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[NSFW] - All is Right with the World [Waifu Catalogue] [Evangelion]

6.0 - Not According to Plan
I had just left the hospital when the alarms began to sound.
My phone went off at almost the same moment, and as I pulled it out, an app opened automatically which indicated that the Fourth Angel had been sighted on approach to Tokyo-3. The expected trajectory showed it moving closer with a strange stop-start gait, which was explained when the screen fuzzed for a moment and a chibi Mel-chan appeared in the corner winking, before I also got access to the JSDF's tactical information.
That's a lot of tanks.
Nevermind. No tanks.
Well that explains the slowdown. Why do they even bother?
"What's going on?" I hear Kensuke say from behind me, trying to look over my shoulder to see my phone but failing due to being a full head shorter than I am. Toji grabs him and makes eye contact with me. I nod my agreement to his unasked question.
"You know what's going on. You guys need to go find a shelter now." I say, looking up at the sky as the alarm begins to change into a rolling tone, like an air raid alarm, and a voice indicates the buildings will be withdrawing into the armor layer in three minutes.
"And what about you?" Kensuke yells, trying to be heard over the alarm.
Before I can answer I feel a tug on my arm. I turn to my left and my own eyes open in surprise. Somehow over the alarm I hear Kensuke choking on his own tongue behind me.
A single red eye stares back at me.
Rei Ayanami stares at me for a moment, and my now awakened senses can feel her AT-Field probing my own where she is holding onto my arm. I open my mouth to say something, but before I can she speaks, tersely, and yet somehow perfectly audible over the sound of the chaos.
"An Angel has been detected approaching from Odawara. We must go. Now."
I nod to Rei and turn to see Toji dragging Kensuke bodily towards a crowd streaming into the hospital's dedicated shelter. Well, they should be fine, and hopefully won't jump out into the battle this time. "You know where I'm going. Heroism calls. Get to a shelter!" I call back to Kensuke. Toji gives me a thumbs up with the arm not wrapped around Kensuke's head.
I turn back. Rei continues to stare at me. Neither of us has moved yet, and her hand still rests on my arm. I move my own hand up to touch hers and she suddenly jumps slightly, her one visible eye widening as she lets go of me and takes a step back.
For a second I thought I saw a slight blush on her pale face, but it's gone as soon as it appears.
"We must go." Rei repeats, turning to move off towards a section of slowly retracting buildings. I rush up to catch up with her.
"Do you know where we are going?" I ask her as we walk quickly along. I'm remembering from the series that Rei was often doped up on a bunch of downers to keep her emotionally regulated, I assume to make her easier to manipulate. Not sure if that's fanon or not, but she seems pretty emotionally neutral.
My magical eye bullshit should burn through it though.
"Affirmative. We are moving to path 45-G, which will lead us to a lift into the Geofront. There are a number of such passages around the city. I have memorized a number of them." Rei responds, still avoiding eye contact with me.
Can she tell something is happening? She might not be used to emotions just in general, and is shying away from me as a result of what she's feeling.
The first time, when I caught her as she fell, we made eye contact, and I wasn't controlling Love Spot.
Magical bullshit likely does go through whatever cocktail of drugs she's on.
"Are you going to be able to pilot Unit-00?" I ask, as Rei passes her ID card over a hidden reader, revealing an elevator. "You seem to still be injured."
She moves into the elevator, and I follow. She shows her card to a reader in the elevator which beeps musically and the elevator begins moving.
I reach out and press a button on the elevator which connects the internal comm to NERV HQ. "Override Elevator Shaft 45-G, Priority Seraphim, First and Third Children on elevator. Clear a path to the Evangelion hanger."
As I release the button, I hear an answering chirp from the radio and the elevator begins to speed up as priority is given to our path to the Evangelions.
Rei looks up at me unconsciously and I make eye contact. We stare for a moment, and she raises an eyebrow at my actions. I shrug. "I did actually read the booklet. Communication discipline seemed important, and it's clear we're the most important factor here."
Rei nods and in answer to my question about her injuries she reaches up and removes her eyepatch.
