(Awe)
I did not have the opportunity to speak with the Commander again before he left on his next business trip.
He even took the vice commander with him.
He had not said this to be explicitly, but I suspected that the recent promotion of Major Katsuragi was done in anticipation of a time where they may both be off-site at the same time.
It could not be avoided, for this was one of his most important errands, one of the last few crucial preparations for Third Impact proper: The salvage of the lance of longinus.
This, at last, he had explained to me, for it was necessary for my work.
It was an ancient artifact that was found along with Adam in the now defunct White Moon.
To SEELE, it was a holy relic, meant to be used in a divinely ordained ritual;
Commander Ikari saw in their prophetic text merely an instruction manual, and in the spear itself, a terraforming device, without doubt advanced beyond anything mankind had ever produced, but nonetheless a tool like any other, that, as such, could be put to any purpose that its users may desire.
Only that its creators had not ordained for anybody but their own kind to wield it…
and that is, in part, why I exist.
No one could say why they only wished for each batch of offspring to inherit only one half of their essence, to be either human or angel, either immortal or capable of wisdom.
Perhaps they feared that their children might repeat the makers' own mistakes if blessed with both.
They never thought they would see their offspring, either, but now, through me, I suppose one of them was technically doing it, though I cannot say if an existence in this form could have any more meaning to them than it did for a human to become deathless in the shape of a cancer cell line.
Whatever the makers had planned, whether they might be called gods, or aliens, or simply an earlier incarnation of humans and angels themselves, it seems that happenstance had thrown a wrench into their plans such as two of their number had come to find themselves on the same planet.
The failsafe that was this spear had been preventing the emergence of the angels for billions of years though this had been, in the beginning, destined to be their world, but now even this defense mechanism itself was going to become a tool for the subverting of the grand design.
And my hands may be the ones holding it -
Though I would simply be a relaying part of the mechanism, a kind of conduit, nothing but a trigger on a finger.
Once this was in Commander Ikari's possession, NERV would have all the pieces assembled to execute its ultimate objective – or rather, all except for one.
We would have to wait and see how the experiment with EVA 04 was going to go.
In either case, the Commander was departed, and I had nothing to do here but to simply exist until he returned to give more orders.
His return would not bring me relief, but neither had his leaving brought me comfort.
I was simply to stay put in case more angel arrived.
To keep obediently taking my pills.
Or so I had thought.
It was Mr. Kaji who broached the subject to me, when he had been stopping by at Dr. Akagi's office to catch up with her.
It seems he meant to take us pilots to a facility where they were preserving all manner of animals that had largely perished in the wild following the Second Impact, along with any personal friends we might wish to bring along, so I took it for granted that Aida and Suzuhara would almost certainly be present, and perhaps Horaki-san as well.
He called it a 'field trip', to make up for the one we had not been able to attend owing to our duties as pilots.
The facility was technically affiliated with NERV and not far from the city, so that we might in theory be retrieved at great speed if an emergency should occur.
So there was nothing explicitly prohibiting my participation.
Right from the beginning, it seems Mr. Kaji had been arranging the entire affair especially so that us pilots would be able to attempt.
I do not know what reasons he might have, be it a desire to give to others what he had been robbed of by Second Impact, or perhaps simply an attempt to curry favor with the Major by entertaining her wards, but either way, I did think it was rather thoughtful of him, to put in so much effort merely to allow us a little reprieve from our duties.
I was inclined to think of miners who invested in contraptions to revive the canaries that they used to guard themselves from poison gas. If we must be sacrifices, I suppose that he and the Major did at least not treat us with unnecessary callousness.
Still I had not thought that I would attend, all things considered.
I had no desire to behold this institution – there would have been no point.
I knew what would be there; If I had really wanted to see it, I could have looked it up in the library or on the internet.
More than that, there was no point to the entire institution.
It was in effect a decoy – NERV's alibi, for all that the scientists employed in there probably sincerely believed that they were doing the work that would serve mankind.
This iteration of the biosphere was already given up for lost, their efforts, doomed to come to nothing, if not by becoming collateral in the onslaught if the angels, then, to be erased when the promised day dawned.
Though disguised as a beacon of hope, that facility was truly the saddest place imaginable – a covert monument to naught but pointlessness and futility.
I don't really think that I have to explain why I had no wish to see it if I did not strictly have to – and all that would incline me is the possibility for a social gathering, which was a type of pursuit that had never seemed relevant to me, so for all intents and purposes, I should never have considered taking part.
Certainly I pictured how exhausting it would be, how I would have to force myself to come and drag myself all the way.
But was I likely to regret yet another day of sitting in my apartment, simply waiting for the day to be over? Simply waiting for the commander to come back and give me more orders? Simply watching as that day blurred together with all the others, barely even remembered, crumbling away to leave me to lament once again how little of this world I would experience though it would soon be time to fade away? Simply, floating through the days as something unreal?
I don't know tha anything I experienced was ever real.
I might not be real.
But, be it only due to some quirks in the workings of human-like memories, that which is novel leaves more of an imprint. It might not truly be real, but it might feel deceptively so.
The days since I'd met Ikari-kun had probably felt the realest out of anything I'd ever experienced, though I knew this might be only because it was unforeseen.
And he had asked me, during his visit, to consider attending the group's next gathering.
That I might come to enjoy it as he had.
Horaki-san, too, had expressed interest in having me attend some joint activities.
There was no work today, Mr. Kaji had probably conferred with Dr. Akagi to pick out a day when all of us were free.
I still did not think I would enjoy it, to be honest. But though I might regret coming in the end, I could not see myself regretting the lost opportunity of another day spent without any noteworthy occurrence.
It came down to the same calculus as when I first invited him: What did it matter? And if the answer was 'nothing', then why not?
Why not?
Distant as it was, there was at least the theoretical possibility of something pleasant, or at the very least something interesting happening.
Something I'll be glad to have experienced in the end, while I was still here.
I wondered even then if it would not be better to never find out what could have been, if it would only ruin the sad little dream that gave me warmth, by letting me see what sobered, lesser thing of ugly truth it must inevitably turn out to be in a universe where such things like hope or truth were only self-serving little fairytales to which nobody had woken up yet, but that thought, too, I squashed and existed by telling myself that nothing of import was likely to pass anyway – at most there would be a few more stray glimmers that might fall upon me.
All I was going to do was to hold open my hand to maybe catch them, and if I didn't, then that was fine too, it would not really have been a surprise.
Such were my expectations, or my lack thereof, but still I showed up at that platform, before the looming gates of the facility.
