Disclaimer: Nope I don't own anything yet.
Chapter Eight: Demons Unleashed.
On the outskirts of Tokyo 3 there stood a one-story brick building, with the windows all boarded up and the door constantly locked. This building was the only one left in Tokyo 3 that was still made out of brick, and for some miraculous reason withstood all attempts at being knocked down. The odd thing though was that no matter what, nothing could be built with in five hundred yards of it.
People tried to enter the building to see if there was anything of important historical value, for this building survived Second Impact, without a single mark on it, but they found that it was locked. The simple wooden door that had interesting and beautiful symbols crafted into it would not open. Adults tried everything, ranging from simply turning the knob to explosives, yet nothing could damage this building, nor the surrounding area.
After awhile the adults decided to fence it off wanting to make sure that their children wouldn't get hurt messing around with the mysterious building. Over time, as the children grew older and heard the story of the haunted area, the made dares about going inside of it and trying to enter the building. One such group of high schoolers, who thought that they were the coolest decided to show Tokyo 3 that the place wasn't that bad. The group of twelve, six males and females each, packs supplies for camping for two nights and hopped the fence.
Three days later their parents began to worry about why their children didn't return. Four days passed altogether and now the parents were panicking, calling NERV Missing Persons section about their children's disappearance. The next day NERV dispatched three ten-man units to search for the missing teams. Parents waited with baited breath, hoping that their children would be all right. The next day, which started out bright and cheerful, slowly began dark and gloomy, as storm clouds formed overhead. Just as the first phone call to a worried mother or father to tell them that their child was ripped apart by something, the cloud broke under the strain and began raining.
One week later, all twelve teens were buried in the Kyoto national cemetery, their casket holding at most an arm or a leg, if nothing at all.
Five days after that NERV dispatched five seven-man teams to find out what the hell killed those kids. The last report that the teams sent in was a recording, which once unscrambled and cleared of un-necessary background noise, said that the person was the last one alive of all her teams, just before it sounded like she was ripped apart. After that NERV quarantined that area and put heavy fines and punishment on anyone seen within a mile of the place.
Dr. Ritsuko Akagi, however kept one small part of the recording away from the public, and even everyone in NERV except for Major Misato Katsuragi, which stated:
'Shin…Ika…, Shi…kari, Shinji…Ikari.'
It was spoken by the devil.
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"Hey Shinji, you free for tonight?" Touji asked as he and Shinji were changing in NERV's locker room after a sync test.
"Sorry man but Asuka and I are going out for dinner tonight. We haven't spent any time together lately and this morning she demanded my presence this evening."
Touji just nodded and went back to replacing his clothes on his body while thinking that he should do something with Hikari as well. He turned as he heard Shinji call out goodbye before he left the locker room. He quickly finished what he was doing before running after his best friend only to find that he was already out of sight. Shrugging his shoulders, Touji turned the other way and began the long trek home.
Five minutes later, just as he was about to leave the geo-front all the lights in the section that he was in died and the sound of electronic locks reached his ears from all around him. Dropping his sports bag that served as his backpack he went into a basic judo stance and tried to find out if he was in any danger.
Not hearing anything he strapped his bag to his back and slowly made his way back to NERV alert for any changes in the environment. He was about a hundred yards away from the doorway that led into NERV headquarters when whatever caused the light failure attacked him.
All he felt was something wet impacting into his body before he sailed through the air and into a cement pillar that crack under the force. Before he could catch his breath and assess any damage that may have happened to him he was flung through the air once more. Landing on his side he rolled with the blow and flipped to his feet before taking a flare out of his bag and lighting it.
In the resulting reddish glow a creature that looked like it belonged in a horror movie appeared. The first thing that caught Touji's attention was the eye's that were pure white, showing that it was blind. Underneath them the place where a nose should have been was a gaping hole in which he could see a needle in it.
The things mouth was similar to a bats mouth, but only longer and having fangs that were dripping with a secretion that Touji didn't even want to guess poking out of it. Two extremely long ears that were pointed sat at the top of the baldhead and twitched with every noise made in the area.
