Well, here's what you've all been waiting for after all this time: the proper beginning of the fic.
Enjoy!
Neon Genesis Evangelion
The End of Evangelion
Final: From Her Heart
Written by Spanky The Dolphin 13 April 2003 - 26 June 2003
Legal Disclaimer: Neon Genesis Evangelion Copyright GAiNAX / Project Eva. - TV Tokyo
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Chapter One: The Long Walk Home
TOKYO-3 - 2015 AD
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Shinji carried Asuka on his back through the broken ruins of Tokyo-3 under the dark starry sky. All around the Children were the shattered buildings and rubble that remained of the outer reaches of the Ceiling City, the metropolis that once covered the now absent Geofront. It was a ring of empty devastation that grew lighter in damage as it flowed up along the surrounding hills. The sounds of the sea of LCL traveled faintly through the night air, but Shinji and Asuka were too far from its shore and too deep inside the field of ruins for it to be in viewing distance. But the gigantic remnant of Lilith's head was visible from everywhere in the valley as it dominated the landscape, as the remaining eye stared widely over Her dead domain.
In a City of the Dead, Shinji and Asuka were the only people that remained. Not even the Dead lived in their own metropolis: for now they resided in the Red LCL Sea.
As Shinji continued on towards Misato's apartment building in the hills, he listened to the ambient sounds around him. From behind he could just barely hear the waves of LCL wash onto the shore. To his left and right were the voices of devastation: water slowly trickling out of a broken pipe, cables scraping against surfaces, metal hitting against concrete. Nothing but dead empty sounds surrounded him.
The only sounds of life coming from anywhere besides his own two feet as he walked upon the rubble were from Asuka on his back. While she hadn't said a word in the time since they left the shore, Shinji could hear her breathe slowly. He made sure that he leaned forward slightly so that she wouldn't fall, since she no longer held onto him around his neck. Her arms dangled limply in front of his chest and her head rested on his shoulder. Shinji felt a slow tingling sensation travel into his ear and down his neck as she breathed softly, emitting an occasional moan that would have been inaudible from a casual distance. He slowly turned his head around, seeing that her eyes were closed and mouth was slightly open in slumber.
<I guess she's been sleeping for a while,> Shinji thought to himself as he turned his head back to look forward. He began to slowly let his attention centre on her, and became increasingly aware of how her body felt against his. The external layer of the Plug Suit's material maintained its light grip against his clothes and skin, but with its vacuumed tension Shinji could also feel Asuka through the Suit as the internal layer tugged on her body. Her chest gently gave as she pressed on his back, and for a moment Shinji blushed as he recalled that Asuka's Plug Suits had cups to provide support, and that he knew this from personal experience.
Noticing that he was starting to get quite uncomfortable by these sensations, Shinji decided to divert his attention to something else. He breathed deeply and took in a faint, sweaty scent drifting through her Suit, noticing that it was still very feminine. Her bangs lightly brushed against his neck and her hair occasionally flickered around to his other side as minuscule breezes caught it. Her head moved in a broken cycle on his shoulder while he walked, and he felt the soft skin of her cheek. Most of all he felt how her relaxed breaths flowed over the light hairs on his skin. Shinji blushed again as he became increasingly aware of Asuka's femininity.
Shinji was still preoccupied with these thoughts as his foot landed on a cracked piece of cinderblock settled in a short patch of muddy soil and debris. When he released his weight onto the block, it slowly slid forward, then suddenly sank rapidly into the ground before he could react. He gasped in surprise as he started to tip over backwards, and felt Asuka's body slowly drift from him. For a third time she was the centre of Shinji's attention, but for an entirely different reason. <If I land on her like this, it might kill her!> he thought to himself in a panic. He strained as he leaned forward, attempting to regain his balance. The block responded by slipping back through the mud in the direction he pushed, throwing his feet out from under him. Shinji began to run forward and awkwardly tried to keep himself upright.
