sumghai
Daga Kotowaru!
- Location
- New Zealand
While not quite 100% following this exact premise, GobHobblin's Someplace Vast and Dry provides an alternative (and unfortunately discontinued) retelling of NGE where Second Impact was indeed an accident.
- The 2015 UN Katsuragi Expedition was investigating an unusual atmospheric phenomena at the South Pole, rather than discovering and poking at an alien progenitor
- Shinji Katsuragi's advance team was caught at the epicenter of "The Event" and exposed to fatal levels of radiation, but managed to warn Gendo, Yui, Kyoko and Naoko to evacuate the rest of the Expedition before they were vaporized by a high energy flux
- A US naval task force evacuating the expedition's survivors was almost overrun by eldritch abominations emerging from the flux, before the portal was finally sealed with a nuclear weapon
- Second Impact, aka "Arrival Day", occured when more eldritch abominations ("The Others") emerged from multiple fluxes worldwide, devastating population centers
- Gendo and Yui adopted Misato, as per Dr. Katsuragi's dying request
- In 2017, the US Army asked Yui to help examine an alien white giant dubbed "Lilith", which had appeared in a field; Lilith mentally communed with Yui, warning her of superior Others called "The Messengers" and bequeathing her own flesh to humanity, before dying due to complications
- The NERV pact was formed by various major superpowers to develop a defense against the Others; Gendo was selected as director of NERV-Japan due to his own merits as an accomplished physicist and A.T. Field expert, as well as his leadership during the evacuation of the Katsuragi Expedition
- NERV was actually part of a two-branch organization, with NERV focusing on applied R&D, intelligence and tactical operations, while the supervisory GEHIRN tended towards theoretical R&D, policy and finance
- GEHIRN chairman Lorenz Kihl was a renowned physicist who had made a name for himself in advanced weapons R&D for NATO; Gendo and Yui disliked Kihl due to what they (correctly) perceived as some sort of ulterior ambition, as well as a subsequent feud over Lilith's remains
- Yui and Kyoko created Rei and nine other human-lilithian hybrids, as human-sized prototypes of the actual biological weapons systems needed to fight the Others; Yui used frozen samples of her own ovum out of convenience, and grew the hybrids in LCL-filled artificial wombs
- Gendo and Yui's natural-born son Shinji was named after their laate friend Dr. Katsuragi
- Rei grew up alongside her older brother, and was incredibly resilient as a child, recovering from cuts and scrapes almost instantaneously; on the other hand, her nine other sisters would experience neurological decay and cardiac arrest unless constantly immersed in LCL
- Misato was fairly close to Rei and Shinji as well, never feeling threatened or replaced
- Gendo cultivated Shinji's love of music via his old SDAT player and watching symphony orchestras on TV together to distract themselves from the doom and gloom of the news
- Kyoko's husband Martin Langley was a former staff sergeant in the Bundeswehr, and exceptionally devoted to his wife and daughter Asuka; Martin had grown up in an abusive household, and was actually illiterate for most of his adult life until he met Kyoko
- Martin joined NERV's Security Department
- Naoko raised Ritsuko as a doting single mother after her (unnamed) husband died many years ago
- Naoko encouraged Ritsuko to seek her own path in life, although Ritsuko defaulted to studying Computer Science and Metabiology just like her mother
- Ritsuko and Misato were close friends since their teenage years
- Misato wanted to enlist in the military to fight the Others and avenge her biological father; Gendo persuaded her to join the JSSDF equivalent of ROTC, as well as emphasizing the importance of a good university education
- Yui's former doctoral supervisor Kozo Fuyutsuki became good friends with Gendo, and the two would often bounce ideas off each other
- Rei, Shinji and Asuka grew up as childhood friends, with Shinji and Asuka fighting over Shinji's stuffed penguin Pen-Pen, which the adults suspected was actually Asuka having a crush on Shinji
- NERV staff also did their best to raise Rei's nine other sisters despite their handicap, dubbing them the "mermaids"; Gendo, Yui and Kyoko would take turns spending time in the tanks teaching them proper human interaction
