Truth or Dare
By Crimson Goddess

Stage 6: Starting Over

-(A few days later)-

The Third Child hadn’t even registered what had happened in the past days. His life had finally become a complete schedule. Wake up, go to school, go to NERV Headquarters, and go home. He just repeated it over and over again, not caring about how long it had been or what was happening around him. When there was an Angel, that’s when he’d care. Only because that would be when people treated him nicely so he could be their little puppet and pilot to save their miserable lives.

It’s not like it had been that long, though. Not more than a week. He had simply grown further from the world and its inhabitants, more so than he already had when we was back in Tokyo-3. He hadn’t allowed Asuka to approach him either. She had tried repeatedly through different ways—following him at NERV, talking to him over the comm during harmonics tests, through computer messages, knocking on his door… None of them had worked. He simply wouldn’t listen.

He had never felt so betrayed by those around him. For a few days, Asuka had become the center of his life, even if she didn’t know, and he had started thinking maybe it would be would to open up, like he had to Asuka. That he actually had a reason to live for, that the world wasn’t simply another circle from hell.

A simple slumber party game had proved him completely wrong.

Even Misato, the person he trusted the most before Asuka, had betrayed him. He had nothing else. He turned on his side in the bed, trying to avoid the bitter memories… But he could not.

-(A few days ago)-

“We’re going to deal with this already,” Misato said seriously, sitting on the kitchen table. Asuka and Shinji sat on opposite sides, the former looking down and not daring to look at Shinji, while he simply looked away unenthusiastically.

“Shinji, Asuka’s not the only one you should blame here,” Misato started in a firm tone of voice. “If you’re going to find out the truth, you’ll find it completely. Asuka wasn’t the one who said she’d kiss you as a dare.” Even the sound of it made her shudder. “I… I was the one who put that dare on her.”

Shinji’s eyes shot wide open as he immediately turned, looking at the Major in complete surprise. Words wouldn’t come out of his mouth; he was far too stunned to ask anything and his eyes themselves were already inquiring for an explanation.

“Her dare was to kiss you…” Her eyes narrowed slightly. “…without making you suspect anything. So one way or another, she’d have to earn your trust.”

Shinji shook his head in disbelief, his expression progressively turning into a frown. “I can’t believe this, Misato… You? Of all people who could have done this to me, it was you?” He stood up suddenly, clenching his fists tightly. “I trusted you, Misato, almost as much as I had started trusting Asuka! You were the only one I could talk to since I got to this horrible place, and you’ve done this to me!”

Misato could do nothing but shamefully look down and keep whispering softly, “I’m so sorry, Shinji… I thought this would work, I thought it would be for good…”

But Shinji simply wasn’t listening. Feeling as angry as deceived, he walked back to his room, not before listening to Asuka talking to Misato in a quiet voice, “Did you make me be here just for that? To see Shinji suffer even more?” He heard the chair being slid; obviously Asuka had stood up as well. “That’s so nice of you, Major Katsuragi.”

Then, he simply headed back to his room before the redhead caught him eavesdropping in the middle of the hallway. Besides, he didn’t think he wanted to see her face for some time… Unless it was completely necessary.

The boy sighed, hearing someone knock on the door. He barely rolled his eyes at it, putting his pillow over his head to drown the sound, but the visitor simply insisted.

“Go away!” Shinji muffled, not in the mood to receive anyone.

Instead of complying, whoever was at the other side of the door just knocked harder, apparently losing their patience. Shinji stood up in annoyance, opening the door ready to drive away at the person who was at the other side. At first he had thought it was Asuka in another attempt to fix things, but he found no one. Looking down, he found the warm-water penguin that happened to reside in their apartment as another member of their dysfunctional ‘family’. By his looks, and the way he carried his food plate with one paw, he was quite hungry and wanting to be fed, having been neglected for the last few days.

Shinji was somewhat disappointed. ‘Pen-Pen… Of course. I should have known,’ he thought halfheartedly as he closed the door to his room, picked the plate from the bird and walked to the kitchen to take care of the creature.

He practically shut off the rest of the world as he opened the fridge and pulled out the frozen fish, then turned on the stove and started warming the food. Since he really had nothing to do in his room he decided to make a better meal to Pen-Pen to make it up to him for the last days. After all, it would seem he was the only one who at least respected Shinji in Tokyo-3.

He pulled out a wooden base and started chopping vegetables, a bit more aware of what he was doing. He could always concentrate perfectly when he cooked; it was calming and relieving for him, and he actually knew how to do it, unlike the rest of the members in the household.

The Japanese boy was rather startled when he heard familiar footsteps approaching. He had wanted to be alone in the kitchen, at least while he was feeding Pen-Pen, but considering his luck was terrible, he couldn’t expect even a bit of peace.

