.hack/EVA: Catharsis: Creeping Terror

Disclaimer: In this universe in the quantum foam, I do not own or in any way shape or form hold a claim to the .hack series or Neon Genesis Evangelion.

" " denotes speech

'italics' denotes thought

'bold' denotes location names

'bold italics' denotes skill use

Computer Operations Room, NERV HQ

It was a generally accepted fact that the MAGI System was the greatest concentration of computing power ever seen in the world. In spite of (or perhaps because of) this, the supercomputer required a bit of preventative maintenance every now and then, particularly because of its proprietary operating system, which was neither ALTIMIT OS nor ALTIMIT MINE OS. Thus, what would be as simple as scheduling a defragmentation and disk scan on a personal computer was generally much more involved.

'While I usually dislike doing this, it is probably a good idea, especially after the AIDA incident where the Obsidian Knights were attacked and defeated,' mused technician Maya Ibuki, fingers flying nimbly across the keyboard of the provided input terminal. 'Besides, I can compare myself against another skilled hacker.'

She referred, of course, to Dr. Ritsuko Akagi, bottle-blond daughter to the late genius Dr. Naoko Akagi, who had designed the MAGI, basing it on aspects of her own personality.

'I wonder if she would have gotten along with Harald, since both were dedicated to their work, and ultimately gave their lives for it…though I admit that in Dr. Naoko Akagi's case, there were…other circumstances at work.'

The mousy brunette grimaced slightly, remembering certain files on the MAGI she had run across during the last maintenance cycle, files that had contained rather dark secrets about their creator's life and death. The tale within had read like a sordid tale of desire and manipulation, charting the course of a doomed relationship between a genius programmer and a certain manipulative unshaven man (not sempai and Kaji, though that interaction was also somewhat amusing).

'And now…even beyond the grave, the MAGI serve that same man and any others who know how to manipulate them, myself included. It is an interesting thing, always playing a role, wondering if and when you will be exposed. I can sympathize with dear Fili the White on that note, as well as Bith, as they are rather in the same position as I am now.'

"You're quick," a voice commented over her shoulder, derailing her train of thought. Unsurprisingly, it was her bottle-blond sempai, who had tried to teach her what she knew. "Then again, you are Maya."

'Well, as one faux blond genius to another, I suppose that's quite the compliment.'

"Of course," Maya cheerfully replied. "You were the one who taught me…but now that you mention it, wouldn't A8 be faster here instead of this code?"

"I'm embarrassed," the good doctor replied. "The student is surpassing the teacher. Status report?"

"127th periodic check-up, all clear," the bridge tech stated, sighing in the hope for a break. And sometimes, miracles did happen.

"Understood," acknowledged Ritsuko with a smile and a curt nod. "Well done, and take a break until the test."

Clean Room, NERV HQ

"Why do I have to strip naked again?" grumbled an understandably irate Second Child under her breath. "I know I have a womanly figure the rival of any, but why do those two bakas have to see it? Data, data, data, Akagi always needs more data—I already know I'm the best, so why do I have to go through all this just for an auto-pilot test? Washing and cleaning 17 times, for an obsessive-compulsive doctor neat freak."

Of course, Dr. Akagi would not be part of NERV's upper management if she just gave simple answers, so she used one of the common tactics used by bad bosses worldwide: ignoring the underling.

"Now, all three of you," the bottle blond was saying, "staying as you are now, go through this room and board the entry plug."

"WHAT?" Asuka replied, hands subconsciously reaching for a non-existent broadsword, eyebrow twitching in annoyance that she was not armed in this world. "You mean…IN FRONT OF THEM?"

The "them" being referred to were the Third and Fourth Children, Shinji Ikari and Kaworu Nagisa, respectively, one of which she was growing to hate, the other of which…confused her in a somewhat pleasant way.

"Don't worry," Dr. Akagi replied nonchalantly, not particularly caring one way or another. "The video monitors are turned off. Your privacy is protected."

'Well, at least I know she won't be selling pictures of me on the Inter—hey wait a minute!'

"That isn't the point!" the Second Child screeched, clenching her hands into fists. "It's about how I feel, you old hag! I don't want these perverts ogling my beautiful body."

'Old…hag?' twitched Ritsuko, suppressing a sudden wellspring of anger that threatened to overwhelm her at those words. It seemed that she and her mother were more alike than they would like to admit... 'Am I really the only one aging here at NERV? Just for that…I'll throw in an extra set of tests for dear Ms. Soryu.'

