This chapter is ouch, but I'm not going to apologize because if I was sorry, I wouldn't have done it. ;)

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The afternoon is surprisingly cool; a breeze brushes over my skin, lifts my hair, ruffles Levi's wings as he stands at the very edge of Wall Rose, his wings halfway extended. I watch him from several meters away; he's impeccably still, like he's waiting for the right moment to leap off the edge. As a result, I'm wracked with nerves - I know he's got wings on top of the fact that he's already passed...but the idea of him freely jumping off the fifty-meter high wall is the opposite of comforting.

"Calm down, kid," he says, the wind carrying his voice to reach my ears.

Dammit. He can feel my uneasiness, even if just a little. And then I realize my heart rate is elevated and curse myself; I'll never get used to that.

"Are you sure it's safe with all this wind...?" I call back, but I know it's a ridiculous question.

"You kidding? The wind makes it easier."

I press my lips together and resolve to just watch. Levi's toes hang off the edge of the wall; he goes back to being still as a statue, listening and waiting, until he suddenly crouches and bounds off, just like that. Like a child, I scurry over to the edge and look down just in time to see him swooping back up, wings fully extended and the cool breeze  beneath them, carrying him higher with ease. As he ascends, flapping several times, I swear I can see him smiling at me.

That has to be what freedom feels like...

He swoops around me, catching different currents of air and banks lower before ascending again. I long to join him, to be able to take to the sky and soar wherever we want, boundless and eternal.

The reality that I can't swarms around my thoughts like wasps. It's a kind of jealousy I've never experienced before.

* * *

That evening, we end up back in my room. I can't get the images of Levi's flying out of my head; every time I shut my eyes, all I see are his dark feathers catching the sunlight, ruffling in the wind as his body moves swiftly, smoothly through the air - a sight I'd never seen before, nor one I thought I'd ever see.

Levi lays across my chest, his warm wings spread lazily out across the bed, our feet tangled together and his head tucked into the side of my neck. He's so warm I can feel myself beginning to sweat where our skin is pressed together, but I can't say I mind, and the coolness of the basement is enough to contrast his welcoming heat.

"Feeling better?" he murmurs. I can feel the low vibration of his voice through his chest.

"Mhmm..." I hum contentedly. I've almost completely forgotten why I'd been upset in the first place.

But my brain never lets me forget completely or for long, and the flash of a memory strikes its way through. Levi must feel me tense, because he trails his fingers gently down my side and presses his lips to my neck. He must think I'm lying...

I allow him the access, though, letting his lips press more firmly into my neck before he moves around, peppering my skin with his damp lips. My eyes flutter shut, and I let him distract me. It works much too easily, too, as his mouth finally finds mine, nipping my lower lip lightly with his teeth before his tongue finds its way in, and I welcome him eagerly.

Despite his claim to lack experience, Levi's always been an excellent kisser. The fact that I've got nothing to compare it to is meaningless to me - he knows just what to do to cause goosebumps to rise across the skin of my limbs, to send an electric thrill right down my spine and ignite the ends of my nerves with pleasant heat. He captures even the quietest of involuntary sounds eliciting from the back of my throat, every light gasp and slightest breath.

The strain in my chest from lack of air forces me to pull away. While he's fine, I'm panting lightly, my eyes still shut and my fingers still curled into his soft undercut. His own hands move up, one cupping my jaw and the other running through my hair, pushing it away from my face before his chin lifts and his lips are pressing tenderly against my forehead. There's a kind of hesitancy to it...or maybe some sort of emotion I've never witnessed from him before, and though I can't place it, it gives me an almost...dreadful feeling in my chest.

My lips are just forming his name when a somewhat strained sounding sigh brushes between his lips and across my skin; his hair brushes down over my face before he pushes himself to sit up, his knees straddling my waist with a palm pressed to the center of my chest. His eyes are mostly shielded by his hair, and what little I can see of them, they're closed, his lashes scrunching a bit as he keeps the lids squeezed shut.

