Creation began on 06-30-13

Creation ended on 06-27-14

Neon Genesis Evangelion

Vengeance of the Seven: To begin anew

A/N: It's hard to gain recognition for what is the longest story I've written for Evangelion, so I'm trying something a little different that's not part of the My Special Keeper universe. I actually enjoyed that I wrote the story. I just wished that there were people that could find enjoyment in it. As always, I'm focusing on the manga version of the franchise.

He'd been avoiding school for more than three months since he'd been freed from the Eva, and there wasn't a day that went by where he was not granted any sympathy or real help from those around him. He'd been drafted back into the cold, soul-rendering war with the Angels, but all he wanted, all he really wanted…was to undo the one thing that he knew he couldn't undo: The death of his friend. By wandering around what was left of the maimed city, Shinji had hoped to outrun his guilt and his lack of any real free will. In addition, it was hard for him to talk to people without them bringing up the Eva, something among his short and simple list that has done nothing but hurt him.

DING-DING-DING! He stopped at the sound of a wind chime, out front of a shop. An antique shop. In fact, this was a shop he was certain hadn't existed in the city before. It was a fading red color on the walls that were flaking off, with an ancient theme, with dragon statues, birds with what looked like long, fiery tails, tigers and snakes atop turtles, with a scent of incense burning.

The sign on the door read Lost Talismans of Desire, carved in a jade plaque. He felt drawn to the shop and decided to look inside it. There were many things that looked old and valuable, some of which appeared to be of Asian culture, with others looking like they were foreign.

"Hello?" He called out, and from behind a door separated from the shop by a curtain of string beads came an old man dressed in Chinese robes.

The man looked like he was in his eighties, his skins wrinkled in extremes, his hair receded to where all he had was a withered ponytail, withered fingers with long nails.

"Good day to you, young one," he greeted Shinji, and walked over to a fish tank to dump fish flakes into it. "May I help you?"

"Well, I… I just saw this shop outside and…wondered if you had anything that…" Shinji started, but the elder raised a hand to silence him.

"I have lived a long time, young man," he uttered, "so I have a talent for guessing what it is that people desire…or what it is that they need. What they truly need. You're in need…of a reprieve from pain and despair…and a second chance to turn your present-day life around. But what you also desire, from a dark place in your heart, is vengeance upon…two people that left you alone."

"I…"

"You can't deny it to me, young man. Admit it. Accept it. It is what you want, deep down inside."

Shinji bowed his head to the man and nodded. As much as he wanted to undo the harm he had been made to cause, he also desired some measure of revenge, of justice, against the two people that hurt him the most: His mother and father, who abandoned him years ago.

"Yes," he told the man. "Yes."

"Come with me into the back," the elder instructed him, and Shinji followed him.

The back of the shop was even darker than the front, with shelves full of old books, statues and other items made the room small and narrow-spaced. Shinji assumed that the elder kept a large inventory of replicas of whatever he displayed out front. A large mural on the ceiling caught his gaze now: It was like an ancient painting, faded, displaying seven red and blue, serpentine dragons and seven white and orange tigers, circling a star with seven points. The dragons and tigers looking like they had performed or were performing acts that looked unusual; Shinji saw a tiger and dragon consuming a large feast, a tiger and dragon being reached for by several arms, a fierce tiger and dragon, looking like they were about to engage in a battle, and a tiger and dragon sitting atop large piles of gold, clawing at them as if to keep the gold from spilling over.

"In ancient times, the tiger and the dragon were considered some of the greatest forces of nature in existence," the elder spoke up, as if answering his curiosity. "Two such creatures were viewed as gods by the people of ancient China. Byakko was the White Tiger and Seiryu was the Blue Dragon. But those you see above your head…are not representations of the two gods. They are representations of the Seven, which reside within us all."

"The Seven?" Shinji asked him.

"They are sins higher than all other forms of sinning. Are you familiar with the Seven Deadly Sins?"

Shinji told him that he knew nothing about the Seven Deadly Sins; they were viewed as a form of Christian religion that was banned from the school education system. Then, the elder, who had been rummaging through old chests, pulled out two trinkets. The one in his left hand looked like a piece of metal sculpted into the shape of a crane with an ankh carved into its body, and the item in his right hand looked like a tiger and dragon interlocked by a star with seven points, like the mural on the ceiling.

"The Crane of Renewal…and the Purge of Seven," he revealed to Shinji. "One to return life…and one to bestow vengeance."

He handed them to Shinji, who accepted them without much question.

"Wait," he hesitated now. "I don't have any money on me."

"I don't have much need for money," the elder responded. "They're on the house. Restore the life of your friend, undoing your indirect sin…and settle the score you have with the ones that have wronged you. Use the Crane at night and tell it the name of the life you want to revive…and the Purge by wearing it as you sleep. What happens next will be up to the darkness you have deep within your heart. Sometimes, you cannot fight injustice with justice. You have to use something else, something more, a different form of injustice."

Shinji looked at the Purge and could only wonder how it would help him, but hoped that the elder wasn't pulling his chain with the Crane.