An audible sigh of impatience came over the intercom, prompting the Director of Project E to stop dodging the question.

"The point of this test is to read the harmonics directly from the body, without the assistance of the plug suit, Pilot Soryu," the good doctor responded testily, her mouth twitching. "And before you object…this is an order."

"Fine!" the redhead spat with a force to puncture steel. "Just don't watch, ok?"

'The Lilim can certainly be…vehement about such a simple thing as nudity,' thought Kaworu, rather amused by the situation, but taking pains not to provoke the Second Child where the cameras could see them. 'Even if the Second Child is reasonably attractive by Lilim standards, and seems to flaunt her body when clothed, it seems that she does not truly wish others to see when she is nude. Is the skin then, the boundary of the Lilim light of the soul, the absolute barrier they maintain? And thus, the empty promise of being able to see confers power over those who believe her words and actions? How very interesting...'

'No, I won't look. I won't look. I won't—if you don't want to look, why are you walking in front of us? I can't go forward if I don't look!' were the thoughts of an exasperated Shinji, just as a naked Kaworu leaned over to him and whispered in his ear.

"Why do you care so much about the First, Shinji-kun?" the grey-haired boy murmured. "Is she not just one being among many, a being doomed to eternal separation because she does not have love? She cannot even do anything for you in her endless sleep."

"What are you saying?" Shinji hissed in reply, eyes darkening at the words the Fourth was saying. "She's my friend. I-I care about her."

"Oh?" whispered Kaworu, raising an eyebrow. "And would you still care about her if she was an Angel?"

"An Angel? No…it couldn't be, Ayanami's not an Angel!" the Third said firmly, just loud enough for the Fourth to hear.

"Heh…you underestimate the Angels," the Fourth replied with an unusually serious expression. "Would not such a powerful enemy have an agent specialized in infiltration? And would not a spy, seeing a vulnerable one, take advantage? Think about it…was she not strange from the beginning, unsure of how to interact with humans, only speaking with you? She could see you had fragile heart, and that you were afraid of so many things—but she protected you, didn't she, making you rely on her, trust her? Even when she became a Lost One—"

"Lost One? How do you know that term?" the Third Child recoiled, leaping away from Kaworu as if the grey-haired boy was some sort of coiled serpent.

"It was in the dossier I was given as her replacement," the Fourth answered with a shrug. "But is it not better this way? For the Angel whose purpose on earth was to get close to you and manipulate you through your feelings, to be put into eternal dreamless sleep? It is for the best that an enemy lies defeated, no matter what the method."

Crack!

"You're lying!" Shinji spat, slapping Kaworu with a fierceness bordering on berserk rage at the insinuations the Fourth was making. "She's nothing like that…and she's nothing like you. I don't care what you say, whether you think she's an Angel or not, she's my friend, and I will bring her back, no matter what it takes."

The grey-haired boy found himself surprised by the defensiveness and speed of the Third, but smirked slightly anyway as he rubbed his stinging cheek.

"Suit yourself, Ikari-kun," the other said after a moment, speaking right into Ikari's ear. "But you cannot run away from the truth forever. Your so-called friend is an Angel, and if she awakens, she will try to cause Third Impact sooner or later…that is the inescapable fate of all Angels, even those who seem human. Would you really want to bring back your sworn enemy, even if she came to you as a friend?"

"You…"

A low growl of warning, to which the Fourth chuckled, a low and rather disturbing sound that unnerved the brown-haired boy.

"Ah, I see, you still think I'm lying," Kaworu mused softly. "But the greatest ability of the Lilim is their capacity for self-deception, is it not? Instead of seeing the totality of painful truth, one sees only what one wants to see. Besides, Ikari-kun, what motivation would I have to lie to you? I only tell you the truth—that like any Angel, Ayanami is destined to bring about the end if she wakens."

Before Shinji could say anymore, the Fourth walked off and boarded his entry plug, leaving the Third Child frozen in place as the words the odd one spoke sunk in.

'No! It's not true! It can't be true! I'm not lying to myself. Ayanami couldn't be an Angel…'

A flicker of doubt.

'...could she?'

