[hatch log / mission: hyrypia] the winds that will be howling at all hours

[onemind]

CHARACTERS: New Hosts & EVERYONE
WHERE: Station 72; Hyrypia - Naerstone House
WHEN: DAY :002 - :003
SUMMARY: New hosts hatch on the Station, are briefed, then make their way to Hyrypia to join the rest of the hosts… while they attend a very important history lesson.
WARNINGS: Will update as necessary. Need a warning added? PM this account please!

STATION 72
DAY :002

NEW HATCHES
YOU WAKE UP are are suddenly changed. --No. That's not right. You're you and there's no suddenly about it. It's been a while, hasn't it? It feels like waking up from a very deep, extended sleep or surfacing up from the darkness of some wine dark sea. Nothing is different and everything is because right there in your own head there's something both familiar and strange. You know intuitively that you've been unconscious for more than just a blink of the eye.

But here you are, a small miracle of the multiverse: lying in a small, faintly hexagonal chamber with a gentle white light emanating from the surrounding walls. If you were injured during your escape, those injuries have been healed. If you were anxious or frightened or distraught, those feelings have been calmed. There's something peaceful about waking up here - like you belong. That feeling persists even as you find the tube running from the base of your neck to the compartment's rear wall.

But once the tube's disconnected? Things get loud. A wave of emotion fills that peaceful void - fear, uncertainty, relief, a sense of purpose or loneliness or anxiety. A matching dread. An easy comfort. Maybe some of these emotions are yours, but they can't all be. After the initial sensory overload, the mental buzz elongates: stretches out into a murmur like the sound of a party happening behind a nearby closed door.

You can sit up - barely -, and shift out of the pod. There’s a ladder at your feet and a little cubby just before it with anything you brought with you as well as a set of crisp, loose-fitting white clothes; while your injuries are healed, whatever you’re wearing is in the exact state it was before. Maybe it's time for a change? Drop down the ladder to the floor of the Nesting Deck and you’ll find you’re not alone.In fact there are lots of you and none of them are the strangers they should be. Some even seems like people you've known for a very long time.They are as familiar as this place you've never been is.

Welcome to Station 72. Beyond this room it's quiet and still, feeling for all the world like a hollow shell.

--Or it does until a voice separates itself from the white noise in your head:


BRIEFING
THE VOICE IN YOUR HEAD isn't really a voice at all. It's the warm tang of camaraderie, tinged with a flash of impatience like ticking hands on a clock face and a flicker of wonder: a falling star. It says:

( My, you're all very fresh aren't you? Unfortunately, the multiverse waits for no spring chicken. Once you've figured out which way's up, won't you all join us? )
Join 'us' where is the question. And yet, once you're ready to meet the owner of the voice in your mind, your footsteps simply lead you there naturally. Two strangers sit in a small circular briefing room - a tall being covered in short brown fur with a rigid demeanor, and a pale alien with yellow washed frills at her jaw and throat who is smiling cheerfully.

"Hey there, sunshine," says Rhan, her frills humming as she speaks. "Why don't you take a seat so we can get started?"

[ooc note: please see here for the catch-all briefing thread]


THE STATION
WITH A LITTLE UNDER 24 HOURS before it's time to make the trip to Hyrypia, this is as good an opportunity as you're going to get to familiarize yourself with Station 72 before you leave it. There's plenty to see, but a distinct lack of people to make conversation with. It's lonely and quiet and there's a sensation of dust gathering even where there is none. Maybe studying the briefing files on your databank and going over your mission kit is the most proactive distraction, but if not? Well there's plenty of places to get lost...

HYRYPIA - NAERSTONE HOUSE
DAY :003

MEETING
A SINGLE SHIP LANDS in a field the color of burnished gold, returning to the place it had until late the night before occupied. It's carefully inserted beside dozens of other spacecraft bearing more than faint similarities, though each has its own unique aesthetic. When the gangplank drops, the loud engines powering down, it reveals--

New hosts. Seven fresh faces - obscured as they are in layers of intricate fabric - are led down the gangplank by Rhan There to greet them is a number of other hosts - any who answered to the sweet crystalline ring of Collector’s voice in their heads hardly a half hour earlier, speaking with certainty born of truth:

( Rhan and Siva’co are returning. Shall we see what stories they have to tell? )

Despite the solidarity that both combined groups provide, there's a feeling of eyes here. A number of guards along the edge of the shuttle field are watching the reunion like hawks. Better perhaps to return to the apartments where they'll be able to speak in private and teach the new hosts what it is that has been learned since their arrival. --Or explore, for those who prefer not to rest. Naerstone House's grounds are vast and they are almost entirely open to the parties of the pilgrims to explore.

