Neji
Neji ( Japanese. 螺 子 , dt. "Screw") is a manga that was drawn by the Japanese artist Kaori Yuki (including Angel Sanctuary and God Child ). It consists of several stories, the first two of which appeared in Japan in 1992/3 . Then the Mangaka interrupted their work to devote themselves to other works and did not draw the third part until much later in 2001, which can also be seen in the changed drawing style. These three stories were also published in paperback by Hakusensha Verlag in 2001 . The single volume was published in Germany in August 2003 by Carlsen Comics .
history
The storyline of Neji takes place in the world of 2033. Medicine, technology and other branches of research are very advanced in this world. While it is normal for robots to be wives, mothers, or servants and humans to live with technical limbs, psychological powers are not yet widely explored. This is what the GERA organization is concerned with, which abuses people with unscrupulous methods as test objects. Screw and Cross fall into the clutches of this organization and their neighbors are not spared either. First the two fight each other with the help of their psi powers, as GERA has both in hand. However, they manage to get rid of it with great losses.
Like all of Kaori Yuki's works, Neji tells a story with depth. The thematic focus is on topics such as identifying or being human by robots and the problem of human experiments.
Act 1
In 2033, a boy with snow-white hair and the number 205 tattooed on his arm suddenly wakes up. He is in the institute of the GERA organization. His supervisor Luther explains to him that ten years ago he was convicted as a felon , killed and then assigned to the organization as a test subject as a rebirther . GERA is an institution that researches ESP and he is here now, as ESP occurs frequently with rebirthers and he has psychic powers.
The boy can't believe it, but doesn't remember anything but a dream. Since he doesn't want to be addressed as number 205, he calls himself Screw ( Eng . Screw , Japanese. Neji ). The boy called this name in his dream, who also had the number 66 tattooed on his arm.
On a tour of the building, Screw sees a woman among the test objects who must have been a very important person to him. Luther then proposes a deal to him: if he works, the girl Snowwhite will not be dissected, but treated, and he himself will be released. He assumes. Snowwhite suddenly reacts to a secret kiss, causing Screw's old memories to come up.
Screw and Snowwhite were lovers who were fatally wounded when Snowwhite was kidnapped. Snowwhite's father had put both of them into a cold sleep in the hope that the medicine of the future could save them. Srew then wants to look at his data on a computer, but discovers the file of Sharif Highman, the boy with the number 66, who was killed by GERA. Screw decides to leave the organization immediately with Snowwhite, but it has long been dissected. This shock releases his psi power, which he uses to kill the employees. Only Luther survives and gives the surprised Screw a new, valid ID.
Act 2
A boy is sitting on the plane. Suddenly his eye starts to bleed, shortly afterwards it explodes. He wakes up at the GERA Institute. Apparently he had capsules of a drug in his stomach that, when they opened, tore his eye apart, but also awakened his psi abilities. Cross is able to send out an astral body and eavesdrop on others or penetrate their minds. In addition, General Sonja, who reports to Luther, has found out that his data are extremely similar to those of Screws. To keep him for the organization, a bomb was installed in his eye that can explode at the push of a button. He is also promised that his little sister, whom he had abandoned and was allegedly found by the organization, will be operated on.
Meanwhile, Screw works as a waiter for Girl. When one day a drug-ill friend of the bar owner is being transported away by GERA, Screw, Girl and a group of resistance fighters decide to save them. At the same time Cross gets the order to listen to the group with the help of his astral body, but Screw notices this attempt and displaces Cross.
