It was the kind of pain you've never felt before. It was so painful you couldn't think of anything else. Your visions started to darken and you were in and out of oblivion. The voices around sounded muffled, there were people but they were nothing more than a blur.

But somehow you can make out a voice, a very familiar voice that you recognize even in your state of near unconsciousness. He was saying something, he was talking to a woman you realize was Ms. Florence. But you couldn't hear what they were saying, their voices still sounded muffled in your ears, and you could hardly focus your senses on anything else because of the pain.

Your voice was no more than above a whisper when you called out his name.

"Levi,"

He was leaving, but you don't want him to leave. You want him to stay by your side more than anyone else right now.

You wanted to call out his name again, but you couldn't find your voice to say it. But there was no need to, as Levi heard you the first time you spoke his name, like the air had carried your voice to him and he stopped before he could open the door.

For a second you saw him simply standing there, as though time had frozen him still. Until he turned around and saw you staring at him, with your tired eyes that were drooping down and half-lidded.

You managed to lift a hand and Levi walked up to you, taking your hand in his. His hand was cold, trembling but when he held yours it was firm as if a silent reassurance and you found your strength seeping back to your system, however little it was.

"Levi...it hurts," you whimpered and you felt how he squeezed your hand as if he's giving you all the strength of humanity's strongest soldier.

But what can he do, really? He cannot just make your pain vanish in thin air, he can't take it away. He's so frustrated he couldn't do anything and Levi never knew how annoying it is to be so helpless for the first time in a long while.

All he could do was give your hand a squeeze and then lean down, close to you as he used his other hand to brush your hair away from your face and the unshed tears in the process.

"Don't worry," he said, whispering the words to you as you focused on his voice and his voice alone. "It'll be over soon. The pain will go away soon, and you'll be fine."

"What..." you muttered, your voice still no more than above a whisper. "Levi..."

He planted a kiss on your forehead that lasted for a while before moving down to plant one on your lips, this time it lasted shorter and then he straightened up. He untangled his fingers around yours before you can hold on to his hand again.

Levi looked at Ms. Florence and nodded, his face gloomy and somber while Ms. Florence had a very crestfallen expression that makes it look like she's about to cry.

"You know what to do," he said to her, taking a step towards her, his face devoid of any emotion like an empty shell. "If she dies, heaven knows what I might do."

Ms. Florence knew that at that moment, she was no longer talking to humanity's strongest soldier who dedicated his heart to humanity. This man is someone who grew up in the Underground, who knew no law but survival of the fittest. He was raised in a kill or be killed environment, in those dark alleys that couldn't be penetrated by sunlight.

He was a thug before he was a soldier, he had held knives to kill people before swords to kill titans. This man is dangerous, Ms. Florence thought to herself.

With a visible gulp she nodded, her eyes firmly on the ground because she couldn't look into Levi's cold gaze that made her shudder. She watched instead his feet, boots against the wooden floor as Levi started to walk towards the door and finally this time opened it and left the room.

"Levi..." you muttered, feeling what little strength in your body dissipated the moment the door closed behind Levi. Before you can say another word, darkness was pulling you in and you found yourself in the otherwise comforting arms of oblivion.

Levi did not leave, he stayed right outside the door of the bedroom, feeling his chest tightened in a way it never did before. He walked across the hallway so he could see the door and leaned on the wall, his hand found the green cloak of the Scout, wrapped around his shoulders, gripping it so tightly as his knees finally gave out and his back slid on the wall.

"Y/n, it hurts too..." he muttered to himself.

The choices he made that day hurt him in more ways than he was prepared to take. Suddenly the cloak bearing the wings of freedom on his back felt so heavy, so suffocating. His chest tightened so much that breathing was starting to get harder and harder.

"It hurts too...Why must... I always have to make the choices?"

He knew he would make more in the future, harder ones. But the choice he made today was a choice he would never forget.

He chose you over the unborn child that's threatening to take you away from him forever. And he wondered then, he wondered for the rest of the afternoon as he sat outside the door, he wondered if he actually made the right choice or he might end up regretting it every single day from then on.

The rest of the afternoon felt so fast, Levi remained there in the hallway with his head between his legs and hand clutching his cloak. Until the last hour of dusk painted the sky in red and orange, he heard your muffled cries again, this time along with suppressed yells.

He leaned his head back on the wall, closed his eyes tightly as your cries continued to echo in his mind. And then some time after that, silence followed.

Levi opened his eyes and then squinted when the door opened. Slowly he stood up and started to retrace his steps back to the bedroom. The sky outside seems to have been scattered with blood orange, and the sun is still providing its light.

Levi's eyes landed on you, and he breathed out a sigh of relief when he saw the rise and fall of your chest indicating that you're breathing.

And then his eyes turned to the small bundle of cloth held within Ms. Florence's arms. He slowly took a step towards her, until he all but heard your voice.

It sounded so weak, but in the still silence of the room your voice sounded so loud.

"My baby..." you said, voice croaking.

Ms. Florence seemed to hesitate before she spoke. "It's... It was a boy."

Was a boy, Levi thought to himself. But when he looked at you, he saw the faintest smile on your pale lips, and the gleam returning to your half-lidded eyes.

"My Lucas..."

But before Ms. Florence could hand the small blanket to you, your eyes closed and for a second Levi thought of the worst, until the young lady beside you said you had simply fallen asleep due to the accumulated exhaustion from the hours of labor and delivery.

Levi turned to Ms. Florence, who looked as if she's about to cry, tears started to form in her eyes. Slowly she handed the small blanket to Levi who took it with trembling hands. He walked near the window, away from the bed where you're sleeping and near the remaining sunlight seeping through the glass from the afternoon sun.

And then Levi looked down and saw the most peaceful face of a baby boy that seemed to only be sleeping, bathed in the golden hour of dusk. Then he felt himself weakened again and Levi fell on his knees, still clutching the blanket in his arms, he held the baby tightly close to him and the tears that didn't fall earlier had started streaming down his face.

His shoulders started to tremble and his cries filled the room. And that for a moment it sounded as though his cries weren't the only thing that can be heard.

It wasn't.

When Levi's cries faded, he could hear another cry. This time it wasn't coming from him but from the small blanket wrapped around the small being in his arms.

The baby began to squirm and Levi felt his sunken heart begin to leap again. Slowly he leaned back and held the baby in front of him. Unlike earlier when his eyes were close and his face looked so peaceful, the baby is now wailing and crying, Ms. Florence could be heard letting out a gasp.

Levi looked at the crying newborn for a few seconds, trying to let things sink in before his vision began to blur again and he held the baby close to him as he lowered his head.

"I'm sorry," he said, voice breaking as his shoulders continued trembling. "I'm sorry... I'm sorry. Papa's sorry."

He apologized over and over again until the last second of dawn's light was swallowed by nightfall and the full moon illuminated the sky along with the stars. And Levi was still apologizing, over and over in his mind. For choosing you over this child, for not choosing both.

On the same day the son of humanity's strongest soldier was born out of a miracle, humanity received a grim reminder. On the same day the child who had seen this world too early was born, Wall Maria was breached after a hundred years of protecting humanity. On that day, mankind received a grim reminder, they lived in fear of the Titans and were disgraced to live in those cages they called walls.