Disclaimer: I am merely playing with other people's creations, I don't own the game/book/anime/TV-show I am borrowing from, nor am I making any money with this. I am writing for fun and practice, as fan-fiction to be shared with others if I feel like it.
A/N: This is Evangelion fanfiction and AU.
Lost Child - Chapter 01
It was getting hard to breathe, and the cold was making him numb. Trapped within the shadow of the 12th Angel, the pilot of Evangelion Unit One was starting to succumb to the loss of life-support systems. The massive bombardment with N2 mines had already began but it was doing nothing to the angel. Shinji knew there was no rescue coming, no way for anyone to try and rescue him, but hearing the bombing begin drove the point home. This time he wasn't going to go home.
While the power in the energy cells was gone, a pulse echoed deep within the Evangelion's core, washing over the entry plug and the pilot, as a power began to build up. Within the core, a tired soul of Yui Ikari had reviewed everything that Shinji had been through and had decided against helping him return to his father and those who abused him. Instead, she had built up power for something else. With a sudden roar in the depths, she reactivated the EVA by burning portions of her own soul-essence to do so. She only had so long before the drain of supporting the EVA would make her fall unconscious again, and if she did then Shinji would die.
Reaching the nearby flat crimson surface of the 12th Angel's core, the EVA drove its hand down shaping the AT field into a spear that shattered the core, causing the Angel to shriek all around them. Hurriedly, the Evangelion began to devour the remnants of the core. It did not have the time to fully integrate a core, but it devoured as much of the Angel's core and basic essence as it could in a quick moment, then forcing it through the EVA's systems. Pushing it towards the core, as well as pushing as much information as she could to the data-recorders at the back of the entry-plug, for whoever would recover it.
Satisfied, she felt some energy pour in from the devoured parts of the Angel's core, but diverted a large amount of it to begin synthesis on her own son's flesh, a pair of crimson jewels embedded into his form to serve as proto-cores that could develop over time. With all this done, she finally charged the remaining power into using the alien nature of the Angel's core to open a tear into the Dirac sea.
As the portal formed, Yui Ikari, or EVA 01 hesitated for a second before ejecting the entry plug, and then pushing it through the portal. Better that Shinji got away from it all on this side at least. This last act of a mother done, she gave control to the beast. Merging with it, she began to break the angel apart, while activating her own self-destruct sequence to finish about the time when the loss of pilot would have finally stopped the EVA despite her efforts.
In the Headquarters of NERV, the monitors were all focused on the 12th Angel floating above the city its shadow spread along the ground but seemingly unaffected by their best efforts, all the N2 mines already spent, when suddenly the sphere began to crack and bleed. A familiar arm thrust out of the core, but just as hope began to rise among the bridge-crew, the flash of intense light shattered the sensors outside, and left them with static for a moment. A satellite image shifted into the view a few seconds later, showing Tokyo-3 from above.
There was no signs of the Angel anymore, no blue pattern detected. However, there was no readings from Unit one or its pilot either. As the satellite image searched for any signs of the unit one it finally gave a ping, zooming in, to a severed arm with the purple armor plating remaining on it. Several other pings began to sound in, showing smoldering remains of the now lost unit.
"SHINJI-KUN!" Misato's scream echoed through the command center as more than her stared at the screen in shock and horror. Despite all they'd been through, the thought that rose to their minds seeing the purple Evangelion clawing its way out of the Angel had been that the seemingly invincible Evangelion had done it again and returned safe and sound. Now, all they had was Asuka and Rei.
==== xxx ====
The whirring machinery was lifting the battered entry plug out of the lake it had crashed into, bringing it over to the shore where the waiting scientists were staring at it with a mixture of dread and confusion, as well as a great deal of curiosity. The blonde woman in a labcoat was holding a cigarette while maintaining a serious expression, while her young assistant was shifting nervously in place while comparing the entry plug to a set of pictures on the clipboard she had with her.
"It appears identical to the early model sketches and concept art, but I don't believe we ever produced this model. It says Unit one, but this is 36b, while we ended up using 47d at the end." The assistant remarked while casting a glance at the doctor besides her.
"I admit this is unexpected sight Maya but we will learn more once we open it." Smiling to the assistant, the blonde scientist took a pull off her cigarette before dropping the stump down and stomping it. As she walked ahead the assistant quietly reached down to snatch it up to a small bag she carried with her, sighing quietly as she slipped it back in her pocket.
"The access hatch has suffered some damage, it won't open normally anymore. We're going to have to breach by force." One of the salvage-crew members commented, casting a look at the approaching scientist.
"How bad is the damage?"
"From the looks of it, the plug has been ejected without firing the rockets at its base, though the emergency beacon has been activated. The systems within are likely to be intact, but the outer case has suffered minor damage, it is merely unfortunate that includes crushing the lock to the latch."
"Alright, break the lock and open it, but try not to damage the rest of it." The scientist nod her head when her cell-phone began to ring. Digging it out of her pocket she stepped a bit aside seeing who it was.
"Commander Ikari, we have the object and have confirmed it appears to be an entry plug of the model 36b, we are attempting to breach now so I haven't got much information to offer you just yet."
