Fanfic / Leviathan (Thuktun Flishithy)

Of course, many feel that this topic is no longer relevant after the Second Impact. There has not been a single kaiju sighting in over five years, and it is the popular opinion that the lot of them were wiped out in the same cataclysm that halved our population and set us back a great many years. Alas, some even feel that the end of the Age of Monsters is one we should rejoice, now that we are free from monsters like Godzilla.
It is the memory of those unyielding eyes that press me to ask this question:
If we managed to survive the Second Impact, why couldn't he?

— Dr. Kyohei Yamane, Monsters and Man: A History of Kaiju in the 20th Century (2004)

A rewrite of the crossover fic Hail to the King by Thuktun Flishithy, this time as a Fusion Fic.

The Age of Monsters ended with Second Impact. The titans of old, which dominated the last half of the 20th century, have long vanished since the cataclysm which wrecked the world. Even mighty Godzilla, King of the Monsters, himself perished.

At least, that is what everyone says.

Enter Shinji Ikari, a fourteen-year-old boy who is fraught with self-doubt, summoned by his estranged and enigmatic father to pilot one of the Evangelions... only to stumble upon a mysterious device that grants him immense power. At the same time, during an attack from an Angel, Shinji is rescued by the King of the Monsters himself as his reappearance heralds the return of his kind to a shattered world that has given up hope and is desperate to prevent an even more imminent, apocalyptic end.

Links to the story are SpaceBattles.com, Fanfiction.net, and Sufficient Velocity.

Shin Leviathan is a remake of this story.

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Tropes:

• Action Film, Quiet Drama Scene: In contrast to the original fic, the story has long stretches of Character Development, along with exposition that result in small, poignant moments between the characters, especially the conversations that Shinji and Ultraman have, punctuated by blistering action and brutal kaiju battles.

