Despite all of the chaos surrounding the first Angel's attack, Shinji made it home without a scratch on his body. This was to be expected; no one was better at running away than he was.
The brown haired boy arrived at the house as if it was any other day. He opened the door, locked it as he got in and witnessed the drab, wooden space he had become so accustomed to. A new sight this day though: Misato had attempted cooking. Shinji walked over to the pot, looked inside and gagged when the unfathomably bad stench met his nostrils. He closed the pot in a hurry and wondered if he could safely dump it into the outside trash can, or if that would constitute as a biohazard.
As he debated this, Shinji noticed a simple sticky note taped to the pot: Shinji, eat up! Dinner's on me tonight ; ) . Even though the pot was filled with noxious chemicals, the boy faintly smiled that Misato cared enough to try and cook for him. She was the only one who truly cared for him. The only human alive whom he could trust. Ever since that day ten years ago, Misato had done more for him than he could possibly repay.
Shinji sat down on their musty couch and played the message on his phone again.
"Hey Shinji~! I hope you had a good time at school! Seems like the day finally arrived… giant monsters will be attacking Tokyo-3 soon, so I gotta do my job and beat them. Heh, hopefully this'll be over soon so I can eat you're cooking again!
"… listen, Shinji. I know you don't think so, but your power can really be used to help people. You're stronger than you realize, so if you want to help us beat the Angels… then we'll be happy to accept you. I mean it. But if not, then please just be safe and I'll be back tomorrow.
"…Love you. Bye."
The black cloaked haired boy had played that message at least five times already. He was nervous, anxious and above all, scared. Misato was the only one he had left. If the Angel made it to the headquarters…
But as much as he wanted to help, he knew he couldn't do a thing. Crippling fear overtook him every time he tried to step out of the house. He would be a kid going up against a monster of eldritch proportions, a beast that could end the entirety of humanity. When he saw the unnatural skull-like face of the hulking Angel, the only thing he could think of was running away from it.
And so he did. And now he was safe.
But Misato wasn't.
At this thought, Shinji gritted his teeth, angry at himself. He was pathetic, a spineless sniveling coward who couldn't even look a pretty girl in the eyes. Why couldn't he be brave like Misato? Why couldn't he be strong like Asuka? He wanted to be great like them, but in the end, Shinji knew for a fact that he could never hope to rise above his own pathetic cowardice. He was born a nobody, born with the world rejecting him at every turn. Some part of him suspected that the reason Misato took him in was because of pity. The lowly human being known as Shinji didn't belong anywhere.
The brown haired boy in the purple jacket had hardly realized it, but during his internalization he had gotten off of the couch and was reaching for the door handle. He began to shake from the fear, from the thought of fighting that thing, from the world who hated him so much. Shinji backed away from the door, sitting back on the couch.
"Then why save them?"
He didn't know why. Sometimes, his body just moved without him thinking.
The brown haired boy sensed a presence, turning to his left and seeing Pen-Pen staring at him. When Misato had first found the penguin, his human-like intelligence had taken some getting used to. Here was a penguin who drank beer, got flustered when eating spicy ramen and even helped Misato do her taxes. But eventually Shinji got used to Pen-Pen, treating him like another family member.
Now, said family member was staring right into Shinji's soul. Despite lacking facial features, the bird's gaze seemed to convey a simple message to the boy, one he didn't want to hear. The brown haired boy turned away from the penguin, "I can't do it."
Pen-Pen continued to stare at him judgmentally. "I can't do it!" Shinji yelled back, a formation of tears in his eyes, "Misato will take care of it, she'll be fine! They even have Asuka on the team, and she's like, the strongest person in the world, so how could they possibly lose!?" Anxiety filled his lungs, causing him to hyperventilate.
The penguin didn't budge a centimeter, still staring at Shinji somberly. The brown haired coward didn't even have the guts to stare back at the bird. At last, Pen-Pen waddled over to the boy and gently touched his flippers on Shinji's shaking, clenched fists. "Wark." said Pen-Pen, trying to meet Shinji's gaze.
He retracted his hands from Pen-Pen's touch. The boy was trembling. He was scared of everything. Of the Angel, of his classmates, his father, and the world around him. Yet, as Shinji's thoughts gathered themselves and his breathing became steadier, the boy realized there was something else he was scared of. Something worse than all of the previously mentioned items, which panged on his very soul.
Shinji was scared that his lack of action, however small it would amount, might have otherwise doomed someone he could have saved. That even one person could have been rescued by him, but because he sat comfortably in his home, that person perished instead. He was afraid that it might happen to Misato. Asuka. Any one of his classmates.
Upon reaching this conclusion, Shinji was forced to realize he was much more terrified of that outcome than anything else he could think of.
Driven by fear, he stood up. As his heart pounded with each step, as his mouth trembled and his brain begged him to reconsider, his hands reached for the door and opened it.
New Reality (Act two: The Strugglers)
Rei's red eyes solemnly looked above herself as the platform she was on rose higher and higher. Within a few seconds she would reach ground level, right behind the Angel. Throughout the transportation, the girl felt a sense of serenity. This is what she had been destined to do. This, fighting the Angel, was what she had been born for. The definition of her existence lay just a few stories away.
She did not feel an inkling of fear. The battlefield was where she belonged, her home. Instead, the blue haired fighter felt what she assumed to be excitement from the fact that she could finally fulfill her purpose.
Rei brought her hands up to her face, staring at them. Her hands were covered in white gloves just like Ikari's hands were. Her gloves were slightly different, fingerless at Dr. Akagi's insistence. Something about being more feminine. However, this did not bother Rei. Although she lightly chastised herself for even thinking it, some small part of her liked the idea that she superficially resembled the one who had raised her.
The platform stopped. Rei's hands came down, seeing as how she had arrived. Her duty had begun. She looked up and the Angel turned towards her as well, likely sensing her presence. The black behemoth with a white mask regarded her with a sense of curiosity, abandoning trying to crash the electromagnetic wall to focus upon her.
As she had done many times before, Rei summoned her power and transformed.
Electricity swarmed her being and the girl started to grow. She grew taller and larger in every direction, as if she was becoming a giantess. This was only half true: As Rei's body grew larger, it also morphed into something decidedly inhuman. Her legs became sleeker, armored, a foreign metal covering her frame. Her arms, midsection and back steadily turned into a greyish blue as they hardened. Notably, the only places that did not harden, the joints, became glowing orange instead.
As the body became more angular, Rei continued to grow. Spikes emerged from her shoulders, small at first but grew larger with time. Spikes emerged from her forearms and began to cover her more vulnerable elbows, while the same thing took place with the girl's kneecaps. Horns grew from the girl's head, which had become a metal mask. The mask around Rei was jagged like the rest of her, overall in the shape of a V. The mask left a less angled V in the center of her face, allowing her red eyes to shine through the newly minted visor-like structure.
