21 October 2015: Reports of monster attacks are on the rise. Most major cities begin building defensive perimeters around their borders.
3 November 2015: First known Nephilim awakens in Tokyo-3. JSSDF forces try to capture him but were unsuccessful. Press reports spin the Nephilim as "just another monster".
7 November 2015: Western Civilization begins to fall apart again as the city of Berlin is overrun by monsters and what appears to be demons.
10 December 2015: Nephilim begin to gather in downtown Kyoto. JSSDF forces move to meet them. The battle that erupts takes many lives and forever sullies the image of the Nephilim. Downtown Kyoto is evacuated.
IV: Complications and Loyalties
Several Hours Ago
Even as Hikari made it home, she still couldn't keep Rei out of her thoughts. Was she still okay? Why did Kaworu make it sound like a big deal that he was going to reveal himself to Rei, and how could he know what it was the Angels felt? It didn't make much sense to her.
Hikari put her key in the lock and turned it only to find the door was not locked.
"Nozomi," she grumbled under her breath. "Left the damn door unlocked again." She walked in and saw someone sitting in the darkness, but they didn't look like one of her sisters, or her father for that matter.
"Who's there?" she demanded. The light turned on revealing a rather thin man wearing a suit and tie. His hair was long and tied back and he was clean shaven. The hair was black, almost so dark looking that it threatened to absorb the light around it. His piercing blue eyes, reminiscent of ice, stared at her and a cruel smile came over his face. He appeared to be Eastern European.
"Allow me to introduce myself," he said in almost regal voice. "My name is Bastion Kane, I'm one of the higher ranking member s of the JSSDF's Division-9. Perhaps you've heard of me."
Hikari's heart froze in her chest. One of the most dangerous men alive to her kind was in her living room with his hands together in front of him, held together in a formation similar to the late commander of NERV. She knew two things immediately; she was in danger, and that her sisters were in danger.
"Where are my sisters?" she demanded.
"That's quite amusing, Miss Horaki… I was hoping you could tell me that."
Hikari stepped forward and was about to speak when she felt something prick her in the neck. She gasped as she felt a cold sensation run though her veins.
'Of course,' she mused as the sedative took effect. 'The bastard didn't come here alone…'
She collapsed to the floor within seconds. One of the men walked over to her and put a scanning device on her exposed forearm which extracted a few drops of her blood. The machine made a noise and the man with the device nodded to Bastion.
"I need your sisters, Miss Horaki," he continued as if she were still awake. He stood up and walked over to her crumpled form, kneeling down next to her and running his fingers though her hair. The wicked smile on his face only broadened. "But you'll do for now."
Langxi, China: Now
Asuka stood upon the platform on the walls of Langxi keeping her eyes opened for anything. The smoldering carcass of the Behemoth from earlier in the evening was now little more than a pile of ashes.
"You're German, right?" came a question from one of the men assigned to help her guard the wall.
Asuka looked over and saw it was Dequan, one of the younger men. His awakening had already happened but he got little out of it save for the ability to partially control his AT Field. This alone was enough for the Chinese Government to condemn him to die.
"Yes," Asuka replied. "Half. I'm also half Japanese."
"How is it you've come to speak Mandarin?" he asked inquisitively.
Asuka chuckled. "Part of my awakening I guess."
"Oh? How many languages do you speak?"
Asuka smiled at him before returning her gaze out to the east. "All of them."
"Movement!" yelled one of the other men just north of her location. Her eyes strained to see what was out there and finally noticed the movement herself. Something was moving across the wastes… a lot of something. They seemed humanoid and yet they were shaped oddly.
"No," Asuka whispered as she realized what they likely were. "A host this big may be too much to keep at bay."
"What do you see?" Dequan asked her.
"Makhai," she replied in an ominous tone.
At the head of the host, the leader stood up to his full height of over nine feet. He pointed with one of his nasty swords towards the town and roared. His skin was almost bronze and his face was mostly humanoid. His eyes however, told the tale of his lack of humanity, baring no pupils or cornea at all, just pale white orbs in his head. A second set of arms also armed with sword were under the first set, and about halfway up his spine, another upper torso could be seen, eternally facing backwards with a pair of sword equipped arms of its own.
