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Episode 60' : Requiem for an Eden Defiled / Harbinger
Part
II
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
CAPTION
RETURN
(The Present)
Fuyutsuki: What you've done. . . You're throwing everything away.
Misato: . . .
Fuyutsuki: Your freedom . . .possibly your life. . . to say nothing of your career.
Misato: . . .
Fuyutsuki: I'm sorry to say that . . . at the beginning, I had very little faith in you.
Misato: . . .
Fuyutsuki: Strange how, now, at least I can find comfort in knowing I was wrong.
Misato: . .what?
Fuyutsuki: . . . Too many have suffered at the hands of our ambition.
Fuyutsuki:
In dark moments, I often find myself searching for
meaning within our continued existence--
Though I am thankful for surviving the second impact,
and the hell that came afterward.
Fuyutsuki:
But to live without knowing the joy living, as we
have in more recent days, I think, is
closer to hell itself.
Fuyutsuki: It is to say nothing of the children we have emburdened with our future.
Misato: . . . We do what we must, to live.
Fuyutsuki:
But, perhaps mankind is not worthy of this continued
existence.
Our innate ability to reason, to better ourselves,
that which
separates us from savage beasts, has taken a secondary
place to our
uncanny ability to render sin.
Fuyutsuki:
If only we, as a people, could reflect upon our folly.
Perhaps salvation wouldn't
lie just beyond our grasp.
(With this, the man makes a slight
motion with his free hand. In the dimness, something
clatters
across the table between Misato's cuffed wrists. .
. taking it between her fingers, she is surprised
to
feel the stark, sharp contours of a small key . .
.)
Fuyutsuki:
You may go, Major. In my report, I will mention the
validity of your alibi. Besides--no
Information of a vital or tactical nature was exposed,
and Caspar is still functional. I will
continue my investigation until the culprit is found.
Misato: . . .Sir . . . ?
Fuyutsuki: Lies do not always need to serve a malignant
purpose, or a machiavellian scheme.
Sometimes, they are necessary to protect the truth--and
the truth seekers.
(The clatter of steel on steel is
his response as the woman unlocks her cuffs, letting
them fall to
the table. Standing, Katsuragi nods to the sub commander
slowly, uttering quiet words of gratitude . . .)
Misato: Thank you, sir.
Fuyutsuki: You're dismissed.
(As the woman takes her leave, shoving
past a surprised Sgt. Mikami, Fuyutsuki looks on with
a
sad smile--a smile that quickly dissolves as the woman
fades from sight, and the thoughts begin to
race through his mind.)
Fuyutsuki:
(thinking) You may not want to thank me, Major.
I fear we may not be much longer for this
scarred world.
But, if anyone can salvage what sanity is left in
this place, perhaps
you can.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(Elsewhere . . .
In the apartment belonging to Misato
Katsuragi, the sound of the door closing behind the
third child is
quiet against the backdrop of life that has once more
filled the living space.
It is a feeling that has almost become
foreign to the boy, the intangible sense of coming
home to the
living sounds of another. As such, Shinji is not surprised
to happen upon Asuka Soryu leisurely planted in
front of the television . It is with a slight nod
that the girl acknowledges the boy's presence, and
little else.
The boy watches her for a moment, his
thoughts a parade of feelings, frustrations and contemplations.
It is this amalgamation of concern that is voiced
when the third child, at last, utters quietly . .
. )
Shinji: You didn't go to school today.
Asuka: . . .
Shinji: You should have--
Asuka: I didn't want to.
Shinji: Why . . .
Asuka: Are you going to mock me, third child?
Shinji: No . . . But if you're really feeling better . . .
Asuka: I shouldn't have said anything.
( A beleaguered pause passes between
the two, driven by the third child's continued uncertainty.
Shutting off the television, the girl sighs loudly--a
drawn, disappointed sound that serves to only temper
her frustration for the boy further . . .)
Shinji: Things change too quickly.
Asuka: . . .
Shinji: I feel different somehow. From before. It's like a growing dread. Like time is running out.
Asuka: Don't be paranoid . . .
(Wearily, the boy rises to his feet, clenching a tight fist at his side . . .)
Shinji: I'm not ashamed to admit . . . I'm afraid.
Asuka: . . .
Shinji: I'm afraid of what you might say . . . I can't . . .
Asuka: Don't. I don't want to.
Shinji: I can't go on like this. Today was too much.
Asuka: Shinji . .
(The second child keeps her gaze
affixed on the window's dwindling light as the boy
brushes past,
unwilling, it seems, to meet his attention. Ikari
stops in place at the threshold of the hallway leading
to
his room, his fists white at the knuckles.
The words come almost instinctively--flowing
as clear as thoughts in his troubled mind, yet spoken
to
the air with a character which makes them seem an
almost unintentional slip of the tongue . . .)
Shinji: I won't play this game anymore!
Asuka: . . .
(Asuka Soryu does not respond. The
words seem to hang in the air with the child's breath,sinking
in
slowly, almost maddeningly . . . The girl does not
rise from her seat as the boy steps from the room,
nor
does she remove her gaze from the dull piece of sky
that it has begun to dimmer in the wake of his declaration.
The world is still, quiet, and cold.
It is not long before the sounds of cello music drift from the boy's room--a somber melody, well practiced and clean.
When she does at last speak, her
voice is little more than a low whisper--as if some
tenant, some vital component of some intangible dogmatic
law has been inordinately violated . . .)
Asuka:
. . . Shiest . . .
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(Far below.
The LCL plant hums with a life of
its own-self sustaining generators filling the vastness
with an ambience
that is theirs and theirs alone.
In the glare of faraway overhead
fixtures, reflected upon the expressionless mask of
the being known only
as "Lilith", a relatively diminutive figure
stands.
Behind him, the sound of the opening
portal echoes loudly in the chamber, heralding the
arrival of
another . . .)
Gendo: Your interrogation was completed earlier today.
Fuyutsuki: Yes.
Gendo: What did you find?
Fuyutsuki: Nothing conclusive.
Ikari . . . Miss Ibuki?
Fuyutsuki: She hasn't changed her statement.
Gendo: How unfortunate. So now events within our own hierarchy must go "unexplained."
Fuyutsuki: You would have me pursue the matter further?
Gendo: No. energy, much like time, is finite. It is no use wasting it now.
Fuyutsuki: . . . Things did not go well with Seele.
Gendo: We have reached a terminus.
Fuyutsuki: Is that why you called me here?
Gendo:
. . . I have just been informed all communication
between the magi and the
open network abruptly ceased three
hours ago.
Fuyutsuki: Yes . . . we expected it as result of the incident earlier this morning--
(Fuyutsuki feels a cold chill travel
the length of his spine as Ikari meets eyes with him--his
face a
somber veil not unlike the mask adorning the massive
figure high above . . .)
Gendo: Do not be quick to assume. The committee has communicated their intention.
Fuyutsuki: . . What are you saying--
(It is then, as if to render Ikari's
words prophetic, the lights illuminating the room
flash, returning
with red hues that blanket the room in a sanguine
haze. From corners unseen, the recognizable howl
of the early warning signal pierces the lucid calm
. . . Kozou Fuyutsuki does not hide the horror in
his
countenance as the dark meaning behind the younger
man's words is made abruptly clear . . .)
Gendo: Prepare the Evangelions.
Fuyutsuki: . . .
Gendo: We may already be too late.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Shinji: . . .?
(The morose lamentation of Shinji
Ikari's cello is unceremoniously cut off by the wail
of alert sirens
that fills the air. They begin as one, barely discernable
from the background noise of the living world,
the city and the song; gathering in number until like
discordant protests to the uneasy tranquility the
battered metropolis has briefly enjoyed. Soon, they
are an inharmonious chorus which heralds a break
from the only semblance of peace the boy has known,
drowning out even the sound of the cello bow
clattering to the floor . . .
No longer able to sit alone with
his thoughts, Shinji turns his eyes from the window
to the figure
he knows is now standing in the doorway. An unconventional
acknowledgement now passes between
he and Asuka Soryu--filled with the screeching wail
of the early warning klaxons that seem to tease
the prospect Armageddon.
Yet, in this new interim, it is as though they have become oblivious to the sound, the second child and he.
Asuka regards the boy with a blue gaze
that denotes a greater loneliness, a greater wanting
than
he could ever comprehend. Within this, too, is the
glimmer of understanding. Understanding of the
morbid fear which once again crawls on the third child's
flesh as the alarm reaches its unnerving crescendo
. . .
Still nothing is said, then, as
the boy retrieves his bow from his feet. With well
practiced precision,
he places it gingerly upon the strings, retracing
the composition's final movement from its point of
abrupt
interruption.
From the doorway, the second child
peers curiously, unable at first to discern the notes
which once
more issue forth from the third child's cello in the
deafening haze that has engulfed them both. It is
a
fleeting ambiguity at best, however, before the meaning
behind Ikari's act become clear.
The song is one of remembrance; the chorus,
one of fear. The notes from within having joined the
notes
from outside, an inharmonious unity forms to create
a new compilation--A sorrowful requiem, one whose
delicate composition is driven now by the expert hands
of fate.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(Somewhere far removed . . .)
Kihl: It begins.
Seele03: So it shall be.
Seele04: Ikari, your time has ended.
Kihl: The cancer must be eradicated, erased from existence . . . and we shall begin anew.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(Far beneath the city streets, in
the control center--)
Hyuga: I've got multiple signals, airborne.
Yuri:
Shit. The perimeter warning system didn't the activate
the EWS.
They must have made a preemptive
strike-the mount Fuji center isn't responding.
Maya: Did the Futagoyama center register a spectral pattern change?
Shigeru: Negative. This isn't an angel.
(From the command platform high above, Sub commander Fuyutsuki growls in consternation . .)
Fuyutsuki:
Though I'd tend to agree, we're in no position to
presume.
Prepare first through third stage countermeasures.
Yuri: Sir, defense systems are 78% operable.
Fuyutsuki: It'll have to do.
Fuyutsuki:
(thinking) They must know our level of vulnerability.
We haven't had
adequate time to repair all of our security
measures . . .
(It is then that a call comes from the command platform far below, as yet another joins the crew on-deck . . .)
Misato: Request permission to -
Fuyutsuki: (interrupting) Granted! Pilot status?!
(A look passes between Katsuragi
and Ibuki as the former regards the latter for confirmation.
Ibuki is
mindful of the exchange, disregarding the animosity
rising within her as she stands briefly within Misato's
gaze. )
Maya: Affirmative. Unit 01 and 02 are prepped. The first child is in standby.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(On the city outskirts-
A convoy of vehicles and varied armor
stretches over 4 miles of mountain road through the
exposed
valley, twisting like a serpent over the rocky ridge
as if preparing to choke the very life from the cliffside
itself.
Overhead, circling like birds of prey,
a swarm of unmarked VTOLs stalk the blood-red skies.
Aboard
the lead aircraft--a hulk of gunmetal gray set apart
from the rest only by the aircraft identification
number
atop its tailfin--the usual banter between central
and command forces is rendered null by the air of
radio
silence which hangs over the mission. It is only within
secure channels that the pilots communicate with
the ground forces below . . .)
Airman A: Locust 07 to control--satellite transmissions
from the target have ceased. External
feed
is picking up an active civil defense siren, over.
(The response comes in a cackle of static--a voice slightly garbled from residual digital frequency encryption . . .)
Command: Roger. Orders received: Initiate phase I.
Airman A: Understood. Commencing operation.
(Without delay, a signal is given.
In an instant, the horde of aircraft break free of
their holding pattern in
the clouds above. Bristling with armament to the very
last, the steel vultures swoop down from the heavens,
tearing through the skies toward the now silent streets
of the unassuming city sprawled below . . .)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(Meanwhile . . . )
Seyoko: Lyn!!
(The swell of humanity that greets
Seyoko Okazaki's senses in the 3rd civil defense shelter
does little to
comfort the young woman in her current state of crisis.
It is the second such mountainside shelter she has
checked in the last 20 minutes, her growing concerns
quickly blooming into a galvanized terror . . .)
Seyoko: (thinking) God, kid, you're scaring me! Where the hell are y-
Touji: Miss - hey, aren't you Miss Okazaki?
(The woman turns to the sound of
the voice, a vague recognition dawning at the sight
of a young boy
and the girl who clings close to him . . .)
Seyoko: You . . . You're one of Lyn's friends, right? The fourth child-
Touji: Yeah . . .
Seyoko: Have you seen him!? Was he here!?
Touji: He was . . but he . .
Seyoko: He what? Where is he!?
(It is the girl, however, who responds . . .)
Hikari: He ran out of the shelter-I tried to stop him, ma'am, but he wouldn't listen!
Seyoko: No . . .
(The thought has not the time to
process, however, as she and the rest of the denizens
of the shelter
are thrown from their feet by a distant blast. Screams
erupt in a chain reaction around her as concussions
begin to rock the small facility in rapid succession,
filling the world within with surprised despair as
the
world outside, it seems, surrenders itself to chaos.)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(below . . .)
Yuri:
I'm reading multiple impacts in the northwestern sectors!
Tacnet transmission from New Akirhaba
have ceased completely-
Fuyutsuki: Any idea how many of them-
Hyuga: Estimated 50 craft, no markings, no response to radio inquiry-
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(Phosphorescent tracers rip through
the skies, peppering mutilated asphalt as they wind
a
dizzying path of destruction to their target: The
civil defense force mobile SAM launcher has no time
to maneuver, to say nothing of returning fire, before
the barrage causes it to implode an instant
before erupting in a blossom of fire and smoke.
Nearby, gutted buildings continue
to shudder with ultrasonic intensity as countless
numbers
of the attacking VTOLs crisscross overhead. Each pass
is followed by brief flashes of light in the
city streets below, as bomb impacts shake the less
stable structures to their foundations. )
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Shigeru:
The secondary defense boundary has been compromised!
3rd
Battalion is in
full retreat!
Yuri: 23 of our 47 remaining mobile batteries have been knocked out--
Misato: What about our airborne units!?
Hyuga: Negative response! Last communiqué reported heavy fire-
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(Explosions continue to rock the
city center, as mounted mobile artillery guns strafe
the battlefield
from the beyond the ridges which surround. The concussive
force of the rail--cannon charges echoes
across the valley as they streak toward impact, obliterating
their targets in a luminous flash of heat
and smoke that rains down in a continuous thunder
from on high . . .
From main roads, pockets of resistance
flare up as automated cannon matrices unleash burst
after futile burst at the passing waves. The stench
of cordite is strong in the air as, one by one, the
mobile guns exhaust their ammunition.
It is mere moments before, one by
one, structures begin to fall: beaten and tattered
remnants of
concrete, girdered steel and glass collapsing upon
themselves in a roiling cloud of smoke and debris.
It is a torrent of dust and fire that engulfs their
battered brethren in a choking mist which obscures
the
light of the evening sun. It is not long before the
haze twists about the center of the city, serving
only to
further enhance the hellish illumination of the barrage
for those soldiers dying in the streets as the
slaughter continues, unabated . . .)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Yuri: Surface countermeasures down to 3% . . !
Fuyutsuki:
Dammit. Initiate ground zero protocols! Seal off all
possible entrances to
The geo-front and central dogma!
Yuri: Roger-
Fuyutsuki: . . .
Misato: sir . . .
Fuyutsuki: Any indications of ground forces within the perimeter?
Yuri: Negative. I've got confirmation on the outskirts, but none of them have moved in . . .
Fuyutsuki: They're there to make sure no one leaves.
Misato: I assumed they were intent on capturing this facility!?
(Shaking his head, the man spits in disgust --)
Fuyutsuki: This is no invasion.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(Meanwhile, far below . . .
(The boundaries of terminal dogma
have yet to show any indication of the hell raging
high above--
the muted air of the LCL plant chamber almost suffocating
in its warmth and humidity.
She remains motionless, as ever
always, as the minuscule figure stands beneath her
colossal gaze of 7
soulless eyes. Eyes which seem, over time, to follow
Gendo Ikari's movements on the small platform that
serves as a dock of sorts within the immense pool
of LCL that immerses the beast; the titanic creature
known only as "Lilith.")
Gendo: It is simple. They mean to destroy us.
(From his pocket the crackle of
static abounds in the relatively quiet chamber as
Sub-commander Kozou
Fuyutsuki's voice rings aloud over a handheld transceiver,
the sense of dismay ever present . . .)
Fuyutsuki: How long have you known?
Gendo:
Not long enough to do more than has already been done.
They intend on clearing preliminary
Resistance before beginning
the second phase of their attack.
Fuyutsuki: A purge maneuver?
(The man is quiet as he grips tightly
the handle of the steel briefcase in his left hand.
. . Before him, a
figure stands between he and the colossus that occupies
the chamber, wearing a sad look upon his ashen face.
It is a faint form, almost an apparition--A
child-being with a shock of white hair that glows
brilliant beneath
the lights of the LCL plant proper.
A ghostly spectre stands before Gendo
Ikari; not on the platform the supreme commander occupies,
but rather, upon the surface of the LCL itself, his
ethereal form reflected in the sanguine fluid. )
Gendo: We have little time.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(Topside . . .
An ghostly calm has overtaken the
embattled streets of Tokyo-3, plunging it into stillness
as abruptly
as the attack began. The ambient haze from collapsed
structures which now fills the air with a thick
smog, besides obscuring the light of ongoing conflict,
creates a sort of muffled eye in the storm.
In an alleyway among the tattered
and gutted remains of new Shibuya, a figure sits huddled
among
broken concrete and plaster dust. Coated in dirt from
head to toe, she makes not a sound As the
luminance from faraway explosions light up the smoke
filled miasma of the descending night, and
the air overhead is torn by the feral whine of attacking
aircraft . . .)
Aoi: Is this the fate we share? Where angels fail, man shall succeed? Even in destroying yourselves?
(From within, the response comes
as a statement more of fact than emotion--from a distant
place, deep
within her psyche that Aoi knows may or may not be
part of her own . . . )
Voice: Perhaps it is the inevitable path, of both the pious and the irreverent.
Aoi: Why do they trouble themselves so? Is it really worth saving?
Voice: An odd question, coming from one such as you.
Aoi:
(bitterly) A week ago, I would not entertain such
thoughts. Amazing how falling from grace
changes one's perspective . . .
Voice:
I remember you now. The memories are faint, but they
grow more lucid with
every passing
moment.
Aoi: . . .
Voice: Standing upon the temple mount, during the city's fall.
Aoi: . . .
Voice: Your eyes were full of tears . . .
Aoi: You only remind me that my pity has always been my greatest weakness.
Voice:
Spoken like a true puppet. How they twisted you, in
the end.
To see compassion
as a flaw . . .
Aoi: That's enough. I am a tainted creature. One of the fallen . . . I am less than the Lilim . . .