"What's wrong?" I ask, worry striking through. If there's one thing I've noticed about him since his reappearance, it's how quickly his mood seems to change - though it's never been quite this drastic.

I'm not surprised not to hear an answer right away, so I slide my fingers between his and give him a moment.

"It hurts, Eren."

The words are so quiet, so full of pain; they seem to pierce right down to my very core. I prop myself up on my elbows, frowning and searching his face for answers.

"What hurts?" I ask.

His lips press together in a hard line as he lifts the hand I'm not holding to run roughly through his hair, unmasking his eyes as they open a sliver. Those dark irises catch the light of the lit torch, and I can see something inside him is burning. Just for that split second I can tell it isn't just something that began a moment ago, or even yesterday, but something he's been dealing with for quite a while now and has hid really, really well.

"All of it," he finally breathes out. His stare is fixed on my chest, his fingers tense between mine. "Being here..." Shakes his head. "I can feel something pulling me back..." Clears his throat. "I don't know what it is...but it's telling me this can't work."

Smothering the sudden buildup of panic inside me is next to impossible. I don't want to ask, but I have to. "That...what...can't work?"

In a flash, he's no longer on top of me but sitting at the edge of the bed, leaning over with his head in his hands. I sit up, too, and as much as I want to, I don't move any closer to him.

"You know what I mean, Eren. This. My being here when I'm clearly not supposed to be."

But you promised.

I don't say it. He already knows he promised, and somehow I think saying it will only be adding to his pain - with everything I've already done and hurt him with, I have no right.

"You mean it hurts...emotionally?" I murmur, hoping there's a way to help him, to talk about this, to keep him here with me...

"Emotionally. Mentally. Physically."

As he says this, I'm trying to swallow my own emotions, trying to suppress the flashbacks of the first time I lost him. Blanking out would do no good now.

In an instant it hits me how selfish I'm being and have been since the moment I realized he was back, making him promise to stay with me, holding onto him so tightly so he doesn't slip out of my grasp again while he's in pain, just to lessen the weight of my own agonies. My self-loathing suddenly doubles.

"So are you going to leave?" I whisper.

"I don't know," comes his quiet reply.

I shoot up and stride quickly to the bars of the cell as if I'm going to walk out myself, but once I reach the metal I realize I have nowhere to go, nowhere I would want to go. I wrap my hands around the dirty metal and press my forehead against it.

I've never been this torn in my life - between wanting to lessen or even erase his pain but not wanting to let go of him for the sake of my own at the same time. Love is supposed to be selfless - through watching my parents when I was little, through seeing Mikasa and Jean and others around, I've learned this. It shouldn't matter to me whether or not I end up in the throes of my own sick, sick mind - it should only matter that he's happy, whether he stays here or has to go...

But what do I get out of this?

Nothing. The answer is nothing at all. Defeated the titans and saved humanity from the clutches of near-extinction? Congratulations, you've won a lifetime of pain and suffering that exists within your own mind!

My whole life suddenly seems pointless. After years of fighting and death and destruction and nothing but agony, even after accomplishing the goal I set for myself at 10-years-old, it all seems worthless now. Humanity was freed from the ruthless wrath of cruel, biological experiments but what kind of victory is it if I have to suffer? If Levi has to suffer because of me? Worthless. Pointless. Meaningless...

And just like that, it hits me. There's only one way to end our suffering, to free us from these clutches that, in their own way, are worse than the titans.

I swivel to the right to find Levi's stood up and moved toward me, his wings quivering ever so slightly.

"What if..." I swallow hard. "What if I...joined you?" I ask, hushed.

His brows immediately furrow. "The hell do you mean by that? How could you possibly-"

"If...if I died, too. I could join you."

Confusion glosses over his eyes. "...what?" I swallow again around the thickness in my throat. My heart is damn near hammering, and I know he can feel it - it has to be part of why he's so dumbfounded. But I wait for him to get it, nervous myself and, honestly, partially not believing myself in suggesting this.

