History Fanfic / DoingItRightThisTime

** However, Shinji has gone for a different view that is far more bleak. In order to stop himself from running again, he's abandoned all hope for success in the new timeline, and doesn't see much point in keeping himself safe or fighting rationally. He likens this to "leaving early to avoid the rush".

* DeterminedDefeatist: Shinji thinks that he has no real chance to set his world right, but he is determined to try anyway.

* DisappearedDad: Gendo abandoned his son when Shinji was four because he honestly thought that Shinji would be better off without him. After returning to the past, father and son have a talk where Shinji tells his father that his "Don't screw Shinji up" strategy didn't work.

* DudeNotFunny: Asuka and Misato have this reaction to Shinji making a rather dark joke about {{seppuku}} in Chapter 3, though it's not so much the joke itself as the fact it's the [[DeathSeeker known suicide-risk]] making it that sets them off.

* EmotionlessGirl: Deconstructed. Gendo ordered Rei to take medication to "keep herself focused". Upon returning to the past, the three pilots find out that her "medication" is a potent cocktail of mood suppressors and tranquilizers which turns her into a completely creepy and unemotional person, barely able to have enough self-awareness to desire death. After stopping to take them, Rei starts exhibiting a normal emotion range but is still going through withdrawal symptoms.

* HeroesWantRedheads: Shinji ''and'' Rei are infatuated with Asuka.

* ShellShockedVeteran: Before being sent back to the past Shinji and Asuka were heavily traumatized and barely sane after the Angel War and Third Impact. After a last violent fight they decided to kill themselves because even death seemed a better option than remaining in a dead world. Then the two of them and Rei got flung back to the past and they started dealing with their issues in... unique ways.

* SignatureHeadgear: Asuka always wore her iconic red clips. In episode 3, she replaced them with an ordinary hair-tie.

* StupidSexyFlanders: In chapter 2 Asuka has this reaction when she sees Rei trying a new dress. When she realizes she is staring she says herself "Stupid hormones". That scene led Asuka to realize she was not as straight as she thought and she liked both Shinji and Rei.

** When Shinji finds out that Asuka remembers everything, including his actions when she was comatose Shinji thinks he has already screwed it up and decides to put himself off his misery. Horrified, Asuka talks him out of it.

* ThatDidntHappen: After Gendo and Naoko broke off, she insisted that they behaved as if their relationship never happened.

* ThreePointLanding: When Shinji and Asuka met Rei, she was perched on her HumongousMecha's shoulder. In order to talk with them, she leapt from the giant robot and landed on the catwalk in this position.

-->'''Asuka''': It's a do-over, [...] It's a motherfucking do-over! [...] I'm gonna do it right this time,
* TimeTravelTenseTrouble: [[http://forums.sufficientvelocity.com/threads/working-title-doing-it-right-this-time-evangelion-extremely-rough-draft.14636/ In the initial draft]] Asuka ran into this trouble while talking to Shinji about the events of the original timeline:

** Before leaving his old home Shinji takes Judo classes.

** Before the timeline restarted Asuka was so infuriated, hopeless and fed up with everything she just wanted to die. When she woke up in her room back in Germany, three months before the beginning of the War, and realized she had another chance, she was absolutely giddy.
** Not having her emotions dampened, gaining a decent big sister figure, and developing a solid, sturdy relationship with her teammates (which later became love) improved Rei's erstwhile somber mood ''a lot''.
** Shinji... Well, he still has some way to go.
* TookALevelInIdealism: After returning to the past, Shinji, Asuka and Rei are more sarcastic but also more idealistic: Shinji does not believe he can change things for better but he wants to try to anyway, Asuka try to be more carefree and a better friend since her former method to cope with her trauma did not work at all and Rei stops wishing for death and begins to learn how living.

