#then finally when her and shinji come back he strangles her!! he also strangles her in that weird trippy part of the

[justnother-user]

No because it actually makes me sick to my stomach when I think about what happened to Asuka in EoE. Like when she reactivates her EVA and fights those units from Seele so it’s a 1v8(?). It’s just the fact that she does manage to fight all of them off only for them to come back and then they attack her and her EVA. And she can’t turn off that thing where if it happens to the EVA you can feel it. So this little girl is feeling them all takes shots at her and SHE GETS HER FUCKING EYE STABBED and she gets basically gutted by them. She’s holding her stomach and eye just screaming. Like I’ve seen the movie 3 times and I can hear her screams and idk. It’s just haunting to me, to know that she did try her best but was overpowered and that she was mutilated by them. And the fact that afterwards when they’re flying off holding the entrails of Asuka’s EVA (and presumably hers too) that Shinji sees it!!!! Like holy fuck that poor guy and poor Asuka like bbgirl did not deserve that.

[tharizdun-03]

this is actually a fairly good example of shinji's misogyny too and how he reduces them to objects for his needs.

shinji constantly tries to reduce the women in his life into neat categories: a mother figure to coddle him, a sexual object to gratify him, or some kind of emotional crutch that exists only for his benefit.

he has difficulties handling the reality of women as fully fleshed-out individuals with their own agency, motivations, and complexities. instead, he wants them to serve roles that make him comfortable.

in end of eva, asuka flat-out refuses to be reduced to a function of his desires. she refuses to be an object, refuses to be forced into the role shinji tries to assign her for his own needs.

earlier in the film, misato even calls shinji out for looking to asuka for rescue when he’s in mortal danger.

there's a whole reason instrumentality is presented allegorically as a return to the womb. evangelion wants shinji to move forward, not retreat into a fantasy world where women exist only to shield him from reality.

we, as viewers, should not be rooting for asuka to meet shinji’s delusional demands. the violence he enacts on her is absolutely misogynistic, and it stems from an attitude he's had since the start (rewatch ep 8 and 9, but he also makes comments about misato in the first episode)

asuka’s role in this scene is that of a victim who asserts her personhood and is met with brutality for daring to do so.

what shinji wants from asuka is often how female characters exist to serve the male lead in some idealized manner. and here that expectation leads to frustration, discomfort, and even outright anger in the man when the women refuse to play along.

shinji is not a heroic figure. he’s hesitant, anxious, and sometimes just unlikeable. the original tv ending was more optimistic, trying to show how viewers (particularly young men) could grow beyond these harmful attitudes and become better.

then the end of evangelion shows an uglier, more hopeless scenario. we see shinji committing horrendous acts of violence, making it impossible to ignore his misogyny. shinji chooses to harm asuka and there's no excuse.

asuka suffers 4 betrayals against her body in eoe. the film begins with a sexual assault, she is then slaughtered, shortly after strangled, and then concludes with strangulation again. shinji is (directly or indirectly) central to all instances of violence against her.

asuka’s anger, her "tsundere" traits, are rooted in deep trauma and unhealthy coping mechanisms. but even then, asuka is more together than shinji in many ways, and she fights her way back to a form of empowerment.

she reconnects with her mother’s presence within the eva, comes into her own strength, and literally battles until the bitter end. shinji, meanwhile, wallows, lashes out, and commits sexual violence. that’s the clearest possible indictment of his perspective here.

one of the best moments illustrating the show’s attitude toward this dynamic is also when rei defies gendo; her abuser. it’s rei finally rejecting the role of a doll, the ultimate display of refusing objectification.

gendo himself is a bit of a cautionary tale, what shinji could become if he remains trapped in fear, depression, and entrenched sexism. shinji’s attitudes -- his discomfort, resentment, and attempts to subjugate women -- could solidify into the cold, calculated misogyny of gendo.

if left unchecked, that is. and i like shinji, but not because he’s a good person. rather, because he’s interesting and deeply flawed. simplistic critiques that paint him as infp soft boy or cowardly miss the mark. his misogyny is central to his flaws too.

and evangelion is littered with terrible men. misato’s father neglecting his family, asuka’s father cheating and ridiculing his wife, and gendo exploiting everyone he can. all of them leave scars on children.

ofc gendo stands out because he’s a serial manipulator and abuser who wields sexual violence as a tool. he views asuka, ritsuko, rei, and misato as disposable objects. shinji is given every chance to do better than gendo yet we see echoes of that same mindset in shinji’s actions.

only when asuka starts valuing herself, coming into her own and shedding the desperation for shinji’s attention, does shinji violently intrude on her boundaries. when asuka calls him out for objectifying her, shinji responds with rage.

asuka’s growth is met with an attempt to reduce her back to an object, and when that fails, he literally tries to kill her. there are a lot of feelings going on in the film that aren't just misogyny, but it is still a reaction to her not serving his needs.

and asuka is consistently disempowered in the series through objectification. misato, kaji, gendo, even kensuke’s exploitation through voyeurism (the photos of her in her underwear).

by end of evangelion, shinji’s lack of empathy for the women in his life is a key point. the final scene, asuka’s gentle caress after shinji tries to kill her, should flip the initial assumptions we might have had about who’s cruel and violent.

Shinji sees sex as a way to "become one" with others, blending Misato, Asuka, and Rei into a bland, homogenized soup of women. But becoming one with others is not the same as actually knowing and being with others as individuals; a theme that comes back big-time in End of Eva.

[a-student-out-of-time]

Twisted Sister Arc Review Part 3

Prison Break

And with this we are finally coming to an end here. Again, apologies for breaking this into 3 parts but I doubt you guys wanted to read about 5k words in one sitting so it’s easier for you to digest. I also feel like I’m not doing a review like this in a long time. Anyway, time’s a-wasting let’s get back to where we left off as we left the demonic guitar child to be mind gutted and to catch those criminals that got out!

With all the criminals running around the one question that is on everyone’s minds is ‘where’s Iroha’? Did she go back to Makoto or did she head home? The answer is, she went back to Makoto and the two having been making it out ever since. Their intense kissing session was interrupted by Nikei and Emma catching a bad guy that got too near the house, and not only does this mean that Nikei gets the confirmation that Iroha is alright, but also Makoto gets to meet Emma and Nikei for the first time. Emma and Makoto meeting went just as I suspected, given that Maku was cool with Makoto and due to how close Emma and Maku, there was little doubt that Emma was gonna approve of Makoto. Nikei though, his reaction shocked a lot of people. I’m guessing since that one dream got posted of Nikei putting a gun to Makoto’s head and threatening him, not helped with how trigger happy he still is, and also all the threats he’s made about Makoto already, for Nikei to be like ‘Sup bro, I’m cool’ means either Nikei was just joking all those times he threatened Makoto (likely) or Makoto’s just that pure of a person. Remember that in Class 78, Makoto was able to befriend literally everyone in his class, and Class 78 had a lot of people who were anti-social and had severe trust issues, so it says a lot about his character that he was able to connect with so many people, and the one person he didn’t connect with, he STILL tried to safe, it’s just Junko didn’t want to be saved and you cannot help someone who refuses it. And given that Nikei’s pretty good at reading people for who they are, he would have realised that Iroha would be in safe hands with him, and that all that worrying was unfounded. Also, Komaru, as expecting is 100% on board with Iroha’s relationship with her brother. When we Anons were suggesting for Iroha to hook up with Makoto, part of us worried how well Komaru would take it but seeing how well they got on, once Komaru finds out that Iroha thirsts for her brother, and I do mean thirst because you are very dirty minded girl, especially given that Komaru won’t be befriending Toko in this timeline so she needs a friend who has indecent thoughts, she would be like ‘yay go sister!’. At some point the other girls will get involved so let’s see when Makoto decides to create Cuddle Puddle 2.0. And even if that doesn’t happen, I can see Makoto by extension of him dating Iroha, hanging out with the Voids in general and giving them the Hopeness energy that he just emits which once Mikado decides to get involved, he is going to have a very hard time doing what he is doing.

That leads me to a thought experiment, what would happen if Makoto meets Utsero? If he starts hanging out with the Voids, and once Makoto becomes relevant to the ‘Saving teh world’ then, then the hunt of Utsero will commence at some point, and while I feel like Utsero won’t give a rat’s arse about his ‘children’, he’ll be quite interested in Makoto as Makoto is basically someone who is the complete opposite of him. Makoto has extreme bad luck rather than extreme good luck and while Utsero‘s entire life is derailed because of it and making him miserable and death seeking, Makoto has one of the most well-adjusted lives out of everyone in Danganronpa, both canon and fanon. Granted I could see Hajime and others screaming if it happens as they fear the world imploding from the sheer luck energy, but while Hajime and Utsero’s talk would be interesting, from a thematical standpoint, the talk between Makoto and Utsero would be more compelling. Also, another way Makoto could spite Mikado.

Anyway, moving Makoto and Iroha’s make out sessions aside back to bad guy wrangling where the QC, assisted by Fuyuhiko and Peko, start to assist the police with arresting all the criminals. This leads to a standoff between an arsonist and Tsurugi who mentions he has planted bombs somewhere…. oh dear…oh dear indeed. Recall the incident when Sasaki loses his life which was the triggering point for Tsurugi’s morality to go down…worrying paths. Now of course that wasn’t caused by a prison break but at this point, we have changed so many things timeline wise that the event could be caused by this, and the QC cannot afford to take any risks. So, when Hajime decides to tackle the bombs, he goes in with Tsurugi and the rest of the QC bar Sasaki from entering. And then shit hits the fan as the bomb goes off and Tsurugi and Hajime get hurt, though thankfully Hajime’s injuries are minor and while Tsurugi’s more severe, he’ll live. This is going to a major event for Tsurugi as before then he was very anti-Kasugano and wanted to arrest him on the spot, and would have done so earlier had the Prison Break not been a bigger concern. But now, Kasugano saved his life, had he not listened to him to hide, the bomb would have killed him. Sasaki is also probably going to have to talk to him about Juu, who is the bastard behind this whole thing. I feel like this isn’t over because not only does Tsurugi have to recover, he and Sasaki need to talk about what Sasaki feels about Juu, but also, I see a massive re-evaluation of values towards Kasugano as if Kasugano is a hypocrite like Tsurugi claims, why would he save his life? Sasaki did sort of guess almost accurately that the police is so corrupt that he has to take matters into his own hands. Shinji makes an appearance here as well and that’s glorious as seeing our Fire Daddy is always a nice thing to see. Mikan getting freaked out over Shinji’s lack of indoor voice is quite amusing as well.

And with that Hajime collapsed into a deep sleep due to all the smoke and everything that has occurred. It’s unknown how successful the QC are with dealing with the criminals, though the lack of mention of Storm concerns me because well…it’s the same prison he was held out and ever since Kyoji mentioned him, I’ve grown concern about him being relevant to the plot. Kyoji might keep telling us he won’t break out but I’m too savvy, when you mention a villain like that, they’re gonna escape it’s just a question of when. Kinda curious to see how Storm is handled as he is essentially a Villain OC. Sure, Junyu and Juu are but they were characters that appeared in canon or fanon, it’s just they weren’t fleshed out, but Storm is an original creation. Can’t wait to see when he shows up and how much I want to strangle him with his purple tie.

And thus, that’s the Twisted Sister Arc over and done with! Easily the most plot tense out of ALL the arcs that have been done as we had bad timelines, villains getting upgrades, serious questions getting answered and the character developments of some characters concluding and others showing they need progress. I will give this Arc an A. And its tied with Concert Arc as my overall favourite Arc, the only reason it doesn’t exceed Concert Arc is because of the whole ‘Yasuke-Multiverse-theory’ which knocks it down some points, though I do kinda blame the fact that Yasuke is generally that much of an arsehole anyway. Don’t expect my reviews to be this intense going forward and with the next arc, I hope I can cram all I want in a single submission. Until then, bye bye! - Review Anon

[animebw]

Ive been reading through your evangelion analysis and I agree with you on a lot of your thoughts when it comes to the show, but I don't really understand how you can ship asuka and shinji, it always seemed incredibly toxic to me, why do you think they are a good pairing?

“Alsoo ,what do you think of the rebuild movies?“

Hoo boy, that’s a loaded question. To be clear, I also think Shinji and Asuka are very unhealthy for each other... during the show itself.

See, what I’ve realized from thinking about Eva for so long is that Shinji and Asuka are kinda the same person. They’re both dealing with the same insecurities of self-loathing and depression, using their robots as a replacement for their self-worth and assuming that piloting the Eva’s all their good for. That’s what makes them so volatile together; they recognize themselves in each other. They can’t help but be drawn to each other by how much of themselves they see in each other. After all, out of everyone in this show, they’re the people who understand each other the best. But because they’re both so full of self-loathing, they also can’t bring themselves to actually risk that connection. If they acknowledge the other’s pain, that means admitting they have carry that same pain as well. So they’re both inextricably pulled toward each other and desperately pushed apart, and that tension results in misunderstandings, anger, and violence.

But under better circumstances? If they were able to start processing their trauma and worked up the courage to give human connection a shot? They might end up being the best possible thing for each other. Shinji could help Asuka work through her pain just as he’s working through his, and vice-versa. They understand each other on such a fundamental level, and if they were able to overcome their insecurities, they could give each other the perfect shoulder to lean on. And that’s what we start to see happening at the very end of End of Eva, imo. When Shinji tries to strangle her, she reacts by reaching out and offering a gesture of kindness instead of fighting back. She offers him a sign that she’s willing to meet him on a human level. And he accepts that sign by stopping the violence he’s enacting upon her. It’s evidence that after all the ways they’ve grown over the course of the series, they may finally be able to reach each other. That’s where the appeal of Asuka x Shinji comes for me; imagining how good they could be for each other if they continue to work through their issues together.

As for the Rebuilds, haven’t seen ‘em yet. I plan to watch them all in one big chunk once the final one finally drops, because Eva’s not the kind of franchise you can properly judge until it’s finished. It’s just too dense.

[takerfoxx]

IM Swiftly Descending Darkness, Chapter 8

Sorry this is coming late, but to be fair it’s longer than most, and I had a really busy weekend.

...

It was a nice night for a funeral.

It was a little past six in the evening, and the Sun had almost set. All day it had been bright and warm, with the sky being that perfect shade of blue that just beckoned everyone to come outdoors, the wind was gentle, and the air pleasantly balmy. And now that it was on its way out, it was leaving Gensokyo with an equally warm and pleasant evening.

Normally on days like that, the children would all be outside chasing each other across the field, napping in the shade of the trees, or roughhousing in the grass. Not on that day though. They were outside, yes, but they were instead gathered in the small copse of trees that they avoided at all other times.

It was there that those who had died in the orphanage were laid to rest, or at least those who had enough of their bodies recovered to allow for it.

Satoko stood in front of the freshly carved headstone, a tiered stone rectangle that reached up to her waist. In her hands was a small, black box. Haruna stood next to her left, with a paper lantern in her hands. Shion was at her right, holding a small bag tied with a piece of twine, which threaded through a pair of coins at the ends. Mokou was standing a little further back, Joshua next to her, little Akito in his arms.

As for the children, they were all present. All of those who had been taken by the spiders and those who had gone after them had woken up, and like Kohta, Rumia, and Haruko, none of them could recall anything about what had happened to them in the Bone Orchard. But something had happened to them, of that Mokou was certain. She had already sent word for the Hakurei Shrine Maiden to come, and until she arrived there was little they could do but watch and wait.

Personally, Satoko didn’t know how much she trusted Mokou’s judgment. After all, the woman was supposedly a centuries-old murderess. It wasn’t out of the question that she might be a little on the unstable side.

Still, there was something odd about them now. Now that they were all awake, they seemed so solemn, so quiet, even moreso then one would expect from traumatized children. The six of them were standing together, apart from the others. That had been at Mokou’s insistence. While Satoko understood the other woman’s concerns, she hated having to do that to them. The other children were whispering about them already.

At least they seemed normal now. Rumia and Keine were side-by-side, awkwardly shuffling their feet. Kana was also standing quietly, though every few seconds she started coughing. That was worrisome. She had been out the longest, and had felt the weakest upon waking up. According to Haruna, her slight frame had been damaged the most by the spiders’ venom, and she would be sick for some time. Kana had insisted that she was well enough to attend the funeral, but now Satoko was regretting not making her stay in at least. Haruko and Hayate were both softly weeping, mourning their friend. Kohta had his hand on Haruko’s shoulder, which was very kind of him, seeing how little they hadn’t gotten along before. Satoko wished that she had done more to curb the three girls’ meaner habits while Eiko was alive, but it was far too late for that now.

They waited, watching the Sun. It sank lower and lower, bleeding gold and orange into the horizon, its blood cleaning the sky away and allowing the stars to shine forth.

Finally it vanished fully, and night emerged. It was time.

Satoko took a deep breath, and she started singing. It was a song that her mother had taught her, who in turn had learned it from her mother, and so on. It was a song that was only sang by her family, when they failed in their duty to look after the small souls entrusted to their care. In other parts of Gensokyo, they sang other songs when laying their dead to rest. This one was theirs.