"Very well Doctor Akagi, keep me informed about this." The call ended, and Ritsuko Akagi returned her phone to her pocket while heading back towards the plug, only to stop short when she saw what the crew members were lifting out of the plug, the shock evident on all of their faces.
It was a young pilot, with short brown hair and a blue and white plug-suit with the number '01' on its chest, and a thick smell of LCL present. The pilot's chest was rising and falling slowly, seeming to be alive, but the few hands patting the pilot's chest and one hand reaching lower confirmed to her what had shocked the recovery crew.
"No way!" The woman with her hand on the crotch of the pilot's outfit exclaimed, and Ritsuko suddenly felt like she needed another cigarette while thinking about it, but she had promised to cut back to only one a day and she had only smoked that earlier. Yet this was a special occasion, she tried to tell herself.
After all, after the second impact had killed half the world's population, nobody had thought they'd see a living man again.
A quick order to the recovery crew saw to it that their discovery was classified, and the young boy was hastily escorted by armed guard and Ritsuko to NERV's hospital. The recovery crew continued to salvage the plug unearthing the hard-drives and the black box. All of them were taken back to NERV while the exterior and the interior of the plug were being examined for clues about its origin and construction.
Two days later, in a small meeting room beneath the central dogma the invited people gathered to view the data that had been acquired. Commander Ikari took her seat silently at the head of the table, with Naoko Akagi at her right, and Misato Katsuragi on her left side. The pilot of Unit Zero, Rei Ikari was present, as were Maya Ibuki, Shizuka Aoba, and Masuyo Hyuga. Standing at the other end with a laptop before her to help her with her presentation was Ritsuko Akagi.
"We have finished a quick overview of the files recovered from the foreign plug, and the examination of the recovered foreign pilot. All of this information is considered Level Nine secrets, and must be kept within this room." After stating this, Ritsuko began her presentation.
"The last records on the plug indicate that our foreign pilot was involved in a struggle against Angels, fighting against them in a world that similar to our own, but where the effects of the second impact were notably different. Primarily, the virus that terminated every male did not appear on their world. Through his battles, this young pilot named Shinji Ikari-" She paused on noticing the shock evident on everyone else's faces as they turned to look at their commander, Yui Ikari quietly.
"Continue." She stated briefly, with narrowed eyes. Ritsuko felt a chill down her spine that reminded her that it was a sore topic for the commander still.
"Ahem. The pilot appears to have been mostly successful in defeating the enemies, but received little in the way of support. The last mission involved fighting an Angel codenamed Leliel, capable of tearing dimensional holes. It became a flat shadow that opened into a much larger internal space, a dirac sea, where the Evangelion Unit One of that world was trapped with its pilot. After running out of power, and the pilot facing imminent death, the Unit activated one last time to attack the Angel's core from within and use its power to shove the entry plug with the pilot through it to our world, in an attempt to save its pilot while already activating self-destruct sequence."
"It became aware." Naoko remarked briefly, rubbing her forehead. "We theorized it might happen but given the nature of the beast the soul within is to tame we thought it was very unlikely to occur." She nodded for Ritsuko to continue onwards.
"Before it sent Shinji Ikari through, the Evangelion appears to have synthesized some of the stolen S2 engine into Shinji's arms, in the form of two crystalline proto-cores that seem to be drawing nourishment from his form to mature. They were briefly tested, and show up as pattern Red, he is human, though one with minor Angel talents once they mature. The EVA also sent all the information it could store on the plug's recorders, and from the looks of it, a lot of information it extracted from the pilot's mind. Keep in mind this may be somewhat disturbing."
She clicked through a few images and then started the videos. Both of the battles against the Angels, and of the treatment Shinji received at home and at the base. People recognized their counterparts, though an indignant squeak from Masuyo on seeing what her male counterpart was like brought a faint smile on few lips for a moment. Nonetheless, it was a grim session as they watched Shinji battle the odds time after time, but receive little in the way of praise.
Towards the end of the viewing, Ritsuko drew a long breath before turning to face the Commander. "We have in our possession the first male in over a decade, who is an Evangelion pilot with a lot of experience, as well as information about his past battles that may help us in learning more about our angelic enemies. He is likely to be confused and overwhelmed about all of this when he wakes up, but I would like to offer him a place as a pilot if he can synchronize with our EVAs, and examine him if we can find a reason for his apparent immunity to the virus. If we are truly lucky it might even be hereditary."
End Chapter
A/N: Bit of a wandering idea of mine, having read "Y the Last Man" and a short bit of story with similar concept of applying Shinji to a scenario where he is the last man on Earth. That story appears to have been abandoned a fair while ago though, which is a shame as the concept was quite interesting. Rather than involving a Random Omnipotent Being though, I thought about using the Dirac Sea as a breaking point where Shinji finds himself lost to one world and yet with the chance to be a savior for another, in more than one way.
I am not sure if I would start writing a full story about it right away, but I thought about a possible intro and what might come along later on.
This is a combination of ideas other people have come up with before, just mixing them together for a moment and contemplating whether or not this would be a story worth spending more time with.
For now, it's just a wild idea let loose.
