31_days fic: Here be a long fic
I'm building up to a scene from Instrumentality (since one of the up-coming prompts is perfect for it), hence why things have been getting darker lately.
Title: "Last Night of the World/Closing Doors and Ticking Clocks"
Day/Theme: Sept 22) private star systems
Series: Neon Genesis Evangelion
Character/Pairing: Kozo Fuyutsuki/OFC
Rating: PG-13
Author's Notes: Takes place just before the events of End of Evangelion/episodes 25 & 26 and follows "A Trouble that Can't Be Named" in "Neon Enoch Evangelion", aka the ambitious NGE project. A very long chapter this time, so you might want to get yourself your choice of a drink.
Suggested track: http://tenshi.ru/anime-ost/Neon_Genesis_Evangelion/End_of_Evangelion.OST/08-Loren%20&%20Mash%20-%20THANATOS%20-%20if%20i%20can%27t%20be%20yours%20-.mp3 The lyrics to this song fit this chapter almost too well...
"Make her disappear, and make it permanent."
"But what about her AT Field? It's not strong, but it still needs to be taken into consideration."
"It seems to activate only when she's anxious. Be certain that she's at ease."
"How do you expect me to do that?"
"I've seen how she looks at you. She trusts you. Make full use of that, by any and every means necessary."
At sundown, Sabia walked home, against an outflow of traffic leaving the city. A major evacuation of the last lingering citizens was underway; she saw UN troops going from house to house, looking for stragglers. She headed for her apartment quickly, careful to stay out of sight and hoping they would pass the complex by completely.
She had little appetite after her encounter with Enniel, but she forced herself to eat some rice crackers and a couple of tangerines. She switched on the radio, but every station broadcasted emergency bulletins; the Internet connection had slowed to dial-up speeds: no doubt everyone was sending last minute messages to relatives or friends that the last phase of the evacuation had gone through. The noise outside -- horns honking, motors grinding, and the clatter that might be a tank going through the streets -- made it hard for her to concentrate on reading.
She finally gave up and decided to call it an early night. She drew a bath and let herself soak for a good long time, but somehow even the relaxing warmth of the water did little to dispell the sense of dreads that hung over her, nor did it drive away the echoes of Enniel's last words to her.
As she got out and toweled herself off, someone knocked at the hall door. Oh great, the UN peacekeepers are here, she thought, wrapping a towel around her head and pulling on a bathrobe. "I'm coming, I'm coming," she muttered, running for the door and funbling to tie her sash at the same time.
She peered out through the peephole and started to say, "I just got out of the bath, give me fifteen minutes to get myself decent and to pack." but she stopped herself.
"Mr. Fuyutsuki?"
"Sabia, let me in, it's urgent."
She pulled the door open and stepped aside to let him enter. Something was up: for once, he was not in uniform, but instead he was clad in what looked like military fatigues. It might have been a trick of the light, or maybe just an illusion, but he somehow looked a bit less robust, though he still looked vigorous
"What brings you all the way out here?" she asked, closing the door behind them. "I figured you'd be holed up in the GeoFront."
"I should be, but I had to come here and find you. By now, you know the city is being cleared of the last remaining civilians, and all NERV personnel are being recalled to the GeoFront," he said.
"Excluding me, because of certain metaphysiological phenomena," she said, trying not to sound bitter.
"Which is what brings me here: I'm moving you someplace where you're less likely to be found." He looked at her, then quickly averted his eyes. "You'd better dress for the woods: it's a long ways up into the mountains. There's a small cabin up there which I've used as a retreat in the past. I'm offering it to you as a refuge till the worst passes."
She looked up at him. "They're letting you do this?"
"I couldn't let you stay down here, and if your nature was found out, I don't want to even think about what would happen to you."
"What's the worst they could do, drop an N2 mine on me? The worst that would do is mess up my hair," she said, heading for the bedroom.
"I was thinking, if SEELE knew you were still here, they could try and turn you against us," he said.
"Kozo-sensei, if they tried that, I'd find some way to self-destruct before they could twist me around their fingers," she said, rummaging in the closet for a pair of jeans and a canvas shirt she knew she had tucked away.