"You're not dying, Eren," he continues, voice edgy with skepticism. "That doesn't make any...sense..."

As he trails off and his eyes widen, his brow relaxing into its neutral position and the confusion being wiped away, I know he's figured it out. I clench my jaw, hold my breath, waiting.

"No," he says firmly. "No, Eren. You can't join me. Not like that. I won't allow it."

His tone teeters on the edge of that of the corporal - hard with authority when his words were absolutely final. I feel it in my chest, but I'm not about to go down without a fight.

"Why?" My own kind of venom has seeped in, now. Not nearly as stern as his, but stubborn. My specialty.

It's the first time I've ever seen Levi fight a bit with his words, and he actually somewhat relents. "Remember what I told you? As long as you're still alive and fighting, you'll never let me down. If you do this..." He trails off again, shakes his head. His jaw is set, his arms crossed firmly, but his eyes show something akin to panic, to fear and another kind of emotion I can't put my finger on.

"Even if it's to join you, though?"

And suddenly there's hesitation I didn't expect. He sits back a bit, like he's weighing the options. He wants it too. I can tell.

"Even then," he finally says.

Something about the way he says it has part of me giving in, and I relax a bit myself. "Why, Levi?" My words are little more than a broken whisper now. "I just want to stay with you...but I don't want you to be in pain anymore." Hysteria is rising; I have to suppress it. After another swallow, I say it without thinking. "You promised to stay, remember?"

"Yes. Of course I remember. And don't think I don't resent myself every minute for leaving you. But you dying won't help me keep that promise, Eren. You know that." His eyes flick down to the floor. "Some promises just can't be upheld. Besides, you don't know that your death would allow you to stay with me, anyway. You don't know where it will take you."

Don't cry.

"To you, Levi. I know that. I can feel it."

A roll of the eyes. "Cheesy lines really don't suit you, kid." But they meet mine again and he steps forward, his hand lifting gently to my cheek. It's so easy to forget how warm he's become, and when he speaks again, his voice is softer than I've ever heard it in such a way that, aside from the words themselves, makes me want to melt and exist inside of it. "I'm not gonna let you take your own life, Eren. It's not worth it."

Suddenly it feels like one of those 'desperate times call for desperate measures' situations. I suck in another breath, and my voice comes out in that same broken whisper.

"But I'm going to die anyway...someday..."

"That's why. Because you will, and then you can find me. You still have time left here. You've got value and your heart is still beating for a reason. You won't be doing anyone a favor by stopping it."

The anticipation, the thought of being without him and that crippling pain breeds more panic.

"What if...I want to die?" I whisper.

"Don't say that," Levi says immediately, loud enough for his voice to echo off the stone walls and all traces of softness gone. "You don't know what you're talking about, Eren. Take it from someone who knows." I cringe. "Existing in this limbo and never moving forward isn't what you want, even for this reason."

I feel myself crumbling; I move to sink down on the end of my bed, my jaw tense and my teeth shut so tight they're nearly grinding together. I don't know how to argue against that. Of course, I could always go against his word and do it anyway...make an excuse to escape his eyes just for a while and use a method quick enough that it'd be too late for him to feel it and come stop or try and save me...

It's like he can sense what I'm thinking, because he moves into my lap, straddling my waist and cradling my head against his chest, a fist curled into my hair.

"This hurts, Eren..." The softness is back. "...but nothing, nothing would compare to the pain of watching you do something like that."

Silent tears are already making wet trails down my face, dripping down onto my bare chest. His words remind me of when I watched him slip away, remind me of the pain I felt because of it, right in that moment. Putting him through something like that intentionally is the absolute worst way I could possibly hurt him.

But letting him go...?

"It doesn't have to be right away, kid. But you know I can't stay forever."

Can he read my thoughts now...?

I move my arms around him and hold as tight as I dare - so tight my arms begin to tremble, but I hold on because I don't know how much longer I'll have him to hold onto...