--->'''Shinji''': Well, he can ''keep'' his fucking approval,
** Shinji really thought a SoProudOfYou moment was the only thing he was getting out of piloting Eva:

* WeUsedToBeFriends: Subverted. Misato stopped being Ritsuko's friend when she found out about the secrets of NERV. When she returned to the past, her original self and Ritsuko had already argued about Ritsuko's actions and made up. So, techinically, they never broke their friendship off.
* WhatDoesSheSeeInHim: After considering his mother got absorbed into Unit 01 on purpose to become an eternal reminder of humankind's existence and she actually ''wanted'' him to watch how she seeming died, Shinji wonders what his father saw in her. Asuka can not figure it out either.

* WhatIf: What if the three Children and several more characters went back in time? And the Children were so sick of love triangles and belligerent sexual tension that they agreed to have a three-ways relationship?

* HumansThroughAlienEyes: [[spoiler:Kaworu]] admires human culture but he does not understand many aspects of human thought. When he undergoes a sex change as part of a plan to break the Dead Sea Scrolls prophecies he does not get why the other time-travellers are so puzzled about him having boobs.

* ICannotSelfTerminate: Kaworu was unable to kill himself and asked Shinji to do it. Understandably, Shinji is pretty irked about it.

* IDidntMeanToTurnYouOn: When Rei tried a new dress and innocently asked Asuka if she looked good, Asuka felt very flustered and very hot all of sudden (that was her first hint that she liked both Shinji and Rei).

** Shinji and Asuka missed their late mothers in the original timeline. Now they know what has happened to them, they are looking forward to meet them again (although Shinji has no idea what telling to Yui after her actions).
** Averted with [[spoiler:Rei who never knew her mother and did not care about it. And now she knows who she is, she does not like her.]]

* InterruptedSuicide: Shinji tried to kill himself -- again -- when he met Asuka again, but she stopped him. His nonchalance and the way how planned out the whole thing in seconds to make it look like a firearm mishandling accident scared Asuka a lot.
* ItsAllMyFault: As Asuka notes, Shinji blames himself for all what happened in canon, including messes were not his doing or he had no control about.

* JustFriends: Asuka insists that Rei is her friend and just a friend. She definitely has not a crush on Rei, not matter how cute she is.

* KnightInSourArmor: Shinji, Asuka and Rei are more determined than ever to save the world. They are also more sarcastic than ever due to be fully aware of having been puppets used to fight massive alien monsters and bring about the end of the world.
* LapPillow: In the initial draft, Shinji, Asuka and Rei combined this with SleepCute. After their first date, Asuka leaned on Shinji as Rei rested her head on both their laps, and they fell asleep.
* LatexSpaceSuit: The pilots wear skintight outfits called plugsuits while pilot to synch with their giant robots. Nonetheless, Shinji really, really does not like them:

* LimitedWardrobe: Lampshaded, justified and then averted. Rei didn't ''own'' any other clothes but her school uniforms thanks to Gendo, whereas Shinji just decided to pick "a look that works" and stick to it. Asuka (who besides the same school uniform as Rei also has [[IconicOutfit her yellow sundress]]) cajoles them both into expanding their wardrobes some. She does so good (especially with Rei) that she runs into a crisis of sexual identity.

* LoopholeAbuse: Defied. Misato notes that while there technically isn't a rule concerning an outfit addition of Maya's of [[spoiler:a BDSM/pet-play collar]], she still shoots it down while among the other staff on account of how much controversy it would cause.

** Chapter 2 gave an example that amusingly combined this with FemaleGaze: the three pilots go to buy new clothes, Rei tries a new dress... and Shinji and Asuka can not take their eyes off her, noticing how the dress clung to her body and showed her curves. The addition of a new pair of heels only made it worse for them, as the heels were doing wonders to Rei's legs.
* MakingLoveInAllTheWrongPlaces: Rei's shutting down Chihiro's AlphaBitch routine was made possible by this.
* ManipulativeBastard: Gendo used their employees' emotions to manipulate them. Asuka has realized he set her up to hate Rei because it made her easier to control and she is done playing by his rules, so she has befriended Rei. Rei also theorizes that he manipulated Ritsuko's jealousy of Rei so that Ritsuko would be more driven to fulfill his agenda.

