[Speculation] a new take on the 'Failures of Infinity'

[thegoodson]

I had a theory that the Mark 9 went around beheading the FoI's with that scythe it used to decapitate the Mark 6, down in dogma. Maybe as to prevent them from "re-activating" in the future.

Even if this doesn't end up being the case, I quite like the imagery of Rei going around and mindlessly decapitating the FoI's, referencing Shinji's training sequence in 1.11. The problem is it looks like they were all moving without their heads already (the one's in the shaft are layered like ants, I don't Rei would have been able to decapitate all of those).

[Simitus]

but as a response to Lilith's corpse headlessness, all the FoIs lose their head as soon as born, with the thousands of FoIs that Lilith summoned, soon their skulls littered the ground, helped with the LCL lake slowly drying to create new FoIs.

I disagree -- when 4th Impact was initiated, the FOIs simply remained lifeless husks, adrift and inanimate whereas all Lilith organic matter exploded into blood/LCL to be reborn. I think the FOIs were actually manifestations of the 12th Angel, given its multitudinous nature and ability to merge all diverging tendrils into a core. One could say that was an attempt to become infinity. During the 14 year time shift, I think there was more than one battle that resulted in the state we find Terminal Dogma by 3.0. Mari and Asuka seem to know a lot more about SEELE, the Adams and NERV by the time we see their characters again - I'm going to go out on a limb and say everything they know they learned the hard way. Gendo's cold war with SEELE would have resulted in the refit of Eva-08 to an autonomous dummy plug driven version because it would have taken Kaworou (SEELE's pet project and check on Gendo's ambitions) out of play as a pilot. There were still Angels to be defeated at that point and the UN seem to have wanted to put an end to everything NERV was doing anyway shortly after that.

[wiser3754]

What I've noticed about the FOI during the Fourth Impact is that all of them is still in Unit 01's image and there is none in EVA13's image. I wonder why?

[ElMariachi]

I think that the FoIs we see are definitively dead and "fossilized" into core material. That's why when 4I started they didn't moved nor changed their shape : that's just a big bunch of cadavers.
We don't know from what the FoIs comes from, but I'm still sure that they were born in Lilith's Chamber, that's the only way to explain the presence of their skulls. But since they are all in EVA-01's image, that Lilith took Rei's image and that Rei is inside EVA-01, it's more probable that the FoIs came from Lilith rather than the 12th Angel, or maybe that was a reaction from when the 12th Angel tried to fuse with Lilith...

Gendo's cold war with SEELE would have resulted in the refit of Eva-08 to an autonomous dummy plug driven version because it would have taken Kaworou (SEELE's pet project and check on Gendo's ambitions) out of play as a pilot. There were still Angels to be defeated at that point and the UN seem to have wanted to put an end to everything NERV was doing anyway shortly after that.

You probably mean Mark.06, right?

Anyway I don't think Gendo was the one who took the initiative to make Mark.06 an autonomous unit : I doubt SEELE would like their trump card being fitted with a Dummy System created in one of the NERV Branch under Gendo's direct control, and if they don't want it, they just have to tell Gendo to stop or they order to Kaworu to fry his brain remotely, so in my opinion it's SEELE themselves who ordered Mark.06 to be changed into an autonomous unit(maybe they feared what could happen to him against the remaining Angels, or wanted him constantly in NERV HQ to keep an eye on Gendo)

[Zoop]

What I've noticed about the FOI during the Fourth Impact is that all of them is still in Unit 01's image and there is none in EVA13's image. I wonder why?

I don't see why the FOI's would have the image of EVA13. The FOIS we see flying around during 4th impact are just the FOI's that already lay there.
When Eva13 went godmode, it did not create new FOI's (afaik)

About the skulls in lillith chamber, I'd say they were already there (maybe as long as lillith has been lying there), submerged under lcl (somehow resembling the Eva graveyard from NGE?). When Lillith went GNR, she absorbed the LCL around her, exposing the skulls. When lillith tangs, the lake is back, and the skulls are once again submerged in LCL.

So it looks like to me that the FOI's (who are newly created) want to fetch their skull to become complete, or some sort. Because I get the feeling the skulls are a lot older then the FOI's (mainly because the FOI's are Core and the Skulls are just bone, I find it hard to believe the FOI's simply lost their heads).

