2023-08-12: +Revolution.

• Log: +Revolution.
• Cast: Kaworu Nagisa, Gridman, Asuka Shikinami Langley, Gai Kurenai, Lina Lombardi, Rei Ayanami, Sonia Sophia-Grace, Liam 7-020, Knight, Lucine Azul, Shozo, Chloe, Guy Shishioh, Takeshi Todo, Alouette Pommier, Mari Makinami Illustrious
• Where: Junius 7
• Date: August 12, 2023 (UC 0097)
• Summary: The end (?) of SRT MOO's Tenth Angel.

--

<Pose Tracker> Kaworu Nagisa has posed.

        Over the past several weeks, some time after Duma was non-fatally shot over Tokyo-3, Duma has been appearing and vanishing in various spots in the space between the Earth and the Moon, uncrumpling from space near satellites, then crumpling away again. NERV has been tracking these appearances, attempting to discern their plan and triangulate a possible base of operations. It's taken some time, but today, they've zeroed in on a section of the space where Junius 7 once was--where the Tsutsujidai PLANT had once been, too.
        
        Which is only natural. That's where Duma was born. Only one member of NERV knows that, though, and he isn't inclined to share those personal details.
        
        When NERV's pilots deploy from Orbit Base as planned and closes in on where Duma is expected to be found, they'll find... not just them, but something else, too. Col. Katsuragi had decided that Gridman was banned from the Geofront and any future Angel missions, and so he wasn't invited to or made aware of this mission... but Gridman had already encountered Duma in this section of Junius 7. He doesn't need information from NERV to know where to find them.
        
        The massive, diaphonous cloud-like entity, streamed through with lightning-like appendages that currently whorl inwards and outwards body, pulses from their core--veiled deep within their translucent form and only barely visible at their center--in red, blue, red, blue, red, blue, almost like emergency lights, except it's so sedate, and the Angel would surely have no concept of what colors humans use on their police cars and ambulances. There's a strange shimmer around the Angel, like a heat haze or a mirage--except this is space, and there's no atmosphere and thus no air to warp.
        
        Or so one would think.
        
        Across the shell of the world, Duma has been visiting all sorts of communications satellites, hubs, and other such places. While they never stayed long, sometimes chased away by the presence of Lilim, it had been enough for them to familiarize themselves with the locations. To leave behind invisible markers...
        
        The shimmer bends and crumples. Countless points all over the inner space between the Moon and Earth crumple too, before hideously familiar crosses of light tear through space. Through their incandescent burn, Duma--no, Dumas, one for each cross beam--appears in all their pulsing glory. The cross beams fade out from behind each iteration of the Tenth Angel, and their red and blue changes to just red... red... red... blinking like the lights on a radio tower in the dead of night.
        
        A signal begins to radiate from Duma--all the Dumas. Static snow with "notes" composed of rests.
        
        The song of silence--a silence to quell hostility from the heart of man.
        
                        ~ * ~ * ~
        
        The S-type equipment was developed some time ago to enable space functioning for Evangelions; it doesn't see much use, but it's been absolutely critical for various missions over the past year or so. Here, the Paradiso, captained by Cpt. Sonia Sophia-Grace, shuttles the Evangelions to Junius 7, each of them attached by umbilical cable to the space-worthy craft until they reach the target and can switch to internal battery power for the fight. Other pilots may potentially be launching their mobile suits from the Paradiso as well, but GGG has plenty of its own spacecraft, including mobile suits with longer-lasting batteries than what the Evas use, even all the way up here.
        
        Not all Evangelions are present. With five active pilots, NERV has the luxury to keep one in Tokyo-3 as a reserve just in case the mission fails, and surprisingly, Mari volunteered.
        
        Once they're all in the Junius 7 area, it's easy to spot and in turn home in on the Tenth Angel. But--
        
        "Is that Gridman with the Tenth Angel?" Shinji wonders, blinking at the monitors. "I thought he wasn't supposed to be here!"
        
        "Gridman considers Duma a citizen of Tsutsujidai, and therefore his responsibility," Kaworu replies. "It's no wonder that he would seek them out on his own and resolve the problem before we arrive."
        
        "But--now that we are here..." Shinji sounds uncertain, and for good reason; he doesn't want to have to end up fighting Gridman to get past him to Duma.
        
        It's something that will have to go unaddressed for a moment longer, for it's in that moment that Duma shifts from blinking blue/red to just red, and then multilocates throughout the Earth Sphere's inner space.
        
        "Don't be fooled. There's still only one true Duma, and they're right in front of us," Kaworu announces through the general NERV lines. "We must make haste. They're making a gambit to subdue the will of all, all at once."
        
        "No time to hesitate!" Col. Misato Katsuragi, on the Paradiso's bridge from the seat next to Sonia's, barks over the NERV comms. "Ignore Gridman; he's not our enemy unless he makes himself our enemy. Rei and other support pilots, open fire from a distance to interrupt the Angel's mental contamination and cover the other Evas as they close in for melee, then follow them in! Asuka, Shinji-kun and Kaworu-kun, close in on either side for a pincer attack to keep that deadbeat from running away again! Guy, as agreed, you lead the charge to get up in the Angel's face and keep its focus on you to distract it from the Evas! We HAVE to end this here and now, for all mankind!!"
        
        Still, the Tenth Angel has created a staggering amount of amplification for their "song," enough to potentially affect those present even with the Evas' A.T. fields to protect them... and even if they are making their own version of a stand, they've shown they can teleport not just themselves but others. For all their refusal to ever physically attack, Duma remains every inch an Angel--and all that implies. Will the Lilim... can the Lilim succeed?
KTS: Gai Kurenai has deployed in Ultraman Orb Spacium Zeperion.

<Pose Tracker> Gridman has posed.

Emotions are one of the parts of being alive that we can't control... but we can control how those feelings guide our actions. Understanding why we're reacting in the ways we are to emotional stimuli helps us do our duties as Beings of Light much better... and helps understand the actions our enemies take, too.

In the grass, on the outskirts of Tsutsujidai, Gridman sits. His eyes are closed. He doesn't have to worry about what color they are. Here, near the sluice gate, all that matters is giving each of his emotions space to exist.

This is how Gai told Gridman he could unlock the power to hear other's hearts crying out for help. First, he has to come to understand and accept his own emotions. That's proven... difficult. His thoughts are consumed, always, with worry for Tsutsujidai, worry for his friends, and the looming certainty of when he will leave this world.

Let them exist. Let them go.

Long minutes pass by as Gridman sorts through each of the things bothering him. Last of all, he thinks of Duma. An Angel too kind to understand humanity. There's been sightings of the tenth Angel, but never anywhere Gridman could get to in time. Gridman wonders where Duma could be now, what he could be feeling.

Red... blue... red... blue... red... blue...

These feelings are strange, like they were created from different concepts than Gridman is used to experiencing. Flashes of understanding come through to his mind, through the static of gently flashing lights.

Red... blue...

They won't hurt each other anymore.

Red... blue...

They won't hurt each other anymore.

Red... red...

It's a slow thing, realizing these are not Gridman's own emotions. Once it hits him, he gasps, opening his (yellow) eyes and getting to his feet. Oshansoo-san is in his hands immediately, calling Max.

"I know where he is. We have to go, now!"

---

"Duma!"

Gridman shouts up at the cloud. He's deployed only with Sky Vitter to get him to the Angel, trying to avoid scaring Duma into simply knocking the Giant of Light with their song. His hands are carefully placed down by his sides. Gridman can't know exactly what Duma is planning, but he knows they won't give up.

"This isn't right!" Gridman flies in close. It's not like keeping his distance would help him avoid the song, anyway. "Humanity isn't meant for this kind of peace! I'm sorry! If you try to brainwash them again, I'm going to stop you. Please, don't make me do this! I don't want to fight you!"

Vit brings them both in a slow arc around the cloud. "This is your last chance, Duma. Either you escape, or NERV is going to kill you. Pretty easy choice, right?"

In the near distance, Calibur and Max watch from a shuttle, Junk resting between them.

"I--it's appearing all over." Calibur mutters, looking down at his phone, at the news reports coming in of the many, many Dumas appearing across the Earthsphere

Max lets out a heavy breath. "Gridman. You must return. Duma is making their move, and NERV will arrive shortly. There is nothing more to be done."

"Damn it--!" Gridman clenches his armored hands into fists. "Just a little longer!"

"Hey, I'm with you until the end, but, uh--" Vit takes in the approaching Evas. "Let's be smart about this one?"

As Duma's song begins, Sky Gridman remains next to the Angel. Gridman, frantically trying to think of what he can say to stop this, begins to hear a familiar note in the Angel's melody. It's not exactly the same, but it's almost the same principle as--

"Bujack." Gridman would blink, if he could. Once, then twice. "Vit, do you hear it? I think I know what to do."

Vit pulls them to the other side of the Angel from the approaching mobile suits. "I'm not following!"

"Something Sigma just taught me. I didn't even realize I was using it before, to save everyone from Bujack! I think--!" Gridman raises his voice, once more, to the Angel. "Duma! Please, stop this and run! I can't do anything else for you. I have to help my friends protect humanity. I can't turn my back on them!"
KTS: Lina Lombardi has deployed in MPMZ-17 Ichinana.
KTS: Guy Shishioh has deployed in GaoGaiGar.
KTS: EN Barrier activated!
KTS: Liam 7-020 has deployed in MD-0031UL Dilanza Sol.
KTS: Liam 7-020 has changed loadout.
KTS: Chloe has deployed in MKA-5C Pallas Makhia.
KTS: EN Barrier activated!
KTS: Sonia Sophia-Grace has deployed in Nelson-Class 'Paradiso'.
KTS: Rei Ayanami has deployed in Evangelion Unit-00.
KTS: EN Barrier activated!
KTS: Knight has deployed in Gridknight.

<Pose Tracker> Asuka Shikinami Langley has posed.

Asuka's been on edge, and on standby since Duma got away. She doesn't like the idea of Angels getting away, it bugs her. Angels were supposed to attack until they die. Even the one that kept coming back, was always attacking. It irritated her, got under her skin, but that doesn't mean that she doesn't think both Gridmen are correct.

Some Kaiju are exceptions, no Angels are.

So while on standby she's mostly been going through her workout routine, time in the sims, and on occasion, sitting around the Geofront streaming movies with Shinji as a standin thing to do together until they can go on a proper date. She had to look up movies a lot to figure out ones with endings that would satisfy him while not being a slog to watch for her.

Then the alert came through, "Of course it's in space, why can't this one just act normal!?" By attacking them again, she means. In a way, it's a relief. She doesn't need to worry about Hikari, or the civilians...

... but...

It's just more irritation. And that transient annoyance becomes one that's more profound once science and logistics say what the Angel is trying to do.

The ride up to orbit base wasn't long, she didn't even bother to take out her Wonderswan, that's how annoyed she is. Climbing into her Evangelion, she waits inside her entry plug on the ride. And when Shinji announces Gridman's presence, "<Again?! Why can't he just-?>" Asuka stops at Misato's orders, making a frustrated noise over the comms, and then...

"<Fine. So long as he doesn't get in my way again.>"

She tells herself she won't hesitate with the knife if he does. Even Knight knows the necessity.

Too much is at stake, to let him. Evangelion Unit-02 launches with the S-Type equipment, still tethered to the vessel. The AT Fields are up, but she still feels the prickle at her brain, like anesthesia. Instead of submitting to it though, there's a sudden spike of rage out of her.

Gridman isn't the only one remembering Bujack.

"You think. That I'll give in. To that SAME STUPID TRICK AGAIN!?"

Rather than motion which direction Kaworu and Shinji have to go on the pincer attack, the S-Type thrusters flare as she carves an arc across space, moving to its right side.

In Evangelion Unit-02's hands are the Thunder Spear.

Apparently she's chosen her own form of solution to the problem that represents Duma's Song of Silence.

No, not the Thunder Spear, though of course that figures into the plan.

Ultraviolence of course.

KTS: Takeshi Todo has deployed as a Sub Pilot for Guy Shishioh!
KTS: Gridman has deployed as a Sub Pilot for Rei Ayanami!

<Pose Tracker> Gai Kurenai has posed.

Gridman's not the only one who can feel it, rippling across the Earth Sphere. Gai Kurenai is a capable receptive telepath, and Duma's thought waves send him staggering against the wall of Junk Shop Aya.

A normal human would have been quiescent in moments - his enhanced physiology as the Crusader of Light buys him a handful more, maybe, before he succumbs, fingers fumbling inside his coat and clasping around the grip of the Orb Ring.

He only needs one.

He takes a deep breath and lifts the Orb Ring to the digital cityscape sky, particles from it swirling around him. He vanishes, and in that single moment he has the clarity he needs to open his card holder, the outside world falling away to his amethyst Inner Space as he draws two cards.

"Ultraman-san! Tiga-san!"

The images of his predecessors appear beside him as he scans their corresponding cards.

"Let me borrow the power of your lights!"

FUSION UP!! (( OST: https://youtu.be/gVWkyuqjffE?t=25 ))

ULTRAMAN ORB: SPACIUM ZEPERION! rises in a swirl of cosmic light. With this power, the distance between Tsutsujidai and Junius 7 is the matter of thought to transcribe, and as Gridman tries to reason with Duma he can feel a familiar presence approaching fast.

Orb arrives as a blur of light, extending on purple, red-gloved arm to rest on Gridman's shoulder. "I knew you couldn't ignore this, Gridman." It is not speech, per se, but Gridman hears him. His crystal-blue eyes stare up at the inchoate, iridescent form of the Tenth Angel. "Do what you need to do; I will protect the humans here."

He drifts away from Gridman, interposing himself between the Hyper Agent and Duma. "I am Orb!" he declares to the Angel, raising his arms in a battle stance as a wave of light ripples out from the ring-shaped Colour Timer in his chest. "I light the Darkness, and strike at Evil!"

It's an unmistakable challenge...

but how does one fight the formless?

<Pose Tracker> Lina Lombardi has posed.

         By all means, Lina probably shouldn't be here. She probably should have been barred from any Angel fights just like Gridman, but there had not only been leniency in her disciplinary action, but she had been permitted, even encouraged by some fellow 3G members to participate in the next assault on Duma. "It's really for the best that you manage to get in Ikari's good graces as soon as possible," they told her. She gripped at the Ichinana's controls. Trading in one hardass for another, it always seemed. She sighs and accepts it, part of being a soldier is following orders.

         "Orbit Base, this is Falco. Deploying!"

         The Ichinana, painted in Lina's trademark green livery, rockets out of one of the Orbit Base's hangars and into the fray. There's Gridman...again. She grabs her head! And there's the Angel...again. She shakes her head, trying to keep herself focused as the Ichinana pulls out its machine gun and points in Duma's direction from a safe distance.

         "Listen, Gridman. I really want to believe in you. But this didn't work last time. Step aside."

<Pose Tracker> Rei Ayanami has posed.

EARLIER:

Rei rests on a table. Round stick-on electrodes along either side of her brow, along her neck, tucked down over her spine. An intravenous feed, but a rather casual one -- and Rei has had many. Something orange and something pallid drip into her arm. She wears earphones, as well, and an eye cover.

Time passes.

An indicator gradually lowers. Gradually.

A discontinuity. The Geofront's daylight is always rather similar, given its origin point, but it does fade when the sun is rising or falling. The indicator is lower, and after a certain point - *piiii!* - it reaches a zone marked as green, not orange.

Heels click down the hall.

"Well, well," says Ritsuko Akagi: "That was productive. You must have made a breakthrough, Rei, or the effect began declining geometrically."

Rei doesn't reply.

NOW

Emerging from Paradiso in the S-type armor, EVA-00 dangles on its long, so-long cable. The attach rack for the familiar Sniper Rifle (with gyrojet terminal adjustment rounds) as well as, of all things, a Federation-standard Beam Rifle with an elongated grip, are toted along.

Rei's eyes focus towards the silent voice of Duma, and towards--

Gridman is there?

Rei's heart pangs. He's still trying. Something about it is hopelessly admirable to Rei. A sensation of something she does not know if she could do; she would simply reach the obstacle and flow downhill from it, yet he keeps driving. But the thought is silent, within her mind.

Rei disconnects the Sniper Rifle, raising it upwards one handed - the tactical railing on it has micro-thrusters, which stabilize it. Rei straightens backwards, even as Duma expands. Rei breathes out, the AT Field expanding outwards in subtle faintness with an auroral fringe on the topmost layer, where the solar wind brushes against it.

A distant song tickles at the edge of her mind.

It is familiar.

"... another?" Rei says, though, when she sees the arriving Orb through her scope optics.

