[There are banks of computers lining the walls, outdated and overused, keyboards worn down enough to make the letters unreadable. The ceilings are high and untiled, bare metal designed like they intend to drag something huge and rough through the halls. The shadows wear military outfits and lab coats, walking briskly through the facility like they're always late.]
[The dungeon is a hospital.]
[There's no warning of the change-- a doorway, a turn in the hall, an abrupt change halfway through a room. Any of it can bring you from the grimy shadows of an old industrial laboratory to a sterile hospital. There are no shadows in these sections, and footsteps echo. Tragedy touches the hospital rooms, in the form of blooded gurneys, children's shoes abandoned in empty rooms, distant sobbing and wordless begging.]
[There are names written on the whiteboards in the hospital rooms. Rei Ayanami and Toji Suzuhara are the most common, each with a grim prognosis scrawled under their names. Rei's list different causes of organ failure, sepsis and blood loss and trauma, while Toji's alternate between "AMPUTATION" written in red marker and "MY FAULT" written in blood.]
[One room is Asuka's. There's a boss in that one. It respawns every time you enter the room, trapped in the hospital and screaming in rage and fear. When it loses a fight, it goes silent and collapses to the ground, untouchable, broken and helpless.]
[In the upper levels, there is little sign of Kaworu. His voice is only heard when opening the door of a new safe room--]
"Are you afraid of other people, Shinji-kun?"
"Stay here with me tonight. It's raining. Your father will understand."
"You play beautifully."
"Take my hand. We will do it together."
[About halfway through, the final line is spoken, and repeats in every safe room afterwards. It becomes almost a chant by the end, echoing through the space and settling under the skin.]
"I love you."
[Shinji's shadow drags an IV with it through the dungeon, wrapped in bled-through bandages with wires hanging from electrodes attached to his scalp. He's wearing a middle school uniform, shorter and younger than his true self. There is blood soaked through the knees of his pants, like he'd been kneeling in a pool of it.]
[It cries. It never stops crying, sobbing and begging for help, for anyone to please, god, help me, I can't do this, please, please, don't make me do this, it hurts, I can't do this, please, it hurts.]
[The basement contains three things-- Shinji's shadow, Shinji himself, and Unit 01. There is blood pouring from the mouth of his mother's shadow, puddling on the floor and leaving it sticky and disgustingly warm. There are bodies at its feet, naked and torn apart. It swallows Shinji's shadow to become the final boss.]
[But it gives him a chance to speak, first.]
"He didn't save me! He just left me alone! He said he loved me and all I have left are his bloodstains on my shoes! I hate him, I hate him, how could he do this to me?! I'd be better off dead than waking up every day and having to remember he's gone!"
[Shinji breaks. He screams at his shadow, tells it he'd never talk about Kaworu that way, he has a persona so he doesn't have a shadow, you aren't me.]
HERE WE GO, 1/2 because I'm separating the dungeon from the aftermath
[There are banks of computers lining the walls, outdated and overused, keyboards worn down enough to make the letters unreadable. The ceilings are high and untiled, bare metal designed like they intend to drag something huge and rough through the halls. The shadows wear military outfits and lab coats, walking briskly through the facility like they're always late.]
[The dungeon is a hospital.]
[There's no warning of the change-- a doorway, a turn in the hall, an abrupt change halfway through a room. Any of it can bring you from the grimy shadows of an old industrial laboratory to a sterile hospital. There are no shadows in these sections, and footsteps echo. Tragedy touches the hospital rooms, in the form of blooded gurneys, children's shoes abandoned in empty rooms, distant sobbing and wordless begging.]
[There are names written on the whiteboards in the hospital rooms. Rei Ayanami and Toji Suzuhara are the most common, each with a grim prognosis scrawled under their names. Rei's list different causes of organ failure, sepsis and blood loss and trauma, while Toji's alternate between "AMPUTATION" written in red marker and "MY FAULT" written in blood.]
[One room is Asuka's. There's a boss in that one. It respawns every time you enter the room, trapped in the hospital and screaming in rage and fear. When it loses a fight, it goes silent and collapses to the ground, untouchable, broken and helpless.]
[In the upper levels, there is little sign of Kaworu. His voice is only heard when opening the door of a new safe room--]
"Are you afraid of other people, Shinji-kun?"
"Stay here with me tonight. It's raining. Your father will understand."
"You play beautifully."
"Take my hand. We will do it together."
[About halfway through, the final line is spoken, and repeats in every safe room afterwards. It becomes almost a chant by the end, echoing through the space and settling under the skin.]
"I love you."
[Shinji's shadow drags an IV with it through the dungeon, wrapped in bled-through bandages with wires hanging from electrodes attached to his scalp. He's wearing a middle school uniform, shorter and younger than his true self. There is blood soaked through the knees of his pants, like he'd been kneeling in a pool of it.]
[It cries. It never stops crying, sobbing and begging for help, for anyone to please, god, help me, I can't do this, please, please, don't make me do this, it hurts, I can't do this, please, it hurts.]
[The basement contains three things-- Shinji's shadow, Shinji himself, and Unit 01. There is blood pouring from the mouth of his mother's shadow, puddling on the floor and leaving it sticky and disgustingly warm. There are bodies at its feet, naked and torn apart. It swallows Shinji's shadow to become the final boss.]
[But it gives him a chance to speak, first.]
"He didn't save me! He just left me alone! He said he loved me and all I have left are his bloodstains on my shoes! I hate him, I hate him, how could he do this to me?! I'd be better off dead than waking up every day and having to remember he's gone!"
[Shinji breaks. He screams at his shadow, tells it he'd never talk about Kaworu that way, he has a persona so he doesn't have a shadow, you aren't me.]
[He doesn't remember much after that.]