Control Room, NERV HQ

Three incomplete Evangelion units floated in the murky oxygenated water of the Pribnow Box, sans armor, legs, cores, or heads, meant as simulation bodies for the pilots. Salvaged from early failures, these flesh mannequins had managed to avoid the fate being consigned to the Evangelion graveyard—for now. Today, they were being used to collect response data for the pilots to assist with the creation of the "autopilot" system that the Director of Project E had been feverishly working on, in a special sync test that allowed no plug suit or any other clothing, for that matter.

"All pilots prepared for entry," reported one of the nameless techs monitoring the test.

"Is that so? Then begin the test," ordered the proud Dr. Akagi, gazing out into the simulation bodies in the water, as if searching for answers to a question she did not even know. Or perhaps, she was wondering how she might surpass her mother.

The techs acknowledged the order, reporting progress with each step of the way, until at last the Simulation plug was under the control of the MAGI.

"Wah! It's so fast, MAGI…oh, great MAGI," praised Major Katsuragi, who had been promoted following the last Angel Incident. Somehow, the bottle blond could not keep from snorting at the thought of the purple-haired Operations Director bowing down to the three computers, worshiping them for the speed and accuracy of their computations. "I simply can't believe it took a week for the first test."

Thankfully, as a master of deception, the good doctor was able to mostly ignore the half-amusing, half-grating image in her mind, and so continued on with her business as usual.

"How are you feeling?" she asked the pilots, all the while monitoring the MAGI readout to check on the rate of data collection.

"Something's wrong with my senses," the Second Child complained, as vocal and outspoken as usual. "Only the right arm is clear, the rest is dull and heavy."

"That would seem to be the whole of it," confirmed the Fourth in a somewhat bored voice, looking out into the water almost…expectantly.

But Shinji was silent.

"Pilot Ikari, is something wrong?" Dr. Akagi inquired, noting his sync ratio seemed a little lower than usual.

"Oh, it's nothing," the Third lied. "I just have something on my mind." 'Things like: Who is Kaworu of the Seashore? Who is Rei of the Wave? Are they alike? Are they different? How does the Fourth know what he does?'

Things settled back into the comfort of routine, until once again the MAGI were stuck in a dilemma.

"That's the personality of their creator," groused NERV's head scientist. "Always bickering with herself, never certain of what to do."

"What are you talking about?" asked Misato curiously. "Didn't you make them?"

"…you really don't know anything, do you?" asked the bottle blond, a hint of exasperation creeping into her voice. 'Exactly how long have we been friends, Misato?'

"Unlike me, you're not exactly talkative about yourself," the purple haired major shot back, all too ready to begin another one of their verbal sniping duels to the pain.

"I just upgraded the system," Ritsuko explained, almost unwillingly. "My mother was the one who created the logic base and architecture."

'There are times I feel the MAGI have independent minds of their own'

Those present continued to work for some time, regressing back into the shells of silence and duty that bound them ever so comfortably.

Pribnow Box

Innocuous corrosion on a protein wall. A slight growth altering temperature and conductivity, sterilization deteriorating, cleanliness in vain. Seepage leaking inwards as a virus spreads, taking over inhuman cellular automata.

The entry plugs has been connected to the EVA units with signals relayed from the simulation bodies, and all was going smoothly when—

Klaxons sounded, stirring the control room personnel from their business.

"Contamination alert in the Sigma Unit, A Floor!" rang a cry of alarm. "87th wall is deteriorating, venting heat now. Additional abnormalities found on pipes 6 - 42."

"Corrosion of the protein wall is spreading," relayed Maya, somewhat surprised at the readings she was getting. "The rate of spread is explosive."

'What could this be…surely not an Angel…all Angels up to now have been rather large in scale.'

Ritsuko Akagi, head scientist of NERV, did not want to shut down the test. It had taken so long to get the data she needed, and if she halted now the Commander would be extremely annoyed. But between facing the Commander's annoyance and getting her test environment destroyed permanently, she would opt for the former, having done it before.

'Besides, his reaction will not be worse than when Rei III failed to activate,' she reasoned logically. 'Hmm…this infection must be biological in nature…'

"Prepare the lasers at maximum, burn out the invasive growth," she ordered, all business now.

"Yes ma'am, warming up lasers now, the rate of spread is continuing to increase."

And as if things weren't bad enough…

"What? This piece of junk is moving on its own?" exclaimed the Second Child, trying to regain control of her simulation body, which had begun to thrash about on its own.

'No…this is…impossible…'

"Corrosion is still spreading," reported Maya, eyes narrowing as the implications of this began to sink in. "It's invading the active water system of the simulation bodies."

