Dummy Plug Plant
Central Dogma. NERV Headquarters.
At least ten identical giggling, drooling Rei Ayanamis hung suspended on the other side of the glass from Shinji, floating peacefully through the fluid that enveloped them. Each one wore the same blissful, vacant expression, their eyes wide and unfocused.
They were also, he couldn't help but notice, all very much naked. He felt his face go red.
"Ohhhhh...." The Doctor breathed. He stepped towards the glass, a fascinated expression on his face. "Look at you..."
"What the hell..." Misato stared into the tank. "What are they?"
"They're spares," the Doctor said.
"What?"
"Spare bodies. Mindless husks constructed from indeterminate matter. All connected to a central backup server." The Doctor nodded at a huge mass of hoses and tubes hanging from the ceiling, which resembled nothing less than a brain fashioned out of rubber and plastic. "Current body wears out or gets damaged, you just pop your memories into another head and off you go. In a way... you could say that this room is Rei."
"Are..." Shinji swallowed. He almost felt like he'd been hit with the pepper spray again, the way his face was burning. "Are either of you going to tell me not to look?"
"See over there?" The Doctor pointed to a handful of smaller figures grouped at the very back of the tank. "Transitional forms. Infant, toddler, prepubescent... they must've moved her up through the series. Gave her the experience of normal human development."
"You said something about indeterminate matter," Misato said. "What does that mean?"
"The stuff Angels are made from." The Doctor glanced back at the statue. "Well, big-A Angels, anyway. Rei and the Evas, too. Grown from tissue samples taken from Lilith, no doubt."
"Oh, fine," Shinji muttered. He pulled the fez over his eyes. "You're both terrible role models, you know that?"
"Imagine atoms that can't make up their mind if they're waves or particles," the Doctor continued. "Or, for that matter, which kind of particle. Control the observer effect properly, you can modify their physical properties on the fly -- mass, density, electric charge..." He took in a breath. "It's the Prima Materia. Dreamstuff. The ultimate form of programmable matter. Packets of energy that'll become whatever you want, whenever you want."
"I... I don't think I understand. What does that mean?" Misato crossed her arms. "What are the Evas, Doctor? What are they capable of?"
"Anything," the Doctor said quietly.
From somewhere beneath the floor came the sound of gears turning. Shinji peeked out from beneath the fez to see a metal cover retract from around the pillar at the center of the room, revealing a glass tube. A hatch in front slid open. Rei stepped out, her clothes and hair soaked with LCL.
Simultaneously, a section of the floor next to her rose out of the ground, exposing a tall cabinet beneath it. Rei reached into an open compartment and withdrew a towel. The cabinet sunk back into the ground.
"Rei." The Doctor turned to her, a solemn expression on his face. "Thank you. Bringing us here -- revealing this place to us -- that couldn't've been easy for you."
Rei lifted up the towel and wiped off her face.
"So what now?" Misato gave the statue an uneasy glance. "We can't just leave this thing here, can we?"
"They know to watch it now," Rei said. "These systems are heavily shielded. It should be unable to manipulate the lights."
Misato glanced at the Doctor. He shrugged. "Should be enough to buy us time, at least. Give us the chance to figure something else out."
She looked back to Rei. "And who's they? What are these things? Can you really... I don't know... possess them or something?
Rei stared into the distance over the towel's edge. "If I die, I can be replaced."
"Yeah..." The Doctor swallowed and looked away. To Shinji, he seemed to be regarding his own reflection in the glass. "I know the feeling..."
Misato looked back and forth between the two of them, then sighed. "Do you have another one of those?" She pointed to Rei's towel, then to her closed eye. "I don't know if you can tell, but this really sucks."
"Oh, right. Here." The Doctor pulled a handkerchief out of his pocket and handed it to Misato. She spit on it and started rubbing her eye. He winced and turned back to the girl. "Rei, I'm sorry. I can only guess how far we've already pushed you. But there's something else I need to know.
"Your memory unit up there." The Doctor motioned towards the brain above them. "It's not just shaped like that for show, is it?"
Rei paused. She slowly lowered the towel and carefully folded it in her hands. "... no," she finally said.
Shinji glanced at the Doctor. "So what does that mean?"
"It means that that's Lilith's brain," the Doctor said grimly. "Ripped out of her skull. Taken apart and scanned for information. Then pieced back together again artificially. It's a primitive neural mapping technique. Serial sectioning, they call it. Guh." He shook his head with a disgusted growl. "Assured me it was autonomic, did he... that's how your dad knew. They must've only left her with the brainstem.
