Neon Genesis Evangelion Fan Fiction ❯ Second Coming ❯ Rock Bottom ( Chapter 22 )

Chapter Twenty-Two: Rock Bottom

 

The next thing I knew, I was waking up in a hospital room. I was confused, to say the least. I seemed to be physically okay, as far as I could tell; however, I did have a pair of intravenous lines in me, and heart and brain monitors.

It's a year ago all over again, my mind pointed out as I sat up.

Much sooner than in the hospital in Toronto, though, I was being visited by a white-coated guest. This time, it was Dr. Ritsuko Akagi.

"Welcome back," she said, arriving at the foot of my bed.

"Wh.. what happened?" I asked.

She continued with her clinical tone, sounding almost disinterested. "You left your entry plug, speaking nonsense, and collapsed soon after. It would appear to have been exhaustion, as far as we can tell. Since you weren't contaminated by the Angel, we can rule that out."

"Uh.. I guess that's good," I mumbled.

"I'm not sure I agree," Dr. Akagi said. "The other pilots are recovering. As for you, I don't know what to think. I was hoping you could shed some light on what happened."

"I thought you said it was exhau--"

"Before that," she cut me off. "I mean the problem with the Eva."

"Oh," I said, frowning as it came back to me, a lump forming in my gut. "It just.. refused to respond."

"The Evangelions don't just 'refuse to respond'," Dr. Akagi sneered. "There has to be a reason."

"I just tried to do it.. I tried to save Rei," I said, trying not to sound irritated. "It wouldn't go."

"I'm not sure there isn't more to this story," the doctor replied. "But we'll get back to that. I want to know how you're doing."

I thought about it for a moment. "I'm a little upset," I replied honestly. "But I guess, all things considered, I'm okay." As an afterthought, I added, "I can pilot. If the Eva will have me."

Akagi jotted things down all during my response. "Why did you get so upset when the Eva stopped responding?"

"I.." I have to be careful here, that's what. "I was sure that something bad was going to happen if I didn't get in there and help."

"What made this different than any other battle? And what about the other Evas that were ready to back you up?"

I shrugged. "I don't know. I guess because Shogouki was still in quarantine, and Asuka was.."

"Asuka was what?" Akagi said as I trailed off.

"I just.. thought maybe she'd have issues too. She's been having a hard time lately, hasn't she?"

She looked like she wanted to frown, and avoided the question entirely. "I'm going to have to ask you to stay here for 24 hours, so we ensure your vital signs are stabilized."

"All right," I said, trying not to sound disgusted with the idea of spending more of my existence in a motorized, wheeled bed.

"I have to go check on the others. Try to get rest and don't worry about what happened. It'll all get sorted out."

I nodded a response as she turned to go, not having waited for me to reply anyway. I wasn't looking forward to being alone with my thoughts.

I tried to look at the good points. Everyone was reportedly okay, and Dr. Akagi had implied that I would be back in the saddle ultimately. I guess that means Kaworu isn't going to replace me as pilot of 03.

Wait.. didn't Kaworu go missing just after things went all to hell? I couldn't remember all the details, but I definitely heard them talk about him at some point.

I found myself left with no option but to go back over the events of the battle and dwell on it. I was sitting in the Eva, trying to go after the Angel, to keep it from killing Rei, when the Eva shut down.

There's more to that story, I heard Ritsuko's words echo in my head. I knew that had to be true, but I had no idea where to begin or what to look for. Why had Sangouki shut me out? What changed from the good, symbiotic relationship we had before?

The whole situation got to me again at that point, and I started to cry. I retreated into a fetal ball again, curled up on the bed, sobbing, and not knowing why. Everything had turned out okay, so it seemed. All of the pilots were alive and well, and the Angel was gone. So why was I so distraught? Why did this feel so wrong?