The red-haired German said nothing, and simply opened the refrigerator, apparently looking for dinner. Like always, it was full of instant food since Misato had been the last one to go shopping. She picked up a small pizza and put it in the microwave, crossing her arms as she waited for it to be ready.

The silence was incredibly uncomfortable for both. And ironically enough, their hardest task was to stay silent. Both of them wanted to scream out at the world what they were feeling, to let out all the repressed emotions of the last days. But they couldn’t, and simply kept it all for themselves. Like they had always done.

“You eating?” Asuka asked in a barely audible voice, trying to use as little words as possible as she pushed the ‘end’ button on the oven and pulled out their meal, which albeit being instant, smelled quite good. She put it on the table and sliced it, serving her own pieces on her plate.

Shinji obviously was going to reject the invitation, but he couldn’t lie to himself by saying he wasn’t hungry. He hadn’t eaten much during breakfast and now it was already past lunch. He ‘hmm’ed in acknowledgement. He didn’t have to talk to her, or look at her—he’d just bite, chew and swallow. Nothing else.

He finished with the penguin’s food and put the meal on the floor as Pen-Pen started devouring it like he hadn’t eaten in weeks. And considering all he had eaten had been Misato’s food… It was like ending in the negative side of the –food+food scale.

The dark-haired boy sat on his normal chair in front of Asuka, looking down at the pizza on his plate and avoiding the redhead’s look at all cost. If he didn’t, he’d break down, and he knew it.

The girl wasn’t making it any easier. On a moment she looked at him, on another she looked away like she was considering something. Shinji knew she could have nothing good in mind. She never did. However, he decided to ignore it and continued eating nonchalantly. What the Second Child did or didn’t do was none of his business, unless, of course, it had something to do with him.

And it did.

Just when Shinji had reached with his hand to pick up the oregano that was placed in front of him, he had felt something warm over it; something he had felt before. Something that had taken him to the paradise he had always wanted, that had made him feel like he never had. Something he had always dreamed for and he had lacked during his whole life—a hand. Asuka’s.

As he looked up to her eyes, he knew it hadn’t been an unintentional act, a coincidence. She, as far as he could tell, was being sincere. Then again, so had she supposedly been last time. He gathered all his willpower not to simply stay there dumbfounded and tried to remove his hand, but Asuka’s gripped him tightly. It wasn’t that he wasn’t strong enough, but that he knew he wanted to feel her hand again. And his body wouldn’t obey his thoughts as much as he tried.

She stared deeply into his eyes. “Shinji, please… please don’t do this,” she asked in a very soft voice.

Shinji shook his head, his voice nearly drowning on his throat. “No… You have no right to ask me anything… no right… whatsoever.”

Asuka sighed, removing her hand and at the same time a huge weight of tension over Shinji. “I know I don’t, but Shinji, I’m so sorry about this.” She looked down. “I didn’t mean to hurt you this way… I didn’t want to this to happen.”

Shinji wanted to reply, but his eyes were already blurring with tears. He decided to stay silent; say nothing and wait for her to say everything she wanted to say before he did.

Asuka bit her lower lip, finally looking into his eyes sincerely. “At first I did, yes. I wanted to do this just to hurt you, just like you had hurt me.” She paused, seeing how he was quite startled, obviously not knowing how he had hurt her. “When you surpassed my scores… It was everything I had, yet you took it away, and it hurt.” She swallowed. “But then… it changed. I started knowing you… I learned so many things about you… I knew it wasn’t your fault. You didn’t mean to surpass me; you didn’t do it with the purpose of hurting me.”

Shinji looked away, knowing it was true. Asuka held up his chin gently, obliging him to keep looking at her blue eyes. At the moment, they were truly being windows of the soul. “Shinji.” She hesitated, but continued, “Shinji, I don’t want you to hate me… I don’t want to be your father; I don’t want to make you miserable. I… don’t want to abandon you.”

Shinji’s tears now ran freely down his cheeks. “But Asuka, you betrayed me… I trusted you… I trusted you like no one else. And you were with me just because of a game.” He took a deep breath. “I liked being with you… I could tell you everything. And it was all worth nothing. For some time, you became the center of my universe, and then shattered it, like they all do.”

Asuka soothingly wiped away his tears. “I’m sorry… I truly regret doing that.”

Shinji sniffed. “How… how can I know if you’re saying the truth now? I don’t know you anymore.”

Asuka stood up and sat beside him, taking his hand once more. This time it wasn’t half as uncomfortable, it was calming for both of them. “I’m telling you the truth. You… you’re not the only one who finally found someone who understood you in the universe… I did too. I never open up as much as I did to you—at least not normally. You understood what I feel because you’ve gone through it before. When we were in the park… I told you the truth. That’s really what I think about you. You have lots to give to everyone, lots of virtues you never show to anyone else.”

