X-X-X
CHAPTER 6
X-X-X
Asuka had never in her memory seen Misato begin an evening meal without beer, and it was a disconcerting sight to see it now.
"Let me guess: it was Misato's turn to cook."
Even stranger, however, was the presence of Ritsuko Akagi at the dinner table.
"What, you don't like it?" Misato quipped.
"Misato, you are the least adept chef I have ever known. You could burn deionized water - in fact, you could render deionized water inedible without even heating it."
"Well, next time I invite you over, I'll be sure it's Shinji's turn to cook," Misato said flatly.
"You say that like you expect me to believe you." Ritsuko arched an eyebrow. "It wouldn't surprise me to hear you intentionally baited me into eating your apocalyptic cuisine."
"You wound me." Misato pouted.
Is something going on between these two? Asuka wondered, as she choked down the barely edible microwave food. They get weirdly… standoffish around each other. And sarcastic, especially off the clock.
"I would have thought eating my cooking would be the least you could do," Misato continued, "Given that you didn't even attend my housewarming party…"
"I forgot. Got caught up in work." Ritsuko's expression betrayed nothing.
"You forget a lot of things, these days."
"Oh! That reminds me!" Ritsuko smacked her forehead with her open palm. "I forgot to give Rei her new NERV passcard - ugh, and I saw her earlier today, too."
One of Asuka's eyebrows twitched, and a silent count began in her head.
"One of the children could -"
"Three." Asuka folded her arms and fixed Misato with a glare. Misato frowned at the gesture.
"Three what?" Ritsuko ventured.
"I was counting seconds until Misato volunteered me or Shinji for lackey work," Asuka said sullenly. "I call not it."
"Well, you heard her, Rits," Misato said brightly. 'Rits'? Was zur hölle? "Shinji can take it to her after school tomorrow."
Ritsuko raised an eyebrow. "Really, Misato? You'd have me send a teenage boy to the apartment of a teenage girl? Where she lives alone, no less?"
From across the table, Shinji began making choking noises. His face flushed as red as a beetroot.
What is this, 1955? Shinji doesn't have the backbone to try anything anyway…
"Well, you heard her, Asuka." Misato looked back at the German pilot, a shit-eating grin on her face. "You're on deck!"
"Gottverdammt, Misato!"
X-X-X
An archaic flip-open cellphone rang, its generic ringtone shattering the silence.
"Hello." The one-word answer betrayed nothing; even on a burner phone, there was no such thing as too much caution.
"Ryoji, this is Ikari." The spy instantly sat up a little straighter. "This line has been secured. Are there any bugs on your end?"
"This is a burner phone. And…" Kaji looked around the bare room, which contained nothing but two tiny cots to sleep on. "I'm not anywhere they'd have bugged. It should be safe."
"I didn't expect to be able to reach you. I was about to write you off as dead." Gendo's voice was hard. "Bethany Base no longer exists, officially or otherwise. What happened?"
"You're lucky you called today. I'm going to ditch this phone later." Kaji pinched the bridge of his nose. "Long and short - Bethany Base is a smoking hole in the ground, the Fourth Angel is dead, Unit Five is barely functional and Mari's not much better off. I have reason to believe the containment breach wasn't an accident."
There was silence on the line for a moment. Then - "The loss of the Fourth Angel is a blow. Project Elohim will have to be put on hold, until such a time as we can capture another dormant angel."
"I recovered copies of a handful of things from their hard drives. I couldn't salvage all of it - there was just too much raw data to grab on the short notice I had - so I just took the communications archives and anything above classification level four. Anything groundbreaking should be in there."
"Project Elohim data is of secondary relevance, given the circumstances, but Dr. Akagi will appreciate it nonetheless. It's more important that you got the Eva and her pilot out alive." Gendo seemed to consider something for a moment. "If the containment breach was sabotage, that paints the disaster with Unit Six and the delays on Project S2 in a different light. I need my weapons where I can watch them if SEELE is trying to cripple me."
"Got it." Kaji looked over at the room's other occupant. "We've jury rigged Baal with aquatic combat equipment. We're making our way there by sea, and with the stealth suite active, she… should be impossible to track. But watch the sky for us, would you?"
"Rest assured, NERV will be watching for unusual UN military action now. If you can get within our operations range, we can also launch our current units for an emergency assist."
"Thanks." Kaji looked over the room again. "We need to get underway. I'll be out of touch until we hit Japan again, but Baal's radiocom will reach Mari."
"I'd say godspeed, but the name of our enemies casts that phrase in a less than appropriate light." Gendo's voice didn't change, but Kaji was sure he was wearing the sly smirk that he was sometimes known for. "Get them here, Ryoji."