It was a song that thanked the gods and spirits for allowing them to look after the child during her time on Earth, and asked for forgiveness for not being up to the task. And it beseeched the river-guardian to bear the newly departed soul across, and for the Yamaxanadu to be kind.

When she was done singing, Satoko knelt down to place the box holding Eiko’s ashes in a small door set in the bottom of the headstone. Shion placed the bag she was holding right next to it, and the two slid the door shut. That done, Haruna lit the lantern she was holding and let it fly. It rose up higher and higher, to join the stars in the sky.

It was all completely symbolic of course. The bag was filled with stones and earth taken from the homestead grounds. By now Eiko’s soul would have already crossed the River Suzune, while the Shinigami that manned the ferry would have already been paid from the offerings the orphanage had made at various shrines over the years. But it was good to remind everyone that though Eiko was dead, she was alive and well somewhere else.

They watched the lantern sail higher and higher. It was good that the wind was so low, else it would probably be blown completely off course to get caught in a tree.

And then it burst into flames.

Haruko and Hayate both screamed as the burning scraps of paper rained down on them. So did some of the boys. Akito started crying. “Holy shit!” Rumia blurted out.

“What happened?” Haruhi cried. “Why did it do that?”

Mokou was already in motion. “Everyone back to the house!” she said. “Go on, go!”

“Wait, what just happened?” Kazuchika demanded. “Why’d it explode?”

“No clue, but we don’t want to wait around to find out. Move!”

Everyone hurried back to the house. The only sound came from Haruko, Hayate, and Akito, who were still softly crying. Satoko was deeply shaken. What had happened? Why had the lantern caught fire? Maybe Haruna had accidentally lit the balloon part with the matches.

(Her mouth finally fell open, and out crawled a fat-bodied black spider. It crawled up Eiko’s face, toward her eyes)

Or maybe it was something else, something much worse.

Then, as they were about halfway to the house, Dai leaned over to Yoshi and said in a loud whisper, “So…does that mean Eiko’s in Hell now?”

What happened next was comparable to a single thrown stone upsetting the balance of a the side of a hill to cause a rockslide. The moment the words were out of Dai’s mouth, a chorus of gasps went up and everyone spun around to stare at the boy. For his part, Dai immediately realized that his comment had been very unwise and his face turned red. However, before he could say anything in his defense, chaos erupted.

There was a strangled sound of pain, and then Haruko shrieked, “YOU LITTLE BEAST!” before launching herself at him. She knocked the younger boy over and began pounding at his face with both fists.

Yuuki, Yoshi, and Hiro all ran to their friend’s defense. Hiro managed to wrap his arms around Haruko’s neck and pull her back, though that didn’t stop her from clawing at Dai while shrieking.

Then a hand grabbed a handful of Hiro’s hair, and a fist drove into his face.

The fist belonged to Kohta, who had begun charging almost at the same time as Haruko. Hiro released Haruko’s neck and stumbled back. This of course drew the attention of Yoshi and Yuuki, who both ran in to tackle Kohta.

They were stopped though, stopped by Rumia and Hayate, who grabbed a boy each and, in synchronization, shoved the two of them backward. That allowed Keine charge in with a running tackle of her own. She drove both of her shoulders into each of the boys, taking them both off their feet and sending them flying back into the gob smacked older kids.

Things might have erupted into an all-out brawl right then and there, but that was when the adults finally intervened.

“STOP IT!” Haruhi screamed. “WHAT’S WRONG WITH YOU?! STOP!” Haruna and Joshua took more direct action, putting their bodies between the two groups and walling them off while Shion quickly pulled Dai away from the crowd before anyone else took a swing.

“HEY!” Satoko shouted. She whistled loudly, shutting down the yelling and drawing everyone’s attention. “What’s wrong with all of you? We’re being attacked by Human and youkai alike and just got done burying one of our own, and now you’re fighting each other?”

Haruka pushed her way past Mr. Joshua. “He said Eiko was in Hell!” she screamed as she jabbed an accusatory finger at Dai.

“No, I didn’t!” Dai shouted back. “I just asked if she was there, I didn’t say she was!”

“That…not really better,” Shinji said.

“Hey, seriously dude. What the hell?” Tomohiro added.

“I didn’t mean it like that! I was just…well, her lantern caught fire-”

“It was an accident!” Hayate said.

“-and she was always been pretty mean-”

“Go to Hell!” Haruko snapped.

“She was!” Now that he was put on the spot, Dai was determined to not back down. “And so were you! The three of you picked on me and Yoshi and Hiro all the time!”

“Dai,” Haruna said. “Shut your fool mouth. Right now.”

“There’s a time and place for everything, son,” Mr. Joshua added, laying a gentle, but firm, hand on Dai’s shoulder. “And that was completely out of line.”

Dai looked like he had been betrayed. “But-”

“All right, enough of the bullshit,” Mokou growled as she pushed herself into the center of the rabble. “Look, you’re kids. And kids fight, kids get mean sometimes, it happens. That doesn’t mean you’re damned to Hell just because you’re still young and a jackass. Otherwise, Hell would be a fucking boarding school.

“And for your information, Dai, no. No, Eiko did not go to Hell. You know how this works. When you die, your soul heads to the River Suzune, where it’s picked up by the Shinigami. And if you can pay the Shinigami’s price, she’ll boat you across to be judged by the Yamaxanadu. And this house donates fairly regularly to at least three different shrines to cover that very price, right? So, Eiko is set there. And as for her being mean, you’re right! She was. But she was a kid, just like the rest of you. And sure, the Yamaxanadu has a reputation for being kind of a hardass, but she’s also got a soft spot for kids, and isn’t about to send one to Hell unless they were genuinely evil right out of the womb, which Eiko was not.”

Despite Mokou’s logical dissertation, many of the kids looked unconvinced, which included Eiko’s friend Hayate, which was interesting. “How do you know?” she demanded, tears in her eyes. “How do you know she won’t? You saw what happened to the lantern! Do you know her?”

“What, the Yamaxanadu?” Mokou shrugged. “Yeah, a little.”

“What,” Hayate said, visibly caught flatfooted. She wasn’t the only one. Even Satoko, who already knew a thing or two about Mokou’s past, was taken back by this. Yamaxanadu Eiki Shiki wasn’t someone one made acquaintances of.

“I mean, I’ve never actually met her,” Mokou clarified. “But before coming here I’ve been known to do odd jobs for people, and she’s needed a thing or two done in the mortal world that needed a mortal agent.”

Hayate stared dubiously at her. “What kind of things?”

“Hunting down escaped evil spirits, mostly.” Mokou said. “Actually, she sent her Shinigami after them, and her Shinigami hired the Hakurei Shrine Maiden, and the Hakurei Shrine Maiden hired me because I knew the area better than she did, and I got to talk to both of them about the boss, but that’s getting away from the point, which is regardless of her attitude, and regardless of what you all thought of each other, Eiko did not go to Hell. She’s at peace in the Netherworld right now, and you two will get to see her again someday. But it’s my job to make sure that day is a long time from now, so let’s all get something straight: we have actual enemies now, which means that of this moment, you are all on the same side. No more dumb bickering, fighting, trying to get each other in trouble, that sort of thing.” To Dai, she said, “And Dai. Seriously. Time and place for everything. You don’t have to like Eiko, but-” Then she seemed to catch sigh of something over Dai’s head, and her voice trailed off. “Uh…huh.”

A group of men were approaching, men that Rumia did not recognize. There was five of them, and they had an air of purpose and authority about them. However, they weren’t wearing the sort of robes she had seen on village elders or the uniforms commonly sported by guards. Rather, they all had on simple, heavy brown robes with long hoods, ones that were kept down.

The one in the lead was the shortest and the plumpest, of comparable shape to Gendou Sonozika, though he had no beard or hat, and his greying hair framed his head like the mane of one of the lions from one of Joshua’s stories.

Satoko was immediately on her guard. She knew those men. She had seen them before, during her trips to the Human Village. And she knew who they followed.

“Ah, good afternoon,” the leader said in a high, squeaky voice, using that fake pleasant tone that grown-ups used whenever they were going out of their way to be condescending. He looked around at the group. “Ah, but perhaps not so good. What’s this, a fight? Well, if you can’t even go for a midday walk without turning on each other, then I guess that…incident in the market is to be expected.”

If Satoko had been angry before, then this brought that rage to a froth. “Seiya Kirisame,” she said. “One of Nathaniel Skinner’s stooges, if I recall. What are you doing here? You are not welcome, especially not today.”

Seiya Kirisame’s smirk grew wider. “So unwelcoming. Are you this surly even at home?”

“We’re coming back from a funeral, if you must know,” Satoko said.

That took Kirisame off guard. “Oh, ah, I’m…sorry to hear that. Someone from one of the villages that you were…friendly with?”

“One of the children,” Satoko said coldly. She watched Kirisame’s face intently. Mokou and Joshua had both said that the spiders had spoke of taking instructions from a Human, a small, plump Human with a squeaky voice, and this one certainly fit the bill.

Sure enough, Kirisame’s smirk disappeared completely. “Oh,” he said again. All of his smug bravado was gone, and he seemed utterly unsure of how to continue. “I…my condolences. Was it…an illness, or…”

“No,” Mokou said as she strode forward and placed herself between the men and everyone else. “A youkai attack, actually. From the Youkai Forest.

The blood drained from Seiya’s face. “A…oh.”

“Spider youkai, to be specific,” Mokou said. Her tone was casual, almost conversational despite the horrid things she was discussing. “Seven of our children were taken. We managed to get six back, but they had already…started when we got there.”

“Spider youkai…” Kirisame whispered.

“Yeah,” Mokou said, staring down into the man’s eyes. “Four of them.”

Kirisame swallowed. “And…what did you do with…said spider youkai?”

Mokou shrugged. “Dealt with ‘em. With prejudice.”

“And they killed one of your children?”

Satoko stepped forward to stand next to Mokou. “Justify your presence, or leave,” she said.

Kirisame didn’t respond. He seemed to be quite beside himself, having lost his line of thought and was mentally fumbling around to find it again. Even the men who had come with him were glancing at one another in discomfort.

“Final warning,” Mokou hissed. “Speak, or get out.”

One of Kirisame’s companions nudged him with his foot, startling him. He swallowed again, cleared his throat noisily, and said reached for something in his robe. “W-Well, this…is awkward then,” he said, pulling out piece of paper. “I am very sorry to have to bring this to you on this sad day but…here.”

He held the paper out. Satoko snatched it from his fingers scanned its message. When she looked up again at the messenger, her dark eyes could have rivaled Mokou’s in burning rage.

“We’re being banned from the village market?” she said. This kicked up murmurs and gasps of surprise from the children and their caretakers. Haruna said nothing, though the fingers of her fists squeezed so hard that everyone could hear her knuckles pop. As for Mokou, she merely looked over to Satoko and the letter in her hand. Then, moving with slow deliberation, she turned her gaze directly toward Kirisame, her hawk-like focus conveying far more malice than words ever could have.

“It was Leader Sonozika’s decision!” Kirisame protested, his words coming out as terrified squeaks. “In light of what happened last week-”

“Bullshit!” snapped Haruko. “They were the ones that started it!”

“That’s not what witnesses say!” Kirisame yelled back. He might have kept yelling at her, but then the same man who had nudged him before placing a steadying hand on his shoulder, likely to remind him that getting into a shouting match with a child would not be to his benefit. Taking the hint, Kirisame stopped himself and took a deep breath. When he had regained some measure of composure, he ignored Haruko and turned his attention back to Mokou. “And…you. Fujiwara no Mokou, is it?”

Mokou arched an eyebrow.

“Regardless of who was initially at fault, you did insult Leader Sonozika and his guard when he was just trying to clear things up,” Kirisame said. Now that he had gotten to his reason for coming, which was no doubt well-rehearsed, he seemed to be regaining some of his confidence. And his slime. “To say nothing of your threats to Brother Nathaniel!”

“Oh, did I hurt their feelings?” Mokou said. “Then why are you here and they’re not? If they got a problem with what I said, then fine. They can come here and punch me in the face themselves.”

Visibly annoyed by being literally talked down to by a woman, Kirisame tried to straighten up to his full, unimpressive height. “They are very important men, and-”

“But they ain’t kings,” Haruna said as she joined her friends in the center. She was of a more comparable height to Kirisame, but was packed with considerably more visible muscle than he. “And you’re forgetting how this works. Gendou Sonozika heads up the Human Village, sure, and he’s got some measure of authority outside of it. But he don’t rule it. He can’t tell the other settlements how to run their business. And he can’t ban nobody from something he don’t run. That’s up to the other village elders.”

Despite the fact that he and his mostly silent associates outnumbered the women directly confronting him five-to-three, Kirisame’s nerve was fast slipping. “I…I think you’ll find that the village elders hold Master Sonozika in considerably higher esteem then you give them credit for!” he cried. “Enough that-”

Joshua walked up to the trio and took his place next to Haruna, arms folding and dark eyes calmly staring right into Kirisame’s.

“-er, that-”

Shion took the spot next to Satoko.

“-I’m sorry, is this-”

Haruhi inhaled deeply to calm her nerves, but she went over to stand next to Shion.

“-are you threatening us?” Kirisame sputtered. “I’ll have you know-”

“Andrew,” Joshua said.

The name being as unfamiliar as it was, everyone on Joshua’s side all looked over to him in bewilderment. However, one of the robed and previously still figures visibly winced.

“Andrew, I know that’s you,” Joshua said. “Come on, kid. Take that hood down.”

A pause, and then the figure reached up to lower his hood. Beneath it was a young white man with untidy hair the color of straw and a face full of freckles.

“Andrew, why are you with these men?” Joshua said. “Intimidating orphans and trying to cut them off from help. Come on, kid. You know this isn’t right.”

Andrew nervously licked his lips. “B-But Brother Nathaniel says that y-you’ve been consorting with demons! He says that you’ll taint us all!”

“Nathaniel is a sad, broken man,” Joshua said. “He sees devils in the candle smoke and hears Satan’s whispers in the wind. And he now works to doom children. If I recall, Christ had quite a few things to say about men like him.”

“But there are demons out there!” Andrew protested. “There’s youkai, and spirits, and…actual demons, and-”

“Enough!” Kirisame spat. “Brother Andrew, it is not your place to speak. Put you hood back up and shut up!”

“But-”

“Do it!”

Andrew looked shaken, but he did what he was told.

“I think we’ve heard enough from you,” Satoko said. “You’ve delivered your message. And since it seems that you’re intent on exiling us from the rest of the Human population, I guess that just leaves us with this plot of land within our fences. So that means that you’re trespassing. So get out.”

“Hey, wait,” Kirisame said. “You can’t just-”

Mokou took a step forward, opened her mouth, and exhaled a torrent of fire right into the dirt road right at Kirisame’s feet.

That finally got the desired effect, and the five of them quickly fled, practically tripping over each other in their desperation to get away. Two of them took to the sky immediately, and the others were quick to follow.

As for Satoko and her family, they were more than a little gobsmacked. After all, it was one thing to know that Mokou was talented with fire magic, but having her literally vomit up flames on command? Now that would take anyone by surprise.

Fortunately, young Shinji knew exactly what to say. “You can breathe fire?” he said to Mokou.

Nodding, Mokou coughed up a bit of smoke and said, “I don’t like doing it. Gives me a sore throat.”

“Still, you can breathe fire!” Shinji sounded genuinely hurt. “That is so cool! How come you never showed us?”

“Never needed to. And it gives me a sore throat, I just told you!”

“Enough,” Satoko said wearily. “Everyone back to the house. This day has been long enough as it is.”

…

Dinner was a quiet, sober affair, with very little actual eating and even less talking. With Mokou now on permanent defense duty, Shion and Haruhi had prepared it, putting together a simple meal of steamed rice and spinach. Joshua had tried to pitch in, but his lack of culinary skills soon became apparent, and the two women kindly, but firmly, suggested that he find some other way to make himself useful.

And that was the problem.

Joshua was the handyman. He fixed things that broke, he improved things that needed improving, and he helped teach whatever practical skills he could. Plus, he was always on hand if any of the children needed an understanding ear. Normally that gave him plenty with which to occupy his time, but now what they needed was far outside of his wheelhouse. Perhaps Satoko would let him reinforce the house, board up the windows, and strengthen the walls. He didn’t like the thought of turning their home into a fortress, but they had to be prepared for any eventuality.

For now though, everyone was going to be sleeping together in the main room downstairs. Joshua was given a sleeping mat, and he brought it down along with a pillow and blanket and a few select belongings, mainly a bag of toiletries, his Bible, and his old wallet, which now only contained pictures of his friends, both from this world and the one previous. As he spread his out in one corner, he noticed one boy in particular looking a little out of sorts.

Dai was sitting cross-legged on his own mat with his head bowed. Normally he would be up and running around with his friends, but even they seemed to be giving him the cold shoulder.

Wincing, Joshua went over to the boy and sat down next to him. “You all right, son?”

