Creation began on 06-21-20
Creation ended on 08-01-20
Neon Genesis Evangelion
Talismans: Living Dead Man
A/N: Can forgiveness be given if one has a chance to atone?
"…Hey," the woman that led the two men as they searched for the talismans uttered as they drove through the streets of Ōta, holding up the torch-like device with the dragonheads, showing that one of the heads was aglow. "We got a talisman in our vicinity."
One of the men was driving their van and looked across the street where a vagabond was, the same way the talisman locator was pointing.
"Let's make sure that we check every possible subject that may have a talisman on them," the guy driving the van sighed, and the woman moved the locator away, only to have one of the other dragonheads' eyes glow, indicating that the talisman was where it had originally.
Then, as the vagabond walked further down the street, the locator kept pointing towards them.
"What's another homeless person that gets beaten to death on the street?" The guy in the back questioned; they had all dealt with those less fortunate than they had been, suggesting that they had crossed the line more than once.
"People die every day," the woman expressed, and the guy at the wheel turned the van around, driving behind the vagabond.
They stopped beside the guy and opened the side door up, and the second man got out to grab him. If he had a talisman, it would be the easiest one to acquire so far.
Whoosh! The vagabond turned around and jump-kicked the man away from him, losing his brown jacket and revealing a face that many hadn't seen in years.
"What the…" The woman gasped as she and the other man got out of the van. "You're Dr. Katsuragi! You're thee Dr. Katsuragi!"
The man, Dr. Katsuragi, looking exactly as he had been depicted in an old newspaper photograph from before Second Impact, listing the number of casualties from the epicenter of where the catastrophe occurred, looked at them and then fled down an alleyway.
"Isn't he supposed to be dead?" The guy on the ground asked them. "He's quite springy for a dead man."
"Probably one of the talismans," the woman suspected. "Let's get him."
-x-
"…Is he asleep, Auntie?" Desdemona asked, looking over at Shinji as he lay on his futon like he had passed out, with Auntie sitting in a chair beside him.
"Nope," she answered, pointing to the talisman hanging around his neck. "He's helping to do surveillance in case anyone's in the city looking for us."
"I know I only asked once, but using that talisman as much as he does, are you sure it's okay for him? Something of this sort can't be healthy."
"We've done our homework on these talismans, Desdemona. The Sheep Talisman doesn't affect anyone on a physical level. Astral projection enables the wielder to vacate their body, which is reduced to an incapacitated state no different from being asleep. If anything, the only risks to the body is being left alone for too long or in a constant state of vulnerability, like wandering around in astral form for weeks, leaving the body to deteriorate due to lack of food or exercise, or being in a room where someone can take advantage of you without your knowledge."
"Shinji's fortunate that he can trust us to watch over his body while he wanders around Ōta for people that shouldn't be here."
"Indeed, he is."
Desdemona, barely into her thirties, was among the taller employees at Auntie's shop. Her crime that ended up putting her in jail in her earlier years as a young teen was running away from home in the aftermath of Second Impact, which more than likely led to saving her life when her parents were murdered by a neighbor that had broken in wanting their food supplies. It was only after she had gone back did she see what her neighbor had done to her parents…and murdered her out of anger. Because of the brutality of her own crime and the fact that it was during a hard time for the majority of the world, not just Japan, Desdemona, originally known as Miyuki Higurashi, was placed in juvenile detention for six years, just long enough for society to rebuild from the horrors that had been unleashed upon the world. And after she was released, she was left with nothing and nowhere to go. It was either by luck or by an act of the kami that Desdemona was found by Auntie and offered a job at her shop. And since then, she has never left Ōta.
"I thought your shift ended two hours ago," Auntie told her.
"It did, but I have nowhere else to be," she responded, implying that she had no reason to leave the shop and return to her apartment during a time like this. "Dragon and Juggernaut are watching the shop in the shadows of the night and everyone else has gone home for the night. Well, everyone that has a place to call home that isn't the shop."
Then she looked up…and saw Shinji's astral form phasing through the ceiling, revealing that just like Juggernaut, Dragon and Serpentina, she could see him just like Auntie had when he showed up at her shop in the night years ago. He looked as though he had something to say.