In this entire area, the air had a sense of cool, salty wetness to it, an impression that was eventually much intensified within the walls of the complex itself.
I was the first to show up, standing there in the mists of dusk, faintly noting some unfamiliar scents in the air, but it was not long before the others arrived with the rising of the sun.
It came to be quite windy then, when the warmth of day first penetrated through.
The skirt of my uniform was being pressed flat against my things from one side and fluttering wildly in the other. Ever and anon, I was forced to brush some of my hair from my field of view.
Normally I would get out a book if I were expected to wait somewhere, but I did not want either the wind or the air moisture making a mess of the pages.
At first, when I stood there by myself like some abandoned stone monolith left behind by some fading civilization, I was already tempted to rule this whole thing a mistake.
I was keenly aware of the weather and all the little aches and discomforts of existence.
I had dragged myself out of bed early, frequently checking the diagram of the public transport network above the doors of the streetcars and then later, the names of the bus stops beyond the city limits, as I had never driven along these particular lines.
Beyond the doors, I supposed there would be scientific facilities not unlike the ones at NERV, and creatures the likes of which I had seen pictured in books and computer screens.
I already knew they existed, they were not truly relevant to my life, and I knew where to find information on them if I had wished to know more of them than I did.
I couldn't say what additional benefit there might be from looking at them in person.
But to turn back now would have been an even greater hassle – I would have to explain why I did, after already spending time and money to get here, and I am not certain that I could have put it into very solid words.
Besides, reason would suggest that one ought to suspend judgment on a novel experience until they have gone through it in full – it was too early now to form an opinion.
So I stood and waited as the blue of the horizon gave way to reds and yellows.
The next person to appear was the class representative – it took me a few split-seconds to tell, however.
The recognition was not instant, the image presented disparate enough from the ones stored in memory to recall a moment's worth of mental processing.
To start with, she was not wearing her usual uniform, but a brown wild leather dress with suspenders and an orange T-shirt beneath it, but the difference in impression was not solely down to her clothes.
Her demeanor was softened overall, expressions of joy less reserved, yet also less confident, there was just a dusting of something shy, yet sincere – in her expressions, her motions, distinctions to subtle for me to pick up exactly outside of their contribution to the holistic experience.
If one encountered her in class, she'd be more likely to reprimand other students for running in the halls than to come skipping when she spotted you after greeting you with a sensible wave, but that was what she did now:
"Ayanami-san! Good morning!"
She waited until she had caught up to me to address me further.
I noted that she had used different hair ties than usual, orange floral decorations to go with her shirt.
"Good thing we met each other, I was just wondering if I'd come to the right place."
"No, this is correct." I assured her.
"I see…" she paused to think for a moment, or perhaps simply to let herself settle and arrive.
"Don't take this the wrong way, but I really wasn't sure if we would ever get you to come… I'm really glad you did, though."
I wonder what she based this on.
Even if my presence was explicitly requested, not knowing what I was supposed to be here for made me a little uneasy, or at least uncertain. Usually there was always some sort of purpose, something to do, some transaction that I knew to stay within the bounds of -
So that I'd know what would be expected of me, what might be asked.
The only reason I agreed to begin with is that, unlike Horaki-san's completely undelineated offer of 'hanging out' or 'going shopping', this pursuit here at least came with a certain skeleton of pre-planned activities to stick to – we were to be walked through the facilities.
This I could do. This I could anticipate, and tell how long it may take or how taxing it might be.
But even so, I did know that I had not primarily been invited in order to look at animals, but for some other shapeless thing that I could not quite define.
"I have to warn you," I confessed, pessimistic in tone and expectation: "I have absolutely no experience with the kind of recreational gathering, and I am not at all certain how one is meant to behave. I am well aware that my actions often read as different from what is expected for a typical adolescent… say, if it were you, what would you do in this situation?"
It was clear from Horaki-san's pause that she probably found this statement to be off in itself, but her response was not without gentleness:
"Well, we did not invite a 'typical adolescent', we invited you, because we wanted you to come. You're you, not me, so you should do what you want. The point of this is to have fun together."
"...so it's alright if I'm different?" I wondered tentatively, half trailing off.
I really wasn't certain about this.
It's different from doing my tasks where I'm able to be competent because I know exactly what I have to do. Fighting angels or finding my way around during the blackout had never disconcerted me so.
Maybe I should have looked into a book about proper socializing – I knew they existed, I just never thought that such skills would be particularly relevant to my cause.
I really did not know how this works…
But Horaki-san seemed to have meant what she said.
"Don't worry about it. Just enjoy your time here, okay?"
She smiled at me encouragingly – by all means, it seems she was absolutely confident enough that no further preparation would be needed.
Did I really not need to do anything else? Would it be okay even if I not know what to do or how, or if I would stand out?
The class respresentative did not seem to doubt it -
Though I suppose she was not really acting as 'the class representative' right now – she wasn't here in any position of authority, or even as a student of our high school or a member of her family.
If she was filling any role at all now, it might have been that of a friend or a visitor, but for the most part, she was simply existing as herself, without any particular purpose.
Though, purposelessness would seem to imply being useless, discarded, having nothing more left to do, and this could not be the case.
She had come here to tour the facility of course, but by what reasoning had she done that?
Interest in learning, perhaps, or loyalty to us, the pilots, whom she counted as her associates, and, in the case of the Second Child, even a close friend.
But then why was she friends with us?
During school hours you might suppose that it was her duty to ensure the welfare and discipline of her fellow students and model desirable behavior when it came to including others, but nothing she did here would reflect on her duties at the school.
She was here on her own time, by her own choice.
Duty may have featured into it, but she was not compelled or expected to follow.
She had chosen to come here or spend time with us, probably for no other reason than that she wanted to. Because it brings her satisfaction, or, because she believed that it would be a good idea.
So, in essence, she was doing it for no sake other than its own.
That is what a leisure time activity basically is: Something that is thought rewarding in and of itself.
It may have filled the roles of rest and recreation, but that alone could not explain why humans would choose one possible leisure activity over another.
She was existing purely for herself right now – here was the Hikari Horaki who was not a class representative.
A curious thing to contemplate.
I wonder if there would be anything left of me at all, if you stripped me of all roles.
If there was anything to me that was not intended for some purpose.
A me that was not an EVA pilot or the key to Third Impact seemed impossible to contemplate, nor did it seem to exist – I meant what I said, when I told Ikari-kun that there was nothing else in my life.
I never used to even consider it, the very premise was nonsensical.
It would be like expecting light to curve, or the rain to fall upward.
