Author: I love writing dialogue between Hange and Levi because Hange forcefully reminds me of someone that I know.
To answer a question asked last chapter...updates are still on Mondays.

"Top of the mornin' to—"

"Stop."

Hange looked over her glasses curiously, examining her colleague across the breakfast table. "Hey...you look like shit."

"Your compliments are appreciated," Levi replied sardonically, tracing a finger along the inner corner of one shadowed eye where fatigue itched and whined.

"Are you hungover?"

"Don't be stupid. I don't get hungover."

"You're drinking coffee again."

"It doesn't count if I don't actually drink it. I'm just looking at it...I don't think that I could stomach the shit right now. Does anyone actually like coffee, or is it just something that humanity collectively started pretending one day?"

"You're talkative, too."

"I am not...not talkative," Levi argued, stifling a barely-perceptible yawn that did not escape Hange.

"Are you not sleeping at night?"

"Not less than usual, if that's what y—"

"Did you hit your head?"

"No...?"

"I should have known the answer to that one; you're not tall enough to hit your head on anyth—"

"I'm ill, Hange, so shut up."

Hange blinked. "You're not."

"I am."

"I don't believe you."

"I'm only human. I get ill just like you do and today I'm ill. I feel like shit."

"What are your symptoms?! Describe it."

"You're not a doctor."

Hange sniffed haughtily. "I am, however, a woman of science. Women of science solve the problems and mysteries of the world and you, Captain Levi, are probably the second-greatest enigma that the world has to offer."

Levi didn't have to ask what Hange thought that the first one was. The prospect of fending her off before dawn, however, made his eyes ache in his skull, so he leaned forward and said, in a low voice, "I have a fever."

"Did you get someone to check?"

"I didn't."

"How do you know, then?"

"I feel hot and cold at the same time. I'm pretty sure that's what a damn fever feels like."

Hange leaned across the table, one hand pushing aside Levi's dark fringe to feel his skin and the other narrowly missing a plate of orange marmalade. "You don't feel warm."

"Don't touch me; your hands are dirty."

"Dirt don't hurt."

"Don't speak like that, either; you sound like a ruffian."

"Yes, you would be the expert on that topic."

"Keep your voice down."

"I am, I am...what else are you convinced is wrong with you?"

"Stomach's bad, throat's weird—"

"Your throat sounds fine to me."

"Are you deaf as well as blind?"

"I'm not blind; I'm near-sighted—"

"Shit." Levi shook his hair back into place, hiding his eyes as his already uncomfortable insides resumed the previous night's gymnastics routine.

"What...?" Hange looked over her shoulder, down the rows of long tables, to where a small group of bleary-eyed young women were emerging through the door at the opposite end of the mess hall. "Levi...are you hiding from a gaggle of little girls?"

"It's...complicated," Levi allowed, a groan seeping into his tone as he caught sight of a flash of ginger near the center of the clique. "Just don't let any of them come over here."

Hange spun back around, slapping both hands against the table. A fork jumped ship and clattered to the floor. "Uh, who's the lucky lady?!"

"Not now; I'm—"

"You're not sick, Levi."

"If you keep talking, I'm about to be."

"Who is it?!"

"If I tell you anything, the entire outpost knows before noon—"

"So, there is someone!"

"—whether it's true or not."

"Did you do it?!"

Levi had been testing the lukewarm coffee, which was only getting worse instead of better, and promptly gagged on it. "What—? No—fuck no—"

Hange snorted into her plate. Levi rose to leave and shoved his chair in under the table in exasperation; it rapped against Hange's knees.

"Hey, Romeo, where are you going?"

"I don't have time for this."

He had turned to leave but Hange, still seated, grabbed his wrist before he could step away.

"Don't make a scene," she said, lowering her voice. "I'm sure that would be unseemly to our mystery lady. Anyhow, it's okay, you know. Welcome, Captain Levi, to the ranks of us lesser mortals: if your personal life isn't a carriage wreck, you are not living it fully."

Despite, or perhaps because of, the preceding banter, Levi felt a sudden rush of admiration for the crazy woman who never failed to take it all in stride with grace and acceptance. He cast a glance over his shoulder at his friend—she was smiling, genuinely, and he felt some of the tension leave his body.

"Okay, doctor..." he said, fighting the corner of his mouth that threatened to turn upwards. "What am I going to do?"

Hange released him, reaching across the table for a butter knife. "I don't know," she said as she spread jam liberally across her toast. "Get laid."