The line unceremoniously died. Kaji let out a huff that might almost have been a laugh, and regarded the phone for a minute - before snapping it in half and tossing the remains into the corner of the room.
"Mari."
The other cot's occupant didn't stir.
"Mari." Kaji poked her ribs sharply with his finger, wincing at the slightly slimy texture of the neoprene. "We need to move, kid. You know the drill."
"Mmmnnnnnfuck…" Mari groaned, opening her eyes. "Oh, ow… remind me never to sleep in a plugsuit again…"
Kaji raised an eyebrow. "Or without showering the LCL off?"
Mari sniffed the air. "Oh, Jesus. Yeah, that too. Normally I even like the smell, but fuck, not the day-old processed crap."
"I would have grabbed you clothes and soap, but I was too busy stealing secrets." Kaji grinned. "Think you can walk on your own now?"
The British pilot pushed herself up with one arm and swung her legs sideways to sit in the edge of the bed, a pained grunt escaping her. "I… think so? I'll be fucking limping, though."
"Limping is okay. If it keeps us ahead of SEELE assassins, I'll take limping." Kaji reached under his cot and picked up a waterproofed bag. "How about the arm?"
"Still dead." Mari's voice was clinical as she looked down at her limp left arm - which bore a circuit-like pattern of scorch marks on the plugsuit surface. "By far, that's the worst feedback shock injury I've ever sustained. Ghost pain usually lasts twelve to twenty-four hours, barring the flashbacks; this paralyzed limb is already over twenty and doesn't even have feeling yet."
"And I can't imagine getting back into Baal while she's still damaged will help."
"I don't expect so, no." Mari stood up, swayed, them stepped towards the bathroom. "Worst case scenario, re-syncing may cause permanent nerve death in the affected area."
"And you're still willing to -?" Kaji shook his head. "We don't have time for you to shower, Mari."
"I'm not showering." The pilot pushed the door open and closed it behind her. A minute later, Kaji heard water running.
"What did I just say, kid?" He yelled at the door.
Mari didn't respond immediately, but the water turned back off after a mere thirty seconds or so.
"I'm not showering." Mari opened the door somewhat awkwardly, trying to clutch a combat knife and the door handle at the same time. "I was just rinsing this shit off. I'm done."
She limped over the the bed and sat down, ignoring the water dripping from her plugsuit and forming a wet patch on the blankets - not that it would have mattered, as they were already stained with the translucent red goo of spoiled LCL. She leaned down stiffly to jam the knife back into its boot sheath.
Kaji frowned. "I don't think NERV will be pleased you wrecked a plugsuit like that."
Mari looked at her now bare left arm, the plugsuit sleeve hacked off at the shoulder to leave a ragged seam and a few bleeding scratches where her precision had been off. "I don't think I give a shit, and this plugsuit was already wrecked. The burned sections won't do more than generate link signal noise."
Kaji nodded, mollified. "Alright. Are you up to move Baal? It'll be quite a few hours before we even get near Japan -"
"Do I have a choice? Let's go."
X-X-X
The city's oddly beautiful after curfew. Nothing is lit but the tower beacons on the buildings that haven't been retracted, and silent but for the cicadas…
The door to the balcony closed softly behind her, and Ritsuko felt a tiny, sharp twinge of tension shoot down her spine. She sucked harder on her cigarette, smoking it like she had a grudge against it.
"So. The kids are in bed." Misato's voice lacked any trace of emotion, so Ritsuko could tell she was tense. "Lay it on me, Doctor Akagi."
Ritsuko winced at the cold formality, but straightened her shoulders and turned away from the dark city to face her girlfriend.
"Where does NERV get its funding from, Misato?" She said, almost idly.
The captain's brow furrowed. "Primarily from the UN Instrumentality Committee," she said hesitantly. "As well as the Strategic Self Defense Force, the countries where we have established branches - China, Russia, Germany, the United Kingdom, the United States, erm, India -"
"Yes, that's all true on the surface," Ritsuko said flatly. "It's a pretty airtight money laundering setup, all things considered. With alien monstrosities attacking earth and us offering the only viable defense, it's no surprise that no one would look closer than that."
Misato's eyes narrowed, and her expression became hard. "What are you getting at, Ritsuko?"
"NERV is actually funded by a shadowy cabal that call themselves SEELE… an illuminati of sorts. There are twelve of them, probably all men, though I've never seen their faces. They are all old, very rich and very powerful… the Instrumentality Committee is actually five members of SEELE, and more than half the seats of the UN itself are in their pocket." Ritsuko took another drag on her cigarette. "They created Gehirn and NERV. To defeat the angels, yes - but only incidentally. The angels had to be defeated for their plan to work."