THE PERFORMANCE
AS THE SINGLE RED SUN of Hyrypia dips low on the horizon there is a long, low, mournful sound. A deep bell-- or a horn? Or maybe it's something else entirely, but the call is heard and answered as any nearby servants inform the guests of the house:

“There will be a performance of the First Journey in a quarter turn. All guests are invited to attend.”

There's no mystery as to where the event is occurring. A steady trail of guests and servants lead out past the Veranda into the central garden where a number of pillars have been mounted and a large tiered platform festooned with with numerous draped curtains and abstract representations of trees and mountains - a great stage - now sits. The stage is surrounded by numerous low settees and tables, piles of thick cushions and richly colored rugs around which guests can be found clustered, lounging while sipping thick, syrupy drinks.

Each table is illuminated only by a single glowing orb at its center. Otherwise, as the sun sets it pitches the garden into darkness as even the castle itself has been left unlit. There are no lights in distant windows or on Naerstone House's high walls; these small orbs and the glitter of stars in the black sky might very well be the only points of light in the whole universe.

The allotted time passes and the performance begins. A sun rises over the stage. It's a much larger, more intricate glowing orb and reveals a number of players dressed far more simply than the Hyrypians the hosts have met. They wear complex machine masks upon their faces that shutter into different expressions as their hands flitter across their faces: dramatic caricatures to accompany the droning sound of their singing voices as they unfold the tale at the center of the performance - the one which drives this pilgrimage and for the Nest's very presence in the universe at all. It's the story of lost Rabadoceans coming to a planet near barren intent on brutalizing them - about loss and hardship until finally a single player separates from the rest. The orb of the sun over the stage turns, it's mechanical face shifting and resetting to indicate the passage of time as the very central platform of the stage begins to turn so that this lone player might walk. And walk. And walk through deserts and scrub land, through dark woods and dark caves, against the wind and with it. Through it all, the orb over the stage slowly lowers until at last this lone player can take it in their hands.

It cracks like an egg and brilliance streams from it. Braziers catch fire in the darkness. The garden illuminates itself. Every light in Naerstone House comes to life.

With that, the silence of the crowd breaks. There is applause -- each culture in its own unique fashion -- and then there is a rise of chattering conversation as the guests are served several small dishes and talk about the show they’ve just seen - and whatever possible clues it might give to the pilgrimage they themselves would soon be undertaking.

---

((OOC Notes: This is the hatch log for all new hosts as well as the evening's performance. Feel free to make your own logs and posts additional to this if you care to. You can find a more detailed overview of the host hatching process HERE and additional setting information about the Station HERE. Please be sure to review the MISSION: HYRYPIA ooc information. If you have any questions, please hit up either the mission's question thread, the FAQ or MOD CONTACT pages!))

NAVIGATION • SETTING • FAQ • MOD CONTACT • GLOSSARY

( CODE BY WHAMBAM )

Comments

common area

[redheadcarrier]

[ There's been something familiar on the edge of her consciousness. She hasn't been able to place it and, besides, she's been occupying herself with so much else. Reading, trying to learn everything she can so she can useful again. She hadn't gone to meet the new hosts; she'd preferred to stay behind and so now that that something is much closer and tugging at her attention, she follows it. It's the common area. She finds him and for a long, long few moments all she can really do is stare as emotions flit through her head and her shields seem to drop open.

He can't be here. Ryohji Kaji is dead. Has been dead. But there he is, pulling books out of his robes like he's some sort of traveling bookcase. He looks exactly like he did the last time she saw him and that - that just sends more emotion swirling through her. Anger, relief, excitement, joy, resentment, jealousy - it's all there. It's all a part of the confused mix that seeps into her and consumes her in that moment. He's here and he's alive and she wants to be happy about that, but she also remembers the way he brushed her off, the way he and Misato carried on (Misato, won't she be overjoyed) and then there's the part of her that feels like a hand has reached into her chest and squeezed her heart until it feels like it's about to burst.

For all of her resentment and anger and hate, she still cares about him. Did care about him. Wanted him to return that affection, even if it went no where. But he says she's a child - but - but- ]

Kaji!

[ Her voice rings out in the common room and she's crossing it, robes and scarves trailing behind her like pennants and there's something painfully joyful in her voice. It's a sound she hasn't heard herself make in a while. And the worst part is, that she's genuinely happy for a moment, even if she knows (knows) that this will probably all fall apart.

