Creation began on 06-26-23

Creation ended on 07-07-23

Neon Genesis Evangelion

Evangelion: Shameful Torment

A rare number of scientists, a very rare number of them, had been known to feel regret for at least some of their decisions and achievements, regardless of their original intentions. But for Yui Ikari, her regret was indivisible from her current state of being right now. Somehow, despite having made a conscious decision to be fused with the Evangelion for when the Angels returned after the Second Impact, a force of power, the likes of which she couldn't comprehend, forced her to return to her previous form, albeit ruined with bits and pieces of machinery still connected to her body, reminding her that her choice carried consequences. Even as she was tended to by medical personnel and mended as best as possible to her present condition, Yui still felt pain, in her heart and mind. It wasn't because of what this force that restored her, but because of what she was forced to realize upon being returned to her body.

Shinji Ikari, her son, the reason she did what she did…was no longer among the people of this world. He wasn't dead or anything worse than imaginable, but he was out of her reach. There was this…being of the darkness, a master of the darkest secrets that influenced the desires of others…and they answered a longing in her son's heart that was so desperate and genuine that they, despite being fueled by the suffering of others, didn't partake on his suffering. And now, here she was, in a trauma center, barely on the mend, wondering where Shinji was…and how bad life had been for him to go down the path he went that led to him being gone. Opening her eyes, she inhaled a new breath that was, for the first time since she was restored, free of much of the pain she was experiencing.

"Yui?" She heard her name being spoken to her by her husband.

She looked at him, seeing that he was anything but pleasant to look at, and sighs.

"Gendo," she utters, "what…did you do?"

-x-

"Are they still in there?" Misato asks Kaji as he and a security guard stood outside Gendo's office where the Cenobites were, and he peeks inside the dimly lit room, seeing six of the mutilated people hanging around, one of which was walking around in a circle around the rest of them.

"Yeah," he answers her. "They're not really going anywhere right now."

Misato sighs and then asks, "Has anyone tried to talk to them?"

"Are you volunteering?" Kaji responds.

"Hell, no."

She walks away and leaves them to resume guarding the entrance to the office; even though it seemed useless because they were dealing with people that were unlike what they had experienced before, it just made them feel some sense of ease.

-x-

"You, too?" Maya heard Asuka say to her as she sat on the steps outside the base and looked up at Leviathan.

"Huh?" She responds.

"Trying to pass the time? Trying to make sense of this madness we're in?" Asuka clarified.

"Yeah. I didn't think we'd be here longer than usual. What Commander Ikari did really messed up things. Oh…"

"What?"

"One of them is behind you right now."

Asuka slowly turned around and saw the dark Cenobite that made the weeping noise.

"Are you…here to hurt us?" She asks them.

"No," they respond. "The Hell Priest…wishes to speak with you (points to Asuka). Speak with you. Release…yourself."

"The Hell Priest?" Maya questions. "The one with the pins all over their head?"

"Yes."

"Just to talk?"

"Yes."

"Be careful."

Asuka sighs and follows the weeping Cenobite.

"Do you…have a name?" She decides to ask them.

"I am…the Weeper," they answer her.

"The Weeper. Well…it's nice to make your acquaintance, the Weeper."

-x-

So far, the Cenobites that were inside Gendo's office were the ones that currently inhabited the base, but soon enough, the NERV personnel were seeing other Cenobites that were associated with the Labyrinth. However, they were seen mostly from a distance and never made advances on anyone. It appeared to be related to the fact that the sub-commander still had an audience with their god to attend to and everyone within the base was just a guest within this domain. Whatever the case, everyone was hoping that there was a degree of personal space that could be tolerated for the time being; so long as nobody tried to bother anyone, the Cenobites would just observe from a distance but not lay any hands on anyone.

"Are you sketching one of them right now?" Shigeru asks Hyuga as they sat in the command center of Central Dogma, noticing that he was looking at two of them that were just sitting on top of one of the MAGI, different from the ones that were in Gendo's office.

