Superwomen of Eva: Legacies
New Daughter of Krypton #2
"It's broken through the coastal defense line!"
The senior UN general of the forces defending Tokyo-3 ignored the panicked yapping from the other UN generals and glowered at the video feed they were receiving from the AWACS plane as the seemingly unstoppable creature drew inexorably closer. His name was Nathan "Hardy" Hardcastle, and he'd seen more than his fair share of supposedly unstoppable creatures.
But none of them had shrugged off this much firepower.
"Have the First and Fourth Armored intercept and engage in a fighting retreat," he ordered. "Get the One-Oh-Seventh Bomber Wing in the air. Coastal Batteries Three and Four should still have an angle; keep pounding it."
That got his aides under some semblance of control. Damn pansies, he thought disdainfully. He hadn't been too keen on a UN posting - it meant putting up with aides who were political appointees from their respective nations rather than people he knew and trusted - but there were precious few with his experience at fighting the inhuman. He took a moment to shoot a glare at the two men silently watching from the back of the command center.
At least the alien wasn't sucking up taxpayer money.
A brilliant flash of light drew his attention back to the video feed.
"We just lost the Fourth Armored! They've been wiped out!"
"One-Oh-Seventh reports ready to engage!"
"All ground units, disengage," he ordered. "Have the One-Oh-Seventh deploy special package one."
The guns went silent, petering out as the troops received their orders, and the bombers overhead released the first special package. Several missiles rocketed toward the Angel, slamming into it before detonating. A pale blue gas billowed out of the warheads before ice began to crystallize on the creature's surface. Soon, it was fully encased...
...for about thirty seconds, before it broke free.
"Have the One-Oh-Seventh withdraw and prep package two. Bring up the Eighth Special and the Thirty-Third Artillery, and have the First Armored switch from APDS to HEAT rounds. Coordinate for time on target fire."
Five minutes later, artillery and tank shells began hammering the Angel as eight powerful lasers burned through the air, converging on its chest. Smoke from the exploding shells obscured the Angel from view.
"The Eighth is reporting heat sinks at maximum capacity."
"Get me a visual!" Hardy barked. "Switch to infrared!"
Moments later, the screen changed, filtering out the smoke for a thermal image. The creature's chest glowed white hot, but otherwise...
"Minimal effect, sir. Forward observers report that, aside from some light scoring, the Angel is undamaged."
"Damn it," Hardy cursed. Had he been anyone else, he might have considered continuing the bombardment, but hard-earned experience had taught him that that would just be throwing away thousands of lives. "All units, withdraw. Have the One-Oh-Seventh deploy package two."
Ikari Shinji had to admit, Miss Misato had chosen a rather good vantage point from which to view the giant monster. Unfortunately, he wasn't in the right frame of mind to really appreciate that, as he was considerably less than thrilled about having a front row seat to a kaiju attack. For her part, the captain was peering through a pair of binoculars as the smoke started to clear. Shinji could dimly see one of the bombers that had flown off now circling back around.
"Oh, my God, that's an N-Two missile!" Misato swore. "Get down!"
Half-buried under the older woman, Shinji saw a faint flash of light. This was followed seconds later by a booming roar as the air rippled with the shockwave, sending the car rocking back and forth... but thankfully not flipping it over.
"Damn it!" Misato hissed, dropping back into her seat. "We have to get to headquarters!"
Gendo watched as the UN generals - save Hardcastle - cheered and gave each other self-satisfied - and quite premature - congratulations.
"AWACS feed coming back online..."
"My God..."
Hardcastle had picked up the phone, apparently intent on taking direct command.
"Estimate eighteen percent reduction in mass," came the report. "The Angel has stopped moving. It appears to be regenerating."
Gendo hid his satisfaction. He knew it was inevitable, that conventional forces could not stand against an Angel. Their casualties, bad as they were, would have been much worse had it not been for Hardcastle.
The general hung up the phone and turned his attention to Gendo. "All right, Ikari," he said. "Your fancy robot's got two hours to take that thing out before we bomb it back to hell."
Gendo suppressed a derisive snort. "After all this, do you really think that would work?"
"One N-Two warhead blew away eighteen percent of its mass," Hardcastle said. "We've got twenty more on the way: ten to have a decent margin of error and ten more just to be sure. If that thing isn't dead when those bombs get there, we're dropping them, regardless of what else is in the blast radius."
"I see," Gendo said. "We will deploy Unit One."
Rei sat in the entry plug and gingerly took hold of the control handles, careful not to damage anything with her newfound strength. Her synch ratio with Unit 01 was not ideal, but it was sufficient for combat. In theory.
"Unit One, launching!" Lieutenant Ibuki reported. Rei felt the shift as the rails launched the Evangelion to the surface.
