NGE "Once more with Feeling" Alt fic

[Darth Fanboy]

I think the only thing left that the esteemed Mr O'Farrell can do to make this resemble an actual story for Evangelion is add in a teaser at the end of every chapter where Misato promises more fanservice.

I rewatched the entire series last week just so I could get into a better frame of mind to read the two excellent Eva fics being produced and I think it's really benefitted me on this story most of all.

[Vehrec]

I've got a question, for both Chris and the whole fan-group here that I think can be best aired here. It's been bothering me all day, so here it is.
How old is Rei, chronologically? In other words, had her creation already begun or was she already in existence at the time of the Unit 01 'accident'? And did Yui know about her 'Daughter'? She was identified as a prospective pilot before Asuka, so what do we know about when and how the First came into existence? Because this seems to be rather an important question of who bears the guilt here and for what reasons.

[Academia Nut]

While there might be some other supplmental information elsewhere, I think that they may have simply screwed up the chronology. All of the normal pilots were born within a year to eighteen months of Second Impact (except Kaworu who was born on Second Impact, but he's special). In fact, if I remember correctly, Shinji was supposed to have been conceived around the time of Second Impact.

Now, Yui got merged with Unit 01 when Shinji was four, and Asuka's mom got part of her soul eaten by Unit 02 shortly afterward, so I think Asuka was at best six, but more likely four or five, when she was declared the Second Child. Thing is I'm pretty sure the DNA they got for Rei was salvaged from traces of Yui in the entry plug, which means that unless they had some sort of growth acceleration technology, she probably wouldn't have even finished gestating before she was declared the First Child.

Maybe someone else knows more, but honestly, it wouldn't be the first time they fucked something up.

[Darth Fanboy]

There's always the possibility Gendo had procured a sample of Yui and was working on the creation of Rei before hand, knowing full well what would happen to Yui once she was absorbed by Unit 01 and only after Yui was gone prepare to introduce Rei.

[Chris OFarrell]

Damn you! I thought there was an update!

























Hang on....








Anyway.
I think the implication from that episode were Kozo does flashbacks for SEELE on the history of GEHIRN and NERV is that Rei was created at the same time Yui died, or at least the *process* of it was started, probably using some kind of accelerated growth technology to get her to be the same age as Shinji and Co. As she is a core part of the Human Instrumentality Project, which Gendo propossed to SEELE in the days or weeks after Yui died.

Agaki -senior- was very surprised by Rei the first time she saw her in what, 2007? I'm guessing between 2004 - 2007 Rei was designed and created, her growth accelerated during those years till she was the same age as the other children.

At least thats my working theory.

[Academia Nut]

Yeah, that theory is the only one that really works from what we're told, but it still throws up the huge mess that Rei would probably have been declared the First Child after Asuka was declared the Second Child. There's some sort of fuck up going on there anyway.

[Chris OFarrell]

I'm more worried that Shinji was conceived about or on the date of Second Impact! How the hell did THAT work?

Yui: "My God Gendo, its horrible! SEELE just detected an enormous explosion at the south pole, we're talking teratons of energy unleashed here, roughly at the same time Katusragi's contact experiment was scheduled! We have earthquakes, water carried shock waves, the works, all heading for the populated areas of the world! Millions, no, BILLIONS of people are going to DIE!"

Gendo: "THen it's time to repopulate the world...oh baby!"

*'Its Gendo!' music starts playing as he takes Yui and carries her into the bedroom*

[Academia Nut]

I think the somewhat more likely scenario is:

Yui: Where are you going?
Gendo: Gonna go have a smoke in the nude babe.

Gendo goes to the balcony only to find the sky is on fire and everything has gone to hell.

Gendo:...awww fuck...
Yui: Again already?

[Vehrec]

Given their mastery of bio-tech with the Evas and successfully cloning Rei in the first place, I guess I can let the accelerated aging thing fly. On the other hand, there never should have been any doubt about her piloting ability. She was made from a woman who went to 400% in 15 seconds and the Second Angel, if she couldn't synch, nobody could.

On the other hand, I just don't want to think too hard about Yui and Gendo in bed. You had to remind me about just how horney they must have been, didn't you? Come to think of it, the sex could have been day-of or before Second Impact, conception takes time.

[LadyTevar]

....... You bastards. I thought Chris had updated.

[ray245]

Same...BURN!!

[Chris OFarrell]

First, housekeeping.

This fanfic as I sort of said in the little disclaimer at the front, was partially an experiment, partially a fun fic, so I hadn't really been doing anything like as much editing and proof reading as I should have. I've always been a little lazy at it, but reading over some of the earlier chapters again, i can't help but wince every few lines. A lot of the errors are upload filters screwing things over, but a lot are not and it rather stands out for me now that I actually looked.

So I've chained Academia to a table and engaged his services as a Beta writer, so I'm hoping you'll see a noticeable improvement away from all the little errors that pop up every few lines from now on. My thanks for his valuable time, extreme patience and suggestions that, I hope, make this a more enjoyable experience.

Now, new business.

This is WAFF territory here. Be warned ye that enter here. I think I might have somewhat overcompensated for the rather...heavy tone of the last chapter of my little trilogy, so I apologize if I've gone a little far, or rushed things a little too much -I think some fellow EVA writers are a bad influence, given how far THEY have moved along the Eva timeline while I'm still not that far from Asuka arriving, even if they started after me

This chapter in fact got so big I decided to split it into two sections, though they are really one big chapter. I've decided to give it a day or two between chapters rather then spamming everyone with close to 50,000 words at once (bloody hell, there are complete Eva fics of a solid quality that are 50,000 words on their own!) and destroying everyones minds. The next chapter should be up in a few days, after Academia finishes fixing the horrors I can see through it.

Well. I think thats about it...all thats left to say is enjoy. And if you find this too WAFFy, don't worry. The chapters after the dance are over will be filled with much in the way of giant robots and giant aliens slugging it out! And of course everything going to utter hell in a handbasket at some point in the next few chapters after that. But hey, its Evangelion...

********

Asuka Langley Soryu was shopping.

All things being equal, this would generally lead to a relatively happy Second Child. She had plenty of cash, she was getting an acceptably high number of interested looks from the boys in the area -which she then ignored- and she was shopping in the company of two of her friends.

But today all things were not equal.
She was behind the curve.
Asuka Langley Soryu hated being behind anything. It was just under two weeks till the so called Dance and she didn’t have an exact idea what she was going to wear.

Problem the first; she couldn’t wear anything that someone else was going to wear, that was a cardinal sin for a women. Hence the presence of the class rep who, besides being her best friend, as a matter of course knew everything there was to know about what people were wearing across the year. In ordinary times, Asuka would have done her own ‘recon’, but the synchronization training with Shinji and Rei had kept her away from school for so long that she simply didn’t have the time, instead relying on Hikari to keep her safe.

Problem the second then reared its head; she couldn’t just wear something unique, it had to be something bold, daring and brilliant. From what Hikari had told her, the year was more or less evenly divided between a traditional Japanese Kimono or Kimono inspired evening gown on one hand, or a more western look for the other half. The good news was that by in large, almost all the girls who had chosen a more western look were highly conservative Japanese girls who went for simple and rather plain designs compared to what she was looking for, which meant she didn’t have to push too close to that thin line between ‘slut’ and ‘superstar’ to make a huge impact.

She wanted to be the center of attention for the right reasons after all, not the wrong reasons.

And problem the third, Rei was with them, needing her own dress.

The trio had been shopping for over two hours with only a quick drinks break to halt their momentum. Rei had surprisingly been the easiest to buy for, she had calmly walked into the second store the three had looked in, ignored everything on display and almost as if she had some kind of sixth sense to select a silvery white dress with light blue highlights that had been sitting at the back of the store. Asuka hadn’t been entirely sure of the choice, but Rei had clearly fallen in love with it at first sight. Rei was a strange one for sure…but when she walked out of the change room with a surprisingly self conscious expression on her face…

She looked gorgeous. And damm her for it, she would have to work twice as hard now to ensure Rei didn’t steal herthunder.

The dress was strapless and hugged her figure almost like a second skin in places, loosely billowing out ever so slightly from her knees where it was slit to show off a small tease of her legs, Asuka making a mental note to double check Rei’s new, but limited shoe selection to make sure she had appropriate heelsto go with the outfit…

“Perfect” Asuka managed to smile, actually feeling –grudgingly- happy for Rei and the surprisingly elegant look she was pulling off, finding that she actually felt happy for the odd First Child, who had had far too little happiness in her life to this date.

Typically, it had taken her to set things right, not even the invincible Shinji had known about her situation, let alone done anything about it.

It had all started so oddly, with Asuka deciding that Rei should be her friend -for conveniences sake if nothing else- with a vague eye to teaming up the two female Eva pilots against Shinji at some point in the future. Rei had surprisingly agreed, although there hadn’t been any more time to explore this ‘friendship’ before she and Shinji had been deployed against the 7th Angel.

It was probably just as well that Rei had stayed behind and avoided running afoul of her rather dark mood on the trip back, her humiliation fueling a storm of anger that Shinji had defused by quietly saying that when they worked together, they did great things. His quiet and sincere admission had shocked her, but it had succeeded in changing her mood around enough to not take it out on Rei, fortune smiling on them as Rei, in that utterly honest and clinical way, had commented that her tactics had been utterly appropriate based on the previous Angel patterns, followed by the agreement among the pilots that each of them had screwed up in battle more then once.

The expression of her feelings might have been a little crude…but the sentiment behind them was so honest it had actually struck deep into Asuka and quietly changed her initial ‘freakazoid’ thoughts of the First Child, a change of attitude compounded when she had later seen the conditions Rei lived in.

It had however slid slightly backwards when she had found out about the school dance from Rei, the First Child not having bothered to inform her about it in the days they had known each other. Hikari too for that matter, but she had been able to –eventually- forgive them.

Shinji she had only –just- forgiven, he lived with her and he had plenty of chances to tell her. Even if he had decided not to go.

At least until she had hinted she might take him and he had jumped at the chance. Predictable; he turned down –preemptively- every other Girl in the year, even setting Rei up with one of the stooges, but the second shewas on the scene, bang, he was begging at her feet to accompany…

Ah hell…

She couldn’t lie that much to herself.

She had volunteered him. When you really got down to it, she had asked him out.

In the end though, the simple fact was that he had rejected everyone but her preemptively, without a thought. Then, when she had put herselfin the running, he had been hers without hesitation. The boy no-one else could get...and damm it to hell, the only guy she knew over here she actually trusted to take her to the dance.
So.
She had an acceptable partner. She had the looks. She had the well established social status…all in all, while she was slightly behind the curve she was well on her way to getting back in front. She was even now shopping for a dress to wear that would utterly destroy every other girl in her year. She had the money to get the aforementioned dress, ‘spies’ to inform her on the current strategic situation across the year and she even had a date…a date?

It’s just a convenient term, nothing more or less she thought asthe ‘D’ word again flashed across her mind, walking into the 12th store of the day. This chain according to Hikari was a European importer, which actually gave her some hope; she had not exactly been impressed by the local offerings.

Well with the exception of the dress Rei had snatched before she could, damm her.

Hikari however, was starting to look a little tired and Asuka mentally decided that if they couldn’t find anything in this store, she would call it a day and come back alone. Honestly, Japanese fashion this season was nothing but the same damm boring cut in different colors again and again and-

Hold that thought.

She slowly walked to a display at the rear of the store, where a lower light level created a much more…sensual mood; approaching a mannequin dressed in a shimmering scarlet evening dress of the exact same tone as her Unit Two that caught her attention like an AT field drew Angels, to the slight alarm of the ultra conservative Class Rep behind her.

“Uh…Asuka…isn’t that a little…adult?” Hikari asked as she followed her deeper into the store, suddenly looking like she was carefully picking her way through a minefield from the hesitant way she walked…

“No, it’s a lot adult” she replied without taking her gaze off the dress as she slowly walked around the mannequin, her eyes missing nothing as her hopes steadily rose.

“Can I help you?” a polite sales assistant asked, moving up towards them and clearly noting the boxes Rei was carrying from a competitor, correctly guessing it meant these girls were actually shopping today and not just looking.

“This dress” Asuka said slowly, still not taking her eyes of it. “Does it come in any other sizes?”

“It comes in all sizes” he assured her. “It just hit the store yesterday; technically it’s not in this month’s catalogue, it was supposed to be a release for next month in fact, three weeks from now.”

Asuka smiled…and Hikari and Rei both shivered slightly at the sight.





Step-twirl, step, step, pause, pivot step and down, left foot, right foot, jump and-

“Yes!” Asuka cried, punching her fist in the air as the final sequence was performed flawlessly, a 100% readout blinking next to the dance mat as Shinji took a deep breath and pulled his headphones off, walking behind her to stretch his muscles slightly.

“Well I’m impressed” Misato said from the table across from them, as Toji, Kensuke, Hikari and even Pen-Pen broke into applause. They had finally done it, both able to anticipate the others moves to the music so perfectly that they could improvise, perfectly ‘harmonious’ moves while keeping in time with the music and each other, without needing the have the pads illuminated.

Asuka still thought the whole thing was a waste of time compared to the real combat training. But it didn’t stop her from striving to be the best of course. And now, she had done it.

“As well you should be Misato” Asuka smirked as she ripped off her own headset with a flourish. “It’s not easy synchronizing to a slower, less efficient pilot like the Baka here” she pointed out, placing her hands on her hips and raising her chin, proudly, looking down at an amused Misato, before calmly lecturing her in the most superior tone she had.

“Of course as Shinji has proven, with enough training and encouragement even the most inept pilot can be trained to follow my superior example, irrespective of their complete lack of hand/eye coordination. But with my example to follow, we did it in only a fraction of the…”

Asuka let her voice trail off as she belatedly realized that the two stooges were desperately trying not to laugh at her, Hikari was looking both shocked and amused at the same time and Misato was going red from the effort expanded to hold back her own explosion of laughter with her hands in front her mouth.

What on Earth she wondered…then a glimpse of motion caught her eye behind her audience, in the reflective surface of a glass cabinet

Shinji was standing directly behind her.

She had a sudden suspicion and decided to test a theory, brushing her hair back, as she kept talking about her superior skills, the motion duplicated in an exaggerated fashion by Shinji as he mimed her movements and talk.

She stopped and smiled.

“Shinji?”

Her ‘audience’ dropped their laughter in an instant.

“Uh…yes Asuka?”

“I can see you in the reflection of the glass behind them, you know”.

There was a moment of silence. A terrible pause in the universe itself as the meaning of the statement permeated everyone’s brains.

“Dearly beloved, we are gathered here to day to say farewell to our good friend, Shinji Ikari,” Toji muttered as Asuka slowly turned around to face an at-first sheepish, then rather nervous looking Shinji.

With her back turned to everyone else in the house, Asuka actually favored him with a rare real smile. It was a funny joke after all; she might well have done the same if he was getting too full of himself.
Not that it meant he didn’t get retribution for it of course.

“I hear you and the stooges have said that playing with me is like playing with fire, Ikari” Asuka said to him as she closed, in a terrifyingly level and polite voice that would have had Shinji running…if not for the fact that he was trapped against the living room wall, with the only exit behind Asuka.

He also knew that protesting would do little good…but as he had little to loose anyway…

“I never said that,” he retorted in a smooth, steady voice.

Well he tried to retort in a smooth steady voice. It came out as more of squeaking nervous tone. But to his credit, he did manage to resist the urge to step away from her as she closed.

Asuka just broadened her smile at his defiance.

“Really? Then perhaps you should listen to them more often,” she suggested as she stopped bare centimeters away, Shinji trying not to shake at the presence she projected like a blazing bonfire…or focus too much on the way the way the sweat glistened on her skin, across the top of her breasts, visible in the low cut tank top she was wearing. A situation made worse as her chest heaved, Asuka still clearly recovering from her physical exertion on the dance mat...

He realized he had probably focusing a little too much on her perfect body and not where her limbs were about the time he felt her foot hook under his, then sweep forward, sending him sprawling with a yelp to the dance floor on his face as Asuka pounced, her body straddling snug against his in a way that he wouldn’t dare to dream about-

“Feel the burn” she whispered in his ear…then his head exploded in fire as she proceeded to noogie him with an expert, aggressive, technique that Shinji had neverhad turned against him until this moment.

“AHHH! I didn’t mean it!” he screamed in protest, Asuka just laughing at his efforts to break free, having expertly locked him in place with an iron grip, her body flush on top of his, trapping him in a curious world of pleasure and pain as his head fried and her ample chest pressed into him…

Pleasure with pain.

That was the truth of living with Asuka Langley Soryu.

Man, she must have a lot of rage left over from after I beat up on her in the simulator today he thought, stretching the truth only slightly in his mind as it burned.

“Mean what?” she asked in an all too innocent and casual tone in reply to his screams, trying to ignore the treacherous excitement she felt as she struggled to hold Shinji down, the taller Third actually putting up rather impressive resistance even as he begged for mercy…

I am NOT enjoying this in THAT way dammit! Asuka shouted mentally to clear her mind, hanging on as Shinji started to really try to throw her off.

“Shouldn’t we be trying to break them up?” Kensuke asked in confusion as utterly no-one moved to help the Third Child, who was half screaming for mercy, half promising death to all redheads in the room, not three meters away.

“Nah, they’ll work it out of their systems pretty quickly” Misato shrugged, looking down in annoyance at her empty can of apple juice and starting hunting for another as Asuka whopped, thumping Shinji’s head into the floor. “Shinji’s fine”.

“Yeah, I don’t get it” Toji said, in a voice loud enough to reach across the room. “Is she trying to kill him, or make out with him? I can’t tell,” he asked Hikari in a confused tone, causing his de-facto Girlfriend to giggle in a way she never would have a month ago, Misato also chuckling as Kensuke tried not to grin.

Asuka, several meters away froze at the statement, mostly because she had quietly started to ask herself the same question, as she realized she was actually finding this activity quite enjoyable, in a way quite different from simply beating up on the Third Child should make her feel.

Unable to answer the question however, she did the next best thing and released her right arm from its noogie duties long enough to scoop up Shinji’s abandoned headphones and send them flying at Toji who, anticipating such a move, neatly batted them aside. Her two second move however was more then enough of a window for Shinji, who used his suddenly free arm to push off the floor, shift his legs around hers and in a tumble of motion; suddenly it was Asuka who was pinned under him with a surprised yelp, her wrists held above her head, his legs across hers, the frontof his body pressing into the frontof hers…

Time froze.

Shinji swallowed as he saw her deep sapphire eyes focus in on him, in surprise at the sudden reversal…

Their noses only millimeters apart…

Their panting breath on each others faces…

His mouth so close to hers he unconsciously flashed back to that ‘almost’ kiss, on this very floor, so long ago-

Asuka felt the wind slightly knocked out of her as she crashed onto her back, cursing her impulsive attack at Toji and the opening he had no doubt planed on it creating for Shinji, while at the same time strangely pleased that Shinji hadn’t hesitated to use it.

He must have a lot of rage left over after I kicked his ass in the simulations today she thought, only slightly distorting the truth.

Still, it was quite the reversal to find herself suddenly on her back, her arms pinned above her and his weight crushing into her…his nose only millimeters from hers, his mouth only centimeters away…as she realized that Shinji could, right now, do anything he wanted to her and in her current state, she couldn’t stop him!

No-one had ever had her in such a position.

All he would have to do would be to lean down ever so slightly…

Could he…would he…will he?

No. He won’t…the Baka would NEVER dare –and she ignored the disappointed sigh she felt in the back of her mind at that conclusion- but just in case-

Asuka’s wrists twisted impossibly up-and-over his and broke his grip effortlessly, allowing her hands to fly up and strike his shoulders with surprising strength, sending him flying backwards off her. Then in an utterly confusing blur of limbs and body, Shinji found himself again face down on the cheap plastic of the dance matt, this time with his right arm held behind his back at an angle a humans shoulders had not quite evolved to naturally be held at.

Damm.

He really should have risked kissing her, then running like hell for the door. Sure she might have hurt him greatly, but as it appeared she was about to do that anyway…

“Would you like to try that again, Baka?” she whispered in his left ear, her hair dangling down past his face and veiling them off from the world, trapped with Asuka and no-one else…

He could think of worse ways to die.

“Yes,” he gasped out honestly; suddenly morbidly curious about what her reaction would be…

There was a moment of stunned silence as she actually stopped breathing, providing just enough time for Shinji to brace for the pain that was no doubt about to be delivered as her grip tightened-

“Alright, you can let him go Asuka, I think you’ve made your point,” Misato’s voice came from somewhere behind him, calling an end to the nights entertainment.

Shinji felt his housemate hesitate, but finally relax her grip as she returned his shoulder joint to a more normal configuration. Then to his surprise, she leaned in even closer to his ear and whispered a rather ambiguous “Too bad,” before she got to her feet, leaving Shinji lying rather pathetically on the floor as she happily strutted back to the table, ignoring the slightly reproachful look from her guardian as Misato walked over to help the Third Child up.

As a women ‘of the world’ so to speak, Misato had noticed the hesitation and, dare she say it, even anticipation in both of her charges for the few seconds they had been literally face to face on the floor.

Annoyingly, she realized she had not really thought through the logical conclusion of having two unrelated teenagers –both going through puberty- living under the same roof when she had impulsively taken Shinji, then Asuka in. And she was not so blind as to miss the sexual tension that had been building with the two ‘eating, breathing and sleeping’ together in their training.

She would have to give them ‘The Talk’ sooner then anticipated. Assuming they didn’t kill each other in the meantime of course.

“Shinji, you have nerves of steel,” she smiled as she reached the slowly recovering Third Child and helped him back to his feet, “but your joints are made of cartilage. Remember that please; I’d rather not have Asuka beating up on you becoming habit forming…not that she wasn’t slightly out of line there” Misato’s voice became somewhat more serious, even if she was still striving for a light tone as Shinji made his way back to the table and crashed into a seat as far away from her as possible.
“Oh Misato, that was just a game” Asuka smirked at Shinji. “No blood, no report and all that” she tried to dismiss everything with an airy, dismissive tone that hid the very real feelings of apprehension she was starting to feel at Misato’s not exactly pleased look, realizing she might have taken things a tad too far, for Shinji just lightly teasing her…

“If that’s her idea of fun play, I’m starting to understand why the Third Branch was so glad to get rid of her,” Kensuke put in, in a sotto voice.

“Oh that’s nothing” Shinji smirked slightly, saluting Asuka with his can of apple juice before she could cut back with a snappy retort. “Remind me to tell you the story of both of us in the playpen at two years old some day; this is just old school stuff for us”.

Asuka’s blinked, then her brittle smirk softened, becoming much more genuine as she recognized that Shinji was subtly making the equivalent of a ‘no hard feelings’ gesture at her rather…aggressive response to his teasing, in a way Misato in her rather disapproving mood could pick up on.

But the electronic chime of the apartment’s doorbell, causing everyone to blink, and then turn to stare at Misato in confusion, threw off any further thoughts on the subject. Everyone who should be here was here after all…

“Oh, that must be Rei,” Misato said, fiddling with her juice can’s ring-pull. “I asked her to pop over for a while. Asuka, be a dear and get the door?”

“Oh fine” Asuka sighed, getting back to her feet and heading for the door. As soon as she was out of sight, Misato turned back to Shinji.

“Are you okay Shinji?” she asked, now with some real concern in her face. “She was a little out of line there”.

“I’m fine, Misato-san, really” Shinji smiled at her concern, as he recalled Kaji’s advice; that this whole dealwas the Asuka equivalent of a playful slap on the back of the head, or blowing a raspberry in his direction. Asuka played rough, but it was still play…after a fashion.

If she had really wanted to hurthim, he would probably be coughing up blood and screaming for morphine about now. But that hesitation, the surprise and…what, he had felt from her, when he had managed to get on top of her…

So much of her was still such a mystery to him, despite everything…

“Oh Hikari, do you want another drink?” Toji fumbled his way into the conversation, as he noticed her drink was empty.

Hikari blinked as she noticed the same, and then glanced at Pen-Pen, who offered her an unapologetic ‘Wark!’ then clambered out of her lap leaving a suspiciously empty can of apple juice behind as he headed for his fridge.

“Yes, thank you Toji,” she smiled back at her de-facto boyfriend, who almost unconsciously returned her smile, while Kensuke made a choking face across the table that Misato managed not to snicker at.

It was almost crazy how much time Toji and Hikari were starting to spend with each other now. Kensuke’s faces were mostly an honest expression of his frustration with the whole situation. As Shinji had been told by his friend in more then one rant over the phone, Kensuke had become little more then a bulwark during lunch hours for the ‘far too happy couple’ to avoid the scandal of sitting alone while Shinji, Rei and Asuka were away on NERV business, meaning he was dragged along as they chatted and laughed, but more or less ignored the whole time.

His friend was almost at his wits end, but apparently had taken heart from the fact that the three pilots would be back at school tomorrow, Shinji’s Father apparently satisfied enough with their progress to let them get back to their ‘normal’ lives with just ‘after school’ sessions scheduled now.

“Hey, Rei’s here!” Asuka cheerfully broke into his thoughts with a high decibel level announcement that was completely unnecessary, as the Second Child led the First into the room.

“Hello,” Rei confirmed her presence, albeit in a softer and less explosive voice, an increasingly common –if still very slight- smile on her face as she looked across everyone present, as always her deep eyes lingering on him, that strange, almost telepathic connection he shared with her pulsing for a second as they stared at each other, before her gaze traced across to Kensuke, as Toji returned.

“Hello Kensuke,” she said, with a slightly broader smile, Rei looking graceful and gorgeous in a fashionable light blue dress that hung loosely to halfway down her shins, her hair as always now a work of art that reduced Kensuke to mostly single syllable words.

“Hi Rei,” was his first effort as he smiled hopelessly back at Rei, as she moved to sit next to him, his attention locked on the flawless Ayanami who returned his smile gently…as Toji, off to the side made a gagging gesture identical to that Kensuke had made at him, that caused Asuka to actually smirk in approval for once at him, both the Second and ‘Forth’ sitting on either side of the class Rep.

“Well, now that we’re all here, I have some news,” Misato called to ‘meeting’ to order, her ‘Captains’ voice suddenly coming to the foreground. “First, I’ve talked to all of your parents,” Misato started, getting a surprised look from the visitors. “They’ve agreed that the logistics of getting everyone to the dance will be simplified greatly if everyone meets up here, gets picked up and driven to the dance, then returned here afterwards, getting picked up again.”

“There is no way the three of us can get ready with all of these guys hanging around” Asuka lodged her protest at once.

“Which is why you three girls will get ready across at Rei’s” Misato calmly replied. “The boys will head over here and get ready, and then we’ll get together and head to the Dance.”

“We can’t all fit in your car,” Asuka pointed out the next problem on her list.

“Which is why we’re taking a Limo” Misato grinned, getting a surprised series of gasps and smiles from the children around her.

Even Rei smiled slightly at the news and if that wasn’t a major accomplishment, then someone was setting their standards way too high.

“Now because this dance has all three pilots attending, Commander Ikari has stipulated certain conditions and precautions” Misato continued. “There will be a Section Two detail at the venue and you’ll have to leave by ten, the Commander doesn’t want you all sleep deprived if an Angel attacks the next morning.”

“Let’s just hope one doesn’t attack in the middle of the dance” Asuka sniffed under her breath, her eyes suddenly becoming dangerous at the thought. “If it does, it’s so going to pay for it.”

Shinji’s mind at once flashed to the image of Asuka, alone in the street, fighting with her bare hands against Zeruel, Bardiel and Armisael simultaneously; in a rage at them for daring to interrupt her dance…

And winning.

“Oh, in that case,” Misato expanded on Asuka’s promise of extreme retribution for Shinji and Rei’s benefit, “there is a Geofront access building two hundred meters North with an elevator link down to a car that will be waiting for us, just in case.”

“Well…I guess you covered everything” Asuka shrugged.

“Well…not quite” Misato said, suddenly looking a little sheepish. “You might recall how the school was looking for a half dozen parents to volunteer to chaperone the dance? As helpers and to make sure nothing…inappropriate went on?”

Asuka’s eyes narrowed and Shinji blinked as he finally realized why Misato had been using the inclusive group pronouns ‘we’re’ and ‘we’ll’.

“Go on”.