Its head rested directly on its body, which was covered in rough, coarse fur that seemed to stand up. It also had bat-like wings, which were thin and leathery, and ending in three sharp claws that rested on calloused knuckles. The main body rested on the knuckles while leaning forward, its back end tilted up in the air a little bit on thick strong legs that ended in two large claws. At the end of its tailbone sat a long thing tail that also ended in a sharp, flat tip.
Touji just blinked before being thrown through the air by what he could now see as the demon's tongue. As he landed on the ground he rolled with the blow while drawing up a thick wall of earth with him in time to see the demons tail pierce through it and stop an inch away from his head. Not stopping he encased the tail in more earth before snapping the thing off.
The demon screeched in agony making Touji cover his ears but he was a little slow in realizing that that was a mistake when he saw the thing bull charge him. Diving out of the way in time he threw his arms upwards creating a large spike, which pierced the demons torso. Getting back up he watched with bated breath as the creature slowly began to still in its movements and breathing. After five minutes Touji was sure that it was dead and breathed a large sigh of relief.
Encasing the thing in stone he pulled it underground in a makeshift grave and slowly began making his way out of the garage after picking his bag back up.
-o0O( )O0o-
While Touji was currently dealing with a demon in NERV's parking lot, Rei was calmly walking home after a long day, waiting for a chance to get back to her apartment and soak in the bathtub for a while. Saying goodbye to Shinji and Asuka, she broke off from them, and decided to take a shortcut, which would take her pass her old apartment building.
Taking notice of Section Two from sensing the water inside of them, a useful little trick she picked up on, she was able to give them the slip by focusing on a nearby sewer pipe to explode, drenching the now sorry guards in stuff that no person should be covered in. Laughing she started to make her way pass her old home when she felt it.
At first she thought that Section Two had found her and was following her again, but after a few seconds she discovered that whatever it was, the thing had too little water to be human. Not taking any chances, she began to speed up a little until she was jogging. Just before she was about to cross the end of the apartment complex, she felt the ground shift a little before a clawed arm shot out of it slamming into her and sending her flying through a window on the ground floor.
Stumbling up she felt a burning sensation in her leg, and when she looked down, she saw that glass was poking out of it. Before she could do anything though, the ground shifted once more before another clawed limb shot out of it.
Rolling to the side to avoid the attack, she quickly pulled the water out of the pipes surrounding her and threw it at the limb. Before it hit, the water became razor thin and sharp, allowing it to easily cut through the limb. Hearing an agonized roar, she started to make her way higher into the building, knowing that if the thing could move through earth like a shark, then she needed to put some distance between her and the ground.
Just as she reached the fifth floor, oddly the level that she lived at, she heard a crashing sound before having the floor behind her blow outward, sending her tumbling forward. Rolling to a stop she glanced behind her to see the demon that she was currently fighting.
It looked like an evolved shark on steroids. Its head was curved into a point, with six spines shooting forwards in a circle. The eyes were tiny, small enough for them to be hard to target, yet obviously large enough to allow the demon to see. From what she could tell, it didn't have a nose, and just under the tip of its head, sat the mouth, wide and curving, filled with neat rows of large jagged teeth.
Moving backwards, its body was flatter then its head with four jagged fins coming out of it, and in between those fins sat four limbs, each thick with muscle, ending in a foot with six claws on it, four in the front and two in the back. On its back sat thin little tentacle type protrusions that swayed together. Finally its tail was a larger form of a shark's tail.
Shuddering a bit, she was about to call for water when she noticed that it had all of its limbs connected. Thinking back she knew for certain the she cut of a limb, and guessed that the demon either had incredible regenerative powers, or was able to reattach body parts.
Ignoring that for now she quickly called the water to her, and created twelve balls, each with spike coming out of them. Commanding them to float around her, she formed the remaining water into needles and sent them flying at the monster.
See the incoming attack, the creature rolled over with surprising quickness, and began to charge towards Rei on its legs. Before it reached her, its front two fins shot forward, intent on impaling her. Before they could reach her however, four of the floating balls shot forward as well and began to rip through the fins. Roaring in pain the creature rush forward, its head turning to the right completely, mouth opened trying to bite her in half.
The remaining balls quickly moved forward while she jumped back, and when she landed, she saw the creature swallow five of the remaining balls before the last three shattered against its head. Smirking she called the balls back to her, resulting in them being ripped out of the creature through its sides, back and head.