<Pose Tracker> Sonia Sophia-Grace has posed.

The Paradiso is a snub-nosed refit of the Nelson-class battleships for NERV and Sonia by extension. It doesn't see a lot of Earth-based usage, being primarily a space vessel, so when it was asked for her to have it available for the 'fight' against Duma, Sonia wasn't ... surprised, to be frank. Her second in command, at the sight of Misato, had even willingly given up her normal seat beside the captain, taking a seat instead in the front, where one of the younger Ensigns had recused themself to a probably less stressful position. It does come to a stop a bit away so that the Evangelions can detach themselves, and allow others to launch.

"Captain?"
"Ensign Suzuki, you can just keep talking."

A moment of hesitation, before the ensign shakes her head. "No, ma'am. Please, just -listen.-" She insists, quietly keying up so the song, even briefly, is heard, causing a round of murmurs around the bridge, before Sonia cuts it off. "Ah." She says, more to herself than anyone else on the bridge. "Noise."

"Lieutenant Adre, please sound all alarms for general acknowledgement." A beat. "Crew, this is your captain speaking. Please report to your required stations but, at this time, I say, do not, I repeat, we do not do anything til we're in a better range." She orders crisply, stepping down from her seat to Adre, her head ducking down as the two have a moment of planning. The Paradiso shifts into movement.

Sonia retakes her seat, tucking her legs under her as she leans back into it. Then, she tenatively, carefully, reaches - not physically. Hello? Is there something there? She hears you.

<Pose Tracker> Liam 7-020 has posed.

        Liam knew Duma would return, eventually. His talk with Guy helped him tease apart his own feelings on the matter. What Duma's planning is unacceptable, and would ultimately strip everyone in Sol of their agency--and to Liam, who was so freshly stripped of his own agency, the possibility feels that much worse. Duma cannot be allowed to sing the Earth Sphere to sleep.

        A freshly-repaired Dilanza Sol jets out from the Paradiso's hangar, the red logo of NERV stenciled on its shoulder shields. It holds its beam rifle across its chest, and trails after Eva-01 as Rei takes to the field. Liam sits in its panoramic cockpit, his heart beating faster--and not just from tension. He took caffeine pills before deploying, and the governors in his fight-or-flight system are cranking out adrenal compounds like there's no tomorrow. "Pilot 7-020, Dilanza Sol, deploying. Target sighted. Engaging."

        Perhaps it's this that gives him the courage to open a quiet, private line to Sigma moments after. <"Agent Sigma,"> he says. His voice is tight. <"Sorry to impose. Can you put me through to Duma? Even if we have to fight, there's-- something I have to tell them. Whatever happens, they have to know.">

<Pose Tracker> Knight has posed.

        Knight did not come here on a ship. He came here on a shuttle, the sort a civilian might use to travel to Junius Seven. The Second -- no, not that one, the one with red eyes -- is still in there; she got her LICENCE, and she can DRIVE. She's very proud of herself.

        "Be careful, Knight," Nidaime says, as she drops Knight off. "Gridman's already..."

        "We'll intervene," Knight interrupts. (Agrees.)

        "Do your best!" Nidaime chirps, as she flies to the outskirts.

        ~*~

        Duma resonates. Gridman reasons. And then, without warning --

        "YOU BASTARD--!!"

        From behind, a creature much LIKE Gridman impacts with the Duma Gridman speaks with -- or into its A.T. field, in any case. Gridknight is nothing but a copy, of course, but at a glance they could be the same man, with all the same martial capacity.

        "Gridman!" Gridknight yells, as he pulls back to circle around the Angel. "It's already attacking humanity! You're still hesitating?!" It is not radio communication; regardless, it transmits, into the radios of those nearby.

<Pose Tracker> Lucine Azul has posed.

        Lucine is in the same boat as Lina: the last time she met Duma, she had put herself in danger in order to try to contact the Angel, contaminating her mind and forcing herself into the temporary position of 'enemy' to NERV and all deployed pilots, including Liam.

        And it was all for nothing, something that still stings like a slap to the face.

        Still, she's not surprised that Gridman is trying to reach out to Duma still. ".... He has more faith than we do, it seems..." Lucine says, from nearby. "... I don't think Duma will listen, though..."

        It takes a measure of strength to quell that bitterness in her heart; Lucine can't blame an angel when she was foolish enough to overlay a human's logic on something that seems, while able to communicate, unable to understand. And she, in turn, cannot understand.

        And time is running out.

        Lucine feels Sonia trying to reach out, and turns towards where she seats, her eyebrows gathered. "..... Careful..." she says, under her breath. Still, she doesn't have the guts to command a captain on her own ship.

        Misato orders them to deploy, and Lucine obeys. Reluctance, bitterness, and determination play their parts in the dance of emotions in her heart, but she will see this through. Humanity will not survive.

        Conflict is not limited to the field of the physical; one's own psyche is a battlefield as well.

<Pose Tracker> Shozo has posed.

Shozo had been home from Tokyo-3 for a while now, but in some part of his alien little brain, the shoe had yet to drop. Shozo had left Kaworu with a promise that he would fight to kill Duma, hadn't he? He always kept his promises, in one way or another.

So when he watches Gridman and the rest of his family take off, Shozo knows that the time had come.

He didn't use the portals anymore, if he could help it. Too much of his father had taken advantage of that, too much of his voice had seeped into Shozo's ears. Luckily, he was still an impossibly strong alien child who couldn't generally be stopped, so a simple shuttle "theft" -- really, he was just borrowing it, he left a note and everything -- and the boy is flying off towards the - no, a Duma. After all, there were many of them now.

As he approached, Shozo looked out the shuttle window, at the collected warriors, clad in steel and light. He allowed himself a smile as he watched Gridman fly around the cloudlike angel, and Gai -- no, Ultraman Orb -- stood tall in the darkness of space. That was their role to play, wasn't it? Beacons in the night.

His expression darkened a bit as he looked at the Evangelions. He'd never seen them before, but something about them made him a bit upset. They felt... arrogant to him. He didn't quite have the right words, but though they stood more like Ultras than simple machines, they felt... almost like parodies of the giants.

A warmth from his pocket, and Shozo takes out the Battle Nizer.

"No, you don't count. You're sincere. I think that makes you a pastiche?" He left the ship on autopilot and walked out to the airlock, opening it and letting himself drift into the void. Floating there, he oriented himself towards Duma, and pointed the Battle Nizer at him.

"Maybe we could have been friends, Duma. I don't understand humanity either. MonsLoad."

A bolt of amber energy illuminated the blackness of space, forming into a rectangular portal -- a door. From within, a silver hand, then another. The Ace Robot pulled itself into reality, golden shackles glimmering in the light of the stars.

<Pose Tracker> Chloe has posed.

        Given the importance of finishing this Angel off once and for all, along with the fact that Chloe has ended up facing off against it twice now, it should probably come as no surprise that her Pallas Makhia currently flies alongside the Paradiso. The Paradiso was looking a little crowded and the Makhia is able to make the flight on its own well enough. So it might as well.

        As such, Chloe has spent the last while on approach to the Angel's location simply sitting on the floor of her wide open cockpit. In the dark for the most part, the only sources of light being the stars displayed on the large forward screens and the few holographic consoles in Standby mode.

        Within the silence, Chloe's thoughts have simply been on the mission. Though not only this one, but the previous one as well. They managed to save the city, but failed to destroy the target. It's important that she doesn't fail, that's what she's always been told. And this is just proof of how right that is. That failure to finish the Angel off has given it yet another chance to attack. And there's no telling how worse this one will be.

        They'll soon find out!

        More holographic consoles begin to appear within the cockpit as the NERV team approaches the suspected location of the Angel. Chloe gets to her feet, her expression as calm as ever, despite the danger ahead of them. She calls out, "Activate Mikani Link." As the holographic representations of her unit's legs and arms appear, she steps in to them. She feels herself connect with the machine through the implant in her head, various sensors now routed into her mind, the sensation of weightlessness washing over her. A few movements of her arms and legs confirm a successful connection, her machine following her movements.

        Chloe then focuses in on the Angel in the distance, a zoomed in view appearing on the large screen across the cockpit's wall. Just as more holographic window pop up indicating comms from NERV team. Chloe listens for the most part, but doesn't reply. Shinji's announcement of Gridman already being here doesn't concern Chloe. If the giant wants to try and intervene again, that's fine with her. Helping the enemy in a battle makes one a traitor and fair game for targeting. Though the orders from NERV's onsite commander makes it clear they should ignore him. It's also those orders that break Chloe's silence, lumped in with the 'support pilots', she acknowledges, <"Yes, ma'am."> Chloe reaches up towards her back.

        The Pallas Makhia reaches for the large cannon on its back, pulling the long barrelled weapon forth with one hand. Floating over to join EVA-00 in support, the Makhia settles it cannon to point in the direction of the Angel ahead. Its finger moves over the weapon's trigger... But then begins to shake.

        In the cockpit, Chloe's finger shakes, a strained expression on her face. The Angel's signal resonates in her head, trying to calm her, trying to control her. She reaches her other hand up to hold her head, recalling her training. Focus... Focus on the mission... Focus on the threat... It's trying to control them.

        To take way their own will.

        To force them into a mindless obedience.

        That is not being alive...

        It is a living death.

        So many, dead. It cannot be allowed!

        Chloe finally pulls the trigger of the holographic weapon, the Pallas Makhia doing the same with the real one, sending the large explosive shell blasting through space towards its target in the distance.

<Pose Tracker> Guy Shishioh has posed.

Guy told Gendo, Fuyutsuki, Misato, and just about every other senior member of the command staff that NERV could count on GGG's full support in the Duma suppression. Not to make up for the perceived wrongs of his associates and subordinates; simply because protecting the Earth is GGG's role, and Duma has proven itself a threat to that.

AND BOY DIDN'T THAT COME TRUE.

Fortunately for Guy's blood pressure it's not where Tsutsujidai is now, which says its own strange things about the Angel and its relation to...everything. If even its relation to 'home' has more to do with absolutes of orbital mechanics than physical spaces and familiar sites, then attempting to relate to it even the most basic levels might be impossible. It *is* a shame. But...

GaoGaiGar is coming, Star GaoGaiGar's Ul-tech Engines blaze green in the night as the King of Braves cruises onto the battleground. "Sigma," Guy says from within the white space of Fusion. "Remember, I know it's tempting, but we have to leave Galeon's systems the way we found them. We don't know what it'll do to the timelines if we can't return him to the spot he came from just as he is. Battle damage is dicey enough as it is."

ANd then....everything goes wrong.

"It's attacking!" Guy yells. "I'm going in!" as planned. The sound hits him strangely, a faint dissonance, but it...reminds him, of an old familiar feeling. Guy was never targeted by Bujack. But he remembers another thing with a similar effect. An impulse pulling on him to just. Not worry about it.

An impulse his G-Stone cells would never fall prey to. "Just like Palparepa," he mutters, and unlocks the motors on the Broken Right Hand of Destruction, already rearing back. "Alouette, still with me!?" he calls. "Eva team, stay behind me while I get its attention!" And then adds: "PHANTOM RING! PLUS!!" as the Phantom Ring launches from StealthGao II's shoulder and slots in over the spinning right arm.

He thrusts out in a solid punch that flies off at the elbow, firing a penetrating fist down range!! Its penetrating power might fall short with Duma's nature, being almost strictly physical.

But maybe the will to fight he exudes in beginning will draw attention down on him. He should be able to take it! He won't yield! Especially not with the support of his team!

<Pose Tracker> Takeshi Todo has posed.

Duma...

Even now, after all this time watching, it still cannot understand that humanity's flaws are exactly what make them so wonderful. Like a child, they try to erase <conflict> without understanding why conflict even really exists. Conflict is the natural result of so many souls coming into contact. It is inevitable, it is often painful, but that does not mean it should be eliminated.

...And yet, as sure as Agent Sigma sounded when he spoke to his brother not so long ago--

He still wishes that Duma could see. That they could... learn to love humanity as it is, not the hypothetical image that they endeavor to mould mankind into. A cursory read of history would show exactly why that goal was folly.

...Sigma promised. The next time Duma made their appearance, he would be there to fight-- For his own sake, as well as humanity's. The alarm goes out, Orbit Base mobilizes to respond, and this time...

Waiting for the Evoluder in the maw of the White Lion is the hyper agent himself. Gridman Sigma's borrowed glasses gleam. "Acting Commander Guy," he says, placing a hand against one of Galeon's fangs, "This time... You will not fight alone."

That was then.

This is now.

"...Amazing," Sigma whispers, his eyes closed serenely. All around him is light. Infinite light. "I had always wondered what it was like for you, Captain. Galeon really is remarkable, isn't he...?"

He must leave it alone. No matter how tempted he is. Sigma is silent for a moment, his gaze flitting toward a distant, fragmented pattern of green amidst the white. "...I know, Captain. As much as I wish he could speak to his son, it's... The consequences would be too dire, wouldn't they...?"

But then-- A song of quietitude washes over them. It races over the Hyper Agent's body in a pulse of circuitry. He takes in a breath--

"Grid... Kinesis!"

With a burst of digital energy, the wave is scattered. A strobing lattice of prismatic, circuitboard light extends from the Hyper Agent, reaching out into the impossibly bright infinity, insulating the King of Braves from Duma's song. Even if his Evoluder nature would be capable of resisting the effects, Sigma extends his protection. But at the same time, he connects more fully with the systems around him, forming the keyboard to a great emerald organ--

...This is no white void. This is a vast, crystalline network, stretching into infinity, pulsing brilliantly from a metropolis of emerald gemstones. They only shine so bright as to appear white, but...

This is simply the light of courage in its purest state.

...He receives a communique from Liam. "Very well," he answers, reaching out. A pulse of connection reaches out towards Duma, "I will convey your words and feelings, Liam. And my own as well."

...He's not just here to act as a living tranciever, this time. But that doesn't mean he won't.

<Pose Tracker> Takeshi Todo has posed.

In the distance, Gridman, his brother, does battle as well. The technique he uses...

"Mm, I knew you could do it," Sigma says with a smile. "Gridman, do you hear me?" He asks, reaching out. "I'm... glad to see you here. That I won't have to do this on my own."

<Pose Tracker> Alouette Pommier has posed.

Duma has once again been sighted. Alouette knows what this means - everyone knows what it means. And it isn't long before NERV has their orders - pilots are to launch from Orbit Base and mount a final decisive attack on the Angel.

"No. It's not Bujack." Alouette tells herself, sitting at her terminal post in Orbit Base as the pilots of NERV begin to deploy. Bujack was a pleasant dream that tore her apart, quite literally in some sense. It was a violence and selfishness that at the end of the day, she understood. "I don't understand you at all, Duma. Why would you die for a dream like this?"

As she climbs into Guardienne Aviaire's cockpit, these feelings weigh heavier than Duma's very own song. Their plan was lined out clearly: GaoGaiGar charges in to distract, while the Evangelions put up their AT-Fields to suppress the mental contamination. Guardienne Aviaire's an Operator's machine, and can provide such support even from within the cockpit. Still... it's a strange feeling, knowing exactly what to do, but needing to force your muscles to do it... but she manages to get herself into the rhythm. "Sorry for the delay, Guy!" She reports. "I'm right behind you." The Angel is not a machine, she cannot try to hack it. Instead... she raises a shield made of Program Matter, a firewall if you will, as the digital energy begins to crackle. It may not stop contamination the way an AT-Field would... but it does convey her desire to protect humanity from Duma.

...But she just hopes she doesn't need to protect them from Gridman, too. "I'm putting my heart into this," she tells the Hyper Agent. "Yours better be, too!" Does he even have a plan? A plan that can save Duma while evading NERV's wrath?

<Pose Tracker> Mari Makinami Illustrious has posed.

"hm, hm hm..."

From a distant point where Junius 7 once occupied, someone watches the desperate exchange between Gridman and the Tenth Angel, Duma.

Enveloped in the silence embrace of space, something looms, its immense size hidden sheerly by distance and debris.

Within a sea of LCL, someone hidden from head to toe in a plugsuit of black hums quietly to themself as the forces of NERV rally.

"Words like violence... Break the silence..."

Within the sea of space, metal plating and the form of a long, sleek rifle strapped against them glint as the diaphanous light of Duma blooms across countless different sources, all at once.

"Come crashing in... Into my little world... mm?"

<Pose Tracker> Kaworu Nagisa has posed.

        The first to appear before Duma is Sky Gridman. He isn't an unwelcome sight, necessarily, but the two (three?) of them have already communicated. Duma didn't make an exception for him when they came to claim Tokyo-3; though they don't want to fight him any more than he does them, they are as determined as he is.
        
