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platypus3333
platypus3333@yahoo.com
http://www.evasource.net
this is bizarre, and nothing like anything else i've ever written. eva history is twisted and modified. there are also three ACC's in this fic. however, none of them serve to take the spotlight in any way. be proud. one of them made an appearance in Meaningless Tracks as a disgruntled ACC. try to guess which! as always, i need c&c, but i usually don't get much, so here's hoping...
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shinji ikari: revelations: part 1 of 2
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I do not hate my father. No one hates their father. No one hates their son. It's unnatural.
But many people THINK they do. I did.
And, as I'm lying on the sandy beach, staring at the murky red sky, trying to find the stars I know, I regret it.
---
He was God, omnipotent. Shinji Ikari, now on top of the world.
Only... he didn't want to be.
The boy huddled into a ball, clutching a small chained cross in his right hand.
He was in the middle of a crossroads to infinity- two paths, perpendicular to each other at this point. From what he could see, there was no indication that either ever ended; they extended far beyond the limits of his vision.
Along these paths were doors: plain, solid wooden doors, hanging in space, their brass knobs well-polished and beckoning for a hand to turn them.
There was nothing else; it was all a void. Shinji couldn't see a horizon, nor could he see a sky; everything was totally white, blank.
He frowned and hugged the cross to his heart, not knowing what else to do.
Just several minutes ago, the world had swirled around him- he had seen friends, enemies, people he had never even known- all looking at him, calling to him. He remembered their faces, every one. Begging, pleading with him. Hoping to make a deal.
Each had a hope, a dream, a wish to be granted.
What could be done?
'The power to do anything,' he thought to himself. 'And I have it.'
"Yes, you do, don't you," a man said. "You feel different?"
Shinji spun, his eyes widening. "Who?"
Gendou Ikari looked down. "..."
"Father..." the boy said slowly.
"What do you want to do now," his father asked, "You have anything, can do anything."
"I... I don't..." The boy fought for words. "I don't know what to DO, I... everyone wants something..."
A sigh. "Everyone always wants something," he said. "Get up." He made no move to help as the boy did so.
They stood there in silence, looking at each other, for several minutes. Finally, Shinji asked, confusedly: "Father?"
"What do YOU think."
"Are... are you..."
"Dead? No." Several more minutes passed, with Gendou staring directly at the boy's face. as if studying it. Then: "I suppose you're wondering what's going on."
"Yes..."
"Follow me," he said, turning and walking briskly down one of the paths.
Shinji did so, first placing the cross around his neck, then sprinting a little to catch up, then marching quickly to keep next to his father. "..."
"Third Impact has occurred, as I'm sure you know by now," he began suddenly.
"I know. All these people, I-"
"That was everyone in the world."
The boy paused a little to assimilate this. "What?"
"You are, of course, familiar with Revelations?"
"The Bible?"
Gendou frowned. "Yes, the Bible. Answer the question."
"Sort of."
"All the souls in the world, all that ever existed, are spilling out."
"Why?"
"To see you." He stopped at a door that looked like any other. Reaching out, he gripped the knob firmly and turned it, pushing. "Go in," he said, holding the door open.
Shinji looked at the man, then shook his head slightly and stepped through the doorway into a small, mundane hallway. He moved aside as his father followed him in, closing the door.
With a gesture, they began walking again.
Shinji looked around. "Where are we going?" he asked.
"To see your family," Gendou responded. "Or, rather, OUR family."
"My family?"
He ignored the question and opened another door, indicating Shinji's need to enter with a tilt of his head.
---
The boy did so, and frowned. "Rei?" 'No,' he then thought. 'Wrong.'
The girl smiled and brushed aside a strand of brown hair. "No, not Rei." Then, she wrinkled her nose in thought. "Well, kind of, I guess. Hello, father," she added over Shinji's shoulder. "She's waiting." With a careless thrust of her hand, she pointed at another door.
Gendou frowned, then nodded slightly to himself and departed silently, leaving the two children alone.
Shinji looked at the girl. 'Green eyes,' he thought. 'Strange!'
"I bet you're wondering why my eyes are green, huh?" She grinned brilliantly, showing off even white teeth.
"No."
"My name is Sen." She held out a hand, holding the other behind her back. "I don't know why my eyes are green either."
"Uh... right," he said. He took the hand. "I'm..."
"Shinji! Right, right." She maintained a firm grip and started dragging him along, back out the door into the hallway. "Well, they're gonna be talking for a while."
"Who?"