* MarshmallowHell: [[spoiler:After remembering everything,]] Misato gave Shinji and Asuka one. Rei pointed out dryly that she was suffocating Shinji.

-->'''Toji''': Aw, hell, what part of this ''isn't'' weird

-->'''Toji''': Yes

* MeaningfulRename: After returning to the past Rei decides she is no longer Rei Ayanami, Yui Ikari's clone had no dreams or hopes and wished for nothing else than the peace of oblivion. She is now Rei Akagi, Ritsuko's little sister what wants to find out what she wants to do when she grows up. Gendo doesn't believe she'd done so.

* TheMole: As soon as Asuka woke up in the past she passed information on Kaji secretly to warn him that the organization she was working for was plotting the end of the world.

** Naoko abused and murdered Rei, despite of knowing that she was her daughter... but now she and Rei have actually bonded because both hate Gendo.

* NiceGuy: Shinji wants to be one. Asuka thinks he is one.

* NoOSHACompliance: Kaworu's desperately improvised time machine required several very important safety features of an already-damaged S2 Engine to be disabled. StuffBlowingUp ensues.
* NoSocialSkills: After returning to the past the three pilots talk about how they are so socially inept that they run away from other people (Shinji), push them away (Asuka) or don't know how interacting with other persons (Rei). However they agree to try to get better at socializing.
* NoAccountingForTaste: [[PeggySue In the previous timeline]] Shinji had wondered why his nice, loving mother would fall for his jerkass father. But after considering his mother got absorbed into Unit 01 on purpose to become an eternal reminder of humankind's existence and she actually ''wanted'' him to watch how she seemingly died, Shinji wonders why his father would marry her and decides there is no accounting for taste.

'''Asuka''': Guess not,
* NotBloodSiblings: A source of some discomfort to Shinji. First he had what he thought was a near-miss with SurpriseIncest before the whole PeggySue thing happened, but now it turns out Rei wasn't a clone of who everyone thought she was and they're definitely not even siblings by adoption ([[YoureNotMyFather Rei's pretty emphatic about that]]) and he has no idea if that makes the time he [[AccidentalPervert accidentally saw her naked]] better or worse. Especially because [[LoveTriangle he has a bit of a thing for Asuka as well.]]

* ObliviousToHints: After Instrumentality Asuka has realized Shinji did not react to her hints because he was oblivious and clueless, not because he was not interested.
* OCStandIn: Mari, although since her ''Rebuild'' characterisation was at best limited there wasn't really much of a choice. Also David Croft, who was only ''supposed'' to be a one-off character mostly for a gag about his name but developed further more or less by accident.

* OrphansOrdeal: Shinji, Asuka and Rei led crappy lives after their mothers' deaths: Shinji thought he had no reason to go on living, Asuka fabricated a loud, attention-seeking personality to validate her existence and Rei was a DeathSeeker. After dying during the end of the world and [[PeggySue being given a second chance]] they decided to support each other to try to cope with the inminent trauma train.

** Shortly before Sachiel shows up, Asuka volunteers to fly out to Tokyo -separating her from her beloved Evangelion for an indefinite period, in order to help train the other two pilots. And that's nothing compared to what happened with Rei... Misato catches on pretty quickly that something's up.

--->'''Asuka''': Well, that was a touching family reunion,\\

'''Rei''': Few details. Only that everything he had worked towards and everything he had put myself and his only son through had been for nothing, and that he would die alone and unmourned, rejected by the only person he had ever truly loved. [...] It was... cathartic,

* DeathSeeker: Rei was one in her former life, seeking oblivion to escape from her pain. Now she is done with it and intends to live and try new things.

