Naota snuck into the room early, at the very start of his shift, just after 4am. He was careful to be perfectly quiet, not wanting to disturb Rien and Kippei, pretty sure freaky Rien would wake up at some point, but hoping he was doing a good job of blending in to the sounds of [...]

Shinji wasn’t just having a bad day. Naota came to this realisation the moment he walked into the room and Shinji glared at him. There was something different about it; it wasn’t an I’m not happy to see you glare, it was an I’m going to kill you glare. There was definitely a difference. He [...]

Shinji woke early the next day, sitting up in bed and eyeing Kippei and Rien in the other bed, curled up together, with a sense of longing he didn’t let himself feel completely. He sat for a while, just staring at them, wondering why they were really here, if they really cared, and how long [...]

Kippei did not have his mind on training that day, hard as he tried. But Shinji and Rien were both waiting for him, somewhere that was likely to become home for the next few months, and god, he wanted to be there. He did his best, but mostly he was just relieved when he could [...]

Shinji was in no shape for therapy the next morning. The infection had worsened, roaring through his system from the exposure of the opened tubes, burning him up with fever most of the night. But it had finally broken in the early hours and he was sleeping soundly, vitals normal. Naota spent an hour discussing [...]

Kippei did want to be there, and was hugely frustrated that he had to be away as often as he did. He still came in the early mornings, after Shinji’s therapy, and in the evenings after he finished training, but he couldn’t be there all day anymore, and he hated that. It kept him awake [...]

Ibu took a few hours off work. Well, he actually took a half days leave, but he was going to use every excuse he had available. He went to the daycare center downstairs and picked up Kaeda, gave him his bottle, and then drove out to the hospital. Kaeda gurgled happily, pointed and said ‘sleep [...]

Rien stayed with Shinji all day, and although Shinji slept for a lot of it, he had plenty to keep himself busy. Plenty to think about, for one thing. Shinji had kissed him, holy fuck. Kissed him like whoa, and yeah… his mind still kind of spaced out and he got a faintly goofy smile [...]