"They could always brain-wash you, or wear down your humanity till the Grigori side of you broke through it's bindings and retaliated," he mused.
She stuck her head around the bedroom doorjamb as she pulled on her pants. "If I didn't feel about you the way that I do, and if I didn't respect you as much as I do, I'd be tempted to throw something at you about now for talking crazy. Whatever my Grigori side is like, I have a feeling it's a lover and not a fighter. And even if they did awaken it, I think it would be more likely to go after them for daring to tamper with it."
He said nothing to this and for a moment, she wondered if she had offended him. She hunted for her carry-on bag and threw together some necessities, including her overnight bag, a few books and her journal. Slinging her bag over her shoulder and hunting for a pair of walking shoes, she joined him in the entryway.
"I'm sorry I snapped at you just now, it was out of place," she said, bowing slightly.
"There's no need to apologize: your reaction was understandable," he said, opening the door for her. "I was considering every possible scenario, and I should have thought better than to say what I said. I should be the one apologizing."
"Now I know why he made you his 2IC," she said, looking up at him.
He looked at her, puzzled for a moment. "Why is that?"
She closed the door behind them. "Because you make a better leader than he does: you have the diplomacy that he lacks."
"You flatter me, Sabia," he said and lead the way down the darkened hallway and thence to the street below. An old sedan stood parked before the doors. No sooner had they exited the building and they had gotten into the car, when a troop of soldiers approached and pushed in the front doors of the building.
"That was close," he muttered, rummaging under the floor mat for the keys.
"I was about to ask, did you use your influence to keep them at bay till you got me out of the building?" she asked.
He keyed the ignition. "These days, as a result of more things than I care to recount, NERV's influence is at an all time low, and if I had tried to warn them off, they would probably have laughed me to scorn."
They headed north, meeting only one other roadblock on the way north, and even then, the police at the checkpoint waved them through, no doubt thinking the two of them were part of the exodus leaving the city.
Sabia breathed easier once they were out of the city proper, but she sensed he concealed something from her, that there was more to this than the gesture of a concerned superior and comrade. But she did not broach the subject, knowing it wasn't her place to ask.
The air grew cooler and the humidity decreased as they drove deeper into the mountains. At length, they pulled off onto a small turn-around at the side of the road. He got out, rummaged in the backseat for a battery lantern and switched it on before he opened her door for her.
"You'll have to follow me: the path is narrow and twisting and you can lose your footing easily," he warned, holding out his free hand.
The air felt cleaner and more crisp, with a hint almost of frost. As they walked through the shadows under the trees, she peered up at the night sky overhead. Orion the hunter gleamed above, the three stars shining like gems and the Orion nebula visible now that they had left the city. Legends were told that Orion was, in fact, the outline of the Grigori Shemyaza, suspended in the heavens for his disobedience, but somehow, she knew there was more to this story.
"Are you cold? I felt you tremble," he asked, his voice bringing her back down to earth.
"No, just old memories coming back but not showing themselves clearly," she replied. She felt him slowing down slightly, and the lantern stopped swaying as he gripped the handle a little more firmly. Something was up.
At length, the trees opened up and the trail took a sharp turn and dipped into a declivity between two spurs of the mountain. Clear blue-white light from the full moon shone down on the clearing, lighting up a small, square cabin. He let go of her hand and reaching under his shirt, took a key from a chain around his neck and fitting the key into a padlock on the door, put his shoulder to it and pushed it in.
"It's a bit rustic, but there's running water connected to a well, and it's clean and comfortable," he said, entering and setting the battery lamp on the floor in the entryway. She heard him rummage in the dark, take down something which clinked metallically, then he flicked on a lighter as he lit a kerosene lamp which he replaced on a bracket hanging from the low ceiling. She entered and toed off her shoes. A few bits of furniture including a pair of rickety bookcases and a few cupboards stood along the walls and in the shadows she could make out a niche for the washroom and a sleeping alcove.
"It's cozy," she said.
"Sabia... there's something I need to tell you: there is more to this, more to my bringing you out here than a kind gesture to a valued friend and assistant," he said, looking her in the face. The flickering lamplight cast his sharp features in high relief, deepening the care lines about his mouth and eyes.