"They created -? Wait, Gehirn existed before the angels were a known threat. Before second impact." Misato cocked her head.
Ritsuko lowered her gaze. "SEELE knew about the angels before second impact… and in fact, they may have purposefully triggered it. I don't know." She shook her head. "The only details I get are what the Commander knows and sees fit to share with me, and all he knows is what he can gather by deduction or espionage."
Misato ground her teeth. "They may have purposefully triggered second impact? You'd better be dead serious about this, Ritsuko. You know what -"
"I'm serious. Very serious. God, I wish I could joke about this." The doctor ground her cigarette out on the railing, her fingers shaking almost as much as her voice. "Just knowing the name of SEELE is enough to get you shot with a silenced gun and dumped in an unmarked grave. And if you think I'm joking, I've seen it happen. There was this lab tech that asked me once, and the Commander overheard him -"
Ritsuko cut herself off, biting the inside of her cheek.
"… anyway, I know I've been all cloaks and daggers recently, but please trust me." Her voice was steady once more. "I won't lie. Not to you."
The other woman didn't respond immediately, and Ritsuko felt the nervousness coil uncomfortably around her stomach again. At last, however, the silence broke.
"I believe you… I think." Misato's tone was guarded. "There has to be more to this, though."
Ritsuko let out a huff that might have almost been a laugh. "Oh, there is. Even if I dared, I couldn't cover it all tonight." She dug her pack of cigarettes out of her pocket. "So much more… for instance, do you know why the Eva units can generate AT fields?"
"Because they're living beings, right? A lot of that's your field of expertise, not mine. Something about molecular biology?" One of Misato's eyebrows rose. "You're smoking more these days."
Ritsuko blinked. "I am, aren't I?" She let out the same weak laugh, and stuffed her cigarettes away without lighting a new one. "Sorry. I know it bothers you. I've been in a whole new world of stress, lately."
"Not my decision to make," Misato replied neutrally, folding her arms. "I can hardly judge you for doing what you feel you have to."
Oh, if you knew half of the things I do 'because I have to', you'd judge me harsher than any. Ritsuko bit her tongue. I don't think I can risk telling her anything about Rei… I can't trust her judgement; she's just too emotionally vulnerable when kids are involved.
"Anyway. Where were you going with the AT fields?"
Ritsuko looked back up. "The secret behind their AT fields is no artifice of bioengineering, nor arcana of technology." She bit her lower lip. "The Evangelions can create AT fields because they are grown from tissue samples of the angel Adam. And that's God's own truth. I took the samples for units Three and Four myself."
"But… the angel Adam was destroyed in second impact." Misato's voice faltered. "I was… I was there, Ritsuko. It…"
"Nearly destroyed, but not completely." Ritsuko held a steely grip on her composure. "It was reduced to a tiny thing, like an egg or embryo of its former self. SEELE kept possession of it until recently. I believe Kaji has delivered it to our dear Commander's custody."
"Kaji…?"
Ritsuko had been listening for a tremor in Misato's voice. The moment she heard it, she stepped forward and wrapped her arms around Misato's shaking shoulders.
"I'm sorry." Really, that's all you can say to her? You really are as cold as they say you are… "We can stop, if you want. Like I said, there's more to cover than one night would give us time for anyway."
Misato didn't respond immediately. She wasn't quite crying, but she was clearly holding back tears. She's been like that as long as I've known her. Never lets anyone see her cry, not even me.
"… what time is it?" The younger woman finally asked. Her voice was quiet, but calm once more.
Ritsuko peered over Misato's shoulder, looking at her watch. "A little before midnight," she replied softly.
"Late…" Misato sounded fatigued. "I don't know… I want to know these things. I hate being in the dark… but just what you've already told me seems like so much."
Ritsuko said nothing. What could I say? The order she put her faith in has betrayed her, and if anything, I am one of the traitors.
"No more. Not tonight." Misato straightened her back and pulled away from the embrace. "I need… I need time to process this. Even if there's more. Especially if there's more."
"That's understandable." A humorless smile crossed Ritsuko's features. "It wouldn't look good for us to both show up late to work at the same time, anyway."
"No, it wouldn't." Misato stepped closer again. "I'm not too worried about that happening, though. I've never seen you show up late. Ever. Do you sleep five hours a night or something?"
