Creation began on 10-29-23
Creation ended on 01-07-24
Neon Genesis Evangelion
Different from You: A Shift in Conflicts
It was quiet. More so than usual, really. Less than two months since the last Angel appeared at night and it seemed as though the peace that resided in the Katsuragi apartment had settled back in for the five occupants. This enabled Misato time to read the rest of the diary the alternate Shinji possessed. She found that Shado's father really longed for a peaceful life, but due to the circumstances surrounding his immediate disposition as an Evangelion pilot, felt the world around them was anything but peaceful since before they even showed up in Tokyo-3.
He wanted peace and quiet, but because of the Angels, his father and NERV, that simple request was more or less denied to him and Shado, she thought as she read how her alternate had once chewed him out for ignoring her calls in order to spend a day of leisure with Shado, as he had promised her on that particular day that it was to be about the both of them and not anything work-related like NERV or the Angels. But at the end of the day, he would rather wade through mud and debris to spend a quiet day with Shado over putting his life on the line to defend the human race.
"A life of violence. Any life that includes violence of any kind, whether it's a large number of people at war over a difference of opinions, of race, of sexual preferences, of choices, over resources…or just people being total idiots that like to pick fight with others that would rather not have anything to do with their madness," Shinji had written in his diary. "I can't protect Shado from the horrors of the world all the time, but that doesn't mean I have to be her window to those horrors every time I step out a room with her. I want her to be able to laugh and smile, to be able to look at the world and see its positive wonders instead of seeing nothing but a world of misery. Again, she is the only light in my world of darkness and pain, regardless of the agony I suffer from at the hands and words of other people that question my status as a father and my ability to do the right thing. I'm not a religious person, but I believe in the kami…and they didn't do anything to torment me. The real tormentors, the actual devils that exist in my darkness…are just the people that condemn me, each and every day…simply for either existing…or refusing to echo my father's actions. I have this little angel at my side, but we live in a world of demons that masquerade as people, making it hard to open up to people. I never know who I can trust because everyone looks at me the same way, like I'm the one with an agenda to cause harm."
And he was hurt by adults worse than people think of ways to hurt other people, Misato thought as she turned to the next page.
With the defeat of the Thirteenth and Fourteenth Angels, originally the Fifteenth and Sixteenth Angels, respectively, NERV was once again on standby, but with only two Evas and two pilots; the search for a Fourth Child had been put on hold again after two attempts were met with decline. And the only other change that was of any significance was Gendo starting to show signs of recovery. This turn of events actually worried Shado a little because she didn't want to engage in any conversation with her grandfather, but Shinji was able to ease her fears by informing her that Gendo was still on a long road to recovery because it was only his leg bones that had healed up, meaning the rest of his body, his muscles, nerves, even his spine, hadn't recovered anywhere close to enable him to cease being bedridden.
"Whoever hurt him made sure that even if he recovers, he won't be able to do much of anything without first going through rehabilitation," Shinji had explained to Shado.
"What is…what you just said?" She had asked, confused.
"That means needing to see a different bunch of doctors that work in helping someone who has been hurt the way that man has been hurt in order to return to a state close enough to before they were hurt. Just because he is recovering, it doesn't exactly mean that he will be able to do everything the same way again. It's like…exercise."
"He… The Monster has to…work hard…to be able to run and jump around?"
"Well, yeah… Yeah, Shado, that's exactly what he'll need to do."
On the plus side, he's still looking at months of recovery, Misato thought as she checks her watch for the current time.
-x-
Despite the ease of how things seemed to be quieting down around NERV and Tokyo-3, Fuyutsuki was still worried due to the fact that there were, if history had a way of trying echo itself in a deviated sense, three Angels left for NERV to face, and each of them would leave a sour taste in everyone's mouth because of how Shado Ikari had described them. For Fuyutsuki, it was mainly because of the Angel that had taken over an Evangelion that her grandfather put her inside and was nearly killed by her father against his will, but also because, as the girl had explained it, the last Angel that looked like a person had made it next to hurtful for her father to put any faith or trust in other people within NERV after facing it.
