Leave Me Behind

The sky is cloudy and gray. My neck fucking hurts and my ears are ringing.

Did I get hit?

What are you doing after we get our cards, Bones? Abrahm’s voice fills my head. He often spoke about what he wanted to do after our last mission, but I never told him what I wanted. I always said I didn’t know. Sometimes I even sat quietly, not responding and leaving the cruelness of my presence to speak for me. But he would smile anyway, so aloof and careless to my callous nature. He liked my silence as much as I enjoyed his refusal to shut up.

I wish I would’ve opened up more to him. I wish I wasn’t such an asshole.

My eyes close and his smile resurfaces in my memory. I can’t remember anything about his face except that fucking grin.

I wonder what his last thought was.

“Bones.”

It’s not his voice.

“Bones, hey—you okay man?” Is that Harrison?

My eyes crack open and I see six figures above me.

Eren’s eyes are filled with amusement. Harrison, Ian, Jefferson, and Pete are covered in red powder. Were they hit too?

Goddammit.

My sight shifts last to the sixth figure lingering above me.

It’s her. Eyes bright against her dirt-smeared face. Her dark brown hair is pulled back into a loose braid. I want to run my thumb over her bottom lip and tell her she makes my chest ache when she looks at me so tenderly. I want to tell her that the nights I laid beside her were the only ones I slept peacefully in fucking years.

I want to tell her that I fucking missed her.

Then that same wry smile that Abrahm had appears on her lips.

My eyes widen and I sit up abruptly at the pain that shoots through my chest. Everyone stops talking and they stare at me like I’ve lost my mind. I hesitantly glance back at her and the smile has vanished.

Why does she remind me of him so much? It makes me angry. She could never take his place and somehow there’s enough of a difference that it soothes me. What does she see when she looks at me? A broken thing, a killing machine, someone who only knows how to hurt others?

Something that needs to be locked away… I need to know. What goes on behind those alluring eyes?Text property © Nôvel(D)ra/ma.Org.

Weariness pulls at my thoughts and I let my eyes close once more, relaxing my muscles and falling back into the dirt.

“Shit. Get the medic, I think he’s having an episode,” Eren says sharply, and a few of my comrades run to get the med guy.

“I’m fine,” I choke out, my voice raspy. Though, something does feel a little off. My hand trails up the side of my head and I unlatch the helmet, letting it fall to the ground beside me. It’s completely red. God, she got me good.

“Stay with him. I’m calling in the chopper just in case,” Eren orders, and his steps quickly fade.

“I don’t need it,” I call out, but no one responds. I let out a long breath.

Fingers thread through my hair gently. The comfort it brings me eases my shoulders. Bunny.

“Can’t even take one hit, huh?” She laughs quietly. It’s not in a bragging way; there’s something sad in her voice. Pity, perhaps. I didn’t think she was capable of it.

I open my eyes enough to see her. She’s sitting beside me, so close that her floral scent is tangible. I wonder if she knows that she smells like flowers, even when she’s bleeding and smothered in mud. Flowers. Like a field of wild, fluttering petals dancing in the wind. I want to sit with her for a long while. For as long as I can.

My jaw sets at her comment, but I’m too tired to fight with her. She continues to thread her fingers through my hair slowly as I watch her distrustfully.

Why is she being nice to me? I cut her… I scarred her beautiful body.

All I do is break things. But no matter how much I push her, she doesn’t stay down. Maybe things that are already fucked up can’t be ruined further. There has to be a point where there’s nothing worse, right?

She gives me a small, gentle nudge with the back of her hand. “Looks like I’m the only one who can be your second, Bones.”

I chuckle grimly. “I guess I probably don’t have a say in the matter anymore,” I say, softer than I intended. Instead of fighting with me she presses her palm against my cheek and the warmth of it is inviting. I let my temple lean into her and she guides my head to her lap.

My mind is so damn loud; I let her comfort me. For the first time, I don’t care if others see me in a weak state. I just want her to hold me and continue to brush my hair back from my face. It brings back distant memories of when I was a child, when, for a brief moment under the sun, I was loved.

Right now, I’m not a dark forces war dog who cuts throats, and she’s not the heartless soldier who blows brains out without blinking. Instead we’re two wounded creatures, circling one another in our cage, curious about what will happen if we give in and collide.

At least my mask covers my grinding jaw and the anguish that pulls at my frown. She really is a beautiful, dangerous thing, just as Jenkins said she was. A warning he gave us when he’d only just got her himself. Eren worked with him often, but I only remember how much he spoke of his new recruit. I had no idea she lived up to his words.

A Riøt on my squad, I never thought I’d see the day.

And for the first time since I lost Abrahm, I feel distinct fear enter my soul. I cannot let her die like he did.

I will not survive it.