"I'm bored and they're just hanging around," Hyuga explains his current action of sketching the two Cenobites. "It's not really hurting anyone to doodle a little."

The two Cenobites in question looked like a pair of twins with wires being a prominent aspect of their aesthetic designs (A/N: The Cenobite twins from Hellraiser: Inferno), but the rest of their bodies showed very little flesh, instead just muscle and sinew. They would look up from where they sat every now and then, but all they did was make strange, eerily whispers.

-x-

Fuyutsuki, aided by a crutch, left his room with Ritsuko and headed to Gendo's office, seeing the man with his wife, who seemed upset with him, and noticed Asuka walking down the opposite way, heading towards his office.

"What are you doing out here?" He asks Asuka.

"I was told the Hell Priest wanted to see me," she tells them.

"Why?" Ritsuko questions.

"Maybe I have a desire I wish to have fulfilled, but I don't want to be left in pain for wanting such a desire fulfilled."

"What could you possibly want?"

"My mother brought back to life?"

"Everyone probably wants something like that to happen."

"Except it always seems to have a price that only the uncaring and most ruthless are willing to pay. I'm not uncaring and I am not ruthless. I can't go and…sacrifice people for such a desire. That's being selfish."

"Only the uncaring and most ruthless would go to such extremes, Ms. Soryu," Fuyutsuki tells her. "Morality plays a factor in all that we do."

They reached Gendo's office…and saw the Hell Priest where they stood. With them were the chattering Cenobite, the Weeper, the gasping Cenobite, the Cenobite whose face was stretched out like a mask, a Cenobite with their arms and head bound, walking in circles in the office…and a Cenobite that was clearly female…holding onto a heavy abdomen that was just as mutilated as the rest of the body was.

"Ohh," went Asuka.

"Greater delights await those that proceed and succeed in crossing the thresholds that stand in their way," the pinheaded Cenobite utters. "Kozo Fuyutsuki, Ritsuko Akagi, Asuka Langley Soryu. Lament. Lore. Laudarant. Liminal. Lazarus. Leviathan. What would you ask of us…Kozo Fuyutsuki? What is your desire?"

Fuyutsuki, inhaling a new breath, holding the puzzle box, walked over to the Hell Priest and stood three feet in front of them.

"Ritsuko Akagi," he utters. "Will you release her from your custody and allow her to return to our world and live? That is the Lazarus Configuration, is it not? Resurrection?"

"It is. If that is your desire, let it be offered. Ritsuko Akagi's life is her own once more."

Then, as if being held by a chain in her back, Ritsuko staggered forward, as though the chain retracted or was cut away from her spine, feeling some mild discomfort, but otherwise unharmed. She looked up at the Hell Priest and exhaled a breath of relief.

"You are free to live," they told her.

"Thank you," she responds.

Fuyutsuki looks down at the box, expecting it to reset itself back into the first configuration it was in when he first saw it. But it didn't change. It was still in its final configuration. This surprised and confused him.

"Isn't this supposed to change back once the holder's desire has been fulfilled?" He asks the Hell Priest, hoping for some clarity.

"Something has shifted when Behemoth was returned," they explained. "It would seem that now six desires can be fulfilled until the audience can be fully acknowledged by our god. Four more remain. The box, I still leave in your hands. Choose. Four more."

Four more? As in four more desires that can be fulfilled by the Leviathan? Ikari made one. I made one, which leaves only four uses left.

Fuyutsuki then slowly hands the box to Asuka, surprising the girl.

"My desire was to bring back someone that didn't deserve to be taken in place of me," he tells her. "Maybe you can get your mother back…if it's what you truly want. Only a genuine desire promises no pain."

Asuka accepts the box from him, pondering her desire.

-x-

Gendo was at a loss for words. All he did was what he had to in order to get Yui back from the Eva…and she was upset that their son had left this world because he didn't feel loved by anyone he was with! She claimed to have seen him in various situations where any and every choice they made had repercussions that went beyond what either of them had intended…but none of them were the Shinji they had left alone. Instead of trying to find him or bring him back to life, and that was assuming that he was dead, he used his opportunity to bring her back.