All around the leader, a host of similar creatures made their way towards the town, each over six feet tall at the shortest and over eight feet at the tallest. Their skin was darker than the leader's and their minds were a little simpler. They had no head for strategy like the leader did, but they were obedient.
"Break out the pikes!" Asuka ordered and her men quickly responded, dropping their swords and retrieving the long spears that leaned against the walls. "Our only hope is to keep them at bay. They close within range of their swords and it's going to get very ugly very quickly."
Asuka glared out at the leader. She knew Makhai were normally stupid brutes, and only the smartest of the group can lead them. In this case, the leader stood out pretty well against the backdrop of other lesser monsters. But even if they were lesser, Asuka would rather deal with a dozen full sized behemoths than this large a host of Makhai.
One more roar from the leader and the army of monsters charged the walls. Asuka counted at least 300 of them, more than enough to roll over the town. That's when she got an idea. She can keep all but the bravest out of town if she gives them something to fear. With a mighty wing beat she was airborne, flying up and to the south of the advancing force. Once she got enough speed she dove from the clouds in a line parallel to the forward attacking ranks and unleashed her fiery potential on the ground before them. The result was a huge wall of fire that quickly froze their forward advance.
Asuka continued, laying down a wall of fire around the entire village before flying up to see the results of her labor. The leader muscled though the wall of flames inspiring others to try. The weaker Makhai perished in the nine foot wide wall, but the braver and more resilient ones made it though and rolled on the ground to put out the flames.
Immediately, townsfolk that were versed in the use of bows launched a volley into the attacking host on both sides of the flaming wall. The monsters that wouldn't dare cross the fiery wall were quickly overwhelmed by the volley, and those that weren't killed by the arrows quickly escaped into the night. This left the leader with a mere 112 Makhai warriors, less than half of his overwhelming host. But with a wall of flames behind him, his only choice was to press forward and he grimly ordered the charge.
The Makhai threw themselves into combat, weapons raised. The wall guardians raised their spears impaling the first to attempt to make it to the wall, but others were already pulling themselves over. Some of the warriors went in with their spears hoping to push them back, but a monster with four sword arms in the front could easily make a mockery of their attempts. An apparent overextension seemed to give the villager a chance but he was quickly knocked back by the second torso's blades. The monsters quickly became roaming chaos as they could easily attack enemies approaching from any direction, and the two brains although simple were able to coordinate their attacks so they never tripped themselves up.
Asuka dove down with her sword blazing, killing any Makhai still trying to get into the village. She was suddenly jumped by the leader. A massive slam with her wing threw him back and she faced him with her flaming sword.
"Your power will be mine, Angel of Fire," the monster roared at her, and Asuka was shocked to hear it. These monsters have never shown the ability to articulate speech effectively, let alone roar out threats or show any real cognition for that matter.
"You can talk," she noted.
"I have devoured the cores of many Nephilim. I will claim your power as my own!"
"Impossible. Only a Nephilim can claim the power of another Nephilim by absorbing their core. What you seek is impossible." At that moment she felt her AT Field being eroded by the monster and her heart beat faster, realizing maybe she was wrong about that.
"So certain are you? I will show you true power!" He slammed his right foot down hard causing the ground to shake and crack around the impact point. Asuka's eyes were wreathed in flame as she stared at the monster, seeing that he already had 7 cores inside of him. They weren't fusing together but somehow his body was able to access at least some of the power they offered. This meant that this monster represented the single most powerful Makhai on the planet… potentially. The thought did occur that other Makhai could do the same, which was not a comforting thought.
Asuka's wings lit up. "Very well, monster," she conceded. "If you wish to throw your uniqueness to the wind fighting a superior opponent, then so be it. But first thing's first." She slammed her sword into the ground suddenly summoning a wall of white flames around the town. Though this took a lot of energy, it would prevent anymore Makhai from entering the town.
