Disclaimer: Neon Genesis Evangelion is the creation of Anno and Gainax. I don't own it, make no claims to it, and am making no profit from the fan fiction. No infringement of copyright is intended. In other words, please don't sue.

Disclaimer: I do not own DC Comics or anything associated with it, and I am making no profit from this fan fiction. No infringement of copyright is intended. In other words, please don't sue.


Chapter Two: First Blood

Misato Katsuragi was tired as she walked through the hallways of NERV that morning, and the cup of coffee she was nursing had yet to have an effect.

I guess it's what I get for staying out so late last night, doing the ' super-hero' thing, she thought as she released a huge yawn.

It kind of seemed unfair, she mused. She'd been out there doing good; she should be rewarded for that, not feeling tired and dragged out in the same way she would have if she'd just been out clubbing or something.

Clearly, there was no such thing as karmic justice in the universe.

"Good morning, Misato."

Misato started, nearly spilling some of her coffee, as she abruptly realized that Ritsuko was right beside her. She hadn't even noticed the blond scientist's approach.

"Morning, Ritsuko," she replied, quickly regaining her composure. "What are you up to today?"

"Running a series of experiments on Unit Zero, starting at 10:30," the scientist answered. "What about you?"

Misato sighed. "You know that whenever there's no Angel around, I'm nothing but a glorified paper-pusher, Rits."

The faux blonde smirked. "True," she said, then she hesitated. "Hey, Misato have you…done something?"

The Ops Director frowned in confusion. "Done something?" she echoed.

"Like go on a diet, or started using some new skin cream or something," Ritsuko elaborated. "You look nice, but I can't put my finger on why exactly."

Misato blinked. When her friend had said 'hello' to her, she'd assumed it was just a matter of time before she started getting needled about how dragged out she looked. A compliment was the last thing she'd expected.

"No, I haven't done anything," she said. "Maybe I'm just having a good hair day or something." She added with a grin, reaching back and flouncing her purple locks.

Ritsuko shrugged. "Anyway, have you heard the news?"

"What news?" Misato asked.

"There's a new one," Ritsuko said, handing a tabloid to Misato.

Large red letters at the top of the cover identified the rag as "The Tokyo Tattler" ('Bringing You Important News, Opinions, and Gossip from the Tokyo-2 and Tokyo-3 Areas').

Below this were the words "Emerald Champion Saves Woman from Crazed Cultists!" done in large, green block letters. Accompanying the dramatic headline was a surprisingly accurate artist's depiction of the Green Lantern, presumably done from descriptions of her given by witnesses. They'd even gotten the Green Lantern symbol right.

Wow, it really doesn't take these people any time at all, does it? She thought, impressed despite herself.

"So, how's the Commander taking this?" Misato asked, suddenly finding her mouth rather dry.

"I don't know," Ritsuko said. "I'm going to try and avoid him for a while. I'd suggest you do the same."

"No argument here," Misato said.

The Green Lantern was not the first superwoman to make an appearance in Tokyo-3, Misato knew. She also knew that the Commander had not taken a liking to a single one of them, and he regarded the ones that involved themselves in the war against the Angels with particular rancor. The man was likely to be in a foul mood for the entire day, at least.

"Well, I have to get moving if I want to start the experiments on time," Ritsuko said. "I promised the Commanders results, so I can't drag my feet with this."

"Right," Misato said, "I guess I'll see you later, then."

She tried to hand the tabloid back to Ritsuko, but the scientist refused to take it. "You can keep that," she said, "I'm done with it."

"Thanks," Misato said automatically as the two of them parted ways.

Once Ritsuko was out of sight, she flipped open the copy of the Tokyo Tattler and began to skim through the sizeable article written on the Green Lantern. The bulk of it was sheer speculation, of course, but still…

This is freaky, she decided, having been unprepared for this part of the 'superhero' gig. Becoming famous just wasn't something she'd thought about at all, though in hindsight it seemed obvious that this sort of thing would happen sooner or later.

With a small sigh, she tucked the tabloid under her arm, then headed to her office.


It was, at first glance, a very ordinary scene in the life of the EVA pilots. The three of them were out of school and were headed to NERV for the usual series of tests. Nothing could be more normal for them.

However, the Third Child had an unusual little spring in his step and was even humming a tune to himself as he walked, which was, altogether, far from the picture that Shinji usually presented to the world.

"Well, somebody's in a good mood today," Asuka commented.

"Huh?" he said, pulling himself from his thoughts. "Oh, yeah. I guess I am."

"And why would that be, Third Child?" Asuka drawled.

"I just had a really good dream last night," he explained, looking rather sheepish. "I guess I just…woke up happy this morning."

