A/N: My schedule's weird so don't be surprised if one chapter pops up in a few day's time and the next comes at 3 AM the following Thursday.
Foreigner
The teen rolled her head around, savoring the satisfying –crick- of her neck as she loosened up her shoulders.
This…
She sloughed off her windbreaker and hat, letting her golden red tresses run freely down her suit-clad back.
This could be fun.
"Hey uhh you!" one of the event managers called her from the doorway "We go live in five, what didja say your name was?"
The girl slipped her cherry-red synchronization clips on one by one, their horny motif lending her a diabolic air. She swished around; slightly disappointed that she could not bring her cape to wave dramatically alongside her.
"They call me" she thrust her hands onto her hips "The Succubus!"
"LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, BOYS AND GIRLS, IT'S TIME FOR THE MAIN EVENT!" the only well-dressed man in the darkened arena boomed into the mic, answered by the drunken roar of the crowd.
A crowd member stood up from his seat in the dim chamber, cupping his mouth with his hands. "BRING OUT THE FRESH MEAT!"
This, of course, immediately led to the other patrons in the stands to get up and start chanting in gruff baritones.
"FRESH MEAT! FRESH MEAT! FRESH MEAT!" they went, banging on tables, chairs, and walls rhythmically.
"IIIIN THIS CORNERRR" the announcer resumed with a flurried hand motion "WEIGHING IN AT A STAGGERING HALF TON OF MEAT, MUSCLE, AND WHOOP-ASS, ITS THE CRUSTACEAN SENSATION, THE TERROR OF THE DEEP, AND OUR RETURNING CHAMP, GIVE IT UP FOR CRABRANTE!"
The crowd's cheers drowned out the rest of his speech as the steel gate on one side of the fighting pit crashed open, revealing a truly massive -holy shit that's a huge fucking crab- as Asuka would later describe it.
At fifteen feet high, the half-man half crab managed to peek over the top of the arena walls, making the crowd silently thankful for the additional lengths of electric mesh above that.
"AAAAND IN THIS CORNERRRR, A CHALLENGER APPROACHES" he gestured to the opposite side, where a lone figure stood, dwarfed by the huge hybrid of man and crab. "STANDING AT FIVE-FOOT-SIX AND CLOCKING IN AT 130 POUNDS, DON'T LET HER FOOL YA FOLKS THIS GIRL MEANS BUSINESS, SAY HELLO TO THE SUCCUBUS!"
The crowd clapped of course, some with more enthusiasm than others. A good bit of the audience liked Crabrante and relished the opportunity to come every week and see him quite literally claw people apart. The remainder, however, whooped, hollered, and whistled as the shapely young woman strutted out in a skin tight jumpsuit.
"LEMME SEE YOUR TITS!" A random called out, sending waves of chortling laughter rippling outwards.
Anger bristled inside her for a second; of course this place would be filled to capacity with assholes. These dregs circling society's drain were exactly the sort who tended to ignore the legality of an underground fighting ring, among other miscellaneous things like differences in age and consent.
"PUNY HUMAN" Crabrante roared, stomping his oddly human-looking feet. Asuka turned to face her opponent, his eye-stalks whizzing around "I WILL CRUSH YOU!"
She grinned and put her hand forward, flicking her fingers in a goading pose.
"LET'S GET READY TO RUUUUUUMBLE!" the announcer cried.
Ding
Crabrante wasted no time, opening with a savage charging strike meant to obliterate slow opponents. Asuka jumped, landing with precision onto his arm and taking in his confused gape.
"What," she teased "you don't like it when the girl's on top?"
Enraged, the overgrown arthropod withdrew his claw, opting to strike her out of the air with the other. Sensing the tension in the limb, she somersaulted off and suspended herself in space.
WHOOSH
The girl maintained her smarmy grin as the wind from the blow harmlessly ruffled her hair.
"Oh yeah, I should mention that I can fly" she glided around him, shrugging her shoulders in a mocking gesture "No big deal."
"GRAAAGH, YOU TALK TOO MUCH!"
The beast whirled around, his mandibles clicking furiously. Without warning, he knocked her out of the air and pinned her to the ground, applying crushing pressure.
