After years of waiting
Nothing came.
As your life flashed before your eyes.
You realize.
I'm a reasonable man, get off my case.
~Radiohead - "Packt Like Sardines..."
Chapter Fifteen
-------------------------------
"... what the hell did you do to him!?"
"Shut up, Toby. Just shut up."
Shinji groaned softly as he was dropped inelegantly into a chair, sure he was about to be violently ill. No matter what he tried, his eyes would not stay open, the world a horribly dim blur for the few seconds he did manage to pry his lids apart.
//... 's going on? Where...?//
"Shinji?" A hand gently touched his back, slid up to the back of his neck. "I know you're a little disorientated. It's just a side effect of the drug, it should go away soon."
//... drug? What drug?//
"Is he ready yet?!"
Shinji heard any further questions as only an angry pile of conflicting noise. He was still too confused to be angry, but he could feel the rage waiting for him, a suit of armor he would soon come to fill. A thought was beating at the corners of his mind, trying to break through the fog, something he had to remember.
//The concert, the concert and... Kaworu.//
/Kaworu!?/
Shinji's eyes snapped open, he moved without thinking - stumbling, almost falling, catching himself at the last minute with an incredible effort. A lifetime of broken dreams dropped onto his shoulders with a crushing weight, howling for vengeance, to make /anyone/ pay - Kaworu had been waiting, and they had taken him away.
He blinked sharply, forcing fumbling fingers against his closed lids until he saw stars, grimacing at the clumsiness in mind and body both... he had been drugged, those bastards had...
"Shinji, are you...?"
A worried hand touched his shoulder, he jerked away, refusing to close his eyes though the world spun around him.
"... don't touch me. We aren't friends... no right, you had no right! I am not your property!"
He snarled the words breathlessly, glad to see they hurt her, suppressing a wicked grin as she flinched, stepped back.
"I'm sorry, Shinji."
It didn't matter what she said, didn't matter if that apology was true. All that mattered was what she'd done, that she was a part of this, she had helped bring him back. He had returned to the seventh circle of Hell, SEELE main, with two dark-suited men guarding each door, Tiphereth standing ready - the suit, there was something different about the suit -
//Who cares about - /fuck/ the suit! HOW DARE THEY!?!//
The anger was burning the rest of the drug out of his system, Shinji could feel it, but the faster his thoughts came together, the clearer it was - he was trapped, with no way out.
"What's going on, Toby?" He tried to keep his voice low, steady. Ten years had thankfully given him at least a little perspective, a margin of level-headedness in the face of danger. It would do nothing at all to panic now, or show his anger, though he couldn't imagine being calm would make much of a difference, that there was any chance of escape.
//Where are you, Kaworu? What happened?//
"The second Dominion has appeared."
Cate stepped forward as Shinji turned, a pillar rising up out of the floor as the man moved toward it, projecting images onto the far wall. The first figure was huge, eight or ten feet tall at the least, the image spinning slightly to give him a full 360 degree view. It looked like a walking sarcophagus, one of those great stone coffins Shinji remembered seeing in a museum, but tapered at its joints, curved in places that made its form not a work of art, but a lethal weapon.
"What's that?" Shinji murmured, as a second picture flashed up, another metallic shape somewhat like the massive golem, but even more curved, vaguely stingray-shaped.
"A part of the Dominion. A secondary autonomous fighting unit." Cate's crisp voice was emotionless. "We believe it's fighting your boyfriend at this moment."
"Boyfriend?" Shinji glared at the man, feeling his blood chill. Cate knew.
"The seventeenth Angel, the reportedly destroyed Kaworu Nagisa. He attempted to intercept us before we brought you back here, but the Dominion arrested his pursuit." One slim eyebrow lifted. "I'd often wondered how something as powerful as that could be killed so simply."
//... so simply.// Shinji repressed the smile, his heart still little more than a raw and bleeding shell from that "simple" action of a decade before.
"If I were you, Mr. Ikari, I'd waste no time in suiting up. The second Dominion is showing power levels unmatched by anything we've seen before - easily dwarfing the first. So far, the primary unit seems uninterested in anything but locating this base, but who knows when that could change?"
Shinji felt his fists clench in useless anger, a part of him wanting nothing more than to curse Cate until his throat was raw, just as he realized it would be completely useless to do so.
//It doesn't matter how hard I fight, does it? It doesn't matter what I do, I can't run away from it... I can't change it.//
He heard Cate leave, but didn't look, gaze focused on the Tiphereth suit - the /new/ suit - something besides the retrieval unit now attached to the back, a new, darker cannon raising from the surface of the right arm. Toby looked tense, so did Lae.
Shinji tried, and failed to force himself to give a damn about any of it.
//It doesn't even matter if Kaworu is here. This is the path of my future, my destiny, whatever... and I can't do anything to escape.//
"Shinji...?" Toby approached very slowly, almost fearfully. "Shinji... it isn't true, what Cate said about you... and the angel?"
He very nearly laughed in her face.
"Shut up, Toby."
-----------------------------
Shinji knew, just knew that if he went into the suit this time, he would never leave it. He /knew/, as he felt the startlingly chilly latex suction to his skin - cold, god it was so cold - that this would be the last time he would ever see the sky, the last few gulps of real air he would breathe. The Second Dominion would kill him.
It might as well have been happening to someone else.
"Shinji, how do you feel?"
"Heart rate's regular, all vitals normal."
