mille2ml@jmu.edu wrote:

NGE belongs to and was created by GAINAX. This fic therefore
also belongs to GAINAX. I doubt they care. This is the first
thing I've written in several years. It's something of a

what if.

Miashara
 

% Hey, hey, nice to have you back. Curiously, I was just

thinking of you 

back when we met at Nekocon in '01. What a conicidence. I

know this is 

late, but I've been letting the stuff I want to C+C pile up.

Hey, all good. With any luck I'll be at Nekocon again this
time around. 

As usual, grammar notes w/o comments are just taken. 

    "Fine then."
    She shut her own door and turned on the car.

% started the car.

It beeped
and flashed a red `Fasten Your Safety Belt' sign. Misato
ignored it and removed the parking break.
    "What do you want?" Shinji whined.
    "No, Shinji. What do you want?" Misato slammed down the
accelerator.
    "I want to-what the-"
    Misato yanked the wheel hard to the left and the car
shot off the road. The mountain side had been paved, and the
car rocketed down, bouncing and jumping off rocks and
stones.
 

% Okay, maybe turned on is more appropriate.

Yeah. This wasn't exactly safe driving, even for Misato.

the floor. The
engine screamed. They kept picking up speed.
    "What do you want, Shinji?" Misato's voice was
mechanical.
    Shinji screamed again and covered his eyes. Misato
swerved again and hit the road. Her transmission was making
noises never intended, 

% That bit is awkward. Not sure how to reword it, though.

    Shinji desperately clawed at his seat belt and managed
to get it on. Misato noticed that the passenger safety alarm
went out and dug her hand into a compartment on her door.
Sometimes she had to take her other hand off the steering
wheel to shift, but she never let up on the gas. They hit
the first street light, pointlessly blinking red to an empty
city, and the speedometer was off the scale. Misato found
what she was looking for, a large, military issue survival
knife.
 

% Heh. Thought she was going to light up there

Oh no. Nothing that safe.

want?"
    "To stop!"
    Tears and snot and blood were pouring off Shinji's
face, and the car was gyrating too quickly for them to fall
down. He was surrounded by a halo of grief and pain, and
somewhere inside he was weeping.

% Weeping on the outside too, with all the tears you

mentioned with the 

snot and blood.

Did that rather specifically. Shinji's losing his protective
numbness. 

    "Now listen and listen really well, because we're going
to be dead before I have time to repeat myself. You don't
want to die, you've never wanted to die, and you never will.
You just want you father to love you, and he doesn't. He
doesn't care about you. He never did. He never will. You've
loved him hoping he would love you back and it didn't work.
You hated him so he'd at least hate you back, and he
doesn't. You're nothing to him. You never were. I'm sorry.
 

% And he's not.

Ayup.

     "I love you. I love you more than you can understand
because no one's ever loved you before. I love you so badly
I don't understand it and I've loved, been loved, and been
in love before. I bleed when you get hurt, my limbs ache
when you fall, and every time you get in that damn machine
my heart breaks a little more.
 

% Nice paragraph.

Thank you. 

your life, and now your
purpose. You have a goal that's clearer, brighter, harder,
and more mixed with good and evil than most people see in
their lifetimes, and believe me, people spend all their
lives trying.
 

% True. Black and white are rarly choices we're given. It's

usually a 

varying degree of gray.

Yeah. That's something Misato's not so much jealous of, but
very keyed into. Shinji's choices are all or nothing kind of
things, and pure at that. I always got the feeling from her
she was kind of lost through much of the series, and that's
coming out here.