Except that Ikari-kun had said something else back then, about how we might find something else along the way. I had not thought it possible, at least, not for me.
But as for him, it seemed like he had already found it:
He arrived carrying Major Katsuragi's pet bird, flanked by his trusty pair of friends: Suzuhara, armed with a fashionable red basecap, had put an arm around him in a fraternal gesture.
Aida, clad in a camouflage vest, had not passed up on the chance to bring his prized camera, and could soon be found excitedly darting all over place, looking to capture the facility on tape.
Trailing somewhat behind them, the Second Child arrived in a pink top and a white skirt, making a point of looking demonstratively unimpressed.
By contrast, Aida's enthusiasm seemed to know no bounds: "This is BEYOND awesome! I can't believe we're getting to see this! Before us lies a state-of-the-art facility dedicated to the preservation of extinct marine life and the restoration of the environment to its state before Second Impact! A forbidden sanctuary of science that conducts experiments of near divine magnitudes! I can't believe that we're getting to see even a small part of it~
It's so great to have friends~"
At this point he could contained himself no more and descended into incoherent noises of excitement as he continued filming everything in sight.
Suzuhara was somewhat more modest in expressing his gratitude: "I gotta give thanks man."
Ikari-kun was abashed at this level of gratitude:
"It's really Kaji-san whom you should be thanking…"
So many people, in one place, without a discrete purpose, as there may have been in the classroom or NERV HQ. At least in those places the many voices can begin to blur together, but in this case, there were few enough that I could understand much of what they said directly.
I kept a good distance behind them to have something of a buffer between myself and all the buzz with its quick movements and loud exclamations.
The outing had not even begun, and I thought it might already be beginning to grate on me.
When Horaki-san told the boys to rein themselves in, she only added to the noise ('Are we even allowed to film here?') - while sticking to my corner, I also made sure to give the Second Child a wide berth. Her performative disdain represented its own kind of charged-up intensity, and in any case I would certainly be better off not drawing her attention.
"Geez. You're acting like children! Oh where could Kaji-san be? He's the only reason I agreed to come along..."
Right on cue, the man in question appeared – not beside us, but as a voice over a speaker. We could spot him in the flesh, however, waving down at us from a small window besides the top part of the gate.
"I'm sorry, but you'll have to bear with a little inconvenience first..."
…
In my line of work, I had seen very many laboratories whose purpose included biohazard materials or rare samples that were difficult if not impossible to replace.
As such, I would have previously encountered cleanrooms and the elaborate decontamination procedures prescribed before entering one.
I had not informed myself about this particular facility before coming here, but from what I'd heard about its contents, I was not at all surprised that it would require us to go through such a decon protocol – it was not as extensive or time consuming as some of the procedures that had been required of me at NERV.
For one thing, this one let us keep on facility-provided underwear after the initial long-wave decontamination step and provided disposable robes afterwards, rather than requiring us to be nude or in airtight suits for the duration of our visit.
The others, however, did not seem to have been especially familiar with such procedures, especially not those who weren't pilots.
Soon I was surrounded all about with as many noises of dismay as five human adolescents and one penguin could produce, standing in place as the clamor of cacophony erupted all around me, the buzzing of machines, the rush of cleansing liquids, and each part making the other worse -
"Ahh, it's so hot!" "brrr cold!" "I can't take it anymore!"
The more was going on, the more than everyone else descended into pandemonium, the less equipped I found myself to engage with this world in any way, so, the more I stood still and silent, dragging myself along as I was ordered to, moving precisely as much as I was told to, no less, but no more.
By the time that the final set of elevator doors was about to open before us, much of the initial enthusiasm had faded and most of my companions looked noticeably worse for the wear.
Aida-kun in particular had been looking dangerously close to losing his breakfast ever since our second encounter with the immersion fluid chamber, even after his now-disinfected camera had been handed back to him along with our disposable clothing.
Then, however, the doors opened, painting a clear transformation on most of the faces around me.
Suzuhara and Aida were probably the most apparent in their enthusiasm, being quick to race into the room: "Whoha~ It's a giant aquarium!"
But even Ikari-kun's normally more reserved countenance lightened up in an instant: "So these are animals that lived before Second Impact?"
By that point, his two classmates had already raced ahead to behold the great tank before them from all sides: "This one got something on its back!"
"I think it's called a turtle!"
"A turtle?"
Whatever adolescent bravado or demonstrative affectations they normally might have projected to their peers, it all melted away before the sheer sensory deluge of motion and color.
Even Major Katsuragi's bird seemed to be having a fantastic time, for it did not take him long to locate an enclosure stacked with an entire flock of his own species, which he eagerly addressed with various enthusiastic bird noises.
I wondered why the Major herself had not come with us – was she simply avoiding Mr. Kaji, or was there more to it?
In any case, the Second Child looked at first to be an exception to the merrymaking, holding fast onto her armor of ironic disdain, ready to sling herself upon a tube.
"Look at them getting excited like children, they look like idiots. Right, Hikari? - uh, Hikari?"
But the class representative, too, had pressed her hands against the glass, giving no thought to disciplining the boys as she might have done in class.
"I don't know. I think these small fish are so cute~ Don't you think so, too?"
I expected that the Second might just sit there being snide and looking down on us for the duration of the entire outing, and it's not like that prediction was wrong, she well might have – but I realized now that this would have been due to a lack of friends to bring along.
Between the gentle encouragements of Horaki-san and Mr. Kaji, even she melted out of her solidified role into raw, sparkly-eyed wonder -
I wondered if that capacity to understand and be touched and awed is the purest, most pristine essence of what being human is, seeing as it comes so natural to them in their earliest stages of being, before that very ability to learn and yearn for communion is perverted to program such young minds for the demands of whatever the current baal or moloch of the present society is…
It did help that Mr. Kaji did have some idea of what kinds of animals the Second might be interested in:
"Look, Asuka, a shark!"
"Where?"
He had clearly been attentive to her. I could understand why she would be fond of him, even if her fantasies of becoming his mate were not especially realistic.
And what of me?
I almost forgot about myself.
I was observing all this, hearing it crash into my consciousness from the edges, but this would have been because my own awareness, once defensively contracted, was blown wide open to every facet of the moment.
I did not exclaim aloud, or rush to run off.
But this was not because I was untouched.
Rather the opposite:
I was stunned into silence with awe, too overtaken by the sights to do anything else.
I thought knowing what was in here would be the same as experiencing it in detail, but in this case, I don't think that my presupposition was entirely wrong.