Voice:
Shame reveals inner goodness. Striving to become better
than what you are,
Is this not the virtue placed within
man by God? Is this not what defines him?
Aoi: But I am not human--Why are you doing this?
Voice: Because no one shall be alone. Not any longer.
Aoi: Your efforts are pointless. I cannot be saved.
Voice: No, you cannot.
Aoi: . . .
Voice: But, perhaps . . . perhaps . . .
Aoi:
I appreciate what you are trying to do . . . But This
isn't Babel.
I should like you to leave my thoughts
now.
Voice: I know you cannot turn a blind eye to them. Not again.
Aoi: . . . Then perhaps one of us will die here, as I promised.
(The girl pauses, a pensive glimmer
in her eyes as distant aftershocks reverberate through
the earth below,
loosing more debris from cracked masonry above and
sending them tumbling about her . . .)
Aoi: I tried. I thought . . . I could be with him. I thought that we could be together.
Voice: But?
Aoi:
I am a fool. We cannot escape our fate. The Lilim,
The Factae de Adamo.
We are tied together, in creation,
and destruction. It was His plan from the beginning.
Voice: You speak lucidly, yet you are unaware of your own words.
Voice:
Free will . . . that which defines Lilim from Angels.
The capacity for sin,
given unto humanity
as a means of testing the mettle of the soul-
Voice: This is also a means by which he determines
his fate.
Aoi: . . .
Voice: A fate which may, indeed, end in his own destruction. But it will be man's choosing.
Aoi: Do you liken yourself unto God, now?
(The voice grows silent, briefly. The girl smiles a sad smile, a glimmer of wry skepticism playing about her gaze . . .)
Aoi:
You would have me twist the course of their fate for
your own purposes.
You are no better than Kihl.
Voice:
Perhaps not. But I am not bent on begetting death.
Aoi: . . .
Voice:
It is an odd connection that I have felt within you.
You are like them,
in that way . . .
Aoi:
(sharply) Stop it . .! It was all a façade!
My behavior, my feelings . . .
And how pathetic have I become? I've managed to deceive
myself
with my own lies . . .
Voice: You know his thoughts . . . are for you, now?
(The girl grows silent--a cold awareness electrifying her senses as the thought echoes through her mind . . .)
Aoi: . . .
Voice: You can taste his pain . .
Aoi: . .
Voice: This is the nature of living.
Aoi: . . .
Voice: To truly feel . . to know awareness beyond mere existence.
Voice: The choice is yours, In'gil Mala'kai. Live or die, their fate--is our fate.
Aoi: That's enough.
Voice: Then . . . you know what you must do.
(The girl closes her eyes, squeezing
out the remnants of gathered tears which roll briefly
down her cheek.
Within her mind's eye, images flash in rapid succession--
The tower, crumbling beneath the
weight of providence
A wasteland of souls,
The ruin of a city of long ago,
A boy named Anouilh . . .)
Voice: You remember when the tower fell.
Aoi: . . .
Voice:
What of the new Babylon? Will it, too, be forsaken
by its angels?
We holy
guardians, whose promise to protect is bound by their
fiery swords . . .
Aoi: . . .
Voice: You cannot throw away what you are for what you wish to become.
Aoi: Tell me where he is . . . and I will consider.
Voice: Tempting. But I do not need to.
Aoi: . . . ??
Voice:
You know, deep within, where he is. It is the same
place your heart has lead you.
For the love of
God, and for the love of man. The same place all go
who seek salvation.
For some, it is
even a place to seek damnation. I have nothing more
to say to you.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(Elsewhere . . .
The warm embrace of the LCL through
the treated fibers of the plug suit is not unlike
a second skin now, or
so Shinji Ikari cannot help but muse as a numb tightness
builds in his stomach. It is a familiar feeling of
anxiety,
brought on instinctively by the mere contours of the
plug seat against the rubberized façade that
clings to his body.
Oddly, it is this very apprehension which
gives the boy an unusual sense of relief; for it serves,
indirectly,
to remind him that he is still among the living.
It is the comforting touch of inner pain.
The butterfly handgrips of the control
matrix before him are surprisingly cold beneath his
fingertips--and even
this realization is a distant one, for faraway is
the mind of the third child . . .)
Kaji:
Though I should like to be between Katsuragi's melons,
This is where I want to be when
I die. What about you?
This brief reverie is interrupted, then,
by the dissonant chirp of the onboard communications
system--the boy
eyes blithely the image of Misato Katsuragi that appears
to hang in the air to his left, Her look of concern
not
lost in its transition to video signal . . .)
Misato: It's not good.
(The third child is jarred a bit
as, abruptly, Asuka Soryu's voice rings through the
comm. in response to the
woman's statement. .
It is curious note to the young Ikari
that, where her image should be, the words AUDIO ONLY
appear instead--
and within the tenor of her voice, an uncharacteristic
reserve is conveyed . . .)
Asuka:
You stuck us in here without a briefing. Again. Then,
you made us wait here for the
last 10 minutes.
I was beginning to think the Angel would have broken
into the
Geo-front by now,
and made its merry way home . . .
Misato: We haven't registered the presence of an angel, Asuka.
(Even without visual confirmation,
the third child is unsurprised as the girl becomes
indignant--easily envisioning
the expression on the second child's face as she responds
disconcertedly.)
Asuka: Then what the hell is going on? If we're not being attacked-
Misato: We are.
Asuka: By what?!
Misato: Not what. Who.
Asuka: . . . Verdamnt, what do you mean "who?!"
Misato: An unidentified military force.
(It is a long, uncomfortable pause that follows the woman's words.
Indeed, the ramifications of their meaning are quick to make their impression on Shinji, even as Katsuragi ventures to elaborate . . .)
Misato: They might be UN, or Japanese Special Defense. Or American. I don't know.
Asuka: . . . It cant . . .
Shinji: . . .
Misato: We've lost almost all of our ground forces.
Shinji: We're . . .
Misato: . . . Air defenses are null . . .
Shinji: We're . . being . . .
Misato: We've picked up a larger contingent on the outskirts . .
Shinji: We're . . .being attacked by . . . people!?
Misato: The Magi are anticipating N^2 deployment . . .
(It is Asuka's disembodied voice which
is the first to proclaim what Shinji himself cannot
find
the words to express . . .)
Asuka: Why, Misato!? Why in the hell are they attacking us!?
Misato: . . .
Asuka:
After everything we've done--after EVERYTHING WE'VE
BEEN THROUGH!?
You're telling
me that Human beings are trying to destroy us?!
Misato: . . .
Asuka: THAT'S NOT GOOD ENOUGH!
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(The atmosphere in the control room
is deathly silent; not unlike the eye of the quickly
worsening hurricane
around them, as the girl's angered cry echoes hollowly
in the external comm. speakers. )
Asuka:
THAT'S NOT GOOD ENOUGH! After everything we've been
through, after everything
I've lost, all
for humanity's goddamn sake, this is the thanks we
get!?
(Distantly, the sounds of early
warning alerts ring impatiently in the morbid calm,
muffled somewhat by the
hushed reserve that has descended upon all who occupy
the command center.
In the middle of it all stands Misato Katsuragi.
The woman turns away from the chaos
mounting on the viewer, searching the faces of those
around her that
watch and wait, mortified at the events unfolding
before them.
Invariably, her eyes come to rest, yet
again, upon the visage of Sub Commander Fuyutsuki
high above; An
impromptu supplication, as if searching for an answer
to the young German's angered query. The old man offers
them nothing, however, his gaze down turned as the
silence continues, unabated, for several more seemingly
endless seconds.
Dissatisfied, Misato turns her acknowledgment
to the woman standing to her left. Maya Ibuki, too,
offers
nothing in the way of a response--the look of compounded
shame in her face speaking volumes more than
anything that might be said at any given moment.
Thus, in the end, it is Katsuragi who speaks for them all.)
Misato: No, Asuka. It's not good enough.
(It is then, for Misato, that a new awareness dawns,
realization of a greater meaning held
within the young girl's words, carried with them that,
until now, she
has remained blissfully ignorant of. )
Misato: But then . . . You both deserve the truth. You, above anyone else here.
Shinji: What do you mean?
Misato: I mean the truth of our place here, Shinji. The truth of man's continuing crimes against man.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(The bindings of the launch moan loudly as the metal transmits the growing heat from beneath the catapult generator.
Asuka Soryu is innately aware of
the sound, transmuted and amplified by the liquid
matrix of the entry plug.
Oft-times referred to by the cage techs as the weeping
of the launch device--a creaking wail of guilt and
sorrow for
the pilots it sends to continuing pain and suffering--It
is perhaps some work of providence that it shudders
through
the EVA's prone form now, on the tail end of Misato
Katsuragi's statement.
The woman's voice is sharp and metallic over the communicator; a quality which gives it a distant, almost captive property . . . )
Misato: . . . beginning with the event itself. .
Shinji: What are you talking about?
Misato:
We know the truth of the second impact. Or at least,
we assumed we knew.
It's funny how
facts can distort reality, when human intention comes
into play.
Asuka: . . .
Misato:
Fifteen years ago, the course of our civilization
was changed, and the price of millions
Of lies paid for
a single mistake.
Asuka: You . . .?
Misato: Or so we've deluded ourselves into believing. All of this---was no accident.
Shinji: . . ?!
Misato: Tell a lie long enough, and you'll soon be convinced it's the truth.
Yuri: Ma'am . . . the tac. net isn't a secure channel. . .
Misato: Good. I've had enough of this.
(The woman turns her eyes upward, regarding sharply at the video image of the third child on the main viewer--)
Misato:
The Second impact was the result of man tampering
with his own fate. It was an intentional
consequence of
people who were not satisfied with the course of our
own progress as a species.
Shinji: Intentional!?
Misato:
Yes. We opened a Pandora's box, knowing full well
what the extent of the consequences
might be. Yet,
these are the same people who helped fund the design
and construction of NERV.
Of the EVAs you
two are piloting. The dummy system. The Magi. They
were the very same
people who oversaw
the selection of our pilot candidates. Your classmates.
Shinji . . .
Shinji: . . ?
Misato: Your father was one of these men.
Shinji: My . . . Father!?
Misato: Yes. But he betrayed them.
Shinji: . . Father . . .
Misato: And now, they are out to kill us all.
Misato:
They want to erase a second mistake. They've been
trying to all this time . . .
Beginning with
the fifth child.
Shinji: . . .
Misato:
Ever sense the destruction of the 17th angel, these
things you've been fighting . . .
They're not real
angels. They're shadows. Things created by man to
artificially
complete a design.
Their technology is no different from EVA's! Dr. Akagi
realized this.
But she doubted
her sanity so much that she hid it, because she was
afraid of what the
consequences revealing
it would be. And she was right to.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Misato: It's funny. I could see the manipulation with my own eyes, but even I refused to believe.
Asuka: Are you saying . . .
(The second child balls her hands
into a tight fists, numbness creeping up her arms
as she fights
back the torrent of rage building up from within her.
. . .)
Asuka: Are you saying that all of this . . . has been for nothing?!
(The lack of sensation in her hands
is , abruptly, replaced by white hot bolts of splitting
pain as the girl
pounds those same fists against the edge of the plugseat
. . .)
Asuka:
We just prolonged our own suffering!? We survived
all that so they could come here
and FINISH
US OFF THEMSELVES?!
Misato: What I'm saying, Asuka, is that all this time . .
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(The woman pauses, a dark chill creeping slowly down the base of her spine . . .)
Misato: . . . We've always been our own worst enemy.
(The room is still, the silence between
words filled only by the white noise of channel static
on the
tactical communication connection. . .)
Shinji: . . . What . . . what . . . are we going to do, Misato?
Misato: (sighing) . . .
Shinji: Are we . . . Do we have to fight them?
Misato: Do you want me to ask you to kill, Shinji? Would that be enough?
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(For Shinji Ikari, at this moment,
the taste of the fluent matrix in which he resides
is particularly
sanguine, as it reverberates the woman's words into
his skull . . .)
Shinji: . . .
Misato:
A few days ago . . . yes . . . I would have asked
you to, given the situation,
without hesitation.
Either them, or us. Some must die, so that others
may live.
Shinji: . . .
Misato: For the greater good.
Shinji: . . .
Misato: But yesterday . . . I visited the graveyard
outside the city for the first time. You've
been there before,
haven't you, Shinji?
Shinji: Yeah . . .
Misato:
It's stupid. In all my time here, I've never visited
it.
I've never wanted
to see that place. Even imagining it . . . is terrible.
Shinji: . . .
Misato:
A field of quiet . . . black marble markers . . .
like shadows, Shinji.
Like an army of
shadows.
Shinji: . . .
Misato:
It's strange. All I could think about was the people
I've put there . . .
Decisions in the
name of ideals that truly meant nothing . . . how
many . . friends . .
and strangers
. . . I sacrificed for a "greater good"
that only served an even greater ambition . . .
(Katsuragi stifles back a gasp as
the first traces of tears sting her eyes, welling
up at the very
edges of her vision, obscuring the solemn face of
the third child which sits before her . . . )
Misato: But . . . I will not have you stoop to our
level. To become what we are.
The past has asked
far more of the future than we deserve.
My father was
a part of it, and I became a part of the lie.
Misato:
And I finally understood . . . the lie was my own
creation. I . . . chose not to see,
Even when others
tried to pull the wool from my eyes, I clung to the
falsehood
of this ideal
. . .I clung to it because I did not want to face
it, like I didn't want to face
those people in
that cemetery . . .
Misato:
What pathetic type of creature have we become? Forcing
our children to fight our battles?
No more.
Misato:
You and Asuka . . . you're the only family I have.
The only family I've ever really had.
I owe you this.
I won't make you join the rest of them . . . those
shadows in the hills.
Misato: I'm not going to ask you to kill anyone. Listen to me!
Misato:
Whatever they throw at us, the AT field will protect
you both. Let them
Blast this place
to hell once and for all, if it's our fate we've earned
it.
You won't be cowards.
We can destroy ourselves, and the future can
be left to its
own. . .
(The woman pauses, regarding the third child knowingly . . .)
Misato: . . . Both of you, alone, if you like.
Shinji: . . .
Misato: No ultimatums. No promises. No more lies.
Misato:
You choose to defend Nerv of your own volition, of
your own free will.
But only if you
can find it within yourselves to forgive the rest
of us. Mankind isn't
in
danger of being destroyed by the angels. We've always
been the greatest risk to ourselves.
Shinji: Misato . . .!?
Misato: I've nothing more to say.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(With this, the channel is severed--the
image of the third child fading from sight before
the boy
can voice his protests, which Katsuragi can read clearly
in the brief seconds his face is onscreen . . . )
Misato:
Isn't it enough we've made them into soldiers?
They've the right
to make their own decision, now.
Yuri: Ma'am! I've got code----we're reading all airborne attackers breaking off---
Hyuga:
We've got incoming-single craft---I've got a visual!
SHIT! Energy signature is
Non-Nuclear! It
looks like . . .
Misato: . . . Secure all channels. Notify all shelters. . .
(The woman steadies her gaze on
the single contrail forming in the darkened sky among
the static
and distortion of the video feed, a sliver of white
drawn in the firmament partially obscured by the
high-altitude strata of moonlit clouds that pepper
the deceivingly peaceful heavens . . .)
Misato: . . . Brace for impact.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(Meanwhile, in the skies well above
the embattled city . . .)
Pilot A: This is BLZ-BB-0794. We're approaching the drop zone in five . . . four
Pilot B: I'm reading clear airspace below. . . weapon diagnostic is nominal . . .
Pilot A: Two . . . One . . . Mark.
Pilot B: commencing phase 1surface dispersion . . .
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(The aftershocks rumble through
the shattered remains of the chapel like livid ruminations
of some
vengeful deity. The pews shift and moan in response,
filling the gutted church with an unearthly wail
that plays on the edges Lyn Anouilh's frail nerves.)
Lyn: I suppose I should pray.
(The sixth child, so deemed by his
seemingly arbitrary selection for the ranks of the
EVA pilots,
sits quietly among the empty rows. The solemn silence
of the church, perhaps comforting in ways
intangible to any but those who deign to complete
life's journey, is but a distant memory in the
aftermath of the initial assault upon the city.
Lyn rubs the stinging dust from
his eyes, waving fruitlessly at the new clouds of
pulverized plaster and
dirt that have been kicked up from the wooden bench
in the passing din. Cracking them open in the haze,
he turns them upward, toward the icon above the ruined
pulpit that has served him many times and many
ways in his young life;
First, as his beacon,
Then, as his salvation,
And finally, as his tormentor.)
(The cross is one of the only remaining
bits of mounted architecture not yet destroyed or
thrown
from the walls by the fracas just beyond his field
of view. Darkness reigns here, for the miniscule light
pouring in through the gaping hole in the ceiling
above is little more than the warm glow of the distant
fires . . .)
Lyn: their mates often talked about how they called
out . . . the biggest, bravest men you could imagine,
reduced to . . . bloody . . . crying
for their mothers because they knew they were going
to die.
Lyn:
I suppose . . . then . . . that's why I've come here.
The instructor kept trying to make a point of it.
Nobody is quite unafraid of death,
because nobody can escape it.
Lyn:
It's the same as being born, I think. It hurts . .
. a lot . . . and you're being torn from everything
you
You know. And you want nothing more
than to see your mother when you get there . . . .
Lyn:
I can't be a brave enough man to tell her how much
I care about her. I tried at every shelter . . .
She mustn't have been able to reach
one in time.
Lyn: Seyoko must be so pissed off at me now. I hope she doesn't stay mad.
(Oddly, Lyn is aware of the oncoming
roar long before he really hears it- suddenly misplaced
against
the eerie calm that has descended, unnoticed, upon
the shattered city.
It fills the air like a thunder--a voluminous
sound produced by massive engines that seem to herald
the
arrival of some great force. Through the opening in
the chapel ceiling, the sixth child can make out the
aircraft's path through the sky; a lazy arc, visible
only by the vapor trail's relative proximity to the
moon . . .
All of this becomes secondary, however,
as the light from Luna catches upon something falling
from
the craft at great speed--a cylindrical object, tumbling
through the heavens toward the hobbled and
wounded Tokyo 3 city below.
It is at this moment that Anouilh finds,
distantly, that he there is no question as to the
nature of the
entity. It is, in fact, a combination on shock and
morbid fascination that drives him to watch on, until
it
is but a thousand feet above the center of the burning
city.
All is made irrelevant seconds later as,
In a blinding flash of brilliance which consumes all,
Night once again becomes day--
And the world plunges deeper, into the farthest depths of hell itself . . .
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(The N^2 detonation is a blossom
of light and heat, flowering above the horizon in
a terrible
flourish that is instantaneously visible for miles.
