And even I know, and I do believe,
and I do believe that there was a morning
I saw your true love burning next to me.
Rufus Wainwright - "Ashes"
Chapter Nineteen
-------------------------------
Shinji wasn't exactly sure where he was, or what it all meant, but knowing he wouldn't be allowed to keep the knowledge made it easier to think about, somehow. He was vaguely aware that this world, wherever it was, was infinitely more intricate than he would ever be able understand, and at the same time no different than he was. No less a part of him than the swirls on his fingertips, or the arms that wrapped lightly around his waist.
"I like being able to hold you again."
"It always felt like you were touching me, from the first time you smiled." He murmured in reply, not having to raise his voice, feeling Kaworu's smile as the man nuzzled his neck. "I never could explain it, even to myself. It used to scare me. Everything used to scare me." Shinji chuckled, just slightly, his naiveté no longer as painful as it was amusing.
"You're laughing." Shinji had to admit he was surprised a little, too. He did feel better, healing, maybe not whole, but even that just didn't seem so very important. Broken places were mending, places that had been damaged long before the battle with the Dominions, even before the Angels, maybe.
"I'm being selfish loving you, Kaworu." He covered the arms that held him with his own, holding on tightly even as he spoke of letting go. "Do I love you just because I know you love me, that-"
He was silenced with a kiss that, despite his lack of experience, he could only describe as 'soulful.' It was a long time before he bothered to pull away, not surprised to find Kaworu smiling. "You still think too much, Shinji."
"So... what's beyond this. It isn't just you anymore, you've brought me somewhere." He gestured into what he realized was a limitless sky, or perhaps the gesture made it so. "How far does this go, where we are?"
"... to God." He realized, even as Kaworu spoke, that he already knew it. He had known it, the feeling felt the same when he had been apart from Kaworu, he recognized it as a part of himself. Why? Why didn't it bring the same peace it did now? Or maybe only angels could keep remembering that they were a part of something greater.
"Do you want to go, Kaworu? We don't have to - I don't have to return."
Maybe the Third Impact wouldn't have been such a paradigm shift, wouldn't have been what SEELE had been striving for. After all, humanity united was still no more sublime than the sum of its parts, but /this/...
"I think we should go... it's so warm."
Shinji frowned slightly, as he felt a sudden tension in the arms around him, the angel's worry shadowing him like a cloud against the sun.
"Kaworu? What is it? What's wrong?"
The fair-haired man shifted his hands, turning Shinji to face him, marvelous, eternal red eyes all he could see, staring into his own before Kaworu sighed, closing them before looking away.
"If you want to travel on, Shinji, you can - but you must go alone."
"A-alone?"
The slight, sad smile hit Shinji like a knife to the heart, he /remembered/ that smile, the very same one Kaworu had worn the moment before he died.
"Free will does not make me human, Shinji. The Lillim were created to go farther, higher than any other, than any angel ever could. I cannot stop you, if you want to go on alone, or if you wish to stay here with me, as a part of me-" He paused, smiling, as Shinji slid a hand around to the back of his neck, pulling their faces together again, until they were brow-to-brow once more.
"Or if I want to go back, which is what you want."
Kaworu's smile was possibly sheepish now, though it was hard to gauge when the angel always looked so self-assured.
"You are my paradise, Shinji, and your life is the most precious thing in my care. I would make you happy if you would let me return it."
Shinji kissed him, and kissed him again, tiny playful nips, blushing and laughing as he reeled back, keeping a hold on Kaworu's shoulder so that he wouldn't fall.
"I feel invincible. I'm afraid - Kaworu - of what will happen when I'm back out there again. I don't want to live like that anymore. Dying while living, and... everything is a part of the same prison."
"The life you lived was an experiment in stasis, Shinji, of trying to model who you would become, to keep you at 14 as 24 as 40. You refused, from the very beginning you would rather break than stay unchanged. So you have been free for a very long time already."