Here it comes... she thought, bracing herself and feeling her skin tighten and prickle as her AT Field started to manifest.
"Commander Ikari ordered me to make you disappear on a more or less permanent basis," he said.
"You mean, he asked you to kill me, when he knows it's difficult to impossible to do that?" she said.
"In a few words, yes, he did. He even told me to... use our friendship to that advantage."
She felt her stomach drop into her heels. "Well, I can tell you won't carry that order out to the letter."
"How do you know that?" he asked, dryly.
"Because you care about me too much, and I don't think you'd be telling me this if you intended to find a way past the damn AT Field."
He managed a flicker of a smile. "You've read my heart like a book. You know I wouldn't bring you to harm, much less use your trust in me as a knife against you." He paused. "It may be stepping over the boundaries of propriety, but I have been drawn to you for some time, even in the few months we worked together."
"That's... that's a relief, to be honest with you. I might have insisted otherwise when certain people hinted at it or brought it up, but I started to have feelings for you almost from the moment we met."
"You remind me of a colleague of mine whom I trusted in perhaps a little too much. Not your appearance, but your personality reminds me of hers. I was probably a fool to feel for her as I did, but it may have been one of my wiser decisions."
She knew better than to say it, but she had an inkling of whom he referred to. "Is love so much a decision as it is a moment of wise madness that makes us realize what really matters in this world?" she asked, her turn to think out loud.
"This may be very likely the last time we see each other," he said.
She managed a laugh that came out like a sob. "Enniel said much the same thing to me today."
"My first thought, as soon as I received my orders, was to spirit you away to Prussot," he said. "I tried to contact him, but his cellphone has been disconnected, as were the landlines."
She looked up at him. "He's no longer in this world; in fact, he offered to let me go with him and the rest of the Grigori."
"So why did you not go with him?"
Feeling the AT Field retracting, she reached up to touch his face; she felt him stiffen and back away from her slightly. "I didn't want to be with them. Whatever I am, I'm more human than Grigori; my place isn't with them, but here, with the humans."
She dropped her gaze, expecting him to push her away even the most gently. Instead, she felt him relax into her touch and he turned her face toward his, looking into her eyes.
"Did you choose this for yourself, or did you choose this because of me?" he asked.
"I chose for both reasons," she said.
"We don't know what's going to happen in the days to come: it could be a new beginning for mankind, or it could be the end of everything," he said. "I just hope, for both our sakes, you did not choose in vain."
"Whatever happens, I made the choice I wanted to make, and I'm ready to take the reprecussions, whatever they might be. Even if we never do see each other again, I'll carry your image and the memories of our friendship with me," she said.
It was his turn to look away now and she thought she saw one corner of his eyes turn damp. She leaned up and kissed him gently on the cheek; she felt his breath catch in his throat.
"You'd better let me go, or I won't be able to let go of you," he said, darting a glance over her shoulder toward the alcove, then looking her in the face.
She withdrew from him more quickly than she wanted to, but she felt herself blushing. "I'd better not keep you: Ikari will get suspicious," she said.
"Let him think what he wants, he will anyway regardless of what I do or don't do," Fuyutsuki said, taking the battery lantern. He paused on the threshold, looking at her one long, last time. "Take care of yourself, Sabia... Miss Valiant."
He closed the door, shutting out the light of the winter moon. She waited a moment, then pulled it open and looked out to watch his long, lean shadow and the speck of lantern light retreat down the trail into the trees and the darkness.
Once his footsteps died away amid the night sounds, the steel cord inside her that had held her upright all day snapped and she slipped to the ground, huddled with her face in her knees. Silent sobs shook her frame, her weeping muted by the ever-present cicadas.
The stars had turned a few degrees overhead by the time she pulled herself back together and went back inside. She found some bedding in one of the cupboards and made up a bed for herself in the alcove.
Once between the covers, however, she found it hard to fall asleep. The bedclothes smelled faintly of him...
"Did you take care of her?"
"She won't be troubling you any more."
"Good. The last thing I need is for someone as loyal as you to be quite literally sleeping with the enemy.
Later, alone in his apartment in the black hours of the middle of the night, Fuyutsuki allowed himself a catnap, sleeping with one eye open.
