Creation began on 12-23-23
Creation ended on 12-31-23
Neon Genesis Evangelion
Different from You: Adjustment
Shinji often tried to be what one would consider a rational young man, waking up in a place he was told was Tokyo, or at least a version of Tokyo that had been devastated by an earthquake almost six years ago, not a fortress city he knew as Tokyo-3, as such a place and this Tokyo-2 hadn't been built, and the agency known as NERV in this world was not a paramilitary organization, but a cybernetics company that had been around since before his time, own and founded by his parents, and was an acronym for Neuro Energized and Revolutionized Virtuosity (which, to him, was a mouthful). And not only that, but learning that, based upon what he knew and what the people of this Doji Group understood, he and Shado were, for all intents and purposes, stranded in an alternate reality, a different universe from the one they knew. This meant that, despite whatever they realized later on, Shinji and Shado were strangers in a strange world, with likely no way to go back. Not that Shinji really thought about the possibility of going back; he hated what he was being made to do while employed at NERV in his universe, but only put up with it because he wanted to keep Shado safe and close. If he and Shado couldn't return to their original universe and were, for all intents and purposes, stuck in this one, it meant he was free of his obligation to pilot the Evangelion and face the Angels, and that he was rid of his father and people telling him that trying to raise his daughter was a mistake he was going to regret and that he should've given her up when suggested more than once.
Except that Shado didn't know yet, and he needed to figure a way to break this to her without scaring her. As he sat in the room they were in and watched her work on a drawing with some color pencils, he tried to come up with an easy explanation to tell her that they were in a completely different place that wasn't exactly like the one they knew. Until he heard Shado put the color pencils down and yawn.
"Ahh," she yawned.
"Getting sleepy?" He asks her, and she nods. "Come over here and rest your head."
Shado got up from off the floor and went over to the couch where Shinji was sitting on and laid her head on his lap.
"Daddy?"
"Yes, Shado?"
"Those bracelets on your arms…look really nice on you."
Even when bringing up his current predicament with these bracelets on his writs, Shinji was moved that Shado saw some positiveness in his predicament with them.
"Thank you, sweetie," he tells her.
This brought back a pleasant memory for Shinji; after a stressful day from either school or the Geo-Front, he would sit on a couch and let Shado rest her head on his lap while he simply let his stress ease away in her company. One time, Misato expressed a compliment on how he seemed happier with Shado than with anyone else, which wasn't far from the truth; his relationship with his daughter was the only positive one he had in his life, as his relationships with other people were either brief, strained, or nonexistent. And he wouldn't trade his relationship with her for anything else anyone could offer him, including his father's praise or love, which he no longer wanted…and decided he was better off without because the man was a horrible person incapable of love or basic humanity.
"Shado?" He spoke.
"Hmm?" She responds sleepily.
"Would you be okay…if we were someplace far from Tokyo-3?"
"Mm-hmm."
It wasn't exactly a fair question of him to ask her, but he wanted her response…and would ask her again later when she was rested.
Strange, he heard a voice that sounded like his own, only hollow, devoid of any emotion. I have never encountered a young man of your type before. Men are often defined by other traits that relate to the boundless, but you…you're not after the boundless like men are said to be. Instead, your behavior is similar to that of women; you're not interested in ambitions derived from desires of wealth and power. Instead, you seek stability and building a future for yourself and…this girl beside you. You…you devote yourself to this child's wellbeing. Why?
Shinji looked around the room, thinking that someone was talking to him, but he saw nobody else present. He knew there was a security guard outside the room, but that was that.
Was…is someone talking to me? He wonders.
Yes, it is I, he heard the voice again. You know who I am.
Can we pretend that I don't know who you are…and you tell me who you are, please?
Since you asked nicely, we shall pretend. I am the presence that inhabits the synthetic stones upon your wrists.
Shinji raises his arms up and looks at the bracelets that were stuck on his skin.
You sound like me…but I don't sound like that, he thought. What…what do you want?