"Took you long enough." Asuka let out a stifled yawn.
With her hands, she held onto the underside of his claws and concentrated. Immediately, the crackling sound could be heard accompanied by the enticing scent of cooked crab.
"LOOKS LIKE THINGS ARE HEATING UP IN THE ARENA FOLKS!"
Asshole! I'm the one who gets to make the fire puns!
"Time to turn up the heat!" she shouted, hopefully loud but definitely annoying enough to reach the crowd. Ignoring the groans and Crabrante's terrified shrieks; she tightened her grip and engulfed his arms in withering flame.
"WRRRAAAAAGH!" wailed the monster, spraying the arena with blood and sputum "I HATE SUPERHEROES!"
With another bellow, he pulled back, sacrificing both claws to escape a fiery end. Asuka's face lit up in glee.
I almost feel bad for the freak.
"I'LL EAT YOUR LIMBS!"
Well… almost.
Waving her hands around, she maneuvered the claws above her, turning them into a pair of giant flaming telekinetic gauntlets.
"I'm on fire!" she cackled. "Well, I guess you are now too."
The now-armless Crabrante charged in vicious animal desperation, assuming that his armor could absorb blows from his own claws. Well, you know what they say about assumptions…
The first strike was a searing cut deep into his reddened carapace, staggering the creature long enough for the next one. Staring down at his own claw embedded in his innards, he never noticed her bringing down the other like a monstrous spear.
"HYAAAH!" she cried, impaling his head dead on and leaving the flaming limb stuck in the bloody hole where his neck used to be.
"Ooooh" the audience cringed. Even some of veteran fighters looked surprised as others covered their mouths in shock.
"YEOUCH, THAT'S GOTTA HURT!"
The crowd continued to look on as Crabrante's macabre corpse stumbled around for a few seconds, his body not yet having registered his brain's destruction. With a triumphant flick, she tore the claw out and floated it above herself as a gory trophy.
"WINNER: THE SUCCUBUS!"
Much to Asuka's dismay, the crowd clapped only half-heartedly, still reeling from their champion's bloody end. She tossed the arm aside, right on top of the beast's still-twitching body, and lazily sauntered over to the announcer.
"Alright alright alright" she grinned, sliding her palms together "So who's payin' me?"
"Well since everyone in the bar bet against you," a nearby bookie answered "it looks like... all of us."
"Fine by me" the teen shrugged, now staring down the rest of the patrons. "Cough up."
"Fuck you!" a man in the stands yelled "That wasn't no fair fight!"
"YEAH!" the mob added.
"I ain't never heard a no redhead gaijin sucky-bitch before!" Another cried, "Who says you ain't one a them Janitors?"
The room got very quiet, and a fuzzy patch on Asuka's suit peeled away, revealing the stylized fig leaf logo of NERV Inc.
"UH-OH FOLKS, LOOKS LIKE THERE'S A PROBLEM WITH THE LEGITIMACY O-"
She swiped the microphone from the announcer's hands, having lost her patience.
"Fair fight? You stuck me in there with a huge fucking crab without even knowing I had powers!"
"Hey we don't judge" the bookie cut in "you wanted a shot and paid the buy-in so I wasn't gonna stop ya."
Murmurs of agreement rose throughout the crowd, who turned their attentions back to Asuka.
"That still doesn't change the fact that we don't fuck with Janitor scum" he spat in her direction.
"Who are you callin' scum, asswipe?" she took a position atop the announcer's podium. "I'm Asuka Langely Sorhyu, S-Class Rank 2, motherfucker. Now who the fuck are you?"
"I'm the one who's gonna wring your neck you little bitch!"
"Hello! Do you see what I did to him?" The girl pointed frantically at Crabrante's smoking corpse "What the hell makes you think you stand a chance?"
"You can't take all of us at once!" A rough-and-tumble bearded type rose from his seat, advancing on her along with several other goons.
"Oooh I'm so scared~" she whimpered derisively "Big Bad Mister Mid-Life Crisis and his crew are coming to get me with their bare squishy hands."
He just got shit on by a girl in front of the whole bar, no way he's backing down.