• Adaptational Badass:
  • Shinji due to bonding with Ultraman, thus being able to take on the Angels.
  • Gaghiel gets a nasty one. In canon he was a largely forgettable fish-like Angel. Here, he's over a kilometer long and requires the combined efforts of two Evas, Godzilla, Ultraman, King Sisha, and Anguiras (though admittedly the inclusion of Ebirah and Titanosaurus make the fight tougher anyway).
  • Anguirus qualifies, too. Instead of being Toho's punching bag, here he's considered one of the four most powerful kaiju on the planet, often considered the Badass Normal of the group.
  • Human weapons are given one. Instead of Palate Rifles, which did absolutely nothing in canon, both JSDF and Eva units now sport Maser weapons. In fact, the JSDF even manage to pierce the Third Angel's AT Field and score a minor wound on it with Maser tanks.
• Adaptational Wimp: NERV. By the time the Sixth Angel has rolled around, they've managed to kill exactly one angel, out of the four that have shown up. The rest got taken out by Ultraman or Godzilla.
• Alien Invasion: Not actually shown in the story, but Earth was invaded three times in the past, fleshing out the fused background.
• All There in the Manual: As with the original fic, the Space Battles link has information, backstory, and a partial timeline on the universe.
• An Arm and a Leg: Godzilla, still freshly enraged over the post-Second Impact world, takes his frustrations out on Sachiel, resulting in the angel loosing an arm from an atomic breath incinerating the connecting shoulder into slag, then tore the other one off when Sachiel tried to escape when a leg got pinned.
• Arbitrary Skepticism: SEELE doesn't think that Ultraman exists, since they haven't seen him in the Scrolls, even though the world is just weird. Multiple alien invasions existed and were repelled by a giant, sentient nuclear lizard.
  • One of the chapter-starting epigraphs openly says that Kaiju make absolutely no sense and violate physics pretty badly, so basically it's best to throw out skepticism because the impossible is frequently done.
  • At one point, Fuyutskui thinks that the at-the-time-unnamed Ultraman looks like a human in silver armor had grown up to that size, and then thinks that given the world they live in, that's actually a possibility.
  • Deconstructed slightly. When Kensuke claims that he suspects that hikers and others disappearing in the mountains and he believes that it's Kaiju, Toji angrily refutes this since Kensuke believes that anything weird is Kaiju or conspiracy related. When Kensuke replies back that he literally fought an Angel several days ago with the help of Godzilla, Toji fires back that Tigers also exist and kill people, but he doesn't go around claiming that every murder is the result of Tigers. Hayata disagrees with Toji (and Kensuke and Hayata are proven correct), but does admit that Toji's logic is sound.
  • Asuka has a similar moment with Rei, pointing out that just because Titans violate all known laws of science doesn't mean that suddenly every weird thing under the sun is suddenly viable.
• Back-to-Back Badasses- a rare five-way version of this trope in the battle of Skull Island. Against an army of Rhedosaurs and Gaos, five titans go back-to-back-to-back-to-back-to-back- Godzilla, Eva-02, King Kong, Ultraman, and Gamera.
• Big Damn Heroes: Multiple times, and often quite literally, considering the sizes of the characters.
  • In the very first chapter, Godzilla catches a VTOL before it can crush Shinji and Misato.
  • Later on, Shinji as Ultraman bails Asuka out during the Shamshel fight.
  • Godzilla does it again during the Gaghiel fight, when he knocks the Angel away from Asuka and Toji.
  • During the Jet Alone fight, Jet Jaguar sneaks in and reprograms it to go straight into the ocean, saving the day.
• Blunt "Yes": Ultraman (using a modified version of Shinji's body at Shinji's request when using it exactly unnerved him) gives Shinji one of these when asked if he's an alien in Shinji's Mental World.
• Crippling Overspecialization: Not in the story proper, but Mecha-Godzilla in the backstory suffered this.
  • To be more specific Mecha-Godzilla was crippled by severe oversight by the Simians. It had no self-righting mechanism in the event it fell over, no melee combat capabilities, and very poor movement on the ground. These problems were caused by the Simians being under the impression that with Mecha-Godzilla's immense ranged firepower, the enemy would be destroyed long before it got close enough to exploit them.
• Critical Annoyance: Shinji as Ultraman possesses a Color Timer, however, it only activates if he is using more energy than he can produce.
• Crossover Relatives:
  • Gunpei Ikari, the Japanese WWII pilot from Kong: Skull Island, is Shinji's great-grandfather. He later receives his shin-guntō.
  • Goro Ibuki, the man who invented Jet Jaguar, is Maya's great uncle except not really.
• Curb-Stomp Battle: Poor Sachiel doesn't last long against Godzilla, and gets torn apart.
