Neon Genesis Evangelion Fan Fiction ❯ If I Am Normal, Are You Weird? ❯ Adolescence ( Chapter 3 )

Chapter 3

Adolescence

"Vroom! Vroom, vroom!" growled Kensuke as he pushed his toy Gratan around his lunch. "Changing to vertical mode!" he cried.

Beside him, Shinji picked at his food. "Aren't you a little old for toys?" he asked.

Kensuke turned his attention away from his mecha and stared at him. "What are you talking about? Age is a matter of the mind."

Suddenly, Touji rushed into the room and jumped into a desk across from Shinji. "You guys just missed it! Kakaru just passed an entire bar of chocolate through his nose!"

"No way!" cried Kensuke as he and Shinji leaned in closer to hear the details.

From her own desk, Rei watched Shinji as he listened to Touji's tale. There had to be some way of getting him to notice her more. Why didn't I make that bento box for him like I was going to? I had this nice vegetarian dish picked out from my cook book and everything! Great time to get cold feet.

She quickly thought back to the times he had paid attention to her. Well, the first time was when he first got to Tokyo-3. She sighed contentedly. The first time he held me in his arms. Then, during the Fifth Angel's attack, I saved him from the particle beam and got knocked out. Then, when I came to, I found that he had forced open the hatch--just to see if I was all right! Oh, and he was crying and everything! She smiled to herself. He was so afraid that he'd lose me that he cried over it. She allowed herself a mental squeal. And he looked so cute when he was doing it, too! Not that I'd ever make him cry on purpose, of course!

She quickly tore herself from her reverie. She didn't need to rehash every cute thing that Shinji Ikari had done in his life. What she needed to do was look for patterns in the chaos. But I just can't help it. He's too cute! No, I can't think like that! I have to be objective. Cause and effect. Analyze the data. Just like before. Just like before... the accident the other day. I was crying and Shinji was right there, holding me to him and... hmm. I'm beginning to see a pattern, here. Her eyes narrowed conspiratorially. Time for a little experiment.

"Ohhh, my head," moaned Rei as she stumbled out of her seat toward Shinji. "It hurts, Shinji," she cried. "My head hurts! I think… I think…" With a small cry, she collapsed into Shinji's lap.

"Ayanami?" Shinji looked at his fellow pilot. "Are you... Guh!"

Shinji was given a near-case of whiplash as Rei wrapped her arms around Shinji's neck and pulled his head down close to hers. "Shinji..." her voice was barely above a whisper. "Tell them... tell them I died in my true love's arms." With that, she closed her eyes and made her body go limp.

The Three Stooges stared at her in bemusement for a quartet of heartbeats.

"So anyway," continued Touji, "it just started pouring out of his nose, all brown and thick and…"

Rei abruptly sat up on Shinji's lap. "EEEEEEEEWWWWWWWWW! Touji!"

Touji's teeth were bared. "Well, who asked you?" he shouted. "And anyway, this is an all male area. No girls allowed!"

Rei turned to Shinji. "Are you just going to sit there and let him talk to me that way?" she demanded.

Shinji looked at each in turn: Kensuke, then Touji, then Rei. "Well, yeah... I guess," he said.

Rei let out a short gasp. This had not gone the way she'd expected. "Oh," she said flatly. "I see." She turned to Touji and bowed. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to disturb you all." She got up and trudged back to her own desk.

"I didn't mean… aw, hell," swore Touji as he turned back to his food.

From her desk, Rei took one last, longing stare at Shinji before turning to her lunch.

In NERV HQ's break room, Rei sat at a table, eating a bar of chocolate. What a crappy day, she thought. A fight with Asuka in the morning, a rejection from Shinji at lunchtime, and to top it all off, she'd been looking forward to performing some tests with her Eva... only to find a lousy written test awaiting her. Chocolate, if it weren't for you, I'd have slit my wrists by now.

"What a waste of my time!" cried Asuka as she stormed into the break room and sat down. "I swear, why are they giving us written exams at headquarters! It's not fair! I wanted to spend some time with my Unit 02!"

"Tell me about it," agreed Rei. "If they wanted us to take a test, they might as well have just kept us in school. It's not like they had to make us come here."

