Neon Echo Evangelion

Episode 2: A Daring Attack

	“Man, this sucks!” Brian complained, he had just walked out of his changing cubicle after putting on his plug suit for the first time, it was all white with a black ‘UN’ logo on the right arm. “This suit makes me look like a gimp.”
	“Hmm…” Jacques stared at him, “Your right you do look like a gimp.”
	“Hey!” Brian fumed, shaking his fist at Jacques as he walked out of the changing room.
	“Hey relax,” Tony laughed, “He just likes winding people up, don’t let it get to you.” Tony was wearing a Red Plug Suit, with a white ‘UN’ logo on the arm.
	“But he’s such a prick!” Brian raged.
	“Calm down, man,” Tony soothed, “He’ll just insult you more if you keep getting angry all the time.”
	“I suppose so.” Brian slumped down on the Bench in the middle of the changing room. “So… Lily’s your sister huh?” Brian managed to say, and then realised how stupid that sounded.
	“Yeah.” Tony replied.
	“So how come you haven’t seen her in a year?”
	“I had to stay on a military base in Italy when she transferred to SIN.”
	“Oh, so are you parents in the Military?” Brain pressed.
	“No,” Tony replied, “They’re dead.”
	“Oh, Jeez, I’m… Oh God I’m sorry.” Brian tried to apologise rapidly.
	“It’s okay, it wasn’t your fault, they died in Second Impact. My mother was badly wounded and died soon after she gave birth to me, a couple of days after Second Impact.” Tony finished adjusting his Plug suit. “We were picked up by the Military and end up staying with them since.”
	“Oh, Okay.” Brian looked up at Tony. “I suppose we’d better get going then.”
	“Yep,” He said flatly.

	“Aah! Your trying to drown me?” Brian started panicking as his entry plug began to fill with liquid. 
	“Don’t worry,” He heard Lily’s voice over the Comm system, “It’s a liquid that will provide oxygen directly to your blood stream.” Brian felt the liquid wash over him and down his throat, he felt like he should be trying to cough the water back up, but he didn’t need to.
	“Pretty weird, huh?” He heard Tony say, a small holographic window had appeared in the Entry plug with a picture of Tony in his Entry plug.
	“Sure is.” He thought his voice would sound garbled in the water, but it carried fine.
	“Okay, everybody set?” Lily said. “Now what you are currently in is a test EVA, these are used to get pilots used to synchronising with EVA’s, now it’ll feel a bit weird at first so just take some time to try and walk around the training area.”
	“How exactly do you work this thing?” He heard Emma say.
	“Just think and it’ll do it, and you work the arms using those two joysticks in front of you.” Lily said. “Got that?”
	“Roger.” All four pilots said.
	“Okay, activating EVA’s now.” Suddenly the dim entry plug became a kaleidoscope of colours as the visual systems came online and the training ground appeared in front of them.
	“Trippy.” Brian said marveling at the rainbow colours that briefly swirled around him. He looked out at the training ground, it looked just like a section of a city. “Wow, this is huge!” he said.
	“What, the EVA or the Training Ground?” Tony asked. He had meant the training ground but then he remembered he was in an EVA, he looked down and the image around the Entry Plug tilted down as he did to reveal the massive body of the Evangelion stretching out below him. 
	“Whoa! This is so cool” Brian exclaimed.
	“Don’t get to excited, we’ve all got ones too you know?” Jacques patronised him. Brian looked to see three more Evangelions stretching out to his left. All of them identical, a dull white colour, a humanoid body, with a boxy head which had a single red lens in the centre.
	“But these are pretty cool.” Tony said.
	“All right, calm down! Jeez you’re acting like kids.” Emma said, an exhausted tone in her voice.
	“Ooh!” Tony and Brian chorused.
	“Oh grow up!” Emma retorted.
	“When your quite finished?” Lily said impatiently.
	“Sorry,” Tony said.
	“Now just walk around the training ground, get used to the controls.” Lily said.
	“Okay,” Brian said to himself, “Walk, just think walk.” The EVA lurched forwards, rocking Brian inside the entry plug, he quickly grabbed the joysticks and pulled them outwards to stabilise himself, the EVA’s arms shot out providing balance for the wobbling giant.
	“Very good Brian, you managed to stabilise it, although not the best way to do it at least it worked.” Lily congratulated him.
	“Phew!” Brian exhaled as the EVA took another step forward safely. “This isn’t that hard,” he said. The EVA moved slowly up the middle of a street towering over the buildings. He looked across to the others who were all making steady progress. He took a left and then a right, and started weaving in and out of the buildings. Run, he thought, and the EVA began to pick up pace, Jogging down the road at a steady pace.
	“Don’t get ahead of yourself Brian.” Lily warned.
	“Hey I’m fine, what could possibly go…”
	“Get outta the way!” He heard Jacques shout.
	
