NGE: DEUS EX MACHINA

CHAPTER 1

The sun beat down on the city of Tokyo-3 like pestles pounding grain in a mortar, warming the tarmac roads and baking the cement to an extent an egg could have easily been fried on it without the use of a pan. Even the metal surfaces were searing hot, enough to brand third-degree burns into the skin if one happened to accidentally touch any of those without wearing gloves or shoes. The citizens weren't spared of the heat either, and as such, the afternoon was bustling with adults, teenagers and kids rushing back home to rest under the cool air of an AC and perhaps grab a cold drink to soothe their parched throats. A few couples walking down the street opened up umbrellas of varying designs and colours to shield themselves from the blazing hot sun, while a group of teenaged schoolkids grabbed a round of iced water bottles from a nearby vending machine that specifically dispensed chilled drinks.

Raiha Shinikami leaned over the balcony of her apartment, watching the going-ons down below from her twenty-six-storey high perch while brushing her long flaming-red mane. Clad in a pale blue tank top and tiny white shorts, even the oldest man would have mistook Raiha for an adult lady when she was really a teenager. She looked older than her actual age, likely because of her slightly sharp features that made her look older or maybe because of her personality. A lot of people did say she was rather adult-ish for her age, but that was a matter of opinion.

Laying on a plaited black and red rug just beside her feet was Sayuri, a teenaged Evangelion who was also her best friend. Covered from head to toe in dark blue fur, she sported a long red mane just like Raiha's, except it had white bangs and dark blue tips, and was generally worn loose, along with a red splash at the end of her tail, red wing feathers that faded to white at the tips, white 'V' markings on her forearms and shins and a white spot at the tip of her long dark blue tail. Her eyes were dark blue as well, with red sclerae that showed off the darker colour in a contrasting effect.

As Raiha watched, Sayuri rolled onto her back and let out a huge yawn, opening her mouth wide to show off her impressive pearly white teeth and shiny red tongue that seemed to want to lash out and kiss her best human friend on the cheek, and then stretching out in tandem with Jiko, Raiha's spoilt white Javanese cat whom the girl had rescued from the streets as a kitten five years ago.

"Plans"? the dark blue Evangelion asked the girl, absent-mindedly flicking her tail from side to side.

"Try not to run into Misato", Raiha answered blandly, bending down to scratch Sayuri's belly. "Or at the very least, don't let her try to take care of us because we can definitely manage ourselves".

Raiha and Sayuri were an Evangelion pilot and battle Evangelion each working with NERV, the organisation that had been set up to save the world from the creatures known as Angels, monstrous giants named after the angels in the Old Testament and New Testament or after various other mythological individuals, if those were suitable. The Angels had started coming after a disaster humanity knew as the Second Impact, when a research team in Antarctica had unearthed something that had caused the Second Impact and as such it had claimed the lives of a fair percentage of humanity, and in the process, awakening the Angels that were now resurfacing to attack every now and then whenever everyone least expected them.

To combat the threat, humanity had decided to make use of an asset they had before the Second Impact occurred in the first place: The Evangelions, giant skyscraper-tall cyborgs who were capable of flight and many kinds of multikinesis (multiple kinetic abilities) that allowed them to give the Angels hell enough to back off. They had been driven off their own planet years ago by a threat so brutal the mere mention of it could just drain the colour out of their fur and make them look like faded clothes until they calmed down. They blatantly refused to speak of it, only referring to the threat as 'brutal savages with totally no regard for the value of life' that had halved their numbers to an extent they would've been made extinct if they hadn't fled their home planet and as such had been allowed to integrate within human society till their planet was safe enough to go home to. Humanity had discovered that they could sync with an Evangelion via brainwaves, thus allowing both man and machine to do and feel things together. Many who had lost family and friends to the Second Impact had signed up as Evangelion pilots in the hopes of avenging their deceased loved ones, or at the very least, seeing the fight for the greater good to the end instead of just dying as a civilian.