"Look at them scurrying around." – Shamshel mused, tone dripping with contempt. – "Not even trying to hide their fear and weakness."
"Are you certain this is the right location?" – Sarafiel asked, glancing around them. Shamshel could feel the younger Angel's unease at the two of them having trespassed into the middle of a civilian population center, but it was a feeling Shamshel did not share. Lilim existed to be trampled on, it was cold, hard truth. It didn't matter what planet they hailed from, they were all the same: if something didn't kill them, they'll kill each other instead. The end result is ultimately the same and thinking otherwise was hopelessly naive. Worse, it was weak – and the universe does not abide weakness.
As an Angel, she knew that very well.
"Yes. This is where the Lilim's fake Angels are nesting, concealed underground as if we do not already know."
"You mean this is where you first encountered them."
"Silence your tongue and wait with patience. They are no doubt licking their wounds, but they will come out without fail if we poke their hideout."
Geofront, AEL Headquarters
January 10, 2042
0812 hours
"Where the hell did they come from?!" – Shepard barked as soon as he dashed into the control center, nearly hitting the automated door with his shoulder. This was not his preferred way to start a day – but then again, soldiers couldn't exactly pick and choose which time of the day they wanted to fight in.
Even worse, this was the final nail in the coffin for the idea that the Angels were just dumb animals. Launching a follow-up attack while they're at their weakest was anything but accidental and it couldn't possibly have come at a worse goddamn time.
"Unknown! They just appeared out of thin air a couple kilometers from here." – that girl who hung around Yui all the time – Ibuki, he recalled – replied from her console.
"And that's not all." – added Aoba. – "One of the Angels is a visual match for the second one we encountered."
"You mean it's the same species, or the same one?"
"Impossible to tell without a close analysis. We didn't find any remains from the previous one."
Then Hyuga said something that sent a chill down Shephard's spine. – "The other one is also a match for one of the Angels encountered two days ago."
'Oh, don't fucking tell me...!'"The one that wrecked the kids?"
He didn't even try to hide his sigh of relief when the response came. – "No, one of the two lesser ones."
Okay, that they can work with. Based on the debriefing and combat footage, the pilots were handling those ones just fine.
"So our luck hasn't run out completely just yet." – he muttered. At that point, he heard the door behind him opening again, signaling Yui's arrival. – "Doc, we've got trouble. Another double event."
"I heard." – the woman replied tersely. – "Unit-02 is ready, we're only waiting for the pilot."
"She just called, inbound with Nagisa." – Maya piped in.
'That's my girl.'"You guys managed to scrape together Unit-01 after all?"
Yui gave him a flat look that all but said 'are you seriously asking me that?'. – "Not even remotely, colonel. I told you yesterday, Unit-02 is all we have."
"What about Unit-00?"
"Being prepared for surgery. Reattaching the head is not a trivial operation and there's a difference between practicing on already expired prototypes and carrying it out on a living subject without killing it."
"Can you send it out without a head?"
"And one arm? She'll never survive."
"She could walk just fine once she had something to replace her eyes." – he pointed out. – "And we aren't sending your girl to fight on the front line, just to lay down some covering fire for Unit-02. Just rig a camera onto the shoulders or something."
"That would take hours."
"Doc, we're kinda running out of choices here. I mean, look at this!" – He gestured at the image of the Angels on the control center's viewscreen. – "However the hell they're getting around, they keep hitting us right here. Which means either they knew where we were based all along, or we're sitting on top of whatever's luring them here. Add in them launching a follow-up attack right after roughing us up with the big guns and this is exactly what I was saying last year: these guys aren't dumb animals, they know what they're doing."
"Then why are they just standing there?" – Hyuga asked.
"Waiting for us to come out, probably."
"And if we don't?"
"I don't know about you, but I'd rather not find out." – Shephard replied with a shrug, turning towards the viewscreen to gaze at the Angels. – "We went to engage the last ones out in the middle of nowhere to reduce collateral damage and if these two throw a tantrum inside the city because we stood them up..." – He trailed off for a few moments. – "Doc, have Unit-02 moved to the cargo elevator immediately. We need to launch the second the pilot's on board. And someone get me a line to the military, I might need to make some calls."
