Shout at the heart of the world (Post from Eva M)

Case: Akai Pallaton. Designated Pilot of Eva Unit 00.
Akai sat in a wooden fold-out chair. Her head was bowed, causing her fringe to cast dark shadows over her eyes, and her braid laid itself against her back. Around her was complete darkness that made her shiver in it’s perceived cold. She was afraid. She wasn’t certain of what, but she was deathly afraid. She wished she had
Sanctimony with her.
“I want my mommy...” She whispered to herself, an amused half-smile touching her face beneath the shadow. Smile in the face of fear, girl...
’Who are you?’ A voice asked. Akai didn’t have to look up- she recognised the voice. Across from her stood a younger version of herself, wearing the red dress she remembered from her nightmare. Her hair was in braided pigtails, and she spoke with a voice at once young but, at the same time, far older then Akai was.
“I am Akai Pallaton, Eva Pilot.”
’Is that all?’
“What more can I be?”
There was a moment of silence.
‘What do you want?’
“I don’t want anything.”
‘What do you want?’ The child Akai said again, without any variation in her tone.
“I told you, I don’t...”
‘What do you want?’ More insistent. Akai hesitated before answering.
“I don’t know. I... I don’t want to hurt anyone any more. I don’t want to be afraid any more. I don’t-”
’We know what you don’t want. We want to know what you DO want?’
“I want... I want to be happy, I guess...”
Silence.
’No you don’t’
Akai looked up, surprised marking her face. The calm brown eyes of her accuser looked back at her.
’You don’t want to be happy. If you did, you could easily make it so. But you want things to make you happy- outside things.’
“How else can you be happy? You need those things- the people around you, the
circumstances...”
’Are immaterial. Pointless. Happiness comes from within. You cannot be given happiness by someone else. Especially when you will not take it when it is offered to
you.’
Another moment of silence. Akai looked towards the ground.
“Erik...”
’Do you love him?’ The voice asked. Akai hugged herself.
“I want to- so much...” She trailed off.
’But?’
“But... I don’t want to die.”

Akai sat on her low bed, an open music box beside her playing the chimed strains of ‘Pie Jesu’. She was looking at a necklace with three shells on it, letting them slide around her hand. A slight smile touched her lips, quietening the chaos inside her.

He’ll leave you behind. Go out to fight, and he’ll be killed. And then you’ll be left all alone... Akai put her hands over her ears as though trying to block the sound.
“Go away...”
You can sleep with them, give them children, be everything they could want you to be. But then God will have his say. God will take it all away from you...
“SHUT UP!”
’Akai.’
“SCREW GOD! SCREW IT ALL!”
You can’t save them...
The image of the monolith showed again in her mind, names scrawled up and down it. Her aunt, Erik, Kazuha...
’She wanted to die. It was her choice to make. Now, it’s your turn.’ The voice was so close... Just behind her ear...
Akai stood up so fast that the chair knocked backwards and collapsed, turning to look at the self behind her. The young Akai pointed back to the front, and Akai turned around slowly to face it. She looked at the figures in front of her. The first was the sandy haired figure of Erik, dressed in his Plug suit. He reminded her of
some sort of colourful Ninja, or an old German night. Beside him was a woman, her hair greying slightly and pulled up into a messy ponytail. Her
eyes were somewhat hollowed, but she smiled a wane smile and seemed strangely peaceful, like she was doped up or something. Akai stepped backwards, heels hitting
the fallen chair.
“Mother... Erik...”
----------
There are always choices to be made - The choice between love and hate, between conception and reaction, between the left or the right...
Between life and death, between good and evil...
Between ignorance and understanding.
And, until the choice is made for better or worse, there will be no movement. And there will be no being.
Merely... Existing.
----------
Akai looked between the figures like a cornered animal.
'There is always a choie to be made. And this is yours.'
Akai looked between them. "I don't... I don't understand."
'When you do, the choice will have been made.' The young Akai said. 'And then, you'll know what to do.'
"Oh, to know what to do..." she said whistfully. She looked between them, rather expecting them to say something. They looked like they wanted to, but neither Erik nor her mother spoke.