I recognized the animals, of course, more than even Aida-kun did.
I had after all read countless books on the subject of biology.
But it was another thing to see these creatures living, moving, all the strange, strange creatures with their many shapes and colors.
By this I do not mean that the sight was superior to the theoretical information, rather, as was noted by the little token part of me that was somehow still noting what was happening as one watching in the distance, much of what this experience was, was in the nexus of those two things mingling.
Of not simply seeing them, but knowing what they were, and recognizing all these parts and components manifest in the world, the bright stream of perception folding open into many component parts -
This there is a coral, a symbiotic organism made up of simple animals and microscopic algae.
Over there were nudibranchs, distant relatives of slugs, marine mollusks of manifold colors and patterns who absorbed their poison from the food they ate.
There was an octopus, of the more intelligent animals the one that was the least related to humans, and one of the very few solitary creatures to attain a semblance of higher thought.
There floated a jellyfish, one of the first and simplest kinds of life, just a few layers thick, almost translucent, an ancient lineage dating back to the dawn of complex life.
Here was a swarm of fish – fish being the ancestors of all vertebrates, so, some of the very same basic rules that governed their swarming behavior could be found in flocks of birds or crowds of pedestrians, governed by the same area in the most primitive part of the brain that was in charge of rhythmic behaviors -
While the others rushed ahead in two groups, Ikari-kun and his friends as well as the Second and those she considered her own close associates – I stayed behind by myself.
Looking deeply into every single tank.
Watching.
Taking it in.
Pausing always to completely read the little plaques by each tank, which labeled what kind of ecosystem each of them was designed to replicate, where these plants and animals had lived.
I forgot all about time, or formalities, or all else, as if I my consciousness had emptied itself out, like a mountain vanished to the ground in supplication at the sight of the face and majesty of god, becoming but a canvas for impressions to play on and leave traces upon.
I could only say in hindsight how much I had been entirely enraptured, when I sort of came back as if from a dream.
Here before me was what I understood as the last traces of what used to be a complex, interconnected web – food chains and carbon cycles and water currents, huge wheels of machinery going round and round and round…
Endless parts interlocking together into manifold visions of splendor, unfolding moment to moment. The pull of the universe tugging at our finite little souls, reminding us of the connection of that above to what lies below, of what is without to what is within – that even I, ever severed, ever separate from most of what went on around me, was currently pushing upon some small part of the cosmic mechanisms, even just by displacing the air molecules as I moved forward.
I differed from the humans of course, but the very part of me that was angel was in fact equally akin to all the many beings here, as ancestral to these translucent jellyfish as it was to these humans, and all the complex interlinked organisms spread out upon this world -
Until the grand wheel of rebirth had ceased, but shortly before my creation.
I had only just missed it.
Mass extinctions were not unusual on this planet, and while some had been brought about by absolute Diaboli ex Machina such as meteorites and volcanoes that came beyond this thin film of biosphere, many had in turn been caused by the lifeforms themselves, like the oxygen catastrophe, or changes in climate and chemistry wrought by early plants and the runoff from their remains in the streams.
This latest one was no exception, yet another time of destruction out of which only a few could be lifted, to become transfigured and take possession of the world.
Who is to say that the present deeds of humans down to orchestrating Second Impact are not mere continuations of those same ancient chemical reactions, thought not just another complication same as photosynthesis or multicellularity?
And I knew still that its end had been foretold.
That even in its prime, it was less an array of circles and more of spirals in which entropy was ever slowly but inexorably dissipating, all things only permitted to emerge from the void because, in the end, they would add back together to zero as if they never had been.
When they'd told us at school about the birth rates steadily decreasing, I recognized in this, too, what I already knew: That the Gauf was empty.
That the souls of living things were not being parceled back out, but rather gathered up, retroactive from the moment of Third Impact that was already preordained, that had already taken place somewhere in the future.
Legend said that, when the first soulless child would come to be born, the apocalypse would have begun, and the souls of mankind due to return to their origin.
I suppose that this child must have been me, even if I was made to become a vessel for one of the ancients themselves.
It all boiled down to the same thing: The same laws of nature that had brought forth all these wonders were also what dictated their inevitable demise, by the very fabric they were made of.
This wasn't just true for life on this planet:
In the end, we were all just stray oscillations in the vacuum, composed of mostly void.
And yet still, there had been something other than nothing.
I was all the more keenly aware of that something for it's obvious, precarious fragility, held as these organisms were in these bubbles of artificial paradise, painfully sustained against the gradients of chaos, isolated from the environment as it was now, in which they would naturally decay.
I suppose all life decays – few things would hold up to the cold, unforgiving vacuum of space, except perhaps for the EVAs.
I suppose humans might temporarily forget this within this biosphere, if they are not very old and keep away from great altitude or pressure, but I keenly felt how much the very substance I was made up of ever sought to unmake itself, restrained in this craving only by Dr. Akagi's hard work, and this, only for a time.
This should be expected.
Why would we even expect anything to last or remain?
There should be no reason to be surprised or otherwise get worked up by what is so obvious.
And yet, as I found myself pressing my hand against a tube-like tank of water, observing the modest swarm of small reef-fish within, I found inside myself a surge of urgent warmth, because they were so clearly alive, and diverse, and orienting themselves around after a fashion – they wanted to be alive and free of anguish, and the world they presently existed in so fragile and narrow.
What other feeling could I have, for another thing of stardust, than anguish of its suffering and a wish for it to know peace?
However could the creatures of this world bear to cause each other hardship, if they could know what each other really is? Why did creatures heap additional pain on each other, if there was already so much of it in the world?
How did they all not rush to alleviate what little pain might be avoided, when there is so much that cannot be escaped?
I was asking this question on more of an existential level, though.
Intellectually, I obviously knew the reasons. Living beings all have things they need, and so they use each other, or lash out in defense of themselves.
Afflicted by pain and fear, it is hard to keep even such grand truths in perspective – and even I could not say that I always did this:
After all, just this morning, I had accounted this entire place and all it represented as not worth coming to, as having nothing left to teach me.
The fish tank recalled to me my calibration tube back in Terminal Dogma.
It was a reminder that I, too, was something rather than nothing, just for a blip in eternity.
Knowing my time to be borrowed and the machinery of this universe to be unforgiving, I had always sought to tread lightly – to let nothing begin, so that nothing would have to end.
That is why I had never answered the invitations to these gatherings before -
why there did not seem to be a point.
But I realized now that I had already failed in this endeavor.
Flimsy and minimal as my existence had been, it was still something rather than nothing.