“And the Commander was going to have to pay overtime to each of the Section 2 agents…and as I am technically the guardian to two of the pilots…and the school wanted several ‘parents’ to watch over things-”

“You,” Asuka said incredulous expression on her face.

“Ja. Me” Misato said with a not very apologetic shrug.

“Oh come on Asuka, its not that bad,” Shinji defended Misato, getting a mummer of agreement from everyone else around the table and a distant ‘Wark!’ from a nearby avian. “Think about it this way; you can be sure I won’t put any moves on you with Misato on overwatch”.

That statement, Shinji knew, could be taken two ways. Either that he would be too busy putting the moves on Misato to bother with her, or, that he wouldn’t try to make a move on the amazing Asuka, under the threat of sanction and punishment from the NERV Captain.

Asuka noted the ambiguity with an internal frown, but smoothly stepped up to the plate so everyone ‘knew’ what Shinji had meant.

“You think I’m worried about handling you? Your short term memory appears to be faulty, Third Child” she sighed, cracking her knuckles ominously with a growing smile on her face. “But if you need another twirl on the dance matt…”

“Ah yes, the Tango-el-Asuka” Toji rolled his eyes. “Step, step, duck, knife thrust-”

Hikari poked him hard in the side and he yelped, falling back away at her irritated look.

“That’s enough Suzuhara” she warned him.

“Sorry” he apologized contritely, earning a smile from the class Rep.

“It’s okay, just stay out of Shinji and Asuka’s marital disputes,” she extorted him, causing Toji, Kensuke and Misato to burst out laughing and Shinji to work his jaw several times, not daring to speak as Asuka’s betrayed expression at her friend turned from shocked, to sly.

“Thanks for the advice. I’m guess you two are becoming increasingly experienced in playing the married couple, I mean what I heard happened behind the school gym-”

“Asuka!” Hikari hissed in embarrassment, her face flushing furiously as Misato, Rei, Kensuke and Shinji suddenly perked up in interest.

Asuka actually had it on good advice they had done nothing more then kiss, but Hikari flushed as if Asuka had accused her of filming hardcore pornography videos, her conservative nature once again coming to the front.

“Toji, you sly devil” Kensuke smirked across the table. “So that’s where you vanished to when-”

“What precisely would they be doing behind the Gym, Asuka?” Rei asked in an all too innocent tone, with a perfectly curious expression on her face…

“Well um…you know…stuff” Asuka lamely replied, suddenly flushing as Rei put her on the spot, to a general snickering.

“Stuff…” Rei echoed as Shinji took a sip of his apple juice, Rei turning to face Kensuke. “Should we also partake in this…stuff?”

Apple juice shot from Shinji’s nose.

“Is something wrong, Ikari?” Rei asked, glancing across at him with that all too innocent tone as Shinji started coughing furiously, Toji and Hikari stared at her in amazement, Asuka’s jaw just dropped and Kensuke looked like he was about to faint…

“No…” he coughed, working to clear his throat and stop coughing as two parts of his mind simultaneously tried to laugh and swallow.

“Let me go and get you a towel,” Misato put in, the Captain getting up and walking out of the room, at which point gales of laughter came back from the hallway, along with the ‘thump’ of Misato sliding down the wall onto the floor, desperately gasping for air as she wondered how the hell she had ever survived without these kids in her life…




The Diet building in Tokyo-2, smelled new, Shigeru Ishiba decided.

He hated it.

The old Diet building had been over sixty years old when Second Impact had hit, having come through the Second World War without being vaporized by Curtis LeMay, then amazingly, it had been in the part of Old Tokyo not to be flooded after the South Pole vanished.
Six months later however it along with what little of the once glorious city that remained above the waterline was vaporized by a rogue nuclear device from Chinese Islamic dissidents, in retaliation for the JSSDF involvement in China.

When the Diet had reconvened in Matsumoto -soon renamed Tokyo-2- the Federal Government had taken over a half dozen prefecture Government buildings until a brand new, dedicated building could be built. Two years ago, with the frantic pace of post Second Impact reconstruction slowing enough that the Government could put tenders out -without massive protests over building for itself while others went waiting, they had finally done it. It was a triumph –apparently- of modern architecture, a glittering series of steel and glass buildings sitting in the middle of the city, surrounded by reflecting ponds and Japanese gardens…

But it just couldn’t replace the original, in Ishiba’s mind. Too much history was being lost in the frantic expansion and rebuilding of Japans surviving cities, with ancient neighborhoods leveled and mass produced apartments thrown up.

On the other hand, he could admit it was not as if they had much of a choice either. In the final analysis, providing somewhere for millions of people to live after countless coastal communities had been flooded was the highest priority, safeguarding ancient neighborhoods less so. And Tokyo-2’s birth hadn’t transformed Matsumoto in quite the same extreme way Tokyo-3 had bulldozed Hakone.

Still. It was hardly as if everything new was bad of course, far from it. Take for instance Subbasement Level-Six inside the new glittering building…

The ‘Dark Room’ sat on the lowest level of the new complex, designed systematically from the ground up by the best engineers and technicians in Japan to be utterly isolated from the outside world. No bug could get in, nor transmit out. No electronic emissions could be detected outside, the only data line was a single fiber optic cable up to the Diet’s own network, on the good side of a dedicated 7th Generation computer it would take something like a MAGI system to brute force a hack into…and could be stopped by the simple expedient of pulling the network cable. Even so, most critical information was stored on stand-alone servers without even that level of network connection, then deleted after briefings or presentations were finished.

And suffice to say, there were no man sized air vents for intruders to rappel down.

Ishiba exited the secured elevator on the sublevel and exited into the brightly lit hallway, the fact that he was a minute late for a briefing he had called not helping his current mood. The walls were a smooth teak and the floor polished black marble like the rest of the Diet, but the hallway itself was rather featureless compared to offices upstairs. No doors lined its walls; no windows looked out across Tokyo-2…

There was just the steel door and guard station at the end of the hallway which he reached in a brisk not quite run, balancing his dignity against the need for haste as he unclipped his photo-ID ‘smart’ badge, thrusting it through the tiny slot in the guard booth to the unsmiling guard inside, then placed his hand on the high resolution hand scanner.
The scanner flashed white, and then green as it compared his palm-print to the record on file for Major General Shigeru Ishiba, the guard then slotting his badge into a reader, causing the keypad next to the scanner to go active. Ishiba forced himself to slowly and correctly enter his eight digit code, which also flashed green as the computer double checked the ID embedded in the badge against the month’s access codes in the database.

Now with both the computers and human guard convinced he was who he claimed to be, the guard bowed, handed back the badge and opened the door for him, Ishiba stepping through into the antechamber outside the ‘Dark Room’ proper, reattaching his badge as it shut. There was a delay of a few seconds as the electronic countermeasure seal was re-established and checked before finally, a second door opened and allowed him access to the most secure location in the Japanese Government.

The ‘Dark Room’ was actually a complex of many rooms under the Diet, though 90 percent of the people to come down to this level, only ever visited one room in particular. He hurried past the lounge / reception area outside the primary entrance and turned left, along a short passage filled with complete, but empty offices, there to be used by the Prime Minister and his staff as a secure working location during an emergency situation, turning up another passage past a pair of fully armed JSSDF soldiers –thankfully in the black of the 1st division rather then the purple of the 3rd- whose salutes he returned as he entered the conference room.

It was an oval shaped, low ceiling room. A dozen communications and computer consoles sat around the perimeter, usually manned by very senior –and fanatically loyal- interior ministry staffers, who were screened by counterintelligence officers on a bi-weekly basis.

The fact that they were not here for this meeting really said a great deal of how serious it was.

A massive circular oak table set precisely in the center of the room with ten seats around it. Nine of them were already filled and he hurried to the remaining empty place, stopping behind it to bow deeply from the waist at the head of the table.

“Susimasen, Kyuma-San. I apologize for my delay”.

Prime Minister Fumio Kyuma bowed back from his seated position, though it would be more accurate to describe the action as an abbreviated nod, raising a hand with minimal effort to gesture at Ishiba’s seat, next to the Minister of the Interior.

Obediently, and rapidly, he sat.

“Shikata ga-nai, General” the Prime Minister replied, stating that his tardiness was of no consequence. “Please, begin when you’re ready.”

Shigeru nodded as he took a few seconds to gather his thoughts. The PM and the Interior Minister had both been briefed yesterday, five days after Shinji’s debriefing had taken place –in this very room in fact- with choice highlights from Shinji’s video played for both of them.

To say the PM was enraged would have been a gross disservice to the look of molten rage in his eyes, even as he commendably kept his face stony, stoically listening to Shinji’s near mental breakdown as he relayed the slaughter that had taken place as the Third JSSDF Division breached Central Dogma.

It was bad enough that SEELE had apparently tricked him into unleashing the dogs of war onto so many innocents, Japanese citizens almost to a person whom he had sworn an oath on his ancestors to serve and protect. That SEELE had done so as a necessary precursor to starting their own private Third Impact, was just beyond any easy ability to get ones head around, the PM sitting for a good ten minutes without saying a sound after the video had ended.

After he had calmed down however, Kyuma –a former district court judge- had pointed out the major problem with Shinji’s evidence. Although accepting Shigeru’s word that it could be taken as the truth, it was a far cry from something legal enough to put in court.

After all, technically most if it hadn’t actually happened.

Yet.

Of course, there was always the ‘dirty’ solution of having Ikari –the elder one- and as many of SEELE as they could get their hands on taken out. SEELE was powerful, but their cloak of secrecy was their protection. Once removed, they were far from bulletproof and the Prime Minister had commented that despite his long service to the rule of law, he was ever so tempted to order the Third Division to send some of its Special Operations people after SEELE, in an attempt somehow to balance the grand universal scales.

But ultimately, all three men agreed that more critical then just stopping SEELE, was tearing down their veil of secrecy and exposing them. The 20th Centuries greatest villains were gifted amateurs next to Keel and his merry men. Hitler, Stalin, Mao; they might have been responsible for one, two hundred million lives, tops, on all sides of their various wars, purges and other activities.

Collectively.

In contrast with the three thousand millionlives SEELE took in the Second Impact however, they looked rather pathetic. Let alone the fact that they were looking to take down the other half of humanity in a Third Impact, deciding the fate of billions of people on their own whims.

No. They had to answer for their crimes. Even if they were all shot at the end of their trials, history needed to record this. To that end, the PM had given the green light for a half dozen operations JDA-Intel had furiously worked up or extended from existing plans, all based off Shinji’s testimony. With what they had learned from Agent Balcony, they now knew where to look for the proof they needed.

It was just a matter of going out and collecting it. And then…oh yes, and then the fun would begin.

But for the present however… Shigeru reached to a series of controls in front of his seat, inserted a flash drive and quickly tapped a series of buttons.

Hung from the low ceiling at six points equally around the table, six plasma displays activated with bright red ‘CLASIFIED’ warnings, as Shigeru marshaled his thoughts. The Generals and Ministers around the table would not be told the whole truth; they didn’t have a need to know. But as they would be critical in the contingency planning against either Ikari or Lorenz trying to end the world, it was time to start filling them in. To a point.

“All of the people in this room are aware of the existence of NERV and their role as the UN’s frontline agency for dealing with the threat of the Angels,” he started, cutting right to the point. “I also suspect that all of you are aware that the JDA -for close to a decade now- has been running a series of investigations into NERV and its predecessor agency GEHIRN, to determine if they had any hidden motives or agendas. The investigation was scaled down dramatically last year, after it concluded that NERV was dedicated to the anti-Angel Evangelion project with no discernable motives beyond that, wild stories of a secret controlling branch known as SEELE having no basis in verifiable fact”.

He paused to take a sip from a glass of icy cold water, letting the people around the table share uneasy looks at each other, all of them sensing the Evangelion sized shoe that was about to drop…

“As of this moment, every person in this room has been given codeword level clearance for a compartment known as ‘Wallpaper’, excepting the Prime Minister and Interior Minister, who have both been in this compartment for over a year now. ‘Wallpaper’s’ goal has been a second tier systematic investigation into NERV and its very real secret controlling organization known as SEELE, while JDA-Intel maintained the ‘public’ fiction of our other investigations to keep it hidden from view. This unprecedented level of secrecy and security was a necessary precaution, after it was discovered that SEELE had compromised JDA-Intel completely, from the former Director on down, including key personnel in the NERV Investigation unit”.

There was an excited and rather alarmed buzz from the people around the table at that bombshell, before a quiet tap of the Prime Minister’s pen against the desk quickly restored order.

“Continue, General,” he ordered softly.

“All the people at this table have been triple screened for any possible connections to NERV or SEELE and have been cleared, as have their immediate family members. All information at this briefing is classified Special Access - Eyes Only. Any leak of this information will be considered High Treason, punishable by life imprisonment or execution”
That statement stopped all fidgeting in the room cold.

“Yesterday, I briefed the Prime Minister on the outcomes of a breakthrough in our investigation unit from a new source, codenamed ‘Balcony’, graded as level Alpha-Two”. Tapping a button in front of him the plasma displays flickered, switching from the classification warning as the lights dimmed, to the unsmiling, visored face of Keel Lorenz.

[Chris OFarrell]

"Baka, where the hell is my lunch?”

The demanding sharp voice slammed into Shinji at point blank range as he carefully stacked his books inside his locker, causing his arm to jump as if he had touched a live power cable, the entire neat row of books at once crashing down into a mess around his feet, a pathetic counterpoint of knickknacks slowly falling one after the other to join the mess, as two dozen students around him in the locker room broke out into applause and cheers at him.

He sighed, but managed a wry smile as he mockingly bowed to his audience, stepping out ever so carefully from the entangling mess at his feet as he turned, staring directly into the ever brilliant sapphire eyes of Asuka Langley Soryu.

“Hikari is making us all lunch today,” he told her in a carefully neutral tone to his roommate, wondering if she really had forgotten that Hikari had offered to cook lunch today as a ‘welcome back to school’ deal for the trio of Eva pilots…or if she had just jumped at the opportunity to see if he would jump.

“Ah. Right” Asuka muttered, glancing down at the mess around her feet and shrugging. “Sorry,” she actually apologized before stepping around him to her own locker, ten meters away.

Okay, so she had forgotten…and she had actually apologized?

Hmm…how far he could push this?

“Uh, a little help?”

“Oh don’t be a wuss Ikari” she snorted as she stepped up to her locker, dropping her bag on the floor with a sigh as he started to gather up the debris that had come loose.

Not that far apparently.

Asuka’s delicate fingers danced across her combination lock. “I have complete faith that as a highly trained Evangelion pilot, you’ll be able to manage the arduous task of picking up-”

Asuka’s locker exploded.

There was no other way to describe it in Shinji’s mind. As the lock disengaged, a wave of paper poured out, flooding down to the ground, countless dozens of envelopes skidding across the polished school floor in all directions like a waterfall that slowly petered out to only a dribble falling to the floor, Asuka’s face flushing as she stared aghast at the countless love letters around her that had built up after her enforced week long absence from school.

The corridor again resounded with cheers and applause from the students, even heavier this time as the two Evangelion pilots, roommates and classmates stood next to each other, up to their ankles in debris from their lockers.

Rei Ayanami, predictably, chose that moment to walk down the corridor. The First Child did not stop, did not alter her usual cool expression except to raise an eyebrow, commenting that ‘Synchronization training can be taken too far’ as she turned into the classroom.

No-one but the three pilots really knew what Rei was talking about…but the fact that Ikari and Soryu had just been ‘ice burned’ by Ayanami, the Ice Queen of all people caused the hallway to utterly explode with laughter, causing Asuka and Shinji to both crash their heads into a closed locker door next to their own, again in perfect synchronization that only amplified the laughter to a whole new level, with students grabbing onto fixtures and walls to hold themselves up.

Fortunately the laughter cut off roughly ten seconds later as Hikari’s head popped out of their classroom, studied the situation and snapped out commands in a tone that would be obeyed. Those who had business here hurried to their lockers, those who did not retreated into their classrooms, the Class Rep recognizing the dangerous look on Asuka’s face and clearing the area around her in a hurry as she walked up to her.

“You okay?” Hikari asked as she stepped carefully through the floor of letters, being careful not to touch any of them.

“Why wouldn’t I be” Asuka replied, her ‘look’ smoothing into a frown as she reached in and swept the last of the letters out of her locker, before selecting first period books and locking back up.

“You looked like you were about to rip someone’s skull from their spine and hold it up as a trophy,” Hikari answered in a dry tone, actually worried a little for her friend.

“So what if I did?” she said, waving in a dismissive gesture at the floor of envelopes and folded pieces of paper littering the corridor around her. “Plenty more where they came from”.

Behind her unconcerned mask however, Asuka found herself feeling acutely embarrassed, standing ankle deep in the pile of infatuation, right next to Shinji.

It was rather strange actually; all the little children who had written these letters always said the same things. That they would die for her if she gave the command, that they would be her slaves, that they would never leave her…

They were all hopeless idiots.

Spineless wimps who could never earn her respect because they would never stand up for themselves. She didn’t want some stupid puppy following her around with wide eyes, apologizing for everything that he thought might have upset her, regardless of if it was their fault or not. What she wanted was a man…and almost against her will, she again thought back to last night, when for those few seconds Shinji had forced her to the floor, holding her down helplessly with a surprising strength, his body on top of hers…

No-one had ever had her in anything like that kind of position before. And she was honest enough with herself to know that if it been anyone but Shinji –excepting Kaji naturally- who had put her init, she would have ensured he would never have been able to have children from that day forward.

But the uneasy truth was that Shinji Ikari, a boy she had known for just over two weeks was starting to drive her nuts in a way no other person her age had come close to. She hadn’t retaliated to his actions last night because, as confusing as it was to her, she had actually enjoyed the tumble around the matt. She had felt both comfortable enough around him and comfortable enough with him to throw and be thrown around, letting him touch her and hold her-

Enough!

Okay, it had been fun.

Okay, Shinji was far closer to her concept of a ‘real’ man then any other person her age she had met –probably from all the time he had spent with Kaji recently- and she could have done far worse for wingmen then he and Rei against the Angels.

And yes, he was the only person in this whole damm city she trusted enough to have escorting her to the upcoming dance, knowing he wouldn’t try to feel her up or take her ‘out the back’ of the dance hall…unless she asked him of course-

Stop that!

They were…so alike in so many ways…but every time she wondered if they might become something more then friends, pilots, housemates…she pulled back.

Shinji, despite knowing her for only a matter of hours, had opened up to her. He had shared with her in a low, level voice, his memories of his Mothers death. His pain and horror, his rage, compounded by his Fathers prompt desertion of him leaving him little more then a tool to be used, only to be called back when it came time to find a pilot for Unit One…

That day, on Over the Rainbow, she had come so close to sharing back with him. Her own history, her own terrors…but he had stopped her, misunderstanding the look on her face…

And the window had been lost.

Since then, she had tried, oh Gott how she had triedto open up to him in the same way he had opened up to her…but she just couldn’t. Every time she had thought the time might be right, every time she had opened her mouth to try and say something, a steel clamp had come down on her vocal cords and she had started trembling, shaking more and more until she had run away to make it stop. Every time she had reached out to open the locked door where she had shoved her memories away, a terrified four year old Asuka had clutched onto her arm and pulled, screaming and wailing as she forced her away from that door as fast as possible.

It was hopeless…and until she could (if she could) let Shinji see that part of her, until she could find the strength, from somewhere to open that door and let the monsters, the terror and the loneliness out for him to see in all their dark glory and accept who she really was…he could never love her.

No-one could.

How could he care about her, if he didn’t know who she was? She didn’t know who Asuka Langley Soryu was half the time! If she let him get close, he would only end up getting hurt, and hurting her, and she quietly admitted that she valued his friendship…as that was what it was she thought about it, the first guy outside of Kaji she could actually respect, far too much to risk it.

It’s better this way for both of us, she decided again. He was a good friend…and a decent enough Evangelion pilot.
Even if his Eva is a hunk of junk she thought with a slight smirk as she turned back to her locker, mere seconds having passed.

“I don’t suppose you have a box or something I can put all this junk in?” she asked Hikari as she shut her locker.

“Here you go” a new voice broke in from behind her. Turning, she found the track suited Second Stooge holding a box –well more of a tray, but it would do- and handing it to her.

Asuka blinked at that. Toji Suzuhara, her enemy, her negative, her, well, semi-nemesis for lack of a better word, was handing her a box.

“Thank you, Suzuhara,” Hikari smiled a dazzling smile at her boyfriend –not that the couple had gotten around to using that word in public yet- as Asuka took the box from him slowly, warily.

“Oh I got the fun out of the system watching the locker explode,” he shrugged with a smile at Hikari as he knelt down next to Asuka, starting to gather up all the letters into a largish pile. “So I thought the least I could do was help clean up.”

Ah. That explains that.

“Commendable” Hikari nodded. “We’ll need somewhere to store all of this-”

“Who said anything about storing it?” Asuka snorted as she knelt down, dropping the box to the ground and starting to shovel the letters into it. “Just throw it all out”.

“Ah…alright” Hikari said in slight surprise, feeling a pang of envy running through her as she looked over the flood of letters. From the numbers, she estimated almost every guy in her year had put something into her locker, though she knew it was probably more a case of some people putting multiples in, plus more then a few guys from a year above or below who had snuck in.

And Asuka was just treating the offers and pleas like a gigantic annoyance.

Well okay, it is a gigantic annoyance Hikari admitted to herself, smiling at Toji as he helped throw the piles of paper into the tray. But…just once, I wish I had been the center of attention this way…

Her thoughts were interrupted as the bell rang, Hikari’s eyes flickering to the doorway into Classroom 3-F as everyone started to amble into their classrooms.

“We have to head inside,” Hikari said.

“Wait, I have to throw all this out! I don’t want anyone going through this!”

“I could take it to the Incinerator” Toji suggested.

“Not without me you’re not” Asuka shot back, suddenly wondering if this was Toji’s plan all along, perfectly explaining where the box had come from. She wouldn’t put it past him in the slightest to sell off the letters to interested parties or something…

“Fine,” he responded with a roll of his eyes, surprising Asuka slightly, forcing her to wonder why he was trying to be helpful.

“Alright,” Hikari chewed her lip. “Go, I’ll explain to the Sensei where you two have gone, just don’t take too long,” Hikari decided, jerking her head back to the class for Shinji, who looked from Asuka, to Toji and back again, before he smirked slightly and followed Hikari off.

Perhaps he thinks we’re going to kill each other Asuka snorted as she scooped up the last of her love letters.

A part of her, a small part of her, noted the effort that some people had put into their envelopes. One in particular had quite magnificent brush strokes on the outside Kanji and it was a pity that she would destroy it.

But it described pretty much the entire collection. All pretty words, no substance at all behind them.

“I think that’s the last of them” Toji said, lying flat on the floor and reaching under the lockers to pull out a couple of the letters and toss them on the top of the pile, quiet awe at the interest Asuka had generated fighting for supremacy with the feeling of betrayal at himself for what he was about to do.

“Okay” Asuka replied, taking a hold of the cardboard box and lifting it.

“This way,” Toji said, leading her down the now almost empty passage, to the stairwell at the far end, then out the back of the ground floor to the back of the school, where the incinerator was, Toji expertly starting it up.

“We’ll just have to wait a minute or so before it heats up” he said, crossing his arms and looking somewhat uncomfortable as the two moved upwind of the stack.

“Okay, that’s it,” Asuka said with a narrowing of her eyes, dropping the tray to her feet.

“What’s it?” he asked with a raised eyebrow.

“Why are you being so nice, or at least trying to be so nice to me, today?”

Toji swallowed.

Asuka noticed.

“Out with it,” she ground out.

“Oh fine” he sighed with a roll of his eyes as he crossed his arms.

“Look, you know how I feel about Hikari and how she feels about me.”

“Know, yes. Understand why she does, no,” Asuka replied, crossing her own arms.

“I’m sure you don’t,” he shot back, then stopped, took a deep breath and sighed. “Look…Asuka,” he managed to get her name out, to the surprise of both children. “I don’t like you a whole lot and you aren’t that fond of me. But both of us care about Hikari. And although I don’t understand how or why she likes you, I just know that you two are very close.”

Toji paused for a second, as if gathering his thoughts. Asuka was vaguely aware that the incinerator was now burning cheerfully, but ignored it, finding this conversation far too interesting.

“Your point?” she asked, albeit with far less venom in her tone then she usually directed at him.

He sighed, before steadily raising his head to look her in the eye. “I was thinking, for Hikari’s sake, we could call a truce.” He held up his hands at once, as if he expected her to interrupt. “I’m not saying that we have to like each other, or pretend to be best friends…I’m just saying that for her sake, we can at least try to play nice around her. We’re both spending a lot of time around each other, between Hikari on one hand and Shinji on the other…so…”

Asuka chewed her lip, a bad habit she had gotten into from being around Misato too much, before sighing. Truth be told, she actually enjoyed the verbal sparing with Toji. Similar to Shinji, except he didn’t back down or get intimidated by her in the slightest. And even if he lacked the polished elegance of Shinji’s comebacks, being in her mind something of a dumb jock, he did not give her so much as an inch. Ever.

She could respect that.

“Okay…” she said, slowly extending her hand as if she feared she was reaching into the nearby incinerator. “Truce.”

“Truce,” he agreed, shaking her hand briefly before they knelt down next to the tray, and they each grabbed a fist full of envelopes, throwing them into the fire.

“Not that this means we’re friends,” he added.

“God no,” she snorted as they worked their way through the pile. “And it doesn’t mean that I won’t call it as I see it…at least when Hikari isn’t around.”

Toji actually smiled slightly at that, standing as they threw the last of the letters into the now cheerfully burning pile, before he reached around and cut the gas flow as the letters were consumed, the paper would burn itself out, no reason to stay.

“I wouldn’t expect anything less” he agreed as they headed back into the school, before adding “Demon.”

“Nor would I, Stooge,” she shot back, again with the slightest smile as they returned to their classroom. “Nor would I”.




Rei Ayanami methodically worked her way through the eighty five messages that were waiting for her, when she booted up her laptop and logged onto the schools intranet. It was an entirely new experience for her to have people talking to her first thing in the morning, and she admitted it was an addictive feeling, a new craving to reach out to other people and be accepted as one of them. It was her first day back at school since the team training and she was finding herself pleasantly surprised with the flood of attention, her mind drifting back over the last hour’s events.

Walking through the gates in the company of both Asuka and Hikari she felt a flush she recognized as apprehension, but for the first time in her life, she had been unable to simply acknowledge the emotion and then place it to the side. It was an intensely curious sensation, but an intensely distracting one at the same time.

Fortunately, her memory had not failed her and she found a new type of enjoyment in smiling slightly at her classmates she had never really acknowledged, greeting them by name and trying one of several dozen variations of ‘small talk’ she had listened too in the school yard, or researched at her new home.

The results were…mixed.

But she learned much and actually made contact with a great many people, learning more about them in thirty seconds of contact then she had in a year of school with them as Asuka and Hikari chatted about a bewildering array of subjects, but invariably, the subject continually returned to her new wardrobe, after many complements over her new hairstyle which she found rather flattering.

Apparently, the girls at school had an exceptionally fine intelligence network in operation. It was so accurate in fact, that Rei wondered if she should report it to the Commander at some point, they appeared to have superbly accurate information on everything from the clothes she had brought to the fact that she had in fact, been asked to the school dance by Kensuke Aida…

Hikari Horaki however, had taken her aside and sheepishly admitted that Asuka had told her everything.

And she might have mentioned it to a coupe of people…who might have mentioned it to a few more in turn.

And so on.

Rei, recalling her calculus and the concept of an exponential curve simply nodded at the explanation, telling Hikari that it was no consequence to her that people knew what she had purchased. Instead, she had quietly slipped away from the mass around the Second Child, smiling at classmates and other people in her year she had never acknowledged, getting surprised smiles back, strolling around the area with her books firmly inside her bag, simply luxuriating in the activity of greeting people she had stoically ignored for so many years. A nod here, a smile there, occasionally a last name combined with one of the two and even a short conversation until finally she came upon the Third Child, along with several of his…and dare she say it, her friends.

“Oh, Rei, good morning,” Shinji smiled, again Rei feeling that strange resonance with him as he acknowledged her, that ‘click’ as she felt his mind connect in a way that she didn’t understand, but still felt none the less. Rei could feel that Shinji was genuinely happy to see her and somehow knew that he no doubt could feel her similar thoughts about him.