"But all that's just lead-up. Here's the big question." The Doctor fixed Rei with a piercing look. "Rei... are you Lilith?"
"Wait, what?!" Misato snapped her head up from behind the handkerchief.
Rei stood completely still. For a moment, it was almost enough to make Shinji wonder if she, too, could only move when out of sight.
"Rei, answer him." Misato said, an edge in her voice. "That's an order."
"Oy!" The Doctor shot her a disapproving glare. "Don't force her! A little sensitivity, thanks?!"
Rei cast her eyes down. "No."
The room fell silent. After a moment or so, the Doctor raised an eyebrow. "Just... no?"
Rei sighed. "That was the hope when I was created. But if any information remains within the Chamber of Guf, I have no conscious access to it."
The Doctor nodded thoughtfully.
"Okay, so no memories." Misato narrowed her eyes. "What does that make you, though? What are you? Human or Angel?"
Rei looked away. "I don't know."
"Guess."
"Both." She shrugged. "Neither."
"What does that even mean?!" Misato moved one hand to her gun in its holster.
"It means she's something new." The Doctor stepped in front of her. "And that's enough, Captain. She's told you everything she can."
Misato opened her mouth as if to say something. Shinji stepped towards her, his hands held out. "Maybe -- um. Maybe we should save this for a day where we haven't been running for our lives?..."
She hesistated, then sighed and let her arms drop to her side. "Yeah, all right, all right..." She rubbed her eye with the handkerchief, then looked back to the Doctor. "Can you help me blank the security footage in this room? I think there might be active cameras in here."
The Doctor grimaced and looked around. "Ooh, yeah. Good thought."
Shinji let out a breath and stepped back. Behind him, one of the Reis blurted out a string of nonsense syllables that ended in a giggle. He twitched.
***
Eventually, he worked up the nerve to go up to Rei. She'd stayed in the same spot, her eyes staring out into nothing. "Are you okay?" Shinji asked. He tried to keep his eyes away from the bodies floating in the tank in front of them, with only the occassional failure.
"I am uninjured," she answered tonelessly.
He rubbed the back of his head. "Yeah, that -- that's not what I meant."
A bubble of air floated peacefully up from the bottom of the tank.
"Given the option," Rei said, "I would not have brought you here."
He hesistated, then shrugged. "Um -- that's okay. I mean, my father probably ordered you to keep all this secret, right?"
"Yes. But that is not the reason."
"Oh." He stole another side glance at the tank. "I - I guess I can see... it is kind of personal."
"Yes," she repeated. "But that is not the reason."
"So... what?"
Rei shifted her eyes away from him. "It is natural to fear what one does not understand."
He blinked. What did she mean? Fear... so did she expect this place to scare him, for some reason? Maybe that might've been the case at one point, but... He tried a smile. "It's all right, Rei. Really. Don't worry about it."
She turned her head and looked at him. Though her expression hadn't changed, she looked sort of... confused, actually. Like he'd suddenly started spouting gibberish or talking in a foreign language she didn't know.
"Well, I mean -- it's just that I've seen loads of stuff weirder than this by now, you know? I mean, come on. Walking statue, right?" He pointed his thumb at the angel behind them. "And these -- the other yous -- well, I guess they're kind of creepy. Because they're smiling and laughing all the time. And I sort of wish they were wearing clothes, too, I guess." He felt his face redden. "B-but it's not like they're trying to hurt me or doing anything other than just floating there, right? So why would I... you know?..."
He trailed off into silence. Oh, God. Why did I have to open my mouth? That was terrible. He looked down, awkwardly scratching the back of his neck.
In the corner of his eye, he saw Rei tilt her head. She seemed to consider him for a moment. Then she raised her hands and clapped them together three times.
He looked up and stared at her. She looked at her palms uncertainly. "I don't think I'm doing it right," she said.
Shinji felt a grin spread across his face. He shook his head and looked away. God, he thought. Look at us. Both of us. We're terrible.
***
They'd tried it again. That was the one thought, white-hot and angry, that dominated Misato's mind. The bastards tried to resurrect an Angel. Again. And I've been working with the results this entire time.
She scrubbed at her eye with the handkerchief again and glanced at the children standing on the other side of the room. God. Just an hour ago, she would've been squeeling at how cute the two of them looked. Now, on the other hand... "Hey," she said. "There's no chance Angels could have diseases, right? Like HIV or syphilis or anything like that?..."