Asuka rolled her eyes for a moment. Only Shinji could sound so embarrassed to admit he was in a good mood. "So what was this dream about?"

"I, uh, can't remember," Shinji confessed.

"You can't remember?" Asuka said, incredulously. "Hmph, more like it was a really hentai dream and you just know better than to tell people the details!"

"What?! No! That's not it at all!" Shinji insisted, his face rapidly flushing crimson.

"I was in it, wasn't I?" Asuka accused, half threatening and half amused.

Of course, Shinji only noticed the threatening half. "No! I swear, I don't remember any of the details!"

And if I did have a dream about you, I wouldn't be crazy enough to say anything about it!! He thought fervently. His sense of self-preservation was better than that.

"So you can't even remember your dream, but it was still enough for you to be cheerful all day?" Asuka asked skeptically.

Shinji nodded. "Yeah," he said distantly. "The only thing I can remember is a lot of green light."

Asuka quirked an eyebrow. "Has anyone ever told you that you can be really weird sometimes, Third?"

"Well, now someone has," Shinji replied.

The conversation sputtered out after this, and the Third Child returned to his thoughts, trying to recall his dream. It was proving itself to be a futile task, however. Every time he tried to grab hold of the memory, it slipped through his fingers like so much smoke, and the veil of green light refused to part and allow him to see anything beyond it.

He was so deep in his fruitless attempts at remembering the dream that he completely forgot about calling his father to inform him of the upcoming parent-teacher meetings. Fortunately, this was no great loss anyway, as the man would simply have refused to go.


Misato had found herself moving very little paper that day. Every time she started really focusing on her work, her attention was somehow drawn back to that damn rag mag Ritsuko had given her.

It was bizarre that she, the one person on the planet who knew the Green Lantern's story, felt so compelled to keep looking at a "news" story about her that was filled with thinly-veiled conjecture, but there it was.

Crazy as the whole situation was, a part of Misato actually found it kind of cool after she'd gone over the tabloid enough times.

Shaking her head in an attempt to bring herself back to the task of doing her job, she looked down at the document she'd been trying to read for at least ten minutes…and realized she hadn't the slightest idea what it said.

"Okay, obviously it's time for a coffee break," she declared.

Leaving her office, Misato headed down to the base commissary, where she acquired a cup of the sludge that NERV euphemistically referred to as 'coffee'. Whatever it actually was, the stuff had roughly the same caffeine content as real coffee, which was what kept the men and women of NERV drinking it.

Less than eager to return to her desk, Misato remained in the commissary while she drank her coffee, telling herself that she wasn't really trying to overhear any conversations that her co-workers might be having about the Green Lantern. However, there were no such conversations, probably because the news hadn't truly gotten around yet, so it was moot point, anyway.

Eventually, she finished her drink, and finally had no more excuse for staying away from her office and the stacks of paperwork contained within. Throwing away her paper cup, she reluctantly left and headed into a nearby elevator, pressing the button for her desired floor.

"Hey!" she suddenly heard a familiar voice cry. "Hold the elevator!"

She looked up to see Kaji sprinting down the hallway and kept the grimace off her face only with substantial effort. As subtly as she could, she reached out and pressed the door close button. The elevator reacted with what seemed, to Misato, to be appalling sluggishness.

Realizing that Kaji was probably going to make it, she reacted almost without thinking.

Two beams of light emerged from her still invisible ring. Carefully keeping them hidden behind her, Misato sent them down to the floor, where they became so flat that they were only visible to someone looking straight down. Then one went left and the other right, until they were hidden from Kaji's view by the slowly closing doors. The two streams of light sprang up and formed a pair of hands, which pushed the doors shut just before Kaji managed to slip a hand in between them.

Misato breathed a sigh of relief as she allowed the constructs to vanish. I know I'm not supposed to use this thing for personal gain, she thought, recalling something the ring had told her when she'd asked about the Corps, but hopefully these Guardians of the Universe have better things to do than nitpick.

It wasn't that she was totally unreceptive to Kaji's advances. On the contrary, she still felt the old spark of attraction when he was around.

Which was the whole problem really. Part of her did want to get back together with him, but she knew better. She'd been in a relationship with Kaji before, and she was willing to bet that if she let herself do it again, it would end in roughly the same way as it had the first time.

She had no wish to repeat that experience, so obviously the smartest thing to do was just avoid him whenever possible.

Suddenly, the elevator abruptly came to a stop, the force of inertia causing Misato to momentarily lose her balance and nearly drop to the floor. The fluorescent lights that illuminated the car went out, leaving her in total darkness.

Damn it, karma, why do you only seem to work when it's time to hand out punishments? Misato wondered, scowling into the dark.