She doesn't bother with any other greeting. Just hurls herself against him and wraps her arms around his shoulder with a squeeze. Her tangled emotions are right there with her and - he'll probably notice - that she's wearing an eyepatch on her left eye. ]

[ryohji]

[ he sees her before he hears her, but that was just coincidence. even if he was trapped in a cage with a thousand screeching strangers, and a thousand more clamoring inside his head, he'd still be able to pick out her voice. he'd bet his last coin on it.

habit has a funny way of overriding shock. asuka was so predictable, profoundly so, that kaji braces himself for the contact before it happens, already making determinations about how best to downplay and deemphasize. gingerly a pair of arms wraps around her, again more out of habit than stark relief. there is nothing relieving about asuka being here. from what he's gleaned so far, the nest had handpicked each and every host to wage war against a staggeringly powerful and malevolent force, the likes of which were stronger than anything they can hope to wrap their minds around. kaji hadn't seen unit-02 about, and without unit-02 she was just a girl - a highly troubled and temperamental girl - with no generalizable skills outside of piloting specifically engineered eldritch cyborgs, under exacting conditions no less. no supplemental ability could make these truths any less evident. no ability could make her a 30 year old liability - like, say, himself - and not a 13 year old one. this must be a fluke; barring that, a cruel, sick joke.

asuka may be able to discern shades of kaji's reluctance, even as he steels his hands against her shoulders and peels her off him to take stock of her for any physical changes. her eyepatch draws his gaze. the pit in his stomach grows. ]

Asuka, [ why are you here? could she hear that? does it matter? ] Don't tell me that's part of your disguise.

[redheadcarrier]

[ Habit. The whole start of this conversation is a habit. She's just glad to see him - alive and well and not dead - but that happiness is fleeting. She knows that he doesn't see her like that and that he and Misato are a thing so the tentative, ginger way in which he handles her isn't unexpected or a surprise. It's just disappointing. Like always. Nothing's changed between them. Why should it have? He's been dead and you can't build a relationship with a dead man.

His dread she can feel in bits and pieces, leaking through the link like sand through a sieve. It's something that rankles her - a sharp jolt of resentment. She's not a child. She's here for a reason, because she's good at what she does, she can do this. She doesn't need him to shield her (although if he did, she might enjoy it, if only because it might mean that he cares enough to do it).

But for that first moment, she clings to him and the warmth of his body through all the layers of cloth and imagines that he might actually return her embrace, feeling oddly comforted by the familiar. Then he peels her back and she eases back, gives him that bit of space. As much as she'd like to link arms and stay with him, she knows what's going to happen and she's not quite the same as she always was. She's learned a few things along the way.

Her stomach churns. Of course he notices the eyepatch. She rubs at it with a thumb, feeling suddenly self-conscious. Almost bashful. ]

Of course it's not! It's - Ugh. [ Her stomach clenches now, a spike of fear running up her spine as memories of her last fight tumble through her head, visions of mass production eva units, blood, blinding pain, the loss of vision in an eye. ]

It's a long story, but - you're alive!

[ She's futilely trying to hold onto that exultation she was feeling a moment ago, but it's slipping through her fingers. It's fleeting and temporary. Seeing him again was always going to be painful, no matter what happens. ]

[ryohji]

[ he is still unaccustomed with connection that characterizes so much of the correspondence between hosts, and ergo many sensations prime for the observing either burden him intensely or fly right over his head, depending. but he sees what looks like primeval evangelion units, ivory, and tastes blood in the back of his throat. perhaps it's because they're facing so close right now, or maybe that she comes from his world. but it gives him pause.

you're alive. that gets the cogs whirring. of course he's alive. when was he ever not? of course, he was only moments away from dying before, during, and after the malevolent force had attacked him. that alone could explain for asuka's quip, you're alive, except for the nagging pulse in the back of his mind. a place low in his gut churns a warning. no, something wasn't right. in fact, something was very, very wrong. ]

Asuka, sit down. [ there are several chairs circling the table, kaji snags the leg of one with his foot and drags it close. ] Tell me what happened.

[redheadcarrier]

[ Kaji wants to talk to her. Even if it's just information, he's still talking to her. He's acknowledging her and that shouldn't make her heart jump, but it does. She hates herself a little for it, even as she settles into the chair and leans forward, arms folded over her middle. She wants to lean in toward him, but she's not sure if she should. She finally does after a moment of indecision, tries to stay close. He's here, he's alive, he's not dead.

Then again, she's come back from the dead. This isn't much of a surprise. ]

Starting from where? There's a lot.

[ She knows things he doesn't, she realizes in the moment. She has power over him. For once, the adults all turn to her to ask what's going on, to see what they should do, and there's something intoxicating and gratifying about it after having been ignored and brushed off and used by them for so long. ]

You remember Ikari getting absorbed into his Eva, right?

