thinking of death

jean/marco

Sometimes Jean wonders what it's like to be dead.

He'd ask Marco, but Marco isn't here.

Sometimes Jean wonders what it's like to be stone cold, to stare at the sky with matte eyes, to not feel or know anything anymore in the world they're living in. He certainly knows what it's like on the other side of the spectrum: to be alive, still running from Titans, watching his comrades die, knowing, feeling.

Being dead must be better. That must be why Marco left.

Sometimes Jean wonders these things where he found half of Marco slumped against a wall. He kneels down, puts a crumpled flower there, and stays there, staring at the chipped bricks. It rained a few days ago and the bloodstains have washed out but Jean can still see them when he closes his eyes. He can imagine what it's like to be dead here, because he's seen the dead here. Citizens who are getting some of their lives back together pass by him, and shake their heads, commenting on the sanity of the soldiers their society depends on.

Jean doesn't care. They don't know the sight of death. Death has the look of Marco's eye and pale, rotting face; death has the look of bloody ribs jutting out of Marco's torso like the wooden framework of a boat.

Jean does this every day, almost. He goes to where he last saw Marco and sits, thinking. Then he stumbles to his barracks, where he thinks some more. Today, he really thinks.

He thinks with a government rifle in his calloused hands. He turns the rifle over and over.

Thinking will kill you. You'll die by your own thoughts. Jean knows this and wants to think.

Marco would say something against this, and Jean would've listened but wouldn't pay any attention. Actually, anything Marco said, Jean would listen but not take heart of it. He just liked listening to his voice.

Jean thinks.

When they were still in training and spent all their energy in the daytime doing drills and weapon practise, they'd come back to their rooms, exhausted. What energy they had left, they used when Armin told them stories. He'd said there was a book written years and years ago, when humans used to think there was a God. (Jean had thought, where is he now?) Armin said that this God described love as patient and kind. It didn't boast, didn't dishonour others, wasn't rude, wasn't easily angered… it protected, trusted, hoped, and persevered.

At the time Jean had taken this all into consideration. Love—he wanted it, wanted all of these qualities, just wanted to experience it.

Jean thinks.

He has experienced it. He did. He thinks of Marco.

Marco was patient, Marco was kind. He didn't boast, didn't dishonour others. He wasn't rude, wasn't easily angered. He protected, he trusted, he hoped, and he persevered.

Marco was the definition of love and Jean had experienced it. Jean thinks of the moment when he, like a little schoolgirl, shyly pressed a kiss on Marco's cheek and muttered, "I kinda like you." Marco had smiled fondly at him and, before Jean could pull away in shame, turned his face so he could kiss his lips.

Jean thinks of when Marco said, "I love you," fully and confidently, looking him right in the eyes. From that point on he and Marco had to keep their late-night kisses to a minimum, hidden away in the corners of their barracks so no one would know. They'd steal quick pecks on the lips, they'd touch every chance they got to. Behind curtains, behind the gun racks, in the alleyways of the city, under the starry moonlight in flowered fields.

Jean thinks of death again with the rifle still in his hands, closing his eyes. The mouth of the long gun peers up at his face.

Death?

The image of half of Marco doesn't appear anymore, but instead, Jean sees his friends, the ten of them from the Corps, standing in a line in their ranked order. Mikasa, Reiner, Bertolt, Annie, Eren… They're all happy, turned toward him. Jean turns to his left, grinning, where Marco stands, and is greeted with empty air.

Jean opens his eyes. A bleak future without Marco. Thinking really does kill you.

He looks down and finds that his tears have landed on the rifle's trigger, where his finger has been resting on for some time now. Jean decides he has thought too much.

He pulls it.