Without lifting his head, Dai lifted his left shoulder in a half-shrug.

Sighing, Joshua leaned back on his palms and stretched his legs out. “I guess we were a little hard on you. But you do understand why, right? Even if you didn’t like her, that wasn’t the-”

“I didn’t mean it like that,” Dai muttered.

“Oh?”

Dai gathered up his legs under his chin and stared balefully out at the room. “I’ve just…you know, been thinking…”

“About?” Joshua prodded.

“The ones you brought back. You know, Kohta, Haruko, and the rest. The ones that didn’t die.”

Well, that was putting it bluntly. “What about them?”

“There’s something wrong with them, isn’t there?”

Joshua slowly breathed out. “Seems that way.”

“What is it?”

“I’m…not entirely sure myself,” Joshua admitted. “It seems that they picked up some kind of…” He winced. Even after all these years, some of the more occult aspects of Gensokyo still made him uncomfortable. “Well, the Youkai Forest has a lot of…”

“Dark magic?”

Joshua nodded. “A good a thing to call it as any. We’re not really sure what it is, but we’re keeping them separate until the Hakurei Shrine Maiden can come by and take a look at them and hopefully cure them.”

Dai still didn’t look at him, and Joshua wondered how much of that the boy understood. He was only eight, after all. Hell, Joshua himself had been in Gensokyo longer than Dai had been alive, and he barely understood any of it.

“So it’s like what they called us then?” Dai said at last.

“Who?”

“Those men. Youkai…taunted?”

“Tainted,” Joshua corrected as a sour feeling built in his stomach.

“Right. That’s what they are, right? They got taken by youkai, and now they’re youkai tainted.”

“Is that why you thought that maybe Eiko went to Hell?”

“That’s how it works, right?” Dai said with a shiver. “Youkai are evil, and everything they touch is evil, and evil people go Hell, so…”

“Dai, Dai, listen! That’s not how it works!”

“How do you know?” Dai said in an accusatory tone. “You have your own weird Outsider religion! You don’t understand any of our world.”

Defensive indignation welled up inside Joshua, hot and salty, and he bit down on his tongue to keep himself from taking the bait. Dai was just a child, a child who was feeling scared, confused, and alone. “I do,” he said, keeping his face and voice calm. “I do have my own faith. But I’ve lived in Gensokyo for a pretty long time. And I’ve done everything I can to learn how things work here.” He shifted his weight. “Look, Dai. Evil isn’t some kind of stain that you get on your clothes and can’t wash off. Evil is a choice, something people have to decide to be. Sometimes bad things happen, and you get angry. Sometimes you grow up being taught bad and hateful ideas. And sometimes you do get, well, smeared with something evil, like the kids upstairs did. But that doesn’t make you evil. Things that happen to you aren’t your fault. Things that you’re told by evil people aren’t your fault. It’s letting that evil get past the skin and worm its way into your heart that makes you evil. Those men that came here today? They weren’t born evil. They didn’t become evil because evil touched them. No, it was their choice to let fear and ignorance decide how they were going to think and believe, so that they now think that hurting us is the right thing to do. That’s what makes someone evil. Eiko wasn’t evil. She wasn’t very nice, and…yes, we should have done something about that, but she wasn’t evil. And the rest of the kids that went into the forest aren’t evil either. They got touched by something that we don’t understand, and we’re going to do everything we can to get it off them, but they’re not evil, they’re just kids that need help.” He patted Dai’s shoulder. “Same with you. Don’t listen to those brown-wearing idiots. They’re all fools.”

Dai frowned. He didn’t seem to be totally accepting what Joshua was telling him, but he wasn’t rejecting it outright either. That was fine. Sometimes it took a bit for lessons to take hold.

Then he asked that question. “What about Miss Mokou?”

It took a considerable amount of will to keep from wincing. “What about her?” Joshua said.

“Everyone’s saying that she’s something…bad. That she’s lived forever and killed a lot of people. Is she evil?”

Joshua slowly breathed out. That really was the real question, one that he had been grappling with ever since the spider’s nest, and especially since she had opened up to him about her past. “I…don’t really know,” he admitted at last. “Y-Yes, she’s a lot more than she seems to be. And yes, she’s…done a lot of bad things apparently. I don’t know if that makes her a bad person or just someone who fell to a bad place, but…” Sighing, he looked to the stairs, which led to where Mokou was currently sealing off the sick room for everyone’s protection. “Some things are so far beyond our understanding that it’s impossible for us to judge. Whatever she is, and whatever she’s done, I guess we’ll just have to leave that to the gods, yours and mine, to judge. But this much I do know: she is on our side. And if she is a monster, then I’ll take a monster like her than the ones in the Human Village any day.”

…

It was almost time for bed, but Noba felt sick.

He had been feeling sick for days, ever since he had gotten hurt at the market. Honestly, he really didn’t remember all that much about the incident. The last thing he could recall with certainty was the night before, when he, Shinji, Kazuchika, and Tomohiro had been discussing a rather lovely young woman they had seen working a stall the last time they had been there, and whether one of them would be able to work up the courage to go speak to her.

He had to piece together what had happened from what the others had told him. Apparently some of the local boys had been making passes to Haruko, Hayate, and Eiko, and he and his friends had taken exception to that and stepped in. And from there things had escalated until practically the whole market had devolved into an outright brawl, and Noba had taken the worst of the beatings.

On the one hand, he felt that he should be proud of himself for stepping in to defend his family. On the other, it was hard to feel good about any of it when his head would not stop aching, nor his stomach stop churning.

Just rest, the grown-ups had told him. Rest, and let yourself heal. Let us know if it hurts too much. In time it will get better.

Groaning, Noba leaned forward and grabbed onto his head.

Whatever was wrong with him, he was almost certain that it wasn’t something so simple as a knock to the head. He had taken knocks to the head before, including one when a bout of roughhousing with Tomohiro and left him dizzy for three days, and that hadn’t been anything like this. This felt like pressure was building deep inside him, like a teakettle without a faucet, while the air thickened around him. It was growing without and within, and constantly getting worse.

He fumbled around the stuff he had brought down for his medicine, which were simple herbal pills that Miss Shion had given him. The relief that they gave him was small, but it was better than nothing, and they did help him sleep.

Unfortunately, his search came up empty.

Noba stared in despair at his small pile of belongings. He had forgotten them. How had he forgotten them? His head hurt so much that one would think that they would be the first thing he would bring down with him! Idiot, idiot, idiot, idiot!

Then he looked over to the stairs. Well, he supposed that he could just go up and get them now. They were keeping everyone downstairs just as a precaution, right? And he had just been up there to get his stuff. All he had to do was head back up the stairs, nip into the boy’s dorm, grab his medicine (he had probably just left them on the chest at the foot of his bed), and head back down again. It would take probably around three minutes.

Except something about heading back upstairs filled him with dread. Because that was where they were.

He still didn’t know what to make of the events of the last few days. A youkai attack, right in broad daylight? Nearly half of the other kids taken? Eiko Goto, one of the girls he had gotten hurt defending, now dead? And the others…

Something was wrong with them. Something was terribly wrong with them.

He had known that even before the grown-ups had told them. Just looking at them had made the ache in his head spike, and it only grew worse the closer he got to them. Beyond a shadow of doubt, they had brought something back with them, something evil.

Miss Mokou was guarding them now, which was good. There were whispers going around that Miss Mokou was something more than she seemed, something dark and deadly. That may be so, but as far as Noba was concerned, it was a good thing. They needed a little dark and deadly on their side, and she didn’t make his head hurt.

Still, heading upstairs would mean getting closer to those kids, and they just scared him.

Noba tried to lay down and sleep. He tried to ignore the pounding in his head, tried to think about something else, anything else.

A few minutes later he got up with a frustrated growl.

Tomohiro, Shinji, and Kazuchika, who had all been talking in a circle, looked at him. “Hey, where you going?” Kazuchika asked.

Noba nodded toward the stairs. “Forgot my medicine,” he mumbled. “Be right back.”

With that said, Noba started the ascent up the stairs.

He wasn’t sure if it was the pain inside his head throwing him off, but for some reason the climb seemed three times more difficult than it normally was. That was odd. He went up and down those stairs every day without thinking about it. Hell, he had just been up there to get his things. But now that everyone save for Miss Mokou and her wards were all downstairs, effectively making the second floor something of a quarantined zone, it did feel that the staircase had grown in length while the steps themselves shrank in size.

Noba’s mouth had gone dry. He tried to wet it, but had limited success. It was just nerves, he told himself. You were literally just up here, and had no trouble getting up and down! Still, by the time he had finally reached the second floor, he had broken out into a cold sweat.

As Noba stepped onto the second story, he shivered. Had someone left a window open? He was pretty sure they had made sure they were all shut tight and locked. He had even heard Mr. Joshua suggest boarding them up, though Miss Satoko had shot that down. He had a feeling that she would change her mind before too long.

Regardless, despite it still being midsummer, the air felt bitter cold, enough to make his breath steam.

The chill ought to be good for his aching head, and yet it now felt worse. Noba breathed deep, hoping that the cold air would numb the pain, but it did nothing.

The hallway stretched before him. Noba frowned. Apparently his mind was still playing tricks on him, because it seemed to be stretching quite a bit longer than it ought to be, like someone had gripped it at both ends and pulled it out like a piece of taffy.

Maybe he was coming down with something. Wouldn’t that just be fantastic, to get sick on top of everything else?

Wrapping his arms around him for warmth, Noba headed down the hall. As he went, his feelings of unease only continued to build.

There was just something wrong about the hall, something he couldn’t put his finger on. But the lines felt off, like entering a hall of framed picture that were all tilted. If he stopped and focused on something in particular, then it looked fine, but when he took in the whole of the hallway, it just looked weird.

There actually were a few framed pictures along the way, and Joshua stopped at one in particular. It had been taken about a year prior, roughly around summer solstice. It was a group shot of all the children currently living at the Aoki Yume’s Children’s Home, with their adult caretakers standing behind them.

Despite how bad he felt, Noba couldn’t help but smile at the memory. Life had been pretty good back then: pleasant, simple, and worthwhile. There had been no monsters attacking from the forests, no awful people beating them up, and no horrible pounding in his skull. But now, everything had gone horribly wrong.

Then Noba frowned. Wait, there was something off about the photograph, something that had changed from the last time he had seen it. His eyes zeroed in on the dead girl Eiko, who was standing with her friends Haruko and Hayate. She was smiling, yes, but her smile wasn’t the small half-smirk she used to wear, oh no, her smile now was a wide and toothy grin, one that was way too wide and way too toothy, and that was because her lips were gone, taken clean off, leaving her with a skeleton’s smile. The rest of her face was dead too, the nose gone, likely bitten off and swallowed as an appetizer, and in place of two child’s eyes, Eiko had two empty, black pits in her face, just like her corpse.

Eaten. Her entire face was eaten off.

Noba’s shivering now had little to do with the cold. His gaze then slid from Eiko’s face to that of her friends. Both Haruko and Hayate still had their faces, their smiles untarnished, but not their eyes. But unlike Eiko, their eyes hadn’t been plucked out and the empty sockets photographed. Oh no, they had been burned right off of the photograph itself, like something had lit a match and pressed it to each of their eyes, leaving a black circle each time.

His eyes then shot to Kana’s. Black circles. Kohta? Black circles. Rumia? Black circles. Keine?

Noba swallowed. Keine’s eyes had also been burned out of the picture, but she also had something new, something that the other defiled children hadn’t been given. A pair of curving horns rose up from her head, like those of a ram or a bull All taken together, it made the sweet, slight girl’s visage downright demonic.

Noba didn’t want to see anymore. He wanted to stop staring at the photograph, to close his eyes and violently shake his head to clear it from the evil visions and open them again to find everything as it should be, with no horns, no fleshless faces, and no black circles.

He didn’t. Instead, he looked up, up at where the caretakers were standing in the back.

Miss Satoko looked fine, perfectly normal, with that tired, yet happy, smile she always wore when things were good. Likewise Miss Haruna’s lovably rough face was just as it should be. Miss Shion looked normal, as did Miss Haruhi.

Not Mr. Joshua though. Instead of the happy, white grin shining in his dark face he had worn that day, Joshua’s face wasn’t smiling at all. Instead, he was staring solemnly back at Noba, his eyes hollow and haunted, his face flushed with sweat. He looked like a man who had seen things and done things that he would be much happier forgetting, and who knew full well that he never would.

Noba swallowed. Then, though he didn’t want to, he looked over at Miss Mokou.

Miss Mokou had been standing a little bit away from the others, near the group without actually being a part of it. Even so, she had been smiling along with everyone else when the picture had been taken. She still was actually, but now her smile was wide and crazed, not the naked grin Eiko had, but the deranged smile of a madwoman. Her clothes had been simple and clean in the picture, just her shirt and her suspenders, but now her shirt was ragged and unbuttoned, hanging loose and smeared with something that might have been dirt, might have been blood. Her face was smeared with it too, caking her cheeks and around her crazed grin. One strap of her suspenders hung down, and her hands, formerly in her pockets, were now hanging at her sides, filthy fingers curled into claws.

The photograph was in black-and-white, but one thing now was not. Her eyes, wide with manic glee, were bright red.

Sweat was starting to sting Noba’s eyes, and he realized how long it had been since he had last blinked. He shut his eyes tight and swiped his hand down over his forehead and his face. He breathed in and out, trying to slow his panting down, trying to slow his heartrate, all the while silently and desperately crying out any gods that might be listening.

He opened his eyes.

They were normal again. Miss Mokou. Mr. Joshua. The rest of the kids. Everyone had on their normal faces wearing normal smiles, as it ought to be.

But that didn’t mean that the picture had been set right. Before there had been eighteen children and five adults. Now the picture was so packed with people that Noba couldn’t even begin to get a proper count. Standing with the kids that he knew were many, many new ones, ones that he didn’t recognize, ones that he had never seen before. And yet they were there, wearing the same uniforms as those who belonged.

Noba stared at them and they stared right back.

He breathed in and out. No, this was wrong, this was wrong! Why were there so many? Why were there so-

A hand came down on his shoulder.

Noba screamed and swung his fist. It impacted against a hard palm, which was attached to a strong hand, which was attached to…

To Noba’s chagrin, he was staring right at Miss Mokou.

“Sorry for scaring you,” she said, moving the fist she had caught away from herself. “But what are you doing up here? Upstairs is restricted now!”

Noba struggled to find his tongue. “M-Medicine,” he stuttered. “I forgot my-”

“Is that it?” Miss Mokou rolled her eyes. “Oh, for the love of…Hang on.”

Mokou walked down the hall to the nearby boy’s room (which was now perfectly straight and of normal length, because of course it was), and emerged a moment later with the bag of pills.

“Here,” she said, tossing it to him. “And don’t come up again. This place is quarantined for a reason.”

Noba’s fingers fumbled, and the bag dropped to the floor. He quickly picked it up. “Er, thanks.” He paused, and said, “Uh, M-Miss Mokou?”

“What?”

“The picture. It…”

The picture was completely normal. No deformities, no additional faces, everything was as it should be.

Miss Mokou glanced to it, and then at him. “Did it change?”

Noba hesitated, and then nodded.

“Did the place feel strange when you came up here?”

“Yes. Everything felt too long, and the air felt…thick.”

At this, Miss Mokou sighed. “Well, what do you expect?” She nodded to the sick room, which now had sealing charms all over the door. “I sealed those kids off for a reason!”

“They’re doing it?” Noba said in disbelief. “I mean, whatever it is that…changed them?”

“Obviously,” Miss Mokou said dryly. “Now, unless you’re planning on spending the night up here in the freaky funhouse, I suggest you swallow your medicine and stay downstairs!”

Noba numbly nodded. And then he turned and hurried away as fast as he could.

…

The day died, night fell, and the Aoki Yume’s Children’s Home was left alone in the dark.

Now officially exiled, it now stood by itself, a tiny island refuge for those who dwelt within, facing oppression from its back and invasion from the front, left vulnerable to the wild beasts and evil spirits that roamed the plains and forests of the Wilds and the nefarious scheming of those who had isolated them in the first place. Already several of their number had been taken and dragged off into the darkness, and one had not come back. As for those who did, no one could say they had returned whole.

Mokou was afraid.

It was curious thing to feel again; she had not really known fear for a very long time, save for a scant few occasions over the centuries. And as one Eirin Yagokoro was not involved, she did not fear for herself. No matter what happened from here on out, she at least was guaranteed to come through alive and well.

No, what she feared for were the tiny, fragile lives entrusted into her care. Mokou was a powerful woman, perhaps too powerful. But her power was directed at self-preservation and wanton destruction. She could lay every single Human village, town, and settlement to waste within a few hours with relative ease. She could challenge such mighty creatures as Dragons or Demons and at least expect to make them sweat. Hell, she was pretty sure she could take on the great Yukari Yakumo and, if not exactly win, give her something to remember her by. But when it came to keeping these few children safe long enough for them to reach adulthood, then even with all her power, she did not feel that she was up to the task.