"Mom and Dad."
"Oh, uh... he's your dad?!"
She paused as she considered the question. "Yeah. why do you ask?"
"Because... ah... he also happens to be mine-"
"I know."
"You do?"
"Yeah."
"And- you don't-"
"Shinji, are you always this thick?"
"What? Thick? I dunno, why?"
She finally let go and spun around, a look of mock seriousness on her face. "Why? You ask why?" she demanded.
"Yes."
Sen rolled her eyes. "Nah."
"Why not?"
"Just because," she said brightly.
"Oh."
"Yep." She smiled again.
"Really?"
"Yeah!" The girl began walking down the hallway again. "Come on, this'll be interesting." She beckoned with her right hand.
The boy followed her. "Okay."
At the end, they made a right into what was apparently a crowded cafeteria. Numerous people milled about, taking some food and standing in line to pay. Yet more sat at shiny metal tables, talking, eating. Shinji looked around blankly, pondering the metaphysical possibilities of digesting food here. In the meantime, Sen skipped through the crowd, cutting in front of various men and women. One gave her an annoyed look, then shook his head and started up a conversation with the person next to him. "Hey, Shinji, over here," she yelled, waving to him from across the room.
Sighing, he threaded his way through and stopped next to her. "What," he said.
"You want something to eat?"
"No."
She ignored this. "Well, the pie here is really good. So're the mashed potatoes- in fact, the veggies. I wouldn't try the meat, though, it's weird." Spooning a large portion of both, as well as snatching a piece of bread, she handed him the plate.
Not knowing what else to do, he took it and stared. "Uh."
She took even more for herself, then nodded with a tilt of her head toward a small, empty table. "We can talk there."
They sat down carefully. Shnji watched as she started digging in, then frowned and prodded his pie. 'Oh well,' he thought, and took a bite. Delicious.
"Hey, I bet you're wondering what's going on, right?"
"Yes."
"Didn't he tell you?"
"Father?"
"Yeah."
"Kind of."
She leaned back in her chair and wiped her mouth carefully. Then, setting it down: "Well, it's weird stuff, really. Not that you're not used to that, of course."
"..."
"See, Rei... well, she kind of... argh. You know, right?"
"She got huge?"
"Yeah! That's good!" She took a sip of juice. "I wouldn't have thought about it like that!"
"Right."
"Huge is right. Major big. Like, godlike. Get what I'm saying?"
"Kind of."
"But Rei... Rei is kind of weird like that. She doesn't know what to do-"
"Neither do I!"
"Even less than you do," she said. "At least you know how to interact, how to deal with people."
"I do?!" This came across as quite a shock. He had never quite heard that said about him before-
"Well, okay, that's kind of an exaggeration. But at least you're better than her."
"Oh."
"At first, she figured- give everyone what they wanted. Make them each a personal Heaven. Sound good so far?"
"Yes." He swallowed some mashed potatoes.
"But that's WRONG. People don't WANT that. Perfection doesn't WORK."
"Perfection? What's wrong with perfection? Aren't they happy?"
"Well, yes, they're happy. Of course they are, it's heaven. But happiness is boring."
"Boring?!" He dropped his fork. "They don't want to be happy because it's BORING?!"
She smiled and cut off a piece of her pie with her fork. "Yep."
"That's stupid!"
"I wouldn't know." Her eyes flickered for an instant- and then she was back. "Anyway, that's how it was. And Rei was confused. They didn't want to be happy. They didn't want to be sad. So, what DID they want?"
"..."
"And there was only one person she could think of that she thought would really know. Everyone else would want power, glory. Few people want normality."
"So... me?"
"Yes, you. Who else doesn't want majesty, or to look really good, or to be all powerful?" Sen reached over and tapped him on the head. "You, my depressive little friend- power should only be given to those who don't want it."
He was silent for a moment. "So... Rei... where IS Rei? And Asuka?"
She laughed a little. "Ah, Asuka. What a bitch! I can't stand her, personally."
Shinji stared at his food.
"..." Sen peered at him.
"I thought she was fine," he said quietly. "I liked her."
She didn't say anything, only watched him thoughtfully.
"Where is she?" the boy asked. "Where are THEY?"
"You'll see them later," she finally said. "Later."
"Why not now?"
"Because." They ate the rest of their food in silence. When they were done, Sen got up, took both their trays, and dumped the trash out into a bin. Then, returning to the table: "Let's go. They should be done."
He followed her out, back to the room where he had met her. Gendou stood there, leaning against the wall. His eyes flickered when he saw them. "You're back," he noted calmly.