Her other eye is perfectly fine. No discoloration, no scarring, no indication she was injured at all.
"I am operating optimally." She says, still staring at me. "I was ordered to continue wearing the bandages unless it became detrimental to an assigned mission. Fighting the Angels takes priority." All of this still in the standard monotone voice. I know she's gotta be feeling strong emotions for what may be the first time in her life, but she's almost challenging herself by continuing to meet my eyes without reacting.
I keep underestimating how utterly messed up most of the cast of Evangelion is.
"What… are you?" Rei asks softly enough that without my superhuman hearing I wouldn't have heard it. I don't outwardly react.
We keep staring at each other for the few minutes the ride takes to reach its destination. Just as she seems like she's about to say something, the doors open, and several Section 2 agents appear as if summoned to escort us to the hangar.
Rei's face immediately returns to its stock neutral form, and we move off.
[hr][/hr]
In short order, we arrive at the Evangelion cages. It turns out Unit-00 is still on ice, apparently the repairs were still not complete. What the hell did that thing do when it raged out? In this timeframe in the original timeline Unit-01 has an entire arm basically regrown. I don't think 00 was available for this fight either though. What did they do to that thing?
I got changed into my plugsuit with practiced speed. Turns out the reason we use these is that apparently there are sensors in the suit that detect your nerve impulses and allow for a better sync ratio. Doesn't help me much since I pretty much have full control over my sync, but they don't know that and I won't be mentioning it any time soon. I wince slightly as the airtight seal forms, particularly around the crotch area. Of course there is a bathroom hookup. It's always almost supernaturally cold. Go figure.
Apparently we got here fast enough that I was going to be able to intercept the Angel outside the city, which should be nice for my collateral damage statistics. Rei also got into a plugsuit, in her own locker area. I'm not sure why, other than procedure, since we didn't have another working EVA for her to get in. I understood they were trying to get a crash program together to rush the repairs on 00, but it likely wouldn't be done in time to matter in this fight.
I will say, I was glad of the padding in the waist area after I got a good look at Rei in her plugsuit though, because damn. These things leave nothing to the imagination, and Rei wears it well.
We make eye contact again, and I catch her eyes slowly running over my body from top to bottom. I smile and as she looks back up she stiffens for a moment before turning and walking away.
As I leave the lockers, the technicians rush me to my plug, and I'm given a short introduction to today's loadout.
I got actual weapons this time! I mean, if you can call them weapons.
Based on the training programs I've done so far, the Pallet Rifle is a complete mess. It's ideal range is one that is outside the range I need to be in to erode the Angel's AT field, and it's damage profile is way too small to penetrate an active AT Field. The only actual use would either be ramming it right up to the angel and firing or having a secondary Eva use it while one was in melee range. Obviously, that's not going to work in a solo fight.
In addition, it was horribly inaccurate. While it's kind of a coilgun, that doesn't eliminate recoil, and it's just not engineered to the specifications needed to get a perfect accuracy at those ranges. These shells were originally designed for artillery work. You can't just scale it up and expect it to make a functional assault rifle bullet. The scales are larger, but EVA combat is basically personal scale combat just scaled upwards. That isn't how it should work, but the fact that 80m tall robots can stand under their own weight already tells physics to take a hike, so I'm rolling with it.
Since literally every part of an Angel other than the core is not vital and can be regrown, accuracy is key. I tried, but even with Martial Talent growing my skills amazingly it's just not effective to use a Pallet Rifle in basically any normal combat scenario.
The smaller Eva Pistol is basically a sawed off semi-automatic version of the same weapon. That makes it a bit more accurate at close ranges, which is where you'd have to be to hit the core anyways. It's still not a great weapon, but it's much less unwieldy. That was part of my loadout. The Pistol had the same technology as the pallet rifle, requiring a complete overhaul to reload, so I had several hardpoints throughout my EVA loaded with extra pistols..
They don't have a Progressive Sword for some ungodly reason, so I got to use something which on paper was called a Smash Hawk, something which I absolutely refused to call it. It was basically a Progressive Axe, using the same sonic technology that the Sonic Lance used, but over a crescent shaped axe blade instead of a knife on a stick.