He awoke before daybreak, and found the pillow damp under his temple...
Title: "Last Night of the World/Closing Doors and Ticking Clocks"
Day/Theme: Sept 22) private star systems
Series: Neon Genesis Evangelion
Character/Pairing: Kozo Fuyutsuki/OFC
Rating: PG-13
Author's Notes: Takes place just before the events of End of Evangelion/episodes 25 & 26 and follows "A Trouble that Can't Be Named" in "Neon Enoch Evangelion", aka the ambitious NGE project. A very long chapter this time, so you might want to get yourself your choice of a drink.
Suggested track: http://tenshi.ru/anime-ost/Neon_Genesis_Evangelion/End_of_Evangelion.OST/08-Loren%20&%20Mash%20-%20THANATOS%20-%20if%20i%20can%27t%20be%20yours%20-.mp3 The lyrics to this song fit this chapter almost too well...
"Make her disappear, and make it permanent."
"But what about her AT Field? It's not strong, but it still needs to be taken into consideration."
"It seems to activate only when she's anxious. Be certain that she's at ease."
"How do you expect me to do that?"
"I've seen how she looks at you. She trusts you. Make full use of that, by any and every means necessary."
At sundown, Sabia walked home, against an outflow of traffic leaving the city. A major evacuation of the last lingering citizens was underway; she saw UN troops going from house to house, looking for stragglers. She headed for her apartment quickly, careful to stay out of sight and hoping they would pass the complex by completely.
She had little appetite after her encounter with Enniel, but she forced herself to eat some rice crackers and a couple of tangerines. She switched on the radio, but every station broadcasted emergency bulletins; the Internet connection had slowed to dial-up speeds: no doubt everyone was sending last minute messages to relatives or friends that the last phase of the evacuation had gone through. The noise outside -- horns honking, motors grinding, and the clatter that might be a tank going through the streets -- made it hard for her to concentrate on reading.
She finally gave up and decided to call it an early night. She drew a bath and let herself soak for a good long time, but somehow even the relaxing warmth of the water did little to dispell the sense of dreads that hung over her, nor did it drive away the echoes of Enniel's last words to her.
As she got out and toweled herself off, someone knocked at the hall door. Oh great, the UN peacekeepers are here, she thought, wrapping a towel around her head and pulling on a bathrobe. "I'm coming, I'm coming," she muttered, running for the door and funbling to tie her sash at the same time.
She peered out through the peephole and started to say, "I just got out of the bath, give me fifteen minutes to get myself decent and to pack." but she stopped herself.
"Mr. Fuyutsuki?"
"Sabia, let me in, it's urgent."
She pulled the door open and stepped aside to let him enter. Something was up: for once, he was not in uniform, but instead he was clad in what looked like military fatigues. It might have been a trick of the light, or maybe just an illusion, but he somehow looked a bit less robust, though he still looked vigorous
"What brings you all the way out here?" she asked, closing the door behind them. "I figured you'd be holed up in the GeoFront."
"I should be, but I had to come here and find you. By now, you know the city is being cleared of the last remaining civilians, and all NERV personnel are being recalled to the GeoFront," he said.
"Excluding me, because of certain metaphysiological phenomena," she said, trying not to sound bitter.
"Which is what brings me here: I'm moving you someplace where you're less likely to be found." He looked at her, then quickly averted his eyes. "You'd better dress for the woods: it's a long ways up into the mountains. There's a small cabin up there which I've used as a retreat in the past. I'm offering it to you as a refuge till the worst passes."
She looked up at him. "They're letting you do this?"
"I couldn't let you stay down here, and if your nature was found out, I don't want to even think about what would happen to you."
"What's the worst they could do, drop an N2 mine on me? The worst that would do is mess up my hair," she said, heading for the bedroom.
"I was thinking, if SEELE knew you were still here, they could try and turn you against us," he said.
"Kozo-sensei, if they tried that, I'd find some way to self-destruct before they could twist me around their fingers," she said, rummaging in the closet for a pair of jeans and a canvas shirt she knew she had tucked away.
"They could always brain-wash you, or wear down your humanity till the Grigori side of you broke through it's bindings and retaliated," he mused.