She looked up to see Asuka staring at her. "What?" She gasped. "I don't have chocolate on my face, do I?"

"No," lied Asuka. Rei had chocolate all around her bottom lip, but Asuka certainly wasn't going to keep her from embarrassing herself. "It's just that…"

"Hi everyone!" Misato's voice cut her off as she and Shinji walked in the room. "Hyuga just got finished correcting your battle tactics and analysis tests, and I have to say that I'm impressed!"

"Well, naturally," said Asuka with a flip of her hair as Shinji took a seat next to Rei. "One of my major fields of study was war strategy back in college."

But Rei was less than thrilled. "Only an eighty-nine?" she cried incredulously. She grabbed Asuka's test away from her. "Hey!" whined Rei. "I got the same answers as she did! How come some of my answers are marked wrong and hers are marked right?"

"Because those answers are right for Unit 02, not Unit 00," answered Misato. "Your enemy analysis scores are top-notch, but you seem to want to go in on close combat, and that's not what Unit 00 is for."

"Well then, what is Unit 00 for?" demanded Rei.

"Well, we primarily consider it best used as a long-range gunner for defensive cover-fire," replied Misato.

"What?" cried Rei. "But my synch-ratio is the lowest of us all! Wouldn't I be better off using my prog-knife? I mean, that stupid targeting computer is always so slow to center."

"You'll just have to bring your synch-ratio up, then," said Misato.

"And then you'll let me do more close-range work?" pleaded Rei.

"No. Then the target will center faster," answered Misato. "Look, I've got to get back to the command center. We can discuss it later."

"Don't think I can't go over your head, you know!" Rei cried after her. "We'll see what Commander Ikari has to say about this." She looked over to see Asuka and Shinji staring at her. "What?" she asked.

"All right," said Asuka. "Who are you, and what have you done with the real Rei?"

"What are you talking about, Asuka? I'm just fine."

"Idiot! What do you think? This new attitude. Since when do you argue with Misato about a lousy test score, or go shopping, or anything remotely normal?"

"Oh," said Rei, "that. Well, what happened was that I wasn't getting enough serotonin in my brain synapses, but when you pushed me into that doorway, it went back to normal. At least that's what Ritsuko says. So I guess I have you to thank for my not being depressed anymore."

"Well, naturally," Asuka said half-jokingly. "My personality is enough to cheer anyone up. Of course, a lack of serotonin wouldn't be the sole source of depression. But then, I've always preferred Skinner to the whole chemical approach," she added, attempting to show off her education once again.

"On hindsight, I'm actually sorry that I called you a fat cow," added Rei.

"You called me a what?" cried Asuka as she leapt up from her seat.

"Don't let it get to you," said Rei. "I was in a lot of pain at the time and…"

"Omigod!" yelled Asuka. "I'm not fat!" She turned to Shinji. "Am I?"

"Well, actually... I don't think you're fat at all... Asuka," Shinji replied wisely.

But Rei shook her head. "She's got those chunky chipmunk cheeks," she commented.

Asuka's face began to turn red. "I do not have chunky chipmunk cheeks!" she cried indignantly.

As if on cue, Ryogi Kaji walked in. "Hello, children!" he greeted them warmly. "You're all looking healthy as usual! Especially you, Asuka." He grinned at her.

Asuka paled. "Healthy?" she repeated. "I-I'm going to the gym!" She quickly ran out of the break room.

Rei turned to Shinji. "You don't think I'm fat, do you?"

"Not yet," Kaji answered for him. "But if you keep eating all that chocolate, you will be. You've got it all over your face, you know."

Rei gasped. "No way!" She turned to Shinji. "Do I have chocolate on my face?"

"Well, yeah. On the bottom of your mouth," replied Shinji.

"Eep!" cried Rei as her cheeks began to heat up. "She said that... I've got... No way!" She began to cover her lower face with her hands. "Don't look at me! Oh, I can't let you see me like this!" With that, she bolted out of the break room.

Lieutenant Maya Ibuki quickly jogged toward the ladies room with one thought on her mind: Man, do I have to go!

