All characters, situations, etc.  are property of Ganiax and other people.

A teenny, tiny spoiler ahead, nothing major ^_-


Manipulations

        Hmmm.  I wonder what he would think of me now.  Would he think I
was insane or just stupid?  Would he think that I have no idea of the
results of my actions?  Or would he try to stop me?  I think I already know
the answer to that one.
        How long ago did we meet?  A year?  Two?  More?  It's getting hard
to rememeber things.  Important things, important people.  Like him.  I
can't remember how we meet, or what we did, but I do remember that the
prospects didn't look good at the time...
        Ah, I do remember!  I'd heard of his reputation, but had never met
the man personally.  One day I was in a real hurry, late for nearly
everthing that day, and I rounded a corner, too fast... WHAM!  I didn't
know what had hit me, I just fell backwards and landed on my butt.  Hard.
He had fallen as well, but landed in one of the chairs that lined the
hallway.
        The next thing I knew, he was behind me, helping me up.  His arms
wrapped around my shoulders and he pulled me to my feet, he was that
strong.  I looked up to thank him, but only got as far as his eyes.  God,
they were beautiful; deep and dark orbs that seemed to take in everything
and gave nothing.  I'd never seen a man have those kind of eyes.  Of
course, other men did date me, but they didn't last.  I usually drove them
away by my odd hours or rambling about sujects they had no clue about.
        It seemed like hours I stared at them, and I'm sure that if he'd
let me go, I would've fallen again.  But then he just looked at me for a
moment and then asked me if I was alright.  I tried to open my mouth and
answer him, but my body just didn't want to do what I told it to.  I
imagine that I must've looked like a moron or some geek, but he didn't say
anything.  Eventually I managed to stagger an apology and run off, but I
really wasn't thinking of anything in particular.  I couldn't.  I just kept
thinking back to his eyes.
        My friends saw me run up to them, and asked where I had been.  I
couldn't tell them, but I think the heat that was slowly covering my face
told them something.  They looked at each other, grinned, and looked back
to me.  They asked me if I was alright, and were perplexed when I laughed.
I doubled over in mirth at being asked the same question in thirty seconds.
They definitly knew something was up when I had to sit down or fall down.
        When I finally stopped laughing and wiped a tear from my face, I
asked them if they knew anything about him.  They knew about as much as I
did, but wanted to know why I was asking.  They wanted to know if I had a
thing for him.  Now that I think of it, I probably did.  After we had
lunch, I went back to work.  I didn't tell them anything, much to their
disappointment.  At work, I asked some other people, but no one could tell
me anything.
        It was some weeks before I saw him again, but I did.  It was in the
same hallway, at the same corner in fact, and I walked up to him.  Just
when I was about to call out to him, he turned around and looked at me,
asking if he could help with anything.  I could feel the heat rise to my
face, burning hotter than when my friends were talking to me before, and
tried to thank him.  I had to try several times, but eventually I suceeded.
He only smiled at me and nodded his head.  He turned to leave, but for
some reason I called out to him, asking him if he was buisy.  He looked
back and frowed a little, saying he didn't and asked why I'd asked.
        After several more false starts, sheer nervousness, I asked him if
he would join me in a walk outside.  He seemed to think about it, and then
looked like he was going to say no.  My heart gave a little flutter at the
thought, but then nodded and said yes.  We must've walked around in circles
for hours, discussing this and that, and eventually he asked me what I did.
I answered him and asked him the same thing.  He told me that he did some
research, but I got the feeling that he was hiding something.
        Eventually, I had to be going, but we made plans to meet again in
three days.  It wasn't until I got home that it hit me.  A date!  I was
going on a date!  And with someone who had a good idea about what I was
talking about.  It was late, and I went to sleep dreaming of him.
        It wasn't for a few months after we were dating that I started to
find out more about him, and didn't like what I was hearing.  For a while
it seemed like he was only interested in me because of those people that I
worked for, and for a few days I was not the same person.  But, I
eventually calmed down, and then rational thought started to kick in.  If
he was going to use me, why coudn't I use him?  I was starting to know what
he was capable of, and those things did have uses for what I was planning.
I knew what my backers wanted for the future and had no taste for it.  When
I woke up the next morning, I realized something, I had real feelings for
him.  I loved him.
        I'm almost positive that he found out what I was planning, but he
didn't show it.  Actually, now that I think of it, it probably pleased him
immensly.  Together we were accomplishing things that would've taken us
years to do seperatly, if at all.  Together we brought the greatest minds
in the world together and put their collective geinus to work in the
directions we wanted.
        It came as no surprise that we married.  On that day, I knew that
we both had real feelings for each other, and that we weren't just
manipuling the other for our own ends.  The project was comming along, and
soon it was bearing fruit.  Just as I did a few months later when Shinji
was born.
        For years we worked tirelessly towards our goal when I made a
startling discovery.  He was starting to think as our backers did.  At
first I tried to tell myself that I was seeing ghosts and conspericies
where there were none.  But the data soon became more numerious and I knew
that I couldn't just close my eyes like it wasn't there and hope that it
went away by itself.  I had to do something about it.  If he started
thinking that way, then humanity was finished.
        For days I thought of what I could do with nothing coming to mind.
Then, new orders came from our superiors and everything fell into place.  I
knew then what I must do.  I looked at it from all angles, hoping that
something else would happen that would change what I was planning.  But
nothing did.  I started my preparations when he walked in the door and
looked over my shoulder.  I didn't realize that he was there until he
started talking.  I swear I must've leapt five feet out of my chair, I was
so nervous.  I started to shout at him for sneaking up on me, but he simply
stood there, calmly, and kissed me on the lips when I was finished.  I was
so shocked that I just stood there, doing nothing.  I hoped and prayed that
he didn't see what was on my moniter, so I shifted around to hide it while
discussing so trivial that I don't remember what it was.
        He left soon, and I just stood there, listning to my own heart
pounding.  It didn't take me long to regain control over myself and put
myself back to work, but I couldn't think of anything other than him.  How
I loved him!  Tears came to my eyes as I typed away, thinking that I
shouldn't be doing this.  But I knew that if I didn't, no one would, and I
wouldn't be able to live with myself.  Knowing what he was going to do.  I
had to do something to change his thinking, to make him fight against our
backers.  I just wished that it could've been something that wouldn't do
this to him, but I couldn't think of anything else.
        When that morning finally came, I was calm about what was going to
happen.  I know I should've been hysterical, but I wasn't.  I knew what I
was doing was for the best, both humanities and his.  I knew that nothing
was going to go wrong, my calculations were perfect.
        When I climbed into the plug this morning, it was with the
knowledge that I was going to save humanity from itself.  Even now, as I
can feel the emptiness of Unit 1 pull at me, I know that I'm doing my part
to save the future.
        Me.  Yui Ikari.

End

Cory Holmes
gholmes@rodeo.sd27.bc.ca