Aesthetic Acid | eren x levi |

♛: Forty-One Ends

"Of course. That's why we came back to finish the job," Eren blurted out boldly.

Petra was still nowhere to be seen, but they could still sense her. Levi feared she was going to give them a surprise attack, and that seemed to be a tactic she often preferred to use telling from past experiences.

"You always sound so cocky," Levi sneered. "Why don't you show yourself?"

Levi wasn't expecting her to listen, but she did as he told her to do. Even in her living days, Petra had always been the type not to listen when someone instructed her to do something. He couldn't decide if it was because she was lazy or it was in her nature. Perhaps both.

Her bright auburn hair looked like a living creature was inhabiting it; leaves and little twigs sticking out of it like birthday candles on a cake. Her face decorated with dust and dried blood and she was wearing a white dress, which Eren found inconvenient since she was still heavily bleeding. An alarmingly large splotch of her own blood was on display on the front of her dress from where Eren had stabbed her. She didn't look as pretty anymore, which was rare for them to think. She was just so beaten, like the way a once so delicious apple began to rot, or stained windows after decades of no attention or cleaning.

"Can I please speak to you before you attempt to uselessly attack us?" Levi asked, annoyance coating his voice thickly.

"What is there to talk about?" Petra growled. Her head twitched to the side and her talon-like nails out in the open for them to see.

"You have claimed numerous times that you're being so angry towards me and acting upon your violent tendencies because I chose Eren over you and I'd like to say that..." Levi trailed off softly, unsure if he wanted to finish what he had to say. "The old Petra would have never acted like this if I were to have chosen another woman over her."

She whipped her head back with her face towards the sky and laugh. It was raspy and dry, almost cough- like as well. She held in her stomach as if Levi had told her the funniest joke.

"Oh, dear Levi. Always trying to find the-" she started and gestured quotation mark symbols with both hands, "-old Petra. I never changed, honey. Your views did. Even when I gave you another chance to be with me you turned it away. Even when you were so lost and miserable without me after you had turned, you didn't want me anymore."

"I'll show you then. I'll show you what you used to be like. Maybe that will change your mind since you're so brainwashed." Levi extended a hand and pointed at her, indicating that he would put his memory sharing gift to use.

Petra hissed and flinched as she backed away, her hands in front of her as if Levi had offered her an item composed of silver. "Don't touch me," she snapped.

"I guess it's time for a timeout then," Eren suddenly added. "Since you won't cooperate, I'll make you."

Petra appeared like she was going to laugh disturbingly horrendous again, but out of the blue Eren fainted and almost dropped to the floor with his eyes closed and hair flowing in the breeze like swinging cattail plants. Levi caught him in time and gently laid him on the ground in a comfortable position. Petra (Eren?) hissed in pain and brushed her arms like she couldn't handle how filthy she was.

"It hurts."

"Eren?" Levi asked to be sure.

"Of course it's me," he replied, deadpanned.

"Still not used to this gift of yours," Levi told him.

"Well, it isn't a gift when you're hurting everywhere." He winced. "What will we do with her?"