[wiser3754]

One thing I'd like to add about EVA13 is that it does turn white when awakened, however it doesn't turn into an energy condensate like Unit 01 or the Adams in the 2nd flashback. It's still remains solid much like the Mark.06 when both units are white.

Also is it just me, or does EVA13 produce an A.T field when it's rammed and then bombarded with ricochet salvos from the WUNDER?

And just one last question, has anyone speculated that there may be FOI or something similar in the epicentre of 2nd impact? Because if NERV was able to recover both an Adam and the Vessel of Adams who's to say that there were more beings like the FOI at the epicentre and were recovered and molded into the MP EVA's?

Yeah, highly speculative, but if the MP EVA's were produced in NERV HQ, I could only conclude that not all the FOI were failures (again, highly speculative).

[ElMariachi]

But if the FoI's goal was to fetch a skull in Lilth Chamber, then why they are all climbing the Main Shaft? Why there isn't a single one seen with a head if a ton of them seemingly reached the big lake of skulls? Also then why the ones on the surface are seen fusing with the ground or merging between them to form something bigger?

Everything point that they originated in Lilith's Chamber, and that the surface was their objective, some of them deviated to reach Lilith's head for some reason, also notices that the ones with Lilith's head are much smaller than the others.

As for why the skulls are made of bones and the FoIs made of core, I think that the FoIs weren't made of core material, but were organic, when they were created they lost their head because Lilith was beheaded too, and said heads decomposed probably into LCL, leaving only the skull behind. And when Mark.06 impaled itself and Lilith with the spears, it paralyzed them by turning them into core material.

So for me Lilith got decapitated, afterwards the FoIs were generated(both event could be a reaction to the 12th Angel reaching her), thanks to some image link or whatever they immediately lose their head which decomposed into LCL, leaving only the skull behind.
Lilith created two groups : the big, Eva-sized ones had to reach the surface to become "Infinity"(maybe by merging with the ground, turning it to core, and merging between them to create those giant red crosses we saw all around the landscape), and another composed of smaller ones with the task to go for her severed head and bring it back to her.

So all hell break loose, FoIs are everywhere, Mark.06 descent to Lilith Chamber, absorbs the 12th Angel and impales itself and Lilith with the Cassius and Longinus spears, stopping the 12th angel, Lilith and the FoIs dead on their tracks, the latter "fossilizing" into core material.

Now the question would be what was EVA-01's eventual part in all of this?


EDIT : @ wiser3754 :
Maybe EVA-13 didn't transformed into a Giant of Light because of the two spears? After all they are essentially big control rods for godly abominations. Or maybe during 2I and N3I the creature awakening had a conscience guiding it, unlike EVA-13 who was a cyborg ADAM stripped of its consciousness?

It's the Wunder who produced an AT Field when it rammed the Wunder : an AT Field cage to keep it trapped(the bubble of energy around EVA-13) and later the AT Field in which the Wunder's projectiles bounced to it EVA-13.

Well, since we saw MP-EVAs arms hanging in neo-NERV, the most logical explanation is that they were created and assembled in neo-NERV. Maybe the construction of an Evangelion consist of growing the head and torso, and later to graft to it the arms and legs which were grown separately, that would explain why EVA-05, an unit not finished, only had an head and torso and all the rest was mechanical.

Finally, we don't know what a success at Infinity means, if it's to merge with the ground or between them into giant red crosses to create a single being a la sea of tang from EoE, then there little chances that neo-NERV managed to make something out of the "Successes of Infinity".

[Charsi]

My thoughts:

Think about where the city is. As far as I know it's on the "roof" of the invierted pyramid, which used to be the GeoFront surface. The land surrounding the GeoFront pyramid has been excavated nearly all the way down to Central Dogma (Lilith's chamber).

Imagine the "event" that turned people into FoI as a slow-moving wave. It starts down in Central Dogma, creating FoI that begin to climb the tunnel upwards. The FoI climb as the wave progresses upward and outward from the epicenter of N3I, which we know to be Central Dogma and Lilith. The wave proceeds upwards through the ground (not yet excavated) and reaches the surface of the GeoFront. People in the city convert, begin merging, and FoI sprout up everywhere, awakening, merging with one another, growing.