[ She's trying to figure out what he knows. What she ought to tell him - what she can tell him. And for all that, her voice still drips with contempt when she says that name. Ikari. Like it's something disgusting she's going to have to scrape off of her shoe. ]

[ryohji]

[ whatever asuka needs to do to psyche herself up, he will give the her space to do it, within reasonable limits. he doesn't shrink away when she leans in. people lean in when they're ready to talk. they do this because subconsciously, they desperately want to be heard. they desperately want to rid themselves of the burden they've been carrying for so long. they desperately want for someone to share the yoke, be a nonjudgemental ear. it's a desire that for most people, works outside their conscious control. ]

Yes. [ an affirmative noise. ] But, NERV managed to set him free. It took a month, but he got out.

[ right? kaji's filling in the blanks, trying to gauge what she knows as much as she's trying to gauge what he does. ]

[redheadcarrier]

[ She stares at him, tries to read the emotion on his face and the emotions she can feel through the pulse and beat of the Nest. It's strange to know what people are thinking (sort of). It's strange to feel it instinctively. It reminds her of the gestalt, the mass that humanity became after Third Impact, but also different. She's still her, but she has the feelings and emotions and thoughts of others buzzing in the background.

Weird.

But he knows something. ]

You were-

[ This is hard to say. How does she tell him that he's dead? She grimaces, drops her gaze, then raises it again, shoulders squaring against the sense of shame she feels. ]

You died. I don't know - something happened and you were killed after that. I don't know how. Just... that it happened.

[ And there's a faint memory of the shock and sorrow and denial that had rippled through her and torn apart her already fragile and tattered psyche. ]

[ryohji]

[ unsurprisingly, hearing asuka say you died is altogether worse than hearing her say you're alive - even though for all intents and purposes the meaning was identical.

but he does not waver. his face only betrays the slightest reaction, jaw jumping, and then his sang-froid returns to him with earnest. it doesn't surprise him to learn that asuka think he's dead. what matters, what he needs to know, is how - and if it matched his version of how, or not. ]

I see. [ what else is there to say? kaji continues on. ] That doesn't explain your injuries.

[ he hopes it doesn't. ]

[redheadcarrier]

[ It doesn't, does it? But he seems to skim over his own death with hardly a reaction - but she can see the way his jaw tenses and she can feel the little twitch through the link that binds them now. It's impossible to be completely unaware. She's always been observant. The next part is harder for her to say, funnily enough. She has to admit failure to one of the people she's looked to the most for approval. Misato she resents for doting on Shinji and ignoring her, but it's Kaji who she desperately wants to approve of her. Through him, she can become an adult figure - someone who need not rely on others, someone who is no longer thought of as a child.

Her shoulders tighten. ]

There was another Angel attack and I went out to handle it, but... it did something to me. It got into my head and it kept - it was replying memories I didn't want to look at again-

[ He knows what they are. He has to. He's read her file and she knows that, even if she's never talked about it with him. ]

I couldn't beat it. I couldn't beat it and they just - Commander Ikari just let it do that to me. It contaminated my mind-

[ Deep breath. It's just a memory now. A horrific, traumatizing memory. There's a ghost of that sensation - of being invaded and made unclean, of having something alien and inhuman take the form of your memories in an effort to attack (communicate). ]

The First destroyed with the Lance. I had to be saved by her-

[ There's hatred and bitterness in that single word. Her. As if she would've preferred to die rather than owe anything to the strange, staring girl with inhuman eyes and the cold sense of contempt. ]

And it was over. But - I couldn't - I wasn't able to pilot anymore. [ Her hands curl into the cloth on her legs, tightening into fists, knuckles starting to go white. ]

The next Angel attack, I couldn't even synch. I was... useless. So I.. left. I didn't want to live anymore. I couldn't. What good was I going to be? [ Bitter, bitter failure and she's admitting it to him. She's tainting herself with every word, making herself less and less desirable with each passing second. But she goes on. Because he wants to know and she's willing to do this for him because maybe, maybe she'll earn his approval. ]

I.. I lost track after that. I was in the hospital for a while-

[ A vague memory of someone - Ikari - standing over her, a realization that he's doing... something unclean and filthy and violating, even through the haze of sedatives and apathy. A vague feeling of disgust that's been sharpened over time, not that she's alert enough to think about it. ]

And then we got attacked. Apparently SEELE or someone pulling the strings didn't like us anymore and they sent in the JSSDF. [ Her tone has gone flat. ]

They put me in Unit-02 at the bottom of the lake. I don't know what happened inside the command center after that, but I heard Misato once or twice - and Lieutenant Ibuki. I didn't want to die there. Who wants to die? [ Her voice has pitched slightly up, something plaintive and a bit fearful, almost guilty, as if she's admitting some other great weakness and her eye has finally risen to glance at him, to see if he's judging her, half-expecting to see contempt and disgust written all over his features. ]

But - I realized - my mother- [ She swallows. This is the hard part. ]

My mother was... in Unit-02 all along. She was with me. She was protecting me-[ And now she's near ecstatic, face lighting up as she remembers something truly amazing. ]

And I could pilot again. I could synch and I was unstoppable! I destroyed them! All of them! [ There's something a bit dark in her tone as memories of crushing a frigate, of wiping out tanks and troops, of swatting air craft out of the sky fills her memories. She was annihilating them. ]

Then - then they deployed some kind of new Eva Unit. The Mass Production models. And I fought them and I was winning, but they - they wouldn't die! It wasn't fair! [ Like it was some sort of horrible game. ]

They had another Lance and I ran out of power and it - it went straight... through.