"Okay, Misato, chill out," she told herself. "The backup power will come on any second now, and—"

Before she could finish, the emergency lights went on, illuminating the elevator with a harsh, orange light. This was not a good sign.

"Ring, what's going on?" she demanded.

"Virtually all power to NERV headquarters has been cut off," it answered simply.

"How?" she asked.

It shouldn't be possible for the power to just cut out like this, she knew. The base had backup systems and redundancies designed to prevent just this very thing.

"Unknown."

"Wonderful," she groaned. "Guess I'm stuck here until Ritsuko manages to fix whatever it is she broke."


Meanwhile, in a dark laboratory in NERV, a group of technicians were collectively giving the Project-E chairperson a look.

"Hey, it's not my fault," Akagi said defensively.


Up above the city, the three pilots had reached the Geofront access point. Rei calmly slid her ID card through the reader, only to get no response from the machine. It neither accepted nor rejected her card.

The Second Child quickly grew impatient. She'd dealt with plenty of such card readers, and she knew that when the cards got old, it often became necessary to swipe the thing much more violently than the First would ever do.

"Let me do it!" she said, pushing forward and swiping her own card.

However, she got the same complete absence of a response. "Stupid thing must be broken!"


Several miles away in Tokyo-2, a group of JSDF officers suddenly saw an enormous object appear on their radar screen. The bogey appeared right at the coast, and it didn't take long to confirm what they knew the minute they saw it.

"Angel number nine," one of the officers said grimly.

"It's heading straight for Tokyo-3," another observed. "Just like all of them."

"Well, there's nothing we can do about it," the first officer said, clearly more than a little disgruntled by this. He crushed the cigarette he'd been smoking into an already full ashtray. "We just have to let NERV take care of it."


Ryoji Kaji was making his way up a very long stairwell when all the lights went out. He froze for a moment, until the emergency lights came on and it became apparent that power wasn't going to be restored any time soon.

Well, there has to be some way to take advantage of this, he thought with a roguish grin as he began to rush down the stairs, off to confront the absurd number of electronically controlled doors in the NERV base, as well as the fact that the organization kept very few records in paper format.


This really sucks, Misato thought as she sat inside the elevator car. I could get out of here anytime, but I can't risk making people suspicious just because it's hot and stuffy in here.

"Attention, Lantern," the ring said, "A powerful and hostile life form is approaching Tokyo-3."

"An Angel?" she asked, her eyes widening.

"Affirmative."

Her first, unreasoned reaction to this information was relief that she now had a valid excuse to use her powers to get out of the damned elevator. Then the news actually sank in, and her face hardened.

Here it was, the perfect chance for her to test the ring's power against an Angel without anyone missing her. It was exactly what she'd wanted, and more than she'd felt she could have hope for.

But the price was that she'd have to go at it alone.

"Completely worth it," she declared.

And with a thought, light unbent around her power ring, allowing it to return to visibility. Green flames swept over her form, changing both her body and clothing, burning away the visage of Misato Katsuragi and leaving that of the Green Lantern in her place.

With a slight smile, the Green Lantern took off, phasing through the roof of the elevator car and then anything else that came into her way. The masses of concrete and metal that made up the base, the plates of ultra-dense armor that shielded the Geofront, and the tons of earth between those armor plates were all unable to even slow her down as she flew up and up, soon emerging at the street level of Tokyo-3.

The Green Lantern didn't stop when she made it to the surface. Instead, continued ascending until she was high above even the tallest building in the city. Then she finally came to a halt and allowed herself a moment to simply look down at the world in awe, newly amazed at the ring which could let her float above everything with only a thought.

Then she turned her focus back to the mission. "Ring," she said, "locate the Angel."

Rather than answer her in words, a thin beam of light shot out of the ring and then went streaking into the distance toward the southeast. Misato nodded and took off, following it.


Down on the street, Hyuga Makoto had only recently realized that the power was out all over the city. The technician could only sigh as he made this discovery, as it seemed like it was par for the course for this day, with the way things were going.

"First, Captain Katsuragi orders me to pick up her dry cleaning for her, and now this," he grumbled to himself.

Sure, he had a thing for the woman, but being forced to take on some of her chores as a part of his job was a little too much. It was almost being like her live-in boyfriend, except without actually living with her or being her boyfriend.

I feel like I've been gypped somehow…

Suddenly, a flare of light from above him caught his eye, and he looked up to see something that was glowing green streak across the sky. It was there for little more than a second, but there was no mistaking that he'd seen something.

Makoto, who always made a point of keeping as current as possible on all superwomen related news, gaped. "Was that…was that the Green Lantern?"


