Experimenting With Miracles // ERERI

Chapter 16

Hanji quietly opened the door to the infirmary, in case the room’s only occupant was still sleeping. She peered into the darkened room cautiously but easily spotted Levi’s form sitting up in the bed. He was looking out the window, head turned away from her.

She approached wordlessly, not really wanting to disturb him. But once she was fully positioned at his bedside and he still gave no acknowledgement of her presence, she decided to alert him to it.

“Hey shorty,” she greeted with her normal range of eccentricity.

He visibly flinched and whipped his head to face her, looking a bit startled as he did. Levi glowered when he realized what had been said, “Fucking woman! Don't come so fucking close and talk so loud.”

Hanji, meanwhile, was very surprised. “Wait you mean you didn't hear me come in?”

“How the hell would I hear that from this far?” His tone was annoyed and yet tired.

In all the years she had known the man, she had never once been able to enter a room without him hearing the slightest sound from the door. It simply wasn't possible to enter his range of hearing without being detected. She supposed that was from his time in the underground, strengthening his senses for self preservation.

So to have actually, and unintentionally, startled him when she wasn't even trying shouldn't have been possible.

“No.. Levi you always hear me,” she argued in confusion.

He seemed to realize it as well and stared back at her stoically. Though she could see the slightest build up of tension in his shoulders.

Her frantic thoughts went back to what Levi’s squad had told her of the expedition and the events that had led up to his untimely injury and near death. She was forgetting something. Then it hit her.

“That… thing picked him up like nothing. It shook him around like some sort of toy…” Jean had said.

“H-He was screaming so badly… We thought it had torn off one of his limbs,” Sasha mentioned with a shudder.

Connie continued from there, “Then it brought him to its face and roared. It was damn near ear shattering from our position below. I can't imagine how loud it must've been to him…”

A sinking feeling engulfed her chest. Hanji swallowed nervously and looked back anxiously to her wounded comrade. “You really didn't hear me come in?”

Levi shook his head mutely.

She bit at her lip, “Okay… Bear with me for a minute here. I'm going to make some noises and whispers; tell me if you hear them.”

His brow furrowed a bit, “Hanji.. What does this-”

“Please,” she pleaded, “I need to test this.”

He released a ragged sigh, wincing just slightly as he did, but nodded.

By the end of her short test, Hanji was only feeling worse about the whole thing. She remained quiet at his bedside, considering the results.

Levi watched her with a careful eye, “Now what the fuck was that for?”

There was no sense in lying to him. She ran an anxious hand through her bangs. “During the incident,” she began, “the titan that had you in its hold apparently roared at full volume. The cadets in your squad told me that it was half deafening for them on the ground below…”

“Yeah..so?” His annoyance was obviously growing.

“You were right in front of its face when that happened, Levi.” Her brown eyes looked up to him, willing him to understand. “You were bleeding at the ears when I got to you,” she continued in a softer tone of voice, being sure to not be too quiet. “Initially I thought nothing of it, figuring it was part of your head wound… But now..”