Disclaimer:
Studio Gainax animation is the sole owner to the rights of Evangelion. I own no privileges to anything currently, (probably never will) and will understandably remove, edit, or delete my writings if needed, rather than getting into a mess dealing with copyright infringement. Everyone has enough of their own troubles as it is.
Chapter
1 – The Kiss:
“Dammit!
I’m not going to kiss her!!!”
“You have
to! You lost!”
Shinji was
trying to argue his way out of the losing end of a bet that he had made with
Touji, but was having no such luck. His mind was racing, trying to think up of
as many reasons as he could to deter his friend’s persistence. Sadly, Shinji
already knew that he would have to go through with what he promised, but before
that happened he was going to delay the inevitable as long as he could.
“You
already knew that Hikari would say yes if you asked her out because you talked
to her yesterday on the phone about it!”
Touji
grinned.
“Well, if
I remember correctly, I just said that if I asked Hikari out, you
would have to kiss Rei.”
Kensuke
nodded and turned to look at his distressed friend.
“He’s
right Shinji. Touji didn’t say he needed to tell you he already talked with
Hikari.”
Shinji
took an exasperated breath and shook his head.
“But he
had an unfair advantage over me!”
Touji
just laughed.
“Considering
you’re an Eva pilot, that would have been the last thing I expected to hear.”
At that moment,
the lunch bell decided to make itself heard and Shinji knew that his time was
up. He looked at his friends, trying to see some look of compassion in their
eyes.
He found
none.
Instead
his so-called ‘friends’ were essentially dragging him to class. Shinji mentally
kicked himself, not believing that he could’ve been so stupid to fall for such
a trick. He was suspicious as to why Touji seemed so confident, but didn’t
really give it a second thought. Now, as a result of his own ignorance, he was
paying a very high price.
The three
walked towards the classroom, or rather two of the three, one being dragged,
and stood just outside of the classroom, waiting until it filled up before
entering.
Still
being held in what felt like a death grip, Shinji managed to stick his head
past the door and take a quick glance around the room, hoping that this would
be one of the days where Rei would be absent from class. He sighed in
disappointment when he saw her, sitting in her usual ‘looking out the window’
position.
“Great…”
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After the
class had gone through their ‘stand, bow, sit’ routine, Kensuke and Touji
finally let him go and walked into the classroom. Slightly startled, Hikari
turned her head towards the group and gave them a flustered look that probably
said, “Why are you guys late?!”.
Touji
just gave her a smile and gestured towards Shinji.
Trying to
escape, the third child quickly headed towards his desk, or rather anywhere
away from the other two stooges. However, Shinji felt his retreat suddenly
halted as the hand of Suzuhara landed on his shoulder; and with a swift nudge,
the boy was pushed out to the front of the classroom. Both taking a seat at
their own desks, Touji and Kensuke just looked at the Eva pilot, bright smiles
on their faces.
Still
standing, Shinji timidly turned his head to look around the room, noticing that
practically every pair of eyes in the class were focused on him. He started to
imagine how the class would react after this event…and to say the least…it was
not a very pleasant thought at all.
As his
eyes continued to search the room, he let out a small sigh of relief at seeing
the empty desk where Asuka usually sat. Considering his situation already, it
was good luck within bad luck that the redhead had decided she would be ‘sick’
today.
If she
had been here…well…
…Shinji
didn’t even want to begin to think about it.
Turning
slowly to look at Rei, he forced his body to move in her direction. However,
getting his legs to do the same thing was another matter entirely. Allocating
together every ounce of concentration into his walking skills, Shinji forced
himself to take a step towards her.
After a
few more moments he finally took a second step, followed by a third, and soon
enough he was heading towards Rei’s desk…
… slowly
…
An odd
thought passing through his head, this circumstance suddenly reminded him of
how he felt when piloting the Eva for the first time; of how stressful it was
just attempting to make the EVA walk. Thinking about it, that was also the same
evening when he had first met Rei …
His foot
lightly bumping against a desk, Shinji quickly brought himself back to reality.
Hoping
that the student body had turned their attention away from him, Shinji
discreetly turned around to look at the class one last time.
On the
contrary, now everyone was staring at him.
Blinking
his eyes, he turned his gaze away and looked at the girl in front of him.
