From: Daniel Snyder Caution: not for the squeamish. A Single Locust Based on the short story "The Brains of Rats" by Michael Blumlein. -- "And the Lord said unto Moses, Stretch out thine hand over the land of Egypt for the locusts, that they may come up upon the land of Egypt and eat every herb of the land..." Exodus 10:12 -- I found out about smallpox while I was reading outside of class. We all read outside of class, since whatever school wasn't interrupted by Angels was slowly killing our interest in learning. So we all read books. Kensuke studied Roman war machines. Touji read about the Celts and Anglo-Saxons. I learned about the settling of the New World. I've learned that it wasn't the Conquistadors who killed so many people in the West, or the English, or the Portuguese. It wasn't a person it all. It was smallpox. A bacterium, now extinct from the face of the Earth. A globule of fat and protein, able only to eat and reproduce, eradicated cultures and slaughtered millions of its own hosts. The first form of bacteriological warfare was when Christian missionaries distributed blankets infected with smallpox to unsuspecting Indians. I imagine this not only coerced the natives into submiting to the Christian's will, but it must have made for fewer souls they needed to convert. Now, on what will most likely be my last day of life, I've come to think of humans in terms of disease. We've been introduced to a new realm we can thrive in, and shit in all we like, since nobody cares about God anymore. Of course, there's an immune system: the Angels. But our human ingenuity, rather than random mutations, has been able to overcome this immune system. On what will most likely be my last day of life, I cry for the dying body we must inhabit by infection. Perhaps I alone thus prove I am a greater being than the bacteria I have come from. Perhaps, even, this gives me an imperative to determine our future evolution. -- This job has given everyone a macabre sense of humor. Someone drew one of those four-panel cartoons about Father taking the Eva out on a date to a fancy restaurant. I laughed. Misato tore it down when she saw it. I suppose this is what comes of not seeing the results of your madness. What does an Evangelion eat, anyway? Only Angels? Or would animals of other kinds do? Sentient beings? Trees? Dirt? My plans after the Geofront collapses are rather vague. I'm presuming that I will survive. If I hadn't had the Devil's luck to live in the shadow of disaster during my tenure with NERV, I wouldn't make that assumption. I digress. I will dig myself out if I have power and climb up through the rubble to the outside world. South seems to be the most logical direction to go from there, so I will proceed south, armed only with an axe, destroying any signs of civilization I come across. I would have liked to have a two-handed sword, like the one Touji showed me in the book he was reading. If an Eva is 60 meters tall, I think a suitable size for a Zweihander would be 75 meters. When I think of it as a twelfth of a kilometer, it becomes much more impressive. When I imagine myself with the sword held over my head, approaching 150 meters in total length, I am awestruck by my own potential for mass-wasting. But I have no sword. So, I will borrow Asuka's axe and chop my way across Japan instead. Eventually, the blade will chip...and my Progressive Knife will lose its blades...then I will be content to take whatever club I can carry with me. I will bash and smash my way to the edge of the South Sea, if my Eva can stay powered, stay eating. -- I wish I could talk to one of the engineers; but, like a policeman, they're never around when you need one. In any case, I'm not quite sure how I'd phrase my question. It has something to do with the structural integrity of the Geofront, and something to do with its design. I suppose I will improvise. I wish I could be like Father, and arrive at this situation with the knowledge in hand. How does he do it, I wonder. My first shot should penetrate the ceiling of the Geofront. If it doesn't, I'm quite confident that I'll have the chance to take a second and third shot without outside interference. What happens after penetration occurs I don't know. I'm thinking that the apex of the Geofront will be supporting the most mass of any point, like a keystone. Remove the keystone and the entire thing will collapse. I have several models to reinforce my belief. Arches in ancient Rome. A baby bird, breaking through its shell. The Geofront, it seems to me, was designed to resist an attack from without; therefore, an attack from within should be simple enough to execute. He achieved it, after all. -- I am utterly, utterly alone. Asuka lies comatose, unresponsive even to the scent of sex against her face. Misato has found a purpose she has forbidden herself from telling me about, one that keeps her away from me when I most need someone. My friends have all run away from me and the terror I sow. Rei is with Father. Father is with Rei. Where the two of them may be, I can't say. I would like someone at this instant. Him. If he could hold me against his chest now, what would I say? Would I say, "I'm sorry"? Would I ask for his help? Would I offer my body and soul to him unconditionally--throw myself onto him, trusting only God and his too-human heart to make the right decisions for me? Yes. I think that that is what I would do. I would find courage in my utter submission, and faith in blinding myself. I could feel his blood contaminating my tissues when I finally returned