	“So let me get this straight.” Jan said looking out of his office window over the training ground, where large cranes were lifting the fallen EVA’s out of the rubble of several buildings. “You managed to crash into each other in your EVA’s and…”
	“Actually he crashed into me.” Jacques said.
	“What? No way, he got in my way and I-”
	“Shut up!” Jan ordered, and the room fell silent. “So you have damaged two test EVA’s and destroyed 5 buildings. And on top of that you started fighting when you got out of your EVA’s?” He turned to look at the two pilots, Brian had a black eye and a cut lip, and Jacques sported a bruised cheek and bloody nose.
	“Well he started it.” Brian muttered.
	“I did not!” Jacques shouted back.
	“Yes you did, you punched me in the face!”
	“You crashed into my EVA!”
	“You should of looked where you were going!”
	“Me? You should of-”
	“Silence!” Again the room fell silent. “Now I am going to give you this warning, just once,” He held up his index finger to illustrate this point. “If you two cause any more trouble,” he stared slowly at each of them, “Your going to be in a world of hurt. Okay?”
	“Yes sir.” They both said. It felt like being told off at school, by the headmaster, it was so embarrassing.
	“Now get out of here, go talk to Lily, she’ll arrange accommodation for you.” The boys filed out quietly. Jan returned to some paperwork, muttering under his breath.
	“I see you can still play the hard ass if you need to,” a voice with an American accent said. Jan looked up.
	“Good Evening, Josh.” He said to the man standing in the doorway of his office. He was a tall lean man with blonde hair, he was leaning against the doorframe. “What are you doing here, I thought you’d be out getting drunk with your Data Analyst buddies.”
	“I would be, but Eve sent me to get you.”
	“Why you, she could have just called,” he motioned to the phone on his desk.
	“I don’t know, I just do what I’m told, I think she just likes ruining my fun. And hell, I wanted to have a peak at what those crazy pilots did, we got a real kick out of that Data, I’ll tell you,” He laughed. “Oh well, I’m off, catch you later,” he flicked his hand in a short wave as he walked out into the corridor. Jan turned his attention back to the paperwork.
	“I’ll never get this finished at this rate,” He sighed and headed off to Eve’s office.

	“A complication has arose.” Eve stated.
	“What is it?” Jan Asked.
	“Production on the Combat EVA’s has been delayed.”
	“How long?” Jan dreaded to ask, they were due for delivery in four days, any later and the Angel would reach the intercept zone.
	“4 weeks.”
	“What!?” Jan exclaimed. “We’ll have to hand over control to NERV.”
	“No,” Eve replied.
	“What do you mean ‘No’?” Jan asked. “How can you possibly fight an Angel without any EVA’s?”
	“But we do have EVA’s.” Eve said flatly.
	“Wait… oh no, you don’t mean the test EVA’s?” Jan asked, Eve simply stared back at him. “Oh no! They’re not designed for combat, they can’t even generate AT fields for God’s sake!”
	“We can defeat the Angel using them,” She slid a piece of paper across the desk to him. “This is a plan to destroy the Angel.” Jan picked it up, his eyes growing wide as he read through it.
	“Eve, I know you want to prove yourself better than Gendo, but this…” he indicated the piece of paper with a look of disgust, “This is suicide.”
	“It can be done.”
	“I suppose there’s no talking you out of this is there?”
	“I have said to the UN council that SIN can do it. I can’t pull out now.”

