bluntly, "I can't pretend that I know what I'm doing, though. Isn't it better for me to look for help when I need it?"
"Yes." Summoning a scrubbing sponge and some soap, she knelt down by the tub and began to work on cleaning him. "There is a difference, though. When you seek help, you are admitting that you don't know everything about everything. When you call yourself unintelligent, you are lying about yourself. It takes an intellectually curious mind to recognize flaws in itself. You try to resolve the issue, find that you don't have the tools to do so, and seek out someone who does to learn how to fix it in the future." Rather than swiftly moving to get the task over with, she lingered on spots while she enjoyed the conversation. "You are now one of the Aesir, in addition to the other hats you wear. What did Holy Bell tell you regarding lies?"
He opened his mouth, realized what he might have been doing, then closed it. "I'm not a goddess. Does that rule apply to me?"
"It applies to you more than it does to her, actually. Hold your breath." Dunking him fully beneath the water, she scratched her fingers through his hair to work clumps free before letting him back up. "When you see rules not being followed by people above you, how does it feel?"
Remembering the number of rules that existed for him alone, while his uncle was free to do whatever he wanted to, the point grew clearer. It might not affect him the same as it did the others, but if he didn't follow the rule himself why should he expect them to? "Good point." Turning to smile at Frigg, he thanked her for explaining in a way he could understand, "It makes a lot of sense when you say it. I'm lucky to have you on my side, so that I don't screw up the easy things like this. I feel like I can trust you to pull me up short when I need it." Her pause, in both physical motion and speech, caused him to worry he might have upset her. "I…uhm…I'm sorry?"
"You trust me?" She watched him slowly nod, confusion writ plain on his being. "Even though you know I…struggle to control my misandry?"
"Your what now?"
Blinking, she dumbed down the question, "My former husband gave me no reason to love men. Those he surrounded himself with, those few men that were allowed to remain in Ásgarðr, were all the worse for his actions. My anger with the goddess last night was because she…brought up something I myself fear. That I will allow my hatred of men overcome my enjoyment of your presence."
With a slight shrug, Shinji admitted how he saw nothing different in her, "Why would that bother me? I hate the dark. I hate being too warm. I hate it when people hit people without a good reason. My uncle did all of this to me," he gestured along his scarred body, "because my asshole father couldn't be bothered to find a closet to stuff me in here. It's not wrong to hate something if all its ever done is hurt you. I mean…so long as you allow yourself to be proven wrong if an exception comes along, or if things improve. I'm frustrated by Fuyutsuki-san, but I don't blame him for what my father and uncle did. Same with Gen-sensei. I let him prove that he wasn't going to hurt me, and I try hard to not hold what they did against him. If you…you know, need time to see that I'm not going to be like Tyr, that doesn't hurt me at all. It makes sense. You're being who you are, and I trust you to be that way. You've never once done anything to me that I think is mean, after all."
Taking the wet sponge and booping his nose with it, she sighed and shook her head wryly with a grin. "And yet you wonder why so many have fallen for you. Keep that heart as it is, my husband. There are precious few in existence of its kind."