A Saint Out of the Shadow
lara@thekeep.org
http://www.thekeep.org/~lara/index.html
{Shin Seiki Evangelion/Neon Genesis Evangelion belongs to Gainax, Hideaki Anno and Yoshiyuki Sadamoto. The use of their material in this work is not intended for profit, and shall not be used in that way.}
[completed 2-14-2001]
A Saint Out of the Shadow
by Lara Bartram
She was partial to black, but she wore that normally, so it wasn't anything different. White maybe... Red or blue? She smirked. Purple. Yes, purple.
She picked out an ensemble in vineyard wine, a deep yet subtle shade of purple, and took it to the counter for purchase.
Then there were the dinner plans to deal with, a nice bottle of wine to pick out, and then... Well, she could hope. Things rarely worked as she planned them, and today of all days. It was a stupid idea, but... she was a romantic, no matter how hard she tried to convince herself otherwise.
If only she could get him to be the same a little more often.
***
The day passed slowly, and it seemed that just about everyone at NERV was hoping for a short respite. Many personnel had spouses or significant others that they wanted to spend the evening with.
As it grew closer and closer to the shift change, some were daring to hope the night would pass without incident. Sure, those happened more frequently than not, but not every day was a special day like this.
When the clock finally signaled the change, a few shouts of triumph were heard. So far the evening was still a go for all the lovers.
Misato gathered her things, leaving the small box and envelope for last. She could guess who they were from, but wasn't sure she wanted deal with that situation yet.
"He's persistent."
Misato sighed and nodded. "I don't know if I can deal with this. At least it's only once a year."
Wearing a sympathetic smile, Ritsuko patted her friend on the shoulder. "I'm sure you'll manage. At least you're getting something; some of us aren't so lucky."
"Yes, but... I'm just not up for it this year." Misato picked up the box and examined it while wearing a subtle frown.
"Hang in there. You'll do fine."
***
Dinner was simple, but elegant. It had been delivered a short time ago and was sitting in the oven, waiting for the guest to arrive.
She scoffed at herself as she lit the candles. A hopeless romantic. That's what she was. Sadly, she knew she was only doing this entire set up for herself; it wouldn't be appreciated by anyone else. But still, she tried. And she would keep trying, even after knowing it was futile.
Futility was a concept unknown to her family.
She paused for a moment to adjust her dress. God, she hadn't been this nervous in... years. Not since that first night, which seemed like it was ages ago. So young, so... stupid. Stupid, yes, but even if she had been able to go back and take a different path, she wasn't sure she would have.
A single knock on the door signaled his arrival, and she caught herself actually hurrying to get the door. She paused and gathered herself, then walked to the door with slow, deliberate steps. He made her wait, so now she would make him wait, if only for a few seconds.
After taking a deep breath, she opened the door. "Hello," she said demurely, almost casually.
He didn't speak as he walked past her into the apartment.
"Hey, come on in," she said with some annoyance, only able to glare at her feet and not the source, and shut the door. Typical. Why she had been expecting anything different, she didn't know. "Look," she said as she turned, "Ge--"
Then he was on her, pushing her hard against the door and covering her mouth with his own.
Ritsuko struggled for the briefest moment when he worked his knee between her legs, but she relented when he ground his thigh into the juncture of her own thighs. Abruptly, her knees wobbled, and she clutched at his back to stop herself from collapsing.
Gendo released her mouth, and took a half step back, allowing Ritsuko to rest her forehead against his chest as she gasped for air. "What...?" she asked softly.
"You think I don't remember?" he answered quietly, tilting her head up with a finger under her chin.
"I... don't know." Her gaze was held by his own. "It was... so long ago."
"It wasn't so long." He lifted the flower he had brought and ran its silky, red petals across her cheek.
Ritsuko quivered, staring up at him like that, her lips parted, but her voice wouldn't cooperate.
"You've arranged dinner, I imagine."
She nodded mutely, feeling like it was that same day when...
<--------------
She wasn't sure she could take it any longer. His touch was so... tempting. He purposely avoided touching her in a sexual way, yet Ritsuko couldn't help but grow excited. At the same time, she loved it and hated it and all the feelings it raised within her.
Even though it was dark, there was enough ambient light that she could see the outline of his neck and chin. His thumb brushed just enough of the flesh of her breast to make her sigh and to make the last of her hesitation crumble.
Surrendering to the now-clear feelings within her, Ritsuko moved her head forward and nuzzled the underside of his chin, then placed a series of soft kisses along his jaw.
Gendo pulled away from her attentions and looked at her sternly. "Things... will change."
"I don't care." She took a deep breath before putting her arms around his neck and kissing him full on the mouth.