She stuck her head around the bedroom doorjamb as she pulled on her pants. "If I didn't feel about you the way that I do, and if I didn't respect you as much as I do, I'd be tempted to throw something at you about now for talking crazy. Whatever my Grigori side is like, I have a feeling it's a lover and not a fighter. And even if they did awaken it, I think it would be more likely to go after them for daring to tamper with it."
He said nothing to this and for a moment, she wondered if she had offended him. She hunted for her carry-on bag and threw together some necessities, including her overnight bag, a few books and her journal. Slinging her bag over her shoulder and hunting for a pair of walking shoes, she joined him in the entryway.
"I'm sorry I snapped at you just now, it was out of place," she said, bowing slightly.
"There's no need to apologize: your reaction was understandable," he said, opening the door for her. "I was considering every possible scenario, and I should have thought better than to say what I said. I should be the one apologizing."
"Now I know why he made you his 2IC," she said, looking up at him.
He looked at her, puzzled for a moment. "Why is that?"
She closed the door behind them. "Because you make a better leader than he does: you have the diplomacy that he lacks."
"You flatter me, Sabia," he said and lead the way down the darkened hallway and thence to the street below. An old sedan stood parked before the doors. No sooner had they exited the building and they had gotten into the car, when a troop of soldiers approached and pushed in the front doors of the building.
"That was close," he muttered, rummaging under the floor mat for the keys.
"I was about to ask, did you use your influence to keep them at bay till you got me out of the building?" she asked.
He keyed the ignition. "These days, as a result of more things than I care to recount, NERV's influence is at an all time low, and if I had tried to warn them off, they would probably have laughed me to scorn."
They headed north, meeting only one other roadblock on the way north, and even then, the police at the checkpoint waved them through, no doubt thinking the two of them were part of the exodus leaving the city.
Sabia breathed easier once they were out of the city proper, but she sensed he concealed something from her, that there was more to this than the gesture of a concerned superior and comrade. But she did not broach the subject, knowing it wasn't her place to ask.
The air grew cooler and the humidity decreased as they drove deeper into the mountains. At length, they pulled off onto a small turn-around at the side of the road. He got out, rummaged in the backseat for a battery lantern and switched it on before he opened her door for her.
"You'll have to follow me: the path is narrow and twisting and you can lose your footing easily," he warned, holding out his free hand.
The air felt cleaner and more crisp, with a hint almost of frost. As they walked through the shadows under the trees, she peered up at the night sky overhead. Orion the hunter gleamed above, the three stars shining like gems and the Orion nebula visible now that they had left the city. Legends were told that Orion was, in fact, the outline of the Grigori Shemyaza, suspended in the heavens for his disobedience, but somehow, she knew there was more to this story.
"Are you cold? I felt you tremble," he asked, his voice bringing her back down to earth.
"No, just old memories coming back but not showing themselves clearly," she replied. She felt him slowing down slightly, and the lantern stopped swaying as he gripped the handle a little more firmly. Something was up.
At length, the trees opened up and the trail took a sharp turn and dipped into a declivity between two spurs of the mountain. Clear blue-white light from the full moon shone down on the clearing, lighting up a small, square cabin. He let go of her hand and reaching under his shirt, took a key from a chain around his neck and fitting the key into a padlock on the door, put his shoulder to it and pushed it in.
"It's a bit rustic, but there's running water connected to a well, and it's clean and comfortable," he said, entering and setting the battery lamp on the floor in the entryway. She heard him rummage in the dark, take down something which clinked metallically, then he flicked on a lighter as he lit a kerosene lamp which he replaced on a bracket hanging from the low ceiling. She entered and toed off her shoes. A few bits of furniture including a pair of rickety bookcases and a few cupboards stood along the walls and in the shadows she could make out a niche for the washroom and a sleeping alcove.
"It's cozy," she said.
"Sabia... there's something I need to tell you: there is more to this, more to my bringing you out here than a kind gesture to a valued friend and assistant," he said, looking her in the face. The flickering lamplight cast his sharp features in high relief, deepening the care lines about his mouth and eyes.
Here it comes... she thought, bracing herself and feeling her skin tighten and prickle as her AT Field started to manifest.
