Neon Genesis Evangelion Fan Fiction ❯ Second Coming ❯ Finest Hour ( Chapter 26 )

Chapter Twenty-Six: Finest Hour

 

I couldn't explain it.

I had no idea how it was possible.

But I knew, in the center of my being, that my - as in Jill's - mother was the soul within Evangelion 03, Sangouki.

The Eva rose to a standing position on the bottom of the lake, and it was difficult for me to tell if it was by my command or some kind of symbiotic agreement between myself and it.

It?

Her?

I didn't know what to think any more.

The spreading of the AT Field was palpable within me, a strength and feeling I'd never experienced before. It was an extension of myself, and I felt in complete control.

I also felt happiness and comfort from San. In a flash, the reason it'd stopped working became obvious to me - back when it had shut down, I had been ready to sacrifice myself to prevent Rei from dying. The maternal instincts of my mother, her protective nature, refused to allow me to do so.

And ever since, I'd fallen into the same trap I'd been chastising Asuka silently for being in herself: I was coming at things from the angle that the Eva was a malfunctioning tool, not that it was a being with which I had a special rapport.

Why didn't I clue in earlier that it was my mom inside? I don't know. It never occurred to me. Logically, since the last I'd seen of her was on a roadside in Toronto, I guess on some level I figured it was impossible for her to be part of the Eva Project in such a manner.

But what business did logic have in any of this?

I heard and felt a shudder from above. Looking up, I was startled to see daylight, even though I should have known it was coming; the bombs the JSSDF were dropping were more than enough to open up the Geofront.

I decided to try something, and was pleasantly surprised when the projection of my AT Field downwards propelled me up through the lake and out of the water into the sky, arcing like a projectile thrown from a catapult.

"Maverick's supersonic," I called out, after remembering to re-open the commlink. "I'll be there in 30 seconds."

"What?! Shut up and help me, you fool!" Asuka shot back. She was occupying herself with swatting VTOL craft out of the sky. It looked like a person grabbing birds by their tails and throwing them at one another.

I landed next to the main highway that circled round the mountains that hemmed in one side of the lake. "Stand down!" I hollered at the soldiers there, both on foot and in mobile armor. "I won't hesitate to use force!"

The peppering of cannon rounds from the mobile artillery felt like a thousand BB gun pellets pelting me all at once. I stood up to the mild discomfort and said, "Last chance! I will do you harm if you make me!"

It was at that point that I realized I'd been deployed with no weapons. Either Misato had overlooked that fact in the rush to get me to safety, or I'd not been expected to recover at all. In any case, I had nothing but the Eva's feet and hands to do the job with, and kicking all the dozens of APCs up and down the mountain was hardly going to be efficient.

The Eva - I'll still call it/her San, because that's how it felt to me - seemed to prod me with a sensation at that moment. If I had to put it in words, it would be, Don't overlook our special abilities. Sometimes the best offense is a good defense.

Of course! I realized after a moment's thought. Thanks, Mom. I spread the AT Field forward and across the mountain, moving the earth and rock and asphalt and everything that was on it. I admit I had to look away when it crushed the line of soldiers and armaments firmly into the ground; I had no desire to watch people die messily and grotesquely. I was reluctant enough to have to end them in the first place, but they left me no choice.

If I was the conscientious defender, Asuka was the completely royally insane one. While I was trying to bargain with the troops to avoid having to kill them, Asuka and Nigouki were swatting, kicking, slapping, and punching air assault vehicles out of the sky left, right, and center. Again, missiles were used, as I think she'd mentioned before I recovered; again, she shrugged them off with little more than an annoyed grunt.

She ended up throwing an AC-130 type gunship at a rail-based gun system - ironically, one we'd employed before to defend against the Angels - to wipe out the last of the offenders in the general area.

"Good to have you back," she said, panting a little. Her image appeared on screen wearing a ferocious grin. "Took you long enough!"

"I should have listened to Ayanami better," I admitted, walking the Eva over to her, sloshing through the lake. "What she was telling you was meant for me, too."

"Well, pleased to meet Mrs. Thomson, then, I guess," Asuka quipped. "What about stupid Shinji, though?"

"Last I heard, Misato went to find him," I said. "I'm sure she'll get him to his Eva. How about you, are you plugged in still?"

"No chance," she replied. "One of the first things they did was shoot up the cable. I've still got over 3 minutes left at max, though."

"I'm going to try to find a working socket," I told her. "You might need the extr--"

"Was ist.. scheiße," Asuka cut me off. "What the hell are those?"

I looked in the direction she was pointing with her Eva. My gut fell into my ankles as I saw nine black delta-winged craft disgorging nine pure, brilliant, white humanform creatures.

"Shit is right," I scowled. "Don't let me down, friend."

 

Misato came on the radio link not long after the Mass Production Evas began circling us.

"Are you two all right?"

"Yeah," Asuka said. "What about you? You sound like--"

"Just a bit of bruising from the airbag," she said over the patchy, broken audio link. "We had a bit of a wild ride. But never mind us. Are you sure of what you're seeing?"