"Four, actually, but -"
"Shhh." Misato's lips were inches from Ritsuko's. "You've given me a lot to think about tonight. Now, how about you take my mind off it?"
What did I do to deserve this woman?
X-X-X
Asuka's eyes snapped open. Her room was dark and silent; with the 11pm curfew in effect and the main buildings retracted into the geofront, Tokyo-3 was utterly still in the late hours of the night.
Mama…
She bit the tip of her tongue to dispel the dream, and angrily cast the blankets off her.
Between Shamshel and… Mama… fuck, feels like I wake up sweating more often than not these days.
Nightmares about her mother's psychosis and death had haunted her for years, but dreams where she relived her death battle with the angel's minions were a new world of terrors. Asuka stood up, her movements subdued from their usual fiery fervor by the weight hanging on her mind.
Her arm twitched, and she grimaced in anticipation. Anytime she woke from a nightmare - whether it was about the angel battle or not - the phantom pains would creep back to haunt her.
It's a nerve shock symptom. It isn't real. It isn't real…
Repeating it to herself almost helped.
Hissing in frustration, she strode out of her bedroom and headed for the bathroom. The sudden light stabbed her eyes, and she winced, glad for a distraction.
Fucking phantom pain… isn't it enough that we feel it in the entry plug? Why's it gotta linger?
Asuka stared at herself in the mirror. Her own tired, adolescent face stared back.
Fourteen years old. Fifteen in only a few months. She looked paler than usual, and there were bags under her eyes. I thought nightmares were something only old soldiers with PTSD got…
Asuka was loathe to admit weakness, but in the quiet stillness of the house she was forced to face facts: the fight with Shamshel's seraphs had shaken her. She'd won, of course, but it was still jarring. Feedback pain in a simulation battle with controlled circumstances was one thing; feedback pain in a true life and death melee was another entirely.
She narrowed her eyes at her reflection, and squared her shoulders. She pulled her spine into a stiff at-attention stance.
I won before, and I will do so again. You only lose when you give up, and the Ace Pilot does not lose.
"… Soryu?"
Asuka whirled, realizing she had left the bathroom door ajar. There, framed by the darkness of the hallway, was Shinji.
"Oh. Hey, Third." She turned back to the mirror. "Something on your mind, or do you just need to piss?"
Shinji looked down. "Couldn't sleep."
Something clicked in Asuka's head. "Nightmares?" She said, her voice softer than before.
Shinji nodded dumbly. "You get them too?" He murmured, almost to himself. His hand clutched unconsciously at his abdomen. "I… I worried I was just the weak one."
"Hey, what's that supposed to mean?" Asuka snapped back.
"I just - I mean - you're so much stronger than me," he stuttered. "You love piloting. You're like this unbreakable colossus compared to me."
"Well, of course I am!" Asuka stretched her best smirk across her face. "I'm the best there is!"
"Yeah." Shinji's quiet agreement gave Asuka pause, and her eyes widened. Glad I'm facing the mirror. "But if even the best hurts sometimes, that means that the pain doesn't make me worthless."
Asuka shifted, tilting her head to look at Shinji's reflection in the mirror. His hand was still resting on his abdomen.
Fuck, I wish I'd seen those recordings of his tangle with Shamshel before I dismissed him so easily yesterday. And that was the real angel, not a seraph. Those whips hurt bad enough through my skin and armor - he got stabbed in his fucking guts.
Scheisse, I'm amazed he's standing.
"… don't sell yourself short, Shinji. You've killed two angels," Asuka finally allowed. "Maybe you don't have my skill or finesse, but if you can manage not to freeze up when an alien's basically gutting you with an arc torch, you've got the steel to make something great of yourself."
"You…" Shinji blinked. "You really think so?"
"Hey, don't push your luck, Third. Potential isn't a finished product, and unworked steel is no use to anyone." She closed her eyes and pinched the bridge of her nose. "Don't think this means I'll accept slack effort from you."
Shinji's brow lowered, and he looked at the floor. "I guess you're right." He sighed slightly. "I… I'm going back to bed. School tomorrow and all."
"Yeah, you do that."
Asuka looked over her shoulder at his retreating form.
I guess I should go to bed too. If I do my LCL-breathing exercises, I might even be able to ignore the ghost pain long enough to sleep.
She flicked the bathroom light off and padded softly back towards her bedroom. About halfway there, she froze.
… was that a fucking moan I just heard?
It was so faint she thought she'd imagined it, but Asuka wasn't the kind of person to leave questions unanswered. Quiet as a mouse, she crept further down the hallway.
"… need to be quiet, Rits. Do you want to wake the kids?"