In a millisecond, neutral air is converted
to superheated plasma, vaporizing solid matter into
further fuel for the thermopositive reaction.
The concussive force is enough flatten
trees on the surrounding mountainside, casting tons
of
rock and dirt into the air like so many pebbles in
a stream. . .)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
( High above, the haze of superheated
vapor momentarily obscures the annihilation of the
city
below from the crew of the bomber overhead.
As the craft banks on its return arc,
shaking with the turbulent updrafts produced in the
fiery
holocaust below, the copilot takes his eyes from the
sensors, which have been rendered useless
by the resulting electromagnetic disturbance, and
ventures a look at the destruction below . . .)
Pilot B: Christ.
Pilot
A: Sensor verification only when they come back on
line.
Residual EMP should
dissipate within the next 5 minutes . . .
Pilot B: . . . Jesus . . . Christ!
Pilot A: Are you listening? What's the matter with you!?
(The copilot says nothing more.
Rather, it is with shaking hand that he indicates
the view below.
Cursing inwardly, his colleague shakes his head--leaning
over the control yoke to follow his comrade's lead
. . .)
Pilot A: What? What do you--
(Then . . . )
Pilot A: . . . Oh my God . . .
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Misato: Ungh . . R . .Report! Is everyone alright?!
(Misato Katsuragi struggles to her
feet--aware of the staggered groans of others in the
control
center. Recovering some of her composition, the woman
braces herself on a control console, rubbing
the side of her head with shaking hand as she stands
. . . )
Misato: Nng . . . how long . . . until we've got sensors back?
Yuri: Ma'am . . . Sensors are reporting minimal damage . . .
(Katsuragi shakes her head, not quite able to process the young woman's words . . .)
Misato:
What are you talking about . . . the shockwave from
the N2 mine should have
knocked them out!
Hyuga: Major . . . S . .She's right . . . Sensors are functioning perfectly!
Misato:
That's impossible--We haven't repaired the shielding,
that should've blown a hole
The size of Kyushu
into the Geo Front!
Yuri: They're functioning . .. perfectly . . . and . . .
(the woman pauses, the color draining from her features . . .)
Yuri: . . . ma'am . . .
Misato: . . .?
(It is at this moment that Yuri
Furikawa faces her commanding officer--the fear present
in
her eyes striking a cold chord in Katsuragi's battered
mind . . .)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(It crisscrosses the sky in half-seen
patterns of radiance, vaguely visible in the quickly
darkening
heavens as the luminance from the N2 detonation dissipates.
The roar from the blast still hangs in the
air, filling the eerie stillness that descends upon
the city like a fog.
From beyond, flecks of particulate ash
tumble noiselessly through the sky, an unnaturally
warm
breeze thundering across the valley, carrying them
along in a torrent of moonlit snow . . .
Lyn Anouilh rises to his feet--unable
to take his eyes from the mosaic of light and force
on high
as it slowly scatters, fading into the darkness and
revealing a clear night sky blasted cloudless
in the reaches overhead.
Somewhere, in the endless moments of afterthought and disbelief, the young boy finds his voice . . .)
Lyn: (gasping) an . . . AT . . field . . ?
Aoi: Are you alright?
(The girl's voice is nary a whisper--yet,
it rings loudly enough in the sixth child's ears to
convey a
message beyond that of the simple question asks.
And yet, it possesses about it a new quality,
one that is not immediately lost upon the Lyn as he
gathers his wits, turning around to face the validation
of his most futile hopes . . .)
Lyn: Oh my god, Aoi!?!
(What the boy sees, however, is well beyond the bounds of expectation or reason.)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Yuri: No mistake--spectral pattern is blue--
Misato: Get me a visual! Pinpoint the location! DO IT!
Hyuga: Aye--I'm bringing it up on the main viewer---
(It is mere seconds, however, before
the control center is plunged into an eerie stillness
yet again--
as half-seen forms make themselves distinct on the
massive wall-screen before them.)
Maya: . . . No . . .
Misato: (breathlessly). . . Tamashii . . .
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(She stands unrecognizable to the voice which bore her presence-
a seraphim, ablaze with an inner brilliance that nearly blinds the sixth child .
It is a being of illuminant form;
Distinctly feminine yet indistinct in human shape,
Her hair stretching in long tresses which lightly trace the earth beneath her heels;
Her gaze is one of crimson - piercing
red eyes that strike a note of insurmountable terror
into Lyn Anouilh's heart . . .
but it is a gaze that carries with it a great sadness.)
Aoi: . . . Are you alright, Lyn?
(Anouilh, however, finds his voice
caught in his throat--unable to completely process
the
astonishing truth that has been set before him, a
beacon of madness in this, the darkest hour.
Beyond his frozen senses, the boy is aware of a roar
in his ears; the rush of blood from his
heart as it threatens to burst from his chest . .
.
Somewhere, somehow, the sixth child finds the will to speak . . . and even this is little more than a stifled gasp . . .)
Lyn: A . .Aoi ?
Aoi: yes.
Lyn: No. . .This . . This can't be real!
(The creature's eyes narrow-her
mane tossed gently in the dwindling breeze, tracing
delicate arcs in the air among the flakes of falling
ash that drift languidly on their lengthy
return to the earth . . .It is a silent descent, marked
only by the sound of young Anouilh's winded gasps
. . . )
Aoi: It is me, Anouilh Lyn Aaron.
Lyn: How . . . You can't be--- YOU CAN'T -
Aoi: But I am.
Lyn: No!
( With this, the child recoils--
stumbling back barely two steps before falling to
his knees,
tearing his eyes away from the searing light that
bathes the creature standing before him.)
Lyn: How!?
Aoi: . . .
Lyn: How could you!?
Aoi: . . .
Lyn: . .H . . How could you be one of them?!
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(Far below,
in the antechamber housing the great beast Lilith . . .)
Gendo: You were made in his image.
Tenkei: Yes.
Gendo: There is no time left. Soon, everything will be gone.
Tenkei: My purpose is neither to stop nor assist you in your task.
Gendo: Then ?
(Gracefully, the child that stands
atop the surface of the fluent LCL gestures to the
creature that hangs, like an inactive golem, high
above them . . .)
Tenkei:
That is for her to decide.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(The boy pounds the earth beneath
him, ineffectually bringing his fist down upon the
crumbled
masonry and shattered shards of stained glass again
and again, until the blood runs from betwixt
his fingers as freely as the tears which now fall
to the earth . . . )
Lyn: . . . Not you . . . Aoi ,please, not you!
Aoi: . . .
Lyn: Aoi . . .
Aoi: You know, in your heart . . . you've always known . . .
Aoi: From the day you and I first met, Lyn. I have watched you from afar..
Lyn: . . .
Aoi: My task was preordained. The ascension . . .or the destruction, of the creature "man."
Lyn: No . . !
Aoi: I have lived longer than you can comprehend. I was sent to this place as the herald of the final day.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(Elsewhere . . .)
Seele 02: This cannot be!
Kihl: It is so.
Seele 03: The prodigal would deign to interfere?
Seele 04: She would stop our hand . . .
Seele 05: She is one of the fallen. Like us. She is without even a mortal life!
Seele 06: But a distraction. Let us continue the ceremony.
Kihl: Ikari . . . not even your enemies can save you . . .
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(In the control center . . )
Misato: Hyuga: . . . Hyuga . . . what are we seeing here . . .
Hyuga: That is the source of the spectral disturbance . . .
Misato: No . . .
Maya: Ma'am, we've got to do something-
Misato: . . . Clear the launch causeway for EVAs 01 and 02.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Yuri: I've got a direct audio feed from one of the Yokosuka district sensor nexus-
Misato: Let's hear it-
(The immediate response is a rush
of static--punctuated by bits of broken tones and
inflections,
before finally resolving into a voice that is almost
foreign, yet hauntingly familiar . . .)
Aoi: You kn@# you have nothing to fear.
Misato: . . .
Aoi:
Rather, perhaps now, it would be best to listen.
Time is short, and I must speak
to all the Lilims.
(Katsuragi is rendered silent--dumbstruck
by both the girl's declaration, and the nature of
her
utterance. It has struck a chord in Misato's mind,
for her tone and parlance are not unlike that of
one who came much earlier: one whose memory resides
upon the minds of those who remember
like a scar, an ever--constant reminder of sins past
. . .
from the com. channel, the sound of Shinji Ikari's voice echoes the sentiment . . .)
Shinji: M . .Misato-
Misato: . . . I know, Shinji . .
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(Within the entry module of Unit
01, Shinji Ikari watches, dazed, the exchange taking
place on
the tac net. The girl's tone unmistakably familiar
to the third child, it brings with it a twinge of
fear
and sorrow, carried to terrible heights by the one
word uttered carelessly on the tail end of her statement.
. .)
Shinji: Lilim . . .
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(The girl conceals a sad smile,
returning her attention to the boy on the ground before
her . . .)
Aoi: They are listening to us, now. It is all falling to pieces.
:Lyn: (sobbing) . . .
Aoi: Why are you crying, Lyn?
Lyn: . . .
Aoi: Am I really so terrible . . . ?
Lyn: I . . . I don't know . . .
Aoi: Look at me. Please.
Lyn: . . .
Aoi: I want you to see me for what I am.
Lyn: . . .
(Slowly, the sixth child raises
his eyes, barely able to fathom the impossible image
of the
ethereal creature that stands there to greet them.
Somewhere, from beyond the limits of Anouilh's vision, the sound of thunder . . . )
Lyn: Aoi Tamashii . . .
Aoi: Part of me. Yes.
Lyn: . . Part . . .?
Aoi: She is that part of me . . . that you have created.
Lyn: Me?
Aoi: Yes. You.
(The boy squeezes his eyes shut,
shouting with such force that the afterimage of the
girl's
brilliance is bathed in a wash of color . . .)
Lyn: I don't understand . . .!
Aoi: The Lilim see without comprehending.
(The girl takes a step forward--placing her feet soundlessly on the cold rubble beneath . . .)
Aoi:
As beings, you exist as a paradox . . . the self that
is, the self created by others,
and the self that sees itself.
Aoi:
The girl . . . Aoi . . . was, in part, my own creation.
A persona, given to the façade of humanity
that
I placed about myself. I . . . am
an agent of theirs. Of the forces that now conspire
to destroy us all.
Lyn: It was a lie, then . . .
Aoi: But . . . given true life, through you.
Lyn: What are you talking about?!
Aoi: Kietsu, Aijou, Haradachi, Yokkyuu, Ikari . . .
Lyn: the . .five passions . .
Aoi: You remember . . . Joy . . .
Lyn: Sadness . .
Aoi: Anger . . .
Lyn: D . .Desire . .
Aoi: Hatred.
Lyn: What of them? Why are you doing this!?
Aoi: Because I want you to understand . . . there is but one more I must teach you.
Aoi: Fuanshin. Fear.
Lyn: . . .
Aoi:
Fear . . . is the original and basic feeling of man.
From fear, everything is explicable,
from original sin to
original virtue. It is the key behind
that which you call
absolute terror field. Are you afraid,
Anouilh?
Lyn: Y . .yeah . .
Aoi:
These define mankind. Give his existence scope, distinctness.
What is good,
without the antithesis of evil?
Hot, and cold. Love, and hate. They give it
boundary, but they do not give it
meaning. Such is the nature of life, and living.
Pain, suffering, striving. Man's
struggle to become closer to his God.
(The seraph takes a second step forward, her body's natural luminance cascading about the ruined church . . .)
Aoi:
I was incapable of these passions. The Natus de Adamo,
I had no free will.
A shape with no meaning, only purpose.
(Turning her eyes skyward, the creature continues . . .)
Aoi: For months, I have watched your agonies. I have played my role in the great scheme.
Aoi:
But in my effort to understand the Lilims, I desecrated
myself.
I came to know the sin of desire.
Of want. Of Choice.
Aoi: For a thing such as affection . . . truly exists
beyond the capacity of our kind. We,
Who are without free will or desire.
We who may only obey.
How polluted was I, to wish for
such suffering? I exist to suffer.
(Rising to his feet, Lyn lowers
his gaze to the shattered remnants of stonework and
glass that
lie around them, the multicolored hues of the fragmented
stained-glass windows fiery points
of brilliance beneath the angel's light . . .)
Lyn: Why . . . why would you. This place . . . it's horrible here.
(For an instant, the girl's voice seems to waiver . . .)
Aoi:
It is question older than your race. From the stars
we came long ago, "Adam" and "Lilith."
But her betrayal
would seal our
fate for millenia, as her progeny were given free
reign of this world.
Lyn:
We . . we are selfish . . . terrible people. We do
horrible things to ourselves . . to each other. .
. .
Why, Aoi? And why me?
Aoi:
I do not know. In'gil Ma'alaika. My name is Malachi.
But . . . I don't feel the truth in my
own words . . . Contact with the
beast has made me lose touch.
Lyn: Contact with the beast . . . the other angel?
(Slowly, the creature shakes her head . . .)
Aoi:
A primitive creature--molded in the likeness of Adam's
apostle.
Blasphemy of form and shape, righteous
of the purpose it has served.
Seele used it to removed me from
their plans, so that I will not interfere.
(she pauses, looking intently at her hands, as if some truth were to be revealed in their form and shape . . .
yet, there is none.)
Aoi: I . . . am fallen. And now, I find myself drawn to you . . . I always have.
Aoi: I have nothing left. If I am to die here, so be it. It is an end I would welcome.
Aoi: I'm tired of lying.
Aoi: I'm tired of wanting.
Aoi: I'm sorry, Lyn. For lying to you.
Aoi:
For this . . . I deserve your disgust. And I would
not hate you for carrying out the
role I was meant to play . .
Lyn: . . role . . .!?
Aoi: Yes. To die.
Lyn: What!?
Aoi:
Some men seek to destroy themselves, because they
believe their lives to be without purpose.
I . . . I am a being of but one
purpose, and nothing more. Such terrible irony.
My reason for being here . . . my
very existence upon this plane . . . was so that I
might die.
To begin the end of mankind, and
herald the day that was our birthright from the very
beginning.
Lyn: . . .
Aoi:
Only then will the scroll's words ring true . . .only
then will the final herald arrive . . .
From the day I first stepped foot
in this new Babylon, my purpose has been clear to
me.
Lyn: . . no . . .
Aoi: Only then . . .can the third impact truly begin, or be thwarted.
Lyn: . . no . .
Aoi: If I do not . . . then . . . Lyn . . . you will have no chance. Your destruction will be meaningless.
Lyn: No . .
Aoi:
There are no more choices left. I know what was in
your heart. You came here to die,
As well, because you thought me
dead.
Lyn: . . .
Aoi: Now, you know the truth. Aoi Tamashii is a lie. She never truly lived.
(It is then,
as if in subconscious reply to the angel's plea,
the boy's hand falls to his pocket,
removing something from within,
and holding it level with the girl's gaze.)
Lyn: Your . . . name . . .
Aoi: . . .?
Lyn:
Aoi . . . Deep Blue . . . Tamashii . . . Soul . .
.
(With quaking fingers, Anouilh's
hand unclasps-
revealing, sprawled about his palm,
a worn and faded length of blue cloth-
one whose very sight strikes deep into the spirit of the creature that stands before him.)
Lyn: I kept this . . . It's yours . . . you . . . left it . . . on my door . . .
Aoi: . . .
(With eyes wide, the girl finds
not the words to speak--instinctively touching the
flowing tresses
which now hang free and unbound from her head, the
afterthought of a distant sorrow carried upon
the tides of recollection brought about by the boy's
act . . .)
Lyn: Your name . . . is Aoi Tamashii. You're . . .
Aoi: . . .
Lyn:
You're as real as I am. If any part of you truly cared
for me, then, at least, know that
I truly loved you.
(It is at this instant that the
girl finds she and the sixth child now stand face
to face--the reality of the
moment driven deeper as the sensation of the boy's
hands on hers, pressing the cast-aside ornament
into her palm, closing her fingers gently. )
Aoi: . . . Lyn . . . this . . is my . . .
Lyn: . . . ?
(In but an instant, the callous pretense of Aoi's demeanor vanishes. )
Aoi: (gasping) You . . . You saved my . . . bow . . .
(Lyn is taken aback as the girl's eyes
soften, her resolve shattering beneath the
weight of his single, simple act.
With a cry that is filled with an innocence
all but foreign to the world around them,
The creature buries her face in her hands. Wracked
with sobs that echo throughout the
carcass of the temple which lies in ruin about them,
the angel melts to the floor, and weeps . . .)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
CAPTION
WITHIN THE DREAM
Aoi: Are you happy now?
Aoi: Is this how it feels . . . ?
Aoi: True sorrow?
Aoi: To know what is, and what may have been?
Aoi: To know that fate has stolen my chance to live?
Voice: Fate is powerless, without faith's hand.
Voice: What do you believe in, Malachi? Or Aoi?
Aoi: I . . don't know anymore . . .
Voice:
You believed yourself a being without choice,
Yet, has Seele
forced your every step?
Perhaps they controlled
your physicality,
But do they also
own your mind?
Aoi: . . .
Voice: And what, then, of your heart?
Aoi: . . .
Voice:
You lament not knowing the freedom that is "choice."
The forbidden
knowledge of true sin. Did Adam not approach the tree
Of his own volition?
Voice: Life wasted for fear of living.
Voice:
But no one has forced you to love the Lilim who stands
before you.
Indeed, if that
is beyond the capacity of your creation,
Then how did it
come to be!?
Aoi: . . .
Voice: Perhaps . . . you have always enjoyed the freedom you so lament.
Voice: And perhaps . . . You are no pawn.
Aoi: . . I . . . I . . . have . .
Voice: You can decide your own destiny . . . and change theirs
Aoi:
I . . . have I made her real!?
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(Below--)
Misato: She's . . . crying . . .?
Hyuga: Major Katsuragi!
(The shout is unexpected--enough
to snap Misato from dreamlike fixation on the turbulent
spectacle
played out on the wall screen before her--)
Misato: Report!
Hyuga: I've got multiple airborne incoming from the north--maybe thirty or more-koumajutsu class!
Maya: Koumajutsu?
Hyuga: Heavy bombers. . . N2 capable transport craft . . . Laser scans--
(It is then, as the final bits of
data register onscreen, that Makoto Hyuga's voice
grows distant--as
if disbelieving of the stark truth flashing wildly
on the monitor before him . . .)
Hyuga: Laser scans . . indicate . . full payloads.
Misato:
They're here.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Lyn: Aoi . . . please.
Aoi: (shuddering). . . Did you mean it . . . Lyn . . .
Lyn: . . Aoi . . . I have nothing left.
(kneeling, the sixth child brings himself face to face with the creature, placing his hands about her shoulders . . .)
