Work Text:
Levi paced the room as he waited for Hange to get home. She was late getting back from work. Not too late, but late. He checked his phone again. She hadn’t texted him back yet. He stared at the message he’d sent her-- really? It had only been ten minutes ago? He groaned.
Me: I have something to show you.
Stupid. Vague. Weird. Levi resisted the urge to chuck his phone at the wall. He rubbed his shoulders and stared at the ceiling. He almost wanted to call her, but neither of them liked talking on the phone very much, and he didn’t know what to say.
“Hey, how was work? I have wings.”
Unfortunately, that was probably exactly what would happen. Maybe he should just take his shirt off now and let her come home to him sprawling the poor, mangled things all over the couch.
Bad idea.
But then, the whole thing was a bad idea. Hange was a scientist. The last goddamn person in the world that he should be telling. Not the first.
But she was his roommate, and she was smart, and he’d rather tell her himself than have her accidentally find out one morning when she walked in on him getting out of the shower or something.
His pocket buzzed, nearly giving him a heart attack.
Hanjo: sorry. I’m going to be so late! Traffic’s tighter than Erwin’s asshole.
Levi almost smiled.
Me: Don’t text and drive, moron!
Hanjo: I’m literally parked on the highway rn. Looks like an accident maybe. Don’t wait up :P
Levi nodded at the text. So he’d just have to sit on pins and needles until she got home. Literally, he could feel his left wing tingling. He wanted to take them out now, but it would be better to wait.
So he waited. About half an hour later, Hange stumbled into their apartment, dropping her backpack on the floor, until Levi glared at her, and she hung it up.
“Sorry I’m so late.” she said. “It was an accident.”
“That sucks.”
“Mhmm.” Hange nodded.
“I, uh, texted you earlier.” Levi said, trying to sound casual.
“You did? Shit, sorry, I didn’t get it.”
Levi shrugged. “It doesn’t matter.” he said. “I have something to show you.”
Hange flopped onto the couch. “Oh yeah?”
“It’s serious.” Levi said, and he followed her into the living room.
Hange raised an eyebrow. “Are you finally opening up to me, Levi?”
Levi scowled at her. “I could change my mind very easily, four-eyes.”
“Wait,” Hange sat upright on the couch. “Are you actually?”
Levi nodded and knelt on the floor. “I don’t… really have an explanation, so I’m just going to show you.” He reached for the first button of his shirt. “But don’t scream, or I’ll punch you in the mouth.”
“If you’re showing me your dick, I’ll punch you right back.”
Levi stared at her. “Why the fuck would I show you my dick?”
“I don’t know.”
“That’s not what it is.”
“Great.”
She was watching him so closely that he felt like one of her experiments, which wasn’t exactly a good thing, but it was too late to back down now. He asked himself if he trusted Hange. He unbuttoned the rest of his shirt and shrugged it off of his shoulders. He looked at Hange briefly. She seemed confused by the tight cord crossing over his chest. That wouldn’t last long, and he wondered what expression she would have next. He had to look down to get the knot undone, but as the cord slackened, he looked back to her. He could feel his wings slipping out of their tight binding, spreading above his head, and twisting to rest their sore tips on the floor. He hissed when he moved his right wing too far away from his body; he hadn’t taken them out in a few days, and he could tell that another primary covert had broken.
He couldn’t tell what Hange thought. She was staring at them with wide eyes, taking in every detail.
“Levi…” she murmured. She stood from the couch, and came closer. Levi instinctively drew his wings closer to his back, but she went around to get a better look anyways. “That’s incredible.” she whispered. He flinched when she touched his back. “Sorry! Does that hurt?”
“Uh, no.” Levi answered.
“Your…” Hange cleared her throat. “Your primaries and secondaries have been cut off.”
“What?”
“The long feathers at the en-”
“No, I know what primaries and secondaries are, it’s just not what I expected you to say.”
“What did you expect?”
“Oh, I don’t know, something like, ‘what the fuck?’”
Hange laughed a little. “Well, yeah, obviously what the fuck, but I mean…” she brushed her fingers softly over the top of his wing. “They’re so beautiful…” It felt strange, having her fingers smoothing down his coverts. “And they’re really soft.”
“Thanks.” Levi muttered.
“Who cut them?” he was shocked to hear the almost dangerous edge to her voice, like she was going to legitimately murder the person who’d hurt him. She might find that complicated.
“I do.” he said. “I can’t hide them if I don’t.”
Hange was quiet for a moment, still smoothing downy feathers on his back. “It has to be uncomfortable, having them that short.”
She was right, although uncomfortable was an understatement. The broken ends itched badly, and whenever he had his wings out, it was agony keeping himself from just ripping the damn things out. But if he did, they’d only grow back faster.
“I know you can’t now, because the primaries and secondaries are so badly damaged, but if you gave them time to heal, do you think you’d be able to fly?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“Because life goes on, shitty-glasses. I don’t have time to heal.” Levi snapped. She wasn’t asking a question that he hadn’t given a million nights’ thought to. It had constantly been in his mind for years, whether or not he was really able to fly. He was pretty sure that they were big enough, and he was light enough, and it could work. What would happen if he let his flight feathers grow in?
He’d get caught.
“It’s too dangerous.” he told her.
Hange moved to stare him in the eye. “Why are you showing me?” she asked.
“You’re my roommate. I didn’t want you finding out accidentally and freaking out on me.”