And ultimately, that was all she needed to know from him and he from her. It was a much more convenient method of understanding then ‘small talk’, all other things being equal…

“Good…good morning Rei,” Kensuke said next, offering her a slight bow as she turned her gaze on him from Shinji. Rei had no such mental bridge with Kensuke, but none the less she took pleasure from his slightly nervous smile, generating a placidly calm one in return.

“Good morning Kensuke” she said back to him.

“You’re looking amazing” he spluttered out impulsively, causing Toji to plant his palm on his face with a slight groan and Shinji’s mouth to twitch up in a slight grin. But Rei, who was not precisely well tutored in the social niceties either, simply broadened her smile slightly and offered a slight bow.

“Thank you” she replied. “I take it that you have prepared for the upcoming dance?”

“Well uh, we’re working on it” he assured her. “Shinji is going to take us for a tux fitting later today”.

“Indeed?” she asked. “Then I will look forward to the result in a week’s time…” Rei stated…then paused, tilting her head as if something had just occurred to her. “I don’t believe you have seen my dress yet…have you?”

“Uh…no” Kensuke managed to get out; swallowing slightly as his mind suddenly wondered where this might be going…

Rei tilted her head back to a more normal inclination, almost as if disappointed.

“A pity,” she simply said, before with the slightest twinkle in her scarlet eyes -and the duplication of a look she had seen Asuka turn on Shinji’s back when he wasn’t looking- she turned away to head into school, her –technically- superhuman hearing easily catching the whispered talk behind her.

“Dude…did Rei Ayanami just flirt with you?”

Toji got no response to his question from Kensuke Aida.

“Dude? K?”

“Oh not again,” Shinji joined in the one sided conversation behind her as she reached the school building, hearing the rapid staccato snapping of his fingers. “Hey Kensuke, come back to me buddy, yo, wake up!”

Presently, Rei smiled slightly in memory of the moment as she finished the last reply, seventy two of the requests having to do with her availability at the school dance were easy to reply to, giving a simple, if slightly apologetic reply in the negative to each.

Strange, how none of these people had shown interest in her, even as a friend before Asuka had ‘transformed’ her…

One of the messages was from Asuka in fact, suggesting a ‘house party’ for after the school dance at her place.

Rei might have had some degree of naiveté at social interaction, but she wasn’t that naïve…replying that she agreed, subject to the approval of Captain Katsuragi.

Asuka did not bother to reply, but Rei heard her ‘humph’ of annoyance from across the classroom when the message arrived.

The final message was flashed onto her screen as soon as the computer finished its external network linkup. The pilot’s laptops looked the same as the other school laptops, but ‘under the hood’ were something else entirely, an order of magnitude more powerful with a customized operating system designed to establish a remote connection to NERV on startup, in case they needed to be contacted and their phones were either out or off. All they needed was a length of Ethernet cable and any kind of internet connection and they would be logged in, anywhere in the world. In Tokyo-3 however where the MAGI ruled, they were always on the internet, something that made them the envy of the rest of the class whose ability to occupy the mind through sensei’s lectures was more limited.

Well, except Kensuke, who had hacked the schools internal firewalls with little effort within a week of starting this year.

FROM [[Akagi::57.128.87.254]]

‘Monthly upload. 16:15 sharp.
-Dr Akai.’

Rei deleted the message with a mental sigh. So, they had decided to continue her uploads, after an oddly lengthy break. The consequences to this sudden decision were immediate and significant.

This would clearly cut into her socialization time.

Frowning slightly at the annoying interruption, she composed a message to classmate Chihiro, informing her that NERV had called her for tests and, regretfully, she would be unable to ‘hang’ downtown after school.

She studied the message for a few seconds, then added that she would deliver a greeting to her Father if she saw him in the Evangelion cages, before nodding, deciding it was an appropriate message, sending it off just in time to calmly answer ‘present’ as the Sensei reached her name on the attendance sheet.


The Boeing OV-203 Hyper-Shuttle screamed through the Earths Thermosphere.

The gigantic space plane was probably the most amazing waste of taxpayers money ever seen, which said much given the pilfering NERV and SEELE had performed on humanities resources over the last fifteen years.

A replacement for the now retired Space Shuttle, the Hyper-Shuttle was actually a marvel of design and technology. Unlike the venerable Shuttle, the Hyper-Shuttle did away with the ‘cheap’ reusable booster rockets and external fuel tank. It could carry fifty passengers in the same comfort as an airliner from point to point in a suborbital arc, or in a cargo configuration, boost huge loads into orbit before heading back down, for a fraction of the cost, waste or logistics of traditional chemical rockets.

The key to its genius was the quartet of enormous engines on each wing, which drank a unique thick ‘sludge’ of a fuel, which six micro particle beams -developed as an outgrowth of fusion research- then blasted and vaporized, generating an enormous thrust impulse which was blasted out the back.

The technology had redefined space flight, suddenly making the entire solar system a whole lot smaller...but ironically, when real space travel finally was in the grasp of humanity, no-one appeared to care anymore.

It is a pity that the human race ceased caring about what was out here Gendo Ikari thought to himself as he stared out at the vast expanse of the unblinking starfield above him. Almost unwillingly, he couldn’t help but remember Yui had been an avid astronomer. Strictly an amateur -her profession was biochemistry and cybernetics, not astrophysics after all- she had loved spending time late at night looking up at the stars and the moon as he looked on from a distance, humming that strange old song about flying to the moon as she paned her telescope around in fascination…

Foolishness Gendo chided himself as he returned his attention outside the spacecraft, looking down at Russia far below, speeding along at 14,000 miles per hour. There is no need to reflect on the past and what has been lost on this road. I will reclaim the past by shaping the future.

The Committee had kept him longer then he had anticipated, the old men both happy and unhappy at the same things as only they could be.

On one hand, they were very happy that the projected engagement-scenario costs thus far against the Angels were coming in far under budget for damage to Tokyo-3, even including repairs to the Evangelions and upgrades to Unit Zero to full combat status.
This had in turned annoyed Gendo, as he realized what he most owed this too was his Son’s superb piloting skills, a fact that had won him a great deal of sarcastic praise from SEELE’s public face, well aware of the friction between the family members and gladly taking the moment to heap praise upon him for raising such a fine warrior.

On the other hand, they were predictably petulant that he had taken a great joy in flatly rejecting any possibility of reducing NERV’s budget to deal with the Angels, pointing out that that because they had been lucky so far in getting off so lightly, that they should not and could not get complacent, lest they all forget what happened 15 years ago.

That had silenced the fools somewhat.

Still, for the moment, everything was proceeding well.

Patrol aircraft over the South Pole had detected a faint energy signature; the Lance would soon be in their grasp once again, apparently none the worse for wear after being at Ground Zero. The First Branch was making acceptable progress in their study of the 4th Angels S2 engine, aided by the partially recovered remains of the 5ths.

They were less then pleased at the loss of a full third of the UN Combined fleet against the 6th Angel, an engagement which was not entirely in agreement with their precious scenarios and had generated a great deal of heat that the Committee, not used explaining its actions to anyone, had been forced to spend vital time and effort putting into handling, to Gendo’s amusement.

They were still not exactly sure why the 6th Angel had attacked the convoy, having no choice but to accept the only logical finding; that Unit Two had drawn it in. Without knowledge of Adams presence on Over the Rainbow, there was no other conclusion they could reach.

Still, the presented explanation had not exactly filled the committee with confidence.

That their attackers wouldhome in on Lilith’s presence searching for Adam had been the basis for all the defensive scenarios NERV had developed, letting humanity concentrate its defenses into creating a gigantic kill zone known locally as Tokyo-3.

But there was always that old staying about eggs and baskets…

NERV Central was the only NERV base with extensive anti-Angel defenses, to say nothing of the only combat ready Evangelions and pilots to drive them. The other branches did have had extensive security, but it was oriented around stopping the occasional terrorist or corporate spy, not skyscraper sized attackers that could chew down an Armored Brigade for a quick snack if they were so inclined. If any of the future Angels decided to visit other NERV facilities around the world, the damage would be catastrophic, to say the least.

And worse, their scenario would be useless for predicting or defending against such a move.

Not that their precious scenario suggests anything like that will happen of course Gendo snorted as he looked down on the Earth. The 6th was off the Japanese coast, close enough to justify it being on the way to attack Tokyo-3. And the 7th arrived precisely according to their scenario, mollifying any thoughts that something was amiss…

“Excuse me. Since we're sharing the flight, do you mind if I sit here?” a voice asked from next to him.

“Not at all,” Gendo replied smoothly, his face not shifting its focus one inch from the world under him and the unknowing people scattered across Siberia working hard in the newly accessible and resource rich fields scattered across the formerly perpetually snowbound areas.

“The revised budget for the…sample collection passed quite easily, didn't it?”

Gendo now did let the slightest smile come across his face. The committee’s desperate need to get their hands on the Lance was amusingly transparent and the cost for funding a modest naval expedition to the South Pole to ‘collect’ it had been neatly attached to the revised budget put to the UN Security Council. SEELE, who knew the true value of the Lance –beyond an enormously powerful Anti-Angel weapon- had played their puppets well, but they in turn hadn’t realized just how much money earmarked for Gendo’s own little projects had been laundered through Tokyo-3 reconstruction and expansion projects so completely that it would take years for them to untangle it…not that they had years of course.

The irony of having SEELE fund their own destruction did amuse him.

Still, politicians could only be pushed so fareven with the best of leverage before they would balk at giving out cash, but with five Angel attacks in as many months after a 15 year pause, money was not exactly an issue. NERV’s slight embarrassment at the initial engagement against the 5th Angel had been more then offset by the successful actions of Evangelions, all but one of the engagements lasting less then six minutes once an Evangelion was deployed, again mocking the UN and National forces which still tried and failed to intercept them out of stubborn human pride.

“The Committee's main concern is for their own survival. They are not stingy when their own lives are at stake,” Gendo replied to the Chinese General as he sat down next to him. General Qiao Liang was apparently a ‘do nothing’ officer formerly of the Peoples Liberation Army and now of the UN’s advanced projects group, at least publicly anyway. In reality, his only real concern was acting as the administrative officer of the newly expanded 6th Branch of NERV in Beijing.

“Oh, I have one more piece of good news,” the General added as he studied his fingers with an unconcerned look. “All members of the UN Security Council bar the US have approved the budget for Eva Unit 06. And it's probably just a matter of time for the US as well, that country is allergic to unemployment.”

Gendo accepted the news with an even nod. The US was always by far the most…prickly nation to deal with, always much more willful and independent then others, even after the Second Impact and the rise of the UN. The fact that they had two NERV branches on their soil, one capable of serial Evangelion construction unassisted by external NERV facilities –and under US Military Control no less- was something that SEELE was becoming increasingly concerned about, but not to the point they would take action.

Yet.

“And what about your country?” Gendo asked, even if he knew the answer. It had been the price of buying the General and his backers in the Chinese Central Committee and it had been all too easy for SEELE to provide it, placing another Government in their thrall without lifting a finger, exposing their existence or placing themselves at risk.

Just him of course.

Liang smiled with the slightest nod, a concession of Gendo’s actions and the upholding of the ‘NERV’s’ side of their agreement, the poor flag officer not having a clue just how far over his head he was in this game.

“We will participate, beginning with the construction of Unit 08. The plans for the second installation project are still viable…however; there is the problem of not yet having found a pilot.”

An irrelevancy if the dummy plug system works as planned Gendo thought. Perhaps it might not be nearly as effective a system in battle as real pilots, but if they could ultimately swamp the Angels with massed S2 equipped Eva attacks without risk to Unit One or the pilot of Unit Zero, so much the better in his mind.

“The Angels have returned. We have no choice but to defeat them” was Gendo’s reply.

Liang accepted the statement at face value with a nod, but his eyes narrowed ever so slightly.

“We don't want another Second Impact either,” he said, causing Gendo to finally glance over at the General and acknowledge him, the double meaning clear.

The PRC Government might not know about SEELE’s existence, but they probably suspected the Committee had some kind of motive…and they were letting them know they were watching.

This was fine by him. Let them watch. By the time they figured it out, it would be far too late to do anything about it. Not that they would push too hard to figure it out, lest they lose their newly promised upgrades and construction rights at the 6th Branch of course and the tens of billions of US Dollars in contracts.

The point made however, the General moved back onto other topics.

“I hear Chairman Keel was sulking over the pilots?”

“Foolishness,” Gendo snorted. “The old men are sticking their noses in where they shouldn’t, because they feel a loss of control over someone they never controlled in the first place.”

“From what I heard, neither did you” Liang retorted with a snort.

“There are many levels of control” Gendo replied, ignoring the sarcastic tone. “Both subtle and unsubtle. The attempt to place a chain around the Third Childs neck is redundant as he has placed one there himself. By letting him develop strong bonds with his fellow pilots and his guardian, he has exposed the fulcrum that underlies his being, as well as the levers to control him. Coercion is both counter productive and dangerous at this stage of the scenario.”

Liang kept his peace as Gendo thought back to where all this had started. Looking for anything to sulk about, one Committee member had muttered about Captain Katsuragi’s competence in controlling her charges, citing the danger of ‘inappropriate’ contact between the pilots that might complicate Angel engagements.

When Gendo had raised an eyebrow and inquired if he was volunteering for the job, he had delighted in the uncomfortable shifting, pointing out that the teamwork exercises he had ordered were still ongoing, with excellent results. If of course they wished to disrupt this and give the Third Child every reason to leave, well that was their prerogative of course.

Keel had not been amused at his sarcastic response (perfectly pitched so it couldn’t be accused of being a sarcastic response of course) but he was far too skilled an operator to say it outright, instead commenting that theywould interview the Third Child at a future point and make a suitable judgment on if his living arrangements were suitable.

It, Gendo had judged, had been a foolish and futile attempt to exert SEELE’s authority.

What pray tell, old man, will you do if and when you tell Shinji to leave Katsuragi and he says in turn he will leave Tokyo-3 if you try to force him?

A rather vain and unusually ego driven move for the usually smooth operators…which made Gendo wonder if he was missing something. Shinji was…complex after all, with no simple definition to label him.

NERV had created the First.

The Second belonged to NERV, her self image and desires had been carefully sculpted around the Evangelion, she could no sooner stop being a pilot then SEELE could give up their quest for immortality.

Shinji however…he was the wild card. He was far, far too valuable to loose given his astonishing, combat proven natural talent and the fact that only he had the ability to pilot their most valuable Evangelion. Yet he was without any strong ties to NERV, every one of his psychological profiles utterly worthless in predicting his actions since he had arrived, almost as if in between stepping on the train from Nagano to Tokyo-3, he had had a personality transplant at a stop along the way…

Gendo allowed the slightest smirk come across his face as the acceleration from the engines de-orbital burn cut off and the aircraft started its atmospheric interface.
Watching Shinji and the Committee face off against each other might prove to be an interesting diversion.

[Chris OFarrell]

“Well. This is the last night we’ll be doing this,” Shinji commented to Asuka as he flung his sheets up in the air, before letting them settle down onto his futon.

“Thank God,” Asuka agreed as she dumped her own sheets and pillows down on hers. “One more night next to Misato snoring and I think I might smother her in her sleep…accidentally.”

“How can you smoother someone in their sleep accidentally?” Shinji asked with a confused tone, but interested look as he placed his pillows down on the floor.

Asuka shot him an arch, superior look.

“Do you want a demonstration tonight, Third Child?”

“Uh no, that’s quite alright,” he replied with a sort of wary dignity that earned him a snort as Asuka continued to arrange her own ‘bed’, fiddling with the arrangement several times before giving up and tossing the pillow down on the floor violently and flopping onto the lounge.

“Man, why do Japanese people have to sleep on the floor? It’s so pathetic” she whined, as she had every night they had been forced to ‘eat, breathe and sleep together’. He had tried to debate this point with her on cultural grounds and lost every single time, Shinji quietly in awe of just how sharp and agile her mind really was when she tried.

So he took a slightly different path this time.

“You know Asuka, you do have more then enough money in your bank account to buy a bed if you want one,” he pointed out in a perfectly distant tone, as if it was something he was saying in passing.

Asuka blinked.

Clearly, this rather simple and elegant solution to her hate of the Japanese custom of sleeping on Futons had not occurred to her.

The ‘first time’ around Shinji recalled she had just pestered Misato until their guardian had ‘borrowed’ a bed from some empty Geofront sleeping quarters for her, ordering some grunts in the logistics department to ship it to the apartment in what probably qualified as an abuse of UN resources...until you calculated that keeping the Second Child as happy as possible was a goal of great merit and a worthy investment of NERV’s considerable resources.

Right now however, the Second Child paused, her mouth hanging half open in preparation for a rant that stalled as her mind analyzed his statement and decided that he actually had a rather good point.
Then it opened fully.

“Why the hell didn’t you tell me that when you thought of it!” she demanded, not missing a beat.

“Because I thought a ‘college educated, honors level student’ like yourself would see the logical solution,” Shinji replied, greatly enjoying throwing back her primary gloating point back in her face, watching her jaw tense slightly in the process. Without any good comeback to that point, she just settled for glaring at him.

God she was cute when she was angry…which was rather convenient given that sometimes he thought it was her default state. And as much as he could sit here all night just staring at her, with her soft silky hair flowing over her shoulders, untamed by the A-10 clips she had left in her room, it was much safer to just to move beyond the annoyance before it turned into a fist fight.

“Come on, let’s get to bed.”

Asuka ‘humphed’ the way she always did on the rare occasions when she lost an argument, before she pushed off the lounge and walked over to the wall to slap the light switch, the room darkening at once, only the moonlight coming through the window lighting her way as she walked back and dropped to the floor with a wave of air.

There was the usual sound of movement as they both settled onto, then into their beds, Asuka taking much longer to find any kind of comfortable position before settling down, Shinji slowly drifting off as his breathing slowed…

“Shinji?”

Part of him could feel the siren call of sleep calling to him and told him to ignore the voice and just surrender to the oblivion...but the larger part Asuka Langley Soryu’s fist had always held a solid grip on told him to wake up.

“Asuka?” he replied as he opened his eyes, letting him stare at the ceiling high above them.

There was a pause and the sound of her shifting on her Futon.

“You know…” she paused as if gathering her thoughts, “we’re all alone here tonight.”

Okay, that got his undivided attention.

His gaze shifted from the etched panels on the ceiling to the person next to him, rolling over to find that Asuka was also staring at the ceiling, her profile just that much more beautiful in the pale moonlight, the expression on her face would have been a mystery to most people…

But not to him.

‘We’re all alone here tonight’ wasn’t what she was going to say Shinji decided, the slight tightening of her face a dead giveaway for Shinji as he wondered what she had hesitated at telling him, but deciding to try and lighten the mood before she started brooding.

“Pen-Pen is going to be annoyed to hear you say that,” Shinji pointed out, causing a flicker of a smile to pass over her face.

“Well the only two humans here tonight,” she clarified her statement, finally turning to her left to face him, unable to see Shinji’s hand under his blanket pinching his thigh rather painfully to force himself to focus on her face and not where her loose T-Shirt barely covered her chest.
“Misato left us both alone here, without supervision.”

“I guess she trusts us both enough not to do anything…inappropriate.”

“Oh?” Asuka’s smile became…dangerous. “Such as?”

Shinji felt alarm bells start sounding in his head at that look.

“Given the way our attempt on that machine ended, I’m guessing dancing isn’t what she’s worried about.”

“Oh stop being such a baby, it takes all the fun out of this,” she sighed, blowing a strand of hair away with a sharp exhale of air as she adjusted her position, mulling over what to say. “You know…I had over fifty offers today to go to the dance with various classmates, at least thirty of whom already had dates, mostly from our own school.”

“I heard,” Shinji nodded, knowing from Hikari that if the class rep hadn’t gone at the ‘line’ of people waiting to ask her out at recess with a preverbal hatchet it would have probably been closer to eighty.
He also tried to ignore the spark of anger and jealously at the thought of all those people trying to ask his Asuka out…

“You should realize just how lucky you are Ikari that I’m going with you. Most guys you age would kill for the honor,” she pointed out when he didn’t elaborate on his reply, clearly impatient for him to confirm this great honor she had bestowed on him.

“More then a few guys expressed the same feeling to me today,” he replied, easing up into a sitting position. “Most of them were rather…jealous.”

“As they damm well should be,” Asuka snorted as she rolled onto her back again, declining to tell Shinji that a very surprising number of girls had approached her with much the same thoughts about ‘getting’ Shinji. Hikari had told her that more then a few of the girls had been convinced that Shinji had known she was coming to Japan all along, hence why he had –politely- let it be known he didn’t want to go with anyone local, despite countless offers.

Asuka had thought about shattering their illusions, pointing out that she had asked him to the dance when she had first found out about it (and that he had jumped at the chance) but she had held back. There was a fine line beyond which gloating was unbecoming, even for her, so she let them have their illusions, encouraging them with a hint that she and Shinji had first met when they were two.

True enough, even if she didn’t remember it…and she grinned tightly as she again thought over Shinji’s story about her whacking him over the head when he dared stand up to her.

Some things never changed, it would appear…and the knowledge that she had known Shinji far longer then she had first thought was strangely comforting to her.

“After all,” Asuka continued to lecture Shinji on just how damn lucky he was as he didn’t appear to get the point, “you’re going to the dance with the most popular, beautiful and downright sought after Girl in school; you should appreciate your fortune Third Child”.

“Well here’s a question, who would you take to the dance, if I wasn’t here, or wasn’t available.”

Asuka frowned slightly at his question, not quite able to completely suppress the suddenly uneasy feelings coursing through her at this line of questioning…if Shinji was starting to get cold feet…or Gott help her, if someone had stolen him from her…

“Are you saying,” she asked in a calm but none the less deadly tone, letting her head turn slowly to the side to glare at him, “that you are planning on standing me up?”

Shinji had the delightfully good manners to look shocked at her suggestion and flinch backwards, something that caused her body to start to leach back the chemical cocktail that had started her heart thumping.

“No no, I was just wondering, that’s all,” Shinji hastily pointed out as he saw the danger signs and hurriedly worked to defuse the bomb he had just armed without realizing.

“Don’t wonder,” she commanded in that same deceptively calm tone, before she lightened it slightly as she considered his question, then dismissed it. “But to answer your question, really I don’t know. I guess I would have picked one of the offers thrown at me at random or something.”

A lie.

I could never go with any of those fakes she thought to herself as the silence stretched uncomfortably, Asuka realizing she had just told Shinji he was no better then any other random person, silently cursing her choice of words, even as a distant part of her wondered when she had become so considerate of his feelings…

Shinji, who could now read all this on her face rather clearly managed not to smile at her and decided not to press the issue, having gotten his answer from her, without her saying a word.

“So…I was talking to Rei about the dress shopping,” Shinji subtly shifted topics, causing Asuka’s slight frown to vanish into a tight smile.

“Were you now?” she asked. “What did the First have to say for herself?”

“Nothing,” he now frowned. “In fact, she refused to say anything about your dress at all, claiming that she had orders not to say anything…you wouldn’t know anything about that, would you?”

“Moi?” she asked with an exaggerated look of innocence on her face.

“Rei wouldn’t take orders from Hikari,” he pointed out. “In fact she would never take ‘orders’ from anyone outside of NERV, which rather strongly suggests that you gave her instructions not to tell me about the dress.”

“Do go on,” Asuka drawled, supporting her head with an arm against her pillow.

“Hikari is your best friend and even though we get along well, she would never tell me anything if you asked her not to.”

“How interesting,” she nodded with a vague, airhead type tone that actually annoyed him slightly.

“So, I was…I was just wondering what it looked like.”

“How interesting,” Asuka nodded again, somehow managing to sound even more vague and stupid, the fact finally hitting him that he was not going to get an answer, she wanted the dress to be a surprise.
Okay. He could wait…there was only a week left as of tomorrow…and if she wanted to surprise him, well…it had to be good.

“Okay fine,” he yawned trying to sound disinterested, rolling onto his back, then his other side. “Good night Asuka”

“How interesting!” she declared again.

”Stop that.”

Asuka just laughed slightly as she rolled her head back and took her victory for what it was, at the same time simultaneously grinning to herself at the flattering thought that Shinji had been asking about her dress, congratulating herself for getting the three people who had thus far seen it sworn to secrecy.

I am going to blow the Baka’s mind into itty, bitty, tiny little pieces when he sees me a week from now Asuka thought to herself with a somewhat evil look on her face. If he doesn’t pass out on the pavement outside Rei’s place then and there, I’m going to be very, very disappointed.

With that happy thought in her mind, she got herself as comfortable as possible on the stupid floor, sighed and went to sleep.

An hour later, the nightmares started again.

“Okay Rei, that’s it, we’re done for the night.”

“Roger.”

Rei felt the familiar but slightly uncomfortable buzzing pressure of the neural scanners lining the tank fade away as they shut down, the First Child opening her eyes as the LCL buoyancy level was reduced, gently dropping her to the floor of the tank as vents opened and the amber fluid was reclaimed. She took a deep ‘breath’ of the fluid as the levels dropped, then leaned over and explosively expelled it from her lungs, coughing out the last of the liquid before she stood as the walls of the tank itself lowered into the floor, allowing her to step out into the cool air, slick with LCL.

Doctor Akagi looked up at her from behind her glasses without raising her head before she returned her attention back to her console as she tapped away, shutting down the system and clearly wanting to get out of here.

“The upload appears to have been routine, but we’ll need to make sure there was no corruption before we move back to a weekly schedule,” she announced without preamble as the console faded to darkness.

“Yes Ma’am,” was all Rei could say, dripping naked in front of her.

“Well…that’s it,” Akagi said with a slight frown at her as she calmly waited for future instructions.

Shoo! Rei translated that as in her mind, the subdued hostility from the Doctor still present in every gesture, nuance and look when the two were alone as, not for the first time, she wondered what she could have possibly done to attract such hate from her…

“Yes Ma’am” was all she said, turning and heading for the tiny shower and locker off to the side of the giant room. She had stocked it with some of her hygiene products recommended by Asuka, taking a guilty pleasure in spending an extra few minutes after washing her hair to run an exfoliating glove lathered with a cleansing liquid over her skin, exterminating all traces of LCL under the hot water before she dried off and got dressed, managing not to shiver as her skin rejoiced once again in its newfound sensitivity. She had come dressed in her school uniform, but she had folded the green dress and red ribbon inside her school bag, complementing a brown ankle length skirt that matched well with the uniforms white shirt, over which in turn she put on one of her NERV windbreaker jackets.

Whereas Shinji’s Jacket was a dark blue and Asuka’s –of course- was a dark burgundy, hers was a light crème that complemented her skin quite nicely, at least in her opinion. Her Unit Patch was circular, the head of Unit Zero on her left breast with a bold red ‘00’ painted across it, rather clearly showing her Evangelion designation, ‘R. Ayanami’ printed in black letters on her opposite breast.

She closed up the locker, ensured the shower was secured and her bag was packed, and then picked it up left the tiny bathroom. Doctor Akagi had long since returned to her office two hundred meters higher above this level and Rei found her own way across the cold and not quite empty room, perfectly aware of who (or whom) waited in the darkness, sliding her access card through a reader next to the meter thick armor grade door. It obediently rose into the roof, which was normal, but it revealed a tall man in a black uniform, with heavy orange tinted glasses waiting outside…which was not normal.

“Rei.”

“Commander,” she said, offering him her usual slight smile that she found was increasingly just a simple a set of muscular actions, without any real emotion behind them, as her new perception of her own worth clashed with his stated goals for her existence.

“The upload was successful?”

“Doctor Akagi requires time to ensure there is no corruption on the upload,” Rei explained as he shifted slightly, gesturing down the corridor without lifting a figure, Rei obediently falling into line towards the elevators as with a hiss, the door sealed once again behind her.

“Indeed? I suspect she is being overly cautious, but that is not an unworthy goal in project of such importance,” Gendo said in a typically dismissive tone. “We are behind schedule already and will need to make increased efforts to return to it”.

“Understood,” she replied blandly as they halted at the elevator. “If…I may ask a question?” she inquired, getting a glance that she knew meant for her to proceed, “why were the uploads halted? Have…I done something incorrectly?”

“Not as such” the Commander replied as the elevator doors opened and they stepped in, the Commander inserting his card and tapping a button much higher in NERV then their deep level, the elevator jolting into action with the usual ‘click…click…click’ of the level counter above the door.

