Hi again,
Here's another short one that I'm kind of stuck with. Feedback on
where to go with this would be greatly appreciated. It's "set" after
an alternate ending to EoE.
Not a *happy* alternate ending.
Usual copyright song and dance.
The Last Letter
A Neon Genesis Evangelion Fanfic
by Sparky Clarkson
Hello everyone,
I know it has been some time since I last wrote you all. Shortly
after my last letter, I fell on the stairs at my home and broke my
hip. Centuries of human medicine have never been able to prevent such
accidents, nor have they really managed to make them easier to deal
with. I spent a month surrounded by doctors, their white coats
flocking around me like... I suppose you know what they reminded me
of. Even now, that memory fills my heart with dread. Doctors do
little to allay my discomfort--they keep their faces grim, but the
odd fire that kindles in their eyes as they speak of the
uncomfortable treatments they'll have to perform makes me think they
are all secretly gleeful at the bad news.
After some time, they managed to fix the bone, though I can't really
walk all that well anymore. Mari--that's Touji's daughter, remember-
-she made me move into a new house that doesn't have any stairs. The
Prime Minister paid for the new place, but moving was a hassle. Mari
and some of the movers kept asking about the leather chest, wanting
me to open it. Some people can't take no for an answer. I suppose I'm
one of them--the penalty for my sin is having to deal with people as
bullheaded as I became
I still remember those first days after the last battle, not so much
for what I did then as for how I felt. I can still recall the oddness
of it--the powerful grief, growing into even more powerful anger.
Even now, the shadow of that emotion washes over me. How could they
have done such a thing to us, to you? With that anger as my strength,
I chased after the truth until everything came into the open. It took
fifty years for everything to come out, for me to wash clean the
names of those who were innocent, and to make sure the names of the
guilty were blackened forever.
I could not save you, so I saved your memories. Misato, do you know
you are a national hero of Japan? I suppose I've told you already...
Mari showed me her daughter's schoolbook the other day, and there you
were in the section on recent history. It's a first-grade book, and I
must say, the dress you're wearing is most inappropriate. Asuka has
her own following--almost every European who interviews me asks about
her first.
People still have visions of Rei. Last year in Mexico, more people
saw Rei than the Virgin. The Catholic church is considering naming
her a saint--since nobody can confirm or deny her status as a member
of their church, they think it's okay.
By the time I had cleared those who needed it, I had grown old--old
and tired. I had spent so long fighting to save the memories that
they were all I had left when I was done. I suppose I regret that a
little, but all the people I truly loved died in Tokyo-3. I suppose I
began this because of that. Unable to see your faces, I hoped that by
putting my thoughts down on paper I could communicate with you, to
say in ink the words I never had a chance to say in person.
Since the move, I have been even more tired. I do not like this
house. It has too many dark corners, too few windows. I need the
light, crave the kiss of the sun, but now I only sit inside with
nothing to do. The media and historians come to bother me less and
less, but those who do visit drain me more than any others ever did.
I suppose that artists feel this way when their masterworks are
finished. My life's work was the truth. Once it was exposed, all I
had left were the ghosts and shades that led me to it.
I cannot live like that anymore. When people around the world cursed
your names, I felt that your spirits still walked the earth, made
restless by the injustice. I could sense you around every corner, in
every shadow. Even last year, before my final report, I felt that I
could almost see two pairs of red eyes watching me from the dark
corners of the bureaucratic burial grounds I was rummaging through.
Now, though... now that you have all been exonerated, I do not feel
you near me anymore. It seems silly, but I miss your spirits more
than I missed your bodies.
I hope it has not been in vain. The world looks kindly on you now, so
you rest peacefully, but that's not what I worry about. I wonder
sometimes if you all knew how much I loved you, how much it tore me
apart to see you hurt. These letters, my work... they were the only
ways I had of letting you know. I hope you do.
These letters... when I fold this one, put it in its blue envelope,
and place it in the leather chest, it will be the 400th one. I
counted them the other week, starting with the 300th. It lends a kind
of symmetry, I think. This *should* be my last letter.
I hope it is. Every day, I feel a great longing in my heart to see
your faces again, to hear the music of your voices. Without you, my
life is empty, as it was before I met you. And at the same time, I
feel myself growing weaker, as if the pain has at last weakened my
heart to the point of collapse. I hope that some night soon, one last
angel will come and collect his harvest. Then I can have the one, the
only desire of my life: to see you and say those words I could not
say before. Those three, simple words.
Farewell, then, Misato, Asuka, Rei, Kaji, mother, Kaoru... Tonight,
perhaps, I will die. I welcome that fate. I am tired, and lonely, and
I so want to see you all again.
Love,
Shinji
<sniff>
Sparky
*********
"Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent."--Isaac Asimov
Access Sparky's fanfiction, links galore, and all kinds of heresy
at Heaven's Gate!
http://sage_ohlmin.tripod.com/evafic.htm
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