Not taking any chances, she called all the water in the building and commanded it to encase the creature before forming large spikes that shot into it from all over, killing it instantly. As the water shifted into more spiked balls incase anything happened, the demon crumbled into dust and blew away in the wind.
Limping back downstairs, she was about to leave the building before she heard her name being called. Looking next to her she saw Mother standing there with a smile on her face.
"It would appear as if the demons are getting more restless."
"What do you mean?" Rei asked slightly confused.
"You're not the only one to be targeted today. Touji has just now dealt with his demon, and is making his way towards where Shinji and Asuka are."
"You mean that they're trying to get us when we're separated, and unprepared?"
"Yes. They believe that if they do it this way then they'll be able to win for sure. However, the one's doing this aren't entirely bright and didn't think to try and attack you each from your respective elements." Mother looked down at Rei's injured leg before grimacing a little. "Yet it seems that you all didn't walk away from it unscathed."
Rei glanced down before sighing. "It'll be difficult explaining this to NERV and Misato."
Mother smiled at this before talking. "You know, the wonderful thing about water is that it's mostly used for defense, not offense. Due to its defensive nature, you can also use it to heal wounds."
Rei was shocked to say the least. She frowned a little before asking her question. "How do I do that though?"
"First call up your water to surround your hands in a thin layer. Once you've done that you have to focus on charging the water with your care."
Rei frowned once more wondering how she would and could charge anything with an emotion. Mother read the question on her face though and answered.
"The water will react to your feelings, for that is how it comes to your call. You may or may not have noticed that so far when you called the water, you were in need of it, feeling a little anger, fear, and desperation. It's through this that you were able to do the things that you did. By feeling the care coming from you, the water will change to become more loving, thereby having healing powers."
Rei nodded before calling up the water as Mother instructed and began to emanate a caring feeling. Looking down when she felt the water shift a little bit, she saw the water gently moving around her hands, slowly glowing. Moving her hands down to her injured legs she covered the wound, and felt the water react.
Keeping her eyes on her leg, she saw the water pull all the shards and slivers of glass out of her leg before flowing in a circular motion around her wound. She watched amazed as the water slowly began to heal to wound, the skin grafting back together. When the wound closed fully, leaving only a thin scar, she stood back up and threw her hands out blowing the water and glass towards a wall, making twin craters in the wall in front of her.
Turning towards Mother she asked the only question that came to mind. "Why didn't I feel the glass coming out or the wound closing?"
"The water knows that you didn't want to feel pain and therefore made it so that you didn't have to. Now you may want to hurry towards Touji because he's currently walking around with a cracked spine. The only reason that he can move around is that the earth that protects him is keeping the crack from doing any damage. However, that will change after a while."
Before Mother had finished speaking, Rei was already out the door and running towards the area where Shinji said that he and Asuka would be at.
"Kids these days, always focused on making it to their destination and never just enjoying the trip." Came Father's voice from behind Mother. Mother simply smiled before both disappeared into the wind.
-o0O( )O0o-
It was a beautiful day out. No school until tomorrow, no homework to worry about, no sync test at NERV. Yup, today was a good day for Shinji Ikari and Asuka Langly Soryu.
"Shinji, where do you want to go?" Asuka asked as she and he walked through the market doing a little window shopping.
"You choose," Shinji began. "Today I'm treating you, okay?"
Asuka was about to go on about how she should help pay and that him being a male didn't make her inferior, however, Shinji spoke up before she could begin.
"I'm not doing it to make a superior/inferior statement here. I'm doing it because I want to have a wonderful date with my beautiful girlfriend."
Anything that Asuka was going to say was killed at those words. She knew that thy both admitted how they felt and they had done small things like kissing and holding hands, but this was the first time either of them said something about the two of them. Deciding that she liked the sound of the word girlfriend she gave him a genuine smile before it turning into a teasing grin.
"Oh so this is a date huh?" Not waiting for him to say anything she continued. "So that's your new tactic? Taking poor defenseless girls like me out for a walk and then demanding a date from them?"