In the span of a couple seconds, Ayanami Rei had transformed herself into ultimate warrior. A titan slightly taller than the angel she faced, armored and vaguely feminine in shape. Her shoulders had become gigantic, going through to her biceps and tapering at the end where her sharp claws lay. The orange parts of her body shone an eerie glow, as was her orange visor. Electricity coursed through her body, from the center of her chest until it reached her hands and feet, where it settled.
Rei could not talk in this gigantic form. She made do with a low growl, sending her AT field to meet the Angel's in order to convey her message: Stand down, or be annihilated.
"INTRIGUING." thought Sachiel as he gazed upon this Not-Angel. It was indeed [SIMILAR/CONGRUENT] to his form. There were several notable differences between his [SOUL/EXISTENCE] and the newcomer's, but the similarities they shared still struck something within the destroyer.
"Isn't it?" said the voice in his head, "Say what you will about the Lillin, but one cannot deny that they make interesting things."
"INDEED, I WILL ALLOW THAT MUCH." admitted the skull masked Angel, "BUT IT'S STILL NO MATCH FOR ME."
Sachiel summoned twin swords from his [EXISTENCE/AT FIELD], one for each hand, and charged at the newcomer aiming for the kill. He swiped left with one sword but the Not-Angel moved with surprising agility and efficiency, completely dodging the strike and aimed her fist into Sachiel's gut. The punch connected and the Angel was blown back, ruining several buildings in the process.
Rei wasted no time and charged a fist of lightning at the Angel. The billions or so volts of electricity she had gathered crashed into the Angel with a might roar, but the monster did not relent. Instead, it pushed Rei off and rapidly grew its energy sword until it pierced through Rei's midsection. Grunting, the girl grabbed the energy saber, held it in place then broke it with the sheer force of her AT field, surprising the Angel.
In this moment of hesitation, Rei struck again. Using the electricity she generated in her feet, she instantly created a polarized field that resonated with the metallic ground- pushing her with a burst of speed which allowed her to tackle the Angel into submission. Now on top of the beast, the Not-Angel delivered blow after blow onto its enemies' head, each with the force of a missile but with the added bonus of AT field penetration.
The Angel's field, though mighty, could not withstand Rei's repeated blows and it steadily became more injured the more it was hit. Sachiel, in a moment of rage, summoned his [POWER/EXISTENCE] and fired a beam of light at point blank range. The laser blast created a cross shaped mark in the ground several times the titan's height, greatly damaging Rei while the force itself got the Not-Angel off of the beast.
Both fighters stood up an instant later, each injured but nowhere close to being defeated. Rei's injuries had already begun to regenerate, while Sachiel elected to do the same.
"IT'S ALMOST A SHAME I HAVE TO WIPE THEM OUT." mused the Angel, almost wanting to see what else the Lillin would come up with if given another 20 years. Almost, but not quite. It charged again.
Asuka stared at the unfolding battle, unwilling to admit that her mouth was slightly agape. The orange haired girl had already been deployed at another hangar several dozen meters away from the fight- though not far enough she couldn't feel every blow between Rei and the Angel.
That giant… that metallic, electricity wielding giant had come from a small blue haired girl, whom they called Ayanami Rei. The super girl had to admit that what she saw from her was impressive. She could see why everyone thought the titan was the strongest person on the planet. It still didn't make her stronger than Asuka though.
"Asuka, you are now linked up NERV headquarters." said a voice in her headpieces, recognized to be the good doctor's "Await further instructions from Misato and or Gendo Ikari. Ritsuko out."
One second after the doctor's voice dropped out, Misato's broke in. "Hey there Asuka, how are you doing?"
"Ready to kick Engel Arsch." replied the ever confident girl.
"I don't know what that is, but good for you!" said the ever peppy strategic commander, "As you can see, Rei is engaging the Angel directly. Your job is to, when Ritski finds a weakness, destroy it from your hidden position. Until then, stay put and wait for our signal. Clear?"
Asuka blinked a few times. They were telling her to play second fiddle? To just be backup? "Ms. Katsuragi, wouldn't my talent be better suited to engaging the Angel directly?" she said with just a slight hint of disapproval.
"Don't worry Asuka, Rei will hold out until then!" said the voice on the other end, while the orange haired super frowned"Hold your position until further orders. We got this."
The black swordswoman disconnected from Asuka, leaving her fuming both figuratively and literally thanks to the wonders of pyrokinesis. Standing still and waiting were not what the girl had in mind when it came to saving the world- she had expected a flashy entrance, beating the Angel to dust as NERV and the world looked in awe, finally delivering an epic one-liner with the last blow.
Okay, so maybe some of the details wouldn't be like in her comic books, but this was straight up a grave misuse of her enormous power. If she had her way, she would utterly destroy that stupid monster.
Asuka grinned. A plan began to form in her mind. Sooner or later, Rei would lose the fight. She would be knocked over, reverting to her human form. And in that moment, right before the Angel killed her…
Her fist clenched with anticipation. That was when she would make her move and save them all.
The head monitor at the NERV command center showed the ongoing battle between Rei and the Angel in the utmost detail. This much was to be expected by such a well-funded organization, but moreover it was a necessary expense. In addition to the normal monitor, several computers hooked up to it were witnessing the battle in the infrared and ultraviolet spectrum, from a heat based perspective, an electromagnetic graph and various other devices. Every single moment was captured, sent directly to the MAGI and every one of NERV's researchers from every conceivable viewpoint if only to gain the slightest edge of winning.
Speaking of which, "Ritski, what do you have for me?" Misato barked into the air.
"I honestly can't tell if Rei is hurting it or not." said the head of R&D,"The new odds of winning are calculated to be 73.4%."
"Never tell me the odds. Anything actually useful?" huffed the purple haired woman.
"Maybe. Initial sensory data indicates that all of its AT field is generated from a single source, like in humans." explained the computer connected doctor, "Hypothetically that could be a weak point… if it exists."
Misato nodded. "Good enough. What about the mobilization of our troops?"
"Done. They are defeating the Angel's spawn as we speak with some difficulty. Shelter 21 was attacked ten minutes ago, I sent soldiers there but thanks to their disruption, I'm disconnected from that sector for the time being." Ritsuko responded.
From above, Gendo and Fuyutsuki watched this without making a sound. Thus far everything had been going according to plan, so there was no need to intervene. The Japanese military had even been so kind as to shut up once they saw Rei.
"Everything goes smoothly." remarked the aged advisor.
"Indeed." replied Gendo still in his Gendo pose. Rei was performing as he had predicted. Not only her, but Misato, Dr. Akagi, everyone in NERV had been following his plans to the dot. Even the casualties were within a certain limit. It was nice when the pawns moved as they should, it made the supreme commander's life a lot easier.
