Chapter 1: No such thing as fairy tales

Oh God when the fuck is this over?

A question groaning inside the mind of one Miss Asuka Langley Sorhyu's mind since looking at her watch for the nth time. Realising that time would not fly by simply looking at her watch, Asuka gave a tired sigh as she used the kitchen's tiled wall to support her exhausted body. Both tired and yearning to get out of her work uniform so she could go home and rest. Though there's no real point of wondering and wanting because all I'll do is just go home, study and then would put up with my room mates.

She was seventeen now and had changed completely changed over the years; physically, mentally & emotionally for one main reason: Third Impact.

When Asuka woke up, she was surprised to have found Shinji on top of her whilst strangling her. By some miracle she had managed to stop him by simply touching his cheek with a gentle warmth that even Asuka herself, did not know that she possessed, stopping his dead in his tracks and instead making him an emotional wreck. The sight of the supposed "Invincible Third Child" disgusted Asuka and made her realise that she wanted Shinji out of her life, permantley.

So when Shinji finally got off of her, Asuka violently shoved him to the ground and ran; fearing for her life. When she was far enough away from Ikari, Asuka stumbled through the ruins of her temporary home, reminding her that she could no longer stay here. But then again, she had always known that this wasn't where she belonged.

With this as her final decision, Asuka decided it'd be best if she just left Tokyo-3 altogether, so after finding a car and having the basic knowledge of how to operate the vehicle, Asuka drove to the furthest city she could think of: Kyoto. Upon arriving to her destination Asuka managed to find an apartment that did still remained intact and did not contain remains of human LCL, then found some appropriate furniture & necessities she would need to survive. A little while after settling into her "new home", Asuka began looking roaming around the broken streets of Kyoto in hopes to find anymore human life and was sadly disappointed to have found the two people that she hated the most: Rei and Mana.

Although Asuka had been greatly tempted to leave them then & there and let them sort themselves out, inside she knew she couldn't abandon them. Because as much as she wanted to have no contact with neither of the girls, she didn't like the thought of being all alone on this god forsaken planet, even if it was Rei & Mana. So Asuka took the girls to her place and tended to them, soon they had came to the agreement that it was best if they lived together for various reasons, even if Asuka couldn't stand the sight of Mana and vice-versa.

As months went by, more and more people started coming out of the beach of LCL and Asuka was overjoyed to see Hikari one day as well as a girl their age named Jayne. She (who is now today 5ft 8) had softly tanned skin with kingfisher-blue eyes and hair the colour of auburn with blonde highlights had a crown-cut style with many layers that seemed to flick up. Although she had all the qualities to be a model, Jayne's dream was to be a fashion designer.

The three of them had become close during the years and though they had all wanted so badly to live together, Asuka knew that it would be best for everyone to live with Rei & Mana for fear that SEELE still existed and looking for them. For that, the people who were somehow involved with Evangelion took precautions such as changing their names and appearances, except for young Jayne.

Rei's name was now changed to Kaldea and she had dyed her hair into a chest length mahogany hair, tanned skin, ice-blue contacts, only growing to the height of 5ft 7.

Mana's name changed to Asako along with her hair which was now shoulder-length caramel-blonde, hazel-brown contacts and with the same height as Rei.

Hikari's name was now Aki who had her hair up to her chest and it was now the colour of burnt sienna with yellow & orange highlights. Her eyes were the bright colour of turquoise with her skin lightly tanned and had surprisingly grown taller than the other two girls just by a few inches.

But out of all Asuka had made most drastic changes; her name now being Dominique and becoming the tallest out of the group with the height status as 5ft 9, piercing her ears with gold & ruby earrings and her belly button which was of a rose-gold sun. Her once porcelain-like skin was now tanned into a golden brown warmth (thanks to fake tanning lotion) along with her once fire-like hair turning into a chocolate-brown that was always worn in a high ponytail, but always keeping her red interference-clips underneath her pillow.

And finally her sapphire-like eyes that she had always been so proud of changed were now the colour of emerald, however, she always covered them with a pair of thin-rimmed glasses that she didn't need to wear but wore anyway so she could have a geeky appearance, thus making boys not give even a single thought of asking her out.