"A lot of people made Daddy upset the day he went bye-bye," he remembers Shado explaining about the aftermath of Shinji facing the Seventeenth Angel because they were concerned about the survival of the human race.
"If I ever had to do something like that a second time," he remembers Shinji saying, only because Shado didn't know where she was, "I'd walk away for good."
And now we know the name of the Seventeenth Angel's human identity of that time, he thought as he looks at the drawing Shado made of the young man her father had to kill. Courtesy of Major Katsuragi reading his diary that he had with him when he arrived in our world: Kaworu Nagisa. The question is, though, will we see him in this lifetime? Will he be sent to NERV…only to be fought against?
Standing in front of Unit-01, the replacement commander of NERV was wondering how much further this was going to go…and where exactly it would end for them all.
-x-
Watching Shado climb up and going down a slide made Shinji smile as he watched her play in the park. With less time to spend at NERV, he had more time to be around his daughter and watch her have fun.
"It looks like she's having fun," he heard Toji say to him as he turned to his right to see him, Kensuke and Hikari.
"Oh. Um…yeah," he responds, turning his attention back to Shado. "Who wouldn't have fun around here?"
They sat on the bench with him and watched the little girl climb up onto the merry-go-round.
"But…isn't it a little hollow?" Kensuke asks Shinji.
"In what way?" He replies.
"Honestly, this playground has been around for ten years…but ever since the Angels started showing up, it's been empty. Shado's the only one here to enjoy it, but it feels hollow because she's the only one."
Shinji sighs and knows this to be true. Despite the lack of activity from the Angels, Shado was, more or less, the only little kid present within Tokyo-3; the majority of other people that lived in the city were either his age or older, making Shado a rarity as the only tender-age child currently living in the city. It was depressing a little because it also meant that Shado, despite her relationship with some of them, had no friends her own age to play with. Even Toji's sister was older than Shado by a few years, so the age gap was a factor. That…and the other issue that was a problem in the world that didn't really involve Shado.
Ever since Second Impact and the aftermath of the global devastation that affected all parts of the world, the natural birthrate was crippled to some extent, with very few children being born over the following years. Even when some children had been born, they didn't live that long due to complications, such as defects in their development that were either unnoticed or even ignored by medical professionals. This also made Shado a rarity; she was the only healthy tender-age child currently alive in the whole of Japan.
"What can I do about that?" Shinji asks them. "I don't know anyone who has kids her age."
Sitting on the merry-go-round, Shado noticed how her father seemed slightly bothered by something that was being said between himself and his friends that came by to see him. And he looked sad because of what was being said to him. If he was sad about something, she was worried about him.
-x-
It was an unsettling decision, but with Unit-00 damaged and undergoing repairs, it seemed like the only logical choice. So, Rei would pilot one of the other two Evangelions NERV possessed until they could find a Fourth Child to pilot. With Unit-03 out of the question, she was assigned to Unit-04, requiring the core to be modified to accommodate her, as the original core in Unit-00 was older and non-transferable due to its prototypical nature. This…and the fact that Rei seemed to be trying to change her behavior a little.
Asuka had noticed this and wondered what changed her tune all of a sudden.
"So, I heard that Shinji's father's bones started mending," she tells Rei as they walk into an elevator. "How's he and Shado taking that discovery?"
"Only his leg bones," Rei responds. "Even though he heals, he still has to go through rehabilitation. However, this doesn't necessarily make Shado feel any safer to know that her grandfather nears the day he can leave the hospital."
"It'd be easier if he never left the hospital at all."
"Maybe…but even Shado doesn't want to keep him from going home when he recovers. She just doesn't want him harming Ikari-Kun or herself. Her fear of him is reasonable."
Asuka couldn't deny this truth; Gendo was a scary person with no indication of having any friends or personal relationships that seemed to matter. With the sole exception of his dead wife, another terrible person that she wished she could question for her choices that led to harming others…and tell her to her face that she was a terrible person for doing what she did to her own son when he was barely a toddler.