Red alert signs went off as Ritsuko hurriedly reported a sudden buildup in the Angel's AT field. The monstrosity on the monitor threw a punch at Rei, who dodged only to be head-butted faster and stronger than anyone thought possible.
On the monitor, the Angel summoned one of its purple spears and threw it at the pulsating titan. Rei wasted no time and used an electric hand to divert the spear from its course at the last second. Then, charging her legs, a lightning strike was shot into the Angel's gut. The Angel gagged a red substance, then quickly threw itself off in order to reposition itself.
Gendo sighed. The only pawn not behaving was the Angel.
The TV screens in the shelter showed the battle with the Angel thus far. Hikari had not been expecting that she would witness the battle even indirectly, but here she was with her eyes glued to the screen. Everyone in her area had gone to Shelter 34 on the southern end of Tokyo-3, one of the farthest shelters from where the Angel was attacking. There had been taken into this particular shelter because when the Angel attacked, it was the closest one and rules were rules.
At this thought, Hikari glanced over at Toji. He was sitting but shaking his feet, moving his arms and doing all manner of knuckle cracks while he sat. The boy was nervous and for a good reason.
"Whoa! She punched that thing with freaking lightning fists!" said the ever excitable Kensuke Aida.
"Uh-huh." Toji replied drolly.
"Damn, if only I could be out there with my camera! I'd get such goods shots of the battle…"
"Uh-huh."
"Dude, I wonder who this 'Rei' chick even is. Until a week ago, nobody had even heard of her. Now here she is, saving us all."
"Uh-huh."
Kensuke narrowed his eyes. "… also, people who wear tracksuits are idiots."
"Uh-huh." The brown haired boy didn't even hear him. He was fervently staring at the TV, specifically the lowermost part where it contained the names of who died and which shelters were active. Kensuke lightly smacked his best friend, which finally got his attention. He assured Toji that his family was fine, that there was nothing to worry about. Sadly this did not ease the boy's worries.
Hikari let out a soft sigh. Toji's mom had died when he was younger, and his father had developed a lame leg. More than that, the boy had a little sister whom he cared about more than his own life. Now that they were in a shelter far away from where the Toji's house was located, the athlete had no idea where either of his family members were.
But their names hadn't shown up on the dead list yet. It was this fact alone that kept the reckless super powered boy from bolting out of the shelter altogether. For now, the stream of names had nothing to do with Toji. He kept his eyes trained on the screen, waiting for his answer.
Just as soon as Hikari thought this, an emergency announcement was made: "Shelter 21 has been attacked by what appears to be smaller versions of the Angel!" said the reporter.
Toji widened his eyes.
"Ten minutes ago, NERV agents were dispatched to the site in order to rescue the people in 21, but have not been heard from since."
Toji stood up.
"Hey!" shouted Kensuke, remembering that shelter 21 was the closest shelter to where the athlete's house was.
"Toji, don't do it!" said Hikari fervently, knowing exactly what was going on in the brown haired boy's mind. Kensuke grabbed his arm forcibly to restrain him.
His friend's words had no effect, in fact Toji Suzuhara probably didn't even hear them. With surprising speed and dexterity, he bolted out of Kensuke's grip and to the front door without laying a single foot on the myriad of people sprawled onto the floor. There, NERV guards tried in vain to tell him to sit back down, only to have green chains surrounding them in the next second. Then with a flash of light, the bolts on the door were forcibly opened, letting in the cold air.
"Toji!" shouted Hikari, trying to think of something that would dissuade him. The brown haired boy heard her this time and regarded her with a cold look. However, his anger vanished when he saw just how worried his friend was for him, as he was for his family. The boy turned to face Hikari with a more gentle expression and put his hand on her shoulder.
"Don't worry. I'll be back." he said with a smile, "Man's gotta do what a man's gotta do." The athlete turned and sprinted out into the danger zone, heading for the 21st shelter.
"You'd better come back…" replied Hikari in a soft voice.
The boy ran desperately towards his destination. Being on the track team served to his advantage, because when combined with his super-powered physique he was able to sprint faster than most Olympians. Toji ran through the idea that ten minutes ago, NERV soldiers had been sent to take care of the problem, which meant he had a window of time between his shelter and the 21st. This gave him a smidgeon of hope.
Toji turned around a corner, going onto a main road which was the most direct path to his family. As he ran, the boy in the red tracksuit observed his surroundings. Tokyo-3 was emptier than he could have imagined, eerie in its own way. Cars both intact and destroyed lined the streets with owners that may never return to them. Windows were shattered on the tall skyscrapers, their glass falling to the streets below. Fires burned and their orange hue rivaled the setting sun, bathing the town in red.
Most importantly, the boy observed a number of the Angel's spawn, scattered about doing who knows what. He didn't care and sped past them undetected. In the background he heard combat noises from a gargantuan battle not too far away from where he was- Rei and the Angel. Luckily for him and his family, shelter 21 was not in that direction.
Finally, Toji turned one last corner and beheld the broken shelter a few dozen meters away. Its windows were smashed, its metal door was mangled and torn off and there was no sign of life. The boy felt his heart racing as he ran to that shelter, being confronted at the last minute by small skull faced monsters.
"Get outta my way!" He bulldozed through all of them and made his way to the door, where he saw a single dead body, a former guard now gone to meet his maker. The boy gulped, expecting the worst. Heart pounding, he raced into the shelter, finding it just as broken as the outside, if not more so. There was no one inside, giving him a fleeting hope that everyone escaped. But then, when he saw the bloodied ground, he panicked.
"Sakura! Dad!" Toji screamed at the top of his lungs, salty tears beginning to well up.
Silence. The boy clenched his fists and shouted for his family again. More silence. Toji Suzuhara was now shaking, the blood on the floor becoming ever more apparent within his mind. Was that the guards? Someone else? Or was it, as his brain went to the worst possible scenario, his little sister's life that had been spilled in this desolate area…?
"Big brother?"
The brown haired boy heard the cry of a little girl whom he knew all too well. He scanned the area for the source of the voice, and found a pair of soft eyes peeking out from a bloodied tile.
"It's Toji!" shouted Sakura Suzuhara, leaping out from the safe space and running into her older brother's arms. As he held his precious sister, the boy saw many heads peeking out from the tile, all of whom were relieved to see it was just a high school boy and not another monster.
"Bout time ya got here." said a gruff older man, hoisting himself up and sporadically making his way over to Toji, putting a giant hand on his son's shoulder.
"Hey, dad."
"Sakura here was worried sick for ya." The old man scratched his bearded face, musing about the crazy day. "We were almost done fer."