Aoi: . . . I lied to you . . . and I am Fallen.
Lyn: And I . . am a coward.
Aoi: . . .
Lyn: Without you . . . I have nothing to live for.
Aoi: . . . But . . . I . . .
Lyn: It doesn't matter. Aoi, don't you see?
Aoi: . . .
Lyn: I love you. I don't care what you are. You're real enough for me . . .
Aoi: . . I . . .
(Struggling to her feet, the creature finally meets the boy's eyes . . .
And it is then, the girl realizes,
For the first time, she truly sees.
Taking the bow in hand,
Aoi Tamashii reaches behind her head,
Tying it about her locks.)
Aoi: I . . . I love you too . . .Lyn.
(As the girl resigns herself to
him, and touches her lips to his, there is a moment
of clarity.
An instant in which all things are made apparent,
from the tumult of emotions raging through their collective
hearts.
An awareness that has been dulled since long before
she can remember. It brings with it a final relief
and,
at the same time, a great sorrow for, in the heavens
miles distant, there is the sound of growing thunder.
Ominous and unearthly, it is a noise that carries
with it the promise of one thing:
Death.
It is, perhaps, with a cathartic
heart that the girl addresses, for the last time,
The disembodied voice that has guided her in this,
the final hour . . .)
Aoi: I see now . . . what I sacrificed in following Seele's decree.
Aoi: It was my freedom.
Aoi: My strength.
Aoi: My . . humanity.
Voice: For some . . . it is a privilege that must be earned.
Aoi: I . . . see now. Your name. They call you Tenkei.
Voice: . . .
Aoi: I understand. I underestimated you, purebred.
Tenkei: Perhaps.
Aoi: I only wish I could enjoy this moment a little longer . . . I can hear them.
Tenkei: . . eh?
Aoi: high above us. I can hear their thoughts, again.
Tenkei: You mean . . .
Aoi: I made a promise to you, Lilim. One of us will die tonight.
Tenkei: . . . Wait!
Aoi: But . . . at least it will not be in vain . . .
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(Simultaneously, in the furthest reaches of Terminal Dogma . . .
The child Tenkei's placid demeanor is replaced, momentarily, by a look of uncertainty.
A realization of the capacity of the girl's resolve,
And the meaning of her heartfelt words . . .)
Tenkei:
Is there no other way . . . ?
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(It is a gentle caress that the
girl-angel or otherwise-leaves upon Lyn Anouilh's
cheek as she steps away from the lingered kiss.
It is with a great relief that the
boy notes the deep blue now present in her eyes,
along with the smile that now graces her brilliant
features.
It is not long before they fade,
however--swiftly, and without warning, as the girl
raises her attentions to the darkened sky above .
. . )
Lyn: What is it?
Aoi:
. . . Thank you, Lyn. For everything. I wish there
was time left. I wish . . . we could continue
this from the beginning . . .
Lyn: Wait--Aoi---!
(The boy's efforts prove futile.
As the girl steps back, her hair furls, as if caught in the throes of some nonexistent wind.
With a life of their own, the flowing
locks twist and expand--dissolving into blinding shafts
of
light that stretch beyond her shoulders, casting off
the darkness of their earthly shape and form.
Born backward by some unseen force,
Lyn finds his senses stripped of him yet again, as
the
creature's stark brilliance overwhelms the meager
supports of the crumbling church, casting the
walls aside like so much dust and clay . . .
The girl rises into the air, hands
open in unearthly supplication, as the newly formed
wings
expand beyond the husks of buildings which surround
them both,
Stretching across the smoldering
valley, they become beacons of light in the receding
night,
growing beyond the tortured confines of Tokyo 3, as
cacophonic winds begin to whip about the city.
Their expanse touches the very ends of the horizons--carrying the creature into the sky.
As she rises, her mind clears--and
the words she speaks come patently and plainly, even
as
the approaching thunder from the north grows in terrifying
volume . . .
Aoi: Listen to me carefully, Misato Katsuragi. I know you can hear my words.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(In the control center. . .
Major Katsuragi finds herself addressed by a voice that seems to come from within-
An echo of thoughts that are not her own, compelling and humbling her with their weight . . . )
Misato: Tamashii!?
Aoi: Hear me, please. Humanity must evolve on its own path.
Aoi:
It must evolve. . . beyond the Angels. Beyond the
old race which seeded this world from the stars so
long ago,
beyond that which
seeks yet to claim it now. This
is my gift to you. In return for the gift of life
he has given me.
Aoi: I would not see your race destroyed for Seele's ambition, or Adam's.
Aoi:
You . . . You have been like a mother to the pilots.
I am glad for my brief time as one,
For I would not have understood
these feelings, otherwise.
Aoi:
Once I am gone, the final messenger will arrive. Seele
is intent on reclaiming Lilith's egg,
and beginning this cycle of suffering
anew. But I will not let them.
Aoi: She lies in wait, in your own sanctum.
Aoi:
She has been given the gift of sight. Possessed, now,
of my immortal life.
Your most difficult trial now awaits.
Aoi: It is the last Evangelion. The one you call Unit 07.
Misato: The EVA!?
Aoi:
It was their plan from the outset. I see this now.
The ceremony must begin with one,
Unit 01 or
Unit 04. Intimately they are the
same. The essence that inhabits
Lilith's first likeness is an impasse,
so they sought to use mine, instead.
Aoi: You are creatures of choice.
Angels and man are not so different,
I think.
We have no free will. You revel
in yours.
Yet fate, however, makes this distinction
meaningless.
It is fate which turns love to sorrow,
and joy to remorse.
Aoi:
You must abandon fate. Fight.
Hyuga: I'm reading N2 deployment! 20,000 meters, over 300 signatures!
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(Gazing into the moonlit sky, Aoi Tamashii cannot help but smile.
Even as the stratosphere above fills with menacing shapes that bring with them a dirge of unholy thunder,
She smiles.
And even as, with heavy heart, thoughts
of an awkward boy glancing timidly at her from the
base of a retaining wall along a street not two blocks
distant, flash momentarily in her memory,
She smiles.)
Aoi: That was your mistake, Kihl. Allowing me to taste life.
Aoi: Malachi is no longer. Aoi is my name.
Aoi: I have a mortal life. Though it may be short, I will die as I would have endeavored to live . . .
(Spreading her arms wide, the girl closes her eyes,
undaunted as, from the firmament
above, the sound of a hundred shapes darting through
the
air at incredible speed greets her ears.
They tumble from the sky illuminated by her glory:
hundreds of N2 devices, containing
enough destructive force to annihilate everything
below a thousand
times over. Mounted upon rocket borne casings, they
twist through the air with a shrill scream, like a
swarm
of wasps, magnified a hundred times into a horrifying
refrain that fills the skies and promises utter destruction.
It is in the face of this impending
doom, that Aoi Tamashii spreads her wings, whispering
to herself with
glad realization an instant before the weapons strike--)
Aoi: May I . . . be redeemed.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(The airburst warheads ignite in unison,
A searing flash that, in an instant, burns away a pocket of the atmosphere as long and as wide as the city itself.
Indeed, The light from the blast alone causes night to momentarily recede a hundred miles in all directions.
Within the singularity, a vacuum is born,
Bringing with it a kinetic release a scale of magnitude unmeasured by human experience.
Yet,
Before it all, floats the vision of the angel,
Her AT field shuddering with concussive
force beyond measure, resonating with the power of
a hundred
small suns of before, finally, yielding beneath their
incredible force; reduced to light and heat that turn
the world,
for a moment, into a dazzling sea of white that consumes
all.
As the humans on the ground and
below are thrown violently from their feet, the city,
itself, still stands:
spared the annihilation it was promised.
As the roar of the blast finally
draws near the edges of the event, the sky above filled
with the illuminant
fragments of the shattered wings,
Which list in slow recoil from the insurmountable impact.
Far below, Lyn Anouilh struggles to his feet,
Even as the earth around him shudders
with the fast approaching shockwave that screams earthward,
a kinetic macroburst from the falling sky with the
promise of death and disintegration.
He can see her.
Her vision is a ghostly form,
Plummeting toward him at incredible speed.
Arms outstretched, her face an embodiment of hope.
In the final seconds, stretched
into endless moments marked by spiritual awareness,
Anouilh marvels at the warmth of her touch as those
arms wrap around him,
And doubts recede, replaced by the
sound of a softly spoken voice that somehow, impossibly,
can be
heard above the deafening thunder fast approaching
to consume them both . . .)
Aoi: Forgive yourself. Release your pain. It is finished, Anouilh.
Lyn: My-
(Anouilh's response is little more
than an afterthought, however, as their combined forms
vanish.
Disappearing entirely, an instant before the shockwave
obliterates the earth where they stood . . .)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(Southampton, England,
A spring day, bathed in the warm
colors of the afternoon sun, filled with the
first songs of the swallows in the trees.
A field of flowers sways gently
in the wind, surrounding a fenced-off sea of green
grass dotted by the unassuming shapes of burial markers.
A funeral is gathered here--a dozen
or so quiet mourners that listen patiently to the
Pastor's
comfort, collected around a modest coffin, covered
in roses and lilies. Among the assemblage
stand two children: a young boy, barely old enough
to see above the casket waiting that is to
serve as his mother's final resting place, and a young
girl-slightly older, possessing markedly
different features, who holds the child's hand.
With his free hand, the boy clutches
at a small metal cross worn about his neck--wracked
with
soft sobs that shake his miniscule form. Even at so
young an age, he can feel the eyes upon him:
Their accusing stares and piteous glances . He can
still hear the voices spoken in hurried tones and
shocked intonations . . . )
Voice: Terrible. So awful. The poor child.
Voice: Dead by his hand? How could he have known?
Voice: A tragedy . . . that the boy will have live with it . . .
(It is only at the hour's passing,
at the service's end, that the boy lifts his eyes
to regard the
stark pain of the world around him. As those attended
disperse to comfort one-another, the child
mutters quietly to his young babysitter still at his
side . . .)
Lyn:
Sey-ko . .
Seyoko: What is it, Lynnie?
Lyn: . . . I . . .
(Suddenly too shy for words, the
child shakes his head, pulling his hand free of hers,
he walks
away from the collective mourners. Seyoko watches
him for a moment, then turns, motioning to
some of the gathered relatives.
Lyn toddles noiselessly across the
hillside, until the sounds of the closing service
are too distant
to be heard. The boy sighs with relief, as the condemning
voices in his head seem to have stopped,
at least for the moment.
Around him, the peaceful setting
of the family grave, while not totally lost on the
small boy, goes
for the most part unnoticed. It is a long time, indeed,
before young Lyn Anouilh realizes he is not
alone in this place.
She stands in the grass not far
from he--wearing a light azure Sunday dress, her dark
hair tied
off by bright blue ribbons in modest pigtails. She
watches him curiously for several moments, before
he, in turn, is even remotely aware of her presence.
Possessed of only the slightest
sense of manners for so young an age, the boy is quick
to note
the graceful shape of her blue eyes that sets her
apart from him and his own--resembling, closely, the
features of his 'big sister' Okazaki . . .
It is indeed a lengthy pause before the
child musters the courage to address the young girl--unsure
if violating the silence of the moment will cause
her to vanish like some sprite of faery. . .)
Lyn: Who are you?
Girl: . . .
Lyn: Are you with Sey-ko's family?
Girl: . . .
(The other child merely watches
him intently, unresponsive to the young boy's queries.
Before he
can prod further, however, the girl turns her back
to him--breaking into an awkward run . . .)
Lyn: H-Hey! Wait!
(It is with these feeble cries that
Lyn attempts to pursue--his painfully tight dress-shoes
falling off in the first few clumsy strides.
Tripping over sharp bits of gravel
and stone concealed among the grass, the child does
his best to try and stop the young Japanese girl.
. . but, it is not long before her swiftness
prevails, and she soon pulls away from her would-be
shadow . . .
Falling to his knees, utterly defeated, the boy pants heavily--quiet sobs intermingled with his short gasps. )
Lyn:
Please . . . please stop . . . I'm not bad . . . I'm
not a bad boy . . . !
I just . . I did what I was told
. . .
(The child covers his eyes with his sleeves--wiping ineffectually at the tears which flow freely now over his cheeks . . .)
Lyn: I loved my mommy . . . It wasn't my fault . . . It wasn't my fault!
(It is only long after the boy resigns
himself to his weeping, then, that he is again aware
of a
presence--this time, in the form of a shadow descending
over him.
Through the fish-eyed lens of tear-stained eyes, Anouilh makes out a familiar shape, standing in the sunlight-)
Girl: Are . . you okay?
(The boy stifles a few sobs, ashamed
now of his weakness in front of the girl.
Lowering his eyes again, he shakes his head soberly.)
Girl: Don't feel bad. It's okay to cry.
Lyn: (whimpering) . . . I lost . . my shoes . . .
(the girl wears a look of slight puzzlement, understanding little of the boy's concern at first . . .)
Girl: Oh . . . Gomen Nasi . .
Lyn: (sniffling) . . . huh?
(It is then, that the young Lyn
Anouilh finds himself greeted by her outstretched
hand.
Gazing up into her eyes once again, he is surprised
to see a warm smile grace her features . . .)
Girl: I'll help you find them. Okay?
Lyn: (sniffling) . . .
(begrudgingly, the boy takes her
hand--struggling to his feet as a light breeze picks
up,
tousling her pigtails about.
As the two trudge slowly across the hillside, the little girl prods . . .)
Girl: Do you feel better, now?
Lyn: Uh . . uh-huh . . .
Girl: Good.
Lyn: . . ?
Girl: Be happy. Okay? If you do, then I promise-
Lyn: what?
(The girl squeezes his hand tightly, smiling a soft smile that sends a tingle of warmth into Anouilh's heart . . .)
Girl: I won't leave you alone again.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(The first shimmers of illumination
in the control center is the sea of static that cascades
across the main viewer.
Struggling to her feet for the second
time, Misato Katsuragi coughs through the blood that
has made its way into her windpipe, the dozen or so
techs sprawled across consoles around
her in a similar sorry state.
As the control team stirs, the woman
grips desperately at consciousness--the words of the
angel echoing portentously in her still shaken thoughts
. . .)
Misato: Rrgh--S-Status! Is everyone still here!?
Hyuga: Ma'am-
Misato: Do we still have power?
Yuri: Shelters are reporting heavy . .damage . . no response from G01 through G06 . .
Misato: (screaming) Do we still have power?!!
Yuri: Generators . .are at . . . 12% . . . The shockwave-
Misato: Launch EVA 07 from the containment cage! DO IT!
Makoto: Ma'am, we haven't assigned a pilot--containment crews are--
Misato: (interrupting) We don't have any time left! WE HAVE TO GET IT OUT OF NERV, NOW!
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(Seconds later, in the containment
bay which houses the still silent form of the creature
once
designated Evangelion Unit 04, battered and damaged
machinery hums to life.
Automated systems, bypassing a dozen
security checks, deploy the lockdown mechanisms
that support the EVA's limp form with an almost human
haste--indeed, even as the mangled wreckage
of the access causeway is pulled free from the cage
proper, the silent behemoth slumps over, crushing
what remains of the knarled metal catwalk beneath
tremendous weight. From the truncated stump that
was its arm, a congealed mass of organic matter and
blood tears loose from the impact, landing wetly
on the bay floor 20 meters below . . .
With a shower of sparks, then, the
lifeless form is shuttled at high speed to the launch
jetty--slamming into
the base of the catapult track with a booming crash
that echoes throughout the hallways of the Nerv subcomplex.
No stability bracers are attached,
and no countdown is given, then, as, without warning,
the launch system
is initiated--sending the wilted form screaming up
the vertical rail at nearly 200 miles per hour . .
With its body pinned against the
launch corridor as it rushes past, the silent EVA's
head armor looses a
metal screech, one that heralds its ascent into the
earthly hell above . . . )
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(Meanwhile-
in a place that truly exists nowhere on earth . . .)
Seele 02: The ascendant is dead. She has spared them destruction.
Seele 03: Can the ceremony be salvaged?
Kihl: So long as the 18th awakens, we can no longer interfere.
Seele 11: Surely not!
Kihl: We risk now upsetting the balance. Now, our timetable rests with the defeat of the last.
Seele 02: Then-
Kihl:
Then, the black pearl will be superfluous. One must
survive. The first, or the fourth,
EVA is the key.
(The words are conveyed with a strange
confidence--the voice transmitting them aged and worn.
It is of no small surprise, then, when the same voice
intones, confused, at the sound of footsteps in a
corridor which exists not upon any plane of corporeal
physicality . . .)
Kihl: What?
(She saunters slowly, deliberately.
Possessed of a purpose that is a mystery to the gathered
monolithic entities, her appearance, rather, is anything
but.
Indeed, it is her appearance that is all too familiar--one that strikes a vim of the utmost fear into those assembled . . .
Her voice is whisper from the past--the shadow of an echo long lost to the ocean of time.)
Rei: I remember this place.
Kihl: You!
Seele 02: How did you--
Rei:
He has granted me this. The memories have begun to
return within me.
Among them, this is one of the strongest.
Seele 05: The dummy prototype!?
Rei: I am the echo.
Seele 05: You . . . you are but one of many!
Rei: No longer.
Kihl: . . . Ikari is a fool, if he believes he can --
Rei: . . . You assume many things.
Kihl: You . . would thwart our quest for man's immortality . . . ?
(The girl's expression remains unchanged--forlorn
yet unreadable, as her unassuming voice
breathes gently her somber words . . )
Rei:
I have learned that one must pay dearly for immortality:
one has to die several times
while still very much alive.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(Meanwhile . . .)
Misato: Time until it's completed its ascent-
Yuri: . . . 10 seconds . . .
Misato: Shinji!
Shinji: Mi . . Misato . . ?
Misato: Are you alright?
Shinji: Anouilh . . . Aoi . . . they . .
Misato: We've got bigger problems. Unit 02! Asuka!
Asuka: . . I'm . . here . . .
Misato: Asuka . . . Shinji . . . .
(The woman pauses, collecting herself. . . )
Misato: Your target is EVA unit 07.
(The disbelief in Shinji Ikari's voice, meanwhile, is almost palpable . . .)
Shinji: Unit . . . 07-?
Asuka: It can't --!
(The words are unmistakable--conveying
with them a sense of dread that is felt by all who
stand witness in the control center, but most of all,
to the woman who is at the epicenter of it all.)
Misato: Unit 07 is the 18th angel. It is the true 18th angel.
(And yet, of all those present dumbstruck
by Katsuragi's declaration, there is one who shares
a greater degree of shock, for reasons that are his
own . . .)
Fuyutsuki: Dear God, Ikari . . . Is this why you kept it here?