"So…Shado gave you a different designation to address you by?" Asuka asks Rei.
"Yes," Rei responds. "Yuki-San."
"That actually does sound better than 'Ghost Girl'."
"Yes, it does."
The elevator reached their desired floor and they stepped out into the hall.
"What do you aim to do," Asuka wanted to know, "when the Angels are all gone?"
"What is there to do?" Rei responds.
"Better things than piloting the Eva."
-x-
It was getting late in the afternoon and Shinji had to get Shado home in time for dinner and bedtime.
"Daddy…sad?" He hears Shado say while he carried her on his back down the street.
"Just a little bit," he tells her.
"Why?"
"Today while we were at the park, I was reminded of something that was bad."
"What is bad?"
"Well, you're the only little kid in the entire city, sweetie. It's a little bad because…you don't have anyone to play with."
"Daddy… This place has always been where I'm the only one my age. Everyone here has always been older than me. But it's okay. I have you."
As much as he wanted to tell her that it wasn't entirely the same as her being around people her own age, the mere fact that he praised her made it difficult for him to correct her on these bitter truths that were around them. Still, it would've been nice if his daughter had a friend her age to play with. Hell, even just one friend would suffice for the time being in this empty city. It seemed like even the tiniest things being asked for were too much to ask for by anyone in a city that was losing its credibility as being safe to live in.
"But it's okay," her words repeated in his head, "I have you."
Even when something is wrong, she doesn't let it get her down, he thought.
Unknown to him, however, a pair of eyes were on the pair, watching with interest. A pair of red eyes that were fixated upon them.
-x-
The Committee was not pleased with the decision Fuyutsuki made to keep the Third Child suspended from piloting the Eva, but it was a choice that had the least amount of detrimental consequences for several people. While there was the concern that the Angels would persist if there was an order they had now deviated from, it was more beneficial if NERV had more than two Evas active on the combat roster, but with five Evas and only two active pilots, it didn't look good for the paramilitary group.
"Just because he plays house for this child," he recalls SEELE 10 say to him during the most recent meeting, "it doesn't mean that Ikari's son should be allowed to degrade in his usefulness to NERV. What of the status of Unit-01?"
"According to Dr. Akagi, it was repaired a week ago," SEELE 06 revealed. "It just hasn't been used in any synchronization tests."
"How soon before the Third Child can return to service?" SEELE 03 had asked Fuyutsuki.
"With all due respect," he had told them of his choice, "as simple as it might seem to return the boy to active duty… I'm not going to do that."
"You do understand that the longer he's not used to pilot the Eva, the more useless he becomes," SEELE 01 reminded Fuyutsuki. "Must he really be kept from doing his duty?"
"In a way, it was this duty that became his undoing. The only reason he even piloted the Eva to begin with was because his father gave him no choice. But Ikari's no longer in charge, so his son doesn't have to continue."
"Don't tell us that little girl has become an excuse for him not to pilot," SEELE 12 suggested. "She is nothing more than another resource under these desperate circumstances."
Just hearing that…and recalling a faint memory of Shinji when he was little…superimposed by his memory of Shado, almost mirroring one another due to their similarities…made Fuyutsuki reaffirm his decision.
"The Third Child will remain off the combat roster," he told them. "We'll find a replacement pilot for him in due time."
He wasn't really proud of his decision, but he didn't want to echo the actions that ruined one small life and could ruin another one if they lost someone they loved. Even if it limited NERV's ability to deal with the Angels, even if it meant the fate of the human race, it felt like a small child's feelings for her father mattered more than a world that had been desolated fifteen years ago and where hope felt like a cheap commodity for even the elitist that ran the remnants.
The fate of the human race or a little girl losing her father a second time, he thinks as he tries to consider the ramifications of either choice. As easy as it would be to consider the needs of the many over the desires of the few, we're already unforgivable by her father before he died. If Shado loses him a second time, she would never be able to forgive us.
