Woohoo! An update within a week, I believe! Not sure if I can keep up with posting so quickly, but I'll try my best. I just started another college course so that may take up a lot of my spare time. Anyway, hope you enjoy! Also, some implied Levihan in here heh heh.
"What are you going to do with it once you get it out of him?" Levi was glaring at her, she could feel his gaze boring into the back of her head. Hange pushed her glasses up and rubbed her eyes, thinking. She turned toward Levi, who was standing by the bookcase with his arms crossed and his eyes narrowed at her.
"I don't know, Levi." Hange said. Levi went silent for a while, drumming his fingers on his upper arm.
"You're not keeping it." Levi said. "Whatever you do, you're not keeping it." Hange turned away from him, tears pricking at the corners of her eyes and her face heating up with anger. What were they supposed to do with it? Take it away from Armin and just kill it? Hange shook her head. She wasn't even sure who had technical custody of the titan. It was growing inside of Armin, but Hange was sure the decision of what to do with it would ultimately come down to her or Erwin.
"It has made no attempt to consume him or hurt him. We know that for sure." Hange said. She put her glasses back into place and glanced at her notes again.
"Yeah, well what happens when it starts getting a taste for people?" Levi asked. "We can't take any risks. We have no idea how big it will get, or what it's behavior will be like. If the MP's were trying to get Eren eaten, then we have to assume it will start wanting human flesh." Hange grit her teeth. He was right, of course. She hated it when he was right about things like this. There were too many unknowns, and too much risk to everyone else.
"Levi, I understand our military training taught us to make fast decisions, but this is different!"
"How is it different."
"I just have a feeling!" Hange's voice cracked. Levi looked at her for a long time, his face expressionless. Hange glared back, staring him down. The room was utterly silent. They could hear Levi's squad talking and laughing in the living room through the thin walls.
After several minutes of glaring, Levi finally glanced away, looking at Hange's desk.
"Tch. If he survives this, and if the titan survives, I suppose you can keep it in the basement...If you keep it restrained. And if it isn't trying to eat us." Hange was getting angrier.
"You can't restrain a baby!" She spat.
"Sure you can. Just tie the damn thing down." Hange stepped toward him, glowering down at him.
"Oh, I suppose it's so easy to just treat everything like a monster, huh?" Hange raised her voice. "Not emotional attachments?!"
"It is a monster!" Levi argued. Hange slammed her hands on her desk, losing her temper. She wanted to scream at him, make him see the kind of valuable information they could gain from such a rare test subject, but her sudden violence toward the table caused one of the syringes to roll. The large syringe rolled off the table and fell to the floor with a crash, shattering and spilling blood everywhere. "NO!" Hange shrieked and grabbed a cloth and a jar off the desk, kneeling down on the floor.
"This isn't one of your damned pets, Hange!" Levi yelled. "We don't know what it's capable of!"
"Shush!" Hange scrambled around, trying to scoop the blood into a jar. It didn't seem to be working very well, so she wiped the blood up with the cloth. She heard Levi mutter something, and her temper flared again. "I JUST DROPPED THE TITAN BLOOD LEVI, PLEASE STOP WHINING AND HELP ME BEFORE IT EVAPORATES!" Levi rolled his eyes and knelt down across from her, picking up the small glass jar. He pushed some of the blood into the jar, trying to avoid the shards of glass within the crimson liquid. "Uuugh!" Hange buried her face in her bloody hands. "It's RUINED! I'll have to get another sample and hurt Armin again and I can't take too much blood from the baby and..." Hange rambled on, trying not to break down and cry. She needed the sample. She had to learn more and figure out what to do.
"Ow, fuck!" Levi muttered. Hange looked up. He was still crouched next to the puddle of blood, clutching his left hand.
"Did you cut yourself?" Hange asked. Levi cursed under his breath and pulled out a handkerchief, wiping his hand quickly. "Did you?" Hange grabbed his hand. There was a cut across his palm, oozing blood. "How did you manage to do that?" Hange wondered aloud. She picked up a handkerchief from the floor. "Is this your blood or blood from the titan?" Hange asked.
"Both, probably." Levi picked up the jar he had scooped a bit of blood into. "Here." He handed it to her. "That's from the floor..." He got up and grabbed a cloth off of Hange's desk and began mopping up the puddle. Hange stepped right through it, making her way to her desk. She sat down and put the jar of blood in front of her, then realized something.
"Levi." Her eyes widened. "Levi, it's not evaporating." Levi looked up at her.