"What? Why would you --" The Doctor gave her an annoyed glance. "Oh, never mind. Look at this." He pulled a panel off of the short span of wall next to what looked like the main door leading out of the chamber. Behind it, amid a rat's nest of cables and tubes, an unmarked binder sat tucked off to the side on a small shelf.
The Doctor pulled the binder out and blew what looked like years of dust off of its plastic skin. He quickly flipped through the old pages. "What is it?" Misato asked.
"User manual, I think... documentation for the equipment in here. Temperature settings, pressure maximums, power requirements, that sort of thing... wait. Hold on." The Doctor flipped back a few pages. "... Rei? How old are you?"
On the other side of the room, Rei looked up. "I don't know."
"Right. In that case, what's the earliest date you can recall?"
She tilted her head. "November fifteenth, two-thousand-and-five Common Era," she said after a moment. "Oh-two-hundred hours. Japan Standard Time."
"Mmh. So what do you make of this?"
The Doctor pulled out a faded photograph from between two pages within the binder and held it up to the light. Rei narrowed her eyes and walked across the room, Shinji following curiously behind her. Misato peered over the Doctor's shoulder. The image, she saw, was of two pale girls dressed in formal school uniforms, blazers and everything, standing together in a sunlit hallway. One looked up towards the camera, a slight smile on her face. The other seemed more uncertain, as if caught off guard.
Both of the girls looked identical to Rei.
The Doctor sniffed the photo. "Must be at least twenty years old." He glanced at Rei. "Ever seen this before? Any recollection of this event?"
Rei shook her head.
The Doctor flipped the photo over in his hand. A few words had been written on the back in ballpoint pen: REUNION. PROJECT ZERO.
Misato felt her head start to throb. Gee, great, she thought. More questions. Because we can't possibly have enough of those right now. She tapped the Doctor on the shoulder. "Look, as great as this is and all -- we still need to get you out of here before anyone notices, you know."
He grimaced. "Ooh, right. The whole not-getting-shot-thing. What was the plan on that again?"
"You'll have to go back through the tunnels to the storage block in Secondary Dogma." Misato fished her ID card out of her pocket. "Use this on the big cargo elevator in the lobby. I've rigged it to take you back to the surface. You just need to -- oh." She paused.
The Doctor raised an eyebrow. "Oh?"
"I forgot -- the keycard's not enough." She rubbed her temples. "Someone outside the elevator has to input my password into the console."
"So come back with me."
"I can't. I've got to stay here and figure out how to explain all this somehow." She waved her hand at the statue.
Shinji raised his hand. "I'll do it, Misato. You can just tell them I ran away when the statue started moving."
"That may be for the best," Rei said. "Pilot Ikari lacks sufficient credentials. He will most likely trigger additional security measures, should he leave through the main door."
Misato sighed. "All right. Fine. Rei, you go get help. Shinji, the password's Kainan Bay. All one word." She passed him her ID card.
He took it. "Do you... um... want me to bring it back after, or..."
"It's fine. Just stay there in the lobby." Misato gazed at the collection of wonders and horrors in front of her. She rubbed her temples again. This... this wasn't going to be easy. "I trust you."
***
Central Dogma Lower Evacuation Tunnels
The Doctor examined the photo again as he waited for Shinji to climb down off of the ruined tram car. Something about the handwriting on the back, maybe? Or a hidden message encoded in the film grain? No, no, that couldn't be it... "Grah."
"What?" Shinji asked as he stepped onto the ground.
"Ohhhhh, there's something else here." The Doctor shook his head. "Something I've missed. I can just feel it."
"Like what?"
"If I knew that, I wouldn't be missing it." And he just knew it was something big and obvious, too -- something staring him right in the face. Maybe even something he'd already thought of and forgotten about. The Doctor hated that feeling. He glumly kicked a torn-off chunk of fender down the tunnel.
They walked in silence for a moment. "Uhm." Shinji licked his lips. He had that look on his face again -- the one where he obviously wanted to talk about something, but was too... well... Shinji to bring it up.
The Doctor, as per long-established policy, wasn't having any of it. "What is it?"
"Umm... well..."
"Come on. Out with it." The Thing That He Was Missing, the Doctor thought, wasn't in the photo. He was certain of that now, at least. Wasn't in the TARDIS, either -- he'd triple-checked the zeiton crystals before he'd left. And turned off the iron.