  • And Shamshel gets its butt whooped by Ultraman.
  • The Japanese SDF have a long, long history of getting these handed to them by various Kaiju. When Godzilla shows up, their standing orders are to get out of his way and don't piss him off.
• Curb Stomp Cushion: Thanks to Masers, the JSDF actually manage to wound the Third Angel, which is more than they did in the entirety of canon Eva against all the angels.
• Darker and Edgier: Than most of the Godzilla movies, save for the 1954 and 2016 versions. Not unexpected, considering that it's a fused setting with Eva. On the other hand...
• Deadline News: One of the chapter prefaces is a transcript of the last words of Steve Martin as he signs off his broadcast as a tsunami caused by Second Impact comes bearing on his position.
• Denser and Wackier: Though still rather serious thanks to Evangelion the largest contributor to the fic, there are still many outright gonzo elements brought in from the Godzilla side of things. Lost islands inhabited by dinosaurs, people with psychic powers, androids, alien invasions... and that isn't getting into the contributions made by Ultraman or Gamera...
• The Dreaded: King Ghidorah. Just the mere mention of the name during Misato and Ritsuko's conversation causes passerby to pause and mutter prayers. A later epigraph revealed that the last attack killed forty-five million people.
  • Godzilla. As the epigraph of the first chapter states, "To fight him is to embrace death itself," and "A monster among monsters, the thing that even boogeymen fear." The JSDF who spot him coming onshore have a massive Oh, Crap! moment and start freaking out that "Kaiju Alpha" is alive.
  • Shinji seems to be this for SEELE now.
• Eldritch Abomination: Gaghiel, who was simply a large aquatic Angel in canon, is turned into a kilometer-long monstrosity with hundreds of Combat Tentacles and countless teeth. It's even outright called "Cthulhu Jr." by Toji.
• Enemy Mine: Averted. It was repeatedly shown in canon that Gendo and SEELE mistrusted each other, so when Ultraman shows up with no warning from the Dead Sea Scrolls, the two groups start butting heads, with SEELE members openly accusing Gendo of making Ultraman up.
• Energy Weapon: Masers are one of the imported elements from the Godzilla side of the fusion. Maser tanks are being rolled into service by the time of the Third Angel's attack, and manage to actually make a small wound before promptly being destroyed- a notable upgrade from the JSDF from canon Eva, who couldn't even scratch the thing.
  • The Evangelions have maser rifles instead the lame pallet rifles from canon.
• Epigraph: Each chapter starts with one. Some are from real sources, such as Os Lusiadas, or they are taken from fictional examples in order to help worldbuild.
• Expy: An in-universe example with the Jet Alone, whose name is an "homage" to Jet Jaguar, which irritates Maya.
• Eye Scream: A berserk Unit-01 gouges out Godzilla's eyes with its thumbs during the latter's attack on Tokyo-3. Unfortunately, all it does is provoke a No-Holds-Barred Beatdown once his eyes regenerate.
  • Shinji uses a Specium Ray to shoot out one of Godzilla's eyes.
• Fan Nickname: Ultrashinji for Shinji/Ultraman.
  • In-Universe: Shinji calls Ultraman, Hayata for convenience.
  • Also In-Universe: The name Ultraman was Kensuke's idea.
• Flat-Earth Atheist: Ritsuko is insanely smart and clever, but she still considers Kaiju to be nothing more than really strong animals. This is despite all the evidence to the contrary, the examinations of psychics, and even things like the Shobijin who commune directly with Mothra, a goddess.
  • Magic isn't much respected in this world, despite multiple accounts of it existing, not to mention Psychics and Kaiju.
• For Want Of A Nail:
  • Shinji can't pilot because Ultraman's mind, alongside Shinji's, confuses the Sync settings. Because of this:
    • Asuka has to get rushed over to Japan much earlier than in canon, and is the one to fight against the fourth angel.
    • Toji's sister isn't put into the hospital, because Shinji's attempts at destroying the angel were never preformed- Godzilla killed the Third Angel much quicker. As a result, Toji is much friendlier.
    • While Kensuke pieces together that Shinji is a pilot, Shinji reveals that he washed out. While it doesn't affect the friendship, it does prevent a minor riot in the class.
  • Because Asuka needs to be shipped over urgently, she is forced to pilot Unit 01, as opposed to Unit 02.
• Fusion Fic: This is what differentiates the fic from the original, in that the author fuses elements from both Godzilla and Eva AND Ultraman into a shared universe.
  • And Gamera, now!
  • The Ymir and Rhedosaurs are living on Skull Island, with the Rhedosaurs taking the place of the Skullcrawlers.
• Grievous Harm with a Body: Godzilla uses Anguirus as a giant mace at one point against a foe.
• Half-Human Hybrid:
  • Rei is, per canon, a half-human half-angel hybrid, but it's hinted that she might also have some Godzilla DNA in her makeup.