Not that she wasn’t going to give it her all. The ability to burn mortal and immortal alike to ashes might not be much use when she wasn’t even sure of the threat just yet, but her impossible durability meant that she at least could throw herself in its path when it revealed itself. To that end, she had appointed herself as the official guardian of the Black Circle Six, as she had taken to calling them. Rumia Yagami, Kohta Momoi, Keine Kamishirasawa, Haruko Kamijima, Hayate Maeda, and Kana Anaberal were back in the sick room, this time to stay until Miko Hakurei finally arrived. Their sleeping mats were arranged in a circle on the ground, their feet all facing the center, while Mokou sat in a chair near the window, arms folded as she watched over them. The chair was leaning back on it hind legs, courtesy of Mokou shoving her foot up against the cabinet. The door and window were both locked tight, charms had been stuck to the walls, and the wards protecting the orphanage grounds had all been replaced. And as for Mokou, she could go for days without sleep before she began to even think of getting tired. She had once hidden unmoving and unsleeping for a solid week in a corner of Eientei just so she could murder Kaguya Houraisan during her birthday party. If anything was to come for these kids from without or within, it was not going to catch her unawares.

A small wooden clock sat on the counter across from her, softly counting away the hours. Out in the hall, the big grandfather clock’s loud ticking could be heard, set in time with its smaller brother. Every now and then, Mokou’s eyes would flit from the children over to check the time. The night was steadily passing by.

Ten o’clock. Ten forty-five. Eleven seventeen.

So far, so good.

Eleven thirty-six. Twelve o’four. Twelve twenty-nine.

Kohta was snoring.

One eleven. One forty-one. Two o’clock. Two fourteen.

So far, so good.

Two twenty-two. Two thirty-eight. Two fifty-five.

And then the ticking…just stopped.

Mokou paused her rocking. Her eyes, as sharp in the dark as they were in the light, focused on the clock’s face. The hands were still moving, indicating that it was two after three, but the clock in the hall had simply stopped ticking.

Interesting.

Mokou took a quick assessment of herself, checking all of her sense. A moment later she determined that she was in fact still wide awake, and this was not the result of her drifting off into a dream. Whether or not that was a relief remained yet to be seen.

Carefully relaxing her foot, Mokou lowered her chair back onto all four legs. She sat with both feet planted on the ground, hands on her knees, ears straining.

The only sounds were the children’s gentle breathing, Kana’s rasps, the ambient sounds of the old house settling, and a far off owl hooting.

Then someone started knocking on the door. Loudly.

Mokou didn’t cry out in surprise, didn’t jump, didn’t even jerk, but she did sit up straighter, her eyes focused on the locked door as someone in the hallway slammed their fist against it over and over, banging as loud as they could.

“Who is it?” she said.

The banging stopped, but nobody answered.

Moving as smoothly as a cat, Mokou rose from her chair. On the floor, the six children were still lying asleep, the note of her their breathing having not changed at all. She tread around them, heading toward the door.

The door handle started to turn.

Mokou watched as it twisted first one way, and then the other, its old joints whining. However, it was still locked, so whoever it was that was trying to get in was unable to open the door. The knob than began rattling and shaking as the banging began again.

“Who. Is. It?” Mokou said loudly, not caring if she woke the children. If they could sleep through that racket, then they could sleep through her voice. Besides, she was pretty sure that she was going to want them awake for this.

This time the banging and rattling didn’t stop, but instead picked up in fervency. Mokou levitated a few centimeters into the air, turned her body fully around so that her face was close to the floor, and peered through the crack beneath the door.

There was nobody in the hallway beyond.

That didn’t stop the banging though, and what was more, it was starting to spread.

What sounded like several fists pounded at the walls. The sick room sat in a corner of the house, so two-thirds of the wall with the door also shared a wall with the room right over, Shion’s room to be specific, while the other wall bordered Haruhi’s room. And from the sound of it, both rooms were filled with people, all slamming their hands against the walls.

Mokou reached into her pocket and withdrew a spellcard.

And then the banging started happening against the other two walls, the ones that went outside.

Mokou whirled around. From the sound of it, the sick room was surrounded on all sides by people trying to get in. And they were on the top floor! Not that it would matter in a country full of people who could fly, but that handily ruled out anyone else from the house being the culprit.

Speaking of which, the six children in the room were still fast asleep!

Mokou glided over to the window and creaked open the shutters with one finger, just enough for her to peek out.

It was a nice, clear night out. And it was completely empty.

Almost as if they had sensed her looking out, the banging stopped.

Mokou opened the shutter fully. She of course wasn’t going to open the glass window itself, but she had enough of a field of view to survey most of the side of the house and the moonlit lawn below.

There wasn’t a single living soul to be seen.

Oh shit.

Mokou moved back from the window. Almost immediately the banging began once again, this time from all over! The cabinets were shaking from the force slamming against the walls, and the door knob was about ready to fly right off if it rattled any harder.

“Enough!” she shouted. “Reveal yourself!”

Again everything again fell silent.

And again it started up all over again!

Mokou had no idea what to do. She didn’t even know what was happening. Anything from the Forest of Magic would have been stopped by the new wards, and anything Human would have tripped the early warning spells. Whatever this was, it was new.

She wasn’t scared though. Supernatural threats were no stranger to her; hell, technically speaking she was one. But she would feel considerably better about her situation if she knew what she was dealing with.

Then, as she slowly rotated around, Mokou got her first real jolt.

The six children, who had all been sleeping soundly just a moment ago, were now all awake and sitting up, staring at each other.

Well, of course they would be awake! Nobody ought to be able to sleep through that racket! It was honestly more of a mystery why it had taken them so long to wake in the first place!

But they didn’t seem distressed like young children woken in the middle of the night by such a cacophony might have. They weren’t crying out, they weren’t asking what was wrong, they weren’t crying, they weren’t shouting, they weren’t looking around in confusion, they weren’t reacting at all.

They were just…sitting there, staring unblinking at one another. Kana had even stopped coughing.

Now Mokou felt actual fear.

The six children, some of which who had actively loathed one another earlier that same week, continued to stare. Then, as one, they all turned to look over their right shoulders at the walls.

“Enough!” they said with one voice. “Leave!”

And with that, the banging stopped, the knocking ceased, and the door knob lay still. And this time it stayed that way.

Over on the counter, the clock began once again to tick.

Mokou’s heart seized up. She had been right. If the kids’ fluid, synchronized movement hadn’t been a tipoff, the change in their voice more than confirmed it.

It had not been their voices coming out of their mouths. That voice had been colder than winter and deader than dry bones. If a coffin were to be extracted from beneath a sheet of ice, and the corpse within were to speak, it would have a voice like that.

And when it spoke, the things trying to get in had listened.

“Who are you?” she asked the entity she now shared the room with.

Again moving as one, the six children turned their heads to stare at her. Six pairs of dark, beady eyes bore into her own. And though it might have been a trick of the dark, she was pretty sure she saw a faint red light shimmering in those eyes.

Mokou tensed up, fully ready to fight.

Then Kana started coughing.

It was like a spell had been broken. The kids finally blinked their eyes, and then began looking around in confusion. “Uh…” Hayate said.

“Wait, what the hell?” Kohta added, scratching his head.

Mokou didn’t drop her guard.

“Miss Mokou?” Keine said. “What…just happened?”

It took some doing, but Mokou found her tongue. “You don’t remember?”

“I…” The tiny girl frowned. “I remember…I think I was dreaming. Dreaming about a deep, black pit. And…”

“Chains,” Kana said. “And quite a lot of them.”

Mokou had no idea whatsoever what to say to that.

And then, from somewhere else in the house, someone started to scream.

…

For what might have been the first time since she had realized that she had left her drab, anxious, and hopeless life back in what she now thought of as the Outside World for an actual world of magic, Melissa Garcia wanted to go home.

It was the strangest thing. Her old life had, in its strangely parallel way, mirrored her current circumstances, except everything had been drab and bleak instead of colorful and full of magic.

Like almost everyone at the Aoki Yume’s Children’s Home, she had never known her parents. They had died when she had been very young, and she had grown up in a Catholic mission. It had been…unpleasant, to say the least. The rules had been strict, the punishments severe, the beds hard, the food unappetizing, and Melissa had expected to go through her childhood with her head down and her mouth shut so as not to attract any undue attention.

The one thing that brought her any happiness was stories. There was one nun, from faraway Ireland, who, when everyone else was asleep, would come into the children’s room and tell them the stories from her home, stories of fairies, of spirits, of leprechauns, and of monsters. Melissa always loved those stories, and the world they described seemed so much more lively and fun compared to hers! Unfortunately, one day the nun was caught and reprimanded, and the stories stopped. Melissa’s life became just a little more grey after that.

And then one day she had woken up to another day of grey hopelessness, of trying to just get by, of having nothing much to look forward to except for the vain hope that maybe she might one day work hard enough and save enough to live a life that was somewhere above tolerable, only to have those hopes dashed when she had gotten separated from the rest of her group during a trip to the nearby village. As she had searched for everyone else, she had attracted the attention of some local men, the unkindly sort with cruel faces and nasty smiles. They had called out to her, beckoning her to come over, that they would help her.

Instead, Melissa had ran.

And they followed.

Convinced that she was about to become another faceless victim found in a ditch, Melissa had gone this way and that, desperate to lose them while all too aware that they knew the village better than she. And then, at one point, she ducked through a long dark tunnel, one that seemed to stretch on and on, one without any light at the end.

And when she had come out the other end, she was in someplace else entirely, a small village of strangely built houses and strangely dressed people, ones who had been just as surprised to see her as she was to see them. However, unlike her, they had quickly figured out what had happened, and though they spoke strange words that she couldn’t understand and clearly couldn’t understand her either, they still managed to calm her down and communicate to her that she should follow them.

Melissa had, of course, been terrified. Where was she? How had she gotten there? Who were all these strange people, with their oddly shaped faces and unfamiliar clothes, who spoke to each other with an unfamiliar tongue? And most importantly, would they let her go back before it was noticed that she was gone? If Melissa had gone missing for too long, then she would be guaranteed a beating and several hours spent in the Othering Closet.

However, if she refused to do as these people said, then they would probably beat her themselves, so with no other choice she had followed them. They had taken her to one of the strange buildings made of wood and paper, into a strange room with strange furnishings, where the walls were made from paper, there were no chairs, and everyone sat on the floor at very low tables.

Once there, they had brought an old woman wearing a lovely black robe, and to Melissa’s utter shock, she began to speak to her in Spanish: stiff and halted Spanish, yes, but understandable Spanish nonetheless.

The woman had explained to Melissa that she was one of the few in the village who had taken the time to learn almost all of the majors languages of the Outside World, so it was her job to greet newcomers, and Melissa was the first newcomer that they had in the Human Village in several years.

Melissa had still be confused and terrified, so she had begged that woman to please send her back before she got into trouble. She would tell no one that she had been taken or how to get to the strange village, but they had to send her back.

In response, the woman had sadly shaken her head and clicked her tongue. And then she had explained to Melissa a few things that had changed her life forever.

Firstly, she was not going to go back. She couldn’t go back. She had been taken, fallen into something called a gap, which was kind of like a hole in a wall, but instead of connecting two rooms, gaps connected two worlds, and rarely lasted long.

Melissa, of course, had not understood at all. She knew the words, she knew what they meant, but the things being described to her were beyond her comprehension? Worlds? As if in, other countries? It had made no sense!

However, there was one thing she did understand, one thing about what they were telling her that her mind and heart had seized upon immediately.

Magic.

She was in a world of magic, a place of enchanted forests and cute fairies, a place where beasts talked and spells were sold on the street corner. And what was more, anyone that came to this magical country, one called “Gensokyo,” could also learn magic, to conjure up mysterious powers with her fingers and fly through the air like a bird.

Needless to say, Melissa was entirely too happy to discard any thought of going back, and while learning the language was difficult, she was perfectly fine with calling Gensokyo her home. After all, she was going to be able to fly!

But now she was seeing the dark side of her new home. Because say what you will of the place she left, but there were no monsters emerging from the forest to eat them. There were no curses that necessitated clearing entire floors of the house. There were no demons after her blood, no ghosts seeking to suck out her soul, no monsters other than cruel men, and Gensokyo had plenty of those too.

Now Melissa was scared. And she wanted to go home.

With those who had been recovered from the forest kept by themselves in the sick room, the rest of the children had all been brought into the main room at the foot of the stairs for the night, with all the grown-ups save for Miss Mokou sleeping with them. Under normal circumstances, it would be an exciting change from routine, but Melissa felt nothing but dread.

For one, it wasn’t a fun sleep-together, and everyone knew it. There was something very wrong with the kids being kept upstairs, something that the rest of them needed to be protected from. “It’s just a precaution,” Miss Shion had told them. “The Youkai Forest has all sorts of bad magics, and we want the Hakurei Shrine Maiden to take a look at them first to be safe.”

Well, Melissa might still be struggling with the language, but she knew when a grown-up was downplaying something bad. Something was wrong with them.

For another, her best friend Kana was among those being kept away. When she had been taken, Melissa had been scared stiff for her. Kana might be kind of…odd, and prone to saying the weirdest things even when Melissa fully understood her, but she was one of the few at the orphanage to not treat Melissa like an oddity. After all, Kana was kind of an outsider herself, so she had no problem spending time with the girl from the Outside World and not treating her like she was dumb just for having difficulties with Japanese, or weird because her skin was darker and her name unusual. Melissa had even taught her a few words in Spanish, and to her surprise Kana would actually use some of them from time to time. So of course she had been nothing but relieved when Kana had been rescued, only for that relief to turn to dread when she saw how weak and sickly Kana now looked. The bad magics were one thing; they probably had ways of dealing with those! But that dry, chest-rattling cough was the kind of bad that Kana had seen before and fully understood, even before coming to Gensokyo.

And finally, as she lay down on her sleeping mat and pulled the thin blanket up over shoulders, Melissa became intensely aware of a third problem: she was the only girl left.

Eiko was dead, and the Kana, Rumia, Haruko, and Hayate were all locked away. That just left her, the grown-ups, and lots and lots of boys.

She tried to ignore it. she tried to close her eyes and sleep. But Kazuchika’s mat wasn’t far from hers, and, well, she had been noticing him a lot lately, so sleeping in such close quarters was all sorts of uncomfortable in ways she really wasn’t ready for yet, with his short, pale hair and piercing white eyes and the way his shoulders seemed to get more broad and his arms more strong with every passing season.

And Noba wasn’t that far either. He wasn’t as handsome as Kazuchika, but there was a gentleness about him that Melissa found very appealing. Not weakness, no. Him rushing headlong into danger to defend the other girls was proof of that. But gentleness. And he still was pretty easy on the eyes. As for Shinji, he was kind of an ass, but a brave ass, one that always liked to show off for whoever was looking. And sure, Melissa had rolled her eyes along with everyone else, but on more than one occasion she had secretly appreciated some of his more physical feats, like when he had used his newly gained power of flight to stand on his head and do push-ups, which had caused his shirt to slip down, exposing his…

Groaning, Melissa turned over, away from the group. If the Hakurei Shrine Maiden would be so kind as to show up and return everything to normal, that would be just great!

She tried counting fairies, leaping over a fence. One. Two. Three. Four.

In time, her breathing slowed.

Seventeen. Eighteen. Nineteen.

She began to relax.

Twenty-nine. Thirty. Thirty-one.

And the fairies were gone, but that didn’t stop the procession from leaping over the fence. Except now it wasn’t fairies, it was those spider people, the ones that had come for them, the ones that had taken her friends, the ones that had eaten Eiko alive. And now they were coming for her, long arms outstretched, scabby fingers grasping, mouths open like black pits ready to-

Melissa’s eyes snapped open as she let out a small gasp.

The room was darker, the lamps having been extinguished. That meant that she had been out a bit longer than her brief nightmare had made it feel. And goodness, it had left her heart racing! Melissa would rather stay up all night than return to that dream!

But even so, it was just a dream. Things were scary and stressful, so of course she would be having nightmares, anybody would. She was all right.

Sighing, Melissa shivered beneath her blanket and tried to relax. Despite it being midsummer, the night had gotten very cold. She turned over and pulled her blanket up further.

Or at least she tried to. The truth was, she only got a few centimeters before she was stopped. Frowning, she tried again to turn, but found that she couldn’t. She was stuck.

Now waking up a little more, Melissa tried again and again to roll over. It was like the covers had been tucked in too tightly around her, forming a sort of cocoon that prevented movement. But how was that possible? She only had the one blanket, and you couldn’t tuck in covers around a sleeping mat!

She wiggled her hand under the blanket. The fabric felt…different, no longer like the woven wool it had been. Instead, it was sticky.

And then she heard someone crying, a young girl weeping softly to herself.

Gritting her teeth, Melissa strained and pushed. She was unable to break free of whatever it was that encased her, but she at least managed to turn just enough to incline her head and get a good look at the room around her.

The whole room was blanketed in what looked like silky white sheets. They covered everything, from the walls to the stairs to the floor. Everyone sleeping on the ground, child and grown-up alike, was all wrapped snuggly in a white bundle, one tethered to the ground by more of the white sheets.