- The mermaids were also quite find of Fuyutsuki
- The Evangelion units were developed based on research into Rei and her sisters; 00 was grown from a sample of Rei's cells, boosted more towards Lilith; 01 and 02 were similarly Lilithian-boosted versions of Yui and Kyoko
- After a terrorist attack involving a stolen N2 device wipes out the city of Aomori, the Japanese government devises the controversial "Three Tokyos" plan to ensure continuity of government; Hakone becomes Tokyo-3
- GEHIRN and NERV begins to fracture after Kihl demanded custody of Rei and her sisters
- Yui survived her Contact Experiment with Unit 01, leaving behind a copy of her "soul"
- Kyoko's own experiment with Unit 02 was sabotaged by mercenaries hired by Kihl as a prelude to a raid on NERV, rendering her senile
- Kihl's mercenaries failed to kidnap Rei or any of the mermaids, but made off with some leftover cell samples
- Kyoko eventually died of an apparent stroke, due to complications from a head injury after a mercenary struck her in the head to stop her nonsensical babbling
- Minutes after Kyoko's death, Unit 02 finally achieved resonance
- A heartbroken Martin resigned from NERV and moved to Switzerland with Asuka
- Shinji gave Asuka his cherished Pen-Pen doll as a parting gift
- Yui discovered Kyoko's intact and sane soul now lived on inside Unit 02; Gendo quietly put Kyoko's body on ice in the hopes they could reverse the process someday
- Naoko tricked 00 into resonance without a Contact Experiment, using modified cell samples from Rei
- The Evangelions slowly became semi-sentient, and started requesting Rei and Shinji to pilot them; Kyoko fought to keep her own urge for her daughter in check
- Horrified, Gendo and Yui sent Shinji away for his own safety; Gendo took the time to explain to and reassure his son
- Shinji was sent to live in Detroit with a trusted Section Two bodyguard, an Afrikaans man named Hunter Vaas
- Gendo and Yui remained in touch with Shinji, visiting him in person when possible
- Consequently, Shinji grows up to have a fairly normal self-esteem despite his living arrangements
- After Misato was wounded fighting insurgents in Indonesia, Gendo convinced her to transfer to a joint JSSDF-NERV post back at the newly-constructed Geofront
- Meanwhile, after the GEHIRN-NERV split, Kihl and his new SEELE agency secretly created Kaworu Nagisa using the stolen Lilith cells (and possibly Kihl's own DNA); presumably, SEELE is building its own Evangelions to fight the Others in Europe, while secretly pursuing a bioweapons arms race with NERV
- With each incursion by the Others, the aliens became more biologically complex; NERV and SEELE would race to acquire their remains by negotiating with local governments
- SEELE makes a clumsy attempt on Shinji's life, with the real aim to unsettle Gendo enough to have NERV miss out on acquiring the Other that attacked New York
- Gendo, Yui and Fuyutsuki continue to grow their network of political, scientific and corporate allies to counter SEELE's influence
- Gendo convinces Martin to move back to Tokyo-3 with Asuka, based on Yui and Naoko's theory that having the children in proximity instead of actually piloting may be enough to activate them
- Rei and Asuka rekindle their childhood friendship, studying together while Rei teases Asuka about her lingering crush on Shinji
- Gendo, Yui and Naoko continue to seek Kyoko's expertise, keeping her current disposition a secret
- NERV continues to have trouble finding suitable adult pilot candidates
- When an Other attacks Tokyo-3 for the first time, Rei and Asuka convince Naoko to let Rei try to pilot Unit 00
- Rei defeats the Other, suffering excruciating pain despite no visible injuries and Unit 00's best efforts to protect her
- Yui has a brief falling out with Naoko over her allowing Rei to pilot
- Martin, still unaware of Kyoko's current disposition, cautiously grants Gendo permission to utilize Asuka as a pilot
- At the mermaids' analysis and suggestion, Martin begins training Rei and Asuka in CQB
- Kyoko tries to set Martin up with Naoko, as the former accepts she is legally deceased, but Naoko refuses out of respect for her friend
- Gendo and Yui wonder if and when to bring Shinji home
- (story discontinued from here onwards)
Last I checked, just that would be a weight off, at least in some parts of canon.