  • Toji's father is half-Simeon, meaning that he's quarter-Simeon. The most this really expresses itself is that he has more developed hair all over his body and a sensitivity towards monkey jokes.
  • Misato's mother was a Xilien refugee, making her half-Xilien.
• Hero Complex: Shinji has developed one through Ultraman in later chapters doing things like pursuing King Kong through Skull Island alone and continuing to fight an angry Godzilla despite sustaining severe injuries.
• He's Back!: Misato's reaction when she realizes just who saved her and Shinji from being paint on the VTOL. The SDF get one when they detect a very fast, absurdly large sonar contact pursuing the Third Angel, followed by sets of spines sticking out of the water, and Asuka gets one when she hears the King of the Monsters' roar as he rounds the mountain to fight the Fourth Angel.
• Human Aliens: The Xiliens, Mysterians, and Simeons, due to actually being transplanted humans. Even the Simeons, regarded as the most different, still share more than 99% of our DNA. That said, there are differences- apparently only humans can Sync with an Evangelion, as the most a Simeon can do is 3% sync rate, not enough to get an Eva to even twitch.
• It Can Think: The kaiju in general, especially Godzilla and Mothra. During the fight with Israfel, Godzilla is able to swiftly determine that the cores need to be destroyed simultaneously, and adjust his tactics accordingly.
  • The ones that really take the cake are King Shisa and Gamera. The former Was Once a Man, hence his intelligence, while the other was bioengineered/magically created, and is capable of understanding human speech due to linking with Rei.
  • That being said, it should be noted that there are Kaiju who are basically animals in terms of intellect- Rhedosaurs and Gaos, for example, display limited intelligence despite their power and strength.
  • Surprisingly, there are those who lump all Kaiju into the "Basically Animals" group, despite evidence provided by multiple sources that they are very much not.
• Jawbreaker: Given to Titanosaurus, courtesy of Godzilla.
  • Also given to Sandalphon by none other than King Kong, who is arguably the Trope Codifier.
• Killer Gorilla: King Kong makes an appearance in the fic, and clearly demonstrates why he's one of the few kaiju to survive a fight with Godzilla.
• Kill It with Fire: NERV's default method of dealing with Destroyah.
• Kill It with Ice: Ultraman's default method of dealing with Destroyah.
• Lost World: Many new Pacific Islands, including Monster Island.
• Massive Multiplayer Crossover: The setting of Leviathan is rather large, with the Toho-verse and Evangelion being the two largest ones, and the ones most important to the plot. In addition, there is also "donations" from King Kong, Ultra Series, Gamera, The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms, and 20 Million Miles to Earth.
• The Mole: Maya Ibuki is one for the counterconspiracy against NERV.
• More Expendable Than You: While Gendo claims that even Shinji is expendable, he's trying to show how much he is in control of every facet of the situation. In reality, the fact that Rei is out of commission and Shinji is unable to properly sync with Eva-01 means that Asuka has to get flown in way ahead of schedule to take up the role of defender of Tokyo-3. In fact, had she been any slower, she would have missed the Fourth Angel entirely, showing the flaws in their pilot recruitment process. In fact, the manpower shortage is so bad that Toji gets pulled up early and has to take Shinji's place as pilot of Eva-01
• My Greatest Failure: Ultraman has lost multiple battles with King Ghidorah. Planets paid the price.
• Mythology Gag: Tons.
  • Apparently, soma is a useful painkiller and all-around panacea reserved for Eva pilots.
  • The three JSSDF generals are named Tsubaraya, Tanaka, and Honda; it is an homage to the three men that practically made Godzilla and Ultraman by themselves.
  • When Shinji learns that Ultraman has no name, he decides to call him Hayata. Hayata is Ultraman's host.
  • Various characters from various Godzilla continuities get name-dropped. Miyuki Ontonashi, Kyohei Yamane, Dr. Serizawa, Steve Martin...
  • The Bikini Atoll nuclear tests were just a cover story for the U.S. military's (unsuccessful) attempts to nuke Godzilla to kingdom come.
  • Chapter 15 makes references to the various expeditions to Skull Island. Including the Challenger Expedition, the Denham Expedition, and the Weaver Expedition.
  • One of the chapters is titled "Folly of Man," one of the lyrics to Blue Oyster Cult's song Godzilla.
  • The Jet Alone project is a multi-layered one. In the fic, Maya is furious that the Jet Alone is supposed to "honor" the original Jet Jaguar because she's the descendant of the creator. However, out of universe, Jet Alone's name and several design features were meant as a homage to Jet Jaguar by the series creators. Even the name references that, as Jet Jaguar's original name was "Red Alone."
