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Eren’s eyes are still a little bleary, but a few hard shakes do him well. He stares at Levi, urgent but confused, and Levi holds onto him as he stands, left leg throbbing, his ankle threatening to splinter under him. Luckily the brat catches on quickly, and he goes to his full height, tearing the lingering flesh of his titan form from his neck.
“Captain Levi,” he says. “What did I miss?”
“Whatever survivors are on this side of the wall are the only soldiers left.” Eren’s breath hitches, and, not bothering to catch his expression, Levi says, “We need to find them, while the Armored and Colossal variants are distracted.”
In the distance, the Colossal Titan is mostly dissolved, flesh spilling into the floor. Its face has molded around the Armored Titan, which can only snap its mouth forward like a bird pinned by a particularly large cat. Unfortunately, it has the privilege of having no bones brittle enough to be snapped under the Colossal’s weight. Levi wonders if the soldiers remaining thought they’d have more back-up when they shot the flare. Even if Levi was able to respond with one of his own, leaving Eren alone was a gamble.
Still. They have a moment. They have a choice.
“The basement,” Eren manages, voice wavering only a little. “They… Even if they’re not there, we can find out if what’s inside will help us.”
Levi nods. “First give me some of your blades. Not all of them. Okay, lead the way Yeager.”
No room for hesitation. Behind them, the Cargo Titan chews eagerly on the Ape Titan’s human source and Erwin lies unblinking in blood-soaked soil. The slime of his exposed innards is crusting on Levi’s hands. He hears the former Commander’s rattled last breath in the crumbling structures they weave through, the new blades in his sheaths, the empty syringe clattering uselessly in the box tucked at his chest. He hears the recruits’ screams in the wind at his temples and in Eren’s shuddering gasp when they find the last Survey Corps members remaining, bruised and burnt and bleeding.
“Armin! Mikasa!” Eren calls before he even touches the ground. Levi descends close to the crushed building, left forearm balancing him on the bricks there. He rubs his kneecap back into place again with his right hand. The kids from the 104th look to him, but he can’t hide this. There’s no time to make plans that cannot be followed through. “What’s going on?”
“The Armored Titan woke up,” Armin says. Compared to the others, he is relatively unscathed. His mouth is tight and his eyes are wide. “It went against the Colossal Titan. We—ah—we can’t count on it to be on our side. Bertolt’s yelling at him, though.”
He calls over Sasha and Jean. As Levi staggers forward, they emerge from a tunnel tucked in the rubble. Mikasa goes to Eren’s side. Her shirt sleeve has been sliced off, leaving a small, blistered expanse of tattooed skin exposed over the cloth spun around her shoulder. Connie stands shakily from where he was squatting before, making to close a medkit clean on the inside but smeared over with gore outside before he locks his gaze on Levi’s leg. Levi glances down too – the fabric is tucked inward where the Cargo Titan blindly bit into him and dyed red all the way down. Worse than the sprain he received from the Female Titan, but this wound is his own fault.
Just a second of losing himself to sentiment cost them any chance of success remaining. There are two choices to make from here. He looks to Armin Arlert, one of two people Erwin entrusted to lead the Survey Corps, and hopes that Hanji has already succumbed to their burn wounds, that they aren’t mindlessly suffering under endless pain and ruined flesh. Armin looks back, pupils flitting for an instant, lips unsteady, until he finds the choices Levi already holds under his tongue.
Armin tilts his chin down, a nod of agreement.
“Sir,” Jean Kirstein says. Beside him, Sasha has metal prongs in her hand. He wants to spit at their stupidity. Did no one consider waking Eren before rushing for the damn basement? But he keeps his thoughts to himself. Even if the Armored Titan somehow betrayed him, the Colossal Titan wouldn’t let them get away with Eren so easily. “Where are the others, Captain?”
Levi stares at him flatly. “The Ape Titan lost control of the mindless ones after my ambush. The old bastard’s fighting off the cargo-carrying variant.”