“I…do not understand,” she replied, mostly because it was what she would have said before she had started to think for herself.

Gendo glanced down at the young woman –he could no longer in all honestly think of her as a ‘girl’- and frowned. Every day that passed, she grew to look more and more like Yui to him. Now with the attention of the other two Children, one of whom appeared to have taken Rei as something of a protégé after finding out how…limited her social skills were, Rei was changing all too quickly in front of him.
True, her growth was still limited and her core purpose, by all indicators appeared still bound to his without any problems, but…

There was always a ‘but’.

What if he was wrong? What if Rei decided to betray him and the very purpose he had designed her for?

Free will.

It was humanities greatest strength…and its greatest weakness, the core difference between the offspring of Adam and the offspring of Lilith, the ability to choose. Oh you could try to constrain it, limit it, direct it…but at some point, every human had to make a choice to accept consequences one way or the other.

His decision to continue Rei’s uploads was a calculated risk. He had considered leaving ‘this’ Rei active until the proper time, terminating her and then restoring Rei to an old image, but again, the blasted possibility of this Rei dying and having to be ‘brought back’ without all these memories raised far too many questions and was just too strong a possibility to ignore happening. Trying to place harsh constraints against Rei could only invoke consequences from the other two pilots, whom had apparently grown quite close to the formerly distant and aloof First Child.

Still, ultimately, he did have confidence. All evidence pointed to the fact that Rei had not breathed a word of her true purpose to either of the other pilots, nor any of the truths behind the Human Instrumentality project she knew of. She had never once given the slightest hint that she would disobey any order from any NERV personnel and when asked of her purpose, she had given the correct answers without hesitation.

All other things being equal, he would therefore have sufficient reason to declare Rei’s new activities harmless to his agenda and in fact useful in their own ways for team building and morale boosting…but in his life, all things were rarely equal.

The line between caution and paranoia for someone in his position was not a well lit sharp edge, but a blurry gray zone that appeared to grow larger and wider every day as fifteen years of his planning came down to months of execution. It was like playing a game of chess where both sides’ knights could randomly mutate into any other piece at unpredictable intervals, changing the strategic situation in an instant. All one could do was to use them ruthlessly when they opened up new avenues of attack, brace the defenses when an opponent achieved a window of opportunity and counterattack hard when again they mutated into a position of weakness.

All one could do was watch, wait and act.

“Rei, your actions recently have…concerned me,” he admitted. “You have become close to the Second and Third children, moved out of your apartment into a new apartment and have dramatically increased your level of social interaction. At the same time, I can find no conclusive evidence that any of this interferes with your primary purpose.”

Gendo turned away, still standing ramrod straight as he looked at the door, considering his position. Truly, he had no real concern if Rei wanted to make any friends, go shopping, date that Aida boy –who’s Father worked for him, a useful fact to know- or go on a nightly killing spree leaping from rooftop to rooftop, so long as at the end of the day, she was ready to do what needed to be done.

The fact that the Second had so proactively sought to improve her circumstances, aided and abetted by the Third and Captain Katsuragi was no danger. If anything, his review of the tactical training exercises had shown a remarkably polished teamwork that boded well for launching coordinated assaults against the Angels as opposed to engaging them piecemeal, the Evangelions fighting as singular parts of a larger, more terrifying machine as opposed to three small individuals.

And if Rei in these new friendships and respects found a greater reason to throw herself into the fray to protect her friends, sacrificing herself in place of them to take out an Angel (and protect Unit One) without hesitation…then so much the better.

Although he had a disturbing thought that he might find the loss of ‘this’ Rei who had been around for quite some time, upsetting.

Irrelevant, she will return if she is lost, that is the covenant I have made with her he thought as the lift continued to rise, finally turning back slightly to face her.

“Indeed, there is anecdotal evidence that suggests these…’changes’ have led to an increase in your value in all key performance indicators and as such, these changes should be encouraged, so long as this remains true.”

“Yes Sir,” was all she said back as the lift slowed, then the doors opened with a light ‘ping’ as they reached the administration level of NERV HQ.

“It’s late. I’ll have a car sent around,” he declared as they exited the lift before he turned and offered her a slight smile. “I will have to…review your new apartment some time…Good night Rei.”

“Good night Sir,” she answered, bowing slightly before he turned and headed for his personal quarters, unlike most people in NERV, he was quite happy to live inside the Geofront…probably because he felt many people wanted to kill him and he appreciated the layers of titanium battle plate around his bed.

So, I have permission to continue from the Commander Rei thought, letting a slight smile come across her face. Unexpected, but none the less welcome.

The marked NERV car was typical of dozens of such vehicles in service around the city and the driver typical of any number of Section Two agents employed by the UN. He said nothing as she got in, driving without instruction up to a surface based train station a hundred meters from the Headquarters pyramid where a car train waited, loaded with dozens of cars of other late shift NERV personnel waiting to go home. Their car was locked in quickly and soon the train was underway, the platform their car rested on rising slowly on its hinges to keep them level as the train ascended a steep thirty five then forty degree angle track up through the Geofront sky towards the towers suspended above them.

It only took half an hour for the train to drop them off at a convenient car train station, and then drive her the few blocks to her house, Rei politely thanking the driver who nodded before pulling away. She glanced down to a nearby cross street down which Captain Katsuragi’s apartment lay and debated if she should ‘impose’ as the Captain continually insisted she do whenever she wished, but eventually judged the time too late in the evening, deciding to just turn in.

She pulled her key out and entered the secure foyer then took the lift to her floor, noting again that this modern lift was clean, smooth and quick, a far cry from the aged and abused lift at her old apartment, which, she had found to some degree of consternation, was scheduled to be demolished.

It was not as if her new apartment was not in every measurable way superior to her old apartment…but she still felt a slight twinge of regret knowing the place of so many memories was soon to be destroyed as if it never existed…

Enough she told herself as she reached her apartment and took out a second key. The past is just that, it is time to build my future.

The door opened and she entered her apartment with a sigh, turning on the lights as she did so. It was much larger then she would have ever considered had she been given a real choice, almost half the size of Captain Katsuragi’s apartment in fact, but Asuka had insisted the convenience of the location was too good to pass up, forwarding the relevant paperwork to the Vice Commander without Rei even knowing, the NERV bureaucracy working surprisingly swiftly for once and before she had truly thought about it, she had moved in. The furnishings were somewhat…sparse, but tasteful, what Rei considered an elegantly understated style where ‘less’ was ‘more’.

The living room had a large soft couch on the far wall that faced the hallway wall and the plasma display hung there –that Asuka had demanded to plug her video game system into at some point- along with a number of bean bags the Second Child had pulled out of her astonishing number of boxes brought over from the Third Branch. A small four place table sat off to the side where the carpet of the lounge room gave way to the tiles of the kitchen, a small but modern and efficient layout she approved of, containing more then ample storage space for her few needs. Beyond the kitchen wall was her bedroom, which backed onto a balcony that ran the rear of her apartment, with a second bedroom opposite it that she had placed a spare futon in, on the off chance anyone ever decided to stay the night.

Next to that spare bedroom and opposite the kitchen was the bathroom and next to that and the entranceway, a small combination laundry / storage space sat.

In short, it was foolishly oversized for her when compared to her last apartment, which had been nothing more then a bedroom/living area, a kitchenette and a tiny bathroom all rolled into two rooms…but she found it none the less a quite pleasant place to live…especially on the few –but hopefully soon more- occasions her friends ‘dropped over’.

Placing her school bag in her room, Rei removed the uniform inside and placed it in a dirty clothes bin, before disrobing and changing into her silk night clothes, shivering as always as the garments slid across her skin like a writhing living creature, simply absorbing the pleasant sensations that resulted as she settled into her bed. She glanced out at the night skyline of Tokyo-3, from this angle she could just make out part of the apartment building in which Captain Katsuragi’s apartment resided…

And as she closed her eyes and fell into a dreamless sleep, she wondered not for the first time, what it would be like to dream, just once…

(“I'm not a child! I'm going to grow up quickly”)-
(“So look at me”)-
(“Please, Asuka, die with me”)-
(“No! I'm not your doll”)-
(“I'm going to think for myself and live for myself”)-
(“That Girl over there”)-
(“Mom! Please, don't quit being my mom”)-
(“Mom! Mom! I've been chosen”)-
(“I'm an elite pilot, chosen to protect all of mankind”)-
(“I'm the best in the world”)-
(“It's supposed to be a secret! But I'll tell you anyway! Just for you”)-
(“Everyone will be nice to us from now on”)-
(“So, we won't be lonely anymore”)-
(“So, we'll be fine, even without Dad around”)-
(“We won't be lonely anymore”)-
(“So, look! Look at me”)-
(“Come on, Mom…Mom…Mom?”)-

-And with a last desperate lurch, Asuka woke, coming off the floor and looking around the darkened room almost wildly as she shook uncontrollably, her face no longer the confident mask she always presented, but that of a terrified four year old as she buried her head in her raised knees and wrapped her arms around her legs tightly.

Slowly however, her racing heart slowed its frantic beating, her body’s instinctive reaction to oxygenate her bloodstream as part of the flight / fight response disengaging as she concentrated, intellectualizing the primal feelings to rob them of their power with some success, as she slowly, carefully lowered her back against the futon again.

Outside, she could hear the distant sound of an ambulances siren as it hurried to help someone, triggering a final spike of despair that no-one would be coming to help her as once again, the nightmares returned.

They had been gone for the last week, sleeping next to Misato. She snored so loudly that she was woken up three or four times throughout the night, just as she had started to dream. It had had the effect of breaking her sleep into chunks of a few hours at a time, leaving her slightly cranky in the morning, but she freely and gladly traded the sleep for a respite from the dreams that had battered her year after year after year.
Oh not every night. Sometimes months would go by, causing her to dare to hope that they might have gone for good…then they would crash into her again.

And now, they were back.

She flopped down on the bed as she glanced across at Shinji next to he, his back turned on her as he happily breathed in and out, a sudden surge of envy at his peaceful sleep hitting her as she looked over at him, angrily reaching up to wipe away the tears that had come unbidden while she slept.

It’s not fair she thought in quiet despair. Why…why can’t I just sleep…what have I done to deserve this…oh Mamma…why did you leave me all alone?

She had asked that question hundreds of times…and once again, no answer came as she shut her eyes, pulled her sheets tighter around herself and grimly settled down, not realizing that she had sprawled out much closer to the slumbering Third Child as she prepared to return to her own private hell.

Slowly she sunk her mind into the depths of unconsciousness and soon she hovered in the poorly defined shadow land between dream and consciousness as she tried -and failed- to return fully to sleep. Relentlessly, her mind fought her bodies demand for release, unconsciously perhaps terrified of returning again to face the horrors.

On the floor with her eyes shut, Asuka fidgeted. Perhaps it was her body randomly shifting, perhaps it was some small part of her unconscious mind seizing an opening. But the end result was that she rolled onto her side…and bumped into Shinji Ikari. On instinct, an arm and a leg came up and over the blissfully ignorant Third Child and latched onto him, her arm across his chest and her leg hooking across and around him, securing her position as her head found a comfortable place behind his, the warmth from his body start to soak through the thin sheets into her.

She made a content noise and, slowly, the somewhat severe expression on her face melted into a softer, calm and almost content expression as for the first time in far too long, Asuka Langley Soryu feel into a deep, restful, sleep.

[Chris OFarrell]

Shinji Ikari slowly woke the next morning, feeling strangely, almost overpoweringly…content. The last time he had felt anything like this…

For a sudden, terrifying half a second, he knew had been taken back to the Sea of LCL...or that he had never left it, that it had been nothing but a dream inside a dream.

With skyrocketing apprehension, he opened his eyes-
And breathed a sigh of relief.

He had never been quite so glad to see Misato’s living room, the soft yellow light from the sun filtering in, but not yet bright enough to signify it was time to get up, closing his eyes again and sighing slightly, exhaling his panic drain away, as he listened to the faint sound of birds chirping in the hills around Tokyo-3 as he relished the physical sensations of a world of AT fields all around him.

The futon was agreeably supporting, but comfortable. The sheets kept off the chill, but were not thick or heavy enough to annoy him and his pillow was soft under his head. The arm across his chest and its partner leg further down both held him gently, but firmly, pulling him close and allowing the incredibly comfortable warmth from the body next to his to flow into his back, as he lazily concentrated on counting the steady, deep heartbeats he could feel-

Wait a second.

Arm?

Leg?

Warmth?

Heartbeats?

Not daringto move so much as a nanometer, Shinji concentrated on the sensations across his back, all of his senses coming online as his brain shot right to First Stage Alert, screaming at his nervous system for all the information they had ten seconds ago.

Yes. He could feel the chest of a definitely female gender pressing into him, making him swallow despite himself as his mind traced the ‘imprint’ being made on his back, body warmth soaking into him and trying to entice him to just relax and go to sleep.

THAT was not going to happen, his heart rate now accelerating like a bat out of hell made sure of that.

Tracing forward and across his side, he could feel the arm looping around his own upper arm and down, terminating in what felt like a hand lightly resting against the left side chest moving ever so slightly as he –and probably she- breathed in and out…and now that he concentrated, he could feel an intermittent but regular breeze playing at his hair, almost as if someone was exhaling into it…and he could smell just the faintest hint of a very familiar vanilla and strawberry scent…

Probing further down his body, he found there was no possible mistaking of the grip of the calf and leg that came across his him at his hip, wrapping over and down the other side to entrap his own legs.

Still almost unwilling to believe, he opened his eyes again and directed his focus down.

There was the arm. Elegantly smooth and limber, it was sitting across his chest, with red painted fingernails catching the early morning light most enticingly. Carefully, he risked shifting his head several degrees and looked down as far as he could…yes, he could just make out the sheet covered limb that had engulfed his lower body and tangled them irrevocably together.

Thinking faster then he ever had, he glanced ‘forward’ at the same cabinet Asuka had spied him in the night before last…and in the slightly angled reflection, he could make out Asuka Langley Soryu pressing right up behind him, holding him like a lover with a content look on her face that he knew must have matched the look on his, before he woke up.

It all added up to one, inescapable conclusion.

‘You are a dead man, Shinji Ikari’ his mind told him with a mental shrug.

He consoled himself with the fact that Asuka was at least holding (or hugging?) him from behind. Had he woken up face to face with her at this range, he probably would have started shaking so violently that she would have woken up…and, well, that would have been that. At least this way, he had time to think, plan and, God willing, escape.

Ever so carefully, he started to move his right arm, pinned under hers, trying to nudge it away-

-And almost at once, it flexed and simply pulled him tighter into her, with a slightly annoyed murmur from behind him telling the folly of that idea.

Okay. He couldn’t get out that way…perhaps if he shuffled his legs forward…
No luck. Strange, he had always fantasized about being trapped between Asuka’s thighs…but he had never thought there would be so much terror involved. It was funny the way some things came true…

He forced himself to relax, counting slowly to twenty before he started to think the problem through. He examined it patiently from every angle; every perspective…and his mind calmly reported the only logical conclusion.

I’m screwed…Okay, okay. Don’t panic…

Then, with a sinking feeling, he felt tremors pass through Asuka’s body followed by a slight sigh, both of which hit him with the force of an earthquake and a trumpet fanfare respectively, announcing to him that the Second Child had started to awaken.

Oh who the hell are you kidding Ikari, panic!
With no other options remaining, he played dead, shutting his eyes and ‘going back to sleep’ in the hope that Asuka might at least put off killing him until he could enjoyit, awake, on as many levels as she would…


Asuka slowly returned from the land of dreams, feeling so utterly relaxed and rested that she had to fight off an instinctive flash of annoyance at the fact that she was going to have to get up soon. Since coming to Japan, she had never had a night’s sleep that had left her in anything like this state…and she didn’t want it to end too soon.

She wasn’t sure if it was because she couldn’t get used to sleeping on the floor, or Misato’s snoring on the times she stayed out here and not in her room, but her sleep had consequently ranged from barely adequate to poor. But this morning…she felt better then she had in months. After her first bout of nightmares, her dreams had been full of joy, hope and peace, of friend and family, of good times and fond memories, the specters vanquished to somewhere she didn’t care to figure out. Even now, she just felt so wonderful, lying on her side and lazily hanging onto the wonderfully warm, soft and comfortable blanket, keeping her eyes shut as she felt the faint thumping of its heart beating, surprised at how fast it sounded to her…her…heart?

Heart?

Asuka’s eyes snapped open, focusing on a mess of chestnut colored hair in front of her face. Almost in disbelief, she flexed her limbs slightly…yup; she was hanging onto Shinji like Misato protecting a slab of beer during an intervention.

From their positions, she made a guess that she’d rolled over and latched onto him at some point during the night…and as she lay there half stunned at this sudden twist in her situation, the rational, logical part of her mind had to wonder if this couldbe why she felt so perfectly at peace this morning. As crazy as it sounded…could simply holding Shinji in her sleep have had such a profoundly relaxing (and calming) effect on her dreams?

Because the fact was, she had never been able to escape the nightmares before. Oh she had avoided them. She had endured them. She had suffered through them, crying herself back to sleep again and again in Berlin and Munich…but they had never just cut off halfway through the night, swamped and buried under such a feeling of peace.

She had never woken up the next morning feeling so…so alive.

But she would not be able to look Shinji in the face today if he woke up and found her clinging to the back of him like some scared child. Biting her lip, she ever so slowly lifted her leg away from Shinji, out then up, grateful that her aerobic exercise programs had left her with such fine muscle control as she removed her leg without disturbing the apparently blissfully happy Third Child.

Damn right he should be happy she thought to herself with a smile crossing her face as she studied Shinji in the reflection of the cabinet beyond him. But then again…so am I. I don’t know how the Baka did it…but if he managed to take the nightmares away by me holding onto him…then…well…

Carefully, she drew back her arm and pulled her chest and hips out of contact with Shinji, shivering slightly at she was suddenly robbed of the warmth of the close contact, before she frowned, hesitated, then leaned back towards his ear.

“Thank you, Baka,” she whispered in a low, almost inaudible tone to the sleeping Third Child, before easing away and getting to her feet, slowly walking to the bathroom…and missing the slightest smile that came across the face of Shinji Ikari, on the living room floor behind her.

“Hey Shinji, wait up a minute will you?” Misato called out as Shinji got up to head for the door as the tone of the doorbell faded, having been rung at exactly seven fifty AM, Japan Standard Time. Rain, hail or shine, Rei Ayanami arrived with a precision that was somewhat spooky to anyone who didn’t know her…and almost as much to those who did.

“Uh Misato, Rei’s here” Shinji pointed out as he hesitated in his half standing half sitting position, glancing at Asuka in the hallway who was struggling to get her shoes on while muttering with a muffled grunting as she hopped around on one foot, saying something mildly insulting about the Japanese customs governing wearing shoes inside a house. “We need to get going or we’ll be late”.

“Its okay, I’ll drop you at school” his guardian called cheerfully. “I just need to talk to you about something real quick, okay?”

“Hey, how come he gets a ride and I have to walk?” Asuka demanded as she finally got her shoes on, picking up her ‘briefcase’ style bag and glaring with her hands on her hips down the hallway at Misato, who was leaning against the hallway wall with a moderately serious expression on her face.

“Because it’s good exercise and I need to talk to Shinji alone about something”.

Shinji couldn’t help but notice how Asuka’s face twitched slightly at the fact that she was being excluded from this conversation…and he saw enough in that twitch to let him know she was worried.
He could guess what was going through her mind, because it was probably the exact same thought going through his.

Misato knows!

The thought blasted through his mind, obliterating any and all other concerns of any and all other issues of the day he might have been thinking about in an instant as he turned back to face Misato, franticly trying to school his face into an expression of simple curiosity as Asuka attempted a final protest.

“Well why can’t I-”

“Now Asuka” Misato ordered in a tone that while still polite, did not invite refusal, the ‘Captain’ tone that not even Asuka would really try to push against.

Asuka managed to avoid chewing on her lip through shear willpower, not willing to show such a clear sign of weakness. If Misato had seen her last night, holding onto Shinji and she told him about it now –after she had declined to say anything about it to Shinji after waking up, she didn’t know if she would be able to look Shinji in the face for the rest of the day…or week.

But unable to do anything about it and too smart to waste energy arguing when there was both no hope of winning and every possibility that she would draw attention to something she didn’t want attention drawn to, she just turned to the door, shot a…well, a look at Shinji’s back before walking down the hallway, stepping outside to greet Rei and shutting the door behind her




Shinji slowly sat back down at the table, Misato taking the seat opposite him at the far end of the table, making him suddenly flash back to his debriefing with the JDA representative a week ago…

“So, Shinji,” Misato greeted him as she settled. “We…need to talk about what -”

Shinji Ikari cracked.

It might have been the semi serious look on her face. It might have been the fact that she had her NERV uniform on, putting her in the persona of ‘Captain Katsuragi’. But his façade cracked none the less and it all come pouring out as he desperately tried to justify himself and ‘his’ actions in some kind of crazy plea for leniency.

“It’s not my fault! I was asleep and she leaned over and held onto me and I didn’t know because I was asleep and I woke up and she was hanging onto me I didn’t say anything cause I didn’t think she knew that I knew and she just wouldn’t let me go when I tried to get away and I just didn’t think that it was important to tell you that…that…”

Shinji’s incoherent rambling slowed, then cut off as he noticed Misato wasn’t looking at him in disappointment, anger, or even acceptance…but confusion.

Confusion that gave way to a surprise…which mutated into amusement…and then exploded into laughter.

“You…you had Asuka grab onto you last night?” she cackled, dropping her folder onto the table and thumping her body back against the wall for support as she was wracked by incessant giggling. “And you thought that I…I…” Misato tried to get out, before giving up and spending a good twenty seconds as she tried to get herself back under control.

“Oh Shinji, I knew I should have checked on you both when I got home” she muttered, all but gloating at his scarlet faced discomfort as he found a wonderfully interesting pattern in the apartments carpet, refusing to look up as he realized how stupid he had just been.

“Mis…Misato, please don’t-”

“It’s okay, I’m just teasing you Shinji,” she chortled with a wave of her hand, her tone slowly mutating into a more friendly and less mocking one. “I know you would never do anything to Asuka…and she would never let you do anything,” Misato said, before she paused and tilted her head slightly with a curious look. “Unless of course she wanted you to ‘do’ something to her…”

Shinji just groaned, folded his arms on the table and crashed his head into the safe, dark place created there.

“Hey look, come on, I’m just joking,” she called out, causing him to slowly raise his head, wondering precisely how much more his circulatory system could take today from these blood pressure spikes before he had a heart attack.

“I know…” he agreed with a rather weak smile, “but she wouldn’t be”.

“Which is why we won’t tell her that you know,” Misato assured him as she reached out for the dropped folder, her face still furiously twitching as she fought the laughter back down. “If anything, I’d say she looked far happier this morning then she had in a long time, it might have done her a world of good to sleep with you, if you’ll pardon the expression”.

Shinji could appreciate that. Her honest comment to him (even if she had thought he was asleep) of thanks, combined with Asuka’s somewhat chipper attitude at breakfast had let him know that whatever else, she had actually gotten a good nights sleep and he knew better then anyone just how rare that could be for her.

“So um…how can I help you Misato-San?”

“Oh nothing much…I just wanted to know why you have gone to such lengths to get the school dance going,” she shrugged. “You got the Vice Commander to put it back on somehow and you’ve brought eleven girls in your year rather stunning dresses anomalously through Hikari, then after making yourself unavailable, you turned around and accepted the offer of a girl you’ve known for far less time then any of them, without protest.”

Shinji felt his jaw drop.
“Um, how did you-”

“All your financial activity statements for the month get forwarded to my terminal,” Misato explained. “And the Commander briefed me on your…activities with the Vice Commander when he called me into his office and told me I would have to go to the dance and watch you three.”

“Uh, sorry about that,” Shinji winced, knowing that most sane NERV personnel spent a great deal of time avoiding his Fathers office if at all possible.

Misato however, just waved it off.

“No big deal” she shrugged. “I got the impression he didn’t really care about this whole thing anyway, he just wanted to make sure there was a certain level of security and safety provided...but he didn’t really tell me anything about the why.” Misato sighed, easing her coffee cup away with a finger as she offered him a comforting smile.

“No I meant you having to go and baby-sit all of us at the dance” he corrected her. “I mean I know it’s your job, but-”

“Screw my job,” she snorted softly, her eyes not shifting from him. “But it’s not your job to look after everyone but yourself. You had barely even started at your new school when the dance was called off, but you went to a great deal of effort to get it put back on. Then you provided funds, anomalously, to ensure no girl would be without a dress. Then you worked to hook up Rei with a date…even if she eventually had to take matters into her own hands.”

Misato paused in thought for a second. “That girl has issues…but damn if she doesn’t look good in a dress…” she muttered before she shook her head. “Anyway. Then, you reject taking anyone to the dance after you went to so much trouble to get it put back on, until Asuka arrived and forced the issue!”

“I’m not sure I get your point” he said with a slight frown.

Misato raised an eyebrow as she opened the folder which Shinji was able to read as some kind of account printout, tracing her finger down the list.

“So far you’ve brought all those dresses, fixed my car for me, brought a few bits and pieces for Rei’s new apartment, brought a lot of food –mostly for Asuka and not you, as well as a few other small things for this place…and the only things I can find that you’ve brought for yourself are the tuxedo for this dance…which you only brought because Asuka dragged you to it, and those new clothes a week ago, because she dragged you along shopping.” Misato looked up with a genuine look of concern at him as she closed the folder. “Shinji, you’ve been running around like the worlds greatest problem solver. And, well, I’d like to know why you’ve been intent on doing anything but cutting yourself some slack.”

Shinji just blinked.

It was all too easy to think that Misato was an airhead, without anything resembling a brain inside her head, especially after she had knocked back a few cans of Yebisu. But he had forced himself since coming back to remember that she had been to college with Ritusko and she had managed to hack into the MAGI system when she put her mind to it…at the end.

She was not an idiot, even if it suited her most of the time to play the giddy party animal.

But how could he possibly explain why helping those he loved brought him such incredible joy?

How getting Rei to open up, watching as she slowly crawled out of the shell his Father had nailed shut around her, had made him so proud of her he could have cried?

How when Asuka had ‘asked’ him to go to the dance with her, that it had taken all his willpower not to strut around the shopping center for the next six hours, smirking at everyone he saw with a goofy grin?

How providing his classmates some kind of joy in their life of Angel attacks and friends vanishing gave him a kind of satisfaction that he had never felt before in his life?

Or how doing such small inconsequential things for Misato like fixing her car, was the most pathetically small thing he could do to make her happy, after she had given up her life to save his?

How the hell could he explain that?

“It was just because I felt a bit guilty,” he sighed finally, telling part of the truth and hoping it would be enough.

He was just getting so sick of lying to everyone.

Especially Misato.

“Why?” she asked, though he could see in her expression that she had made a guess.

“The dance had been canceled because the insurance wouldn’t cover it,” he explained. “And the reason because it wouldn’t cover it, is that the Angel attacks had screwed up everything in this city.”

“And you felt responsible for that?” Misato asked with a raised eyebrow.

“According to Doctor Akagi, the Angels keep attacking Tokyo-3 because the Evangelions are here” Shinji pointed out with a slight snort. “That sort of says it all, doesn’t it?”

Of course he knew that was a load of crap and he suspected Misato thought as much. Strategically, Tokyo-3 was little more then a gigantic lure for the Angels, that much was true. But the bait was Lilith, the echo of the second Angel apparently so similar to the minute heartbeat of the First that the Angels were inevitably been drawn here when they awoke.

Well except Gaghiel, who had passed close enough to the real Adam to go into a frenzy.

“So one way or the other, we’re responsible for the problems caused by the Angel attacks. My classmates had the dance taken from them for no good reason, just illegal profiteering. I could do something about it, so I did do something about it.”

There, that should be believable enough-

“I don’t believe you”.

Dang.

“You piloted Unit One initially because Rei would have been put in mortal danger. I saw the look in your eyes when you and your Father talked; I felt more warmth when I was at the South Pole fifteen years ago, I didn’t think there was any way you were going to get into the Eva. But when Rei was wheeled out, you changed your mind and you’ve been frankly, protecting and helping her ever since then. And Asuka…” she shook her head slightly. “I was thinking that you two needed ‘The Talk’ sometime, I’ll probably have to expedite it after what happened on the floor last night”.