"I don't believe you... but I believe you." Shinji sighed, pulling Kaworu closer, taking in one more deep breath of this place, this fantasy where he could be something he was not, with eternal peace and safety at the price of change. "We're horrible, humans are. We choose to hurt rather than stay the same - we /choose/ that pain. I don't want to go back, but I don't want to hurt you and there isn't a compromise. I want to be worthy of your trust in me."
"... always, Shinji. It's what makes you beautiful, whether you believe it or not." Kaworu's words were already beginning to blur in his mind, as the angel pulled him close, laying a feather light kiss on each of his closed eyes.
Shinji clung to Kaworu, to each sensation and each word, feeling chagrin rather than frustration as it all slid away despite his best efforts to keep it in his memory. The dark-haired man smiled as he fell, at the perfect world rushing past. He was falling from paradise, knew it, but with Kaworu smiling at him it just didn't seem to matter all that much.
----------------------
"We're ready to start, sir."
Lae nodded, grimacing as he heard the door hiss open behind him, short, clipped steps, and a louder, dull sound out of cadence with the sound - a cane, most likely. Cate, of course, hobbling here to watch the initial run.
At the moment, Lae hated the way he felt about Misato, because he knew it would make him brave. Abysmally, stupidly brave, to prove to her that he was different, that he wouldn't stand by and allow anything bad to happen to her charge. If Asuka was in danger, he would stand up against Cate, never a good thing to do, especially now.
Cate had seemed much more interested in using Asuka as their primary pilot, even when Shinji had seemed the most logical choice, but Lae knew better than to assume that meant he cared. In the end, their commander believed in utility above all else, that nothing stand in the way of his final plans. He might not sacrifice her life for the third Dominion's destruction... but he would trade her for the final Angel's demise, Lae knew that wasn't even a question.
//I won't let it happen. I don't know how... but I won't.//
He still hadn't turned, though he knew Misato had, knew that Cate was standing over his shoulder, the oppressive weight of his gaze threatening to crush the scientist where he stood. He took his mind off of it by starting the test.
"Miss Soryuu? Can you hear me all right?"
The helmet shimmered as it turned in his direction, and she paused for a long moment.
"... yes."
"All right, then." He gestured to one of the other scientists, who nodded back, though her eyes never left the stream of data on the screen in front of her.
//Now or never.// He tried to silence the voice that muttered uncertain cynicism, whether it would be better for this to work or not.
"Miss Soryuu, can you stand up for us? Use the table for balance if you need to."
He glanced out of the corner of his eye, Misato completely stone-faced, but biting just slightly on her lower lip, gaze fixed on the still unmoving figure on the other side of the glass.
"Miss Soryuu?"
Misato leaned forward slightly, as if waiting for Asuka to call for her, to ask for her help, though that plea never came. Slowly, the dark-red boots descended off the table, and Asuka lifted herself up to full height.
"The interface is compensating for the decreased muscle mass, the electrical interface is functioning. All systems are connected and working at 100 percent."
"Good." Lae could hear Misato gasp wetly, but refused to look at what he was sure were a few tears in her eyes, granting her any small privacy he could. "Asuka... you can take a few practice steps if you'd like, get yourself acquainted. We'll take this nice and slow"
----------------
"Miss Soryuu, can you stand up for us? Use the table for balance if you need to."
It tasted strange, the inside of this suit, like chemicals and plastic, unnatural, but it certainly wasn't anything like the fluid in the EVA plug -//mother//- and Asuka could listen to her breathing and find a certain measure of steady peace.
Wrong, it was all wrong. Why was she here? What was going on? Wasn't she supposed to be an EVA pilot, or were these just more of the tests?
//Mother, I'm going to be an EVA pilot... Mother...//
Except her sync ratio had gone through the floor, she had been of no further use to anyone, she had been nothing to the Angel that had wormed its way down, burrowed and blasted and taken the only thing that had made life worth facing.
//won't matter if I don't have a father won't matter I'll be the best and nothing else will matter, nothing, nothing...//
Ten years. Asuka's hands flexed inside the suit's gloves, and she gaped at the feel of the material against her hands, she was piloting again and they had brought her here to fight because she was the best -//not the EVA not the EVA//- and she had spent ten years muddling about with muddy water and stupid paints like a damned child.
