Chapter 12: Weaving together (1)
It was messed up. Just messed up.
Ellen mentally cursed himself as he kneeled on the ground, head bowed and trying to figure out if glares could kill. Technically it couldn't, but it seemed possible with the glare Heichou was giving him. More than possible, actually. He felt like he was going to die right this minute from anxiety and dread. Ellen tightly bit his lips and squeezed his eyes as he awaited his doom. What did he do to deserve this?
A few days have gone by after the 57th expedition, but Ellen had stayed quiet. He needed time to plan his move and get Heichou off guard. When Levi Heichou was relaxed and expecting nothing, he'll strike.
But today, he had other important things to do. He needed to talk to the person he was going to weave together with Levi. Petra.
Ellen carefully planned his time to approach Petra. He accidently 'happened' to walk by her when she was getting water from the well, and 'accidently' knocked off one of the buckets, spilling the water all over the ground.
"Oh, I'm so sorry, Petra-san!" He apologized, getting to his knees to mop up the mess.
"No, it's quite all right…" Petra kindly smiled, she too getting on her knees and hands. Ellen quietly observed her, thinking how kind she was and how she would be able to heal the scars inside Levi's heart. A perfect match, it was.
They cleaned the mess in silence for a while, both busy. When Petra-san was done and was about to stand up, Ellen looked up and spoke.
"Petra-san, do you love Levi Heichou?"
Petra seemed to be caught off-guard by that question. Her face became bright cherry red, and she was unable to speak for a couple of moments.
"W-W-What are you talking about?" She stuttered, gritting her teeth.
"Well, I do know that you love Levi Heichou, but would you accept this Levi Heichou, the Heichou from the other world?" Ellen innocently clarified, a genuine look of curiosity hanging from his face.
Petra did not answer. They both sat in silence, Ellen patiently waiting for Petra to talk and Petra struggling for words.
"…I do love him…" Petra began, grudgingly opening her mouth to speak.
"Since I was a newbie in Survey Corpse, I looked up to him and always thought that I wanted to stand by him.
But I'm not so sure anymore…Levi Heichou is the man I love yet not the man I love. He is the man I know yet not the man I knew. But if he says that he loves me…what can I do? I love him; but he's not the man I loved. And he will leave, won't he? He needs to leave for his own world…and what will happen? Will the Heichou from this world love me too? What if he doesn't? Then should I just sit back and watch the man I was in love with fall for another person?"
Ellen listened attentively, partly understanding the confusion and disbelief Petra was feeling. He was the one who was moved into another world too, after all.
"And I heard what he said about the moving between worlds. After he moves back, he won't remember anything, will he? And I won't, too. I will never remember that we loved each other… I don't know, Ellen. I don't know."
Petra finished talking, her face buried in her hands. The yellow-eyed boy only stood up and walked away.
Matchmaking was not easy as he thought.
Ellen felt absolutely miserable.
He had decided to make Petra and Levi discover that they loved each other and start a relationship, but to say the truth, he had no idea how. How would be make them tell each other that they loved each other? And that's not even the reason they're not together. They're afraid of the eventual parting they would have to experience later. But that was reasonable. Ellen knew how much it would hurt when the time came to parting, even if the memory would be probably erased later.
"Thinking, eh?" A cheerful, energetic voice piped up from behind him. Ellen looked behind in surprise, seeing that it was, just as he expected, Hange-san. The overexcited woman plopped to the sit next to Ellen and made herself comfortable.
"H-Hange-san…" Ellen stuttered, not sure how to exactly react. What was she here for? Did she need him for another Titan experiment? Or did she want to discuss more about the parallel universe theory? Whatever it was, Ellen was ready to welcome that with open arms. His head ached from thinking too much and he could use some distractions.
"They're a hard couple to string together, aren't they?" Hange-san said mysteriously, staring off to the blue sky. Ellen only stared at her quizzically. She couldn't be talking about…them, could she?
"Um…who?" The yellow-eyed boy cautiously questioned, flinching as the crazy woman slapped her hands down on the ground and whipped her head around.
"Who? Who? Who know who! Levi and Petra, of course! Everybody knows that they love each other but too shy to say it. What, you can just see love from the look on their faces when they look at each other! Why, even yesterday I saw Levi staring at Petra withthis super-longinglookonhisfacewithlove-"
"Yes, I know…" Ellen cut her off as the crazy woman's words began to marge together in excitement.
"I know that they love each other…and I think they know it themselves, too. But they refuse to be together! They're afraid of it!" Ellen gushed, getting swept away in some of his own temper. But as he almost reached the boiling point, a fact popped into his head, making his head sag like a lost puppy.
"But it is fair to be afraid…who wouldn't be? They would have to part later, no matter what. Even if the memories are erased, the hurt remains, rooted forever in the heart…I can't just force them together just for my own sake. I can't."
They stayed silent for a moment, Hange quiet for once and Ellen remembering how much it hurt when he realized that Mikasa and Armin, his two friend who were always by his side, was one someone else's side. He didn't realize how precious they were to him, how much he loved them until they were taken away.
Ellen snapped his eyes open.
"That's it!" He yelled excitedly, all concerned swept away in his new, brilliant idea that popped into his head.
"What?" Hange looked at Ellen, feeling some of her own excitement rising.
"I think I know how to make Heichou and Petra realize their love to each other. But we'll need other people's help to make this work."
So, Ellen briefly explained his plan to Hange, who listened attentively and pointed out some things that could use the improvement. Ten minutes later, they had the whole plan formed.
"I'm pretty sure I can enlist Eren, Mikasa, and Armin to help us…Sasha will do anything for food…"
"I'll get Erwin to help us, too. He'd been waiting for an opportunity to string them together for forever. And I bet I can persuade Mike and Nanaba into helping, too."
They nodded at each other, and ran off in different directions, to bring help and put their plan to action.
A/N: The plan will be carried out in the next chapter! I'm sorry if this chapter was a bit boring but I had the writer's block and had to squeeze by brain for ideas and to meet the deadline I set to myself. I gave out so many hints in the previous chapters, but now I have no idea how to connect them...But I'll figure it out somehow. Also, in the previous chapter, I kind of bombed the readers with the info that Levi was actually from another world...and was bombed myself by the fact that nobody seemed surprised. Was that obvious? Anyway, thank you for reading, please review!