"He's not dead, just gone," he tries to explain to her.

"We drove him to go away," she tells him. "We drove him to do what he did. Every time we make a choice that affects him in a negative way, something happens to him that pushes him further away from us. But this is one of the worst ones to have ever happened! Where is he? Where is he?!"

That's all she wanted to know, where their son was. She didn't care about anything else. All that mattered…was the child they left alone. This made Gendo suspect that if the puzzle box he used to get Yui back could do the same with Shinji, assuming that they had done something to him.

Fuyutsuki has the box, he thought as he left the infirmary in search of the sub-commander. I'll take it from him again and fix this matter.

A door opened in the hallway…and out came a young girl with pale skin and blue hair.

"Rei," he utters. "You're awake."

She turns to face him…and her vacant expression contorts into one of contempt.

"One desire per person, Commander Ikari," she tells him.

"What?" He responds.

"One desire per person," she repeats. "The box doesn't allow more than one desire for a single person. It doesn't play favorites. What was your desire? If you have obtained it, you are not entitled another one."

Gendo wasn't sure what Rei was saying, but it sounded like the puzzle box that caused all of this, while allowing for a myriad of possibilities for whoever had it, didn't let a single person have more than one desire fulfilled. If this was so, then it meant he couldn't use the box a second time. And from what he learned from the videos recorded and posted online, those that used the box and received their desires could only exchange them for a different desire, meaning that they had to give up the prize they initially received from the Cenobites. It was basically like trading money for jewelry or water for oil.

But then, he had an idea upon realizing this. If he couldn't use the box to receive answers on the whereabouts of their son…then it would fall upon Yui to use the box and obtain the information they coveted; she never used the box, so she could have any desire she wanted from Leviathan.

"Yui," he utters as he runs back to his wife. "I need you to come with me!"

Rei then walked out of the infirmary, intent on doing something she desired to do now.

-x-

Asuka sighs as she hopes her desire came off as pure and genuine. If she could have back her mother, even just to talk to her and have more clarity to why she was the way she had been prior to her suicide, maybe she could move on with her own life since the life of an Eva pilot was not a guarantee towards a future.

"My mother was sick when she died," she tells the Hell Priest. "She was involved in an experiment when I was younger…and I have to believe that it played a role in her death. Can you bring her back to life, give her a second chance to live?"

The Hell Priest then saw in this girl a pain that was…similar to his. They once believed that the boy's pain had been a rarity among the mortal and desperate, not something that was one of a kind…but hard to encounter. While this girl had a violence in her soul that was vile, it was less than what she exhibited without her red behemoth.

Another rarity, they thought as Leviathan realized that this girl was a soul deprived of what they had rarely known before losing what mattered most to them. Her blood and pain…is not ours to claim. Very well.

They approached Asuka and nodded their head in the positive.

"For your efforts, we offer you the Lazarus Configuration," they tell her.

-x-

Evangelion Unit-02 came to life for a moment, and its chest was ripped open to reveal a red sphere like in Unit-01. It released a humanoid being from its internal grasp that, unlike Yui Ikari from Unit-01, was less grotesque and shaped more like a human female body. Hair, flesh, nails, organs and all were in their proper place as the body fell from the sphere and onto the bridge in front of it.

Go home to your daughter! She heard a voice yell at her as she slipped in and out of consciousness. Live and do right by her!

"Aaah!" The woman that was Kyoko Zeppelin Soryu groaned as she was now alive once more.

-x-

Asuka handed the puzzle back to Fuyutsuki and departed the office to go see her resurrected mother as the medical personnel contacted Ritsuko to inform her of a woman found outside of Unit-02.

"Three more to go," the Hell Priest informed them.

"Doctor Akagi?" Fuyutsuki offers her the puzzle, but the faux-blond shook her head in the negative with her hands raised against the puzzle.