“He’s still alive?” Mikasa’s voice isn’t accusing, but the shock of Erwin’s corpse rattles through Levi’s body, the knowledge of his failure leaking into his blood, dampening his instinctive strength even more than the injury, it seems.
“He was shit at close combat, but Erwin and the rookies’ distraction didn’t stop his mindless friend from nearly tearing my leg off.” That placates her, but he notices the others’ shock at his own implications. There’s a roar in the distance, and they straighten themselves up. Sasha and Connie try to discretely wipe at their eyes. Jean pulls at his collar, chest expanding in a shaky breath.
No more time to waste.
“Armin,” he says. He sees the cold determination in Armin’s stare drowning alongside the fear, melding into a film of unaffected distance. He is nothing like Erwin. Armin is a kid who spent his life fighting in spite of his weakness while Erwin fought alongside his detachment and carried his guilt-ridden grief as a battle flag on which he drew his dreams until it came time to sacrifice that too, but the look on his face reminds Levi so much of him that his heart aches, but only for a second. “It’s time.”
“Yes, sir.”
Armin turns, lifts his head to the outline of the Colossal Titan’s shoulders. His hands are pulled into fists. Levi wants to apologize. In a world much kinder than this one, it would mean something if he told him that he doesn’t deserve this. That he wanted the three of them to freely pursue the dreams he and Farlan and Isabel never could. That he remembers the names of all those he cared about, the ones who carried his love in their cooling flesh like a blade under the heart. That he’s so, so tired of adding onto this list of names with nothing but his own memories as proof of their existence.
But kindness is not afforded to the children of tragedy, and he will always be thankful that Armin’s voice doesn’t shake when he speaks. “Eren, can you climb up Wall Maria?”
“I think—”
“Can you?”
Eren’s breath catches. Levi doesn’t let himself look at him. “Yes, I can.”
“Here’s the plan.” Armin spins on his heel, closing into the mouth of the tunnel as he continues. “Sasha, Connie, and Captain Levi will keep watch while the rest of us enter the basement. We’ll collect as much knowledge as we can. Then we leave. And the rest of us will distract the titans for as long as possible while the Captain and Mikasa escape on Eren’s back.”
He is so still, and the others stare at his unwavering back in silence. Levi feels Eren shift beside him, but it’s Mikasa who speaks first. “I can help you,” she says, stepping forward, fists firm.
“Captain Levi is too injured to protect Eren on his own,” Jean says. He swallows hard, loud enough for them all to hear his throat work. “…Armin’s plan is the best we have now. If just the three of you come home knowing what’s inside there, humanity still has hope.”
They can all feel Eren’s grief before it rips into the space between them with more precise destruction than either Levi or Mikasa could ever be capable of. Levi breathes in deep, places all his weight on the wall behind him as his leg starts trembling, blood seeping low in his boot. “No! We’re all leaving together! We can still fight!”
“Eren,” Sasha whispers. She’s not crying, not yet. Connie is bundling some medical supplies in a clean cloth. Levi catches threading and bites back a sigh of relief.
“T-There might be something in the basement! And we’ll fight with you guys, and we’ll all—”
“Eren.” Armin turns, face stony, eyes cold. The sun is blocked amidst the structures remaining among them, and his eyes are sunken, skin ruddy, hair tangled. “This is supposed to be an easy decision because it’s the only decision. Please don’t make this harder than it needs to be.”
The three kids of Shiganshina stand there in the ruins of their former home. Eren cries freely as only he can when enraged and helpless, staring at his childhood friends with more than desperation. They look at one another, almost still, and though it lasts for barely a second, Levi feels the moment span years of a lifetime stolen from all three of them.
“Let’s go,” Mikasa says, leading the way into the basement. Armin follows, then Eren, and Jean too.
