abandonhumanity | PSL / MEME CONTINUATION

It was a compliment.

Hey, hey. I can take a compliment. [That might be the most bold-faced lie she’s managed in a while!]

Maybe we’re thinking about different things.

[She sets the drink down. Glancing aside, and mumbling as her face goes pink:] …Thanks.

[Now he really wants to put his arm around her. She’s cute…]

I don’t think we are.

We’ve talked about it all before, of course. You know how I feel about things like kindness and hope.

[The fact that he said it was a compliment makes it all the more so, considering.]

If you ask me, you shouldn’t be able to find those things. But you do anyway.

You’re stubborn.

[She’s about to protest that she might actually not know how Eren feels about kindness and hope anymore—and then he concedes that she’s found them. It gets an eyebrow raise.

[Plus, “You’re stubborn.” That’s the wavelength Aubrey’s used to.]

Well, hey. If it’s working then I’ll keep being stubborn. [She smirks a little, for good measure…

[…though it falters.] You know, despite what I said… I don’t want to break you.

[Ah...

[He stiffens a bit at this; can't help it. It had been easy, at the time, to tap into his inner darkness when they had that conversation. It's not that he lied; he did hate her in that moment - he loved her too. And maybe this is Hell; all the more so for how pleasant it can be.

[But maybe he wouldn't have said it if his heart weren't rotten past its expiration date. Would have, could have, should have - it's all useless. They are who they are.

[He flexes his left hand without thinking about it, then realizes. His fist clenches, but he doesn't look angry, really. It's something worse. Yet one more cold spike through his heart.]

You can't take that back now.

[The clench draws her attention to his hand. The names may be gone, but she wonders if anything changed for good. It sure has on her.]

I know I can’t.

[She’ll never forget how Reiner, Reiner Braun rotted his chest from the core. Or her own name scrawled across his neck, her arms tightening around it.

[There’s so much that none of them can ever take back. And even if they apologized and groveled and forgave and mourned a thousand times over, the past can’t change.

[…Still.]

We’re moving forward. [Who is that affirmation for, really?] But if we’re trying to take control… we can’t pretend to leave the rest behind.

[And it’s always so goddamn impossible to prepare for.]

[Moving forward. "Even if you die. Even after you die."

[Eren waits for the memory to play, but it doesn't - at least, he doesn't think so. He's grateful for that. Aubrey may know him, but she doesn't know everything, and this is a card he's always held to his chest.

[Since when is he afraid of her knowing he's a monster? Oh yeah.]

We're moving forward. [An affirmation - his voice holds something back.]

I haven't left anything behind.

[Isn't that the problem? He remembers everything - everything all the time.]

[There’s still so much they haven’t learned about each other. They’re married. Nothing they could learn would change a single vow. It’s insanity, really; but what else are they here for?]

[Eren says he hasn’t left anything behind. Aubrey wonders about the unspoken anyone. But those names—those faces—were answer enough, weren’t they?]

[Aubrey doesn’t say anything for a while, as if distracted. She feels all too present. Maybe she put the drink down too early.

[But the quiet is unbearable in its own way.]

If I see anyone again, I’ll tell you. First chance I get.

[She’ll hold him a thousand times again, if she has to.]

[Her words should infuriate him. They should set his teeth on edge, make his body tense; he recalls the feeling of his shattered wrists and fingers once the initial shock wore off. He should be furious. He should hate her.

[He feels grief instead. For once, he can't keep the emotion off his face. It's only there for a split second - not the expression of someone who's been stabbed or punch; it's a man at the pulpit of a funeral he never got to attend. He can still see Reiner in his mind, leaving, leaving, always leaving.

[Does he really not understand why she didn't tell him? Of course he does.

[And he won't make her the same promise. He's at a loss for words. He downs his drink. It feels weak. He fills it again. Downs it again. Fills it again. Holds it.

[She's right. The silence is unbearable, even with the cacophony of shadows, chattering all around them with no words.]

You talked to him.

Right?

[She nods, simply.]