home that evening, the evening I had killed him and proved the awfulness of my species. I took a long bath and explored my anus. At first, I was terrified of the delicate lips hidden away in my flesh. I grew to trust my fingers. Stroking around the wrinkled edges with the tip of my middle finger, I felt pleasure thrills racing along my spine: not merely of sensual joy, but also of excitement about the unknown. By nature, I'm not good with new things, I've learned not to be curious. I never would have penetrated myself if I hadn't been thinking of him. I dove in beyond the borderline and noticed that I was growing erect. Not very erect, mind you; only enough to make my penis swell. My hairless nipples were becoming sensitive, too. I lay on my left side with my right hand between my buttocks. My left hand roamed around my upper chest, tickling and scratching at my torso. Unconsciously, I massaged and beat the skin over my heart. I could feel how I would have him behind me. His right arm would be under mine, wrapped all the way across my body. His thighs would be pressed right up against my backside. And his manhood would be lying right in the cleft, ready to go up inside me when he wanted me. Shinji, he would whisper to me, I have nothing to give you. "But of course you do, Kaoru," I moaned against the tiling. Only you yourself can give those kinds of gifts, Shinji, he would reply. Only you can set your own soul free. "Become one with me, please...soul and body," I stammered, my tears of sorrow and of ecstasy. "I'll do anything you want, Kaoru." I felt his chin rest upon my shoulder as the tip of my penis slipped against the porcelain tub wall. My entire trunk shuddered. We would have reversed roles. He would teach me to see beyond good and evil and let me know how to make sense of human madness. I could have taught him about mortal life, why it is that we treasure the illusions of this world so much. I... We did teach each other. But not how I would have had it. Not in glory and sanctity. Not by whispers. We taught each other as butterfly wings were torn asunder and the world's glee buried my sorrow. I couldn't leave the bathroom for an hour, I was so exhausted. Even the mass of the water couldn't support me. Even its purity couldn't clean me. -- What if I were all alone, and I was a locust? What if I was a locust on the very edge of a wheat field, with no other locusts around me? Would I go and call all of my other brethren so we could descend onto the field in a buzzing cloud of black? Or would I gorge myself on the golden strands of wheat in front of me? What if I was a smallpox bacterium? Would I blindly descend through the atmosphere, seeking out a moist nostril to make my home? Or would I try and be choosy, investigating each and every nose before selecting one? Perhaps even soliciting opinions from whatever life forms were living there already? What is the difference between a bug and a bacterium, in their _modus operandi_? I can't know what I don't know even exists. Is there a God? How do I know? How do I disprove its existence? Science and faith...is there some common ground between the two that I can use to attack them both? I mustn't run away. I mustn't run away. I mustn't run away... If there is a single reality, then it stands to reason there must be one God, one right and wrong. But there is no single reality, because we each have our own views of it. But there is no plural reality, because those views are based on a single reality...aren't they? Stimulus leads to response, doesn't it? Kaoru, help me. You're the only one who would understand why I ask these questions now. And only you could tell me whether the answers are worth having...even if you didn't have the words, you could have showed me with your heart in all our nights and days together. Oh, Kaoru, help me now. -- I toweled myself off from the bath last night and slept naked in my bed. This morning I rose and did not dress. I walked through the streets of town, naked, to the Geofront. Nobody was around to care. Nudity, it would appear, is a victimless crime. Now I sit naked in my Evangelion. I have started all the systems I could, readied the weapons I will need, without the assistance of anyone else. Someone on the bridge, doubtless, is scared shitless as a result of my actions. But they have more pressing concerns--someone else has decided to peek inside the Geofront today. Not wishing to be raped any longer, I will fight--not against the symptoms, against the disease itself. I will fight the reality I live in, one symbol at a time. I take one step, and then another. The restraints around me shred into a snow of flak. Klaxons explode with angry roaring. I give this all no mind. I'm going to tear through the flimsy curtain and take a glimpse into what reality is truly like. Mother, I'm sorry. I'm sorry that you didn't live up to my expectations of what you could be. You have been nothing but a dream--you never did exist after all. Kaoru, catch me. I'm falling like an angel, and I do not know if there's anywhere I can land. -- Copyright 2000 Daniel Snyder. Permission granted to duplicate in any digital, binary, or e-mail format; however, any physical printout is strictly prohibited. Based on characters created by GAINAX. Shin Seiki Evangelion/Neon Genesis Evangelion is the intellectual property of and copyrighted by GAINAX, adapted by AD Vision and Viz Comics for North America. "The Brains of Rats" copyright 1986, 1989 Michael Blumlein. Any resemblance to persons living or deceased is purely coincidental.