Lae called out from the other side of the room, but they both ignored him, Toby watching him worriedly, trying to touch and keep from touching at the same time, afraid to anger him further. Shinji flexed his hands inside the protective gloves, looked up to the fluorescent lights above the slightly raised dais he stood on. He stared into the brilliant whiteness too long, just to feel his eyes ache from the light, just to remind himself he wasn't already dead.
"Shinji..?"
//... if this were Japan, she would call me '-kun,' and she would want to be my friend... but I never really had any friends, did I? Just other Children, other soldiers, no one real, not ever. Not for me.//
"It's burning me."
He spoke softly, carelessly, though the chilling burn in his back was nothing he could overlook or ignore, icy teeth biting against his shoulder blades and pushing hard, low against his spine - an enormous hand slowly reaching through his insides, choking off his breath with a freezing fog.
//It's someone else... this is all happening to someone else.//
"It hurts."
Toby bit her lip, frustration warring with some other emotion in her eyes, as she said nothing, only continued the final checks of the suit, gauging the readings for what seemed a much longer time than she had for the first fight.
"I know it's a little uncomfortable, but if you can take it right now, I promise it won't get any worse." Her words were clipped, and she wouldn't look him in the eye as she patted down areas of the suit, more a nervous habit than anything necessary. "I've triple checked every part of the cannon, it's crush-tested to over three-thousand pounds - this thing is goddamned /invincible/..."
"Cannon?"
Her head snapped up, staring at him in disbelief, and he could see it dawn on her that the worries that had up to this point consumed her life meant absolutely nothing to him - he didn't know what she was talking about.
"We've created a pulse cannon, it blows the electrical attack structure all to hell..." One finger traced the black wiring that slid beneath the armored suit, snaking up and into the pack that had been built in below the retrieval case.
"We can use the power of the Dominions against them. It's just like your first cannon, aiming and targeting, but one good shot with this..."
"I can't carry another core back with me, Toby."
Worried eyes met his, but the scientist looked away quickly, voice shaking but words professional - "All you have to do is hit it, and -"
She was afraid. Toby knew exactly what she was sending him into, and she was afraid of what would come of it.
He stayed silent, watching the flurry of movement at the other end of the room, Lae's eyes widening as they met Shinji's, the man immediately dropping his head, obviously trying to make himself as invisible as possible.
//I could kill them now. I could kill all of them, probably before Cate could stop me.// He flexed the fist on his newly armed hand, could already feel the suit charging... his synch ratio was off the scale, certainly he could find a way to command the power...
//... and then what? Cate still has that magic button, you'd be dead at his discretion.// A roomful of corpses, and what would it bring him? Nothing, not even satisfaction.
"Shinji...?" Toby's voice was again that tremulous half-whisper, as she slowly pulled the helmet from its stand - she had something else to say, something else he wouldn't want to hear. "If that angel... Kaworu, what if he was trying to trick you, to get closer to Adam?"
"You don't understand any of this, do you?"
It came out harsher than he'd intended, but really, Shinji didn't care, couldn't feel anything as he watched the hurt fill her eyes but the burning cold that had completely enveloped his chest, and was working its way down his abdomen, into his legs. Toby said it meant nothing, a temporary condition. If that was true, though, what was the fear he saw, flashing now and again from the edges of her eyes?
"If he asked me, I would give him whatever he wanted. I killed him once, because I thought he was right... that humanity deserved a chance to live..."
"... and you don't believe that?" Her voice changed, just as soft but stronger, the words not her own. "I will not again curse the ground any more for man's sake; for the imagination of man's heart is evil from his youth; neither will I again smite any more every thing living, as I have done."
Shinji raised an eyebrow.
"Do they make you learn that here?"
"I memorized it..." she shrugged slightly, obviously uncomfortable with the turn of the conversation "So that that I'd always remember, that we weren't truly fighting against God. You don't believe it, though, do you?"
A small smile tugged at one corner of his mouth, at the irony of her watching him, so openly afraid of what he might say. As if he, out of anyone in the entire world, would somehow have a greater perspective on this madness?
"Of course I believe it. Who am I to pass judgment on the world?"
//... this was never about the world, was it? It was only about you, and your pain, and how tired you were of being alone.// It never felt as pathetic as he knew it was, that self-pity - it just hurt, worse than anything the Angels - save Kaworu - had ever managed to do to him.
"I'm selfish, Toby. I can't hurt him again, I won't. He may still be right, humanity may still be worth more than the Angels, than..." His breath caught, not out of emotion but that bone-deep chill, his body already showing signs of the stress of wearing the suit. Shinji tried to suppress it, knew Toby hadn't seen...
"It doesn't matter anyway. Kaworu doesn't want to start the Third Impact."
"... then what does he want?"
Shinji smiled, a real smile, as he slid the helmet on.
"I'll tell you when you're older."
------------------------
The only thing Kaworu could hear was the edge of his shirt, rippling in the high night wind, the water stretching out below him like the end of the world itself, spread thin with frozen, sparkling light.
The moon itself was brilliant, shining impossibly large and bright in a night free of clouds, even the nights of the city stretched out along the bay were dim, as far up as he was. He hovered effortlessly, even his vision unable to pick apart much of the darkness. It was still nearby, though, and it would attack again.
//... not the Dominion. Merely a distraction.//
Kaworu was calm, though the remainder of his human side realized he had no right to be - he was caught fighting phantoms, while Shinji had been stolen from him, to be their divine wind - he could /not/ allow -
Kaworu twisted sharply out of the way, the copper-colored weapon glancing off the edge of his AT field, though he felt the blow, knew what that meant. The creature was testing him now, preparing for a greater battle. It had been created specifically for this purpose, and could potentially neutralize his field if given the time.