[ She ends that part of her story with a little gesture, voice dropping low and ashamed as she gestures, indicating the way the lance had speared into her Eva. Her voice is small and for the first time she does sound like a frightened girl recounting a horrible nightmare. ]

And they killed me. They tore me apart. Shinji never showed up. He never even tried. Misato left me to die. And... then. Third Impact.

[ That's it. That's the end. She waits in stony silence, waiting for him to say something, afraid that he's going to discard her all over again. That now that she's told her story, he's going to pat her on the head and smile and tell her to run along. ]

[ryohji]

[ the story asuka threads together, the visions she can't help but spill over the link, is enough a horrific visage to repulse the hardest of humans. kaji rides each seesaw emotion with slow-to-blooming nausea. it's gruesome, bloodcurling, hard to listen to. the truth often is. asuka was a tragedy forged, not born, and at each pit stop on the road to her undoing he - they - did nothing to stop it, could no nothing to stop it. it makes him sick. it makes him want to reach out for her, if only she were a different kind of girl. it's not the fear of her misunderstanding that keeps his hands still. it's because she's been touched so much, against her will,
that to add to that, even with good intentions, seems wrong. it's not right.

so he just sits there, by now the melancholy clearly visible across his features. she doesn't need to prod the mental link to capture his guilt, and sorrow. ]

You're here now. [ so is he. and she's here as a child soldier, no less. the realization comes too late. ] I'm sorry, Asuka. NERV...

[ she knows this, doesn't she? ]... failed you. You know that, don't you.

[redheadcarrier]

[ The horrible part about the words he says to her is that they're genuine. Maybe for the first time, he's being honest with her and it hurts. In a way, it hurts more than if he'd continued his indifference or his attempts to keep her at an emotional arm's length. She'd been prepared for that - hoping for something different, but steeling herself for the inevitable dismissal. But she can feel the guilt and the sorrow leaking through the lin kthey share now and it's all too real. She wants to scream about not wanting pity, not wanting help, but she's past that now, isn't she? For all that she despises accepting help (or says she does), this is what she's wanted.

Validation.

Someone to tell her that it's not all in her head. The thought's occurred to her more than once: that all the indifference and cold dismissal was in her head. That she was imagining things. That she was crazy and to expect anything else out of the world besides empty smiles, pats on the head, and the cold dismissal was the height of insanity.

But he's admitting it. That she's been failed. And it's not just NERV; in a way, "NERV" is just a stand-in for everyone else. Him, Misato, Shinji Ikari, her mother, her father, her step-mother. He means it.

She digs the heel of her palm into her eye, scrubbing at the sudden sting. She's not going to cry. She's not crying. ]

Of course I know that, idiot! Why are you saying that now?

[ There's a tightness in her throat, an exasperation in her tone, a choked quality. Why now, why only now is he telling her that and being honest? Where was this months ago? Years ago? It's selfish of her, she knows, to expect more. To have wanted anything else. It's just the wya the world is, right? ]

Kaji-

[ Another choke, because she hates this. She hates feeling vulnerable and scared and raw and open, but she can't stop it and she can't help it. ]

I'm glad you're here. [ It's a small voice. Not the exuberance or the lilting joy of a teenager with a crush. It's something smaller; a child telling an adult a secret held close to the chest. She wants to touch him; wants him to touch her. A reassurance he's real, but she can't reach out like that. She's already on the verge of tears and she's sure that if it happens, she's going to break down and she's not sure she's ready or willing to handle the shame of letting him see her that raw and open.

She doesn't like letting people see her cry. ]

[ryohji]

[ kaji remembers the last time he cried as if it happened yesterday. he could write an affidavit and swear to its veracity, that it happened seventeen years ago, the date, the time down to the painstaking minute, lucid to him. and he remembers the feeling, too, and could describe it with as much certainty as he could the cold objective facts. it felt good. it was an advertisement of sadness and a shout of aggravation all at once. he's tried to replicate the success he's had with crying, to no success. the last time was the last time, and if kaji could cry again, he would do it every day of his life.

asuka deserves this cry. what she doesn't deserve is the audience. ]

Let's get you out of here. [ kaji stands, a sudden, sure motion, as if standing could whet the sincerity behind his voice. only then does he reach out to nudge her with a gentle pat to her shoulder. why is he saying this now? it's a good question. it merits a spot on his long list of good questions, many of which will never obtain answers - only pathetic, cowardly excuses. ] You know this place better than I do. You lead.

