Third Movement.
The room became a maelstrom of activity. "Alright, pilots!" Misato said. "We've got to scramble the Evas! Everybody into your plug suits and get to the cages as fast as you can! Go!" The three children scattered, sprinting the short distance to the locker rooms.
Asuka had no time for angry ruminations as she rushed to change into her plug suit, hurriedly stuffing her school clothes into the locker and forcing it shut. Rei stood beside her, already covered in her white, form-fitting plug suit. The two of them moved quickly to the cages, where the Evas were being readied for combat.
Shinji arrived in the cage less than a minute after the two girls, and all of them stood, waiting for the sortie to be announced. Shinji looked slightly frightened of the beast in the sky, Rei was emotionless as ever. Asuka appeared to have tensed her muscles, like a cat waiting to spring onto its prey.
There was a slight jolt as the huge metal platform began to rise into the air. Through the wire mesh they could see the Evangelions, all three polished and shining. The platform stopped with a clank and the pilots went to their respective entry plugs.
Asuka could hear the hiss of the other two plugs opening, and then spun the hatch open on her own machine. She climbed inside, reminded of the previous day's synch test.
Now it's all real, she thought sardonically.
The inside of the plug was dark, so much so that she could not see her own hand in front of her face. "Flooding plugs." A technician's voice came over the radio. A moment later LCL began to fill the entry plug, and Asuka braced herself for combat. She concentrated all her thoughts on the coming battle, trying not to be distracted by the day's annoyances.
The plug filled to the top with LCL, and Asuka could hear the sound of mechanica pulling her tube into the air, distantly sensing the moments when the plug had no contact with the ground. There were loud hissing noises from outside the entry plug as the back of the Eva slid open and the plug was inserted into the giant machine.
Asuka pressed a small control nub near one fingertip and the inside of the plug lit up, cycling through a rainbow of colors before settling into a near-clear hue, tainted by the slightest violet. Asuka could see the cage from where she sat, a huge room created only to house the Evangelions.
"All Evas, board the launch catapults," Misato commanded. She sounded notably calmer than she had when she dispatched them. The metal monsters took deliberate, laborious steps toward and onto the giant platforms which would raise them cityside.
Each Eva assumed its place on the catapults, and with a start they began a rapid ascent to the surface of Tokyo-3. Asuka closed her eyes so the launch tube rushing past her viewscreen wouldn't make her sick. Suddenly the three pilots and their vehicles were standing amongst the skyscrapers, some extending higher than the Evangelions themselves.
Floating many hundreds of meters away was the angel, a strange sight that put the children on edge. "All readings say the target hasn't done anything since we first identified it," Misato said over the radio. Asuka opened vidlinks to her fellow pilots, both of whom were wearing stern, focused expressions.
"Evas, advance on the target to five hundred meters," Misato said. The robots moved slowly forward, both to avoid provoking attack and because the city was a veritable obstacle course of buildings, kiosks, and other comparatively small but destructible objects.
Asuka kept her Eva close to the buildings, as though she were sneaking up to the angel. Shinji lowered his robot into a crouch; only Rei remained fully standing.
"No readings from the target," Misato reported. Asuka nodded her head, momentarily forgetting that Misato couldn't see her, although the other pilots could. "Hopefully this won't be too hard," Misato said. "The plan is for all three pilots to advance on the angel, with one pilot taking point and the other two as backup."
"Great!" Asuka said. "Shinji should take point," she added with a touch of sarcastic overenthusiam, "seeing as he has the highest synch ratio and all." She smirked.
"I'll do it!" Shinji said, almost excited. Asuka's mouth dropped open.
"You'll what?" she said incredulously.
"Shinji," Misato said, concerned, "the point is…I mean, are you sure—"
"Asuka's right, after all," Shinji informed them. "That's what you said, isn't it, Misato? 'You are number one!'"
"Well, I, er…"
"C'mon, Shinji," Asuka said, baiting him. "Nobody's objecting."
Shinji urged his Eva forward, moving as quickly as he could across the city. He stopped behind one particularly tall building, brandishing an oversized energy pistol created for the huge robot.
Rei and Asuka immediately threw their machines into gear, rushing to flank him. That idiot, Asuka thought, visibly angry. He's so rash…we don't even know how to fight that thing…
In his own Eva, Shinji sat and waited impatiently for the others to arrive. If we don't attack soon it'll move, he worried, watching the angel float in the sky before him, not a hundred meters off. The other Evas were still several hundred meters away from him and the going was slow.
I'm just going to have to do it myself, Shinji thought. Without warning he stuck his Eva's torso out from the building, pointing the huge pistol at the orb in the sky. He fired three shots, each one rattling the Evangelion and resounding throughout the city. With barely a sound the angel vanished, disappearing without a trace. It suddenly rematerialized not twenty meters from him.
A shadow began to grow from beneath the angel, an ever-expanding circle of blackness. Shinji let out a strangled cry as the shadow reached his feet and his Evangelion began to be absorbed into it.
"What the hell!?" Asuka shouted, watching Unit-01 sink into the shadow.
Shinji pointed his gun downward and frantically began firing into the dark mass, but the shots were merely absorbed by the stuff, and the shadow did not stop spreading over the city. Entire buildings began to sink into the blackness, until the shadow covered nearly half the city. Asuka leapt up and clutched the side of a drowning skyscraper as the shadow passed under her feet, pulling her Eva laboriously upward to avoid being sucked into the black.
Shinji's panicked cries rang in her ears. "Misato-san! Misato-san!" His Eva had been absorbed nearly to its chest and was sinking rapidly, and his shouts became all the more desperate. "Misato-san! Asuka! Ayanami! Misato-san!"
The Eva's head vanished into the shadow. "Shinji-kun!" Misato's cry sounded over the radio, but did not make Shinji re-emerge from the blackness.
"All Evas, pull back," Misato said.
Asuka started. "But! But Shinji—"
Misato's voice was filled with terrible defeat. "That's an order."