"Yeah, what happened here?" Toji looked around the destroyed place and the faces of the curious survivors, peeking out from under the floor. Sakura and Daigo Suzuhara explained that they had gone to shelter 21, just as ordered, and for a while everything was quiet. Then, the mini Angels came- an entire army's worth- and started to assail their fortress. The army defeated one of the guards, killing them, and then proceeded to injure the other.
From there they broke into the shelter and started to round up the humans as if they were cattle. For whatever reason, they didn't immediately kill everyone in the shelter, instead observing them for about 5 minutes. After that grace though, the Angel's spawn started to attack everyone they could. They didn't get very far.
"And then… uh… I dunno what happened." The elder Suzuhara closed his eyes from confusion, "Then they all just started dying."
"Huh?" Toji wondered.
"Yeah, somebody invisible beat them all up!" Sakura interjected.
The grey haired father shrugged, "Somethin' like that. They all just kinda fell down at once. Then the floor cracked and somebody told us to go into the underground shelter- and whaddaya know, there's a whole 'nother space underground that we all fit through."
This all sounded very familiar to Toji. Invisible army? Maybe it was just one Invisible Boy. Maybe…
A hissing sound to his right caused the young man to turn, he saw a single masked monster standing a few dozen meters from the shelter. It clicked in a strange tone, and soon more of them appeared behind the first one.
Toji grimaced, forcing his sister to his father. "Stand behind me!"
The army charged with a rallying cry of hisses and distorted screams. The energy constructor immediately threw himself outside the shelter and created a two green gates, which sealed themselves shut, at the front of the shelters broken entrance. Toji summoned several swords hanging in the sky, a knight's armor to protect himself, and a life sized steamroller just in case. Now they had to go through him in order to get to Shelter 21.
Toji was ready for combat and so was the newly formed army. The mini-Angels charged at him while hissing and thrashing their sharp limbs. And then a couple of them fell over, as if hit with a great force. The mini-Angels halted their advance for a brief moment, scanning the area for the second enemy- the one that had distracted them not too long ago.
Shinji Sekai appeared right beside the knight themed teenager, surprising Toji. The shorter boy had a look of regret on his face as he gazed towards the one body outside the shelter: the corpse of the NERV soldier killed in battle.
"I wasn't fast enough …" the invisible boy muttered to himself, almost too low for Toji to hear. The athlete understood well enough what Shinji was referring to, and in response gave him a light pat on the back.
"No. Ya did what ya could." said Toji, now meeting his eyes "The fact that my family's still alive, that was your doing, right?" Shinji avoided meeting his gaze at this, a sure sign that he did "I owe ya one."
Here, the army of creatures finally noticed Shinji. Screeching, they charged at him, but their charging was halted by a gigantic blade slashing the ground. This giant blade created a gash in the earth, briefly separating the angel and the two males.
"Toji… I need to be somewhere else. Can you handle this?" asked Shinji in a timid voice. Laughter broke out from the other youth, "Hah! If I couldn't handle this much, what kinda man would I be!?"
The energy constructor let the steamroller loose, now paired with a bulldozer, which mowed down a path in the now dwindling army "Go! We'll talk later!"
The timid boy widened his eyes, but nodded his head. Steeling his resolve, Shinji vanished again. Toji turned his attention back to the army- their numbers had decreased somewhat, but they had finally bridged the small chasm the broadsword had created. They marched in chaotic fashion towards shelter 21, intending to finish their job of killing everyone inside. Toji politely disagreed with this sentiment so he shot a couple of green spheres into some of them.
One came with a simple charge attack, but Toji sledgehammered him into submission. He was met by two more that attacked from either side, to which the youth responded by throwing small knives in the creature's masks to disorient them. This unfortunately was the last breathing moment that the energy constructor had, for then a wave of black pounced upon him.
In perfect synchrony, one of the mini-Angels grabbed Toji's leg while another grabbed his arm. They flipped him on his back in an instant while three more leapt upon him, slashing with their sharp claws. It was fortuitous that he made a suit of armor around himself, or the boy might have been done for at that moment. For no sooner than he was attacked by those three did the entire army dogpile on top of him with their own AT field's no less, their sheer weight would have otherwise crushed his human body.
Toji's armor would crack in about ten seconds from the pressure of the AT fields and mass, which gave him that much time to come up with a plan to get out of that situation. Two seconds in, the boy had something which resembled a plan: He created as many small sharp, indistinct shards as he could in the limited space between himself and the creatures, then commanded them to spin in a circular fashion at very high speeds.
This spinning loosened the mini-Angels hold on him, allowing Toji to create more small blades, then more in succession as space was created by those, until an entire tornado had formed around him. The green tornado whipped and threw away all of the creatures that were once on top of him. He had to cancel the tornado the instant he was free though, as it took too much energy to control that many objects.
The mini-Angels were bleeding an unnaturally familiar red hued blood, but they were still alive for the most part. Toji had no time to repair his cracked armor as they charged at him again. He met their claws with swords, hammers and knives. Soon his body was moving in the rhythm of battle, as enemies from all sides attacked him. He was weaker, but so were they. And so they fought again.
A punch here, a slash there, a mace there, a bulldozer there. Toji became a flurry of motion as he met the creatures head on, not allowing a single one of the bastards to hit him. He screamed, he choked, he bled. After what seemed like hours to Toji, he whipped around to face another one of the masked creatures only to realize there were none left.
All of them were dead, and their bodies were dissolving into black mist. Toji's lungs burned as he inhaled, his muscles ached and his brain grew foggy from the lack of oxygen. He was bloodied, bruised, beaten to the point of exhaustion and alive. He didn't realize it at the time, but the youth had destroyed a total of 86 mini-Angels in the span of less than fifteen minutes.
He didn't even have enough energy to keep the gate open, which also dissolved into nothingness, revealing a crowd of wide eyed people eager to see the results of his battle. From the crowd emerged a young brown haired girl, who eagerly swept her brother up in her arms, afraid for the state he was in. As tired as the boy was, his instincts as an older brother commanded him to look cool in front of his little sister. So he gave Sakura a hearty smile and laughed.
"Ain't I amazing?"
Rei delivered a five megaton punch infused with electricity straight into the Angel's face. She followed up with a left hook into the beast's vulnerable side, then used that hook's momentum for a devastating lightning kick in the same area. The skull masked creature toppled over- but not before razing the side of Rei's steely face with a pink and white beam.
The kaiju-sized girl yelped in pain, reflexively reaching for her cheek before the training kicked in, allowing her to ignore her instincts. She charged at the Angel, engaging in fisticuffs once more.
In the command room, the men and women of NERV watched in awe, truly realizing what it meant to fight monsters. Rei's massive transformation had startled the ones who hadn't been briefed on her, but her fighting capabilities were beyond anything they had ever seen. She was fighting with the Angel, a harbinger of extinction, on equal footing. A feeling of ease overcame the men and women in the last bastion of humanity, a sense of confidence that they could win against these creatures.