I also put some time in on my AT manipulation skills, and I can pretty regularly keep part of my field around my weapon in the same technique I used to kill Sachiel. That should let me parry Shamshiel's laser whips if they use the same mechanism that empowered Sachiel's lances. It also turns the entire axe, not just the bladed end into something that can effectively parry, which changes entirely how you fight with the weapon and eliminates one of the biggest issues with axes vs swords.
I've also started to manipulate my elemental affinity. I chose Light as an affinity primarily because of the whole 'light of the soul' think Kaworu harped on about in the show, but it's turned out to be really useful. And as an unrelated mystic power, it doesn't 'count' as AT manipulation for the purposes of NERV's sensor network - I tested that one - which is a plus.
The basic powers seem to be light emission, low grade lasers, and plasma generation. I haven't quite figured out how to wrap the plasma around a weapon to create an impromptu Power weapon, but I think i'm getting there.
But at its core it's just light manipulation. I'm hoping I can finagle this into hardlight, illusions, invisibility, there's a lot of utility that can be gained out of this specialization. It's going to take a lot of work or some waifus or opponents to gain knowledge or power though, and nothing in Evangelion would count as Light magic experts.
I briefly review my Exit Stage Left window. As of right now I'm at 6% completion to be able to move on to my next world, but I don't want to do that too quickly before I get the ability to choose my next world and/or a Home with a portal hub for easy moving back and forth.
I think I need to try and see if Shamsiel is claimable. If the Evas are Tier 7, claiming Shamsiel would net me a lot of points, especially if I immediately sold it - I have no desire for a giant squid waifu.
Plus I don't want to be self-destructed on again.
[hr][/hr]
It takes a few more minutes to get to the surface this time. They aren't rushing to send the EVA into live combat, so the Angel must still be well outside the city limits.
Grabbing my extra weapons from a supply building, I disconnected my power cable, watching the five minute timer pop onto my HUD, and moved to the farthest point on the line the Angel was following as it approached the city.
I can see the streets cleared out of traffic. Some poor sods didn't get their cars out of the way, and few fall victim to my size 5000 boots as I move through the city.
I sure hope anybody living here has some serious insurance.The premiums must be insane.
I slide behind an armored building and reattach a power cable on that side with room to spare. Man, having to plug in your giant robots is really annoying for maneuverability purposes. The cable was several kilometers long, but I can see me tripping over it, and it's just a huge liability in combat.
I can only imagine the damage a 4 meter thick cable with enough juice to overload a nuclear plant running through it could do as a live wire if it gets severed too.
I start my trek outside the city. The landscape here is hilly, and I think I just walked over the overpass Misato and I got blown off by the N2 mine when I first got here. It's amazing how well they've cleaned up less than 3 weeks after a goddamn nuclear bombing.
I curl my cable and crouch behind a hill. My radar senses tell me it's filled with guns and launchers, and several other similar hills are around this valley which it was decided I would intercept Shamshel in. It's a natural killing field. I was surprised NERV was so effectively setting up an ambush.
Well, as mucha s is possible when it's impossible to hide my bulk and the ANgel probably has soul vision. I don't think they need eyes to see. I don't.
I settle in to wait for the Angel to approach our ambush location. I can see the emplaced weapons and army vehicles moving into position, highlighted in my field of view.
As opposed to the chaotic mess that was Sachiel's approach to Tokyo-3, Shamshel approaches serenely, floating quickly but looking like it is barely moving as it approaches my position. I see the turrets tracking its movement, and several rocket batteries and tanks turning to aim. I send several messages to them warning them to back off, but all I get is some military bravado telling 'The kid to clear the goddamn channel'.
Well, I'm not here to prevent idiots committing suicide.
Shamshel almost calmly floats to settle down across the field from me. I can see its body shifting from a long flight form to a tall stilly slightly floating squid monster tall form. Its nubby arms settle to the side, and my soul senses feel the flesh parting and growing outward as its pink whips begin to form.
Then a single tank fires a shell at Shamshel, who is still beyond my AT field erosion radius. The shell flattens against the orange hexagons in mid-air.
Then it moves.