And then, there was the memory of her father dying in front of them, angry at them. Angry, confused…and hurt. To Fuyutsuki, that wasn't a teenage boy full of resentment towards his father…but a young father that felt betrayed by the world he was forced into and had to lose the one person that mattered to him, leaving her alone in a place he despised, surrounded by people he had no faith in, no matter what they tried. It was utter despair and bittersweet.
"I take it the Committee were upset by your decision?" He was asked by Ritsuko in the hallway.
"I just couldn't do it," he tells her. "I couldn't do that to either of them. Even if it means endangering the world, I can't get his hateful words out of my head. What does something like this truly do when someone that we try to convince them to do something that is dangerous and that they are doing a great service to the world? How does that really affect them when they are near Death's door…and we fail to save them? Can you answer that?"
While Ritsuko was willing to sacrifice the pilots if the situation warranted doing so, the mere fact that they saw a pilot die in front of them was not exactly how she thought any would go out. In battle against an Angel? Totally. But because of injuries caused by another person that refused to let them go? She didn't want to think about it in the least. And then, there was the little girl that addressed the Third Child as her father, something nobody at NERV expected to know about.
"Why is Dr. Akagi called 'Ms. Egghead', Shado?" Shinji had asked the little girl.
"Because people like her know everything other people don't," the girl had explained her designation, "but they also make other people feel bad for not knowing."
The nerve of her, Ritsuko thought; she honestly felt that her designation as Ms. Egghead was more disrespectful than to make up for her difficulty with pronouncing people's names. Except that she's right, I know more than other people do.
But the fact that they weren't using Shinji made Unit-01 next to useless, even though most of the damage it sustained from the alternate Third Child's arrival, it hadn't been used in any synchronization tests to make sure it still worked. While Unit-01 still had the most impressive performance record in terms of defeating the most Angels, this was mainly due to the Third Child, and not using him made the Eva next to useless. Still, the little girl's relation to Shinji had been an unexpected boon and bane to NERV; some of the social media posts had brought into question whether or not the paramilitary group was striving to be child-friendly while other posts were of people wanting to know how an unimpressive man like Shinji Ikari ended up being a teenage father to a little girl that nobody that had seen the young man some time ago had never noticed a day in their life. While this brought into question NERV's ability to keep the girl's existence quiet, it brought more attention to them than they needed because of her connection to the Third Child.
-x-
Shinji stopped walking and turned around to face the sidewalk he had come down from as he continued to carry Shado on his back to Misato's apartment. He didn't see anyone, but he couldn't stop staring at the small shadows of streetlights and signposts that seemed like they hid something from his perception. Whether this was just paranoia or even his paternal instincts, he wasn't sure, but he was starting to get the impression that they were being followed by someone.
"What is it, Daddy?" Shado asks, worried that there was something out around them.
"Probably just my imagination, sweetie," he answers and turns back to the path to the building.
Shado looks back at the sidewalk, just in case her father missed something, but saw only the same shadows that he had seen.
"Your original name wasn't really good when I met you for the first time, sweetie," she remembers Shinji telling her. "It was really sad and unfitting for you, so I asked to change it to Shado. Your mother, that is, the lady that hurt me before she had you, gave you a different name that meant something demeaning, bad, because it meant something nobody should have to hear about. But Shado is a better name because it has a meaning to me. You're my little shadow, and I want you by my side for as long as I may live. You're…my lovely, beautiful shadow that holds more light in her than what I see in the world every day."
She didn't know what her previous name had been or why the lady that had her after hurting her father would give her a hurtful name that required her father changing it into something better to hear, but she valued the name her father gave her, even if it did mean being his shadow. She would rather be his shadow than be someone else's…or anything else's for that matter.
As Shinji carried her into the elevator, the same red eyes that had watched them from a distance watched as the doors closed in front of the pair.
"For now, just observe these two," they had been instructed. "Try to get close to them, but don't make yourself known to either."
But all they were really seeing of these two were a young man trying to make this little girl happy…and a little girl that seems to mirror this young man's sadness because he was trying to do right by her.