She smiled slightly as she saw him actually considering what she was saying and not simply denying everything. As if he was actually going to let her have his trust and vice-versa. “So… Would you give me another chance, Third Child?” Her smile widened.

Shinji narrowed his eyes as he studied her. “Is this real… or just another game of Truth or Dare?”

“Only if the dare is for you to forgive me and then show you I care,” she said with a grin.

Shinji’s tears gradually stopped their flow. “You didn’t answer the question.”

She nodded. “I know I didn’t.” She leaned forward, closer to his ear. “Because you know I’m being honest.”

Knowing she had already convinced him and interpreting his satisfied sigh as a ‘yes’, she moved her lips away from his ear and gave him a simple kiss on the cheek, whispering her thanks before she stood up and left.

The boy merely stayed on his seat, rubbing his hand gently against his cheek doing something he hadn’t done in a long time—smiling.

It had been very frustrating for Misato having to deal with Shinji’s situation from afar for the last days. She wanted to help doing whatever she could, but before Shinji there was something as hard as a brick wall that wouldn’t let her come through. An actual brick wall. Shinji’s room.

Every day, when she came back home, he was always sheltering himself inside of his room and wouldn’t let anyone in or simply ignore them. She understood he was mad to both of them for what had happened, but if none of them helped, who would? As far as she was concerned, Shinji’s friends had tried to help him at school but he hadn’t really listened to them.

That was the main reason why she was so surprised when she entered her apartment and saw Shinji out in the balcony looking at the city. It had been quite a while since the Third Child had last gone there for anything, so she didn’t waste any time, threw her jacket aside on the couch and then went out with him.

“Hi, Shinji,” she greeted, trying not to interrupt his thoughts too abruptly.

He barely turned around to look at her as he leaned on the railing. “Welcome home, Misato.”

Slightly startled by his attitude, she approached him even more and leaned beside him, her look coming to stop at the city lights and buildings as well. It wasn’t that she had nothing to say, but her mind had become turmoil and she didn’t know where to start.

“I’m sorry about what happened,” she confessed. “I shouldn’t have.”

Shinji studied her curiously, then looked away once more. “I… know you are.” He hesitated before continuing. “I wanted to talk to you… to thank you.”

Misato blinked, now looking at him questioningly enough for him to keep talking without her having to ask what he meant.

“Things didn’t turn out the way you planned them to, but it wasn’t your fault,” he cleared up. “You were taking a big risk… And you did it for me, and for her. At least you tried to do something good for both of us.”

Misato shook her head. “You shouldn’t thank me for that. I should have never played with both your feelings for something that had a probability of less than 0.00001 of success in the end.”

Shinji laughed softly to himself. “You’re starting to sound like Doctor Akagi.” Receiving a blush and an eye-roll from the Major in reply, he continued, “But you did it with a good intention. It’s the feeling that counts… Although it was wrong of you to risk so much.”

Major Katsuragi nodded, then grinned vaguely. “So, tell me, Shinji… Did it work?”

The Japanese boy took his time to reply. “It’s complicated… I learned a lot of things with this. With Asuka, I opened up, I told her things even I didn’t know… Through music. And she understood. I learned to trust her, as she learned to trust me, and comprehend my emotions. Maybe from now on I could learn how to understand her. And maybe then… We could extend those feelings to other people not to be alone anymore.” He smiled. “But for now, I think it’s just going to be Asuka and I.”

Misato smiled back, wondering why she felt so proud of the child before her. “I’m glad to hear that. There are wounds in life you can only heal by comparing them to someone else’s.” She stepped away from the railing and stretched. “I suppose you two made up?”

Shinji nodded with a faint smile.

“That’s relieving… I hope things turn back into what they were before very soon. And it’s nice to see you feeling good, kiddo.” She ruffled Shinji’s hair as she winked and walked in from the terrace. “G’night.”

The Second Child had never had the need to go to Ayanami’s apartment. When she didn’t go to class they always sent Shinji or Touji to take her homework to her, and had they given it to her she would have tossed it in the trash and walked back home. On this occasion, however, it wasn’t about homework, NERV or school. It was about something much more relevant.

Asuka pressed the intercom button, still wondering how Rei could live here with all the noise and the junk the construction nearby left in the surroundings. Besides, the building was practically disintegrating.

The owner of a familiar pair of crimson eyes opened the door for her—eyes that narrowed when the girl noticed whom she was receiving in her living quarters. She didn’t open it any further, waiting for Asuka to bring whatever she wanted to bring and then leave.

“Do you require anything, Pilot Sohryu?” Rei asked bluntly.

Asuka, however, didn’t feel intimidated by her attitude. She had come for the reason she had come and she wasn’t about to leave. “Yes. I need to talk to you. Can I come in?”

