FicWad

Levi
I was frozen in place, unable to move as I watched Reiner beat on the glittering diamond Leonhardt encased herself in with his heavy fists, his face red and scratched from our battle, and wet glass paths of his tears trailed down his face. I watched them fall like rain from his jaw and on to the girl he unfruitfully called to.
An unscathed head and body of my comrade pushed their way through the red rubble of the Underground prison, and thick clouds of dust and debris cascaded like billowing smoke in to the grey light of the outside world. It fell to the ruined cobbled earth beneath our unsteady feet like shimmering falling stars, but we had no wishes to hope for: the last battle for Humanity was laid out before us like a journey through soaring mountains so toweringly high above us they seemed to scrape the warring, glittering Heavens.
The raped earth around us unsteadily began to tremble and rumble violently, and I looked up at the steaming demon before me to see it raise its massive foot to take its first step slowly, so slowly I felt the minutes unaccountably tick away with fast ease.
Reiner stopped his incessant beating and reached for his blades, regaining his fallen composure; he planned to escape.
“Don’t you worry Berty! I’m comin’!”
Violently, Mikasa freed herself from her rubble with hard jerks and loud grunts, and, with her damaged gear, she charged the man. He looked to her and raised his glinting titanium sword to the sky, to the Collossal Titan lurking above, and his brows furrowed with his sorrow.
“I’m sorry Mikasa,” he breathed barely above a whisper as she sliced her blade through the air before him, but he shot himself in to the sky above and safely away from her.
The Collossal Titan took his first step out of the prison.
I reacted.
I began to move, to pull myself from the destruction and rubble, to free myself of my fear and shock; Hell was set loose on the world in an unwitting, untimely moment, and we had nothing to show for it beside a mystery locked away from us in unbreakable bonds. I roughly shoved bricks and stones and splintered wood from my body, and, with great strength, I freed myself from the prison of my mind and the heavy burden of the massacred prison.
Mikasa stood still where Reiner left her, her blades lowered to the ground where their razor sharp tips kissed the crumbled earth beneath her boot-cladded feet, and her pale face was held up to the mourning sky. She stood in the pale light like a flower basking in a new found life.
No one else freed themselves from the rubble.
I breathed deep and coughed to free my lungs of the dirt and I strode fast to Mikasa, and I grabbed her arm hard to bring her back to the present. Slowly she peeled her dark eyes from the darker sky to look at me, her face quiet and distant, cool and calculating.
“Mikasa, I need you to help me free Armin, Hanji, and Erwin.” She took a moment, but she nodded her head, and, with a shake, she quickly rushed to the pile closest to where she sprang from. With strong hands, she pulled and tore at the fallen stones and bricks.
I looked around the circular room quickly, trying to waste as little time as possible, to gauge were I last saw our friends. In all of the chaos, I didn’t see where everyone stood last before the Collossal appeared, so I ran to a thick spot of the rubble and began to work at it. I threw boulders and plaster and splintered wood over my shoulder, desperate to find life beneath the ruins.
“I found Armin!” Mikasa called to me from across the room, and my heart beat deep like a drum within my chest with panic as I continued to come up empty. I reached the floor without any success in my first search, so I went to another pile.
“He’s unconscious, but alive. I-I think he’s okay!”
I nodded my head, quickly growing desperate to find my remaining friends, to find Hanji, who my heart solely beat for in my fleeting, dying world.
“Keep searching for the others,” I commanded the Oriental girl, and she grunted in determined acknowledgement.
As I continued to dig faster through my new pile, it felt as if something beneath the pile moved the rubble as well, and soon I ran in to Erwin. He coughed and spluttered as he took thick, deep drags of the fresh air around him, and I continued to dig him out. He grunted and moaned with every move of his battered and bloodied body, and once I cleared the destruction, I fell to his side. He panted hard and looked to me beside him, his face furrowed with worry and pain.
“I broke my arm,” he said matter-of-fact, and I looked to him. His arm was bent awkwardly at the shoulder in the wrong direction it should have been, and pooling blood began to stain the tan jacket of his uniform where the broken bones of his shoulder jutted out of his torn skin and through the thin cloth.
I grimaced darkly as I looked upon him, and I bent down to help him up. I threw his good arm over my shoulders to help support him as I got him up. I led him to where Mikasa propped Armin up against a smooth slab of fallen brick, and I helped him settle himself beside the unconscious boy.
Mikasa quietly walked around the room while I helped Erwin get decently comfortable on the ground, and she turned to me.