Screw decides to break into the organization to find out more about GERA. Girl can't be dissuaded from accompanying him because she wants to look for her friend. Again there is an argument with Cross. Luther advises the latter to look for information about Screw in a room. There he sees computers projecting his little sister's images. He realizes that GERA had never found his sister. He wants to confront Commander Sonja and just comes in when she shoots the girl. She calls her by her real name, Heather Garland, and Cross recognizes her as his lost sister. In fact, Cross also spent a few years asleep on the plane, so he did not know that his sister is now older than he remembered her. The captain also explains that Screw's brother was Cross's grandfather. This relationship explains the similarity in their data. Cross is beside himself and Soja demands the remote control for the bomb in Cross eye from Luther to be on the safe side. But Cross is no longer deterred by this and attacks Sonja. When she operates the button, however, the main computer, not Cross Auge, explodes. Luther had given her the wrong remote control. Screw and Cross escape, bury Girl and decide to stay together for a while.
Act 3
Screw has found a job in a bar and is back to work as a waiter. He's just allowed to serve his great-nephew, who cheerfully orders food at Screw's expense. Suddenly a girl comes through the roof, where she puts half the bar in rubble and ashes. The girl, actually a robot, flees from pursuers. That evening a Norma Jean-type doll murdered the owner of the manufacturing company, whereupon all the other dolls of this type went crazy. There were many deaths in the process, so the company has to eliminate all the dolls as quickly as possible. The young son of the company boss carries out this action and wants to lead away the doll that has landed in the bar when Screw and Cross hear the doll's silent screams: It begs for its life. So the two attack Mr. Ziggy and flee with Norma Jean.
Shortly afterwards she confesses that she actually killed the company owner. But she doesn't know why or how she came into possession of the weapon. Since all the other Norma Jeans are networked with her, they went insane for breaking the 1st Asimov Law, which says that no doll is allowed to kill a human being. However, since the doll had just been created, it was not yet baptized into these laws. While Jean puzzles over her existence as a doll, Mr. Ziggy finds out the whereabouts of her two rescuers, lets them attack and take Norma Jane with them. When Mr. Ziggy wants to get rid of them like all the other Norma Jeans, Screw reaches the tower where the young company boss is staying.
Apparently Mr. Ziggy had programmed the doll himself so that it had to kill his father. When Screw storms into the room, Mr. Ziggy falls into the pit with the dolls of the killed Norma Janes and you can see that Ziggy is a machine itself. He's actually a copy of the company's actual son. Since his son was repugnant to him, he killed him and created the doll from his data. But with the data, the son's hatred of the doll also spread and she did everything possible to kill the father. Ultimately, Screw has to shoot him as Ziggy points the gun at him. Norma Jean is sad that the doll's only purpose in life was to be someone else's copy. She believes that there must be life and a soul in dolls like her. Screw and Cross agree.
people
- Screw - was fatally wounded in 1992 when he tried to save his lover, Snow white, from kidnappers. Her father put him into a cold sleep with her out of gratitude, in the hope that modern technology of the future could help them. In 2033 he wakes up as a rebirther and finds himself in the GERA organization, endowed with psi powers thanks to the cold sleep. It's number 205.
- Snow white - is Screw's lover, he no longer knows her real name. She is alive, but not awake, as if she were in some kind of coma. It only shows a movement when Screw touches it and is then dissected by scientists for the purpose of investigating this phenomenon.
- Cross - worked as a drug dealer to pay for his sister's surgery. When he leaves to sell metal paranoia, he scratches his sister's chest so that he can recognize her later. But the deal goes wrong and Cross is treated by GERA and also put into cold sleep for a few years. When he wakes up again, he has psi powers. It is used to stop Screw.
- Girl - is actually Heather Garland and thinks her brother left her because she was just a disability for him. There is no happy ending for her, because she dies in her brother's arms after accompanying Screw to the organization and bumping into Cross.
- Luther - is also a rebirther. His former name was Sharif Highman and his number was 66. He was very unruly, so it was decided to kill him. The still young commandant Sonja came just as Sharif pleaded for his life. Since then he has been working for GERA and can no longer escape because a transmitter has been built into him. Nevertheless, he helps Screw and later Cross to escape.
- Sonja - is a commander and invented the drug metal paranoia with scientists. This drug awakens psi powers and was developed to get test subjects to study ESP. It saved Luther's life, but at the same time made it hell for him. For that she is betrayed and killed by him in the end.