A child. The Second Child, but she hadn't been needed, and if she wasn't needed then she wasn't anything, nothing to anyone and - Oh god, where was she? Where was she, what was going on and why was she back in an EVA?
"Miss Soryuu?"
The voice snapped her back to the present, though she was annoyed at the almost gentle tone. Weren't these military men? How dare they assume weakness in her!
Panic broke through the annoyance - fear, alarm, back to confusion but she clawed to bring it together, to force it all to make sense - she could not fail them, somehow she had earned a second chance.
It was still hard to get to her feet, and she was cautious, careful, afraid the shining plastic would stick to the slick floor though she quickly found she couldn't have had better traction if she were magnetized. Instantly, the pain in her hips, lower back and legs was tremendous, and Asuka sucked back a breath, refusing to scream, knowing they would fail her if she did so.
//Strong, stay strong, this is a test just like the rest of them.//
Where was Gendo Ikari? Where was Dr. Akagi, or Misa - no, there - there was Misato, staring at her from behind a thick pane of glass. Asuka could see her clearly, the suit's enhanced optics zooming in as she squinted to give her a crystal clear view - but the woman looked... wrong, strange and different and /old/. The shock was enough for the red-haired woman to ignore even the pain for a moment.
//What - what happened?//
"The interface is compensating for the decreased muscle mass, the electrical systems are connected and working at 100 percent, sir."
At once, the piercing pain subsided, ebbed away to nothing, and Asuka gingerly took a few more steps, and then stopped hesitating altogether, testing the way her body moved - she could feel again, feel the way her spine shifted and her skin tingled, she was biting her lip against a few hesitant gasps, it was just too hard to believe.
"Miss Soryuu? How does it feel?"
No words, she simply had no words, everything shifting into strange layers - thought, sensation, action, memory - all were separate, but shaded with the sensation of one another. Her body moved again, thrumming with feeling from head to toe, responsive to her commands if not hyper-attuned.
A suit? A tiny Eva, self-contained, strangely delicate with its seemingly thin barriers of plate and rubber skin, not unlike her human body, the way the Angel had so easily -
//No... that's over. I will /make/ it be over.//
Asuka /pushed/ somehow, feeling a moment of intense pain - head and heart - grimacing as she shoved harder, throwing all that shame and rage and horror away, pushing it down. It didn't matter how much these people needed her, she needed them more, needed this suit, needed this... nothing, not her past, not what it had made her, /nothing/ was worth losing this chance.
"I'm fine." Asuka had to force herself to stop talking, from asking too many unnecessary questions. It was a bit like waking from a fever dream, skating on a thin sliver of reality, realizing at any moment she would have to plunge back down beneath the surface. No, she couldn't remember where she was or who these people were or what they wanted, why she was in an Eva or why her legs worked or what had happened to her hills and mountains and nightmares. It didn't matter. It was comforting to see Misato here, but even her presence wasn't necessary.
"I'm a pilot again." She barely dared to breathe the words, but needed to say them, needed to hear them.
"Yes, yes you are." A voice broke in through her speakers, this one colder, no hint of gentleness. Asuka didn't mind, kindness didn't matter, it was irrelevant to the more important things. "I'm certain this is an adjustment for you, but we need to ensure you are battle ready. It is always an uncertainty when the next attack will come."
Asuka immediately could tell who was speaking, the man Misato was giving a death glare to, while a slightly shorter man appeared to be trying to intercede. The red-haired woman knew it didn't matter, no one spoke so coldly if they didn't have absolute authority, and it was clear by what he had said, he /knew/ why she was here, knew what she craved, the need to be here all-consuming.
//... and if you don't fight, you can't stay. They'll find someone else, someone better.//
"Test me. I'm ready."
-------------------
Two clear notes.... then three, then two again. It was only when they finally overlapped, no longer in tandem, did Shinji realize it wasn't an electronic noise, but birdsong.