Melissa stared numbly at the scene, her scared and tired brain unable to make sense of what she saw. She had to still be dreaming, right? It was the only thing that made sense. Why would anyone cover the whole room with…

Suddenly, Melissa realized what she was seeing.

They were spiderwebs.

They were all covered with spiderwebs.

Melissa wasn’t the only one who had been woken up. Here and there she saw other kids trying to free themselves. Over in the corner, Mr. Joshua was struggling to sit up, but had only managed to elevate his shoulders. Miss Satoko was tugging and pulling at her restraints, but to little avail. Kazuchika was trashing as hard as he could in his attempts to free himself.

Noba, however, wasn’t fighting. Instead, he was staring upward, at the ceiling.

When Melissa saw this, she got a sinking feeling. That was where the crying was coming from.

Now Tomohiro had noticed where Noba was looking. He looked up as well, and his eyes went wide. Over in one corner, Miss Haruhi was making little whimpering sounds as she stared at the same thing they were.

Though she did not want to, Melissa looked up as well.

Eiko was there, handing upside-down from the ceiling by a glob of webbing to the bottom of the chandelier. Her whole body was encased in webs, her legs glued together and her arms stuck to her sides. Only her head was free, and her eyes were closed as she softly cried to herself.

“You…” she whispered. “You…you…you…”

Then her eyelids snapped open, revealing a pair of empty pits.

“You let them do this to me!” she cried. “You let them…them…”

For a moment it seemed as if she were about to vomit. Her mouth opened and closed without any words escaping, and her throat was heaving in and out.

Something was coming out. Something was forcing its way out from inside her mouth, something black and wriggling.

A massive spider emerged from Eiko’s mouth, a spindly horror larger than one of Mr. Joshua’s fists. It crawled out from between Eiko’s lips and walked up (down?) Eiko’s face to perch on her forehead.

But it wasn’t alone. More were pushing their way out, more than Eiko’s mouth would allow. There was a horrible crack, and her jaw was snapped out of its sockets. Her cheeks ripped open like paper, and a torrent of spiders poured out of her to spill down onto the horrorstruck captives below.

…

When Mokou heard those downstairs scream in terror, she found herself faced with an unenviable dilemma.

On the one hand, she knew that she ought to rush in to their defense. After all, now that the invaders were actually in the house, she was pretty much their first, second, and only line of defense. Even an especially armed and determined Human could wreak considerable damage before they were stopped.

But that would mean leaving the six under her care alone, which given what had just happened, was not something she was about to do. And to even if she could, she would have to exit through the front door, which could let in whatever it was that had been banging on the walls.

Damn it.

“Stay where you are!” Mokou called over her shoulder. “Don’t leave the room!” With that, she swiftly unlocked and opened the door just enough for her to squeeze out. Then she used her key to lock it again.

As expected, the hallway was empty, which told her what she needed to know about the invaders. Shaking her head, she bolted to the stairs and flew down enough to get a look.

Everyone was sitting up in their mats and screaming at something on the ceiling. Mokou thrust a hand out and ignited a ball of light over her palm.

“It’s me, it’s me!” she said. “What happened?”

“It’s Eiko!” Shinji wailed. “She was here!”

Shit! “Eiko. Okay. Where?”

Everyone pointed up to the ceiling. Mokou craned her neck to look, but saw nothing but the chandelier.

“She…She was there!” Yoshi cried. “I swear, she was right there, hanging from the ceiling!”

“And we were all covered with webs!” Keiichi added. “They were everywhere! I could barely move!”

Melissa had curled into a ball and was rocking back and forth, whispering non-stop to herself.

Mokou looked the scene over. Certainly all the children were in the same panicked state, which ruled out a simple nightmare. She glanced over to the other adults.

Whatever it was that the children had seen, they had seen it too. Haruna was holding a sobbing Haruhi in her arms while she stared blankly at the far wall. Shion was up and moving about the children, trying to do her best to console them. Joshua was sitting on his knees with his eyes closed, hands gripping his cross as he whispered to his god. And as for Satoko, she was holding little Akito in her arms, trying to soothe him as he squirmed and cried.

Mokou jogged down the stairs toward them. “Hey,” she said. When that failed to garner a response, she clapped her hands loudly together. “Hey!”

That got their attention. Satoko, Haruna, and Joshua all started, like they had been awakened from a trance.

“What happened?” Mokou demanded. “Tell me!”

Joshua’s mouth was moving, but he was having difficulty getting words out. “There…I-I woke up, and I heard crying, but wh-when I tried to-to-to get up…”

“Webs,” Haruna said in a hollow voice. “Everywhere. Covering everyone.”

Mokou glanced around. Well, these supposed webs were all gone now. “Continue.”

“I saw some of the children…” Joshua swallowed. “Well, they were awake, and staring up. At the ceiling. So I looked up too, and…”

“Eiko,” Satoko whispered, her arms tightening around Akito. “She was there, hanging from the chandelier.”

“Hanging? You mean, like by a rope? A noose?”

Satoko shook her head. “No. She was upside-down, and just covered with webs. She…She talked. She blamed me for letting her die. And then her mouth was just ripped open, and all these spiders poured down on us.”

“Her eyes were gone,” Haruhi said. Then, in a rising shriek, she repeated, “Her eyes were gone! She had no eyes!” Despite being near a breakdown herself, Haruna quickly shushed her before her panic set off the children.

Not that they needed the help, Mokou observed. It seemed that everyone was near hysterics. “Satoko. I need to talk to you in private.”

Satoko stared at her like she was speaking in an alien tongue.

“Please,” Mokou said. She held out a hand. “I need to ask you something.”

“What? Oh. Ah, okay.” Satoko handed Akito to Haruna and got up to follow.

Mokou led her into the hall that led to her kitchen. Once they had a measure of privacy, Mokou said, “Satoko, do you remember what happened to our wards?”

“Of course,” Satoko said with a shiver. “They were sabotaged, right? But you replaced them, didn’t you?”

“I did. With better ones. But all this has got me thinking about what happened to them in the first place.”

Satoko stared blankly at her. “What do you mean? Someone found them and destroyed them. It’s not like they were hidden.”

“No, but they weren’t torn up, they were burnt,” Mokou said. Her mind was racing back over the events of the last few days. More pieces to the jigsaw puzzle were coming to light, and she was not liking the picture they were forming. “Someone burned them. All of them, in one night. Doesn’t that sound like something we’d notice?” She paused for a moment to mentally examine the evidence, and then said, “I think they were destroyed by an overload spell.”

Satoko frowned. As she did not come from an especially magical background, that concept was unknown to her. “Explain.”

“Basically, what it does is use a ward network’s own connection against it,” Mokou told her. “It fires off a highly concentrated stream of magical energy that pushes a ward past its threshold, overloads the runes, and incinerates them. Then it moves onto the next ward in the line, and the next, and the next. Only thing is, this happens so fast that it would be done in less time than I’m taking to describe it, and it does it quietly. We’d have to be looking directly at the wards to notice something was wrong.”

Now Satoko got it. She might not be all that versed in combat magic, but she understood the basics, and what Mokou had explained to her drained the blood from her face. “But…something of that magnitude.”

“Yeah, it does take a lot of juice,” Mokou nodded. “And they’re extremely difficult. You have to be pretty proficient with magic to be able to pull one off. But there’s a couple more catches as well. First of all, they can’t be performed by a youkai without them risking tearing their own bodies apart. Permanently. Even magician youkai that used to be Human can’t do them. So whoever pulled this off had to be Human, and a powerful one at that.”

“Go on…”

“Secondly, even if you are a Human magician with enough knowledge to safely pull one of these off, you won’t be able to do it alone. You need a source of youkai magic at hand to channel into the wards. And that’s a one-way trip for the youkai, so they tend to be kind of unwilling.”

Satoko made a face. “You’re telling me that to sabotage our wards and leave the children vulnerable to attack, a Human captured and murdered a youkai?”

“If they used an overload spell,” Mokou said. “Which, okay, is just a theory, but it tracks, doesn’t it?”

“Yes,” Satoko said with a contemplative nod. “But what does that have to do with what we just saw?”

“Because an overload spell wouldn’t just go for the perimeter wards. It would take out every ward, charm, and protective rune in a five kilometer radius, provided that they were part of the same network.” Mokou stared hard into Satoko’s eyes. “Now, I want you to think really, really hard: are there any other kinds of wards or anything else of that nature that we didn’t think of? Maybe something in the house itself?”

That was the key. Until they had been sabotaged, the Aoki Yume’s Children’s Home had been well-protected against supernatural threats of all kinds. No youkai could even step past the perimeter fence; not even fairies were able to fly past it. Hell, even Tewi needed a special charm Mokou had made for her in order to pass.

But not all dangerous magic came from without. Gensokyo was a country practically made from magic of all kinds, and it wasn’t just youkai they needed to fear.

The orphanage had existed for generations, providing a haven and a home for children who had lost their families, protecting them from the dangers that roamed the Wilds. But unfortunately, as the last week had proven, they couldn’t always protect them. Sometimes the dangers won, sometimes the monsters got through, or even sometimes fates as mundane but no less deadly as a bad fall, a summer illness, or an inhaled piece of food reared their ugly heads. Children died quite easily, and the orphanage had seen the deaths of many children over the decades.

Now, given the house’s age and the pain carried around by its inhabitants, it would make a prime breeding ground for ghosts, specters, poltergeists, and the like. Except it wasn’t. The house had never seen single haunting.

The reason for that was quite simple: the Yume family weren’t fools. When Satoko’s multiple-times-great-grandparents had turned the family farm into an orphanage, they would have foreseen the various dangers it needed to be protected from, both from without and within.

But the downside of that is that if those protections had existed for so long, they would have done their job so well that those that they protected would simply stop thinking about them. And if they were taken away, it might be some time before anyone even thought to check that they were still there, even after the monsters had gotten in.

Before, Mokou had chalked up any strange going-ons, such as the flaming lantern or any strange upstairs shenanigans, up to the curse that the Black Circle Six had brought with them. But now she felt that they had nothing to do with it at all.

“Oh, my gods,” Satoko whispered.

Mokou nodded grimly. “Yeah, I thought so. Where?”

“Th-The foundations,” Satoko stuttered. “The stones. They all had special runes engraved into them, so any negative spirit would, you know…not form.”

Mokou nodded again. “I’m willing to bet anything that those runes are now a scorched and blackened mess.”

Both women were now thinking down the same lines. Eiko’s death had been horrible. She had awoken weak and sick from spider venom to find herself in a dark and frightening place, surrounded on all sides by hideous monsters. And before she could even figure out where she was and why she was there, they had eaten her alive.

Such a painful and violent death would certainly leave a stamp. And in a place swimming with magic like the Youkai Forest, an aftereffect forming was practically an inevitability. From there, it would either fade away as its body rotted, or it would gain enough strength to continue on, joining the many dark spirits that wandered the forest, forever an echo of a dead girl’s pain and fear.

Except the body hadn’t stayed where it had died.

“It came back with the body,” Satoko said.

“Makes sense,” Mokou said. “The place where she died would be unfamiliar, and that nest got scorched pretty bad, disrupting any magical ties. So it would migrate to someplace she knew.”

“And with the wards down, it wouldn’t have gotten blocked out and broken apart,” Satoko continued. “And when we cremated her body…”

“That basically cut it loose.” Mokou looked toward the main room, where everyone was struggling to make sense of the fearsome apparition they had seen. “So, on top of everything else, we are now officially haunted.  

…

Okay, full disclosure: I may have recently watched all of The Haunting of Hill House and read The Shining for the first time, and they may have both heavily influenced where this story is going. So yeah.

Until next time, everyone!

[veryfantasticstudent]

What happens after Evangelion? Posthumanity in 新世紀エヴァンゲリオン (Neon Genesis Evangelion)

I finally watched (and subsequently re-watched) the classic (and highly controversial anime) Neon Genesis Evangelion, thanks to Netflix’s partial acquisition of the rights to the show—they somehow forgot “Fly Me to the Moon”[1]. Evangelion is an anime about a lot of themes—too many, thanks to Hideaki Anno’s dodgy responses regarding its interpretations. Alienation and depression are at the center of it all. Countless articles will tell you that Anno was suffering from depression while working on Evangelion. Further, Japan had recently faced terrorist attacks in Tokyo, as well as a series of devastating earthquakes. In the face of such tragedies, Evangelion asks, what will become of us in the future? In a world where lives are arbitrarily lost, where we have no direction to go towards, how can humanity itself continue?

These are some of the bigger questions that Evangelion asks, and they connect to the more intimate, the more human questions it poses as well. How can two human beings form any connection when disasters like the Second Impact occur? The English title of the fourth episode of the series is “Hedgehog’s Dilemma”. Philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer coined this term to express the complexity of human relationships; moving closer together—physically or mentally—means that we will hurt each other. And yet, this proximity is what we humans crave the most. How do we reconcile these conflicting desires and keep moving on in the face of tragedy? For many of us, these thoughts may not result from Second-Impact-scale disasters, but personal tragedies—the death of loved ones, or even the break-up of friendships or relationships. These feelings seem unconnected to the future of humanity, but as the series repeatedly emphasizes, the two are linked. Evangelion asks: how do we face tomorrow. In my essay, I propose that there multiple ways that Evangelion answers these questions, and all of them are linked to the notion of posthumanity.

Before I get into Evangelion we must clarify what I mean by “posthuman”. An umbrella-term, “posthuman” is literally what comes after humanity. It is the posthuman who must adapt to the new world that is altered by climate change, nuclear wars, alien life contact, and endless numbers of (not entirely) science-fictional scenarios. Bio-technological invasion of the human body alters the limits of a human being, extending us into our electronic environments, interfacing us with machines and artificial intelligence. This is a kind of posthumanity, often leaning towards calling the current human being a “cyborg” (in Donna Haraway’s term). A central aspect of posthumanity tends to be the displacement of the “rational thinking machine” of the Renaissance humanist. “Man” is no longer the measure of all things. The posthuman is as much an animal as any, and no longer claims a moral stature higher than its fellow earth inhabitants. It suggests an equality with everything, especially if we look at vitalist materialist Rose Braidotti’s stance in her book The Posthuman. These are the broad notions of the posthuman that I will work with for this essay.

The people in Evangelion are, in at least the bio-technological sense, posthuman. This is especially true for the three EVA pilots, who meld with their EVA Units. However, that is not enough to survive in this world. Humans are no longer allowed their aspirations, displaced as they are by repeated Angel attacks. They still do not connect with their environments—the futuristic landscapes of Tokyo-3 little more than blast shelters. Animals do not even survive in this world. There is something missing in even the humanity of the Evangelion human beings, and all characters can feel that. That is why there is a thrust to the posthuman in the show with the 人類補完成計画, translated as the Human Instrumentality Project, comes into play. 「人類方完成計画」means different things to different people and organizations—is not surprising, considering this is Evangelion. I see three major interpretations of this phrase, and these are the posthumanities of Evangelion, the humanities after the Evangelion series. These are the posthumanities of Seele, Ikari Gendō, and Ikari Shinji.

Let us start with Seele. “To return humanity to its original form”—this is the posthumanity of Seele. All individuality must be extinguished, and we must return to the primal forms of Lilith and Adam. Why Lilith? This is where my knowledge of the Christian tradition fails. As far as I know, Lilith was Adam’s first “companion”, but she never lay with him. Instead, she gave birth to all the monsters of the world. Often, she has been thought of as a witch. If you want an instance of Lilith close to the world, Jean E. Graham’s paper “Women, Sex, and Power: Circe and Lilith in Narnia” compares the White Witch of Narnia to Lilith. In fact, she is explicitly noted to be a descendant of Lilith. This is speculation, but it seems that we are all, then, descendants of Lilith. Not even those of Adam and Eve, we are irredeemable monsters, unless we go back to the form that bore us, and resume the innocence of the formless. This needs the destruction of the human, and in some ways, this is the end that Ayanami Rei almost leads us to.

Ikari Gendō’s posthumanity is a rogue form of Seele’s plan, insofar as is it wishes to bring together all the living and the dead. The show repeatedly tells us that Ayanami Rei is somehow connected to Ikari Yui, Ikari Gendō’s deceased wife. Most people seem to find this form of posthumanism twisted and somehow fundamentally wrong. Akagi Naoko found it disturbing enough to find Yui still shadowing her that she committed suicide.

Finally, we have the posthumanism of Ikari Shinji. This is how I read the last two episodes of Evangelion, the two episodes that make the least sense in an anime where few things make sense. Over the two episodes, the EVA pilots and other NERV personnel face the monsters that have haunted them throughout their lives and try to overcome them. Shinji’s fear is the fear of intimacy, of becoming close to people. He does not know how to open himself up without getting hurt, primarily because his father never showed him any warmth even after his mother gave herself up to EVA – 01. It is the Hedgehog’s Dilemma all over again. The primarily-teenage audience of Evangelion possibly relates the difficulties that Shinji faces, the inability to somehow “let loose” and connect with people freely. How can one do that when it is so easy to not only hurt others but also hurt oneself? This is what stops Shinji often taking decisive action and stops him from fully realizing himself.