Rei shot a disapproving glare at her, but then simply opened the door and walked in, waiting for Asuka to follow. She sat on her bed, hoping for the redhead’s speech to finish as fast as possible. Asuka simply stood in front of her, not feeling very comfortable in the atmosphere.

“I… came to apologize, Ayanami,” she said rapidly, never having been good when it came to apologies. “I’m sorry for lying to you. That was far below the belt.”

The blue-haired pilot was rather surprised by the redhead’s words. “It was,” she agreed. “And I accept your apologies. But I think you need to speak to Shinji instead of speaking to me. He is far more hurt than anyone else because of what you did to him.”

Asuka looked away. “I know he is. And I wanted to tell you… I didn’t mean to hurt him that way. At first I needed a reason to do so, but then I simply did it because of the confusion of the moment. I didn’t mean to hurt him… At all.”

Rei tilted her head to the side. “Were you being true when you asked me to keep Major Katsuragi away?”

Asuka was slightly taken aback. “I… don’t know.”

“I see.” Rei stood up, ready to join Asuka to the door again. “I hope you do not play with Shinji’s feelings again. He is a sensitive being and needs love, not betrayal.”

Asuka rolled her eyes. “I won’t,” she said in a low voice.

They were both relieved the visit was over. Rei didn’t want this visitor in her home, nor did Asuka wanted to be a guest… or intruder in it.

Days passed in a mostly normal way. Normal for us pilots, anyway. Shinji and I kept talking like we did before, just trying to give personal space to each other every once in a while to be sure things were going okay. Misato and I promised never to play that game from hell again… and Pen-Pen is now at least a bit more taken into account. I think the poor thing was already thinking of running away.

Asuka came out of the shower and put on her towel, then wrapped her hair with another one. With a very active train of thought, she got dressed in her normal home attires, her yellow shirt and blue shorts, and walked out of the bathroom to allow the other members of the household to have some time of their own in it.

Shinji and I have gotten closer, but have decided to take some time before starting a real relationship. After what happened last time, I can’t blame him…

She tossed the bag of clothes on her bed and closed the door to her room as she walked outside. Shinji was currently doing the cleaning, which was quite a hard task since Misato had gone frenzy the night before playing one of those beer-drinking games of hers. The cans of beer were still scattered around the floor, but that was something the fourteen-year-old redhead was not aware of. Her mind was elsewhere.

His friends and I still don’t get along well, and I don’t think we ever will. They don’t trust me, and I don’t expect them to do so either. It’s hard for them after I betrayed him, but I don’t care. As long as Shinji trusts me, I’m sure they won’t influence him into leaving my side.

Asuka could tell Shinji was quite frustrated by Misato’s pile of trash all over the living room. He was the one who took care of all the cleaning in there, but she could at least be nice enough to put all her cans in a bag before she had left. The girl watched him, lifting an eyebrow in amusement, being weird of the boy to be frustrated about something.

I’ve seen sides of Shinji I never had, and it’s always been amusing to me. It’s funny to see him frustrated or cursing about something every once in a while, since he never does. And when he sees me he simply blushes, like he hadn’t wanted me to see that side of him.

Her amusement hadn’t allowed her to notice the can in front of her, or the boy pointing to it and ‘Asuka!’ing her. She felt it as she stepped on a cold, round object, and cursed at it for being, precisely, round. The can rolled in her opposite direction as she lost her balance and fell forward, falling over a surprised, crouching Shinji who lost his balance as well.

I had never truly kissed Shinji. The first time I did, boredom was ruling over me and I had only felt curiosity. The second time it had all been about games, prizes, losses, betrayals and pride.

Their lips only millimeters away, her heart pounding nervously against his, she doubted no more and using the impulse of the fall she closed the distance between them. It was a moment of pure bliss, as Shinji’s wide-opened eyes closed slowly, losing himself in her kiss and starting to accept it…

And return it.

After all that had happened and all I had gone through to kiss that wimpy boy and make him mine… After all the time I had waited for the moment when we had reached ‘that’ stage of the relationship… The first true kiss I received from his lips was an accident.

After they broke, no words were exchanged. They were superficial, and not required for them. This time, it was Shinji who leaned forward to kiss her.

An accident? Misato’s can in front of the hallway was suspicious. So was Shinji cleaning in frustration, knowing I’d be too amused to notice the can there. Was it true… or a dare?

And she accepted and returned it.

It was true.

Author's Notes: Hundreds, thousands, tons of thanks to KawaiiChare, Weltall Elite and Autophage for pre-reading this for me. You guys rock and rock hard and loud. If you have any comments, don't hesitate and leave them here, or send them right over to my e-mail... I love receiving feedback, constructive and honest criticism. I hope reading this fic was as enjoyable for you as it was for me to write it. Drop me a line.