Before Asuka could continue on with her teasing, Shinji quickly gripped her by her wrist and in a quick display of speed, power, and grace, spun her around until she landed in his arms, her own wrapped around his neck, in a dip. As she re-oriented herself from the spin she opened her eyes and blushed under the intense gaze that Shinji was showing her.
"Asuka, if there was one person in the world who I knew without a doubt about not being defenseless, then it's you."
Before she could say anything he dipped his head down and lock lips with her. At 1st she felt like struggling but as soon as their lips touched she felt an electric surge flow through her like lightning. As she felt this, the surrounding world just dropped away, and she knew, without a doubt, that she wanted to grow old with Shinji.
Just as quickly as the moment came, it was gone, and in its place was the sense of something about to go wrong. Shinji and Asuka both acted like nothing was out of place but they were secretly watching everything going on around them. Not seeing anything in the immediate area they both relaxed a bit, both thinking that they were just high-strung.
This proved to be a mistake when they were both blown backwards from a rather large tail slamming into their stomachs. When both landed, they rolled with the blow and ended up on their feet only to get smacked once more by a tail. This time Asuka was sent through a wooden bench, demolishing it in the process, while Shinji was sent into a street light, breaking it in half.
As Asuka shakily stood up she caught a glimpse of something charging her before she was rammed by a rather hard head. Flying backwards she saw that she was about to slam into a wall and shut her eyes tightly, bracing herself for the impact that was soon to follow. However, instead for feeling a hard impact she felt like she landed in a bed of feathers. Cracking her eye open she saw Shinji holding his hand open while staggering to his feet.
Smiling she only had enough time to open her mouth before something rammed into Shinji, similar to the way that she was hit, making him fly towards the same wall. Unfortunately, he did not have enough time to stop the impact in time and was sent straight through the same wall she was saved from.
"Shinji!" Asuka cried out while jumping through the newly made whole, keeping her back towards the insides of the building. Hearing him cuss, she was relieved to see him stand next to her after a moment of waiting.
"Did you see anything at all?" Shinji grunted, holding his ribs.
"At first no but slowly they seem to either be slowing down or I'm just able to see them." Asuka said scanning the now empty lot in front of her, the people having fled a while ago when they saw both of the flying through the air.
"Well then, lets test that theory, shall we?" Shinji asked while stepping out in the open.
"Shinji what the fuck do you think that you're doing?!" she screamed out.
"Trying to see whether or not you can see them going at their normal speed. Now shut up and concentrate."
At first she wanted to scream and rage at him but she knew that he was the one out of both of them that could take a massive beating without taking a whole lot of damage. Look around Shinji she noticed the air surrounding him ripple a little. Seeing as how he wasn't flying off anywhere, she assumed that it was his wind powers coming into play.
Looking around she noticed a flash of red out of the corner of her eye and whipping her head in that direction she managed to see the creature as it speed towards Shinji. The thing that she was looking at stood on four short, stubby legs, each that held the body only about a foot and a half off of the ground.
Following the legs upwards, she saw what looked like the body of a crocodile, only fifty times bigger. The body itself was as long as a school bus, and ended in a tail that started off thick and round but slowly flattened into a flat edge that was encased in what looked like metal. At the front of the creature sat its head, which once more reminded her of a crocodile only with the mouth filled with millions of tiny teeth, made for shredding.
Sitting on the front of the head, where the mouth met, sat a round, sledgehammer looking bone, with the front encased in the same metallic looking substance as the tail. Looking closely at its body showed that it was covered in millions of tiny metallic scales that were reddish looking in color. All along it back sat rows upon rows of one inch blade-like extrusions poking out at an angle, each row flowing backwards.
Before she could call out a warning, she felt a tail wrap around he waist and whip her through the air. As she was sailing through said air, she saw the red demon charging Shinji bypass him and then a sound of rage and pain coming from it as a leg was cut off.
By the time she hit the ground, she saw a second demon coming towards her in a dive from the sky. Thinking quickly she started to spin in place, while charging her power. When the flying demon was within ten feet of her, she released the built up fire raging in her veins and watched as the fire started at her feet, following the spin before it exploded outwards in a blazing vortex.
