Wings in the Dark

Chapter 9: Thorns on the Rose

*Levi's POV*

When Levi came to, he felt lethargic and disoriented. His head was pounding, limbs heavy, and he even found breathing to be tiresome and difficult. Something that would have normally been alarming, if he could think straight.

What day was it? Was it night or day? Where was he? Why did he feel like there was somewhere he needed to be, something he needed to do?

He attempted to move his arms to start to sit up, opening his eyes briefly before immediately closing them as the world spun around him, the bright light painful on his eyes. A groan rumbled in his chest but didn't make it past his lips as he slowly started to sit up, using the soft surface below him as a sense of stability and direction while the world was spinning around him. As he sat up, something sheer and soft slid off his bare skin, scratching against something that was covering his lower torso.

Levi opened his eyes more cautiously this time, squinting against the light that came in through the window as his vision slowly came into focus on the familiar room around him.

His room. His bedroom.

What the hell was he doing in bed? He never slept in his own bed–it was there for decoration more than anything else. If he'd fallen asleep it would have been in just own chair.

And why was everything in his head such a confused mess? He shouldn't be this disoriented right now, why couldn't he remember...remember...

Levi lifted a heavy hand to his head, fingers digging into his hair as he tried to remember how he got here, what had happened before he'd fallen asleep?

Wait, there were...bandages on his head? Had he been knocked out by something? Some freak accident?

Right, he hadn't fallen asleep...he'd fallen unconscious because...

Levi looked down, finally noticing the bandages wrapped around his middle as well, covering his abdomen with a few strips wrapped over his shoulder to keep them in place. His hand lowered carefully to his middle, hand pressing tenderly for a wound, for some reason expecting to see blood gushing everywhere or to at least start seeping through the bandages.

The skin underneath was tender, sensitive to the touch and admittedly painful now that he was aware of it, like one large bruise or burn. Except, he knew that wasn't what was underneath the wrapping.

He remembered...blood. Lots of it, seeping out of a hole in his stomach, a hole ripped through him by the broken debris of a warehouse. He'd been losing blood so fast, staining his shirt, his skin, his hands, the floor...he'd known the moment he realized he'd been impaled he was going to die.

So why wasn't he dead?

Why had he gone to the warehouse in the first place?

The door to his room–the office portion–opened without anyone knocking, and Levi looked up in surprise. Considering the lack of an inquiry, he assumed it was Erwin coming inside. They cut right through his office without hesitation, heading right towards his bedroom door to reveal–

His stomach lurched, panic started to try and rear its head from his chest.

Red eyes, burning skin, a necklace, arms that threw him through walls and into the wood that impaled and should have killed him, an arm pressed against his lips, forcing blood into his mouth and holding fast to keep him from spitting it out though he still tried, in vain, to do just that, hands over his mouth and nose, cutting off his air until his body grew so desperate for oxygen it swallowed the blood in his mouth on a reflex.

Hands pressed against his fatal wound to try and stop the bleeding, arms that pulled him free from the wood he'd been impaled upon, a voice that tried desperately to keep him awake even when he lacked the strength to stay conscious any longer.