	“Well,” Brian said looking at the Address on the slip of paper he held, “looks like this is it. He had emerged from the underground base of SIN to the city of Nouveau Verdun above. According to Lily NERV have a similar set-up whereby their HQ is underground, much further than SIN’s, with a city above for its staff to live in. But while Tokyo 3 was built especially for NERV, Nouveau Verdun was already there and SIN HQ was built underneath. It was already 8:00pm, it had taken him nearly an hour to find the apartment.
	He put the key in the lock, but the door opened straight away. “Huh?” he silently slipped into the room. The apartment was on the fifth floor of a tower block, near the centre of the city, it looked quite spacious. As he crept into the room he saw the TV was on and various bags were scattered about the apartment. What’s going on here, he thought. He crept over to the TV, some music channel was on, blaring Heavy Metal, he switched it off.
	“I was watching that.”
	“Argh!” Brian screamed, hearing this unknown voice.
	“Whoa, calm down.” Brian looked round to see somebody standing in a doorway, staring at him.
	“Tony, you scared the crap out of me.” He slumped down on the couch in font of the TV, visibly relieved.
	“Me? I thought you were a burglar at first.”
	“Hey, what are you doing here?” Brian asked.
	“I’m your roommate,” Tony said, as he turned and began unpacking some bags that were lying on the bed in the adjacent room.
	“Roommate?”
	“Yeah, SIN could only find three empty apartments, and they figured the two of us wouldn’t mind sharing. You don’t mind do you?” Tony asked, not taking his eyes of the bag he was packing.
	“Uh, no I suppose not,” Brian said, sounding deflated. “I just thought that I would have got an apartment to myself.”
	“Yeah me to, but… what cha gonna do?” Tony said, shrugging. “And I got dibs on this room.”
	“Okay, why that room?”
	“It’s nearest to the fridge, so I can save time in the mornings getting breakfast.” Brian looked over at the small corner of the living room that functioned as the Kitchen, it was nearer to Tony’s room. He looked over to the other side of the living room where the other bedroom was, and noticed that the toilet was also on that side of the room, taking up a third of that wall.
	“Hey!” Brian shouted. “That’s also the biggest room.”
	“Yeah that was the deciding factor in my choice. Hope you don’t mind.”
	“Well it doesn’t look like I’ve got much choice.”
	“Those bags on the left of the room are yours, some guys from SIN dropped them off about half an hour ago.” Tony motioned to the pile of messily piled up suitcases, one of them had opened, spilling clothes on the floor.
	“Aw man, my clothes are everywhere.”
	“Hey blame SIN. I didn’t do it.” A chirping noise began somewhere in the room.
	“What’s that?” Brian asked.
	“It’s the phone I think.” Tony said.
	“Where is it?”
	“You got me. It’s rung about every ten minutes for a long time, I haven’t been able to find it.” Brian sighed and got up following the sound to behind a bag on the counter in the Kitchen.
	“Hello?” He said, when he picked up the phone.
	“Where have you been?” Lily shouted down the phone at him.
	“Well I just got here and…”
	“Get down to SIN HQ now, Jan has called a tactical meeting.”
	“At this time…” but Lily had already hung up.
	“Who was it?” Tony asked, he sat down on the couch and switched the TV on.
	“It was Lily, we have to get to SIN HQ.”
	“Okay,” Tony obediently switched the TV off and stood up. “Better get going then.”