The purpose of the last two Evangelion episodes is to show us how Shinji admits that he has been drawing walls in the way he imagines the world to be. In the alternative world that he dreams of, he acts the same way as his classmates—a carefree, horny, uninhibited, Japanese teenage male. It is just an altered version of a scene we have already witnessed before. It is important that this world is not radically different from his own world. The people are the same—his classmates and Misato still make the experiences of this world. If it can be done in that imaginary world, why not in this world? Shinji realizes that the world he has been looking for does not need to be an LCL-fuelled dream, but a world that he can inhabit. When Shinji rejects the dream world that Lilith-Rei gives him, Shinji accepts the difficulty of human existence. He accepts the borders that characterize the individual human and yet also looks to the possibility of moving beyond our borders and bonding with other people. The “congratulations” sequence in the original ending and the final scene of the 1997 movie (where he almost strangles Asuka), both accept the fact that people are always distinct, but there is no reason why we cannot connect with each other.

The show then inevitably puts its weight behind the last form of “perfection” or 「完成」(Kansei). This is how human realization should function. The show not only addresses teenage anxieties through this, but its rejection of other forms of perfection is important too. It rejects forms of human perfection that try to take us into some primordial past or try to erase all our distinctions. The erosion of borders, the assertion that we are all the same is, is as threatening as the assertion that some shadowy organization that does not even live among us can decide who is or is not a part of a community. Evangelion is prescient in the fact that not only does it see the creation of rigid borders as a problem, but it also sees that the complete dismissal of borders is not a solution either. I would like to think that it gives us tools to think about the problems of borders that we face in many regions of the world—whether it is the wars in the Middle East, the anti-immigrant agendas of Trump’s America and Modi’s India, the slowly digesting monster that is the PRC in Hong Kong, or even the xenophobia that countries like Korea and Japan still struggle with. Every individual must revaluate themselves before we blindly forge on this path that we call “humanity”. Maybe we all need to pause for a few days and watch Neon Genesis Evangelion before we create the cataclysm of the Second Impact.

[1] Before pointing out that Netflix’s dubbing and subbing has horribly altered the anime and therefore Evangelion has lost its essence, please note that I know Japanese. You can find that on my LinkedIn Page. Of course, I haven’t linked that anywhere on Tumblr, so don’t look for it.

[themattress]

Evangelion: the manga > the anime

Reason 13: The Ending

This is it. The big one. The reason above all else why I think the manga is a better-told version of the NGE story than the anime in spite of all the anime’s many strengths. 

Only the manga has a fully satisfying ending.

The anime TV show ending is a preposterous puzzle, filled with increasingly low-budget animation and long-winded philosophical musings as Anno finally makes good on what he had been building to: using the show and characters for his own personal therapy session, which we are a captive audience to. The main details is that Instrumentality has happened...somehow, and that Shinji is in control over whether or not it will go through to completion...somehow. In his depressed state of mind, Shinji is tempted to just let the process run its course so that all life will merge into a single immortal being who will never feel emotional pain again. But with realizations such as there is no real sense of self without the presence of others, truth and reality is what an individual make of it, and that he’s projected his own fears, anxieties and self-loathing onto others in order to shape his negative self-image and that this can fixed, Shinji realizes there is value in living as himself and destroys Instrumentality.

I love the message in this ending and I especially love the conclusion - yeah, everyone clapping and telling Shinji “Congratulations!” is cheesy, but seeing them all smiling and then Shinji himself smiling as a beautiful instrumental version of “Cruel Angel’s Thesis” plays in the background is a great, uplifting note to end what has been such a dark, depressing story on. BUT the lack of details, plot development, or conclusive character development for anyone who isn’t Shinji in favor of all this sermonizing is really annoying. From what can be surmised, a lot of things in the outside world seem to have played similarly to EoE, but it is strongly implied that it’s Gendo’s version of Instrumentality that succeeded here: Gendo, with Adam inside him, merges with Rei who returns to Lilith, creating the Adam/Lilith hybrid being but with Gendo’s mind in control of it. However, his plan to merge with Unit 01 and reunite with Yui goes awry thanks to the mentality of its pilot, Shinji (no thanks to Gendo himself, so it’s pretty karmic), who inadvertently causes the interfusion of souls to happen. The two-part series finale transpires within the minds of all who are caught up in this, particularly Shinji. But by then, viewers were fed up with this kind of mind-screw, so this ending was panned.

Then we have EoE, where we finally get actual details and plot development in the outside world. The big difference is that Rei abruptly turns on Gendo, taking Adam for herself and entering Lilith without him. The Adam/Lilith hybrid being merges with Unit 01 and puts Instrumentality in Shinji’s hands, and this time Shinji consciously and deliberately enacts the interfusion of souls, saying “everyone can just die” (boy, doesn’t that make him likable, huh?)

This is part of EoE’s biggest problem: it is made when Anno is no longer in a state of therapeutic pondering, but a state of anger and hatred. This anger and hatred permeates throughout the entire movie, informing every choice made in it. Shinji jerks off over Asuka’s comatose body. Misato is cold and abusive toward Shinji, and then dies for nothing. Shinji doesn’t honor her final wishes and just mopes. Asuka receives an uplifting emotional closure that brings her badassness back, only to be defeated in battle and utterly brutalized. Ritsuko fails because one of her mother’s AI computers betrays her in favor of Gendo, who shoots her dead. Gendo is killed in a mind-screwy way that plays to his worst fears and offers no redemption whatsoever. Shinji strangles Asuka within his own mind, then proceeds to willfully destroy humanity. And during the equivalent to the TV show’s therapeutic sequence where Shinji changes his mind about Instrumentality, the Adam/Lilith hybrid being has its throat sliced open right after actual written death threats to Anno from fans disgruntled over the TV show’s ending flashes on screen. And through all of this, Shinji just keeps SCREAMING!!!

This cinematic ending is wonderfully directed, beautifully animated, and contains a lot of great ideas, but it is just so unpleasant to watch. Even when coming to the same uplifting message, it falls flat when the last scene is Shinji washed up on the shore of a barren hellscape along with “Asuka”, who he truly does strangle this time, only to stop when she touches his face which leads to him breaking down into heavy sobbing. Asuka quietly says “How disgusting”, and suddenly “The End” comes on screen. That’s it, that’s how it ends: not with Shinji being congratulated and smiling, but Shinji crying while being insulted yet again. What. The. Fuck!?  If the TV show’s ending was the equivalent of Anno guiding the viewer through a slow, tranquil therapy session in order to lead them to the story’s moral, this ending is the equivalent of Anno mercilessly beating the shit out of the viewer until they grasp the story’s moral. And the problem with that is that most viewers aren’t going to remember the moral, they’re just going to remember the beating! Anno failed to stick the landing twice, and unfortunately I’m hedging my bets that he’s going to strike out with his third attempt next year in the ending to the Rebuild film series, especially with how that series has gone thusfar.

With the manga’s ending, Sadamoto combines the tranquil therapeutic sensibilities and clearly uplifting message of the TV ending with the plot and detail of EoE. It’s essentially EoE as it should have been, since it’s being made by someone who isn’t in such a negative state of mind as Anno was. Each alteration made here is an improvement, and these include:

- Shinji doesn’t jerk off to Asuka’s comatose body, and instead tries to shake her awake while yelling about how much she means to him. She wakes up in a fit of indiscriminate madness and (hilariously enough) strangles Shinji before being restrained by the infirmary staff.

- That scene with Gendo and Shinji is added, doing wonders for both characters.

- Misato, while maintaining a hardened edge, isn’t abusive to Shinji. After slapping him when it’s necessary, she pulls him into a hug, saying that she isn’t like Gendo - she wants him to pilot Eva, but not just for others: for himself, too, and that she won’t allow him to lose hope.

- Misato is given a more triumphant send-off, blowing herself and several enemy troops up with a grenade rather than just being shot down. We also get a chapter cover where she is reunited with Kaji in the afterlife. I still hate that she died, but this is better than EoE’s version.

- Rather than moping and wasting Misato’s last request when he sees Unit 01 stuck, Shinji rediscovers his backbone and wills it free by appealing to Yui’s soul within it. (“MOVE!”) Because of this, Shinji is able to rescue Asuka before she can be brutalized by the MP-Evas. 

- After Rei turns on Gendo, it is revealed that Ritsuko isn’t quite dead after Gendo had shot her after all, and she is able to fatally shoot him through the neck before finally expiring. 

- Shinji’s mind-fucking when the Adam/Lilith hybrid being merges with Unit 01 is portrayed completely different, centering around a flashback between him and Yui. The decision he comes to deliberately initiate the interfusion of souls has a completely different motivation: he wants to save everyone rather than destroy them, Lilith messing with his mind has skewed his noble intentions and made him believe that Instrumentality is the only way to stop everyone from suffering ever again. This, along with what ends up happening later, maintains sympathy for Shinji, as he is trying to do the right thing and is being misled on how to do it.

- Asuka gets “tanged” during Instrumentality, with the Rei spirit who does so to her appearing to her as Kaji, whom Asuka is happy to realize did love her even if in a fatherly way and not in the romantic/sexual sense, which provides some closure to that relationship. Given that Asuka spoke of Kaji after her mind rape in both the anime and manga, this is appreciated.

- Gendo’s death isn’t a cruel WTF moment, but his only measure of atonement as Yui’s spirit guides him to remember that he did love Shinji from the start and denied that to himself because he was afraid of loving his child and being loved by his child given the issues he developed with his own father. Gendo’s dying wish is for Shinji to survive...and to live.

- The climax within the merged Adam/Lilith hybrid and Unit 01 is between Shinji and Rei (no needless Kaworu cameo here). Instead of Rei, then Kaworu, and finally Yui convincing Shinji to reverse course, Shinji decides it all by himself: his head is now clear of Lilith’s meddling and he realizes that this horrific result isn’t what he wanted after all...yes, everyone will no longer suffer, but only because there no longer is an “everyone” to suffer. Even if it comes with pain, people can only be people when they are allowed to be their own individuals and co-exist with each other. Rei had re-joined Lilith hoping for this exact outcome, and together she and Shinji re-awakens Yui’s soul and they destroy the Adam/Lilith hybrid being together, reversing Instrumentality and returning all souls to where they belong in a truly spectacular sequence. Thus, as “Cruel Angel’s Thesis” says, does a young boy become a legend.

- Rei has an emotional death scene where, without Adam/Liltih to sustain her, her soul breaks apart and is fragmented across the new Earth, becoming snow. Her final words to Shinji are thanking him for helping her develop her own individual self, and her final thoughts are that she, merged with the new world, will be waiting for Shinji to be reborn there. It’s beautiful.

- Before Shinji fully becomes LCL in preparation for his rebirth, he actually sees the souls of Yui and Gendo, projected from Unit 01 which remains in space. This brings closure to the main theme of the story: the relationship between Shinji and his parents, combining a visual from the TV ending (Shinji smiling as he is congratulated by his parents) and Yui’s inspiring words from EoE (”As long as the sun and the moon and the Earth exists, it will be all right.”) 

- The perfect epilogue to the story, where we actually get to see the new world and humanity reborn into it rather than just Yui’s claims that it could happen. It is snowing, which means a proper weather cycle is back rather than endless summer. The MP-Evas are frozen like statues, and are considered mysterious artifacts by humans, who no longer remember anything involving Evas and the Angels. The new, well-adjusted Shinji meets the new, well-adjusted Asuka for the first time (oh, and Kensuke too). And the sequence of Shinji walking down the street mirrors the beginning of the manga, except this time his inner monologue is different: uplifting and optimistic rather than depressed and cynical. As we see that he still bears the crucifix that Misato gave him before she died, we hear that he is keeping his promise to her: “I will do my best. I will find my own path. It may be rough and winding, with driving wind and rain, and some days may be freezing cold. But...I know the sun will light the way. My future...holds infinite possibilities”.  Damn it! It brings tears to my eyes every time!

Sadamoto is the only one to end the story of NGE in a truly ideal way. And this factor alone is justification for my unshakable belief that the manga is the definitive version of that story.

[fluffmugger]

introspectivenavelgazer replied to your post: introspectivenavelgazer replied to...  CYBORGS? WHAT? I AM SO CONFUSED. aconiteherbalist replied to your post: introspectivenavelgazer replied to... Yes? Explain? Please?

OK. This is gonna be full of massive fucking spoilers, ‘cos I’m gonna lay it all out rather than feed it to you piecemeal as the show did with the slow unfurling. also people are probably gonna yell at me on this and that.  

IN THE BEGINNING, THERE WAS LIGHT

ok, you probably noticed this show is huge on stealing from religious mythology. Chiefly abrahamic.

So: Progenitor species ( Yeah you could call them aliens, or celestial beings, it’s really down to whether or not you want to be religious or scientific or both, because the show allows for both and lets be honest the progenitor species fulfill all requirements for god.) sends out “seeds” to various planets.

One of these, called in the series Adam landed on Earth. Adam is known as the Seed of Life.    The seed of life creates god-like creatures, these were known as the Angels. 

However, later on (the First Impact) another seed hit earth.   This was the Seed of Knowledge and is known in the series as Lilith, which would create a species that in’t god like, but instead is co-operative and uses technology. This is the creation of the human species

 Two seeds aren’t supposed to hit the same planet because the combination of the two would result in god like powers on the same level as the progenitor species - this is what they called “forbidden knowledge”.  So Adam went dormant and the angels left Earth. 

Just to dogleg here - the seeds came via “moons” (FUCKING TRANSPORT MODULES) with a “lance of longinus” as their control system.  Adam came on the “white moon” and Lilith came on the "Black Moon" and lost her “spear” (control system). Since Adam’s spear (control system) was still active, it picked up Lilith’s arrival and shut down due to safety protocols to prevent a merging.  The “dead Sea Scrolls”  are actually a user manual, but seeing as we’re also talking about a species with PHENOMENAL COSMIC POWER they're also prophetic and shit as perceived by piddly human brains. 

So humans ended up evolving and breeding and covering the planet and so you have our reality.  La di frickin’ da.

So you have SEELE who have been poking at this manual and realising what's happened and going HEY LETS BECOME GODS.  They already have Lilith - that big marshmallow fucker that's nailed the cross, it's basically a big Meaningful Imagery of a species progenitor kept in check, what's leaking out of her is Primordial Ooze - but they need the other Seed.    They fund an expedition (lead by Misato's father), who then goes poking around and finds Adam, its Spear of Longinus, and the White Moon in Antarctica. (The progenitor program, control system and space ship). They decide to poke it with a stick, and fuse some human (lilith-created) DNA with him, which created the Fifth Child / Angel (Kowaru).  This triggers a safeguard and causes the Second Impact because, you know, THEY'RE NOT SUPPOSED TO MERGE.   (They also use the lance to reduce Adam to an "embryonic" state to try and stop the angels from reactivating and returning. )

 The "official" UN story is that the second  impact was a meteor strike.  Two billion people in the southern hemisphere were killed by tsunamis caused by the explosion, with more worldwide drowning in coast floods.  In the chaos that ensued wars broke out due to the destabilisation of many nation states, food supplies were fucked, it was catastrophic. Civil wars broke out everywhere, refugee crises, ethnic tensions, the whole shebang. India and Pakistan went full trump and nuked the shit out of each other, and finally 2 days after the disaster another nuke was detonated in "Old Tokyo" killing two million people. (and leaving that bloody huge hole)   Worldwide war broke out for a year.  Basically all the shit we're looking at in a worse case scenario with climate catastrophe happened.  Half of the human race and thousands of plant and animal species were wiped out entirely.

 And so we have the world of Eva, the result of the Second Impact.  Pretty standard "mankind meddling with things he was not meant to know and now we're all fucked" trope.

 Misato was at ground zero, but her father managed to place her in a protective capsule, so she survived, but the injuries left that massive scar on her chest, and massive psychological scars which is why she's a raging drunk.

 AAAAANYWAY  Seele aren't done with the befucking however, because as we all know humans are garbage and groups of men in darkened rooms sitting around a table even more so.  So they keep right on fucking.

  Seele embark on the "Human Instrumentality Project", which is to use a controlled third impact to force the evolution of humanity to the same level as the original progenitor species - a fusion of Knowledge and of Life seeds.  This would also result in the erasure of individuality, with all human souls fusing into a single "being" for want of a better word, the physical forms goopifying and creating a sea of primordial soup, known as LCL. I don't know if you've ever watch DS9, but the Great Link of the Founders (Odo's species) is a pretty close parallel.

 Problem is, the Angels are awake.

 The Angels are attempting to return to Earth, to basically initiate their own second impact, except in this case it would involve re-activating Adam which would erase all humans.  This would be done by an "AT field" clash  - basically AT fields are what binds a life form together - not just the physical form, but psychological, so essentially an unmaking that would revert all non-angel life to primordial goop. An Adam-generated "Angel" life form template would goop a Lilith-based "human" template.  (for the majority of the series, Lilith  is actually misidentified as Adam if that helps. If anything helps. It's a h o t mess).  Particularly where Evas utilise their AT fields, think of it as an EM field + extras.

