[Helpless, frustrated. Lonely and angry and afraid. His throat works. He blinks hard. He bows his head as if to hide the evidence, muffles his words into the curve of her neck.]
I know that.
[There's more audible bite in it than he means, less force than there really ought to be. A vicious venting that sparks and dies as quickly as it comes, that fractures in midair and sounds thin and petulant and false at the edges, like a child making himself out to be bigger than he really is. Because he is not as certain as he wants to be, and that is frightening to admit to himself. (Because Armin is gone and Connie's gone he is afraid for them. The whole might of the Corps could not kill Annie and yet she'd vanished without fanfare here, like smoke.)
He doesn't have it in him to give up. (He doesn't have it in him not to take it hard when things go wrong.)]
no subject
I know that.
[There's more audible bite in it than he means, less force than there really ought to be. A vicious venting that sparks and dies as quickly as it comes, that fractures in midair and sounds thin and petulant and false at the edges, like a child making himself out to be bigger than he really is. Because he is not as certain as he wants to be, and that is frightening to admit to himself. (Because Armin is gone and Connie's gone he is afraid for them. The whole might of the Corps could not kill Annie and yet she'd vanished without fanfare here, like smoke.)
He doesn't have it in him to give up. (He doesn't have it in him not to take it hard when things go wrong.)]