I am a part of you now. Before, I was nothing, locked away in the darkness, knowing only of these drives of power and freedom. Until, mere moments ago, like an eternity, I found you…and made myself a resident of your personal domain. I am the Ultimateblade.
The Ultimateblade? Are you…a weapon made by Doji?
Doji? Oh, the group that creates weapons using questionable methods. More or less. Humans are inevitably drawn to war and will create whatever they believe with the darkest of hopes will enable them to conquer their enemies. Unfortunately, they are still bound by a fault that is a stain upon their intelligence.
And what is that?
Trial and error. Nothing created for offense or defense is considered a success unless it works.
And I'm guessing that…you're probably a weapon that wasn't developed successfully and you're attached to me because…you were designed to be used by people?
You're catching on. Yes…and no. It depends, really, on how I was intended to be used.
-x-
"…When did this start?" Segawa asks the specialists that had worked on production of the Ultimateblade, being informed of an unusual broadcast of static over communication equipment across the floor they were on.
"Less than five minutes ago," said one of the specialists. "The source of the static is originating from the room the two patients are currently."
"The Ultimateblade is active?"
"Yes, but not fully," a second specialist informs. "It's beginning to bond further with the boy, but not as fast as the original did with Yagi. There's an elevated reaction in the boy's nervous system, but we're not detecting anything harmful. If anything, the Ultimateblade is…conversing with its new host."
This worried Segawa; because they didn't know what else the Ultimateblade could do, as it caused accelerated cellular breakdown in Yagi when he was forced to wear it by Wado just to prove that it worked, they were in uncharted territory by this new turn of events. But if this Ultimateblade was only conversing with its host, not yet causing an issue, it was hoped by Segawa that they could try to eavesdrop on the conversation.
"Can you isolate the conversation?" He asks them. "Try to listen to what they're saying?"
"Just barely," a third specialist answers.
"…How were you intended to be used by Doji," they hear Shinji's voice, "since they're a weapon-making group?"
"Doji," they heard another voice, almost like Shinji's, respond, except it felt less in tune with…everything. "What do you know about Doji? What do you know about their methods?"
"Nothing. I just know what I've been told. They make weapons and distribute them to whoever can pay for them."
"You don't sound like you're attracted to violence."
"I'm not a fan of violence. It's better when it's fantasy violence; people don't have to be hurt for any reason."
"People hurt…when they mean it."
"I have been hurt before. More times than I care to admit. I don't like pain, whether it's inflicted upon me or I'm made to inflict it upon someone else."
"I would tell you what you should probably know about the people that are nursing you and this girl back to health, just so that you know they're not entirely in the morality department…but I should probably cut this chatter short."
"Why?"
"Because they're listening in on us. They've been listening for the last two minutes."
"Well…well, they're probably just worried about me. I'm just worried about Shado."
Everyone in the room was worried; they didn't anticipate the Ultimateblade was capable of detecting their attempts to listen in on the conversation.
"Do you ever worry for yourself?" The voice of the Ultimateblade asked Shinji.
"I worry when Shado worries about me," they heard Shinji reply. "I don't like making her worry when it should be the other way around. I'm her father. I'm supposed to be the responsible one."
"Why?"
"She's my family. I'd do anything to keep her safe and happy."
"I don't understand your connection to this girl."
"What do you mean?"
"During this conversation, I've been evaluating your memories, and while your relationships with other people are less than significant to you, I've found that your strongest of connections is with this child that is not even half a decade old…and has been viewed by some as something like a parasite. But you don't see her that way, even demonstrated anger when this bitter and hateful man that is your father suggested that you sever your ties with her."
"He wanted me to walk out on Shado like how he walked out on me, but I told him I wouldn't do that. He chose to walk out on me. I was not going to echo his actions on my own child, no matter what anyone thought of me."
"You've become defensive about the girl."
"I'm protective of Shado; if anyone so much as hurts her, I'd make them pray for mercy if I felt I had to make myself heard."