Around the same time the FoI reach the Command Center. We know the Command Center is somewhere below the surface of the GeoFront since Zeruel blew up a surface pyramid and began to descend through the main shaft before reaching it. It's presumably around the level at which Evas are stored and activated, because Shinji busted through the wall, punched Zeruel, then took a magnetic rail back UP to the surface of the GeoFront in 2.22.

So where's the giant Rei head? In the Command Center. Relative to the newly sprouted FoI on the surface, it's below them. Relative to the FoI swarming up the shaft, it's above them. So it kind of makes sense if you think of the "event" as a slow moving wave that reached the surface and started to really reconfigure/wreak havoc on the world at around the same time the FoI's reached the Command Center. The ground probably blew outwards around then, excavating and elevating the former NERV pyramid and obliterating the earth surrounding the GeoFront. Kind of like a giant eye blinking then opening. Then it all went pear shaped and the FoI's were frozen as core, most clogging the main shaft upwards, some still awakening within the city on the surface. The whole thing ground to a halt.

[Simitus]

Everything point that they originated in Lilith's Chamber, and that the surface was their objective, some of them deviated to reach Lilith's head for some reason, also notices that the ones with Lilith's head are much smaller than the others.

I think Lilith herself, like the FOI were climbing out of Terminal Dogma and reached as far as the command center (still full of holes from the fight with Zeruel and Eva-01). But Lilith got no further than the command center before losing her head and returning to a dormant state. The posture of the body in Terminal Dogma doesn't seem consistent with falling headless down the shaft though, unless it kept moving for a while before dying. Perhaps it was one of many safeguards NERV put in place, something like a DSS choker to prevent her falling into an Angel's hands should everything else fail. Either way, Lilith is dead as far as everyone but Gendo and Fuyutski know, and the reason for the GeoFront, Tokyo-3 and NERV no longer exists. Their priorities were to defend Eva-01 and Lilith, at both of these they failed.

(BTW Mariachi, I did mean Unit-06, thanks :), but I still think SEELE had no choice in the matter. Unit-06 is after the events of N3I, the only remaining functional Eva. Perhaps N3I convinced the countries building Evas that pilots were too dangerous and all remaining units were refit to autonomous types, either way it seems clear that by the time Unit-06 fought the 12th Angel it had no pilot.

Now the question would be what was EVA-01's eventual part in all of this?

I have been wondering about this lately. Shinji has no memories after defeating Zeruel and saving Rei. Yet Unit-01 was moved, presumably searched (and nothing found that time) and finally considered so dangerous (or valuable) that it was launched into orbit. This depends on how all post N3I players view Unit-01. Gendo views it as essential to his plan, if it weren't for SEELE's interfering he would have had his impact. This convinces me that Gendo lost control of NERV / was relieved of command and possibly imprisoned as a result of his scheming. Either way, he has lost the war with SEELE. SEELE on the other hand, views Unit-01 as having triggered an impact and therefore is the true Eva they've been looking for all along. That was their ambition for Unit-06, but hey whichever one proves itself first -- the problem is that Unit-01 did this too early and the rest of SEELE's plan wasn't ready. Given how much everyone else fears Unit-01 I think they'd be ok with SEELE offering to remove it from the planet and safeguard it with the NEMESIS series until their other chess pieces are in place.

But we don't know when the decision to move it to space was made, or what else if anything Unit-01 did between N3I and then. I will venture to say it was put into space early in the 14 year period if for no other reason than the time it would take to build AAA Wunder. It makes Nimitz class Aircraft Carriers look like tug boats and Arleigh Burke class destroyers look like rubber duckies. Something that big does not get built overnight and it seems it was still barely finished / never been fully tested by the beginning of 3.0. Yet its most vital part -- Unit-01 was not retrieved until the opening battle of 3.0. That seems like a big chance to take -- build something the size of the Wunder without knowing well ahead of time what its main component is going to be. I find it interesting that despite having Units 02 and 08 they had to retrieve 01 for this purpose. Makes me wonder what their plan A was and why it went wrong.

[ElMariachi]

Well, the tesseract had neo-NERV's logo on it, so it's probably Gendo who ordered EVA-01 to be shot into orbit.

As for the FoIs, they can't have been born on the surface, look at them :

SPOILER: Show

[wkimg]File:Eva3-33 C0804 comp.jpg[/wkimg]
[wkimg]File:Eva3-33 C0805A comp.jpg[/wkimg]
[wkimg]File:Eva3-33 C0805B comp.jpg[/wkimg]

Don't you see something lacking? There is something lacking : holes.
If the FoIs were created from the core material on the surface, we should have seen holes in the ground and in building where the core material was transfered to the birthing FoIs, yet every single building and roads are completely intact, meaning that they can't have been originated here!