Of course, the angel had no plans of giving it the time. He had taken to the sky as soon as possible, simply to draw it away from the city, knowing it would have hurt Shinji to discover anyone else had suffered for this. But he could not stay in the air, would need /something/ to destroy this fragment of Zacharael and move on to the necessary battle his love was already fighting.
//I'm coming, Shinji. I promise.//
Red-amber eyes searched for a suitable place along the bay, glancing past the near-dark fields, the inhabited buildings flush with light. He needed something large enough amidst those spaces, a lumberyard, perhaps, a dock or a construction-
//There.//
Kaworu dropped, night air whistling in his ears as he descended, along with the Dominion's scream of surprise as it swooped down to follow, the act more instinctive than that of a sentient being, an advantageous thing.
//A little light...//
He had been created with so many powers, really, but found joy in employing the more simple ones when it was possible. Just as his feet touched the ground, he reached out with his mind, found the switch for the floodlights that circled the property, conveniently connected to the generator in the site's center - this would be easier than he had anticipated.
Snapping on the lights hurt his human eyes, but he had been prepared for it, the smell of fuel and grease rushing past in a slightly warm wind as the generator squealed into life. The sound nearly eclipsed the Dominion's own scream, simple programming interpreting the light for an attack, causing it to swerve sharply.
Kaworu heard the shatter of glass, the next few impacts slightly muffled as the creature slammed through the warehouse. The inertia of its downward flight was enough to carry it entirely through the building and out the other side, broken glass exploding once more in a shower of moon-lit diamonds. The Dominion screamed once more, disappearing immediately into the forest of half-constructed pillars surrounding the site.
The pale-haired man didn't move, save to lift one hand, a few steel rods scraping against each other as they lifted into the air by his command. Kaworu's eyes narrowed slightly as he tried to judge the speed of the copper flashes between the pillars. The site was a rough circle, the Dominion reduced to circling him like a shark, unable to plot more than a standoff with its limited mind.
//Now.//
He shot the rod forward through the gap, but he had misjudged the distance, millimeters off. The length of pipe tore deep through one of the creature's "wings" before embedding itself in the wall beyond - enough to injure, but not to kill.
Kaworu watched the slug-like shape limp through the air for a moment, before falling hard to the earth, raising a cloud of dust as it thrashed in pain. He let the other poles drop, moving forward to the gap in the pillars. It would be easy to crush the simple machine now, he needed to be close, but -
It was mistake, he recognized it for the trap it was the moment the Dominion moved, gleaming panels shivering down along its center, covering the wound as a long, whip-like tail of thin, square sheets shot out from it's spine, curling tightly around the pillar nearest him, pulling hard.
The AT field easily deflected the falling slabs of concrete, Kaworu stepped back slowly, watched the lashing tail scatter sparks back and forth against it, the creature blindly pushing him backward as it kept trying to overcome his far-superior protections.
//It's over.//
The delicate whip lashed out one final time, and Kaworu ignored the field, refused to raise it, allowing the end of the sharp tail to wrap around his wrist. He curled his fingers over the sharp slices and turned, pulling back and easily drawing the Dominion into a wide circle, directly into the side of the generator.
The pale-haired man let go as the creature spasmed, lifted his other hand once more, to draw up three more long, thin metal poles, throwing them into the Dominion with the barest tilt of his fingertips, pinning the screaming slave unit to the machine, arcs of electricity leaping from the beams, the lights around them flickering, and dying along with his enemy.
Kaworu moved forward once the echoes of the creature's screams had vanished from the air, eyes slowly adjusting back to the darkness, to the black mass of twisted metal now smoking slightly in the moonlight. He looked down briefly at his injured wrist, watched the broken skin heal almost instantly.
The slight crunch of the Dominion's whip beneath his feet barely touched the silence, the thin copper plates now as lifeless as the rest, a pile of strange, organic metal like nothing ever seen on Earth, but nothing of great importance, not anymore.
"It still makes no sense to me."
Kaworu turned at the low, shadowy voice, unsurprised.
"I didn't hear you coming."
It was a joke between them, and she smiled. It was the sad, pitiable creature who could not know humor - and never by divine order.
"You can feel the battle, can't you? Shinji and Zacharael?"
He ignored the question, intrigued by what she had said.
"You don't understand at all, why I'm doing this?"
"No."
"Then I can't explain." He reached out, touched her over the heart, or where it ought to have been. "I can't explain if you don't know, Zadkiel."
"... they changed you, when they made you human, Tabris."
"Yes, but not like you think, not in the ways you think."
"You don't hate them for it?"
"The first chance I had, I came back. I-"
Kaworu paused, feeling the sudden shock, a cry of pain that echoed into eternity, beating just like a bird inside his heart.
Shinji.
"He will die."
"No."
A slim hand reached up, against the linen suit, feeling the beat beneath, but whether it was with jealousy or indifference was impossible to tell.
"... because of this?"
"I already told you that."
A smile for her - he had always been her favorite - before he turned, and vanished back into the darkness. He would be too late, was already too late, and Zadkiel knew Tabris knew it... but for that human heart.
-----------------------------
"Shinji!!!"
He tumbled, head over heels, thrown by the Dominion's powerful blow through a wide, wooden barricade, barely catching himself before he slammed into the side of the half-fallen building. The dark-haired pilot shook his head to clear it, and noticed he had still managed to leave a crater in the concrete on impact.