"Yeah, we just got some food." She paused. "Does HE go?" she asked, indicating the boy.
"No."
Sen frowned slightly, then smiled brilliantly again. "Well, I gotta go, Shinji." She gave both of them a peck on the cheek, and opened the door. "Bye!"
---
Shinji regarded his father warily. "Go where?"
"Nowhere." Gendou pushed himself off the wall and straightened. "We have a lot to do."
"Oh." They began walking together. "Who was she?"
"The girl?"
"She said you were her father. Are you?"
"Yes."
Shinji frowned. "Who was the mother?"
"Yui." Gendou took a left at the end of the hallway, leaving the cafeteria at their backs.
"She was my sister?"
"Yes."
"You never told me this," he commented. "Why?"
"Because you didn't need to know."
"That I had a sister? The hell I didn't!"
The man ignored this outburst from his son. "You didn't need to know."
"She was my sister!" he exclaimed. Then he paused. "What happened to her?"
"She died. A year before you were born, when she was only one." Gendou paused a moment, thinking. "Got sick, had a fever." Then he resumed his steady pace.
"Oh."
"You think she looks like Rei."
"I do."
"You should," his father responded. He took another right, into a wide-open area filled with yet more people. No one the boy could recognize.
"I should? She doesn't even have the hair, the eyes..."
"She IS Rei. In a sense." One short glance told him that the boy didn't understand. He sighed.
"..."
Gendou continued. "When your sister was born, we took skin cells, samples- we did it for all the children the scientists had, in case there were problems with the AT radiation."
"Even me?"
"Yes, even you," he said. "They were kept, frozen, in a cryogenic lab in sublevel 3 of Tokyo-3."
"But... Rei. Ritsuko showed me the tubes, there were dozens..."
"I'm getting to that, Shinji." His father waved him silent impatiently. "Once your sister died, we aged some of the cells by around two years to keep her age correct. She's sixteen now, or would've been," he added.
"Rei has blue hair," Shinji muttered. "And red eyes."
"I'm aware of that," he snapped.
"Sorry."
"...There were two beings created: Sen and Rei. Sen was a perfect duplicate; completely the same, but healthy. When we produced Rei, we artificially infused her with AT energy by splicing her genes with those of the first Angel's. By doing so, we created the first true pilot."
"Rei isn't human?"
"Not completely." And, for the first time, the corner of his father's mouth quirked. "But you guessed that already, didn't you?"
"Yes."
"Rei is the one you knew."
"She was 14-"
"She was not."
"...I see. What happened to Sen," he asked. "I've never met her until now... didn't she live again?"
"Yes, she did..." Gendou walked up to a glass door and knocked. "But that's not up to me to tell you." He turned. "I'll be back when you're done," he said, and left.
---
Shinji stared blankly, then jumped when the door swung open. A thin boy with short, spiky brown hair popped his head out and blinked. "Wha?" He looked half asleep.
"Uh..." Shinji made vague gestures in the general direction of his father's departure. "Er..."
"Oh, right," the boy said. "Come on in. I was... well, I was sleeping."
The office was a mess. Shinji carefully navigated around several large piles of empty pizza boxes and two-liter bottles of iced tea. He noted the presence of an old, lazy-looking cat warming itself on top of a radiator. "..."
"Sorry, things are kind of a mess right now- well, they're always this way, but you know what I mean, right?" He grinned. "Trash seems to accumulate all over the place."
An image of Misato and Rei flashed briefly through Shinji's mind. "Yeah," he said cautiously.
"Yep!" He gestured toward a chair. "Make yourself at home." He watched as Shinji carefully sat down. Then the boy placed himself on a rolled up sleeping bag and leaned against the wall. They regarded each other carefully for several minutes.
"Well, uh..."
"Yeah?"
"Aren't you supposed to tell me something deeply profound or informative?"
"Hell, no! I couldn't come up with that if I tried!" He grinned. "I guess I'm supposed to, though."
"Yes."
"Well..." He scratched his chin. "'God is a potato,'" he finally said.
"..." Shinji stared blankly at him. 'God... is a potato?'
"Well, glad that's over with. Want to play Dreamcast?" The boy kicked away some pizza boxes to uncover a small white machine. "Yeah, I know it's old, but-"
"Who are you?" Shinji asked.
The boy paused at this. "Who am I? What do you mean?"
"What is your name," he said slowly, as if talking to a mentally deficient individual. Which, of course, this boy appeared to be.
