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The LCL was pressurising, turning murky. It was getting hard to breathe, his breaths becoming shallower and shallower.
His thoughts were flying around, they were about everything and nothing. He saw his mother working in the lab, just before that ‘accident’. He wasn't convinced that it was a coincidence.
He saw the day he was thrown away by his father, he stood there, small and cold in clothes many sizes too big. He had nothing, the minute Yui was gone he was abandoned, like a failed experiment. He stood there and cried and cried and cried. His father never had that big of a role in his life but that didn't mean it didn't tear him apart.
All he wanted was to be appreciated, to be cared for. He wanted his mother back. He guesses this is why he was captivated by Misato, she gave him a home, she cared for him, those times when he was stuck in the Eva, he was told she couldn't sleep until he was safe.
He saw her as a mother, he saw every girl in his life as a mother. He laughed to himself at the absurdity of it all, but started choking and coughing halfway through, he felt his airways slowly closing.
The pain in his abdomen was he got impaled with a spear. He hadn't, of course, but the Eva had.
He felt as though his body was about to be ripped in half, and his guts to fall out.
He could barely see through the murky liquid, but the angel was recharging for another shot. This angel, like many others, was oddly shaped, a sphere with masses of spikes and shaped jutting out of it and rolling around its body. Its body growing in mass slightly as it regenerated its energy.
Shinji couldn't see the core anymore. Rei and Asuka had already been taken down by the angel, Eva’s lying broken and misshapen along the city floor, 01 about to join them.
Then it hit, agonising pain as the light beam hit the Eva’s skull, feeling as though Shinji’s skin was peeling off, revealing muscle and sinew, and then bone. He felt as though thousands of needles were stabbing and ripping into his brain and tearing it apart bit by bit. His vision was full of gaps and flashing, blinking lights. His eyes stung, tears running down from them as he pulled at his hair and curled up in a ball. He gripped his head, hitting it, trying to get it to stop. It kept going and going and going and going and going. It wouldn't stop, he screamed and let out inhuman shrieks and cries as it hacked through his brain with violent jabs and tears.
He screamed until his throat was raw and the LCL was almost out of oxygen. He couldn't see outside, the Eva had been nearly completely ravaged by blast after blast, the systems were failing, life support was at 5%.
He wasn't going to make it,he realised. Tears coming down faster than ever, he was hyperventilating, using up the rest of the oxygen.
He couldn't move anymore, his body going limp. He had given up. There was no point in fighting it. He should have just left before this had happened, like he tried to. SO. MANY, TIMES.
His head still searing, and torso crying in pain, his eyes started to close. He was sick of trying so hard, and for what? For the greater good? No he was much more selfish than that, he didn't mean to be, but living with no parents for years made him crave validation and praise from anyone, even the one he hated the most. He just wante He ju he
Help.
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He woke up in a cold sweat, shaking in a familiar room. Sitting up he realised the lights were out and the first rays of sunlight peeking through the curtains. He was so preoccupied with the rest of the room he didn't even notice the other in the bed sitting up beside him.
“Shinj?” The voice came from the one beside him. Shinji’s head whipped around to see them. If he tried hard enough he could see red eyes and a face painted with concern, framed by silver hair.
They put their hand on Shinji’s shoulder “Hey, are you okay?”
Then it hit him. Kaworu. It was Kaworu. He couldn't comprehend why it took him so long to realise.
“Did you have the dream again?” he nodded slowly, tears welling up. He threw himself against Kaworu’s chest, clutching onto his shirt. They hug back.
He's alive, he's alive. It wasn't real, it wasn't real, it wasn't real. Kaworu is real, Kaworu is here, Kaworu won't leave.
Kaworu’s hand moves to his head and drags it through Shinj’s hair, their grip tightens on Shinji, grounding him.
Shinji is safe here. Wherever Kaworu is Shinji is home.