Every now and then, he noticed the songs of birds outside his window. Nothing like Tokyo-3, only the toneless buzz of the cicadas, little more than white noise when it had been a part of his life since birth.
Birdsong, and Shinji blinked, and took a very deep breath, wincing as his body seemed to buck beneath him like an untamed animal, resisting his attempt to control it. He looked down, as a pair of arms clenched slightly around his chest, before disentangling themselves to a more comfortable position. He smiled at the long-fingered hand that drew away, he had never thought there was a match for pain, a true opposite to loneliness, but yes, his heart was singing.
He was happy to let out a soft sigh, as he felt the ball of Kaworu's thumb against the nape of his neck, fingers sliding through his hair in a pleasant, almost ticklish movement that seemed to melt and shiver down through all of his muscles, and turned, and kissed the other man with his eyes closed. It was safe, safe to kiss with a smile on his face and safe to hold the angel close, the fading connection between them, the fading memory just a reminder - Kaworu would stay, nothing could kill the hope that burned in him, warming even the empty places.
He finally met Kaworu's eyes, crimson eyes gleaming with an ever-present affection, the angel's head tipped mischievously to one side. Shinji blushed, he couldn't help it, and knew the pale-haired man was intentionally making him flustered, enjoying the way he fidgeted.
"Quit it." He finally managed, the words embarrassingly breathless - and yes, he realized they were both quite naked beneath the sheets. He knew it should have mattered, but it didn't - after all, they had been so much closer just a short while ago.
It was fading, that sensation, not being his own, what it had felt like -
//... it felt like being loved.// When he looked into Kaworu's eyes, though, he was swallowed up by that love again, no less than what he had felt before. He hadn't really lost anything, then, had he?
"Would you have been angry with me, if I hadn't come back?"
"You always think too much, don't you?" Kaworu murmured, playfully kissed the tip of his nose. It was true, for as much as he wanted to let go, delve deep into the tickly sweet sensations that shivered over his skin, Kaworu running long fingers through the hair near his temples, playing in the space behind his ears, there were too many unanswered questions, once again, too many reasons to be afraid.
"So what happens now?"
"Nn? What do you want to happen?"
"I want a happy ending. I want you to touch me... just like that." He smiled, gasped ever so slightly with the feel of Kaworu's hand nestled just above his hip, thumb against the ticklish skin around his navel. "I want every day to be like this, quiet, with you and me - that you'll stay here, with me." He paused, turning slightly as he finally heard another melody, soft background noise beneath the sound of the wind rushing past the window.
"Kashmir. Zeppelin." Kaworu murmured, smiling as he ran a fingertip along the edge of Shinji's ear. The dark-haired man knew he was blushing again. Kaworu's attentions always made him so embarrassed to be the focus of such affection, and that usually just made the pale-haired man try harder to embarrass him.
"Who?"
"No, different band." He chuckled as Shinji stared incomprehensibly. "It doesn't matter." Shinji sighed, as the fingertip was replaced with lips and tongue, the small, warm gesture still awakening cold, wild thrills along his arms and legs.
"I'm back." Shinji stretched more as reflex than anything, as the pale-haired man found several near-ticklish spots that made him squirm, Kaworu anticipating his moves and meeting him with a kiss at every pause. "I could get used to this."
"I often wondered why you thought it would be such a... burden." The angel murmured with a smile.
Kaworu was relaxed, comfortable in his skin in a way Shinji could only envy. He, in contrast, fumbled, and knew he was fumbling quite awkwardly as he tried to pull the angel closer. Instead, he very nearly kneed him in the groin as they tumbled together on the bed. Thankfully, the angel was infinitely more graceful, managing to turn his disjointed movement into something like foreplay.
Shinji was sure he was blushing - he couldn't keep a thought in his head, that was for sure, except for some hilariously bizarre nonsense about being able to gather all his sexual ponderings in the past and throw them in a plastic sandwich bag with room to spare. It felt... well, it felt wonderful, tearing any focus he might have had into a thousand pieces.