“I can’t find Hanji.”
I stood still for a moment as my breath hitched gruffly in my lungs, and I whipped around to face the strong girl.
“She’s here goddammit. She didn’t just up and leave, so find her,” I barked at Mikasa, and I turned back to Erwin who wouldn’t meet my eyes. Beside him, Armin began to stir, his soft eyelids quivering slightly as he tried to open deep blue eyes.
The fallen ashes and fading embers of the Female Titan’s corpse were gone.
I left Erwin’s side to join Mikasa’s search, and I felt them- her and Erwin- eye me cautiously; I was not about to accept the idea of Hanji’s death. She could just be unconscious like Armin was, and I held on to that last shred of hope.
“I found her!”
I whipped around to where Mikasa was across the room, and I ran to her side. I ripped and tore at the rubble fast and strong, and I found more and more of shreds of Hanji’s mousy brown hair as I got deeper and deeper in to the pile with Mikasa.
“Hanji,” I whispered as we unearthed her bruised and bloodied face, and, quickly but not quickly enough, we freed her from the destruction. I held her delicately in my arms, and I pressed my ear to her chest to listen for the unending beat of her unending life.
I heard her life’s drum beat inside of her chest, strong and steady like her presence.
I licked my dry lips and tasted wet and cold saltiness on my tongue. I touched my face and realized I had been crying.
Softly I trailed my finger down her dirty cheek, trying to coax her into wakefulness.
“Hanji, we need you awake,” I shook her softly and Mikasa gripped my shoulder firmly. I looked up to her.
“We can’t waste any more time. I can take Erwin, Hanji, and Armin to a safe place where they can get medical attention; I’m strong enough to protect all three. Right now, as we mozzy about, the Collossal Titan freely strides through Wall Sina, and we must assume the Armoured Titan will appear next. We don’t have time to waste anymore. We need Humanity’s Strongest to take down the Collossal Titan.”
I understood she was right, but I did not want to leave Hanji. At least with her by my side, I knew I could protect her properly, but to trust her life in the hands of another? I did not know if I could do that.
The thing was, it was not only Hanji whose life hung in the balance of my decision in that moment; Humanity’s continued existence rode on my decision.
I nodded my head in agreement with the girl, and, gently, I laid Hanji down on the floor at our feet as I stood up and prepared my undamaged gear for battle. I readied my blades and looked at Hanji’s sleeping face a final time.
“I will save Humanity.”
Hanji
I bounced hard with every uneven step we took through the black chaos around me, and I felt my body continue to lurch hard. It hurt. I groaned and forced my heavy eyes open to only see a bloodied and dirt encrusted Scout uniform upside down. I realized I was slung over a man’s shoulder, and I tried to pick myself up to see what was going on, to see who carried me. I tried and failed, my head spinning hard with dizziness as nausea rolled over me in thick waves, and I held my head lightly with my hands as I fell back down with a hard grunt and swam in and out of consciousness.
“Hanji,” the man said. I realized it was Erwin and, through my bleak tunnel vision, I made myself focus on the sound of his deep voice. “Try not to move. You were hurt, and we think you hit your head. Stay with us.”
I stayed silent for a moment as I tried to recollect my thoughts.
“Levi,” I moaned through gritted teeth, “where is he?”
Silence answered my question and I began to move and shift my weight off Erwin’s shoulder. I needed to see Levi.
“Hanji stop!” Erwin yelled at me, and I threw my fists in to his stomach hard. He doubled over and dropped me on the crumbling earth beneath his feet. I rolled from my stomach to my back weakly, and I covered my face with my arm to shield my eyes from the blinding dim light above us. I saw sparkling and fading stars burst around me, and my eyes flittered unsteadily in my head. Beside me, Erwin grunted in pain as he balled up, and I heard someone ahead of us whip around hard, the gravel crunching beneath their feet.
I moved my arm and opened my eyes, and I wished I could go back in to unconsciousness.
The towns of Wall Sina were destroyed around us, and people screamed and ran about like scattered ants in a rainstorm. The once cobbled street we were in was churned; brown wet earth found its way in to the clouded light from above, and houses fell in thick crumbling piles.
We faced ruination.
My heart beat hard inside my chest as memories of moments ago flooded my mind, and I gasped in pain. The world around me began to spin again as I pulled myself up to sit.
“Hanji, we need to keep moving. Don’t be a burden for the Commander.”