As she got to the restrooms, Rei's voice pierced the air. "That little liar! I can't believe she said that I didn't have any on my face! And Shinji saw me, too! I'm gonna kick her ass come sparring time!"

Maya quickly walked past the bathroom, looking for another one.

Kaji headed toward the gym, as was his daily routine. In addition to being a training room for the pilots, the gym was a great place for officers on their break to work out. And since Kaji's workload wasn't that big to begin with, he could often be found improving on his manly physique.

As Kaji approached the gymnasium, Asuka's voice came angrily from the doorway. "Just who does Wonder Girl think she is, calling me fat! I'll show her! Just wait until sparring time!"

Didn't I have some work to do at my office? Kaji wondered to himself as he quickly did a one-eighty.

"Ayako wore what?" Asuka asked Hikari the next day at school.

"A sports bra," repeated Hikari. "And practically stuck it right in his face."

"Of all the disgusting things!" cried Asuka. "I've never heard of a more indecent way of attracting a guy's attention! It's revolting!" Her nose suddenly scrunched up. "Speaking of revolting, what's that smell?"

Hikari's nose also scrunched up. "Yeah, I smell it, too. It smells like... like…"

"Cheap perfume," deduced Asuka.

The fragrant stench got stronger and stronger with each passing moment. Asuka began to feel it taking over her taste-buds. And then, just when she felt that she could bear it no longer, the classroom door burst open, and Rei Ayanami bounded up to the two of them.

"Smell meeeeeeeee," she ordered.

"Too late," said Asuka, gagging.

Rei's eyes narrowed at her. "For your information, I was talking to Hikari." She turned to Hikari. "Smell meeeeeeeeee."

Hikari reflexively covered her nose. "No! Jeez, Rei, how much perfume did you use?"

"Only half a bottle," answered Rei.

"Half a bottle?" repeated Hikari incredulously.

The teacher of classroom 2-A waddled in.

"All rise," gagged Hikari.

The sensei scrunched up his nose. "Could someone open up a window?" he asked.

After class, Asuka and Shinji walked to NERV HQ. "Man, talk about embarrassing," laughed Asuka. "Using half a bottle of perfume at once. Of all the stupid things that Wonder Girl's ever done, this ranks among the stupidest."

"Well, it's not like she can help it," argued Shinji. "I mean, when has she ever used perfume before today?"

"True," conceded Asuka. "I suppose she needs someone to walk her through this passage into womanhood."

"Someone like you, right?" Shinji sighed.

"Are you kidding?" cried Asuka. "There's no way I'm going to have anything to do with Wonder Girl's adolescent little crises!" Her eyes narrowed at Shinji. "And anyway, it's your fault that she's acting like this, you know!"

"My fault?" repeated Shinji incredulously. "How is it my fault? You were the one who knocked her neuro-whatevers loose!"

"Shinji, you idiot! Haven't you noticed that she has a crush on you?"

Shinji's jaw dropped.

"She's practically throwing herself at you, in case you haven't been paying attention," Asuka continued. "This perfume problem was just another attempt to get you to ask her out."

Suddenly, Rei's voice came from behind them. "Gang way!"

Asuka and Shinji turned to see Rei running at top speed with a swarm of bees on her tail. "Get down!" ordered Asuka.

As Asuka and Shinji hit the dirt, Rei vaulted over them and cut through the grass. The bees passed over them harmlessly.

Asuka got to her feet and dusted herself off. "Well, now you know why I don't wear perfume to school," she quipped.

Splash!

Shinji's eyes widened at the sound. Not hesitating, he took off in the direction that Rei had fled. Her trail led to a small pond... in the center of which Rei treaded water.

Asuka pointed to Rei. "Schauen sie dem einweichen-nässen dummkopf an!" she shouted, laughing.

Rei, meanwhile, was dog-paddling for all she was worth toward them. Shinji quickly stretched out his arm.

"Well, look at it this way," said Shinji. "At least you don't smell like perfume anymore."

As soon as Rei was on land, she grabbed Shinji in the biggest hug she could, and her school uniform began to drip all over him.

This, of course, made Asuka laugh even harder.