Just barely there, and thus, capable of being extinguished – all the more destructible for its deliberately conserved smallness.
Try as I might to ignore it, try as I might to remind myself that it didn't matter, I still did exist as a subjective, temporary being – like one more twinkling star inside a sea of eternal void.
I was something rather than nothing, and as such, I stood exposed before the hungry void.
Something would end whether I kept myself aside or not.
I was trapped either way, lodged in the threshold of a world I could neither truly partake in nor wholly withdraw from.
How very, very sad this was, or so I thought, as I observed the little fish swimming around with their fragile little fins, so exquisitely vulnerable to all manner of pathogens or minute imbalances in the chemistry of the water…
It was then that I heard noises drawing near - steps on the metal scaffolding of the walkway.
Something looking to pass, I figured, or perhaps come to look at the fish themselves.
Except they slowed down, and came to a halt as they approached my position, eventually revealing a familiar face distorted in the glass beside me.
Ikari-kun.
I suppose he, too, was something rather than nothing right now, for a short time…
As it would seem, he had chosen to dedicate some of that time to seeking me out:
"Hi there Ayanami! I'm really glad you were able to make it this time! Have you been feeling alright?"
"...Yes. I had no assignments today, so I was able to come."
This was indeed the reason, yet I do not think that it was firstly my schedule that he had been asking about – I had simply responded in so far as I knew how.
There was so much enclosed in that simple question that I knew not quite what to do with, even if it was, on the surface, but a routine inquiry.
Or, the words were the same, but his intonation and the shifts of his face were by no means simply casual.
There it was again. Casual, easy evidence of concern, as if this were as simple and natural as could be. It was easier to contemplate that this warmth and concern was simply exactly what it appeared to be, nothing more nothing less, that it might not need complicated ulterior motifs or justifications behind it – If one could be, if they were willing to really look, be moved to compassion for simple fish, was it not believable that he might harbor goodwill toward a being he could even speak with?
Of course, it might be easier with an animal or an infant, which may not have demands of their own, or opinions to disagree with.
The sentiment might be pinned to something that is but a symbol or misunderstanding, just some temporary idea of me that might easily be dispelled, something built on false pretenses.
But whatever it was, at least in this moment, he must have genuinely believed that his intentions were as sincere as could be – the feeling was plain in the tone of his voice. He probably could not have faked or concealed anything if he wanted to…
His relief at getting a response, and probably, succeeding in even addressing me, was no less apparent in his aspectabund countenance, not the small surge of excitement, half-sublimated nervousness, that came forward as he felt himself settled into the common space of a moment, looking to carry on the conversation, and noticing, as some initial tension receded, for example the fish in the tank before us.
"Looks pretty cramped in there – they ought to have more space to swim."
Once again, he probably did not mean anything unkind by speaking of such things as if they were feasible. It was not his intention to mock or make light of anything.
The worst he had done was to naively assume a better world – a fairer world, perhaps.
One that was merciful and harmonious.
He simply did not know any better – but that did not change the facts:
"Impossible…" I stated, sadly acknowledging the reality though wholly understanding it tugged at me with sorrow for the worthy, lovable small creatures: "These little ones can only live in here. In this, they are the same as me."
And for both of us, the fragile artificial bubble that had allowed us to cling onto being against the flow of entropy was very soon going to pop.
...
Eventually, we were finished touring the content of the cleanrooms and led back to the lockers in which we had left the clothing we arrived in.
This was then accounted a good time for a lunch break.
There was a metal grid overpass, nothing special really – it was surrounded to all sides by the staircases and large tubes that made up the machinery of the facility.
To its right and its left, there was a string of potted plants – and these were plants who were very much part of the facility's purpose, new little sprouts and cuttings of endangered species that were being reared for their multiplying and propagation.
Yet nonetheless, their arrangement in two rows by each side of the passage had probably been done with some thought given to decoration. They could have been placed anywhere where one might find sufficient light – here, they would have offered the researchers and technicians working here with little specks of beauty, just for its own sake, without any particular reason: Fragile, little specks of green, alive among the mental and concrete.
Perhaps for this reason, this spot was chosen as a suitable place to dine.
A large blue picnic blanket was rolled out, and a smaller green one, for good measure.
It was not long before Ikari-kun, now back in his white polo shirt, began arranging various boxes and vessels from the backpack he had brought with him.
There were paper cups as well.
It seems that he had planned to provide us all with refreshments.
Beside him, all other members of our group set themselves down on the fabric – all of them left behind their shoes at the edges of the cloth, with the obvious exception of Major Katsuragi's bird, but he too drew near, becoming a part of the loose, rough circle that the others had arranged themselves into.
I gathered from this that I was to remove my shoes as well, but beyond that, I was uncertain how to proceed.
The others sat closely together, taking on a variety of marked poses and making a great deal of noise.
The space seemed very, very filled.
I was reluctant to draw near.
At a loss, I carefully sat down at the edge of the lower blanket.
Eventually, Ikari-kun outfitted everybody with a small dark box of what was presumably our lunch, but I wasn't sure that I would have use for it – most of what he'd laid out in larger boxes for common use contained meat, so the smaller boxes might be the same.
This suspicion was confirmed when the others opened theirs.
All around me, they descended into a flurry of motion and excitement.
I had been invited and offered free things besides, so I was not in a place to complain or question the others' pre-established reunion, but all in all I had never understood why people got so excited about mere sustenance, even getting together with others in order to consume food together, or going to expensive specialized places even to buy themselves food and share it with each other.
I'd read in some stories about how many people even had ritualized practices in their homes – a common staple in fiction books was for a young person to be reprimanded for wanting to consume their food in their room.
I never understood where the problem was with that.
Certainly you could make the argument that it was the parents' role to control that their child ate the correct kinds and amounts of sustenance, but if the child promised to do this, particularly if it was an older adolescent, was this not redundant?
I supposed that human beings made rituals around all kinds of things. Graduations. Weddings. Jubilees. Harvest time. The simple passing of the seasons.
Still I never saw what could be exciting about food: Was it not the most trivial thing there is?
I had never thought of it as more than a hassle:
Another annoying thing I'd have to do to keep on living.
To keep on suffering.
To waste time on this foreign hunk of flesh that somehow carried my consciousness from room to room.
I did not have a dining table in my apartment.
If possible, I preferred to take care of such maintenance tasks in as swift and uncomplicated manner as I could. There was no need for frills.
Food pills, instant noodles, protein bars, various shakes – so long as it was cheap, quick to prepare, predictable, and technically nutritionally complete, I cared not.