-x-

There had been enough death in the months he'd been in the city, even though the only deaths he'd ever seen were the fall of some of the Angels…and the unjustifiable murder of Toji Suzuhara. The city looked like a large scab that had been patched up too many times and all attempts to make it a place where people could actually live were in vain. It was something Shinji couldn't help but hate about Tokyo-3, almost as much as he hated his father and the Eva. As he returned to Misato's flat, he recalled more information from what was left of the city's library's access to the Internet that helped to enforce further information the elder had given him about the seven sins.

Seven Deadly Sins, he thought, going up in the elevator. Pride, Greed, Envy, Wrath, Lust, Gluttony and Sloth. According to the elder, everybody is capable of exhibiting one or many of them, but there are very few of them capable of demonstrating all seven at once. By going to sleep with this medallion, all seven sins will awaken within me. I hope this actually works.

Upon reaching Misato's flat, he saw Asuka, looking irritable, as usual.

"And where have you been?" She asked him.

He tightened his grip on the paper bag containing his talismans; as much as Asuka treated him like scum, he didn't want to risk her trying to interfere with his agenda, even when he had no idea on what he was going to do the next day.

"I was out," he answered her, keeping it simple.

"You're as dull as ever," she told him, and left.

He was glad she left now; this allowed him to get his thoughts straightened out before he did anything that was beyond rational…or sane. All he could accept of what he was doing was that there would be no turning back after everything that had happened in the past. He needed to undo the unnecessary and obtain the justice to the injustice he'd been dealt with. He prayed that the two trinkets he got from the old man were really what the man said they were.

-x-

"…With the continued rate of steady progress, Units-00 and 02 will be battle-ready in three more days' time," went Ritsuko Akagi to Gendo Ikari and Kozo Fuyutsuki, inside Gendo's office.

"Very good, Dr. Akagi," Fuyutsuki responded, looking out the massive windows at the Geo-Front.

"Continue with the repairs," said Gendo to her, "and also have the pilots check in for further synchronization testing."

"Yes, sir," Ritsuko responded and left the chamber.

"What's the point of testing him if Unit-01 is suspended, Ikari?" Fuyutsuki questioned Gendo.

"The Third Child's become invaluable," he answered, though that was the only reason; as much as he disregarded his son, he couldn't let an invaluable resource go to waste…until he no longer had a need for it.

"Just because he came back during the last battle doesn't mean he's likely to continue."

But Gendo wasn't too concern; with careful manipulation, he was certain that the boy became attached to the purple behemoth. He made it so that Shinji couldn't get away from Unit-01, even if he wanted to.

-x-

Everyone seemed too busy, too wrapped up in their own, personal issues, to talk about something as trivial as how one's day went at the table of the Katsuragi flat. Dinner was as silent as a person who was mute, and as rigid as a bridge that had been in use for too many years and had become unstable for further use.

When Shinji finished first, he excused himself from the table and went into his room. He looked at the two talismans he had gotten today and then looked out the window at the city that had been maimed enough times to lose interest in the hearts of those that either commuted between it and other places or lived in it in the hopes of getting a fresh start. Then, as his bedtime neared, he looked to the Crane and hoped that what it could do was genuine as he placed the Purge around his neck.

"Toji," he spoke to the Crane, following the instructions the elder gave him. "Toji Suzuhara. Please…bring him back."

He then set the Crane down on his dresser and went to bed.

-x-

Atop a lonely hill overlooking the city, a young teen with greyish hair and red eyes stood in the silent night, dressed in a white school shirt and black pants.

"Hmm?" He went, feeling an unusual energy that didn't seem normal. "How strange."

Then…he felt another wave of energy that was unusual. The first wave felt calming, almost benevolent, but the second wave was that and something else that seemed too commonplace to not understand. He could've almost made out a sound from the second wave, like a…tiger or dragon roaring, only he had never seen either creature before in his life.

-x-

Asuka was the first to awaken from her night of slumber. She exited her room and stepped into the kitchen, but didn't find Shinji there with breakfast on the table. This made her angry.

"Where is that idiot?" She questioned, approaching his room. "Hey, stupid Shinji?! Get up!"

But no response came, so she stepped into his room. He looked like he had a restless night, laying face-down on his futon with some strange object hanging around his neck. It looked like a star with seven points in between a tiger and a dragon.

"Idiot," she muttered, raising her left foot at his right shoulder and kicked him. "Wake up!"

But there was no reaction from being hit by her that he gave to indicate that he was listening to her. She kicked him again, but still didn't get so much as a mumble from him. In fact, she took a closer look at him…and he didn't look like he was even breathing. So she turned him over onto his back and found his chest wasn't rising or falling…and the talisman around his neck started pulsating, as if it was breathing for him. She made an attempt to remove the relic.

Don't touch it! A grand voice shouted at her, in her mind, and she pulled her left hand back from Shinji.

"Misato!" She called for her guardian, running to her room.

-x-

He felt like he was in a haze. A drug-induced haze. The last thing he remembered was a man in white robes telling him that some place where suffering was nonexistent in the sky wasn't ready for him just yet, and that he had to return to his home. He was also informed that a friend of his had made a choice and it would affect every other choice yet to be made. The one place that made any sense to him was the last place he spent any reasonable sense: Tokyo-3 Municipal Junior High School.

