Follow Lara's journey, an orphan girl of just ten years old, who joins the Survey Corps. Having Levi Ackerman and Hange Zoë as her tutors, her life takes on a new meaning as the relationship with these two soldiers grows. And, as time goes by, she d...
Flying like a thunderbolt through the trees, Hange heard someone scream. It was Levi. She maneuvered her ODM gear towards his voice, her hair ruffling by the wind.
Her entire body was shaking and her vision was blurred. Hange pressed her fingers on her wrist and felt her heart beating fast. She struggled to stay focused, as she knew that her blood pressure was probably too high right now.
A few minutes ago, in the camp, when she heard Lara's cry of despair coming from the forest, Hange never imagined she could ever feel so much fear in her life, although she had already witnessed terrifying scenes of her fellow comrades being slowly devoured alive by the Titans.
Hange was extremely worried about Lara and felt tears coming down her eyes, fogging up her goggles. But, she was also worried about Levi. The way he looked when he ran towards the forest, it seemed of a person on the verge of insanity.
When she finally reached the clearing, she was able to witness Levi finish off slashing the nape of a Titan which - to Hange's terror - was now holding a completely dangled and passed out Lara in its hand.
Hange saw Levi not only cut the nape of the Titan, but also cut off its entire head. For a millisecond, their eyes met.
"HANGE!" exclaimed Levi, signalizing Lara with his head.
As if they had arranged it before, she nodded and flew towards Lara, just in time to hold the girl, while Levi cut the Titan's hand, to loosen it, so Hange could take Lara in her arms.
Levi watched the girls land safely on the ground. Now, he could finish his work.
Levi didn't just cut off the Titan's head and its hand.
He sliced it all up and made mincemeat out of it.
Every drop of his blood boiled with anger and most of all, with fear.
Levi didn't stop until he completely dismembered that Titan's body. Only when he saw smoke coming out of it, Levi turned away to run to Hange and Lara.
He struggled to breathe and staggered towards them. With only a few meters left, he could already see that Hange had put her goggles on her forehead and that she looked at Lara, lying in her arms, with an expression of the deepest pain.
"Lara..." cried Hange, sobbing and rocking her body back and forth. "My baby... My baby..."
Hange lifted her eyes and saw Levi approaching, literally throwing himself on the ground in front of her. Now, they were on their knees, with Lara laid down between them.
"Levi..." Hange grabbed his cloak, shaking it in desperation, "Levi... Help me!"
Panting and with his entire body shaking, Levi analyzed Lara's small body from head to toe. Her hair was disheveled and dirt covered her face, marked with tears that, moments ago, came down her eyes. Her left foot was strangely crooked. Levi noticed that Hange was running her hand on Lara's left side.
"I think she broke a rib! It's very swollen in here!" exclaimed Hange, lifting Lara's shirt enough to see that there was a huge bruise on the area of the last two ribs of her body. Hange's hands were shaking badly and her frightened eyes met Levi's.
Hange placed her ears close to Lara's mouth while holding her tiny wrist.
"Levi!" shouted Hange, desperately, shaking him again. "Her breathing is very shallow and I can hardly feel her heart!"
Immediately, Levi began performing CPR on Lara. At this point, despair took hold of Hange's heart in such a way that the only thing she could do was to hold the girl's hair and touch their foreheads, crying like never before in her life.
Between doing cardiac massage and mouth-to-mouth resuscitation, Levi felt like he was in a dream, or rather, in a nightmare. Everything around him seemed to have vanished and a lot of sweat ran down his forehead.
"My baby..." sobbed Hange, who was unconsciously pulling grass from the ground, while squeezing Lara's hand and leaning over the girl. "My daughter..."
Levi felt his vision blurring from the tears that flowed in his eyes.
"No...", he thought, as he massaged Lara's chest with fingers interlocked, hands one over the other. "This can't be happening... Not now..."
Hange not only continued to cry, but now she was also screaming for her daughter's name. Levi shook his head in denial as he desperately continued to give Lara the cardiac massage, his own tears pouring down the body of the child laying on the ground.
"No..." said Levi, his voice choked up in emotion, "Don't do this to me... I came, I'm here! Daddy's here..."
In a second of affliction, just like Hange, Levi also leaned to touch his forehead on Lara's, and the three of them stayed there, together.
"Daddy's here..." Levi whispered in Lara's ear, after gently kissing her forehead, "I'm he—"
He didn't manage to complete the sentence, as a deep cry echoed in his throat. Completely ignoring his emotional state, he went back on performing the CPR on Lara.
After a few minutes, Levi felt a hand grab his cloak.
"Levi..." mumbled Hange, seeming she was about to faint. Slowly, she began to shake her head at Levi, as if to say: "It's no use..."
He felt his entire body freeze and with a look of fury, he shouted a resounding "NO!", doing the cardiac massage once more. Levi didn't know how long he stood there, doing the CPR, but he felt that his green cloak was about to be torn, because Hange was squeezing it so tightly, while rocking her body back and forth. Hange's crying was very painful to hear and mingled with Levi's own crying.
Out of their sight, all the Survey Corps' soldiers were watching the horrible scene taking place on the ground of that clearing, looking from above, on the trees. They were only able to find them now, by listening to Hange's screams of despair.
Erwin watched the scene of those two adults, bent in deep agony over their child, over their daughter. Indeed, the Commander carried the weight of many lost lives on his back, but none of them were weighing as much as this girl's, for he had become very fond of Lara. Not just him, but every other member of the Survey Corps. Here and there, small sobs could be heard from some soldiers among the trees and Erwin felt a tear run down his face.
At this point, Levi had no more strength in his arms, which were tingling and he felt he was about to faint at any moment. Slowly, he stopped the cardiac massage and observed the body of Lara, his daughter, motionless on the ground.
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