Story: Evangelion Oversynch

Don't really have a subtitle in mind for this one. Anyone got an idea?


Instrumentality is bullshit. No. It’s worse than bullshit. It’s insane. On each and every step along the way it is predicated entirely on bullshit, madness, short-sightedness and lies. Its proponents viewed it as the ultimate evolution of humanity, little realising that the term “ultimate evolution” was a concept that should only be reserved for either badly written science fiction or creationist propaganda. These two areas are not mutually exclusive, incidentally.

So the idea is to merge all of human consciousness and combine it all into a single entity, so that the flaws of every human being would be balanced out by the strengths of others.

Does nobody else see the inherent nonsense in this? Does nobody else observe the stunningly obvious faults in this plan? Because anyone that can’t doesn’t know the slightest damn thing about human beings.

I could go on for hours on this point, but that’s not why you’re here. Just trust me when I say that the only rational explanation for anyone supporting Instrumentality (that is, precluding the possibility that the proponent is under the influence of mind-altering substances or has the natural brain chemistry of a meth lab) is simply this: A bunch of old, powerful and influential men collectively woke up one morning, realised they were likely to die very soon and had recently uncovered a way to sort of kind of cheat death and were attempting to rationalise their very selfish choice as being ultimately beneficial to all of humankind because <i>they</i> couldn’t <i>possibly</i> be the bad guys, because nobody actually really believes they are the bad guys when you get right down to it.

Still need convincing? Alright! How about analysing a microcosm of the ultimate result? So, Shinji, Asuka and Rei are all telepathically connected, with little pieces of their consciousness flitting about between the three of them. Shinji is a shy, apologetic wreck of a boy that feels a powerful physical attraction towards Asuka and an emotional one to Rei. Asuka is an outgoing, arrogant wreck of a girl that feels a rather strong physical connection to Shinji that she absolutely denies with the vehemence of a hurricane and is repelled by absolutely every single thing about Rei because of her issues with dolls which stem from her mother. As for Rei, she’s… Rei. Describing Rei is like looking at a magic eye. Sometimes you see the camel, sometimes you don’t, but hey! The overall image itself is kinda pretty if you like kaleidoscopes.

You could hardly find three people more different to one another being forced to interact. None of them truly understood the other, but now they would have no choice but to learn… However, the end result may not be what those in favour of Instrumentality might have expected.

<hr>
Ugh. It felt like his mouth had been rinsed out with Misato’s last attempt at breakfast after it had been left out overnight. His whole body felt kinda weird too, come to think. But even without opening his eyes Shinji could tell where he was. He recognised the textures and the smells of the room around him from far too frequent visits, and he knew that above him was a ceiling he was rather familiar with by now. There was little else to do but open his eyes and sigh wearily at the sight above him.

“So you’re awake,” Doctor Akagi said, stepping into the side of his vision. “You both had us a little worried. How are you feeling?”

“A little strange,” he said. Huh? Weird, what was wrong with his voice just now? It sounded a little high pitched for some reason. And there was something else a little strange about it too, actually.

“You slipped into German,” Doctor Akagi said. Shinji stared up at her. That’s right. It had just dripped off his tongue like he’d been saying it all of his life. But he barely knew how to string together a sentence in German, and the only person he knew for a fact even spoke it -

Shinji turned his head to the right, and a stray red hair fell across his vision.

“Asuka? Is something the matter?” Doctor Akagi said.

Shinji stared down at his body. Her body. Asuka’s body. And then everything went dark for a split second, before he realised he was sitting up in bed, taking long ragged breaths. A hand suddenly rested upon his shoulder and he jerked around to stare up at - Misato? When did she -

“Shinji?” she said. “Please, calm down. What’s the matter?”

“N-Nothing,” Shinji said, not entirely believing it himself. “Just a bad nightmare. That’s all.”

Though bad nightmare or not, he did have to wince at the realisation that he’d woken up alongside “little Shinji” as well. Hopefully Misato wouldn’t notice that. This whole thing was embarrassing enough as it was.

<hr>
Stupid brain with its stupid nightmares! Why, she almost believed she actually was Shinji for a moment there! An experience she absolutely would not, could not ever ever ever be permitted to relive. Or be reminded of! Asuka shuddered, she may never feel clean again!

“Are you quite alright, Asuka?”


“Of course!” she replied instantly. “Why wouldn’t I be?”

“You and the other two pilots were just in an accident which rendered all three of you unconscious. We need to be certain there have been no side effects. Have you noticed anything out of the ordinary?”

Out of the ordinary?! What sort of question was that?! Given everything she’d seen and done over the course of her life, given the people she interacted with, given all of that, would she know what “ordinary” even meant?! Okay, sure. Being thoroughly convinced that she was actually the wimpy Third for a moment was a little bit… off-putting, but -

“No,” she said. “Nothing at all.” Not even the strange whispers she was resolutely ignoring at the back of her mind. Or the fact that she was somehow aware that Shinji was awake in the next room and really hoping his erection had passed by unnoticed, or that the doll was walking into the room to check up on -

Part of Asuka was hugely surprised when Rei strode through the door, but every instinct in her body was telling her “Of course. You knew she was coming.” A paradox that wasn’t really at the forefront of Asuka’s mind right around about then, because it was rather caught up in a rather significant problem that would become exponentially worse the more people were involved in such a gestalt.

