"You aren't gonna lose me."
The words play back again in his head like a never ending loop as he sees her broken body slumped against the tree stump, eyes wide and mouth parted, as if she were completing a sentence before being cut off by death. They ring in his ears, and for a moment, he feels as if he may faint.
"You aren't gonna lose me."
The words she had uttered just before the 57th expedition had began, his face in her hands and her eyes fierce with determination. He had been concerned for her safety, and asked if she would stay close to him. She retorted with a laugh and saying that she could take care of herself. He responded by telling her that that wasn't the point, that he knew she could take care of herself, and was probably the strongest solider in the entire squad.
(that had made her blush, and made a small smile appear on his face. he always loved it when she would get flushed - the only type of rushing blood that he could ever imagine himself loving)
That he just had a bad feeling about this expedition. "We don't know what that Jaeger brat will get us into," he had said, and she laughed and came up closer to him to put his hand in hers. "I just want you to be okay, Petra." He looked up at her then, with hints of emotion peeking through his stoic grey-blue eyes, shattering his stony resolve. A flash of sadness appeared across her features, before she had taken his face in her hands and kissed him so tenderly the walls he had attempted to build up crumbled between her fingers as she held him.
"Levi," her voice a soft whisper that pierced the silence that had fallen around them. "You aren't gonna lose me." Words unwavering and eyes as stubborn as ever, she had stated it so boldly: as if the Titans had never existed, as if the faith of humanity hadn't been resting upon their shoulders, as if they weren't just a mere seconds away from death's door everyday. "It's gonna take a lot more than a few titans to keep me away from you, Captain."
(apparently so. it had taken a human in titan form to take her out, and even so, she had fought long and hard with her comrades and until the bitter end)
He had then chuckled, lightly taken her hands off his face, and placed a soft kiss to each of them, giving her a rare small smile. "I will never let anything bad happen to you, Petra."
He lied.
"You aren't gonna lose me."
He wants to cry, wants to scream, wants to curse the world for taking away the one thing he's ever cared for, the only person he could ever love.
(have loved, he corrects himself, and the past tense of the word sends his heart into an apocalyptic storm)
He wants to cradle her body and sob into her chest, hoping to locate the heartbeat that he had fallen asleep to countless nights before. He wants to duck down and close her eyes so she never has to see this disgusting world again, even in death. He wants to hold her, wants to kiss her, wants to touch her one last time. He wants to tell her he loves her, even if it is just to a dead corpse with lifeless hair, and bloodless skin, and dull eyes, but who is still so, so Petra.
He just wants her to know.
But no, no he would do none of that. He would stay cold and composed, just like he's always been - just like he's always had to be. Even if the girl with the strawberry blonde hair, and amber eyes, and kiss so soft it took his breath away was taken from the world, from him.
(how could he have ever deserved something so pure, something as precious as she was? the world could not let him have such a joy, that he was certain of)
He has to stay focused, has to stay strong, has to stay sane, but then realizes he can't feel anything at all anyways.
So instead, he gazes at her with the calm face he had been taught to put on for so many years. Instead he looks at her broken corpse as if she was just another solider, as if that was all that she ever was to the world, but then remembers the fact that he was never a good liar anyway. Instead, he stares at her beautiful face and her mangled body for just a few short seconds before zipping off in his 3DMG gear and never looking back.
"You aren't gonna lose me."
But he had. He had lost her. She had lied to him. And now she was gone.
(but, really, he had lied as well, so truly, who was to blame? both in the moment had made godly promises of controlling their fate that they knew they were incapable of keeping, but made them anyways because in the face of love, reality doesn't really seem to make sense, does it?)
The words taunt him as he flies, and Levi wonders why he was foolish enough to have ever believed that they could survive in this catastrophic world of theirs. Once again, he lives as he always lives in the midst of death and destruction, and she not, and he can't shake the feeling that death should've taken him too.
(he pretends not to see the paleness of her face, and pretends not to notice the sting in his heart when he realizes the rise of colour in her cheeks is gone)