"It's true," I cut in. "Evas five through fourteen. They--they're.. scary." I wasn't lying; seeing them in paint and plastic cel was one thing. Standing face to face in real life with even one of them would have been daunting. At that point, staring down all nine, I'm lucky I didn't fill my plugsuit from the inside out.

"They're here to kill us all, starting with you," Misato said. "I'm not going to sugarcoat it. You have to destroy them all."

"Oh, is that all?" Asuka quipped. "Anything else when we're done that?"

"Hopefully, that'll be the end of it," Misato responded. The happy-go-lucky, boozing neighbor was nowhere to be heard; we were now in the presence of the tactical officer, the Major of operations for NERV. There was no nonsense in her voice.

"Copied," I answered her. "We'll do our best and report back."

"Good luck, you two. I have to sign off, now - we need to hike a bit further to get to the Cage."

The link was cut short with a beep tone, and Asuka frowned. "Nine in just under three minutes?" she said.

"I know we can do it," I said to her. "Should we try to appeal to their sensibilities first?"

"Um, Fourth.." Asuka made a point of looking across all her wraparound displays on-screen, as if surveying the total carnage around us. "I think we burned that bridge and stomped it into dust a while back."

"Fair enough," I replied. "Let me try just this once, though." I looked towards the MPs. "I don't know if any of you are piloted or if you're all dummy plugs, but if there's anyone out there, we don't intend to just lie down. If you're going to go through with this, you're going to have to go through us."

One by one, the evil, nightmarish red lips of all the MPs parted in feral grins.

"I think you got your answer, Fourth," Asuka said, tensing up.

 

My mind was tumbling thoughts over and over in my head. The Evas were obviously going to wait for us to make the first move, and why shouldn't they? They had S2 cores; they could wait forever. Asuka didn't and couldn't.

"Asuka, let me find you a working umbilical," I told her. "These guys are going to be brutal. They--"

"I can do this with time to spare!" she crowed, lunging forward at the one nearest her. There was no AT Field, or it was negated by Asuka's; in any case, the face of the Eva was caved in by a flying leap-kick delivered by Nigouki. Just as I'd expected, Asuka picked up the bleeding, wounded form, and held it over her head, turning towards me, as if she was a professional wrestler showing off her strength.

In a few moments, the body of the MP gave out, and blood from the beast cascaded down all over 02.

"Ha! One down, Fourth! I was first!"

I grunted. "Watch out!" I called out, running toward her to block the attack coming at her from behind. Unwillingly, I was drawn into the fight, instead of looking for the power cable.

The Eva I went up against first - I have no idea which number it was, as they didn't appear to be identified - swung at me with the large, two-handed, two-ended blade, the one I knew could turn into a Lance, or a copy thereof, given the right contingencies. I parried, weaponless, and got sharp pains in my forearms for my efforts.

Speculation prompted me to open the prog knife holster on the shoulder pylon, and lo and behold, it was there - the knife, that is. It wasn't showing up on the armament display, but I had to remind myself that San was not exactly in tip-top shape when things began.

Still, it was like fighting a swordsman with a drywall knife. Again the mass-production unit took a mighty swing, and again I managed to block it - this time with the knife, which lost three segments of blade in the process. I pushed out more blade and tried an offensive slash.

I managed to cut the Eva on the arm, but that didn't seem to faze it. It reared back for another grand swing, and I, on instinct, or perhaps in concert with something inside Sangouki, turned my (the Eva's) wrist around and rammed the knife up under the MP's chin - or where the chin would have been, had it had one.

The greyish tongue lolled out as the jaw was forced open, and blood followed, reminding me this was a living, breathing creature I'd just slaughtered. It slumped down and backwards due to the weight of the blade held over its head, and splashed down into the lake.

Suddenly, Air on a G String began playing in my mind.

Fuck off! I cursed. Not now!

Meanwhile, Asuka had discarded the first one's corpse and made short work of a second, breaking its neck barehandedly, and was moving on to a third, growling in a scary tone as she went on.

I turned to look for another, trying to keep my eyes out for a power source for Asuka at the same time. To me, that was the only way we were going to win this fight.

I'd almost forgotten that the one I'd just fought had fallen with its sword or Lance or whatever we should have been calling it. Turning around, I hurried over to pick it up, then rushed back into the fray.

Another MP was staggering toward Asuka and the one she was currently grappling with. In the back of my mind, I wondered why they weren't ganging up on either of us - it was like in the movies, where the bad guys off-screen are idle, just hanging around waiting for their turn. I mean, yes, they were moving in on both me and Asuka, but given what I expected of their actions later on (which hopefully wouldn't come to pass), it made sense to me that they'd swarm early on.

It was difficult for me to swing the two-handed blade; I wasn't used to something sharp that was held in the middle, instead of at the end, so I was still thinking of using it like a sword. The blade bit just as deep into the shoulder of the Eva, though, when I swung it, nearly decapitating it and certainly severing vital arteries and organs - if, that is, the Evas were built like us inside.

In any case, it went down, and Asuka was, as far as I knew, totally unaware it had even been charging. She was busy in a wrestling match with the beast before her, carving up the landscape with giant footprints and the occasional hand crushing something, et cetera. Once in a while, the remnants of a JSSDF mobile armor unit, a power pole, piece of guard rail, or other junk would fly up out of the ground debris, tossed violently by the energy being spent by the two combatants. If it hadn't been so deathly serious, it would have been comical at times.