I don't know how long I was in the pit of despair when I heard the door latch click as it opened once more. I tried to regain my composure, but too soon, the visitor presented herself: This time, it was Rei Ayanami, clad in white shirt and trousers. The Japanese equivalent to a hospital gown, I eventually would realize.

"Why are you crying?" Rei asked, looking somewhere between surprised and confused.

"I'm.." I began, then sniffled. "Sorry," I said. "I'm not taking my last performance very well."

"You're upset," she said, as if understanding. Then: "At yourself, or at Eva?"

"Wh-what?" I asked, still trying to get under control. "What do you mean?"

Rei looked at me for a long moment, with a look that almost could have been contempt, if I'd thought she was capable of that great a range of emotion. "You know why the Eva didn't work for you."

"N-no," I said.

"You do. You just do not wish to accept it."

"What are you saying?"

"What were your intentions?"

I blinked, trying to figure out what she meant. She reiterated: "What did you plan to do?"

"I, uh, ..." I didn't know how to tell it to Rei. Eventually, plain-and-simple won out. "I was going to pull the Angel free from you."

"You could not have done that."

"I could've tried," I countered.

"You did not undergo the bonding with the Angel," Rei said, eyes shimmering as she stared at me. "It was not pleasant. You would have been incapacitated as we were."

"Well, I had to do something!" I said, slapping my hands on the bed in frustration. "I couldn't just let you be a martyr--"

The room was silent as I realized what I'd said. Rei fixed her gaze on me for a long, long time, deathly quiet, and then said, "How do you know what my intent was?"

Crap. There was no weaseling out of this one. "It was the most obvious option," I said, manufacturing an excuse on the fly and hoping it didn't sound that way. "There was no core for us to breach, and it was fusing with everything it touched.. there was no other way to defeat it."

Again Rei eyed me for several moments. "You did not want me to sacrifice myself."

"Hell no!" I barked. "Why would I?!"

She had no reply to that.

"Rei, your life is too valuable to just toss away. Don't be so cavalier with it. Fuck Gendo." No, scratch that, my humorous side said, peeking out from its hiding place. "Even if you could be replaced, there are still people here who care about you. And I'm sure you care about them, too--"

Rei was staring with surprise at me again. "How do you know that?" she asked.

I didn't even bother with an excuse this time. "I can't say. I just do."

Our firm, flat expressions stared off at one another for a few moments, until I ventured: "You are the second, right?"

Rei gave a slow nod. "I am," she answered. Looking down at the floor, she seemed to gather her thoughts. "Excuse me," she said, and swiftly left the room.

Great, I sighed to myself as I flopped back on the bed. I suppose that could have gone worse; she could have brought a gun and shot me in the head or something.

 

I lay in bed for a long time, once again left to contemplate things. Everything was falling apart! The Eva had given up on me, Rei was pissed with me, and I didn't even want to know what Asuka was going to say when she showed up.

Rei seemed to have it in her head that I knew why San had forsaken me. I didn't, unless I was being particularly obtuse. I couldn't figure it out. And I couldn't communicate with the Eva; it was a little harder than asking 'Hey, what's got you down?' to Asuka. It was like trying to have a conversation with a tank.

I wished I had a clue. Did the Eva have some kind of pre-knowledge of what was to come, in some other fashion than I, but with the same results? And if so, did it know that Rei was 'supposed' to die, and was angry with me for trying to change things?

No. It didn't make sense, even if the Evangelions existed somewhat outside the realm of normal physics. They weren't able to bridge spacetime, and they didn't have fortune-telling capabilities. It couldn't possibly know that Rei should have died.

Unless it read my mind, I thought. That was one thing I knew the Eva could do; if not read minds, then at least peer into them, picking up on the mood and behavior of the pilot. That was part of the whole concept of synchronicity.

So what had I been thinking? What thoughts had betrayed me in those moments of need?

I closed my eyes and directed my focus inward, trying to remember the entire ordeal. I was still foggy about some things, probably because of my hysterical response to the whole thing, but enough of the gist of it was clear for me to piece things together.