(Realization is a cold dagger for
Kozou Fuyutsuki--one that twists slowly, painfully
within his
chest as it drives itself ever deeper into his consciousness
. . .)
Fuyutsuki:
. . . Is this what you planned?
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(Clouds of dust whisk through the
ravaged streets of the third Tokyo city. Gutted structures,
empty husks that have weathered the most horrifying
single night of their brief existence, tremble
now, as the familiar shape of the rectangular launch
platform bursts onto the surface. It is a sound
that echoes across the silent city, the shrill squeal
of rending metal as the conveyance spills its
lifeless cargo onto the broken pavement.
As the inert form of EVA04 falls
hard upon the ground, sending small tremors rippling
through
the surrounding buildings, all is otherwise silent
in the decimated metropolis . . . and remains so for
a long interim . . .
Until, there is movement
It begins as a rumble - A guttural sound, not dissimilar to a low growl of some stirring animal awakening from a fitful slumber.
And then, with a shudder that ripples
through its cracked and battleshod armor,
The beast awakens . . . )
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Yuri: Ma'am! I have activity---!
Hyuga: Tangent graph is off the scale--AT field index is growing at an unprecedented rate!
Maya: . . . it's awakened . . .
Misato: Evangelion status?
Makoto: . . . EVA 01's S2 engine is functioning properly . . . EVA 02 at normal levels. . . .
Misato: I leave it to you, now. Shinji . . . Asuka . . .
Shinji: . . .
Asuka: . . .
(subconsciously balling her hands
into tight fists, the woman resigns herself to what
must be
done--exhaling sharply before giving a command which,
even now, she dreads to her very core . . .)
Misato: Launch EVAs!
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(The woman's final words echo through
Asuka Langley Soryu's thoughts, even as she is pinned
to her seat by the G-forces of the launch system .
. .
They bring with them the specter
of old feelings - old fears and doubts, renewed in
the wake of
the familiar, sickening rush of the combat sortie
. . .
It is at this moment--this brief
respite before entering the throes of hell itself--that
the second child
finds her thoughts focused on something that is, to
her, quietly surprising.
Something within the image of Shinji
Ikari, which floats at her side as it has done so
a dozen times
before. Yet, somehow, this time, it is different .
. . perhaps, she muses, in the silence that traverses
the
physical rift between them, as the world rushes downward
around them. Perhaps it is the terror which
waits to greet them in the trip's inevitable end.
Or perhaps, it is the manner in which the third child gazes back at her--his eyes piercing and unwavering . . .)
Asuka: Nng . . Sh . .Shinji . . .
Shinji: I'm here . . .
Asuka: . . he was right . . .
Shinji: What?
Asuka: The boy . . . The boy in the hospital.
Shinji: Asuka-
Asuka: In my hospital room. Shinji. He came to me in my hospital room.
Shinji: Who?
Asuka: The little boy . . . that they kept hiding with Ayanami.
Shinji: . . .
Asuka: He came to my room . . . and he told me about her.
Shinji: Her . . ?
Asuka: Tamashii.
Shinji: You knew?!
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(Topside . . .
Vibrations rock what remains of
the city center as the now rogue Evangelion takes
its first lumbering
stride forward, its footfalls landing heavily on streets
that further crack and buckle beneath each massive
step.
At its side, the bloody mass that is its gory stump
ripples with an unnatural vim--black sanguineous tendrils
erupting from its edges as viscera and bone only to
knead themselves like clay, manipulated by forces
unseen
into a shape bound onto the exposed axilla, heralded
by a bright blue glow . . .
It takes only a moment for the process
to complete itself--the newly formed appendage joining
its brother
at the Eva's side, listing steadily with the avatar's
movements.
It is then, that the earth on opposite ends of the city quarter shudders again, proclaiming the arrival of EVA 01 and EVA 02.
It is then, indeed, that the beast
seems to smile---)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(Within the entry plug of EVA-01
. . . Shinji Ikari stares morbidly at the menacing
figure onscreen,
his thoughts interrupted by the second child's whisper
over the comm.. channel, barely audible against
the background static . . . )
Asuka: . . . I thought . . . it was a dream . . . I didn't believe it . . .
Shinji: . . .
Asuka: And then he touched my legs . . . and I could walk again . . .
Shinji: How . . .
Asuka: Shinji: . . . he said . . . I had to be whole . . .
(The boy tightens his grip on the
control nexus before him, vividly aware of the pulsing
of his
own heartbeat in his ears . . .)
Asuka: We . . have to end this.
Shinji: I know.
Asuka: I understand now, Shinji . Why all of this has been happening.
Shinji: . . . I know. I remember . . .
Asuka: . . . Shinji . .
Shinji: . . ?
(The silence is ebbing, almost agonizing,
as the creature in Ikari's field of view takes its
first
movements toward his position. . . )
Asuka: I want to live.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
EVA-07: GRRRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGH!!!!!!!
(The screech is a shrill scream,
one that threatens to pierce the sanctum of the entry
plug's interior
as the beast rears back, lunging toward the stoic
form of EVA unit 01.
Shinji's response comes almost too
late--barely evading the demon's reach as it barrels
past.
Unit 01's stride is uncalculated and abbreviated as
the third child struggles to bring himself unsteadily
about.
Mere meters away, the creature lands
with a resounding crash that sends a cascade of tremors
shuddering
through the vacant city. The beast's posture is almost
supine--poised to strike even as it turns to face
its recovering foe . . .)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(Meanwhile, far below . . .)
Gendo: What is happening!?
Tenkei: She awakens. "Lilith."
(The sounds of a low, muffled moan
echo through the LCL plant, nearly deafening to Gendo
Ikari who
watches, mesmerized. Before him, the titanic creature
Lilith, once sedate and lifeless, now, struggling
at
the bonds of the crucifix to which she is held fast.
)
Tenkei: . . . the life-giver.
(The violent tremors which besiege
the beast's frame are transferred to the LCL pool
that immerses her--
sending meter-high swells of the fluid through the
asylum that knock the elder Ikari from his feet. Soon,
the
creature's moaning is joined by the groan of metal
and splintering wood--as the cross to which she is
held
begins to give under her impossible struggles . .
.
Coughing on the sanguine liquid,
Gendo attempts to straighten his glasses, his vision
marred and
blurred by the rivulets of LCL that cling to them
. . . )
Gendo: Then, she--senses he is close . . .
Tenkei: He?
(The child cocks his head to the side thoughtfully . . . finally nodding after a moment's contemplation . . .)
Tenkei: Ah. You mean the one you have brought here with you.
Gendo: . . .
( Ikari makes no attempt to respond--wringing
his wrist subconsciously, aware of the distinctly
foreign
contours of his own palm . . .)
Tenkei: You are . . .partially right.
Gendo: Adam.
(The boy seems indifferent to the
grotesque thrashing of the giant behind him. Rather,
he peers with
saddened eyes at Gendo Ikari; the expectant spark
in his gaze not lost on the commander . . .)
Tenkei: She senses the end is at a near. I sense it as well.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(Elsewhere . . .)
Seele 02: Madness! You are but a shell--an automaton!
Rei: Are we not all? Merely shells for the spirit?
(The girl's face remains emotionless, expressionless--her eyes, however, piercing in their countenance . . .)
Kihl: You are different. Though your shape is that of a human, you are less.
Seele 02: Spiritless.
Seele 09:Unlike them.
Kihl: A thread pulled between two points, strained to the very breaking limits of its definition.
Rei: Perhaps . . .
(Ayanami's gaze diminishes, softening slightly as the elder's words echo endlessly in the ethereal void . . .)
Rei: But I sense a difference within you, as well. You are no more "normal" than I.
Kihl: . . .
Seele 02: Remove her! Jam her signal!
Seele 04: by what means? It cannot be traced!
Seele 05: What . .What is happening!?
(The girl does not regard the voices
of protest which ring out from the dark corners of
the throne chamber.
Rather, she keeps her eyes fixed on the monolithic
image Kihl--faceless and silent beneath her piercing
gaze.
It comes without warning.
A chorus of muffled screams, shouts
of rage, and astonished gasps as, one by one, the
representations of
the twelve begin to fizzle and distort--wavering with
some unknown interference before discorporating entirely.
With a discharge of light and electricity that arcs
wildly in the darkness, they vanish, leaving behind
only the
echoes of their cries to resonate endlessly in the
chamber for those who still remain.
In the space around Ayanami, the
familiar traces of octagonal lines of force still
resonate and persist, much
like her untiring stare directed at the singular form
which now shares her company, and hers alone.)
Kihl: Madness.
Rei: I have sensed their fear. They were merely pawns, as well.
Kihl: Why have you come here?!
Rei:
She is awakened . . . and she has shared with me her
will.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Shinji: No--!
(The third child's scream comes
over the tactical network before EVA-01 hits the ground--the
rogue Evangelion
atop it in a tangle of inhuman forms that pulverizes
a city block beneath their tremendous weight . . .)
Shinji: Agh . . AAAAGH!
(The third child's shout can barely
be heard over the deafening crash of the crumbling
buildings which
rattle to pieces around them. Around him, the viewing
window is a haze of static, save for the clouds of
dust and debris obscuring the horrifying creature
that now pins EVA-01 to the earth.)
Shinji: Nng . .Get . . .GET OFF of . . . GET OFF OF ME!!
(The boy's cries go unheeded, as the beast
atop him wraps its knarled fingers about EVA-01's
neck.
Shinji Ikari's vision explodes into fragments of light
and stars, then, as his Evangelion's agony is transferred
through the A-10 neural connection into his own. Before
him, the smoldering haze begins to dissipate,
revealing a pair of burning yellow eyes whose gaze
threatens to pierce the canopy armor and drive
themselves deep into his very soul itself . . .
The third child soon finds he has
not the ability to scream as the beast's grip tightens--forcing
the oxygen-rich
LCL from his constricted throat. Ikari's vision begins
to blur as he thrashes ineffectually at fingers that
are not
there, a phantom vice about his neck that drives him,
now, into his seat . . .
From somewhere, beyond the roar in his ears, the boy's fading mind is dimly aware of the sound of footfalls . . .
And in the distance, beyond the fading light that burns in the eyes of the 18th angel, there is a voice . . .)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Asuka: FIESLING!
(Asuka Soryu's scream rings loudly
over the tac. net, her EVA bounding the distance between
itself and the
struggling forms of Unit 01 and 07 in seconds---The
Evangelion's strides are swift and unbroken, even
as it reaches
and pulls free the progressive knife from its shoulder
sheath . . . )
Asuka: Shinji-
(There is only static to assail
her ears in response, along with the sound of muffled
screams as unit 01's
struggles grow more frantic. The second child, it
seems, needs little more encouragement. . .
within an instant, she is upon them--ultrasonic
blade bared, whipping outward toward the stooped form
of
the rogue Evangelion at blinding speed.
It is with a lightning quickness,
then, that the creature releases its grip on EVA-01--turning
itself about in
a fraction of a second, bringing its arm to bear.
In the millisecond that follows, Asuka Soryu catches a glimpse of the creature's face-
a distorted smile of blood and metal,
twisted and fractured by forces beyond measure . . .
It is an image which brings a flash of understanding and despair . . .)
Asuka: (gasping) . . !
(The AT field materializes with
a roar like thunder, the air around it instantaneously
displaced as unit 02
collides with its insurmountable force at the apex
of her strike. )
Asuka: AAAAUUGH!!
(The EVA is thrown back nearly a three
hundred meters, tossed like a rag doll across the
barren city
waste, demolishing everything in her path . . .)
Shinji: ASUKA!
(It is in this interim, then, that
the third child finds his breath--lashing out at the
beast in the brief
moments its attention is diverted.
Unit 01's fist connects with the
side of the creature's skull--shattering armor and
bodily hurling the
creature from atop his prone Evangelion.
Rolling away quickly, Ikari gasps for air, watching cautiously as his vision clears. . .)
Shinji: (coughing) Asuka . . . Asuka!?
Asuka: That thing . . . Its AT field . . . Gott Im Himmel . . . It was like a hammer . . .
Shinji: Mi . Misato . .!
(It is with the crackle of static that the woman's response is heard over the comm. channel. . . .)
Misato: Shinji! I'm here-
Shinji: We . . We need weapons, Misato!
Misato: We've been trying--the ordinance dispersion was knocked offline in the last explosion!
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(In the control center . . .)
Hyuga:
The armory distribution system is nonfunctional--The
entire grid is fried!
We've got a team
working on a compromise.
Misato: They don't have time--
Maya: Ma'am . . . The angel's AT field . . .it's like nothing we've ever encountered before . .
Misato: What do you mean?
Maya: The waveform pattern is dynamic. . . constantly shifting pulse imprints!
Misato: Are you saying they may not be able to neutralize it?!
Yuri: The speed at which it alters the pattern--we've never encountered this before!
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Asuka: Ungh-!!!
(Asuka Soryu pants heavily as EVA-02
weaves through the vacant city streets--her target
visible on
the ridge, rising grotesquely to its feet . . .)
Asuka: No weapons . . . then . . . we make due!
(The girl mutters to herself darkly
as her EVA comes to a grinding halt--reaching into
the base of a
small 7 story apartment complex. The avatar's fingers
dig into the concrete and steel foundation like
soft clay, fixing themselves before, with incredible
strength, the Evangelion exerts against its weight;
the shattering of stone is accompanied
by the violent shredding of steel girders as the multiton
structure is torn readily from the earth, spilling
fragments of glass and concrete that bounce ineffectually
off of Unit 02's armor as the second child hoists
it high above her EVA's head. The structure begins
to
buckle under the strain of its own mass as, within
the entry plug, the second child strains to steady
the
impossibly huge object, fixing her gaze hatefully
on the creature that has now become
the singular target of her fury . . .)
Asuka: AAAAAAARRRGGHH!!
(With a scream, Asuka Soryu wills
her EVA's titanic strength into action--stepping forward
and
hurling the massive projectile at its unwary target
. . .
the building sails across the sky in slow motion--its arc trailing bits of debris and broken stone through the air.
It is a breathless interim that
is concluded as the beast turns its attentions to
the colossal
missile an instant before its strike, its eyes ablaze
with an unfamiliar light.
With a flash like lightning, the
AT field materializes in blazing luminance that lights
up the
night sky for miles. Mere feet from its intended target,
the building implodes against the unassailable
force with a tremendous crash, pulverized beneath
the weight of its own momentum . . .)
Asuka: Shiest! How could it move so fast!?
Shinji: ASUKA!
Asuka: ?!
(The boy's shout registers an instant
after the creature has become airborne--propelling
itself
with unearthly litheness from the spot where it stood.
Indeed, in the precious half-seconds it takes
for Asuka Soryu to realize what has happened, the
beast is already upon her;
Eva-07 collides with Unit 02
with the collective force beyond measure, pulverizing
its armor
beneath and driving it into the earth. The second
child has not the chance to scream before she
is knocked senseless by the impact, the sudden inertia
throwing her bodily from her plugseat
and into the viewing window itself . . .)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Shinji: NO!
(The third child wills his EVA to
its feet--pulling the progressive knife from its shoulder-sheath.
The weapon's ultrasonic resonance casts an eerie sanguine
glow on Unit 01's demonic form as the
Evangelion drops to a sprint, bounding toward its
quarry with renewed fury . . .)
Shinji: GET OFF OF HER!
Misato: SHINJI! WAIT!
Shinji: It's got unit 02-!
Misato: You can't get close to that thing--
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(The high-pitched wail of grinding
metal fills the night air a second time as the rogue
Evangelion
fixes its grip upon the head armor of unit 02, which
even now struggles weakly beneath its tremendous
weight. The quartet of green crystal-compound lenses
fracture in unison beneath the tremendous pressure
exerted upon the cuirass, then, as the beast squeezes
with incredible might. Stabilizing braces and
binding bolts snap, then, as the creature pulls--
tearing the carapace from its mounting, revealing
the
tenuous organics beneath . . .
Tossing the fragment aside, then,
EVA-07's jaw opens wide upon its hinge--a low, bestial
growl
escaping from its distorted metal grimace as it hovers
mere feet from Unit 02's exposed tissue . . .
Within the darkening entry plug,
the second child finds herself frozen beneath the
creature's
burning gaze--Seconds are stretched to endless minutes
as Unit 07's smoldering eyes seem to
affix themselves upon her own, staring somehow beyond
the layers of metal and tissue which
separate them both into the most darkened corners
of her soul.
Fire and shadow consumes the second child;
a numbing void bereft of thought or meaning that
encompasses her totality in a lucid blackness. Soon,
there are only the eyes-- blazing and ceaseless,
relentless as they bore themselves into the depths
of her fragile consciousness . . .
It is from within this dark place,
then, that the voice first comes--an echo from her
own thoughts,
a jumble of almost primal fears . . .)
Asuka: Get Away . . . GET AWAY FROM ME!
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(Far below . . . )
Tenkei: It was you. You who brought Haziel into the black moon.
Gendo: . . .
Tenkei: It vexes me. It is a risk too great for words.
Gendo:
Seele would have affected their own outcome,
Had we not taken the initiative.
Even now, they watch, and wait.
Whether the angel is defeated, or
if it succeeds in bonding with Adam,
They have twisted events enough
so that both outcomes will play in their favor.
Tenkei: And that is why you are here, is it not? Why I have been drawn to this place.
Gendo: I have little choice. If there is any chance to affect a third tangent--
Tenkei: Choice. So much importance placed on choice. Decision. Judgment. Desire.
(The boy closes his eyes, shaking his head forlornly . . )
Tenkei: Death must be the result?
(The sound of splintering wood fills the chamber then, as,
with the sound of a thousand voices raised in unison,
the cross upon which Lilith hangs shatters.
Tremors shake the very walls of
the chamber as the fragments tumble into the murk,
Sending waves of LCL churning through the small lake.
Ikari is once more knocked from
his feet as the fluid cascades about him. It is only
when the creature itself tumbles into the
pool--falling to a crouch as its palms tear free of
their stigmatic bonds--that the liquid is
displaced beyond the floating platform, crashing against
the doorway to the plant
entrance in thundering waves.
With a moan that is a chorus of
anger and pain, then, the creature begins to move--lurching
upon bent knee as it rises above the waterline, gallons
of LCL spilling from its frame. The elder
Ikari finds his sanity held by the a perilous thread
, then, as the being locks him in a gaze from
the 7-eyed façade that makes up its fearsome
countenance, the fluid weeping from every corner
and crevice of the sodden mask like tears . . .)
Gendo: . . .
Tenkei:
You are no stranger to this. Gendo Ikari. The race
of man hangs upon a precipice.
The moment is
near.
Gendo: You would stop me?
Tenkei: Your suspicion belies understanding. No.