As he haphazardly ran through the ruins, Asuka was jostled and bounced around on his back. She started moaning weakly, cuing Shinji that she was waking up. Knowing that having her topple over him forwards was just as bad as him landing on top of her, Shinji did the first thing that came to mind. "Unng... Shinji, wha--" was all that Asuka was able to utter before he suddenly released her legs from his grip, dropping her. She quietly let out a surprised gasp as she fell, and then cried out sharply when she hit the ground. She landed directly onto her posterior, which sent enormous arcs of pain shooting through her body. She tightly closed her eyes and clenched her teeth as her field of vision was filled with darkness illuminated by fireworks, which continued as flashing sparks that slowly traveled away from the centre.
"Ow!!" she cried out angrily, "damn it--shit, stupid Shinji!! Why the hell'd you do that?!" Asuka darted her eye around frantically as it started to well up with tears from the pain. She found him sprawled out after tumbling onto the ground about a metre away from her, slowly moving to seat himself up. Shinji quickly glanced over Asuka's body, searching for any obvious signs of injury on her. After noting that there weren't any, he looked up at her face and swallowed with dread. While the features of her face were expressionless and displayed a nearly statuesque neutrality, all of her emotion was gathered into her un-bandaged eye Her gaze burned into him with a rageful silence, and her quick breaths were the only sounds being made by either of them for a long and agonising moment, while she became increasingly flushed with anger.
"Are . . . are you alright, Asuka?" Shinji finally said.
Asuka's first responded by blinking slowly, causing a single tear to build up and run down her check. It was another long and agonising moment before she made her second response. "Why did you . . . drop me? Shinji," she asked sternly in an almost inaudible mumble.
He thought quickly before answering, trying to figure out the best way to tell her without making her any more upset. <It doesn't matter how I tell her,> he concluded. "She will get mad and yell at me anyway.> "I--" he began, "I slipped and I started to fall, Asuka. I tried to not to fall, so I wouldn't land on you-- so you wouldn't get hurt. But then-- then I slipped again, and I let go of you so you wouldn't get hurt." His explanation was met with silence. "I'm sorry, Asuka," Shinji added. "I-- I panicked. It was the best think I could think of. I didn't . . ." He broke off, letting his words drift away as she maintained her silent anger at him.
"Get up and carry me, Shinji," she finally whispered.
"What?"
"I said get up, come over here, and carry me," she said, sternly. "I know it was an accident, Shinji, but I'm still angry. I'm too tired to punish you right now, so I'll wait until later to give you what you deserve." Her eye followed his movement as he got to his feet and stood up.
Shinji walked back to her and knelt down, helping her get onto his back again. Asuka groaned as she moved her joints, noting that they hurt even more then before she fell. She draped her arms around his neck and held on to his body tightly, while he made sure that his grip on her legs was secure. Shinji turned his head around, but could only see her hair, as she now rested her head looking away from him. "Ready, Asuka?" he asked. Her head weakly nodded in a meager affirmative. He turned back to the landscape in front of him and started to walk. After several seconds he looked back at her again. "Are you alright?"
Asuka kept her head down. "I'm fine," she answered in a small, trembling voice. Shinji looked forward again and continued walking, while she started to cry silently to herself.
<God, I'm so pathetic.>
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The End of Evangelion
Final: From Her Heart
Chapter 01: Welcome home.
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Before Third Impact, if a citizen of Tokyo-3 were to drive from the edge of the sea to the apartment building of the late Misato Katsuragi, the trip would take less then thirty-five minutes. Now, in the world after the failure of Instrumentality, Shinji and Asuka had taken more than four hours to walk as far as halfway up the hillside road, which was two thirds the distance to their destination. It was a tiring journey to take, with a goal at the end that may no longer exist any longer.
Shinji was starting to become visibly strained after walking for such a long time without stopping, and the slope of the road as it snaked up the hillside only tired him further. Every time he flexed his knees they ached painfully and his calves hurt with a continuous burn, as if the muscles would snap from his ankles at any moment. Each new step he took only made it more painful, which was not so much a sensation as it was simply an experience to endure.