"Left shoulder panel, five percent damage. Primary chest armor ten percent. No structural failure, life signs normal."
The chattering in his communications link - the scientists talking to him and to each other - was like a swarm of insects buzzing in his head.
"Shinji are you all right? Lae, he's not responding..." The familiar voice was breathless with worry.
"I'm fine, Toby. I'm fine."
Every frightened word betrayed her, convinced Shinji he shouldn't have ever been here. The woman would never have been so afraid, not if the suit were truly safe.
//So tired... cold... I...//
The chill was threatening to sap his strength at every turn, icy power pouring over every inch of his body, a second skin depending on him for it's life. It felt as if those tables could turn at any moment, though, and the suit would drain him dry without hesitation.
A deep roar, much too close, sent shivers of slight pain along his sides - //Move, Shinji... move!// He struggled to follow that inner voice, his body still marvelously light and fast, enhanced by the suit. Shinji gritted his teeth, scrambling to his feet, quickly leaping to another building, and another. He was unable to do much more than kill time while he tried to think of a plan. Too bad his mind kept wandering, badly.
//Sleep, it would feel good to sleep right now... just to stop, and curl up and be warm... and god, what would it have been like, to be with Kaworu again?//
/I'll see him, if I win. All I have to do, all I have-//
"Shinji, look out!!!"
He rolled to the side, feeling the impending attack even before he saw it, barely missing the solid wall of metal that slammed down, slashing deep into the ground right where he had been. Shinji looked up, found himself frozen just for a moment, staring at his reflection in the shimmering copper skin.
-------------------------
"His strength is fine, but his reaction time is down twenty percent at least."
Lae grimaced, watching as Shinji barely dodged yet another blow, leaping across to the edge of another building, his breathing harsh and loud over the communications link.
"We can't have him attacking that thing hand-to-hand.. it's far too dangerous."
Tiphereth's physical attacks had actually been doing damage, connecting as well as anything - the creature had inexplicably not raised the AT field it seemed to possess - but the Dominion was just too strong to risk close-quarters combat. Cate had been right, it was much more physically powerful than even the imposing first. One well-aimed blow alone could easily be lethal.
"Do we try the cannon?" Lae murmured, Toby shaking her head.
"We can't use it /now/, we're in the middle of downtown..."
They'd managed to isolate the Dominion to a section of abandoned buildings, built on land that had shifted into unstable swamp. The series of levies, dikes and engineering marvels that had been put into place to keep the city dry had been forced to shift, making the area uninhabitable - but it was separated by the rest of the city by only a narrow strip of highway. One misjudged move, even one error could endanger thousands.
"We have to get out of here. Toby, can you switch stable power to the thrusters?"
"Sure I-"
Toby cut herself off, watching in amazement as the power shifted immediately, without her even touching the panels, Tiphereth adapting to Shinji's needs all on its own.
"... not even a barrier between them anymore." Shinji and the suit were synched past measure, no discernable difference between man and machine.
-------------------------
Shinji couldn't help but stare at the water as he skimmed just above its surface, pushing hard out to sea with the Dominion right behind. It was almost hypnotic, the elegant shifting patterns of beaded silver on the water. Shinji found he had to draw his mind away more than once, thoughts still wandering badly, as if this somehow wasn't a fight to the death.
The core still burned ice cold, shoulder to shoulder, not as painful as it had been - bearable - but reminding him every second of what was coming, what they would expect of him.
//I don't want to use the cannon. I don't, I don't.//
Toby had said it was safe, but then, she knew he was in pain now, and didn't care. For all the differences, it was the same organization, and just like his father, or Ritsuko, or Misato, his well-being was a very low priority compared to the success of the mission.
As long as he could be recovered, no matter what shape he was in, Shinji knew that was what mattered. He shivered, not because of the suit this time. Firing the cannon scared him in ways he couldn't even explain to himself, possibilities he knew no one had foreseen, of harnessing that kind of energy at the level of a weapon... but to save innocent lives he'd run, directly, to the perfect testing ground.
"It's closing on your position, Ikari."
"Of course it is." Shinji knew why the creature hadn't raised an AT Field, why it wanted him to come closer. "It wants the core back. Let me see it."
His view of the depthless ocean was suddenly halved, a grid appearing with the Dominion in the center, numbers in the corner - the distance - scrolling down as the copper-colored blur hurtled closer.
"Oh god... it's human."
Shinji blinked, attention snapping at the murmured words.
"What?!"
"The readings... that thing's interior... it's one of us. Human."
Dominion.
Human.
Angel.
Toji... just like Toji.
An alarm pealed into being, directly in his ear, and Shinji never had the time to find out how the Dominion had hit him, before he was slammed in the back, full force, spinning wildly off balance and plunging into the sea.
Shinji turned, the suit protecting him from the force of the blow, leaving him with only the gentle comfort of hitting something soft and buoyant, though his mind was still reeling - just another moment of his past, come back in painful hyper-clarity. Toji in the Angel, a friend made an enemy in an instant, no other recourse but destruction. Another innocent, inside a weapon that had to be destroyed.
//Not again, not again!//
"Shinji?!"
"Where is it? Why isn't it attacking?"
He turned in the water, until his feet were slightly above the rest of his body, the propulsion keeping him from floating up, cradling him in the water's embrace, a few feet below the surface. He braced himself for the sudden splash of the Dominion, the oncoming underwater battle - and paused, as nothing happened.