“Um…my Uncle gave me the talk a year ago,” Shinji muttered but Misato just kept talking without noticing.

“Shinji, I don’t know why you’re so dead set on trying to help everyone around you, just that you appear…well, driven to do so. The fact that you look so happy while doing it has delayed me having this conversation with you for some time, but I have to have it now. I want a promise”.

“A promise of…?” he asked carefully, feeling suddenly trapped as Misato let her lips twitch slightly into a somewhat sinister smile.

“I want you to promise me that you’ll go to this dance and enjoy yourself. Not fret about Toji or Kensuke or Rei or Hikari or even Asuka. Not look to help half your class…I just you to say screw it to the rest of the world for a night and have fun”.

“You’re…ordering me to have fun at the school dance,” he said in a somewhat amused tone.

“You got it,” Misato beamed.

Shinji rolled his eyes.

“Oh gee, Yes Ma’am Captain Katsuragi” he said with a mock salute. “Have fun at the dance, it will be hard, but I will be sure to – ouch!”

Shinji’s slightly sarcastic response cut off as Misato kicked him under the table, causing him to jump half out of his chair before easing back down.

“As I was saying,” Misato continued in a perfectly calm and all too happy tone as she ignored his surreptitious rubbing of his shin bone, “I want to see you have fun there, not just get dragged in on Asuka’s arm as a glorified evening bag. You need to learn to live a little Shinji. There isn’t any point in saving the world unless you can enjoy it”.

Trust me Misato, I do appreciate it…I appreciate this world more then you can ever possibly know…

“Misato…” Shinji sighed slightly. “It’s not that I never wanted to go to the dance. As I said to Asuka, it was just because I didn’t have anyone to take. All the girls in the class who kept offering to go with me just saw the famous Evangelion pilot, the hero, the whatever. None of them, except Rei, had a clue whatit meant to step into Unit One and fight the Angels. As far as they all know, it’s just a giant robot daddy gave me to play with, like a giant video game.”

Shinji took a breath and swallowed before plunging on, noting how he was coming dangerously close to saying things he shouldn’t.

“I don’t hate any of them, it’s just that none of them were at all interested in getting to know me, except for Rei, and I’ve connected to her on a level that just didn’t feel…” he struggled for a word, “right, for someone to take to the dance. Asuka…” he paused and smiled slightly. “I did think about asking her soon after I saw her…but frankly, I was convinced I never had a chance in hell, until she asked me.”

There was silence in the room for a few seconds before he continued, looking at her with a level, earnest expression.

“You don’t have to worry that I’m not going to enjoy myself Misato…I…I’ve wanted to go with her almost from the first time I saw her. I don’t know if she asked me just because I was a convenient target or not, but I’m going to make the most of this and just enjoy myself…even if she really doesn’t care about taking me.”

Well that was true enough. It had taken him all of six seconds from hearing of the dance (and its cancellation) from Toji to thinking about taking Asuka to it. There had been, of course, the slight problem that he hadn’t had the first clue how to get her to go with him and he had resigned himself to asking and probably failing…until he had talked to Kaji, the master of masters of manipulation, finally understating why Misato had been so utterly suspicious and cautious around him for so very long, before just letting herself go.

Misato returned his stare for several seconds, her eyes boring into his rather uncomfortably as if trying to judge the truth of his statements, before they softened and she blinked, smiling slowly as she stood.

“I think you might be surprised Shinji,” she commented cryptically, closing the folder and getting up. “Come on, let’s get you to school.”

[Xess]

WOOO! New update! I haven't read it yet but I'm sure it's good based on the previous entries, all of which were excellent. I often find myself wishing this could replace NGE, only to remember that without NGE this would make no sense whatsoever. I especially like this fic because it reminds me of my own ongoing recovery from severe depression. It's like being given a second chance at life even without time travel. Very, very well done.

[Academia Nut]

Well, I think I can have the next chapter editted and sent over to you... oh, sometime in the afternoon Mountain Standard Time, I think. I gave it a once over and caught a bunch of little mistakes, but I'll work on the grammer and such more after I get back from school.

And man do you make me feel puny with my 15 page chapters. This single chapter alone is something like a 1/3 of the entirety of Thousand Shinji. Oh well, just means that there is more awesome.

[Setzer]

I was a bit worried when I read that earlier bit about stopping Rei's memory backups. I had this horrible suspicion that she'd die and end up back at square one.

I've got nothing against our heros running into adversity. I just hope this time they have the strength to pull through and stand by eachother when they need it. If everyone in this fic ends up a lonely wreck of themselves like they did in canon, I'll never forgive you. Not after such an excellent setup like this.

[LadyTevar]

YAY! HE UPDATED!!!

Now Do a Chapter of DERELICT!

[Vehrec]

I agree with everything Tev said, and also think that Keel should be destroyed. People are starting to do the algebra and realize that X is not 4 but 8 or i or some other unlikely number that requires a few more variables than had been planned for.

Also, the HAB would like to purchase 100 OV-203 hyper-shuttles for our medium close air support needs.

[Darth Yoshi]

Hey! New chapter. Or rather, half a chapter. Good stuff, and keep it coming, Chris.

The only thing is that the board formatting makes scene breaks slightly confusing.

[Sidewinder]

Good job. You made some grammar errors, e.g., using "then" when "than" is appropriate, and apparently using "anomalously" when "anonymously" is appropriate, but I like the character development you've made. Keep up the good work.

[Chris OFarrell]

“D-Day. In all historical texts, a reference to Operation Overlord, which took place on the Sixth of June 1944; the Allied invasion against the German occupied French Coast as part of a major push against the Nazis to end their reign of tyranny. And today, once again, we find ourselves set in the nexus of great events. The Germans, represented this time by one Fraulein Langley Soryu, will-”

“Stooge…”

“Soryu? Um, where the heck did you come from-”

“I am going to take that camera and place it where the sun-”

“Pilot Soryu? I must insist on him remaining intact for tonight.”

“Oh, right…okay. Look, I’ll hold the camera until after tonight, and then see how far it can go?”

“This would be acceptable.”

If one were to watch the footage being recorded at a later date, at this point they would have had a nice view of the floor tiles bouncing and blurring as Kensuke cheesed it down the school corridor and around the corner, a rather dramatic end to the footage of one of the most important days at this school, this year.

Shinji Ikari, watching from a distance, simply shook his head as he retrieved the books from his locker he would need for this weekends homework. Asuka looked somewhat miffed as Kensuke skipped out of her grasp, the Second Child appearing to debate chasing after him and doing things to him with his camera in exchange for his…colorful monologue, but she somehow managed to contain herself, turning back to her locker.

Shinji just gave thanks that that was the end of it. Since Asuka had gotten up this morning, she had been acting rather…twitchy. Hell, all the girls had been acting twitchy today, leaving the guys of his year dodging and running the hell away from them most of the day. He had seen Hikari, ‘Miss Conservative and Control 2015’ herself throw a rather large book across the classroom and peg Toji when he made a relatively harmless crack about the relative level of estrogen in the room. Asuka had put two guys in the nursing office when they made desperate, last ditch pleas for her to have pity on them and take them to the dance, by grabbing her shoulder and turning her around to beg.

And even on a ‘good’ day, that approach could be best described as suicidal. Asuka had damn near made sure they wouldn’t be going to the dance, even if they wanted to, necessitating a reprimand from the principal in his office that probably hadn’t had the slightest effect on her given the cheers she had received.

Chiniko Tanaka had slammed her date -a popular track and field star- against the wall -who out massed her by three to one- and blasted him for five minutes straight with a tirade that had even Asuka clapping, after he commented that he would try to get around to pick her up around ‘five o’clock-ish’ rather then exactly five o’clock.

But perhaps the strangest thing he had seen was Rei Ayanami, generally as cool and gracefully calm as always, following her fellow classmates around with an intent expression on her face, as if she was mentally taking notes about everything going on.

She had stood against the wall with an intent expression as Chinko berated her date.

She had silently glided behind packs of girls roaming the halls during recess and lunch as they chatted about everything, almost as if she was taking notes the whole time.

Then she had tried out most of it on poor Kensuke at various times throughout the day, at one point channeling Asuka in a bad mood as she had all but turned him into a quivering wreck for giving the ‘wrong answer’ when she had asked him what time he would be ready by.

It had earned her a standing ovation from a nearby gaggle of girls, but Shinji had quickly pulled her to the side to ask her to tone it down somewhat, for the sake of Kensuke’s sanity. She had readily agreed, probably confusing and terrifying Kensuke even more when she had walked over to the cowering boy and apologized, kissing him lightly on the cheek before walking away with her usual placid expression on her face.

Kensuke had just walked away in turn, lifting his glasses off and rubbing his nose slowly as his brain started to overheat. And now of course Asuka had finally all but crushed the last remnants of his sanity…but he shouldhave known better then to make such an insanely stupid comment to Asuka on this day.

Well, we’ve got a few hours to rebuild his confidence Shinji shrugged, guessing that all three girls would calm down considerably when the dance itself actually came around. Out of the corner of his eye, he glanced at Rei waiting nearby, a calming presence in the chaos around him. He smiled tightly to himself as he saw that the ‘bubble’ she had always carried, an air of personal space that had kept people away like an AT field had vanished some time in the last week, watching as now she traded slight smiles and nods with all manner of classmates.

Rei hadn’t really changed that much in most ways.

She rarely laughed. She often didn’t do much more then smile slightly at people. She still spoke in soft, somewhat clipped and direct sentences…

But for all that, for all the things ninety nine percent of people would look at and say ‘oh, she’s still the same old Rei’, Shinji rejoiced in her changes. She was just so much more alive compared to the memories he had of her. So much so in fact that it had been very difficult not to laugh as she had ‘politely’ screamed at Kensuke, his poor friends face going almost as white as Rei’s plug suit, probably not understanding that Rei really didn’t mean most of what she was saying.

He would have to try and explain that to Kensuke. That she actually didn’t mean any of it, just that her current role model could be a little…excessive.

And speaking of Rei’s mentor, where had Asuka gone?

Frowning, he reached for his locker door and swung it shut, turning to the side…and took an instinctive step back as he was presented with Asuka’s unsmiling face at point blank range.

“Um…hi?”

“Aren’t you finished yet?” she demanded without preamble. “We have to get going if we’re going to make our appointment Baka and so help me, if Hikari Rei and I are late because of your screwing around…”

She left the threat unfinished, but Shinji got the gist of it; he wouldn’t live to have the glorious honor of accompanying her to the dance tonight.

Some small part of Shinji’s mind therefore let him know it probably wasn’t going to be a good idea to point out to Asuka that their hair styling appointments were not for another hour. And that it was only a twenty minute train trip from a nearby train station to Francesco’s hair studio.

“Of course, I was just finished,” he instead replied quickly.

“Well what the hell are you waiting for then?” she demanded with a roll of her eyes, grabbing his wrist and yanking him after her down the corridor towards Rei Hikari and Toji, Shinji barely managing to get a hand on his bag and drag it after him.

“Uh…well you see,” he tried to explain as he stumbled after her, “I’m not actually going with you to get your hair done”.

Asuka stopped.

“Then WHY THE HELL am I dragging you along?” she all but screamed causing every male in a thirty meter radius to flinch away from the shockwave as they waited for Shinji Ikari to pass into the realm of legends from the land of the living. The first person in their year to score a date with Asuka, who was then killed by Asuka on the day of their ‘date’; an object lesson to all future generations that some things came with too high a price tag…

Fortunately for the Third Child, the Second took five seconds to close her eyes, take a deep breath and recover her poise, speaking in a deceptively calm voice as she relayed simple, easy to follow instructions as if speaking to a six year old.

“Go home. Get the stooges ready. Pick us up at five thirty. Got it?”

Shinji swallowed.

“Go home, get the stooges ready, pick you three up at five thirty,” he repeated her words carefully back to her.

“Good,” she declared, letting his wrist go and whirling around, hair charming auburn hair appearing a particularly burning shade today, sparing his life for now as she collected the other two girls and hurried them out the door without a further word.

Yeah, this is so much fun Misato he silently muttered as he wondered why in the hell he had ever thought getting the dance put back on was a good idea...

Toji appeared to read his mind.

“Do you understand now Ikari?” Toji said in a somewhat bitter, despairing voice, perhaps unconsciously rubbing his muscular arm where Hikari’s math’s textbook had crashed into it, leaving an impressive bruise. “This is the end result of your tampering with things that should have been left the way they were! It’s the natural order of things man, but no, you had to go and be a hero! Game over man, game over!”

The ‘tough guy jock’ then moaned and placed his head in his hands, leaning up against the wall of lockers.

It was a surprisingly common pose today Shinji reflected as Kensuke shakily moved up to join them, having seen the Demon safely off the school grounds.

“If Shinji hadn’t tampered with things, you wouldn’t have hooked up with Hikari,” Aida pointed out. “Nor I with Rei,” he added, clearly wondering if the dance at the end of this really would be worth it.

Shinji could appreciate that.

Unlike Toji, who appeared to really be getting into a serious ‘thing’ with Hikari, Kensuke’s relationship with Rei was much more poorly defined. She had invited him to the dance as her partner and was acting rather friendly towards him. But he couldn’t help but remember that initially when he had suggested Kensuke to her, she had agreed on the grounds that he was an ‘acceptable choice’. He granted that Rei had grown up a great deal since then, but how much of Rei’s activity towards Kensuke was Rei doing what she ‘should’ do in this situation, and how much came from her, he just didn’t know.

On the other hand, Kensuke had never had a girlfriend before, let alone one as molten hot as Rei had suddenly become. So it was rather unlikely he would give her up if he had a choice.

Toji meanwhile had paused on the verge of a rant, raising his head from the wall as he frowned slightly at Kensuke’s point.

“Well yeah…uh…I think-”

“Don’t think, your brain can’t handle it,” a younger female voice put in. The three men turned to see Kana Suzuhara, Toji’s younger sister walking up to her brother with a knowing expression, before placing her hands behind her back and beaming a dimple filled smile at Shinji that was all too cute. “Hi Shinji”.

“Kana,” he smiled back, still getting a kick out of seeing her walking around and beating up on her brother, rather then in traction learning to walk again. If that was the only thing he had changed with all his efforts, he would still go through it all again, all the pain, the horror, just to see this result of that mistakes correction. “What do we owe the honor of your presence?”

“Since you didn’t invite ME to go with you to the dance I’m not exactly happy with you,” she pouted. “Still, Hikari was nice enough to let me help out with getting you ready,” she said, squaring her stance. “Hikari gave me the job of making sure all of you get home and get ready on time,” she declared, with not some small bit of pride, placing a vaguely serious look on her face, her brown eyes narrowing ever so slightly in a way that was probably supposed to look intimidating, but she didn’t have quite the experience to pull off, given the age difference between her and the trio of guys across from her.

Kensuke just smiled slightly condescendingly. “Sorry kid, we were going to go to the arcade and take an hour to just calm down for….”

Kana simply turned her gaze on him for five seconds and Kensuke, already fragile from the events of the day, crumpled like cheap tinfoil.

“…but heading right home sounds like a far better idea,” he finished lamely.

“And you,” she said, turning to face Shinji, “need to get going. You have to change and be ready to pick up these two by four at the latest!”

“Kana, I think you’re taking this a little too seriously,” he tried to calm her down with a smile, then hesitated as she pulled a cute pink mobile phone from her pocket and pointed it at him like a weapon.

“Failure to comply will result in a call to Asuka stating that you are all dragging your feet and not taking this seriously,” she pointed out, getting instant silence and dropped jaws from two of the three guys, none of whom had ever suspected Kana, cute little old Kana, could be so ruthless.

Shinji though well recalled what she had done to Toji the first time around, after Toji had punched his lights out in her name. It took a lot to get Toji coming to someone and begging them to hit him. And he kept that memory firmly in mind when dealing with the healthy, vital Kana.

“Don’t worry Shinji, she’s bluffing,” Toji declared with narrowed eyes at his sister, as if trying to see through her mind.

He did not however sound entirely confident.

Kana just raised an eyebrow at his statement and flipped her phone open. And as she started to methodically dial Asuka’s number, Shinji folded.

“Okay okay! We’re going!” he surrendered, yanking his bag up. Kana smiled and canceled the call, but kept her phone at the ready as if it was a gun pointed at him…which he guessed it was, from a certain point of view.

“Good!” she said happily, as if she hadn’t just threatened them with the horrible fate of a rampaging Asuka coming looking for them, pointing towards the exit. “Now MARCH!”

The three boys exchanged a look, and then headed down the corridor, herded by the 6th grader. It was a state of affairs that would have been patiently absurd any other day of the year, but just appeared to fit in perfectly with the way the space time continuum had warped for this day as he wondered how and when Hikari had co-opted Toji’s younger sister as part of her ‘team’.

“So um, I’ll pickup Toji first, Kensuke, at about or a bit after four, and then we’ll swing by and pick up you?”

“K,” Kensuke nodded with a subdued voice as they exited into the school yard, not a girl from their year in sight, just a whole bunch of shell shocked guys.

Well, at least they had a weekend after the dance to let everyone calm down and restore normalcy.

“I’ll see you then” Toji said with a salute, breaking off at the gate to head for his house with Kensuke following. Kana shot him a dimpled smile before turning to follow, Shinji just shaking his head and walking the other way for his house, almost, almost wishing that Sandalphon would just get it over with and launch an attack on Tokyo-3 tonight.
Almost.

The thought of trying to deal with Asuka after such a hypothetical attack had the dance called off, however, put any and all pain today into perspective rather clearly.




“The Section Two detail reports that the venue is secured and has been confirmed cleared of any surprises. Section Seven also just reported that the press is remaining in the dark about the pilots identities, I have to admit I’m quite surprised that the censorship is still holding so well”.

Silence.

“Captain Katsuragi will be leaving shortly to begin preparations for the dance. She has met the protective detail and supervised their preparations, her last report at thirteen fifty stated that all was in readiness for tonight, including the contingencies in the event of an Angel attack”.

Silence.

“The First and Second, along with one of their classmates, will be getting their hair done for some time, then a NERV car will drop them off at the First’s apartment to finalize their own preparations”.

Silence.

Kozo Fuyutsuki looked up with slight irritation as Ikari continued to ignore him, brooding out across the vast expanse of the Geofront in the mid afternoon light, but he knew better then to say anything about it, simply closing his folder and waiting.

“Things are beginning to happen,” Ikari finally said after a two minute silence, broken only by the low hum of the air conditioner.

“Such is the nature of scenarios; they reach moments of transition and points of mutation,” Kozo replied after a short pause to consider the statement, finally edging one of his stones on the ‘Go’ board out, after several minutes of thought, pushing towards Gendo’s flank.

“The committee wishes to speak to all three children at some point soon,” Gendo replied, not even hesitating as he glanced over and made a counter move, aggressively pushing a stone out of line before he turned back to the huge windows in front of him. “Their meddling could have significant consequences to the team dynamic Captain Katsuragi has built up through the training programs.” Gendo slightly tilted his head as if studying something only he could see. “Fortunately, this dance has generated the ideal opportunity to reinforce their inter-team bonding and resist any externalinterference.”

As opposed to your interference Kozo thought but would never dare to say, although both men knew perfectly well he was thinking it.

“It is somewhat lucky that your Son went to such lengths to get this dance put back on then,” Kozo replied, edging more stones to Gendo’s apparent mistake.

Gendo actually smiled…chillingly.

“It is the reason I had it canceled in the first place,” he replied without turning as he reached out and moved another stone, into a rather foolish position.

“You…had it canceled?” Fuyutsuki asked in both astonishment and confusion with a raised eyebrow, something of a rare dramatic expression of emotion for him in the presence of Ikari.

He had killed the dance, and then given the okay to use NERV’s influence to have it put back on?

“Correct,” Gendo replied coolly. “The Third Child since his arrival has shown a predication for acting to actively help others, rather than acting out of his own self interest. All reports also indicate he only had the most casual of friendships and relationships at his old life, yet he has quickly made several close friends here.”

Gendo finally turned away from the windows to face the Vice Commander, reaching over to slide a stone forward that Kozo had ignored as strategically worthless.

“By presenting him with the ability to act and help them, we have further encouraged him to put down roots and we have given him a taste of exerting the influence and authority that an Evangelion pilot can expect, within reason, to help others. The illusion of controlling one’s destiny can be a powerful tool.”

Kozo just stared at him, then down at the board, where in move Kozo had never seen coming, Gendo had lured him into the jaws of a flanking maneuver that would rapidly eat up a quarter of his remaining space at the cost of a sacrificial pawn or two, winning him the game handily. He could fight it out, but the endgame was no longer in doubt.
It was a valuable lesson, if he hadn’t learned it many times around Ikari, that he was more then willing to sacrifice ‘lesser’ units to achieve his own goals.

Signaling his surrender with a slightly admiring incline of his head, he leaned back in his chair.

“And it could not possibly be because you would like to see the children actually have some degree of happiness in their life before the end?” Kozo asked, with the slightest edge of sarcasm he couldn’t keep out of his voice.

Gendo smirked slightly at that, looking across at the Vice Commander.

“You were always the sentimental one, Sensei,” he noted. “If they are able to find enjoyment out of tonight, then I have nothing against that. Indeed, it can only help building links between them, further anchoring Shinji to this city and his purpose”. Now his eyes narrowed slightly. “So long as they continue to fight and all play their appointed roles, then I have not the slightest care if they are able to find any enjoyment in the little time we have left”.




“Come on in, it’s open!”

Shinji tapped the ‘open’ button next to the door and sure enough, the door to the Suzuhara residence neatly slid along its tracks, allowing him to walk into Toji’s apartment at precisely 3:59:32 PM, Japan Standard Time.

“You’re early Shinji,” Kana’s voice came from the living room. “Asuka will be pleased”.

“You planning on telling her?” he asked with a slight smile that faded into a look of confusion as he walked down the hallway to the living room, to find Kana facing the TV while hanging upside down off the lounge, her shins over the back, her body on the seat and her head hanging down to the floor.

He felt understandably confused at the sight.

“Uh, if you’ll pardon the question…why are you doing that?”

“The games are too easy the ‘normal’ way,” she shrugged in response without looking away.

Looking across at the TV, he saw that sure enough, she was playing the families video game console…and she was doing it upside down, with one hand and still beating the crap out of the AI.

“And yes,” she added as an enemy was thrown across the screen to smash into a brick wall, her spare hand picking up her phone which had been lying on the ground next to her head, and pressing ‘SEND’. “She wanted to know when you arrived, and I just sent her a message.”

“Asuka asked you to report on my progress?” he asked in slight amusement…and fear.

“Oh yes” she replied with a giggle. “You have a very interesting girlfriend Shinji, almost as beautiful as me.”

“She is not my girlfriend,” he replied sternly.

Yet.

None the less, his face went somewhat red at her claim.

“Is too”.

“Is not”.

“Is too times infinity!” Kana declared in a rather petulant tone as she, for once, actually acted her age, perhaps distracted by a fifteen punch combo that sent her virtual opponent into virtual oblivion.

“Kana, last warning,” Toji put in as he stomped in from his bedroom down the hall, ready to go. “Dad says you’ll kill your eyes doing that. And Shinji for the record got dragged into this by the Demon; he has more sense then to date her.”

Kana glared, but clearly knew she had probably pushed as far as she could for the day, flinging her legs up and crashing onto the floor before rolling upright, her face a rather curious shade of red as she got to her feet.

“Whoa…that really rushes to your head,” she laughed as she collapsed into the lounge. “And I think Shinji has more then enough sense to date Asuka,” she added. “I mean six months ago if I had told you that you were going to date Hikari…”

“Okay, you made your point,” he muttered.

“What was it you called her? Oh yeah, that ‘pig headed pig tailed’-”

“Okay that’s it,” Toji said as he started to flush red, reaching down to yank the cables out of the games console, liberating the dull black box with a triumphant gesture.

“Hey!” Kana protested as her night’s entertainment vanished.

“Do your homework,” he ordered her. “I’ve told dad that you’re going to have it all done by the time he gets home tonight and you wouldn’t want to disappoint him would you?”

Kana glared.

“Oh I love that look,” he muttered, before leaning over and giving her a surprisingly tight hug that she –grudgingly at first- returned, tightly in turn.

“Don’t screw this up,” she simply said. “I like getting lunch at school”.

“Har, har,” he muttered as he stood. Like Shinji, he was dressed in his black pants, a white shirt and polished black school shoes he had very rarely worn to school, in favor of his omnipresent tracksuit. The bow ties, vests and jackets had been picked up by a helpful Kaji in the morning and dropped off at Misato’s, letting them get dressed while waiting to pick up the Girls, and prevent any kind of accidents taking place with their clothes. “Come on Ikari” he said, heading for the door.

Then he stopped, turned and picked up the console before heading out, ignoring the muttering from his Sister.

Misato was waiting in the car park, still in her NERV uniform as she greeted Toji, who for once appeared to be a little too preoccupied to drool on sight as he and Shinji climbed into the back seat…and took a hold of the door armrest.

He had driven with Misato before too.

A short –in time, if not distance- drive later and Kensuke was added to the cars occupants, his usually messy hair actually combed into something neat with a part in the middle of his head, the hair still just wet enough to signal that he had showered and dressed at the last minute, Misato getting them back to the apartment by twenty past four.

“Make yourselves at home,” she cheerfully said, breezing past the boys and turning into the bathroom, while continuing to shout instructions. “I’ve got to go and have a shower and get ready. Shinji, if the limo and Section 2 car arrive, just tell them to wait.”

“Okay,” he called back, gesturing everyone to leave their shoes on, the trio sauntering into the lounge room where the rest of their outfits were hanging from an indoor clothes line to make sure they didn’t get wrinkled.




“Asuka, please stop pacing before you wear out the carpet.”

Asuka Langley Soryu, milliseconds away from spinning around at the apogee of her cycle and walking back down the carpet glanced up at Rei, who to her great irritation, was looking as calm and untroubled as ever, sitting on a beanbag, as if she didn’t have the slightest care in the world.

“How can you sit there and be so calm!” Asuka simply demanded in reply, energy seething along her nerves and demanding to be released, barely able to fight the urge to move, to do…something!

“Would not being calm have any direct effect on making time run faster?” Rei asked, an expression of mild curiosity lining her face.

“ARG!” Asuka just exploded in response, crashing down onto the lounge opposite Rei’s TV.

“Be careful,” Rei chided her. “You do not wish to upset your hair or makeup”.

“Does it look okay?” Asuka quickly asked in sudden worry…for the 19th time this afternoon, by Rei’s count.

“It looks very okay” Rei confirmed as she suppressed an annoyed sigh, wondering why pilot Soryu, who had always appeared so self confident, so self assured, needed continual reassurance today.

For that matter, this whole exercise had been a most irritating mix of confusion and enlightenment. Since Shinji had arrived, she had been thrown into a kaleidoscope of emotions and situations that she had not been prepared for, but was eternally grateful to have experienced, rapidly -almost recklessly- plunging into it all head first as she tried to absorb and understand everything of a world that had been hidden from her for too many years.

She had felt a great deal of confusion at the way so many of the girls in her year had been berating their dates, people they trusted and cared about to at least some degree and had decided to ‘try’ it on Kensuke to gain a better understanding of why they did it…and had only discovered that it had made her very uncomfortable and had hurt Kensuke, something she intended to make up to him tonight at some stage.

Still, for now, her only real concern was to keep the over excited Second Child under control before she exploded. The sheer energy Rei had always seen in the Second Child had always quietly awed her, but right now, with no outlet, it was doing considerable harm.

“Close your eyes,” she ordered her.

“What? Why?” Asuka asked with a frown.

“Please,” she asked quietly, holding her gaze levelly.

Asuka’s frown deepened, but she complied with an exasperated sigh, closing her eyes and leaning back into the lounge. “Fine”.

She’s probably worried I’ll knock the TV off the wall Asuka thought with a sigh as her thoughts continued to chase themselves in small circles. She didn’t know why she was so nervous. She had been to a few dances back in Germany and she had never felt this way. She had even attended the Oktoberfest festivities in Munich last year with Kaji, Germans (quite rightly) having a much looser view on underage drinking then many other countries. And while notallowedto get drunk, she had gotten a mildly enjoyable ‘buzz’ that she would kill for right now.