Verifying that Unit-02 was standing securely on the rising elevator, Asuka checked the vacuum seal of her plugsuit again. Who in the world came up with the design, she seriously had a second thought about not asking from Yui. Having to wear a specialized suit for handling military hardware has been a reality for air force pilots for nearly a century now, she was aware. But these things, skintight and thin as a swimsuit without even covering the head? Literally the only reason she could see for it was keeping out the LCL so that she could move around and operate the entry plug controls unencumbered, as opposed to having her clothes pull against every move as if she was trying to swim in street clothes – or even worse, having to pilot in one of those old, goofy diving suits, except with the LCL being inside rather than outside, weighing her down non-stop.
Still, it was like someone with poor vision mixed up a swimsuit and a HEV suit. Wearing the former would be practically the same. But at least she didn't have to pilot in the nude. She learned early on that soldiers can't be pampered or choosy about what they were ordered to do and with what, but that particular requirement would've been an instant deal-breaker for this job. Salary or no salary, she was a pilot, not a stripper.
...although a small part of her teenage brain did find the mental image of herself sitting in the entry plug in her birthday suit without anyone's knowledge to be an intriguing one, regardless of Sekhmet's jeers about her proportions. She was still developing, damn it!
No time to dwell on that, though, and she most definitely didn't have time to daydream about a naked Mari sitting in the entry plug either. She had a job to do. – "Okay, what's our play?"
"Listen up." – her father spoke up on the comm window to her left. – "These things dropped in on us way too fast for the authorities to sound the civil defense alarms in time. We have no idea how many people didn't make it to the civil defense shelters yet, so watch your step."
"How? This thing doesn't exactly fly, you know."
"I have no idea why but these things seem to be awfully interested in the Evangelions in particular. Maybe we can use that to lure them away from the residential districts."
"Pretty big maybe, but we'll see."
"Good. In the meantime, I'll see if I can't get you some air support."
"We wouldn't need any if I still had A-type equipment." – Sekhmet grumbled.
"Take it up with the boss, she's the one who had it taken off and disassembled for stress analysis after what we put it through." – Asuka replied without missing a beat. – "Besides, more armor is a good idea for going solo."
"Why bother going to the battlefield if you're scared for your life?"
"Why fight if you don't plan on surviving so that you can fight in more battles?"
"I am a weapon. I am meant to kill!"
"No, you are the prototype of a weapon." – Asuka retorted. – "Under normal circumstances, they wouldn't let you go anywhere near a battlefield. The only reason you're going there anyway is because they don't have anyone else to send yet. So shut up and be happy you're even getting this chance!"
"You little-!"
"I don't want to hear it, tin can! Save your murderboner for the enemy!"
"Not exactly how I would have worded it, but I agree with the sentiment." – Yui noted. – "Sekhmet, focus on the task at hand."
"Same here." – Closing her eyes for a moment, Asuka gave the controls a squeeze as she released a sigh to calm herself. – "Time to see what this tin can's really made of."
Asuka already had the approximate location of both Angels highlighted on the entry plug display by the time Unit-02 reached the surface. Not that it was of any advantage; as soon as she actually spotted them, they were already turning towards her. Clearly there was no room for stealth here. Even so, she knew better than to run in and engage right away. All that time she learned how to shoot, how to fight, how to pilot a battleframe, it was repeatedly hammered into her head that the fastest way for a soldier to get themselves killed was to stick their neck out looking for trouble, instead of laying low, assessing the situation and figuring out a way to hit the enemy where or how they didn't see it coming.
The capabilities of one of her foes, she already knew by experience to be packing more ranged firepower than her rifle. The other, she had seen combat footage of and knew it was oriented more towards CQC, for which all she had was a pair of knives and the back of her rifle. The equation was therefore clear: she was screwed either way if she charged in.
If only she had something to get the Angels' attention with... not that it was a likely prospect, based on her father's yelling in the background of her comm link to the control center. – "What don't you understand, dipshit?! Look at the goddamn satellites, there are active hostiles in the city right now!" – A pause. – "No, for the last goddamn time, this is NOT a drill!"
She had heard from her father how hard dealing with the Navy was for an Army officer (and vice versa), but he was supposed to be talking to the latter rather than the former, close air support supposedly being Army jurisdiction, which meant it was probably bureaucratic trouble rather than interservice BS. Of all the times...