I looked to the Oriental girl before me, Armin slung over her shoulder in a similar fashion I was held in earlier, and her face was ashen and grey. Her black eyes, so alike to Levi’s, shone bright and true with strength and capability, and I trusted her, but I needed Levi. I needed to know he was alive.
Unsteadily I pulled myself to my feet, the screams of the innocent people washing over me in an ironic, chaotic, baptism; I felt waves of calm flood through me.
“Hanji,” Mikasa said to me, but I ignored her and turned to Erwin who still sat on the street, his arm around its obviously fell counterpart. I felt my stomach lurch and my hands moved to my hips in realization I had no gear.
I looked to the girl again and ran.
I did not know what I thought in the instant that made me run, but I knew I needed gear. As I wobbled unsteadily through the streets, I searched for a fallen comrade, and it wasn’t long before I found one. It was an old man, a father most likely, with a prickled, unshaven face that was as white and dead as snow. He was covered in hot, sticky blood from head to toe, and his head bent at the neck in the wrong position.
I looked behind me and did not see the girl or Erwin pursue me.
I ripped at the dead man’s belts to remove his undamaged, glinting gear, and, once I freed it, I strapped it on myself with weak hands. I was so dizzy and my whole body ached with protest.
I paid it not heed.
I readied blades for myself and shot in to the sky.
Levi
I flew through the sky as fast as lightning, hunting, stalking my steaming prey so far ahead of me, and I knew I was not fast enough to reach the giant before it destroyed the last Wall of Humanity’s salvation. Still, I flew on fast and hard with unearthly stealth.
The Collossal Titan reached the Wall and held itself against it with strong, massive hands as it raised its foot high above its head from behind. It swung its leg with incredible speed in to the towering Wall, and a boom of thunder sounded like trumpets of defeat through the air as the Wall crumbled and fell. Enormous clouds of debris flew through the air and then came the winds so powerful that they made me fly backwards against my gear’s embedded hooks. I fell and crashed on to the cobbled ground in the street as the winds died down, and I looked back to the Wall.
Sunlight poured through the hole in the Wall, and only billowing smoke, alight with crimson embers, was left of the disappeared Collossal Titan.
I pulled myself up to my sturdy feet, and flew in to the sky to the breach.
It wasn’t long before I found my first titan that pulled a small blond girl from her demolished home, and it crushed the child in its hands easily. I pulled my blades close to my body and swung myself in to its nape, killing it easily.
I just was not fast enough to save the girl.
Soldiers flew past me and I watched hordes of them die as I attacked and murdered the monsters around us that craved the taste our living flesh.
I looked to my side to a titan when I saw Hanji fly towards it unsteadily, and she readied her blades to engage. My breath caught in my throat as it swung its hand towards her to crush her like a pestering gnat, and I soared to its back that was turned to me. I struck it as hard as lightning, and it fell below me to the street in a heap of ash as I landed on the rooftop Hanji flew above.
She flew to my side and I embraced her, listening to her quickly beating heart. It soothed me and I took in the smell of her dirtiness, but anger boiled inside of me at Mikasa’s incompetence at keeping Hanji away from the battle in her injured state.
I looked up to the beautiful woman and smiled at her, and she smiled back, her hand easily rested on the nape of my neck where she played with my hair.
“It’s good to see you Shitty Glasses,” I said to her playfully, and she bent down to my height to kiss my dry lips. She was covered in her own blood from the destruction of the prison and she was encrusted with dirt and grime, but really, I did not give a shit.
I kissed her hard and then broke free as I heard approaching booming footsteps.
“Let’s give ‘em hell,” she said, and I grinned madly.
“Yes,” I agreed, and, together, we soared in to the sky, our blades thirsty for spilled Titan blood.
We sliced and slashed through the napes of titans easily together as one as we approached the breach, but Hanji was not herself. Her movements and strikes were unsure, and she looked distant, like her mind wasn’t fully resolved in the tasks ahead of her.
I tried to stay near her at all times to compensate for her mindlessness, but soon we were separated by titans. I easily defeated mine as I bounded from its head to slice through its neck as easily as if through butter, and I looked to Hanji to see how she fared.
She flew through the sky above a street.
I screamed and flew to her.
A titan below her bounded up in to the sky and nipped her easily. She horribly screamed in pain as she collided into the red brick rooftop with a crash, and roof tiles flew around her with lingering black dust. The titan that bit her climbed onto the roof to snatch her up, and I flew in to its neck with my blades. It fell with a thud to the ground in a heap of flittering ashes, and I ran to Hanji’s side.