        The hostility of the Lilim can be quelled. They know it can.
        
                        -- they're so much like the repli-compoids after all --
        
        So when Gridman begs Duma to stop, that he has to side with humanity on this, there is a sense of acceptance and resolve that he and Orb, and perhaps even Sonia and Lucine, will feel. No words--Duma has never used Lilim words--but it may resonate in their hearts. Sigma will likely feel it too as he opens a 'line,' as it were, for Liam.
        
        Duma won't stop trying to bring about peace. Even if Orb denounces them as evil, even as Shozo appears in/through the Ace Robot out from a door of reality, even if NERV has come to kill them, they won't accept the Scenario that has been laid out before them. (Would Alouette understand that, if she could hear? Duma had been shaken by her words before, but contact with the First's dream reassured them.) To that end, they're prepared to stand to the very end. They won't back down this time.
        
                        -- they mustn't run away --
        
        Shinji has enjoyed spending time with Asuka lately while on standby at the Geofront. It made the tension of waiting for the call to deploy easier to bear. He asked Gridman if it would be possible to chase Duma away, to force them to leave the solar system, but... of course it wouldn't be that easy.
        
        Privately, he feels sorry for Duma, but there's no way he can let them do this. It was terrible when it happened to Asuka and the others, and it's terrible now.
        
        Kaworu agrees. He made his own feelings known. Duma has made their choice despite that, and he too accepts it.
        
        "<Asuka! I'm right with you!>" Shinji calls as he and Kaworu detach Unit-01 from the Paradiso and send the violet Eva flying forward in an equal and opposing arc from Unit-02. She might not have said which way she was going to go, but it isn't hard to see, and with Kaworu supporting him in their two-seater entry plug, it's astonishingly easy to match her.
        
        Guy tells the Evas to stay behind him, and Shinji does his best to match that up until the King of Braves has soared in to punch the Angel in a direct assault. Knight helps out with his own charge out of nowhere, shouting to Gridman that he has to fight. Sure enough, both of them meet headlong with a powerful expression of Duma's A.T. Field, hexagons of light sailing outwards from where both of them hit. Chloe opens fire with her rifle, further distracting the Angel from the incoming Evangelions, and more to the point, adds a wobble to the snow they emanate, audible in the incoming radio on the Paradiso. That numbing sensation decreases for a moment; then it redoubles, echoing in from all directions. The strategically placed Evangelions' A.T. Fields block some of it, and Sigma and Gridman's Grid Kineses scatter the rest, protecting those present--but the signal is still playing from literally all over the world. It might be harder for some than others to deal with it, necessitating more personal attention from one or both of the Hyper Agents.
        
        That's when the pincer strike happens.
        
        Where Unit-02 wields the Thunder Spear, Unit-01 draws the Magoroku Extermination Sword. Asuka roars in from one side to charge at Duma from one side, screaming her rage and defiance, and Shinji screams too, loud and raw, as he and Kaworu zoom in from the other. (Kaworu himself is silent. He is resigned.) Their weapons impact too on the brilliant A.T. Field.
        
        Shinji makes agonized noises of determination, and Kaworu supports him in silence, as the light of Duma's heart begins to rupture. The Magoroku Extermination Sword and the Thunder Spear melt partway through, eroding the A.T. Field in their wake and creating a brief opening for the others. Duma's tendrils shrink back for an instant...
        
        And then space shears around Unit-01 and Unit-02, swallowing them up in a void.
        
        It lasts for but an instant; then they reappear a short distance away. It's thanks to their own A.T. Fields that it wasn't much, much farther.
        
        "Shinji-kun! Asuka! Kaworu-kun! Are you all okay?!" Misato shouts, leaning forward in her seat.
        
        "<I-I'm okay!>" Shinji transmits back.
        
        Misato breathes a brief sigh of relief. "Good... I'm glad." Then, with renewed ferocity: "Units 01 and 02, make your way back into melee range! Everyone else, keep at it! It's working; we just need to keep chipping away at its defenses!"
        
        Knight, Orb, and Shozo might not have been invited to the party, but as long as they're helping out, she'll welcome them. At least she can welcome them; that black-clad figure is an unknown still...

<Pose Tracker> Gridman has posed.

"I know I'm banned, but it's not joining a NERV mission if I was here first, right?" Gridman half-jokes, his voice picked up by each machine. "I'm not going to interfere. I think I know a way to stop the affects of Duma's song!"

Gai appears next to Gridman, and he looks to his fellow Giant of Light. "Thank you. I'm relying on you, Gai. I'll protect everyone from the Angel's song, but I won't be able to fight while I'm doing it. Please, keep everyone safe."

"Alouette! I will!" He calls, looking toward Guardienne Aviare. "I'll be by your side, even if you can't see me! Don't give up!"

"Don't worry, Knight. This is something only I can do." Gridman gives his almost-double a nod. "I won't hesitate, I promise. I'm going to keep everyone safe. Fight bravely in my place!"

With that, the Giant of Light vanishes in a pixelated blur of radiant blue light. Instantly, Vit and Gridman, in Yuta's body, appear in the shuttle with Max and Calibur. Both Hyper Agents look distracted, their gaze faraway.

"It's already affecting us. Hurry." Vit says, one hand coming up to his head as the song invades his mind. "We'll be... fine..."

Gritting his teeth, Gridman drags his gaze away from his comrades and back to Junk. Raising his arm, he shouts again: "Access Flash!"

And though he vanishes in a burst of light, Gridman does not appear in the outside world. Instead, he finds himself in the odd, digital space just to the side of reality. Darkness surrounds him, broken only by crystalline shapes. Glimpses of his allies flash through the blackness.

"I can hear you. Thank you for teaching me, Sigma." Gridman touches an image of his brother, watching him fight in his own way. "We can do this together."

Duma's song radiates through this in-between realm in visible waves. Gridman watches the pattern. It can be disrupted if he uses himself as a barrier in just the right place...

"Grid Kinesis!" He shouts, into the emptiness.

The Light of his Accepter shines, shrouding Gridman in a washed-out glow. Stepping forward, he attempts to lessen the intensity of Duma's song, leveraging his Light against the Angel's. Just like when he fought Bujack and saved his friends, he can heal mental contamination before it can get a hold of someone's mind. But who does he pick? Shining yellow eyes look from one window to the next, looking for hints of Duma's song overwhelming anyone.

"Standing" this close to Duma, in a dimension where emotion becomes visible, Gridman can hear the Angel's heart all the more clearly. And as Duma thinks of Tsutsujidai, of the Repli-Compoids, Gridman pauses in shock.

"Duma... Did you get your idea from Tsutsujidai?" Gridman spreads his arms wide, blocking a little more of the song. "Do you think..." He goes quiet, fear nagging at his heart. "...do you think the Repli-Compoids were meant to be the way they were, back when the kaiju were attacking?"

<Pose Tracker> Asuka Shikinami Langley has posed.

White hot anger surges through Asuka. Another Ultraman appears, she doesn't pay him any mind on it's periphery. She marks Gridknight as an ally, by instinct alone.

She knows his position.

Chloe she's seen enough from Duma's first appearance to know that she won't back down with what needs to be done.

Shinji says he's with her, and once upon a time she would have rejected needing him, but now, "<I KNOW!>" Before, "<TAKE IT DOWN!>"

There is no intent for mercy in it's motions, as the massive Evangelion flies in, spear at the read, "HAAAAAAAAA-!" At the moment of impact, the AT Field shines, and it's Bayonet starts wedging in, "THAT WON'T BE ENOUGH!"

Space shears around Asuka, and suddenly, "AT FIELD MAXIMUM OUTPUT!" Duma's effect contacts it, and Unit-02 is shifted away.

Asuka is panting already, "<FINE! I'M FINE!>" However, being interrupted like that is rough on her. There's a single mindedness needed in shutting out Duma right now.

A purity of rage, and that interruption breaks up that pattern as she calls back out to Shinji. "<BACK IN THERE! IT WON'T MANAGE THAT TRICK TWICE!>" And it's perhaps notable, that even as she flies Unit-02 back in there at melee range...

... it's moving more slowly, the logistics department catching a small but steady tick down of Asuka's synch rate.

At this rate, it's only a matter of time, perhaps.

<Pose Tracker> Lina Lombardi has posed.

         "Gotcha, Guy!"

         The Ichinana boosts to the side and begins to open fire at Duma, its bullets glancing off its AT Field in a burst of small rippling hexagons. She knew the only way to break through would be to keep up the pressure, and the barrage of machine gun fire was the best way she had to do that. She's still keeping a cautious distance, waiting until the field is broken to rush in, lest she risk falling further to the effects of the Angel.

         As she continues firing, she sees a familiar ship and feels a familiar presence reaching out. Her cheeks lightly flush red at the realization that the girl she likes is here and watching her. Of course she was, she works with NERV! But...still... She figured she should probably at least reach out to her.

         Sonia! It's been too long, hasn't it?

<Pose Tracker> Liam 7-020 has posed.

        Some of the tension in Liam's heart dissipates as Sigma acknowledges him. <"Thank you,"> he transmits. The Dilanza Sol breaks away from Eva-00, and sweat beads on Liam's brow as a faint sluggishness settles into his mind. He breathes. His eyes hood as the Dilanza Sol charges Duma, jets blazing.

        Even if the world won't accept monsters like us, we can be monsters together.

        Tears bead on Liam's lashes as he remembers. He is no Newtype, but he reaches out to Sigma all the same, through the field of the Grid Kinesis.

        An image: two Lilim, one bald and scarred, the other with bright red eyes and pink hair. They stand in a liminal space, hemmed in by multicolored wires. The wires form a skeleton, of sorts, the supports for a clay creation.

        A kaiju. Bujack.

        That same young man is there, in Tsutsujidai, and Bujack is in the background, passing through the city, ephemereal. The young man notices.

        He is sick with worry. When he is not, he is numb. Parts of him have been suppressed or gouged out. Bujack did this to him, but it was just an instrument. The young woman--Akane--made it, just like she made all of Tsutsujidai. A place where a lonely heart could find refuge, no matter how false it was. And it was false. Now there are others here, too. Now they can all be scared and broken together.

        "<Her name is Akane Shinjo,>" Liam says aloud, to Duma and Sigma and Gridman. "<What you saw was the work of a heart that... didn't want to live.>"

        In real space, Liam focuses; the Dilanza Sol surges forward towards the opening Eva-01 and 02 have made. It slashes its bayonet towards Duma's cloudy "innards", a testing strike.

        "<A heart that was being used.>"

        A pause. Liam takes a breath and switches channels. "Bracing for AT Field displacement," he says, because Duma's probably not going to put up with that. The Dilanza Sol sweeps the butt of its rifle in a strike at the diaphonous mass, and then settles back and waits.

        "<No one should ever be made to feel like her! That emptiness, no matter what form it takes!>"

<Pose Tracker> Shozo has posed.

Shozo, after checking the Ace Robot's maneuverability in zero-g (not ideal, but there weren't actually any problems), he lets himself float back, deciding to head towards the big ship that had brought the Evas up. Nodding to (and receiving a nod from) the Ace Robot, he lets himself drift backwards at high speed until he catches the golden solar/communications panel on the side of the bridge -- careful Shozo, don't break it!

A few minutes later, the cherubic face of Shozo could peer down from the top of the bridge window of the Paradiso, waving at what must be the horrified bridge crew within.

"Hi there! Do you guys need some help?" How did he talk, in space, through the window? Who could say?

<Pose Tracker> Knight has posed.

        "Where are you stepping?" Gridknight snarls, and it might, at first, seem he's speaking to Gridman.

        He isn't. He already asked him. But there's more than one heart crying out, right now.

        The only hint the world gets of that nuance -- of Duma's own volition -- is what Gridknight does say to Gridman, a breath later: "Then do it!!"

        It's worth learning what Gridman is capable of, as his eternal understudy; but Gridknight has another role, here. He's standing with Asuka, against a threat to humanity. And when she and Shinji are pulled a short distance away, he yells: "Evangelions! You're not done, yet!"

        Is Asuka fine? She'll be more fine if they defeat the enemy.

        And while she surges in to close the space with Duma again, Gridknight springs back into the fray just the same, leaping through space to spin forwards through that vacuum and drop his heel in a vicious axe kick aimed at that Angel's strange defences. Even if he can't break through -- he's not stopping.

        He made his choice. Protecting humanity means not hesitating to kill kaiju.

<Pose Tracker> Gai Kurenai has posed.

Ah! He can see it, now, as the Evangelion units fly in, their burning blades sticking into empty space that resolves into the flickering hexagonal barrier of Duma's AT Field, which is slowly pried apart - until the Angel lashes out and the strange giant machines are suddenly far away from the battle.

Within the Inner Space, Gai frowns, changing his grip on the Orb Ring. Cast beyond the bounds of the physical by Grid Kinesis, the two Gridmen can see him floating in his own spherical space in this realm, surrounded by a glimmering violet starfield with the Orb Ring in his hand shining steadily. A sudden comprehension - the device in his hand corresponds to the crystal shape on Ultraman Orb's chest.

He glances towards the two, aware of their presence if not able to see them, and nods. The sphere surrounding him shimmers with light, pulsing out against Duma's song and shielding the Crusader of Light from the Angel's induced solace. "I can protect myself! Help those closest to succumbing first!"

He returns his attention to Duma, and we zoom out of the Inner Space, as Ultraman Orb's purple markings flare with an azure light and he accelerates, blurring into a position in line with the hole Asuka and Shinji tore into Duma's AT field, spreading his arms with a twisting halo of white-and-indigo light that collapses into his right wrist as he brings his arms back together in that classic right-arm-up left-arm-across Ultra Beam Pose.

"SPERION BEAM!" The light on his arm volleys forth in a stream to capitalise on the damage inflicted on the AT Field and force the hole wider.

The sight of the silver-and-red giant emerging from the hole in space causes Orb to glance over in surprise. "Ace-san...?" ... but no, it's not. The golden shackles are the physical mark, but the sense of presence is... different too. He spots Shozo on the Ace Robot's shoulder.

Orb's expressionless mask does not change, as he returns his focus to his beam assault.

He's watching Gridknight too - the Being of Light (Kaiju of Light?) born of Akane Shinjo, so much like and yet so much unlike the being he was made to learn from.

<Pose Tracker> Chloe has posed.

        Each shot of the Pallas Makhia's cannon causes it to float backwards a short distance, before whatever it uses for its space flight counters the inertia and pushes it back into place.

        In the cockpit, Chloe continues to pull the trigger, watching shot after shot soaring through space to explode against the target. She has no idea if it's working. Or doing anything at all. All she can do is trust in the plan.

        She can do that.
                I shouldn't be fighting.

        That's what she was trained to do.
                There's no need to fight.

        Trust in the plan, trust in your superiors, trust in your teammates.
                Everyone should just get along.

        And everything will work out!
                continuing down this road will lead to our own self-destruction.

        Thoughts of backing down, of letting go, continue to try and edge their way into Chloe's mind. She bites down on her lip, a small trickle of blood forming as she tries to keep her mind focused on the task. Keep shooting!

<Pose Tracker> Rei Ayanami has posed.

The others position themselves. They aren't fighting each other now.

Rei does not know where that thought comes from. They did NOT actually fight each other, other than the Second, didn't they? And what the Second did did to Gridman did not leave any harm, the equivalent of a shove. So she has been told.

Rei does not feel that in her gut, but it is, at least, a story that can be held to.

Others move. Someone new arrives, which Rei does not recognize. (Shozo, she will surely learn later.) Her eyes turn towards the roaring charge of the King of Braves. He shows courage, as always; he shows courage by leaving the AT Field. Can he, in all his strange glory and confidence, resist Duma's call?

There is a brush of something - against the AT Field. Grid Kinesis, and not a very familiar feeling. Not unknown, though Sigma's presence makes it stranger.

Rei does not 'speak' very easily, but in this way -

A ceiling. A comfortable bed underneath her. A bed that grew slowly less comfortable in a subtle manner as the light moved through the room. Very gradually could it be seen, but the memory began to telescope and the shadows moved across nearly the entire ceiling and the light began to change and something tickled in the back of her throat and it was a little harder to breathe, and yet there was no reason to rise.

- memories can escape.

"Gridman," Rei says, quietly, perhaps assured that Gridman would hear her voice. "... Will you always reach out?" It sounds curious, and it comes as the S-Type armor maneuvers the Evangelion into a very slightly higher position, the sniper rifle brought down and sighted down but not yet fired. It is not a weapon for simply drowning the enemy in rounds, after all.

Unit 01 and Unit 02 close... their weapons swing... and...

They both instantly vanish.