"No thank you," she tells him. "I've been in the Labyrinth. I understand that the price of knowledge is realization. I don't need anything else in the form of a reward or gift. Let someone else who desires something receive it if they know what it is they want."

He sighs and accepts her refusal. But if they were to finish the audience with Leviathan, three more people needed to have their desires fulfilled, whatever they may be. They could have anything within one of the six choices offered by the box. There had to be someone in the base with a genuine need of something they longed for, whether it was love, knowledge or even power…so long as it was a genuine desire.

"Hand it over, Fuyutsuki," he heard Gendo's voice behind them, and turned to see that he and Yui were by the entrance to the office. "We need it."

"You already brought her back, Ikari," he says, "you can't get anything else from them unless you exchange your prize for it."

"Not for me," Gendo reiterates. "It's for Yui. She has a desire."

"Does she?" The Hell Priest questions. "Greater delights await only those that have the drive to proceed. What is it that you would ask of us?"

Yui walks inside the room and holds out her bandaged hands to Fuyutsuki, wanting the box.

"What happened to my son?" She asks, and Fuyutsuki gives it to her.

"They only gave him what he wanted most, Ikari," he tells her. "They never hurt him. They couldn't have his blood or pain."

"But where did they take him?" Yui reiterates. "If he's alive, where is he? That's what we need to know, so we can get him back."

"You can't have him back," the gasping Cenobite utters. "We cannot interfere with another's desire, no matter what others ask for."

"What?" Gendo demands. "What do you mean, we can't have him back?"

"Taking him away from his prize is a violation of what we gave him," the Hell Priest informs. "He did not reject the gift our god gifted him…and continues to enjoy it with all his heart. His pain, his blood…was not ours to claim. Gifts cannot be ungiven. Only exchanges can be made."

This was a shocker. The Cenobites couldn't return Shinji from wherever they took him because doing so violated whatever rules and regulations they were bound by, even if someone else wanted him to be returned. But if Yui couldn't have her son returned to her, what was the point of even trying to obtain what she desired from these beings? What was the point in Gendo needing her to use the box because he couldn't without exchanging his prize to have her back for something else he wanted?

"If you can't bring him back," she speaks up as a suggestion rises in her mind, "can you show us how he is doing where he is?"

"Knowledge of your son's life?" The Hell Priest responds.

"Yes."

"If that is your desire."

Yui sighs in acceptance; if she could know of his current status, that would be a small comfort to her soul.

"It is," she relents.

"For your efforts," the Hell Priest declares, "we offer you the Lore Configuration."

The ceiling shifted into a formation of clouds parting as something descended from them. It slowly spun around, resembling one of the puzzle box's previous configurations, stopping in front of Yui.

"Knowledge's price is realization," Ritsuko utters.

Yui raised her hands up and held the device.

"Show me, please," she speaks, and the top of the device opens up like a flower blooming.

-x-

It was difficult to ignore the Cenobites that were just standing around in the halls of the trauma ward, but Asuka found Misato and Kaji in front of the entrance to the room her mother had been put in to recover.

"How is she?" She asks them.

"The doctors say that she was in better condition than Ikari's wife had been when they found her," Kaji reveals. "Just malnourished and some pieces of metal that needed to be removed, but otherwise in one piece. Did you really…cause this?"

"I made a choice."

"Was it the right choice?" Misato questions.

"Is there a right or wrong choice beyond the choice you make?"

"No. I guess there isn't. I didn't think it was possible. This is all uncharted territory."

"Life, knowledge, love, sensation, resurrection, power. I chose Lazarus. Who wouldn't seek an opportunity to have someone back in their life?"

Kaji and Misato look at the recovering woman as Asuka walked inside the room and sat beside her bed. In the end, it was just hard to believe that someone could just have something like this granted from a being from the opposite side of existence. It was tempting to the former couple…but neither wanted to risk getting more than what they truly desired by dabbling with a force beyond their comprehension. Even if they wanted to recall loved ones from beyond the grave or receive love from someone they longed for, they were already too broken to be able to mend what had been shattered long ago.