"Do you have something to say, Shinji?" She asked him.
Yeah, I do, he responded. Three people that don't belong in Ōta, a woman and two men, are chasing this homeless guy that is quite springy and may be invulnerable. I saw the woman shoot him in the back, but he just kept on running. And…I think he saw me. I told him to run to the shop, just to be sure.
"Did you see anything unusual before you left?" Auntie asked him.
The woman had a strange torch with her that had four dragonheads, Shinji revealed.
"A torch with dragonheads? I read something about an object like that belonging to the Fire Demon Shendu. Based on legends, he used the object as a means to locate the powers that reside in the talismans that used to belong to the twelve noble animals."
"So, it's likely these three serve Shendu?" Desdemona asked her.
"Yes, it's possible."
Oh, great, went Shinji, feeling like he just did something he was going to regret later.
"However, that's only if they have the locator," Auntie told them, "and the legends don't state that Shendu has more than one."
Desdemona then got an idea; if these three that were in Ōta were after the talismans, then they would likely come here for the ones Shinji and Auntie had, but because they were to be Shinji's once he amassed the funds he needed to pay Auntie for them, so the locator they were using needed to be confiscated.
"Auntie," she spoke to her boss, "does something like what they might be using to locate talismans be dangerous if they brought it here?"
"Yes, Desdemona," Auntie responded.
-x-
It was against her better judgment, but Misato drove back to the antiquity shop that she discovered that Ms. Rekishi lived at. Maybe she was kidding herself, but she had to hear from the boss lady why someone like Shinji Ikari preferred working at a junk shop when he could've worked a paper route or as a grocery store clerk. That, and because she wanted to confront the kid that dared her to shoot him before he escaped from NERV and returned to this city.
What the Hell was he thinking? She thought, coming to a stop at a traffic light.
Thud! Someone ran into her car and climbed over the hood.
"Hey!" She yelled, and saw that it was a guy. "Watch where you're… Huh?!"
The guy stopped and looked at her for a moment, but then resumed running. There was something about his face that made the woman think that for a second that she was…
"It couldn't be," she uttered, and then saw two guys and a van go down the way the other guy was running, right towards the antique shop, which suddenly lit up like a Christmas tree. "What the Hell is going on here?!"
The light turned green and she sped over towards the shop.
-x-
Desdemona opened the door to the shop and saw the homeless guy run towards her.
"Get your ass in here!" She told him, and he did just that. "Now, who told you to come here?!"
"A dead boy!" The guy answered her as he collapsed onto the floor. "Well, I thought he was dead! He was see-through, but he seemed full of life!"
"Fourteen years old, skinny, dark hair, wearing black slacks and a white, button-up shirt?"
"Yeah, him! Is he a ghost?!"
"No, he just likes to do that with his free time. Why are they chasing you?"
"I don't know why they're chasing me. My best guess is that they want me dead."
Desdemona looked at the two guys coming towards the door and quickly locked it.
"Come with me," she told the homeless guy as they broke through the glass. "Oh, this is going to cost me."
She dragged him to the back of the shop where Dragon and Juggernaut were.
"You two do your bouncer thing!" She told them, and they got up from the table where they were playing cards.
"Okay, we know you got the homeless guy," they heard one of the men say. "He's actually Dr. Katsuragi, and he has something that doesn't belong to him. Just hand it over, and we'll be on our way."
Juggernaut's body glowed red again…and he was wearing that armor like before at Shinji's apartment building.
Dragon's body glowed green…and something emerged from his back like a ghost, taking shape and resembling a greenish dragon with red eyes that was the size of a refrigerator (A/N: Picture Shenron from Dragon Ball).
"Get out!" Dragon yelled, and the dragon he had summoned grabbed one of the intruding men by his neck and raised him off his feet.
"What the Hell?!" The other guy gasped, seeing his ally being lifted off his feet by an invisible force, and then saw one of the two men in front of him approach him. "Aaah!"
PUNCH! Juggernaut let him have it and sent him flying backwards towards the front of the shop, where he inconveniently landed on the woman from the van.