Rei stares ahead and THIS is when she fires several rounds at Duma, the subrocket motors spinning and adjusting their vector to home in towards Duma. Even if they may, in the end, simply break against the Angel's AT field, they must cross the boundary of Eva-00's own to do so.

<Pose Tracker> Takeshi Todo has posed.

"I didn't need to teach you much," Sigma answers his brother, feeling more than seeing Gridman's presence in the strange reality that they share, if only by the narrow tangents where they barely intersect, considering Sigma's current place of being is within Galeon. "I just had to remind you of what you were capable of. The power was within you all along." And there is still another that Gridman has not yet grasped, but...

Well. All in good time.

Duma. Sigma hears his brother's pleas. He hears Duma's response as well. A feeling, more than anything else. They won't back down. They're prepared to put their life on the line.

"...Don't you see, Duma?" Sigma asks, perhaps even pleading, "This fury you feel-- this desperate need to change an injustice you see in the world-- this is the same feeling that drives so many humans into conflict with each other. It is not the sole motivator, but it is among the most beautiful. Surely you can understand that the same desire burns within all of these hearts as well. If it can motivate you to such ends..."

"Don't you think that drive to change the world for the better no matter what the cost may be... is worth protecting? Perhaps you're more human than you think, Duma." And yet, this may be Duma's last day. If NERV has its way, it's all but certain.

But even so, some of them... are still trying to reach out. Sigma feels Liam's message as he transmits it. The fear, the anxiety, the understanding of the broken soul that built Tsutsujidai to begin with. Sigma smiles gently, "...You've learned such compassion as well, Liam. Truly, humans are beautiful life-forms."

The Gridmen are not the only other aliens here. One, Ultraman Orb, acknowledges Sigma's presence, and Sigma reciprocates. "Understood. Unfortunately, my attention will be occupied for a short time. Gridman, I'll leave protecting the others to you for now. As for me..."

His fingertips brush the keys. A signal ripples through the landscape of information, the shining internal network of the Space Lion Galeon pulses as Sigma accesses the function he's searching for. One after another, glowing windows begin to appear all around him. There are dozens. Hundreds. So many. "Captain Guy," Sigma calls, "I'm going to be borrowing your communication channels for a few minutes. Splicing ports now, making contact and establishing proxy connections--"

Guy would feel them too. Countless connections being made all across the Earth Sphere... No, across the vast communications network that interconnects humanity all throughout the Earth Sphere. "If Duma is using the approximate locations of our satellite network to guide his assault, then we already have the tools to secure our victory. Once the connections are made... We'll make our move. I know it may be difficult to multi-task, but I would appreciate your assistance. GGG's emergency codes are enough for many of these junctures, but some are a little more... stubborn."

(That is to say, they may be somewhat more secure. Or just, don't allow for Emergency GGG Access.)

<Pose Tracker> Lucine Azul has posed.

        Settling into the cockpit of the redesigned Dianthus, the conflict in Lucine's heart is like an old antenna, diligently relaying Duma's song to her soul.

        It would be better to let the others deal with it than get involved herself, after all.

        She's Lucine, after all, gentle, peaceful Lucine, soft-hearted to a fault, always accepting, always advocating for the most non-violent solution. She hates violence. She hates fighting. She doesn't fell a rush when she's against a big foe. She doesn't get a kick out of teasing out a kill through attacks from afar and swiping in for a kill. There's not a violent bone in her body.
        She'd never shoot at someone.
        She'd never punch someone.
        she'd never advocate for violence
        She'd alw a y s for gi v e

        Because even if the world won't accept monsters like us, we can be monsters together

        Images flash through Lucine's mind, not her own, but familiar in a way the vaguer thoughts weren't. She was being influenced.
        She sat in her cockpit, not even deployed yet, and Liam is remembering--

        "..... Duma, I'm sorry. I'm... as much a Lilim as anyone else." Lucine flexes her hand, and, with effort, reaches out.... to press down the comm button.

        < "...... Apologies for this." >

        It's only a few inches difference, but Lucine feels it's necessary to draw her hand back, and then slap it down on the closest analog to a 'play' button on her dashboard, hard enough to make the sensation of it radiate up her arm with a flash of slight pain..

        Lucine has a secret weapon, using a cryptic Martian technology known as: heavy metal.

        (BGM: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CIQ9Suj6idQ)

        Well, it's hard saying *where* this song came from, but her dad liked it. It's not Lucine's cup of tea, but few tracks on her list had quite the same amount of bite.

<Pose Tracker> Sonia Sophia-Grace has posed.

There's a tap on the bridge, causing a bit of a rumble through the room. Sonia doesn't open her eyes from where she's closed them "Er..."

"Suzuki, we just said--" "Ma'am, please just Look."

Sonia opens her eyes and blinks. A couple of bridge members have stood at the sight of Shozo, and some others have leaned back as far as their chairs will allow them. "Well, open up the broad band, Ensign!" She finally says after a beat. Then she responds to the question:

"Doing quite well, please just keep an eye out for us in case of stray bullets or spears, if you'd be so kind? Thank you for your consideration." Sonia says to Shozo with a smile. "We're good at dodging, but we're not that fast - we'll get there eventually. Now, if you'll excuse us, please - return back to duties at hand. Everyone." She adds on the last, glancing around at her crew, who immediately snap back to attention.

A soft voice comes from her left. "Ma'am... are we still on no firing orders?"
"Yes, thank you for checking Lieutenant Badeau."

That being handled, Sonia drops back against her chair. First, though, a response. To Lina, Hello dear... I'm glad to see you're here. A whisper of caution, then of music, and Lucine gets briefly nudged as well. Thank you... nice pick. Sonia doesn't recognize it, but the idea is a good one. Plus, who can resist some heavy metal?

Then she keeps tentatively reaching - drifting. Hello Duma ... there are some that must fight to show their way. For this, you are seen as unforgivable .. but I thank you. For my own reasons.

<Pose Tracker> Guy Shishioh has posed.

The Broken Phantom SLAMS into that AT Field. The original Broken Magnum was one of GGG's finest weapons against Zonder Barriers, but Angels are made of some of the finest stuff out there, and slightly different principles apply. Different enough that after spinning powerfully, the Broken Phantom eventually pings off and tumbles back toward GaoGaiGar, which accepts the fist back onto its elbow. The Phantom Ring autopilots back to its pylon while Guy braces for what will come next.

He flinches as though in pain. The Angel's numbing assault isn't lost on him, though its grip is far weaker yet, and he seethes a breath through himself. It'd be so nice to be able to rest. To let people have peace. For everyone to rest in--

Grid Kinesis cracks through the Fusion space he's sharing with Sigma, and the lines of light across Guy's body spark to life, firing information into and out of Guy's mind. "Roger," he says., and clenches his fist. His left hand glows with a G-stone circuit, and the same emblem glows on GaoGaiGar's own raised left hand, as Guy bends the whole operation of GaoGaiGar into Sigma's task. "I have an idea to neutralize these copies once we have the transmission method, but...it's risky."

"The reason we never used it when I was a cyborg is the risk of it shattering my body completely. As an Evoluder, I should be able to bear it. But I don't know how safe you'll be, Gridman Sigma."

<Pose Tracker> Alouette Pommier has posed.

Alouette cannot understand Duma's words, how they plan to weaponize the circumstances that brought the Repli-Compoids into existence (the same circumstances that allowed them to be deleted?). But there's a slight flash of understanding - this is what never giving up means to an Angel.

"Even if I can't see you?" Alouette asks, confusion in her tone, as Gridman vows to do what he must. She never saw him fight Bujack in a similar way, after all. "It sounds like you have some kind of plan... good luck. And of course I won't give up!" And true to his words, Gridman vanishes into blue light.

Just as she reminded herself, Liam reminds Duma what Bujack really is: a tool of violence deployed by a broken heart who only wished to show others that same placid dream.

Alouette has just one thing to add to that digital space: the fate of Akane Shinjo, the mastermind behind Bujack, was not ambiguous, Duma will learn. Even after Bujack was rend asunder, after Akane became a kaiju herself... that broken heart was given the opportunity to heal. The solution was not the artificial silence created by a kaiju, but the relationships who gave her that chance even after. Duma should understand the whole story.

With Gridman preventing the mental contamination before it can even reach her, Alouette doesn't have any doubts. All she needs to do is what she must. "EMISSION!" She chants, turning that Program Matter that previously formed a shield, into a rapier of light. "I showed you what it means to be a shield for humanity." Alouette explains, with a flourish. "But occasionally, humanity needs the form of a sword even more." It's the very same thing Gridknight shows him, even if he uses a kick to do it instead. The rapier twists into Duma's AT-Field.

Sigma takes over the communication channels to counterassault Duma. At the same time, Guy has an idea. The risk of shattering his body completely... "I'm not going to let the two of you do something so risky without thinking about it first!" She demands. "If there's anything I can do, anything the entire team you have over at Orbit Base can do..."

<Pose Tracker> Mari Makinami Illustrious has posed.

"Painful to me... Pierce right through me..."

In the distance, hexagonal light flashes and pulses over and over in the midst of a full-fledged assault to break the alien determination that fuels that field of absolute terror.

"... Can't you understand?"

And in response, the tingling sensation of dominating, pacifying silence weakens only to intensify twofold. Space twists and sunders around Unit-01 and Unit-02, displacing them from Duma.

Within their entry plug, the soft singing by that distorted voice comes to an end. The figure in black laces fingers together and stretches their arms forward, feeling the soft pop of knuckles before they lean forward within their seat... and then rise up from it entirely as they push into a standing position.

"Alright.
        Time to be the villain."

                        ~*~

There's something coming.

It registers first on the radars as a bogey fast on the approach that cannot be positively identified by any known, friendly IFF.

Visuals can be gleaned shortly thereafter as the sight of something running past chunks of space debris can be seen in the distance. Not flying, not propelling --

Running. Charging.

On all fours.

Clawed hands and feet impact space with a sudden, shimmering octagonal pulse blooms beneath the thing's feet, used as a launchpad to send it -leaping- through zero gravity until those limbs strike another colorful, pulsing field of geometric to rebound off of.

An AT Field. It's using an AT Field to pounce through space.

And the closer it gets, the clearer it is. Covered in steel gray, blue and black armored plating, it's larger than them, by a not-insignificant degree. It shows up on no registered database. Its pylons, located at its hips instead of shoulders, seem to contain nothing except black scales that pulse with sickly bright crimson lines of light. And the long, intricate-looking long-distance rifle slung to its back is no model NERV has ever made for use with their units.

But there can be no mistake:

It's an Evangelion.

And it's closing in on Duma and the others.

-Fast-.

KTS: Mari Makinami Illustrious has deployed in Evangelion Wolfpack.
KTS: Will Barrier activated! (But will not apply until relevant Morale threshold.)

<Pose Tracker> Takeshi Todo has posed.

With the full computational power of Earth's Strongest King of Braves at his command, Sigma sets about his task in earnest. This was surely not something that Cain had ever intended for his creation, but that's the power of ingenuity for you. One after another, shuttered satellite systems open themselves to Sigma's call. But...

Guy has a suggestion. A potentially dire one.

"...Oh?" Sigma asks, arching a brow before his eyes widen in understanding. "Oh...! You mean-- I see," he nods, "...Don't worry about me, Captain. I presently exist in a space only tagentially connected to physical reality. What you suggest may still affect me, but the World Wall should absorb most of the power. I should be fine, but... I admit there is some risk if I'm occupied keeping these connections open--"

Alouette pleads with them-- think this through before they do something stupid. If there's something she or Orbit Base can do...?

"Hah... yes," Sigma chuckles, shaking his head at his own foolishness. "Of course. Alouette, Operator Hana, if you would please assist me. If you can help take some of the computational burden off of me, I should be able to better defend myself. There will still be a risk, but..."

He smiles, "We'll just have to make up for the rest with courage, won't we?"

A beat.

Something is approaching.

"...Hold on. I have another IFF on the way. Evangelion...? Orbit Base, NERV central, can you confirm this signature...?"

<Pose Tracker> Lina Lombardi has posed.

         Dear?! H-Hey! Wh--

         Lina's mind sputters as she pulls out the Ichinana's blade and decides to risk coming in closer, thrusting into the AT Field. The teasing is honestly a blessing, as it's keeping her mind occupied enough to distract from Duma's effect. Her gaze turns to Guy as he proposes a drastic solution.

         "I'd say don't push yourself, but I doubt you became the King of Braves by being careful about this kinda thing! If there's anything I can do...!"

         She's interrupted by...what the hell is that...another Evangelion? Maria madre di Christo, it's on all fours! As if these things weren't freaky enough!

         "Is that one of ours?!"

<Pose Tracker> Kaworu Nagisa has posed.

        "You do?" Misato says to Gridman through the comms. She considers for a second; then she nods. "All right! We're giving you a second chance, Gridman! Show us what you've got!" Shozo taps on the 'window', and Misato double-takes at the seeming child floating in the vacuum of space before she recognizes him from a previous NERV report. That doesn't make him less weird, but it does contextualize it. Regardless, if he's approaching them instead of going straight to fighting the Angel, maybe he has something in mind. She lets Sonia handle it; it's her ship, after all.
        
        "Col. Katsuragi!" Lt. Maya Ibuki calls from her station on the bridge, looking up from the controls. "Asuka's sync ratio... It's starting to drop!"
        
        "Dammit! The Angel must be getting to her," Misato growls. Her own head has been fuzzy; her hatred for the Angels and sheer willpower have let her keep her focus, but she can only imagine how it must be for her. "It's fine! We're on a time limit, anyway--let her keep going!"
        
        Through Sigma, Liam transmits the message of his heart, the memories of when he'd been under Bujack's influence. He is a Lilim, so it's not the same, of course. He wasn't that way originally, but he had been made that way--as had Alouette, who contributes her own experiences, or rather, the follow-up to them--thanks to the God of Tsutsujidai.
        
        They know her, of course. Akane Shinjo. They never approached her directly as had been suggested to them, but they'd been told of her. They saw her power, and how she ruled over the city of her heart. But that heart had been broken, Alouette claims. That heart was--
        
        A heart that didn't want to live. A heart that was being used.
        
        ?
        
        Perhaps you're more human than you think, Duma.
        
        ??
        
        Do you think the Repli-Compoids were meant to be the way they were?
        
        ???
        
        Thus does the Angel register confusion.
        
        The Repli-Compoids had all been so spiritually quiet. A pleasant silence. They had never minded their presence, no matter how near or far they'd been. They'd co-existed just fine. The war and chaos that broke Tsutsujidai from reality shattered that for them, but they were that way to start.
        
        They were that way to start (rubytext: all along).
        
        And so Lilim can surely be made like them--
        
        Lina's gunfire peppers against miniature evocations of the Angel's A.T. Field, manifesting like ripples on a pond that refuses to yield. At the same time, Knight swings in with an axe kick right up in the Angel's face and Alouette swoops in with her rapier to ram into the iridescent-orange hexagons. All three serve to distract them as Orb fires that Sperion Beam in the rupture in their A.T. Field, eroding it further to open it up to Rei and Chloe's gunshots. The shimmer around Duma, and the pearlescence of their wavering colors, mean it's extremely difficult to sight on the core, but they still shear through some of the lightning tendrils, reducing them to ash.
        
        The song is interrupted, briefly, by a cry. It's incorrect to call it a cry. It's silence, breaking through the signal of snow for a moment as each bullet lands. They start to crumple in on themselves, and it might look like they're about to teleport away--but no; they stand their ground, layers of A.T. fields glittering into existence to cover up their weakness. The song resumes...
        
        Or tries to. The instant it had been interrupted left an opening for Sigma to take advantage of. The satellites throughout the world respond to his hacking, and the lines absorb not just Duma's signals but everyone's. That includes Lucine and her Martian (?) heavy metal, the epitome of cacophony. For an instant, Duma's silence is cut with the harshest of noise.
        
        Still, they don't give up. Ironically, Sonia's expression of gratitude bolsters them. (How can they be wrong if the Lilim themselves thank them?) letting them shore up their defenses, especially with the seeming breather Guy gives him as the GaoGaiGar doesn't follow up with a direct attack.
        
        In that time:
        
        "<R-right!>" Shinji says back to Asuka--but truthfully, he's worried about her. She's almost always angry, of course, and she has every right to be especially angry now, but there's a weird desperation about her right now. (Because it's always difficult to detect a negative, he doesn't realize that for some reason, he isn't being affected by Duma's 'song' at all.)
        