 And so  you have Adam's "Children" (Known as angels,  but also referred to as apostles) start hitting earth one after the other, and this is where you get the Evas pulled into production and the Big Robot Battles

 NOW TO THE EVAS

  Unit 01 (Shinji's) was actually generated using genetic material from Lilith itself. It's also known as a clone.  As  a result it tends to go batshit fucking insane ("Beserk") on occasion. It's a living being in an armoured suit with a lot of intertwined mechanics - the Evas are in fact, cyborgs.    There are indications that Eva was an attempt to create a controllable Lilith - Lilith (progenitor program that created humanity) having lost her "spear of longinous" (Control module) is essentially unusable.    Shinji's mother and Gendo's wife Yui initiated a contact with this eva unit pre-series, but in fact merged with the eva - her body goopified, but her soul remains inside the unit. This is why Unit 01 runs so well with Shinji (her son) as pilot, and goes beserk in battle situations where he is threatened.

 Unit 02 has a similar deal, except it went wrong. Only part of Asuka's mother's soul was absorbed, the resulting schism driving what was left of her insane ,and she commits suicide.  The part of her that still resides in Eva-02 is what makes Asuka her pilot, but without the same level of integration and control that Yui has in 01, having fully melded.  Asuka, honey, I know you're pissed that Shinji is a better pilot than you, THERE IS A REASON FOR THAT.

 Evas are cyborgs with merged human souls.  Once they worked out it made the fuckers work, they really went to fucking town on it, so every Eva is a human soul, preferably one who was the mother of the pilot if they can get her (weaponising maternal instincts yooooo)

 Go, take a break, take a walk, try and digest it for a bit.

So to give us the cliff notes at this point:  Eva is about a battle between two species over who gets to become god, with humans using genetically engineered monsters that have absorbed human souls.

 Now to REI what the fuck is up with Rei

 Rei is a clone.  She was an attempt to retrieve Yui from Eva 01 using what they could scrape up of her DNA, but Yui basically told them to go fuck themselves she wasn't coming out.  So Rei is used as a vessel for Lilith's "soul" - she's basically an attempt to first rescue Yui, then later an attempt to create a control system for Lilith.  This is why she can pilot 01 so readily, and why she's so disconnected from reality.  There are at least three Rei's in the series:

 REI I:

The first attempt, the little girl in the red dress who got strangled by Akagi. Seen in flashbacks she was very different from the others, and seemed to have more of a personality. To this end there are theories that her soul was used for EVA00, which would explain why it seems to hate her, and hate all of NERV because she's fucking well aware of what the cunts did to her, and being part Lilith has the full capability to express this.

 REI II:

This is the one we see throughout the series as a teenaged girl, who is killed when she self-destructs her Eva unit to kill Armisael.

  REI III:

Fresh clone right out of the vat and seemingly more involved and aware. She rejects Gendo's attempt to control her, giving the complete control of the third impact to Shinji instead (SHINJI TAAAAAAKE THE WHEEEL) 

RIGHT, NOW TO SKIP FORWARD A BUNCH TO THE THIRD IMPACT

The idea behind it:

Seele wanted to initiate Third Impact to bring about Instrumentality. They would use an Anti A.T. Field to neutralize the A.T. Fields that separate human beings from each other, causing all of humanity to revert into a giant ocean of LCL, freeing their souls. All the souls of Earth would then be collected inside the Adam/Lilith hybrid being.  Basically we goop, then Great Link as mentioned above.

Gendo doesn't really give a shit about humanity, he just wants his wife back.  He approaches Rei III (the most lilith-like and most human of Rei clones) with the Adam embryo, and she rejects him, takes the embryo, then returns to Lilith to fuse with her.   After assimilating Lilith, the inchoate form begins to merge with Evas and with all of humanity, causing everyone to go sploosh as they approach "the divine", seeing their loved ones and going all religious ecstasy.

Thing is, at the end of the day, Lilith and Adam, as advanced as they are, are created functions.  They have control software and with the introduction of Rei, Shinji becomes the pilot.

And shinji is realllllllly fucked up, hence that whole wtf ep where it's basically the destruction of his ego, the exposure of his self loathing, jacking off over Asuka, trying to choke her, facing all the fucked up parts of himself then learning that everyone else is as fucked up as he is and no dude, NO ONE KNOWS WHAT THE FUCK THEY'RE DOING.  It kinda derails for a lot of people at this point as it's a confusing montage of imagery, but basically that's a big ol' trip through a teenage boy's psyche, and reflective of the mental issues Anno himself had at the time. 

 But it ends in a breakthrough.

SERIOUSLY WATCH “THE END OF EVANGELION” ITS BASICALLY THE SERIES END REWRITTEN AND SANER AND OH MY GOD 

 And so Shinji rejects instrumentality.  The process is left in a state where everyone has the option to *choose* - to remain linked in the singular being, or be individual, which in and of itself isn't really a failure as the ability to control your own physical forms was part of Adam's lifeform archetype.    Hence the sea of LCL, with dotted humans.  Shinji and later Asuka return to human form, but the fate of everyone else is left open.

 OK I'm gonna take a break for a bit here because holy shit this is tolstoy here and I’m actually at work, so please PM me with further questions and I shall do up further posts, but this should be enough to get you going.  No one gets Eva on the first watch, it's a fucking glorious mess and even after years of watching you're gonna pick up some new shit.

[justaramblingromantic]

when she was little - part i

Characters/Pairing: Sarugaki Hiyori and Hirako Shinji/ShiYori

Type: Canon, Post!Series, Say Please!verse, Lily and Thistle!verse, ShiYori Week 2018, 

Word Count: 2897

A/N #01: First of seven parts. I will post an update daily just for this arc, in honor of ShiYori Week 2018. I’m already days behind and I don’t think I will be able to meet all the prompts, but I will still do what I can. :)

Wow. I’m still so amazed by the existence of a ShiYori week! Back in the golden days of this fandom grandma, we just yelled ship gibberish into the void and maybe every turn of the century, some casual ShiYori shipper would take pity and touch base for a while. This…This must be what they call progress!! You go, you, ShiYori Week Organizer!

FYI, this chapter corresponds to the Prompt for Day 1: Reversed.

A/N #02: Back to this arc – I’ve always wanted to explore a de-aged Hiyori so I finally got around to writing it. Baby!Hiyori is so cute I can’t even. I hope you guys have your fluff caps on.

Random note: I’m always endlessly amused that the ‘hiyo’ (ひよ) in Hiyori’s (ひよ里) name is also used in ‘hiyoko’ (ひよこ) – meaning ‘little chick,’ haha.

                                              Though she be but little, she is fierce!

                                                          - William Shakespeare

When Hiyori was late for lunch, which almost always never happened, Shinji should have already guessed that something was not right. 

His petite lover never missed a free meal as a general rule of thumb, which was how he was able to (often) lure her back to Seireitei to seek him just like he had this time. She still did not like Soul Society all that much, but with enough incentive (as well as the promise of his charming escort and company) she could usually be convinced to set aside her prejudice temporarily and learn to enjoy her time with him in this realm that they both originally belonged. He hoped that he would eventually be able to wear down her resistance and reluctance to come back permanently to Soul Society – he did not expect her to return into service as a Shinigami of the Gotei 13 (that would be too much to ask from her and would earn him nothing but her fury), but it would at least be nice to have her nearby all the same.

He had promised to treat her today – yakiniku, her favorite – and in light of that, it hadn’t taken much persuasion on his part to get her to clear her ‘busy’ schedule to lunch with him. She had grudgingly agreed to turn up at noon when he spoke to her through the phone last evening, but it had already been a couple of hours past that appointed time, and she still had not showed at his office in the Gobantai. Shinji had been quite busy with his paperwork and therefore he had only been mildly exasperated by her unpunctuality; two hours had to be some kind of record even for her.

His Lieutenant had approached him a while ago, and Momo had rather concernedly enquired if her Taichou would like her to bring back some takeout for his sake instead. The dark-haired female was very conscientious of her duties and would often fret when she felt that her Captain was neglecting his personal wellbeing, though she stopped when he explained that he was waiting for a certain snaggletooth monkey brat. His Fukutaichou had smiled then with understanding, content with the knowledge that her Taichou wasn’t starving himself under her watch, and work in the office resumed for the next hour or so.

By then, Shinji had already finished all the bureaucratic tasks that he had set out to do for the day, and Hiyori still had not showed up at his office. The fine-haired Vizard Captain was no longer just disgruntled with his significant other, he was also starting to become a mite concerned. It really wasn’t like Hiyori to be late at all, in fact, she was usually excessively on time for appointments, often even going so far as to arrive early (and then she would go around beating up those who came after her for being tardy). Shinji was starting to wonder if something had really happened – though if it turned out that the brat was indeed simply, just unbelievably, incorrigibly late, then he would be really unamused.

It was then, that there was a quiet knock on the door of the Gobantai office, and both Taichou and Fukutaichou looked up from their desks to see the composed figure of Kurotsuchi Nemu standing at the entrance. The artificial soul sketched a solemn, polite bow to her fellow Lieutenant and the latter’s Captain before asking for permission to speak.

“Go ahead,” Shinji responded, intrigued by this unusual visit. The Fifth Division and the Twelfth Division typically did not have many dealings with one another, so he was curious to see what the latter Squad wanted from his.

“Good afternoon, Hirako Taichou,” the young woman greeted in a calm, modulated tone. “The Twelfth Division seeks your assistance in light of a particularly unexpected situation that we are currently doing our best to correct. We require your cooperation in the meanwhile as we’re not equipped to deal with the subject, and our Third Seat has mentioned that you may be able to offer invaluable assistance in resolving this accident.”

Shinji was visibly baffled. “Subject? Accident?” he echoed, his brow furrowing ever so slightly in bewilderment. “…This isn’t another one of yer Taichou’s ploys ‘ta get a Vizard Shinigami on his table again, is it? What, or, as I suspect, who are ya talkin’ ‘bout, Kurotsuchi Fukutaichou?”

In response, the Juunibantai Shinigami moved aside slightly and made a small gesture with her hand, revealing the presence of the Third Seat of her Squad who had just shifted into sight.

“No, Hirako Taichou. This is not a ploy.” the other Lieutenant replied quite truthfully and courteously. “I shall allow Akon-san to explain the situation in detail.”

Shinji had not seen the horned scientist of the Twelfth ever since that last time they had that conversation about Hiyori, and as Shinji’s dark golden gaze shifted over to younger male, mouth already open to ask what was going on, he immediately caught sight of the tiny bundle that the clearly discomforted man was gingerly holding in his arms.

The little thing that Akon was carrying with painstaking care shifted and moved slightly, and Shinji’s eyes widened imperceptibly in surprise.

It was a child.

A very young, tiny one at that – not exactly a baby and probably just slightly more grown up than a toddler, but what had stunned the Captain so much was not the presence of the child, but rather, her all too familiar appearance.

Soft, fluffy, shoulder length blonde hair. Cute, cherubic features. Small rosebud mouth. Huge ochre eyes. The unmistakable smatter of freckles dusted over babyish cheeks. The young one did not look a day older than four or five, and in reaction to that sight, he had damn near shot up from his seat instantaneously, the earlier bemused, laidback look in his eyes disappearing abruptly, agitation visibly thrumming through his previously calm spiritual pressure as he grimly eyed Akon.

“What exactly is this?” he demanded immediately, his tone becoming sharp and clipped, an apparent undercurrent of growing ire in his abruptly shifted demeanor and speech. “What have ya done?”

There weren’t a lot of things that would immediately rile the lean, rangy blonde, but what he was looking at right now came pretty damn close. ‘What the hell are ya tryin’ ‘ta pull?”

Poor Akon visibly blanched at the deadly serious, borderline angry expression on the Captain’s face, suddenly reminded of the fact that this usually laidback male was also quite powerful in his own right. The black haired man nearly took a step back before he caught himself and shook his head quickly. “Hirako Taichou, believe me when I say that this is anything but intentional. …There has been an…unfortunate mishap.”

And it had been an awfully unfortunate mishap, indeed.

It turned out that Hiyori had somehow decided to make a small detour to her old Division when she had arrived in Seireitei ahead of lunchtime, and thanks to an unfortunate series of events (aided and abetted by her bottomless pit of a stomach), the waifish blonde had ended up eating something that she shouldn’t have – i.e. an entire plate of delicious looking (but highly experimental) cupcakes that had just been freshly created by the R&D department of the Juunibantai, mistaken by the pigtailed female as part of the refreshments that her ex-colleague Akon was serving her – and the result was now one age-diminished female Vizard, both her physical and mental forms returned to that of a young, impressionable child, with no memories of her adult life whatsoever, and currently more fascinated by her surroundings than in understanding whatever had happened to her.

Shinji was flabbergasted as he listened to the explanations of the two Juunibantai Shinigami, and then he had quickly gotten pissed off on the behalf of his hapless lover.

“How come yer squad’s always leavin’ this sorta highly ambiguous and dubious things lyin’ ‘round?!!” the Gobantai Taichou had demanded with significant displeasure even though he had already been repeatedly assured that this…affliction that had come over her could be corrected and that they were working on the cure to counter the reverse aging effects, though that would technically rectify itself eventually, given time – a few centuries of it. Shinji had not been amused. At the same time, since Hiyori had ended up ingesting several servings of the spiked cupcakes all by her petite lonesome, it had actually been a surprise in itself that she hadn’t accidentally overdosed on them and eaten herself right out of existence – Shinji was hardly impressed when that possibility had been mentioned to him by the clinically composed Kurotsuchi Fukutaichou, and he had been very close to storming over to the Twelfth Division himself to strangle her ‘father’ with his bare hands whilst demanding that he fix this, right now.

For the first time ever, Momo got to experience her usually calm and laidback superior blow his top, and the blonde would honestly be growling and snapping much, much, more, if not for the tiny little girl child who was still ensconced in Akon’s arms.

The same tiny little girl child who also happened to be his lover, and was now staring warily at him like he was a raving madman – which he had been pretty much behaving like for the past half an hour or so.

The young girl had one arm slung around her temporary caregiver’s neck even as she was being securely held on the side, and her large eyes took in everything with unbound curiosity. She instinctively pulled herself closer to her current guardian when their gazes crossed, and Shinji frowned inwardly at her unexpectedly timid reaction. In response, Akon awkwardly petted the child on her back and held her snugly, and even though Hiyori was only a five/six year old in physical form, Shinji was still immediately irked by the fact that she was being cossetted and comforted by somebody else. She was very young and vulnerable right now, and that only made his already existing protective instincts towards her increase even more – a lot more.

“I assumed since she’s your…partner,” Akon spoke up rather carefully then. “-that you’d at least be informed about this situation. I feel partly responsible, so I’d like to help out too since uh, little Hiyori may be too much of a handful for you to handle by yourself, Hirako Taichou.”

Perhaps the kid truly meant well with his offer, but Shinji felt his eyes narrow slightly at the less than well-meaning way in which he had structured his words. Why, that punk- He still obviously hadn’t given up on his little crush on Hiyori yet.

“I ‘preciate yer offer, but that ain’t necessary,” Shinji replied in turn, his earlier irritated and upset demeanor fading quickly as he regained his cool composure. “She’s never gonna be ‘too much’ for me ‘ta handle, so ya can just pass her over right now – I’ll take care of her just fine on my own.” The blonde walked over to the Twelfth Division Third Seat and reached out towards the little golden haired girl still ensconced in the latter’s arms, and child that she was, young Hiyori put up no resistance as the now significantly older blonde placed his hand on her small shoulder.

No, the one who failed to budge was Akon, and this time, Shinji’s eyelid twitched as he looked at the latter’s equally dogged features. The blonde gritted his teeth slightly and ‘smiled’ at the Third Seat. “Ya should really let go now, Akon-san,” the Vizard Captain commented rather pointedly, but much to his chagrin, the black haired man maintained his grip on the precious cargo.

“I think I’d still like to offer my assistance,” Akon insisted with determined firmness even as he subtly attempted to maneuver Hiyori back closer to him. “Like I said, I feel partly responsible, so I want to do my part to help as well.”

Shinji placed his other hand on Hiyori’s other shoulder and lightly tugged her to him once more. “And like I said, yer assistance’s not needed here,” the Gobantai Taichou retorted in return. “If ya really wanna help, then go straight back ‘ta yer Division and do yer best ‘ta figure out how ‘ta undo this mess. Now, give her ‘ta me.”

Akon rocked backwards slightly in an attempt to loosen the other man’s hold on his charge. “I’m pretty sure that I can be of service here as well,” he insisted with an equal modicum of stubborn politeness, though Shinji wasn’t about to be shaken loose so easily. “Besides, it’s obvious that Hiyori likes being near me – she has been clinging to me the whole time.”

Shinji’s eyelid twitched again, and his pull became stronger. “Don’t make it sound so unnecessarily suggestive. Yer startin’ ‘ta get on my nerves, Third Seat!”