What was her choice here? The choice between the dead and the living? Her mother and her family?
She blinked. Her mother... and her family...
"The pilots are my family." She said, startled. She was an only child, but it occured to her that being an Eva pilot was a lot like having siblings. You were stuck with each other, and you had to rely on them even if you didn't always get along. And a lot of these people she had liked... She had lived. She had lived far more in the past year then she thought she ever had. And it hand't been going out and partying, or having fun most of the time. But she had been alive.
And it had hurt like hell.
"But that's it, isn't it? Living is pain. It's anguish. It's loneliness. But it's also joy. It's the chance at happiness, and it sustains humanity.
"But it doesn't have to be that way." Akai jumped as her mother spoke. "People can be one and the same. no loneliness, no pain... Because pain and loneliness are caused by other people."
"But without pain and loneliness, there could be no joy or happiness either. No hope." Erik countered, matter of factly. Akai's mother's eyes seemed to snap into focus suddenly as they looked towards Erik.
"To get rid of everything bad... You have to get rid of everything, right?" Was it worth it? How could she justify not doing it?

There was a price to pay... There was always a price. To be better, you had to destroy something in yourself. To be happy, you had to understand that you could also be sad. To love, you had to understand loneliness. And to remove all these things that made you uncomfortable, angry or sad, you had to accept that you would never feel joy, love or hope again. That was the price. But she couldn't decide wether either was worth paying.

She looked at Erik, and then back at her mother.
"This isn't fair!" She exclaimed at last.
'It never is.'
"What am I suppsed to be doing? I don't even know the options, how can I pick one!" She shouted, turning to face her younger self. A pair of clear brown eyes looked up at her sadly. Akai found herself hesitating. She looked down at her hands. Clenched in the fist of one was a flat stone, the edges sharp enough to cut her hand. Blood trickled through her fingers and a single drop fel to the floor with a noise like rain on a drum. She opened her hand, Looking at the broken rock with names engraved on it. The headstone... from the nightmare... Akai stared blankly at the stone while her mind, now no-longer subject to her concious perceptions, started to seriously work things out.
"...The choice..." She turned back to the figures standing in front of her. Her younger self watched her curiously, wondering what she had decided the choice was.

"The choice is between Love... and Fear."
The young Akai's eyes lit up.
"It was always there... I always knew that that was what it was. I've been so afraid... For as long as I can remember, I've been afraid of loving anyone. Mother," She looked at her. "We loved my father. And he died, and I lost you. I loved you, and then I was alone because you couldn't bare to be. You couldn't love me."
She turned towards Erik, reaching out and taking one of the boys hands in her free hand. "And I couldn't love you. I thought I wanted to and just couldn't. But I think... I think the truth is that I did. And I didn't want to. And I was so wrapped up in worrying that I'd loose you, I didn't realise..." She trailed off, begining to choke up. She steped forwards until their shoulders were touching, speaking to the emptiness behind him.
"The truth is... I'm afraid of you too. Not just you... All of them. People... I try to be outgoing, to make an effort, but I do it because I'm so afraid... And I never realised that everyone else was too. That's enough." She finished. And her choice was made.
Akai let her grip loosen enough to loose Erik's hand and turned to her mother, gripping the stone and looking towards the floor as she stepped up to her. "Momma..." She whispered, raising her eyes. Her mother put her hands on her shoulders and smiled wanely at her. "I love you, Mother. But we're done."
Akai's hand shot out like a viper, sending the shard of stone into her mothers chest. She stumbled backwards, her face blank as she watched the dream verson of her mother fall to her knees, while the Erik looked at the fallen woman with shock written on his features. She smiled at the ground - Pride? Akai looked her.
"I choose love. I choose life. I choose the chance to be miserable, lonely and hurt for the chance to be happy, to love and to live. I choose to accept it and live it instead of fighting it and fearing it. And it is my choice, my right and my life, for better or worse."
She looked back to where her younger self was, finding the space empty.

"I am mine. I want to be. And I will be."

The room lit up. Akai was standing alone, blinking in the sudden onslaught of light.
"Helo?" She called out, the sound echoing off of the walls. Nothing.
She shrugged and walked to the door.

"Have groove, will boogie."
- posted by Washi @ 1:14 pm