"Where is it?"
"It knows you're down there. It's right above you."
"... must be why it kept the field on, when it followed you over the water." Shinji could barely make out Toby's voice, the woman talking to herself more than speaking aloud.
"What?!"
"It's too heavy. If it goes below the surface, I bet its propulsion wouldn't be enough to keep it from sinking like a rock."
"It's human! You said there's a human in there!" He could hear the scientists pause, knew they regretted revealing that information. "I won't fight it. I can't... not if there's someone trapped inside of it!"
"Shinji..." He winced at the tone in Toby's voice, knew she was preparing to rationalize with him, which really meant she'd do whatever it took to get him to fight, to ignore the fact that he was killing an innocent.
"Shinji, we're not reading any life signs from inside of it. Our readings could be off, or whomever it is... they could already be dead."
"Or you could be lying to me."
Lae's startled oath broke the tense moment.
"Shit, it's drifting... it's going to turn!" Apparently waiting for the core wasn't worth the time, not if it could reach Adam anyway, and Shinji's view switched - perhaps linking into a satellite feed from high above - until he was watching the Dominion pull away from his position.
He couldn't let it return to the city, even if Toby was lying, even if there was someone inside there, someone alive and utterly terrified.
Shinji knew he'd never been good at these moments, not when he'd had to make the tough decisions. He couldn't help but freeze up, when either choice would end up killing someone. Except this time it wasn't between Toji and himself, but between one person, and the city, maybe the world... and ten years had somehow given him the resolve - the maturity perhaps - that he hadn't had then.
//I'm sorry. Forgive me.//
"Toby... start up the warm-up procedure on the cannon."
He braced himself for the push, propelling himself up to the surface, abandoning skill and tactical grace and simply slamming into the Dominion from behind, grimacing as the monster fell, only to catch itself just above the surface of the sea. The field would be impenetrable, the simple solution of sinking the creature was impossible.
//It doesn't look human... it doesn't look human.// He was badly preoccupied by the thought as he continued to pummel the Dominion, watching its blocks and return attacks for any human nuance, any sign that someone might be alive in there.
//The Angel didn't look human, either, not at all... but Toji was still alive in there.//
/I don't have a choice!/
Shinji grimaced as a new flood of ice spread across his body - not enough to slow him down, he still caught the massive three-fingered fist that sought to snap him in half, using all his extra agility, his smaller status to flow with the monster's attacks until the cannon was working.
He could feel his heart beating very fast, amazed one of the scientists hadn't brought attention to it - //why would they care, you're only a weapon// - he felt almost dizzy, another rush of cold pouring through him, and heat - a slight heat, in the center of his back, curving against his spine.
"The main cannon sequence is on-line, Shinji. Get a few hundred meters away, as far as you can..."
"Try not to aim for the core, if you can, Ikari." Cate had finally broken through the scientist's discussion, perhaps trusting him more than he had the first time, allowing Shinji to take the initiative.
//Of course he knows I'll do what he wants, he knows I can't disobey - that there's no turning back.//
/Never was... but it's still human, just remember that./
Shinji swallowed hard past the sudden tightness in his chest, the swell of guilt and pain. "Easier said... than done... you bastard."
It was hard to catch his breath, though he barely noticed it until he heard his own panting... his body seemed lighter than air, and strangely energized, electricity sliding in liquid waves across his bones.
For a moment, it seemed almost too easy to fight the Dominion. Shinji felt no pain while blocking it's attacks, and dodging seemed almost like a game - he could hear Toby yelling, perhaps it was Lae, but it didn't connect...
The illusion was shattered as one of the Dominions fists finally did connect, slamming directly into his chest, sending him skipping across the water like a thrown pebble. Only luck kept him from dropping back under the water, his balance regained at the last moment.
Shinji could feel the pain for a few heartbeats, spreading across his chest - he had to have some cracked ribs, at least - but that strange, sweeping numbness took it away even before he drew himself up fully, and kept building, consuming him, rising up, past anything he could control...
//... this is going to be bad.//
The monster had thrown him the necessary distance, and Shinji suddenly realized what Toby was screaming - fire.
It should have been a release, a lessening of that horrible pressure to raise his arm and let loose with a blast from the cannon, but instead the pain only seemed to build - no longer numbing now but agonizing, a swiftly spreading burn through his chest, eating away at his lungs and throat, spreading swiftly up his neck, he couldn't breathe, couldn't /see/ -
//you knew it would hurt, you knew -//
The thought vanished without an echo in the white blaze that finally engulfed his world. Shinji heard something screaming horribly, distantly wondered who it was - and the power snapped, surging forward like molten lead, liquid nitrogen down what seemed to be a phantom limb, all that could possibly remain - and out of the cannon, consuming the Dominion, the ocean, all of it in an ball of brilliant oblivion, an all-consuming incandescent blaze that tore the world away.
---------------------------
"Vitals!?"
It took everything Toby had not to scream, relaxing her white-knuckled grip of the table was impossible. The radio, video, all systems had gone dark with the release of the core's power. She didn't have to look at the readings, to know they'd gone past anything she had thought to calculate.
"Stable. They're stable. Pulse is a bit high... Automatic stabilization systems on Tiphereth are functioning perfectly."
"Any sign of the Dominion?" Cate snapped through the intercom. Toby barely noticed him, glad Lae had taken the initiative.
"We can't get a reading yet. All I can tell you is, Ikari's still alive."