When Levi hears the creak of a door opening, he eases his weight down. There’s an outdoor set of stairs next to Eren’s collapsed house, and he lifts himself up a step, lightly running a hand across his leg. The exposed wound is clotting at the corners, but the tissue is infested with debris. His entire shin is already looking thicker than his other leg. A vague, irrational part of him longs to rip his boot off and wash this leg, even if he wouldn’t be able to put it back on.
“Captain,” Connie says, cloth in hand, eyes looking somewhere beyond him. Levi shifts his lower body, and Connie comes in closer, unrolling his supplies. He takes a pair of stainless steel scissors, added to the military issued medkits after Queen Historia increased the Survey Corps’ supply budget, and cuts away the fabric around the bite marks. Then he removes as much debris from the wound as he can with a spare canteen and cloth. Levi wonders when he last needed to be treated with stitches and gauze. “This will hurt, sir,” Connie tells him as he moves for the alcohol.
“I’m sure,” Levi replies.
It fucking burns, almost matching the fierce thrum of his heart. He watches the clotted blood in his tangled leg hair fall loose. He breathes.
Maybe he has a lapse of consciousness. Connie already had the needle threaded by the time he comes back to attention. Sasha is nowhere to be found. Probably checking the titans, then. Levi can’t remember which of these two were in training to become a medic. Petra had the most graceful hand of any soldier he ever knew, but Farlan grew up stitching together fabric for his mom as her fingers shriveled up with disease. Levi wonders if these kids had a parent who died too soon or a talent he would never know about. He wonders if he would’ve learned if they had time.
“Sir,” Sasha says. He looks up to find her. Her gas tanks rattle loudly against her thighs. If it wasn’t for her expression, he would have assumed that the titans were going for them now.
“Sasha,” he says. “Are the those two still occupied?”
Her arms are stiff by her sides. “Yes, Captain Levi.” Sasha’s face matches the rookies forming a river of corpses on the other side of the wall, but her eyes are old. “But if you can, make sure my dad stays safe. If anything happens to Wall Rosé, please make sure he gets to the Wall Sheena, sir.”
Connie’s fingers are steady with the needle. “Sir, please don’t let them hurt my mom.” He fastens the knot on the last stitch, closing the first gouge with detached ease. “And if there’s…a cure, or something, inside there, and if she wakes up…let her know I wanted to make her proud.” His voice only catches on the last word.
There’s no room for tears. Levi isn’t sure if he can promise they won’t die in vain, and even if he could he’s not sure if they’ll believe him. The Monkey Titan lives on and Levi is drowning in sickness. Erwin is dead and Levi’s lungs are lined with his endless sins. The Scouting Legion is over and Levi has outlived yet another family.
“To the best of my ability, as long as I can fight…” His breathing goes unsteady, but only for a second. “I will ensure that your efforts were not in vein. I will tell everyone your lives meant something. And…” Levi’s knuckles go white past dirt and grime. “…I will make them pay.”
Sasha and Connie do not reply, though Sasha turns, one hand clapping over her mouth, rocking on her heels.
The silence goes on. The throbbing pain lulls him into flickers of delayed awareness, stealing away fragments of his time as if they were not these kids’ final moments alive. Each impression of the needle brings him back to the forefront. Connie covers his leg with gauze, letting it soak in the stray clots bubbling between the stitches, then wraps a clean cloth around that. This one has those new hook-and-loop pads they retrieved from an inventor who emerged after Queen Historia was crowned; Levi eyes them with distrust even as Connie ensures the cloth stays in place. Sasha checks on the titans but doesn’t see them move for them. She’s far off again when the basement door opens.
The four of them emerge from the basement empty-handed. Deep, dark despair wells in Levi’s gut before he spots the odd bunches in Eren and Mikasa’s clothing, the softened corner of a folded fabric in Mikasa’s pocket. Nonetheless, only Armin doesn’t look even a little disappointed. Levi hears Sasha’s boots stomp on the tiles beneath them, and Jean’s face, now starch-pale, contorts as he staggers from the other three and retches once.