(The relatively miniscule figure
of the child continues to hover motionlessly above
the still
rippling waters of the LCL plant interior. The boy
is, incredibly, somehow heedless of the titanic
figure that dwarfs him from behind. )
Tenkei:
My allotment in this place was assigned to me by she.
Mother, the first other.
"The complementation
of man."
Gendo: Yes. That was the name of the project that sought your creation.
Tenkei: "Creation?" That is one of but many illusions the race of man cling to.
Gendo: What?
Tenkei: You have created nothing.
(A crash of waves seems to punctuate
the boy's words, then, as the left hand of the behemoth
behind him emerges from the murky depths--spilling
a river of the liquid from betwixt her fingers . .
.)
Tenkei: The act which you refer to as "creation". . . was nothing more than an act of means.
Tenkei:
Man and woman . . . mother and father . . . the very
act of conception itself.
These are but
catalysts. True creation is beyond the realm of your
understanding.
What you know
is little more than tugging at the genetic strands
of your ancestors-
Pulling remnants
from the great tapestries of generations before you,
unweaving them
and reweaving them into what is and what shall be.
A knot. A link. A chain.
By this distinction,
your future cannot exist independent of your past.
(The boy turns, then--indicating
the monolithic entity which now begins to reach its
massive hand
toward the two interlopers into her chamber; Gendo
Ikari recoils as the creature's fingers knarl into
an
open clasp, the object of her struggles now becoming
alarmingly clear . . .)
Tenkei: Creation . . . true creation . . . needs no precursor . No basis by which to exist.
Gendo:
If it is our limits which define us as human beings
. . . why then we are born with the need to go
beyond such limits.
Tenkei: . . .
Gendo:
It is our right! We have reached the limits of our
mortal frame.
We now face the prospect of our
own extinction, unless we become more than we are!
Tenkei: . . .
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Asuka: Wh . . Who are you!?
Child-Asuka: . . . you don't recognize me?
(The world as it is, plunges into blackness, then, for Asuka Soryu.
Populated by indistinct sounds that
fill the farthest edges of consciousness,
distant echoes which populate the silence with distorted
voices . . )
Child-Asuka: I am I. Is there anything else?
Asuka: This is a dream! The angel-
Child-Asuka: So what if it is a dream?
Asuka: Shut up!
Child-Asuka: Why don't you run away again?
Asuka: What . . ?
Child-Asuka: Why don't you run. Flee, as you always have.
Asuka: You're not real!
Child-Asuka: . . . Neither are you!
Asuka: . . . This . . . isn't happening . .
Child-Asuka: Isn't that what you said when you found her? When you found Mama?
Asuka: Shut up!!!
Child-Asuka: This isn't happening!
Asuka: Shut up!
Child-Asuka: This isn't happening!
Asuka: Stop it!
Child-Asuka: This isn't happening!
Asuka: STOP IT!
(The sounds of crying fill the void. Asuka Soryu claws at her ears, attempting to shut out the voice from within to no avail . . .)
Child-Asuka: Wretched girl. Deep in your heart.
Asuka: No . .
Child-Asuka: From deep in your heart, you've always been a coward.
Asuka: . .
Child-Asuka: Hide! Hide in your bed,
Asuka: . . .
Child-Asuka: Hide in your hospital room,
Asuka: . . .
Child-Asuka: Hide in your EVA!
Asuka: . . .
Child-Asuka: Hide behind your AT FIELD!
Asuka: . . .
Child-Asuka: HIDE FROM HIM!
Asuka: STOP IT!
Child-Asuka: "Don't tell me there's more to life."
Asuka: . . .
Child-Asuka: Your own words, yes? You know nothing of living.
Asuka: . . Mama . . .
Child-Asuka: . . ?
Asuka: Why, Mama . . .
Child-Asuka: . . .
Asuka: Why do you torture me so . . .
Child-Asuka: . . .
Asuka: Why . .
Child-Asuka: How else can I make you strong?
Asuka: . . .
Child-Asuka: How else . . . can you desire life?
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Maya: I'm registering mental contamination in the second child!--But . . She's fighting it!
Misato: Disengage neural connection!
Yuri: No response! The pulses are flowing on their own!
(Katsuragi's hands ball into tight
fists as she her mind rages at the growing futility
of her efforts.
Diverting her attention to the fore, then, the woman
steps forward, shouting with renewed urgency--)
Misato: NOW, SHINJI!
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(the Progressive blade flies through
the air at nearly the speed of sound--its ultrasonic
edge etching
a path through the atmosphere as it twirls, end over
end, in a lateral arc that carries it nearly a mile
before
it buries itself between the shoulder blades of the
stooped EVA-07.
The creature is nearly thrown to
the earth by the strike, one that sends a geyser of
its viscous life-blood
jetting into the sky. The beast wails a cry that is
heard across the valley as it comes to its feet, releasing
the now still EVA 02 from its grip.
Tearing the implement from its back with
a snarl, the EVA turns--a blood-curdling screech escaping
from its jaws as it turns to face the source of the
assault . . .
EVA-01 stands firm, its armor glinting
brightly in the moonlight as it braces itself, digging
its heels
into the pavement. Inside the entry module, Shinji
Ikari tightens his grip around the control yokes,
watching
apprehensively the shadowy form which rises 40 meters
to its full height . . .)
Shinji: Misato -
Misato: He's fast. Its reflexes border on clairvoyance . . .
Shinji: It . . .it can see the future?
Misato:
I don't know. But it has demonstrated the ability
to read your tactics.
It's been shifting
the waveform pattern of its AT field before you can
neutralize it with your
own--instead of
creating a destructive interference,
it forms an exponentially
more powerful field.
(The boy shudders through clenched teeth . . )
Shinji: . . . It's using our AT field against us?!
(Katsuragi is quit, for a moment. When she does speak, it is in a voice that is resolute . . )
Misato: . . . You can't win this alone.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Gendo: . . . What is happening!?
Tenkei:
She is drawn to him. Not unlike the Natus De Adamo.
Gendo: Adam?
Tenkei: Yes. She is aware of his presence . . .
Gendo: And you?
Tenkei: Hmm.
(The boy smiles, gazing intently
at the elder man as the gargantuan form behind him
writhes
slowly, sending endless ripples reverberating through
the stasis pool . . . )
Tenkei: I am Factae De Adamo. Like the guardians. I am free of his spell.
Gendo: . .
Tenkei: You knew this . . .
(Inhuman groans fill the LCL plant
chamber, now, as the beast Lilith's massive palm inches
toward the diminutive figure of Gendo Ikari--his own
hand bared, compelled by some unseen
force that exists beyond madness or reason . . .)
Tenkei:
But her attraction to the first is unlike theirs .
. . While theirs serves as a basis for destruction,
Hers is an attraction
on a more basic level. A fusion of wills.
Gendo: I don't understand-
Tenkei:
She wishes to return to him. She has lived a thousand
lifetimes, died a thousand
Deaths, even forsaken
her own progeny, simply to reunite with him once more.
(Ikari is silent--)
Tenkei: It is an obsession that borders on madness. And it is one that you know well, Gendo Ikari.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(Within the entry plug of EVA-02
A haze of static illuminates the
prone form of the second child. Assailed by a pleading
voice
from all sides, the girl stirs--shaking free the vertigo
that claimed here only moments before . . .)
Misato: @!#ska? Au#ka? #@ Asuka?
Asuka: Nnng . . . no . . .
Misato: Are you reading me? Come on, Asuka!
Asuka: Make it stop . . . please . . .make it stop . .
Misato: Asuka, please! Unit 01--Shinji needs your help!
Asuka:
Ungh . . . !?
(opening her eyes, at last, the
child struggles to her knees--crawling into her plugseat
with little ease . . .)
Misato: Asuka . . . talk to me!
Asuka: Mi . . Misato . . .
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(From the entry module of Unit 01,
the third child breaths a cautious sigh of relief as EVA-02 begins to stir--rising perilously to its feet.
Ahead, the form of EVA-07 is still. Motionless, as if awaiting some signal to continue its attack . . .)
Shinji: Asuka . . ? Asuka, are you there?
Asuka: Shinji . . ?
Shinji: Asuka . . .please . . .tell me if you're okay . . .
Asuka: I . . . I think so . . . It moves too fast, Shinji!
Shinji: We have to try one more time, Asuka! We have to do this together!
Asuka: What?!
Shinji: We have to fight it together!
Asuka: How? How can we beat that thing?!
(The boy grits his teeth, swallowing hard against the fear which now rises within him.
A fear born of doubt,
A fear born of self-loathing
A fear born of loneliness.
In the warm matrix of EVA-01, Shinji Ikari takes hold of the voice of the anxious girl over the comm. channel. . . )
Shinji: We're only going to have one chance!
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
The Three figures stand motionless
in the barren waste that was once the thriving metropolis
of Tokyo 3. Churning winds howl through the ruined
streets, as the first corona of the approaching
dawn glows mildly in the sky beyond the eastern horizon.
Two of the battle-scarred EVAs face
the third, in the center--its posture low, almost
primal.
As the first rays of sunlight glance over the far
hills, the pilot of the first--Shinji Ikari--watches
closely the movements of the second, piloted by Asuka
Soryu.
It is upon steadying knees that
Her EVA struggles to its full height, reflective of
the pilot's
pain from the assault only moments ago . . .)
Shinji: Misato . . .
Misato: We're ready, Shinji . . .
Shinji: Asuka: . . ?
Asuka: Shinji . . . are you sure . . .
Shinji: No. But this is all we have left.
Misato: Remember, Asuka . . . accessory route 6 . . .
Asuka: . . . Shinji?
Shinji: . . . yeah . .
Asuka: I'm sorry I locked you out . . . I'm sorry I yelled at you . . . Ikari . .
Shinji: . . .
Asuka: Please stay alive, third child.
Shinji: . . . Same . . . same to you
(The remark is silent--almost like
words of prayer over the communications network. The
boy
closes his eyes, inhaling deeply the oxygenated liquid
that encompasses him inside the entry-plug's womb-like
embrace.
And from a time beyond distant memory . . . the moment comes.
With it, lucidity.
Reflection.
Action.)
Shinji: (shouting) Now!
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(With a roar that shatters the deceptive
silence of the new morning calm, EVA-01 bounds
toward EVA-07 with footfalls that shatter buildings.
The air about it grows murky and distorted,
then, as the intangible walls of the Absolute Terror
field grow about it--colliding with a peal of thunder
with the same field produced by Evangelion unit 07.
The two walls of force resist each other like magnets of the same polarity--
fragments of debris, chunks of concrete,
and even smaller structures and cars lifted skyward
by
the incredible forces which push at one-another, bolts
of lightning traversing the divide between the two
fields as EVA-01 braces itself in the pavement, arms
raised against the tumult of immeasurable
power that has grown between them.
The roar is loud enough to shake
the entry plug interior itself, nearly deafening the
third child as he struggles
to keep the tide of force at bay. Before him, the
raging form of the possessed Evangelion screams, its
figure warped
and distorted by the fierce clash of wills manifest
in the electrical storm between them.
Nearly blinded by the growing light
from the creature's quickly strengthening field, Shinji
Ikari shields
his eyes as he screams into the comm. . . .)
Shinji: Misato!
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(an instant later, below . . .)
Yuri: Field polarity at maximum!
Misato: Launch the fourth catapult!
Hyuga:
Roger! ETA 10 seconds until Tokyo surface--
Misato: Asuka!
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Shinji: DO IT NOW!
(Within the entry plug of EVA -02,
Asuka Soryu finds herself borne into the moment by
the
sound of Shinji's voice--the will to fight rising
sharply within her as she grips tightly the Evangelion's
controls . . .)
Asuka: SPREADING AT FIELD!
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(It manifests itself in the air
of Tokyo 3 like a hurricane-
an ever-expanding field of energy
that defies the very boundaries of known physics and
human faith.
It erupts from the air around Unit
02 in a hemispherical flash of brilliance--spreading
like a tidal wave,
annihilating what few structures that yet stand in
its path.
With incredible speed, it streaks
overland like a cataclysmic force of heaven toward
the embattled
forms of EVA-01 and 07, the rogue unit unaware of
its presence until it is all but an instant too late.
The creature is nearly thrown from
its feet as the third waveform collides with the first
two--the energy
surge tearing the collective AT fields apart , causing
their fragments to discorporate like ethereal shards
of shattered glass. )
Shinji: AAAAAAAARGH!!!
(The third child screams, then,
as EVA-01, free of the beast's hold, charges forward
with ferocity
previously unseen. Armor shatters as the two collide,
The Evangelion prototype raking its fists across
the enemy's jaw. The blow sends the creature off balance,
and it is then that Ikari finds the opportunity
he seeks. With a second lunge , the EVA tackles its
prey: wrapping its arms about its foe even as the
beast thrashes maddeningly beneath the incredible
grip . . .
It is then, even as his EVA's strength begins to give, that the boy shouts the final signal. . . )
Shinji: ASUKA!
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(Below--)
Misato: ETA!
Hyuga: 3 . . . 2 . . .
Misato: SORYU!
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(No word of acknowledgement is given
by the second child as her EVA breaks into a sprint--its
path
taking it on a collision course with the struggling
forms of EVAs 01 and 07.
Distantly, the second child is aware of
the screams of Misato Katsuragi, even as the ground
between
her and her intended target crumbles, revealing something
rising from the sodden rubble.
The world falls into a timeless
state, then, as the familiar object bursts from the
earth, haphazardly mounted
atop a launch platform normally reserved for EVA sorties.
Its gleaming surface catches the
light of the morning sun as its unmistakable shape
burns deeply into Asuka's
resolve, bringing with it the echo of a fighting spirit
long thought lost by the second child.
EVA-02 doesn't break its pace as
it grabs the SEI Katana blade from its makeshift stand
on the fourth catapult--
drawing the massive weapon from the where it has been
driven into the base, and twirling it expertly to
trail it behind
as it Unit 02 hurls itself toward Unit 07 at top speed.
It is then that Unit 01 shifts its
immense weight--turning its captive to face the scarlet-clad
herald of death that bears
down on it, her blade raised to the fore . . . Ikari
has no words to give in the milliseconds before the
strike as it EVA-07's
chest armor crumbles away in its struggles--revealing
the seamless red contours of the beast's S2 core to
glint brightly
in the morning light . . .
None are needed.)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Asuka: AAAAAAAAAAAAAAGGGHH!!
(The blade pierces the nucleus with a
torrent of sparks, punctuated by bolts of electricity
that lick across its edge as
EVA-02 throws all momentum into the lunge, driving
it through the creature's chest to the weapon's very
hilt.
The screech produced as the weapon enters rings across
the valley as a horrifying death-knell, deafening
and
terrible as the wind carries the sound for miles .
. .)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(For Shinji Ikari, the realization of the implications of the moment come but an instant too late.)
Shinji: Aaargghh!!
(The third child looses a strangled cry, then, as the blade emerges from the enemy's back-
traversing the distance between them,
and embedding itself into unit 01's own S2 core . . .
Daggers of white-hot agony scream
through Shinji Ikari's chest as the EVA's pain is
transferred to his own,
the sensations of the blade's final resting point
at the very center of unit 01's midsection vividly
and mercilessly
conveyed by his own neural connection. )
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(The 18th angel shudders once, before
a flood of black sanguine fluid erupts from between
its jaws, splashing
into the eyes of its apparent slayer.
Distantly, Asuka can feel the tremors rock the creature's form, impaled upon the steel sword held fast by Unit 02's grasp-
But her eyes are not filled with the thrill of impending victory.
Rather, they are a mask of sheer horror:
locked upon those of Shinji Ikari, whose
image waivers breathlessly on the active comm. connection
between them,
his strangled breaths inaudible over the wails of
the agonized beast between them.
It takes but a second for Soryu's mind to process the terrible truth of what has occurred . . .)
Asuka: SHINJI!
( The shout comes even as the second
child braces her EVA to remove the blade--Unit-01's
grip
becoming limp before its hands fall away.)
Asuka: No, Shinji! NO!
(In her frantic struggle to pull the sword from the 18th angel's chest,
Asuka Soryu is unprepared, then,
As the creature between them shudders
with renewed vigor--loosing an ear-shattering
scream that stops the second child in her tracks.
Freed of EVA-01's grip, the beast places
its fingers about EVA-02's exposed neck --pulling
it from its feet
, and driving the impaled blade further into its own
chest.
Soryu screams in terror as her grip
upon the sword loosens--torn free entirely as EVA-02
is born
into the air in the 18th angel's grasp, the umbilical
cable binding it to the power generators far
beneath the city surface splitting free . . . )
(Gasping through her rapidly closing windpipe,
the second child's world is once more consumed
beneath the sadistic gaze of the maddened creature
before her--its blazing stare framing the rapidly
fading image of Shinji Ikari, who clutches desperately
at his midsection as a trickle of blood escapes
from his lips, dissolving into the LCL around him
. . .
For the pilot Soryu, however, the terror
is now tenfold--for the blow from the now silent EVA-01
has removed enough of the creature's head armor to
reveal, beneath the broken façade of blood
and steel,
not two,
but , in fact, seven such eyes . . .
Eyes previously hidden by the beast's
now shattered cuirass, now bared and staring hatefully
at her from atop the creature's mangled brow . . .)
Asuka: (screaming) MISATO!!! It's not dead!!
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Rei: The throne of souls. That is what you call it.
Kihl: Yes.
Rei: And yet . . . I sense something astray.
Kihl: Do you, now?
Rei: You wish to harness the power of the third impact . . . for yourself. . .
Kihl: It is written . .
Rei: Even your name . . . Kihl . . . in the dead tongues means "One Like God."
(A verve of energy ripples through
the chamber, then, as the monolithic representation
of Lorenz
Kihl vanishes, replaced by the image of the man himself--his
eyes obscured behind a mechanical visor,
his face a smug cowl of crooked lines in ancient features
. . .)
Rei: It is what you aspire to be.
Kihl:
You speak as though you have known . . . our manipulation
runs beyond what petty
Revelations you choose to impart.
Rei:
But is through "revelation". . . I have
seen it all.
He gave me the dream.
(The girl affixes her eyes upon
the man's countenance--her vision focused upon something
which
lies beyond the luminant manifestation that resides
across the room . . .)
Rei:
The dreams . . . were always similar. Even before
he had a mouth with which to speak
or eyes with which to see, his will
was drawn to me. Because his will was born of her
will.
Her will, which has driven me to
this moment. We share one mind, and many bodies.
Kihl: Enough of this.
Rei:
Even the greatest mountains shatter, beneath the impossible
weight of time. Growth and change,
Ruled by an ever-present flow that
I have come to know as intimately as my own breath.
It is this flow which drove the
visions, my consciousness disembodied in EVA's cradle,
in my own
sleep.