Yes Dominique these days hated the thought of getting attention and was even more disgusted at the thought of how she use to thrive on her popularity. Dominique never bothered to make any friends these days because she had Jayne & Aki and she was satisfied with that. She didn't need any other friends because everyone at her school were all a bunch of dick heads that thought of her as a freak, but fuck them. She no longer cared whether she was the prettiest or the most popular in school because none of it mattered once they entered the real world.

Some would say that Asuka (or I should say Dominique) was a bitter bitch who loved to burst someone's bubble with her cynicism, but for those who truly knew her, knew that she was only being realistic because none of them ever had to go through all the shit she had been put through and unlike the pretty girls at school that were under delusion by hoping to find their "Prince Charming" and get their "Happily ever after", Dominique just rolled her eyes and thought they better get off whatever drugs they were taking.

Because this was reality and in reality there's no such thing as fairy tales.

Her thoughts were quickly interrupted by her boss. For whoever called Dominique a bitter bitch, then that person should definitely meet this lady because this woman was Big Bitch Infinity plus one. She was in her late 30's with a height of 5'5ft with a reasonable figure, short platinum-gold hair (which Dominique contemplated many times as to have been bleached) and almond coloured eyes. "Your shift is over Dominique. I'll see you tomorrow, sadly..." Ryoka said with a bitter tone and an obvious look of disgust on her face.

"Have a good afternoon, Miss Ryoka." Dominique said in a honeyed tone, knowing that she had struck home.

A look that Dominique could not describe had crossed Ryoka's features but she said nothing, only grunting and then walked off. Thankful for that, Dominique quickly left and got into her cherry-red Citroen; it was a convertible 2010 model and auto. The car had sentimental value to her because this was the car she had used to get to Kyoto and escape from her old life, grateful for its act of kindness, she kept the car in a mint condition before she was legally allowed to drive it.

As the brunette entered her apartment she took her time to walk to her room, but did not bother greeting her room mates as she knew that they'd probably be out. Over the years the three girls lived together Kaldea (Rei) and Asako (Mana) had managed to become close friends almost instantly, which did a great favour for Kaldea because this had helped her to become more sociable around friends, but somehow she had managed to still keep her quiet nature even around some of her friends.

Dominique grabbed a can of soft drink from the fridge and went to her room but frowned as she remembered the state of it; textbooks, study notes & clothes all over the floor. The ex-Eva pilot was currently studying for her year twelve exams and was struggling at choosing which university was best for her to enrol to, although she knew that she didn't need to go to uni again she chose to attend for several reasons:

1. Even with her qualifications, Dominique had a new identity and it wouldn't look good if she used her uni certificate under her old name.

2. It would mean that she could finally leave this apartment and live on campus, meaning she would never have to hear from neither Mana nor Rei again.

3. It would give her the perfect chance to meet people who were like her and know that she would be respected as a equal and not be given the treatment of a little girl.

The seventeen year old shuddered at the unpleasant memories attending university as a thirteen year old. It pissed her off to remember that although she would act maturely and have the same views & opinions as an adult, she was still seen as only a child that shouldn't be in this strange yet fascinating stage of her life yet. Even when she piloted Eva, she knew that she thought as merely as a child but now Dominique would give anything to be a little girl again because you only have innocence for so long.

Now at seventeen it hurt realising that she had given up most of her childhood and her chances of being a normal kid so easily, but now she tried to take advantage of every second of her limited childhood knowing that once it was gone, it'd be gone for good. But at the same time she refused to act childish as other kids when life became shit because Dominique knew that she had big responsibilities to uphold such as working hard through all of school, keeping her job as a waitress at a small but popular cafe and making sure the government wouldn't find her or her comrades.

Dominique was about to go onto her laptop until she got a text message on her small, Nokia flip-top phone. The message was from Aki.

Hey Dominique, wanna go out 4 a slice of pizza? I'm with Jayne so she could pic u up if u want.

Dominique groaned aloud, she wasn't sure if she wanted to do that at the present moment but when she remembered that she'd probably have to cook one of those frozen meals the girls have been living on for the past few weeks, the young girl decided she's take her chances on pizza.

Sure c'ya in 5.

Dominique got a reply of acknowledgement and quickly changed into a slightly unbuttoned long-sleeved navy top, faded ripped jeans with blue converse sneakers, she then ran out the door to see Jayne's car which was sky-metallic blue Mini with the roof currently down.