"You're positive that isn't Armin's blood?" He asked. Hange said nothing, picking up several dropper and two slides for her microscope. She smeared a drop of the titan blood on one, a drop of Armin's blood on the other, and compared the two. Levi got up. "Right, you do that. I'm gonna go wash this off..." He left, leaving Hange in peace for the moment.
Hange noticed that the two samples were very similar. She ran some tests, subjecting bits of both samples to certain chemicals to see the reactions. As time passed, she noticed some of the titan's blood begin to evaporate, but it was very slow. Much, much slower than a normal titan.
"Find anything interesting yet?" Levi had returned. He had a bandage on his hand and had completely cleaned the floor. Hange said nothing, scribbling down notes so fast her hand began cramping. "Hange?" Hange continued writing.
"It's titan blood. It's slowly evaporating..." She stopped writing and laid her pencil aside. "But...it's very similar to a human's."
"How similar?" Levi looked over her shoulder.
"Same reaction to certain chemicals that never worked on titan subjects." Hange said.
"What does it mean?" Levi asked. Hange stayed silent for a while, thinking. Her conclusion was insane, and needed more testing, but still. It was the only thing that made sense.
"I don't have any clear answers..." She began. "That would take months of extensive research and tests, but we don't have that time..." Hange pushed her glasses up and leaned back in her chair. "It's implying that it's part human." She turned to look at him. "I don't know if the serum was created that way, or if it's...binding with his DNA...what or how...but..."
"That's..." Levi shook his head.
"I have to keep them both alive." Hange said. "I won't know for sure until it's born." She propped her elbows on her desk and rested her head in her hands, feeling exhausted and drained again. She had only slept for a few hours the previous night, and being so anxious and worried was emotionally draining.
"You should get some rest, four-eyes." Levi said.
"But I need to check on him soon..." Hange said. She sighed. Her limbs felt heavy with exhaustion, and her stomach growled loudly with hunger.
"Hange." Levi rested his hands on her shoulders. "Go eat something and take a nap."
"Not...Hungry..." Hange murmured, nodding off. Her eyes drifted shut, and after a few minutes she felt Levi drape a blanket over her shoulders. Hange began to slip sideways out of her seat, and she jerked awake out of reflex.
"Ugh!" Hange shook her head. "Fine..." She got up and walked over to her bed, dragging the blanket with her. She flopped down face-first, burying her face into her pillow. "But only ten minutes..." She murmured. Levi laid down beside her, and she fell asleep in seconds.
The titan was squirming restlessly again, creating small ridges under the skin of Armin's belly. Armin was laying on the couch, his shoulders propped up with a pillow and his legs resting across Sasha's lap. Sasha was watching his stomach, munching on an apple from the plate of snacks resting on Armin's shins.
"Wonder if my stomach would do that if I ate a whole snake or lizard alive..." She wondered aloud.
"That probably isn't a good idea..." Armin grimaced uncomfortably as the titan continued squirming around.
"I would be tempted to try it for bragging rights alone." Conny piped up from his position on the other couch.
"I seriously doubt you two would want something like that in you..." Jean shuddered. "No offense, Armin. It's just not very ideal, y'know?"
"Yeah..." Armin agreed. "And it's not very comfortable..."
"What does it feel like?" Conny asked. Armin rested his hands on his belly, trying to figure out how to explain the odd sensation of another being squirming and moving around inside your belly.
"Like something is squirming inside me..." Armin said. "Pushing around on my organs..."
"And when it grows?" Sasha asked, her mouth full of bread.
"It gets hot and then feels like it's squeezing me from the inside..It really hurts..." He said.
"Well, here, this may help." Historia had caught the end of his sentence on her way back from the kitchen. "Maybe this will make you feel better after that shot." She laid a warm washcloth on Armin's belly. Armin smiled. It did feel better.
"Thanks." He said, tilting his head back to look at her. Historia smiled at him apologetically and sighed.
"This is my fault..." She said.
"No, don't blame yourself." Armin said.
"But it was me they were after..." She said.
"Still..." Armin was going to say there was nothing they could have done to prevent what had happened, to assure her that it wasn't her fault, but the heat and pain in his stomach was kicking up again. The heat became so intense he cried out, hunching forward and holding his belly.
"Armin!" Historia came around to the front of the couch. Sasha quickly picked up her plate and set it aside before it could spill.
