Chapter Text
“I don’t know, Erwin. Ever since Pops died, I just don’t know if I can come back there. Can’t we just take a goddamn road trip and see something interesting?”
“Come on, Zoe. You know you’re going to hate yourself if you never come back here. You grew up in Paradise. Plus, all you ever do is travel for your project, or whatever it is you’re working on. Don’t you want a break?”
“...Call me Zoe again, I’ll kick your face in.”
“Okay, Hange.”
Hange never liked any of the shitty bars that seemingly surrounded the town they grew up in, but they had a particular hatred for a grimy tavern named Kenny’s Bughouse. It was always full of loud, rowdy country boy types from towns in the neighboring county. Maria County, undoubtedly full of concerned parents and old people that rejoiced at the return to Puritanical killjoyism, passed a contentious law by the skin of their teeth about five years ago that the entire place would be a “dry county.” No liquor could be found anywhere. In any of the towns in the entire county. Hange almost felt bad for them, because honestly, nothing but alcohol could make living anywhere in Maria County sound like a good idea.
Anyway, enter the slightly rundown town of Paradise. After the iron and coal boom in the 50s had ceased, the town had all but died– but the one thing keeping steady traffic running through it was the fact that it was right on the border of Maria County, but technically, fell under the jurisdiction of Rose County. Kentucky State Representatives everywhere were quaking in their boots. Every person of legal age (and some who weren’t) hightailed their asses to the longtime favorite watering hole, Kenny’s Bughouse. Hange’s least favorite place. Once, on spring break in college, someone had tried to spike their drink there, and the night ended with their best friend Levi speeding to the only ER in the entire town while berating them for drinking in the first place. They swore they would never go back there.
Anyway, long story short, Kenny’s was their least favorite place. However, they had agreed to go with Erwin and Levi as part of the “Boys’ Weekend Extraordinaire” he had planned. Hange told him the name was a little gay. Erwin agreed, but kept calling it that anyway. Hange asked him if he was gay for the third time that week, and he rather aggressively answered that a gay person wouldn’t have eyebrows as “manly” as his. Clearly, he was caught up in some extreme personal confusion that caused everyone around him to suffer.
“How goes military doctor life?” Erwin asked gleefully as Hange jumped off their motorcycle and went through the motions of removing their helmet and cleaning residual dirt off their gold glasses.
“Erwin, I’m not that kind of doctor. Jesus Christ.”
“Why is your name Doctor Zoe Hange then?” he asked, wiggling his eyebrows in a ridiculous manner.
“Because I went to school for too long and it made me absolutely undesirable to any human alive so they added that to my name in honor of my sacrifice. What an effective method of birth control.”
Erwin sized up the 5’7” brunette in front of him and concluded that clearly Hange hadn’t looked in a mirror at all since joining the military, partially because despite the silk patch covering their left eye they were terribly attractive (he would possibly argue more so), and partially because they clearly had not devoted any attention to their appearance whatsoever. Maybe they didn’t have mirrors in the military. He wouldn’t judge. “I still don’t believe you. Didn’t you go to medical school?”
“I– Do not trust me with the health and safety of anyone. Literally.”
Erwin laughed and laid the pitchfork he had been holding against the fence. “Come on in and put your stuff down, Hange.”
Hange’s grandparents, who had raised them after their parents had both died in a horrific incident they still refused to talk about, had passed a while ago. They of course left their house to Hange, but Hange refused to step foot inside. Their grandmother passed first, and not long after that, “Pops” had died of a heart attack brought on by the stress of losing her. Hange really never recovered. Erwin and Levi had gone in after the wake and thrown away the perishables, but Hange insisted that every belonging be left alone to collect dust and eventually turn into it. They said something about “immortalizing a moment in time for the man who gave his heart to his beloved” or whatever. Erwin thought they were really dramatic but didn’t press the issue, but he and Hange always stayed at Levi’s when they came into town so he didn’t say anything. Besides, it was more fun that way.
Hange stepped inside the house and dropped their duffel bags next to the couch in a perfectly normal (and not loud) manner, and then took off running toward the kitchen when they saw a familiar flash of dark hair around the corner.