Meanwhile, Asuka had just pronounced herself the leader of the trio of EVA pilots, and the three of them had arrived at a door that would lead them into the tunnels below the city. From said tunnels, they could get into the Geofront, and then to NERV headquarters.

At least, that was the plan, but they'd already run into one obstacle, namely the electronically controlled door's refusal to open without power. Fortunately, this problem was far from insurmountable, because there was a large crank for manually opening the door located right next to it.

"Well, this is your department, Shinji," Asuka said imperiously. "So hop to it!"

Releasing a groan, the Third Child reluctantly did as he was told, grabbing the crank and beginning to turn it.

When's the last time they oiled this thing? He wondered as he applied all his strength to the task, which got the door opening at a very slow pace.

After a few seconds of watching, their fearless leader rolled her eyes. "We're going to be here until Third Impact at this rate," she complained. "Here, baka, move over and let me help."

Shinji certainly didn't complain as Asuka placed her hands along side his on the large crank's handle, and with her help, the door was soon opening considerably faster than it had been.

Rei just stood behind them, observing with a slight frown. Then she saw brief flash of green light from up above. Turning to look at the sky, she found no sign of anything green. With a mental shrug, the First Child turned back to look at her companions.


The wind roared in the Green Lantern's ears as she soared away from Tokyo-3 and across the countryside. The sensation of complete freedom was incredible, and had circumstances been different, she would probably have been smiling from ear to ear.

However, she was en route to a battle against one of the monsters that had killed half of humanity, including her father. A deadly serious expression was etched upon her face as her mind, in full Operations Director mode, ran through potential methods of attack at high speed. Adrenaline surged through her veins and she seemed to be able to see the world with greater sharpness and clarity.

It had been a long time since she'd experienced the rush that always preceded combat. Commanding battles from a distance came with a very different set of churning emotions than actually plunging into one yourself, she'd learned.

"Approaching hostile," the ring informed her.

The Green Lantern squinted into the distance, just making out a small, dark shape on the horizon. Said dark shape rapidly grew as she approached it at top speed, until she was able to see that the latest Angel had taken on the form of the daddy longlegs from Hell. Its central body was also covered by a multitude of eyes, because apparently a giant arachnid simply hadn't been creepy and gross enough.

"Ew," the Green Lantern said as she came to stop well above and before it.

The Angel, unsurprisingly, ignored the glowing green gnat that wasn't even blocking its path, and kept plodding toward Tokyo-3, its immense legs moving slowly but still eating up the distance between itself and its target, thanks to their sheer size.

"Ring, any civilians in the area?" the Green Lantern asked.

"Negative."

Moment of truth, Katsuragi, she thought to herself as she gathered up her willpower for her assault.

"This is for Dad," she said softly, and then she attacked.

A blast of emerald death exploded from her ring, as thick as a tree trunk. The Lantern's aim was straight and true, and it streaked toward the Angel's central body.

Then an orange, hexagonal barrier of light flashed into existence, halting the progress of the green beam. The Green Lantern gritted her teeth as she tried to overwhelm the Angel's defenses, pouring her strength and determination into the attack.

She gave the assault everything she had…but in the end, it wasn't enough. The green petered out, while the orange barrier held fast, not even having started to buckle, so far as the Green Lantern was able to tell.

"No…" she managed to gasp out, abruptly feeling as though she was on the verge of tears.

It had been a very difficult thing, when she'd finally managed to join NERV and learned that she could never pilot an EVA and fight the Angels directly. The knowledge that all her determination, all her hate, all her lust for revenge was ultimately impotent against the Angels had frustrated and angered her to the very depths of her being.

And now it looked like she had to swallow that bitter pill all over again.

The Angel, of course, wouldn't have cared one bit about its attacker's emotional turmoil even if it had had the capacity to do so. It did, however, care that the green thing had attacked it, and thrown an impressive amount of destructive energy against its AT field.

Over a dozen of the Angel's eerie, yellow and blue eyes shifted with a horrible, wet sound to focus upon its enemy. Then, it loosened a high-pressure blast of brownish liquid from every one of them, sending it soaring toward the hostile.

"Whoa!" Green Lantern exclaimed as she saw the liquid coming at her.

She didn't know what it was exactly, but she didn't think it would be a very good idea to let it touch her, regardless of the protective sheath of emerald light she currently wore over her costume. The Green Lantern ascended rapidly, just avoiding the shower of mystery liquid.

Let myself get distracted, she scolded herself. Another rookie mistake. Damn, has it really been that long since I was in the field myself?

Gravity eventually reclaimed its hold on the brown stuff that the Angel had fired at her, and splashed down onto the countryside. The Green Lantern's eyes widened as everything it touched began to smoke and rapidly dissolve.

"Acid," she muttered to herself. "I might have guessed."