        "<I know!>" Shinji shouts to Knight and Asuka both--there's nothing else that needs to be said. They're both right. As sorry as he feels for Duma, they're the ones who're protecting everyone else; they have to do what they must to keep the world safe. As she launches back in, struggling with her dropping sync ratio, he does likewise, closing that distance as a timer ticks down. It's not a distance that either of them can close instantly, but they've both got to give it their all.
        
        Heart hammering in his chest, Shinji hisses through his teeth, "<Come on... come on...!>"
        
        But Unit-01 and Unit-01 are trying to use the thrust of the S-type equipment to make it. Someone else is using something far more effective.
        
        "What the hell?" Misato utters, rising wide-eyed to her feet at the approach of the unknown Evangelion. Sigma asks, but even if he hadn't, she'd still say, "That's not one of ours! How the hell?!"
        
        Still, if it's an Eva, it should be an ally. Maybe another NERV branch expedited its construction and Commander Ikari sent it up as back-up; after Sahaquiel, that's fully believable. Maybe it is one of theirs and she just doesn't recognize the design. Misato shoots Sonia a look. "Captain Sophia-Grace, patch a line through to the unknown Eva!" She slams a hand down on the console and focuses on the newcomer. "Pilot of the new Eva--do you copy?"

<Pose Tracker> Shozo has posed.

Shozo nods sagely at Sonia's request, and gives her a thumbs-up before pushing off the ship, back towards the Ace Robot. He even leaves a little handprint on the window!

The Ace Robot, meanwhile, is floating just outside of Duma's operative range, twitching his limbs stiffly as it sizes up this iteration of the angel. As Shozo approaches, he thrusts his hand out, an arrow-like burst of energy flying into the night, grinding and skittering across Duma's AT Field for several moments before finally shattering and vanishing into the darkness.

"Hmmm... That AT field is a bit annoying, huh?" Shozo says as he floats within "speaking" distance of his robot friend, and gets a stiff nod in response. "Mister, what do you think we should do? Did you ever have to deal with something like this before?" The robot crosses his arms quietly, as if lost in thought, before slowly nodding again.

"Hmm... Sure, that could work. Go wide continuously." Shozo raises the Battle Nizer again. "MonsAlter! Verokron!"

In the vacuum of space, a horrid, grinding roar can be heard (Sound: https:'www.youtube.comshortsO90rkU3LtHE ) as the silhouette of a knobbly creature appears behind the Ace Robot. Moments later, missiles, hundreds of them, begin flying out of the Ace Robot's back, an endless flood of them filling the space around the robot, all hurtling towards the Duma.

"Yeah, Verokron's control should make friendly fire much harder if it teleports them away."

It isn't until after the missiles have begun to fly that Shozo notices the new Evangelion approaching.

"Huh... I thought they were supposed to look like humanoids."

<Pose Tracker> Gridman has posed.

"Thank you, Misato!" Gridman can't help the little rush of relief her words give him. "I won't let you down!"

In the darkness of the in-between, Gridman feels another Light. Turning his head, he sees Gai, floating in his own in-between. So that's how he transforms... A ring is way easier to use than an old computer. Gridman feels a little jealous!

"Right!" He answers Gai. "Shout if you need us!"

Liam's heart reaches out to Duma, channeled through Sigma. Gridman hears whispers of it as he continues to fight back the Angel's song. It feels so personal... Gridman winces at his accidental eavesdropping.

"You've never been a monster." Gridman murmurs, watching Akane and Liam stand together in Bujack's web. "Not you, not her. And Duma doesn't have to be. If only Liam's thoughts could reach the Angel's heart..."

Just as Liam's memories fade from Gridman's mind, Rei's take their place. His defense stutters. What is this? Did Rei choose to be still that long? Did someone force it on her? So much of her life is a complete mystery to the Hyper Agent. Her difficulty breathing echoes to Gridman, though he needs not breathe in this form, and he shudders.

"Rei?" He looks up. A window through the darkness, just above Duma, features Rei fighting. Gridman watches as she takes aim with her sniper rifle. There are so many questions he wants to ask her, so many promises he wants to make, but now isn't the time.

Instead, he offers: "Yes! No matter what! I'll never give up!" Gridman brings a fist up to his heart, then quickly lowers it. He's got to hold back the song! "When someone needs me, I'll fight for them until I can see them smile under a blue sky!"

Maybe Gridman can't be as altruistic toward humanity as his brother can, but his faith in individual human beings is unshaken. His friends, his allies -- they've proven themselves to him time and time again. If they decide humanity is worth saving, then he'll fight by their side.

"I can do this, Sigma! Do what you have to!" Gridman is nearly pushed back as he loses his brother's help. Planting his feet in this strange darkness, he perseveres. This is nothing compared to what the others are feeling! He can't give up!

Duma's song echoes particularly loudly in one direction. Gridman wades through the waves of otherworldly music, reaching out with one hand clad in pure light. The song is especially targeting... Gridman can't help but shake his head. Of course.

The song is targeting Asuka.

The window to her consciousness shows her struggling. Duma seems to recognize her as a serious threat, teleporting her away, targeting her with his song... It's no wonder. Asuka is every bit as fierce a fighter as she is a person. No one else is as big a threat to the Angel.

In the face of such a powerfully foreign expression of emotion, Gridman is pushed back again, until his body nearly presses against Asuka's window. "Rrgh--!"

With every ounce of his strength, he reaches for the Light inside him, and it answers his call. Glowing ever more brightly, Gridman takes a step forward, parting the waves of music to leave Asuka's mind sheltered behind him.

"I know you don't need my help." Gridman says to her, as the contamination eases, his voice echoing oddly in this in-between realm. "But I still want to make things easier on you. Redheads have to stick together, right?"

His voice is strained. Gridman, new to this ability, has never utilized his Light in this fashion. Every second he stands between Duma and Asuka feels like his body is being eaten away, even through the barrier of radiance. It doesn't matter. Asuka wouldn't give up. Gridman won't either.

Duma's inverse-cry startles Gridman -- nearly causing the Giant of Light to topple forward from the sudden lack of resistance pushing against him. The conceptual thoughts of the Angel still echo through to him, and that feeling of dread in his heart intensifies.

"It's not... like that, Duma." Gridman shakes his head, hating saying this, hating potentially revealing it to other factions. "Aka -- There were kaiju in Tsutsujidai that... had the ability to spread a poison mist that reset everyone's memories. That's what kept the Repli-Compoids s--so quiet."

"It was never who they truly were. It was forced on them. And once those kaiju were gone, they became their true selves. That brought conflict, and arguing, but--! That wasn't all! It brought out the best in them! Everyone worked together to save the city!" Gridman sounds desperate. "Even if they're not as peaceful and quiet now, they're better for it! They're brave, and kind, all the things they could never be before!"

Light blooms from Gridman's Accepter at his words of belief in the people he loves so much. "Please, please try to understand! It's not too late!"

But with the appearance of that new Eva... Maybe it is.

<Pose Tracker> Chloe has posed.

        Continuing to provide artillery support for the units engaging in close-while simultaneously struggling to focus her thoughts on the mission-Chloe is briefly grateful for the distraction provided by her sensors showing the arrival of something new.

        That feeling quickly switches over to concern though as her system is unable to identify the unit. Chloe stops firing for the moment as she turns her head to look in the direction of the approaching unit. The Makhia's head turns the same way, cameras within focusing. A zoomed in view of the approaching unit appears on Chloe's screens. She stares in some confusion at the form of the four legged machine. That shape design... Definitely based off an Eva. Though none she's ever seen. Is it a friend?

        ... No, if it was, it would be saying as much. To her allies, Chloe warns, <"Caution. That new unit is not using a valid IFF code. We cannot assume it is here to help."> Before, Chloe would have considered someone hindering a mission to destroy an Angel to be extremely unlikely. But after recent events...

        Still, Chloe doesn't immediately open fire on the quadraEva just yet, returning to firing at the Angel.

<Pose Tracker> Liam 7-020 has posed.

        Liam's strikes, as careful as they are, must be like mosquito bites to something as vast as Duma. The AT Field displacement never comes; Duma's too busy shoring up their defenses to repel him. Liam lets out another breath. The Dilanza Sol jets back and away, a barrier of shimmering hexagons snapping into place.

        Liam smiles a weak but genuine smile at Sigma's compliment. "<Courage,>" he says. "<'Liam' means 'protector'. And I won't stop protecting them. Even if it means fighting. It's up to you, Duma. But if you're set on dying here... you should know what you're dying for!">

        Liam lets out a breath, and more of the memories bubble up.

        The same young man sits lifelessly in a classroom, aware he does not belong. Akane did her best to put together something to help him feel 'normal', but it's not working. The blonde cosplay wig is obviously a different color than his brows. The high collared-vest is just there to cover up his neck scars. He should feel safe, here, but he does not.

        The same young man sits in the cockpit of a construction Labor, a machine that should absolutely not be in combat, much less fighting a kaiju. Bujack, wingless and wounded, looms over it. Tears pour from Liam's eyes as he remembers the bright flash that took his parents. He remembers their last words. Whatever happened, they loved him. They wanted him to live. What Bujack did to him kept him from living. He greets the kaiju's death with a mixture of grief, anger, and deep, profound relief.

        The same young man sits on a plastic chair, watching a soil probe as it collects data. They're in a makeshift greenhouse; outside is an empty space where a Venora once loomed over the skyline. Beside him are an older woman and a younger man: Repli-Compoids. They're scared. They're both so scared, and he's scared, too, but in their shared struggle, there is kinship. Little by little, Mrs. Sakai and Yamamoto start to change. They get frustrated and upset and elated and determined. They become fully-realized people, just like everyone else.

        "<Gridman's right,>" Liam transmits.

        That hollowness. Liam shakes it off with a shudder. His thoughts flash through memory after memory: the boy who became Knight pulling Akane from the core of the kaiju she'd become. The sudden horror as he realized Sahaquiel was going to drop itself, and the horrible memories after. A quiet birthday in a ramen shop with three of his dearest friends. Cooking for the first time. Screaming for the others to run as the drones dragged him into the belly of a stealth craft. Sweeping Lucine into his arms for their first kiss. The terror he felt when Lucine reached out to Duma in Tokyo-3. Making up with her after.

        This is the world. It is beauty and horror and love and anger and so much more--and it is a world of change.

        This is a world where flowers bloom!

        Liam sags against his restraints. Perhaps unwisely, he reaches up and unseals his helmet, letting his tears drift into the cockpit. Then--

        "Moving to identify," Liam says, thoughts snapping back to the mission. The Dilanza Sol recovers from its brief dormancy(?) with frightening speed, turning, snapping its shields down, and moving into the path of the oncoming Eva.

<Pose Tracker> Asuka Shikinami Langley has posed.

"<Of course- I'm not- DONE!>" Asuka yells Knight's way, but like a horse that's slowly running herself aground, it's like her breathing is growing more irregular. "<You get in there TOO, MUNCHKIN!>"

Can she hear Shinji's worry, his concern for her? Right now it's like her focus is just steadily narrowing, winnowing away by the strange anesthestic effect of Duma's mental contamination.

The bayonet HAMMERS into it, like a bludgeon, rather than a puncturing tool, pressing into it's AT Field. In space, leverage doesn't exist, so instead the S-Type thrusters fire hard.

To try and just, get- through.

And then the chatter over the comms causes her focus to expand somewhat, to the Eva coming at them, RUNNING (???) through space?

"What the hell kind of Eva is THAT?" Asuka comments, surprised. It doesn't make sense to her, in more ways than one. In a sense it challenges a lot of what she thought she knew about Eva.

Especially because she suspects right away what reason it's able to do this through space.

Her mind whirls around the possibilities, another branch? Internal politics? Someone trying to one up them? A secret weapon?

Or...

... darker possibilities... such as it not being a part of NERV at all, but how would that be possible?

The shock over the moment though, causes her focus, her anger to slip. "Well let's see... what-what you're..." Within the sea of LCL, she shakes her head, her red hair floating around like strands of a jellyfish.

She tries to blink away the cobwebs from her eyes... only to see the blur of another being, "Don't." It's vaguely familiar, "... don't need..."

Yet the interference of Gridman starts having an affect right away, as she lurches up, hands gripping her induction levers, white knuckled. "Redheads? You bastard-" Panting again, hard, amidst the foam of bubbles, "-acting like you're more human every day and you think-"

She still does not accept that Yuta Hibiki was not his own person, even as a fragment of Gridman's soul.

"-THAT'S OUR COMMON GROUND? HOW! DARE! YOU!"

For all the things she doesn't accept about him, for all the things she's yelling at him right now. She doesn't reject his help though.

What she rejects is something far more simple.

As the Thunder Spear tries to push further and further inside the Angel's AT Field with renewed vigor.

For what she hopes, will be, the inevitable result-

<Pose Tracker> Guy Shishioh has posed.

Guy lets up to give Sigma full control of GaoGaiGar's power, but that lets Duma rally its own defenses. But. They need to plan for this. "Alright. It'll sting a little, but with us hooked up to so many broadcasters, I think this signal will turn the tide! We can't let this thing amplify its signal any more!"

With Sigma's protection, Guy doesn't have to worry too much about the increasing power of the Angel's song, but in time, it's possible they'd be the only ones standing. They have to move quickly. Alouette demands he actually use his brain for a bit, and he chuckles. "We'll be fine, Alouette. Do you remember? What we based the Melting Siren on?"

The Melting Siren...GGG's strongest countermeasure to Zonder Barrier technology, which could strip away such defensive measures with empowered soundwaves. And the origin of that technology...

Guy puffs up his chest and cries, "YOSHAAAAAAAA!" before he throws his arms wide so that Galeon's face on GaoGaiGar's chest can gleam in the light of the battlefield.

"Go ahead and cry out! Let every soul in the Earth Sphere hear it, and remember that the White Mechanoid Lion stands for courage! GALEOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOON!"

<Pose Tracker> Knight has posed.

        Alouette may well have seen Gridknight be a sword, but, well -- he needs to wear Calibur, to do that, and his mentor is busy helping Gridman right now.

        Antagonistic as he is, Gridknight is letting Gridman work on his own level, now. He'll extend him that much trust.

        (Gridman Sigma, on the other hand, Gridknight knows little about; he was involved in Renais's troubles, more than any other agent of 000. He knows he is Gridman's ally. He'll... recognise that much.)

        "You?!" He yelps, when that Wolfpack of an Evangelion bounds in. "Who the hell are YOU?!" He's one to demand that; he wasn't invited, either! (Knight hears the cries; he has his own ways of appearing, in a place. His own ways of hearing everyone, now.) He clears space to let some of those other attacks lay in, like those dozen-dozen missiles.

        Gridknight is no less dangerous when he's not in Duma's face, though. Drawing a line through empty space, he summons light to become a saw, as he incants: "Gridknight... Circular!" The circular saw, all formed of purple and white light, crashes in to force Duma to choose between it and Asuka's Thunder Spear.

        "He's pissing you off?" Gridknight issues -- past Duma, to Asuka. "Good. Use it!"

        And again, he doesn't say, so directly, that the next thing he says is for Duma's silent ears: "You're not LISTENING to them!" The steel of Gridknight's chassis has no cloth about it; still he feels the sensation of Utsumi's grip.

        Rather, he remembers.

<Pose Tracker> Rei Ayanami has posed.

Gridman answers her and Rei gives him a look that is somehow both warm and mournful. To hear him speak so is somehow pleasant in a strange way; and yet, of course, even if he tries...

There is something coming. Something alien. Something new, perhaps.

Rei glances to the side as something in the sparkling light makes her think of -

Unit 00's cameras, so to speak, zoom in on the object and Rei is struck quiet at its absurdity. It only takes a moment, though. A simple mmoent of shock, but someone else is speaking in pain. Shinji is.

Then Misato Katsuragi reveals something astounding.

"...?" Rei half-vocalizes at the news that it's not one of "theirs." Did one of the Bloc Evangelions return here to reinforce them? But they are in space, not in Zaftran or Britannian territory. Also, the Evangelion is running on all fours. It is possible an Eva could do that, just as a human might, but -

The Second is screaming.

Rei does not throw the sniper rifle aside because such a flourish would be unnecessary. Orbital trash is everyone's responsibility. Instead, Rei picks up the beam rifle, which is nearer to a heavy pistol even with the adaptive grip, and leans forwards.

The reminder. It's ghastly. The reminder of that time under the spell of Bujack. The touch of an alien entity however graciously meant. It floats through Rei's mind, like a rancid fluid from a boil that had sat quietly but unlanced for a long time. Here, now, it seems somehow more revolting than it did before.

And yet she could not bear a grudge against the girl who did it. She meant well. She was only a handful of years older than Rei herself.