All Toby could hear, though, was the echo of Shinji's scream, just before they lost contact - a sound so tortured it was nearly inhuman.
//Shinji is fine, though... he is... Lae said-//
Toby's heart plummeted, fingers aching as they dug into the tabletop, at the man's sudden hiss.
"... damn it, the system's leaking."
"What?"
She nearly shoved him out of the way, to have a better look at the screen, swallowing her own curses as she saw he was right.
Not all of Tiphereth's systems had come through the blast unscathed, even the Dominion's blocked punches had been powerful enough to damage the suit, and some systems had diverted naturally to the places they were needed most, pulling themselves from the usual power structures, draining the reserves.
"He's not going to have enough power to return now." Lae tapped the screen, the batteries at half-power at best...
"We've got to go get him, then." Toby shrugged, moving to the door. "We'll take the Scarab and-"
"It's still alive!!!"
Toby froze along with Lae, unwilling to believe the shrill yell, the other scientist staring at them both in disbelief. Her body seemed beyond her control, though, forcing her to move to the computer panel, forcing her to see.
The false-lit screen was almost completely gray, countless tons of water now steaming their way into the upper atmosphere. Toby could see the ocean was boiling, wherever the steam didn't completely obscure her vision - and she could easily make out the dark mass moving steadily forward, from the center of the cloud. The Dominion seemed completely unscathed by the blast.
It was only then that Toby realized Shinji hadn't spoken, not since that horrible scream.
-----------------------
The system had been designed to lock into place at the moment the cannon fired, to brace the pilot's more fragile body from the inevitable recoil, not to unlock until he was prepared to move again.
Shinji didn't know it, he didn't know /anything/ anymore, except that the entire world had vanished - body, heart, mind - everything except whatever part of him could still feel pain.
//... help me... anyone... please...//
His breath came in slow, sobbing gasps, body completely limp and useless, sagged inside the hovering cage of the suit. He was shaking helplessly, muscles trembling as the unrelenting cold continued to wash over him, the only other sensation that of the heat on his skin, sticky and horrible. He barely fought the urge - more than once - to rip the helmet off, tear at the suit with his bare hands to remove it, but the frenzy was checked by his inability to even lift his hands.
//You knew... you knew it would hurt...//
No. It had been a feeling /well/ beyond pain, beyond anything he had ever felt - as if his soul had plucked out, and snapped back into his body like a rubber band. His mind focused desperately on the simple physical pain, if only to relieve himself of having to think of that unimaginable, horrific sensation.
He ached, right arm throbbing hardest of all, as if all the skin had melted from the bone, and iron pins screwed in tightly to what remained. All his joints jabbing at him, though, with even the slight rising and falling of the suit, Tiphereth calmly hovering in the air, waiting for him to recover.
"Shinji?! Shinji, can you hear me?"
//No more. God please, no more, I can't... I can't.//
"Shinji?!"
He swallowed, almost cried out at the ache it caused, stunning pain spreading through his chest, forcing him to breathe shallow as he tried to gather the energy to speak. His mind reeled, he could feel a darkness opening up beneath the spinning, jumbled images - it might be better to let himself fall into it, it would stop the pain...
"Shinji, you have to retreat! We'll come for you, but you have to get away! It's not dead! The Dominion isn't down! Get out of there! Shinji!"
//Not dead... all that, and it's not...//
He made a tight, pathetic sniveling sound, somewhere between a desperate laugh and a sob, the weakness in it nearly making him laugh again... except he couldn't breathe... he couldn't breathe...
"SHINJI!!!"
He knew by Toby's scream that it was on him, that he had no chance left to run, even if he hadn't still been too weak to move. The dark-haired man wasn't at all surprised when a sudden jolt nearly broke his neck, Zacharael's massive hand closing fast around his head, immediately starting to squeeze.
He could hear alarms blaring dimly inside the suit, as if the slight cracking sounds weren't enough, flickers of electricity here and there as the view of the outside world flickered and faded and Toby's voice went in and out, still screaming his name. It was crushing him, and unlike before, the core was buried beneath that copper-colored armor - he would never be able to find it, to stop this Dominion as he had the last.
//... don't you want to see Kaworu again? You were nearly there. Cate was the only obstacle.//
/I... I can't.../
The wailing alarms were horribly off-key, bright red lights flashing against his closed lids. He wanted it to stop - remembering the concert - only a few hours ago, for only a few moments, but he had been happy...
//You won't fight for him?//
The remnants of ten years were strewn at his feet. How long could he be expected to try and build a life from scraps and tatters?
/I fought... I fought for so long.../
The voice that spoke to him, some inner sadist, was undaunted and unmerciful.
//Eternal vigilance... the price of that freedom. If you want him, you have to fight for him.//
//I...//
It wasn't going to end until he was dead, and he was going to be dead, so very soon now. Why make it easy?
He didn't even bother to breathe, just punched, straight forward with all the power Tiphereth could provide. A second punch followed immediately, up into the monster's elbow joint, and he saw the golden limb buckle, heard it grunt in what almost sounded like surprise, as it let go of him.
Shinji dropped the thrusters without a second thought, as the enormous creature staggered back slightly, counting on what he could only pray was there - prayers answered as his feet hit the AT field the Dominion never dropped, to keep itself from falling into the sea.
He pushed up, thrusters reigniting, and half-shoved, half-hit the Dominion into a wide arc away from him, the effort nearly sending him back to his knees as he swayed, thrusters relighting, leaving him just above the surface of the still-steaming sea. He gasped, at a horrifyingly familiar burning against his back, the arctic chill he had all but drowned in...