“Captain,” Sasha says.
He doesn’t hesitate. Connie steps back and offers a hand, but Levi waves him off. He stands, his limbs cold and cramped now, inhaling hard past the constant, painful throbs that ripple through him. After a second or two upright, he steps forward, but his knee buckles beneath him.
Mikasa goes to his side immediately, perhaps to her own surprise too. He eases an arm up around her back and hangs on to her. Eren steps over next. Levi can hear his breathing, thick and fast.
And this is it. Armin, Jean, Sasha, and Connie stare back at them, faces clear of any fear or grief now. They are so strong. They are so young.
Armin nods at Mikasa and Eren in turn, and finally the silence is shattered.
“We’ll find the ocean, I promise,” Eren says. “And…and we’ll make a path to it, so everyone can see. So everyone can be free. So…”
In the instant Eren pauses, Mikasa releases Levi to glide into the midst of this hurried farewell, diving forward to bring her hands around Armin’s waist, her cheek tucked close to his temple. The sweep of her arm is fast, and by Eren’s stillness, Levi assumes he is the only one to notice her slipping a single blade segment into Armin’s sheath.
They hold each other close. As they pull away, Mikasa says something too fast and low for anyone to make out her words, but the corner of Armin’s lips quivers, the only mourning these two will allow themselves in front of each other.
It occurs to Levi that this might be the only goodbye Mikasa ever had the chance to make. Levi wonders if he ever had that option, and for a quick, startling moment, his own breath goes unsteady, for once not in sympathy for his soldiers, for these kids, who certainly never deserved this, but for his own youth, for a kid who didn’t deserve losing almost everyone he ever cared for. He stifles the thought, knowing that his own regret will do nothing. He can drown himself in their pain once their lives are avenged with the freedom of humans, once no other person lives in fear of titans.
Mikasa backs up, supporting Levi once again. Armin looks to them, Eren and Mikasa, the only family he has left, and smiles with the peace of a boy who is about to die. “I am so glad I met you two.” The last word is still fading from the space between them when he launches off.
“I swear you won’t die for nothing.” Eren’s grip on Levi’s shoulder tightens, bordering on painful.
Sasha unsheathes a set of blades and nods. “Just don’t let our people starve!” And she’s off.
“Keep them safe.” Connie is next.
Jeans takes a second longer, gaze flickering between the three of them, taking a few steps backward first. “Tell them what happened here. Tell them what happened to us. Please.”
And it’s only the three of them. Eren takes a long, awful breath, then releases Levi. Without his support, Mikasa brings them both to their knees. Levi’s leg juts uselessly to the side as Eren steps to the inner borders of Wall Maria. He swallows as a titan’s roar ripples through the air.
“Levi.”
Of all things, it’s the lack of an addressing title that shocks him into looking at Mikasa, instinctively wanting to reprimand her. But her face untwists in the instant it takes for his head to move, cheeks red and streaked with thin lines of tears. Her mouth works slowly. “It never gets easier, does it?”
Levi nods.
Mikasa sighs, wet and shaky, and lifts them to their feet again. “Can you use your ODM Gear – sir?”
“I’ll manage.” He has to. Levi peels away from her, and they clasp their handles in their palms. If Erwin could do it with a missing limb, then he has no excuse. “Mikasa.” She pauses with her fingers on the triggers. “You never forget them. But it…”
There’s a human shout in the distance, forming words he cannot make out, and then Eren’s titan form bursts from the earth in a funnel of steam.
Levi thinks of his mother’s singing as she put him to bed, Isabel’s hair in the sun, Farlan’s grey-gold eyes in the shade, Hanji’s throaty laughter, Erwin’s smile. He thinks of Gunther, Erd, Oluo, Petra, and then Jean, Sasha, Connie, and Armin before he stops himself. It’s too late anyway.
“It scars you over, after a while,” he says.
He goes first, and Mikasa follows him, leaving behind the ones she loved.