My first sight upon the Angel's arrival was it piercing Zero's AT Field without any resistance whatsoever. My thoughts at that point were of Rei and how she would be responding to the Angel's assault. I was also certain I wouldn't set up my AT Field, so that I wouldn't be harmed. That was something I'd been drumming into my head: AT Field equals contact with the Angel equals bad.

I remembered deciding, after a lot of consideration, to take on the Angel regardless, to save Rei from certain death. I recalled thinking that there was no other way I could see to subdue the enemy, but that Rei deserved at least an attempt by me to do something.

Then, I tried to 'do something', but it was all for naught.

I'm no further along than before, I sighed, rubbing my temples. Nothing stuck out in my mind that would have caused San to shut down.

Part of me wanted to head directly to the entry plug and try to sync up again, and have a chat with the being inside 03. Another part of me wanted to just curl up on the bed and forget about the whole thing, to walk away, and live like a normal person again - and let the rest of them deal with SEELE and the Angels and Gendo Ikari, without me.

The latter was much stronger than it'd ever been before, and that scared me.

 

My senses first came back to the sound of a ringing electronic bell. I was confused; obviously I'd fallen asleep again, but what was that noise?

A Doppler-effect caused the pitch of the sound to change drastically. I looked around - not able to remember having opened my eyes, actually - and saw the insides of a JR train car. The ringing sound, then, was a crossing signal as we passed it.

What? How'd I get here?

The setting sun spilled in through the windows, but nothing else was visible. No one was in the car with me, and I couldn't see into the other cars from where I was sitting.

"What's going on?" I asked myself rhetorically. There was, of course, no response. "Why am I here? What happened?"

"You have become lost."

I was caught off-guard by Rei's voice. I blinked and there she was, sitting right across from me, hands folded against her school uniform skirt, a mirror image of me in some respects. It was as if she'd been there all along.

"I what? How?" I asked.

"Your concern for the outcome caused you to lose sight of the goal," Misato said, suddenly appearing to my left, standing, holding onto a hanging strap. To say she appeared suddenly is a misnomer, though - she was just there. It's hard to explain otherwise.

"The goal? Do you mean.. what do you mean?"

"You were so wrapped up in saving the First Child, you failed to see what the ramifications were to yourself," Shinji said from his position beside Rei.

"I knew what I was getting into," I protested.

"Your actions may hasten the coming of the final Angel," Rei said.

"Why? Kaworu's here already. That's already said and done."

"His presence and his power are not causally connected," Misato said evenly.

I turned to her. "What are you saying? Something I did made him more powerful?"

"It is possible he may possess what is needed to initiate Third Impact now," Ryoji Kaji said, sitting casually on the bench to the left of Rei.

"And I did that? How?" I retorted.

"Every action has consequences," Shinji contributed. "That's one of the certainties of this world."

"So I'm to blame in some butterfly effect kind of way? I don't buy it."

"Blame is irrelevant at this point," Rei said. "Taking action is of the utmost priority."

"Like I can take any action," I responded sourly. "San's given up on me."

"Are you sure?" Misato queried.

"What do you mean, am I sure?" I retorted. "It was plain as day!"

"Are you sure?" Shinji chimed in.

Even though, on some level, I knew all this was being manufactured in my head, this gave me pause now that both of them were questioning me. I looked at Shinji. "What are you getting at?" I asked.

Suddenly a red-suited Eva pilot was standing over me, her fists against her hips in a defiant pose. "Are you stupid?!" Asuka snarled. "Don't you think it's possible you could've got it backwards??!"

 

I jerked awake, still in the hospital room.

Staring at the ceiling, I began to remember the dream I'd just had, not sure if it had actually been a dream or a memory. Focusing on resolving the room into clarity, I sighed.

I guess I should feel privileged that I finally experienced that.