* DevotedToYou: Subverted. Shinji is completely devoted to… both, Asuka and Rei. In turn, they're devoted to him and each other.

* DidYouJustHaveSex: In Chapter 3, Ritsuko is looking ridiculously cheeful and sporting a huge hickey. Misato tries to work up the nerve to ask the obvious question... [[spoiler:And then Maya walks into the break-room sporting a ''collar'', which answers questions Misato didn't want to ask.]]

* DrinkBasedCharacterization: A subtle one happens in chapter 6, which opens with the first three pilots visiting Mari at her new place, where she serves them tea. Readers who are familiar with British tea culture will notice that uses teabags and plain china mugs rather than cup-and-saucer sets and loose-leaf and brews it fairly strong, signs of being a down-to-earth, unpretentious girl from a fairly modest background.

* DrowningMySorrows: In the first story draft Rei decided to get hammered when she thought she had missed her second chance and Asuka had beaten her to the punch again because she was under house arrest (long story) for long enough for Asuka getting there and get her claws into Shinji before she did.

** In chapter 2 the three pilots go to buy new clothes, Rei tries a new dress... and Shinji and Asuka can not take their eyes off her, noticing how the dress clung to her body and showed her curves (along with how a new pair of heels was highlighting her legs). Asuka can not take her eyes off Shinji, noticing how yummy he looks when he wears nicer clothes:

* EmotionlessGirl: Deconstructed. Gendo ordered Rei to take medication to "keep herself focused". Upon returning to the past the three pilots found out that her "medication" was a cocktail of mood suppressors and tranquilizers which turned her into a completely creepy and unemotional person. After stopping to take them, Rei starts exhibiting a normal emotion range.

* EthicalSlut: Asuka actually wants to become this when she returns to the past. Shortly after meeting her teammates again she purchases "The Ethical Slut", familiarizing with the book's jargon and taking notes, and later she proposes Shinji and Rei having a three-ways relationship in lieu of repeating the LoveTriangle and having all their hears broken again.

* ExpositoryHairstyleChange: Asuka removes her hair-clips and ties back her hair into a ponytail when she decides that she's done with devoting her life exclusively to piloting Evangelions.

* FemaleGaze: When Shinji tries new clothes Asuka spends a while thinking of how yummy he looks.

'''Shinji''': What,

* GenderBender: When Kaworu decided to send himself and the other Children back in time to prevent the end of the world, he thought he might avert to play his role in the Dead Sea Scrolls prophecies if he changed sexes. So he turned female.
* GenreSavvy: The people hiding together with Shinji in the shelter know how the "HumongousMecha versus {{Robeast}}/{{Kaiju}}" thing uses to work:

* GratuitousGerman: Asuka thinks or exclaims "Mein Gott" ("My God") every so often:

* GreenEyedEpiphany: Subverted. When Asuka begins to suspect that Rei's feelings towards Shinji are not sisterly at all she gets jealous... and then stops herself, remembering that was when everything started to go wrong in the original timeline (she loving Shinji but being unable to spit it out and being jealous of Rei because she thought that Shinji liked her was a major factor in her break-down).

** After having been his dutiful servant in the original timeline Rei slapped Gendo and called him out on everything.

* AMechByAnyOtherName: The Evangelions, as well known as "the secret anti-kaiju weapon that will work."
* AbusiveParents: Besides the usual culprits (Gendo abandoned Shinji and ordered Rei to live in a dump and kept her heavily sedated, while Asuka's father threw her aside after getting married to his lover), Naoko Akagi is worse than she was in canon due to the changes done to Rei's background, as [[spoiler:she used her own DNA as the "mother" source for Rei's creation as a high-tech BabyTrap, and when that failed ,she subjected her to non-stop emotional abuse and ultimately strangled her to death.]]
* AcePilot: Asuka travels to Tokyo-3 early to help with Shinji and Rei's training. When Shinji asks if she is right with them getting kills while she remains benched, Asuka replies she is rationalizing that it will be thanks to her training. Shinji replies it is not a rationalization because she was the best pilot and he was just lucky.