In the end, Asuka beat it down, of course, jamming her prog knife through its head, pinning it to the floor of the lake. By then, I had turned to defend myself against yet another assailant, clashing its blade against mine over and over.

"Kaworu," I muttered, remembering the dummy plugs from this point of the fictional fight. It probably would have been easier if Kaworu had really been in charge; he'd've listened to reason, I suspected.

Or maybe not, considering what I did to him.

From out of nowhere, a furious chop cleft the white Eva before me in half at the waist, the top half tumbling aside in a spinning motion. Asuka stepped forward, brandishing another stolen blade.

"Six! Three to go, Jill!" she hollered, stomping off towards another.

We can do this, I realized with a shock. It hadn't been anywhere close to three minutes yet; Asuka wasn't going to run out of steam. Another MP lunged for me, and I brought up the blade quickly. It fell onto the end of the blade, shaking it loose from my hands, and luckily just missing ramming it back into my own gut. (The Eva's, of course.) It seemed unconcerned, letting it drive all the way through the beast and out its lower back. Once it slid down the blade far enough to reach me, it clawed out with its hands at my throat, trying to choke the life out of Sangouki.

Don't worry.. I won't let them!

I couldn't be sure if the thought came from me or San, but in any case, the MP's progress was halted when 03 reached forward and pushed at the MP with all our combined might. I decided to push down on the Eva at the same time, hoping to cause the impaled blade to inflict more damage. It seemed to come up against something hard, and I looked down, to realize it was hung up on the MP's core.

Then it hit me.

Fuck!! The cores!

"Asuka!" I yelled. "We're not done! We have to destroy the cores--"

"This is the last one!!" she shrieked, and I looked over to see her reaching through one 'dead' MP to crush the chest of another, again, with her bare hand, as if she was the Thugee guy in Temple of Doom going after Indy's heart.

Or just like I remembered it having been committed to cel and film, a lifetime ago.

"No!" I hollered. "Asuka! Take out its core!"

She couldn't hear me; she was bellowing for all she was worth.

The one atop me suddenly shifted its weight and stopped resisting me, and with that, was propelled clear off the blade, staggering to an upright position. It wasted no time in wrestling the blade out of the ground, and flung it towards Asuka.

"NO!!!" I screamed, leaping up and tackling the Mass Production monster, far too late to make a difference.

"Th.. the Lance of..?" I heard from Asuka, even though I couldn't see what was going on. I was busy pounding at the torso of the Eva beneath me, trying to fracture its core and kill it dead, dead, dead. I was in a blind rage; somewhere on the periphery of my mind, I was aware of a plan to go around and take out all the cores of all the MPs, even if I had to fight for ten times as long as we already had, but there was no way I was going to let them violate Asuka like I feared they were going to try to. She'd survive, with a bad head wound, but I would make sure the MPs paid for what they did, and that Third Impact wouldn't come to pass. They couldn't do it without the MPs, right? And the MPs can't pick apart Nigouki if they're dead either. So I had become a totally detached, running-on-autopilot killing machine.

I didn't clue in to the fact that the others had awakened until an excruciating, nearly-indescribable pain caught me in my right leg. The one I'd been fighting took advantage of my involuntary pause to shove me away and try choking me again.

Three others were crowding me now, one having yanked at and snapped San's right femur like a twig. I was clawing around frantically at the strangler, trying to ignore the pain, and regretting wondering earlier about the swarming tactic. Distantly, I heard Maya scream for Asuka, with no reply.

Another pair of hands took hold of my left arm, which had gained purchase on the strangling Eva, and bent the forearm past its breaking point. I gasped and yelped out in pain, which was already hard to do considering it felt like my windpipe was being crushed.

San's left leg was next to get done in, and then the right arm. The MPs systematically, methodically, rendered me unable to lift a limb - literally - to defend against them.

Another sharp blow took my breath away as pain shot up my lower back. I couldn't see it, but one of the blades had been rammed through from behind, just at the waistline, driving down into the earth until it dug into bedrock.

The Eva's screen was filled with a leering, grinning beast, squeezing with all its might against my throat. And there was nothing I could do to stop it.

Oh God, I realized. This is it. We failed.

"Asuka.. everyone.. I'm sorry.." I whimpered through the pain and the suffocating grip. Even if no one could hear me anymore, I wanted it said.

"Mom.. I'm sorry.." I cried, barely able to manage the words. "...I'm scared.."

There was a crunching sound, and everything went black.

 

A moment, or an eternity (I couldn't tell which) later, an image faded into view before me. I blinked a couple times, trying to resolve it into focus, but it was hard to pin down. I first thought I saw Rei, but then..

"Mom?" I gasped. "Mom!"

My mother approached, arms stretched out before her, reaching for me. "I'm right here, sweetheart," she said. "I'm here with you."

"Mom," I said again, reaching out for her and collapsing into her warm embrace.

The last thing I heard as consciousness slipped away was faint giggling.