This sentiment was not shared by the bionic woman who ran the MAGI.
"Misato, I still can't tell if we're doing damage to it." said Ritsuko from one of the many speakers.
The commander narrowed her eyes, "What do you mean? Rei's blows must be hurting it, or else it wouldn't bleed."
"That isn't the problem. When the First Angel was hit with the N2 mine, I was able to detect that it was capable of instantly regenerated the damage that it did. And although the Angel's biology is still unknown to me, if we assume its regeneration speed is equal to what was gathered from earlier, then we aren't hurting it. Worse, Rei is guaranteed to lose."
Before Misato could question why that was, Ritsuko explained further: "I can quantify the amount of damage Rei does with each blow, as well as the Angel to an extent. Their blows are approximately equal when everything is evened out, with the Angel being slightly stronger. However, the Angel can regenerate at a rate of at least ten times what Rei can do… meaning that over time, the battle will eventually turn in the First Angel's favor."
Hearing these words, the men and women of NERV were reminded that they were currently fighting an abomination which could end the world. The tension came back instantly, and the staff became more alerted to their jobs. The purple haired Misato frowned, "Then I guess it's a good thing Rei isn't alone."
Misato turned her eye to the side in order to discreetly observe the Supreme Commander. His bearded face was as expressionless as always, observing the battle from his white gloved hands while the ever present Fuyutsuki stood in attention at his side. The two men were so calm about the situation that it unnerved Misato for an instant. "Ritski, give me three maps of the local area where they are fighting, angled top wise and either side of the battlefield. Convert those battle calculations into easy numbers I can use and overlay them on those screens, as well as any readings from its AT field."
"You intend to observe the Angel to see if it had any fighting patterns?"
"Yep. Once I figure that out, I can send in Asuka safely."
"Understood. I'll help you with that. Bringing you the relevant data…" As per Ritsuko's will, three screens appeared right in front of Misato, showing the Angel from the top, from a distant right and a close up on its left. The Angel was colored grey while green and blue numbers appeared in synchrony around the screens, green for expended kinetic energy and blue for AT field fluctuations.
"Asuka," said Misato into her headset "Get ready to scramble, we'll need you soon."
She didn't wait for a reply, turning her attention back to the monitors, trying to discern a pattern within the calculations that appeared onscreen. The Angel was of course, using a fighting pattern that was completely alien even to the battle-hardened Misato. She could already discern that the thing fought neither like a man or a beast, its movements were completely foreign.
"I've determined the source of its AT field." said Ritsuko, putting up a red sphere in the middle of the holographic Angel, lodged deep into its chest. "This is a structure analogous the heart in humans- but unlike ours which pumps blood, this one releases AT energy in regular intervals."
"You don't say…" a smile formed on Misato's lips, a plan forming. Once she realized the Angel's attack pattern, she could figure out a way to send Asuka to sneak up on it, then deal a devastating blow to the Angel's core. She turned back to their champion on the monitors to see the state of the assault.
In the battlefield proper, the electric wielding kaiju had just delivered a stunning double fisted punch directly into the Angel, infused with electricity of course. The electricity was intended to disable the Angel, and it had worked. As the Angel had stuttered backwards while static cracked along its body, its limbs trembled chaotically, the electricity paralyzing it.
Seeing her chance, Rei shrouded her right fist in a gauntlet of electricity, charged her feet against the metal on the ground, and rushed in to deliver a blow to the Angel's core, which as she just learned about was located somewhere in the Angel's upper midsection. This was it. That was to be the last blow, a megaton of electricity shot directly into the apocalyptic being's core, killing it for sure.
And then in the command center, the blue numbers on the monitor suddenly grew larger by many folds accompanied with the obligatory warning labels. Before Misato could scream at Rei to dodge whatever was in coming, it had already happened.
With widened eye slits, the lightning kaiju realized at the last second that it had been tricked; the Angel hadn't been paralyzed at all. In the ether, Sachiel grinned as it summoned the true power of its AT field and warped the laws of momentum, slowing Rei for 1.271 seconds.
Within that precious instant, the First Angel materialized a kilometer wide sword and impaled directly into Rei's chest. Before the girl could get over the shock of being impaled, the spear exploded while still lodged within her, dealing a devastating blow to the titan. The explosion propelled her backwards on a collision course with several buildings. Her electronic screams filled the air until she finally hit the fifth skyscraper and stopped cold, only for the Angel to have distorted gravity, leapt several dozen kilometers in the air, and crash into her like a meteor.
The crack of Rei's bones was heard by everyone.
It was especially heard by Asuka, who took it as a signal to fly faster than sound towards the unsuspecting Angel. Within a second the super girl closed the distance between her fist and the monster's head, punching it so hard it toppled over. A grin overtook her face for just an instant, before being replaced the Angel quickly regained its balance and swung at her with its laser sword.
Asuka caught it with her bare hands, but the force was greater than what she anticipated, the sword swung downwards and her with it until it crashed her into the streets below, leveling the area. Sachiel noted the newcomer and tried to kill it as fast as possible. It created another sword in its arms and swung at the red colored fly with all it had.
The super girl was fast enough to dodge its strikes and now smart enough to know that if it landed a good hit on her, she would be fried. In her ears, Misato screamed at Asuka to get back into position. Yet she wasn't to be deterred- Asuka flew back towards Sachiel's head and uppercutted the jaw of its skull mask, twice. The creature fell back for a second, and Asuka used her fire powers to finish the job.
By creating flames hotter than plasma torches, the girl seared the monster in a maelstrom of fire. The beast's skin burnt, its mask started to melt, and Asuka could see that there was a red sphere just under its chest, now revealed because of the burning. She aimed a more precise flame at the core and fired.
Sachiel noted this and replied by crushing Asuka back into the dirt with a well-timed and expertly placed sword swing. This act rended Miyabito Street in half, caused the buildings around the street to topple from the sheer force of impact, and the red haired girl herself felt pain like no other, screaming as she collided with the ground.
The Angel turned its attention away from the red fly and focused back on his real opponent, who was still hunched over and immobile from his last attack. A bright pink and white beam emerged from the beast directed at the Not-Angel, and when it collided it shredded the [mockery]'s upper body into nothingness. Now with its head and shoulders torn off, the lightning kaiju was officially deceased.
Or was it?
"WAIT… THIS [SOUL/EXISTENCE] IN THAT BODY IS STRANGE. IT IS AS IF THE BODY IS BUT A SHELL WITH NO SUBSTANCE…"
"I think you've been had, Sachiel. The one who you were fighting abandoned that body already."