Asuka pressed her ear to Misato's door, and held her breath.
"It'd be a lot easier to be quiet if you weren't… oh. Oh-h-"
"Shhh!"
And then, the unmistakable sounds of kissing.
Asuka recoiled, narrowly avoiding falling over in her retreat. She clamped a hand over her mouth.
Misato and Ritsuko?! Misato and Ritsuko are… kissing? Fucking?! Her mind was reeling. Scheisse, I… I guess I knew that two girls was a thing that could happen, what with growing up around Mari, but… I sure as fuck didn't expect to find it this close to home!
There were more muffled noises from the room, then a slightly louder moan. Asuka clamped her hands over her ears and stood up, tiptoeing as quickly as possible back towards her bedroom.
From how they behave at work, you'd never think they were more than moderately antagonistic friends. Certainly not… ugh, it feels weird to say it… lovers.
She lay down as fast as possible, clamping the pillow over her head with her arms. Now that she knew what she was listening for, the faint noises were unmistakable - they were on the edge of hearing, but Asuka had never been able to switch off her carefully trained attentiveness.
Sleep was a long time coming.
X-X-X
All my classes today have had some empty seats. Some have had a lot of them. This school isn't as lively as a central urban school should be.
It's because of the angels, isn't it? No one wants to live in a war zone. NERV made Hakone into the fortress of Tokyo-3, but now that it's under siege, the city is slowly starting to die.
"Are you okay, Soryu?"
Asuka blinked. "Huh? Yeah! Why wouldn't I be?"
Hikari's expression was concerned. "You've, um. You've been kind of… not all there. For most of the day."
Asuka looked around the classroom, where students were slowly filtering out. "Oh… was that the last class?"
"See, this is what I mean," Hikari sighed. "Is something on your mind?"
"Just tired is all. Stayed up too late." Yeah, because I was kept up by gottverdammt battle nightmares and my two immediate superiors fucking, but that's technically the truth. "Oh… fuck, is Rei still here?"
"Ayanami?" Hikari looked around the classroom. "I don't think so. When she doesn't have cleaning duty, she's usually the first out the door."
"Gottverdammt… I was supposed to give her a reissued NERV ID." Asuka dragged her hands down her face. "I don't suppose I could stuff it in her locker?"
"She doesn't have a locker."
Asuka blinked again. "Wait… really? How is that possible?"
"I don't know. She's the only student at the school without one." Hikari shrugged. "We have the empty locker space, but she always says she doesn't need one. I'm fairly sure she carries all her books from home."
"Oh for fuck's sake… I don't suppose I could just give it to y- oh wait, fuck no, I'm not handing NERV documents to civilians." Asuka sighed. "Well, I guess I didn't really have anything planned this afternoon." Not that I'm exactly thrilled to spend it in The Wonder Girl's company, but it can't be too bad. It'll be an exchange between professionals, nothing more.
"I beg your pardon?"
"I'll just head out to her house and give it to her. Do you know where she lives?"
"Well, yes," Hikari replied, looking at her feet. She really has that cute demure look down. Wait, cute? Was zur hölle, Asuka? "But I don't know if I should -"
"I'm a coworker and a NERV officer." Asuka rolled her eyes. "I think you're okay telling me."
"Well… if you're sure." Hikari produced a notepad and began slowly scratching her pen at it. "She lives kind of… out of the way, though."
"Oh? How far is it?"
X-X-X
It took Asuka almost two hours to reach the address, and she rode the light rail for most of it. The journey took her way into the western outskirts of the city, out past the primary defensive perimeter. No one lived out here - it was nothing but a few dying criminal gangs, homeless people, and disintegrating, abandoned buildings. The sounds of demolition works echoed through the district at all hours of the day.
I'm amazed there was even a rail stop this far out. Asuka's face had been set in an angry expression for most of the trip. Still had to walk nearly a fucking mile, of course. Which of these ruins am I even looking for?
She finally stopped in front of what looked like the concrete skeleton of an apartment building.
Scheisse, wondergirl lives here? That's what being the commander's favorite does for you? I don't even want to know what he does to people he hates!
Grumbling to herself, Asuka stepped up to the stairwell. Good fucking thing she only lives on the fourth floor. If I had to climb all the way to the top I'd just fucking go home.
The building looked even worse from the inside, with grime and decaying litter lying everywhere. The refuse thinned out slightly as she climbed - apparently vagrants weren't inclined to climb more stairs than they had to - but the grime certainly didn't.
Then, finally, she reached the door to apartment 402.
Well, what now, Asuka?
