Chapter 32: The Worst Thing

Blood. So much blood.

He just wouldn't stop bleeding.

Her bloodstained hands covering the hole in his body weren't enough. Someone held out a white rag directly in front of her. Hange. She was saying something about a tourniquet, disappearing out of Nora's field of vision.

Nora bunched up the cloth and pressed it to the wound with both shaking hands.

Levi's face was lifeless, deathly pale where it wasn't covered in blood from the wound on his head. She had no way of telling how bad that one was. Only that it didn't nearly bleed as much as the one on his abdomen.

This wasn't real. This made no sense. It was Levi. He didn't get hurt.

Except he had, in the past, just never like this.

Someone closed the door. The airship came to life.

"At least thirty soldiers in close quarters left for him, I estimate, and he made it out alive? And then managed to get up here in this condition?" Ayad sounded impressed. No, positively delighted. "Fascinating."

"Shut the fuck up!" Nora's voice was shrill, hurting in her ears. The cloth was already soaked dark crimson. Her hands were wet and slippery with Levi's blood.

So much blood.

She didn't feel her body anymore. There was only naked, mind-numbing, soul-crushing terror.

Shit. Shit. Shit. I can't lose you. I cannot do this without you.

He had kept his promise—he had made it back—and it would be for fuck all.

Her ears were ringing again. Beneath that, she registered strange, harsh sounds whose source she couldn't determine, at first. They came from her, she realised then. Vicious sobs were racking her chest.

Not that it mattered. Not that anything mattered, anymore, other than that the person dearest to her, the best thing that had ever happened to her, was dying right under her hands.

Hange had just joined her with more supplies when the scientist started speaking again. "You might already know this, but I was a surgeon. Well, I still am, just in another—" He stopped himself, shaking his head, one corner of his mouth lifting into a sardonic half-smile. "Never mind. My point is, if his regenerative capacity is anything like I expect it to be, I might be able to save him. If you let me."

Nora just stared at him, fingers clawing into the warm, wet cloth. She must have heard wrong, or he must be joking; judging by his tone, he could as well have offered to bake them a cake. As if it made any fucking sense to casually suggest this to your enemies and abductors. As if he were only looking for a pleasant diversion to pass the time during their trip.

Liar. They had got themselves a fucking sociopath.

The hatred inside Nora burned hotter as she took in his calm and calculating expression. "Do you really think we're that stupid?" The uncontrollable, ragged breaths wrecking her lungs chopped the sentence into three parts.

"I think that if you wait until we arrive at your island, your beloved will probably die of blood loss. A tourniquet is of no use here. He has internal bleeding and I assume organ damage that your doctors might or might not be able to deal with appropriately. Provided he even holds out that long, which is unlikely, to state it optimistically."

Hange lightly squeezed her shoulder. "He isn't lying about Levi's condition, Nora." The controlled calm of her voice didn't quite hide the tremor in it.

Even more hot tears obscured Nora's vision, streaking down her cheeks, dripping on her hands, mixing with his blood covering her skin. "Why should we trust you?" she choked out. "Why would you want to save one of us?"

"Despite what you may think, I have no reason to hate you Eldians." The doctor fidgeted with his cuffed hands behind his back, pulling a face. The cuffs were chafing. Good. "I'm on no one's side but my own and on science's, which might be, I believe, the reason you chose me, and not one of the researchers born and raised in Marley." He wasn't exactly wrong; Eren might have picked him for this reason among others, and they had put some hope into the fact that he was of Mid Eastern descent. His smug, punchable face indicated that he could read the affirmation plainly from their faces. From Hange's, at least. "Frankly, I am in no rush to die, and I am very invested in preserving someone with such a special biology as him."

"So, not out of the goodness of your heart, then," Nora concluded, her quavering voice dripping with cynicism.

"God, no." He shrugged. "I'd advise you to make your decision quickly."

"Nora? What will it be?" asked Hange.