She was well and truly on her own here, then. Which is why she took aim but didn't fire, locking her eyes on the Angels but waiting on them to make the first move.
The silent standoff was finally broken by Shamshel as she slowly began to slither towards the lone Evangelion.
"This one is mine!" – Sarafiel objected, moving to overtake Shamshel. – "It hurt my brother."
"And ran from mine. Until the others come out, this one will provide us with entertainment just fine."
With that, Shamshel increased speed. That was the cue for Unit-02 to open fire, its rifle's shells exploding harmlessly against the Angel's AT-field. Still, the Eva started backpedaling to keep out of range of Shamshel's plasmawhips while continuing to fire, seamlessly reloading and resuming fire within less than two seconds as soon as the rifle's first magazine clicked empty.
It was at that point that Shamshel put her AT-field behind her movement and blasted off towards the Evangelion much faster than it could continue running away, only for Unit-02 to simply sidestep her charge, turn and fire at her back. Shamshel immediately threw up her AT-field but the first two shots slipped through, the sudden pain causing the Angel to lose focus and crash lengthwise against the streetfront.
Turning around to get eyes on its other foe, Unit-02 narrowly avoided being skewered by an energy beam from Sarafiel who was skimming sideways at high speed while lobbing off more attacks above the rooftops from her palms, evidently using Asuka's own tactics from the previous battle against her.
Returning the favor in the same way (as much as she could without the mobility of A-type equipment, that is), Unit-02 dodged under an incoming shot from the now rapidly approaching Angel into a roll that took it behind a building. Sarafiel immediately rounded the corner, palm raised and ready to fire... only to find nothing but an empty street. Her confusion lasted for only a moment before the Eva rose up on the other side of the building and shot the Angel directly in the face across the roof, Sarafiel stumbling back with a grunt of pain as the first couple of shells connected before she threw up her AT-field to send the rest ricocheting away.
Her next attack pulverized the building completely, Unit-02 narrowly diving out of the way of the flying debris before quickly crawling behind the next building and huddling down out of sight, waiting to see which side the Angel will approach from. Asuka nearly missed the upper edge of her field of view suddenly shifting and looked up just in time to realize that she was looking at an upside-down image of her Evangelion reflected off a mirror surface floating in the air. – "Shit!"
"I can see you!" – Sarafiel taunted before letting loose with a flurry of beams that curved around the building and battered the hiding spot Asuka hastily vacated in a very undignified manner.
"What the hell was that?!"
"That humanoid-type Angel can use its AT-field like a mirror, it can see around cover!"
Which meant that abusing concealment to control the range and angle of engagement like she preferred wasn't going to work, seeing how the Angel apparently wised up to the fact that it could neutralize said concealment at any time with a real-time bird's-eye view of the battlefield that didn't even require it to get off the ground and abandon cover itself. Which in turn meant that she had no choice but to put the pressure on hard enough to keep her opponent too off-balance to strike back, something she hated. It was the tactic of the desperate, not that of a professional.
She had no more time to consider her options before Shamshel burst through the building she was next to and rammed Unit-02 hard enough to shove the Evangelion into another building hard enough demolish it completely. Striking down on its prone foe to deliver the killing blow, Shamshel's attack was blunted by Unit-02 swiftly kicking the Angel in its midsection, making her stumble back just enough for the superheated tentacle to glance off of the Evangelion's frontal armor rather than slicing the torso itself in half, a brief bolt of lightning running up the tentacle as the voltage in the electric reactive armor followed the ionized plasma to ground itself through Shamshel. Although it wasn't enough to actually hurt or even disorient the Angel, Asuka swiftly grabbed the tentacle and yanked on it to pull the Angel down on the ground, driving her other fist straight into what she presumed as its face to knock it aside before rolling away and getting back onto her feet just in time to avoid a sweeping beam from Sarafiel perched up from behind a building in the exact same way Asuka herself did earlier, missing her to instead diagonally slice half a block's worth of buildings in half. – "That cheeky little-!"
"Asuka, watch that collateral damage!" – her father warned.
"Tell that to the Angels!" – Asuka yelled back and killed the connection. She did not need the distraction right now.