Now look at the first image, see the tendrils coming from the neck stump? It's the only FoI we see with such tendrils coming from its stump, all the other FoIs, the ones which were not fusing with the ground, had the neck stump clean cut.

Now see how the FoI spreads its tendrils on the ground? We saw something similar in 3.0, and in live :

SPOILER: Show

[wkimg]File:Eva3-33 C1364.jpg[/wkimg]
[wkimg]File:Eva3-33 C1365 09tendrils.jpg[/wkimg]

Mark.09 did a very similar thing when trying to take control of the Wunder from EVA-01, and it clearly looked like an infection.

So for me, the FoIs, were born in Lilith's Chamber, climbed all the way up to the surface, once there released tendrils from their neck stump to infect the ground and turn it to core, and once the surrounding transformed, the FoI started to merge inside the core newly created, each FoI spreading the infection farther from the starting point that is the Geofront.

[Zoop]

As for why the skulls are made of bones and the FoIs made of core, I think that the FoIs weren't made of core material, but were organic, when they were created they lost their head because Lilith was beheaded too, and said heads decomposed probably into LCL, leaving only the skull behind. And when Mark.06 impaled itself and Lilith with the spears, it paralyzed them by turning them into core material.

Alright seems solid enough, there is no reason to think there aren't still bones in those corified bodies, so the flesh fell of the skull thus these remains did not get corified, leaving a skull.

The interesting part then is, that the FOI's seem to resemble lillith's state, thus linking them directly to Lillith. They also resemble Unit-01 looks, so that links them to Unit-01. Furthermore, Lillith has Rei's looks. Unit-01 (with Rei in it?) MUST be involved in whatever happened here, and I'm pretty sure it did not happen during N3I.

The FOI's might have more to do with the 12th Angel's nature, than the actual Impact. Note how much it resembles Armisael the ring-shaped angel from NGE. Which had infection-type attacks and in the director's cut it was shown to grow some sort of grotesque biological tree with the shapes of previous angels embedded in it. Also it is said that it's entire body is made out of core. Maybe the Angel functioned as some sort of mass photo-copy field by using Unit-01 (maybe posessing even? could explain why third impact would have resumed), then getting near to Lillith, but when it got ready to make the jump to Lillith, Mark 6 got in between, sealing it inside.

Seeing that even when speared and dormant, Unit01 could still pose a threat, they shot it up to space. If the infection stuff is indeed inherit to the angel, then so is the Wunder, thanks to what Unit09 does.

Maybe a longshot, could be I'm fanwanking to much trying to explain what happened to the 11th and 12th angel, but that's for another post, I suppose ... it still does not explain the Foi's and what the hell they are doing

[K40s]

^ maybe the 12th is Armisael and we are seeing the outcome of what would have happened if Rei 2 hadn't stopped it in NGE.

Armisael fused with Eva-00, an Adam based Eva, and was about to restore all the dead angels back, maybe more than a restoration is a creation of new life based on the organism it's being fused with, Eva-00 being Adam based it allowed Armisael to create organisms using the angels' DNA, represented by using their multiple forms, maybe if it fused with Eva-01, a Lilith based Eva, it would have created new organism using Lilith's DNA, since the only organism in the series that can be considered a true direct offspring of Lilith (lilin having evolved from the primordial LCL ooze instead) is Eva-01, we see this represented by a bunch of copies of Eva-01: the FoIs.

So basically in NTE the 12th (Armisael) showed up, fused with Eva-01 to the point of creating an "Eva-01-tower" a-là NGE, thousands of these were born, then Mark.06 did what Rei 2 did with Eva-00 in NGE: fused with the 12th, absorbed it into her core, trapping it and then speared herself instead of self-destructing.

[ElMariachi]

Well, if you except his color, the guy is pretty much Armisael, so I'm OK to call him that.

About your theory, it could be a nice twist on all the theories we have seen, but then why would everyone in WILLE hate Shinji : the guy had nothing to do with what happened, if they had someone to blame, it should be the morons who though that Mark.06 would be enough to protect Lilith(meaning Gendo and SEELE).