I did.

[And leaves it at that, for now. Aubrey wants to take Eren’s hand; she doesn’t, yet.

[He said he wouldn’t run. Did he even notice Eren…? Did he have a face at all?]

[Is there anything she can say that he wouldn’t already know?]

[Eren's voice more resembles that memory than it does anything Aubrey's heard first hand. In the same, searching, "Do you really love me?" tone:]

What did he say...?

[…Ah.

[She can’t tell him anything less than everything, huh?]

[Aubrey only hesitates for a second.] Okay. [Even that feels too long.] Here, let me try—

[“—this again,” and a warning; but Eren won’t hear the rest. Aubrey takes his hand, and as soon as their skin connects he’ll get the memory—all of it. The aftermath of a damnation wrapped in a vow; a tentative conversation with nothing to hide; steady, somehow calm, despite everything behind it…

[“It’s a million times worse.” The memory spares nothing; what went unsaid was, in a way, the strongest part. Relief, agony, ever the contradiction. The understanding that that’s the only way it can be. And it will kill them. Eren is suffering, and he’s only ever wanted freedom, and he believed in it once; and they want to, need to, have to help, and it will kill them all.

[And they won’t run. It’d be impossible if they tried.
[They don’t want to try, anymore.]

[The memory fades with the handshake. Eren will find Aubrey squeezing his left hand in both of hers. Gentle. Because he doesn’t have to be dangerous, and he’s not broken beyond repair; they can, will, and have brought other sides back.]

[And she doesn’t want to break him anymore.]

[The memory is startling at first; after that, it's just Hell.

[He wanted to know what Reiner said. Aubrey gave him that. She gave too much - the said and the unsaid in a wretched harmony, made all the worse by how it feels--

[How it feels to be them. How it feels to love him.

[A worse Hell than he can imagine. Eren feels sick. The two full cups of booze he just downed probably aren't helping that, but they wouldn't be close to the only cause. Goosebumps prickle up over every inch of his skin.

[Aubrey and Reiner; both comforts, both weapons, both aimed at point blank range.

[Eren doesn't pull his hand away yet.

[He looks like he's about to shatter.]

What...? [It's a breath of a word.

[He tries to muster up anger - he tries, but it's...it's not working. Nothing's working. He isn't himself - or maybe he is. He doesn't know who that is anymore. He doesn't know anything anymore.

[None of it has ever made sense. They loved each other. Reiner as much as confirms that it wasn't a lie with his muddy, contradictory words. But it had to have been - and it couldn't have been.

[His hand is trembling just slightly. Aubrey will feel it if she's still holding on.]

What...

What right does he have...?

[He feels like he's going to dissolve. It's odd - there's a sudden desperation for Armin, ever there to pick up the pieces when Eren needs it. Then comes a worse desperation. He can't stand to face it. Reiner's right; the only thing he could ever bring Eren now is pain.

[Right?

[Eren wishes he were dead.]

You're wrong. [There's no edge to his voice - just dull shock, thinly obscuring miserable, aching, all-consuming grief.

[He wants him, he wants him, he wants him.]

You're both wrong...

[Now he pulls his hand away, shaking his head. He backs away from Aubrey. He looks like he's about to run - a cornered animal.

["I broke him."

[He hesitates. He doesn't retreat. Not yet. His voice comes out like a whisper - young, insistent.]

He's wrong.

[Aubrey doesn’t realize her hand was tipped more than she intended; her memories are nothing if not consumingly, disgustingly strong. She doesn’t have Armin’s sense for the world’s interventions. But she does intend an outpour of honesty, and if any of them were good at holding back they wouldn’t be here, and what was or wasn’t meant is washed away as Eren shakes, crumbles, pulls away. Aubrey holds on as long as she’s physically allowed, and it’s not enough. It never is. It never will be.]

[She doesn’t know what Eren’s talking about; of course she knows; that doesn’t matter, either. The last time he ran away like this, broken buttons in his wake, Aubrey didn’t see him again until he was mauled and left for dead.