"Asuka?" They heard the woman speak as she opened her eyes. "Asuka?"

"Hello," Asuka responds. "How do you feel?"

"Lousy. Very lousy."

"How so?"

"What I did to you. What I almost did when I wasn't…myself…and then the years spent inside the Eva. I poisoned you with my ambitions and drive towards perfection."

It was the first time Asuka heard her say that she had done wrong to her.

"I hated what had been done to you," her mother continued. "I didn't want this kind of life for you. I wanted… I should've wanted for you to be happy, not be some…pawn in some sick game played by some cruel people."

"But there were other people playing other games that had different rules than the ones the cruel people were playing by. And…the outcome isn't all bad. I mean…you're outside of the Eva and alive again."

Kyoko had to consider that her daughter was right about the situation not being all bad if she was no longer stuck inside the Eva. It was its own Hell, one she couldn't escape from because of the circumstances of her contact experiment and detachment from her daughter that led to her death. And ever since her essence, her consciousness, her very soul was entrapped within the Eva, she was just unable to escape the agony of her situation…until she saw this great, diamond-shaped being of unimaginable power and authority. It was like being in the presence of a deity and its followers, unable to run or hide. And then, this voice telling her to go back to her daughter and live again, to make things right.

"This being you saw," she went, "it's called…Leviathan?"

"Yeah," Asuka replied. "Receive an audience with Leviathan…and claim a prize in return."

"What did you choose for a prize?"

"I think you already know what I chose."

"And it was possible?"

"Only because a price had been paid early on. The sub-commander offered up several Angels to the Cenobites and made the audience possible…and he was doing this all to undo something he never intended to do."

"What did he do?"

"He accidentally offered someone in place of himself by solving a puzzle box that was connected to someone that went missing a few years ago. It turned out the box was one of many that connect to places like this one we're in…and he claimed a prize. His life was not a happy one…and all he wanted was happiness."

"Everyone wants happiness."

-x-

It was a quiet neighborhood, like the kind you'd see in films, with beautiful gardens and children playing around. As Yui, Gendo, Fuyutsuki and Ritsuko were shown the result of Yui's desire to find out what happened to Shinji, the quartet saw a young man of fourteen years of age playing with a little girl that couldn't have been more than four or five years of age. If anything, the young man resembled a younger version of Gendo, but without the arrogance or spiteful attitude while the girl resembled a younger version of Shinji, who had a slight resemblance to his own mother. They all saw the girl being pushed on a swing beside a small boy being pushed by a young woman that seemed a little older than the young man, with long, brownish hair and gray eyes; the boy and the young woman seemed related.

"So, Shinji," the woman spoke up, "are we on for dinner tonight?"

"Totally," the young man responded with a smile.

"Higher, Daddy," the little girl utters, and the quartet gasped in disbelief as the teen Shinji pushed the little girl higher on the swing.

"He has a kid of his own?" Ritsuko questions.

"Hey, you four!" They heard someone call from inside a house nearby and saw a woman that resembled Yui, but with a brighter personality. "Dinner!"

"Coming!" Shinji replied as he stopped the swing so he could help the little girl off.

"How is this possible?" Gendo demanded to know; they were standing next to Yui, and yet they saw a woman resembling her standing in a house.

"The multiverse is vast and without end," went the Hell Priest to him in explanation. "Just as our gifts are boundless, so, too, is the multiverse. Without boundaries and infinite in possibilities, it is easy for our god to traverse the realities in search of one that promises what one asks for. This one was tailored to the boy's longing for what he was denied long ago and desired only that. Here, he has what his heart was starved for, what he no longer feels envious of others for having. Here, his parents are not scientists out to change the world, save it or even wreck it. Instead, they're just doctors and amateur sleuths. His best friend is a childhood friend that he recently started dating. He has a daughter that is the result of an excommunicated scientist who tried to create an enhanced version of the boy from his blood, thinking that he could create a bio-weapon that would impress some very influential people…only it didn't pan out because he failed to consider how the girl he created from the boy's blood would react to how her existence was based upon a cruel ambition; she is more like her father than the man who made her for less than benevolent reasons, and didn't want to be a weapon. The scientist was incarcerated for illegal genetic engineering and modification…and the girl sent to live with her father."