* AgeAppropriateAngst: Shinji has the occasional moment when he comes off as a bit of an EmoTeen... But of course, in addition to the fact he has [[TraumaCongaLine plenty of past experiences he has every right to angst about]], he ''is'' fourteen. He's allowed to be a bit melodramatic.

* AllForNothing: When Rei meets Gendo for the first time after travelling to the past, she slaps him and informs him all of how his planning was for nothing because he would fail. Gendo was pretty... shaken afterwards. And what does he think is worse than what Rei told him? Proof she wasn't exaggerating.

* AnswerCut: When Shinji idly wonders what Kaworu and Mari's guardian are getting up to together. [[spoiler: They're in Siberia, where they've teamed up with Kaji and are currently fleeing from the police in a stolen big rig. ItMakesSenseInContext.]]

* ArbitrarySkepticism: Averted. TimeTravel? Shinji finds it perfectly believable. After all that has happened to him, why not?

* ArchnemesisDad: Subverted. After returning to the past, Shinji thought he would have to find some way to stop his father's plans. When he and Asuka arrive at Tokyo-3, though, it turns out that Rei had confronted Gendo earlier and revealed that they were time-travelers and his plans would fail, no matter what. Ergo, Gendo lost his motivation to oppose to them.

** Shinji tried to hit his father with one of these when he met him (unfortunately, it doesn't have the effect he was hoping for, since [[spoiler:Rei stole his thunder a bit.]]):

* AwLookTheyReallyDoLoveEachOther: When Shinji and Asuka visit Rei's apartment for first time after their return and she tells them what her life was like, the three children hug each other reassuringly.
* AxesAtSchool: Asuka obtained three handguns for Shinji, Rei and herself. They carried them everywhere, including school, hidden in their outfits or handbags. Their guardian Misato did like not it, but Asuka argued that they needed extra protection, and if they could be trusted with a giant robot then they could be trusted with a gun.
* TheBabyTrap: In this story, Naoko was supposed to use Yui's eggs to create Rei. Instead, she used her own eggs. Ritsuko thinks her mother was trying to baby-trap Gendo, but Gendo doubts Naoko swapped her genetic material with Yui's because she was trying to make him committed to her.

* BeneathTheMask: Asuka was a lonely, frightened, vulnerable girl that fabricated a mask of harshness and arrogance to push everyone away so that no one could hurt her. After the events of the original timeline, she has realized it was very counterproductive, so she has dropped it. She is still bold and daring but she no longer tries to look mean.

* TheBerserker: Shinji's fighting "style" can be summed up in raw, thoughtless violence with no regard for his own safety.
* BetaCouple: Hikari and Touji. Shinji, Asuka and Rei run into them for first time when they were about to go out. It turns out that [[spoiler:they had got together after Touji got maimed during the war and had been dating for a while before the world ended and they were sent back to the past, too. Kensuke came back in time with them, as he himself reveals to Asuka.]]
* BewareTheQuietOnes: Rei was calm, reserved and little communicative. Then she got sent to the past, and she was feeling suitably angry. She slapped Gendo to pay him back for mistreating Shinji and several months later tore an EldritchAbomination apart to vent her anger.

* BoredWithInsanity: Asuka had gone through huge emotional and psychological trauma during the original timeline (her mother's madness and death; her father's adultery and abandonment; people using her like a doll; her surrogate family and friends hurting her, betraying her or leaving her; constant beatings, humiliations and a MindRape at the "hands" of alien monsters; the boy she liked treating her as masturbation fodder after spending months clueless to her hints; getting chopped into pieces and eaten alive...) and it had rendered her mad and unstable. Even though she survived the end of the world, she was so broken she decided to kill herself. Then she got sent to the past. She was so thrilled with having a second chance she decided to forget about her mental issues and start from scratch. [[https://forums.sufficientvelocity.com/posts/4047455/ In an outdated version of a scene of the second chapter]] She blatantly says she got bored of being crazy.