Damn Misato for banishing us to Rei’s apartment and not Shinji and the Stooges! Her beer may suck but it’s still something!

Her disgruntled thoughts came to a halt however as with a whisper of air, Rei sat down next to her, Asuka slightly surprised that she hadn’t even heard her walk over. Even more surprising was when Rei took her hand in her own, Asuka flinching from the cool contact as she started to pull away-

“It’s okay,” Rei said softly. “Just…breathe”.

Asuka hesitated, not exactly feeling comfortable with the close contact, but forced herself to relax and humor the First…

And the strangest thing started to happen. Little by little, she felt her tension and anxiety start to fade off as Rei did nothing more then just sit there, holding her hand.

She didn’t say anything. She didn’t move closer. She didn’t offer anything more then her hand. Her grip was light, but none the less, Asuka somehow felt powerless to pull away, so she just sat there as the minutes passed as Rei took the ‘edge’ off her emotions. Not eliminating them…but calming her enough so she wasn’t about to go kicking down walls.

She opened her eyes, blinking to see Rei calmly move across to give her back some personal space.

“Calmed down?” she asked.

“Um…yeah” she nodded slowly, not entirely sure she had done it, but not able to argue with the results. She still felt her excitement for the dance, as well as the nervous energy she had been felling all week, but it was no longer overwhelming her.

The bathroom door opening down the hallway cut off any further thoughts.

“Um…I coming out,” Hikari called from down the hall, sounding slightly nervous.

“Toji’s going to be rather disappointed,” Asuka called back with a sly grin on her face.

Rei could feel the flush of embarrassment from all the way down the hall at Asuka’s jibe.

“Please, come out Hikari,” Rei called in a softer, reassuring voice, shooting a slightly amused if chiding look at Asuka.

Asuka had to blink several times as Hikari entered the room.
Hikari was her best friend and she loved her like a sister, but she was just way too conservative for her own good, either unwilling or unable to make the leap from ‘girl’ to ‘woman’. She still carried her hair in the same pigtails she had worn since she was six and she still dressed in somewhat ‘girly’ clothes.

Now however, the girl had gone through the same crucible Rei had several weeks ago and at the hands of Francesco and his team, the woman had finally emerged. She now sported lighter brown highlights in her dark hair, her forehead covered with a fringe to just above her eyes that bridged the shoulder length haircut that wrapped around her skull, the thin and randomized highlights that layered throughout just perfectly accenting the cut.

The style was so foreign from her usual and rather severe ‘pull back and pig-tail’ effort, when combined with the expertly applied mascara, eye liner and slightest touch of lipstick, that Asuka hadn’t even recognized her at first.

The dress she was now wearing, however, shifted the ‘Hikari Improvement Project’ into second gear.

The sleeveless black dress started as a thick strap on her left shoulder, one side of which curved left to wrap around her left side and the other which shot right across the top of her chest, defining the ‘high’ watermark of the front of her dress. It was higher then Asuka would have wanted if it was her dress, but it still showed off a respectful amount of skin as the line crossed to her right flank just under her armpit, wrapping steeply down and around the side to emerge at the base of her ribcage, zipping straight across her back and connecting to the dress on her left at the same height. The soft fabric strip that curved around the back of her left shoulder then split into twin, thinner strips. One shot straight down defining the edge of the dress coming around, with a loop under her armpit to leave it free, while the other slashed diagonally down and across to where the right flank emerged, supporting that side.

There was a slit at below knee length that teased views of her legs, again without showing too much, but the dress halted just above her ankles, to show off a pair of black stilettos she had borrowed from her elder sister.

It was perfect for Hikari, a huge step forward, but not so much she was going to faint the first time she looked in the mirror…at least Asuka hoped she wouldn’t.

“Wow,” was all Asuka could say as she completed her circle around Hikari, finding everything exactly as it should be. “When the stooge sees you, his mind will probably blow so keep at least a ten meter radius for the first minute,” she advised.

Hikari just smiled shyly, looking at herself somewhat nervously.

“Are you sure this-”

“You look beautiful,” Rei stated gently, greatly surprising Asuka.

I’ve never heard Rei say something like that to someone before she thought.

But the sheer honesty and truth in Rei’s tone passed right through Hikari’s rather nervous and defensive air, the class Rep actually smiling and straightening slightly in pride at Rei’s statement.
“Thank you, both of you,” she beamed with a slight bow. “Now I think it’s…Rei’s turn?”

Rei nodded and left the room as Hikari carefully sat down leaving Asuka to wonder if she really had done enough to stand out.





Shinji made a final adjustment to his bow tie in the mirror before he decided that he had gotten it about as good as he was going to get it and turned back to his friends.

Kensuke was still staring at his reflection in a second smaller mirror, as if trying to find himself in the mirror…and Shinji could see how this might be a bit of an issue for him. The contact lenses he was wearing in place of his glasses, combined with his hair actually being somewhat neatly combed rather then just hanging out all over the place, had done a remarkable job in changing his appearance completely. Hell, he almost looked respectable, ready to interact with normal people in a normal environment!

Toji, in contrast, fidgeted. He was continually in motion, bouncing from one wall to the other as his athletic nature continually tried to dissipate his nervous energy by doing things, a state Shinji wouldn’t be at all surprised to find Asuka in at this moment either.
Toji was also of two minds about his tux. On onehand, he hated wearing anything tighter then a track suit, which was why he wore one to school every day in place of his uniform. How exactly he was able to get away with it was unclear to Shinji but he had never asked how, deciding some things were better left unknown.
But on the other hand, he looked damned sexy in the Tux, Shinji knew. Mostly because Toji had said so at least seven times in the last fifteen minutes until Shinji and Kensuke had made him stop.

Both of his friends however stopped and turned to face him as he cleared his throat.
“Okay, the time is ten past five, I think we’re just about ready to go down to the limo” he said with a slightly nervous grin, the Limo having arrived several minutes ago and a typical section 2 agent calling up to let them know.

“Except Misato” Kensuke pointed out with a glance towards the closed bedroom door Misato had vanished into half an hour ago.

“Yeah she better hurry” Toji muttered. “If we’re not there at the Demons appointed time, she’ll-”

Toji cut off from delivering his dire warning as Pen-Pen suddenly emerged from his fridge.
The warm water Penguin halted in his trip to the kitchen to stop and glare at the trio for at least thirty seconds, not a sound coming from his beak the whole time, before he turned away and waddled on.

“What was that about?” Kensuke called after the bird which pointedly ignored him.

“I think he is insulted by your choice of ‘penguin suits’ to wear to this dance” a rich and amused female voice came from behind them, causing the trio -whose nerves were not exactly calm- and avian –whose sense of decency was mildly insulted- to turn…and drop their jaws (and beak) in perfect unison.

Misato was wearing a slinky black dress, one Shinji recognized as the one Asuka and Rei had brought her in the shopping trip they had all taken a few weeks ago. It hugged her like a second skin, held up by thin spaghetti straps that arced into a deep ‘V’ neckline letting any male within visual range known that she was definitely a woman, and don’t you forget it.

Asuka had long since stolen his heart, as much for the fire in her spirit as for her looks but when you got down to it, she was still a young teenager, a month or so away from her 15th Birthday. Misatoon the other hand was a woman and not in any way shy of advertising the fact. And while she often enjoyed wearing loose T-Shirts and shorts around the house….nothing she had ever worn in his presence before today had blasted him with such raw, overwhelming, sexuality.

“Um…wow” were the only two words his stunned mind could think up, vaguely noting that Toji and Kensuke, in synchronization and without prompting, had both fallen into deep, respectful bows…possibly because their bodies were chasing their jaws as they dropped towards the floor.

Pen-Pen just continued to stare with an open beak for several seconds, before snapping out of it and continuing on to the kitchen in haste.

Misato just laughed goofily at them, thankfully shattering the moment as she took in their reaction.
“Oh come on, I know I look good, but if Asuka Hikari or Rei find you three drooling over me when we pick them up, you’ll regret it”.
Well that was a buzz kill Shinji thought, none the less grateful for it as Misato somehow turned back from the high priestess of sexuality to his beautiful, if slightly quirky guardian.
“You look almost a pretty as Toji feels” he nodded slowly with a rather sloppy grin, shattering the stasis lock his two friends were caught in, generating laughter from one and a sheepish look from the other.
“My, you three do turn out nice with a little work” Misato nodded in approval, then frowned as she stepped closer, sliding a glittering black evening bag onto her shoulder. “But what have you done to your bowties?”
“What’s wrong with them?” Shinji said a little too defensively at her tone.

In truth, they had rather screwed up that whole part of getting dressed and despite a dozen attempts each, along with following step by step instructions pulled off the internet on Shinji’s laptop; they had made something of a dog’s breakfast of the whole deal.

“Men” Misato said with a rather theatrical roll of her eyes and a loud, exaggerated sigh. “You’re all hopeless. Here, let me”.

All three boys made it a point to stare at the apartment’s rather uninteresting ceiling as Misato expertly and rapidly untied, then retied their bow ties one after the other.

“Hey, that’s awesome” Toji perked up as he leaned into the mirror, a perfectly symmetrical bow tie now sitting proudly around his collar, above the light gray vest he wore under his black tux jacket. “Thank you Misato!”

“You’re welcome” she beamed. “Well, shall we go pick up your dates?”

The group moved towards the door, with Pen-Pen muttering a rather annoyed ‘wark’ in a low tone that earned him a scowl from Misato, the Penguin ignoring her look and heading for the TV as they entered the hallway.

“Okay, lets do this thing” Toji declared in a voice that suggested he was starting a basketball match as he opened the door, Kensuke following him towards the lift as they looked over the concrete railing to make approving noises at the cars waiting in the street below.

“Don’t you forget your promise Shinji” Misato said softly to him as he started after them, bringing him to a halt as she stepped out and locked the door. “You owe me one night of fun and relaxation”.

“Even if you just increased my blood pressure twenty percent by walking out in that, Misato-San?” he muttered back.

Misato grinned in a disturbingly…wickedly way, extending her arm in an clear gesture for Shinji to link with her, which he did, the two walking after Kensuke and Toji in the slowly cooling evening air, his guardian leaning in slightly towards his head…and Shinji trying not to shudder at the scent of lavender coming from her.

“Oh Shinji, if this little number raised your blood pressure, I’d better call Ritsuko and get her ready for the heart attack after you see Asuka”.

Shinji managed –somehow- not to faint dead away at Misato’s whispered comment, but he did feel his bowtie tighten by an order of magnitude as he got into the lift with her, Kensuke and Toji just smirking slightly at the linked arms as they descended.

The lift arrived at the ground floor with a ping and they exited, Shinji carefully untangling himself from Misato, who looked vaguely disappointed…but he wanted to get plenty of horizontal separation from her by the time they reached the limo.

[Chris OFarrell]

A Section 2 Agent in what looked to be a some kind of standard issue tuxedo was waiting at the door and quickly opened it for them, Misato giving him a professional nod which he returned as the group descended the steps to the street from the apartments front door. A black limo was waiting right in front of the building, along with an unmarked black car with tinted windows, which Shinji guessed belonged to the quartet of agents standing around the Limo, vigilantly watching for the threat that probably wasn’t there…but one day, might be as they approached the limo. One of the agents, his back turned, reached over and opened the rear door as they approached…then turned to grin at Misato from his –for once- clean shaven face.

“Well, don’t you look lovely tonight?” Ryoji Kaji asked with his omni-present sloppy grin, causing Misato to come screeching to a halt from her previously graceful strides.

“YOU!” she gasped, all her poise lost in an instant as Shinji just enjoyed the look on her face, once again cursing his lack of a camera to capture Misato dumbstruck with shock and surprise before her eyes narrowed in suspicion.

“Yes, me” Kaji agreed with an overly dramatic bow. “Don’t worry dear, I’ll be on my best behavior” he promised as Toji and Kensuke, knowing the history between the two, quickly ducked inside the stretched limo and started gawking. “And if you would be so kind as to supervise the other children and keep them away from the alcohol, I need to have a quick talk with Shinji”.

Glaring at him, but clearly happy at the opportunity to get away, Misato edged past him and into the limo, letting Kaji shut the door behind her.

“Now that dress could set a man straight” Kaji sighed, before stepping away from the limo and apprising Shinji with a critical, but approving eye. “Well, I have to admit Shinji I’m impressed. And I have a feeling Asuka will be as well” Kaji grinned, his eyes studying his closely. “How are you doing kid?”

“I feel like I’m going to throw up and suffocate at the same time” he admitted with complete honestly to Kaji.

“Ah the first date” Kaji said, letting a nostalgic look come across his face as he threw an arm across his shoulders, leading him a few meters away from the Limo. “Cherish this night Shinji; you’ll look back on this in the future with fond memories”.

“Assuming Asuka didn’t kill me by the end of the night” he corrected Kaji, conquering his desire to throw up for another minute or so as he become increasingly convinced he would rather go five rounds with an Angel then take Asuka out into such a critically public event. “I’m terrified I’m going to upset her or embarrass her in front of the entire year and she’ll never forgive me for it” he stumbled out his worries out in rapid fire.
Kaji just broadened his smile as he let go of his shoulder, turning to face him with a semi serious look on his face.

“The fact that you’re more worried about Asuka then you is actually a good sign Shinji. As long as you keep that in your mind, she’ll pick up on it, take care of you, forgive you for any small mistakes you might make, don’t worry about it”.

“But I am” he gulped as it continued to sink into Shinji’s increasingly terrified mind that this was real, it was about to happen and he was about to take Asuka Langley Soryu to the biggest social event of the year, a dance, when he was still so utterly unskilled in such social events he didn’t have a clue what he was doing here!

Some of the sudden spike of panic must have shown, because Kaji stepped back close and laid a hand on his shoulder.

“Don’t worry, I’ll be keeping an eye on you” he assured him.

“And won’t it look slightly suspicious if you keep coming over to the table and offering advice?” Shinji muttered back, wringing his hands nervously.

“No, because I won’t be” he smirked, reaching into his pocket and pulling out a tiny nub of plastic with a flourish.

“What’s that, a sedative for Asuka?” he asked in hope.

“You want to start your relationship with Asuka by drugging her? You’re kinkier then I thought kid!” Kaji chuckled, causing Shinji to groan and, for the lack of any nearby walls to hit his head against, reach up and rub his temples as he realized what he had just said. “Seriously though, just hang on” Kaji asked in a suddenly professional tone, leaning in…and Shinji flinched slightly as Kaji pushed the oddly shaped thing into his ear-

“It’s a microphone and speaker combo” Kaji explained, stepping back. “I’ll be watching and listening, but this is your night. Asuka didn’t invite you because she hates you, just keep that firmly in mind and be yourself, and you’ll do just fine” he smiled, walking back to the car and opening the door for him, smiling at Misato who pointedly ignored him.

Shinji gave him a wry smile, but ducked into the limo-

Wow he thought as he looked inside, gawking at the interior before he carefully stepped over Misato with an embarrassed smile to an empty seat.

“Now this is why its useful having a famous Eva pilot as a friend” Toji declared as Shinji looked in, his friend clearly finding this ‘little date’ far superior to the one Misato had dragged him on, that had ended up with him on Over the Rainbow getting slapped by Asuka…
Shinji just hoped she would have a less hostile reaction to him tonight if (when) he screwed up as badly as he knew he would.

The interior of the Limo was white leather with polished brown wood paneling that turned the limo from a simple vehicle into a luxury transport. The seats were arranged in a backwards ‘L’, with a three place seat at the back of the car curving around and up the right hand side, facing a cabinet filled with all manner of alcohol and crystal tumblers, with a small plasma TV mounted on the low wall separating them from the drivers compartment.

Misato was sitting in the seat nearest the door and Shinji sat next to her with one seat between them, noting that Kensuke and Toji had claimed the ‘sideways’ seats in front of the liquor cabinet, both young men studying the drinks in front of them with considerable interest him as the car pulled out from the side of the road.

“They have every form of alcohol under the sun!” Kensuke near squealed in delight, reaching up to adjust his non existent glasses before he blinked in annoyance and leaned in closer to examine the labels. “Champaign, scotch, vodka-”

“Oh boys?” Misato called lightly as Kensuke started to reach for a bottle.
The trio turned to look back at her…then did a double take as she raised her right leg slowly and crossed it over her left, getting their undivided attention as she let the dress slide away up the leg…and reveal the mate black barrel of a Heckler & Koch .40 USP in a thigh holster.
“There will be no drinking tonight” she said, her tone rather substantially reinforced by the muzzle of the gun glaring at them before she uncrossed her legs, letting the dress shiver back down.

“You brought your gun to the dance?” Shinji asked in amazement…and not a little fear.

Misato just shrugged.

“Regulations” she dismissed in an airy tone. “Technically I’m here as part of a security detail. Consider it incentive for you three to stay away from the drinks over there”.

Shinji mentally sighed as his somewhat desperate plan to take the edge off his rather shaky nerves with hard liquor was rudely eliminated by Misato.

“Trust me” Kaji’s voice suddenly came in his ear from the front of the car, somehow guessing his thoughts. “The last thing you want is to say hi to Asuka with Vodka on your breath”.

Well, fair point.

The rest of the trip passed quickly. Partially because his mind was elsewhere…but mostly because Rei’s place really wasn’t far away, but he had no time (or liquor) to try and calm himself down, meaning his mind was a whirlwind of emotions as the car pulled to the side of the road.

Rei’s apartment building sat on the same ring of the Tokyo-3 valley as Misato’s, but it was built on a slope that necessitated a line of shallow steps to the front door, which was flanked by well trimmed hedges that made it very difficult to see anyone walking up or down them from any point but the bottom of the stairs. Misato swung her legs out onto the pavement as the Limo door opened, accepting Kaji’s offered hand without thinking as he materialized at the door and helped her too her feet, only to pull it away in reflex with a glare as she realized who was holding it.
Shinji followed Misato, not really noticing the supporting look Kaji shot him as he and his friends assembled into a line next at the front of the Limo, still well short of the steps to the apartment, feeling his heart starting to try and pound through his chest as he realized that he hadn’t even felt this nervous when he had woken up to find Asuka holding onto him like a limpet…probably because she had been unconscious at the time.

“Alright” Misato beamed, giving them all a final critical look over before nodding, Shinji giving thanks that she hadn’t reached over to try and rub some smudge off their faces or something. “Perfect, don’t move” she ordered, flipping open a cell phone and waiting for a few seconds before someone picked up on the other end, simply stating “we’re ready”, Shinji missing the small but expensive camera sneaking into her hand from her bag as she retreated to the rear of the limo behind them, his focus entirely on the apartment.

Shinji heard the apartment door open...and the butterfly squadron launched.

A figure, sheathed in black, moved down the stairs but he couldn’t make out anything more then that until Hikari Horaki stepped onto the street and turned –with just the slightest self conscious hint in her stride- towards them…
My God…that’s Hikari? Shinji thought incredulously.

In between her totally new hairstyle, the ever so subtle use of makeup and the deep, dark black dress, Hikari looked…well…sexy.
Sure, he had never thought of her as ugly, far from it. But nothing about her had ever caught his eye in a ‘drop-dead gorgeous’ sort of way, her rather severe attitude not helped by her rather conservative tastes.
And being best friends with Asuka, like a candle trying to show off next to a bonfire, meant she was often rather overshadowed in his mind. Probably.

But right now…

Damn.

He managed to tear his eyes away from Hikari feeling a blush on his face from his naked stare to glance over at Toji.
Shinji had always suspected that while there wasa real relationship building between the two, but that Toji may not have taken it as seriously as Hikari clearly did.
After all, Hikari had somewhat followed the ‘Asuka strategy’, hiding her feelings by mercilessly ‘beating up’ on Toji for quite a time. And despite the time they spent together, Shinji had always wondered if all his efforts might have been in vain, if Toji would hesitate in really giving Hikari a chance…
But from the look on Toji’s face right now, Shinji had a sneaking feeling that it wouldn’t be a problem, as Toji stepped out of line, both partners visibly swallowing as they just stared at each other, flushed in unison, and walked back to the limo with small smiles on their faces, pausing for Misato to take a picture, before getting in.
All without saying a word. At least audibly.

“I’ll book the church” Kensuke muttered.

It was afunny enough joke, but Shinji was so highly strung out with tension right now that it just washed over him as he spotted a second figure making her way down the stairs, this time a figure of white and blue that Shinji knew in an instant from her movements, as graceful as a ballerina and precise as a surgeon, the identity both lowering and raising his tension as Rei Ayanami stepped out onto the street.

Yet again, Shinji felt the powerful –and somewhat disturbing- duality of lust followed by pride coming forth as his ‘Sister’ walked forward in an utterly perfect white dress with light blue highlights that perfectly complemented her new spiky, ‘thick’ haircut. She wore her dress with a poise that a Supermodel would have traded her soul for as she strode up towards them and as her eyes flickered to meet his, Shinji felt a deep amusement at his gob-smacked expression coming from her, before she smiled almost shyly at Kensuke who Shinji guessed was even odds to pass out on the street right then and there.
But surprising –and impressing- Shinji, his friend simply offered an arm to Rei which she took calmly, Kensuke utterly absorbed and/or smitten with her as he moved up to the door of the Limo, again pausing for a photo from Misato before he helped Rei inside and then followed her in.

Leaving him alone on the street as he heard the door open for a final time…and he saw a figuremoving slowly down the stairs.

Red. Of course it would be Red was the only thought that came to his mind before Asuka stepped out onto the street, turned to face him and stopped.

‘Beautiful’ wasn’t anything like a strong enough word to describe the young woman in front of him. ‘Vision’ was a little better, as were –paradoxically- ‘indescribable’ or ‘un-quantifiable’. There were several choice epitaphs and curses which might express to some degree, the emotion explosion going on in his mind, but they seemed a trifle crude for the occasion. He knew on one level that she was still a fourteen year old teenager in the blurry line between girl and woman, still growing, still filling out, that she wasn’t a ‘woman’ as Misato, in the strictest physical sense was.

But it didn’t change his feelings in the slightest.

Asuka, was a Goddess.

It was the nearest word in his vocabulary to put in words, the flood of emotions running through him at that point in time as he simply absorbed what his senses were relaying to him.

She wore a pair of heels that perfectly matched the color of the dress, boosting her height to exactly match his own, a fact that he dismissed having any possibility of sheer coincidence. Her dress reached to her ankles and…her dress…

It started with an embroidered strip perhaps one and a half centimeters thick that wrapped around her elegant neck, crossing just under her throat, thickening to a modest width halfway down each of her breasts to create a thin triangular shaped gap in the precise center of her chest, as the embroidered pattern gave way to pure, smooth, silk that resonated in the sunset. The ‘outer’ edge of the ‘strips’ continued down, cupping around her outer chest and wrapping around both flanks of her slender body to meet just above the small of her back, the scarlet dress closing in on her hips before flaring out again to partially cloak her legs, though the knee length slit somewhat defeated the purpose of hiding her legs –if indeed it ever was a design goal of the dress.

Above the stunning, adult dress however –which was more then potent enough to blow his mind away- was her face.

Her hair was no in any of her usual styles, but had been worked into an astonishingly elaborate series of highlighted strips and curls that wound around, through and over each other at the top of her head, then cascaded like a waterfall down the rear of her head and her back, covering most of the skin exposed there, with a few curls teasingly rolling down the sides of her head to rest on her shoulders…and a fringe that masked her blue eyes behind a forest of dark red highlights in her auburn hair.

Lightly applied mascara framed her sapphire eyes which danced with emotions Shinji could not name, her lips forming a tiny smile, but if it was because she was happy to see him, pleased with his presentation, or just delighted that she had blown his mind somewhere into the ionosphere, he didn’t have a clue, those twin orbs impacted with such an awesome presence, a feeling he had not felt outside of that seething siren call of humanity during the Third Impact. But if his mind had always shuddered away from that memory, right now he was desperately trying to burn every facet of this single, perfect moment into his mind.

She was nothing more or less then living proof that humans could find just as much joyand understanding in a world separated by AT fields, as the world where they were linked as one. Standing there, he confirmed, for the last time he would ever need to that he was irredeemably in love with Asuka Langley Soryu. If the USS Missouri had been within a hundred kilometers of Tokyo-3, he would have asked Asuka to wait for few minutes while he ran to the quarterdeck to find an the instrument of surrender to sign, but he ruefully admitted it was little more then a formality, she had claimed him a long time ago…





Asuka felt her heart jump giddily as she walked out on the street and turned to face Shinji alone, the two Stooges having collected their dates and retreated inside the Limo. Steadily, she closed the distance with all the poise and demure presence she could muster…and in that one moment as she looked at Shinji, she knew she had done it.

His mind had been blown clean into low Earth orbit.

All the effort she had gone to, all the panic shopping, all the work today to get ready…it was all worth it for this single perfect moment as she looked at Shinji’s eyes and knew without any doubt that she finally had cracked the Shinji Code, and she had him in the palm of her hand…

Two weeks ago, she would have had a delightful time over the next few hours, doing everything she could to assert her dominance over him and put him in ‘his place’ relative to her. Not that she would try to make his time miserablejust for the sake of it, no; it was just a case of making sure he knew his place in the pecking order of Eva pilots.
Asuka at the top, followed by either of the other two, she didn’t really care who came next, as long as neither of them dared to presume they ranked up with the great Asuka Langley Soryu!

Even two days ago she would have smirked and done something to throw him off balance, just a little, just for fun without any real malice behind it.

But yesterday, Misato had taken her quietly aside while Shinji was in the shower.

And she had been uncharacteristically direct.

Shinji, Misato had told her in unequivocal terms, needed to have fun at this dance.

Misato had then pointed out –in case Asuka had been living in a cave on Mars for the last few months- that Shinji had been working all but non stop since he had arrived in Tokyo-3. That in between his crash course in Evangelion piloting, settling into a new school and having to deal with a new home with a new group of people –not to mention the occasional Angel attack- he had not had any chance to stop and just have fun.

Asuka had seriously considered Misato’s pleas.

She had been brought up as an Evangelion pilot; it was all she had really ever known. Shinij on the other hand had had all of this dumped in his lap not four months ago, without the luxury of years of testing, training and frankly, time to stop and blow off steam. And Asuka knew perfectly well, he had had all of it dumped into his lap in a city under attack and in full knowledge of what Unit One had done to his Mother.

But Misato’s damn near deadly insistence that Shinji needed to have a good time…and the implications both said and unsaid that she would make or break this evening for him…

And in that moment, leaning against the Balcony railing with her guardian in the rather pleasant evening breeze, Asuka finally cracked the ‘Misato code’.

Gott knows how many times she had tried to crack it back in Germany, but her blunt warnings about Shinji had finally provided the clue she needed to understand the core ideal that underpinned so many of her actions.

And it was so simple in hindsight. All the drinking, the debauchery, the overly happy and giddy attitude…

There was no point in saving the world if you couldn’t enjoy the world.

Reflecting on her sudden epiphany, Asuka had walked back to her room without saying a word, not out of spite, just in deep thought. Granted she wanted –had- to go to this dance to complete her arrival in Tokyo-3 in a grand, formal style. And granted Shinji was an important part of that…but in between when she had conscripted him and now, she could quietly admit she had come to look at him in a rather…different way.

No, not that way…but, as someone much more then he had been to her…

And as Misato had so bluntly pointed out to her, if she screwed this up, the friendship, one of her few genuine friendships with someone who was so much like her in so many ways, could suffer.

And Asuka, although she hated to admit it, was tired.

She was tired of being the Second Child.

She was tired of being the designated pilot of Unit Two.

And she was tired of being the most beautiful, most popular girl in the whole school.

She still was all these people, but a week of non stop Evangelion training, followed by a week of non stop school plotting had just left her wanting to go and have fun and to hell with the wider concerns for the night and her future, just this once.

And if Shinji wanted to do the same after months of non stop Evangelion training and combat, well, what was the harm in two friends just enjoying each others company?

Not that any of this meant she wasn’t happy when she saw the effect she had on him as she stepped into view…

“Don’t forget to breathe,” Kaji’s helpful advice came over his earpiece, breaking the moment and making Shinji blink, realizing rather belatedly that much of the incredible tightness in his chest was probably due to the fact that his lungs were screaming at him for oxygen.

Asuka meanwhile, glided to a halt a few meters away, waiting calmly for him to get himself under control.

Inhumanly calmly in fact.

“Shinji,” she acknowledged him in a soft voice.