Nora didn't understand, didn't want to understand. "What—what should I—you tell me, Hange, please, you're the commander, why would I—" Her voice, high and desperate, failed. She met Hange's gaze, imploring.

"I'm sorry, Nora, but no. This is your decision to make. And I trust you." Hange did sound apologetic, but first and foremost she was adamant. Issuing a command.

It was cruel beyond expression.

Shit. Think. Think. Nora looked at her hands again, at the cloth, red red red. Then took in Levi's still, grey face.

No. She couldn't think like this. She could barely breathe like this. Her heart was bruising her ribcage, so painful that it nauseated her. She squeezed her eyes shut.

This explanation was the first thing Ayad had said that made sense. He might still just be a skilled liar, but why go through all that trouble to harm an already dying man if it meant his own death? And he'd made it abundantly clear this wasn't some altruistic act.

"Do it!" She was almost screeching. Focusing on her anger—at that man, at the present, at the fucked-up life they had to lead. "Do it, with Hange's assistance, and I will watch, and if you do anything to purposely harm him, I will kill you without a moment's hesitation, I swear. And I'll make it slow."

"I believe you." The doctor's eyes had widened a bit, not quite as unaffected and business-like as before, his throat bobbing as he swallowed. "You will not watch, however. There's nothing worse than loved ones in the room when I'm cutting someone open."

Another wave of panic swallowed her whole, battling with her fury. Her nausea worsened. "No chance in hell am I going to—"

"Then I won't do it, simple as that." He still seemed afraid, yet steadfast. Well aware he had the upper hand, the bastard. "You would only be distracting me and therefore endangering him. Do you want him to die?"

Two seconds of silence, of failing to come up with a quick solution that wouldn't require her to leave. "Fuck you," Nora spat, chest heaving. Her blurry gaze fastening on Levi, she backed away, wiping at her tears with her bloodied hands, and let Hange take over her spot. "Uncuff him," she said in the general direction of her comrades, throat constricting.

They were going to do this. They were going through with this lunacy, and again, it was on her.

It was Levi, and it was on her.

Rubbing at his wrists, Ayad nodded, all business again. "Which medical supplies do you have here?"

Rummaging through the sizeable kit she had brought, Hange rattled down the list, the only sign of anxiety her pressed voice. "Everything you need to work sterile, bandages, suture kit, gauze, morphine, scalpel, tweezer, the likes—and me to assist you. As well as three other soldiers who aren't quite as… personally involved." She threw Nora an apologetic glance. "I have the most experience, but every one of us is trained in first aid, so if you need another—"

"One will suffice," Ayad said, already inspecting the instruments. He had got up from the bench and drawn closer the moment Nora had stepped away. "What we've got here will have to make do. Regarding the blood loss, we'll have to rely on his enhanced regeneration." He took another cool, assessing look at Levi. "In fact, you'll have to hope he has even better healing capabilities than I presume."

Utter desperation carved out Nora's insides, leaving behind nothing but undiluted agony. She wiped and wiped and wiped at her eyes with her trembling hands, over and over, to no avail.

"Everyone leave now," Hange ordered. "Wait in the back room."

Two steps forward again, Nora couldn't help it; her grip on Hange's arm was like a vice. "Watch out for him."

Eyes locking, Hange laid her palm over Nora's hand for a brief instant, giving a squeeze. "I will."

One last—maybe the last—look at Levi. When she turned and exited the room, stifling another sob with the back of her hand, her heart was left behind, beaten and broken.

#

What followed were the longest, most excruciating hours of her life. Was it even more than one? Two? Three? She had no idea.

This was real. This wasn't what if anymore.

Sasha had sat down next to her on the hard bench, with only a hand-width between their shoulders. She was quiet, but her shoulders were quaking every now and then.

Nora couldn't understand. How come Sasha didn't hate her?