* BoundAndGagged: In the first draft, Rei covered Kaji's helping her get out by leaving him tied up in a closet to make it look like she'd broken out.

* BreakTheCutie: Meek, soft-spoken Shinji had been so thoroughly broken by the Angel War that after surviving the world ending he [[spoiler:decided to kill himself.]] He got sent to the past instead, and although he is trying to change things for better he is very fatalistic about his chances.

* CanNotSpitItOut: In the original timeline Shinji thought Asuka did not like him back, Asuka thought Shinji did not like her back and he loved Rei instead, and Rei was unable to recognize her own emotions. In the altered timeline neither of them confessed for a while since Asuka was confused because she also started liking Rei, Rei was unsure about her feelings towards Shinji and Asuka, and Shinji thought he would have to choose between both.

* CombatPragmatist: In chapter 2 Misato reminds Shinji that the Angels DON'T play by tournament rules and she wants that her pilots are willing to fight dirty. A GroinAttack from Asuka is what led to this reminder.
* ConvenientlyAnOrphan: In the original timeline Shinji and Asuka spent a long time mourning their deceased mothers as they fought space aliens. Ironically they -- and Rei -- now know that their mothers were always with them.

* HurtingHero: When Shinji was four he saw her mother's body dissolving. His father abandoned him shortly after. When Asuka was four, her mother went crazy, stopped acknowledging her and killed herself. Her father -- who cheated on his wife without caring about Asuka hearing him and his lover -- remarried and abandoned her shortly after. Rei was ordered living in a dump and taking a cocktail of feeling-numbing drugs. The three of them were forced to fight giant {{Eldritch Abomination}}s despite of being kids. And then the world ended and they died. And now they have been reborn in the past and have to go through it once more.

* TheHero: Shinji intends to save the world this time.

* HasTwoMommies: Discussed. Asuka, Rei and Shinji have a three-ways relationship. Both girls agree if or when any of them has a child with Shinji, they will raise him or her together.

* RelationshipUpgrade: Ritsuko and Maya have been building up to one behind the scenes since Ritsuko left Gendo, but in Chapter 3 they go public with it. ''Very'' public.

* TheyDo: Shinji, Asuka and Rei eventually get together.

* TriangRelations: Shinji, Asuka and Rei have a Type 8 three-ways relationship. Each member of the triangle loves the remainder two. It is a kind of spiritual FixFic in response to their Type 6 LoveTriangle in ''Fanfic/AdviceAndTrust''.

* AmbiguousDisorder: Asuka on Kensuke, after he makes a rather tactless remark:
--> ''Not sure if on the autistic spectrum, or just being a jerk.''
** Not that these possibilities are in any way mutually exclusive, of course...

* ArmorPiercingSlap: Delivered by Rei to Gendo. It was strong enough to send Gendo sprawling and knock his glasses off his face.

* ShesGotLegs: In chapter 2 Asuka notices Rei has very nice legs.
-->''A pair of strappy sandals with four-inch heels completed the ensemble, doing wonderful things to the shape of her calves and...''

* NiceShoes: While shopping, Rei tries on a pair of strappy sandals with four-inch heels that do ''wonders'' to her legs.

* AdaptionalSexuality: Risuko Akagi was purely straight in the original series, and only dated Gendo. Here, she largely dumps Gendo once she figures out he's been manipulating her and slept with her mother, and later ends up in a relationship with Maya, whose more than like not-platonic feelings in the original series were never reciprocated.

** Similarly, when they accidentally meet Touji and he gets shocked at seeing Asuka, they realize they are not the only time-travellers. Touji was part of a different group alongside Hikari and Kensuke.