Knight says that YOU'RE NOT LISTENING TO THEM -- he speaks to Duma --

Why is he speaking to Duma? Why speak at all, Rei wonders. To communicate is a fumbling thing; the peaks of great ice mountains in the water gesturing one to another, as if to express some fraction of what stands above the waterline.

Rei fires the weapon. The condensed streaks of magenta-violent megaparticles aim towards the central mass of Duma.

Is this not courage? Rei thinks as she hears the roar of the King of Braves.

Rei's eyes turn towards one side, and by happenstance she views the Moon, not the Earth. Her teeth press together as her jaw tightens. It was quiet there. It was silent. Perhaps she can empathize with the Angel that much.

<Pose Tracker> Gai Kurenai has posed.

The Sperion Beam is not enough, Gai can feel it, as the Evangelions pull apart Duma's AT field further; it just makes more to shield its injury, its tendrils lashing furiously and dangerously. Keeping up with that assault would require fury of their own...

A wolf leaps through space on an AT field, the distinctive shapes of an Evangelion identifying it.

GaoGaiGar lets its core machine's voice sound out, a roar of defiant courage that can even bolster the soul of a millennia-old Being of Light.

Yes... among this company, he can trust himself to give over to his own beast.

"Forgive me, Duma," Gai says, raising the Orb Ring in the Inner Space and drawing two more cards; one a glittering gold, and the other... a malefic indigo. Light envelops the Inner Space, the cosmic backdrop taking a bloody cast, as in the physical realm Orb is consumed by light radiating from his heart.

"Zoffy-san!" The golden card is scanned, resolving into the image of one of the Land of Light's most storied warriors, noble and true. Then... the purple card, which almost fights Gai's attempts to scan it... but acquiesces, as the Crusader's expression tinges into a snarl.

"Belial-san." This time, the Reionyx-possessed black-suited Ultraman appears to Gai's right, posture hunched and hands heavy and clawed, his mask a mocking sneer.

Lashing out with his hands, Gai writhes and lifts the Orb Ring up. "I'm borrowing your powers of Light and Darkness!"

FUSION UP!!

ULTRAMAN ORB: THUNDER BREASTAR! emerges from the swirling light that engulfed Spacium Zeperion in a vicious lunge, clawed hands extended to carve through Duma's tendrils, black-and-red lightning crackling around wickedly-sharp nails. Ferocious amber eyes loom from Orb's mask, but despite his savagery and violence he moves to intercept the tendrils as they lash out at the Evangelions, with a defiant roar: "I EMBRACE THE DARKNESS, TO BECOME LIGHT!!!"

This paradox, perhaps, is the most illustrative of what it means to live.

<Pose Tracker> Alouette Pommier has posed.

When Gridman Sigma requests as explanation for what in the world that quadrupled Evangelion is, he's met with utter silence. Of course, none of them have seen it either! The blonde Neo-American accented researcher, Swan White, gasps as she looks closer at the feeds. "My! If that isn't Satan's hound from the very depths of Hell!" Her interjections are very colourful... they decide to leave working it out to NERV proper.

Also in Orbit Base, Hana Hatsuno nods and salutes as Sigma delegates an all-important task to her. She and Alouette work in as perfect sync as they always do, even so far apart as they are. Such precise work of reducing the strain on Gridman Sigma might seem difficult when you're resisting a numbing form of mental contamination. For Alouette, it just makes her work harder, as Program Rings surround GaoGaiGar, sustained by Hana's work at the desk. Tasks like this? It's what Alouette lives for... not even Duma can't take that away from her anymore.

"Melting Siren? That came from Galeon, didn't it?" When developing PhantomGao, they had specifically decided to adapt Holographic Camouflage instead. "...I see what you're trying to do." She realizes, with a wry smile. "Hana and I did everything we could. We're counting on you both now!" They've never seen what this technology can do on such a scale... will it really work?

For now, Alouette attends her focus back towards Duma themselves. The noise is such an alien one she doesn't even register it as a cry. But the response she received of the memories she shared with Akane? Was that confusion? She tsks, although she's not sure Duma understands what the annoyance and impatience of a teenaged girl are. "If you still don't get it... then I'll make you understand!"

The rapier she still wields glows a distinct pink coloured energy - sheer, uncontrolled Broken energy amasses around it. That's not everything, though. It looks like Alouette is preparing something, as Guardienne Aviaire's other hand glows a gold that's just as distinct. Can she really do it again?

<Pose Tracker> Takeshi Todo has posed.

That unknown IFF-- is an Evangelion, but NOT one of NERV's? How is that possible? What are their intentions...? He can't worry about that now. Not yet. "I won't leave you alone for long," he says to his Brother. "Hang on, Gridman." He has to believe in Gridman's strength. The light of his heart won't be so easily extinguished, even by Duma's incredible AT field. And... soon, the signal won't be nearly so deafening, either.

"He's right, you know," Sigma says to Duma, of the pain that Liam shares-- but also of the strength and resilience that those in his memories hold. "The Repli-Compoids of Tsutsujidai were kept pacified by the Venora, the kaiju in Liam's memories. But even those days were not without suffering. All Akane truly did was to rearrange memory into convenient shapes."

Those who died still remained dead. Those who suffered, suffered regardless of the Venora's mercy. Sigma appends the images to Liam's heartfelt outreach. Of a father grieving his daughter, one who he lost only days prior-- but who was made to believe she had passed years ago. And still the mourning, the pain remained. It was a story repeated time and time again. Repli-Compoids were not perfect, pacified creatures, their hearts, their pain, their sorrow-- but also their joy and resilience-- were all too human.

"They were never how you thought, Duma," Sigma shakes his head, "I'm sorry. "

He takes a breath. It's time to focus. "Understood, Captain. Then..." His fingers dance, keys flashing as walls of circuitboard-patterned light surge up all around him, patterned like sound-attenuating panels, all in anticipation of--

"Galeon, let them-- all of them-- hear your roar!" Sigma yells as he delivers the final keystroke. Gaogaigar connects to each of the satellites, whether by proxy through Orbit Base or directly through its own systems. "There are no souls who are not stirred by this sound. This is the roar of courage itself! Hear it now, Duma! This, too, is an irrefutable facet of the human heart! Let it awaken you from this self-destructive delusion!"

Galeon roars.

Sigma--

He roars too. In pain, yes, but also in exhileration. The great lion's voice surges through him and from there into the satellite network. From each and every one of them, across every channel, Galeon's roar thunders. Each Satellite becomes a signal booster, blasting the nearby specters of Duma with the full force of that tremendous, heart-racing voice.

Even with the firewalls, even separated from physical space as he is, Sigma can't help but be affected. He is so close to the source. So suceptible to powerful surges of emotion...

But... He is not alone. Another presence protects him. A great white beast, formed of the light of this place, curls protectively around the Hyper Agent and his organ--

Galeon, himself, is a Brave of GGG, after all. And GGG members always protect one another...!

<Pose Tracker> Sonia Sophia-Grace has posed.

Lina just gets the feel of Sonia giggling softly.

However, Duma ... Duma's reaction to her thanks is almost startling, but Sonia's attention is dropped back out of space - literally - back to the actual physical present, as her comms officer calls over her shoulder about and pings the ... wolfEva? Her eyebrows raise, fractionally, glancing at the handprint - someone's going to have to clean that later, before she leans in to Misato. "I thought we left the other at the Geofront?" She asks, calmly.

<Pose Tracker> Lucine Azul has posed.

        Sonia's mental communication briefly receives a feeling of confusion in return, then understanding. Emotion is able to filter through this line, like the sputtering of someone half-asleep trying to communicate back.

        Embarrassment. Thankfulness. Memory. Happiness. Nostalgia. Embarrassment. A pleasant roller coaster, conveyed through the link before Sonia moves on.

        Lucine uses that as a nudge to continue deploying Dianthus out and then forward, towards where--

        < "..... Liam... I'm coming to support you. Because I feel all of you still trying... I have to try too!" >

        So she doesn't attack with the Dianthus, but she does not perform as a shield, either; those taking a more direct route to stopping Duma are no less unhampered.

         Our definitions of peace are different. So I will try again to reach out to you, because others still are trying.

         The people you protected, they have found love, and happiness. Rikka found <<love>>, and broke through to Akane using it. And Akane... followed her, when she was nearly lost, in order to bring her back. This is... another form of <<protection.>>

         You didn't fully understand us then, when you visited Tsutsujidai that one day. But you came, and you felt something unique. You found it within you the want to <<protect>>.

         So, what does this mean, when something threatens those you protect? Would you fight, for the sake of those you protect?
         That is why many of us are here. We also protect. We do not want harm done to others, whether they're Lilim like us, or something a little different.
        
         Gridman... was trying to protect you, because you tried to do the same for him. He considers you... a part of Tsutsujidai. A citizen.

        A pause. The song is beginning to make her thoughts hazy. Her audio begins to feel distant, a pleasant memory of her father's old radio, <<before she found it broken on a cold ground>>
        She has a few more seconds from the shock of that intrusive memory.

         You are also something that can be <<protected.>> Gridman doesn't try to do it... by stripping you of... makes you, we... call Duma.

         ... seeds, never planted, never bloom.
        
        The mental contamination may not be worth it. But if others she trusts are still trying to reach him, and others fight to make sure Duma's efforts at taking control fail--

         And this... flowers.... .....

        Liam completes the thought where Lucine's own further becomes muddied.

<Pose Tracker> Lina Lombardi has posed.

         Lina can't help but snicker at Miss Swan's interjection. It was always something about God or Satan with that woman, wasn't it? "Well, Miss Swan, it's a good thing I'm Beatrice and not Dante then, huh?"

         Galeon roars. Was this the true strength of GaoGaiGar? The courage that was the lynchpin behind the Guard...the strength of will she had devoted herself to! The Ichinana begins to heat up, the red panels on its chest beginning to glow red.

         "I hear you, Galeon! We'll use all of our power to bring this thing down! Graaaaaaaah!!" She lets out a roar of her own, blushing even further through the natural embarrassment of such a display.

<Pose Tracker> Mari Makinami Illustrious has posed.

"All I ever wanted... All I ever needed..."Space shudders in little, pale blooms of octagonal ripples with every impact the encroaching Evangelion makes on what should be empty space.

                        "... Is here in my arms."

Every leap, and every ripple, brings it closer and closer to the Angel and its foes. And as it closes in, voices fill the entry plug of the strange, enormous Evangelion, both through radio feeds and something that might as well be the equivalent, for how it carries with crystal clarity through the translucent fluids of LCL.

        You?! Who the hell are YOU?!

"Hee. What a grown up sound," murmurs the Evangelion handler to themselves, a voice that Gridknight, at least, might hear, distorted and modulated though it is. But their FIRST answer, the answer that broadcasts to everyone--

        Pilot of the new Eva--do you copy?

<"!@&*%#@#">

Is a sudden and earsplitting burst of incomprehensible static.

Silence settles in. And then, past the dimming crackle of interference, a voice, speaking with dry matter-of-factness. Heavily modulated and artificial in a deeply recognizable way that might bring some people here back

to a day where a figure in black nearly killed Kaworu Nagisa, Administrator of NERV:

<"Words are very unnecessary.">

Communication cuts off entirely.

It's then that the Dilanza Sol moves into a path of interception. So close, now, Liam can see how immense this thing truly is. Evangelions are already colossal, towering over most conventional mobile weaponry. This thing --

This thing dwarfs the Dilanza at well over five times its size as it bears down upon the mobile suit.

Liam can, for a brief moment, feel space literally -shudder- as two tremendous, clawed hands slam into the vacuum just in front of his mech. Radiant, octogonal geometry blossoms outward beneath them both, and for a brief moment, the Dilanza experiences groundedness in space.

<"Excuse me.">

The warbling voice crackles through Liam's communication lines, pitching high then dipping low.

<"I am on a mission of salvation.">

And then that whole, titanic Evangelion LEAPS over the Dilanza, cresting just over the mobile suit in its wake; more AT Fields bloom as it weaves through countless missiles that rain across the battlefield for survival -- through tendrils of ephemeral light as the clawed hands of an Ultraman wielding contradiction in light and darkness tears through them --

And lands upon its own AT Field, clawed feet-first, directly above Duma. Stretching out to stand on two legs 'upside-down' over the Angel, one clawed hand reaches behind it and unslings that rifle, swinging it down until the barrel points directly at the Tenth Angel.

"Words are very unnecessary..." repeats the black-clad Evangelion pilot to themself as a punch pink targeting array floats across the black glass visor of their helmet.

deet deet

deet deet deet

deet deet deet deet

And as Asuka rages, trying to reach to the heart of the Angel with a pointed speartip -- as Gridman tries to reach the heart of the Angel with plaintive words--

deetdeetdeetdeetdeetdeetdeetdeetdeet

"... They can only do harm."

deeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee

                <"Bullseye.">

BGM: https://youtu.be/p-JCOpNuoIw Depeche Mode - Enjoy the Silence

And there is not a single second of hesitation before a gloved finger mimes pulling a trigger,

an action echoed by the Evangelion as a subdued flash of frenetic crimson energy chasing after a specially-charged rifle round punches downward through space in helixing tendrils of light, a single, high-pitched sound that somehow sings even in the depths of space heralding it.

<Pose Tracker> Kaworu Nagisa has posed.

        "<What?>" Shinji utters, now noticing the incoming new quadruped Evangelion, running off ledges made of its own A.T. Field. "<What in the world is that?>" Misato says it's not one of theirs, but--it has to be an ally, right? It's a fellow Evangelion!
        
        Kaworu only frowns as he eyes the beast. "..."
        
        Misato boggles at Sonia. "You're joking, right? That's obviously not Unit-04!" she tells her. Chloe raises a valid point about the strange unknown Eva's lack of valid IFF code, and she narrows her eyes back to the display of the strange Eva. Those newfound suspicions seem confirmed when she gets horrible static in response--and then a strange non-answer in a heavily modulated voice. Though she wasn't there for the attack on Administrator Nagisa, Misato has gone over the reports many, many times, and women's intuition is a fearsome thing. "Don't tell me--you're the one who shot Kaworu-kun--?!"
        
        But then the transmission cuts off. There's no time for that, anyway. Misato and Sonia can only watch from the Paradiso's bridge as everything unfolds.
        
        The Ace Robot (the thing on the Ace Robot's back?) unleashes an ungodly number of missiles, which all sail in towards Duma in between the cracks of the others fighting them. Just as Shozo predicts, they react by catching each incoming explosive and teleporting them away. However, thanks to Sigma and Alouette's hacking, the missiles aren't flung to some other remote point of space. They follow the connections in space Duma has to their reflections and land on them.
        
        This by itself disrupts the other Dumas violently. Even that, Duma might have been able to recover from, but then Guy unleashes Galeon's Roar, which likewise travels through the connections in space, this time through the ones Sigma and Alouette have created for him. The light of his courage shines as he lets out that leonic cry. As it broadcasts around the globe, it shatters each of the extra Dumas, breaking down the signal boosts and ending the 'song' they transmit.
        
        It's just Duma themselves, now.
        
        Asuka's mind is freed of Duma's influence thanks to Gridman's Kinesis, and in doing so restores the strength behind her hostility. At the same time that she rams her Thunder Spear in towards the A.T. Field, Gridknight slashes in towards Duma with that circular saw. As Gridman recognized, there's no question that Asuka in her Evangelion is the bigger threat, and so the saw shears in through the drapes and capillaries of light. Duma's form is enormous and their diaphonous form continues to mask the exact location of their core, so even as they combine with Chloe's continued gunfire, even as Rei fires particle beams with all the unexpressed ire of her own time under Bujack's influence, even as pieces of Duma burn and burn and burn away, there's still no decisive blow.
        
        Orb changes form to merge darkness and light, and zooms in to grapple with Duma's tendrils, something that makes them shrink back. They struggle, but Orb Thunder Breaster tears through them, while Alouette and Lina charge up their next attacks. The tendrils lash out in an attempt to whip Ultraman Orb away, and Duma struggles to reassert their boundaries as more of those anti-cries ring out, interrupting the heavy metal. But it doesn't interrupt the truth.
        
        Gridman explains the Venora and their role in making sure the Repli-Compoids were complacent. Liam explains how that quiescence was not peace, how they changed to be like Lilim once the kaiju were gone. Knight yells that Duma's not listening, the implication that they should start. Both of them pour so much of their hearts--a being that borrows the body of a Repli-Compoid, and a representative of the Lilim. And beyond them--
        
        "It's true," Kaworu murmurs, eyebrows curving up at the center as he gazes at the Tenth. "Duma... It seems you've gravely misunderstood. The Repli-Compoids were not corrupted. They were returned to the way they were meant to be. You could perhaps bring that same silence to the Lilim--but it, too, would be a false state of being. It wasn't the Repli-Compoids's nature, and it will not--cannot--become the Lilim's nature, either."
        