The relentless flow of tears slowly, steadily ebbed away. As if, now that reality had finished taking its poisonous roots inside her, her mind and body no longer had the capacity for crying, too busy with everything else this reality brought in its wake. To keep from moving, from breaking apart into even smaller pieces, she dug her blood-crusted fingernails into the soft skin of her wrist, drawing her own blood, over and over. The short-lived, sharp sting of pain was no match for her inner torment. And each time, the red crescents would mend themselves in an instant; as Levi could not.

The thin slivers of steam were mocking her.

She wished this wasn't real. She wished she weren't real. Just another one of her godawful dreams, fading to nothing but an echo of pain after a while.

Softly, Sasha tapped a spot close to her left shoulder, right below her clavicle. Nora almost jumped in her seat. Her leg stopped bouncing like crazy.

"You've got a hole in your uniform here. Did you get shot?" Sasha's voice was hollow, her big, golden-brown eyes bloodshot. She was a husk of herself, her expression utterly unanimated, rendering her features unfamiliar.

It took Nora a while to process the words, and even longer to remember. It seemed an eternity ago. It seemed like such an insignificant detail. It was an insignificant detail. "Yeah, actually."

Sasha considered the long-gone wound, gaze empty. "Did the bullet pass through?"

"No idea." Nora shrugged, sounding so very much like Sasha: like nothing. But unlike Sasha, every single one of her movements was jerky, agitated. "Does it matter?"

Sasha merely blinked at her, as if she hadn't heard the question. "Can I look?"

Why not, Nora thought. If Sasha wanted to, for whatever reason, then she should. Nora turned her back on her younger squad mate.

"There it is," Sasha said after several seconds. "I suppose it's a good thing you don't have a bullet left inside you." Her finger drew a circle at the back of Nora's shoulder. "The exit hole is bigger."

She tensed. I know. Images of Connie flashed before her eyes, seared into her brain forever, in good company with the ones she had of Eld, Oluo, Petra, Gunther.

She would never, ever share those details with her squad mates, least of all Sasha. It didn't really matter what it looked like, if your body was broken and bloody and your head bent backwards, or if you were torn in half and your entrails spilling out, or if your brains were blown out; gone was gone.

They'd already lost too much, tonight, and still it wasn't over. It wasn't like in most stories, where everyone else was safe for the duration of that particular adventure just because one of the characters had died already. Where never, say, four friends were killed in the span of minutes. But above all, it rarely, so rarely, hit the strongest. The strongest was the hero, and he was always in the greatest danger, yet he always saved the day, and he never got hurt beyond a little scratch.

Her life had never been like those stories she read. Neither had it been for any of her friends and comrades. They all weren't heroes—there was no such thing as a hero in a war—and maybe that was why these rules didn't apply. Maybe that was why he'd got hurt, very, very badly hurt.

Not only her favourite person, but her person.

Levi was her person, her once-in-a-lifetime, both her journey and her destination. And she was about to lose this forever, because nothing was permanent—except death.

If this was the price of freedom, it was too much to pay.

So, if he died, to hell with it all. Why continue to suffer, to kill and kill with no end in sight, when she had lost what made it worth it? When she had lost the pivotal factor all her goals hinged on? No, fuck it all, then. Let someone else have her as a snack and take over her role as an instrument of mass destruction.

She couldn't follow him—there was nowhere to follow—but at least the pain would stop, then.

Levi wouldn't want her to die, obviously. But what he wanted would hardly matter if he didn't exist anymore, would it? Death was the end. There was no going back. Nothing left aside from an empty shell, the mind that had once inhabited the brain inside gone for good. She had seen it countless times.

Her thoughts made her feel exactly like the devil she probably was, like the one she would have to be. But without him, how could she possibly find the strength to keep fighting, to do whatever had to be done? Without him, how could she possibly find the strength to do anything?

This life, without him… She wouldn't be able to bear it.

Any life, at all. Not after he'd shown her what it could be like.

#

The door opened without warning, revealing Hange and the doc. The knots in Nora's gut tightened and twisted as she shot to her feet. She tried to brace herself, but that was impossible.