The Angel sent another spray at her, and the Green Lantern had to dart to the side in order to avoid it. The evil thing was obviously able to send its acid flying an incredible distance. She'd practically have to be outside of the Earth's atmosphere to be out of range of it, she feared.

It fired still another spurt of acid at her, and again she dodged, this time retaliating with an energy blast that impacted the Angel's AT field harmlessly. The Angel responded by loosening another volley of acid, but this time it didn't aim every eye it could bring to bear at the same point, instead firing at various points around her as well as where she was.

The result was that the Green Lantern had a significantly harder time dodging, though she did manage to pull it off.

It's learning, she thought grimly.

The tactically smart thing to do, she knew, was to withdraw back to Tokyo-3 and alert NERV of the incoming Angel, since it was increasingly looking like all she could do against it was slow it down and give it a nice warm up battle before it was time to face the Evangelions.

But she just couldn't bring herself to concede defeat and go running home that easily. She had waited too long and wanted revenge too much to retreat now. Besides, it was just her out here. It wasn't like when she commanded the Children in battle; she had every right to risk herself as she pleased.

Part of her mind whispered that there were people who needed her, not least of all her charges, but she shook those thoughts off. Shinji and Asuka needed to not be murdered by an Angel, too.

And it's not like there's nothing to be gained by delaying this thing, she thought. It'll give NERV time to get the power back on.

Her mind made up, she began to fly in an erratic pattern, going as fast as she could in an attempt to evade all the blasts of acid.

It got more difficult every second. The Angel's continued failures to reduce her to a liquid state actually seemed to infuriate the thing, and it began firing its acid with an ever-increasing frenzy. Eventually, it got to the point that nearly very single one of its eyes was firing a continuing stream of the corrosive liquid up into the air.

Oh god, this is bad! Misato thought as she dived and whirled crazily through the air, barely able to keep a half-step ahead of her attacker.

Fortunately, this particular Green Lantern didn't just have the ability to overcome great fear. She also had the ability to think under high pressure, and to come up with creative solutions to problems while she did it. Indeed, for whatever reason, she actually tended to become more inventive when under large amount of stress.

And if there was ever a situation that got her creative juices flowing, this was it.

With a thought from her, the ring suddenly expelled a dozen points of light. Every single one of them hovered in midair for a moment, then rapidly began to grow and change shape, until each was a perfect likeness of the Green Lantern.

Of course, despite how perfectly shaped the doppelgangers were, they were all still made of nothing but emerald light. So it would have been plain to even the most dim-witted human which woman was the real Green Lantern, and which ones were the energy constructs.

Fortunately, the Angel was not human, and that the constructs were mere decoys was not something that was immediately apparent to it. It immediately began to divide its fire thirteen ways, allowing its true foe a moment to breathe.

She was doing pretty well on defense now, but offense was still sorely lacking, and she simply couldn't win unless she could get past the AT field.

A blast of acid passed too close for comfort, and she flew up and toward the right to put a little extra distance between her and the fatal solvent.

Geeze, this thing's insane, she thought, gazing down at the Angel, which looked for all the world like the most evil lawn sprinkler on the planet at the moment, as it fired acid in every direction. How the hell does it keep up those high pressure jets?

And suddenly, just like that, inspiration struck.

Back when she was a young child, she had often played with water balloons in the hot summer months. The packages of the things usually came with a nozzle that was used to shrink the stream of water from a garden hose or faucet and make it possible to fill the balloons.

Naturally, the result of shrinking the stream was that it increased the pressure that the water came out with.

She wondered, might the same principles apply to the energies of her power ring?

Only one way to find out, she decided, readying for another assault.

Just as when she'd first lashed out at the Angel, she gathered every ounce of willpower and determination that she could muster. Her ring glowed menacingly as she prepared for her strike, looking almost like it was ready to explode with the amount of energy it held. This was not the case, however, as the Green Lantern was firmly in control.

"Take this!" the Green Lantern screamed, releasing her attack.

Another blast of emerald light erupted from her ring, containing just as much power as her opening assault. However, this time, the beam was as thin as a pencil and blindingly bright. It looked like someone had somehow removed and transported a tiny sliver of a green star.

The energy bolt streaked toward the Angel, soon impacting its AT field. The emerald beam crashed into the orange barrier, pressing against it furiously. The AT field flashed brightly as it attempted to hold back the beam.

Then, just as the Green Lantern was about to lose hope of ever being able to destroy an Angel herself, the thin bolt of her willpower's manifest got through, punching a small hole through the shield and then through the Angel itself. The spider-like beast hissed and chattered in agony, but it didn't let up its assault for a moment. Obviously, the attack had not hit anything vital.