Hange nodded a bit. “Okay, but you could probably have still kept them hidden.” she said. “But you decided to tell me, a physiologist, instead.” Her eyes flashed. “Why?”
Levi glared at her. “There’s no special fucking reason, I just didn’t want you to barge in on me getting dressed sometime and call the fucking cops or some shit.” he grabbed his shirt and went to stand up, but he moved the wrong way, and his right wing sent out a sharp pain signal. He gripped it where one of the feathers had been dented, and fell hard to his knees.
“Levi!” Hange cried out. The muscle in his wing was twitching underneath the broken feather. “Levi, are you alright?” Hange moved her hand over his, and circled her thumb over the back of it until Levi let go of his wing and let her look at it.
“You have a broken pin feather.” Hange said. “Which I suppose isn’t really surprising, since you don’t seem to take very good care of your wings in the first place.”
“And what would you suggest I do, leave them out all the time, and never be seen in public again?” Levi spat out. “Brilliant idea. Yeah, the feathers break a lot, and it hurts, but what else am I supposed to do?”
“A broken pin feather is serious!” Hange shot back. “You could bleed out from something like this, if you don’t take care of it!”
“What am I, some fucking pigeon?”
“Well, I know I’m not a pediatrician, so stop being a fucking child.” Levi’s mouth actually fell open when she said that. “I’m also not an aviary vet, so say still.”
“Ow!!” Levi shouted when Hange pulled the feather out. She waved it teasingly in front of his face before her face fell, and she sighed.
“I’m going to go get some cornstarch from the kitchen.” she said, standing.
“Cornstarch?”
“It’ll help clot it, genius.”
Levi grunted. “Fine.” he sat and pulled his wing forward around his shoulder a little better to look at it. Hange was right, of course, breaking a blood feather was serious, but this wasn’t the first time it had happened. He’d broken lots of blood feathers before. Whenever he molted, the old flight feathers that he’d cut would fall out, which was fine, but before long, new ones would grow in, and he’d have to be so careful. He was glad to work from home, since he couldn’t cut growing feathers without bleeding to death, and while they were too long and fragile to bind, he couldn’t go out, either.
Hange returned with cornstarch and a wet cloth. “I got the whole thing out on the first try, so that’s good, but I still want to make sure it clots.” she applied slight pressure to the follicle, which didn’t hurt that much, but Levi still winced, possibly just to make her feel bad about it.
“Hey, Levi?”
“What?”
“What would you do about them, if you could?”
He stared at her for a moment. “What do you mean?”
“If you could do anything, leave them out, get rid of them entirely, with no real repercussions, what would you want to do?”
While Levi thought about it, Hange continued smoothing his coverts down. “I’d want to leave them out, let the feathers grow back in completely.” Levi answered. “I can’t, of course, but…” he sighed. “Whatever.” he muttered. “Kind of a pointless question.”
Hange lifted the cloth from his wing. “It’s already clotting.” she said. “No worries there, then.”
Levi hummed a non-committal answer.
“I’m glad.” Hange said.
“That it stopped bleeding?”
“That you do like your wings.” she smiled. “I like them. They’re beautiful.”
Levi raised an eyebrow. “What, even like this?”
Hange nodded. “Yeah. They’re a really nice colour. What colour… what colour are the primaries and secondaries?”
Levi had to think about it. “Uh, the primaries are white and gray, and the secondaries are blue.”
Hange’s smile broadened. “That sounds pretty.” she said, and reached up to push Levi’s wing open a little bit. “Does that hurt?” she asked.
“No, it’s just sore.” Levi answered. Hange stood up to stretch Levi’s wing all the way out. She only paused when the joint made an alarming cracking noise, but it was just stretching more than normal, and Levi assured her it was fine. The wing stretched far, almost to the couch. “And that’s with the primaries cut!” Hange said. “You could fly with these, if they healed.”
“And I can take that as your scientific opinion, can I?” Levi asked sarcastically.
“Sure, although you know, as a renal physiologist, I’m not really an expert on birds.”
“I’m not a bird.”
“No, you’re much dumber.”
Levi yanked his wing back. “Fuck you.”
Hange laughed. “Still, who knows. I might learn a lot about birds from this.”
“I’m not a bird!” Levi insisted.
“I don’t know, you’re certainly getting all ruffled up!” Hange teased.
“Shut up!” Levi said.
“And the amount of preening you do on everything?” Hange suggested, still grinning ear-to-ear. “Your hair, the apartment, my hair, it’s very bird-like!”
“I preen? You’re the one who’s been picking my feathers apart since I showed you my wings in the first place!”
“And they look a lot better for it!” Hange smiled.
“The hell does it matter?” Levi said, and suddenly, he could feel a happiness that he hadn’t even noticed was there fade away. “I… I’m just going to have to tie them back up in the morning.” he said.
Hange’s smile went away, and Levi felt bad for killing the mood, but it was true. He couldn’t leave his wings out. He never could, he’d known that since he was a little kid.
“You know, you never answered my question.” Hange said.
Levi snorted. “Which one?”
“Why did you tell me?” Hange asked again. And then, slowly and deliberately she asked yet another question. “Do you want my help?”
Levi thought he might be feeling his throat closing up, which was stupid. He’d asked himself earlier if he trusted Hange, and he found himself asking again. “Yes.”
Yes he did.