The lines around Hange's mouth were tense, her face pallid, weary creases decorating her eye. Ayad, on the other hand, looked tired and dishevelled, too, but nothing in his face indicated any sort of tension. Then, of course, he didn't care outside of mild scientific curiosity.

Before Nora could feel more than a wave of nauseating dread, the doc said, "He is stable for now, but in critical condition. I managed to stop the worst of the bleeding and removed the destroyed part of his liver. The bullet, as well; nasty little thing was lodged in his ribcage. The next few days will be crucial. And even then…" He hesitated, eyeing her apprehensively. As if whatever he was going to say next made him fear for his safety. "I cannot say when he will wake up—if at all. It depends entirely on just how much more resilient he is compared to regular humans. Only time can tell."

It was hard to hear everything over her thundering pulse. Hard to focus when her mind got caught on certain scraps of Ayad's report. Like, removed the destroyed part of his liver.

And if at all.

The weak flicker of relief in Nora's chest after hearing "he is stable" had been smothered near instantly. It wasn't a not, it was only a not yet. The waiting wasn't over. Somehow, she had assumed that after this, the waiting would be over, one way or another. This was immeasurably better than that one alternative, yet she didn't know how she could possibly have the strength to endure more of this. For an indeterminate amount of time, with an indeterminate outcome. If every fibre of her being hadn't been consumed with the need to go see Levi, the weight of her new reality would already have pushed her down to the ground, unable to stand up again.

Unasked and uncaring of her state of mind, Ayad added, "In my estimation, it is more likely that he won't make it. But I am exceptionally curious."

Bleeding git.

Without a glance, Nora brushed past him—he had the good sense to shrink back—and headed into the room she had been banned from.

They'd moved Levi onto a stretcher, away from the bloodbath near the door. He was bare from the hips upwards, except most of his torso was covered in bandages. Another bandage was wrapped around his head, just above his eyes and ears. Where the wound was hidden beneath, the white cloth was reddening already: a long streak from his left temple to past his ear. It could only have been a graze shot.

His face was as still as the rest of him. There was nothing in his expression, no tension, just nothing.

Nora dropped to her knees beside him. It felt like her heart had been wrenched out, leaving behind a bottomless pit. Seeing him like this… He was barely there. It was like watching him die.

She might just be watching him die.

Blinking back those useless tears and swallowing a sob, she wrapped her hand around his wrist, pressing her fingertips to the inside, feeling for a pulse. When she found it—weak, slow—she stayed exactly as she was. Else, she might lose even that last tiny shred of composure she had recovered.

Hange settled down beside her into a cross-legged seat. She didn't talk, just kept her company. Nora's gaze was fixed on Levi; she didn't glance over to find out where Hange was looking, and what was on her expression.

What Hange had done took too long to sink in. How composed she'd been. No loved ones, Ayad had demanded. Well, Nora might have been painfully obvious, but next to her hysteria, he seemingly hadn't noticed how close friends Hange was with Levi.

Hange had needed to function, so she had functioned. Impeccably. She was just that strong, that great of a soldier.

"Thank you for doing this," Nora said hoarsely. "Must have been difficult." Her voice was void of all human feeling. She didn't have any left to spare; it was all stuck inside, so much her body couldn't feel it all any longer. It was still there, but numbed, as if smothered by a scratchy blanket.

Her words had to suffice.

When Hange spoke, Nora could hear the sadness, the weak smile. "It's certainly not an experience I want to repeat."

"If it's any consolation," Nora said blankly, "you won't ever have to rummage through my innards. I'll sort it out myself, if I want to or not. I'm just that considerate." Her eyes were no longer directed at Levi's face, but at her own hand, covered in dried blood, clinging to his wrist.

"Sometimes, you still manage to surprise me," Hange said after a few seconds, that little smile still audible, now probably accompanied by a faint shake of her head.