Hearing the demon above her screech in pain, she did a dive roll out of the vortex in time to see the demon just before it could turn to ashes, before getting blown away in the wind. Turning towards Shinji she saw him whip both hands upwards towards the demon effectively cutting it in half lengthways.
Running towards him, she slid next to him before wrapping her arms around him and giving him a hug. Hearing him grunt a little she remembered that he was holding is rib earlier and winced in apology. He just waved her off before grinning at her.
"Well that wasn't as bad as my last couple of fights." He said.
"If that's what I have to expect from these things then I don't see why Mother and Father are so worried about them." Asuka was back to her usual gloating self, sporting a superior grin. Seeing this Shinji smiled and went to grab her to kiss her when, once more, both of them were sent flying through the air. This time though both of them heard an audible crack as Shinji's ribs finally broke under the blow.
Before they could land however, they were both wrapped with tails and lifted into the air. Shinji, almost out of it as the pain in his ribs increased a hundred fold, could do nothing but watch as the ground grew smaller and smaller. Asuka was calling towards him but he couldn't hear her at all. Shaking his head he began to make out what she was saying slowly. Giving his head one more shake, he finally heard what she was saying.
"Shinji, do you think that you can control our landing?!" she yelled over the rushing air. Nodding slightly and preparing himself for whatever she was about to do, he gave one more nod to tell her that he was ready.
Before she started her attack she took a good look at the demon that was carrying them upwards. She a little surprised to see it look almost identical to picture of pterodactyls. The major differences was that the demon carrying them was covered in a shimmering see-through set of feather that oddly enough showed right through to the other side, a long reptilian looking tail that started thick but slowly got thinner and more whip-like that longer it got.
Another major difference was the mouth and instead of having small teeth made for catching fish, these teeth looked like they could bite a car in half. Also instead of the bone protruding from the top of its head similar to a pterodactyl, it was replaced with a blade that was serrated on both sides and looked like it was hinged and was able to swing forward so that it was pointing straight towards where the demon was flying.
Seeing this she took a deep breath to calm her nerves, something that proved a little difficult do to the thin air at such a high altitude. Stretching her arms back as far as they could go, she brought a ball of flames into each before slamming both her hands together as hard as possible.
The result was a fiery shockwave being blown outwards that sliced straight through the demon that was still carrying them. Almost immediately they began to fall towards the earth once the flames burned the tailbone. Looking upwards, they watched the demon turn to ashes before both of them noticed that it was incredibly black and that the stars were much closer than should be allowed.
Looking down both of them felt their hearts jump to their throats when they were able to see all of Japan and almost all of China. Screaming, Asuka wrapped her arms around Shinji's front, holding on fore dear life. Shinji, letting out his own scream, yelled out to Asuka.
"Asuka, you have to shift around to my back and wrap your arms around my neck! Whatever you do after that, don't let go!"
Hearing him she nodded slightly before shimmying her way onto his back. Feeling her tap him he nodded before releasing the wind that he gathered to keep both of them still in midair. Falling towards the earth, he and Asuka kept their bodies as straight as possible to increase the speed of their decent. Feeling the air around them begin to heat up, both of them began to push their elements away from them in order not to burn up.
Within in a period of five minutes, Japan grew to be the only thing that encompassed their vision. At seeing thing, Shinji began to use his element to slow them down and within a span to ten minutes, he had cut their speed down by half. Another ten minutes later showed the area they were before. By the time they reached the ground, Shinji was able to make a soft landing.
As Shinji touched down on the ground, he was hit full on by three tails and rammed by a head. Asuka, who had jumped off of him as soon as it was a safe distance from the ground, watched in horror as he doubled in midair before flying backwards and through three cars that were parked in a row. She was so shocked that she didn't feel the blood that landed on her face, nor the four demons that stopped to watch as the cars that Shinji was sent through explode.
Asuka was feeling a little hope at the fact that she knew that Shinji took far more damage than that and yet he still managed to get up after taking it. When she saw the care explode in a large fireball, however, the little hope that she held was instantly crushed. Hearing a strange wheezing, hacking sound coming behind her, she turned to see the four remaining demon laughing at Shinji's death.