"Hey, get off me!" She yelled at him, and saw Desdemona approach them.
"Going somewhere?" Desdemona asked them, and yanked the guy off the woman, just to pick her by her neck. "I could choke the life out of you right here and now, but then it would reflect badly on me, so I'll just say this: Hand over the locator. You don't deserve it."
She felt Desdemona tighten her left hand on her neck and feared for her life.
"Alright! Alright!" She whined, revealing the locator to her.
Desdemona took it and threw her out of the shop.
"This place is off-limits," she told her as Dragon and Juggernaut came out from behind her with the other two men. "You come back here again, and you're going to need a doctor. Capiche?"
The lady just had to assume that this place was run by some freaks and nodded that she understood, and then watched as the two men she was with were released by the other men that were at the shop.
"Have a nice evening," Dragon told them, and they got up and fled in the van. "Well, that wasn't so bad."
"They broke the glass on the door," Juggernaut told him. "It was bad!"
"What the Hell is going on here?!" They stopped and turned back outside, seeing the woman they had been informed of earlier by Shinji.
"Aw, shit," Desdemona sighed. "This…is not what I had in mind. What are you doing here, Ms. Katsuragi? This is…"
"Did you say Katsuragi?!" The guy from earlier gasped as he came out front, seeing them. "Is her name Katsuragi?"
"I take it you know this woman?" Juggernaut asked him.
Misato looked at him again…and felt her memories of a man she felt nothing but bitter resentment towards come to the surface. Even after all these years, he looked the same, albeit dirty and covered in grime. It was just uncanny, the way he appeared.
"Who…who are you?" She demanded of this man.
"Hideaki Katsuragi," he introduced himself. "I'm a… I was a researcher of alternative energy."
"That can't be. He…you… That man died fifteen years ago."
"A lot of people died fifteen years ago, Ms. Katsuragi," Dragon told her. "Nobody bothers to keep track of how many, anymore."
"How does someone like you survive…when everyone else that day didn't?" Misato demanded again; she couldn't believe that…that this man in front of her…was her father.
"I've been asking myself that question ever since that day," Hideaki responded.
Desdemona picked up the torch-like object those three trespassers left behind, and found that it was glowing on all four dragonheads in front of Hideaki.
"Well, you clearly have something on you that may explain why you survived up to now," she explained to them, but then sighed. "Perhaps we should take this inside the shop?"
-x-
"…Our boss is gonna kill us for losing the locator," the woman expressed as she stopped the van by a park and took out her cell phone, dialing a number. "We need reinforcements. We need the Shadowkhan."
-x-
Misato was surprised to find that Shinji was also in the shop, and he was surprised to see her here, but found that he was more at ease around these strange people that seemed to have great respect for this elder woman that ran the shop.
"Shinji," she greeted.
"Miss Katsuragi," he responded, and sat down at the table that Dragon and Juggernaut had been sitting at earlier.
"I take it this lady is your boss?" She asked, pointing to Auntie.
"She is," he answered as Auntie sat down and gestured for everyone else to do the same.
Misato sat, but was hesitant due to her father sitting across from her.
"Why is that torch thing glowing?" Shinji asked Auntie.
"It's clearly meant to locate the talismans," she explained, and looked at Hideaki Katsuragi. "Mister Katsuragi, do you something have something shaped like an octagon, made of stone with a depiction of an animal with some character markings inscribed on the back?"
Shinji then showed the man an example of what Auntie was asking about by showing his Sheep Talisman to him.
"It'd be something like this, but with a different animal," he told him, "probably a member of the Chinese Zodiac."
Hideaki looked at the object the boy had on him…and lifted up his shirt, revealing some sort of vest underneath that had the coveted object embedded in it.
"I woke up adrift in the ocean," he uttered, "and found this in my possession. I wasn't sure how or even if it was some kind of fluke…but ever since that day, this thing is probably the only reason I've lived this long when I should've died."
Depicted on the talisman was a dog, revealing that it was the Dog Talisman.
"Yeah, you owe your survival to the dog," Auntie expressed. "This talisman is basically a magical version of Man's Best Friend. It restores the youthful energy of whoever holds it and ensures eternal life…so long as they continue to possess it."
