INBOX - NHD-C12-KRI-248 - IKARI, SHINJI

[forevalone]

ikari.shinji@cdc.org
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[paraclete]

It's all okay. [He can even smile when he says this, eyes closed.]

[forevalone]

<sub>[It's not really the answer Shinji wanted to hear, but at least Kaworu seems to be smiling this time. Timidly he reaches out with a hand to set it upon the other boy's cheek.

He'll just have to take Kaworu's word for it.]</sub>

[paraclete]

[The contact against his face is unexpected. Kaworu opens his eyes again right away. He's greeted with a sight so lovely that it both pillows and rends his heart. Shinji's human warmth is such a comfort, and it's humbling to be offered such a thing. Kaworu lifts one of his own hands, setting it atop Shinji's, over his own face.]

Thank you.

[forevalone]

You don't need to thank me.

_{[Really, he's done nothing worthy of thanks. Not recently anyway.]}

[paraclete]

I do. I want you to know it. You're... [It's so nice to be touching. To be resting. Kaworu deserves neither of those things, yet Shinji offers them. He feels swaddled in cotton. He feels like the moon swinging in orbit, and Shinji is the Earth, filled with the potential to be bursting with life. Kaworu remembers looking down at planet Earth. He'd like to have seen it when it was still blue.]

Inside of me, [he says,] there's an opera. It's carrying on loudly and fantastically. You composed the whole thing. Your voice lends to every role.

[forevalone]

_{[There's a soft, faint little laugh as Shinji smiles back at the Angel laying beside him. An opera?]}

I don't think it'd be very good then, if I sang every part. I'm not the greatest singer.

[paraclete]

No, your voice is beautiful. You're beautiful.

[Shinji's laugh set all of Kaworu's nerves alight at once, and now he's suspended in clouds, getting progressively closer to the stars. He watches Shinji's face with awfully soft eyes. He wants to see Shinji develop laugh lines and crow's feet.]

[forevalone]

You...you always say that.

_{[It's embarrassing, evidenced by the pink hue of his cheeks and averted eyes. He still doesn't know how to take such a compliment. One wonders if he ever will.]}

[paraclete]

I want you to know it. [Sasuke had given him legitimately good advice, and he means to utilize it. Make sure he realizes how important he is. Yeah, that's definitely something Kaworu wants.] What you mean to me — it's immeasurable. I've realized that all along, it's been you. Everything has led up to meeting you.

[forevalone]

I just...I don't know how someone like me can be so important to someone like you. It's strange, isn't it? No one...cared about me for me except you, Kaworu-kun...why is that?

[paraclete]

I can't fathom why others didn't value your heart. I don't know, Shinji-kun. I don't know how anyone could leave you be. [Once Kaworu fell in love, there was just no going back. By now, it's been a long time, and his fervent love for Shinji is how Kaworu defines himself. What was it like before? Nihilistic. Was there anything? He was only a wretched child.]

"Someone like me." What does that mean?

[forevalone]

_{[He shifts a little on the bed, gaze still averted. All people ever did was leave him be, at least until he'd been befriended by Toji and Kensuke. Misato in her own way had cared, somewhat, but she was also messed up in a slew of ways. No one really wanted him unless they could use him. He was a discarded, unwanted child.]}

Worthless, Kaworu-kun.

[paraclete]

[Kaworu takes his hand away from Shinji's, and lays it at the other boy's cheek. Now their bodies mirror each other.]

You're living. No matter what happens, nothing will change the fact that you've truly existed. You've met other people, and other people have met you. You've learned things. You've done things. You've felt things. You've spent almost fifteen years becoming the person you are now. How is that not worthwhile?

[Naturally this is hypocritical, but his words aren't empty. Even in his exhaustion, his words are weighty with everything in his heart.]

There is nothing to me that has more worth than you.

[forevalone]

Because I haven't become anything worthwhile, Kaworu-kun...

_{[How could he not see it? How could he just blindly love him and not see any of his glaring faults? How could he excuse them? Not even his personality is very good.]}

[paraclete]

You have become you, and you will become you in other ways.

[Selfishly, though insisting to himself that it's for Shinji's sake, Kaworu moves his fingers into Shinji's hair.]

What kind of person do you want to become, Shinji-kun? What qualities do you want to have?