* BoredWithInsanity: Asuka had gone through huge emotional and psychological trauma during the original timeline (her mother's madness and death; her father's adultery and abandonment; people using her like a doll; her surrogate family and friends hurting her, betraying her or leaving her; constant beatings, humiliations and even a MindRape at the "hands" of alien monsters; the boy she liked treating her as masturbation fodder after spending months clueless to her hints; getting chopped into pieces and eaten alive...) and it had rendered her mad and unstable. Even though she survived the end of the world, she was so broken she decided to kill herself. Then she got sent to the past. She was so thrilled with having a second chance she decided to forget about her mental issues and start from scratch. [[https://forums.sufficientvelocity.com/posts/4047455/ In an outdated version of a scene of the second chapter]] She blatantly says she got bored of being crazy.

-->'''Asuka''': Yes, I remember everything. So do Rei and Shinji, who's probably hiding because he blames himself for what happened to you; in fact, come to think of it he blames himself for pretty much all of it.

* TriangRelations: Shinji, Asuka and Rei have a Type 8 three-ways relationship. Each member of the triangle loves the remainder two. It is basically a kind of spiritual FixFic in response to their Type 6 LoveTriangle in ''Fanfic/AdviceAndTrust''.

* IllGirl: [[InSpiteOfANail As in the original timeline, despite everything else that changed,]] Sakura still got hurt during the battle against Sachiel. ''[[SubvertedTrope However]],'' she's only got a broken wrist and will be running around like nothing ever happened in a month's time, rather than possibly ending up in a wheelchair for life like canon. Plus she got to see Rei suplex an Angel, which in her own words was "''totally'' WorthIt!"

* AllForNothing: When Rei meets Gendo for the first time after travelling to the past, she slaps him and informs him all of how his planning was for nothing because he would fail. Gendo was pretty... shaken afterwards.

* BetaCouple: Hikari and Touji. Shinji, Asuka and Rei run into them for first time when they were about to go out. It turns out that [[spoiler:they had got together after Touji got maimed during the war and had been dating for a while before the world ended and they were sent back to the past, too.]]

** Rei, too. After returning to the past she has decided that resorting to extreme violence to deal with the enemy is a perfectly acceptable therapy. When she sorties for first time she decides against using weapons because bludgeoning the giant alien with her Eva's bare fists would feel more satisfactory.

* CombatPragmatist: In chapter 2 Misato reminds Shinji that the Angels DON'T play by tournament rules and she wants that her pilots are willing to fight dirty.

* DrivenToSuicide: After returning from Instrumentality but before being sent back to the past, Asuka and Shinji had a nasty fight and a long talk. During that talk they decided anything was better than staying in that post-apocalyptic, ruined, desolate world, and made a mutual suicide pact. Then they walked into the sea together, hoping returning to Instrumentality or drowning.

** In chapter 2 the three pilots go to buy new clothes, Rei tries a new dress... and Shinji and Asuka can not take their eyes off her, noticing how the dress clung to her body and showed her curves. Asuka can not take her eyes off Shinji, noticing how yummy he looks when he wears nicer clothes:

* GoodMorningCrono: All time-travelers started out their new lives waking up in their beds.

* ImportantHairAccessory: Asuka makes the important decision to ''stop'' wearing her neural connectors as barrettes, to symbolise the fact that being an Evangelion pilot isn't ''all'' of who she is anymore. And then a few scenes later she discovers a practical advantage; a long ponytail makes it possible to do a proper HairFlip for emphasis when making a dramatic gesture. Lampshaded by Kensuke, with his usual tact and diplomacy:

** The three Children want to destroy SEELE because the organization ruined their lives.

* LimitedWardrobe: Lampshaded, justified and then averted. Rei didn't ''own'' any other clothes but her school uniforms thanks to Gendo, whereas Shinji just decided to pick "a look that works" and stick to it. Asuka cajoles them both into expanding their wardrobes some.

