Neon Genesis Evangelion II: DELTA Invasion

Neon Genesis Evangelion II: DELTA Invasion is a self-insertion fanfic written by Tom Dyron. Like many other Evangelion fics, it was MSTed at Elmer Studios (link goes to a mirror, the old site was on the now-defunct Geocities) and an audiobook production is also currently in the works. Set post-series (but ignoring both episodes 25-26 and End of Evangelion), it concerns NERV's conflict with a new group of enemies called Invadors (yes, it's spelled like that throughout) and the adventures of new pilot Tom Dyron.

Considered to be a "Cult Classic" of badfic in its day, DELTA Invasion still gets a giggle every now and then. No "raw", non-MSTed copies are known to exist; whether this is a bad thing is another matter. Recently, Elmer Studios themselves have come out of retirement with an updated version, the "Rebuild of Delta" (work in progress).

The unMSTed fic can be read on the Wayback Machine here.


 * Ace Custom: Tom's rebuilt EVA-03, complete with custom paint job and "progressive grenades"
 * Author Catchphrase: More like signature spelling and grammar errors; there's "The Invadors", the use of the term "children" for the singular, calling it "The Nerv" throughout, Ritsuko handing people mallets, the outdoor 'floor' in the fight scenes...
 * Beta Couple: Shinji and Rei.
 * Brother-Sister Incest is (sort of) averted by an Author's Saving Throw Retcon where it turns out Rei was unrelated to Shinji but injected with Yui's DNA for... um... some reason.
 * Completely Missing the Point: By focusing on battles against generic goofy baddies who are easily defeated with a bit of teeth-gritting and Tom's would-be cool antics, this fic basically turns Evangelion into the thing it was originally a Deconstruction of.
 * Department of Redundancy Department: There's a lot of repetition of statements throughout the fic.
 * DELTA Shattering Kaboom
 * Expansion Pack Past: Crossed with Continuity Snarl; John Barren's backstory seemed to constantly change and mutate with each retelling. His variable number of siblings (some of them called Charles) didn't help.
 * Faux Action Girl: Asuka is pretty much helpless for much of the fic, constantly needing to be rescued by Tom.
 * Genre Shift: Chapter 4 reads like a knockoff of a standard martial arts movie plot, with Tom entering a fighting contest to get revenge on Jeff.
 * Gratuitous Japanese: Mostly averted, save for the inexplicable, constant use of "Hai".
 * Improbable Age: At age 16, Tom has been a state kickboxing champion, singer in a world-famous band, and a fighter pilot. It gets worse.
 * And then there's his size. To quote Elmer Studios, "That's not a kid, that's Shawn friggin' Michaels!"
 * Infinity+1 Sword: The Blade of Souls.
 * Informed Attribute: John Barren is special, and you will be reminded of this fact constantly. Of course, he is actually an inferior Evangelion pilot to everyone else, is effortlessly trashed in virtually every fight he's in, never contributes to the plot and spends the last few chapters in a coma. But he's special. Really.
 * Also, Jeff is supposedly a professional hitman who has killed fifty-seven people. His modus operandi would suggest otherwise.
 * Info Dump: Huge blocks of stats are dolloped out when new characters show up.
 * Luke, I Am Your Father: Keel Lorenz is John Barren's father. Maybe. Possibly. It's hard to tell.
 * Mind Screw: Delta theology, aka chapter 11.
 * Mix-and-Match Critters: The Invadors are made of this trope; most of them are described by some variation on "body of an A, head of a B, arms of a C, legs of a D, etc.". Mercilessly parodied by the Random Delta Invasion Episode Generator.
 * Mister Exposition: This is pretty much all Ritsuko does in the fic. Well, that and endless synch-tests.
 * Old Shame: The Author pulled the fic from the sites that it was hosted on because it "didn't represent his vision for Evangelion". That it had become a subject for fandom-wide mockery probably also factored into it. One of the reasons why no "raw" version is known to exist.
 * That the man has the decency to be ashamed of himself provides a small comfort to anyone who has ever read the fic, as it happens.
 * Pair the Spares: John is paired with Tom's ex-girlfriend for no obvious reason.
 * Retcon: EVA-00, EVA-03, Tokyo-3, Toji's limbs and Kaji are all back in one piece with nary a reason given.
 * Take That: Tom's overly harsh treatment of his ex-girlfriend sounds suspiciously like the author venting.
 * Took a Level In Badass: Bike riding, beer-swilling, metal guitar-playing Shinji. Sadly, probably the best treatment he's ever gotten in EVA fic.
 * Wave Motion Gun: The "nuclear based cannon".
 * Weddings for Everyone/Babies Ever After: Chapter 13.
 * X Meets Y: This fic is basically a cross between Evangelion and the WWE. Wheather this is a good or bad thing is up to the reader.
 * You Fail Biology Forever: The Invadors are made of this trope.
 * You Fail Economics Forever: Tom tries to raise money by letting people challenge him... for a few yen each, as he apparently don't grasp exchange values. He makes a total of forty yen, which he spends on a lavish dinner at a restaurant for all his friends.
 * You Fail Physics Forever: The Progressive Grenades, The Nuclear Based Cannon... in fact, the entirety of the space trip to DELTA could be summarized as this.
 * When the heroes' ship is attacked en-route to DELTA, there's a brawl with intercepting Invadors. When killed, the Invadors spiral down to their doom. In space.

The Elmer Studios MSTings provide examples of:


 * Berserk Button: Tsuneo is driven into a frenzy by the crazy backstory infodump in chapter 11; the others have to bring in an electronic monk (from Martian Successor Nadesico) to calm him down.
 * Running Gag:
 * John Barren is Special.
 * Tom cooks Newspapers for breakfast.
 * Charles and his brother Charles.
 * The singing fleas and cockroaches in Misato's apartment.
 * This series also introduced the "What, you dare (blank) the great Asuka? WA-TAK!" gag that was, for some time, a Memetic Mutation of its own within the Evangelion fanfic community.