Rei: Six. Six spheres. Dancing, ever-changing, ever-fading.
Rei: The self that is, The self that is seen, and the self that sees itself.
Rei: They have become one.
Rei: Within me.
Rei: I have come here to deliver unto you a message.
Kihl: You will end nothing, girl. Even now, the blessed moment approaches.
Rei: My message is simply this: Your will shall achieve nothing.
Kihl: . . .
(It is at this, then, that the apparition of the girl vanishes--)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Hyuga: Shinji's heart-rate is at 170, rising!
Yuri: I'm reading activity in the 18th angel--It's still alive!
Misato: disengage Shinji's neural connections--
Shigeru: Safety's still unresponsive! AT field interference-
Misato: Eject the--
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(The panicked calls from the control center slowly fade beneath the growing roar in the third child's ears. . . )
Shinji: (choking) . . .
(Shinji Ikari chokes on the coppery
taste of his own blood, intermingled with that of
the LCL
around him as horrifying images flash upon the flickering
viewers around him.
The thrashing form of EVA-02,
The impossible strength of the maddened beast that holds it in his grip,
The shadow of hope which fades into all-consuming nightmare that has enveloped the world.
It is here, othe threshold of his own death,
Shinji recedes from the unweaving tapestry that has become his reality.
Awareness dawns:
Awareness from beyond the definition of his own form from places far and near.
A flash of images, then.
A parade of thoughts.
Memories.
Regrets.
A bicycle pulled from a junk heap,
The angered accusations of authority.
The humble accouterments of a foster home.
A smile.
These are but afterthoughts;
shadows of recollection brought on by the rapidly fading moment, and the knowledge that the end is coming.
Shinji Ikari feels his body become
weightless--the trappings of sensation falling away
in an encroaching
warmth that soon envelopes his entire being. The self
that is dissolves, replaced by what is and shall be.
The stream of consciousness flows, carrying him through
the blackened void
as a pebble in a raging torrent.)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(Somewhere else.
A balmy summer day.
A gentle wind across the geoid plane.
Two figures stand here, lost to
the serenity that courses through the nature around
them . . . The taller
of the two is a young man, who carries in his hand
a humble gardening tin. The shorter figure watches,
patiently,
as the man uses the can to water a series of squat
shapes nearly concealed by the listing grasses: )
Shinji: I'm . . . I'm different, somehow.
Kaji: You can tell? That's a sign of presence. It suits you.
Shinji: . . . I suppose.
Kaji: You're wondering what to say to her, aren't you?
Shinji: . . I . . .
Kaji: It's alright to be afraid. You are afraid, aren't you?
Shinji: Yes.
Kaji:
You aren't the first. Women are a strange thing, truth
be told.
So very much like us, yet so very
different.
Shinji: I . . .
Kaji: You're afraid you don't deserve her, eh?
Shinji: . .
Kaji: You wouldn't be the last.
Shinji: All this time . . . I've tried to be brave. But it always hurts so much . . .
Kaji:
Being brave was never mistaken for being easy. That
is the path of foolishness,
Really.
Shinji: But . . . a fool can be brave . . .
Kaji: Are you a fool, Shinji?
Shinji: Yes . . I . . . sometimes, I think I am . .
Kaji:
A great man once said, "know first that you are
a fool and know nothing---
This is the first step along the
path to attaining true wisdom."
Shinji: . . .
Kaji:
I've always considered that a paradox of life.
The journey to rid oneself of foolishness,
and learn all that
can possibly be learned . . .
Shinji: That's impossible.
Kaji: Of course. It's a fool's endeavor. That's what makes it a paradox. It is a contradiction.
Shinji: . . .
Kaji:
No, my young Ikari. The path of life isn't to become
all knowing.
It isn't to become like God. That
violates the very nature of our mortality.
Shinji: Then . . .
Kaji: I think you would agree . . . that the meaning of life is found in living, itself.
Shinji: your answers always sound so easy . . . but they never are.
Kaji: (smirking) Indeed.
Shinji: . . eh?
Kaji:
Your fate is to pilot EVA. But you make your own fate.
That's what life should be. Take the
chances, risk sadness. It is a far
better thing, than to ponder what might have been.
Even doubts
are the shadows of possibility.
It's the act of nonaction--apathy towards embracing
life. That will
be the true end of mankind . . .
not the third impact . . .
Shinji: . . . You're right.
Kaji: Am I?
Shinji: Hunh?
Kaji:
I suppose . . it all depends upon your point of view
. . and if you have the strength to grow beyond
your making . . .
(The man chuckles to himself. It
is then that the sound of running water abruptly stops--the
gardening
tin dripping its last drops upon the rotund shapes
in the grass with an almost glaring finality. . .)
Shinji: . . .
Kaji: We're all afraid, Shinji. It's what keeps us living.
Shinji: I'm . . .I'm afraid for different reasons.
Kaji: Of course. And that's why you feel ashamed.
Shinji: . . .
Kaji: Don't be, Shinji.
(It is with a smile, then, the figure of Kaji Ryouji motions to the object of his recent attentions.
But, as Shinji returns his gaze to the earth at his feet,
He finds his voice lodged in his throat.
For, sitting peacefully in the warmth of the afternoon sun, is not a patch of watermelons he expects to see.
Rather, it is six spherical shapes--gleaming red, like polished glass, displaced against the backdrop of the small garden.
The shapes of red cores.
Shinji recoils back as his breath leaves him, the utter abomination of the image sending a lightning bolt of fear through his body . . .)
Shinji: What---What are those!? KAJI!? What's going on-
(And yet, as her turns to again
regard the young purveyor of wisdom, he finds not
only
is he gone, but
so is the world, as well . . .)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(A dry heat blows across the sun scorched planes of the communal cemetery set on the outskirts of Tokyo 3.
It is here, now, that Shinji Ikari
finds himself-alone among a faceless congregation
of dark obelisks
spanning the countryside from horizon to horizon;
The sea of black stone markers surrounds
him on all sides, each a silent cry in the collective
stillness
that permeates the air and the earth that abound the
third child. It is an unhinging calm that consumes
him
entirely, beckoning from the very edges of sanity
as he stares at his face reflected a hundred times
in a
hundred of the polished sable mirrors that comprises
each monument.
It takes but a moment for fear to
grip his heart--fear at the realization that he is,
perhaps, completely
alone here, among the dead, torn from his reality
for reasons he cannot begin to comprehend . . .)
Shinji: . .K . . Kaji!?
(wind and echoes serve the only
response to his singular, futile question--one that
is
soon left to the void as the child runs.
dozens of the markers whip past
as he sprints for his very life--weaving around the
evenly spaced
memorials in a fruitless attempt at flight from the
shadows which encroach . . )
Shinji: Hello!? Somebody?! PLEASE!!
(Again, no answer as the third child
stumbles onward--his heart threatening to burst from
his
chest as the blood boils in his veins.
Shinji Ikari cries out as his vision
doubles, his breath leaving him swiftly as he falls
to his
knees in a cloud of dust and dirt . . .)
Shinji: SOMEBODY! ASUKA! AYANAMI! . . MISATO!
(clutching his arms about him, the
boy gasps for breaths that will not quite come, peering
wildly for some sign of reason in the encroaching
madness that surrounds and envelopes him . . .
And it then, that he sees it:
In the distance.
The shape of a figure, standing
behind one of the gravestones, obscured by the wavering
heat rising off of the sun bleached plane . . .
Pulling himself to his feet, the
boy forces his way between the forty or so rows of
obelisks
that stands like an army between he and this last
bastion of hope and clarity. The burning in his
constricted lungs is a fire in his chest, spreading
through his veins as he struggles to maintain
his sights upon the quickly distorting image of hope
which stands before him.
Blinded by the midday sun which
hangs high in the heavens above, Shinji Ikari casts
his
eyes downward, watching his own footsteps as he weaves
around grave after grave, the weight
of his physical burden growing heavier and heavier
by the moment, for reasons his rational
mind cannot fathom.
Indeed, it is not long before he
tumbles to his knees a second time, reeling from the
exhaustion
that seems to pull his breath from his lungs before
he is even able to draw it in.
Realization comes slowly, then,
as the boy lifts his gaze--and finds himself kneeling
in the stranger's shadow . . .)
Shinji: Help me . . I'm . .
(Panting heavily, the boy lifts
his eyes to the stranger's face--one which is obscured,
partially, by a
blinding halo of the sun which frames it from behind.
Shielding his eyes, the third child struggles
to peer beyond the shadowy silhouette . . . an iota
of
recognition held within her distinctly feminine features
as the suns blinding afterimages begin to fade . .
.)
Shinji: Ayanami? Is --
The boy stops, however,
as a new madness grips his heart.
But it is not one born of terror or fear.
Rather, it is born of the singular sense of pure, seizing disbelief . . .)
Shinji: . . . no . . .
(It is with sad eyes that the stranger,
who is truly no longer a stranger, acknowledges Shinji
Ikari.
They carry with them the impression of a grief beyond
measure, a terrible sadness that is reflected in the
cemetery field, in the howling wind, and in the petrified
heart of the third child . . .)
Yui: Hello, Shinji.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(Terminal Dogma . . .)
Gendo: Of course. You know my thoughts.
Tenkei:
I know them as well as you. As well as any human being
may know.
It is the ultimate sympathy that
I feel, knowing what pains and drives you.
Gendo: . . .
Tenkei: You wish to have her back.
Gendo: . . .
Tenkei: Much like She wishes for reunification.
Gendo: . . .
Tenkei: Much like I wish to return to her.
(Gendo Ikari strains with mortified
surprise, then, as the unidentifiable forces which
impel his
hand upward grip his forearm--splaying his palm open
toward the impossibly huge creature before
him, her hand similarly outstretched. )
Gendo: How . . . how can I---The ceremony must be initiated. Red-earth or blue-earth--Seele--
(The man cringes as pain sweeps
through his arm--a searing heat flowing through his
every
corpuscle, driving him forward into the waist-deep
LCL pool at the human complement's feet as
the beast draws closer, dwarfing them both beneath
it . . .)
Tenkei:
The Red Earth ceremony . . . the final ascension of
man, a chaotically uncontrolled
fusion of all.
The Blue Earth ceremony . . . a negation of all that
is, reborn to a world
fashioned of a
singular will. Would you decide the final course of
Mankind's fate?
Gendo: . . .
(It is then, with eyes that bore into Ikari's heart, that Tenkei addresses him grimly . . .)
Tenkei: No. You would use the Lilim's final reprieve, to bring back a single life.
Tenkei: It has consumed you.
Tenkei: It has scarred you.
(Immeasurable pain shoots down Gendo
Ikari's forearm, then, as the boy reaches out--clasping
the man's hand firmly in his own, his fingers twining
about his palm . . .)
Gendo: STOP THIS--ARRRRRGHH . . .!
(The man's protests are cut short
as, without a hint of warning, the child locks his
grip about Ikari's
hand with inhuman strength, driving a strangled cry
from Gendo's his lips . . .)
Tenkei:
You are like children struggling to follow a design
you cannot comprehend. Look around you.
Death and destruction
consume your world. And yet you press on, struggling
to ascend from
The reality of
form we have fashioned for ourselves.
(Ikari is aware, then, of an overriding
numbness encroaching upon the surface of his flesh.
Like an electric verve it ripples from the core of
the boy's touch, overpowering his senses entirely
before,
at last, it is replaced by a pain greater than any
he has known:
An agony of loss, of wrenching away, as the child pulls his hand free--
Borne with it, to the elder man's horror, is the object of so much suffering and loss,
torn from its place in the center of his palm . . .)
Gendo: No . . .
(It is at this moment, the phantom force
which impels Gendo Ikari forward is suddenly removed--casting
him aside as the focus of its power is withdrawn and
transferred.
The human complement watches morosely
as the man falls into the LCL lake, the ripples erupting
through its fluent mix growing in frequency as the
movement of the beast behind becomes more fervent
. . .)
Tenkei: You . . are not worthy of this mantle.
(peering down, the boy looks derisively into his own hand.
It is here, formed by distorted puckers of flesh, that the distinct outline of an embryonic shape are visible.
Ikari struggles above the water's surface--his glasses lost now beneath the opaque miasma that surrounds him . . .)
Gendo: No . . .NO! . . . Adam . . . Return it to me!
Tenkei: So . . . this . . . is what completion is . . . I understand now . . . her name . . . was Ikari . . Yui . . .
(Abruptly, the child's expression
changes into one of ultimate contempt. A sardonic
glance cast upon
the sodden figure of Gendo Ikari reveals a final understanding
of the man's motives--and a fearful tone that
has now overtaken the human complement's demeanor
. . .)
Tenkei:
Mankind must be saved from the angels . . but first
. . .
It must be saved
from itself . . .
(And then,
as the beast Lilith's fingers encroach upon the diminutive form of the child Tenkei,
the boy, at last, regards the masked creature.
Raising his palm to her face.
Gendo Ikari cannot fathom what happens next, then,
As a piercing bolt of light emerges from the child's palm.
It streaks across the LCL plant, its intensity setting the entire chamber alight,
Before bearing down into the center of Lilith's mask.
The ray pierces the sodden construct like an arrow,
Searing flesh and bone, before emerging from the back of the golem's skull.
And it is as the being falls, lifeless, into the murk of the LCL plant pool,
Sending shockwaves which cause the very walls of the room to tremble, then buckle,
The screams that are heard are not those of the creature itself, or even the boy Tenkei.
They are, in fact, those of Gendo Ikari. )
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(Meanwhile . . .
on the precipice which hovers between life and death . . .)
Shinji: How . . How is this possible!? How can you be here?!
Yui: Shinji . .
Shinji: Where am I--? What is going on!?
Yui: You're inside the EVA, Shinji.
Shinji: The EVA . . ?!
Yui:
Yes.
(The figure of Yui Ikari is at once
a specter , almost a phantom to the disbelieving eyes
of the third
child. And yet, her presence is unmistakable; real
to the finest detail, from the manner in which her
graceful form clutches mirrored obelisk that she stands
behind, to the way the churning winds whip
through her clothes and hair . . .)
Yui: You are dying, Shinji.
Shinji: How . . How can you be real?
(The woman shakes her head--her voice a shadow of distant sorrow . . .)
Yui: None of it is. All of it is.
Shinji: . . .
Yui: We are everywhere and nowhere.
Yui: This is the vacuum of EVA's spirit.
Yui: The plane of EVA's RAM.
(The boy drags himself to his feet,
struggling to steadying himself on one of the gravestones
as
his increasingly weakening legs threaten to give out
beneath him . . .)
Shinji: Mother . . .
Yui: It is my fault, Shinji.
Shinji: . . . You . . . you left me . . . you left me alone . .
Yui: I know. It was not my intention, Shinji . .
Shinji: You . . were always here . . ?
Yui: . .
Shinji: Why? How?
Yui: You know why, Shinji.
Shinji: What do you mean!?
Yui: You have always known.
Shinji: . . .
Yui: Every moment you have spent . . . every moment you have suffered in EVA . .
Shinji: Why . .Why is this happening now?!
Yui: You are losing your grip on your pain, Shinji.
Shinji: Why did you leave me!? WHY DID YOU LEAVE ME, MOTHER!?
Yui: A mistake . .
(The woman casts her gaze downward, unable to meet the child's eyes. )
Yui:
. It was my absence that protected you from my own
fate . . . your pain is the AT
Field which protects you from EVA's
clutches.
Shinji: . . . But . . . You didn't protect me . . . from him.
Yui: . . . Another mistake . . . Shinji . . .
Shinji: (gasping) Don't . . be . . .
(The child finds his breath leaving
him as he sinks to his knees, staggered against one
of
the tombstones. It is here that he finds, to his continued
horror, a red stain spreading from the
center of his chest . . .
The vision of Yui Ikari makes no
motion in response as the boy struggles to breathe,
clutching
tighter the monolith she stands behind . . .)
Yui: It is my fault, Shinji.
Yui:
The world is a hell that I brought you into . . .
Because I feared being alone.
You mustn't ignore your pain, Shinji,
or EVA will have you forever. As she has me.
(The apparition leans toward the boy, her words barely audible now above the rising winds of the cemetery plane . . .)
Yui: From the first moment EVA welcomed you into her embrace, I have known the pain in your heart.
Yui:
I have tasted your fear, I have known each and every
second of despair you have suffered, because of
My error.
Yui: I brought you into EVAs RAM, Shinji, because I must ask for your forgiveness . . .
Shinji: (struggling) F . . forgiveness . . ?
Yui: It cannot be enough. It can never be enough.
Yui: You must confront your fear, Shinji. And you have to let go!
Shinji: I . . can't . . .
Yui: From the very beginning, I have tried to protect you!
Shinji: Mother!
Yui:
You have to have the strength to say what is in your
heart. Take the risk, if it's a worthy risk.
Time is unforgiving. Life goes on
and ends with too much left unsaid.
Too often we make our own prisons,
we damn ourselves because we're afraid.
We both know why I'm telling you
this. The time for suffering must end.
(It is then, in-between his ragged gasps, that Shinji Ikari's eyes fall to the sable marker that Yui's form clings to.
What he sees, however, is not a reflection of his crumpled form.
Rather, it is the image of Asuka Soryu--contorted in abject pain that radiates from the icon like scalding heat. )
Yui:
You know what you must do, Shinji---I have lived for
you, and now . . . I must right my error.
EVA. You have to let go, Shinji.
Of me.
(It is upon the fringes of the woman's
statement, that the world around Shinji Ikari begins
to
fade--a breathless quickening engulfing him, as his
mother's final words echo deeply
into his waning soul . . .)
Shinji: WAIT!!!
Yui: LET GO, SHINJI!
Shinji: MOTHER!
Yui: THERE IS NO OTHER WAY!
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(Blackness frames the second child's vision;
A border of horrifying oblivion
which surrounds an equally terrifying image portrayed
on the quickly
fading viewing window before her, as she struggles
for ragged breaths beneath the grip of the beast that
holds her EVA aloft.
The malicious, septocular glare
of the 18th angel, pinned bodily against the limp
form of EVA-01 by the
bladed weapon futily driven into its chest, holds
the second child in a similar vice-like clutch.
It is from this tunnel vision, from
this precipice which treads precariously the border
between lucidity and
madness, that the second child spies a flash of movement-
It is, at first, all but a hallucination--
The figure of EVA-01, stirring impossibly to life,
Its eyes lighting aglow from some power held deep within,
Driven to motion by a will Asuka herself cannot begin to comprehend.
It is in this moment,
That hope once more flares in the second child's heart;
Her disbelief all but quelled as, with a strength beyond ages,
The Evangelion prototype roars a piercing bellow, raising its fists high,
Striking EVA-07's arms at the crook of the elbow.