When she saw this, something inside of her snapped, and her vein felt like they were filled with magma. Still reeling from the death of Shinji, she gladly grabbed hold of the power rushing through her in order to decimate the demons in front of her. When she accepted the fire rushing through her vein she instantly started to change, slowly morphing.
Asuka hunched down, almost kneeling, holding herself as the metamorphosis began to run it's coarse through her. One of the demons, noticing something was happening that they didn't want to happen, took a step towards her only to freeze in place when Asuka's head snapped up and showed her eye, which were glowing a deep red. Before the demon could do anything, in started to disintegrate into ashes.
The other demons began backing up when a huge rift appeared under Asuka but instead of falling in, she floated above the rift. A second later magma came rushing upwards, blocking her from view. After a minute of this the magma receded back into the rift and it closed soon afterwards.
What stood in the place of Asuka was something not of this world. What stood before them stood on four feet, each one thin yet sturdy looking, which ended in clawed feet with four sharp looking claws at the end. On top of the legs sat the body of a wolf, tail included. The head began at a point at the bottom and curve upwards until each par came to a point then curved downwards to meet at a point. Near the middle point sat two glowing red eyes. All-in-all the entire whole thing looked like it was carved out of rubies and seemed to glow with a supernatural light.(A/N: If you want a better view then Google Freezing Beast, a Yu-Gi-Oh card, only imagine it blood red.)
The demons cautiously approached the beast, each one coming from a different angle. The beast just sat there with its tail slowly moving back and forth. Noticing that it looked like it was content in not moving anywhere for the time being, one of the metallic monsters rushed forward and was about to bite it. Within the second the jaws snapped shut; the beast looked up and vanished in a red flash.
Before any of the demons knew what happened, the attacking demon screeched aloud and collapsed on its left side. Looking at the felled demon, the others noticed that it was slowly being burned alive from the stubs that its left legs were.
The other demons began to move as fast as possible, however while they disappeared from normal view, it seemed as if they were moving slowly to the beast. Standing up, for it was once more sitting when it finished attacking the demon, the beast slowly extended its claws before it once more disappeared in a flash of red light.
Within a span of a minute all of the ground demons where writhing on the ground slowly burning alive after having various body parts ripped off. The only air demon quickly made the decision that it would be safer in the air and quickly gained altitude. Looking back down to the earth, at let loose a cry of terror, sounding like nails on a chalk board, when it noticed that the beast was using its weird jumping ability to gain altitude as well.
Before it could fly any higher, the beast flashed in front of it before its eyes began to glow a deep burning red. When the beast reached the apex of its flight, the beast let the light that was building up in its eyes loose. A flash of red was seen by the demon before it was engulfed in a pillar of black flames. The demon didn't even have enough time to blink before it was flash disintegrated. The flames continued downwards until the pillar plowed into the ground with enough force to penetrate it. The beast flashed once more and landed on the ground in a small crater that blew flames outwards. Looking over at the pillar, which died out, the beast saw a pit was created, with the sides glassy smooth.
Looking over to the crater that was made by the explosion, the beast slowly trotted over to it before seeing a shirt flapping in the wind. Going over to it, the beast set a claw on it before it could fly away, and mournfully howled into the afternoon sky.
-o0O( )O0o-
A/N:
Done! Man did this take awhile to get out. For a while there I was stuck with wondering in which direction I wanted to go. Do I kill Shinji or not? Do I let Asuka morph this chapter or no? Did I not want Rei to gain healing powers or to?
Simple questions I know but for me they could drastically change the direction this story went. I have to say though, when I started on Shinji and Asuka's battle, I knew what I wanted and had fun writing in out. Hopefully you all enjoy this chapter as much as I do. Personally I think that this is the best chapter I wrote yet.
Really quickly a small poll:
Now you all know that the elementals have a form that is brought out when they feel intense anger. Should I have a second form for them? If so then would you want Dragons of my own creation or something else? Do you have a better second level for them? If so tell me and I'll consider it. See below for the dragons that I was going to use.
Pendragons
The size of a Great Dane, Pendragons are identical to normal Western Dragons. The difference though is that they have a mastery over their respectful element. When in battle they have the ability to grow five times their normal size to end up a little larger than actual Dragons.
Reply what you want.
Later!
Dragonmage182