-------------->
Ritsuko took a measured sip of her wine and watched Gendo eat at the opposite side of the table.
Between them, in the middle of the table, was a small vase with the rose in it that he had brought her.
Except for the quiet noises of two people eating dinner, there was no sound. They might as well have been two strangers at an empty restaurant.
Until Ritsuko asked, "How is it?" She took another sip of wine.
"Good."
"Good." She looked down at her plate and pushed her food around a bit, feeling uncomfortable just like she had the previous year, and the year before that... "I'll be giving the MAGI their monthly diagnostics tomorrow."
Gendo nodded.
Was this the best she could do after she had prepared everything? This was her attempt at having a romantic dinner? Pathetic. Ritsuko sighed and pushed her plate away. There was nothing less romantic to her than the MAGI; not even the EVAs. Those beasts didn't carry the same baggage.
<--------------
She stood atop the case of Melchior with a tear-streaked face. "I hate you!" she screamed, and swung the heavy wrench she had found at the metal.
It bounced off, leaving a mark, and making her arm vibrate painfully.
"You can't do this to me! You can't just die!" She swung the wrench again, not even seeing the audience she had drawn.
None of them dared try to stop her, afraid she would turn her weapon upon them. They simply stood there and watched as this young woman tried to destroy the most sophisticated computer in existence.
"You bitch! I hate you!" Ritsuko swung the wrench down again, but when she got the same results as before, she decided to change her tactics.
The MAGI were well protected on the outside, but inside, they were vulnerable. Just like she had been. And just the way her mother had tried to destroy her, she would destroy her mother from the inside.
Ritsuko hopped down and forced open the access panel. There it was, all her mother's work, and it was at her mercy. With a snarl, she cocked her arm back, preparing to slam it down into the delicate hardware within. "You deserve this!"
She started to swing, but her wrist was caught in a grip of iron. Her arm was twisted painfully, and the wrench fell to the floor with a deafening clatter, and she cried out. It almost felt like her arm was being yanked from the socket when she was jerked away from Melchior.
"I could have you shot for that," a menacing voice informed her quietly.
She was turned around and stared up at the impassionate gaze of _that_ man, the one her mother had been having an affair with. "I don't care," she hissed back at him with as much venom as she could muster.
"You should. This is not an idle threat."
Ritsuko held her head up, tears rolling down her cheeks from her anguish and from the pain he was causing her wrist. She stayed that way for a moment, then used her free hand to slap him.
His almost immediate response was to slap her in kind, which crushed her utterly. Ritsuko collapsed to floor, sobbing, while Gendo kept a firm hold of her wrist. One hand covered her face and she leaned against his legs as everyone stared.
Except for the sounds of her crying, there was silence. No one dared speak and call attention to themselves. After a few seconds of vague discomfort felt by all, Gendo waved his hand, and people cleared the command center.
When alone, he pulled Ritsuko to her feet. "Is this what you're going to let your mother do to you?" He shook her. "Are you so weak?"
When his criticism was answered only by sobs, he sighed. "Come with me." And then he led her out of the command center.
--------------->
"I'll go change." After receiving a dismissatory nod from Gendo, Ritsuko retreated to her bedroom to dress in the lingerie she had purchased earlier. Once in private, she sank to the end and sighed heavily.
It was times like these she wondered why she was fooling herself. They happened more often than not, where any sort of civility between them would be forced and awkward, but they would have sex, and the emptiness wouldn't seem to matter as much.
At the worst times she ended up questioning her actions that night, and pitying herself. Had she pushed their relationship too far? Had taking it to the next level been a mistake? That's when the pity would start: she was the cause of her own misery.
Yet, at the same time, for someone in the condition she had been in at the time, and still was in some ways now, his attention in their highly inappropriate relationship was the one thing she had needed.
Or thought she did.
Slowly, Ritsuko began to undress. Misato had been a drooling fool for Kaji back in college, which had seemed so silly. But after Ritsuko's mother had died, there was a sudden gaping distance between her and what she felt was reality. Somehow, she had let her mother separate her from the rest of humanity.
Now nude, with equal slowness, she began to dress in her lingerie. Then he had started to pull her back.
<---------------
Gendo wiped her cheeks gently with a warm, damp cloth.
"Why?" Ritsuko asked softly, drained physically, mentally, and emotionally.
"Because."
She looked at him, her eyes seeking more information from him, wanting to know why he would threaten her with being shot then do this. What did he really want with her? But she wouldn't ask, wouldn't push the matter in case he changed his mind.
"She has hurt enough people."
To Ritsuko's ears, it sounded as if he had more to say, more that he wanted to say, but didn't. Instead, he merely wiped the cloth across her forehead, moving aside blond locks of hair that had slipped into her eyes. "I... don't understand."