"You don't actually believe that rock gives someone immortality, do you?" Misato questioned.
"We've been around Auntie enough to see things that most don't believe in," Shinji responded, defending the belief that the talismans were magical, and then took off his Sheep Talisman. "I've been using this to get away from people ever since my maternal aunt gave it to me for my fifth birthday. At first, I had no interest in it…until I discovered what it could do. Whenever I'm not up and about, I'm…out and about. Astral projection."
"You actually believe that?"
"You try it."
Misato took hold of his talisman and looked at it. It didn't even look special. There was no switch and it didn't seem like Shinji used an incantation.
"How do you use something like this?" She asked him.
"You hold it in your hand and clench it," he suggested.
Misato gripped the talisman, still not thinking it would do what Shinji told her it did for him…and it looked like the sheep depicted on it glowed for a moment.
What? She wondered, looking at everyone. I don't buy into this one bit.
"Just so that you know, Ms. Katsuragi," Auntie spoke, "you've successfully astral projected yourself from your body. Look behind you."
Misato did as she was asked by her…and saw…herself, still in the chair, looking like she had passed out.
What?!
"Excluding Shinji and perhaps your father, the rest of us can see you," Auntie explained to her. "Astral forms can pass through walls and fly around, but, unless you have a special power, like heightened spiritual awareness, and that is a real power, you can't be seen or heard unless in the realm of dreams. I wouldn't spend too much time away from your body, though; your body can only survive for so long without sustenance while your soul wanders."
Misato waved her left hand in front of Shinji, but he acted as though she wasn't there.
"Is she doing something I should be concerned about?" Shinji asked them.
"Other than waving her hand in front of you, she hasn't done anything ridiculous, like flash us," said Juggernaut to him, and Shinji gave him a scornful look.
"Please, Juggernaut, I could care less about that ridiculous photo she sent me in that crappy letter my old man sent. We've all had depressing childhoods, you really think I would behave like a typical teenager that sees a woman over twice their age and get… Whatever it is that people my age would do around people her age?"
"I'm among people her age, Shinji," went Desdemona to him as he took back the Sheep Talisman from Misato.
"You know what he means, Desdemona," Auntie expressed and Misato returned to her body, regaining consciousness. "Are you convinced now?"
"How the Hell did you get something like that in your possession?" She asked Shinji.
"Birthday gift from my maternal aunt," he repeated his reveal of who gave it to him. "Honestly, it was the only gift I was grateful for her giving me, even if I thought it was just a piece of stone with a sheep depicted on it. Among most of my possessions, I value it above all."
Hideaki then removed the Dog Talisman from his vest.
"If I no longer possess this, will I die instantly?" He asked Auntie.
"No," she answered him. "You're immortal as long as you have the talisman. You still live a regular life without the talisman, aging and all."
"Some men would give anything to live forever. But I've lived with a lifetime of regret after that day. I still hear their screams…and see their faces burning away."
"Aaaahh! Aaurgh! Aaaaahh!" The echoes of people from his expedition around him dying as he tried to get his daughter away.
Auntie then took off her Horse Talisman and offered to use it on him.
"What could that talisman do for him?" Misato questioned.
"Heal injuries," she answered.
Hideaki touched the talisman, only for a second, and it glowed and enveloped him in light.
"When I said I hear their screams, I meant it because I still felt guilty about what we did in the South Pole," he uttered, looking slightly better now. "Hey…hey, my insides don't have that mild pain I've felt for years."
Misato then grabbed hold of the Horse Talisman to see if there was something about it that was different from Shinji's Sheep Talisman.
FLASH! It glowed briefly and she felt a tingling sensation on her torso.
"I take it you had an injury?" Auntie asked her.
"I'm fine," she claimed, and Auntie then pointed to a bathroom near a refrigerator.
-x-
Returning to the shop, three people that had been after the homeless guy because they believed he had a talisman on him were back with a vengeance. And behind them was a large group of men in black, like ninjas.
"Let's get this over with," the woman said.
"Yeah," agreed the men.
