Ruth woke up in a hospital bed, questioning whether or not the events of the day before were some elaborate dream.
"Good morning. You're awake just in time for me to run some tests."
"I'm confused. For what?"
"Remember? You were the first to pilot a Franxx in 18 years. Between that and being the first naturally born human to pilot it, we need to make sure your vitals are normal. Not to mention piloting with a klaxo sapien have shown adverse effects on a human with the admittedly limited research we have."
Ruth nodded. "So that was real…" she thought.
Yuji entered the room. Naomi was sitting at her desk next to a white board filled with calculations for God-knows-what. She was currently futzing with her mechanical arm with a cup of coffee sitting on her desk.
"Oh. Hey, One. Long time, no see!" she said. "So, you actually piloted that thing with Ruth."
"Right..."
"You're lucky. I was never able to pilot a Franxx, especially not after I lost my arm. Became one hell of a HATM pilot though, owing to the fact that I designed them," she added. "Coffee?"
"No thanks."
"Oh, right. I forgot. Sweet tooth," she replied before pulling a bottle of cola from the fridge and giving it to him.
"Speaking of your genes, check this out," she said, pulling up some data from her desktop. It showed a variety of charts and graphs of various pilots' flight history. "This is the effects of when Hiro and Zero Two piloted…and compare that to the data from your last run"
"No sign of mutation." Yuji replied. "Maybe the effect only occurs when the pistil is a sapien…"
"Or maybe your unique genes cause a sort of cancel-out effect, slowing the process down. We still don't know what would happen if you truly pushed Strelizia to its limit. You were fairly aggressive in your assault but not quite to the extent Zero Two apparently liked it."
"So, what are we gonna do about the power source?" Yuji asked.
"That's true. As strong as Strelizia is, its core is obselete tech," Naomi replied. "Tell you what. Give me a few days- no, hours, and I'll construct a proper hydrogen power supply for a Franxx."
"What would anyone do without you?"
"A hell of a lot considering I was under stasis for several months after my accident."
"Fair enough," Yuji replied before grabbing a lollipop from her container.
"Take all of them, One," she commented.
"She actually gave a proper name – Yuji."
"Beautiful. Both of you remind me a whole lot of Hiro. Though you for more obvious reasons." Naomi replied. "It's a shame I never got to see him again."
He put his hand over her shoulder. "Take care of yourself, Naomi."
"Man, I hate these barracks near the mountain. It's always way too cold," exclaimed Akio.
"Quit being such a big baby," Satomi replied while reading a novel.
"I'm just saying. The Toyama base is first class. Here, it's like they slapped it together. And the wi-fi is garbage"
"I personally like the remote location."
"Yeah," he snarked "Because you're boring."
"I heard that."
Mitsuru entered in the common room. "We have a transfer from Weapons Development into the squad. This is-"
"Yuji," he said as he entered with Ruth, putting another lollipop in his mouth.
"I told you there was a klaxo sapien in Weapons Development!" Akio blurted out.
"You were also told not to provoke a klaxo sapien." Satomi added
"Provoke? What are you talking about?" Akio replied
Yuji was glaring at him and Akio chuckled nervously.
Yuji went to his room to unpack his bags.
While he was doing that, Akio came in. "Oh, hey! I guess we're sharing a room!"
Yuji paid him no mind. Akio continued, "Y'know, I didn't mean to offend you or anything earlier. It's just…I always thought people like you and Zero Two are just so cool and mysterious and…exotic…"
"Has anyone ever told you that you talk too much?" Yuji replied.
"I lost count…" Akio replied. They spent the next several minutes in awkward silence.
Meanwhile, Satomi and Ruth were chatting in the other bedroom.
"I'm surprised you and Yuji were able to sync up," Satomi said.
"What do you mean?"
"I don't know. He seems kinda intimidating."
"He's pretty nice, though. You know, once you get to know him."
"Now that I think about it… He's kinda cute."
"A minute ago you said he was intimidating."
"It's the whole mysterious cool vibe he gives off. I can't decide whether I should be scared of him or jealous of you."
"It's sounding like you're both."
"Yeah. You got him for a partner, while the closest thing I got is Akio," Satomi replied as they started to burst out laughing.
Everyone later went to the dining room to get dinner.
"Thank God Kokoro was here to do cooking," said Akio "This makes our living situation 100 times better."
"You should have been here when Futoshi cooked for us, Yuji." Satomi added. "He's even better."
"I wouldn't argue," he replied.
As a server delivered the dessert: strawberry shortcake, Satomi asked "So, Ruth. I almost forgot. How was it like to pilot a Franxx?"
"It was surreal," Ruth replied. "We were simultaneously controlling the unit at the same time. It was initially awkward with how the dang thing is operated. But I got used to it fairly quickly considering the HATM were heavily based off the Franxx."