With a roar, the girl charged forward and leapt over the building, grabbing Sarafiel by the face and putting Unit-02's entire weight and momentum behind a shove that knocked both combatants off their feet. Grabbing a prog knife, she immediately went for the Angel's eye but Sarafiel caught the blade hilt-deep in her own forearm with a grunt before grabbing Unit-02's face in return and pushing back, squeezing in a grip Asuka could feel was slowly cracking the helmet. Driving elbow into elbow, Unit-02 managed to weaken and break the hold, trapping the arm under its own to wrestle itself behind its foe and bending the Angel's arm backwards in an angle that would force any human on their knees.
Before she could do more than that, Asuka abruptly let go and threw herself backwards just in time to avoid Shamshel diving down on her like a bird of prey, somewhat clumsily but effectively turning the fall into a backwards tumble from which she got back onto her feet. Reaching back with one hand, she grabbed onto a construction crane and tore it straight out of the ground before swinging it like an improvised mace, the sound of thunder blasting across the street as metal struck AT-field hard enough for the recoil to make the Evangelion take a half-step backwards. Shamshel immediately swung a counterattack but only managed to slice off the rear end of the crane's shaft before Unit-02 swung the rest back around and clobbered the Angel full-force with it, Shamshel's grunt of disorientation summarily turning into a shriek of agony when Unit-02 reversed the swing and drove the bent and half-molten stump of the crane's shaft directly into one of the Angel's eyes, twisting it for good measure.
Down in the control center, Aoba whistled. – "She's good..."
"Way better than Nagisa." – Hyuga replied.
"Eyes on your displays!" – Maya snapped at both of them. – "This isn't a sports event, she's fighting for her life out there! Keep watching the telemetry or Ikari's going to have your heads!"
Back on top, Asuka's head snapped to the right and Unit-02 ducked just in time to avoid a nearly point-blank palm blast from Sarafiel before swinging the crane around one last time, sweeping Sarafiel's leg out from under the Angel and sending it onto its back just as the crane finally succumbed to the repeated abuse. Even so, the loss of the improvised weapon only bought Sarafiel enough time to get back on her feet before the red Evangelion grabbed her face with one hand and proceeded to introduce her torso to the business end of the progressive knife held in the other.
"I'm REALLY-!" – Stab. – "Fucking!" – Stab. – "Sick of this!" – Stab. – "BULLSHIT!"
A flash from the corner of her eye alerted Asuka just in time to let go of the knife lodged into Sarafiel and yank Unit-02's arm back a split second before Shamshel's tentacle would've lopped it off. Good news was that she still had both arms. Bad news was that the tentacle immediately swung up and coiled itself around her other arm.
Gritting her teeth, it took all of Asuka's fortitude to not scream. So that's what Nagisa felt like too during his own turn against this particular Angel months ago. Good to know.
Knowing full well that she had only seconds until experiencing what it felt like to have her left arm fully deep-fried, she did the exact last thing both Angels expected to. Instead of trying to pull it off and get her other hand burned as well, she let go of Sarafiel with her ensnared arm, grabbed the Angel with her other hand and pressed Shamshel's superheated appendage directly against Sarafiel's core.
Down in the Geofront, Kaworu flinched hard from the sharp spike of pain lancing through his head from the deafening scream of absolute agony that erupted out of Sarafiel as she violently shoved Unit-02 back hard enough to free the Evangelion's arm, both hands gripping the charred red orb as tiny crystalline fragments spilled from between her fingers. Whatever Rei did to him after whatever Ramiel's presence was doing to him, it worked fine during the last time, at least until that third Angel – what did Tabris call it, Zeruel? – showed up. With that one, no amount of mental fortitude could stave off the sheer, oppressive pressure the Angel was radiating with its mere presence. It wasn't merely powerful, but its mere visage was somehow scratching and gnawing at him, making it known that this was not an opponent he wanted to cross paths with.
There was no way to deny it: in the last battle, he froze up. And summarily paid the price for it, just as Asuka has been saying. This time, however, the coin was lying on its other side: Kaworu knew with absolute certainty that Sarafiel just experienced something more painful than he had ever felt in his own life.
"W...what the hell...?" – Asuka murmured, unconsciously rubbing her left forearm. From the way the Angel reacted, that had to hurt and the knowledge that she was finally doing damage to those fuckers was a welcome one – but that wasn't the reason she stopped.
She could swear she heard something...