"Shinji, we've got to take another shot-"
He curled reflexively, holding his still aching arm tight against his chest.
"NO! No more!!!"
//You have to fight for what you want.//
He felt betrayed, by life, by Toby. God, he had expected this of Cate but how could /she/ possibly ask him...
"It hurts, Toby... oh god, it hurts. I can't... I can't take it... /please/ don't do this..."
"Fire the cannon, Kent." Cate's voice, and Shinji's heart sunk. /This/ was humanity, this was what it meant to trust, to believe - when Toby could hear him begging, and it made no difference, because Cate said fire.
Zacharael hit him. Shinji thought he'd put enough distance between them, that the alarms would sound before the Dominion had closed the gap.
//They were damaged... probably...// It was the single clear thought in his increasingly muddled mind, Shinji found it fairly funny that it was a useless one.
He took the blow and did not fall, getting his feet underneath him just in time for the second strike to land, a wicked backhand to the jaw that ought to have torn his head clean off, and very nearly did.
"... sorry Shinji... there's no choice..."
He nearly screamed at the noticeable surge of pressure, building like a faraway storm, felt that same familiar numbness, it would have been comforting had he not known what was coming next, what would happen after the pain had ebbed...
"Please... please don't..."
"I'm sorry."
He didn't realize they could take control of the suit, or perhaps it was only possible since he could barely stand, couldn't concentrate to do much more than watch the monster approaching. His arm raised, power crackling a bit, the suit barely cooled down for a second blast, his body and mind already poised to destruction from the first. It was going to kill him, and no one cared enough to stop it.
The power built, shoving red-hot shafts of iron up his arm, burning along the bone, the pain beyond bearing - until the Dominion's talons wrapped around his arm, slicing through the suit's armor like butter, digging into his skin.
Shinji knew he was the one screaming now, there was nothing else he could do, twisting madly as the power continued to build but could not release. The Dominion had clamped down on the outlet stream beneath the armor, taking out the power at its source, turning the pilot into the reservoir.
He writhed, until something slammed hard into his back, pinning him against a smooth copper plate. Shinji choked back a scream as the searing pain took two forms, the Dominion's other claw attempting to crack the casing on the core even as the built-up power from the cannon roasted him alive.
"Up! Shinji, go up as far as you can, right /now/!!!"
He thought he dimly heard the words, or perhaps only imagined them, wasn't sure if he was able to activate his thrusters or if it was someone else, but he pushed anyway, or thought he did, aware of nothing but the unforgiving pain and that he was unable to escape...
//... die for you... can't see you, Kaworu... but I'll die trying.//
It was cold comfort. It was no comfort.
Shinji heard the voice again, shrieking in his ear, but the words couldn't get past the pulsing agony, the increasing splintering of the core's protective cover - he was sure the Dominion had nearly reached it now... oh god, he didn't /want/ to die-
All at once, everything was shaking, and the pain ebbed slightly as the Dominion pulled away, drawing back with a shriek of pain - fire, Shinji dully noticed the fire, an explosion along the copper skin, and as his head dropped forward for a moment - he was too weak to do more than let it fall - he saw something sparkling on the sea, far below.
//... boat?//
The Dominion was still shrieking, futily trying to douse the flames that continued to burn along its back, until finally it let go of Shinji's arm, as if forgetting about why it had held on in the first place - and both of them were instantly plunged into unholy fire, like the center of a newborn star.
-----------------------------
"Legs, thirty-five percent damage... right arm forty-five percent... left arm sixty-three, head and chest seventy. The core read at twenty-percent undamaged. There's no way to tell if it breached the final barrier."
"The Dominion? Is it dead?"
"I don't know. The missile seemed to do some damage, but..."
Toby was already searching skyward, night-vision binoculars picking up nothing but darkness, the fading after-image of the second blast.
"How is Shinji?! Is he still alive?!"
"I can't get a readout... it's too soon."
Lae flipped through the monitors on the dashboard. The readings the boat could take were not one-tenth as precise as those they could get from land, but the blast from Tiphereth had shut down all communications for at least a few minutes, shut down everything.
//Please, God, let him be all right. Please...//
It was so easy to make decisions in the heat of battle, to do what needed to be done, but Toby could already feel the long nights after this lining up in preparation. She would blame herself until the end of time, if he died here tonight.
"What about the Dominion?"
"Nothing." Lae looked up at her for a moment, and quickly back down, in the way of his that could only mean he knew what he said would hurt. "The blast was much less stable than before, that's why it's knocked out our systems as badly as it has, for as long... The suit was damaged in the fight, and the cannon didn't have the optimal time to cool down..."
Toby knew what words lay behind his quiet gaze, the brutal accusation.
//You knew you were sending Shinji out to die, and you didn't care.//
"Keep looking." Toby felt herself tense, more noticeable with the swaying of the ship, but noticing it only made her jaw clench harder. The angel had been right, the suit had failed its pilot.
//You sent him to die.//
"We've got radio..." She did shove Lae out of the way this time, equal parts desperate and already sure she would get no response.
"Shinji?! Shinji can you hear me?!"
"The other scanners are still offline..." Lae murmured, several frantic tries finding nothing.
"Shinji?" Toby looked up, the last light from the explosion had long since faded, but there was still no sign of anyone in the sky. "Shinji, oh god, please... answer me..."