Episode 2: First Blood

	It took them about 10 minutes by bus to get to the SIN building which housed the three elevators that were the primary entrance to SIN HQ. It took them about 5 minutes to find the briefing room in the complex.
	“Good Evening Gentlemen,” Jan said as they walked in. “Nice to see you’ve decided to join us.” Brian and Tony took some seats next to Emma and Jacques on the front row of the small briefing room. “Now that we can finally begin I can brief you on the attack plan. In 5 days time the Angel will reach the city of Nouveau Ypres.” The screen on the wall flickered into life, displaying a birds eye view of a city slightly smaller than Nouveau Verdun. “The city will be evacuated, and don’t worry about damaging the city.” A picture of a Test EVA appeared on the Screen. “Unfortunately you will have to fight using test EVA’s, due to problems with the delivery of the combat EVA's."
	“Excuse me but is there a difference?” Jacques asked. Jan realised he hadn’t explained the threat of the Angels to them at all.
	“Ah, yes. You see Angels produce something which is called an Absolute Terror, AT, field which mean that they are completely invincible to standard weaponry.” He pressed a button and a picture of the angel designated Sachiel being hit by an N2 mine appeared on the screen. “This is an Angel who attacked Tokyo 3 a few months ago, as you can see this N2 mine had very little effect on the Angel.
	“Oh my God,” Emma whispered.
	“And we’ve got to fight these things?” Brian exclaimed.
	“Yes, the thing is though that AT fields can be neutralised by other AT fields. And EVA’s produce AT fields.” He heard a sigh of mild relief from the pilots. “However,” he said menacingly, to get the gravity of the situation across, “Test EVA’s do not produce AT fields.”
	“What!” Brian jumped up and pointed his finger at Jan, “This is a suicide mission.”
	“I agree entirely, however Eve believes you can pull it off. This…” he said, as a picture of a bullet appeared on the screen “Is the most expensive bullet ever made. Our technicians managed to fit an AT generator inside it, therefore it will be able to kill the Angel. But we only have one, so Emma must take the shot.”
	“Me? But what if I miss, what if…”
	“Calm down Emma, you’re the best shot on the team. As such you are the most qualified, if you can’t do it, then nobody can.”
	“Where do I need to hit it?”
	“Every angel observed so far has had a ‘Core,’” the picture of Sachiel zoomed in to show the red orb in the centre of its chest, “If the core is destroyed the Angel will die, therefore you must hit it there. The battle plan will be that the other EVA will try to immobilise the Angel so Emma can take the shot, do this any way you can. But remember Emma you only have one shot, only take the shot when you feel sure of a hit. I suggest you get some training in between now and then. Dismissed!”