Jayne had a pair of green denim shorts, green strapped hill-platforms and a baby pink tube top with both mint-green stitching & ribbon for straps she made herself which was currently showing her white-gold moon belly ring while Aki had her hair down wearing yellow halter top showing her yellow-gold star belly ring, an orange skirt with splits on each side and orange platform boots. The three girls had gotten their bellies pierced together when they were all seventeen as a triple dare one Friday night after a Shakespeare exam.

When Dominique got into the back seat of the car, Jayne put an old CD of the Black eyed peas into the CD player and the car's speakers roared playing Pump it as Jayne took off. "So have you had any thought about going to the Kyoto ball?" She asked when she finally got onto the main road but was paying more attention to the road than her question. The Kyoto ball was a huge masquerade formal for all the high schools in the country, only seniors were allowed to attend.

"Fuck no! I don't go to that kind of shit, it's all 'fancy dress, romance & happy times' kind of fantasy crap!" Dominique answered.

"You know Dominique, you use to love that kind of shit before Third Impact!" Aki retorted in a laid back tone wearing a small smirk.

"I know but that was before the world turned me into a bitter bitch!" The brunette replied a mock-seriousness tone.

"God damn it you're not a fucking bitter bitch! Just because they can't get a grip on reality doesn't mean they should take it out on you!" Jayne said rolling her eyes.

"Fuck them, why are we even bothering remembering them? We only have to put up with them for another few months then we're out of here!" Said Aki.

"I know. We'll be able to do whatever the hell we want and no one will be able to stop us!" Jayne replied.

"Jayne, we do whatever the hell we want anyway!" Dominique reminded her.

"Yeah but we'll also be working hard to achieve what we want," Jayne said in a girlie tone mocking the whole BFF crap and making the other two girls laugh.

"Oh shit Jayne are you sure you wanna be a fashion designer? Because you would be great as a comedian!" Dominique asked after getting over her fits of laughter.

"Nah too much publicity, besides I rather not be like Andy Kaufman if that's alright with you, pretending to be someone else as a joke and then pretend they're a real person! That's too fucking creepy! Anyway back onto the real subject, are you sure you don't want to go? I wanna only go just to design the outfits for the evening and they'd be really good for my portfolio. Can we go? Pleasssssssse?" Jayne pleaded with those same innocent puppy eyes that always made Dominique wish that she was still blind, well half-blind.

"Oh come on Dominique, it'd fun watching everyone make an ass of themselves and besides it may be fun!" Aki said with the same look in her eyes.

"Oh god, I must be getting soft! Fine, we'll... we'll... Go to this thing. There are you fucking satisfied!" Dominique yelled out in a defeated tone and threw her arms up in the air, annoyed when she heard both of her friends cheer. "But I'm not getting a date!"

"Of course you don't have to! I'm not!" Aki said.

"No chance in hell for me either! Not much to choose from anyway."

"You got that right." Dominique remarked and none really bothered speaking until they got to the pizzeria but they were sadly disappointed to see that it was busy tonight with mostly teenagers so they went to MacDonalds instead and ordered through the drive way.

Most of the kids were from their school.

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A few hours later Dominique quietly entered the apartment door after being dropped off by Jayne. She waited for any yelling from Mana for not telling either one of them where she was going, or for not getting any groceries. Basically they tried to use Dominique as a slave but she wasn't going to take any of that. But all was quiet.

So this is what Shinji felt like when I gave him shit or when he got home from NERV? Oh god damn that would suck! When she entered her room, Dominique slowly pulled out her hair band making her hair fall gracefully to her waist, she then took off her glasses & contacts and fell backwards onto her bed.

Nothing but silence played in her ears as she looked at her ceiling. So this was her life and although Dominique didn't hate it but she didn't love it either, it was just balanced. She knew that she would do the same routine again tomorrow but she wanted it that way.

That way she could forget all about fairy tales.

End of Chapter 1.

AN: I hope you all liked and I'm sorry to everyone who wants to flame me for changing all the girls' names & appearances but as I say once again they are hiding from SEELE and if you want to flame me for that then stuff you! If anyone liked this then please R&R because I really like the idea I have for this story. It's basically another Cinderella plot you've read in other fanfics but I'm doing it with an Evangelion twist and I'm doing the best I can to keep Asuka (Dominique in character.)