“LEEEVIIIII!!” They screamed, jumping at the shorter man from behind. Levi whipped around just in time and smacked them in the face with a wet, soapy sponge he had been using to clean off the countertops. Hange gagged and spit, choking on the soap. “Hey, shortass! No fair!”
“You’re so damn loud, you bitch,” Levi half-laughed, allowing Hange to gather him up into a hug. “But I did miss you, even if you’re an idiot.”
“I’m trying to express my love for you and you rejected me!” Hange cried dramatically, reaching for a wooden spoon on the counter nearby.
Levi was just a step faster than them, grabbing it away before they could get at it. “You are not going to smack my ass with that filthy spoon. I couldn’t ask for a worse best friend.”
“That spoon is clean!”
“Guys,” Erwin walked in with his hands up. “Are we gonna go tear up the town or what?”
Levi, ever the designated driver, refused to allow Hange to ride their motorcycle. “Where will we put Erwin?” he demanded logically. “We are taking my truck.” Hange opened their mouth to throw a fit. Levi’s truck was so clean, they had a heart attack every time they got inside. They were extremely sure that Levi spent more time cleaning that truck every week than they had spent bathing over their entire lifespan.
“I will throw up in there,” Erwin warned them.
Levi whipped around to face him. “We are not taking my truck.”
They ended up driving Erwin’s car to the Hange farm, dusting off Hange’s old blue Silverado, and driving that to Kenny’s, because as Levi stated, their truck “looked like an atomic bomb had gone off, and some vomit would probably improve the conditions in there,” which was fair, considering the only thing "clean" about it was Hange’s old hat sitting on the dash. He did sit on a blanket the whole drive there. Hange rolled the windows down and whooped loudly every time they hit a pothole, and once swerved violently to avoid a squirrel. Erwin took control of the playlist, and kept what he called “hype music” going the whole time. For some reason, his hype sounded a lot like really sad songs about unrequited love and not being noticed, but nobody questioned it.
Everything went surprisingly well once they got to Kenny’s. Erwin was chatting it up with the bartender, laughing at Levi who was aggressively playing cards with a nearby table, and about to order his fourth shot when he felt two smallish hands grip his shoulder.
He turned around to face Hange, who looked like they had seen God. “O-oh my god. Oh my god we have to go. We–we have to leave.” they pleaded, gripping Erwin’s jacket for dear life.
“Hange. Why,” He sighed, prying their hands off his jacket and turning around to face them. Hange pointed past him toward the other end of the bar with a shaky finger.
Erwin turned around to see a small, pale girl sitting at the end of the bar. She looked tired. She was staring into a full shotglass numbly, and the man sitting next to her laughed raucously, pausing to down more of his beer. “What am I looking at here?”
“Finger,” Hange whispered.
Erwin turned back to Hange, who was apparently more drunk than he had thought. “What.”
Hange jumped up onto the stool next to him and sighed, pushing their glasses up into their hair and covering their face with their hands. “Pieck. Pieck Finger.”
Erwin turned to the girl at the end of the bar and then back to his friend. “That is Pieck Finger?! Who you were in love with forever before she ghosted you?! Shit. I didn’t even recognize her.”
“Don’t say that out loud, oh my god!” Hange groaned, dropping their head down to rest on the counter. “I want to die.”
Erwin sighed. “Go talk to her!”
“I would rather blow up my other eye.”
“Well, what else can you do?” Erwin asked, fervently hoping Hange would just go ask the woman what was going on and get it over with or drop the issue before the night was ruined.
The scientist raised their head up, squinting to see without their glasses. “No. I’m going to drop it. Besides, that was two years ago. I don’t want her to know I still remember that.”
“Hange. That crushed you.”
“No more than anything else did,” they sighed, pushing their glasses back into their rightful place on their nose. “Besides, I–” they squinted again. “Wait. Is he trying to take her home with him? She’s clearly drunk. He better not be.” Hange sighed and turned away to face the counter again. “Well, she can make her own choices, I guess,” they said morosely, slumping forward, and then suddenly sat straight up.