She bled heavily from her mid-thigh where the rest of her leg was missing, the crunched bone sticking out oddly from the heap of her torn flesh and once white turned crimson pants. I screamed as she bitterly cried, and I tore the tan jacket of my uniform off of my body to tie it around her profusely bleeding nub of a leg. She moaned and screamed as I quickly tightened it with shaking hands, and her eyes widened as she looked up to the sky.
“LEVI!” She screamed, and I turned around fast, my blades drawn and ready, as a titan hand came to fall on us. I slashed its fingers off easily and then I picked Hanji up in my arms. She screamed with her body warped with cringing and trembles from pain as we flew away from the titan that swatted at us again.
I could not defend the both of us with Hanji in my arms, and she would not be able to defend herself at all. Her face became stark white as the color ebbed away from her skin and out of her body in thick, dripping blood.
I knew Hanji was going to die and there was nothing I could do to save her. There was nothing anyone could do to save her as the last Wall fell and Humanity descended in to chaos in its final hours.
With Hanji in my arms, I flew above and over Wall Sina.
Hanji
The world around me flashed brilliantly before my eyes, and sound washed over my in waves of muffled sound. I felt everything with heightened sensitivity, and yet, I felt nothing at all but a soft tingling that faded in and out with my consciousness.
I closed my eyes.
I felt myself thud hard on a wood flooring and a warm body, and I jerked myself in to wakefulness. The small, dark room I laid in spun around me dizzyingly, and I closed my eyes tight, fighting back the urge to vomit.
I felt the Cold rising through my body deep within my bones.
I looked up to see Levi holding me in his arms, and he smiled down to me, soft tears kissing his face. I smiled at him, and he bent down to kiss my lips. I kissed him back hard, sensuously, letting myself be enveloped by his warmth.
In that moment, I wanted nothing more than him.
I sighed deep and we broke our kiss.
I felt myself fading quickly.
I looked up at him again and took in his face. It was like I had never truly seen him until my last moments on the spinning earth with him.
His silky raven black hair was so much longer than it had been the year before when it was an undercut; his hair almost kissed the skin of his strong shoulders. He usually wore it up and once, when I questioned why he never cut it again, he said he wanted a change. It fit him. He had it tucked behind his soft ear today, and wisps of its messiness fell in front his pale face. The year before, he always had dark, sleepless circles beneath his eyes, but they were gone now, replaced by a light pink flush that kissed his features true and warm. His dark eyes shimmered like dark pools of fresh ink, and I wanted to dip my quill in to their stillness to write my heart’s undying vows upon his perfect being. His lips, a year ago so used to a dark grimace, pulled softly up at the corners in a half smile, and they were almost red with fresh blood. They were chapped from all of our kisses. Through his white and torn shirt, I could almost see his scars that traced his body, but they only made him stronger; a testament to the Hell he had survived and rose from. He was greatness and power, lust and passion, warmth and love.
He was my everything in this world in which I had nothing.
He smiled widely at me and I felt my last breath leave my lips as he bent down to kiss me a final time.
“I love you,” I breathed.
Levi
“I love you,” she breathed lightly, her chest falling deep and hard from her laborious breathing, and she did not speak again.
“I love you too,” I said to the empty room as I cradled Hanji in my arms, and I rocked us back and forth gently as I looked in to her lifeless rusty eyes.
“Hanji,” I whispered, “you can’t leave me alone like this.”
Silence.
“We still need to see the outside world; we still aren’t truly free.”
In the distance, loud booms sounded through the walls of the little room I wept in.
“I promised to teach you to play the piano. We still need to go back to that little music shop in town and sip hot chocolate and listen to carolers. We missed them last Christmas!”
I laughed bitterly.
A shadow fell over the dark room and I looked to the window where I met the grey, lifeless eyes of a titan. Quickly, I picked up Hanji and bolted through the window opposite of where the titan peered in to our little safe house, and I flew in to the sky.
I scouted the fallen world around us and spotted a black forest ahead, and I flew to it with speed to escape the chasing titan behind us.
Hanji felt so cold in my arms, her icy skin as hard as frosted diamond.
We entered the forest and I felt us begin to fly lower to the ground.
I looked at Hanji’s face a final time, and I saw a soft smile playing at her dead supple lips.
There was a loud bang and a woosh as I looked up to see a lumbering titan hand collide with us.