This catapult was in the outermost ring, at the very edge of Tokyo-3. Rei could see the Third Angel in the distance, recovering from the damage the UN forces had inflicted upon it. It was still within range of her umbilical, though just barely.
Approaching one of the weapon lockers, she drew forth an MM-170 semi-auto/pump-action 500mm smoothbore. Racking a canister round into the chamber, she turned and charged the Angel.
Hardy watched as the purple monstrosity - allegedly on their side - charged the Angel, massive shotgun in hand. It loped across the landscape, eating up distance, before launching itself into the air, taking aim...
...and getting blasted by the same kind of cruciform energy blast that had wiped out the Fourth Armored.
"I need a revised ETA on those bombers."
Rei felt a dull ache. Were her synch ratio with Unit 01 higher, it would likely have hurt a lot more. Sluggishly, she brought Unit 01 back to its feet. Her synch ratio of ~25% was well past the absolute borderline and considered acceptable for combat conditions.
Just barely.
On the other hand, Sachiel was hardly in top form either, still reeling from the N2 strike; the way it swayed as it rose to its full height gave that away. She recovered the gigantic shotgun and, squaring Unit 01's feet, charged again, expanding her AT field to counter the Angel's. As Sachiel lashed out with one arm, Rei threw Unit 01 to the side, bringing the MM-170 up and firing.
Canister rounds blasted out of the smoothcore cannon, the casing falling away as designed, releasing a cluster of submunitions. As the projectiles struck, percussion detonators triggered, setting off the explosive cores in each submunition, to devastating effect.
The Angel sagged, listing to one side as it flailed its arms, catching Unit 01 across the shoulder before Rei could evade, twisting it halfway. Rei ignored it and lurched forward, reaching up to draw Unit 01's progressive knife from its shoulder mounted pylon. Taking care to reverse her grip on it without dropping it, she brought the prog knife down on the Angel's core.
Lois Lane had had better days. She'd also had a lot of worse days, true, but that was quite some time ago. The story of the century was in Tokyo-3, but the editor had grounded her. She supposed Perry had a point. She just wasn't as young as she used to be. Still, it stung.
She still did what she could, racking up the international minutes, but Nerv and the UN kept stonewalling her. Even worming out Hardcastle's contact information hadn't worked. Not that she'd really expected much out of "Hardass" Hardcastle.
She froze as she glanced at the glass doors leading to the balcony. Her apartment was a good twenty storeys up, and the balcony was typically well-lit at night by the security lights below. Currently, the thinner set of drapes was closed, and an unmistakeable shadow had just flitted across them, landing gently on the balcony.
"Clark?" she breathed.
It only took a second for her to realize it couldn't be Clark. Once the billowing - cape? - settled, it was clear that, whoever it was, was considerably shorter and of slighter build.
Warily, she pushed the drapes aside, then tilted her head curiously. It was a girl, no more than fourteen on the outside, with blue hair, red eyes, and a thin blanket wrapped around her. It was the blanket that had given her silhouette the impression of a cape. Opening the door, Lois folded her arms.
"Okay, kiddo, you've got my attention."
"Aaand you can't tell me why you think you're developing Kryptonian powers," Lois said, leaning back in her chair. She had turned the chair around to face away from the small desk so she could face the girl, who was now seated on the couch, looking positively adorable.
The girl - Ayanami Rei - nodded. "I have reason to believe it is related to the AT field theory developed by STAR Labs in order to explain some of Superman's powers."
"All right, fine," Lois said, "so why contact me?"
"Next to your late husband, you are the foremost expert on Superman," Rei said. "If I am to continue my duties, I will need to learn to control these abilities."
"And exactly what duties are you talking about?"
"I am an Evangelion pilot."
"Reaaally?" That certainly perked up Lois's interest. "Tell you what, kid. Let's talk, and maybe you can tell me something about that battle while we're at it."
The girl paused, considering the offer, then nodded. "That is acceptable."
"Okay," Lois said, grabbing a notepad and pen and setting her smartphone to record. "Let's start off with something simple. You ask me a question, then I'll ask you a question. Fair enough?"
Rei nodded.
"So, shoot."
"How strong will I get?"
"Whoo," Lois blew out a sigh. "You don't start off easy, do you, kiddo? In all the years I knew Superman, I don't think he's ever really hit an upper limit. They used to say he was more powerful than a locomotive. By the end, he was probably several times as strong as that big robot you pilot."
"The Evangelion is technically a cyborg."
"Oh?" Lois perked up, jotting it down. "Uh, right, of course. So, my turn. What the hell was that giant monster out there?"
"That was an Angel, designated Sachiel," Rei answered. "How many powers am I likely to develop?"
"Hope you don't have an early day tomorrow," Lois said dryly, "'cause that one's gonna take a while."