-x-
"…Say, those people that chased after me earlier this evening," Hideaki brought up, "what's to keep them from coming back? What if they bring a whole gang?"
"Which is why Auntie has Dragon and Juggernaut as the enforcers at night," Shinji stated as he brought a small case over for Auntie to contain the Dog Talisman while Desdemona locked the talisman locator inside a small cupboard.
"Do you believe in sacred ground, Mr. Katsuragi?" Auntie questioned. "That certain places carry a certain measure of protection against certain dark forces? My shop is similar to sacred ground. I keep many things here that could be put to good use…with the right owners."
Auntie looked at the Dog Talisman, tempted to use it for a while, but showed restraint and closed the case and handed it back to Shinji.
Misato then came out of the bathroom, stunned to discover that her body's most prominent injury received fifteen years ago was no longer present under her clothes, and looked at her father with disbelief. If it wasn't bad enough they were both at the epicenter of the worst event ever witnessed in the history of the most traumatic events in history, it was the fact that her father had managed to survive due to a small piece of stone imbued with supernatural magic that enabled a person to live forever. And he saved her life that day…but she still resented him.
Hideaki looked at her and knew that not even old trinkets in a junk shop could remedy their strained relationship.
"Oh, Kami, you two need to sit your hides down and talk it out," Desdemona told them as she yawned. "Whatever problems you have with one another, you only live once to try and fix them…if you have the will to try, that is."
She then followed Shinji and Auntie down a flight of stairs that led to another level of the building, leaving the Katsuragis with Dragon and Juggernaut.
"She's right, you know," agreed Juggernaut as he walked back to the front of the shop. "Yo, Dragon! Keep an eye on the back of the shop! We got a bunch of guys dressed like ninjas outside with those three losers from earlier!"
Hideaki sat at the table as Dragon grabbed a large sledgehammer that was leaning against the right side of the refrigerator.
"You're kidding, right?" Misato asked, pointing to the sledgehammer Dragon had.
"It's mainly for scare tactics," he told her, "but I've struck people with it in their arms or legs to get the message that I'll go down protecting everything and everyone in this shop."
Misato then sat down as the young man walked away to a different part of the shop.
"That's commitment," Hideaki told her.
"No, that sounds more like crazy," she countered. "I don't know these people, but the boy, Shinji Ikari, my job has currently given me some grief because of his actions."
"What has he done? He doesn't seem like a troublemaker. And on that matter, what do you do?"
"I work for NERV, the successor organization to GEHIRN, the organization you used to work for. My job requires me to command children born after Second Impact to pilot large, cybernetic behemoths called Evas to face unknown entities codenamed Angels."
"Angels? Like the one I helped to find and excavate in the South Pole? The First Angel?"
"That's right."
"And what did the boy do?"
"He ran from NERV, refusing to comply with his father's request for him to stay and pilot the Eva. He hasn't been…cooperative."
"Wait a minute, you mean, his father is Gendo Ikari?"
"That's right."
"No offense to Shinji, but that Gendo isn't fit to be a father to anyone."
"You're not one to talk."
"And I have to live with that, but what I say about Gendo is the truth. He's unfit. He doesn't know the first thing about being a parent."
"He's the one tasked with leading NERV, so what he says goes."
"Even if his son wants nothing to do with him?"
"We're dealing with a crisis, so we don't have time to ponder morality."
"You sound like him, Misato."
"You've been declared dead for fifteen years, so you'll have to forgive me if I can't believe everything you say."
"If your job is to direct children to pilot cybernetic weapons, why make such a fuss over one kid when there are probably others that have been informed of what's going on and have been trained to do what this one wants nothing to do with? I mean, was he informed ahead of time? Was he given a choice?"
"Again, we didn't have the luxury of pondering morality."
"Misato, I know it means nothing to you to hear this from me, but if he doesn't want to do what you and Gendo Ikari want him to do, you should leave him alone. Just move on to the next person that has the will to listen to you."
"Because we don't have the luxury of waiting for the next pilot to show up when the next Angel could show up in days. He spent several hours in an Eva, so he has the basics down."
