You floated in the Coordinate for what felt like an eternity. You no longer existed in a plane of reality that was tangible. You were not human, a living being, nothing. You were a star on a Path, and stars burned.

You went wherever you were pulled, as though you were an omnipresent deity. A ghost gliding with the cold current of a haunted river. In the Path, you could feel every emotion from every Eldian in history like their memories were yours. You felt their happiness, their anger, and above all, their grief at not having the chance to be free. Their lives were intertwined in strings of fate, like branches of a tree.

You saw visions from all the lives you had lived.

There could only be one life, not thirteen, and that was why Eren was at risk and it was also why you had given yourself in his stead. After all, although Eren had died in previous lives, so had you.

Every time you died, the loop reset. You were not supposed to be dead in any reality.

You saw it all, memories that flashed through your head, so warmly familiar and subsequently painful. You saw the Titans, saw every moment you loved destruction.

Thirteen lives, you heard someone whisper to you. It sounded like Eren. You tried to say something in response, but you did not have a mouth or a body. Frightened, you flitted through the void of stars like a comet passing through. Nine Titans. An exchange.

Exchange me for you, you called into the void. I lived.

You died in those lives.

No, you said. You did.

Eren's voice went silent.

He manifested before you—not the scared, lost boy you last saw of him. You saw the Paths dimension version of him—the alternate, hidden prisoner he was in the Founding Titan.

Like in the Reiss cave from years ago, Eren's wrists were chained to what looked like the skeleton of his final Titan form. His body was slumped, like he was in deep slumber. Weak. Injured. Dying of a broken heart that needed yours.

Take my life, you said.

You lived thirteen times.

You had not just rewritten the fabric of reality, having lived thirteen times. Eren had been helping you in the Paths—waiting for you to what? Tell him you love him? No. It was not only that. It's not just a loop.

You had torn reality apart and stitched it together many times. You had altered the series of events that never should have been manipulated in the first place.

You had told Eren you loved him—that was something that was supposed to happen. A choice you willingly made in this life, fulfilling something that would free him.

After that, then what? You pondered.

There could not be thirteen lives. There could only be one. The thirteen universes were crashing into each other on the Paths' plane of reality—fighting to be the one real life. The trigger had been your confession to Eren.

Now, you were in the Coordinate. Under the tree, you carried Eren's weight and some of the Founder's power. You had the freedom to pick which realities you could sacrifice.

A lightbulb went off in your head. It was clear to you now. There was a loophole.

The sacrifice didn't have to necessarily be you.

The past lives you lived through were an ample number to choose from. Thirteen.

You and Eren had wanted each other badly enough to come this far. This fabric, a quilt made up of thirteen pieces, was trying hard to become one, but it could not. The Coordinate would not allow it—it did not fit in any plane of reality.

You had to sacrifice some of the pieces.

Sacrifice.

Nine Titans.

Thirteen lives.

A loop repeats.

This would be your first act of letting go.

"I was a Titan for three lives," you began. Your voice echoed to the unconscious, chained Eren kneeling before you. "So I can't exchange those because it connects me to those Titans' Paths."

You were not sure if he could hear you. He might not even be the real Eren. He was just a manifestation of who Eren felt he was deep inside—a prisoner to his fate. He did not have to stick with that ideal; you knew better than anyone that it was okay to alter destiny.

Your eyes widened. You had lived thirteen times, and the nine Titans had to be destroyed in exchange for a life. It did not mean you had to be dead. You just had to offer a life. A life where you had already died.

"Eren, I... I'm giving the other nine lives to the Coordinate! So, this last life—the one where I tell you how I feel—this is our real life. This is how our life was supposed to go."

The loophole.

At that, Eren stirred. His sleepy green eyes blinked at you, squinting in the darkness. Are you real?

You were sure your form was human enough to have a body, because you could feel it twisting painfully in your chest. He looked at you with such longing and desperation, that it broke your heart.

"I don't care about anything else," he whispered. "I just want to be with you."

"I have to give you my life," you said. Your voice softened and lowered to whisper. "I want to be with you too."

You wanted to tell Eren everything—that you were sorry for leaving him every life, that you felt at the time it was the only choice you could make. But you were wrong. There was always a choice.

You wanted to tell Eren everything.

"I love you, I love you," you whispered. "I love you, Eren."

The chains around his wrists dissolved into sand. Your declaration had broken the illusion of imprisonment in his head.

The memories flooded your head like shards—from the moment you met, to childhood and to the cadet corps, to the military and the world beyond the cage. To now. To the past, the present, and inevitably, the future you could never see.

You gasped. It felt like something venomous was being extracted from your body.

Both you and Eren dropped onto the sand, coughing and gasping as though you had drowned. He had seen the memories too. He was only an arm's reach away from you.

This was it.

You could feel the weight on your shoulders—one you hadn't even realized was there—lift. It was dissolving your past lives.

"Eren," you whispered. "You're free."

-

Eren was passed out. As a Titan, he was akin to the heroes in Armin's storybook—in one such story, a Titan held the world on his shoulders as a form of imprisonment.