[As if he’s not dying now. Forget dull declarations; seeing Eren like this, both freer and more tethered than she’s ever seen him, Aubrey feels like a monster. They all are. Monsters. Humans. Cornered animals.

[And this one’s hers.]

Eren…

[She reaches for him again, just a hand raised; strangely resolute, as if throwing her arms around Eren Jaeger was what she was born to do. As if…]

[Eren is her responsibility.
[Not Armin’s. Not Mikasa’s. Not even Reiner’s. It was Aubrey’s name on his neck.
[She loves him.]

Stay.

[How the hell did this happen....]
[She loves him so much.]

You can't stop me.

[His voice breaks miserably. It's the least convincing threat he's ever made.

[He doesn't retreat.]

[She takes his hand. And if he’ll let her, Aubrey will, slowly, raise her arms around Eren—and hold him.]

[Not harsh. Not sudden. But, gradually and not at all the less, tight.]

[Holding him must feel like a thousand spines sticking in her skin. It must feel like trying to muzzle a rabid dog. It must feel the way her left side looked, marred by his name. It must feel as terrible, and miserable, and hopeless, and overwhelming as that sick memory - how it feels to love Eren Jaeger.

[He wants to pull away, but he doesn't; he can't, whether by some force of this universe, or...by some other force entirely.

[All at once, he feels drunk. It's not good timing; he shouldn't have chugged those drinks. He's not used to it. On top of the emotional onslaught, he feels...actually sick. His head is swimming. He closes his eyes and lets his head rest on Aubrey's shoulder. It's a funny-looking position - six foot tall, bent over like that.

[He puts his arms around her. He grips tight.

[If I had to venture a guess, I'd say that Eren's shown sides of himself to you that he hasn't shown anyone in a long time.

[Reiner's right about that. Trust tethers him to Aubrey.]

I hate him. [As though she needs to be reminded; it's worth mentioning that, for all the hate Eren has shown Aubrey, this really sounds nothing like it at all.]

I don't want his help. [His help. A covert concession - one even he doesn't realize he's made.]

[Eren is warm. Holding him feels like being smothered by a body in a barracks; necessary, consumed, everything. It’s being so viscerally engulfed by the person keeping her alive that her soul will never recover. His head on her shoulder—his head! on her shoulder!—is the cry of a broken 9-year-old; his grip around her is a barrage of kisses, empty and wicked and cherished and beautiful; and she holds him back, firm as pressure on a wound, gentle all the same, close.]

[This—this—is what it’s like to love Eren Jaeger.]

[“I hate him.” And he does love him.]
[“I don’t want his help.” And so…]

[Eren could collapse here and now; Aubrey would go down with him, and not let go, never for a second.]

[She holds him.]

[She holds him. In that moment, she loves him more than anything, and she knows exactly why.]

[She holds him.]

[He's held.]

Why?

[His voice is weak. His head is spinning.]

Why do you do this to yourself?

[He knows, doesn’t he?]

[Aubrey’s voice is light. Yet she’s never felt more certain.]

I love you.

Why?

Because I want to understand you.

You saved me, Eren… and I want to save you, too.

Because you’re human.

I'm not. [His face is still buried in her shoulder. He feels like he might cry.]

I'm not.

You are.

I’ve seen you, Eren. You can’t take that back.

[She doesn’t let go. But she does shift, slightly, as if to look at him; to invite him to lock her gaze, and let her hold his face, so he knows.]

Neither can I.

[Aubrey and Eren know each other. When she moves with an intention, he follows through with a response; then, his face is in her hands, and her warm eyes are locked with his. And he doesn't hate her. Not at all. Not ever. Not in a million years.

[She's beautiful. It makes him feel all the more monstrous. The people back home would marvel at Aubrey's ability to tame a beast...

[His head remains heavy and warm, like his skull is full of hot water, sloshing back and forth as he tries to focus on the words coming out of his mouth; it's hard to focus on anything other than his wife.]

How did you do this to me...?

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