"And he ran back to here because…what, a creature showed up or he saw an opportunity to flee? And your orders were to bring him back to his father, even if it means using force?"
"His father isn't…the understanding type."
"So…you're going to make such a fuss, cross the lines of morality and use whatever methods you have at your disposal…just to push one kid that has every right to refuse you…until he comes back to work for NERV?"
"Those…were my orders."
"What do you know about Shinji Ikari? What can you tell me about him?"
"Beyond the fact that he up and ran and dared me to shoot him when he left Tokyo-3, there's hardly a thing in his file that helps to understand him. He used to live with his relatives, but later went to live on his own. He's been living here in Ōta ever since he left his aunt and uncle's…and works here for that Auntie woman along with a bunch of people that have criminal records."
"How many children would prefer living on their own instead of being in the care of adults?"
"Oh, don't tempt me to answer that question."
"So, he's independent in a sense. He's simply rebelling against people he doesn't know or trust."
"Stop defending his actions like you know what he's been through! You don't know anything! You've been gone for fifteen years! Everyone we have ever known or loved died after Second Impact! For fifteen years, I've blamed you for everything that went wrong, and it's exactly your fault the world got dragged halfway to Hell! If you hadn't taken me with you to the South Pole when you did, I wouldn't have to hate you so much!"
Misato got up and walked away to the front of the shop, seeing Juggernaut standing in front of the doors and windows that were covered by the security fencing, seeing that there were a bunch of men outside dressed like ninjas.
"You remind me of Shinji," she heard Juggernaut say to her. "He doesn't like to talk about his father, either."
"Shinji seems like the type that doesn't like to talk about anything," she responded.
"Oh, he'll talk about anything, so long as it's not related to his familial ties that he really needs to disassociate from. The Ikari name is meaningless to one like him if he has to be reminded of who his relatives are every day, from a mother he has no memory of or even a single photograph of…to a good-for-nothing father that sees him only as a means to an end."
"It doesn't sound like you care much for the Ikaris."
"Sometimes, you gotta let go of everyone from your past to fully embrace your future, wherever it takes you, wherever you want it to take you, even if it means disappointing those that had some hope or expectation of you."
When the ninjas came closer to the shop, they suddenly vanished in the form of dust.
"What the…" Misato gasped.
"They have members of the Shadowkhan with them," went Juggernaut, seeing the three people from before still out there.
"Shadow what?"
"Expendable warriors created from darkness. They can't get in here, though."
-x-
Shinji, astral projected once more, flew through the floors and ceilings under the shop and into Auntie's room.
They brought a tribe of Shadowkhan with them! He alerted her, and she and Desdemona rummaged through chest.
"Is one of them wearing a mask?" Desdemona asked him, pulling out a mask that was purple and hideous. "Creepy, the stuff of nightmares?"
No, none of them are wearing a mask, he told them, and the Shadowkhan with them look like ninjas. Regular ninjas.
Auntie held a small shirt of blue silk and nodded her head to Desdemona.
"Protect the shop," the woman told herself before putting on the mask. "Protect the shop."
Placing the mask on, she groaned as she felt it lock around her face, a mild discomfort as its ancient properties accommodated to her body. She could feel the soul of the demon within the mask try to take over her own, but she remained focused on her objective, needing this power only to do one thing.
Dark patches surrounded Auntie and herself, rising from the floor and walls, assuming the forms of tall, humanoid beings with razor hands and pointed legs.
"Protect the shop," Desdemona ordered them, her voice deeper and almost like she was broadcasting through a microphone.
They then sank into the floor and disappeared from the room.
The first time I saw these guys, I was glad I was astral projected, Shinji told Auntie and Desdemona. I still get the metaphorical willies in this state.
-x-
"The Shadowkhan are not doing what they were summoned for," Shendu revealed to the man in the office.
"What, are they afraid of something in some lousy town?" He questioned.
"The Shadowkhan are not capable of fear. Something is preventing them from taking the talisman from where it was located."
-x-
"Gah!" Misato gasped as she saw Desdemona with the mask on her face.
"This is only temporary," she told her as she walked past her to the front of the shop.
"Oh, you had to put on that mask, didn't you?" Juggernaut asked her.