The monster growled in annoyance and charged her. Asuka quickly ripped her sword out of the ground and blocked the sudden offensive. Though the monster had six blades to his credit, Asuka was much faster allowing her to block the attacks with her single massive Zweihänder. The monster's movements were fast in their own right. With supposed overextensions meant only to bring the secondary monster's weapons to bear as well. Asuka floated back and flanked when she could, keeping up the assault and trying to find a weak point in the monster's defenses, but the sheer number of blades being brought against her was a match for her own speed.
The few Makhai that enter the town were suddenly finding they were becoming overwhelmed by the sheer number of defenders. 300 Makhai and only 3 had managed to enter the town itself, and they were now being effectively stabbed to death by a host of spear wielding commoners, most of which had no real powers.
Asuka and the Makhai locked their weapons briefly and Asuka flew back as quickly as she could but managed to take a nasty wound across the stomach for her attempt. It cut though her armor easily and dug deep into her flesh. Immediately the wound started dripping vile puss and corruption along with her own blue blood.
"Forgot to mention, I lick my blades," the monster triumphantly jeered. "You'll be too sick to fight soon, and then you'll be mine."
Asuka realized she was in trouble. She couldn't cauterize the wound since she was immune to fire completely due to her nature. That meant that the corruption would start running rampant though her body. She could increase her own body temperature to try to slow it down, but the damage was already done. Her only chance was to defeat the monster before she succumbed to the corruption.
"I'm not done yet," Asuka replied as she launched herself forward with a renewed determination. The monster fended her off trying to keep her out of strike range until the corruption could weaken her enough to finish her off, but Asuka in her rage was twice as dangerous, and twice as fast. After a brief struggle to keep up he finally lost the engagement as she managed an upward swing that cut him from the right side of his lower abdomen to his upper left shoulder, just deep enough to put him in intense pain. He bounced backwards, cradling the wound with two hands that had no choice but to drop their weapons.
Asuka tried to press forward but sudden felt herself beginning to retch. Her helmet disappeared and she fell to her knees, throwing up a green puss-like fluid.
The monster tried to step forward to claim his prize but was shot nearly half a dozen times with arrows. Realizing he couldn't get to her he finally sounded the retreat and ran back through the still smoldering first wall of fire. Only a handful of Makhai survived the attack, and he knew he would have a nearly impossible time gathering another host like that considering the casualties in this engagement. His chance had been completely lost. He knew she would never survive the night.
The remaining fires died out and Daquan ran to her side.
"Asuka!" he called out. "Stay with us, please."
Asuka coughed up more green stuff and finally spoke. "I'm infected with some kind of corruption. It's tearing my insides apart."
"Just hang on," he asserted and began to drag her back into town. Her armor faded away leaving her in normal clothing, and the extent of her wound was now clearly visible. It almost cut through to the abdominal cavity, and the flesh at the edges almost looked as if it were going necrotic. It certainly smelled that way.
Daquan got her into a bed and several of the townsfolk helped out, gathering bandages and clean water. Her eyes opened a bit and she stared at the ceiling.
"You'll be okay," Daquan told her. "You have to be."
Asuka could only nod, but deep inside she knew the truth… she was dying.
"So this is how it ends…"
Tokyo-3 Underground, 30 minutes ago
Rei sat up in bed and began dressing herself. It wasn't much, just a pair of jogging pants, a T-shirt, and a sweatshirt, but it beat being in this cold underground bunched under covers, wearing only a pair of panties. She stood up, using her hands to push up her breasts, lamenting how she doesn't have a bra. She really wanted to know what happened to the clothing she was wearing before.
A knock at her door roused her out of her thoughts.
"Come in," she called out. The last person she expected to see walked into the room. "Tabris?"
"I go by Kaworu now," he replied. "But yes, daughter of Lilith, it is I."
"Kaworu," she corrected herself. "I have not seen you since Third Impact."