Nora could have asked what was so surprising. Then again, it didn't matter at all. Minutes passed without either of them saying a single word. With the faint tap of Levi's pulse against her fingertips, her capability to form analytical, critical thought processes slowly returned. Those that she usually couldn't shut off without Levi's help. Except, sometimes, when she was flying.

Their return was a very, very bad thing. It tore holes into the numbing, scratchy blanket.

"You were probably right," Nora said, voice thick. "We should never have done this. Maybe it was all for nothing, and now Connie… and Levi—" She broke off before another sob could escape her. She hadn't known she still had some left. But she didn't have the necessary air in her constricted lungs to continue talking, anyway.

"No," Hange told her, so firmly Nora looked up, stunned. "Look, the man might be an ass we can't trust, but he is doubtlessly brilliant. The way he worked was nothing short of amazing. Whatever his motives, he definitely did his best to save Levi." Hange's gaze was full of conviction, not straying from Nora's for even a second. "If today showed me anything, it's that you were right. Not that you hadn't already convinced me before, or I would never have agreed to this. We should have focused on our scientific progress earlier. I know we didn't because we had our hands full with developing our military and infrastructure, but how else are we supposed to survive, and maybe even find a long-term solution for peace? We can't defend ourselves properly with what we know now, and trade offers alone aren't enough to end this war. We can't convince the world to accept us if we know no more than the practical aspects of titan biology. People fear what they don't understand and what they can't control."

It was Nora's own foolish sentiments on the subject—before—repeated back at her, embellished with Hange's unique insightfulness. Reasonable—in theory. In practice, Nora couldn't bear to hear any of it. Not when excruciating grief and regret tore her up inside. Who knew if she thought clearly, right now, but the more realistic potential outcome seemed clear enough to her. "Everything about this is uncertain. It's wishful thinking. Maybe there is nothing helpful to learn, only shit that makes it worse. I pushed you to do this because of nothing but wishful thinking." The pitch of her voice had climbed up, her eyes burning. "I'm not Erwin. I'm no good at betting. Levi fucked up big time, back in Shiganshina, only so I could fuck up now." And this was what he got for it. For the first time, Nora truly, wholeheartedly wished he hadn't chosen her. Her grasp on his limp wrist tightened. "No matter what, this risk wasn't worth taking."

"Stop. Yes, you aren't Erwin, but everything else you said isn't true." Hange took Nora's face in her hands, bringing their foreheads together for a moment. "We completed this mission, we suffered painful losses, and we have something to show for it. Sound familiar to you? Don't forget who you are. You are a Scout. You have always known what that means. Every single member of the Survey Corps knows. If not for our dedication, our sacrifices, our conviction that the fighting and the risks are worth it, we all wouldn't be here anymore. Please, believe me, continue believing this no matter what."

The lump in Nora's throat seemed to have grown to the point she shouldn't have been able to get in any air at all. Regardless, she felt like a big, jagged stone had been lifted from her chest—one of a hundred—alleviating some of the pain. She nodded, wrapping her free hand around Hange's wrist, and did her best to whisper, "Thank you."

She was suddenly ashamed of herself for what she'd thought in her despair, when Levi had been on the brink of bleeding out, and she in another room with no way of knowing if it had already happened.

Yes, it was true that she didn't want to live in this fucked-up world without him, she held no illusions about that. And if she died in this war, well then too bad. But what she wanted wasn't the point here; she couldn't leave Hange to deal with this alone. She couldn't just leave all of this alone, unfinished. She wouldn't, no matter what happened next. Until this ended, she couldn't stop fighting.

So that everyone could see the ocean, one day, and what lay beyond. So that everyone could live their life, simple as that. No matter what they were born as. Besides, there were truths left to be uncovered. Truths that would not interest her any longer, if it came to the worst. Her worst.

Still. Whatever was left of her would continue fighting.

After all, Levi had always been saying she was stubborn.

AN:

... I hope you enjoy pain, I guess?