"... by?"
Her heart seized, at the barely breathed sound.
"Shinji!? Shinji, are you all right? Where are you?!"
"... am I? In the sky, Toby." He sounded bemused, the words thready and weak.
"Come down, Shinji... we're right below you," she hated the ease with which her voice slid into that calm, gentle tone, that after all she had done, she would still feel any right to try to be his friend, let alone his protector. "Come down... we want to help you."
"I can't get him down." Lae murmured. "The systems, they won't respond... I can't do /anything/."
"... Dominion's still alive. Still alive... up here, with me."
As he spoke, she saw him, the tiniest dark spot, barely visible in the sky. Close, much too close to him hovered another, larger shape... the crackle of electricity outlining its form.
"... absorbed the blast, Toby... adapted... nothing I can do..."
"Shinji! No!"
"... sorry."
--------------------
//Kaworu...//
He tried to get his lips to form the word, just as a prayer for himself, he had nothing left for SEELE or Toby or anyone anymore, but they failed him, as his body was failing him... fading...
//... tried. I tried.// It was only because his father wasn't there, hadn't been alive for years, that Shinji knew it felt like enough... but still, at this moment, he wasn't ashamed. Hopefully, Paradise might make concessions for the weak... he didn't really want to think about hell.
The Dominion knew it had him, was taking its time processing the power from behind its AT field, so strong that Shinji was sure he could see it even without Tiphereth's help. Once more, the suit's locked position was the only thing keeping him up in the air, his thoughts fading in and out very badly. He knew he would not be able to sit up straight, had he been on the ground.
Shinji blinked hazily, watching the edges of the damaged screen in front of his eyes flicker, feeling sweat drop onto his cheeks from the ends of his damp hair - he would give anything to take the helmet off, but knew he was well past finding the strength to raise his hands.
//I want it off... I want it off before I die.//
The Dominion was going to kill him now, with the power it had absorbed, it's adaptation rate so much faster than anything SEELE might have imagined. The field would keep any more explosives - even if they had more - from doing any damage until it was ready to fire...
All Shinji could think about, though, was taking the helmet off, getting a breath of cool air, something steady in a painfully variable world. He alternately burned and froze, the temperatures twisting back and forth as the damaged suit attempted to regulate itself... and beneath that simple physical temperature, the cold was still seeping into him, digging into his mind, attempting to drown his soul.
//Hurts... so tired...//
He was too exhausted to care.
The Dominion shifted shapes while he dully watched, metal plates locking into a new position, sliding forward into a cannon that seemed to be simply a mockup of his own, though the bore was bigger, a neat hole he could see straight into, a perfect void. Nothing could be alive inside that thing, there was no way any human could have survived...
//I'm sorry... I'm sorry.//
Shinji could hear his own breathing, shakier than he had ever heard it, the trembling back in his body, worse than ever... it didn't matter, though... he had only seconds...
//Mother...//
Light, he could see the growing glimmer now inside the void, the cannon charging itself to fire. Shinji heard screaming, but it didn't matter anymore, and he wished he had the strength to tell the voice to shut up, to let it go, to help him get this damned helmet off, so he could feel the wind again, just one more time...
//Let me see my mother, let me see her...// He /would/ see her, he would fight for that, before they sent him to wherever it was cowardly souls went, where failures had to spend eternity. //Mother... mother, I tried. Kaworu...//
He didn't want to die, but knew there was nowhere left to go.
/Kaworu... I'll wait for you./
There was a moment of perfect silence, absolute peace in the world, and Shinji calmly closed his eyes against the last blinding flash he would ever have to see.
---------------------------
"I love to see you smile, you know."
An arm... someone was holding him, as he dimly realized he could no longer be holding himself in the air. The suit was no longer flooding him with cold power, no longer doing much of anything at all. Shinji tried to lift his head, heard a few small clicking sounds from what seemed to be miles away, and the screen before him went dark, as the helmet was pulled off, quickly falling into the darkness below.
He breathed in deeply, grateful for the cool wind against his hot face, though the cold seemed almost too cold, matching a chill deep in his chest. The suit was no longer affecting him, but it didn't have to, there was something... something...
//... but... someone?//
"Why would you think you shouldn't smile? Why would you think I wouldn't be watching you, and be happy when you smiled, if I loved to see it?
The words were so close, husky, breathed into his ear like a sonnet, the same person who spoke also the owner of the arm around his chest, holding him close... and the same one responsible for the AT field he could now see, flickering slightly in front of him, that had completely blocked the Dominion's lethal blast.
"It didn't hurt, you know, all those years ago." The words were soft absolution, Shinji could feel himself melting into the murmur, willing to believe whatever he was told. "I accepted my death then, in a way few Lillim can."
The sudden kiss was startlingly hot against his neck, a tender flush of warmth that seemed to trickle down, and warm the frozen places deep inside. Shinji tipped his head back, had forgotten about the Dominion, hadn't cared for ages - only this moment was real, and only it mattered. He looked up, mind in turmoil but at the same time perfectly clear, staring into the most beautiful, clear light crimson gaze, the most peaceful eyes he had ever seen.
"The only thing that ever hurt me, Shinji, was not seeing you smile."
"Kaworu."
The word was a sob, as he pressed his head against the fine, porcelain skin of the man's neck, and let the tears fall.
"It's all right." Kaworu pulled him closer, the warm hand gently stroking his neck the only stable focus, the only thing true and sure in the entire world.
"You're safe, Shinji. You're home."