It's not like Sachiel. Shamshel seems to glide over the ground, unlike Sachiel's slow ponderous steps. Instead of a thundering earthquake, it's more like a raging tempest, rushing forward. Shamshel slides over the terrain like it isn't even there, and streaks of pink light shoot outwards, tracing curving lines through space as they drag along the mountain ridge the offending tank and its entire squadron was futile firing from. I hear screams through the comms, cut off suddenly as a wave of explosions follows the neatly bisected tank squadron.
The whip flashes again, and I see a hundred meter wide chunk of the hill cut through diagonally, the edges flaring with fire and the shattered remains sliding down the hill to crush a squadron of rocket artillery vehicles.
"EVA Engaging," I call out over the comms. "JSDF, clear the area, I am weapons-free."
I give them a few seconds to sputter in response and I raise my left arm, my Pistol barking once a second, sending shells downrange to impact against Shamshel's shield, trying to get its attention.
I see its face turn, and the smoke billowing up from the exploded shells seems to burst away as it rushes towards me. Behind, I see the shattered remains of an armored squadron retreating.
Shamshel crosses the 300 meters separating us in seconds. Out AT Fields collide, and again I find myself the stronger, pushing through Shamshel's field. With my extra strength I focus on creating friction in the air, attempting to slow down its prodigious speed into something I can actually see and counter. It works, and I see the flash of pink to my side and slide myself backwards, our AT-Fields shearing against each other as Shamshel's right beamwhip slices toward me.
My left hand comes up and my pistol barks again quickly, three artillery shell sized projectiles striking towards Shamshel's core-eye unprotected at this range. The right whip shifts position almost instantly, cutting the projectiles out of the air, but giving me time to retreat.
Shamshel has two whips however, and the left one slices for my EVA's face, only to be intercepted by my glowing axe. The reinforced field around the axe holds off the corrosive AT-Field attached to the whip, as I hoped it would. I shift to try and capture the whip, my pistol still barking to keep the right whip at bay defending Shamshel's core.
The left whip wraps around the axe handle, but Shamshel, though fast, is not as strong as Sachiel. And with it's floaty gait not nearly as stable.
I pull my axe backward, my AT Field assisting my movement to pull the whip taut. My pistol shoots for the final time, clicking empty, but it's bought me enough time. Time to go off the rails.
EVA-01's eyes flash in a familiar way to anyone who watched the fight against Sachiel.
Shamshel freezes for just a moment, as if in shock. And that moment is enough.
A cross shaped beam of purple light drags like a laser through the intervening space, tearing through the ground in a line between us before raising to strike directly at the Y shaped appendage that supports Shamshel's trapped whip. There's an alien screech and a burst of red blood, and the whip wrapped around my axe dims to gray as it is severed from the Angel. I take a step forward, but Shamshel rushes backwards out of range before I can capitalize further on my strike.
I don't think most Angels are sentient. But they have instincts, and I can guess what Shamshel's are saying right now. The Angels are predators, but on a normal world they would be competing with each other. I'm getting a look now that my empathic sense pick up as waryness and respect for another killer. Not the contempt it shows to others.
I twist my axe, and the field I have wrapped around it flexes, shredding the unpowered whip which falls in pieces to the ground. I take the chance to discard my now empty pistol, drawing a new one from the EVA's waist. Like an Age of Sail pirate, I carry multiple pistols. Reloading is just too awkward at this scale.
Its stump is already bursting outward, attempting to regenerate its lost whip. Before it has a chance, I rush forwards, my AT Field speeding my steps along as I charge my opponent.
I can only imagine what the OPS brigade is thinking right now.
[hr][/hr]
"What the hell was that?!" Risuko basically screams as she grabs a monitor with both shaking hands. The power readings spiked tremendously, but somehow the energy draw from the umbilical cable didn't change! It was completely impossible!
But it happened. And the result...
Ritusko stares up at the monitor as the boy rushes forward again, tearing up the terrain as his opponent arm splits and bulges as it regrows, the remaining whip slashing through space in a warding pattern to protect its recovering body.