”Asuka,” he acknowledged her back, after swallowing several times. “You look…” he hesitated, the old Shinji in great form tonight as she raised the edge of her mouth slightly in clear amusement at his state of stunned absurdity, which in turn triggered his mouth without his mind realizing it.

“Like a Goddess,” he near stuttered out.

Then the corniness of what he said hit him

Why the hell do I keep doing that? Shinji wondered, his mind flashing back to his impulsive complement of Asuka’s hair style a week back. Okay you might think that about her and she might think it about herself, but you don’t say it to her face!

How in the hell is Kaji so damn smooth at this?

Asuka however, to his immense surprise, didn’t roll her eyes or snicker at him…in fact, she blushed –if only slightly- at his horribly clumsy complement, keeping her eyes locked on his as her upturned lip was joined by its other side, twitching into a perfectly genuine smile.

“Thank you,” she said in a maddeningly calm tone, Shinji just focusing on his breathing as she let her eyes wander over him in casual study before returning to his face. “And you look quite well turned out as well”.

“Th…thank you,” he replied, but with amaddeningstutter as she stepped closer -directly in front of him- with the light scent of strawberries crashing into him on the evening breeze as her smile turned into a tight grin.

“Relax Shinji, I’m not going to bite,” she whispered softly for their ears alone but with an almost playful undertone to it. “Just keep breathing and everything will turn out fine,” she advised as she stepped to the side and offered him her arm, which Shinji carefully took.

Apparently too carefully for her tastes.

“I’m not made out of porcelain Baka,” she muttered at his light touch, Shinji again feeling a wave of heat on his face, but throwing caution aside, he linked his arm and found her hand, gripping it…and getting gripped back.

“Much better,” she sighed. “Just relax. It’s just me, Asuka, you know the person you live with? Train with? Go into combat with?”

The girl I fell in love with, shared my first kiss with, the Girl I abandoned to die-

No.

For her sake, he wouldn’t, he couldn’t think of her in that context. Not any more.

Not ever.

And right now standing right next to her, so vibrant and alive, frankly Shinji, for the first time since he had returned from the terrible events of that final day of his first life just didn’t care about what had happened that day.

He was far more concerned about what might happen, now. Drawing strength from Asuka’s firm yet gentle grip, he walked her to the Limo.

“Oh this is perfect,” Misato grinned broadly as she studied both of them together, an ominous whine coming from her cameras flash as it recycled for another shot. “I’ll send out the wedding invitations!”

Misato was confronted with two separate glares that as always, had not the slightest effect on her enthusiastic energy.

“How long have you been saving that one up?” Asuka demanded.

“Most of last week,” Misato shrugged with an utterly unabashed look at her cameras ready light flashed on. “Okay, smile!”

Asuka’s face immediately shifted from ‘Laser Death’ to ‘Angelic Innocence’ and Shinji, almost helplessly, felt a smile resonate onto his face as he again took in her perfection, before turning to look at Misato. Just in time too, as the flash went off and dazzled his eyes.

“Come on, let’s get this show on the road, we’re on a tight schedule!” Asuka demanded with a great deal of enthusiastic energy. Shinji let Asuka’s arm go as he gestured her forward, Asuka carefully and quickly threading her way into the limo with the agility and flexibility of a gymnast, her right leg shamelessly sliding loose from her dress and getting his undivided attention for a few seconds as she swung down and in, before he followed.

The rear of the Limo was designed to seat seven people, which was rather convenient given the size of their party. The ‘long’ seat heading up the right hand side took four people, already filled with the other children who were all chatting to their partner, utterly oblivious to their arrival for a few seconds.

Then the two boys noticed Asuka sitting down on the right most seat at the back, carefully adjusting her dress as Shinji sat to her left and Misato to his.

They both blinked. It had never been her looks they had had a problem with, after all.

Then they both snapped their attention back to their own dates and continued their inane chatter, as Shinji and Misato sat down and the car moved off.




“So where is she?”

“She’s coming with Soryu of course. She should have been here earlier…but it’s not like we really have anything to do or that we had to be here early, it’s just about showing how dedicated we are, getting here this early”.

“Oh please Riko, Hikari is so dedicated to her job she’ll probably report herself for being late by five seconds. So we can cut her a little slack tonight.”

There was a giggle among the four other Class Reps of the year represented at the dance as they considered the absent representatives legendary reputation for strictness and conservatism that had made her something of the ‘Alpha Female’ in her group of all girl Class Reps.

“Well she better get here soon, or she’ll miss the start of this.”

“Oh please, there is no way Soryu will let them get here late. You just know she is timing it for a dramatic entrance.”

“That’s the truth. Damn that girl has an ego.”

“She has a fifty meter tall robot. It’s not really that surprising she’s a little…excitable.”

“Ayanami isn’t anything like her,” one of the Reps protested mildly. “And Ikari is just so…so…”

“Selfless?”

“I was going to say heroic and amazingly self effacing, but I’ll take that.”

“Cute too,” another put in.

“Asuka’s property,” Riko commented lightly. “Unless you feel like fighting her for him?”

“Uh no, that’s okay…and speaking of the devil…”

The quartet standing at the edge of the sprawling reception center followed Representative Ayano’s gaze to see a black four door sedan of some kind stop in front of the building, well ahead of the red carpet that led from the road a good fifteen meters to the floor to ceiling glass wall that was the front of the reception area. The second floor of the building jutted out almost to the road forming a large overhanging area people could assemble in, but everyone had moved inside to the reception area, which was little more then a large room backed by closed doors and steps that led to the upstairs dance area.

Almost their entire original year was standing around and talking inside the reception area, the girls busy complementing each others appearances, the boys just sharing a continual series of collective shrugs. Both groups also spent a great deal of time catching up with old friends who had been invited back for the dance, students whose parents had transferred them out in a panic with the first Angel attacks. More then a few of that group would soon move back in with their parents in Tokyo-3, as the initial panic after the 3rd Angels attack gave way to a weary acceptance of their inevitability, combined with the proven civil defense success that had kept civilian casualties from the Angel attacks at zero.

But right now, attention steadily turned from idle small talk to the car that had pulled in well ahead of the red carpet, blue and red lights flashing in its window as a half dozen men in tuxedoes exited the car and were suddenly confronted by an identical looking group who materialized from behind the stone pillars and shadows out the front. The two quartets conferred for a few seconds before six of them headed back inside, threading their way through the interested students, politely smiling and nodding to inquires, but not engaging in conversation before they headed upstairs.

“Those three get their own bodyguards?” one of the four class Reps muttered in disbelief.

“Don’t you ever attend the school council meetings?” another rolled her eyes at the ignorance of her friend. “Their lives are just too valuable to risk given what they do.”

“Oh yeah, like Asuka needs a bodyguard? Lest we forget what she did to two idiots early today?”

The quartet shared a laugh at the fate of the two idiots dumb enough to grab onto Asuka’s shoulder and spin her around. Asuka’s reflexive punch-kick combination had been extremely impressive, cementing her place as a ‘do not screw with’ girl in the minds of many and ensuring those two guys wouldn’t be doing any dancing tonight…

Though the fact that they had done something as stupid as touching Asuka and –barely- lived to tell the tail had made them some kind of minor celebrities in the eyes of those guys.

The girls –sensibly- just rolled their eyes. Men, who could understand them?

Out the front, a black Limo now pulled into the curb, stopping with its rear door precisely lined up with the red carpet and setting off a wave of hushed murmurs as the class drifted towards the floor to ceiling windows. Parents or friends had dropped off most of the class, though a few had put together the money to take a limo or hire car of some kind.

None of them had a car full of bodyguards however, which made the identities of the people inside a forgone conclusion as the year waited for them to show themselves…

The door finally opened…and Misato Katsuragi stepped out, flicking her hair back over her shoulder as she adjusted her dress slightly.

The utter silence from the males in the room staring out the window was rather conspicuous.

“What” Representative Riko asked in an awed, low tone as she studied Ikari and Soryu’s guardian, as she made her way towards the building, “is holding up that dress?”

“The mental powers of every girl in this room who has a date,” Representative Ayano guessed shrewdly, cocking her head slightly as she heard the curious sound of almost a hundred sets of teeth grinding behind the males who had crowded the windows.

There was a wave of deep bows from the guys as the NERV Operations Director glided through the front doors and into the reception area in her midnight black dress, the lady smiling in a friendly enough way at them but not saying anything as she breezed over to where a cluster of parents and teachers were finalizing their preparations, quickly making herself one of the group who headed inside to the relief of the girls.

At least until all attention refocused on the limo as Toji Suzuhara got out, followed by…

“Hikari?” all four Reps spluttered in perfect synchronization as the final member of their group was helped out of the car by the jock.

“No…way,” Ayano managed to get out as they started down the carpet, holding each others hands with a suspiciously practiced ease, Hikari’s new hair and dress styles making it extremely difficult to believe that this was Hikari Hokori.

Actually, only the fact that Toji was on her arm appeared to lend credence to this conclusion, because this girl was very much hot, a label the absurdly self conscious Hikari took great pains to avoid…

“Nice shoes,” Riko said in an outwardly clinical voice that dripped with envy to the female ear. “I think they’re Kodama’s, that dress is new though.”

“That Hikari is new,” Ayano corrected her. “I think Soryu is having some kind of weird effect on girls she hangs out with,” the Rep said, swallowing slightly.

“Why do you say that?”

Ayano just inclined her head fractionally and yet again, the Reps gasped as they watched Rei Ayanami step out of the Limo, along with Kensuke Aida.

Rumors had circulated wildly and widely after Rei’s so called ‘transformation’, though most of the girls had quietly dismissed most of it as something of an exaggeration. Sure Rei was much more active now, but honestly, it was Rei Ayanami! The idea that she could turn into some kind of sex kitten overnight had been widely dismissed by more then a few of the girls.

Such thinking wasn’t just eliminated, it was shattered as Rei and Kensuke walked up the red carpet.

Rei walked the carpet as confidently and proudly as any celebrity or supermodel might walk such an event, her absurdly stunning dress and exotic haircut grabbing attention like a magnet.

Former classmates who had not heard of this transformation just stared, working their jaws as they tried –and failed- to make some kind of comment on the situation, the two couples arriving soon after each other and soon being swamped by classmates and old friends, Hikari making her way over to the reps, who’s more traditional Kimonos and dresses looked rather pathetic in comparison.

But all that attention stopped as Shinji Ikari exited the limo and reached an arm back inside…





Asuka got to her feet carefully with Shinji’s help, adjusting her dress slightly as he shut the door and let the Limo move off to find some place to park.

“Well. This is it,” she declared to Shinji, noting the stunned expressions from their classmates out of the corner of her eye as she carefully made sure her hair was in place and her dress flawless, before generously taking the time to give Shinji a once over to make sure he hadn’t lost his jacket or something.

“Yes, it is,” he replied to her announcement with an only slightly nervous smile at her, extending his right which she took easily with her left, again gripping his hand and ignoring the slightest shakes she could feel from him. All things being equal, he was actually doing much better then she had thought he would be doing. Apparently he had used the Limo trip between Rei’s and the convention center to try and pull his shattered brains into some kind of order.

“Just remember Ikari,” she gave final instructions as they headed in, the pair slowly walking towards the building and the faces pressed against the glass wearing expressions of envy and lust in the female and male areas respectively. “Have fun and enjoy yourself.”

She paused for a second to shoot him a look, unable to help herself.
“But try to feel me up and you’re a dead man.”

“Situation normal then,” he replied with the slightest twitch of a grin on an otherwise all too serious face, getting a half snort, half snicker from her, and a slight grip of reassurance which he returned as they walked inside.

They were instantly all but mobbed.

The next five minutes were an astonishing blur for Shinji as they broke apart into the surging crowd. Fully a third of the people at the dance were school students who had left before Shinji had finished his first week in Toyko-3, being buried deep in NERV running combat simulations that whole time and Toji and Kensuke happily took him around introducing him, as Asuka conquered the female half of the room.

It was even money in Shinji’s opinion, if the ‘newcomers’ were more stunned by the new German student, or, by Rei ’Ayanamis and her ‘new look’.

“And this,” Toji proudly introduced a giant of a friend, uncommonly tall for a Japanese guy of their ages, “is the second best basketball player formerly in our year, Osami Watanabe”.

“What do you mean second best,” the giant shot back in a surprisingly high pitched voice with a glare at Toji. “I out shot you by three baskets last season.”

“If you include them and the other nine fouls that were called on you,” Suzahara snorted, crossing his arms in an unimpressed, but amused way.

“Ref had his eyes shut,” Osami muttered, glancing across at Shinji. “So, you are the famous Shinji Ikari? The pilot of Eva Unit One?”

“You’ve heard about me?” Shinji asked with a raised eyebrow and slight smile. “I thought there was a news blackout on most of NERV outside of Tokyo-3”.

“The news blackout is almost total,” Osami assured him with a roll of his eyes. “I have no idea why given that that huge blue thing sat downtown for weeks where everyone could see it, but when you get outside Tokyo-3, news is hard to find on anykind of official publication, meaning there are millions of rumors going around that hide the truth. I haven’t seen anything about you or Ayanami…or that new pilot…?”

“Devil Girl,” Toji supplied helpfully.

“Her name is Asuka,” Shinji put in with a reproachful, if amused tone, this conversation helping him greatly to just loosen up and calm down.

“Yeah, she’s pretty hot,” Osami agreed in appreciation as he tried to study Asuka through the pack of Girls around her.

“Uh no, I meant she’s a total…bother to be around at times,” Toji caught himself from saying anything more descriptive as Hikari started to drift in hearing range, getting a betrayed look from Kensuke.

“Coward,” Aida muttered at his friend, who shot him a helpless glare.

“But hot,” Osami insisted, clearly not going to let it rest until they acknowledged it, looking across at Asuka and the dress that hugged her body like an oil slick with a great deal of approval.

“Yes, okay, she’s hot,” Toji said with a sigh that said louder then words, that his friend just didn’t get it and never would.

Fortunately, Toji was saved from trying to explain as the doors to the dance floor finally opened and the school’s principal in a rather new looking suit moved to stand just inside the doors, waving for their attention and slowly getting silence from the crowd.

“Can everyone hear me? Yes? Good. Well, I’d like to welcome you one and all to the Summer Dance,” Shinzo Suzuya said with a smile that got him a round of applause from his students, dutiful at best from the boys, but somewhat more enthusiastic from the girls.

The fact that it was the middle of autumn and going into winter had confused Shinji slightly when he had first heard the dance’s name, until he had been told it was something of a mocking name over the fact that post Second Impact, it almost always felt like Summer in Japan, regardless of the time of year.

“Now, you’ve all signed your permission slips and handed them in so I know you all carefully read the rules…” -there was a general snickering at that- “…but to be sure, I’ll go over them again. No drinking, no fighting. Oh and the men with the earpieces are from NERV intelligence, Section Two and are authorized to use lethal force, so play nice with some of our more…famous alumni, if you please.”

To Shinji’s disappointment, none the guy’s still shooting looks at Asuka whenever their dates were not paying attention looked in any way deterred by the threat.

“And on the topic of NERV, I’d like to pay a special thanks to a person from NERV, an organization that went to extraordinary efforts to get this dance put back on, after it was taken off.”

Shinji felt his blood turn to ice at the casually announced doom upon his head, exchanging glances with Kensuke and Toji, who suddenly looked tense.

All of them were thinking the same thing and all glanced over at Asuka, who had inclined her head slightly in confusion with a frown. Apparently he had caught her eye and she returned his glance with a frown and shrugged, misinterpreting his look as confusion rather then near panic, before they both turned their gaze back to the principal.

“As you may or may not know, the dance was called off for reasons of insurance, but we were lucky enough to have the insurance issue dealt with by NERV, allowing us to reschedule. Without this organizations help, we would not be here tonight.”

Shinji felt Principal Suzuyas eyes focus on him for a second and he desperately gave the slightest shake of his head, not daring a more violent reaction that might give the game away, getting a rather worrying smirk in return.

“So please give a round of applause…” their principal continued, clearly about to turn this night into a nightmare for him…

When Asuka found out that not only had he known about this dance all along, not only had he gotten it put back on, but that hadn’t told her anything about it until Rei spilled the beans, his previous defense that he hadn’t cared about it blown out of the water-

“Captain Misato Katsuragi!” Suzuya declared with a beaming voice, getting a thunderous applause from both sexes –for different reasons- as she stepped down the stairs next to him, taking her hand and lightly kissing it to a flattering smile as she waved out at the students.

Shinji managed not to fall to the ground, instead closing his eyes for a second and taking a deep, long breath, giving silent thanks that Misato had apparently talked their principal out of publicly congratulating him, accepting the thanks on NERV’s behalf.

It was a very Japanese thing for the company to take the credit for the actions of someone working on its behalf, and right now Shinji couldn’t be any happier for it as the pair retreated and the students started on in-

“Are you three ready to dance?” Hikari’s voice suddenly came in his ear, making all three stooges jump a foot into the air before they turned to find the cluster of class Reps had dissolved, with the quintet heading back to their dates, the other four already pushing forward to get in at the front of the line.

Toji just grinned rather goofily at Hikari, before turning to his friend.

“Uh, you remember Osami-San, don’t you Hikari?” Toji replied, gesturing to his friend and causing both of them to blink.

“This,” he said in utter amazement as he looked at the girl in the shear black dress in front of them, “is “Hikari? As in Hikari Hokori?” Osami demanded.

His unbelieving tone earned him a rather cute (in Shinji’s mind) blush in return from Hikari as he scrutinized her face. “Damn, you’ve, um…changed!”

“Oh great, another stooge,” Asuka joined her best friend with a roguish roll of her eyes, clearly having overheard the conversation and deciding to come to her friends aid. “So, you’re breeding now?”

“Yeah, we reproduce like amoebas,” Toji deadpanned, earning him a snicker from Kensuke and Shinji.

“And have the intelligence of one,” Asuka replied sweetly, not giving ground for a second.

“Peace,” Hikari cautioned. “Let’s just try and have fun, okay?”

“We are!” Toji and Asuka simultaneously protested, then blinked and looked at the other in clear confusion, before almost unconsciously taking a step backwards away from each other, identical looks of suspicion on each others faces that damn near made Shinji burst out laughing.

“And on that note,” Kensuke smiled as Rei glided in looking prim, proper, and gorgeous as always. “Chow!” he declared, offering her his arm which she took, smiling faintly as they headed inside.

“Good idea,” Hikari beamed, holding out her arm to Toji, who abandoned his confrontation with Asuka willingly with a final trade of smirks before moving over to join the slowly thinning group at the door that were heading upstairs.

“Did you have any idea Misato was responsible for getting the dance put back on?” Asuka demanded without pre-amble when they were alone.

“No, I had no idea,” Shinji replied with absolute honest.

Asuka studied him for a few seconds and then nodded.

“Well…we’ll have to find some way to thank her,” Asuka muttered, exchanging a smile with a girl Shinji vaguely remembered was in another class as she dragged her date in, the boy stealing glances at Asuka until he noticed Shinji’s glare at him and he promptly directed his attention elsewhere, before turning back to Asuka.

Asuka who had seen and actually felt, slightly, touched by Shinji’s defensive reaction on her behalf –not that she needed anyone to look after her- just smiled and took his wrist.

“Well come on, we’re going to be the last ones in,” she sighed, walking up to the door and leading him in then up the dim stairs to the top…

The dance room was dimly, but adequately lit by a series of windows behind the stairs that looked out over the street, currently framing a stunning view down over LakeAshi as the sun set on the horizon. There was a large open area –clearly the dance floor- directly in frontof the stairs, with a stage against the fall wall closed off with curtains, a smaller ‘DJ-Stage’ set up in front of it, with a rather…’ghetto’ looking DJ finishing his setup.

An upper area ran in a horseshoe fashion from either side of the stage, down the walls and around behind the stairs, elevated from the dance floor with a railing separating the two areas and filled with dozens of large tables, already quickly filling up. A small number of rather formally dressed men with lists were directing people at the top of the stairs and Asuka strode up to the nearest.

“Names?” he asked politely.

“Asuka Langley Soryu,” she supplied carefully and slowly, clearly surprised –or annoyed- that he hadn’t known who she was at first glance.

“And you are Shinji Ikari?” the man asked after quickly consulting with his list.

“Yes,” Shinji said with a polite nod.

The man bowed with a great deal of grace. “You are seated at table nine,” he informed them, gesturing to a nearby table which Shinji quickly spotted their friends sitting down at and Shinji smiled slightly, clearly Hikari had taken steps when planning the seating with her other class reps. “And if there is anything you need tonight, do not hesitate for a second to ask for it.”

“How about some dance music?” Asuka didn’t quite demand, holding firm in place as Shinij started to step away.

The man simply smiled, pulling a tiny radio from a pocket and giving a brief order.

At the far end of the huge room, Shinji saw the DJ act and suddenly some generic J-Pop song started blasting through he speakers.

“Ladies and Gentlemen, welcome to the Tokyo-3 Moonlight Lounge, let’s blast off the night with some classic Hamassaki. Come out on the dance floor and lets get this started, don’t be shy!” the DJ called, his voice amplified over the PA system.

“Thank you,” Asuka smiled happily at the staff member before turning back to Shinji.

“No, way,” he said flatly.

“Baka, it’s a dance” she pointed out in an irritated voice. “It’s what we came here to do!”

“Yes but no-one else is out there,” he pointed out in a rather pathetic voice, knowing the eyes of almost two hundred fellow students would lock onto them as Asuka dragged him out there, knowing in such a situation he would screw up horribly and embarrass Asuka so badly he would be begging for her to just kill him and get it over with later…

“You can pilot a Fifty meter tall weapon of mass destruction, fight against the greatest enemies mankind has ever seen in its history…but you’re afraid to dance with me?” Asuka asked in a tone that magically mixed amusement and exasperation into a whole new level of sarcasm.

“Look…I just don’t want to embarrass you,” he told her in a low, highly embarrassed tone, feeling the confident façade he had put forward to Asuka for weeks starting to crack.

Instead of just rolling her eyes and dragging him out anyway as he expected, Asuka narrowed her eyes and studied him before she lost focus, looking at apparently nothing much at all.

“You actually mean that don’t you,” she muttered, talking as much to herself as him, before she shifted her attention back to him, appearing to take a deep breath.

“Listen Shinji, I’ve invested a lot of time in teaching you to dance to something other then Mozart over the last couple of weeks. If you can’t trust yourself, then trust me, you’ll be fine.”

“Told you so,” Kaji’s voice smirked in his ear, Shinji pointedly ignoring him.

“Well,” he took a breath and met her gaze helplessly, “Okay, let’s do it”.

Asuka grinned. Now she yanked him out, Shinji happy to see two or three other couples had formed on the floor happily bouncing and bobbing to the music, with more heading in, generally with one partner dragging the next with a great deal less enthusiasm, Asuka letting him go at the exact center of the lightshow being made of the dance floor, raising her arms above her head and starting to gyrate in a highly distracting way to almost every heterosexual male in the room between the ages of fourteen and fifteen.

[Chris OFarrell]

Fifteen minutes later, Shinji crashed into his seat, his face flushed but feeling alive in a way he had rarely felt in his life, ever. After a few awkward minutes of feeling hundreds of pairs of eyes on his back, he had just gotten lost in the music and Asuka’s movements, the NERV synchronization training stamped –twice- into him taking over and the two started to move to the music, then unconsciously to each other and just had fun.

Finally, as more and more people overcame their reserve and moved onto the dance floor –or just moved in closer for a better look as Asuka’s hips gyrated doing interesting things to her dress- they had finally called it a dance and with an exchange of friendly smiles, headed off in different directions, Asuka pounced on by a pack of girls and Shinji just slinking back to his chair and blushing at more then a few ‘appreciative’ comments from some female classmates as ‘his moves’. Asuka herself had cocked an eyebrow as their final song had ended and commented a simple “Not bad Baka” before moving off, which Shinji took to mean that he hadn’t utterly screwed up.

The boost to his confidence was considerable.

“You looked like you were having fun with Asuka,” Toji noted as Shinji crashed into his chair, the jock having just returned to the table himself after having just finished circling the room and chatting to friends and former students.

It wasn’t quite an accusation from Toji.

“As I told you, Asuka really isn’t that bad once you get past the daily beatings…in fact, I have to say both of you have been a lot more…civil to each other, the last week,” Shinji pointed out, that nagging detail he had meant to talk to him about.

Especially in comparison to their screaming matches the ‘First Time’ around, where Asuka had never really gotten over Toji’s ‘change’ on Over the Rainbow or had the moderating influence of the Hikari-Toji factor…

“Uh yeah, about that,” Toji muttered, looking rather embarrassed. “Look…um…we just came to an arrangement”.

“You, made a deal with the Devil?” Shinji asked with mock horror.

“Oh shut up, it was for your benefit, sort of,” Toji grumbled. “We came to an understanding. As we were seeing each other around Hikari a lot, we decided it would be best if we acted civil so we didn’t upset her…and there you go…and well, we sort of stopped screaming at each other when she wasn’t there either, it was just easier, you know? To keep track of everything?”

“Well, if you and Hikari can fall in love,” and Shinji tried not to smile as Toji’s face instantly flushed and he looked away at that naked accusation, “then Asuka and I can at least be friends, can’t we?”

“Well, I guess…” Toji conceded with a grunt, clearly eager to change the topic. “Say, where are the girls anyway?”

Shinji looked around and frowned. He couldn’t’ see them…

“Hikari and Asuka both went into the ladies room a few minutes ago…and I am not going to look,” Kaji supplied as Toji muttered something about going to look and walked away.

“Where are you?” Shinji asked, keeping his voice low and moving his lips as little as possible, after Shinji managed to pick out two Section Two agents, but none of the others, nor Misato, nor Kaji…

“Oh, around,” Kaji vaguely supplied and Shinji could hear the grin. “Great dancing by the way, I see you’ve been paying attention to Misato when she gets a little buzzed and starts running around the apartment.”

Shinji just rolled his eyes and got to his feet, locating the ladies room and starting to walk in that general direction, raising his hand over his mouth as if in deep thought as he continued to talk.

“So where is Misato?”

“She’s talking to a few of the parents and your teacher; I think the poor woman is being lectured on the Second Impact.”

Shinji felt a sudden wave of pity for Misato as he wandered around the room, nodding and smiling at various classmates. The dance floor had emptied a little, with the first wave of dancers taking a break and the timid staying away due to the lesser numbers of people to ‘hide’ in. There were perhaps twenty people on the huge floor, but the night was young, as Misato would say, the sky outside steadily darkening as a new song started, although it wasn’t Japanese, he could at least recognize some of the words as German. Great beat though.

“Hey, Kensuke,” Shinji waved as he saw his friend moving around, Kensuke turning and hurrying over.

“Hey Shinji…have you seen Rei?” he asked with a somewhat confused look on his face.

“Um, not since we were downstairs,” Shinji admitted, frowning. “What happened?”

“Well, we were just walking around the room and talking to people and I turned around…and she was gone suddenly.”

“Well she couldn’t have gone far,” Shinji tried to calm his rather worried looking friend down, knowing just how much of a hammering his friend’s nerves had taken over the day. “She can’t have gone far,” he assured Kensuke, glancing around the immediate area and not seeing Rei, most of the people sitting at the tables watching the dance floor with increasing interest on their faces.

“She’s probably found someone better to go and have fun with,” Kensuke sighed. “It’s probably for the best, I’ll just circle the room and stay out of her way,” he continued, with enough self pity to make even Shinji rolls his eyes.

If I used to be like this all the time, its little wonder I drove Asuka nuts he thought to himself.

“Look, she is not going to dump you, don’t jump to conclusions like that just because she’s walked off for a second. Asuka and Hikari are in the bathroom, Rei might be as well”.

“Nope,” Kaji’s voice, sounding highly amused came back in his ear.

“Well where is she?” he asked back.

“I don’t know, that’s why I’m asking you,” Kensuke replied in a slightly confused voice.

“Uh, just thinking out loud,” he apologized. “Come on, Rei stands out just a bit in a crowd, she must be around here somewhere…” he tried to cheer his friend up, getting at least a semi-enthusiastic response as he started looking around the crowd of people in the upper area, noting that more and more of them appeared to be turning their attention to the dance floor, with expressions of amazement on the faces of the girls and a familiar hormone driven expression on the faces of the guys…

Then it clicked. And slowly, he turned his gaze tothe dance floor.