"Ejecting all plugs now! Hurry the laser!" called the bottle blond doctor, as she pulled the emergency eject button to send the entry plugs hurtling towards the surface of Lake Asinoko.

In the next moment, the lasers powered up, locking onto the corruption and firing—only for an all too familiar orange hexagon to spring into being, blocking the lethal rays from striking their targets.

"AT-Field! Analysis confirms blood pattern blue!"

"An Angel?" crackled the voice of Sub-Commander Fuyutsuki over the intercom. "You let an Angel get inside?"

Ritsuko could only apologize.

"Sorry, sir."

"No excuse needed," the superior officer stated brusquely. "Seal off Central Dogma and separate it from Sigma Unit, then abandon the Prinbow Box."

"Sealing now," an anonymous tech confirmed.

Stunned by the unexpected developments, Maya and Ritsuko both simply stood there, until Misato grabbed both of them and physically dragged them into the lift.

"What are you doing? Hurry!"

Bridge, NERV HQ

Around NERV, things had a tendency to get much worse before they ever got better, as anyone who'd been witness to the Angel battles of the past could confirm. When facing the Third Angel, Shinji had been brutally beaten in his first sortie in EVA-01, only winning because the unit went berserk to save him. In facing the Fourth Angel, EVA-01 had been tossed around and impaled, barely managing to defeat the enemy at (literally) the last second. Against the Fifth, Shinji taking a high-powered particle beam to the chest and EVA-00 nearly being destroyed counted well enough. The Sixth, having been fought in international waters, far from the Geofront, had not posed much trouble. The Seventh had seemed easy, but then had split into two Angels that required perfect synchronization to defeat. The Eighth – again defeated by a berserker. The Ninth, two of the pilots went MIA. And one shouldn't even mention the Tenth, and the victory by catching the Angel as it plummeted from orbit.

Given that trend, it was all Maya Ibuki could do not to wonder if this Angel was somehow going to cause complications great enough to make the trials faced during the others seem…insignificant. So far in this encounter with Iruel, the EVAs had been ejected without pilots to prevent infection, attempts to destroy it with lasers and high concentrations of ozone had failed (with the nanoscale life form rapidly evolving to deal with the changes to its environment), and now it was hacking into the MAGI.

'A hacker angel…why couldn't it have just been some eldritch abomination from beneath the sea? Why a nanoscale, virus-like hacker Angel?' Maya asked herself silently. After all, titanic combat monsters that had come at NERV before had always been easily recognizable, and easy enough to come up with strategies against and thus fight, in theory, if not in practice.

"The growing lines are the electrical circuits," breathed Lt. Makoto Hyuga, monitoring the growths on the simulation bodies. "The Angel is itself a computer…"

"It has bypassed decoy entrances and is accessing the Security Databank," reported Shigeru Aoba, last of the bridge officers, his voice verging on panic. "It's cracking the password. 12th digit, 16th digit. D word cleared."

"It must want to invade MAGI," reasoned Dr. Akagi, fingers flying across the keyboard at a speed that was almost inhuman. "Attempting to shut down the I/O system. Shutdown in 3..2..failed. "

"Angel has made contact with Melchior, and is about to take control," Maya reported, watching helplessly as sectors and clusters of data fell one by one under the Angel's aegis. "Melchior has been reprogrammed by the Angel."

'This is bad…The World:R2 was still running as a hidden system process at the time of takeover—I was not able to shut off the connection. If the Angel enters the global network and takes up residence in The World, then they might be able to use their abilities against us—AT fields and all. Worse yet, there are AIDA fragments remaining on Melchior….'

But the mousy brunette pushed aside those thoughts for now…while there might be another problem soon to come, the more pressing concern at the moment was stopping the invasion of the MAGI, especially as—

"Self-destruction was proposed by the Artificial Intelligence, Melchior," came the feminine voice of the computer. "Rejected."

But before anyone could breathe a sigh of relief that disaster had been averted.

"N-now Melchior is hacking Balthazar!" cried Aoba, fingers racing as he tried one technique, then another to counter the Angel's progress.

"Damn, its fast!" was Hyuga's reaction, as he too plugged in command after command, with the other officers looking on.

'Where is Helba when you need her?' was the thought going through his head. Rather ironic, as the person behind the identity of Helba was thinking, 'Where is Aura when one needs her? If she had not returned to the sea of data, this would not have happened…'

Seeing how the second of the three MAGI computers was almost halfway to falling, Dr. Akagi settled for a delaying tactic, taking a deep breath and setting her teeth, she snapped out:

"Change the login mode! Set the synchro code to 15 second cycles!"