"Commander Ikari ordered me to make you disappear on a more or less permanent basis," he said.
"You mean, he asked you to kill me, when he knows it's difficult to impossible to do that?" she said.
"In a few words, yes, he did. He even told me to... use our friendship to that advantage."
She felt her stomach drop into her heels. "Well, I can tell you won't carry that order out to the letter."
"How do you know that?" he asked, dryly.
"Because you care about me too much, and I don't think you'd be telling me this if you intended to find a way past the damn AT Field."
He managed a flicker of a smile. "You've read my heart like a book. You know I wouldn't bring you to harm, much less use your trust in me as a knife against you." He paused. "It may be stepping over the boundaries of propriety, but I have been drawn to you for some time, even in the few months we worked together."
"That's... that's a relief, to be honest with you. I might have insisted otherwise when certain people hinted at it or brought it up, but I started to have feelings for you almost from the moment we met."
"You remind me of a colleague of mine whom I trusted in perhaps a little too much. Not your appearance, but your personality reminds me of hers. I was probably a fool to feel for her as I did, but it may have been one of my wiser decisions."
She knew better than to say it, but she had an inkling of whom he referred to. "Is love so much a decision as it is a moment of wise madness that makes us realize what really matters in this world?" she asked, her turn to think out loud.
"This may be very likely the last time we see each other," he said.
She managed a laugh that came out like a sob. "Enniel said much the same thing to me today."
"My first thought, as soon as I received my orders, was to spirit you away to Prussot," he said. "I tried to contact him, but his cellphone has been disconnected, as were the landlines."
She looked up at him. "He's no longer in this world; in fact, he offered to let me go with him and the rest of the Grigori."
"So why did you not go with him?"
Feeling the AT Field retracting, she reached up to touch his face; she felt him stiffen and back away from her slightly. "I didn't want to be with them. Whatever I am, I'm more human than Grigori; my place isn't with them, but here, with the humans."
She dropped her gaze, expecting him to push her away even the most gently. Instead, she felt him relax into her touch and he turned her face toward his, looking into her eyes.
"Did you choose this for yourself, or did you choose this because of me?" he asked.
"I chose for both reasons," she said.
"We don't know what's going to happen in the days to come: it could be a new beginning for mankind, or it could be the end of everything," he said. "I just hope, for both our sakes, you did not choose in vain."
"Whatever happens, I made the choice I wanted to make, and I'm ready to take the reprecussions, whatever they might be. Even if we never do see each other again, I'll carry your image and the memories of our friendship with me," she said.
It was his turn to look away now and she thought she saw one corner of his eyes turn damp. She leaned up and kissed him gently on the cheek; she felt his breath catch in his throat.
"You'd better let me go, or I won't be able to let go of you," he said, darting a glance over her shoulder toward the alcove, then looking her in the face.
She withdrew from him more quickly than she wanted to, but she felt herself blushing. "I'd better not keep you: Ikari will get suspicious," she said.
"Let him think what he wants, he will anyway regardless of what I do or don't do," Fuyutsuki said, taking the battery lantern. He paused on the threshold, looking at her one long, last time. "Take care of yourself, Sabia... Miss Valiant."
He closed the door, shutting out the light of the winter moon. She waited a moment, then pulled it open and looked out to watch his long, lean shadow and the speck of lantern light retreat down the trail into the trees and the darkness.
Once his footsteps died away amid the night sounds, the steel cord inside her that had held her upright all day snapped and she slipped to the ground, huddled with her face in her knees. Silent sobs shook her frame, her weeping muted by the ever-present cicadas.
The stars had turned a few degrees overhead by the time she pulled herself back together and went back inside. She found some bedding in one of the cupboards and made up a bed for herself in the alcove.
Once between the covers, however, she found it hard to fall asleep. The bedclothes smelled faintly of him...
"Did you take care of her?"
"She won't be troubling you any more."
"Good. The last thing I need is for someone as loyal as you to be quite literally sleeping with the enemy.
Later, alone in his apartment in the black hours of the middle of the night, Fuyutsuki allowed himself a catnap, sleeping with one eye open.
He awoke before daybreak, and found the pillow damp under his temple...