"All right," Lois said. "Last question from me." They had been going back and forth for several hours, through which she gleaned what she was certain was a fairly complete accounting of the battle with Sachiel. "Now that you're developing these powers, what are you going to do with them?"
"I..." Rei trailed off. "I do not know."
"Well, think about it, kiddo," she said. "You have those powers for a reason. It'd be a shame to waste 'em."
"I... will take that under advisement."
"Listen, kiddo, you ever need an ear to listen, just stop by."
Rei nodded. "I will do that."
Ikari Gendo had not had a good week. First, Unit 00's activation test had turned into a disaster - it was a miracle no one was seriously hurt - then one of Nerv's civilian backers had somehow caught wind of the activation failure and... pressured him into bringing Shinji in as a back up pilot at least. And now this. This, however, was something he could address.
He gazed across his desk, hands interlaced in front of his face at the man in charge of the Nerv Department of Security Intelligence, better known as Section Two.
"Agent Chiron, correct if I'm wrong, but it is my understanding that Sachiel's attack was deemed classified."
Chiron Iwao was not an easy man to intimidate, and he answered to higher masters than the Nerv Commander. Even so, the atmosphere of the office was difficult to overcome. Resisting the urge to tug at his collar he nodded. "That is correct, Commander."
"And it is the responsibility of the Nerv Department of Security Intelligence to secure classified information, correct?"
"Yes, Commander."
"Then would you care to explain this?" Gendo asked, pushing the document across his desk.
Chiron didn't need to see it to know what it was. It was a copy of that morning's Daily Planet, Japanese edition. Accompanying a very blurry photo of Sachiel was a big bold headline: "ATTACK ON TOKYO-3!"
At that point, Chiron would have cheerfully strangled Lois Lane. Instead, he said stiffly, "I cannot, Commander. We are investigating every possible lead to identify the leak. However, it should be noted that a military operation of this scale is not something that can be completely covered up. This is as much a PR issue as it is a security issue. Commander."
"I will take that into consideration, Agent," Gendo said. "It was only a matter of time before the truth about the Angels became public knowledge. It seems we will have to accelerate our contingencies."
"M-Miss Ayanami?"
Rei stopped, just shy of entering the school grounds, then turned.
"Yes?" It took her a moment to recognize the boy. She had seen him all of once: He had been at Nerv when Unit 01 was recovered after the battle.
He looked around nervously, then said, "I just... I just wanted to introduce myself. I-I'm Ikari Shinji, and I've been chosen to pilot Eva."
"I see," she said. So this was the Third Child, the commander's son.
"Well, umm, it was nice meeting you."
She nodded, then turned and continued on her way, dismissing him from her thoughts as she headed to the class room and took her customary seat by the window. She had enough on her mind right now, and any thoughts of the Third Child would only-
"Hey, uh, Miss Ayanami?"
She turned. "Mister Suzuhara, Mister Aida," she said, acknowledging the pair.
"I heard you were the pilot of that giant robot," Suzuhara said. "I just..." he hemmed and hawed for a while, before Aida jabbed him.
"Iwantedtothankyou," Suzuhara said.
She blinked.
"I do not understand."
"I wanted to thank you," he repeated. "Listen, my sister got caught outside the shelter - my fault, really - but you... you killed that monster before it could even get to the city. So... thank you."
"...you are welcome," she said finally. She turned her gaze back to the window, studiously ignoring Aida.
Hopefully, the rest of the day would remain uneventful.
It was somewhat less uneventful than she would have liked.
Time ticked by, and at lunch, much to her chagrin, she came to the realization that, amidst the concerns over her new abilities, she had forgotten to bring any. She wasn't particularly hungry, but she was pondering what to do about that when her thoughts were once again interrupted.
"M-Miss Ayanami?"
She looked up to see the Third Child and Suzuhara, with Aida off to the side. "Yes?"
"I noticed-" Pilot Ikari started, before Suzuhara elbowed him.
"We noticed you didn't have any lunch," Suzuhara said.
Pilot Ikari nodded mutely. "If-if you like, you can have some of ours." The other two nodded.
She opened her mouth to reply when a moment of vertigo struck her, and their clothes faded from sight, giving her an excellent view of the trio's... assets. Her cheeks suddenly felt warm.
"Miss Ayanami? Are you all right?" Suzuhara asked, shaking her out of her momentary stupor, their clothes rematerializing. "You look a little, I dunno, flushed."
"I-I am well, Mister Suzuhara," she stuttered. "Thank you for your concern."
"Would you like some of our lunches?" Aida asked, dragging them back to the reason they had approached her.
"I dislike meat."
"Okay," Suzuhara said. "We can work with that, can't we, guys?" he glowered at the other two. After a quick shuffle, Rei found herself with a makeshift meal slightly larger than what she would have made for herself had she remembered.
It felt... nice.