"Roger," acknowledged Aoba and Hyuga, inputting the changes, and watching as the invasion was halted, at least for a time.

"How long do we have?" inquired the Sub-Commander, not looking any happier about the situation than any of the others.

"Judging from observations, about 2 hours," responded Aoba.

"So it's the MAGI…against us," murmured Maya, grimacing at the thought of trying to outhack a sentient computer. 'I've done it before against Morganna, but not under these time constraints. After these wars are all over, I should really look into getting another job. Maybe CC Corp is hiring…I still have Lios' phone number…and I'm only half-joking.'

Lake Asinoko

Three thrones of the soul floated on the still waters of a lake above the Geofront, with two of the three pilots disoriented after the turbulence of a force eject and venting from the Pribnow Box (the remaining one, of course, was Tabris, who remained calm…even if the MAGI did self-destruct, his AT field would protect him from harm).

The Second Child, of course, was rather displeased, as she couldn't get out of her plug without clothing, and so was just sitting in the her entry plug sulking.

In the silence, the Third Child found his thoughts drifting back to recent events concerning Rei Ayanami, The World, the other Children, and everything that the Fourth had said to him earlier, even as he tried to put it from his mind time and time again.

Thunk!

With a dull metallic clank, the hatch to his entry plug was thrown open, and in popped an all too familiar face, one inset with crimson eyes and topped with a grey mop of hair.

"What are you doing here, Nagisa-san?" Shinji asked warily. After the Fourth's words earlier in the day, the last thing he really wanted was for the grey-haired boy to throw anything other confusing statements at him.

"I simply wanted to speak with you, Ikari-kun," Kaworu replied. "May I come in?"

Of course, it was also against Shinji's nature to refuse a courtesy to anyone who was not explicitly his enemy, so with a sigh, he gave in.

"Fine," he replied, averting his eyes from the near-stranger. "What did you want to talk about? Have you come to apologize for what you did earlier?"

"There is no apology to be made for the truth," was the firm but gentle response. "For you, like most Lilim, are like a hedgehog, a prickly being that prefers to be ignorant of the truth of others, that you may never know betrayal. But even you cannot run from the truth forever…that you are alone, that everyone is alone, that everyone has secrets that they do not wish you to know. Just as you have your secrets, and yet you have something that you want me to hear, is that correct?"

"No, Nagisa-san, it's not," rebutted Shinji Ikari, his eyes narrowed to a sliver of their usual size. "I don't have anything to say to you, except that I don't know why you were chosen to replace Ayanami. Ayanami was kind, even if she could not express it well, and you…you are cruel."

"Ah, but that is just how the Second wishes me to be," came the glib words of Kaworu. "To be truthful instead of hiding behind a mask, to face the world, not run away. You…like me, are bounded by a destiny we cannot abide."

"No, Nagisa-san…I am nothing like you," the Third rumbled, his eyes flashing in the darkness. "Please…leave me alone. Go to Asuka-san, if she desires you so."

"Heh…you are stronger than I had thought, Shinji Ikari," the grey-haired boy murmured as he left the plug. "But only time will tell how well you endure the trials to come."

This, of course, left Shinji wondering: 'What did he mean by that? And why does he say Lilim instead of human, as if he was not?'

Within MAGI Casper, NERV HQ

"…the end of the evolution is self-destruction…death itself."

Maya found herself mulling over that thought often at moments like this, especially as she had some experience with evolving artificial life forms, namely Vagrant AIs and AIDA, applicable in this case, as this Angel was in some ways similar to the AIDA, consisting of nanomachines capable of evolving a form of intelligence. While it was true that the end of evolution tended to lead towards self-destruction, evolution also had a tendency to spawn off unexpected adaptations to an organism…Aura's ascension to godhood via death being a case in point.

After some deliberation, a plan had been devised to defeat the Angel: by directly connecting Casper, the only remaining free MAGI core, to the Angel, a self-destruct program code could be uploaded, thus forcing it into a choice between coexistence with the MAGI or self-annihilation. Because it was the mandate of all life forms to live (especially those that had eaten of the Fruit of Life), what they would do is essentially call the Angel's bluff in attempting to destroy headquarters.

