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platypus3333
platypus3333@yahoo.com
http://platypus3333.tripod.com
Kangae: Gendou is in its final stages. In the meantime, here's the next part in the
series. This story is a little nuts right now. I was in an extremely bad mood when I wrote it.
It's also really short... as always, please send me C&C...
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Kangae: Shinji
Or
The Bull
Part 1
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We hide. We hide under our pretense of civilization, adopting society's manners in a
futile effort to appear, outwardly, normal. Controllable. And yet... held inside every one of
us there is a wild animal, an uncontrollable, passionate force, waiting to be released. We feel
it when we get angry, our faces reddening, our fists fighting to clench, our teeth gnashing as
we try to run away. To hide from our nature. We feel it when we fall in love, or perhaps in
lust. The urge to just go and throw ourselves upon the other like a stallion with a mare,
ignoring all shades of what we think ourselves to be and what we were trained to be. We like to
believe ourselves passive- everyone does- or, at the very least, contained. You know this,
don't you? Every time you get angry or excited or anxious, you think this to yourself. "I am
calm," you say. "In control of my emotions." Sometimes, you even take a deep breath and count to
ten. But then something inside of you, deep inside of you, laughs at you and tells you that's
not so, you're not calm, you're not in control, and that that little something would escape soon
enough, unchain itself, manifest itself, and rip apart the screens of "humanity" you've striven
so hard to put up. You know this. There are no exceptions: we are all alike underneath, raging
cauldrons threatening to just boil over, to explode. You know this. I know this. We know this.
This is our nature, our most base knowledge, our most base facet.
There are no exceptions. Not even if you're a Child. Like me, for example.
My name is Shinji Ikari, or Ikari Shinji if you prefer to hear it the Japanese way.
It makes no difference, really. Names are nothing, just another facade, a false meaning to
bind ourselves by. A cage, a prison, iron chains to hold ourselves to what people think us
to be. But cages open, prisoners released, iron melted. The true measure of a person is how
long he or she lasts in the cage, as is the same with a prisoner: it's self explanatory. A
prisoner. You're already trapped, you're already caught, you're already facing probable greater
punishment. There's nothing left to do, really, but tough it out and see how long you last
before you finally crack. Before you go insane and scream and start trying to kill those next
to you and trying, desperately, to get out, to get out, to get out, to get out. To get out of
the prison, get out of the cage, get out into the whole wide world where you're free. That's
what I'd like to do. But me...
I'm still trying to last. I probably won't last much longer: I'm not that strong.
But I'm still here, I'm still toughing it out, and I have been doing so for the past 14 years.
I won't last much longer, I'm sure. I'm not that strong.
Right now I'm standing in front of my father: more accurately, I'm glaring at my father,
fighting the desperate urge to take my backpack and throw it at his head. Maybe, with luck,
I'll bean him and make him drop the 35 feet onto the platform I'm on. Maybe, with luck, the fall
will kill him. Maybe, with luck, the last thing he sees is my face, cold, dark, the years of
his absence from my life manifested. But a part of me doesn't want to kill him, really. A part
of me wants to get to him, to hug him and see if he'll hug me back. Maybe he will, maybe he won't
. That's immaterial right now, I guess. He's up there, I'm down here, and that's the way it's
been and the way it'll probably continue to be. Now, we're both trying to appear strong, each
holding up an invisible, impenetrable wall, trying to look strong, trying to see who'll crack
first. It's a challenge for both of us, wild wolves circling around each other in our minds,
waiting, anticipating the other's leap.
Damn him. Damn him. I know what I'm here for, I knew it since he called me. Or, at
least, I knew the part that mattered. We weren't here for some great, human, family reunion,
exchanging hugs and kisses and presents and kind words and all that other shit I really don't
understand; I haven't experienced any of it, to my knowledge. We were here, in fact, because
he needed me to do something for him. I thought so. I really shouldn't... the animal inside
snarls and growls and tells me what I should do for him... but I can't help it. A part of me
still wants him to smile at me, I guess. A part of me still wants some acceptance, some
acknowledgement.