She pressed the doorbell, and ground her teeth when the resounding silence declared that it didn't work.
Growling in frustration, she pounded her fist on the door. A few letters fell from the stack wedged in the mail slot as she did so.
There was no response from within, despite the loud knocking. Asuka gritted her teeth.
Well, one more fucking thing to try, then I'll leave this freak to her freakish ways.
Asuka grabbed the doorknob and twisted like she had a grudge against it. With a soft click and a considerably louder crash, the door swung open.
Of course she doesn't lock it. Why would she lock it? That's something normal people would do, Asuka thought inanely. Fuck, isn't she at all worried someone might break in? Probably not; you'd never guess anyone lived here by the look of the door…
The floor of the entryway was rather dirty, and sported footprints that indicated Rei apparently ignored the Japanese custom of removing her shoes when she entered a house. Well, if she doesn't need to, I don't either. The rest of the apartment wasn't much cleaner; damp dust covered most of the floor, except for the paths Rei walked, where the dust was scuffed away with more footprints.
Where the fuck is she? Is she not home? Then the faint sound of running water hit Asuka's ears. Shower, probably. Wow. She does human things and I'm genuinely surprised by it. Then Asuka's eyes narrowed, and a wicked grin settled on her features. Well now, this is an unusual opportunity to prank a fellow pilot…
However, as she entered the bedroom, her malevolent intent faded away. Scheisse. How the fuck could I actually make this any worse?
The walls, floor and ceiling were bare, dirty concrete, and the walls weren't even smoothed - just raw construction slabs. The only light came from an algae-encrusted window and a single fluorescent light overhead. There were precisely two pieces of furniture - the bed, its sheets stained with blood, what the fuck - and a dresser.
Seeing little else worth investigating, Asuka approached the dresser. A cursory investigation of the contents revealed only simple white underclothes and a few empty drawers.
The top of the dresser was a bit more interesting, however. There was a pair of cracked orange sunglasses - can't imagine her ever wearing something like this, wonder why she has it? - a sheet of paper that looked like medical instructions and an unnervingly large collection of pill bottles, a 1 liter beaker of water, and another bottle of LCL. Beside the bottle, there were two packs of syringes; one sealed, one open.
Was zur hölle are all these? Asuka eyed the pill bottles, then picked up the sheet of paper. Fluoxetine, diazepam… Wondergirl's on antidepressants? Wait, clozapine… what's that? Where have I heard that before?
Then her eyes widened. Mama! They put mama on clozapine. It's an antipsychotic. But… fucking why?! I thought she was a weird antisocial freak, but it turns out she's just doped into oblivion! Gott im Himmel… She scanned further down the paper. Ketamine… secobarbital… meperidine… 'nephilim syndrome supplement'? fuck, I don't even recognize half of these. How is she still breathing? I'm no pharmacologist, but I'm fairly sure that this many hard drugs at once should be more than enough to kill someone. Especially a little waif like the first.
Asuka put the paper down gently, her hands shaking. She drew a deep breath and, carefully, collected her composure. Her gaze flickered over the dresser, looking for something to distract her attention from the witches' brew of pills in the center.
These glasses… something's fucking familiar about them.
Frowning, she poked them. Not only was the orange glass cracked, the frame was also slightly bent?
The Commander! Asuka's eyes widened. Commander Ikari was almost exclusively seen in sunglasses, and - though she was hardly afforded many opportunities to look at him closely - he did seem to have a penchant for orange lenses. They're his. They have to be. Why does Wondergirl have a broken pair of his sunglasses?
She picked them up, sliding the bent frames awkwardly onto her face. The glass wasn't cracked in a manner that suggested they'd been crushed, but Asuka couldn't think of why else the frame might be bent.
Then there was the sound of a door opening behind her, and Asuka realized - with a spike of panic - that the soft hiss of falling water had gone silent.
X-X-X
This body is 10.51 years old and its heart has beat 442,430,483 times
This body is 10.51 years old and its heart has beat 442,430,484 times
This body is 10.51 years old and its heart has beat 442,430,485 times
Rei liked showering - and as one of few things in the entire world that could elicit the word 'like' from her, that was no small statement.
Water was something special to her. She enjoyed swimming, too, but access to a pool was harder to come by than a shower. It was all too easy for Rei to drift through life in a detached, mindless haze - barely more than a vessel for the vast and ancient presence that occupied her core in the place of a true soul - but the soft, omnipresent contact of the cascading water always seemed to bring her back to herself. It reminded her that she existed; that she was real.
Intellectually, she knew this was not necessary. The Commander had no need of a tool with perceptions beyond its purpose.