"ANNOYING. WHERE IS THE REAL BODY?" Sachiel was then attacked by a desperate Asuka, who tried to punch it in the gut, but was met with another swords strike in the process, sending the girl into the skies.
"I can't say. I'm too far away to accurately sense her, now that's she's hiding her [AT FIELD/EXISTENCE] from us." replied the voice somberly.
Meanwhile on the ground, the black suited champion limped and bled her way to relative safety. As mentioned in the declassified briefing on Rei Ayanami, her kaiju form more or less operated like a giant, organic robot with Rei as the controller. Thus, when her body transformed into that giant form, Rei's real body lay in the skull case, where the brain normally would be. From there, the girl controlled the titan's body while wrapped in a cocoon of organic nerve-like structures.
However, Rei could abandon her titan sized body with ease by detaching herself from this cocoon. This was the case now; like a lizard cutting of its tail to escape a predator, the girl had leapt out of the brain case and fled to the streets below. She breathed deeply, in pain and wishing her regeneration speed was faster.
"Rei! Status!" yelled Misato desperately as the Angel fired a beam that incinerated her titan form's head.
"I… I am alive." said the blue haired girl succinctly, wincing from the pain. On the other end, the strategic commander breathed a sigh of relief. Rei laid down next to a collapsed steel building that was already destroyed, a less likely place for the Angel to attack "I am injured… I cannot create another Titan yet because of my wounds…"
The girl turned towards the Angel, a distance away fighting Asuka. The red haired super was managing to hold the creature's attention, but it was clear that she was losing the battle. Each time Asuka struck the Angel, it retaliated with greater force and speed.
"It is good that you are still alive." This was a new voice, one Rei knew all too well. "Therefore, Rei, you will use this time to heal your body. As soon as you are able, Titanize and deal an attack into the Angel's core." quickly, her headpiece displayed a 3D image of the Angel, along with its red spherical weakness. "The rest of you, launch missiles in order to distract the Angel to buy Rei more time."
"You can't be serious, Gendo. If we launch our weapons while Asuka is in the vicinity-"
"She ignored our orders."
Rei could feel the hiss in his voice even from here, "We are up against a force that threatens all of humanity, so this is not up for discussion. Rei's safety takes more priority than Asuka's."
The supreme commander was threatening to blow up the area in order to buy time for Rei to heal. It was a logical decision, but one that the blue haired girl somehow couldn't agree with. Rei belonged on the battlefield, for that was her purpose, but this was not the case for Asuka. Unlike herself, Asuka had chosen to fight for humanity, had chosen to stand on this battlefield despite the odds against her. What's more…
"Commander, if I may speak?" said Rei, her vocal cords having been fully healed "Please prioritize Asuka's safety. That would be most logical course of action."
"Elaborate."
Stoically, she explained: "This is not the only Angel we will face. It is then reasonable that we have the largest combative force available to NERV at any given time. If Asuka dies, then we will lose war potential. However, if I were to die, war potential would not be lost, since I can be replaced."
Silence filled the radio, until at last Misato spoke up "Rei, what are you talking about!?"
"Do not worry, Misato. I will be back." The girl began to titanize even with her injuries, which as past experiments indicated, would produce a malformed body. Yet, the incomplete transformation would buy them some time for Asuka to get out. From there, the missiles would appear, Rei would be replaced, and deliver the final blow to the Angel. It was the most logical strategy.
"Wait."
A voice down below. Her transformation suddenly stopped, though not by her own will. Rei was trapped between titan and human form, a ten foot tall amalgamation of metallic sheen and human flesh. She was however, able to turn her head and see just who it was that had spoken to her.
"You need time to regenerate… right?"
"Contact with Rei has been lost." breathed Ritsuko from the MAGI.
"What!?" Misato slammed the table, "What do you mean lost!? Isn't that virtually impossible!?"
"I know, I'm trying alternate routes, but they aren't working for some reason!"
The commander and vice commander of NERV, who had been mostly silent the whole time, began to shuffle uncomfortably. A knowing look was exchanged between the two. After a moment's pause, Fuyutsuki moved from his position and towards the elevator, which he took down to an unknown floor. Gendo remained alone, carefully observing the situation.
Misato felt sweat drip down her face. Everything was going all wrong- Asuka was disobeying orders, Rei had been hit with a severe blow and was now missing, the Angel was getting closer to breaching the Geofront…
But she forced herself to remain calm. To not show any fear, so that her loyal soldiers wouldn't lose their cool too. She gripped her iron sword unconsciously, briefly remembering the man who knew no fear, who had given it to her.
"Get Asuka out of there." decided Misato, pressing a few buttons on her display "After she's gone from the battle we'll bombard the thing with enough missiles to distract it. Then, we find Rei. Get on it, Ritski!"
The computer technicians began to input missile trajectory calculation while Dr. Akagi silently began putting her electronic feelers out. Misato barked into Asuka's channel "We're going to use missiles to distract the thing, so get the hell out of there!"
"-so get the hell out of there!"
The proud and mighty Asuka Langley Soryuu, who possessed five great powers and was indisputably the strongest person at Tokyo-3 High lay bleeding on the ground, covered in dirt and with a few broken fingers and ribs.
Sachiel's blows finally caught up with her body. The girl was in pain. She spat out some of her own blood and tears sprang from her eyes.
She was angry.
This was all wrong. She was supposed to save the day and be crowned a hero. She was supposed to beat the apocalyptic Angels and be forever remembered as Earth's greatest champion. Instead here she was, on the ground, crying like she never had before at her own helplessness. Her fire barely singed the monster, her strength was no match for the Angel's titanic power. In short order, she was far weaker than the Angel was and if it hadn't ignored her after that last blow, she would have been dead already.
It ignored her because it didn't see Asuka as a real threat. She wasn't worthy of its attention. So there she lay in the dirt, alive and broken.
"You will never be my daughter."
She was angry. Furious. Livid. Ferociously mad at everyone and everything.
Beaten.
A small Asuka stared at the stone. Written on the stone was the name of her father, Pieter Langley. Hesitantly, she turned to the side, facing the woman. The black haired woman looked haggard and scary. Papers were in her hand, given to her by the nice Gehirn scientists. The woman hated the papers, but Asuka didn't know why.
"You fucking bastard." the woman hissed, scaring little Asuka. The woman turned to her now, still with the same angry look in her eyes. "And you…"
Now the woman's attention was fully on the small, frightened child. The black haired lady told her in stern voice "Every time I look at you, I feel sick."
The woman walked away. Asuka had to follow her, since she had to live with the woman from now on.
"No… Not yet…!" Asuka struggled to get up, managing to stand if only by sheer willpower. The strategic commander screamed her from her earphones, but Asuka couldn't hear it. Infernal power welled up within her, driven by her anger towards the Angel. Her fire became hotter and hotter, a flaming aura with temperatures reaching solar levels burning the local area, rising in temperature along with her fury.