"Armin?" Eren knelt down beside him. Armin gasped as his belly swelled, pushing down the waistband of his pants and stretching his skin even more. The titan began squirming around frantically, pushing outward. Armin groaned and rolled onto his side, curling up in pain. The wet cloth slipped off of his belly.
"Oh...Armin, your um..." Historia prodded his belly button gently. Armin glanced down at his stomach and saw that his belly button was slowly surfacing, creating a small round knob poking out. He stared blankly, too exhausted and in too much pain to be surprised by much more. The titan calmed down, and the heat slowly backed off. Armin turned onto his back again and stretched his legs out across Sasha's thighs.
"Are you okay?" Sasha asked. Armin took a shallow breath.
"No." he said.
"I'll be right back..." Historia headed toward the door and hurried outside. Armin laid his head back and closed his eyes, exhausted. Historia came back after a few minutes, and laid something cold on his stomach. He looked up in surprise and saw a small chunk of ice on his stomach. "The stream outside is starting to freeze." Historia said. She laid a cloth over the ice and held it to Armin's stomach for him. Armin closed his eyes, relaxing. The ice was soothing against his stomach and was cooling him off.
"Armin..." Eren was still kneeling beside the couch. "How do you do it?"
"Not like he has a choice..." Jean muttered. Armin cracked his eyes open and looked at Eren briefly, then closed them again. His breathing was shallow and painful. The titan was pushing on his insides so much it was making it difficult for him to breathe.
"Do I need to get Hange?" Eren asked.
"No..." Armin said softly. "It's stopped growing for now..." He rested his hand on his stomach, and the titan pressed it's foot to his hand in an apologetic way. The titan shifted a bit, and he began to feel a tiny, rhythmic pulsing inside his belly. It showed even on the outside, and Historia pressed her ear to his belly curiously.
"It's...hiccuping..." Historia said. Armin looked up.
"What?" He asked. Sasha leaned over and pressed her ear to his belly too.
"It is..." She said, her eyes wide.
"What? No waaaaaaaay." Conny came closer. "You sure that's a titan?"
"Noooo Conny, of course not." Jean said sarcastically. "Armin just became the first pregnant man by magic." Eren shook his head.
"It just doesn't make sense...It's not acting like a titan at all." He said
"Except the heat." Sasha said.
"It's...gentle, usually..." Armin said, looking at his stomach with a torn expression. "It doesn't mean to hurt me..." Armin rested his hand on his belly, getting teary again.
"What's wrong?" Eren asked.
"Wh...what if it's...not a monster?" Armin asked, beginning to cry. It was growing quickly, of course, but it felt so human. What if Hange killed it because it was a titan?
"Hange and Levi know what they're doing." Jean said. "They'll figure out the best thing to do." Armin wiped his eyes.
"But...ngh..." The titan began squirming again, pushing upward and making it even harder to breathe.
"Armin..." Eren rested a hand on Armin's shoulder. Armin arched his back uncomfortably and then lay still, feeling miserable. The titan already felt too big, like it was going to split his stomach open. His hips were hurting from being pushed apart, and Armin suddenly wondered if he was going to end up with broken bones from all this. He was sweating from the titan making him too hot, and altogether felt so miserable he just wanted to cry some more.
"Sorry..." Armin whispered.
"Don't apologize." Eren looked distressed. "Armin, do you want to move to your room?" Armin nodded and sat up slowly. Sasha and Mikasa helped him up and helped him back to his room.
Armin stopped and leaned against Sasha while Mikasa arranged his pillows for him, then lay down. Mikasa had arranged some pillows to support his back and legs, and the position helped the pain in his hips.
"Better?" Sasha asked.
"Yeah..." Armin pulled a blanket up, feeling cold suddenly. "Better..." Eren brushed Armin's hair out of his eyes and felt his forehead. He frowned.
"You're too warm." Eren said. Mikasa touched Armin's cheek.
"Just a low fever..." She said.
"Armin, lose the blanket. You need to stay cool." Eren said. Armin looked at him wearily.
"Fine..." He sighed and pushed the blanket off. Armin closed his eyes and lay his head back, trying to sleep.
He was just beginning to doze off when Eren spoke again.
"It's hurting him, Mikasa." Eren said.
"She needs to take it out of him..." Mikasa agreed.
"Do you think it's killing him?" Eren asked. He sounded scared.
"It's dangerous, even if it's not trying to be." Sasha said. She sounded nervous and wary. Mikasa sighed, and Armin felt someone stroke his hair.
"I don't know how much longer he can keep this up..." She said.