"Let's just get this over with," she told him, summoning her tribe of Shadowkhan. "Frighten them away."
Misato retreated back to the back of the shop where her father was.
"Let me guess," Hideaki responded to her presence, "her wearing the mask intimidated you, as well, didn't it?"
"Is there anything you don't find strange about anyone here right now?" She asked him.
"Misato, I saw the worst things unleashed upon the world that make everything else that transpired around me a dream when I helped to open Pandora's Box. We both saw the worst things unleashed. Whatever these people are capable of is their business. Things were crazy before that day, and they haven't gotten any saner after."
"Oh, and you're suddenly a believer because you held onto a piece of stone that kept you from aging for fifteen years? How do you feel now that you no longer have it?"
"How am I supposed to feel? Am I supposed to feel relief for having survived when everyone else that was part of the research team that day didn't? Am I supposed to feel proud that my daughter is trying to force a kid she doesn't even know to operate some sort of weapon made by an agency she works for that's a successor to the one I worked for? If anything, I'm very upset with the current state of things, including how we both turned out."
"You're upset? You're upset?! Where do you have the arrogance to say you're upset? Do you have any idea how naïve that sounds, coming from you? Oh, you're in no position to tell me that you're upset with how we both turned out ever since that day."
"And you are?" They both turned to face Shinji, who had just returned from down below the shop with Auntie. "Really?"
"We've done some research after Shinji here came back from his discomforting visit to Tokyo-3," Auntie expressed, "and have concluded that the recent…restoration of the planet to a semblance of pre-Second Impact conditions…was the work of some rather ancient and very dangerous demons associated with ancient China…and they didn't heal the planet outta the would-be goodness that doesn't exist in them."
"Demons?" Misato questioned, and then looked at Shinji. "You actually believe in demons?"
"Well, we both saw one when I made the choice to leave Tokyo-3 that night people came looking for me after I left the hotel," he told her. "You think that was a movie being made? I saw a guy get decapitated by a woman that wasn't even a woman in the human sense, and she wanted my talisman!"
"Bai Tza," Auntie revealed.
"A cross between a mermaid and a gorgon of sorts?" Hideaki asked them.
"I take it you've seen her, too?" Shinji responded.
"And six others, all hideous."
"Demon Sorcerers, beings of dark magic and elemental abilities," Auntie revealed. "It's a theory that at least seven of these eight demons got together and undid most of the damaged done to the planet because they have their own plans for the human race."
"Don't they want us all dead or use us as sacrifices for more power?" Hideaki suggested.
"Based on myths and legends archived for thousands of years by various people that knew about them, including the Eight Immortals that defeated them to free China, the demons had no agendas that included genocide. Humans, for them, were only good as two things: Servants and food; they would serve them until they were no longer able to…and then devoured later on."
"I take it there was some way to kill them?" Misato asked them.
"They're immortal, so killing them is impossible," said Shinji to her. "Besides, there's a rule about defeating someone: If you can't kill, you can surely contain. The Eight Immortals that originally defeated them in the past did so by banishing them to another realm, presumably the same realm they escaped from when Second Impact occurred. We can send them back if we have the resources required to banish them."
Shinji then walked past Misato and sighed.
"You should count yourself lucky that your father is alive," he told her.
"He's not someone I'm proud of," she retorted.
"You thought he was dead, only to find that he's very much alive, even if it was only because of a magic item that bestows immortality to its holder. How often do people get to see at least one of their parents after such a long time? Think about it. At least now, you got an opportunity to catch up on the years missed and try to repair your screwed-up relationship."
"Would you try to mend your relationship with your father?"
"There's nothing to mend…because we don't have a relationship, my father and I. I gave up on him a long time ago; that happens when you spend a vast amount of time away from your body wandering around places unseen by virtually everyone."
Crash! They heard glass shatter out front.
"Sorry!" They heard Dragon yell. "I had to break the door again!"
"Oy," Auntie sighed. "There hasn't been this much drama in my life since I turned thirty-nine."
"I haven't felt this much drama within my body since I had to run for it in Tokyo-3," Shinji added in.