"It would have been better if you were never born."
"VERRECKE DOCH!"
She rushed towards the Angel with all the hatred she had. Her fist made contact with the unsuspecting monster's spine, shattering its bone-like structure. As the beast turned around, Asuka fired off another punch- much stronger than the last and initiated a combo of blows upon the beast. She pummeled the Angel with all she had, her strength growing with her anger. It hit her back, but she ignored it and continued to beat her enemy like a raging beast.
After enough blows its blood spewed out and blotted out the girl's eyes. She continued to hit it. The girl felt something snap, possibly the Angel's bones or possibly her own. She continued to hit it. Asuka's ears were nearly deaf from her own screaming. She continued to hit it.
She wanted it to feel pain. She wanted it to suffer for what it had done to her. Her overtaxed body was being pushed to the brink, but she kept going, tears and screams masking the impact noises of her fists. The Angel was defenseless against this newfound power increase. It had to divert all of its energy to defense and regeneration, for Asuka's blows were too powerful to do anything else. Its form began to shrink as layers of skin melted away, as its bones began to break. Asuka was driving it into the ground. Every second, the crater where she was beating it grew larger.
Suddenly Asuka's arm stopped moving. Her other arm fell limp shortly after.
The girl coughed up blood. Her great power immediately dissipated and she fell to the ground like a stone. The girl had far breached the limitations of her body and soul, and now she was paying the price. Every bone in both her arms was broken, her muscles had been ripped apart from the strain, her AT field had disappeared altogether, and the energy feedback caused her skin to bleed from every pore in her body, coloring the girl a pure crimson.
Covered in her own blood, barely conscious and unable to even breathe properly Asuka lay in the dirt, feeling a little less angry than before. It was a miracle at all that she wasn't dead yet.
The now risen Angel would fix that. Although it had been costly, it had spongified its form in order to lessen the damage from Asuka's attacks. Now that it was back to its more solid form, it stared at Asuka with blood red eyes, out for revenge. Asuka had actually managed to hurt it- but in the girl's rage, she had completely avoided Sachiel's core, saving it from death.
The girl could only stare up at the apocalyptic being with tears in her eyes, weeping.
Sachiel used his power to summon four more arms from his shoulder, each one manifesting a deadly purple spear.
"DIE." commanded Sachiel as it thrust all six spears into the ground, each one containing the force of a nuclear explosion. The spears shot forth towards Asuka's helpless form and exploded upon impact, decimating both her and the local area to nothingness.
From the command room, everyone fell silent as they watched Asuka die. This was it. That was the moment of humanity's extinction.
The Angel stood tall, having defeating both of the Lillin's champions. It turned its attention towards the electromagnetic barrier and with a slash, destroyed it. It advanced towards the Geofront, where its true goal lay.
Then a giant metallic fist collided with the Angel's skull mask, sending the monster flying. Everyone inside of NERV gasped from shock and relief. The Angel had never been more annoyed. Misato practically cried at the monitors readings.
"Apologies for the delay, commander. I have recovered."
The lightning kaiju stood tall and proud, not a single deformity on its body, indicating Rei's healthy status. At once, both the command center and Rei became a buzz of activity. Misato frantically shouted orders into Rei's earpiece, telling her to slice at the Angel's chest- which hadn't fully regenerated yet according to the MAGI.
Rei summoned electricity and forced it into the Angel before it could react, following up with a clawed swipe at its skin- revealing the red core. Sachiel was now worried, its regenerative powers were waning, and the Lillin had exposed its core.
"DON'T THINK FOR A SECOND THAT YOU CAN WIN!" A purple aura surrounded the humanoid angel, drastically increasing its speed and offensive capabilities at the cost of defense. It slammed back into Rei with all size of its swords, decimating the local area and landing several good blows on the kaiju. More expertly timed sword swings followed, but Rei was able to block most of them thanks to the MAGI analyzing its fighting pattern. The metallic titan bided her time, patiently waiting. She blocked a few blows, another few pierced her, but she remained calm, waiting for the opportunity.
It finally came. In the middle of two horizontal slashes from either side, plus an angled chop from above, the Angel froze in place for half a second.
Rei's hands aimed for the chest and the Angel gaped down in horror.
A cannon of lightning half a kilometer wide shot from her open palms and directly onto the Angel's core. It was all the electricity Rei had in her body, unleashed all at once towards a single target. The electromagnetic force broke though the core's outer shell and exposed the liquid interior, which the lightning also shocked. This severed blow caused Sachiel to collapse, smoke pouring from its body.
"ONE MORE SHOT, REI!" yelled Misato. Rei leapt to deal the final strike and end this madness, but the Angel shot a beam at her in midair, diverting the girl's path. Rei crashed through some buildings instead, but stood back up.
"YOU… INSOLENT…" Already, Sachiel's [SOUL/CONSCIOUSNESS] was beginning to fade away. His core had been broken, half of it destroyed by the creature's lightning. The Angel considered his options while carefully timed metal rods were hurled in his direction, covering up his vision with their explosions. The lillin weapons did not hurt him and Sachiel could still sense his opponent in the distance. He fired an all-encompassing beam at that location, decimating yet more skyscrapers and directly piercing the body of the Not-Angel with his attacks.
Sachiel was then stabbed in the back, the lightning spear now lodged firmly into his core.
The swords dissipated and all six arms went limp. The skull faced Angel turned around to meet his aggressor- a malformed kaiju hastily conjured by the blue haired lillin. She had distracted him with her old body, then snuck around with this new one.
"HOW ARROGANT...!" Sachiel spoke to Rei, although she only heard strange groaning noises. Its six arms combined their respective blades at the apex of its head, where upon firing a laser straight into the sky, the swords collided with this laser to form a pink energy sword several kilometers long. Both NERV and Rei gaped at the sheer size of the blade, which was now aimed in the titan's general direction.
"NOW PERISH ONCE AND FOR ALL!" The sword swung down and incinerated everything it touched. The air screamed in pain, the tops of buildings vanished from the heat and the sky itself turned a pink hue as the power of the apocalypse came crashing down upon humanity. Rei stood still, gazing up at the pink sky. Either one of two things would happen. Either she would perish here, or…
In the distance, Shinji gathered all the energy he had and raised his hand, eyes aglow with an unearthly power.
"No."
Right before the monstrous power slashed her into less than nothing, the blade slowed at an increasing rate until completely stopped in mid-strike, along with Sachiel's six arms.
"WH-WHAT!?" gaped the beast.
Rei saw that the sword had stopped and wasted no time. She rushed forward with all the speed her malformed titanic body could muster, awkwardly hurrying to the Angel.