• Never Found the Body: The quote for this page, taken from the Epigraph of the first chapter, basically points out that despite him not appearing for a long period of time, there's no evidence that Godzilla actually died in Second Impact.
• No-Sell: Godzilla proves to be the master of this trope, just in his movies. Only Sachiel's spurs were able to make the King bleed; everything else just annoys him, whether it be getting hit with Ramiel's beam, or having a destroyer dropped on him.
• Nuke 'em:
  • The US tried to kill Godzilla in the 1950's with nuclear "tests". Needless to say, they failed.
  • Also tried by the Mysterians in the backstory, only for Rodan to swat them away from human cities.
  • In the story proper, both Shamshel and Israfel are hit with N2 mines, which manage to force them to regenerate long enough for the heroes to get ready.
• Oh, Crap!: The JSDF get a *big* one when they figure out what that 80,000 ton sonar pulse is chasing after the Third Angel.
• Outside-Context Problem: For SEELE and NERV, Ultraman is this. SEELE has been following the Dead Sea Scrolls, which managed to predict the Angels and Godzilla, but Ultraman came right out of nowhere and is mentioned not once in the scrolls. And NERV doesn't know who he is, either.
• Phlebotinum Killed the Dinosaurs: Or, rather, King Ghidorah did.
  • The real-life Toba Catastrophe, which reduced humanity to only a few thousand individuals more than 70,000 years ago, was caused by a cataclysmic battle between Godzilla, Anguirus, Mothra, Rodan, King Shisa, Gamera, and the mysterious Utsuno Ikusagami on one side, and Bagan, Orochi, the Gyaos, and their queen on the other side. The fighting was so bad, the entire island of Mu sank beneath the waves, and humanity was nearly wiped out in the aftermath.
• Prehistoric Monster: Skull Island, there are even rhedosaurs there.
• Psychic Powers: Rei is explicitly shown to be one, though it seems she's better at picking up empathy than actual thoughts.
  • Psychics in this universe are considered real phenomonon, with Miki Saegusa in the backstory being known to have a psychic link with Godzilla.
• Religious and Mythological Theme Naming: SEELE applies this to non-Angelic kaiju as well, using biblical and apocryphal names. Leviathan (Godzilla), Behemoth (Anguirus), and Golem (King Shisa) are the known ones so far.
• The Remake: Of Hail to the King (Thuktun Flishithy).
• Roaring Rampage of Revenge: Once Godzilla wakes to find a post-Second Impact world, Godzilla's out for Angel blood. And after when he forms a telepathic bond with Rei and finds out about SEELE's responsibilities behind the Second Impact and their and Gendo's plans to create a third one through it, he's itching for their blood as well, only held at bay for now by Rei's appeal.
• Robotic Reveal: Maya is actually M-AYA (aya being the Xilien word for eleven in this fic), Jet Jaguar's android "daughter".
• Take That!: When Shinji brings up the philosophy behind the Hedgehog Dilemma (brought up in Evangelion as the idea that people can't get close without hurting each other), Hank Marlowe tells him "You've got issues, kid. We're not fuckin' hedgehogs." He then refutes it by quoting Winnie the Pooh.
• Teeth-Clenched Teamwork: Downplayed and one-sided. Asuka's willing to fight the King of Monsters himself if he gets in the way of fighting the Angels. She's also the only one to even consider it possible.
• The Scourge of God: Godzilla, Anguirus, Rodan, and Mothra have been worshipped as gods in the past, notably by the peoples of Mu. There's also all the mythological creatures they've inspired. Misato currently worships Mothra.
• Trash the Set: A pretty colossal example: the Skull Island arc ends with the island's complete destruction.
• Swiss-Army Superpower: Shinji has these as Ultraman. In addition to the classic specium beam, he can also fly, teleport, produce force-fields strong enough to endure Ramiel's beam for a few moments, throw cutting discs ,has super-strength, and can produce freezing gases.
• Symbiotic Possession: Ultraman fusing with Shinji allows the two to fight Angels and Kaiju on even footing. It also allowed Shinji to survive his head injury he sustained from the Third Angel's attack. Unfortunately, it also means that since there's a second, very much non-human mind inside of Shinji, he can't sync with an Evangelion.
• Tap on the Head: Shinji gets a very serious head injury from Sachiel's attack caused from a piece of concrete rubble beaning him on the head. Had Ultraman not intervened, the blood loss and trauma would have killed him.
• There's No Kill like Overkill:
  • Godzilla kills Titanosaurus by ripping off its mechanical arm, prying open its jaws until they break, then flambeing its insides with his atomic breath until its head comes off (basically what happened to the Female MUTO in Godzilla (2014)).

• Wham Episode: "Folly of Man" shows that Project O is NERV's attempt to make the Oxygen Destroyer- and Ritsuko just succeeded.

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