Damn him. He knows exactly how I work. He probably knows how everything works.
He knows the buttons to push, how people will react, how people won't react, what people
will do with each other. My father. The grand manipulator, the grandmaster chess player with
the world as his board. He probably cheats, too. Damn him. I can't think of anything else to
say. Damn him. Damn him. Damn him. Damn him. Damn him.
Finally, inevitably, it's me that breaks down, that looks away sadly. Damn him. He would never
let me win. Never. I can't run away now...
That bastard...
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I met a girl today. Her name is Asuka. She talks quite a bit. In fact, in the entire
period of time I've known her- which, granted, is not significantly long- she has not stopped.
It is, quite honestly, starting to annoy me. Talk, talk, talk, talk. That's all she does,
really- well, that and suck up to authority and smack me around. How in hell do you smack
around someone you barely know? Jesus. And I thought I had anger management problems. It's
like all the spine in my body was sucked out at young age and surgically implanted into hers.
Talk, talk, talk. Smack, smack, smack. Right now it's the former. She's bragging, of all
things, about being an Evangelion pilot. I understand that even less. Why would anyone brag
about being stuffed, just when puberty hits, into a liquid filled chamber with orders to
fight huge monsters? It's like she's happy some asshole managed to coerce her, at a young and
impressionable age, into risking her life on a totally randomized basis. She's trapped too,
she's a prisoner. The irony is, she has no idea as to her captivity. She thinks she's special
or something, in a unique group of people that comprises a small percentage of the population.
Hell. So are rape victims. And I seriously doubt they brag about their status.
The sad part is, even animals in zoos are smarter than her about this. They can tell
they're trapped, you can see it in their eyes. The way they look at you, all pitifully. "We're
trapped," their eyes tell you. "We know it. You know it. Sure, we get it good here. That's what
it looks like."
And then, you probably ask them what in hell they're talking about (in your mind, of course.
No matter how nuts or insane you know you really are, you refuse to show it to others.)
"Well," they'll start in an amiable fashion. "Like we said: it looks like we got it good in
here, in these cages. We have no food problems, no survival problems, no hunter guys waiting
to use our pelts as hats."
Sure, you agree. That makes sense, right? You ask them to continue.
"But then, you see, even if we get fed in these cages, we survive in these cages, we aren't
hunted in these cages... we ARE still in cages, in the end. We're trapped here, and I'll be
damned if those guys sitting in yonder office, sipping their filtered Colombian bean juice
or whatever, are willing to let us get back into the wild."
Sure, you agree. That, too makes sense. But then you wonder: why would they WANT to get out
of these cages? Aren't they fed, don't the survive, isn't there an astounding shortage of
guys with rifles walking about? You ask them this.
"Here, let me put it this way. Yeah, we get all these nice amenities, yeah, we eat the same
stuff we do back out there. But it's different, you know? It's different."
How so, you ask.
"Back out there we were free. We got to do whatever the hell we wanted, whether play a game
of chicken with a moving vehicle- something I hear deer still indulge in- or eat food that's
bad for us or screw around with people's minds by setting up paw marks that look suspiciously
like addition. Back out there..." The animal will look at you, straight at you, and you can
see the hatred in its eyes, hidden behind that veil of resignation. "Back out there we were
free to do whatever we wanted. That's all we ever asked. Hunters... guh. What kind of idiotic
judicial system cages the victim?" The animal would pause and stare off into space, thinking
fondly of its homelands. Or maybe the animal would stare at some imported plant, trying to
imagine what life would be like without all the humans, what life would be like back home.
But they're safe here, right? Safe from the hunters. They'd be dead without humans. You smile
and marvel at the inherent kindness of people. And then, some thought nags at you in the back
of your mind. Wait, you think. What species were the hunters? You blink a little. They're
people, just like you. They're humans, just like you and the people who work at the zoo. Humans
have succeeded in rescuing animals from themselves, in the process trapping said animals,
taking them, stripping of all they once had and what made them so valuable and beautiful to
watch in the first place. You get it, now. It's people. People screw with the animals, people
have messed up their very lifestyle.