He looked back over his shoulder and caught Asuka turning her head to look down at the road under his feet. <Might as well just go ahead and ask her,> Shinji thought to himself. He cleared his throat before speaking. "Asuka, do you mind if we stop and rest for a minute? I'm getting tired."
Asuka moved her head to look up at his face. She held her gaze for a short time before closing her eyes and replying. "Go ahead," she said quietly.
Shinji sighed as he knelt down to the ground. Asuka slowly slid off of his back. She groaned as the pavement pressed against her extremely sore rear end, and she brought her knees close to her chest and wrapped her arms around them, thinking that it would probably be easier to get back up later if she didn't lie down. Asuka watched Shinji as he lay down within a metre to her left, then turned her head and looked out over the broken landscape spread out in front of them.
Before her she saw the massive circular hole that used to be the very top of the Geofront, but instead of NERV Headquarters located inside she could only see emptiness, as if the massive subterranean complex never existed. Around the hole were the ruins of the Ceiling City and Tokyo-3, sprawling outward into the surrounding hills. Glancing over to her right gave Asuka a partially blocked view of the gigantic white head of a woman far out into the sea of blood, divided in half like some horrible cross section in a pathologist's dissection. Glowing above in the sky was the stained Moon, accompanied by a thin band of blood that stretched across the star-filled heavens. What used to be home for the last several months now looked to her like a completely alien world. "Shinji?" she asked the boy next to her.
Shinji narrowly opened his eyes at the sound of his name, as if she had woken him up while half asleep. "Yes?" He glanced up at Asuka and saw only her bandaged eye, which made him feel slightly uncomfortable.
"What happened?"
Shinji stretched his limbs out from his body. He brought his fingers together as he held his hands high above his head and tried to gather his thoughts as best he could before answering her. "I'm not exactly sure, Asuka," he said. "The only thing that I really know is that Third Impact happened."
Asuka kept looking out over the valley, and remained silent and unexpressive for a time after he finished before speaking again. "Do you mean that we failed?"
"No, I don't think so." He paused to rest when a thought suddenly ran through his head. <How much can I tell her now like this?> he asked himself. <She might not take it very well at all, and I still don't know exactly what happened myself. So It'd be better to jus-->
"Is everybody dead?" Asuka asked, interrupting Shinji's line of thought. He thought hard for several seconds, trying to rapidly figure out the best way to bluff his way through what he knew and what he didn't know. He took a deep breath before letting out what he had hastily put together in his brain.
"Not exactly. Some of them might come back, eventually." He closed his eyes again.
"'Eventually?' What do you mean by that?"
Shinji hesitated momentarily before replying. "I'm sorry, Asuka, but I really don't know right now." He prayed that would be enough for her to accept.
"Alright," she said as Shinji gave a mental sigh of relief. "And Wonder Girl?"
A rapid succession of images and memories of the First Children flashed through his mind as he opened his eyes wide in surprise. It was nearly a minute later that he finally answered her. "Ayanami is . . ." he said, pausing as he made sure that what he was about to say was really what he wanted to tell her, "she's dead. Ayanami won't be coming back."
Asuka didn't immediately respond to Shinji's announcement, but after several seconds she replied with a relaxed and distant "I see . . ." while still looking out over the valley. She then tilted her head back, and both Children began to watch the night sky above them as clouds passed by slowly in front of the Moon and Red LCL ring overhead. They remained silent, and it was at least half an hour before they set off again.
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The front door to the apartment slid into the wall as Shinji slowly pushed it open. After he picked Asuka up off of the floor, he stepped into the entryway, and almost announced that he was home, but stopped at the last moment. <Just a reflex,> he thought, <a case of habit.> Shinji's breathing was quite laboured and beads of sweat were forming on his brow, the result of being forced to carry Asuka up ten flights of stairs to get to the eleventh floor of the building. He was far too exhausted to remove his shoes, so he kept them on his feet for the time being as he trudged through the dining room and into the living room. Inside the apartment it was almost too dark for him to see, but the unnatural illumination from outside allowed for the various shapes and forms in the room to be made out enough so that navigation was possible.