"Yes!" she shouted triumphantly, and immediately got to work capitalizing on her small but essential victory.

Rather than cutting off the beam, the Green Lantern transformed it, not allowing the crucial hole to close. The energy blast became a pair of surgical retractors (or, as the Green Lantern would have described them, "those things they used in that medical drama I used to watch to hold the guys getting surgery open"), which expanded the hole to a much more respectable size and prevented it from closing.

Unfortunately, the Green Lantern realized abruptly that she'd been dedicating too much of her concentration to rendering the mighty Angel vulnerable. Her decoys were all gone, though whether the Angel had destroyed them or if they'd just faded away because she hadn't been willing them to continue to exist, she didn't know.

However, it was a rather moot point, since, either way, she had a flood of acid shooting through the air straight at her.

It was too close for the Green Lantern to be able to dodge this time; she'd noticed it too late. She hadn't felt confident enough to try and actually block the spray of deadly fluid with her ring, but now she had no choice.

The Green Lantern brought her ring up and reacted without even consciously thinking out what she was about to do. Emerald light shot out, creating a construct. However, instead of the shield that she probably would have willed into being if she'd had more than a fraction of a second to think about it, the construct took the form of a funnel.

The acid all shot into the large end of the jade funnel, and before it could shoot out the smaller end, Green Lantern added a tube to it, barely doing so quickly enough for the acid to flow into it.

The tube twisted around, redirecting the acid spray into the direction from which it had come. With a huge, gaping hole in its AT field, the Angel was defenseless against having its own acid shot back at it.

The deadly liquid splashed down onto the Angel's arachnid body and it released a horrible, chattering screech of agony, this one much louder and more intense than the one it had uttered before. Great clouds of smoke rose up from its body, momentarily obscuring the Green Lantern's sight of it entirely.

Seconds later, the smoke had cleared enough to let her see it, and despite her hatred of the Angels, she had to wince. The upper layer of flesh on the top of it had been eaten away by the acid, exposing bright pink flesh below, and most of its eyes had been utterly ruined. It was writhing about in obvious agony, its enormous legs moving in quick, jerky actions.

Any reflexive sympathy she might have felt for the Angel was quickly dispelled, and she wasted no more time in moving to finish her enemy off. She formed a construct of a green progressive knife, just like the one that Unit One was equipped with, and then plunged it right into the center of the wounded beast, where she assumed the core was.

Her assumption was apparently correct, because after releasing one final scream of pain, the Angel collapsed and was perfectly still.

However, the Green Lantern wasn't about to fly off without making certain that she'd won. "Ring," she said, "is it dead?"

"Affirmative," it answered.

"Good," she said, then took off, flying back to the city.

It didn't hit her immediately, or all at once, which was probably because she was still wired on adrenaline and her multiple brushes with death. However, as the tension began to leave her muscles and her heartbeat slowed to a more normal pace, it began to dawn on her.

She had slain an Angel. She had done it all by herself, not through teenage proxies, with the abilities granted to her by her power ring.

The Green Lantern released a gale of triumphant laughter and did a few loop-de-loops through the air as she headed back to Tokyo-3, feeling a rush of deep satisfaction that simply orchestrating the battles against the Angels had never brought to her.

Vengeance truly was sweet.

"Look out, Angels!" she cried out as she soared through the sky. "All the rest of you that come here, beware my power! Green Lantern's light!"


Meanwhile, Shinji and Asuka crashed out of a ventilation shaft, landing painfully on the floor in one of the EVA cages. A moment later, Rei gracefully jumped down, landing lightly on her feet.

"We're here!" Asuka announced unnecessarily, quickly untangling herself from Shinji and getting to her feet.

"Good," Akagi said. "Then I guess we're ready if we need to launch the EVA Units for some reason. Uh, until the power comes back on, you three can just have a seat or something."

Shinji and Asuka were two very different people, to put it mildly, so their minds very rarely functioned on the same wavelength. However, in this one instance, the exact same thought went simultaneously through their heads:

I climbed through the air ducts for this?!


Power was eventually restored to NERV headquarters, allowing the Ops Director, who had (allegedly) been trapped inside an elevator for hours, to finally escape.

Not long after this, the confusion started.

The JSDF contacted NERV to reluctantly give the obligatory congratulations for defeating another Angel, as well as to demand to know why the quasi-paramilitary agency had decided to perform a communications blackout without warning.

Much as NERV, and the Commanders in particular, would have liked to have claimed credit for the latest victory against the Angels, they simply didn't have enough information to be able to lie convincingly about it. As a result, they were forced to admit that they hadn't even known an Angel had made an appearance, much less destroyed it themselves.