Then the animal looks back at you and pauses at something in your eyes. "Yeah, I think maybe
you get it." It blinks once, maybe twice. "Humans are just another animal, aren't they? They
want to do the same thing as us. Selfish bastards."
You respond with an inquisitive look. How so, you ask plaintively.
"Well, now." The animal settles back. "You eat junk food, right? Don't even try to lie." It
looks at you. "Sure you do. Sure you do. You people throw those foil things into the trash
all the time, right?"
You nod, uncertain of where this is going but still with a slight inkling of what is being
suggested.
"We do too." The animal nods wisely to itself, then nibbles on a little lettuce, or whatnot.
"Also, we like to have fun and to take risks and to just, in general, mess around and have
fun with our lives." Then it looks off into the distance again, its mind drifting. "But you
bastards... you stupid bastards. Always screwing up everything around you. All you do is kill
and hate and rob and act so bloody superior. But you're no better than us, you know. You just
got a good hand, and can't stop crowing about it. Stupid, selfish bastards. If you don't trap
us you trap each other. It just never stops, does it? Stupid, stupid bastards. Who in hell
gave YOU the right? Who in hell gave you the right to make yourselves feel good, feel...
human... at our expense?" And then it ignores you, turns back to doing whatever it was doing.
And you think to yourself: stupid, stupid, selfish, bloody, bastards. Who gave you the right?
Who gave you the right.
Who... gave... you... or us... all of us... the right.
We are all just caged, all just animals on the inside. We're like special exhibits, we do
things for others to look at and enjoy and maybe spit upon. She just doesn't get that,
understand that. Asuka, I mean. She just doesn't. I can tell: I'm looking at her right now.
She's still talking about how damned special she is. She looks smug, like she has since
I met her. People that have even the tiniest inkling of all the shit they're in don't look
smug. People with even a little comprehension look tortured, tormented, trapped, like wild
animals. Asuka, however- she looks like she owns the damned zoo. I can't stand it. I just
can't stand it.
It's kind of like Charlie Brown... this 20th century comic strip character. He was a
pathological loser, almost like it was his job to make people feel good about themselves.
He was almost never, ever happy for more than 30 minutes at a time. Damn, sad, huh? He's
also the smartest guy I've ever seen, heard, or read about. Brown knew what life was ABOUT.
Life was not winning all the time, being happy, having smiles pasted on your face like some
demented arts and crafts project. No. Life was the exact opposite. Life was losing. Life was
watching someone else smile- usually at your own expense. Reality hit this guy- and me- at a
disturbingly early age. It's almost like we're born to be lonely, born to lose, born to die
sad and pathetic.
See... now, to extend the metaphor, Asuka is the real-life equivalent of this character
called "Lucy." I won't get into that right now. Asuka.
...She's not that bad to look AT, actually. In fact, she's downright gorgeous. Too bad her
personality more than compensates for this generous distribution of physical beauty. I
wondered about that the minute I met her. What was with this world, I asked myself. All the
most beautiful girls suffered from psychological problems so frightening that Freud would've
just jumped off a bridge, sick of it all. It's weird, that's what it is. In case you need some
clarification, here we go. Misato is a slob, and she spent several years in an institution
staring at her feet. Rei... damn. I don't even want to start with her. Asuka suffers from
constant PMS. Maya... well, actually, Maya is okay, but I seriously think she's a lesbian or
something. Ritsuko... Jesus, she's either a lesbian or in love with my dad. MY DAD. You can't
get worse than that. Falling in love with my dad is like falling into a meat grinder. It might
be thrilling at first, and even when you touch the blades they might scratch some itch you
happened to have on the top of your head. But, over time... it starts to hurt. It starts to
hurt and hurt and finally you just can't feel anything anymore, you're just... dead.
I sure wish I was like that. Unfeeling, I mean. I'm not sure about the dead thing.
Yet, I mean. I'm not sure yet.
I really wish she would stop talking about her job.
It's starting to bother me.