	5 Days Later.
	“This is Crazy!” Brian said, as he made his EVA pick up the power cord and attach it to the socket on its back. On the other end of the power cord was a truck with a large generator on its back.
	“Calm down, you heard Jan, if we stick to the plan we’ll be fine.” Tony said. Over the past few days their performances had been monitored to determine who would be the best at the various team positions. Emma had obviously been given Sniper. Tony had gotten artillery, meaning he got to handle the big guns. Jacques had been appointed as Assault, this meant he was responsible for close combat attacks. Brian on the other hand had gotten Shield.
	“Shield… What the hell’s that?” He had remembered asking.
	“It means you are essentially the bodyguard of the group.” Jan had replied.
	“A Bodyguard?” Brian was upset with his position.
	“Yes you will be carrying a large anti-ballistic shield and you will be responsible for shielding the other pilots from damage, primarily you will be involved in protecting Assault.”
	“You mean Jacques!?” Brian felt disgusted, he had save that morons life?
	“Hey Shield!” Jacques shouted at him, “Get your head out of the clouds, I don’t want to get killed just because you’re fantasizing in the middle of a fight.” Jacques EVA was standing not to far from his, staring out over the city to the hills beyond. Brian was sorely tempted to just reach over and pull his power cable out, but he restrained himself.
	“Scouts have detected the Angel, it should be coming into visual range in a few minutes,” Lily reported, “You all the plan right?”
	“Right,” The pilots replied in unison.
	“Okay, good luck.”
	“I’m really nervous,” Emma confessed.
	“Don’t worry, we all are,” Tony tried to calm her, “And besides we’re all here to back you up. All you need to do is take one shot, you got the easy job.”
	“Don’t say that,” she said, “You’ll jinx it, if I miss the shot it’s your fault.”
	“Fine,” Tony laughed, “If we all die you can blame it on me.” Brian looked back to where the two pilots were, they were standing in the middle of a grassy plain further away from the city than he and Jacques were.
	“There it is,” Jacques said calmly. Brian looked past the city, he could see something moving on the other side. He flicked a control and the vision zoomed in. He could see the Angel clearly now, it looked like a huge snake, covered in bony armour, its only distinguishing feature was a huge mouth at the front of its body. 
	“It’s massive!” Brian exclaimed. He could tell even from this distance that the creature’s head alone was as large as an EVA. 
	“Alpha team, engage the target.” Lily ordered.
	“Okay,” Jacques said, “Let’s rock and roll.”