Of course, if NERV hadn't destroyed the Angel, that inevitably brought up the question of who had.

The list of suspects was short and entirely composed of females.

In the end, no one reached any firm conclusions about who exactly got to put the death of the Ninth Angel into their personal win column, though Makoto would gladly tell anyone who'd listen that it was probably the Green Lantern.

Nothing much came of the whole strange incident, at least not from the brass's side. The JSDF and JSSDF gleefully made noises about how NERV was useless next to a group of girls in colorful costumes, and SEELE issued a few (mostly empty) threats to Gendo, warning him not to allow NERV to appear so impotent in the future.

All in all, it was business as usual for the big boys. However, in the days following the battle, Misato came to an important decision.


Gendo Ikari's secretary was a crone. There was simply no other way to accurately describe her. Ancient and hunched, she kept her snow white hair tied in a professional but severe bun, and her lined face seemed locked in a stern, scolding expression that inevitably reminded nearly everyone who saw her of some particularly unpleasant teacher or another. Her eyes were as cunning as a cat's, but completely joyless.

Some people in NERV whispered that, not long ago, she had been young and attractive; basically, the typical kind of woman that powerful men liked to employ as their secretaries. However, the story went, being stationed just outside the Commander's dark and cavernous office—which was commonly referred to as "the lair" by the average member of NERV when Ikari wasn't around—had rapidly sucked both the youth and happiness from the woman.

It was utterly ridiculous, of course, but it was strangely easy to believe when you were right in front of her. That Misato couldn't remember the secretary's name for the life of her wasn't helping matters, either.

"Hello, Captain Katsuragi, what can I do for you?" she asked Misato, in a tone that suggested she'd just as happily knife the younger woman as listen to whatever request she might have.

"I'd like to see the Commander, if he's free," Misato said.

Without another word to Misato, the old woman picked up the phone and rapidly dialed an extension. After a clipped conversation, she turned back to the purple haired woman and said, "You can go inside."

Misato nodded and thanked the woman as politely as she could, then pushed open the large doors to Ikari's office and stepped inside. She instantly felt a chill as she crossed the threshold, closing the door behind her. The room's size, its lack of proper lighting, and the strange and vaguely foreign-seeming designs on the floor all combined to make the Commander's office possess an extremely intimidating atmosphere.

The man probably likes it, she thought. Most people are probably more obedient when they're in here, because they're afraid.

She fingered the currently invisible ring on her finger, remembering what it had said to her: "You have the ability to overcome great fear."

Vice Commander Fuyutski was at Gendo's side, as usual. He greeted her as she approached the desk that sat at the far end of the room.

"Captain Katsuragi, what brings you here?" he asked.

Part of her barely able to believe what she was doing, Misato took a deep breath through her nose and said, "Sirs, I am hereby resigning my position as the Tactical Operations Director of NERV, effective immediately."

"What? Why?" Fuyutski demanded, obviously surprised, and even Gendo's eyes widened briefly.

Misato hung her head slightly. "I believe that my emotions got the better of me at Mount Asuma, which caused me to issue reckless orders," she said formally. "I don't trust myself not to do the same thing in the future, and I don't want to get any of the Children killed in action because my judgment is impaired."

This, of course, was a massive lie. While her actions (as well as Hyuga's words) at Mount Asuma had bothered her, she never would have considered resigning over them. Under normal circumstances, she would have simply drowned these concerns in Yebisu until they went away.

However, now she possessed a weapon that she knew could hurt the Angels, and she didn't want to sit back at the command center when she could be doing real good at the front, and be personally taking her revenge against the Angels.

No matter how she tried to figure out a way, it was simply impossible for her to be in two places at once. She'd had to choose whether to fight this war as the Green Lantern or as the Operations Director. In the end, she'd come to the conclusion that while there were tacticians aplenty across the world, the Earth had only one Green Lantern.

"I wish you'd reconsider," Fuyutski said after a long pause. "You realize that you'll be leaving some very big shoes to fill."

"I don't think it will be so difficult to replace me, sir, but thank you for saying as much," Misato replied.

"Do you have any idea what kind of nightmare you leaving NERV will generate?" Fuyutski asked. "You're in too deeply to just quit."

This one knows too much! Misato couldn't help but think, and resisted the urge to smirk.

"Sirs, respectfully, I don't wish to resign from NERV, I just don't want to be the one calling the shots when the Evangelions go into combat," she said. "I don't want to abandon all of my duties. It would sadden me, if I were discharged from NERV, and the Children were taken from my care as a result."

Gendo and Fuyutski traded a quick glance.

"Very well," Gendo said, speaking up for the first time. "Your position in NERV is changed to tactical consultant. You will advise the new Operations Director as requested."