Shinji shook Asuka lightly. "Asuka, we're here," he said as she roused from her state of semi-sleep. "We made it to Misato-san's apartment."
Asuka moaned as she moved her head to survey their surroundings. "I think I can stand on my feet now," she replied. "Help me to my room, Shinji. I want to go to sleep." She started to shift her body over to his left side as he let go of her legs and assisted in supporting her waist and shoulders. When she touched the floor and applied her weight onto her feet, Asuka slipped and for a brief moment started to fall, but Shinji immediately caught her before she landed. He blushed absentmindedly as she tightly held on to his shoulders.
"Um, actually Asuka, take my room," Shinji stumbled with his words as he assisted in supporting her. "I remember Mi-- Ah, Misato-san said she packed up your room while you were in the hospital."
They reached the middle of the hallway, the doors to their rooms on each wall. <I'd refuse if this was any other time,> Asuka glanced slowly in both directions as she thought. "Okay . . ." she finally replied. Shinji held her up from around the waist as he opened the door to his room, which other than the reddening glow from outside was darker then the living room and hallway.
"My, uh, the bed is over there," Shinji pointed over to the middle of the far wall. "Just go in a straight line and you shouldn't run into anything." Asuka responded by snorting in an irritated manner. They let go of each other and Asuka stepped into the doorway, supporting herself by holding onto the retracted door. Shinji was turning around to head back to the living room when she suddenly spoke aloud, still standing in the doorway between rooms. "Shinji . . ."
"Hmm?" He turned back to her. With her back still facing him, Asuka continued.
"Thank you."
"For what?"
"I don't know," she replied. "I just feel like you did something. And I feel grateful for it." Shinji was confused by her answer, and silently continued to watch her standing in the doorway, before she finally spoke again, walking into the room and disappearing through the darkness. "Goodnight."
"Uh, Goodni--," he tried to say, but Asuka had already shut the door behind her.
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Asuka leaned back against the door while she tried to gather enough composure and strength to begin the journey towards the bed. With her first step she stumbled and almost fell flat on her face, but she was able to maintain an upright position as pain shot up her legs and pierced her brain in response to the error of sudden movement. <Okay, Asuka, easy does it,> she thought to herself. <Just take it nice and slow and you should do fine. It's just walking to a bed . . .> Asuka took a deep breath and began to walk, moving her feet across the floor with a limping shuffle.
When she reached Shinji's bed, Asuka turned around and brgan to take off her Plug Suit, after so many hours of being forced to keep in on. She clicked the button on her left wristband, releasing the vacuum seal of her Plug Suit with a hiss, and the Suit's abrasive grip against her skin loosened as the material expanded. Unhooking the collar, she winced as she pulled her aching arm from the Suit's remaining sleeve, pushing it down past her waist. She sat down on the bed so she could slip her legs out of the remaining portion of the Suit, and it landed on the floor in a rubbery clump. Asuka dropped the interface nodes she used to pilot Unit Two and hold her hair up next to her Suit, and let her hair loosely fall down her back.
Asuka moaned as she lay down, and then sighed as her body relaxed against the bed's soft support. She didn't care that she was naked. She didn't care that she wasn't under the covers. And she didn't care that it was Shinji's bed. <I'm too tired to even think. I just want to sleep.> Asuka looked up at the ceiling illuminated by a faint red light, as her eyelids closed under their own weight and she drifted into unconscious slumber.
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Shinji trudged back into the living room and sat down on the floor, completely exhausted. He bent forward to take off his shoes, which he placed nearby. Lying down, his thoughts solemnly drifted back to a certain little square cross back at the shore: the one he slipped onto a nailed post, for her sake. He breathed deeply and sighed.
"We're home. Misato-san."
-END OF CHAPTER ONE-