	“Jacques,” Brian whispered, although he knew the Angel couldn’t hear the communication, “Where is it?”
	“Moving towards us, down the main street,” Jacques said. “We need to draw it out of the city so Emma can get a clear shot, Okay?”
	“Got it.”
	“On the count of three we both jump out and attack, Okay?” Jacques’ EVA was leaning against a building on the other side of the main street from Brian.
	“Yeah.”
	“One,” He saw Jacques EVA reach up and draw two pistols from the blocky shoulder units on his EVA.
	“Two,” Brian tightened his grip around the joysticks, in response his EVA tightened its grip on the shotgun it held in its hands. On the end of the shotgun a large Shield framed the guns barrel, this allowed Brian to hold the Shield and shoot at the same time.
	“Three!” Jacques cried, both EVA’s simultaneously twisted round to step out into the main street. Jacques raised his pistols and Brian leveled his Shotgun on the Angel. They both opened fire, bullets and shotgun shells flew down the street towards the massive bulk of the Angel.
	“None of the shots are hitting it!” Brain shouted. It looked as though the shots just ceased to exist once they came within a few metres of the Angel. The Angel reared its head and charged down the street at them. Jacques dived to the side, as did Brian. The Angel plowed through a corner of  building and caught Brian’s leg in mid-leap, spinning him round so he landed flat on his face.
	Brian slowly pushed himself up, and twisted round to look down the street. To his horror the street had suddenly turned into a black tunnel framed by razor sharp teeth. 
	“Help!” He cried. The Angel reared up its head preparing to devour him. He swung his shield at it, catching it on the side of its head. The Angel didn’t flinch, however to Brian it felt like every bone in his hand had spontaneously shattered, he cried out in pain and the EVA’s arm fell lifeless to the ground. Suddenly gunshots rang out, the Angel turned to find its new attacker, Jacques continued firing at the Angel with his pistols, it didn’t do anything but it distracted it from Brian. Again the Angel raised its head, preparing to tear Jacques to pieces when a ball of flame blossomed on the Angel head. Several cannon shells struck the Angel’s head, it roared in fury, and charged down a side street out of view.
	“Thanks for that one Tony.” Jacques said. Brian clambered out of the debris of the building to see Tony standing at the end of the street, the two cannons strapped to the EVA’s arms still smoking from the rapid volley.
	“Any time,” Tony replied.
	“Brian follow me,” Jacques ordered. Brian found himself obediently following him, he might be a jerk, he thought, but he certainly seems to know what he’s doing. 
	The two EVA’s emerged from a side street onto another large street. Brian twisted round to look up to the centre of the city, his arm still hanging useless by his side. Jacques looked out towards the outskirts of the city.
	“Can you see it?” Jacques asked, as he edged slowly down the street.
	“I don’t think so,” Brian began edging up the street towards the city centre. He peered down a side street.
	“Lily?” Jacques asked, “Have you got a visual?”
	“Wait a minute…” Lily replied. Brian edged further up the street, and peered down another side street. “Brian, look out! It’s right in front of…”
	“Huh?” Brian looked up the street just in time to see the Angels tail swinging round into his view.
	Jacques looked around to see Brian’s EVA smash into a large building, the many window panes on its exterior shattering under the impact of the huge fighting machine. “Holy Sh…” Jacques saw the Angel charge through the devastation, its mouth wide open, teeth glistening in the sun. He stuck out his arms and grabbed the Angel’s jaws, bracing himself against the massive creature’s impact. His feet scraped along the floor, it looked like a man on roller blades trying to stop an express train. He could see the buildings flying past on either side, and still the Angel was only slowly decelerating under his force. He felt the ground beneath his feet give way from concrete to grass, he was able to get better grip and managed to stop the Angel. He stared down into the creature’s mouth, deep at the back of its throat was a red orb.
	“The Core!” He shouted, he realised he and the Angel were now both out of the city now, he could see Emma behind him. “Emma quickly shoot the damn thing!”
	“I can’t get a clear shot, you’re in the way.”
	“Just do it!” The Angel tossed about like a mad bull. He had a hard time keeping the creature still, and its mouth open. “What are you waiting for?”
	“You’re blocking the shot.”
	“Take the shot!”
	“Emma, open fire now!” Lily ordered, “Take the shot!”
	“I can’t!” She had the Angel lined up in her scope, the core could only be seen occasionally appearing round the side of Jacques EVA. Her finger tensed on the trigger.
	“I can’t hold it much longer!” Jacques was sweating profusely, and his arms were burning with the strain from holding the Angel. “Come On!”
	“Emma, I order you to fire.”
	“Shoot!” Jacques cried. Emma closed her eyes, don’t think, just do it, she thought, don’t think, just do it.
	“Do it!” Jacques screamed. Emma pulled the trigger. The AT bullet flew out of the barrel, leaving a  purple trail in its wake, it crossed the quite large distance in milliseconds, it penetrated Jacques’ EVA’s Shoulder, tearing its arm clean off before finally embedding itself in the red orb in the Angel’s mouth. It’s life snuffed out, the Angel’s mouth snapped shut, severing Jacques EVA’s hand. Jacques cried out in pain, his right arm had been shot off, and his left hand had just been bitten off.
	“Cut the Nerve Links!” He heard Lily cry over the intercom. The pain disappeared. Jacques’ EVA collapsed on the ground, he lay in the Entry plug, his breathing heavy.
	“Did we do it?” he asked. 
	“No lifesigns detected from the Angel, it looks like its dead,” Lily replied.
	“Your damn right its dead!” Tony cried, “See Emma I told you you’d do it.” Tony reached down and pulled Brian out of the wreckage of the building.
	“It feels like I’ve been lying on a bed of nails,” he complained, he looked down the street at the dead Angel and the prone form of Jacques’ EVA. “Wow, he really did it, and he saved my life, that crazy frog.”
	“I couldn’t let you die,” Jacques said, “Your just so much fun to insult.” He laughed when he heard Brian grumbling over the Comm System.
	“You moron,” Jacques could see Emma’s EVA standing over his, “You could have been killed, what were you thinking?”
	“Hey, I wasn’t killed. And for your information I wasn’t thinking of anything.”
	“Huh, I could’ve guessed. Only an Idiot would try something that stupid.”
	“Mission over everyone,” Lily Announced. “Return to base for your debrief, and congratulations.” The Pilots smiled as they heard the cheers of the operation team fill the Comm System.

Ending Theme: KMFDM - Ultra