No, that is an incomplete picture. The Commander has required me to pilot EVA, attend school, and maintain all appearances of being human. These functions are not directly part of my true purpose, but they aid in its pursuit. Hygiene is important to maintaining health and social standards.
Her apartment lacked any heating for the water. Rei barely felt the cold, the vanishingly faint chill bearing little more than academic interest to her.
It makes sense that I am required to pilot. Of the other three pilots that exist, one appears substandard and one is absent. I, and pilot Soryu, seem to be the only reliable pilots on the force.
She felt a spike of tension in the back of her mind as her thoughts drifted to the other pilot. The feeling seemed familiar, but she couldn't place it.
Pilot Soryu is everything I am not. She is loud, insubordinate, and reckless. She dominates the pilot corps by simply shouting over opposing voices. Rei's eye twitched, and she noted the irregularity. She walks fast and runs faster. She could be compared to a dancing flame, in that red plugsuit - and indeed, fire is an apt metaphor for her existence.
Rei retrieved a bottle of salve from the shelf beside her, squeezing it onto her fingers and applying it the the skin around the uplink tap on the base of her neck. That done, she moved on to the ones on her shoulders, then her lower spine.
She fights with passion, heedless of the destruction or risk of her own death. She is a unique soul in a unique body, fragile and irreplaceable, yet she strides into battle without fear. She does not ask for attention, she simply takes it - her presence invading the space around her until I can fixate on nothing else. Rei closed the bottle and deposited it back on the shelf. Yes… fire is a very apt metaphor. She shrouds herself in red. She is bright, animated, and unstable. She is dangerous. She is wild. She is painful to be near.
This body is 10.51 years old and its heart has beat 442,431,517 times -
Quick as a snake, Rei's hand lashed out and struck the faucet handle. The shower stopped instantly.
Two heartbeats longer than my standard shower length. I allowed myself to become lost in thought. Rei stepped out of the shower, heedless of the water dripping onto the bare concrete of the bathroom floor, and retrieved one of the two threadbare towels she owned. This phenomenon bears further observation. I cannot allow myself to become defective.
She ran the towel down her body in a cursory effort to absorb the clinging water, then draped it across her shoulders without further ceremony; she would have preferred to let herself entirely air-dry, but she could not justify the extra time it would take before she could get dressed. She rubbed the other towel through her hair in a similarly careless manner.
Still lost in the tedium of her shower ritual, she slid the bathroom door open.
Immediately, she stopped and took a moment to reassess the situation.
The second child is in my apartment. This was not an expected development.
Asuka had turned to face her, and the blue eyes widened. Rei didn't question why - her attention was fixed on one thing alone.
She is wearing the Commander's glasses.
A feeling that she didn't understand seized her, and she dropped the towel, her wet hair forgotten. She took two sharp strides forward, snatching the glasses from Asuka's face.
Asuka recoiled from the sudden intrusion. Unfortunately, she was already backed up against the dresser, which caused her to rebound back towards Rei - who was drawing back with the glasses clutched triumphantly in her hands.
The collision sent them both tumbling to the floor with a crash a short series of small clacking noises. Rei faintly registered several spikes of pain in her back.
X-X-X
Asuka had expected a concrete floor to feel harder and smoother, and a collision with one to feel more painful. She hadn't expected it to be yielding.
It's cool, but not as cold as concrete should be. And not as smooth as it looked. Almost… bony, but kind of soft in certain -
Then Asuka's vision refocused, and her mind caught up with her perception.
She had avoided the concrete floor by landing flat on top of Rei, who was sprawled on her back beneath Asuka. She was suddenly very uncomfortably aware of exactly how closely pressed against the other pilot she was, and how thin the cloth between them was.
"Will you get off?" The other pilot whispered, so quietly as to be inaudible from any distance greater than lying right the fuck on top of her. It didn't even sound like a request, just a dry question for clarity's sake.
Wait, she actually spoke? Wait, that's all she can say, when I'm practically molesting her?! Shock and irritation vied for control of Asuka's mind, until mortification beat them both. Oh. I'm… oh, Gott im Himmel.
Rei was so bony as to feel almost emaciated, but Asuka's left hand definitely wasn't feeling bone. In fact, it had landed on something soft and rounded.
Fuck. Fuck, fuck, fuck. Asuka cringed, scrambling off Rei as fast as she could manage. "I - fuck - I didn't - you shouldn't have -" she shook her head, swallowing the rising storm of anxiety and reflexive anger, and closed her eyes. "… I'm sorry," she finally managed, her voice a touch sullen.