I had not wished to preoccupy myself with such a sysyphean task as the maintenance of the flesh for longer than strictly necessary to carry out my duties.
It was bad enough that I had to do it at all – that pangs of fatigue or hunger would over and anon distract me from my thoughts, or whatever I had been reading.
I had figured that all that kept the others doing it as they did was simple habituation to ritual, but, neither was I interested in it. I had not paid attention. It never seemed relevant.
We had lunch breaks at school, but I never went to buy myself anything – I could wait till I got home. I preferred to spend that time having some peace to myself.
Not so the others:
They seemed to find great pleasure in what they had been served, trading words of great pride excitement.
Though Ikari-kun was the one who prepared it, even the Second Child could not find anything wrong with it: "It's not half bad!"
Mr. Kaji did not hold back even that much: "Superbly grilled and finely seasoned!"
"You've got to give me the recipe!" beamed Horaki-san.
Aida, as usual, did not want for enthusiasm: "It's hard to believe that this is the usual half-synthetic meat substitute!"
But Suzuhara, too, was impressed: "Looks like Shinji's been hiding his secret talents from us..."
Despite the all-around rejoicing, Ikari-kun did not seem to account his skills as anything special.
"It's really not that big a deal." he claimed, a bit abashed, while handing out paper cups full of soup. "It's just that Misato-san isn't much of a cook, so, if I wanted anything other than instant food, I kind of had to learn to make it myself…"
Mr. Kaji, however, seemed to consider this an opportunity to perhaps shore up Ikari-kun's self confidence, or maybe impart some more wisdom to the younger generations:
"Shinji-kun, men who can cook get all the girls."
Aida apparently considered this a good opportunity to make a point, turning toward Suzuhara to make a remark:
"See?"
"Nah. I'm old fashioned."
...what does that have to do with cooking? Oh. Oh right. One of those arbitrary ritualistic social things.
If I'm not mistaken, this particular convention was considered outdated, however.
Horaki-san expressed some displeasure:
"Geez, Suzuhara!"
The Second Child, however, was not content to let it rest at a mere admonishment:
"Are there really still people in this day and age who believe that kind of backwards stuff? How dumb can you be?"
"What did you say? I'm only living by my principles!"
"Every time you open your mouth, you get dumber."
Fortunately, before the debate could escalate any further, Ikari-kun distracted them both by the timely offering of some rice balls.
He did not really voice a position of his own either way, but even so, he was always concerned with ensuring a degree of harmony in his surroundings.
He always tried to defuse whatever arguments the Second was willing to start without taking any side himself.
I was not so sure whether or not that was really a virtue, though I suppose that it did speak of some form of goodwill, simplistic as it may have been.
Even with his intervention, the noise of the crowd had barely died down at all.
But of course.
Of course they are loud. Of course they would take pleasure in the processes of life.
They are living – same as all the animals we saw before.
Everything here wants to live, and relishes living, even though it is doomed to perish.
They have life -
They are not artificial constructs that are barely holding together, their unlike components screaming every moment to disentangle themselves.
To seek pleasure, to take pleasure in the activities that sustain life – was their very nature. Congregating with others of their kind, taking in sustenance…
Such is their nature.
It's probably what you might call 'vibrancy' or 'vitality', the drive to live.
Something I don't have.
I am outside of nature.
Or, if I did have a nature, I presume it would be something very different from all these kinds of life…
...Huh?
Oh. Oh right.
Ikari-kun had just spoken to me:
"Sorry, Ayanami. Did you not like it?"
I don't know why that surprised me.
Logically, it should not have. Of course he would see me. Of course he would concern himself with me just as he would any other person here.
Still I felt surprised, as if I had just suddenly been reminded that I was, in fact, in this room with them, still holding onto the little box that had been placed in my lap earlier.
I think I had figured that I would just sit off the side and do nothing, let the others continue to enjoy their meals, and then place the box back into the picnic back in the end, or hand it out in case anybody wanted seconds.
I could wait to eat till I got home. It really wasn't that important.
Though I did not want Ikari-kun worrying or blaming himself about possibly having made a mistake with the cooking, so it seemed right that I should explain myself:
"No, it's not that. It just don't eat meat."
As ever so often, the Second Child seemed primed to take offense at every single thing that either of us did or said. First, she chided Ikari-kun:
"Why do people in this country always apologize even when they've done nothing wrong?"
Then, she went off at me:
"And you – Living things eat other living things to survive! If you let good food go to waste, that just means they died for nothing!"
What is she justifying herself for?
I never said that she can't eat meat.
For some reason, humans sometimes take it as criticism or offense when others express other preferences than their own.
I can't say I really understand it, so, I had little confidence in my ability to say anything that wouldn't just be taken as more cause for offense.
"What is it? You thinking you can just pick a fight with me because you're the Commander's Pet?"
So far as I can discern, the only one picking a fight here is her.
What am I even supposed to say to that?
That is when Suzuhara asked our pardon to move across the picnic rug.
It seems that the Second Child need not have worried about anything going to waste.
Not only did he pick my portion out of my hand, he was soon followed by Major Katsuragi's pet bird, who, it seems, also had some interest in additional fish.
Something of a squabble ensued, ending with the bird chasing Suzuhara while vocalizing a chirp that sounded remarkably like the word 'Moron'.
I was aware that some birds could imitate human noises, but I didn't think penguins were on that list. Regular ones probably aren't, but I did recall Dr. Akagi mentioning that this one used to be a lab animal before the Major adopted him.
Mildly intriguing though this might seem, the Second Child was not impressed:
"How dumb can you get?"
Soon, however, my attention was called away from the spectacle when I noted Ikari-kun moving closer, carrying another large thermos that, like the one whose contents he'd been handing outt before, might be filled with soup:
"Then, how about some Miso Soup?"
With a hint of a gentle smile on his lips, he unscrewed the top of the vessel and proceeded to fill it with steaming warm liquid.
It was somewhat turbid and dotted here and there with bits of tofu and seaweed.
"Try it - It'll warm you up."
He carefully handed it to me.
Our fingers might have brushed, ever so slightly.
I'm not really sure. It happened quickly.
I figured that I had already deviated from my usual habits so many time this day.
I could indeed feel the warmth of the liquid seeping into my fingers, not too different from the tea a while back.
I decided that I might as well give it a try.
It felt kind of strange in my mouth, sort of, textured.
But not in a bad way, really, more like…
...how to describe it...
…?
?!
!
...this… this is good.
This is really good.
I think my eyes might have gone wide.