And sure enough, the men rushed forth in barely-contained masculine fury, intent on overwhelming the girl with sheer numbers. She ducked the first punch, jabbing her attacker in the stomach before wheeling around and cracking one behind her with an elbow.
"That all you got?" She knocked two heads together and kicked a third square in the nose "I'm not even breakin' a swe-"
DONG
She lost her words, thoughts, and movements in the periphery as her body reeled from the shock of being hit by a – fucking metal pipe the size of my arm- as the after-action report would detail.
The men bum-rushed her, quite literally as after she found herself at the bottom of a sweaty, middle-aged dog pile she also felt a not-so-subtle grope along her left buttock.
Oh it's fucking on now.
She closed her eyes and snapped her fingers, and the heap exploded outwards. For a few moments, the men hung suspended in the air, along with the various tables, chairs, and beer glasses. Many, many fragile beer glasses fully capable of splintering into painful shards.
"Disgusting."
They fell, and amid a multitude of groans, the doors crashed open to reveal a ghostly young woman flanked by two men in suits.
"Hey!" Asuka waved with a grin, wiping some of the blood off of her forehead "I was wondering when my you'd show up to join the fun."
"The commander reported that you required assistance." Rei surveyed the crime scene, along with it's thoroughly incapacitated suspects. "This does not appear to be the case."
"Oh these guys?" The redhead gave one of the prostrate men a light kick, making him groan "Piece of cake. Just some low-key case I was taking care of."
"Low-key" her partner repeated in a deadpan voice, observing what remained of Crabrante. "Did you plan on including this casualty in your report?"
"Since when do freaks count?"
"Asuka-"
"Calm down, Wonder Girl, I just won a wrestling match against twenty goons twice my size. I haven't exactly had the time to do a write up."
"Still, these are important matters that must be accounted for. The commander would be most displeased if an unjustified death tarnished NERV's image."
"Unjustified my ass, he had multiple outstanding warrants on him for murder, Rei. The guy cleaved some poor kid in half for doodling on his shell."
"That is rather unfortunate" Rei recoiled somewhat, remembering the Section-2 mop-up squad's report on the incident. "At the very least you could claim self defense."
"Knew I could count on you" the second nudged her in the ribs "You know one of the these fucks had the nerve to call me a Janitor? Christ, this is all 'cause of the commander and his stupid 'clean-up crime!' posters everywhere. If I don't get a cool name then what's the point in going on?"
"I suppose there is some truth to your arguments" the albino floated around the other girl's back, eyeing the new name stenciled on the suit "…The Succubus."
"Oh yeah" Asuka scratched her head, noting the slight but steady drip of venom into her voice "Got a nice ring to it don'tcha think?"
"Asuka, we are designated names for a specific purpose. Now I realize that you may harbor some distaste for yours but there are proper protocols that must be followed."
"Yeah I know fill form 15-C and submit it to Department K-12 as per Section blah-di-blah-di-blah" she gurgled in exasperation. "Plus you and I both know that Red Eagle was always a shitty name."
"You could always go back to being the Second Child."
"Ah, she's got a sense of humor! Did Daddy finally break down and buy you one?"
Rei rolled her eyes at her partner's antics, but chuckled lightly nonetheless.
"Let us go, Section-2 will handle the rest and I'd like to get back to the Geofront as soon as possible."
"I thought the commander was too busy with his press conference and all for a standard debrief."
"He is, but there's an open bar and according to preliminary reports the major is going 'hog wild'." Rei replied with a conspirator's grin.
"Oooh can't wait!" Asuka matched her smile and careened out the door before launching herself up into the air. "Last one there's a rotten egg!"
Rei's eyes narrowed as she shot upwards, joining her friend in clouds above.
A/N: I saw some you guys had questions so I'll take the time to answer them here
UltimateTouken: Rei and the rest of the cast are actually a little older than canon in this case. I tend to keep the characters' ages purposefully vague to avoid confusion and contradicting myself later on, but in this fic all of the children are now "young adults" and you're free to imagine them at any age between 15-19. I might get specific in the future but we'll see how it goes.
StraightEdgeWingZero: You got it man.
Ads.A1: Always good to have feedback, especially from someone who actually read through my other fic.