        Duma listens.
        
        And abruptly, Duma's scintillating form turns ash gray.
        
        It wasn't that they wanted to die. They were simply prepared to risk their life to bring about peace to the Lilim. It's two very different things.
        
        But now--
        
                But now--
        
        They were never how you thought, Duma.
                I'm sorry.
        
        Lucine is very kind, to reach out to them again after all this time. She'd been there from the start, hadn't she? She'd always reached out, and she reaches out again now, even as it hurts her. As they hurt her. As they hurt the Lilim and all their staunch allies. It's through that kindness that Duma finally comes to an understanding.
        
        Even if they can be <<protected>>, they can never be <<forgiven>>.
        
        The snow-in-summer stops. The twinkling red lights turn blue, blinking in noiseless patterns that nonetheless convey a message (rubytext: melody) that might be decoded later. There is one who recognizes it immediately, though, as the curtains of Duma's form part. The hexagons of iridescent-orange fade away...
        
        They drop their A.T. Field and bare their core.
        
                -- shall i go --
                        -- all alone --
                                -- on an azure... --
        
        In Unit-01, Kaworu's whole body stiffens as his eyes widen. "No--please, don't!" he urges. Though his voice is low, there's no mistaking the horror in it.
        
        Shinji looks over his shoulder, Unit-01 reflecting his hesitation by failing to bring down the sword on Duma. "Kaworu-kun?"
        
        Asuka of course never hesitates. With no A.T. Field to stop her, she can jet in and plunge the Thunder Spear into the exposed core.
        
        Except before it can reach, the strange Evangelion seizes the opportunity to leap up over the Angel, centered at the end of their scope, and opens fire. Loaded in that rifle is no ordinary bullet; it crackles with an arcane scarlet energy, symbols carved along its length, barely visible in those helixing strands of light before it strikes the Angel.
        
        There is a sense of a scream, raw and unrelenting. But there's no sound, of course. It's just a feeling.
        
        Crackles spread at the speed of thought over the surface of the red sphere. A crystalline substance overtake it next, as if to cover the core in a thick layer of ice. The core convulses and shrinks to a fraction of its previous size--but it doesn't explode in a flood of crimson core fluid. What remains of the so-called 'glow cloud' that was the extension of Duma's body does succumb to the slashes, bullets, and tears that the others had inflicted upon it and swiftly reduces to stardust. The core itself, though, is consumed by the 'crystal,' and left dim and inert at its center.

<Pose Tracker> Gridman has posed.

"Er--!" Gridman stutters in his defense again as Asuka shouts at him. "What else do we have, Asuka!? I guess we both care about Shinji?"

But if Askua is strong enough to shout at him, Gridman must've succeeded at healing away Duma's contamination. With a nod to himself, the Giant of Light looks to his other companions, searching for someone in need. Lucine's voice is growing faint, and Gridman moves in her direction.

"Asuka! I have to help Lucine! I can still help keep the song away from you, but not completely. Get ready!" Gridman tenses up. "Three... two... one! Now!"

With a grunt of effort, Gridman pushes himself forward. As he moves, some of the 'waves' manage to pass behind him, crashing against the window showing Asuka once again. He's got to make it to Lucine before it's too late. Gridman has no idea how much he can heal -- it's better to try and prevent damage.

Thankfully, Lucine's 'window' is close by. Gridman positions himself in front of it, preventing any further notes of Duma's song from reaching his friend. His light radiates out, gently washing over Lucine. Gridman doesn't know how, or even if its possible, but he's going to try and heal the damage Duma has done.

"I'm with you." He offers, quietly. "Don't worry, Lucine. Please keep fighting bravely, if anyone can reach Duma's heart, it would be you. Don't give up!"

Gridman can hear his allies calling about a strange machine -- a new Eva? He glances between the windows, only getting glimpses of the strange quadruped. With so much of his focus going toward protecting Lucine, Gridman doesn't put much thought toward the new machine, until--

Don't tell me--you're the one who shot Kaworu-kun--?!

"Kaworu!" Gridman shouts. He can't move, not while the song continues. "Kaworu, I'll be there as soon as I can! Please stay away from that thing!"

And even as the Giant of Light grows afraid for his boyfriend, Asuka moves forward, enabled by the protection Gridman gave her. Duma's colors vanish. Kaworu's whisper reaches Gridman. Sharply, he raises his head, looking toward the window that features the Angel.

That black machine, some kind of dog-creature, stops Asuka. It fires, and Duma screams, and in this in-between space, Gridman is sent to his knees by the sheer expression of anguish. He can only stand it for a moment before he vanishes in a burst of pixellated blue light.

Back in the shuttle, Gridman gasps in his human form, both hands clutching his head. Something is wrong. That's not how angels die.

"That -- thing! It did something! It hurt Kaworu-- Calibur, Vit, now!" Gridman turns, still on his knees, facing Junk again.

Max steps forward, freed from the song. "Gridman, you--"

"ACCESS FLASH!" Gridman shouts.

Calibur and Vit follow behind him, and in the air around Duma, Gridman merges with his comrades. Vit's thrusters are fired almost before they're securely attached, and Gridman snatches Calibur. In a matter of moments, he's hovering in front of Unit-01.

"What did you do!" Gridman shouts at the interloper. "What did you do to him!"

The Giant of Light, brandishing his sword, sounds wrathful. The person inside that thing nearly killed Kaworu, and now they've done something terrible to Duma. There's no way he could ever forgive it -- and no way he'll let Kaworu get hurt again.

With a yell, Gridman accelerates toward the strange, black machine. Calibur raised high, he attempts to take a two-handed swing right at the beast's 'head'.

<Pose Tracker> Liam 7-020 has posed.

        Lucine stops talking. The song--had she ever played it before?--is still going. Liam knows his beloved well enough to guess what she's up to through context clues. She's reaching out to Duma, again, except she's not going through Sigma, like he is. "<Gridman! Sigma!>" Alarm seeps into Liam's voice even as he stares down the bounding mystery Eva. "<They're getting to her! Protect her!>" He can't. He can already feel the hazy buzz seeping into his mind.

        'Excuse me.'

        The Dilanza's flight computer does not know what to make of the force the Eva is projecting. Liam keeps it steady, even as proximity alarms detect the weird quasi-force of the Eva's AT field. The Dilanza Sol shakes violently, and Liam's head whips back and forth, glancing off his headrest. Only his reinforced musculoskeletal system and the shock gel doping his cerebrospinal fluid save him from a concussion. He snatches his helmet out of the air, jams it back into place. The Dilanza falls, and the AMBAC corrects; it rests for a moment on the raw force of the Eva pilot's will.

        "Whose salvation?" Liam barks, and Misato--

        "YOU! STOP RIGHT THERE!" The Dilanza Sol responds with sudden force. Liam whirls the machine around and jets after the Eva. In the cockpit, a 'ping!' alerts him to a target lock. He unloads both missile pods, one after the other, into the beast.

        It's too late to stop them. Liam sees Duma turn that ashen grey, and the flight computer records that strange flashing--but he's consumed, in the moment, by what the Angel is doing. "DUMA!" He was prepared for it to end. It still seems so violent. But...

        That's not how an Angel dies, is it? Maybe Duma's special like that, too, but...

        The Dilanza Sol coasts to a stop, still locked on the mystery Eva but otherwise unengaged. That changes in a big hurry. "GRIDMAN!" Liam cries, and the Dilanza Sol jets in to try and head off the intruder, shields raised, and bayonet at the ready. What are his orders here? What's the call?

<Pose Tracker> Lina Lombardi has posed.

         The Ichinana raises its arms to ready its attack, and

         Oh. It's...it's dead. Lina thinks? The Eva shot it, and...it's not doing anything. The Ichinana's arms lower and the panels begin to cool. A part of her is disappointed she didn't get to do a big attack. Wait, why is she disappointed?! The enemy has been neutralized, the mission has been accomplished! That's all that matters!

         Her conflict is interrupted by the screams of Gridman and Liam going after the mysterious Eva. "HEY, GRIDMAN, CALM DOWN! We don't know what the hell that thing is! Guy, what do we do?!"

<Pose Tracker> Chloe has posed.

        Chloe quietly admits to some surprise as she observes the strange four-legged Eva move in to attack the Angel. Perhaps there is some merit to the idea of it being a friend after all. Or at the least, having a common purpose here. Although the chatter over the local radios about this potentially being the same one that tried to assassinate Kaworu-an event that Chloe was not actually aware of, for one reason or another-brings doubt once again. Though there's no confirmation yet.

        It doesn't really matter though, as soon enough the Angel's AT Field is gone (Chloe not experienced enough in Angel-killing to realize this wasn't a direct result of their attacks) and the strange Eva's weapon 'freezes' the monster's core. Seemingly rendering it defeated. Though this is not like the death of an Angel she's seen before.

        Again, it doesn't really matter though. The Angel is not escaping, like last time. And it seems that its attempts to control their minds has faded. As far as Chloe is concerned...

        <"Mission complete.">

        The Pallas Makhia lowers it large cannon, seeing no reason to engage further. The interloper Eva, questionable in its alignment as it is, has not directly attacked them. In fact it has helped them defeat this great threat to the world. That deserves at least some respect.

<Pose Tracker> Asuka Shikinami Langley has posed.

'shot Kaworu-kun' Something about that statement shifts her thoughts upon the person in the wolfpack. It's not that she likes Kaworu, but the thought that someone who tried to off him is among them-

"OF COURSE HE'S PISSING ME OFF-!" She shouts at Gridknight as he interrupts her processing, but it's clearly she's not upset at him, in this fight they're comrades, "WAY WORSE THAN YOU EVER DID! AND THAT'S SAYING SOMETHING YOU BRAT!"

It's galling in a way, how Gridman helps her, yet she doesn't reject it. It is in fact, the way she can bring all of that rage and violence to bear.

How could she reject anything that facilitates that, truly?

The Thunder Spear clashes against the surface of its AT Field. "SCARED YET? YOU SHOULD BE!" Asuka shouts at the Angel that in her eyes, is soon to be a mess of core fluid.

And what Gridman says next, "MORON! YOU CAN'T JUST SAY THAT!" About... them both caring about Shinji? Isn't she dating Shinji? But Gridman says he has to move his influence to protect Lucine.

"DO WHAT YOU NEED TO DO-!" And as he countsdown, she steels herself even before she draws a Prog Knife from a pauldron, grabbing it and slamming it against the AT Field, screaming a battle cry as it freezes in place, as she feels the protective influence recede.

The countdown helps, but she doesn't offer that.

The Wolf Pack suddenly leaps up, and Asuka glances long enough to see the glint of the scope against the rays of the sun.

Long enough to see that helical glow as it slams down into the Angel. Exactly a split second before her spear can move in.

The scream splits into her psyche. The core convulses and becomes part of a crystal even as she dashes the body apart with the violence of a slashing knife and the piercing onslaught of her bayonet and it's extreme voltage.

Panting as the mental influence fades, the Eva turns in space to regard the Wolf Pack and it's unknown pilot. For a time Unit-02 just floats, as Asuka glares at it, disregarding Gridman's ire for a time as she hails it belligerently.

"<The hell did you just do? Who are you!?>"

A glint of a knife, and that bayonet. She's ready to take it on if need be, "<Is what they're saying true?>"

<Pose Tracker> Shozo has posed.

Shozo stops, eyes wide, as the Evangelion-creature slaughters Duma. The Ace Robot, the power of the Choju fading slowly turns his head to follow his master's gaze, at the enraged Gridman. At the chaos this lone thing has caused among his family.

"Mister, take me there."

The Ace Robot grasps Shozo in its fist, and with a stunning amount of thrust, BLASTS off towards the now-remains of Duma.

Moments later, Shozo is there, watching Gridman raise his sword to kill his friend's murderer.

"Gridman?" he asks simply -- his voice carries through the vacuum, as it always seems to.

"Are you going to kill them?"

<Pose Tracker> Guy Shishioh has posed.

Galeon roars.

This was a technique they always could have done...but they never did, in the Primeval War. Galeon only released his barrier-shattering roar while unassisted. The reason was, indeed, as Guy indicated: Guy's position, while Fused, is in Galeon's mouth. The sonic-and-beyond forces would have shorn him apart as if they'd put him in an industrial shredder. As an Evoluder, as a Genesic Server, as a being attuned to Galeon and to power, Guy endures it better.

He still howls in pain, "ghk...GHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!" under the thunderclap of Galeon's mighty roar echoing across the whole of the world.

When it ends, Guy slumps in his cockpit. GaoGaiGar's sensor fin pings a few times, giving him and Sigma eyes on what's occurring, but even that...

"...it gave up," he says, sadly. "How--"

Wait. The other unit. He'd barely had time to even acknowledge it, and now everything's happening at once. It moves, in a way so like an Evangelion, alarming and 'unnatural' by the very nature of how incredibly natural it looks. And what happens to Duma's core? Guy's seen Core explosions before, seen the impossible tidal waves of fluid erupting out. This? This...stasis..

"They sealed it," he says. "GaoGaiGar is not in condition to engage yet, be careful!"

<Pose Tracker> Rei Ayanami has posed.

The lights change and darken, emergency-lights and gray.

Rei speaks. "... Who are they?" she says, her eyes on the intruding new Evangelion.

Anxiety tickles around the edges of Rei's nervous system as the unknown entity smashes inwards. A brief communication, charging past and over the Dilanza. Rei can see it as the S-type armor jinks her to the side.

But it does not strike the Dilanza, or Liam. Instead something is coming, landing in the air with impossible ease and brings out a rifle as something is brought upwards and the Second surges inwards and

Something screams.

But there was no sound.

And there was no burst, either.

The Thing that has been introduced into the field of Rei's reality is gazed upon as the last moments of something strange and unique dissipates, the hopeful monster... ... what?

Gridman shouts.

Once again, Rei thinks with a filthily familiar feeling. The beam rifle --

-- is thrown away.

Rei's hand shifts something forwards and Eva-00 leans forwards, then dips -- and turns, coming up to rise slightly in front of Gridman, popping up from the Z-axis of infinite space with both empty hands held upwards in loose U's to catch at Gridman's wrist and put the bulk of Eva-00 in the way.

Eva-00 twitches for a moment, head jerking nearer to-- no, in front of Calibur's blade. It seems tense. Maybe feedback or something, the monoptical frontispiece of the featureless head bifuricated by the blade.

"Ikari," Rei then says, now with determination. "Nagisa; is he well?"

<Pose Tracker> Sonia Sophia-Grace has posed.

Misato gives Sonia an answer. Then -That Happens- to Duma, and Sonia and the rest of the crew currently active on the bridge all stare at the scene of what happens, and the inert (dormant?) Angel core that is still residing in space from where the mysterious Evangelion 'finished' the fight just ahead of Asuka. Nearly as one, and uncannily (perhaps) in tune with their captain, does Misato find herself being stared at by ten people ... and Sonia.

"... can you explain that, then, ma'am?" She asks, lifting her eyebrow slightly.

<Pose Tracker> Gai Kurenai has posed.

The lupine Evangelion does something... unusual, and Duma goes inert, its shimmering cloud body disintegrating and its core going dull.

Should that happen? Gai frowns in concern - and then he feels Gridman's fury and aggression spiking.

Thunder Breastar, drifting in the void and watching the strange phenomenon washing over Duma's core, suddenly snaps around and moves, shimmering energy around his body seeming to direct it straight towards Gridman. One great clawed hand comes up to intercept the swing of the Gridman Calibur; the other to be planted on Gridman's chest, open-palmed. If successful; the tableau is a strange one, the fierce and dangerous cast of Orb Thunder Breastar calm and composed against the noble-seeming Gridman's aggression.

The Giant of Light sees it, in his mind's eye - Gai's Inner Space, as he lowers the Orb Ring, Thunder Breastar's feral amber eyes locked to Gridman's own.

"Are you really willing to take a human life in rage, Gridman?"

<Pose Tracker> Alouette Pommier has posed.

It appears Alouette never even had to combine two powers into one - that all-so-mysterious new Evangelion model finished the job for them. No matter how much pain it causes Guy and Sigma... they might not have won without Galeon's roar. "Guy, Sigma! Are you all right?" She asks, concerned, and although unsaid, there's some concern for Galeon itself in there, too.

But something isn't right - something is horribly wrong, in fact. As the others surmise, that isn't how an Angel has ever died before.

And Colonel Katsuragi... Alouette hears her intuition. She was there when Kaworu was targeted, too, so perhaps she understands what she means. "Kaworu...?" Alouette asks, hesitation in her tone. "Do you really think they're the one who tried to kill you?"