"It's delicious."
...
The event more or less petered out once the intended activities were finished with.
One last thing we did before departing was to visit one of the facility's higher towers from which most of its area could overlooked, especially the water purification and reclamation machinery spread out upon a wide plateau of interconnected basins.
Aida was using this opportunity to get it all on camera, gushing somewhat about the mechanisms and speculating about how it worked – or at least, he was when I last heard him.
I had taken this opportunity to step outside the enclosed glass facade of the tower, standing outside on the terminal platform of a small external metal stair, maybe a fire exit.
Horaki-san had been somewhat worried and advised me against it, but, it is not as if I had anything to fear from falling.
I wished to imprint this place into my memory, to look around at wider angels than the straight glass windows permitted, and feel my hair and skin whipped upon by the wind.
Somewhere down at the railing next to the largest reserve tank of purified water, I spotted Mr. Kaji, who had taken Ikari-kun down with him to discuss some things – with some delay, it occurred to me that he was probably seeing this as imparting some wisdom on the next generation, or as giving some special attention to the one who had been thrust into this situation without preparation.
It took some thinking to get there: Oh right, of course, he doesn't know the end is coming. He thinks there will be future generations. He is not aware that the execution of the angels is already scheduled, same as the day of Third Impact.
His bringing us here shows how he values all these little creatures – he would still remember a world where they used to be abundant, after all. He must wish deeply for their preservation.
From his point of view, it must seem very imperative to ensure that Ikari-kun not decide to leave again. So, one might say that he was merely furthering his own agenda by taking the boy under his wing. He did not take the Second Child down with him, though this had left her somewhat peeved (not far from here, she stood with her arms crossed behind the glass) – but of course, her motivation as a pilot could be considered to be assured...
I might have said so, once upon a while, I think.
Much talk is made, in books discussing the motivations of both real and imagined persons, about what someone's 'true' motivation might be, and which ones are excuses.
People may have excuses for instrumental purposes indeed, but I do not think that it is really so simple – there can be multiple, equally true reasons behind the same action.
Indeed, people probably act when they have more reasons to do something than not to.
People may bring regrets upon themselves if they are only aware of one part of them – which they may deem 'right', or 'strong' or 'reasonable', but the presence of such unacknowledged reasons does not mean the ones professed are false, just that they are not the only ones.
I thought it quite likely that, in regarding us, and particularly Ikari-kun and the Second, he felt that same wish for the well-being of other creatures as one might have toward an endearing animal or young child, or anything that might strike one as worthy of being kept from harm.
Even if this did not negate my earlier observations that he was probably looking to ensure that the angels kept being repelled, and to make an impression on his preferred choice of mate by giving attention to her young wards.
I didn't really use to understand that before, but I think I was beginning to.
And, I suppose, the same might be true for Ikari-kun:
He may have approached me, in part, out of pity, obligation or the desire for more friends – or even some idea of getting closer to his father, but, clearly, whatever other reasons there may be, it was apparent that he relished in having me present and was honestly concerned for my well being.
At least, there was a lot indicating it and nothing that logically contradicted it.
Judging by every indication that I had, there appeared to be a bond between us, as genuine as any bond could ever hope to be, if they were not all just transaction in the end.
If such a thing as bonds could be said to exist at all.
There were more reasons than there were to think otherwise – it is prudent to give precedence to the null hypothesis at first, to assume that potential objects, principles or relations to do exist.
But at this point it would require more assumptions to explain them away.
It would be less reasonable not to believe in it.
Everything would suggest that he really valued having me around, just for its own, intrinsic reward, and that this coincided with sincere well-wishes – nothing more, nothing less.
Everything would suggest this, except, I suppose, prior experience.
The prospect was unfamiliar, after a life in which I'd never had reason to thank anyone.
The very idea seemed foreign enough that I was not sure I could have recognized it, even if I had come to experience it.
So I stumble around grasping in the dark like someone drawing a unicorn from a description of a rhinoceros, or the scaled likeness of a lion from a country too northernly for lions to exist.
No wonder then, that Mr. Kaji had thought it important to show us this.
It is not as if we did not know that the survival of life as we knew it was as stake.
Ikari-kun and Second, surely, must know it, even if their actions did not always seem to bear this out.
That is because for an action provening from rational knowledge to override the preoccupations of instinct and emotion (such as status-seeking or fear), the active exertion of self-control is required, which draws from the same pool of mental energy as willpower, concentration, socializing, and even maintaining discipline throughout physical activity.
It takes effort to hold abstract, technical awareness in your mind, at least it seems to for most humans.
Ikari-kun had not been reluctant to fight because he did not know the risks, but because he struggled to keep this present in his mind when he was frightened or in pain.
'Humanity' or, 'the living creatures that populate this planet' were but words on a paper.
Coming here, however, might change this – give him something tangible to associate all this with.
Seeing the animals here, having a picnic with his gathered friends, or whatever Kaji himself was currently discussing with him – Those were all images to imprint upon the senses and his intuitive associations, or moments to touch his heart.
Maybe, one day, he would think back to this moment and find a source of strength in the remembered images, something to hang onto.
Of course, this was all based on false premises. Third Impact could not be prevented; The scenario would take place whether Ikari-kun was a part of it or not. It was initially conceived without him, with me as EVA 01's pilot. He only came here because I was injured, and if he left, others would take his place – perhaps the dummy plugs, for I had heard that Dr. Akagi had seen a significant breakthrough in their development recently. The project was entering its hot phase.
The pieces were being gathered. Even the advancement of technology had become a predictable process these days. The remaining unknowns were being illuminated just as it had been predicted.
I could see the end coming every day; It was only that not many knew to read the signs written plain upon everything, even the countless copies of our very DNA in each and every of our cells.
Still, I did not think Mr. Kaji foolish.
Humans could only act on what they knew; To ignore that and expect people to predict the correct outcome from the start, to assign some moralistic value even, that unwanted outcomes must be down to hidden character flaws, would be unreasonable.
The knowledge that you have is your only means to know the correct relations between cause and effect. If you don't know the effect of your actions, you cannot get the outcome you want even with the best of intentions. Even the degree of compassion you might have depends on what you think the situation is – so it is not at all possible, like some suggest, to arrive at a result by putting aside your understanding. Your feelings and intuitions might even work against you.
For example, well-meaning parents might subject their children to barbaric rituals accepted in their culture because that culture's association tie it to the parental responsibility to protect the child. Behind any manner of nonsensical beauty ritual meant to conform to ideals that now seem as arbitrary and superstitious to us as the pyramids is the very rational desire not to be unloved, abandoned or left without the means to provide for oneself.