In reply, Akon pulled back. “I apologize, Hirako Taichou, for that’s not my intention,” he replied in a passive fashion, though that turned out to be more passive aggressive than anything else, for he continued. “But you can safely entrust Hiyori to me; I’ll take good care of her and make sure that she is well tended to-”

It sounded suspiciously as though the younger man was asking him for her hand in marriage. Unsurprisingly, Shinji started to look more than a bit brassed off then.

“Oi. Ya do not get ‘ta say this sort of things ‘ta me!!”

Meanwhile, the two Fukutaichou of the Fifth and the Twelfth stood to the side and watched the ensuing altercation with varying degrees of chagrin and clinical fascination. After all, it was a rather unusual sight - two grown men, both powerful in their own right and usually insouciant and pretty difficult to stir up, were resorting to downright childish levels of rivalry as they argued rather fiercely for the possession of a little girl.  

Momo glanced timidly at her fellow Lieutenant, who was still intently watching the rather comical scene of the two men currently involved in a tug of war over a child. “Ah…I had no idea that Akon-san felt so…passionately over Hiyori-san.”

Nemu inclined her head slightly in agreement. “Neither did I. It’s interesting.”

Momo did not quite know what to make out of this whole escalating situation (this was not going to end well, she was sure), and she was about insert herself between her Captain and the Twelfth Division Third Seat when the issue suddenly resolved itself.

Tired and wary of the two men fighting over her, Hiyori flinched away from the blonde man and quickly cuddled towards her default guardian, wrapping her arms firmly around the latter’s neck and hiding her face in his shoulder.

Shinji paused, surprised by her action, but she had clearly chosen, and it was Akon’s win.

“Hiyori’s more familiar with me now,” the black-haired scientist remarked then, though to his credit, if he was quietly gloating over his victory, then he was hiding it very well. “Let me take care of her for now-”

“Hiyori.” Shinji spoke then, and there was a quiet, compelling tone in the way he said her name, completely different from which he had bickered with Akon earlier, and it was enough to prompt the young girl to lift her head and peek at him with curiosity in her large ochre eyes, automatically drawn to him even though she did not understand a thing. The child silently watched the beautiful looking, golden-haired man talking to her.

“S’this what ya really want, brat?” Shinji asked, before simply stretching his arms out towards her once again, this time not touching her yet, but close enough that she should be able to make contact with him should she wish it. “If not, then come back ‘ta me.”

She continued to stare at him for what seemed like the longest time, as if mesmerized by the quiet intensity in his eyes, trying to figure something out in her mind. Then, at last, still without a word, the little blonde started to loosen her arms from around her black-haired guardian’s neck and simply reached towards Shinji to be carried, going so far as to lean her torso slightly towards him as well so that he could take her easier. Her act of blind trust made her lover really happy, though he was careful not to show it. Slipping his hands under Hiyori’s skinny arms, he lifted her easily from Akon’s grasp (the latter finally, reluctantly letting her loose then) and rather awkward fitted her to his own lanky form. It was a good thing that she was already old enough to somehow cling to him on her own, for Shinji was very quickly learning just how challenging it was to carry a child by propping her against the side of his distinctly non-womanly and non-curvaceous hip.

The man was still rather awkwardly trying to figure out where to appropriately place his hands on her small body (she was so much tinier now than she had ever been, and he still had problems getting over that fact), when the child boldly reached up, caught his face by placing her little hands on the two sides of his cheeks, and made him look at her.

Then, she asked the question that had been plaguing her since she had been brought into this office.

“Are ya my family?”

                                                                   ::tsuzuku::

[mozillavulpix]

Evangelion Thoughts, End of Evangelion

The End, again.

Episode 25′

Oh. It's the 'everyone dies' ending. Damn it.

Also I think I'll need to rewatch Episode 25 again

Anyway, to try and summarise what I think was going on:

Since the Lance of Longinus was what you needed to activate the Human Instrumentality Project, Seele's backup plan is to use the Eva series to do the same thing. And apparently only the old Eva series works, so they invade the Nerv facility and kill a whole bunch of people. They don't get the Magi because Ritsuko steps in.

I sort of don't remember where Asuka was at the end of Episode 24, but apparently she's unconscious in hospital at the start. And that whole meme thing with Shinji is actually at the very start.

Anyway, Asuka's unconscious body basically gets chucked in Unit 02 (which I think explains a scene in 25 when she's randomly in the Eva and doesn't know how?) and as the Seele troops are trying to destroy it, she gets saved by...her mom? It's almost like a counterpart to Shinji. If Unit 01 is Shinji's mom, Unit 02 is Asuka's mom. And that realisation kind of makes Asuka suddenly become a badass. The Eva action was amazing.

Meanwhile, Shinji is sitting there immobile the entire time and Misato literally has to drag him to the Eva. This sort of does feel a bit weird and like...overdone? I remember someone saying somewhere that End of Eva was a response to the fan response to Eva, and it's like exaggerated on purpose? As in, the fans were getting pissed off Shinji kept saying he didn't want to pilot the Eva, so Anno went extreme and made him literally not move at all the entire first half basically out of spite. That might be wrong. I kind of hope it is. That feels awfully mean-spirited.

Another tie-in to 25 is Gendo explains to Rei their plan is going to begin, but get stopped by Ritsuko. She tries to make the place self-destruct, but the Magi rejects it. And then Ritsuko dies. But Gendo seemingly says he does love her, but whether that's true or not is....who knows?

Oh yeah, and also Misato dies? Like...kind of out of the blue? And Asuka also seems to die and the other Eva series turn into birds and start eating her organs and what the fuck

When Shinji basically gets dragged by Unit 01 itself into the robot, he arrives just in time to see that lovely sight, start screaming, and end of Act 1. So this has gotten depressing. I think I knew end of eva had a total downer ending, and that makes me sad. Especially given that this does seem to be the way the series was intended to end. Characters die and it sucks. And while it seems like Shinji is going to be the thing that saves the day, he's kind of had no agency this entire first half.

And while I love Asuka's final stand, I do kind of wonder if her revelation power-up thing was a bit rushed. Like, she was literally just unconscious before she somehow realises her mother is there and then goes to fight and it's like....there's no build-up?

Look at me, critiquing End of Eva like I'm some sort of important person who can do better

It's like, 25 and 26 seemed to imply that things suck but everything can get better, you know? But End of Eva seems to just be that everything and everyone sucks.

Also now this is making me wonder what the hell 25 was supposed to be if the Human Instrumentality Project hasn't actually started yet. So how were they all on those chairs at the same time as these things were happening? Or was it like, when the project starts, all their souls start reflecting on the events of End of Eva Part 1 which we never got to see? I'm sure there's an answer somewhere.

Okay, just looking over my screenshots of Episode 25 again, they end with implying the reason everything is going to shit is because of Shinji, so I guess it does make sense. It didn't seem to really imply half of them are dead, though. Although those shots of dead Ritsuko and Misato ARE how they happen in the film. Damn it! Does everyone need to die? No one really had to die in the story so far!

Episode 26′

Sorry guys. I think I managed this long, but End of Evangelion has now officially lost me. I don't get it. Let me try and figure out the stuff I do get.

1. The Human Instrumentality Project actually involves something to do with the unification of Adam and Lilith, and Eva and Angel. And the reason Gendo was so obsessed with it was because it would let him see Yui again. Because....either she exists as part of those souls that get merged together, or it's that thing where everyone sees their loved ones before they explode into LCL

2. But at the same time, Rei...disobeys Gendo? This is the part I didn't understand. She seemed to want to obey Shinji, and Shinji's depression meant he wanted everyone's souls combined, but then what did Gendo want instead? If she disobeyed him?

3. Then Shinji gets mind-raped except not actually rape this time and it turns out he's been totally misogynist? He wanted Asuka, Rei and Misato's attention without even considering what they wanted? This is all news to me, that's for sure. And it's one of the most confusing parts of this movie, I feel. The series did not imply his depression came out as insecurity and hatred of the women in his life. Or if it did, I missed it.

4. Trying to figure out the swingset scene...is the idea that he breaks down his own sandcastle because he's upset at being abandoned like...self-destructive behaviour? Is Shinji just self-destructive here?

5. Back onto the women thing, there's a sudden push onto Asuka as, like, the most important women here in his life and I don't understand it. Oh, and then Shinji strangles her? Which tbh does get an explanation

This makes sense, but I didn't see it ever before this, really. Just that line in 25 saying this was the world he had wished for.

6. Turns out Gendo was such a dick because he was scared of the world and relationships, so he did everything he could to cut himself out of them. What do you know.

7. I think I got lost a bit at the live-action segment. Presumably it's this version of the 'generic anime opening' that was the other world in 26, but instead of it saying "the world can be different if you change your perspective", it said Shinji was ALREADY looking at the world in...essentially a wrong way. Escaping into dreams. Also, were they filming a screening of End of Eva in End of Eva?

8. And Shinji seems to spend time in Instrumentality for all of like 2 minutes before he decides that it's not right and chooses to separate everyone again. I don't know if he was learning something in those earlier parts and I didn't get it, or that this came almost out of nowhere.

9. Turns out the point of having a soul in the Evangelion was a way to become immortal. And the reason for doing that was to try and prove human existence, even past the point of...entropy and you know. So Yui's soul will stay inside 01, which is why Shinji bids her farewell at the end of 26.

10. Okay what was that final ending. Shinji wakes up, sees Asuka, tries to strangle her again like in his mind, stops, and then Asuka calls him disgusting. yeah so this is the downer ending huh. what is that supposed to be and why. That Shinji wants to still be self-destructive after getting what he wanted? Or wouldn't choosing to not strangle her be a sign of improvement? Why is he being called out on it?

So there that's End of Eva I maybe get 50% of it I guess here's some screenshots

oh yeah also how did the lance of longinus come back and what is it

congratulations to maya for coming out

get it it's a vagina and shinji is a penis

And that's Eva!

Until the Rebuilds, I guess

[i-was-a-teenage-eldritch-horror]

1. Everything about the sequence in the hospital in Episode 22 signals that it hasn’t been that long since the contact experiment with Unit 02. If it’s been long enough for Asuka’s dad to (healthily) grieve and move on, then why the fairly long conversation between him and the nurse about Kyoko’s state? Surely, if it had been a while, there would be no reason for this discussion; it would already have been had.

Additionally, the fact that his new girlfriend is a nurse at the hospital suggests that he wasn’t spending much time grieving and/or visiting Kyoko. That the nurse plainly states that she doesn’t like Asuka (a grieving toddler) and says it to her dad’s face doesn’t paint a very flattering picture of Asuka’s dad (or the nurse, for that matter).

Also, it’s implied that Kyoko was released from the hospital eventually. In Episode 24 when Asuka comes running to tell Kyoko she’s been selected as a pilot, we see a different doorknob than in Episode 22′s flashback to the hospital. Also, wouldn’t Kyoko have logically been under suicide watch or enough supervision to prevent her from hanging herself had she still been in the hospital?

2. Ok. If that’s the case, then why is the lance of longinus penetrating Unit 02′s AT field deliberately framed as such? At that point in eoe, we have not one but several instances of caretakers failing, all happening back-to-back. Gendo assaulting Rei, Misato assaulting Shinji, Naoko rejecting Ritsuko, and Ritsuko doing nothing to help Rei. Are we really truly meant to think of Kyoko as an exception when it’s surrounded by a whopping four other instances of caretakers failing?

Whether or not this is fair of the narrative to Kyoko is another discussion entirely; the point is that it is framed as such.

Additionally, the lance took its sweet time pausing in the air and tearing through the AT field. If Kyoko wanted to, she could’ve acted of her own accord and moved to spare Asuka a gory, gruesome death. Unit 01 does this exact thing several times; it is entirely within the realm of possibility. Unit 00 also acts on its own accord numerous times throughout the series.

Also, Kyoko has blatant homicidal feelings towards Asuka -- she hung her in effigy with the ragdoll, as we saw in Asuka’s encounter with Arael in Episode 22, even asking Asuka to die with her. It’s even said that she was treating the ragdoll as if it was Asuka, and we see her strangling it in the hospital in Episode 22. Strangulation is always an attempt on someone’s life. You’re either trying to break their neck or suffocate them. If that wasn’t harrowing enough, delayed death after strangulation is extremely common as well.

Kyoko dipping out in eoe was probably a second attempt to die together. Which is all the more gut-wrenching when you remember that Asuka’s whole arc in eoe is partially centered around her making the difficult decision to live after a period of suicidality.

3. Misato doesn’t have a good track record with other women, period.

She speaks of her mom only once throughout the entire series, and even then its in relation to her dad. This is in spite of being raised by her both after her dad’s death and probably before as well -- how many times does Misato say her dad was totally absorbed into his work?

Misato is also dismissive towards Ritsuko -- she notes that Ritsuko doesn’t talk about herself, yet never questions why and if that’s unique to Ritsuko’s relationship with her (it is, for the most part), and later rebuffs Ritsuko’s attempts at rekindling their friendship.

In Episode 9, Misato uses Rei specifically to bruise Asuka’s ego after having to unexpectedly take Asuka in (probably after some needling by Kaji or Ritsuko). When Ritsuko shows Misato Rei’s origins, she doesn’t care, and says this isn’t what she came to see.

Finally, when Asuka begins to slip into a downward spiral towards the end of the series, she is completely and totally unsympathetic. She dismisses Ritsuko’s concern about Asuka’s falling sync rates with the flimsy excuse of “she’s on her period” instead of investigating or admitting the true cause. It tracks well, then, that because Misato recognizes the masculine parts of herself in Shinji and the feminine parts of herself in Asuka, that she neglects Asuka and dotes on Shinji. This is not to say that her treatment of Shinji was good, obviously. Only that Misato tried with Shinji.

You’re right, though, that Asuka rejected Misato in turn. We know that Asuka doesn’t think very highly of Misato -- she says as much to Kaji in Episode 22. However, that doesn’t excuse Misato’s behavior at all. If it had been Shinji audibly throwing a fit in the bathroom in Episode 22, Misato would not have been nearly as apathetic. How many times throughout the show does she take Shinji aside and have a heart-to-heart with him?

The only equivalent instance I can think of with Asuka is in Episode 10 at the hot springs, when Asuka is ashamed that Misato knows every bit of her trauma, only for Misato to blithely respond that it’s part of her job. Misato knows every ounce of Asuka’s pain and still neglects her.

Asuka Was An Accident

Unit 02 is notoriously flaky, and dare I say, the most lifeless eva of all. Asuka even thinks of it as a “toy.” Whereas Unit 01 is protective and lively, and Unit 00 is erratic and self-injurious, Unit 02 fills the role of “robotic military weapon” the best out of all the evas, at least for the majority of the series. Towards the end, Unit 02 becomes obstinate and flaky.

Since Unit 02 contains Kyoko’s soul, I think this indicates something about her as a parent. Namely that Kyoko didn’t want to be a mother, in my opinion. After the contact experiment with Unit 02, she retains not only her body, but a piece of her mind. Yui, however, didn’t even retain her body (Gendo states in Episode 15 that the gravestone is an artifice), only enough DNA to be used to make Rei. This is because Yui wanted to be a mother, and to be an eva. She directly tells Fuytsuki in Episode 21 that she wants to have kids. Shinji was planned. I don’t think Kyoko particularly wanted either of these things; motherhood or being an eva. Hence only a part of her being taken into Unit 02.

Asuka is introduced into the series late, unexpectedly (to the audience), and she completely changes the game. Character dynamics, tone, everything. What does that sound like to you? To me, it sounds like a surprise pregnancy, and an accidental child.

If we know one thing about Asuka’s father, it’s that he’s a jackass. He cheated on Kyoko while she was in the hospital– a startling parallel to how commonly men cheat on their wives and girlfriends when they experience long-term illness, such as cancer. If I’m being honest, I think Mr. Langley probably pressured Kyoko into keeping Asuka. Benefiting one-sidedly from a woman’s labor and sacrifice.

Taking this into account, it’s no surprise Unit 02 is so flaky when it comes to protecting Asuka. Kyoko tried her best to cope with being a mom, and what that ended up looking like was lifelessness, to the point that Kaworu was able to use Unit 02 in Episode 24. But ultimately it was just too much for her, so she dips out when it becomes too hard, like at the end of Asuka’s fight against the MPEs in end of evangelion. Of course, Asuka bears the brunt of that.

So, there’s another one to add to the pile of Asuka-Ritsuko parallels: being accidents. Because unless Naoko is older than Gendo, she would’ve had to have been a teen mom, and most babies born to teen moms are accidents.

Additionally, Misato and Rei, characters who are each associated with motherhood in their own way, reject Asuka. Misato consciously, purposefully neglects her. Rei ignores her. Misato also has to take Asuka in unexpectedly at the last minute.

The cherry on top of all of this is that Asuka is literally a red-headed stepchild. For those who aren’t familiar with the term, “red-headed stepchild” is a saying used to describe someone who is both fussy, hard to handle, and neglected, unwanted, and mistreated.

Sound familiar?