“Kensuke?”

“Yeah?”

“Found Rei.”




Asuka and Hikari had retired to the bathroom in a timed honored tradition that had forever confounded the male mind. It was a social event in of itself, separate yet intricate part of the larger events taking place outside and around it.

Safe from the men’s gaze, the women –including a female Section Two agent who sat like a fly on the wall- could communicate, plot or fight as needs be.

Asuka had quickly used the facilities before stepping in front of the huge wall of mirrors and painstakingly checking her dress, hair and makeup to ensure they all remained perfect, basking in the looks of envy more then a few girls inside shot her that she caught out of the corner of her eyes as Hikari leaned in closer, painstakingly checking her mascara to ensure it hadn’t started to run.

“You’re going to have to go out on the dance floor when you get back out,” Asuka said in a matter of fact tone that made Hikari wince.

“I don’t know,” she muttered back. “I’m not anything like as good a dancer as you”.

“Few people are,” Asuka shrugged back without the slightest hint of self consciousness on her face at the statement, having earned the right to claim such a title in the bathroom with a payment of sweat on the dance floor several minutes ago. “But it’s not a question of being good or bad Hikari, but about enjoying yourself.”

Hikari accepted that in silence, her nerves still clearly a little tight, but was saved from replying as another girl stepped up to the mirror and took out some lipstick.

“So, miss Soryu, you and Shinji make a rather cute couple,” the girl said, instantly gaining Asuka’s attention, though outside she kept her face perfectly calm as she adjusted her dress strap slightly.

“Oh Asuka, this is Natsuki,” Hikari supplied the name, in a tone that was also a warning to her friend. “She evacuated after the Angels started attacking but she’s moving back”.

“Oh, hi,” Asuka said with a smile that was as empty as a beer can fifteen seconds after Misato opened it. “Nice to meet you”.

“And nice to meet you,” the not unattractive girl replied with a slight nod, her attention still on her reflection. “So, how long have you and Shinji been together?”

“We’re not ‘together’,” Asuka corrected her on reflex. “He’s a friend”.

“Really?” Natsuki commented, glancing at her for a second, before letting the slightest smile flicker on her face. “Too bad, you two looked quite good together.”

The girls in the bathroom continued their activities, but their attention shifted rather suddenly to the conversation as Asuka smiled back, feeling a great deal of annoyance at the audacity of this girl…threatening to touch her stuff.

“We are good together,” Asuka replied with an all too sweet tone in her voice as she leaned away from the mirror but continued to study her reflection. “We both pilot Evangelions, working together to save the city you ran from and believe me, we are very good at it.”

‘Ouch’ the collective looks on the other girls in the bathroom said.

Natsuki let her smile become slightly brittle.

“Oh I’m sure you’ve established quite a good working relationship with him,” the former student dismissed Asuka’s warning with a slight shrug. “I’m just thinking it might be nice to get away from all that NERV stuff once in a while and have some fun.”

Even Hikari flinched at that, Asuka clearly being dismissed as ‘NERV stuff’, if not directly enough to be called on it.

Many of the girls expected Asuka to grab Natsuki by the back of her head and ram her into the mirror in response, but Asuka just grinned somewhat impishly, leaning in closer as if to tell a secret.

“Oh we are having fun,” she assured her. “I’ll have to tell you about the shopping trip we went on where I modeled bikinis for him for a while, after he asked me to the dance.”

MINE the girls translated Asuka’s almost giggled confession, sounding to their ears like the bark of a particularly nasty dog at its competition, Natsuki actually flinching slightly away from Asuka like a puppy that realized it had pushed the ‘big-bad’ a little too far.

“Well…um, I’m glad you’re having fun then,” she replied in as dignified a voice as she could, smiling slightly as she backed away. “Well….see you later.”

“Bye,” Asuka replied, not bothering to look at her as she backed away through the door, the gaggle of girls inside glancing at Asuka before starting to chat away again, all clearly thinking the same thing.

What does Shinji Ikari mean to Asuka? She denied she was ‘an item’ with him, and then warned Natsuki away rather…pointedly.

Outside of Hikari, none of them guessed that Asuka was thinking much the same thing.

“Ready?” Asuka asked Hikari simply as she finished her inspection in the mirror.

“As I’ll ever be,” the still rather shy Class Rep sighed, clearly gathering her courage to go out onto the dance floor.

“That’s the spirit,” Asuka congratulated her, heading for the door and back out into the somewhat loud music with…German vocals?

Cocking her head slightly, she listened and the song clicked. It was ‘The Ding-Dong’ song, one of Misato’s favorites back when she had been back at the Third Branch…and she wouldn’t put her guardian to have supplied the CD either.

She giggled slightly at the lyrics as the chorus came around, getting an odd look from Hikari as they walked towards the dance floor, giving thanks that as far as she knew, there were no German speakers among their year except her who knew what the words meant, spying the Three Stooges among the rather impressive crowd on the railing looking at the dance floor from the perimeter.

With a wicked look on her face, she easily moved up behind him with the noise of the music covering her tracks, easing into position next to his ear.

“Shinji,” she whispered.

He jumped about a foot into the air and slammed back down to Asuka’s delight, turning around from his place at the railing where he had been watching the dance floor to smile somewhat sheepishly at her.

“Ah. There you are.”

“We had to go freshen up,” Asuka explained, offering him a smile as she looked into his own smile, again feeling…she didn’t know what for him...but again throwing aside those questions for another day, just wanting to have fun. “So, what is everyone standing around for? Let’s dance!”

Shinji’s smile twitched slightly and he gestured her forward. Confused, Asuka pushed in next to Shinji, several people making way for her…and felt her jaw drop slightly as she looked out at the dance floor.

Rei was dancing, with the two dozen other dancers on the floor having formed something of a ring around her as she moved her body in ways Asuka didn’t think were possible for a human.

By herself...

In the middle of the dance floor...

‘You touch my Tra-la-la…’

‘La la la la la la la la la la la la la la…’

‘Hmmm, my ding ding dong…’


And hell, she can dance!





Rei Ayanami didn’t care about the fact that close to two hundred pairs of eyes were staring at her as she moved in a way most men in the western hemisphere would classify as ‘interesting’.

Nor did she care about any ‘social protocols’ which she had only something of a passing familiarity with.

She did like the music however.

She had spent the last several days studying examples of ‘dancing’, practicing based off research she had conducted with the same methodical and total concentration of her attention she applied to her school work or Eva piloting. Research over the internet had provided a wealth of material she had looked over…and gotten nowhere.
Pages of text just didn’t help her understand.

The breakthrough had come when she had stopped listening to the songs she was practicing against and started to listen to the music. And it had clicked as she stood in her apartment, music blasting from her new stereo system. For hours, she simply become lost in the incredibly intricate symphony of vocals and instruments that wound together in a way Rei found somewhat profound, for lack of any other word to describe it. Expressing emotion was something Rei found difficult at the best of times. But dancing to the music just came naturally for her and she just moved with it.

In some ways her style might have been called almost mathematical. Or perhaps clinical.

But she enjoyed it none the less.

So she stood in the middle of the dance floor, her eyes closed with an expression on face that might be described as a slight smile, moving her body as an expression of the music. Her hands, her head, her hips, her arms, all of her body moved in a whirlwind of motion that kept building until the song finally climaxed and she snapped to a halt with a final jerk of her head and her dress spinning around her legs, breathing deeply, but not truly hard as she opened her eyes.

A hundred people broke out into applause, cheers and more then a few wolf whistles as she stood there.

“Ladies and Gentlemen, MissRei Ayanami,” the DJ announced, generating even more noise from the crowd.

Rei flushed, very slightly feeling somewhat embarrassed at becoming a spectacle, but the feeling quickly faded as she realized the crowd was simply signifying its approval and enjoyment of her performance, quite possibly the first time she had ever felt so…accepted, by such a large number of people.

It was intoxicatingly addictive.

As the applause slowed, she walked to the side of the dance floor, exchanging smiles and thanks from countless people as they rushed past her onto the dance floor, almost as if a dam had burst and suddenly everyone wanted to dance.

“Rei, where did you learn to dance like that?” Asuka demanded as she reached the small group of people among the crowd, who were unique in as they were people she classified as friends. “Have you been sneaking out to clubs over the last week or something?”

Rei cocked her head slightly in curiosity over the question. Truly, the possibility had never occurred to her.

“No. Should I have?”

“Not without inviting me,” Asuka grinned wickedly, before impulsively reaching over and embracing her. Rei blinked in surprise before slowly returning the gesture, feeling a strange comfort in the physical contact before Asuka let go, Kensuke easing forward and clearly in some kind of distress.

“My apologies for leaving you without informing you,” Rei said with a slight bow at him, suddenly feeling a shiver of unease and even guilt over the fact that she had left him without warning, the siren call of the music all but taking over her body, finding herself on the dance floor almost without realizing it. “I…just wanted to go and dance for a while by myself.”

Kensuke just continued to stare.

“Kensuke?” she asked, starting to feel a worry that she had somehow harmed him by leaving him without warning.

“You were fantastic!” he spluttered out, to a strange simultaneous roll of eyes from three of the four other people around him, only Hikari abstaining from the strange synchronized action.

“Thank you,” she smiled at him. “Would you like to dance with me?”

“Uh huh,” he nodded.

“Come,” she said, extending a hand he took as she led him back out to the dance floor.

“His mind can’t take much more of that,” Shinji commented with a raised eyebrow as they vanished into the growing crowd on the floor.

“Uh huh,” Asuka agreed. “Not that there was that much of one to begin with.”

“Asuka,” he sighed.

“Oh I’m just kidding,” she laughed, turning to glance at him with a grin. “Think you can hold out another round with me, Baka?”

“Always,” he smiled, again getting hopelessly lost in that face. Asuka held his gaze for a few seconds before turning to face Toji.

Toji stared back.

Asuka’s smile intensified into something more akin to a glare and flickered to Hikari, who was studying the patterns on the carpet with great interest…and Toji finally got it.

“Um…Hikari…would you…um, like to-”

“Yes!” Hikari blurted out.

“Uh…cool,” he said, trying –and failing miserably- to keep the ‘too cool for school’ look on his face before he took her hand gently and they headed out into the thickening crowd.

“I hope he wasn’t going to say ‘marry me’,” Asuka sighed at the lack of polished class from her friend, as they vanished into the mass of crowds bounding to a fast paced dance track of some kind.

“I don’t think it’s much of a danger,” Shinji assured her, before extending his hand and recalling some of the German Asuka had tried to teach him one boring weekend so long ago.

“Daf ich?”

Asuka smiled and took his hand.

”Bitte,” she replied, firmly taking his hand and leading him out to the dance floor.


Several hours later, Shinji sighed in contentment as he continued to steal glances at Asuka next to him as they lounged about at their table. Misato had come over and told them they would be going in less then half an hour which was a bit of an annoyance to Shinji, who had never in either of his lives had anything like as much fun. Once the shock of Asuka’s stunning beauty had worn off earlier in the evening and he had found –to his shock- that Asuka appeared to be working hard to make this night easy on him for some reason, he had simply tried to enjoy everything.

And he wasn’t the only one.

After their first dance, Hikari and Toji had rarely been off the dance floor until dinner had come up. Kensuke and Rei somewhat less so, but they were almost never apart from each other.

With Rei and Kensuke too busy to talk, he and Asuka had become the targets of mobs of people desperate to hear from NERV’s Evangelion pilots about the war they fought. Shinji had lost count of the number of times people had congratulated him on his defeat of the 4th Angel and the creation of ‘Nike-Ridge’ as the imprint of Unit Ones feet on the Cliffside above Highway 16 had been dubbed by the locals. And Asuka of course countered with the story of the combat against the 6th Angel every time. The gasps when she –with only slight embellishments- described grappling the thing on Over the Rainbow before sinking under the water, getting swallowed, ripping its mouth open and being flung a thousand feet into the air by a gigantic nuclear detonation had continually won her thunderous applause from groups of admires…and protests from Kaji as the number of progressive knife strikes she had managed to put in again Gaghiel rose from zero to fifteen by the end of her retellings.

The fact that he had been in the cockpit as well was mostly the punch line after she had landed, turning around to find he was snoring.

Shinji wasn’t entirely sure if one could snore in LCL, but he just smiled and mockingly bowed in honor of her superior skill each time, finding the whole celebrity experience something of a novelty to enjoy with her.

Then they would go and dance together, though the sheer energy Asuka put into her efforts often left him calling a time out that earned in a playfully scornful look as she sighed and left the dance floor with him.

Now however, the dance floor was empty, light music circling through the room as the students finished off their dinners. Their table had been one of the first served –thank you Hikari- so they were mostly just waiting around watching the clock tick down…

“I hope we can get a final dance in,” Shinji spoke up as he fiddled with a fork against an empty plate, Toji having ‘liberated’ the remains of his fries when he turned his head for a few seconds to gaze at Asuka’s stunning profile yet again. He felt he had made a great deal of progress with her tonight, hoping that she had enjoyed it as much as he had…but he just felt something was still lacking. His impulsive ‘Goddess’ comment was sinking into history as every minute passed him by and he just couldn’t think of any way to make an impact on her…

“Right now Shinji, you’re thinking ‘how do I end this night’ aren’t you? Just tap the fork twice if you agree,” Kaji’s voice came from nowhere, almost making him jump. His ‘shadow’ had vanished for an hour or so without a word even when he had tried to talk to him but he was back.

Shinji tapped the fork against the table. Twice.

“In exactly twenty seconds, turn to Asuka and ask if you can have this final dance and you’ll be set. Oh, try not to screw this up, it’s probably the most single important thing you’ll do tonight. Have fun!”

Shinji made a mental note to hit Kaji in the face the next time he saw him for returning every one of his nervous emotions to life, with interest on where they had been waiting for Asuka in front of Rei’s place.

He sat and went over the line several times as he counted agonizingly second after second, took a deep breath and stood, turning to face her questioning look.

“Asuka…may I have this final dance?” he got out in a surprisingly smooth voice, holding out a hand, part of him noticing that there was no music as yet and cursing himself for jumping the gun, but not daring to sit down.

Asuka opened her mouth, probably to point out that there wasn’t any music, when the speakers started up again and a soft slow drum beat started to play.

Her expression became somewhat amused, but as she sat there and listened it softened quickly, before she looked back at him with an unfamothable expression, before getting to her feet without a word and accepting his hand.

They got a moderate amount of attention as they walked through the tables, but when they stepped out onto the dance floor as a series of synthesized strings started up; Shinji felt every eye in the room tracking him as they walked to the center.

Asuka turned to face him and Shinji started to move to take her left hand with his right, but she pre-empted him by carefully, almost delicately wrapping her hands around his neck, forcing him to swallow slightly and place his hands ever so lightly on her hips.

“You asked me to dance, so hold me,” she said in an odd tone that caused him to flash back at once to a memory from her mind as the 16th Angel destroyed it…

(“Why are you there?!”)-

(“You won't do anything! You won't help me!”)-

(“You won't even hold me!”)-

No…not this time he decided…and throwing aside his nerves, he gently, but firmly, pulled her closer, getting a surprised but pleased look as she cocked her head, then smiled as the vocals started.

They were in English so Shinji didn’t have a clue, but Asuka clearly approved…and as they started to sway around the floor slowly, utterly unconcerned about what anyone else might think as Asuka lay her head on his shoulder, her eyes open as she once again enjoyed the warmth of his body against hers, letting the words of the song wash over her…

‘I’ve never seen you looking so lovely as you did tonight …’

‘I’ve never seen you shine so bright... …’





Fifteen meters above them in the catwalks, manipulating events from the Shadows as he always did, Kaji grinned as he watched the two dancing. He knew Asuka well enough to see that the absurdly formidable walls around her heart were starting to waver as she danced with Shinji alone under the spotlights under the catwalk. He had picked this song with much care, finding it so excruciatingly perfect that he suspected some kind of karma had been at work when the DJ had let him flip through his CD collection earlier in the night.

The fact that Asuka was one of the few people in the room who would understood the words, was just a bonus.

‘I’ve never seen so many men ask you if you wanted to dance’

‘Looking for a little romance, given half a chance…’

Lifting his radio to his mouth, he gave his final instructions for the night to the Third Child, finding this to be the most entertainment he had had for a very long time…and the utterly least possible thing he could do to try and help Shinji find some enjoyment, in a life which could at best be described, on a good day, as ‘FUBAR’.

“Just dance it out, hold her, don’t say anything unless she does, I’m outta here, have a nice night,” he signed off, killing the radio and starting to stand up from the railing he had been leaning against-

“You,” a familiar female voice accused from behind him. Long practice let him keep calm and not jump over the railing on top of the Second and Third Children. Turning around, he found Misato looking as appealing as she had ever looked, the dress hugging her rather impressive figure and her hair swirling most enticingly down her hair.

But after Shinji had detailed the heroic actions that had led to her bleeding to death, exchanging her life for his as the JSSDF hunted him down; it had become an excruciating exercise to hold his sarcastic, sloppy façade in place every time he looked at her.

It gave him some small insight into the steel that must be in Shinji’s spine, if he was able to live with both Misato and Asuka. If he was able to find the strength to face them one day at a time and just take one more step forward…

“Well I have to admit I’m impressed you managed to track me down,” he smirked as he stepped out, casually slipping the radio into his pocket without her seeing it-

“It was you all along,” Misato repeated, crossing her arms in front of him and not quite glaring, but definitely holding him with an intense stare as she slowly shook her head with a look of disbelief on her face.

‘I have never seen that dress you're wearing’

‘Or the highlights in your hair that catch your eyes…’

‘I have been blind…’

“That scene at the shopping center, where Asuka asked Shinji to the dance…” Misato said, slowly walking towards him. “Some of his, how shall we say, actions tonight…with Asuka,” Misato continued, glancing down at the blissfully happy children rotating slowly and feeling her anger reduce, despite himself at the fact that regardless of how they were brought together, they were clearly at least having fun.

‘Lady in Red…is dancing with me…’

She made another mental note to thank Asuka for easing up on the War on Shinji for the night, and then turned her glare back on Kaji at full force.

Although he maintained his slightly smug expression, Kaji knew from long experience that that look was a rather serious one. And he knew perfectly well that Misato was willing to kill to protect Shinji.

This meant he probably had ten seconds to explain why she shouldn’t put a bullet in his kneecap.

“I didn’t do anything more then help Shinji be confident enough to stand up to Asuka,” he replied, letting the smug tone drop.

“Go on,” Misato ordered with look that suggested she was listening, but he was on very thin ice.

“I’m sure you know that Shinji wanted to ask Asuka out the second he met her on Over the Rainbow,” he started without preamble, getting a nod that was cool, but edged with the faintest curiosity.

Kaji took the opening and dropped his tone into utter seriousness.
“Then you know that despite how much Asuka may love to flaunt herself off as the desire of any man, she is desperately afraid of letting anyone get close to her. You also know just how similar she and Shinji are to each other, what they both went through as kids and how quickly they’ve been forced to grow up.”

Misato just continued to stare at him with a level expression, but she did not look away and he could tell he was getting through to her, as much as she might not want him to make sense. Taking a step towards her, he held her gaze and refused to flinch away, recognizing her anger was little more then a mask for her concern over his intentions with ‘her’ kids.

“Shinji came to me for help to get through to Asuka. I didn’t talk to her; I didn’t tell him anything about her, or her history, I care about her too much to betray her confidence, even for Shinji. I agreed to help him because frankly, they might just be able to find something worthwhile out of this whole insanity of using kids as Eva pilots.”

Misato just stared at him for a good thirty seconds as the dance continued below, seeking something that she apparently found as her face softened slightly and she shook her head, almost in disbelief.

“Whatever happened to the Ryoji Kaji whose idea of ‘responsibility’ was skipping a week of lectures to fool around with his new girlfriend from dawn to dusk?”

“Ask yourself what happened to the girl who was just as eager to fool around with him back then and you’ll have your answer,” he replied, giving her a slight nod before heading for the door, noting with a bit of amusement the look of stunned surprise that came across her face with his utter lack of an attempt to grab her and kiss her into submission she expected.

“What. That’s it? No complements? No flirting? No annoying coming onto me?”

Misato sounded strangely both pleased and upset, causing him to stop and glance half over his shoulder with a slight smile on his face.

“Not today Misato…if both of us are still alive after the Angels stop coming, give me a call,” he said, keeping the look on his face until the door was shut behind him, granting himself all of five seconds to let his face fall to a bleak depression as he leaned against the wall, suddenly feeling old.

God he loved that woman.

But all it took to get him walking back down the stairs with straightened shoulders was the memory of Shinji’s testimony, when he reached the bit about how both of them had finally gotten back together, then him dying a matter of days later and utterly destroying her.

Well that his new, modified roadmap to starting over with her.

Step one, defeat the Angels.

Step two, Kill Keel.

Step three, Kill Gendo.

After their confessions of course.

And step four, get a bunch of flowers and start to try and make up for years of screwing around the love of his life.





Not that far away, the Second and Third Children were oblivious to the thoughts running through Kaji’s mind as he entertained himself with recall the various methods of executing war criminals the UN still sanctioned, or Misato’s mind as she wondered who the hell that man was and where Ryoji Kaji had gone. Their concerns were entirely ‘local’ to an area only a few meters in radius.

Asuka had long since placed her head on his shoulder and closed her eyes, breathing deeply. Only the fact that she still kept a solid grip on his shoulders and moved her legs in perfect time with the music let him know she was awake and aware, Asuka apparently perfectly happy to just listen and dance.

Shinji also quietly reflected that holding Asuka like this, her perfect scent overwhelming him also wasn’t exactly a bad way to end this school dance for him. He had no idea what the song was about, guessing it was some kind of love song, but while Asuka spoke fluent English, she wasn’t sharing with him and he was disinclined to break the mood by asking for a running commentary.

“Shinji…” she asked softly into his ear, causing him to shiver. From the sensation or from sudden stress, he didn’t quite know.

“Asuka,” he replied, not daring to say anything else. Since Kaji had left him, he suddenly felt like he was on a tightrope, walking across one of NERV’s many bottomless shafts in Central Dogma, without a net.

“What…” she asked slowly, “do I mean to you?”

‘Oh…fuck’ was the first thought that came to his mind. To say that was a loaded question was a bit of an understatement.

But Kaji’s advice came back.

Speak from the heart.

And don’t say the L word, DON’T say the L word!

“You mean…a great deal to me,” he admitted softly into her ear, forcing himself not swallow, not shake and not fall to the ground whimpering. “I think of you as a close friend”.

“How close?” she asked, her head shifting off his shoulder to move in front of him, her eyes looking into his. Not in hostility, but with a definite tension behind them that let him know that regardless of what he had just thought, lying to her would be the biggest mistake of his lives right now…even as he knew that if he said “because I love you”, she would think it utterly insincere and slam her walls up higher then she had ever built them.

“If it had been anyone but you who asked me to this dance, I would have turned them down” he told her, holding her gaze levelly. “I just…I just don’t think any of the students in our year could understand what I’ve, what we’ve been through.”

He paused for a nanosecond, debating bringing up Rei before deciding that he had to clarify the statement before Asuka drew her own conclusions about their ‘relationship’.

“Well except Rei,” he amended his statement quickly, “but she is much more like, well, a Sister I never knew I had. I don’t feel for her in the same way I feel around you.”

The air was becoming dangerously charged between them as Asuka narrowed her eyes. Not in hostility so much,but as if she was trying to see through him; he felt like he had been placed under a gigantic microscope.

“And how,” she asked quietly, “do I make you feel?”

“Alive,” he answered in just as quiet a tone with utterly sincerity, congratulating himself on finding a word that supplied an idea of how he felt that didn’t sound corny or insincere, before he broke the visual standoff and glanced away, feeling his face flush with a surge of emotions, continuing to dance, but feeling like he was dancing on egg shells.

Asuka continued to stare at him for a few seconds as he managed to bring his face back around, studying him before she nodded slightly and leaned forward again, once again placing her head on his shoulder…and perhaps even tightening her grip slightly as she sighed and muttered “good” into his ear.

Asuka…let down her walls.

It was the hardest thing she had ever had to do. For most of a decade, she had built them as high and as thick as she possibly could, trying desperately to keep everyone out…or herself in, she just didn’t know.

But for the next two minutes and fifteen seconds of the song, she just relaxed into Shinji’s arms and closed her eyes, secure in his grip that he would not let her fall or try to do anything to her.

And not because he feared her or because he would need to work with her later, or live with her…

But because he respected her.

She didn’t kid herself that they really had any chance of a real relationship in the long term, or that they even really had anything now, beyond the shared pain of a childhood both would rather forget and a fifty meter tall burden they had to carry, because no-one else could.

But for the next few minutes…she could at least pretend they did.
And so just listened, and danced.

‘Lady in red is dancing with me...cheek to cheek’

‘There's nobody here’

‘It's just you and me’

‘It's where I wanna be’

‘And I hardly know’

‘This beauty by my side’

‘I'll never forget the way you look tonight’

Finally, the song ended and she returned to reality, slowly letting go and feeling a similar sort of reluctance from Shinji, both of them blinking slightly as they looked around and found several dozen other couples had appeared on the dance floor and continued to dance, another slow dance from Japan this time, started up.

“Let’s go home,” she said simply, offering him her hand, again something that may or may not last beyond the night…but while the rules were suspended…

He accepted it and they headed off the floor, Asuka noting with a flicker of her ego which she had chained to the floor, that almost every person in the room was looking at them with expressions from envy to heartbroken, with the exceptions of the relatively few dozen people on the dance floor, who might have just found some kind of happiness.

Asuka wished them luck, as she reunited with the quartet and Misato…and the six Section Two agents who just appeared from nowhere again, heading out to the Limo and home.





Shinji yawned as he stepped out of the bathroom, noting that the clock was nearing midnight and giving thanks that Tommorow was not a school day as he headed out into the corridor, making for his room.

He and Asuka hadn’t said a word to each other outside of ‘housekeeping’ such as organizing the showers and their collective farewells to their friends on the way home, the Limo taking a circular route around Tokyo-3 to drop them off one by one. To his delight, Toji and Hikari had said little the whole trip, Toji just keeping and arm wrapped around a slightly tired Hikari as she leaned into his chest…a pose reversed and mirrored with a slightly amused looking Rei holding her date, Kensuke finally looking like his brain had just shut down from the overload, though he did manage to stumble in his front door with a wave back and a chaste kiss on the cheek from Rei.

Rei had of course been the last to be dropped home, sliding out of the limo and heading inside with a slight smile on her face the whole way that gave Shinji enormous hope that he might have just shoved an Eva sized stop sign in the way of his Father and SEELE, while Misato, had actually said goodnight to Kaji as he opened her door in a tone with rather little in the way of spite or flirting on either side that had rather confused him.

But Asuka…

Putting it out of his mind, he turned to head for his room…and there was Asuka, studying him in a rather simple T-Shirt and shorts that did rather little to detract from her beauty in his mind.

“So. That was a fun night,” she offered him, Shinji trying not to sigh at the fact that her walls had clearly gone back up…though he was heartened by the fact that he didn’t think they were nearly as high as they had been even this morning.

“I’m glad you asked me to go,” he said in complete honesty.

“Of course you are,” she rolled her eyes, albeit with a twitch of a smile on her face, levering off the wall and strolling towards him slowly, before she let the grin fall back off to a more…serious expression, Shinji not daring to move, that ‘deer in headlights’ situation that so often occurred with him around Asuka once again seizing his limbs as she closed and stopped.

“Did you mean it?” she asked simply, her vibrant eyes again making him feel like he was under a microscope. “Or was it just something you said in the heat of a slow dance. I’m not going to get angry or-”

“I meant every word I said,” he replied without waiting for her to finish her defensive proclamation.

Asuka studied him, then let a slight smile come onto her face as she leaned in quickly…and kissed him softly.

On his cheek.

“Thanks for the night Baka,” she sighed into his ear with a smirk in her tone, stepping around him to her bedroom.

“Bitte schön,” he replied a few seconds later to her back.

She stopped, but didn’t turn, Shinji catching a tiny part of the tight smile on her face as she shut the door behind her, before he headed into his room and flopped onto his bed, savoring that single, chaste kiss on his cheek, feeling it throb for many, many hours before he finally fell to sleep.

Asuka on the other hand, for the first time on a Futon, fell to sleep at once, into a sleep once again devoid of any of the specters that had haunted her so many times.