The girl was shaken out of it by Shamshel attempting to take advantage of her distraction to decapitate Unit-02, only for Asuka to reflexively duck under the swipe, grab the tentacled Angel with her right arm and smash it face-first into the nearest building before backing away just in the nick of time to avoid getting caught in a hailstorm of ordinance from the fighters and gunships roaring overhead.
"About goddamn time they're here!"
With Shamshel distracted, Unit-02 turned away and broke out into a sprint towards Sarafiel, drawing a knife mid-step with obvious intent to finish off her wounded foe...
...only for Sarafiel to turn tail and run, stumbling around as if feeling sick but very obviously trying to put distance between itself and the charging Evangelion.
Not that Asuka was going to give her a chance.
"COME ON, YOU MOTHERFUCKER!" – Asuka roared as she opened up with Unit-02's head autocannons, every single shell of which slammed into Sarafiel's back with no AT-field in the way. Right before she could catch up, however, reality suddenly tore itself apart in front of Sarafiel into a hole of complete darkness that swallowed the Angel in an instant. Asuka immediately dug in her heels to stop, skidding to a halt barely a few meters from the hole before jumping back into a fighting stance, ready to face whatever emerged from the hole.
Instead, another hole opened to her right and before she could react, every single autocannon shell yet to hit Sarafiel when she vanished was spat right back at the Evangelion at point-blank range. And unlike the Angels, she didn't have an AT-field.
Nor were the impacts rocking her in her chair aimed at the Evangelion's armored torso.
"Alert: reactor core containment compromised. Emergency SCRAM engaged. 20 seconds until reactor shutdown." – Sekhmet reported tersely as both holes collapsed into themselves and vanished without a trace of having ever existed.
"Fuck!" – Asuka swore. – "Sekhmet, drop the reactor!"
"Why?"
"We've still got battery power, right?"
"That's for emergency use only!" – Yui interjected, having apparently resumed communications while Asuka was distracted. – "I'd highly advise you to retreat until we can attach a replacement reactor."
"Boss, I'm alone with no backup. If this isn't an emergency, what is? "
"She's got a point, doc." – Shephard chimed in. – "If that Angel decides to follow her down here, it'll trash this place before your people can put that reactor in place."
"And every second we spend arguing about it is one second off the battery. Sekhmet, we're going in."
"Now you're talking my language, girl."
With series of bangs, puffs of smoke emerged from the Evangelion's back as explosive bolts between it and the reactor housing fired, causing the cyborg to stumble forward as the several hundred ton hump on its back dropped away and hit the pavement in a loud crash.
Taking a moment to feel out the different balance of weight, Asuka noted the new warning on her HUD.
PRIMARY POWER OFFLINE
AUXILIARY POWER STATUS: DISCHARGING
99.99% / ~9m59s REMAINING
'Straightforward enough.'
Looking around, she finally spotted Shamshel in the distance, angrily lashing out at the aircraft buzzing around her like flies - and as several columns of smoke showed, it wasn't entirely unsuccessful. Flexing her fingers on the controls, Asuka pushed ahead, steadily accelerating into a run as she got a feel for her newly unencumbered steps.
Fighting with a heavy reactor on her back was one thing and felt some getting used to, even though it wasn't that fundamentally different from a battleframe. But this? She felt like she was going to fly up into the sky with each step, even as the ground shook and cracked under her feet. She had found herself wandering sometimes just how can something that large and heavy can move the way Rei could make Unit-00 move, but now? Now she finally understood it. It wasn't merely a matter of the quiet girl somehow inexplicably being better than her, who spent most of her life training. No, the answer was right here, under her beck and call.
It was pure, sheer power like none she had ever felt before in her life.
Shamshel was, no shame in admitting it, more than a little annoyed.
It was supposed to be an easy run. Knowing Zeruel's handiwork, she knew for a fact that the Lilim's fake Angels couldn't possibly be in any condition to stop her and Sarafiel from getting a little payback. She was especially eager to find the silver one and carve out its heart herself, watching the life leave its eyes and enjoy every second of it with the satisfaction of having avenged her earlier humiliation, even if she could've done it only after her brother already softened it up. And when the red fake she didn't know appeared by itself, Shamshel felt victory already in her grasp.