** Chapter 2 gave an example that amusingly combined this with FemaleGaze: the three pilots go to buy new clothes, Rei tries a new dress... and Shinji and Asuka can not take their eyes off her, noticing how the dress clung to her body and showed her curves.

* MeaningfulRename: After returning to the past Rei decides she is no longer Rei Ayanami, Yui Ikari's clone had no dreams or hopes and wished for nothing else than the peace of oblivion. She is now Rei Akagi, Ritsuko's little sister what wants to find out what she wants to do when she grows up.

* TheMole: As soon as Asuka woke up in the past she passed information on Kaji secretely to warn him that the organization she was working for was plotting the end of the world.

** Similarly, when they accidentally meet Touji and he gets shocked at seeing Asuka, they realize they are not the only time-travellers.

* PercussiveTherapy: Ritsuko suggested to Rei that she should take her feelings towards Commander Ikari out on the Angel. Even Misato, who has [[ItsPersonal ample reason to hate Angels]], was a bit creeped out by the results.

** Gendo figures the Children are up to something... so they confront him from the start and tell him his scenario to reunite with Yui will fail.

* RetailTherapy: Asuka takes Rei out clothes shopping, after finding out just how her fellow Pilot had been living thanks to Commander Ikari. A JustifiedTrope in this case as she didn't ''have'' any clothes except her school uniform beforehand.

* SingleWomanSeeksGoodMan: After the shopping trip thinks that she liked Shinji because he was a good person:

** [[InSpiteOfANail Despite the fight against the Angel Sachiel playing out rather differently]], Sakura Suzuhara still ended up getting hurt, albeit nowhere near as badly. But she got to see a HumongousMecha pull a SuplexFinisher on a {{Kaiju}}; in her own words, "''Totally'' worth it!"

* [[MetaGuy Meta Girl]]: Asuka, when she realises what's happened, doesn't so much lean on the fourth wall as trip over and bang her head on it. With a side order of ConversationalTroping on top!

* NotBloodSiblings: A source of some discomfort to Shinji. First he had what he thought was a near-miss with SurpriseIncest before the whole PeggySue thing happened, but now it turns out Rei wasn't a clone of who everyone thought she was and they're definitely not even siblings by adoption ([[YouAreNotMyFather Rei's pretty emphatic about that]]) and he has no idea if that makes the time he [[AccidentalPervert accidentally saw her naked]] better or worse. Especially because [[LoveTriangle he has a bit of a thing for Asuka as well.]]

* CurbStompBattle: Rei against Sachiel. She kicked its groin, shattered one of its kneecaps, slammed its face against a building, suplexed it and finally disembowelled it.

* ASpotOfTea: Chapter 6 opens with the first three pilots visiting Mari at her new place, so this trope inevitably comes up. Doubles as a low-key EstablishingCharacterMoment for Mari if you know your British tea culture: She uses teabags and plain china mugs rather than cup-and-saucer sets and loose-leaf and brews it fairly strong, signs of being a down-to-earth, unpretentious girl from a fairly modest background.

* OrphansOrdeal: Shinji, Asuka and Rei led crappy lives after their mothers' deaths: Shinji thought he had no reason to go on living, Asuka fabricated a loud, attention-seeking personality to validate her existence and Rei was a DeathSeeker. After dying during the end of the world and [[PeggySue being given a second chance]] they decided to support each other to try to cope with the inminent trauna train.

* SchoolgirlLesbians: Chihiro and Megumi, who try not to let on that they have gone far, far beyond [[RomanticTwoGirlFriendship "Class S"]]. Although their SecretRelationship is [[TransparentCloset a lot]] [[TheNotSecret less secret]] than they realise.

* NotSoDifferent: During the extended flashback in Chapter 3, Kaworu alludes to passing over his own personal Despair Event Horizon and going out to set off Third Impact and wipe out all life on Earth. The circumstances were somewhat different, but the parallel is noticeable enough that Shinji feels a bit of sympathy for Kaworu despite the bad blood between them.