[redheadcarrier]

[ Asuka's different in that regard. Crying has never proven to be very cathartic for her in the past. Tears have always been shameful, something to be hidden, something to deny. Crying means she's failing at being an adult, because adults don't cry. It's always left her exhausted and drained and feeling like nothing is ever going to be right. It's why she's still holding it back now, trying to avoid falling apart. ]

What-?

[ She's surprised when he stands and speaks, but she follows automatically. The nudge to her shoulder makes her heart skip and almost instantly there's a nagging whisper of suspicion in her ear. What does this mean? Why is he doing this? What does he want? But then there's the part that's wanted this since day one and that part of her is happy to lead, heart hammering away in her chest. ]

I've got a room. Did you pick one out yet? [ Despite the suddenly too casual subject, there's a tremble in her voice and a tightness in her throat. The tears haven't been stopped, just temporarily put on hold. She adjusts her robes and starts to lead. Her room isn't that far away and it's spartan and relatively bare - especially when compared to her room in Germany or the cramped apartment she'd shared in Tokyo-3. She settles onto the bed and glances up at him. ]

Why'd you want to move? [ She sort of knows the answer and even here, cut off from the eyes of everyone else (but not their minds; there's really nowhere they can go where they won't have an audience), she's holding back the tears, trying to force back the sting at the corner of her eye with sheer willpower. It's going to crack, through. Just give it time. ]

[ryohji]

[ he keeps to the threshold, the door kept barely ajar to his preferences. in mind he'd had a place that skirted the lines between public and private, someplace like a garden or a defoliated area tucked away. but kaji finds himself unwilling to shoot asuka down so soon, even as the discontentment mounts as he realizes where she's lead him. ]

It has nothing to do with me. [ so much masquerading even as he can see she's nearly ready to erupt in a paroxysm of tears and screams. the thing about mastering the art of posturing is that you know how to spot a front in somebody else. ] It's okay to cry, Asuka. Don't hold it back the way you are.

[ implicit in his comment, maybe, is the following charge: just not in front of other people. he can understand - and even share - in her reluctance, at least: asuka was always a girl who was acutely bound to the perceptions of other people, stranger or not. anything that made her seem weak, or pathetic, or vulnerable was unbecoming of her, even as her efforts to rise above it all only served to have a counterintuitive effect of making her seem needy, desperate, pitiable. asuka langley soryu was a tragedy coiled in a thorny bramble. kaji's expression is grave as he watches her, urging her to let up the act. ]

[redheadcarrier]

[ For once, the choice of her room isn't related to some sort of scheme to get him to start acknowledging her or to try and "seduce" him. It's just the first private location that popped into her head. Funny how that works out. She can pick up on the bit of discontent and there's a twinge of resentment and guilt that mixes together. She doesn't (didn't) want to disappoint him now that he's back from the dead, but there's another part of her that wants to claim a space as her own. To have something that she can say is hers. ]

What-?

[ She's lying to herself, lying to him, trying to maintain that facade of an independent, tough young woman who doesn't let hardship get to her. She's trying to be that brash, arrogant girl who doesn't need people. Who doesn't need to cry or let the world hurt her.

You don't let the world do anything, though. The world does whatever it wants and human beings just react.

Her shoulders tighten up as he continues and there's truth in his words. What's more, there's an acknowledgement of her pain. Of her emotions. That they might be valid, that it's OK to express them in a way that doesn't involve arrogance. That one can be weak at times. There's something relieving about that. ]

I'm not - I'm not going to cry-

[ She tries to stave it off with one more push, but the permission that Kaji grants her is really all that it needs. She's being allowed to feel. The tears start to come, slowly at first, but very quickly starting to become an ugly mess. No one is ever attractive when they cry. Especially not when it's a paroxysm of repressed emotion and pain. She's been holding this in for a long time. At least since she woke up on the beach. Probably longer. It's an expression of the frustration and despair and pain that dogged her throughout Japan. The loss of Kaji. Her own failures. It hurts and it's cathartic and it racks her shoulders in shuddering, ugly sobs as she tries to draw in breath, unable to really stop the flood.