It is sensible behavior for pack animals, based on the limited understanding they had accessible for themselves.
And this includes, of course, the unique barbaric rituals of our own day, such as historically unprecedented workloads or the self-abuse in scientifically unsound diets.
The disposition of someone looking to find a dubious cure of poisonous mercury for their child in the middle ages is little different from a parent looking to buy legitimate medication today, and even very recently, there have been many well-known errors in what was thought to be common sense.
In that sense, we were all imprisoned, limited by our imperfect ability to understand the world.
I could not not know this: For my entire existence, I had been working to bring about an event that those around me widely feared – but they did so because Third Impact would only bring destruction to them so far as they knew, and because they were unaware that the continuation of what they'd always known was already wholly impossible.
Even if they were told that a transfiguration into another kind of life was the only means to continue, chances are that many would not be able to handle it, or refuse to accept it and act accordingly.
I could indeed not imagine that someone like the Second Child or Major Katsuragi would so easily surrender the lives they had known – I could see how fiercely they were currently fighting to keep a hold of them.
People would squander the few remaining options of survival in actions of panic and desperation, or so the commander had told me. They would refuse to accept the inevitable, because their inner animals were programmed to keep living and their hearts bound fast to all they were attached to.
In such a state, they would not be receptive to comprehending the big picture, so one could not even fault them -
One could only act based on the knowledge available to them.
Well. I had known this in theory.
But I was yet to come to know what this means in practice and in earnest – and I would know it upon my very flesh, or even the fabric of my soul.
It had occurred to me already then, to wonder about the commander – does he simply have the foresight and strength to think first of the big picture always, or does he too have something more concrete or personal that he thinks of to keep himself going, some secondary goal beyond peace on earth, and if yes, what might it be?
It was not for me to know.
I was only an experiment, probably.
Someone who had never had reason to thank him.
I also thought of this: Those who were fighting to preserve the present form of life -
(who may not have the strength to do what needs to be done without the false promise of a continued status quo?)
People like Mr. Kaji, the Major or the Second Child.
If they knew what I knew they might ask me this:
If the sights of this place had so moved me, should it not have come into my heart to wish that it could keep existing?
Would it not be grand the corals and the jellyfish and the little tiny reef fish and even the plankton might not have to perish?
Had I no pity for the people who had gone out of their way to invite and include me?
The answer is yes. I did feel sorrow and regret in considering their inevitable erasure.
But I was never one to expect that something would be possible simply because I wished for it.
I could be sad that it all must perish without ever thinking to doubt the certainty that it must be so, just as one can be sad that a cherished day ends without entertaining any foolish dreams of halting the sun in its tracks.
Still, I think it is not bad that I had come here.
That I had seen all this, and come to better know the weight of what I must do.
If I would be the final executioner, it was only right that I should carry the knowledge of all I would erase, including of those who don't have names.
A sacrifice, even an inevitable one, should not be done lightly or without thought.
…
I could not quite look at the world in the same way.
Mr. Kaji had rented a minivan to drive us back, so that we would not have to be riding public transport after dark, and as long as the remaining daylight lasted, I spend glued to one of the windows, fingers on the pane, looking out on the landscape beyond.
On the way here, I had hardly looked at it.
Why would I have? It was just another piece of land. I basically knew what was in it.
Or so I'd thought.
But I could no longer think like that:
The grass and plants and flowers that had once seemed pointless and interchangeable to me now stood out as remnants of a greater ecosystem, living beings in their own right with their own, unique histories and small life stories, and I found myself thinking:
'Even this?'
Is this, too, beyond salvation? Is this, too, so rotten than its only salvation is a purge in the deluge of Third Impact?
This too?
And, if so, how sad.
How sad that this must be.
I wished I had spent more time looking when I drove here in the morning, but soon, the light had faded, and the opportunity was gone.
I suppose this was true for most of the opportunities that had ever existed on this planet.
The clock was just about to strike twelve.
In the night, the city lights appeared as passing streaks beyond the window, giving it all the touch of something unreal, the invitation to imagine a world that might be just the same in this limited visibility, but altogether different once the lights had come back on.
The landscape curved before us, foothills of the mountains encircling Tokyo-3.
The street was only visible as procession strings of light, red ones in the lanes before us, and white for the vehicles that streaked across.
Simplistic as the picture was, one became aware that it was really just an arbitrary arrangement of lights. The same image might be produced in a different universe with very different physics, where eyes adapted to interpret it would construct a very different world from it -
were it not for the last vestige of reality that was the cool pane of the window resting against my forehead.
Since this was a rented vehicle, it lacked the kind of characteristic animal smell typically found in homes or family vehicles.
Even this sensation of it as any sort of unreal intermediate place was just due our sight's interpretation, in any other respect it was every bit as solid as every other arbitrary part of the world at the earth's surface.
The world would not actually change much when Third Impact came: The molecules at its surface would simply come into a different arrangement, moving around in a liquid rather than being bound up in tightly packed solids.
And yet, a world would be gone.
And yet, some of it was still there:
The last lights fizzling out.
The last slender towers sinking down in the rising turbid seas.
The people sitting besides and in front of me had been consigned to death for so long that speaking to them ought to have seemed like reaching into the pages of a book to rework the narrative, as if to warm the fates of figures who had long since been lost.
And yet…
"Ikari-kun?"
"- Huh?" the sleepy boy beside me came back to sudden awareness. "What's the matter?"
He must have been nodding off – I think most of the passengers had been lulled into an indistinct dozing by the steady motions of the vehicle.
"Sorry – Did I perhaps startle you? Is it a bad time right now?"
"No – I'm just surprised. It's rare for you to talk to anyone of your own accord. Not that that's a bad thing! Not at all...!"
"I'm sorry. I've just been thinking, and it occurred to me that there is something I should tell you."
"…ah, is there?"
Judging by the instant apprehension in his voice, he must have immediately assumed it to be something bad. Maybe I could have phrased things differently to put him more at ease.
Yet, I could not change this now. My best bet was just to bring to conclusion what I had chosen to begin:
"I am glad that you spoke to me about maybe coming along. You were right. It was a worthwhile experience – I think I learned something important today…"
"...yeah. I'm glad to hear that… Me too, I think. I can't say what I think about it yet, but I think that it's going to be important…"
Beyond the glass, the noises of the highway continued rushing past.
By now you have probably figured out that if I'm taking a while to update, it's because the chapter turned out to be A Long(TM)