"You two…are weird," Misato declared her opinion of them.
"If you stick around long enough," Auntie told her, "you might believe that there's a benefit to being weird."
-x-
With no more members from the tribe of Shadowkhan accompanying these three, they were left at the mercy of these other Shadowkhan members that were clearly stronger.
"You have one chance to live," Desdemona warned them after holding one of the men's left arm in her hands, threatening to break it in half while she was wearing the mask. "Leave this place…and never return."
"Yeah, what she said," went Dragon.
"Sure thing," the woman gave in as she and the other man got back inside the van. Our boss is going to kick our asses over this.
"They're going to be pissed at our lack of results," the second man groaned as he dragged himself back to the van. "This ain't over! This ain't over by a long shot! You think we're all that's after the talismans?! You've got another thing coming!"
They drove away and Dragon sighed.
"Well, Desdemona," he uttered then, "I would say that our lives around the shop and in Ōta…have officially gotten dragged into the affairs of demons."
"I am not going to spend the duration of these times wearing an oni mask that slowly affects my morality," she told him, and willed the Shadowkhan under her control away. "Come on."
-x-
Hideaki and Misato watched in awe as Auntie made Desdemona's hands glow after speaking an incantation that was only understood as a means to remove the mask on her face. Then, Desdemona brought her hands to the mask and removed it from her face.
"Every time I wear one of those masks, I have to be careful not to give in to my inner negativity. Oni masks are like an infection that gets worse if not treated quickly."
"And your boss actually keeps these masks in her shop?" Hideaki asked her.
"There's a difference between harmless artifacts…and harmful artifacts that can be controlled," Auntie explained. "To control what is or might be dangerous, you must have knowledge and resources that can keep problematic items in check. I keep the more dangerous items from being sold off to the wrong hands that could end up causing untold harm. Everything in the front of the shop is common objects. The dangerous artifacts, I can't sell to regular people."
"But…you can to people that know what they're getting into and are prepared to deal with dangerous objects?" Misato suspected.
"You ever met anyone you wanted to trust with something dangerous?" Shinji asked her.
"No."
"That's just depressing. I'm learning everything about ancient, magical items from Auntie and most of the other adults that work here."
"I take it that the entire work force of your shop has had some exposure to magic at some point in their past?" Hideaki asked Auntie.
"Yes," she answered him.
"Is there…any chance you're still hiring?"
"Huh?!" Misato gasped at his question.
"People think I'm dead. What good am I to a society that has no place for someone like me?" He explained his reason.
"It depends on whether or not I can trust you," Auntie responded. "There must be a measure of trust and discretion between one that hires…and one being hired."
"I just want to be able to…rebuild my life, however way I can."
"Just be mindful of one very crucial fact: I don't forgive easy."
Hideaki nodded in understanding; he lost his past and peace of mind in Second Impact. He just wanted to be able to claim some measure of order and stability in life. There was no point in returning to NERV…or GEHIRN…or whatever it was called now; he had no intention of returning to an organization with what had happened.
Misato then walked away and knew she had to leave.
"Let me guess," Shinji stopped her for a bit, "you intend to inform that man that I refused to return yet again?"
"I get the impression that if I said anything associated to what I saw here tonight, I'd have to look over my shoulder for the rest of my life," she told him. "What do I tell your father? His son is affiliated with a bunch of people that believe in magic, that magic exists and he has a prior obligation that he's more willing to deal with than a global crisis? All I can really say to him is that…you're not someone NERV should bother with because you'll just run away again…and again…and again. Whether or not he accepts this is up to him."
"Just so that you know, if we're to meet again next time, I will not be using that name I was cursed with since the day my life began."
"Fair enough."
As Misato left, Desdemona then realized something crucial.
"As fearful as I am right now of her leaving to return to Tokyo-3, she might be staying until morning," she told them. "I just remembered that one of the Shadowkhan I summoned had slashed through her car's tires."
"I'll use the Horse Talisman to fix them," Auntie told her.
To be continued…
A/N: Well, here's the new chapter until later. I hope y'all enjoy it. How many of think Misato's happy to have been relieved of her scar due to the power of the Horse Talisman?