Several girls looked up at him…and gasped. There was no way he could be back.

Kensuke Aida, looking at the sky outside the school windows, turned to look at the school grounds and at the boy people were gasping at like he was a monster.

"No way," he uttered. "Toji?"

Then Hikari came by the window and saw the boy she hadn't seen in months.

The teen looked like Toji Suzuhara, but he seemed like he was woozy, like he was just coming out of deep sleep or coma.

-x-

"So, what's wrong with him?" Misato asked Ritsuko, looking into the room where Shinji was hooked to a respirator.

"We're not sure," she answered. "He's in a persistent vegetative state."

"Asuka and I were with him last night, and he was fine."

"Did Asuka hit him or kick him?"

"No. I mean, I didn't see him with any bruises."

"But we've all seen Asuka hit him enough times to know how to cause injuries to him that wouldn't have been mentioned."

"You're the expert, Rits, if there were injuries, you would've been the first to notice them. Asuka said she kicked him, thinking he was asleep, but then she turned him over and saw that he wasn't breathing."

"Yeah, the bruises on his head and shoulder confirm she hit him, but there was no major injury to his brain. And then, there's that relic around his neck that Asuka not to remove."

"I've never see Shinji with it before."

-x-

In an alley, ignored by many, between two dumpsters, seven individuals loitered around the setting. Each person, in their own way, resembled one another, but lacked certain details that the others had in their possession.

"We could've explained what happened," one of them, a boy, spoke up.

"No, let them waste their time trying to figure out what's wrong with him," another boy responded, sounding cruel, but also confident at the same time. "It's not like we'd be believed if we told them ourselves. Would you risk the truth…and our lives themselves…being found out like this?"

"I know I wouldn't," went a rather feminine voice spoke up. "Do we go out there into the city now?"

"Not yet," the confident one responded.

"How about now?" Another feminine voice spoke up.

"No."

"Go?"

"No."

"Now?" All six voices asked the confident one.

"Now we go," he answered, and they all stepped out of the alley.

Like something out of a movie belonging to the supernatural genre, all seven individuals walked out of some smoke that covered their entrance into the streets of Tokyo-3. Now out in the open, the seven were separated into five boys and two girls. The boys were dressed in the same school uniform while the two girls were dressed in summer dresses.

-x-

"This just keeps getting better and better," went Asuka, walking down the street toward the school. "The Third's in a coma and I'm forced to go without breakfast or lunch today."

As she reached the school, she noticed an ambulance out front, which indicated that somebody got hurt around the building. But she paid it no mind as she stepped onto the school grounds and entered the building to get to the classroom. There were several students around her gossiping about something she paid no mind to.

"…My parents said this guy died…"

"…There was no funeral…"

"…Didn't he have a sister…"

"…I was told he was murdered…"

"…Yet, here he is…"

"…Horaki-San was shocked to see him walk through the front gate…"

As she entered the classroom, she saw two paramedics carting away a boy. But the sight of the boy's face was what caught Asuka off her guard. She didn't know any other boys with brownish hair with a light tint to it or wore black, gym clothes like they were a fashion trend.

No way! She thought, unsure if there was any other guy in school that could look anything like the Suzuhara stooge she knew died in the Unit-03 incident.

"…Class Rep…" She heard him say under an oxygen mask.

-x-

Finding an intact piano in the ruins of a few houses that didn't survive the arrival of the last Angel to invade the city, the boy from last night sat and began to play a classical song, Ode to Joy. It wasn't even eight minutes that a stray kitten came by, suffering from the defects of hunger and in need of food. The boy looked down at the kitten and stopped playing the piano.

"You poor thing," he uttered, picking up the kitten…only to start choking it.

He was close to ending its life…until he felt something strike him on the back of his neck, forcing him to release the kitten.

"You could've tried taking this defenseless animal to an animal shelter," he heard a female voice say to him as he got up. "Or contacting someone to see if they could spare some food. You don't have to commit murder and call it an act of mercy."

"Mew…" The kitten whined, and was immediately picked up and comforted.

"There, there," the voice went. "You'll be alright once you get something to eat."

As the boy got up, he turned to face his attacker and saw a girl with a rather attractive face, some boyish features, a white summer dress with a skort underneath, and long, dark hair. By her left was a boy with the same uniform, but his face had a stern expression, like he'd been the victim of cruelty and his only response to such hardship was to be cruel.

"You tried to kill an innocent life," he told the boy, bringing up his fists and hitting his knuckles three times, indicating he was about to lay down abuse. "I don't like you right now."

The girl was cradling the kitten and sat down and holding a small carton of milk.

"The difference between seduction and rage," the girl uttered, just as the boy approached the attempted cat killer, "is that vengeance has limits…that seduction will never know."

To be continued…

A/N: The arrogance of Gendo and Yui is thinking that they can decide the fate of everyone…and not expect for there to be repercussions or countermeasures. Now, their son has become a repercussion.