"What have we built?" Ritsuko whispers to herself as she watches the impossible battle on the screen. Chatter around her seems to fade as nothing but the battle of titans catches her attention, the discussions on force composition, the retreating JDSF's casualties, Misato's orders, it all just seems to be random noise.
She looks down again at the readings. So similar to the first Angel's weapon...
"Are they learning?" she murmurs. "Is She learning?"
Ritsuko has all her life sought scientific truth. For the first time, she has asked a question she isn't sure she wants the answer to.
[hr][/hr]
"Get it Shinji-kun!" Misato cheers with a dark sense of satisfaction as she watches the Angel retreat, screaming in pain. Her tongue darts out to wet her suddenly dry lips as she watches the thing cower in fear.
Monsters should be afraid. The night is dark, but humanity is bringing the light. And Shinji-kun is riding vanguard.
Misato wasn't sure when her feelings about the boy… well, man really, changed. It seemed to happen pretty quickly - sure, he was easy on the eyes, but there were plenty of those in a military organization.
There was something about Shinji. He was dependable, he could cook like a professional, and his eyes...
Misato bit her lip.
Plus he took to Evangelion fighting like someone born to it. She had been with Asuka during some parts of her training at NERV Berlin. Asuka was good, and she was still probably better than Shinji at direct Evangelion combat, but she had over ten years of training on him. Shinji had gotten competent so very, very quickly.
And he did things with his AT-Field that nobody, not even Rei, had managed before. It was incredible. And apparently frustrating as hell for the scientists, as she could see Ritsuko shaking a monitor and yelling off to the side as she watched the fight.
And the dreams. Oh gods the dreams.
Every night for the last two weeks, Shinji cooked her an amazing dinner. They spent time talking and once or twice they watched some silly show on television. And it took almost all of her concentration not to just jump him right there on the couch.
Because every night she was having the most intense erotic dreams she had ever had in her life. It was like her mind was punishing her for not following through with it.
She knew she was supposed to keep it professional, to treat him as an underling. He was in her chain of command! There were rules about this! Hell he was over ten years younger than her.
But goddamn it was difficult. She knew she was going to screw up eventually. There's no way it could be as good as it was in her dreams, but at this point she'd take anything. It had been quite a while.
Her musing are interrupted by a scream that isn't discordant and angelic. And as shee looks up she hears a gasp from Maya next to her and her eyes go wide.
EVA-01 is running backwards, and its left arm is gone. The scream was Shinji, his left arm hanging dead at his side and sweat beading on his forehead.
The Angel, it's arm regrew. And it split. It now has three laser whips, one on the right and two on the left. And the new one cut right through the Evangelion's arm.
Misato brings a hand to her mouth and her heart seems to drop like a lead weight into her stomach.
But Misato's fear response has always defaulted to fight, not flight.In seconds she's calling up every single artillery piece and weapons emplacement in the valley, and before the Angel can take another step forward its surrounded by a wall of explosions.
"Shinji… hold on!" Misato growls, her heart hammering as she barks orders to the various departments.
[hr][/hr]
"Fucking OW!" I shout, pulling the EVA back as the Angel in front of me is surrounded by explosions.
I did not expect a second whip! Shamshel never had three whips!
The arm regrew insanely fast. Under a minute to complete restoration - that's much faster than Shamshel even managed. And when it did, at first I thought it was only one whip. But the damn thing split as it rushed at me. I only have two arms to parry!
One whip was blocked by my axe, the other deflected by my pistol.
The third took off my left arm right above the elbow.
My pistol and forearm fell to the floor. I was at about 81% sync at the time, which means I felt it about 140% above what a normal human would feel having an arm lopped off.
It was not fun. I do not recommend it.
If I was not superhuman, I might have passed out from the pain, and that would be death. Shamshel is so fast, it's incredible. It's completely melee optimized - I don't think it even can shoot the beams that Sachiel had. It seems like it's adapted based on how I fought Sachiel - speed over strength, melee and maneuverability to counter my grapple-kill.
Is that how the Angels will react now? Can I even count on my foreknowledge in that case?
I think I'm going to have to cheat. Just in case.