Maya was somewhat uncomfortable with this, having spent enough time around artificial life forms to know they could be unpredictable, as well as around Makoto Hyuga, whose beloved manga protagonists always seemed to choose a third option when confronted with a binary choice, but had no choice but to agree.

So the mousy brunette found herself crawling on her hands and knees alongside Dr. Akagi and Major Katsuragi into the core of Casper, only to freeze at the sight of pieces of paper scattered around the interior.

'Either someone was very sloppy with filing their work, meaning that this is the reason we get occasional overheating and malfunctions, or…these are secret developer notes.'

At times like these, there was nothing to do but ask the obvious question:

"W—What are these?" Maya asked, looking from interior bulkhead to bulkhead and finding each and every one covered with notes. "Could they be—?"

"System developer's notes," confirmed Ritsuko, somewhat stunned, but not entirely surprised. Her own desk wasn't too clean either, and it wasn't too much of a shock that her mother had kept some things out of the manual.

"Unbelievable…these are the secret codes for the MAGI!" the bridge tech gushed enthusiastically. "I can't believe I'm actually allowed to see this! With these, we can program much faster than was expected."

'And with this, I gain a decisive edge over any manipulations of MAGI I might need to perform in the future, adding to my alter-ego's reputation as a genius hacker.'

"Thanks, Mother," Dr. Akagi muttered. "With these, we'll make it for sure."

The next part of the mission had involved (very literal) hacking into Casper, using wrenches, screwdrivers, and a buzzsaw to get at the biological brain of the unit, using leads and probes to directly interface. Dr. Akagi passed the time by relaying tidbits about MAGI, concerning how it had been created using the personality transfer OS, transferring three aspects of Naoko Akagi's mind onto cloned templates.

'Which of course, makes for an interesting question…can a MAGI unit be infected with AIDA? Its brain is identical in nature to a human being's, if far more specialized…'

And then Balthazar was taken over, and all hell broke loose, pitting two genius programmers against one hyper-evolving Angel.

The voice of MAGI didn't help matters any.

"Self-destruction is now voted for by the AIs," it informed all who were left within the command center. "Self-destruction will be executed 20 seconds after all three have agreed to it. Due to the activation of special rule 582, cancellation by two of the AIs is impossible."

Casper, the lone remaining MAGI, struggled valiantly against the combined might of the other two,

"Self-destruction in 20 seconds."

Frenetic typing, as the Angel's tendrils invaded more and more of the remaining data clusters.

"Self-destruction in 15 seconds."

"Ritsuko! Hurry!" urged Misato Katsuragi, understandably a little anxious about the situation. Near death experiences tended to have that effect on people.

"Self-destruction in 10 seconds."

"Done," reported Maya, eyes focused intently on the screen as she input further commands to lock the Angel out of the programs of the two surviving Obsidian Knights, and attempted to cut off the I/O to the outside world—but there was no more time.

"Self-destruction in 5 seconds."

"Hit it," Ritsuko ordered, and in unison, the two pressed "enter", sending and executing the program.

"4, 3…Self-destruction cancelled by AIs. Special rule 582 has been cleared. MAGI system returning to normal operation."

The screen showed the infection backflowing from Casper to Balthazar to Melchior, and then it vanished, with everyone breathing a sigh of relief. Everyone, that is, except Maya, who had seen but was unable to stop a large transmission from Melchior to the global network before MAGI returned to normal operation.

'Damn…it took the third option.'

Sea of Data

Corrosion. Seeping, leaking, squelching into dark places of The World, reviving the place where the fruit of knowledge had been claimed, and a fallen angel bound. In an infinite expanse of darkness stirred three sleeping forms, revenants of the old world reborn into the new through the intervention of the Dawn. Created to correct imbalance and war against AIDA, they were Knights beholden only to the Goddess and her kin.

A stitched-together zombie-like Twin Blade, clad in red and black, wreathed in azure fire and carrying in his distinctive tri-edged weapons, the dual swords Empty Skies. A feral growl escaped his lips as he snapped shut his weapons, touched the bracelet on his arm, and vanished in a ball of light.

A feral knight in tarnished armor, with silver hair and sticklike wings, the shadow of azure sky with demonic grin baring teeth and a wickedly curved sword, an empty mirage.

A burly, battle-scarred stitched together woad raider, wearing little armor, save for the black and green body paint that bore his sign, a remnant of the azure sea, armed with an empty shadow.

As one they vanished into light, bound for the battlefield to prove their worth anon.