Chapter 55:
White Coat Party

 

“NO, I’M NOT GOING,” Asuka said.

Toji thought she would’ve been interested, at least. He took out a tablet and showed her pictures of the high school he and Six had been in that afternoon, though he wasn’t entirely convinced that he hadn’t dreamed the entire episode.

“Ya sure about that? Shinji’s in there.”

The last time Asuka had seen Shinji, he was a giant of light carrying the entire weight of Yomotsu Hirasaka on his back. Now he was sitting in class as if nothing had happened.

“Now you’re interested.”

“Is he so lonely that he has to haunt our school now? Besides, you haven’t told me why Hikari was in the Euro Eva—”

Asuka stopped when she saw Hikari in Rei Six’s picture. She wasn’t supposed to be anywhere near Tokyo-3. She also noticed Kaji’s former assistant at Nerv’s intelligence division. Kensuke was there, and none of them were happy to see him.

Asuka didn’t know what had transpired on Earth after her recon mission to the moon, but she retained none of the

memories of her time as an Eva synthesis, either. All of this came as a surprise to her, but Toji had to move her along.

“Never mind that. Look at the classroom.”

Misato, Fuyutsuki, and the other commanding officers at Nerv Japan didn’t show much interest in the classroom. Apparently, this strange anomaly was using images from Shinji’s residual consciousness to produce images that other observers would be comfortable with.

But they were adults and as such were prone to giving up on lost causes.

Shinji was dead to them.

He’d escaped death so many times in the past. Even Toji had been ready to accept his fate when Super Eva had turned into a pillar of salt.

But again, Shinji had managed to return. Toji thought he had enough faith for one more run. He’d come to Asuka because he needed an accomplice.

“What are they wearing?” Asuka asked about the uniforms.

“Doesn’t really matter. That’s what we’ll be wearing when we step into the classroom.”

 

<<The classroom is Shinji’s dream,>> Shinji’s mother had said, under Cinq’s likeness.

The intelligence division had discovered that the black uniform everyone wore in the classroom had originally belonged to Yui. Shinji might be the dreamer, but his mother had influenced the setting.

“This uniform’s so frumpy it looks like it belongs in the last century. I wouldn’t be caught dead in it. I’m not going.”

“Can you please not think about fashion for a second?”

Toji jabbed at Asuka, while Little Rei Six laughed at her, lips red with tomato sauce. “Frump, frump!”

Not a trace of foreign organic data was left in Asuka’s body. The newly reconstituted seventeen-year-old had regained her individuality, but her physical form was far from stable. Sometimes, the outline of her figure blurred into particles and only regained their solidity when she gasped herself back into existence.

Asuka received a welcome worthy of anyone who’d been assumed dead. Everyone was shocked to see her in one piece. Misato had hugged her for longer than she ever had.

Now she was in the Ayanami tuning room along with Trois, Six, and U.S. Eva pilot, Mari.

Her organic data had been in a state of turbulence for a long time, and she’d been exposed to a space battle right after that. Her vitals were now being monitored in the white room filled with machines.

They had to wait a long time for the procedure to finish. The main reason was that the one conducting the tests, Ibuki Maya, chief of the science and engineering divisions, had been preoccupied with something in the cage. Even Toji didn’t know what she was up to.

And so the girls enjoyed a slumber party in the sterile environment. Toji felt incredibly awkward walking in on them when all he wanted was to check up on Asuka.

Asuka, Rei Trois, Rei Six, and even Mari were all in white coats. They sat on the floor in a circle, feet bare and hair down.

Misato had warmed up several frozen pizzas as a treat for what Rei Six was calling Asuka’s homecoming party.

The biggest surprise was Mari, pilot of the U.S. Eva. She was as small as Six and stayed very close to Asuka, mumbling under her breath.

She’d completely changed. The cat ears on her head were no more. Like Asuka, she’d been broken down and reconstituted by the spatial lens. When she materialized at the convergence point, what appeared wasn’t a test subject with a horde of animals spliced into her DNA, but a healthy little girl.

Anyone would’ve clapped their hands at such a happy ending, but not everyone could enjoy happiness when it was given to them. Mari felt lost without her pack, and she clung to Asuka like a gosling to a mother goose.

Trois picked the salami off her pizza—she’d never liked it—and gave it to Mari. The little girl eyed the meat cautiously before wolfing it down.

“Woof!” she announced.

“Woof!” Trois repeated back to her and wondered if the girl was finally enjoying herself.

“I have no idea what’s going on here.” Toji cleared his throat.

I can’t be too pushy, or I’ll lose them.

“You know, the Shinji in that classroom looked like he didn’t remember any of you.”

That might be too obvious…

“He what?”

Nope, that was perfect! Toji kept his face like a stone to prevent himself from grinning and slapping his knee.

Easy now…

The red fish had taken the bait. While Asuka no longer wanted any special treatment, she doggedly maintained that everyone should be treated according to their merits.

Rei Trois noticed that Toji’s statement was a bluff to enlist Asuka’s aid.

Six, the only one who’d been present in the classroom the entire time, said, “Really? I don’t think he—”

Before she could reveal the truth, Trois shoved a plastic fork loaded with pickled jalapeno into her open mouth.

“Gaah!”

Six’s hair stood on end as if something had just exploded in her face. She was sensitive to spicy foods. The pulse on her monitors spiked, stirring Azuchi, who was sleeping beside her.

Trois knew she couldn’t help Shinji on her own. She also knew that Asuka wouldn’t sit idly by and do nothing. She debated whether burning her little sister’s taste buds had been the right thing to do.

Not a mistake.

But she couldn’t help feel a certain degree of frustration at letting Asuka do all the work for her.