All his senses were going pleasantly into meltdown, with Kaworu's fingers sliding over his skin, along the curves of his taut shoulders and almost dancing, twining their fingers together until Shinji couldn't tell them apart, finally sliding ever so slightly beneath the slip of sheet that had somehow managed to stay across the dark-haired man's waist this entire time.
He couldn't stop watching Kaworu's eyes, the relief he felt matching any thrill, anything, that the pale-haired man's eyes were kind, and wanted only pleasant things. It wasn't a connection as total, perhaps, as the one they had shared before, but it was pure, and sacred. Acceptance, and love - and mistaking where the edge of the bed was as his hand came down and found empty air instead.
Shinji yelped, tumbling backward as he overbalanced, blinked and found that he had wedged himself in a u-shape between the bed and the wall, staring at Kaworu over the tips of his toes.
"I suppose it goes without saying... I've never done anything like this before."
Kaworu sat up, tipped his head in mock puzzlement.
"I don't claim to be an expert, but I'm fairly certain this is not how it goes."
Shinji was ready to speak again, and paused, watching the pale light melt against Kaworu's body instead. The light sculpted his bare chest, the bed sheets draped around his waist, all of it softly, a marble that would be comforting to touch, and brushed his pale hair with a breath of light that was certainly other than natural.
//He isn't natural, not really. He looks like what he is. Beautiful.//
"I love you, you know."
"I always knew, Shinji."
... and he reached out a hand, and Shinji took it. No more words, just more touches that were sometimes gentle and sometimes more fervent, breathy murmurs whispered like prayers in each others ears, a secret of adoration, and passion, and for a very long time, they were content in the sweet, strange familiarity of each other.
Outside, Virgil snoozed peacefully in the shade of the low bushes, paws moving as he ran through his dreams, tail wagging now and again into the warm sunlight.
... and all was right with the world.
----------------------
Asuka could hear herself breathing hard, but grinned as a few beads of sweat dripped down, one landing on her cheek like a tear. No. No tears. No need to cry, when they had made her a warrior again. Lifting herself up to full height from where she had been crouched, Asuka turned just as the pillar she had struck crashed to the ground, shaking her hand free of a few tingles of near-pain from her strike.
The red-haired woman assumed she had been expected to deflect the energy beams and projectiles, that it had been a simple dexterity check to dodge the attacks and take the power source from it's center. Simply plowing the structure down, demolishing it completely with three quick blows and taking the power source with her as it collapsed - judging by the radio silence - might have been a bit more than they were expecting.
She turned, already lifting herself into the air in a flip as something whizzed beneath her, skimming the ground, only to switch directions in mid-flight, zooming toward her at an impossible angle. The red-haired woman blinked, and there were two, one blade following in the wake of its companion. Asuka tossed her recent prize up like a baseball, drawing both prog knives from behind her shoulders, nearly laughing as she watched the shining buzz saws close in. It was fun, barely even a calculation, the suit more than fast enough to catch them in midair, impaling first one and then the other on the edge of the blades, and Asuka dropped back to the ground, holding one hand out to catch the power source just before it hit the ground.
"Excellent work, Miss Soryuu." The kind voice again, and she snarled slightly. It wouldn't be good enough until she had the other one's approval, grudging though it might be. It might not have been the NERV she knew, so many years had passed, but only Gendo Ikari's opinion had truly mattered then, and it seemed that only the names had changed now. "Now, I'd like to see if you can handle the next test with only the whips, if you could."
"Whips?" A few rambling German curses rattled through her mind, what was this weakling talking about? "What whips?"
"Please, hold your hand out, and lift up your palm toward the wall."
Asuka saw a slot slide open in the wall, something small shoot out toward her, and tensed, ready to reach for a knife even as she followed his order. It happened so fast she couldn't track it, only seeing a streak of something dark, and the explosion as it hit the target that had been shot at her. The red-haired woman gasped, feeling the retraction as an echo, staring down at the small weapon against the bottom of her wrist. She had thought it was a gun, had wondered when they had planned on letting her use it.
