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Cosmonaut (End)

EPILOGUE: The weight of a heart in between her fingers

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Rei wakes before the dawn can cut through the windows, her arms bunched around her throat, a knuckle at her chin. Morning routine takes over. She makes her bed, goes into the kitchenette to set the kettle, retrieves a tin of milk from the overhead cabinet –

She stops. She doesn't see any wheelchair. The house is dead, a tomb, a mausoleum with statues of furniture and dust-coated photographs.

The tin falls to floor. She realises what she's done.

And then her body takes over. She calls Shinji, mumbles something into his voice message and she sprints out the door.

At the elevator she hesitates whether to go down or up. She slaps the buttons, waits for the elevator to stop and doors to open, before she flies up the parapet and out into the cold grip of morning.

As she pants, frosted feathers of breath wing from her nostrils. She strides forward to the wheelchair left by the edge of the parapet like a monument watching over the waking city. The bundle of fabric and blankets slumps forward when she shakes its shoulder, rock hard and freezing to the touch.

"Commander?"

No response. Chaffed, deathly blue lips frame his half-open mouth. The stumps of his fingers are brittle, cold and still. He stares blankly back at her.

For the first time in a long time, Rei's breathing intensifies, panic slicing through her throat and choking her. She desperately tries to warm his hands, to find a sign of life, any sign, anything to –

Then she sees one bloodshot eye blink.

With all her strength, she cradles the Commander's frail body back down, into the elevator and across the corridors to her home. She fires the faucets by the bathtub and as the water fills she presses her body to his and blows warmth air on his birdlike, crumpled hands. When the bathtub finally fills with warm water, she dunks herself and the Commander into the bath.

She dips and baptises him, calling out his name like a supplication until his senses finally accept the shock of cold erupting into warmth. He coughs; his eyes, rimmed with exhaustion, turn to acknowledge her. His fingers close in around her hand and she grips them.

"Commander?"

"Yui?"

She pulls him so close she can hear his heart thrashing away in the skeletal cage of his chest.

When Shinji arrives later, the Commander is resting soundlessly, buried in multiple strata of blankets. She sees him go to the Commander's bedside and watch his father's chest rise and fall. When she makes her presence known, Shinji startles. Only then does she understand she's still wet and not doing anything to help her modesty.

She tells Shinji everything - from what happened after he left, the dinner conversation, and her actions last night and in the morning. She expects some kind of reaction, from shock to fury, but all he does is loosen his tie and run a hand over stubble that's equal parts black and ash grey. It makes him seem older than he looks. As they wait by the bedside in silence, Rei has a terrible premonition that Shinji will become just like the Commander, and she will also be tending to him in this house.

"Thanks, Rei," he says finally. Her focus shifts from the Commander in his bed to his voice. "For telling me. And for taking care of him."

She wants to ask him why isn't he angry, or how he can be so calm after what she did. But she doesn't. Instead she lets Shinji encircle her wrist with his big, tanned hands as they sit side-by-side.

"Why do you still care for him so much, Rei?" he asks.

"I think," she says, "it's because I can choose to."

The Commander stirs. He groans, dribbling saliva over his lower lip. His eyes spin and look straight at her. She croaks a name – a name only she hears –

"I'm here, Commander," she tells him.

She wipes the crusted saliva from his lips and strokes his forehead. Slowly, quietly, the Commander returns to his sleep. But Rei keeps her hand there, fingers lingering over the point where hair and temple meet. She can feel the flaring warmth of his body radiating, the dull throb of his pulse.

"Rei?" Shinji says.

Shinji's hands are like a bracelet over her wrist. She doesn't break his hold or remove her fingers from the Commander's face either, her touch a bridge between them on the bleak, quiet universe of the Commander's bed.

They remain like that for a long time. She doesn't want to let go.

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END

Edited: 23.11.2013 (final)

NOTES ON:

(a) The Ending - The epilogue was split from the two chapters because the second chapter was too long. So this ending was supposed to be part of the main story. The epilogue gives it a bit of unnecessary drama.

(b) Relationships - All kept ambiguous. Gendo's words and who exactly he's calling for - well, I leave that up to readers to decide who's more significant.

(c) Feedback - Thanks for all the feedback and comments! I tried to heed the good advice that you gave. Most importantly, let me know what you think of the story in its entirety and/or the ending.

Personal Note: I'm still a bit stunned at the unexpected reception to Cosmonaut. I enjoyed writing this a lot, partly because this particular style of 3rd POV, present-tense is slowly becoming my signature style. Hopefully for my next Eva fic, I'll have to challenge myself to write something technically different, with different characters. In particular, I would like to single out KendrixTermina's original comment on 'less is more' than led me shape Rei's voice in the story.

Finally, this story wouldn't be what it is without the help of my beta anime-freaksg, who stuck with this story even though he's a die-hard Asuka fan.

Thank you for reading!