What a strange pair, they thought, turning away from the building and evaluating what they had seen of the two.
-x-
"…I don't think I've seen Shinji look that bothered by the fact that Shado's the only kid of her age in the city," said Hikari to Asuka as they were in her room that evening.
"Yeah," Asuka agreed with her; with the downside to being a fortress city being that most of its population being paramilitary personnel, Tokyo-3 was practically a city that was not for regular families to build a life in. "It's not really his fault, though. This city has been… Well, has it always been like this?"
"More or less. But ever since the Third Angel attack, the first attack we ever found out about, the same one Shinji was involved in, any number of regular people that used to live here packed up and relocated elsewhere to safer areas. In many respects, Tokyo-3 has been the only place in Japan where regular people would rather…commute to and from than to actually live in. And after the Fourth and Fifth Angels, you'd either have to be crazy or foolish just to live in a city that gets attacked by giant monsters because it's becoming cheap to live here."
Asuka didn't realize it like that, but as of late, Tokyo-3 had become a place few would want to live in, either due to lack of means or because of lack of employment. The only people that were still in the city were all NERV-employed, but even that didn't change the likelihood that some of them would get the idea to leave one day.
"For real, though," Hikari decided to change the subject, "you didn't know that Shinji had a daughter in the time you two were living together?"
"No," Asuka responds. "I never asked him, and he never said anything about Shado. Shinji wasn't exactly someone I…saw as someone to talk to. All any at NERV even mentioned about him was how he synced with the Eva adequately on his first sortie with no training. There was no information about his background, aside from who his father is."
"Nothing? Really?"
"Yes."
"That's really sad."
"Why is that?"
"It's like trying to pretend there are people that don't exist in the world when they do exist."
As much as Asuka wanted to explain to her friend that Shado was from an alternate reality, stranded in this one, or that she didn't know that her actual father was dead, she knew she had to keep it secret because it would put the little girl in danger of being taken away from Shinji. And from what Misato had informed her of, it was unlikely that Shado and her father had much of anything from their past, meaning that whatever life the girl had as of the time being was where she was now. Even if there was a possibility of minor memory impairment for both father and daughter, it was unlikely that Shado had lost all of her memories of her past if she knew things they hadn't known of. The girl possessed recollection like an elephant, as her limited knowledge of the Angels and her comprehension of events that either led to people getting hurt or worse was undeniably invaluable to NERV.
"It is sad," she agrees with Hikari. "But we can look on the bright side. After the Angels are all defeated, Shinji and she will probably go to a different city, away from his father. Someplace where Shado has people her age to befriend."
"You do realize that is unlikely, as Shado's the only one of her age currently alive in the whole country. The chances of her ever meeting someone else her age are practically nonexistent."
Still, Asuka had to be hopeful, even if it seemed hopeless to begin with.
-x-
Misato returned home from NERV and found the apartment quiet. She went over to the living room and found Shinji watching the news about something going on elsewhere, Shado asleep beside him on the couch while he sat on the floor.
"Where's Asuka?" She asks him, and he turns to face her.
"Spending the night at Hikari's," he answers. "Today was…a little depressing."
"How so?"
"We were at the park. I was watching Shado play, but she was the only one there. That…that really bothered me a little bit."
Misato looks at the sleeping girl, dressed in her pajamas and wearing a sleeping cap modeled after an Eevee's head. Even reading from her father's diary about how he felt powerless over the fact that Shado was deprived of a friend of her own in an entire country whose entire birth rate was, more or less, in decline. He had once or twice wondered why it seemed like Shado had been condemned in a way that wasn't even fair to her, because she had done nothing wrong to deserve any of what was happening around them.
"That's rough," she tells Shinji, and then looks at the television. "What's going on in the world?"
"Nothing," he says. "Just talk about rain, celebrity updates, sports coverage, controversy over a new movie, what shopping centers are going out of business, why the Prime Minister is being perceived as nothing more than a figurehead by the masses. Honestly, it seems like the country had better days before Second Impact. Better days before the Twenty-First Century."