"Nice."
No word from her trainers, but all at once the wall began to move, panels shifting and falling away. She heard the soft hiss, a wave of sound as a wall of weapons hurled themselves at her.
Underneath the helmet, Asuka grinned. No challenge, none at all.
----------------------
"I knew they'd work, I knew it I knew..." Lae quickly snapped out of his elation as a side glance at Misato showed she was as stone-faced as ever. He sighed, though he'd been expecting nothing it was still hard to receive just that, his dreams seeming so much more stupid now that she was here to provide reality.
He turned back, relishing in the small victory rather than mulling over his losses, all his fears about how the girl would be able to perform now proven false. The initial reports had said she was mentally unstable, a much higher risk than Shinji, but if it was true he couldn't see it. It was as if she had shrugged off the insanity when the suit went on, being a warrior rendering it insignificant. Actually, it wasn't the best of signs, no healthy, normal person could simply drop facets of their personality so fast, but another glance past Misato, to where Cate now stood, told him quite plainly it didn't matter.
Cate had preferred Asuka from the first, if it hadn't been clear before it was now. Lae didn't want to get into Cate's head enough to figure out exactly what made Shinji weak and Asuka strong in his eyes, but knew that was the way it was. The look on the man's face was bizarrely abnormal, almost pride, totally unlike anything the scientist had seen before.
Asuka's fighting style was a beautiful thing to see, he had to grant his commander that much. The way she moved was effortless, graceful, almost like dancing, dodging and blocking attacks, drawing back in long, fluid leaps before reaching out, catching a column at the other end of the field and using it to turn herself, skating on one edge of her boot in a wide arc and taking out enemy after enemy with a flash of her blade.
"Give me a reading?" He finally murmured, as she finished destroying what remained of the training devices.
"The link between her and the suit isn't as strong as Ikari's." The young scientist who answered Lae grimaced as Cate shot him a dark glare. "It's better that way, there should be a lower sync ratio between her and the suit, but it's still reacting well to her moves, we really couldn't ask for better."
"On the whole, her readings are higher than those of Shinji Ikari's." The woman who spoke up kept typing away, screen flashing as the system continued to scan Asuka, pulling in data. "Soryuu is faster, stronger... if I had to place a bet, I'd have given her even odds with Tiphereth, even though he interfaced better with his suit."
"Man, I would have loved to see those two in a fight."
Lae glared at the first scientist, though the man didn't wilt under his gaze as he had under Cate's. Misato acted as if she hadn't heard any of it, or didn't care, still as silent and expressionless as ever. He turned back once more, Asuka was still now, in the center of the room, destroyed enemies littering the ground around her. Lae could hear her breathing, just slightly harder, glanced down to see her readings nearly at normal.
//A machine... NERV had her listed as a war machine and they were right.//
"All right, Miss Soryuu, that's enough for today." Once again, Cate beat him to the announcement, and Lae felt another nudge of concern. It was never good, when he took a personal interest. The second moment of concern was hot on the heels of the first, as he looked up, to find Asuka staring back at them. It was unnerving, though he couldn't see her eyes, nothing visible but the flat, mirrored sheen of the helmet reflecting the lights above - but he knew she wasn't ready to stop. The tests hadn't been enough. It might not ever be enough.
"All right."
The pilot's soft words shook him from his worried daze, and he moved out through the door, down the hall and into the training room. He knew Misato was following him, silently grateful not to hear Cate behind her. Things were already quite tense enough. He could see Asuka fumbling with the helmet, finally managing to pull it off, long hair disheveled, falling like a river of fire around her pale face.
"Did everything work all right? Did you find it acceptable?" He paused again, as she lifted her wrist, the whip-like cord extending just slightly, hovering in the air like a snake as she ran her thumb and finger along it, studying it.
The barest gesture, a hint of a thought sent it lashing outward toward what remained of the pillar she had already destroyed. The wreckage exploded, pulverized on impact, a plume of powder that quickly settled on the training room floor. Lae winced as it retracted, wondering if she had done it on purpose, to let him imagine exactly what one of those could do to him.