"A mad scientist made a clone of the boy?" Ritsuko questions.

"A modified version of him. Nobody wants an exact copy of someone or something…and you can't create an exact copy indefinitely. The scientist tweaked with the genetic code before he even began growing her spine in a tube."

"And the authorities just let him bring this girl home to raise?"

"She needed love, the same as her father."

The scene shifted to the interior of a dining room where they saw Shinji with his girlfriend, his daughter, his parents and the little boy sitting around a table, enjoying a meal.

Yui couldn't believe that the woman on Shinji's left side was a version of herself that was not a scientist but a regular doctor that seemed to enjoy where she was in this life of hers. Not only was she not a scientist, but it was like she had no cares for more than what she already had. There was no desire to ensure a bright future for all of mankind, no ambitions, not even any signs of possessing a similar mindset as she did. But then again, this was just one version of herself that was from a different universe, and one where Second Impact likely never occurred and where SEELE was never established, and she has to believe that there were other versions of herself that were just as different from how she was much of the time.

"This can't be what he wanted," said Gendo as he looked at his alternate self. "None of this can be real. He needs to wake up and face reality and accept that he can't have what he wants whenever he wants it."

"Except he did get what he wanted," the Hell Priest confessed. "This is his ultimate desire. This is the life he cherishes above all else. His pain, his blood were not ours to claim. As an innocent soul, his only want was to be loved and accepted…and our god gave him what he asked for. Family and friends, home and happiness. He will never suffer like before now. This all exists…all for him."

"No." Gendo declares as he approaches the sitting body of his son who abandoned him when he had a need for him, intent on reprimanding him. "You need to come with us now!"

Click-snap! A chain shot out of nowhere and penetrated Gendo's right hand, hooking his palm.

"Aah!" He groaned.

"Hmm?" The little girl went.

"Is something wrong, sweetie?" Shinji asks his daughter.

"I thought I heard a small yell just a moment ago."

"Must've been a prairie dog," her grandfather suggested.

"Yeah."

"Knowing is not the same as touching, grabbing, being," the Hell Priest told the four as Gendo was pulled away from Shinji. "Knowledge is the gathering, hoarding and distribution of wisdom. It does not guarantee much in the way of one obtaining something beyond what they already possess. Those that believe that knowledge is a power of its own have yet to prove such is so."

Gendo was dragged back to Yui's side and the chain detached from his hand.

"He looks genuinely happy," said Fuyutsuki.

"That's because he is genuinely happy," the Hell Priest responds. "You cannot fake the pleasure you truly feel when it comes from a place of longing."

Yui sighs as she watches Shinji wipe the mouth on his daughter's face with a smile. There was a time when she used to do that for him, but it was so long ago that it might as well have been a lifetime ago. Even if she recovered from her injuries sustained from being separated from the Eva, even if the world as she knew it wouldn't end, she knew that a part of her world had been removed from her presence. She had paid a price for her agenda and it cost more than she had expected of it because of the pain she had inflicted upon her child. There was no way to remedy this, so all she could do was accept what she did to cause this.

I'm sorry, Shinji, she thought as she sees him smiling again when the little girl hugged him.

She turned away and closed the device in her arms, sending them back to Gendo's office. She then walked out of the room with her prize, her expression one of shame.

Fuyutsuki follows her to try and talk to her about what they had witnessed.

Ritsuko looks at Gendo nursing his injured hand as it slowly bled.

To be continued…

A/N: Four desires down, two more to go. What do you think so far?