By the time she finished talking, Yuji was already done with his dessert and requested seconds, much to the shock of the squad. Right as his seconds were delivered, an announcement:
"All Squad 00 members. Please report to the operation room immediately. This is not a drill."
They put on their uniforms and Yuji brought his dessert to eat during the meeting.
As they entered, Naomi was furious. "Can someone explain why a band of rebels have a hold of my tech!?"
"It may have to do with the raid made a few weeks ago," Mitsuru replied.
"That's a load of crap and you know it. There's no way they got that many units from that."
"We'll talk with Weapons Development and see if they can do another round of inventory."
"This would've never happened if they didn't 'suggest' my resignation…"
"Sorry about that," Mitsuru said, finally addressing the squad. "We're getting reports of Paragon preparing to infiltrate our facilities. Your mission is to ward them off and keep them from taking this facility."
"Explain to me why they want this boring-ass facility," asked Akio.
"This is the most secure facility we have. What you call be boring, we call functional" Naomi replied. "Plus it offers a great vantage point to onlook from."
"Unfortunately, only Alstroemeria and Satvium are functional." said Mitsuru. "Naomi, what's your progress on converting Strelizia?"
"I was right in the middle when you interrupted me," she replied. "I'll need another hour or so before Yuji and Ruth can be sent in. And we can't use their HATM's in the meantime, since Sinesis and Gypsophila were severely damaged on the last mission."
"So, it's gonna be me and Akio against how many?" Satomi asked.
"Around eight. About four of them are their own special forces." Mitsuru replied. "We're currently arranging for backup to arrive, but it's gonna take some time, so your first priority is to hold them back until Strelizia can be deployed. Dismiss, and good luck."
"Mayu, what are you seeing?"
The Paragon squad was assembled near the base of the mountain at the edge of the forest. Mayu was surveying the area with binoculars.
"Teams seem to be preparing to launch. Any closer and we're setting ourselves up for an ambush." Mayu replied.
Another slightly older looking man came toward them, "How about we ambush them? That would give us both the numbers and element of surprise."
"Good thinking, Takeshi." Hayato replied. "You hang back and find a good vantage point to snipe them with Myrtillus."
Hayato motioned towards a red-haired girl with yellow horns. "Hotaru, head to that nearby hill in Syriacus. You and two of the others will stage the ambush."
"Okay," Hotaru replied.
"The rest will stay with me as we continue to assess the situation," Hayato added. "Let's go."
Satomi and Akio began loading their HATMs.
"I don't know why we still name our robots after flowers considering the reproductive metaphor is completely lost in a one person unit." Satomi said.
"I just like the name of mine: Alstroemeria," Akio replied.
"Yeah, but on the back of my mind, all I can think about is that my HATM is named after cilantro."
"You worry too much, Satomi."
"And you're too reckless."
"Am I?"
"Alright, quiet you two." Mitsuru chimed in. "Alstroemeria, Satvium, prepare to launch!"
On the other side of the loading dock, as Satomi and Akio are launching. Yuji and Ruth are waiting as Naomi labors over Strelizia's new power supply.
"What's the status, mom?" Ruth asked.
"Still finishing the battery itself." Naomi replied. "Testing it is gonna be another ballgame. If this craps out in the middle of our operation our squad is SOL. We gotta make sure this works."
"This does not look good." Yuji said. "Those two are out there against at least eight other guys and they're a long way from getting any form of backup."
"I swear. If I find whoever let them take my crap, I'll see that they're transferred to the North Pole," Naomi said.
Satomi looked at the map on her heads up display. "Our intel said they were supposed to be around this area. So we should be getting close."
"I don't know," said Akio. "We've been surprised before."
"You're not referring to when you forgot to go to the bathroom before a mission, are you?" Satomi replied.
"That's not what I meant!"
"Hang on…" Satomi interrupted. "I think I see something up…WATCH OUT!"
Hotaru in Syriacus had suddenly leapt from the cliffside and attacked them with its sword. Two other Paragon HATM units shortly followed.
Akio pulled out Alstromeria's sword to attack Syriacus.
The other two went after Satomi. She used Satvium's energy shields to block their artillery fire while Akio was clashing against Syriacus.
She found an opening as one of them had to recharge and fired a shotgun blast to tear one of the two goons apart.
Akio was struggling to get a clean hit on Syriacus. Hotaru put up a fierce offense and it took most of his strength just to defend against her attacks. However. He found a brief window and he took it to break from Syriacus and rush the second grunt that accompanied it.
"Now, pilot. It's 2 to 1," where's the rest of your friends?" Akio asked as he and Satomi surrounded Syriacus.
He got his answer as he heard a loud rifle shot from far away. Akio barely escaped the sniper shot from Takeshi and Myrtilllus from a distance away.
This was gonna be more difficult than they thought.