“What am I saying?! She’s drunk, of course she can’t!” Hange was out of the chair before Erwin could ask what was even happening. He scanned the crowd around them for any sign of them, and failing, decided to walk over to Levi for help and melted into the crowd.
“Hey! Is that your girlfriend?” Hange asked sweetly, taking a drag off the cigarette they were holding as they leaned against the outside wall behind the back of the bar.
The man who had his arm around Pieck froze, and then nodded. “Yeah! Come on sweetie, let’s get you home,” he coaxed. Pieck was unresponsive, staring past Hanji with heavy lidded, dizzy eyes at something they couldn’t see.
Hange knew instantly that it wasn't just alcohol that was making Pieck act that way. He took a few steps forward toward a nearby truck, and Pieck came along with him mechanically.
Hange stepped along with him. “Well, you guys seem like nice people!” they said brightly. “Maybe we could get to know each other a little better before the night’s over! I’m Hange,” They said, extending their free hand toward the man. The man stopped, staring at her.
“Oh, come on! Don’t be weird!” Hange laughed, a little too loudly for the situation. “You’re gonna make me think you’re a kidnapper or a serial killer or something! What’s your name?”
The man paused before taking their hand and shaking it. “Ryder.”
“Nice to meet you Ryder!” They said excitedly. “What’s your girlfriend’s name? She seems quite lovely!”
The man froze. “...Helena,” he drawled slowly. “Her name’s Helena.”
Hange smiled brightly, showing too many teeth.
“Wrong answer,” they said, still smiling, dropping the cigarette they had been holding and grinding it out on the pavement with their boot.
“What–” the man began, but was cut off by a swift blow to the face that knocked him down.
Hange grabbed him by the collar and held him inches away from their nose. “Listen, buddy. I’m gonna kick your ass.” The man kicked against them, and Hange landed a swift, well-placed kick. “You can’t even fight right!” They laughed.
The man kicked their legs in retaliation, and Hange struggled to keep their footing. Ryder bounced back up to his feet and landed a sound blow to their nose.
“Hey! I like my nose where it is, motherfucker!”
By the time Levi and Erwin found Hange in the parking lot, Pieck was in the back of an ambulance nearby, the man was screaming incoherently at the cops shoving him into a squad car nearby, and Hange was grinning maniacally with bloody teeth and a still-bleeding nose in the back of a cop car. They waved excitedly at Erwin and Levi.
“Sheriff Pyxis! What is happening here?” Levi demanded from the nearby Sheriff.
Pyxis sighed and looked up from his clipboard. “Looks like this man here, William Greyforth, has been potentially drugging girls at this bar for a while. We had him down as a suspect, but we couldn’t confirm anything until tonight. He had a decent amount of Rohypnol on him and there was evidence of it in one of the drinks served to that girl earlier; it’s enough to put him away for a while.”
Erwin sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose. “I mean Zoe. Why are they in the back of a cop car? Drunk and disorderly?”
Pyxis sighed and turned toward Hange, who was now breathing on the car window and trying to write something in the fog. “Well, they are extremely disorderly, I’ll give them that. They knocked the lights out of that guy, and I think a couple teeth too, but they were actually sober when we breathalyzed them, so that’s… confusing. We actually just put them in there so we could take them to the hospital, because we’re pretty sure they have at least a mild concussion, but we don’t know for sure because they tried to bite the officer who arrested them initially thinking it was a drunken fist fight and we kind of didn’t follow up from there because they are… ” He paused, searching for the right word. “Horrifying.”
Levi sighed. “They’re normally like this.”
“Levi!” Erwin chastised. “Be nice!”
Hange did, in fact, have a concussion, which sort of explained why they were acting so weird, but not really. “He smacked me into the pavement pretty good,” Hange sighed, staring at their bandaged hands. “But! I do have three of his teeth in my jacket pocket!” they whispered with a mischievous glint in their eye.
“Hange, give them here. You can’t keep the teeth from a living person!” Erwin hissed under his breath, holding his hand out over the hospital bed.