One hand scrubs at her face and then she hides her face in the crook of her elbow, half-bent over on the bed. There's no screams or accusations here (at least not yet). Just an outpouring of grief from a girl who's tried far too hard to suppress this outburst. Her free hand comes up, makes a clenching gesture. She shouldn't want this, shouldn't need this, but she does and she risks even more hurt by even acknowledging this. ]

Kaji- [ His name comes out in a stuttered sob, forced in between shuddering breaths. She feels naked and vulnerable and that mixes with the deep sensation of pain and grief that permeates her mind. ]

Please. [ The last word is said in a small voice, choked back and throttled, as if she doesn't even want to say the word. ]

[ryohji]

[ he has never seen asuka cry before. he'd come close, just after the attack of the 14th angel. after she'd been recalled from the fray, asuka had been left alone to boil in her agitation within the suffocating darkness of the entryplug. NERV was much too busy with zeruel, and the prospect of shinji's death, to cart her away to safety. and only after they'd apprehended unit-01 under miles of corded polyester rope and steel did NERV technicians come to fish her out. he had accompanied them against orders to never poach upon their territory, even as all formal affiliations between him and asuka had long been severed. she was a wreck, he remembered, face wet with snot, teeth grinding down, whining into her hands. but she hadn't been crying.

even with the symbiote bridging the once inviolable gulf between their minds, kaji can only stare at her with a twisted, pained expression, like an evacuee surveying destruction from atop a helicopter. perhaps a small part of him feels relief, and a smaller part jaundiced envy. she doesn't know how lucky she is, to still feel enough to cry. ]

It's alright. [ slowly he shuts the door behind him, as if it could drown out asuka's wailing for anyone who happened to be within a hearing distance, or mental distance, away. ] I'm right here. Don't stop until you can't anymore.

[redheadcarrier]

[ Maybe she is lucky. She's still young. In a way, she still has a chance to move on from everything. She can try to find a way to heal. She can be better. Her life story isn't written or set in stone (not yet). But the pathways that are open to her have been closing off, one by one, as she's gotten older. How much longer does she really have?

Those thoughts don't cross her mind, though. She's too wrapped up in the tears and the sobs and utterly draining, isolating feeling of letting grief and anger and pain vent itself in this messy, painful display of emotion. She can't see very well - she has to keep clearing her eyes - but she can see him near the door and a part of her wants to believe that he's only there so he could shut it, not because he wants to keep his distance from her. She sucks in another breath and it comes out in another painful sob, shoulders heaving.

She feels alone. Even with him in the room. It's a painful feeling, having to endure this by herself and maybe she understands Third Impact a little better now - or will, once she thinks back on this moment.

Asuka doesn't like to ask for help. She doesn't like to ask for anything. But he's there and he's not moving and she wants something. She lifts her gaze, blinking through the tears. ]

Kaji-

[ She repeats his name again, the syllables broken up by a sharp, involuntary intake of breath. She pushes to her feet, still crying, still hiding her head against her arm,
and she crosses the space between them with a few halting steps. She doesn't wrap her arms around him in an embrace. She doesn't try to cling to him like she has in the past. She just buries her face against his robes and digs her fingers into the cloth, stepping close so that he can at least feel his presence. In a way, she's forcing him to act - to do something. And failing that, she'll lean on him and use his presence as some sort of comfort, even if she wants more. Some acknowledgement.

The tears keep coming. ]

It hurts.

[ She doesn't say what "it" is voice muffled by his robes. The tears or the emotion or her loss and anger or something else entirely. It's just another small statement, another little voice that adds to the weight on her shoulders. ]

[ryohji]

[ it isn't as if kaji does not want to be a part of asuka's road to rehabilitation. but there are forces acting outside of their control that make it a near physical impossibility. for him to offer anything more than his presence, pendulous like an uncertain spectator, would be to contribute to her re-ruin. the danger of regressing her back to square one with newly torn wounds hanged over them like a portention. the guilty should never contribute too much to their victim's recovery, or else the victim will become lost in the process, or else asuka's suffering is made his own, is sublimated into his guilt, and kaji will only feel for himself-as-the-guilty, rather for asuka-as-the-victim, or ikari-as-the-dead, or the first-as-the-tool.

and of course, there wasn't any such road to begin with. asuka's path forward had been burned at her behest. the most she could ever hope for was ending up someone like him, or misato, or the commander. and that was a fate kaji wouldn't wish on his greatest enemy. ]

I know. [ what he can do, what he will do, is pull her closer, squeezing her shoulders in time with her strangled gulps of breath. this is going to be a long night. ] I can feel it, too. What you need, Asuka...

[ ...is to never have been born. he can't say that, he can't even think it, so the sentiment is expressed of its most abstract, irreducible form, like a messaged played backward. ]

...is to decide who you are. Who you're doing to be, [ dead? or alive? he wouldn't fault her for eitr choice. he threads a hand though her hair. ] even if you have to forget this ever happened.