He was not a Titan anymore.

You knelt beside him. He had slumped with his head across your lap. You cupped Eren's face in your hands like you were holding something precious. It was muscle memory. You brushed the strands from his forehead like you always did, and looked into his closed, fluttering eyes.

"Don't give up," you wept. "You don't belong in this hell, 'Ren."

You leaned forward, holding his shoulders to keep you both upright, and gently pressed your lips to his.

At that, Eren recovered quickly. His eyes opened, then widened like he was still that little boy from childhood. You would know. You had seen it for the first time many times.

"You have dirt on your face," he croaked out, mouth moving against your lips.

Between your tears, you laughed. "I hate it when you say that."

"No, really. The sand got on your cheek."

Reaching out, his hands slowly slid around your waist to pull you closer in his arms. His heart beat fast against yours. You threw your arms around his neck, returning his kisses with fervor. He kissed you deeply, so hard that you both angled diagonal.

When you finally broke apart, the love in his eyes took your breath away.

"We're free," he repeated, correcting you from earlier. "[Name], you're... you're incredible!"

"Just... lacking lives," you said, something between a laugh and a sob choking you.

Eren took your hand in his. "This life is all we need."

"Is it...? I lived in a time loop," you said. "I repeated our lives, over and over again."

"I know," he said. "I was there. I have those memories. I remember them now because of you. You... you saved me. You saved us."

You slowly began to laugh in disbelief.

"Oh my God," you said. "You were in the loop with me, and you didn't even know."

"I sort of did, but... I thought I was going crazy." He rubbed the back of his neck. "I would see these visions of us, all these different scenes in my head and I... it almost felt like I was disrespecting you, in a way. And it drove me insane."

You giggled, and let your finger trace his jawline.

"You were going crazy," you said, confirming what he already knew. "I know I was."

When you looked at him, for once you did not see the despairing man destined to die. You saw the boy you knew, glittering in his irises. Freedom.

For a moment you both sat there holding each other's hand. You were aware of the weight of everything on your heads. You felt every overwhelming emotion like rain cleansing your sins—guilt, grief, and not as oddly, joy.

"When we get out of the Coordinate," Eren said, "this pocket of reality won't exist anymore. You gave nine of those twelve lives to free us, one for each Titan. So... we might not remember that those lives existed at all."

You stopped. "I won't remember the loops?"

"They don't exist anymore. You gave it to end the curse, and it cancelled out."

"So they never happened at all."

"We'll recall the ones where you were a Titan, I guess, but..." Eren trailed off. "I think it'll be just like me before I became aware. We'll think it was just something like a dream."

You quieted.

Upon noticing your sense of dejection, Eren touched your arm. "Are you upset?"

After a few moments, you shrugged. You had no idea how to feel. You supposed victory truly never came without sacrifice. If it boiled down to saving Eren and never being able to recall the loops versus remembering everything without having accomplished a single win, you knew which choice you would make in a heartbeat.

"I don't know," you said. "I was going insane remembering those lives."

Eren rested his chin on your shoulder.

"That's why this place is going to get destroyed," he said. "And it's probably why you were going crazy. This little part of the Coordinate is the inside of our minds, really. It's just how us Eldians are."

"A universe in our minds." You looked up at the Paths' sky. "It's like those stars."

Eren hummed. "Those stars are exactly this."

"Maybe the real world is just another universe inside our heads."

"You'll go crazy trying to make sense of it all. I don't know. You know me better than I know myself. Our minds are linked and it brought us here."

You thought it over. "Or maybe they really didn't exist. They lived to be lost."

"Huh?"

"The time loops..." you said. "We loop because you wanted something to happen. I wanted to save you. Maybe... I had to live all thirteen lives to save you."

"To be able to exchange those lives, you had to live through them. You never had a choice," Eren realized. "It was written from the start."

You nodded. "It all came to this. And... I wouldn't have it any other way."

"Why?" asked Eren. He spoke like it pained him. "You suffered."

Finally, you smiled. You pinched his arm. "Because I would do anything for you."

You cupped his face. His flesh—a face that was smooth, alive—was warm in your palm. It slowly sunk in that you had succeeded. You had saved Eren. You had broken out of the loop. The hell was over.

Strangely, you grieved.

"In every life, I loved you," you said. Your voice had gone hollow. "And now I'm going to forget those lives. They... they'll cease to exist."

"[Name]," he replied softly, "for all I know, I've loved you even more times since then. It doesn't change a thing."

"I know."

"I want to be with you in every life."

Your fingers looped together and you gently kissed his knuckles.

You repeated your words, dropping to a whisper.

"I know."

Everything began to fade. It reminded you of all the times you were dying, slowly dissolving into a new reality. This time, it did not feel like death. Your hand still rested in Eren's as you both turned into a million shimmering stars. You were going back to the real world to live.

It was cruel, but it was fair.

You had no idea how the timeline would occur now.

For once, you did not care.

"I love you."