"Some day... you will. But for now, rest."
And she did as she realized how drained she was. But still she couldn't shake the feeling that he wanted something from her.
------------->
When Ritsuko emerged from her bedroom, feeling oddly embarrassed over her outfit, she found Gendo standing in front of her mini-shelf stereo. The door to the disc selector was just sliding shut, and a moment later, soft music was filling her apartment.
"Good choice," she said, though there was little to indicate in her voice she much cared.
He looked at her, and Ritsuko paused in the hallway. He had removed his glasses and jacket. A bit of a grin, one without his normal smugness and superiority, touched the corner of his mouth. Gendo approached her and took her hand, then led her to the low, plush couch. "Purple," he said simply.
As he sat down, she sat next to him, her hand still in his. "Yeah, purple. Something wrong with it?" she asked, almost defiantly.
Gendo shook his head. "You look very nice in it." His eyes never strayed from her own.
The pit of Ritsuko's stomach dropped like she was on a roller coaster, and in a way, she knew she was. To try and figure out just what he was doing, planning, what kind of reaction he was trying to get out of her... It twisted her in knots, emotional and physical rags wrung out in his grasp that she had to try to smooth out the next day.
Why had she seduced him, let herself be seduced by him, let this continue for so long? Why could she never get any satisfactory answers? And wasn't this whole situation what she wanted on this day? Maybe... could she shed all her guilt and doubts, even at the danger of letting his hold on her become stronger and more deadly, just for this one day.
With a sudden sigh, her eyes closing, Ritsuko leaned forward to kiss him, but ended up against his neck as he turned his head. "Wha...?" she breathed softly.
His answer came without immediate words; his arm wrapped around her waist and held her tightly, while his other hand still enclosed her own. "Do you always need a reason for things, Doctor?"
For some reason, that question was like a strong wind blowing away the fog of doubt that still clouded her. It was time, for just a little while, to drop the scientist guise because sometimes... it hurt too much.
It hurt too much to feel so like her mother. A process she had sped along by ruining the carefully balanced, almost intimate friendship she had managed with Gendo. Or that he had allowed.
<-----------------
She couldn't see his face in the darkness of the bedroom, didn't need to. Long before this, she had memorized its every detail because... That was something she didn't need to consider. Neither of them spoke, made any noise at all as they lay together. Though they were both fully clothed, she had abandoned her bra before slipping under the sheet with him.
With her head resting in his arm, and her hand on his side, she felt a kind of contentment she hadn't known before.
Hesitantly, she moved her foot and brushed her toe against the roughly-calloused sole of his foot. It was a caress she could play off as accidental if it was unwanted or if she determined later it was a mistake. But right then, she didn't think it would ever be a mistake, and before she could stop herself, she did it again. This time, she didn't stop, and let their feet continue in this slow dance.
His arm went over her own, and his hand fell upon her side abruptly, but gently. It remained motionless for a moment, then slowly moved to her back.
Ritsuko's breath caught in her throat at the touch, and her feet paused in their movement. She had no idea what to do.
Gendo rubbed her back slowly, his hand sometimes venturing along her bare skin.
It seemed inevitable to her, so when it happened, Ritsuko was almost able to act like it was something she experienced every day.
His hand went under her shirt again and moved up her side, then paused on her rib cage. His fingers were so dangerously close to her breast that if she took an especially deep breath, she would feel their touch. The closeness without actually touching was probably worse though, even if the idea of him doing so frightened her.
A nervousness was building in the pit of her stomach, so heavy, she felt sick.
But his fingers never did more than that awful, awful teasing, and she was glad, but also maybe somewhat disappointed. In the end though, it was comforting to fall asleep to, in his embrace.
There wasn't anything that made her feel more secure.
------------->
There wasn't anything that made her feel more secure, and it felt like it had been forever. After sex, it went she rolling to one side and sleeping, and he rolling to the other and he might sleep if he bothered to stay.
"I do need an answer to something," Ritsuko said as she rested her head against his shoulder. "Why these?" She ran her fingers underneath the strap of his suspenders, a rare accessory for him to wear.
Gendo shrugged. "I wanted to do something different today."
Something different. Contentment enfolded her just like his arm was doing. It wasn't too late, she hadn't ruined things completely, and he didn't see her as...
That night, she managed to shed her scientist facet, and discovered that the problem with her mother was not so bad. If Gendo could perceive her like this, the way the two of them used to be, then perhaps it wasn't too late.
Ritsuko let herself relax completely, and settled into him. She wasn't her mother because that woman was never interested in this; she had only been a tool.
Ritsuko knew she was more than that to him, and for this night, that was all she needed.
[End]