Seeing
her reflection in the window, she apparently seemed oblivious to his presence.
Not that it would really matter in a moment. About to call her name, an odd
sensation suddenly passed through him.
For some
reason, Shinji could honestly say that idea of kissing Rei somehow didn’t feel
as bad as he originally thought it would be…
Closing his
eyes for a moment, he opened his mouth to speak.
“Umm,
Rei?”
Turning
her head slowly away from the window, she looked up, her eyes meeting with
Shinji’s. An uneasy pause lingered in the air, the seconds passing by painfully
slow. Tensing his muscles, Shinji ignored his feeling of hesitation and
resolved himself to carry out his part of the bet.
“Yes
Pilot Ika…?”
Placing a
hand on one side of her face, he quickly bent over and kissed her.
Time
suddenly seemed to stop.
The class
gasped, catcalls were heard, people whistled – essentially …the room became
total chaos.
“Shinji,
you lucky bastard…”
“When did
you guys ever hook up?”
“Way to
go man!”
“Damn!
Who would’ve thought that? ”
“Have you
guys done it yet?”
Questions
and comments filled the room in an instant to the point where Shinji couldn’t
even make out any of the sentences they said due to the sheer volume. However,
as shocked as the class was at this revelation, they were even more so when
their attention shifted specifically to Rei. Her eyes went wide and her cheeks
flushed with a shade of crimson red; feelings of surprise and embarrassment
clearly expressed on her face.
Trying to
tune out the class, Rei broke the kiss and turned away towards the window again,
her face still flushed. Shinji basically jumped back towards his desk,
wondering what the hell he’d just done.
Enjoying
this moment, Kensuke and Touji just looked at each other, a big smirk on each
of their faces.
To put
their friend in this situation was one thing - but to put Shinji Ikari, the Eva
Pilot who defeated demonic angels once and again, the same Shinji Ikari who
couldn’t defend himself from the barrage of questions coming from his
classmates, was quite something else.
Oddly
enough, the sensei, with his back turned to the students the entire time, was
still continuing to give his lecture, oblivious to what all was happening ….
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After
having told the sensei about the ‘events’ during class today, Hikari
assigned clean up duty to both Shinji and Rei that afternoon. Since the sensei
did not actually see these events, he considered that he couldn’t be a fair
judge on disciplinary action, so he trusted the class representative to choose
the repercussion.
Thinking
about what she knew of Shinji’s personality, she highly doubted that he would
have done anything so rash by himself.
More than
likely he was dared to do it by one of his friends, so clean up duty seemed
like the most lenient thing she could offer.
However,
something else bothered her.
After seeing
what Shinji did today, should she tell Asuka what happened? Even though the
redhead said that she didn’t like Shinji, her own feminine instincts told her
otherwise…
How would
her best friend react to the news? Would, she be sad? Angry? Jealous? Both?
Should
she even tell her?
Either
way though, she knew that Shinji unfortunately would be receiving the sharp end
of the spear.
Walking
into the classroom, she saw Rei sitting at her usual desk, seeming staring at
something outside. Walking up to the girl, she placed a mop and bucket in front
of her.
“I’m
sorry about this Rei, I know you didn’t do anything but …well …”
Rising
from her desk, Rei picked up the cleaning tools, not really listening to the
class representative.
Frowning
slightly, Hikari felt it rude for the Eva pilot to just ignore her like that.
About to say something about it though, she knew that the girl just wasn’t a
very social person. In fact, she couldn’t recall her ever talking to anyone
besides Shinji or Asuka, and even then, she had only exchanged a few phrases.
Pushing those thoughts aside, she then walked over to a rather worried looking
Shinji and pulled him outside of the classroom.
“What the
heck were you doing today?” Hikari whispered.
He
sighed, turning his gaze to the floor.
“Isn’t it
pretty obvious?”
Hikari
raised an eyebrow.
“Do I
detect a note of sarcasm?”
Shinji
blushed.
“I’m
sorry. I didn’t mean to sound rude … it’s just that today’s been rather … hectic.”
Hikari’s gaze
softened. Hectic was a vast understatement in her opinion.
“I
understand.”
Letting
him gather his thoughts, she waited for the dark haired boy to look back up.
“So …
what made you decide to kiss her, huh?”