"Well -- I..." Shinji turned bright red. "I just -- I was wondering. If you had any ideas."
"About?" It wasn't anything to do with the off-brand Cyberman or the not-zombies -- though the Doctor really did need to follow up on both those. Maybe something back in the Reiquarium, then?...
"About -- um." The boy squirmed. "How would you -- how would one go about talking to... uh... to Rei?"
"Oh, is that all?" Something about the tanks? Or something he hadn't noticed about the spares? "Look, I know it's a lot to take in at once. But you need to understand -- what you saw back there, what Rei is -- it's a perfectly valid form of life. I've seen it loads of times. Well, mostly in history museums, but still."
"That's, um, that's not what..."
"It's not like she's changed or anything. It's just your perspective on her. Well, you've known she isn't human -- you just know more about her now." The Doctor paused. "Including what she looks like under her knickers, come to think of it."
"Uh." Even Shinji's ears turned bright red. Amazing thing, the human cardiovascular system. Where did it find enough blood?
"Bit awkward, I know, but you'll get past it." Something about the big brain? No, no, that didn't feel right... "The point is -- she's still the same person. Still culturally human, more or less. She's still your comrade who saved your life. All of our lives, in fact. And rather brilliantly, too, I might add."
"Yeah." Shinji smiled a bit and glanced back in the direction of the room. "She's... she's pretty amazing."
So the Thing Being Missed was not in the room, the Doctor thought. Something about Rei, though -- that felt right. But not just about Rei... Rei and the Angels? Rei and humanity? Rei and -- wait, back up. He just asked me about how to talk to her. He knows her. Why would he ask me how to talk to --
The penny dropped.
The Doctor froze in place. "Oh." He looked up at Shinji, the Thing He Had Missed-Slash-Forgotten now revealed to him in all its hideous glory. "Ohhhhhhhhhh..."
Shinji stopped. "What? What is it?"
For the third time that day, the Doctor felt like a complete and utter git. God, he missed Donna. Donna would've seen this coming from miles away. Lightyears, even.
He adjusted his tie. This... this wasn't going to be easy.
"Er... Shinji?" The Doctor coughed. "There's... something I really should've mentioned before..."
The poor boy looked at him, as clueless as the day he'd been born. "... what's that?"
"Well..." The Doctor carefully put a hand on Shinji's shoulder. "... so you know how Rei doesn't have DNA so much as a repeating energy signature she transmits as part of her wave function?"
"Uh..."
"Really? Could've sworn I'd mentioned that. But anyway..." The Doctor waved a hand. "Point is, she does. And her signature bears a remarkable resemblance to the human genome. In electromagnetic form, if you can imagine that."
Shinji tilted his head. "I... guess that makes sense? Ritsuko said something like that once, I think."
The Doctor gritted his teeth. "So... Rei's signature is similar to your DNA."
"... yeah, so?
Big swing, no ding, the Doctor thought. That's okay, sticky wicket. Let's try that again. "Very similar. To your DNA in particular. Your specific... unique genetic information."
"Wait. Are you..." Shock dawned across Shinji's face. "Are you saying we're related?!"
The Doctor grimaced and slowly nodded.
"But how... if she's not even... but..." Shinji's jaw worked up and down silently for a moment or two. "... how close a relative?!"
The Doctor drew in a breath. "Sis... ter?" he guessed. "Though, really, given the degree of the match, X-chromosomal clone's just about as likely..."
And he'd just said too much, hadn't he. He saw something behind Shinji's eyes shatter into a thousand pieces. Oh, now he'd done it. Brilliant job, Doctor, just brilliant...
The boy didn't say anything for a while. He just rocked back and forth on his feet, staring out into nothing. "... Doctor?"
"Yeah?"
"I think... I think I'm going to need some more time in the Zero Room."
The Doctor nodded and patted him on the shoulder. "Yeah. Think we can make that happen."
He gently guided the boy down the tracks towards the cavern.
"It's probably for the best, though," the Doctor offered after a few moments. "Don't know if you picked up on it, but she can't be much older than ten years. Eleven on the outside, I'd reckon. And if it helps, this is actually a well-documented phenomena between siblings first meeting after childhood, believe it or not. Genetic sexual attraction, they call it. Bit interesting, really, from an macro-evolutionary standpoint. Relates back to selfish gene theory..."
"Doctor?"
"... not helping?"
"Not. Helping."
"Yeah..."