[redheadcarrier]

[ This is always what she wanted. Validation. Someone to comfort her. The feeling of love. To have someone value her, to give her a point of contact when she felt so horrifically, terribly alone. A part of her resents him for it still - why now? Why did it take two deaths, the end of a world, and being stuck together on an alien planet for him to finally do this? But he's giving he something - a lifeline, maybe. He's giving her permission to be weak and vulnerable and even if she detests herself a little more for having the nerve to finally have a long cry, it's cathartic. She's held the tears in for the most part and even when they've crept out, they've been contained and muffled. Giving them room to flow helps.

Their emotions are mingling in a confused mess. She can't pick up on all of his thoughts or emotions or ideas but she doesn't need to and doesn't want to. There's a hand on her shoulder and in her hair and for once she doesn't mind feeling like a child who needs comforting. For once she can act like she's scared and lost and hurting. Even if afterward, she's going to wipe her eyes and pretend it never happened. ]

I don't know.

[ Her voice is weak and it hurts to admit it, but they'll both forget this, won't they? They'll put it away in those parts of their memories where uncomfortable truths go to be forgotten. Her shoulders shake as she sucks in another deep breath and sobs again, acutely aware that she's probably making a mess of Kaji's robes. ]

I'm not supposed to be alive. [ She knows that. The only reason she's here is because Third Impact came along and plucked her soul from the brink of oblivion and then the Nest plucked her from the shore of a blood-red sea. ]

But I don't want to die. I can't die.

[ So she'll keep living, but only because she hates the alternative. ]

[ryohji]

And then what are you going to do?

[ there is a time for everything, and kaji finds himself out of turn, saying the worst possible thing at the worst possible time. but i don't want to die simply isn't good enough. it isn't good enough for her, because it wasn't good enough for him. that's as much a plan as the commander was a father. it won't get her anywhere, if kaji's experiences are any judge, and kaji only has himself in way of reference. when he was her age, he didn't want to die. he also wasn't supposed to be alive, and lived in despite of it. fifteen years and counting and finally, he realizes, he'd made a huge mistake.

what kaji doesn't yet realize, what he can't realize, is that asuka deserved none of this. it is different, when misato says she doesn't want to die, but because kaji sees her as a survivor who's earned her right to be one, because he cannot help but see her as anything else. asuka was young, young like he was. asuka was scared, scared like he was. these days he can only see himself, dirtied and terrified, in children. he takes her by the shoulders to force her his gaze. ]

Are you going to forget about what happened to you? Are you going to avoid anything that reminds you of piloting, or EVA? Avoid me? Change your name, like I did? Are you ok with being another child soldier, Asuka?

[redheadcarrier]

[ When he forces eye contact, she stares up at him with a red-rimmed eye, blinking away the tears that still prickle at the corner of her eye and dampen her eyepatch. She doesn't want to think about what she's going to do or how she's going to do it. This isn't supposed to be about that; this is meant to be catharsis. This is meant to be a chance for her to let it out. Not decide on the path she's going to take. Anger flares in her chest, fighting with the flood of other emotions that are already overwhelming her. Her jaw clenches and she takes a breath in, sniffling as she tries to clear snot. Her fingers tighten against his clothing and then she draws a hand back to draw it underneath her nose, eye blinking rapidly, pupil dilating as she tries to deal with the impression she gets from him.

Why is he asking her this? Why is he asking her questions that he knows the answers to? Her throat works in a swallow and her voice emerges as a croak until she pauses and forces it out, voice cracking. ]

Forget? I can't forget! [ It's louder than she meant, almost a yell, anger crackling underneath the surface. ]

Why are you even asking me that? [ The hand that's still fisted in his robe opens, turns into a push. ]

I don't want to forget!

[ A part of her does, but another part of her knows that to forget and to try to run away would be horrific. It would make her like Shinji (and she can't think of anything more abhorrent). ]

I'm going to fight! I'm here and I have a mission again! [ I'm not a child.

But she knows what she is and she's going to keep doing the only thing she knows how to do: fight. Be useful. Find the target; eliminate it. She doesn't get to be a "normal" teenager and she never will. She lost that chance a long time ago. That path is closed to her and trying to pry it back open will only result in more heartache. ]

Why are you asking me this? Do you think that I'm going to run away like Ikari did? [ She spits the name out and now the anger is winning, her yelling coming in between sobs. Ikari. She hates the name, hates the thought of the scared, pathetic boy who she had to live with for months. Hates that he never tried, hates that he left her to die, hates that he tried to strangle the life out of her.

She slaps her hand against his chest. There's not enough force to do much other than get his attention. ]

I can't run away. I don't want to run away. There's nothing left back home, there's nothing to go back to, so I have to keep going! I can't get stuck like Misato! I can't pretend that we can fix it, because we can't! [ All of her frustration with Misato creeps out, mixing in with the anger. The thought that somehow they could change the past, go back and fix everything if they just tried hard enough, is a fool's errand and she knows it. The only way out is through (forward). ]