I grit my teeth, and I pull up one of my prepared Ritual Circles. In the split second between realizing I was fucked and getting hit, I tried to create a Ward against AT-Fields to depower the whip as it came for me.
That didn't work. It seems like I can only Ward against physical objects. That is a bit annoying, and eliminates some strategies I may have had in the works. I suppose it's fair I can't just automatically win by warding against "Souls" or something.
Still, Ward is an incredibly powerful ability. This time I set one up that completely surrounded Shamshel, trapping it in the wall of explosions that came in from all sides as those hidden gun pieces finally fired.
I then try a capture while it is trapped in the first Ward.
Unfortunately, it doesn't take. "No Will detected." is the response I get from what seems like an error message.
It seems for at least Shamshel, it isn't sentient enough to pass whatever bar is required to qualify something for capture. Damn. That's a lot of points left on the table.
Well, I guess I'll just have to kill it.
I stand perfectly still and focus on my missing EVA arm. Shamshel is realizing something is wrong, and its whips are beating against the Ward. Unfortunately for it, I set the requirements of this Ward so high that unless it was Adam himself beating on it, nothing's getting through it for the next few minutes.
I feel the flesh begin to bubble, and my arm slowly begins to regrow. This is what I learned from defeating Shamshel, and I haven't had much of a chance to practice, so its slow and painful, but after about a minute of artillery firing, I clench my left hand again, the nerves buzzing down my arm as I feel it reconnect to the EVA's new appendage.
I send a message to the MAGI to make the records seem like the EVA has berserked, and I roar as I increase my sync ratio. One shot at this, it's going to have to be a single rush in while I can. I can't fight that thing for a prolonged period if it regenerates like a Hydra.
Now I'm really going to cheat. I cover my left hand with a corrosive AT-field and circle around to strike from behind Shamshel, pulling back my axe as I rush in. I channel Light around my hand, forming an orange claw, protected by the AT-Field's effects. At the last possible moment I see the artillery stop firing and the smoke begins to clear. I made the Ward the color and shape of an AT-field, so it looks to the outside that Shamshel was just bunkering down.
Before the smoke clears, I dive at Shamshel while it is trapped, dropping the Ward at the last second while it is distracted trying to break its way out. My entire AT-Field slams on it while it is distracted, focusing on increasing the weight and drag on all its arms, and its supernatural speed slows to a slow wave as it tries to turn to face me, but my regrown hand reaches out and crushes its double-whip arm where it connects to the body, tearing it away again as the twin whips fall dead.
My axe comes down like a falling tree on the top of its head, trying to strike through the flesh to hit the core from behind. Shamshel screeches as my feet jump off the dirt and with my momentum and an AT-Field covering smash themselves through its torso.
I then set up another Ward around my right side, which deflects the whip coming for my neck with a burst of orange light.
Then brutally, hacking with my axe and tearing with my claw of light, I crush Shamshel to the ground and tear it apart.
Its struggles end when my claw rips chunks out of the core. Remembering the fight with Zeruel, I consider eating the thing, but I don't want to do that so early in case they adapt with my current strength in mind. Damn this is annoying. I doubt they can adapt to my Company perks, but my in universe power set is going to have to evolve gradually.
Tearing open the flesh, I stare at the core and with another cross beam shot, I annihilate every speck of it entirely.
A crater forms under my feet and I stand in the bloody wreckage, the EVA's head thrown back as it howls to the sky.
I sit back in my seat, breathing hard, and let the EVA collapse. The power cable was severed again in Shamshel's death throws. And as I relax I feel the new Power slamming into my mind. The speed, the levitation, the faster growth and the laser whips, manipulated not only by skin or nerves but by AT field magic.
That was too close. I need to get stronger. And I need help. It's time to talk to the weapons team, and also to get them off their ass to get Unit 00 active again. I don't want to have to solo any more of these bastards.
Still, any battle you can walk away from. I'll take the win while I can. But my training is going to have to be taken up a notch.
Thinking of Rei and Misato I smile. At least I'll have a few ways to relax afterwards.
[hr][/hr]
A/N: Again, sorry for the delay with this one, but I should be over the hump now.
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