Gridman, filled with rage and lust for revenge for his boyfriend and the Angel they just helped stop - chases after the Wolfpack Evangelion. "Gridman! Be careful... if they could even catch Kaworu off-guard, who knows what they'll do to you!" She warns, genuine concern for her friend surging through her.

"Colonel Katsuragi, what should we do? They're evading all our questions... surely we can't just let them go free." GaoGaiGar is obviously in no shape to engage, Guy says.. "Guardienne Aviaire's still in fighting shape. I'll go in your stead." Alouette offers, as she approaches the Wolfpack Evangelion, blade and shield still drawn.

<Pose Tracker> Takeshi Todo has posed.

In the wake of Galeon's roar, Sigma is--

Well. He's not in the WORST state he's been in the past few months. That dubious honor belongs to the absolute god-awful funk that Duma themself inflicted on him in the wake of their last engagement. But enduring the white lion's roar has exhausted him nevertheless. Sigma is hunched over, barely holding himself upright on the keyboard of his piano. "Captain Guy..." he grunts, forcing his head up, "I saw... Duma's copies disappear. Did we--"

No.

Something has happened. Something terrible and alien, even by comparison to the overall vibes of the situation until this point. He had felt it, Duma had... finally come to a realization of their own sins. In that instant, Duma decided to reveal their heart and-- to end it all, on the tip of Asuka's spear, but...

That's not what happened.

"The core...!" He calls to Alouette, "The core is still there, Alouette. Liam. Kaworu, Shinji! Someone... Please, retrieve it before-- whatever that thing is, does!" Gridman-- goes wild. Sigma winces as he reaches out, "Gridman... Please, remain calm. Protect the others, but don't overextend yourself. Don't let yourself be blinded by rage...!"

Gaogaigar can't move-- neither can he. This... Is as much as he can do right now.

<Pose Tracker> Lucine Azul has posed.

        In the next moment, Gridman's light washes over Lucine, waking her from her slumber, who grumbles like a sleepy child that just had the covers pulled off.

        < "..... Not without everyone else here..." > she finally says, in response to Gridman. < ".... I'm only here because you didn't give up on Duma, Gridman. I'd..." > She had given up, bitter in the way a human uniquely could be.

        _Even if they can be <<protected>>, they can never be <<forgiven>>._

        The azure ball of the Angel's soul is exposed. Lucine can't quite appreciate the significance of this, not quite knowing, or perhaps not remembering what this means.

        Just that this is some sort of End.

        < "... on an azure journey..." > Lucine sings that last line quietly, in complete contrast to the loud noise that came from the same cockpit.

        ---!

        The path of Asuka's weapon is intercepted by the mysterious new EVA. The pilot is too shocked to react further; she simply rises slightly from that semi-seated position, as if that would make what she sees just a little clearer through her display.

        < ".... I don't... understand... You're... the person who shot Kaworu, and now...?" >

        If she had a few more wits on her, Lucine would be active, but here, she's numb, the not-shriek still ringing in her brain.

<Pose Tracker> Mari Makinami Illustrious has posed.

The Dilanza's missiles chase after the strange Evangelion. Crimson, rune-like patterns are glowing in the interior of its rifles barrel, slowly fading away like the dissipation of hate by the time that offensive spread catches up to the beast. It turns its great, muzzled head.

The sound of warheads rippling heat across a blooming field of prismatic-pulsing octagons is muffled within the steady embrace of space.

Heat and fire is sucked away towards whisping nothing as that AT Field remains, rippling before the Evangelion now floating prone in space.

And yet...

It doesn't aggress. Instead? Instead, that rifle is holstered once more at its back. It bends with uncanny, disconcerting flexibility in space, armored plates practically rippling as if something was flexing and bulging beneath them as it settles onto all fours upon its shimmering AT Field once more.

It lowers onto its haunches before the core, like a predator readying for the pounce.

        What did you do!

"... Hoh?"

                What did you do to him!

Before the Evangelion can do -whatever- it is that it is planning to do, a visage of wrath in silver and red brandishing a great sword collides with the beast with great and vengeful speed. The titanic monstrosity SMASHES into Gridman as that blade swings --

        C R A C K

--and finds no AT Field resistance to stop it; only the abrupt tackle of the Evangelion to halt Gridman's momentum.

... like it was letting that blade's stroke through, opening itself to a sword's dangerous swing the same way someone might leave themselves open to a person's vengeful fist.

Within that entry plug, the pilot snaps back, grabbing their head with a strangle, distorting sound as bubbles bloom furiously around their helmeted face.

... Outside that entry plug, Calibur's blade lodges into the thick armor plating of the Evangelion's face, spider-line cracks fissuring through that muzzle-like armor.

What did they do?

Guy offers an answer to the chorus, that they sealed Duma -- and the Evangelion's pilot, tellingly, offers no rebuttal or denial. They lurch forward in their entry plug, bubbles subsiding as they heave out a slow, garbled exhale.

What did they do?

Instead, they provide a supplement to that answer.

<"What you couldn't have, Hyper Agent,"> comes the answer, simple, matter-of-fact, and so impossible to decipher the intent of past the heavy modulation of that voice as it says:

                        <"Sorry.">

The pilot leans forward.

The Evangelion tilts its abominable weight into that blade.

        Are you going to kill them?

The armored facial plating begins to tremble and strain visibly as the cracklines spread exponentially swifter.

        Are you really willing to take a human life in rage, Gridman?

<"Are you?">

And that armor suddenly SHATTERS around Caliburn, revealing the great, many-fanged maw of flesh and bone now clenching impossibly sharp teeth into that blade.

The Evangelion and its pilot don't wait for an answer. Instead, the head of the beast LASHES to the side, intent to try to -fling- Gridman away towards the approaching Guardienne Aviaire.

Sigma warns.

The Evangelion lunges.

And it seeks to catch that stilled, crystalline-coated core within its fanged maw with a shockingly delicate clench as it comes to a shuddering stop across the bloom of one of its AT Fields.

What did it do? The answer to that has already provided. But...

        Who are you!?

The Evangelion pauses, for a brief moment of stillness.

<"NERV's enemy.">

And the four cylinders at the Evangelion's back begin to spin, their dangerous whine silenced in space as they all glow with dangerous, orange light,

like the nuclear bloom of a star

The inexplicable and abrupt bloom of a blinding N2 reaction ripples from the conical structures of the Evangelion's back, compressed to impossible densities and then unleashed in a single, searing flash. Streams of light ripple past the Eva, obliterating debris and melting rocks into nothing but cooling droplets of slag...

... yet none of those blinding, searing streams target anyone here. They just come close enough.

Close enough to distract.

... in the aftermath, the Evangelion is gone, its signal growing rapidly more distant.

Duma's core in tow.

<Pose Tracker> Kaworu Nagisa has posed.

        So much happens all at once that it takes Shinji a moment to process it. It's just as well that he can't hear Asuka and Gridman talk about what they have in common during the Grid Kinesis; that'd only short-circuit his thoughts. That strange new Evangelion shoots Duma's core, and his heartrate, already rapid, spikes. He doesn't understand why until Misato's voice finally filters into his consciousness--
        
        Don't tell me--you're the one who shot Kaworu-kun--?!
        
        He knows right away it must be true. There's something about the vibe to that Evangelion, to the weapon it carries, to the bullet it fires, that shocks him back to that day when he saw Kaworu collapse in a pool of his own blood. He claps a hand to his mouth to lock away the bile that rises in his throat.
        
        For Kaworu, it's even worse, if in a different way.
        
        As Duma "screams," he cries out too, clutching the side of his head where a bullet had cracked his skull. He doubles over on himself, back and shoulders trembling. Shinji twists in his seat, and when he sees Kaworu--gracious, unflappable, beautiful Kaworu--any confusion over what is happening to Duma, any thought about piloting (let alone fighting), flees his mind.
        
        "KAWORU-KUN!" He pushes himself up and twists around to take his co-pilot into his arms. "Kaworu-kun, hang in there!!" He shoots a look up, but Gridman is there all of a sudden, blocking the space between Unit-01 and the unknown Evangelion. He blasts off to engage it. "Gridman, wait!"
        
        But he of course doesn't wait, and Shinji is left both frightened and angry. Rei at least goes off to stop Gridman from following though with that head-stab (he averts his eyes here) with an actual kill, joining with Ultraman Orb--though frankly, Shinji understands how Gridman feels, and that frightens and angers him more than almost anything else.
        
        "<Ayanami! No, he's in pain!>" Shinji calls--but the gentle touch of a hand on his shoulder makes him look down to see Kaworu partially uncurl, his other hand still clutching a should-be healed wound.
        
        "<It's all right, Shinji-kun,>" he murmurs, voice strained. He looks up with haggard eyes as Alouette and Asuka both ask for a conversation. "<...Yes. There is no mistake. That is the one who tried to kill me.>"
        
        Shinji sucks in a breath of LCL as his fingers curl along Kaworu's shoulders and back. A powerful hatred ignites in his eyes as he leans in protectively close to his dear friend and glares at the Wolfpack, head ruined (so many teeth, so much tongue) and yet still moving. Who is that pilot...?!
        
        "Sealed it...?!" Misato echoes, dumbfounded by Guy's realization. But then realization and understanding flicker in her brown eyes. After all--she'd been part of the ground mission to take out the true and final iteration of Sandalphon. She knows what they'd carried there, and what it was for. But back then, it had killed the Angel. Why would it be sealed now? And more importantly, why is that experimental device in the hands of Kaworu's would-be assassin?
        
        Sonia asks if she can explain what's going on. Misato frowns at her--but she'd been there for that mission too. She meets her eyes for a moment as her bad feeling turns even worse. "I sure as hell can't," she says, clipped. Sigma has the right idea, though--and the unknown pilot makes their motivations clear. "NERV's enemy..." Misato mutters. Alouette barely needs to ask what to do; she shouts, "Get that core! Don't let the unknown escape with it!"
        
        But besides Alouette, there are few present who're in a state to actually carry out that order--and when those explosions go off, Misato too is caught in their blinding light, recoiling to protect her eyes with one arm. It's enough time for the Wolfpack to grab the sealed core and jet. Once Alouette presumably takes chase, Misato straightens and folds her arms. "...For the rest of you, let's consider this mission complete for now," she says grimly. "Sonia, let's get everyone back."
        
        They'll all need a lot of time to reflect and recuperate back at Orbit Base.

<Pose Tracker> Liam 7-020 has posed.

        Liam's lips twist in a snarl as that A.T. field manifests, stopping his assault cold. "Answer them!" he shouts, even though he feels like a mouse screaming at a giant. Gridman strikes true, and the pilot addresses him, even as their Eva's armor starts to crack.

        "What are they--?!" Liam's voice trails off in a scream of shock and horror. The teeth. The eyes. There's something alive beneath that armor, and the sight of it turns his guts to water.

        The Dilanza jets back as the flash erupts, both shields slamming down in an attempt to ward off the radiant blasts--

        An effort that turns out to be unnecessary. Liam sits in the cockpit, breathing heavily, eyes wide as saucers. Misato drags him out of it. "Understood, Commander." The Dilanza jets back towards the Paradiso's hangar bay. Mission complete.

<Pose Tracker> Gridman has posed.

Voices call after the Giant of Light as he charges forward, Calibur glimmering with violent intent. None of them manage to slow Gridman's attack, and despite everything:

Calibur slashes into the Eva.

Even Gridman himself seems shocked, for the one second he has before his friends come to stop him. Why didn't that Eva protect itself? Where did its AT Field go? It's fast enough to be able to dodge such an obvious strike, how, why--

Kaworu's scream of pain cuts through Gridman's thoughts. None of those questions matter anymore. "Kaworu!" He shouts, wrenching Calibur free of the monster. Gridman winds up for another swing, using his sword more as a club than a true blade--

Shozo's voice carries to the vacuum, reaching Gridman's heart. The Giant of Light's voice is strained as he replies. "I'm not going to kill anyone! I'm going to smash this thing to pieces and pull the pilot out to face justice!"

But they're in the vacuum of space. With the haphazard way Gridman is attacking, there's no way he's going to extract the beast's pilot safely. This nagging truth is pushed aside, Calibur starting to swing forward--

Only to be stopped. Two beings reach out for Gridman, preventing him from making a terrible mistake. First is Ultraman Orb -- Gai, in that feral form. Gridman strains against his hold, bringing one hand down to try and pull away Gai's hand.

"Let me go! You saw what they did!" Gridman struggles, but doesn't lash out at Gai. He could never. "They nearly killed Kaworu, they made him suffer so much! It's only right that I destroy them!"

Protective, loving fervor echoes from the Giant of Light. It's an overwhelming sensation, combined with the agony he just experienced from Duma -- the combination enough to fully sweep him away.

"Nnh--! Let me go, Gai!"

Even if Gridman is able to force the other Giant away, Calibur still doesn't move. Unit -00 grabs his wrist. It puts itself in between Gridman and the monstrous Eva. Rei -- Rei does this, and it's enough to make the Giant of Light freeze. In this moment, the voices of his friends finally reach him, begging him not to lose himself, and he shakes his head.

"We... we can't just let it go." He says, after a long moment's silence. "We can't..."

Gridman's shoulders slump. Was he really going to kill that pilot..? There's a human being inside that machine, and he swore never to fight a human, not to mention kill them.

Raising his gaze up to the beast's head, Gridman startles, a strangled sound escaping his throat.

Teeth. Skin.

"W--wh--!" Gridman strains in his friends' hold again, this time overcome by horror. He has to get between them and that... creature. It's dangerous. It shouldn't exist. Something about it, Gridman feels, something about it is extremely wrong.

"Get behi--!" Is all he manages.

That horrible maw grips down onto Calibur and sends Gridman flying, breaking some of the grasps his friends have on him. He can't stop himself, there's nothing to use to break his momentum--

For one insane moment, Gridman is reminded of the enormous roller coaster he rode just a few days ago--

Calibur, with visible teeth marks marring his body, speaks up. "Vit! Take us up!"

Thrusters burn, engines run hot, and Sky Vitter exhausts the remainder of his strength pulling Gridman up just before he crashes. It's a close thing, but it could've been much worse.

"Sorry, that's all I've got..." Vit croaks out, as his weaponized form vanishes from around Gridman.

Now fully unable to control his momentum, Gridman floats, dazed. The terrifying Evangelion is gone, Duma's core along with it. Was all of this fight... Was it a trap for Duma? Did they all weaken the Angel enough for some monster to capture it?

"No.." Gridman clenches his hands into fists. "Everything we did -- it was all for nothing, again."

It won't be long before the Giant of Light vanishes much like his comrade did, leaving nothing behind but fading blue light.

<Pose Tracker> Rei Ayanami has posed.

Rei hears other sounds coming in. Her teeth clench a little. A quick glance to the active time clock - less than two minutes -

The other machines are not in position to do much about this. Badly battered, their energy expended. Rei has all the energy she wants for one minute and forty-six seconds, counting down.

Other people are speaking. They speak to Gridman. Will you take a human life? Are you going to kill them? Are you?

Annoying, Rei thinks.

And Go away.

She softens at Shinji's report, but it is not because she feels better; simply a different negative emotion. Worry. It is eased, somewhat, Kaworu speaks too. "-- Understood," Rei says, because this means that the 'Evangelion' behind them is an enemy.

Eva-00's head turns JUST in time to see that horrid revelation as Calibur is used involuntarily to sever bindings and reveal that HORRID FACE. Eva-00's singular optic disk glimmers faintly. Something beneath it -

Something at the back of the intruding machine begin to spin. A premonition makes Rei lean Eva-00 forwards slightly and take a deep breath, deep enough to feel fluid running over her teeth as the AT Field invisibly expands around Eva-00.

Which means that the N2-weapon burst happening right next to them and giving the enemy(??) Evangelion one hell of a smashing burst of thrust -- tragic, in its way, that LCL is almost the perfect place to be in the face of ultra-high-thrust maneuvers -- reaches the invisible plane and, even as Gridman and his allies topple, they are shielded. An immense glimmering octagon in the dusty aftermath of Duma's passage, not perhaps from this world, but into something else --

Sky Vitter controls their speed, Eva-00 turning its head to look towards the approaching Guardian, but she exhales afterwards, and her grasp weakens on Gridman's arms. Down to his wrists.

Gridman clenches his hands into fists.

"That's wrong," Rei answers him. Eva-00's fingers curl further down. Not pulling, but resting against the space between fingers and palms in a clenched fist. A mote of pressure; the slightest encouragement.

"The unknown didn't hurt you. Now it's not unknown," she concludes, her head bowing slightly.