Besides if EVA-01 fused with Armisael, that would have leaved marks on it, no? Most of the armor would had been destroyed, yet the few images we had of Unit 01 in 3.0 showed that someone re-armored the thing, and I doubt that someone would have taken the hassle to put a new armor just before putting it in a giant tomb and shot it to space seemingly forever, or when WILLE recuperated it since they only meant to use it as a living battery inside an armored pod.

[Shinoyami65]

Perhaps "NME!Armisael" infected the Mark.06 first, then came into contact with Eva-01 (similar to how it attempts to merge with Eva-01 in NGE) and turned its Angel tower into an Eva-01 tower instead, using the Mark.06's biomass to fuel the tower? That might explain how all of the Mark.06's body seems to have vanished from within the armor, even though Angels apparently don't need to eat or feed on flesh.

[ElMariachi]

But then it just transfers the question to Mark.06 : if the tower emerged from Mark.06, then why its armor is completely intact 14 years later?

[Zoop]

Besides if EVA-01 fused with Armisael, that would have leaved marks on it, no? Most of the armor would had been destroyed, yet the few images we had of Unit 01 in 3.0 showed that someone re-armored the thing, and I doubt that someone would have taken the hassle to put a new armor just before putting it in a giant tomb and shot it to space seemingly forever, or when WILLE recuperated it since they only meant to use it as a living battery inside an armored pod.

Well, in the first fight against Sachiel, Eva01 is shown to regenerate an arm, with armor and everything. I don't think we see enough of Eva01 outside the Wunder to actually know in what kind of state Eva01 is.
We don't know if this angel even leaves marks (maybe penetrates without actually pysically touching it).

Also the Armisael thing is jut suggestion, I know my story is flaky, but I can't help but think that the angel has more to do with it, other than just functioning as a Fruit of Life to eat, and going godmode.

[edit]:

quoting myself here:

Seeing that even when speared and dormant, Unit01 could still pose a threat, they shot it up to space. If the infection stuff is indeed inherit to the angel, then so is the Wunder, thanks to what Unit09 does.

There is another simularity that links Eva09 (and thus the Wunder) to the FOI's other than the infection tendrils: Losing it's head. Eva09 seems to have a mechanical head, maybe Eva09 never had a head, but a mechanical one is there to replace it (for optical sensors and whatnot). It only regains it's head after the spears get pulled.

[ObsessiveMathsFreak]

Now see how the FoI spreads its tendrils on the ground?

Why assume that those are tendrils. They look an awful lot like pipes and cabling.

SPOILER: Show

[wkimg]File:Eva3-33 C1364.jpg[/wkimg]
[wkimg]File:Eva3-33 C1365 09tendrils.jpg[/wkimg]

Also, I've only just noticed that in the second image here, the Wunder's pipes have turned blue as well, despite being red in the previous shot. Is this an animation goof, or is the Wunder's "blood" actually being turned blue as well?

[Zoop]

You mean the tubes like the topright one? It does not seem to be part of Eva09, looks like regular tubing That goes into the screw like things, that look like the top end of an entry plug when it's rotated into an eva), but colored the same blue as the infection without the speckle effect. It doesn't look like it's in the process of being changed though. So I'd say its blue tubing / lighting effect.

If it really is already spread that far, then maybe Eva09's infection might have caused some more permanent effects.

[one-point]

First post, I had to emerge from lurking because I think I have some insight on this puzzle.
I re-watched EOE a couple times recently and found the red units or 'failures' discussed here in the third impact sequence! I am pretty sure that the red units are simply an intermediary point in the instrumentality process which is post-tanging and pre-complete merge with Lilith. The 'failures' referred to in 3.0 are souls which didn't complete their journey through instrumentality and instead got stuck in an intermediary form, most likely due to impact being aborted.

Screenshots: Failures of Infinity in EoE[/spoiler]

[ElMariachi]

^
If I recall correctly, that was just the Lilin souls, pretty far from the giant Eva like monstrosities that are the FoIs.

Also, I've only just noticed that in the second image here, the Wunder's pipes have turned blue as well, despite being red in the previous shot. Is this an animation goof, or is the Wunder's "blood" actually being turned blue as well?

I think that it's just a way to visually represent Mark.09's energy, and with it its influence on the Wunder, as it spreads through the ship.