The sound of crunching bone and
pulping muscle reverberate through the entry module
of Unit 02, as
the iron grip which holds the Evangelion prone is
suddenly reduced to nothing.
Asuka gasps for breath as the beast's
grasp vanishes, her EVA, its internal power supply
long spent,
toppling to the earth like a broken doll even as a
renewed Unit 01 locks its hands about the hilt of
the
embedded katana blade, pinning the beast's now useless
arms beneath . . .
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(Harsh light and splitting pain greet the third child, as reality returns to him in all its morbid fury.
The boy contorts in the plug seat,
gripping the phantom blade that remains lodged in
his chest as
a warmth spreads from the surface of his heart, into
the plug matrix which encases him. )
Shinji: Aaargh . . AAAAAAAAAAAARGH . . .!!!
(The vision of the dream echoes
in the child's mind as painful clarity once more returns--his
first gasps
at the LCL punctuated by a splitting pain in his chest
as his cries resound within the fluent womb of the
entry plug. )
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Misato: Shinji!?
Maya: Negative! Third child's signal is still unreadable.
Misato: You mean-
Maya: All Pulse flow has ceased! EVA's systems are functioning on their own!
Misato: The EVA-
Yuri: Ma'am! I'm reading cascade activity in the S2 core!
Maya: What?!
Yuri: The energy matrix output is rising exponentially!
Maya: No!
Misato: What does that mean!?
Maya: The Eva's power core is initiating a solenoid inversion!!
Misato: Inversion!?
Hyuga: . . . A Dirac sea . . .?!
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Shinji: Gnnnnnnh . . .
(Pain, torturous and crippling,
is all the third child knows. His vision is blurred--distorted
and confined
as images on the viewing window are, one by one, replaced
with the apparition from his dreams only moments before
. .
the field of obelisks, a flash of static,
the tombstones demarcating living from dead . . .
the rolling winds, churning clouds of dust that blot out the light of the sun,
all around the vision of Yui Ikari
now, clutching the edges of her own grave marker as a silent storm boils about her,
her lips moving in silent cries to the dying child in EVAs womb.
The roar in the boy's ears is louder
than any thunder, shaking the very walls of the entry
plug even
as the systems begin to fail, one by one . . .
It is here, as the final seconds
approach, that Shinji Ikari realizes the meaning of
his mother's words.
The same words which, even now, the image of Yui Ikari
screams silently from the plane of EVAs consciousness
. . . )
Shinji: . .R . . . Release . . . ?
Asuka: Sh$#% . . . S#!$#I . . SH#NJI!!!!
(The voice which comes, however, is not that of his mother--though it resides in a place no less coveted in his own heart . . .)
Shinji: A. . Asuka . . .
Asuka: SHINJI!! You're Alive!!
Shinji: Asuka . .
Asuka: What's happening!? Unit 01, it's going crazy!!
(And, at last, for Shinji Ikari,
clarity ultimately comes--carried on the desperation
in Asuka Langley
Soryu's faint transmissions, it brings the child from
the edges of madness-
On the viewer before him, the images
of delusion fade, replaced at once by the struggling
form of EVA-07.
It is here, then, that Shinji Ikari
finally understands.
Struggling to a sitting position,
the boy feebly grips at EVAs controls, before facing
the image of the
second child on the fading comm. window before him
. . .)
Shinji: E . . EJECT THE ENTRY PLUG!!!
Asuka: What!?
Shinji: EJECT! GET OUT OF UNIT 02!
Asuka: . . .
Shinji: PLEASE! THE EVA-
Asuka: . . .
Shinji: NOW!!!
(The second child questions no further--the fear in the third child's mien carrying his words into her heart.
Without a second word, the girl
keys in the three step manual override sequence--her
eyes locked on Ikari's as she does so.
It is only as her fingers hover
above the key signaling final confirmation, the girl
regards the third child
for what will perhaps be the final time . . .)
Asuka: Shinji, please----
Shinji: Asuka . . . .
Asuka: . . .
(It is with this that the boy resigns himself to his chosen fate,
relaying the ejection command with
this final cognizant thought . . .)
Shinji: . . . Goodbye, mother . . .
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(The entry plugs emerge from the backs of the prone Evangelions with a burst of smoke and fire,
their surfaces glinting brightly in the light of the new dawn.
Like missiles, the modules streak
into the firmament, borne by the bright blue tails
of rocket
engines that carry them into the sky . . .
From EVA-01's core, however, a new darkness emerges-
The roar from its power plant sending
tremors which obliterate what remains of downtown
Tokyo 3
around it. It blossoms from the Evangelion's center
like an unholy starburst.
A nebulous form, nearly spherical in shape,
Composed of ethereal matter of the darkest pitch, light neither cast nor reflected from its surface.
It expands at nearly twice the speed
of sound, engulfing the struggling forms of EVA-01
and EVA-07,
as well as the prone form of EVA-02.
Their figures cede into the blackness
that overcomes them, even as the edges of the singularity
stretch ever further, growing beyond the borders of
their existence, into the ruins of the city itself.
From the geoid surface below, the
horrifying spectacle emerges from the tattered ceiling
in a
hemispherical burst,
Piercing the confines of Lilith's egg as matter and energy within it are reduced to an abstraction of nothingness . . .
But then,
As the sphere of darkness encroaches upon the base of the Geoid surface,
Its growth ceases-
And with a peal loud enough to herald the end of the world,
It collapses-
Vanishing into nihility, leaving a vacuum larger than the city center that once stood.
With an explosion that is heard
for nearly a thousand square miles across the planet,
matter and
air rush to fill the void, the energy of the inversion
causing the churning plasma within to ignite,
resulting in a fire ball whose light rivals that of
the rising sun,
before plunging the world into complete and utter silence . . .
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
CAPTION
EPILOGUE
Ritsuko: Tisk tisk, Misato, no need for coarse language.
Misato: Eh.
Ritsuko: So . . . A Solenoid inversion, eh? I'll admit, I'm impressed.
Misato: What the hell is that supposed to mean?
Ritsuko:
By all rights, it is an impossibility. Theoretically,
it would require more
Energy than matter
which exists in our realm of physicality.
Ironic that EVA
would be capable of such a feat . . .
Misato: Not that it means anything, now.
Ritsuko:
Indeed. Though I'm sure the research is still very
much intact . . . I doubt
Any country will
be willing to risk financial and economic crisis to
create more.
Misato: Good riddance.
Ritsuko: . . . I could always be wrong, you know.
Misato: For once, I hope you're not.
Ritsuko: I'm flattered . .
Misato: You still haven't answered my original question, Ritsuko.
Ritsuko: Being?
Misato: Why. Rei, the Magi, Tenkei . . .
Ritsuko: If you're so curious, you could always wait for my deposition . .
Misato: I'm not kidding, Ritsuko. How could you.
Ritsuko: . . . I suppose it was . . . a labor of love.
Misato: What?
Ritsuko:
What does it matter, anymore? Tenkei is gone . . .
Rei is gone . . .
Ikari is gone .
. . Seele is gone. You said so yourself.
I do hope Maya
is taking it well.
Misato: . . .
Ritsuko: Perhaps it is as you said. "Good Riddance."
Misato: . . .
Ritsuko: And what about you?
Misato: What about me . .
Ritsuko: I think we both know the question.
Misato: . . . I'm going to finish what I started.
Ritsuko: Ever the stubborn one, but this zest for completing things is new.
Misato: Someone has to watch over them.
Ritsuko: Is that a hint of guilt, I detect?
Misato: No. Call it . . .
Ritsuko: motherly compassion?
Misato: . . . Dysfunctional or artificial . . . family is family.
Ritsuko: . . .
Misato: . . . well?
Ritsuko: My time is up. I have to leave now, Misato.
Misato: Alright.
Ritsuko: Soon enough . . . I will be gone too.
Misato: . . . Take care of yourself.
Ritsuko:
Advice you'd better follow, Major.
(The subtle "click" of
a receiver punctuates the end of Ritsuko Akagi's response.
Setting her own handset into its
cradle, Misato Katsuragi runs her fingers through
her hair,
Sighing forcefully as she replays, in her mind, the
contents of the exchange. Seemingly
dissatisfied, the woman rises from her seat--pulling
the edges of her jacket about her in
the dimly lit briefing room . . .)
Misato: Good Riddance . . . Indeed . .
Seyoko: Not the bastion of answers you'd hoped for.
Misato: . . . How long have you been standing there?
Seyoko:
Not long enough.
(Okazaki folds her arms across her
chest, dropping her gaze to nothing in particular.)
Misato:
As long as we're nosing about business that isn't
our own . . . how are you doing?
Seyoko: I don't want your pity. I'm dealing.
Misato: . . .
Seyoko: I came here to tell you something.
Misato: . . ?
Seyoko: I'm sorry. For placing the blame on you. For all my accusations.
Misato: hmph.
Seyoko: Lyn left a note on my mobile terminal. He'd planned to kill himself, rather than go home.
Misato: I'm sorry.
Seyoko:
I'm sure you are.
(Okazaki makes no effort to hide
the venom in her voice.)
Seyoko: I should like to think . . . that he is truly
happy, wherever he is now.
Be glad . . .
that you have a second chance, Major Katsuragi. To
be a better
human being.
Misato: I am.
(Surprisingly, then, Seyoko offers
Katsuragi a sad smile . . .)
Seyoko: Life can go on. At least . . . it still has
a chance.
Misato: Is this your way of saying goodbye?
Seyoko: Tokyo 3 is a sovereign body, now. Your Commander
Fuyutsuki has seen fit that I
apply my diplomatic
skills to its cause.
Misato:
Will it last?
Seyoko: I spoke with embassador Yuh. If Taiwan's support
is of any indication . . . perhaps.
I will offer this
to the late commander Ikari; his preparations were
far reaching.
Misato: Indeed.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
CAPTION
ANOTHER FAMILIAR CEILING
(Blue hues wash the sterile trappings
of the base clinic quarters in a cool splendor. )
Asuka: Just . . . stop. Stop thinking about the future, for a minute, third child . . . Shinji . . .
Shinji: Then what am I supposed to . .
Asuka: Just . . the moment. Right now.
(Shinji Ikari shifts to a sitting
position in the starched bedspread, raising his eyes
pensively at
the burnt-out fluorescent fixture that sits above.
Beside him, Asuka Soryu suppresses a slight
grin--one that is not lost upon the third child .
. .)
Shinji: What . . ?
Asuka: Who would've thought our roles would switch so suddenly. Here you are . . . and here I am. . . .
Shinji: . . yeah . . .
Asuka: . . .
Shinji: . . .
Asuka: So . . . there's been no word. Commander Fuyutsuki-
Shinji: I talked to him. I know. And Misato.
Asuka: . . . Do you think they're hiding something? Maybe they know what happened . . .
Shinji: Honestly . . . it doesn't matter to me, anymore.
Asuka: . . .
Shinji: I spent . . . I spent so much time, trying to figure out how I felt about him. My father.
Asuka: . . .
Shinji: It would have been so much easier if I hated him . . . or . . . or if I loved him. . . .
Asuka: . .but . .
Shinji:
In the end . . . the worst part was feeling guilty
. . that I didn't feel anything.
Hating him . .
.at least that would have made me feel connected.
Asuka: . . .
Shinji:
That's what all of this . . . all of this has been
about. Being . . disconnected. Alone.
Even when I .
. when we . . . were surrounded by others.
Asuka: It makes it easier sometimes.
Shinji: . . . But . . . that . . . was running away.
(The boy acknowledges Asuka with a pensive gaze.)
Shinji: I saw her. In the EVA.
Asuka: . h. . her?
Shinji: My mother.
(The room is deathly still. Long
after the boy's words have faded into the air, their
impression
yet remains. The second child offers nothing in response,
save for an unreadable look that only
drives the stillness of the moment further . . .)
Shinji: She . . . was in there. The whole time. From the very beginning.
Asuka: . . .
Shinji: She was watching me. I felt her there, from the first minute I let them put me in the entry plug.
Asuka: . . . She spoke to you.
Shinji: Yes . . .
(The girl wrings her hands together uncertainly, unable to make eye contact with the third child.)
Asuka: You don't have to say any more.
Shinji: I have to.
Asuka: . . .
Shinji:
The entire time . . . the entire time . . . I believed
I was going to die.
And all I could
think of was-
Asuka: Shinji. You've got to stop. This isn't-
Shinji: isn't what?
Asuka: . . isn't . . .
Shinji: You don't want me to say it?
Asuka: I . . just . .
Shinji: you're what?
(The girl sighs--at last, bringing her gaze to meet his own . . .)
Asuka: I'm scared. Alright? I'm . . scared.
Shinji: Scared of what.
Asuka: Scared of being . . . happy.
Shinji: . . .
Asuka:
You and I have already known more pain in our lives
than anyone else here.
I've grown up
so fast, I never knew what things like innocence meant
before they were
gone.
Shinji: . . .
Asuka:
If I . . . If you say what I know you are going to
say . . . then the next time something
Terrible happens,
it'll be all the worse. And I don't know if I'll be
able to take it.
(The boy stares at her, wide eyed, before dropping his attention to the bedsheets between his fingers.)
Shinji: Since when did we reverse roles like this?
Asuka: What are you talking about . .
Shinji: I'm supposed to be the coward here, remember?
Asuka: . . .
Shinji: well?
Asuka: You're mistaken. I've always been the bigger coward.
Shinji: . . .
Asuka:
At least . . .at least you weren't so afraid of what
others might think of you that you
Behaved like something
you weren't. At least you didn't shut everyone out
at every turn
Because you were
afraid of what they might see if they got close enough
to get under your skin.
Shinji: . . .
Asuka:
So . . . I'm trying to save you from making a mistake,
Shinji.
From taking on
a responsibility you don't want.
Shinji: . . .
Asuka:
EVA is done for. You and I . . . we have separate
paths again. There isn't
Anything left
here for us.
Shinji: . . .
Asuka: We have nothing left to--.
(The girl, however, is unable to complete her sentence,
before the third child is suddenly out of his bed, and facing her.
She has not the ability to respond
to this sudden movement, then,
As the boy brings her face to his--timidly,
yet firmly, bringing her lips to his own.
Asuka Soryu finds herself incognizant
of the moment, at first--the passage of time flowing
quickly
before it slows to a sudden crawl with the realization
of the third child's act.
For a moment, every impulse in her
being cries to be torn away--to push free of this
unexpected contact
and run from everything that remains to remind her
of the sorrow of life and living.
But only for a moment.
The boy's lips are clumsy against
hers--his unpreparedness and inexperience readily
apparent to the young
woman who now, yet, marvels at his boldness. Yet,
it is not Shinji Ikari's brazenness which strikes
Asuka Soryu into silence;
Rather, it is the sincerity behind it.
As the boy slowly pulls away, a
visible shiver shudders down the length of his frame--the
two of them,
for a moment, speechless at what has just occurred.)
Shinji: If I didn't want to take the responsibility for my actions . . then . . I really would be a coward.
Asuka: . .Shinji . . .
Shinji:
I don't know what is going to happen to us. I don't
know what is going to happen tomorrow, I
don't know what
is going to happen ayear from now, or if the world
is even going to be here.
All I know is . .
Asuka: . .
Shinji:
. . . I can't promise happiness. I can't lie to you
and tell you that you'll never be sad again.
All I can promise you is . . .is
that I love you, Asuka. And that I won't run away.
Asuka: . . I . . .
Shinji: . . Never again. And not from you.
(The girl closes her eyes. The seconds
tick by indiscriminately as the two children regard
one another
truly, for, quite possibly, the very first time--and
not quite as children any longer . . .)
Asuka: Alright, Shinji . . .
Shinji: . . .
Asuka: If you can be brave . . . then . . . I . . . have no more excuses.
Shinji: . . ?
Asuka: Ich Liebe Dich.
Shinji: . . .
Asuka: I love you . . . too . . . you. . . idiot. . .
(Nothing more is said as the girl
utters these words--there is no embrace, no cracking
of the thick
tension which now occupies the air of the hospital
room like a choking fog. Rather, there is only the
humble security
of Asuka Langley Soryu's hand in Shinji Ikari's.
And yet, for these two pilots, as the silence mounts between them, it would seem that nothing further is needed. )
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Closing Theme: Human
Complement - © Maher Al-Samkari
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
(The amber hues of the rising sun
greets the new day with a sanguine wash of color across
the horizon.
On a hilltop overlooking the necropolitic husk of
Tokyo 3, two figures sit in quiet observation; a morbidly
picturesque impression of dead serenity before them
as ocher rays stream from gutted holes in drifting
skyscrapers.)
Rei: I had the dream again, last night.
Tenkei: . . .?
Rei: The same as before. Your intention?
Tenkei: (nodding)
Rei: You spoke of your task . . . Is it finished?
(Curiously, the younger child does not regard her directly as he responds, his voice a muted tone--)
Tenkei: Wheel turns. River flows.
Rei: It is the end, then? Humanity will continue on its course, determined by his own destiny?
Tenkei: . . . who can say?
Rei: We are all connected. Slaves of fate?
(Standing in silent confirmation,
the boy nods. A mountain breeze whips through his
hair, a shock of
ghostly white that is given ocher hue by the slowly
growing light of the sun. Tenkei smiles sadly, turning
his eyes to shrine of dereliction filling the valley's
vast expanse; its crumbling towers, its pitted and
pulverized
streets, somehow teeming with the impossibility of
life in the aftermath of unspeakable horrors.
The boy regards Ayanami once more,
falling to his knees, wrapping his arms about the
girl's shoulders.
Though she makes no motion of her own, Rei relinquishes
herself to the gesture, for it is one that the younger
child has been given to do many times. The only mildly
startling aspect of this particular moment, she finds,
is the wetness of his tears upon her cheek--tears
which serve as somber validation of her suspicions.
)
Rei: You wish to say goodbye. You tried to before, in the field.
(The boy offers no immediate response.
Rather, he stands, staring at the young woman's form
with
palpable sadness. With a final nod, the child utters
quietly . . .)
Tenkei: This is the meaning of every vision I have given you.
Rei: . . . yes.
Tenkei:
Humanity's fate is preordained. But it is a fate of
his own choosing. Though it is written,
It is mankind
which will ultimately decide its own path. And you
must decide your own.
(It is with this final declaration
that the human complement turns his back to Rei Ayanami,
trodding slowly
down the hillside. A second breeze picks up, whipping
the first child's hair before her eyes, obscuring
her vision
of the creature known simply as Tenkei. As she brushes
the errant strands away, she finds his figure suddenly
gone--faded, like some ghostly apparition, from her
sight.)
Rei: Go in peace . . . "Kaji."
(These are but her last words before
she, too, dematerializes--her vision an echo on the
wind of
a soul in tension, liberated, at last . . .)