"You get no argument from me on that belief. Japan was a lot better back in the time before Second Impact. There was more…more…"
"There was more of what, Misato? There was more of what?"
"There was spring, winter, fall. Tokyo was a booming metropolis that was the biggest in the world. And at night, out on the streets, it was as though the city could spring to life and you could enjoy it all right up to the sunrise."
"Those sound like…heavenly dreams, Misato. Forgotten joys."
"Forgotten joys," Misato had read in Shinji's diary. "What I would be willing to part with… What I would gladly give up in exchange for a better future for Shado and I."
Misato sat down beside the pair and felt the need to ask Shinji a personal question.
"Tell me, Shinji," she starts, "what would you give for a better future?"
"What would I give?" He responds. "That's obvious. I would give up the Eva. I would give up the Angels. I would give up whatever chance of a positive relationship with my father if it meant that Shado and I could have a better future."
Exactly what he said in his diary.
"I would even give up on redeeming people that have done wrong and did nothing to make anything right," she hears Shinji say, which was exactly what his alternate reality counterpart had said in his diary.
-x-
"…And what did you learn?" A male voice asks in the darkness.
"You instructed me to follow the Third Child and this little girl that is related to him, but to keep my distance," a female voice responds, "and they don't seem to be special in any sense. The boy was watching her play at this recreation park with others his age, but his expression was one of bitterness after a conversation, which appeared to be echoed by the little girl. One of the other teens had said something to him that he appeared to be upset about."
"Did you hear what it was?"
"Something about the girl being alone due to her age."
"Alone because of her age?"
"I was too far away to hear anything relating to why, but it may have something to do with the girl being the only child in the city."
"Yes, that would make sense; the girl is, according to her NERV record, four years old, and with the decline in the nation's birth rate, she is the youngest Japanese person currently alive. Every other child is older than she is by several years, leaving her behind in the race towards the rest of life. Tokyo-3 has practically no children her age for her to be around. In a way, she's both a rarity and an unlucky child."
"What are your orders?"
"Get close to the pair."
"But sir, I can't get close to either without being noticed. According to you, the girl has seen all of us. The second she sees me again, she will get suspicious."
"We can fix that."
-x-
For some reason, Shado found herself wandering through the halls of NERV HQ. Looking behind her, she saw this…the Ghost Boy, except that he was different from before. Instead of being around her father's age, he looked around her age.
"You can't escape from your fate," she hears him say, but he sounds like her grandfather, devoid of any sense of friendliness. "In the end, you're going to meet your end."
Shado attempts to run, but finds her path blocked by…the right hand of the purple Eva that her father hadn't been wearing like armor for quite some time now, which she grateful for because every time she saw him get into the Eva for anything was a moment in time where she would wonder whether or not he would come back to her in the end. She felt stuck between someone she knew was no longer around…and something she didn't like because it caused her father pain…and she didn't like it. In her mind, both were bad because had caused pain to her father, who took it upon himself every day just to put on a smile for her.
"Shado," she hears her father's voice beside her, and looks to her left, seeing him and a hallway leading away from the Ghost Boy and the Eva. "Let's get out of this place."
She smiles and reaches out to him, wanting nothing more than to get away from this nightmarish place they were in. She closed her eyes for a moment…and then opened them again, finding herself in her father's room, beside him on his futon. It was just…another dream…or a terrible nightmare. She looked over at the small window and saw the sky was cloudy and gray…and the glass was wet with water.
"It's…raining," she utters.
To be continued…
A/N: Anime-wise, I think one of the only good ones left to watch at this point is Demon Slayer; it hasn't disappointed me like the Attack on Titan canon did. Fanfiction-wise, it's stories like these that do better than the canon because they don't always fail to impress with incredible turnarounds and characters that get a twist in their background. But anyway, what do you think about this chapter? How do you feel about Shado's undesired predicament and how Fuyutsuki continues to keep Shinji out of the Eva, even though it upsets SEELE to know that he's next to useless by doing nothing to contribute towards NERV's mission to defeat the Angels?