“I don’t have them! They’re in the stupid bag!”
“Leave them alone,” Levi sighed from nearby, where he was standing against the wall with his arms crossed. “It’s not like they can put them back.”
“Oh, they could, don’t worry.” Hange reassured him. Erwin looked at them in horror.
“How have you not been arrested before now?!”
Hange shrugged and grinned. “This is why I don’t go out much!” They paused for a second, as if searching for something, then slowly turned to Erwin. “Where’s Pieck? Is she…”
“Pieck is fine,” Erwin reassured them hastily. Hange sat back against the pillows, relieved.
“Are they gonna keep her overnight?” Hange questioned.
“Probably,” Levi interrupted. “I can’t imagine a scenario where they wouldn’t. She wasn’t doing well at the scene.”
Hange paused and stared at the open hospital room door. “I need to go to the bathroom,” they said suddenly, before jumping up and heading out the door.
Erwin sighed and ran after them. “Hange, the bathroom is in here–”
“Oi! Erwin!” Levi cropped up behind the taller man, grabbing the collar of his shirt and pulling him back. “Obviously,” he whispered through gritted teeth, gripping the back of his shirt tightly, “they’re looking for Pieck. Not the bathroom.”
“You never know with Hange!” Erwin hissed back through clenched teeth, his face flushing. “Besides, the nurse is going to notice that they’re gone literally any second because she just went to get the paperwork to send them home, they’ll never find her!”
“Quit being a brat, Eyebrows,” Levi hissed back and pulled him into the hospital room.
Hange did, in fact, make it to the room where Pieck was laying quietly, staring at the ceiling. They stood momentarily in the doorway, watching the girl sleep, listening to the beep of the IV machines and monitors around her, not wanting to intrude on the moment. This could be their closure. They could leave now and know that they saved her, even if they’ll never speak to her again.
“I can hear you, you know.”
Hange froze. “How much of that did I say out loud?”
“None of it,” the girl murmured, keeping her eyes closed. “But I heard you walk up and I knew it was you.”
Hange laughed nervously. “Whaaaaat? No. I’m not someone you know, I’m just here to… do medical stuff!”
Pieck opened one eye and then closed it again. “I’m not stupid, Dr. Hange.”
“Don’t call me Doctor. You’re making this like, super weird.”
“I’m going to make it weird. You’re weird. You stuff your brain with all kinds of knowledge, ‘doctor.’”
Hange sighed. “Why did you ghost me?” they blurted out.
“Really?”
“I’m being serious,” they sighed, walking closer to the hospital bed and sinking down in the chair next to the bed. “I…” They wrung their hands together in their lap. “It made me sad.”
Pieck opened her eyes and met Hange’s stare.
“Because, Hange. I loved you, and you didn’t love me, and I knew you were going to leave me and go do your Jeager Project experiment or whatever the fuck, and I didn’t want to hold you back. That was your dream.” She sighed. “But I didn’t want to get whatever was left over of you. I didn’t want us to stay together and watch whatever was between us burn out.”
A single tear slid down Hange’s face. “You could’ve said something. God, I wish you’d said something.”
Pieck stared at them with some emotion written across their features Hange couldn’t read. “I don’t know what I could’ve said.”
“I would’ve listened if you’d actually said it,” they whispered.
“Hange! You didn’t even tell anyone about us. Officially, we were nothing to each other. Stop acting like you cared.” Pieck said quietly.
“But you were everything to me.”
“What?”
That broke the dam. “For fuck’s sake, Pieck! I would’ve thrown everything away for you! I wouldn’t have finished my goddamn degree if that’s what it took! I would’ve never touched another microscope! You’re so stone-faced, I never knew what you wanted from me! I thought you didn’t care,” Hange sobbed, burying their head in their hands.
Cold fingers brushed against their cheek, wiping away the tears that were running down their face. Hange looked up. Pieck was sitting on the edge of the bed, tears dripping out of her own eyes.
“Keep your microscopes, Hange. Just… maybe make room for me to look too.”