Freedom Fighters League of the Exiled

Quite the Scare

I opened my eyes. Despite feeling my whole body scream at me I sat up. Looking around I realized I was in bed in our room. "Was that all a dream?" I whispered faintly remembering the chaos.

"Sadly no," Eren said and I turned my attention to him. He was sitting next to me on the bed. He looked so relieved to see me wake up. I didn't even know he was there. Wait. Why didn't I hear his thoughts or feel his emotions? What's happening? I started to panic for a moment when his thoughts faintly came through. They were like whispers in the back of my head. I could barely tell what he was thinking. It started to get clearer, but it still stayed quieter than normal. "Hey don't stress yourself out," he said quickly.

"Why can't I feel your emotions?" I asked, completely ignoring his request.

"It's not permanent," he said quickly taking my hand in his, "Hanji said you overworked yourself both on the mind-reading and on your empathic abilities so you might be numb to feelings for a little bit until your body fully rests up," he said with a comforting smile.

"I didn't even realize I was overdoing it."

"Adrenaline will do that."

"Wait so how are the rooms fixed? Didn't I pass out before that?" I asked looking around.

"Franz helped Petra using your powers."

"Oh." I said quietly, "how long was I out?"

"About an hour."

"That long?"

"Long?" Eren asked with raised eyebrows. "You do realize Hanji said that you would probably be out for the rest of the night." We all thought it would be a lot longer. I faintly heard his worried thoughts.

"I didn't think I overdid it that much?" I asked. Then again I've never had backlash this bad from my mind-reading or empath abilities since we were in school.

"Are you kidding? You overdid it to the point where we are discovering new backlash. Your powers are barely working right now and you think that's normal?" not to mention- his thoughts cut out and I couldn't tell if I just couldn't hear them or if he just stopped mid-thought.

"No I guess not, I just, I didn't realize that I really overdid it. I didn't feel it until-."

"Everything calmed down and your adrenaline disappeared."

"Yeah," I said, realizing that of course, I wouldn't feel anything with that much adrenaline going through me, and everyone else around me.

"Also Thomas told me to tell you that you're a hypocrite," Eren said confused. "Do you know why he said that?"

For a second I was as confused as he was about that comment until I remembered the last thing I said to him. "I told him not to push his powers past its limits cause we didn't need to deal with backlash." I took a deep breath. "I did exactly what I told him not to."

"Oh, so you are a hypocrite," Eren nodded.

"Well, I didn't realize I was pushing myself."

"And if you did?"

"And if I did?" I asked back trying to see where he was going with this.

"Would it have changed how you would have handled that situation?"

I just sat there staring at him. I wanted so desperately to tell him that yes I would have done things differently, but we both know that's a flat-out lie.

After staring at each other in the dead silent room he just shook his head, "exactly."

"Did I miss dinner?" I asked about changing the subject.