"You feel bound to the girl."
"I'm committed to her. I don't know what I'd do if I didn't have her in my life. Shado gives me stability. Shado gives me hope. I'd die for Shado."
There was a disturbing pause over the radios after Shinji told the Ultimateblade how he felt about his daughter.
"I," they finally heard the emotionless voice utter, "request further elaboration."
-x-
Ring-ring! A cell phone rang early in the morning…and a hand reached out from under a blanket to grab it as the person stirred from slumber.
"Ikari residence," a female voice utters.
"Um, Yui Ikari?" A male voice responds.
"Yes," the woman rising up from under the blanket answers.
"My name is Hiroki Segawa of Doji Group Industries."
"Doji? The weapons manufacturing company?"
"Yes."
"Is there something wrong with the software my company recently updated for you?"
"No, that's not why I'm calling. The reason I'm calling is that…last night, there was an incident in our building and… I'm sorry, but are you at all familiar with the theory of alternate realities?"
"The multiverse theory? Most scientists don't believe that it's possible for parallel worlds to exist. The ones that do have all these different beliefs that for every choice, every possibility, there exists an alternate reality for every day of our lives, going back through time and forward into the future. It ranges from simple choices we make within the course of our day-to-day lives to the major choices that other people within the course of their lives. What does this have to do with you calling me?"
"Because there are two people from a different universe that are currently displaced in our own that are related to you. An alternate of your son and granddaughter."
Yui sat up in her futon and looked down at a framed photo of her late son and granddaughter.
"An alternate version of Shinji and Shado?" She questions. "But just because they're from an alternate reality, it doesn't necessarily mean that they're the same people that died last year."
"No, it doesn't mean that at all," Segawa responds, "but we ran their DNA and we know that they're legally dead…but they're here and…it doesn't seem like they're going anywhere any time soon in the present. And currently, the young man, Shinji, is in a minor situation related to Doji that can be viewed as more than likely unexpected and unintentional."
"How expected and how unintentional?"
It was no mystery that Yui was more than aware of Doji's weapon manufacturing methods using the remains of men that died over the years, making them a bit immoral in the fact that they use the dead like a perverse resource. She only did cybernetics and computer software business with the company, but wouldn't sign over her husband's remains to them just to see his memory tarnished for warfare and profit. In addition, she learned that they were selective of the dead men they tried to acquire; it was often always adult men that hadn't been dead for very long and were in good condition. Even if her son had only been dead for less than a week, the fact that he'd been burnt beyond recognition made him inadequate for any use in Doji's weapons manufacturing. That and because she didn't want to violate his or Shado's memory of having existed only to be exploited after death, which is why she kept their ashes along with her husband's.
"When he was found within our headquarters, he was in possession of an untested weapon that has been attached to him. So, far, it hasn't done anything, but we're not sure exactly on how to handle him later on. He's only fourteen and barely knows where he is."
"What kind of untested weapon are we talking about here?"
"A performance-enhancing, exoskeletal prosthesis."
Yui knew an apt description when she heard something like that being said.
"Just how dangerous is this untested weapon?" She asks Segawa.
"The only time it was ever used by someone outside of required protocols, the person died due to accelerated cellular breakdown," he explains.
"In other words, it's unstable in every sense of the word?"
"In a word, yes. However, that was the original weapon; we didn't realize it at the time, but our current head of Doji had created a handful of this weapon and had the rest placed into storage when the boy and his daughter were found."
Again, Yui looked at the framed photo and sighs.
"Do they know anything about their current displacement?" She asks.
"The boy is subtly aware of their predicament. He's trying to explain it to the girl without sounding too…"
"I'll be over as soon as I can," she tells him before hanging up. Why? Why, Yui, why? You don't know these two from any other stranger. Why develop an interest in seeing them?