even
then he won't hate you for failing. I won't either, but I
won't love you any more because I'll be dead. You've wanted
love your whole life and I'm giving it to you now but you
have to fight for it and fight with every bit of good, evil,
hate, and despair within you, and you have to do more than
that because you've got to fight with love, happiness, and
anger and everything else you've never had or never let
yourself want and you've got to do it now.
    "So I'm sorry, and I'm dying a little right now and you
have to get in there anyway, do the thing you hate more than
anything else in the world, but at least I understand and
I'll be with you, crying, bleeding, and fighting to breathe
harder than I ever thought I could.
    "You're fighting for everything. You're fighting for me
and fighting so I can show you what love really is.
    "If you win and you think I've done wrong, I'll spend
the rest of my life making it up to you and do it gladly.
Take me to court and I'll be your witness. Sue me and I'll
give you everything I have and spend the rest of my life
slaving to make money so I can give you more. But it won't
matter unless you win, and I can't make you understand how
much I love you when I'm dead.
    "So win, Shinji. Get in that machine and kill. For
yourself."
    Shinji burst into tears and ran, towards NERV.
 

% Very, very nice emotional passage.

No pressure. I'll just strip your life of every comforting
illusion, nearly kill you, and rub your face in everything
you've ever really wanted or thought. Then take it away unless
you obey me. No pressure.

bath for a few days, maybe a week, but when you get
out of that you should be good as new. Not even a scar."
 

% Except her old ones, I assume.

Well, most of her skin's getting replaced, so most of those
will be gone too. A few will probably remain.

    Misato laughed and then coughed up some blood. 

% Nice

Thank you

"How is
he?"
    "He's all right. I've put him on some mandatory
therapy,

% Which should have been done from day one.

Well, it might have made him less crazy. And in this
situation, that's not necessarily a good thing. Strength of
madness, and all that. Besides, as is he's totally under the
control of Gendo. 

That being said, from any kind of rational viewpoint, ding,
ding, ding. 

Misato almost shrugged but
stopped herself. "Rei was out, Asuka was out, and there was
no way Shinji could have won as he was. We were all going to
die."
    "But to do that? How could you hate him enough?"
    "I don't hate him. In fact, I think I love that kid
more than anyone else ever has."
 

% And sometimes people need kicked in the teeth when they're

being 

exceptionally dumb. And god knows Misato is the type to do it.

Yeah. Yeah.

    "I think so. I'm very tired and everything seems a
little weird."
    "Are you sure you don't want to come back to NERV? You
could get something to eat and sleep."
    "No! I can't stand that place. I just wanted to know,
um, when the city would be fully up again." Ritsuko's voice
was quiet and he thought they had had been disconnected.
    "Not long now. Why don't you come back to headquarters
Shinji. 

% Shinji?

Not a question. An order, phrased politely.

    "Rei?"
    "She might join you later. We're holding her under
medical care until her appearance becomes absolutely
necessary."
    "Who?" Shinji appeared confused on the large screen.
With his face enlarged to fill four hundred square meters of
screen, surrounded by orbital recognizance and histograms,
every minor twitch and expression was clear for the bridge
crew to see. There were none. Except for mild bewilderment,
Shinji's face could have been computer generated, young,
smooth, and emotionless.
    "Who's holding her under medical care? I am."
    "Then why did you say we?"
 

% Ritsuko: It's a royal 'we', like queens use.

because I rock!

    Ritsuko did not immediately answer.
"When will you come back?"
    "I don't know. You can talk to me now."
    "But-" Shinji did not finish.
    "Don't worry about them. Just talk if you need to.
Ritsuko may give orders if I can't, but I'll be here."
    "What about my father?"
    "Forget him. He's irrelevant."
 

% Actually that's largly true. :)

yup. Misato's breaking down Shinji's walls.

    He whimpered.
    "Shinji?"
    He wished he could look away; the fear was too great.
    "I meant everything."
 

% Hmm. Not the ending I expected. Interesting piece. I liked

the early 

parts more than the latter, but they were exceptional. Very

nice story. 

Interesting. Several people commented they liked the later
more. This is good to hear, not only to supplement my ego,
well mainly to supplement my ego, so I can tell both sides are
well burnt. The prologoue was much more emotional and less
polished, and the main body was the recovery. 

Thanks for sharing.

Thanks for reading and commenting. 

DB Sommer

Miashara

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