 

My apartment door slid open later that night with a vocal barrage right behind it.

"Are you in here, Fourth??"

"Yeah," I called out from the bed, where I was lounging atop the covers, relaxing and watching television.

Asuka charged into the room, looking relieved when she found me. "What are you doing home? Is it true you signed out of the hospital against medical authority?"

"It's against medical advice, and yes," I said. "I'm fine. There's nothing wrong with me."

"Are you sure about that?" Asuka said with concern. "You really fell apart today."

Says the one who's supposed to be in a medically-induced coma right now, I didn't say to her. "I just had a bad day."

"Yeah. Uh-huh," Asuka nodded, with a sarcastic tone. "Miss Perfect didn't seem to think so."

"What?" I said, doing a double-take, muting the TV. "You? You talked with Rei?"

Asuka shrugged. "What do you want me to say? She came to me." After a pause, she added, "You got a lot of people who care about you, Jill."

I let that sink in for a second, then said, "What did she say about me?" I winced as soon as I said that, realizing how petty it sounded.

"She said you were acting like you were going to sacrifice yourself."

"She said that, or you said that?"

Asuka hmph'ed. "Let's say it was a consensus."

"Right," I said. "Okay, well, despite what you all say, that wasn't my intent. I just wanted to get the Angel away from Rei." Somewhere inside me, despite what I was saying, I knew that I'd been willing to die if that's what it took to keep others from getting hurt. Maybe what they were saying was true, then; but I didn't want to admit it to anyone.

"You spend all your time telling me not to do things on my own, not to be the hero, and what do you go and do?"

I sighed. "You're right. I'm sorry."

Asuka nodded, satisfied with the chastising she'd accomplished. "Now then. We need to think about what's to come next."

"'We'?" I queried. "Does that mean I'm not grounded or quarantined or anything?"

"Not that I know of," Asuka said, quirking an eyebrow. "If you don't feel all right, you shouldn't have left the hospital, dummy."

"I told you, I feel fine," I shot back. "It's just that.."

"Just that what?"

I can't exactly tell her that when it happened to her, she was kept sedated in guarded condition. "I.. just figured that with what I went through, the Commander would want me sidelined--"

"Bah. No offense, Fourth, but you're assuming your situation was worse than it was. You had a bad outing with your Eva. Who hasn't?"

I frowned a little. "I guess you could be right," I admitted.

"Anyway. The Commander and Misato and the rest are flipping out over the Angel's disappearance. They even have an idea that the Fifth Child's having gone missing has something to do with it."

I perked up. "Oh really?" I asked. "Tell me more."

She shrugged. "That's all I've got," she said. "He hasn't been seen since before the fight. They haven't got any idea where the Angel went, so they're scanning all over the globe, from what I've heard. They may even deploy us all individually world-wide, in case it pops up somewhere else."

"Yikes," I responded.

"Misato said she's not coming home tonight," Asuka said. "She's got a lot of things she wants to look up."

"I bet," I nodded.

"So, want to come over? Watch a movie or something?"

"Eh, I dunno," I shrugged. "I don't think I'm in the mood right now."

"Fair enough," she said. "C'mon over if you change your mind."

"'Kay," I said.

Asuka headed out, and I flumped back on the bed, again. My mind had now had time to digest everything, with Asuka's help, and my immediate thoughts were on what was supposed to be happening next.

Rei's death would cause questions to be raised when Rei III was found alive in the hospital. SEELE would throw a hissy-fit and demand her for questioning, but Gendo would send Ritsuko in her place. Ritsuko would resent that Ikari protected Rei, choosing her over the good doctor, and would destroy the Reiquarium out of spite, after having shown it to Shinji and Misato. That, in turn, would give SEELE the ammunition they needed, figuratively speaking, to send the JSSDF after NERV, and set into motion what would culminate in Third Impact.

I couldn't decide if what'd happened instead was a good or a bad thing.