"WHAT IS THIS!? WHY CAN'T I MOVE!? THIS… THERE IS AN INTERFERENCE! SOMETHING IS INTERFERING WITH MY [BODY/SOUL]!"
Humanity's titan rushed forward, her left and fully formed first now tightly clenched, swinging back to end it. Sachiel could only gape in horror as the puny human finally reached her destination and punched the Angel's broken core in a mighty crash of electricity and power, frying and pounding at the core with every ounce of power she could muster.
The crack of the Angel's core being broken reverberated throughout the area. Everyone in Tokyo-3 heard it.
The skull masked being looked down at her and growled. "WELL PLAYED, LILLIN."
The Angel's body exploded a sea of red down below, the energy in the sword disappearing along with its owner's existence. As the red rain came pouring down for a few seconds, Rei's titan body collapsed to her knees.
It was over.
The girl breathed deeply, gasping for the oxygen she so craved. Funnily enough, it tasted much sweeter than it had before the battle. Rei supposed that this was the taste given to one who survived.
Her train of thought was interrupted by the headquarters. "…Rei… Rei! Answer me!" shouted Misato.
"…I believe this is victory." stated the blue haired girl.
That one statement from Rei was enough to cause the entire headquarters to erupt into a cheer. They had done it. After so much planning, so much fighting, the first Angel was utterly destroyed. The news was quickly spread to everyone in Tokyo-3, who also cheered for the occasion. A bunch of lowly humans had defeated an apocalyptic monster, which wasn't too bad for the species.
Unfortunately there were going to be more of those monsters, Gendo noted. Additionally the rest of the Angels were supposed to be stronger than Sachiel. He contemplated sharing this news with the people down below, to remind them that the war had only just begun. However in a rare moment of reflection, the commander of NERV stayed silent. They needed their morale boost, after all. Let them have their superficial party.
As the cheering continued and everyone patted each other on the backs, Rei's voice crackled in through the radio "Major Misato, I do not see subject Asuka anywhere. Did she flee the area already?"
The room immediately went silent. In all of their celebration, they had forgotten about the orange haired girl. Misato began to choke up. From her omniscient viewpoint, Ritsuko could already see that her friends was going to take this personally. And indeed, she was.
The purple haired commander felt a single hot tear in her eye as it dawned onto her what had happened to Asuka. Today, she had let a young girl rush to her death. A thousand thoughts flooded her mind, all of them having the commonality of what she could have done to keep the vibrant girl alive. None of them had the effect of altering the past. Misato Katsuragi was a failure as a commander, and she had to tell Rei what had happened. She opened her mouth to give the bad news.
"Oh, there she is." said Rei before Misato spoke.
Curious, Ritsuko quickly provide a visual of where Rei was pointing at. In the center of the crater the Angel made with its six swords, much to the surprise of everyone in the room was an unconscious Asuka. Every person in the room widened their eyes to the point where they nearly flew out of their sockets. A few gasped from the sheer shock of it all, still more stammered from the loss of words.
Gendo raised an eyebrow. Today was a rare day indeed that he could be surprised by something.
"But… how!?" Dr. Akagi ran the calculations through her quantum mind, "That explosion should have killed her… how did…"
Actually, a lot of things didn't add up. Ritsuko keenly noted that Rei had recovered from her injuries faster than usual and that the Angel twice had stopped itself in the middle of its attack. And now, Asuka had shown up miraculously alive when every single quantum calculation said it should be otherwise. None of it made any sense.
At the former battle zone, Rei stared at Asuka's unconscious form. From the state of the discussion, the blue haired girl gathered that this super girl had been caught in an explosion she shouldn't have survived. Yet, here she was, not only alive but almost fully healed. Many of her previous wounds had all but vanished, leaving her with little more than bruises. Rei could think of only one answer to why.
"I can… help get you healed in time. But you have to promise me something." said the brown haired boy wearing a tattered trench coat, "You have to promise not to tell anyone about me. I was never here."
The malformed Rei/titan hybrid looked curious "Although I am confused, these conditions are agreeable, provided you can in fact aid my recovery." It was only now that Rei realized her communicator wasn't working. The device was still intact, but it appeared to have been shut off somehow.
"I heard you say you can heal fast, right?" said the boy "Then…"
Suddenly, the world seemed to rush. Rei felt strange sensations- everything became more purple in appearance, the Angel who she had fought was moving slower, but her every action seemed to be sped up, including her healing capabilities. She felt her body go numb, so her consciousness was a blur during this time. Yet in mere moments, the world snapped back to its rightful place and the girl became fully conscious once more. The sensations faded away.
Moreover, Rei's injuries had completely vanished. The girl flexed her fingers, testing them to be sure, but there was no doubt: She had made a full recovery. From her half formed state she stared at the boy, who still wasn't the least bit frightened of her ghastly appearance "How…?"
"I'll help you guys whenever I can." said the boy before vanishing.
Rei had a promise to keep, so she feigned ignorance. "I do not know how Asuka survived the explosion. There is nothing I can think of which would have allowed to survive and recover from her previous energies. This is not a lie."
Before Dr. Akagi could question what that meant, Misato interrupted her, back to her usual cheery self. Loudly and proudly, the black swordswoman declared that the Angel was dust with no casualties, making this battle a complete victory for humanity. She broke out the champagne and everyone cheered more from that. Ritsuko decided to let go of her questions for now and simply told Rei to get Asuka back to the hospital, to which the blue haired girl complied.
Meanwhile, several stories below the command center, Fuyutsuki stood in a dark room, staring at a glowing red button. He was waiting for orders. Things had been quiet now, which for Gendo was a good sign. His suspicions were confirmed when his superior radioed in: "Rei is alive and well."
"Good." replied the vice commander. He shut off the machine and the red button stopped glowing, retreating into a metal crevice inside the super-computer. The elderly commander sighed, giving one last look at the stasis tubes filled with green liquid and black forms, before heading back to the elevator. The less time he stayed in that awful room, the better.
"So, did we win?" Fuyutsuki asked as he boarded up.
"Of course. Our victory against the first Angel was never in any doubt." replied Gendo.
"Of course."
"Poor Sachiel." said a voice within the ether, "I really hoped that we would end this with the first battle. It would even be better for the lillin, to die quickly than to suffer a prolonged one."
"I'M SURPRISED TO HEAR THAT YOU CARE ABOUT THE PRIMATES." spoke another voice.
"Don't look too deep into it. I simply wish to fulfill the will of Adam as soon as possible."
"ONCE I AM [BORN/MATERIALIZED], THIS SHALL COME TO PASS. WITH THE BATTLE DATA GATHERED BY SACHIEL, I NOW KNOW THEIR WEAKNESSES. THE LILLIN WILL NOT STAND A CHANCE AGAINST ME."
"See that you do, Shamshel. The sooner that we can end this farce, the better."