Added to the list of things I never wanted to find out: Rei's hair is, in fact, naturally blue. Somehow.
Rei didn't respond at all. She simply pushed herself to her feet and walked calmly over to the dresser, returning the glasses to their spot beside the pill bottles and retrieving a set of underclothes from the drawers.
It would occur to Asuka, later, that staring at someone as they were getting dressed after a shower was incredibly rude - but Rei seemed to have no objections to her presence or gaze. Indeed, the blue-haired girl seemed content to utterly ignore Asuka's existence, and Asuka was too dizzy from the hurricane of confusion to remember a sense of propriety. So she watched her.
She'd known Rei was a slight girl since the day she'd lifted her onto a medical gurney, and lying on top of her earlier had driven the point home - but it wasn't until she actually looked at her that Asuka realized just what it had meant. Rei's hips and shoulders were actually wider than Asuka's, but she was so skinny that it barely showed; every rib and bone stood out under her skin with painful definition.
Worse still were the scars. Some of the ones on her arms and legs looked accidental, but the torso scars were all surgical - some recent and red, many more white and faded. Their sheer number was terrifying.
What… what happened to her? She's a wreck. Is this why she's on so many medications? Does she have some kind of chronic illness? That paper mentioned a 'nephilim syndrome…'
Rei, still completely oblivious to Asuka's scrutiny, walked back to the bed and began pulling on her clothes. Asuka - now finally afforded a clear view of Rei's back - bit her tongue.
There was metal grafted into the flesh of her back, and the skin around each graft was rough and scarred. They looked like small circular ports which suggested cables to plug into. Asuka could count seven in all: two on her shoulders, three running down her spine and two on her hips. The '03' tattooed in dark red ink between her shoulderblades only accentuated the macabre image.
"Verdammt, First. What the hell happened to you?"
"Clarify," came the soft reply. Rei was already pulling on her skirt.
"Your - that - those things on you back. Was zur hölle?"
"Part of a now obsolete entry plug design." Rei picked up the white collared shirt, pulling the sleeves over her arms. "It is necessary for me to synchronize with Asherah's prototype systems."
Asuka blinked. At no point had Rei broken her clinical tone, but it seemed almost out of character for her to use her Eva's callsign - names whimsically assigned to them from ancient pantheons of pagan gods - instead of simply saying Unit Zero.
If they're part of the synchronization links, that means major nerve surgery. Scheisse, I've given my life to Evangelion, but I think even I might have hesitated at that. How does this quiet little twig of a girl pull off being so hardcore?
"What about that tattoo?" Asuka made a vague gesture to Rei's now-clothed back, despite the fact that the other girl wasn't looking at her. "Didn't really think you were the type to get inked. Aren't you too young, anyway?"
Rei tied the bow around her neck, and Asuka's jaw dropped as she realized that what Rei had put on was in fact her school uniform. In fact, I don't think I've ever seen her in anything but a school uniform or plugsuit -
"I am not at liberty to divulge that information." Rei pulled on her socks and shoes with practiced ease, then slid two innocuous bracelets onto her wrist. "Goodbye, pilot Soryu."
Asuka stared in shock as Rei walked over to the door and left the apartment.
Did… did she just give me the 'it's classified' treatment?! Me, a fellow pilot?! She seethed, clenching her fists. And over a fucking tattoo, no less!
For a moment, Asuka entertained the idea of chasing the first child down and demanding an explanation. The moment passed with pride as the clear winner.
Fuck it, if she wants to walk off with a stranger in her apartment, that's her verdammt business. Asuka shook her head. Gottverdammt… why was I even here in the first place…?
Asuka let out a loud groan as she remembered the NERV keycard tucked into her schoolbag.
X-X-X
Much later, Rei would return to her apartment. Her ID card had been rejected by NERV's security system, and she had waited nearly an hour by the entrance. One or two other employees had come and gone in that time, but none had helped her.
I failed to meet with the Commander as I usually do. This may displease him.
Eventually, she had simply returned to her apartment. Inability to access NERV headquarters was a problem she was not used to, but there was no reason to disrupt her sleeping pattern for it, and not did she have any reason to believe the situation would not be rapidly rectified by Section Two.
When she got home, however, she was greeted with something she hadn't expected: an envelope lying on her pillow. It was entirely blank, without postage or address, save a message scrawled in faulty Kanji on the front of it.
Since I forgot to give it to you when I was here, here's your new NERV ID card. -Asuka
Rei blinked, slowly, but the envelope stubbornly continued to exist.
"Oh," she said eventually, and the soft sound almost echoed in the barren room.
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