[forevalone]

_{[He's not used to fingers in his hair, but it isn't unpleasant. Kaworu's presence is comforting. Everything about him is.]}

I...I want to be a good person. Someone people can depend on. Someone people like. I want to be strong and smart and quick and tall...but I'll never be the last bit because I'll never grow up.

[paraclete]

[Is it all right to say this? He's been sitting on so much for so long. He quells things. He covers his mouth and files memories away in countless coffins. The lunar surface is a library of things he can't tell Shinji. Chidori-san said it's dishonest to keep things secret. Kaworu won't lie to Shinji, but there are some things he just can't say. This feels like one of them. But maybe... Maybe— ]

Just as you depend on others, there are those who depend on you.

[He's settled for being avoidant, but it's implicit in the way he cups the back of Shinji's head: he's talking about himself.]

[forevalone]

I'm not dependable, Kaworu-kun...

_{[Not compared to Kaworu who was amazing, who was smart, powerful in incredible ways and talented.]}

I don't want to let you down...or anyone else.

[paraclete]

I also hate— [He smooths over Shinji's hair, over his forehead.] To let you down. [It's why Black Box was such an awful thing, and why he's so wearied.] There's no way to have a relationship with others without some pain coming from that relationship. You will be hurt by people, and you'll even hurt them, too. But you'll also find joy, and love, and strength in them. And they'll find the same things in you. That's where I find all those things — in you, Shinji-kun.

[forevalone]

_{[Kaworu is so gentle with him, so encouraging he still doesn't know why he deserves it. Out of everything terrible that's happened in his life thus far, Kaworu has been the one positive influence he's had left carried over from his world. Even if Kaworu had betrayed his feelings when they'd first met he hadn't really tried to understand the other boy either. It's an event Shinji never wants to repeat and relive.]}

Even if it hurts, I want to be close to you, Kaworu-kun. It's far more painful not to be.

[paraclete]

[Kaworu strokes now behind Shinji's ear, at the start of his neck, along his hairline. He's awfully indulgent right now, isn't he... But Shinji's such an anchor.]

When I left you, [when I died (when I asked for you to kill me),] I wasn't trying to hurt you.

[forevalone]

It hurt...more than anything else.

_{[More than what it felt like when his heart had stopped, or the feeling of having his arms being twisted and broken. It hurt more than anything he'd experienced piloting Unit-01; even though physically he was fine, his heart had been broken beyond repair. I wanted to die is what he refrains from saying, letting his eyelids fall to half mast as he stares at the Angel. It's soothing, to have Kaworu stroke his head like this. It fills a void he didn't realize needed filling so desperately.]}

[paraclete]

I know. I'm more sorry than I can express. But I don't regret allowing you to live.

[His fingers continue their calming motions. Really, dying is okay if Shinji is alive and well. Anything is okay if Shinji is alive and well. While he aches knowing of Shinji's anguish, at least if Shinji is alive, he has the opportunity to mend. (Kaworu doesn't know that In my heart of hearts, I know that I could never love again.)]

Thank you for letting me be near you, even though I hurt you so much.

[forevalone]

_{[There's a shift in bodies as Shinji scoots closer until their foreheads are touching and his own fingers have slid away from Kaworu's cheek to rest in the soft hairs at the nape of the Angel's neck. Curled up like this in his bunk with the divider closed with Kaworu is the most safe he's felt in a long time. He'd been hurt but he'd been hurt countless times before. Now Kaworu was here to extend a hand and help him up back on his feet, as were others. As much as he liked to convince himself that he was alone...he wasn't. Not here.]}

I want you near me, Kaworu-kun.

_{[The closer the better, but he shoves that thought away as quickly as it comes.]}

[paraclete]

Draw near to me, and I'll draw near to you. [He's learned, along the way, that Shinji's desires must come first. He can wait fourteen years, or however much longer; when Shinji asks Kaworu to come, he'll come.

But he can't deny that it's wonderful to be close to Shinji like this. The sight and the scent, and his hair and clothes and skin. When Kaworu called Shinji down to his piano, after a decade and a half of staring at the stars, it was all he could do not to scoop Shinji up and inhale deeply. But even sitting next to him was enough. Now, to be gifted with the press of Shinji's hands...]

In the end, it all returns to you. I'll return to you, always.