"Yes, sir," Misato said. "If I may ask, do you have any idea who you'll appoint to the Ops Director post?"

"Not at present," Gendo lied. "Is that all?"

"It is, sir," Misato said.

She saluted and then walked out. The Commanders waited until she'd shut the door behind her to say anything.

"It looks like we overestimated her hatred of the Angels," Fuyutski observed dryly.

"Perhaps," Gendo replied, "though I suspect it was more a case of underestimating her bleeding heart. She's grown too attached to the Second and Third. It appears that it was a mistake to allow her to take them in."

"Well, nothing to be done about it now, I suppose," Fuyutski said. "So, who do you intend to replace her with?"

Behind his folded hands, Gendo smiled.


Author's Notes: And so the first Angel to face the wrath of the new Green Lantern falls, and Misato decides where she wants to be in this war. Now the question is, who will the new Ops Director be? Tune in next time to find out.

Anyway, not much else to say, except sorry that it's a little short. It seemed like, up until this point, the addition of the ring didn't seem like something that would be affecting the other characters all that much.

Zenn1, as someone who majored in Journalism in college (though, as you can probably guess, I never covered court stories, otherwise I'd have known the difference between "summon" and "summons"), let me tell you tell you that I understand your need to point out that mistake perfectly. I'll do my best not to repeat it further.

Ryousanki, I realize that one chapter might not seem like very long to get the hang of something like a GL power ring, but the comics have led me to believe that the learning curve isn't very steep on those things. At least, not on the basics. Also, the clone/shadow/whatever was just something I never really considered for this story. I've admittedly been kind of leery on the concept ever since orionpax09 started using it in "The Fourth Degree" but it's mostly because that sort of thing is pretty much just beyond the power of the ring. One of the few hard restrictions on it is that it can't create life, so the clone is out. And the constructs are never really independent of the ring wielder, so the "shadow" just isn't really feasible.

NefCanuck, the ability of the ring to alter the wearer's appearance always struck me as a bit too limited for someone be able to pull something like that off. Plus, somehow it just doesn't feel like the sort of thing Misato would do to me. Besides, I've already done the Shinji with fourteen-year-old Misato thing anyway.

Popkov, wood was the weakness of Alan Scott, the golden age Green Lantern. When the silver age of comics rolled around, DC decided to re-imagine a lot of their characters whose books had been cancelled. The weakness of the Green Lantern was changed as a result of this.

Anyway, thanks as always to all my readers and reviewers, and thanks to my beta readers. Now for a little fun.


Omake

Obvious

"Damn it, Misato!" Asuka roared as she approached the purple haired woman. "Losing to Shinji is bad enough, but being upstaged by you?! You're not even supposed to be able to kill the Angels at all!"

Misato blinked dumbly, just wondering how the hell Asuka could have known that she was the one who'd ended the Ninth. Then she quickly regained herself and said, "I don't know what you're talking about, Asuka. I was trapped in the elevator the whole time!"

"Oh, don't give me that!" Asuka exclaimed.

Before Misato could force out another denial, Shinji rushed up over to the two ladies. "Misato," he said breathlessly, "why didn't you tell me that you're the Green Lantern?"

"What?!" Misato squawked. "No! I'm not the Green Lantern! Where did you get such a crazy idea from?"

Asuka took her cell phone out of her pocket. "Somebody got a picture of you and put it on the internet," she explained, handing the cell phone over to her guardian.

With a trembling hand, Misato took the phone and looked at the thing's little screen. However, instead of the picture of her in the middle of transforming that she'd feared, there was a shot of her fighting the Ninth Angel. It had been taken toward the end of the battle, and it showed her using the funnel and tube she'd created with the ring to send the monster's acid back at it.

Misato suddenly felt a good deal calmer. There was a phrase for this, and that phrase was "plausible deniability."

"That woman's wearing a mask," Misato said. "She could be any number of people. I don't even know why you two leapt to the conclusion that she's me."

Her charges shared a look for a few seconds before turning back to her.

"Misato," Shinji said slowly, "the reason that we think you're the Green Lantern is because—"

"Her—your—weapon of choice against that Angel was a giant beer bong!" Asuka finished.

Blinking, Misato took a closer look at the picture displayed on the cell phone screen. She hadn't even realized it at the time, but the thing she'd used to beat the Angel was indeed a ring construct of a giant beer bong.

Huh…I guess I shouldn't exactly be surprised that that's where my mind went when I was under pressure, she thought. But still…

She looked at her two wards. Asuka's eyes were full of smoldering anger and resentment. Shinji's were full of amazement and admiration. Neither had a drop of uncertainty in their gaze.

"Okay," she said with a sigh. "I'm the Green Lantern. You caught me."