Only for the fake to stubbornly refuse to die, even when outnumbered, putting up a far better fight than the other two ever did to the point where Shamshel felt incensed. Where was this one the last time she was here? Why wasn't it the one who fought against her that time? Did the wretched Lilim actually think she was too little a threat to merit their strongest warrior? She was no Zeruel, but the thought of Lilim daring to condescend to her was infuriating. They were nothing but cattle to be harvested and molded into service, the rightful cosmic order of things every Angel knew from the moment of their quickening. Sachiel being defeated by them was not proof of their strength, it was proof of Sachiel's own weakness.
She thought that Sarafiel at least would be marginally stronger, but that particular thought only served to enflame Shamshel's fury. Damaging the throne of the soul is one thing, but to think that the wretched Lilim would DARE turn Shamshel's own attack against Sarafiel in that way...!
As soon as she finished swatting away the annoying flies buzzing around her as if they could hope to hurt her, she was going to find that red fake and render unto it what her brother had done to the silver one, even if she had to recruit Israfel to avenge Sarafiel in case she doesn't survive her injury.
Silently seething, Sarafiel swiped at another aircraft making an attack run on her, splattering its molten fuselage across the ground. – "Run, you vermin."
Whatever else the Angel was about to say never came, as Shamshel was suddenly planted face-first into the ground from the force of Unit-02's running dropkick connecting to the back of her upper body. Scrambling back onto its feet, the Evangelion immediately grabbed the Angel's tail and swung the entire creature around itself, spinning around several times like an Olympic hammer thrower before letting go to let the latter's momentum take over.
All Shamshel could do as her involuntary trajectory carried her over the edge of the lake was scream in impotent rage as she couldn't slow her tumble enough to regain her bearings, even as the surface of the lake drew closer and closer.
Then her plasmawhips touched the water and all hell broke loose. The surface of the lake visibly bent upwards for a split second before erupting into a titanic shockwave that rippled outwards, shattering every window that was still intact in the port before the tidal wave arrived and swept the coastal structures away like a house of cards in front of a standing fan.
And in the middle of the apocalypse stood Unit-02, refusing to budge against the assault of the elements as the mushroom cloud of the steam explosion caused by a small lakeful of near-freezing water being flash-boiled by the plasma temperatures of Shamshel's whips rose high above the city in the background.
In the entry plug, Asuka panted, hair falling over her eyes, before looking up to glare in the Angel's former direction. – "And that... is how it's done."
Chapter completed on 21/07/12.
I'm not sure what exactly inspired me to have part of the fight use the same choreography as Asuka's fight against the MP Evas in EoE, but I can't complain. Like the saying goes, imitation is the sincerest form of flattery and in this case, Asuka gets to be the last one standing due to no pesky battery limits snatching defeat from the jaws of victory this time.
Although LCL is only ever talked about in canon due to its properties immediately relevant to Evas, it is actually the sole reason why the pilots don't end every single battle as a red paste on the wall of the entry plug from G-forces. While loss of vision and consciousness during high-G maneuvers happens due to brain hypoxia, internal injuries sustained during high-energy impacts such as car crashes are from to the internal organs being jostled around hard enough by inertia to tear soft tissue due to the surrounding environment (air) being nowhere near dense enough to either catch the impact or prolong it. Submerging the soft tissue in liquid, on the other hand, plays to the fact that liquids are extremely resistant to being compressed and thus any force from the outside will be actively resisted against by fluid pressure; one needs not even look further than the fact that getting a concussion requires quite a strong shock to the head, rather than a mere bump of the forehead against the bottom of a table, thanks to the brain being fully submerged in cerebrospinal fluid at all times.
Simply taking a swim, however, is not fully sufficient, as bodily cavities filled with air are still going to be weak points - but if these cavities are also filled up with a fluid of similar density as the surrounding flesh, the human body is apparently capable of pulling over 20 gees and holding it for a duration where even trained fighter pilots wearing modern G-suits would be at actual risk of death. Which is where breathing fluids like LCL come in, albeit not without a caveat: unlike LCL which is apparently so close to air in density that it can be breathed by an Eva pilot just fine, currently existing real-life breathing fluids are denser than water which, combined with the fact that an average human adult would need several liters circulated through their lungs per minute, means that mechanical ventilation is the only way to get CO2 out of the blood fast enough, which is why the technology isn't already in active use.