"It's different than the Eva, but it still responds to me."
"I - we spent a lot of time on this suit, Asuka, for you. It was created just for you."
"Do you want me to fight Angels?"
"Yes, in a way." Given the girl's past, he was hesitant to say too much, or promise things he could not deliver - especially safety. "So far, the attacks have all been completely physical. We don't anticipate anything... that you should have to face anything like you did in NERV."
Just the mention of it was enough, he could see the blind terror screaming in her eyes, but she blinked once, twice... it was gone, replaced with a calm certainty that left him stunned.
//The strength in this girl... amazing.//
"I want to stay, Misato." Asuka glanced up, speaking as if she really had any choice in the matter, as if all of this had been for her benefit. The dark-haired woman finally smiled, a small, benevolent expression, and nodded.
"All right, Asuka. We'll stay."
"I can help you get her back in her chair, if you'd like? I'm working on a smaller system - I've been working on it for a while - that would allow her to walk again, it isn't quite done but...
"We'll be fine. We can manage."
Lae knew he should have shut up, but he just couldn't help himself.
"We have an apartment set up for the two of you, I'd be happy to show you-"
"I know how to read directions."
Lae winced, nodding, surprised when she met his eyes - and smiled again, the tiniest bit.
"... thank you. If I need anything, I'll ask."
He willed himself not to blush, a forty year old scientist with a schoolgirl crush, turning away before she might see any hint of his embarrassment in his eyes.
"My... m-my pleasure."
-----------------------
Kaworu blinked lazily as awareness returned, enjoying these waking moments as some of the best that being somewhat human had to offer. He gladly lingered, warm and half-awake, reaching out an arm as he turned, Shinji's back smooth and slightly cold, the sheets all tangled between them. The dark-haired man murmured contentedly as he was touched, but did not wake up, and Kaworu smiled, languidly getting to his feet, pulling on a few clothes in the warm, bright room.
Very bright, in fact, and the clock was turning its way into the afternoon hours - he'd lost track of time again.
It didn't seem to matter all that much. Virgil was still asleep, woke up when the door opened and buried his face in his food dish as he always did. The pale-haired man smiled as the dog quickly remembered the new addition, nosing open the bedroom door to greet their visitor. He could hear a few grumbled mutterings from inside - Virgil liked to lick fingers and toes - as he set on a kettle for tea, wondering vaguely what day it actually was.
Kaworu glanced up at a knock on the door, left the tea to steep, still enjoying the way his body moved, the very nice relaxed sensation - the Angels may have been given some higher sensibilities, but sex was not such a poor consolation prize for Lillim, not at all.
He was a bit surprised when he opened the door, and the girl on the other side seemed, strangely enough, equally startled. Karen stammered, though it was clear to see she was trying to do anything but, while Emily was too busy studying the flowers that had been planted just off the porch to give her any assistance.
"Well, we were just sort of in the neighborhood and Emily thought we should come by and say hi and it's been a few days, I know you said you needed some time off for an emergency and we thought we should make sure you were ok and, well..." She shrugged, grinning lamely. "We really have /no/ lives, that's about the whole of it."
"Not hardly." Emily chirped, instantly hanging on her shoulder. "His music collection is way better than mine now and I wanted to ask him if I could rip some tracks, since I got my ancient burner actually working again."
"... Kaworu? Is someone there? Who is it?"
All conversation came to a perfect halt at the soft voice from the other end of the hall, Shinji padding out on bare feet, yawning as he slipped one of the angel's shirts loosely over his shoulders, slacks baggy on his thin frame. He froze when he saw the two girls on the other side of the door, staring at them as they stared back. Karen finally gathered together a polite apology.
"I... wow, we're sorry, we didn't realize you had company."
Emily, as usual, abandoned politeness entirely, pounding on her shoulder, voice broadcast in a laughing stage whisper.
"I told you he was too cute to be straight, I /told/ you!"