"I know, I thought it would be best if we didn't have any contact with each other, at least a first. However inevitability it seems can be quite persistent in that regard."
"You are leading the refugees?" she asked.
"Yes. I am trying to guide them into the future that He wanted for them."
Rei frowned. "The humans have been nothing but cruel to us… why?"
"You know the answer to that," Tabris pointed out. "The humans fear what they cannot comprehend. They fear our power, our abilities, and our seemingly lack of mortality. We are close to the Angels who once nearly destroyed their world. They will never accept us."
"So what must we do?"
"I wish them no ill will, but there are some of our kind that do."
"Jackals," Rei pointed out.
"Yes… the Jackals…"
Rei suddenly grabbed her head. She barely managed to hear Tabris asking her what's wrong and even less so felt his hands on her as her surroundings changed to the inside of a hut in a poor area of what she figured was China. She saw people mourning someone in a bed and heard some whisper that Langxi was doomed if she died. Rei walked closer to the bed and smelled rotting flesh. Resisting the urge to puke, she pressed closer and saw Asuka lying in the bed with a wet rag on her forehead. She was dressed like a Chinese peasant and had a nasty wound on her stomach that started to expose her internal organs, all of which were visibly going necrotic. Rei tried to back away from the bed and Asuka's hand grasped her arm. The psychic gasped as Asuka's eyes stared at her with no cornea and no pupils, just green tinged orbs in her head. She said two words that sounded wet as puss gurgled from her mouth.
"… help… me…"
With a loud gasp Rei finally broke from the vision. She found that she was in the bed now with Kaworu standing over her.
"What is it?" Kaworu asked, knowing she had some kind of psychic episode.
"Asuka," Rei managed to get out, noting his reaction to the name. "She's hurt badly. She won't survive the night."
"What happened to her?!" he demanded. "Where is she?!"
Rei's eyes unfocused a moment before she answered. "Langxi, China… a Nephilim village. I think its west of Shanghai."
"I have to get to her," Kaworu replied.
At that moment, two of his men entered the room.
"Don't you knock?" Rei asked annoyed.
"Kaworu," they began, ignoring her. "We have a problem. Kodama and Nozomi Horkai are here, but Hikari has become a guest of Division-9. Bastion Kane got to her."
"No," Kaworu replied. "I can't be in two places at once. But if we leave Hikari in Kane's hands, he might be able to break her and get her to tell him about the underground. We're all in danger!"
"I'll rescue Hikari," Rei offered.
"Are you mad?" he asked her. "You barely have a handle on your own powers and you're willing to go into the lion's den?"
"I don't know what I am to Hikari," Rei started. "All I know is that she's become the most important thing in my life. The thought of losing her is too much for me to bare now. I have to try. And I know Asuka means as much to you."
Kaworu looked down. "Fine but you're not doing it alone."
"I will go alone. I will not be responsible for the deaths of more of our siblings."
Tabris looked skeptical.
"The can never catch me. And even if they could, they could never hold me. I am beyond them."
"Good luck then," Kaworu finally relented. "I have to get to Langxi."
"Yes you do."
The Black Moon
"She is beginning to believe in herself…"
"Yes, she is… she is my sister after all."
"My Avatar… I have given her great gifts… but will she learn how to use them in time?"
"For Hikari's sake, she will." Shinji sighed. "I believe it is time… The Shepherd must return to Tokyo-3."
"Is that wise?"
"It must be done… our people have no future if we don't act now… we both know what is coming… Once more… Tokyo-3 will become a shelter for the innocent… a refuge for the righteous…"
The wretched are the wounded,
The hungry starve to death,
In a place where no one goes,
The air itself is a final breath,
So discontinue, the anti-septic, care charade,
As a cry of justice comes,
A malignant fire fades
I am the reason your future suffers,
I am the hatred you won't embrace
I am the worm of a pure gestation,
I am the remedy, spit in my face
All your laws and rules are outdated,
All your subjects are killing the kings,
I can rattle off a million other reasons why,
But does it matter when the only thing we love will die?