"Oh. James Ishida."
"Ah." Assuming everyone already knew his name, Shinji caught the tossed controller and stared at it. "You know Asuka?" he said suddenly.
"No. Well, I know who she is, at least."
"We used to play a little, she liked it a lot."
"Oh." James pressed a little button on the box. "I dunno, Sen doesn't seem to like her much."
"You know Sen?"
"Yeah, why? You met her?"
"She's my sister."
"Whaa!" He bolted up and started rubbing his head. "She's your...!" He started walking around in a circle. "Jesus!" Then, suddenly, he sat back down again and resumed his original position. "Ignore that."
"I'll try." 'God, let me be able to ignore that.'
"Didn't know that." James stared blankly at the screen.
"I have a question."
"Yes," he responded. "What is it?"
"Why am I here?"
"Why are you here? What do you mean, why are you here?"
"Here." He put the controller in his lap and gestured at his surroundings. "This doesn't mean anything, does it? It's not leading me anywhere, or teaching me anything... what does this all have to do with ME?"
James shut off the machine and turned to look at the other boy. For the first time, his eyes were serious. "Well, all right. Let's go." He got up and jumped over several large pieces of trash to open the door. "If you say so."
"Yeah." Shinji tossed the controller to the ground and followed.
---
"We have to get Sen first," he said, as they were walking past the crowd of people again.
"Why?"
James glanced silently at the boy. "Why do you ask," he said. "You don't like her?"
"No, that's not it, it's just that... I dunno," he responded, shrugging. "This doesn't feel right. This entire... journey. I'm just bouncing around, everywhere."
"Such is life," he commented. "As far as I know, of course."
Shinji didn't say anything.
Suddenly, the boy began again: "You wanna hear a story?"
"About what?"
"About everything."
"Fine."
"Swear you won't ever tell anyone?"
"...I swear."
The boy paused in the hallway, and leaned against the wall. "This is going to take a while, so sit down, if you like."
"That's okay," Shinji said, also leaning against the wall.
James started talking. "This was in 2014, when all that stuff you were a part of was being set up. Follow me?"
Shinji nodded.
"Okay," he said. "The Second Impact had done a whole lot of things, Right?"
"Yes."
"ONE of the things it did was open... I dunno, a gateway. To the Angels," he said. "And Lillith was in there. You know Lillith?"
"Kind of," he responded. "The thing in the basement?"
James smiled. "Yeah, the thing in the basement. That's it. So," he continued. "They sent three people in to get her, three kids artificially infused with AT, so that they could synch with Evangelion prototypes."
"Infused... like Rei? My father said something about gene splicing..."
"No, not exactly. I don't know how they made her, exactly." He laughed. "Boy, she's one weird girl..."
"I guess."
"But no. I guess that gene splicing thing, it means she got it when she was made. These kids didn't. They got it through exposure to radiation.
"It has to be kids, though- for a bunch of reasons, I dunno. Something about puberty. These kids were sixteen, all three. Born in 1998."
"Wasn't Sen-"
"Yeah," James said. "She was. That's it.
"They sent these three kids in- two Japanese, one German. One girl, two boys- each with an Evangelion prototype. All the children of lead scientists." And then he was silent, deep in thought.
Shinji blinked, then prompted the other boy: "So... what happened?"
"Bunch of stuff, I'm thinking," he muttered. Then: "Three weeks later they got to the end of the line. These three- they're tired, weary. These guys finally see Lillith, trap her. Over. They're all ready to go home, and then-"
"And?"
"And then the German kid pulls out a gun, points it at the girl. The other kid, he sees it, he's running to get her. He shouts, and she starts to turn. Then boom," he said quietly. "She's dead. Just like that.
"Then the German says a few words.
"The other boy doesn't know what to do, it's too sudden, he's cradling her body, he's sad. All he knows is... he wants to kill this guy. The German shoots him.
"Turns out the kid was a SEELE plant. So was his father. He takes out a small tube, cuts off a piece of Lillith, and leaves. Leaves the two bodies just sprawled there, lying together.
"Goes home a hero, he's celebrated, gets an award."
"...What about the two?"
"The two? They didn't get much. Death. Love. I dunno."
They stood there in silence, until James began again. "Well, I guess... that's my story. I dunno why I told you, really." He pushed himself off the wall slowly. "Nobody needs to hear this, am I right?"
Shinji nodded silently.
"Yeah... people need to be happy," the other boy said. "Screw what they want."
They walked off down the hallway.