You see, it works thusly: You see with your brain, not your eyes. Everything that you see around you is classified by the brain as a particular object regardless of what it is you’re actually seeing. Every object has a particular emotional connection to it. When Shinji looks at Rei, he feels a distinct fascination that draws him inexorably towards her and that’s even before the physical attraction he feels towards her otherworldly beauty. When Asuka looks at Rei, she sees an annoying doll that needs to either break free from her shell and live a little, or just go away.

Now consider the existence of optical illusions. Is it two people kissing or a vase? Is it an ugly old woman, or a young woman turned away from you?

The two previously described viewpoints of Rei may seem pretty opposite to one another, but right about now all three of their minds were a chaotic mess. Which meant that when Asuka looked at Rei, she did not see “annoying doll”. She saw “otherworldly beauty”. That same pale skin that seemed too inhuman before now seemed soft and alluring. That same blue hair that she’d think was dyed if anyone else tried wearing it framed her gorgeous face and her red eyes seemed to be staring so deeply into hers…

At that moment Asuka wasn’t seeing Rei. She was seeing a gorgeous, enticing, entrancing figure. And in spite of herself, felt her heart skip a beat.

But it didn’t quite stop there. Because this illustrates another problem with removing the barriers between people’s thoughts.

Asuka was feeling Shinji’s attraction towards Rei (and Rei was feeling Shinji’s attraction towards Asuka). That’s fine, that’s simple, that’s neat. But there’s a problem here: Namely, Asuka and Rei’s dislike for one another was being overwritten by - frankly - overly hormonal responses to two pretty girls he was interacting with regularly.

Shinji is attracted to both Rei and Asuka, and now his mind was connected to both of them. Which meant that the two of them were feeling that as well. Which further meant that while Shinji’s lustful feelings towards them both were being shared, both girls were also feeling the lust reflected within one another, which they also in turn felt.

Ever put a microphone next to a speaker it was attached to? Similar principle. Except that instead of a high-pitched whine, you wind up with two girls who used to hate each other secretly and (sort of) independently planning to get the hell away from Doctor Akagi and fuck the other stupid.

“Was there something you wanted, Rei?”

The word “yes” echoed in Asuka’s mind, prompting her to shake her head clear of it.

“I was concerned about the condition of the other pilots,” Rei answered with a hunger in her that Asuka felt only she could see. “Nothing more.”

“Well, so far as I can tell… Her heart rate is a little elevated, but she seems otherwise healthy. I’d like to perform a few tests to make sure, but it seems likely you three will be allowed to go home soon enough.”

<hr>
“A few tests,” Asuka grumbled in the car with her arms folded across her chest. “I feel like I’ve been beaten all over my body by dwarves with bags full of sand.”

“Well, it was only for your own sake,” Misato cheerily said, swerving around the road like she was doing her absolute damndest to get them all killed. “After all, if you’d been allowed to go home and something had happened -”

“Like what, exactly?” Asuka snapped. “Like maybe Shinji collapsing while trying to pretend he’s not checking out my butt?”

All of a sudden Shinji looked rather pale and stammered his usual denials. “I - I’m sorry! I mean, I don’t do that! I mean! Um!”

Except he totally did do that, she realised. Hell, even now he was stealing little glimpses of her legs while she was looking out the window. Little perv. She should give him a little piece of her -

She squirmed in her seat and didn’t quite know why. Gods, what was with her today? First those weird (wonderful) feelings while staring at Wondergirl and now - She cast her eyes back at Shinji, certain that she’d catch him checking out her legs. He was. Not even trying to hide it. Just staring openly at her with a lustful gaze like he didn’t even care if she caught him in the act. And to her immeasurable surprise, Asuka found that she wanted him to continue staring. Maybe even reach out and touch her -

“Say, did you two want anything special for dinner tonight?” Misato asked all of a sudden. The spell was broken, and Asuka suddenly realised they’d arrived back home.

“No meat, please,” Shinji said. “For some reason, I don’t feel like having any.”

Weird. Neither did Asuka. In fact, the more she thought about it the more wrong it seemed to eat meat at all. Like, if she tried to eat some right now she might just throw it right back up. Seriously, what was wrong with her today? It felt like her emotions were flying all over the damned place, never sitting in one place, never settling down on one specific thing -

“Hey, watch where you’re going!” a male voice angrily yelled in German.

“Sorry, sorry,” Asuka replied without even thinking. Hold on. When had she even gotten out of the car? Male angry voice in German? That was… Shinji? And she’d just <i>apologised</i> to Shinji?! Ugh! Something really was wrong here!

1. Follow Shinji and Asuka through dinner. And what’s Rei doing?
2. The trio have some fascinating dreams. Or perhaps nightmares?
3. They try to deal with school. It gets… complicated.
4. Angel attack. Because that’s exactly what they need right now.
5. It seems the intermingling might not just be limited to mental traits after all.
6. Something else