Shinji
blushed even harder.
“I um …
well … you see …Touji and Kensuke …”
Hikari
waited a moment, but seeing that Shinji wasn’t going to finish his sentence, or
rather wasn’t going to finish it anytime soon, she already drew the obvious
conclusions.
“Touji
and Kensuke put you up to this didn’t they?”
He just
nodded.
Hikari
rolled her eyes. ‘I can’t believe those two sometimes’
“May I
ask the reason why they made you … “
Pausing
in mid-sentence, she shook her head.
“Nevermind,
I probably don’t want to know…”
Shinji
seemed to wilt with relief.
Pursing
her lips in thought, Hikari decided that she would talk with Touji about this
later. Even though it was just a joke, he and Kensuke should have known better.
“Well, don’t
worry. I’ll have a very … ‘stern’…talk with them about this. Sorry that I have
to assign you guys clean up duty.”
“It’s
okay.” Shinji said dryly.
Feeling
that this conversation wasn’t going to progress any further, Hikari let out a
slight sigh.
“Well, I
have to head back to the house now. I guess I’ll see ya tomorrow for class …
…hopefully
on time…” She teased.
Shinji
just lowered his head even further.
“Bye
Shinji.”
“Wait.”
Hikari
turned back around.
“What is
it?”
“Ummm…”
Shinji started. “Could you not tell Asuka what happened today?”
Hikari
frowned. ‘I knew that he would ask about this sometime.’
“Why not
Shinji? She is my best friend you know.”
Shinji’s
mind raced to think up of a response. “I realize that, but could you please
not?
She
didn’t seem very convinced.
“I’d
never hear the end of this from her.” He added hastily.
Hikari
thought about it a moment. ‘Well, she bound to find out about it sooner or
later. I guess I don’t need to tell her yet…’
“Ok, I
won’t. But if you pull anything like this again, even if Touji and Kensuke dare
you too, I’ll tell her every single detail of what I saw today.”
Shinji
dramatically bowed in relief.
“Thanks
Hikari.”
“No
problem, but remember what I said.” Giving him a quick smile, Hikari turned
around and swiftly disappeared down the hallway.
Letting
out a breath he’d not even realized he’d been holding, Shinji walked back into
the classroom.
Upon
entering, he immediately spotted Rei cleaning the floor. As she also looked up
to see him, they both unknowingly stared at each other for a second. Blushing
for what seemed like the umpteenth time that day, Shinji turned his gaze
downward, picking up his mop to begin cleaning the floor.
Had he
not turned away from Rei so quickly though… he would have noticed that she had
continued to look at him, her face also expressing a light tone of timidness…
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Shinji and Rei had mostly worked in
silence as the time passed by, both of them taking occasional discreet glances
at each other. Shinji wanted to say something to her, to explain what happened
today, but simply …well… couldn’t gather up the courage to do so. He knew that
if this bad been someone else…specifically a certain redhead…he would have been
in the hospital by now. However, Rei seemed to be pretty calm about it. If
anything, she appeared as if nothing had even happened today. Then again, to
his knowledge, she always appeared composed.
Stretching his neck, he turned to
look up at the ceiling.
‘How am I going to tell this
to…’
“Why did you kiss me today?”
His line
of thought broken, Shinji paused, not really knowing how to respond.
Of course
he knew the reason why he kissed her, but it might hurt her feelings if
he told her the truth.
So, in a
compromise, he gave his usual ‘strategized’ answer.
“I don’t
know.”
Knowing
that his reply probably wouldn’t suffice, he unconsciously started cleaning the
floor even harder.
‘Think
Shinji! Think!
Seeing
movement out of the corner of his eye, Shinji turned to look at her again, and saw
that her gaze was still fixed on him.’
Putting
down her mop, Rei slowly started to walk towards him, her eyes continuously
staring into his.
Shinji
nervously sat down at a desk, his legs feeling like they were about to buckle.
Pushing
his mop off the desk, Rei stopped in front of the third child and leaned over,
her face bare centimeters from Shinji’s.
‘Is
she going to slap me?’ He thought,
his mind flashing back to the incident on the escalator when he insulted the
commander.
Not that
a slap would be the worst thing in the world, but …
“Do you
like me Shinji?”
He almost
fell out of his chair.