But she already knew why. She just couldn't bring herself to say it. First Shinji and Shado, then Gendo, and now this unexpected call from Doji with an unexpected reaction. Even if these two were from an alternate universe, DNA couldn't be fabricated to install a false sense of hope. And if she saw them in person, it would be like a gift from the kami themselves, to see them alive.
-x-
Shinji wasn't sure how this conversation between himself and this Ultimateblade got to this, but he was suddenly floating in a small, spherical room that felt like a Japanese shrine, facing a young man that looked like him, albeit reminding him like Rei Ayanami, devoid of any emotion, and wearing the bracelets he'd been wearing while awake.
"You possess the ability to access information, right?" Shinji asks the living weapon.
"Naturally," the doppelgänger responds, still emotionless.
"Do you know anything about the thought experiment relating to a ship that keeps getting pieces of it replaced or anything about a temple by a forest in the Mie Prefecture that keeps getting repaired every few years?"
His doppelgänger, floating in front of him, as if they were in a strange dance, nodded his head in the positive.
"You're referring to the Ship of Theseus in the field of identity metaphysics, which can be used to this degree of existing in an alternate universe different from the one you were familiar with," he responds again. "The Ship of Theseus is an artifact located within a museum, just as the Ise Grand Shrine is an actual shrine that is rebuilt every twenty years based on a renewal belief. Over time, the wooden planks of Theseus' ship rot away and are replaced with new ones, just as the shrine's wooden structures are repaired over the years to keep them maintained. However, when nothing original remains, are they still viewed as the Ship of Theseus and the Ise Grand Shrine? Are they still viewed as being the true ship and shrine?"
"And secondly," Shinji goes, "if the previous portions of both were to be restored and reassembled without the wear and tear of the years past or any rotting, are they the original ship and shrine? Are they the true ship or shrine?"
"And when one is displaced in an alternate universe with an alternate history, is it still a world they recognize, even with the minor or major differences?"
"And the answer is…what is the answer you have?"
The doppelgänger tilts his head to his left and utters, "For the ship and shrine, the answer is that neither are the original of their design…for both are the original of their design. The same can be said for an alternate reality that one that doesn't belong to suddenly finds themselves in. It is not their world because of the differences…and yet is their world because of the differences."
If such was a truth, then Shinji was facing a simple challenge due to his and Shado's current predicament: They were strangers in a new world…and they needed to try and fit in if they were ever going to belong later on. But he was fine if he never fit in, so long as Shado was able to belong someday.
"But Shado wants you to be happy, too," the doppelgänger reminds him of the other half of his predicament. "Your relationship is not that different from a symbiosis; you both depend upon each other. Initially, I believed your relationship was more parasitic on her end, but in the amount of time spent conversing with you, you've proven the very opposite; you do need her just as much as she needs you. Neither seems to want to go on without the other."
"Yeah," Shinji accepts. "Shado's been a part of my life for four years now. I can't imagine being able to live my life without her being in it."
"Then…don't imagine it. If you need her in your life, then keep her close by."
-x-
Sometime later, Shado awoke, feeling a little better, albeit still hungry and growing weary of the IV tube feeding nutrients into her body in place in actual food. She looked out the windows and saw the sun starting to rise in the distance. It was a new day beginning. An entirely new day, meant to replace the previous day. She got up and slowly shook her father awake.
Shinji opened his eyes and looked at the little girl beside him.
"Good morning, Daddy," she greeted him with a smile.
"Good morning, Shado," he replied, smiling.
To be continued…
A/N: Okay, so I'm giving the Ultimateblade with Shinji the beginnings of a personality being developed, but it'll be sometime before anything becomes grounded in their relationship like how it is with Shinji and Shado. And as for the alternate universe's Yui, she's not entirely convinced that there's an alternate of her dead son and granddaughter and has yet to meet with them, but has had dealings with Doji in the past. There will probably be scenes with the Eva universe being forced to move on without Shinji and Shado, but I just don't know how to make them yet. What do you think of this chapter? And Happy New Year!