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nymphofthefountain · 11 days ago

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Again and again, even though we know love's landscape [Chapter I]

Chapter I: If your eyes looked up and met mine one more time

Levi Ackerman/ Reader | Reincarnation!AU| 6.5k words

Masterlist | AO3 | Next Chapter

CHAPTER SUMMARY Levi people-watches every day after work. He perches himself in any downtown restaurant with outside tables and searches for your face on the streets.

AUTHOR’S NOTE:

This was written for LeviWeek24’s day one (Prompt is “Happy Birthday Levi”). It was originally supposed to be a one shot, but it got out of control. So out of control that this ended up being a 6-chapter fic. I didn’t even get to write the fics I had outlined for the other days — they might become extremely late entries, depending on how hard the new year hits me. Anyway, this is a Reincarnation!AU that alternates between the reencounter of Levi and the reader (written in present tense) and the birthdays Levi spent with the reader on their first life (written in past tense). Hope you enjoy it!As always, all comments (thoughtful analysis, keysmashes, concrit, emojis) are welcomed <3

Levi remembered on his seventh birthday.

It had already been a shitty day.

It had snowed the night before —nothing but sleet; enough to coat the entire neighborhood with a slimy brown mock. That morning, when Levi peered through the window, all he could see were trails of mud. Kenny brought it inside when he arrived that afternoon. His boots splattered dirt all over the hallway, and Levi had to follow his steps with a wet rag —Kenny called him a pathetic rat, the smoke of his last cigarette still trapped in his throat.

So, by the time he was waiting in the decorated living room for the party guests to arrive, the prospect of having the nasty neighboring brats come to make a pigsty of his mom’s new house was appalling.

No one came. No child wanted to spend Yule at the birthday party of the poor, grumpy, fucking creepy kid. His mom waited half an hour before she became all sorrowful caresses and pity smiles. They just don’t know you yet, my beautiful boy , she said. Kenny laughed in that rough way of his, extending his large legs on the couch. A giant in a doll’s house.

“Don’t listen to him, my baby. We can always celebrate, just us three.”

Levi stood in front of the homemade cake —white frosting, “ Happy Birthday Levi!” swirled in green, artful cursive. His name was slightly raised: Kenny had passed his finger across the top of the cake to taste the icing, and his mom had to redo it.

The early sunsets of winter had darkened the room; the single candle in front of him cast reddish hues on the faces of his family. He blew the flame. And through the thin line of smoke, the paper serpentines and balloons his mom had hung from the ceiling formed some sort of monstrous eye.

He felt them first, the time-worn sensations of a life ago.

The weight of the metal trigger on his palm. The inexorable void in his insides —that heartbeat before the cables pull forward. The constant burn of the wind. The stinging safety of the leather digging into the arch of his feet. The deep pain: his leg, his fingers, his face. The memories were engraved in his trusted flesh, in those genetically soldierly bones and muscles and sinew and blood.

Next, it was the anger. The shame. The separation like his beating heart ripped off his chest. The all-encompassing despair that rose like hot air from a scorched earth.

Levi knows he must have screamed, then. Some fervid wails that tore down his throat as he clawed at his face. That’s what his mother told him between sobs the next morning, when he woke up tied to a hospital bed with every sedative known to man shoved up his arm.

He felt the visceral awareness of your loss before he could understand anything else.

Levi people-watches every day after work. He perches himself in any downtown restaurant with outside tables and searches for your face on the streets.

Sometimes, he glimpses a feature that tricks him just enough to let hope gather in his gut. A certain slope of the jaw. A similar mouth. Gentle eyes. And, for an instant, the force of habit makes it cherished, familiar. But then, he sees those faces again and they’re nothing more than strangers.

He stays until the servers stop asking him if he’s going to order more tea. Then, he takes his backpack, filled with finger paintings, a pharmacy’s worth of alcohol wipes, and the sporadically forgotten teddy bear, and returns to his apartment amidst imaginings of your new life.

He wonders if you are properly covering yourself from the raw winds of late autumn, if you are happy at your job —he would let you complain about your shitty boss at night, fingertips following the outline of your neck. Then, he cooks dinner. Some quick, easy meal, much more nutritious and appealing than any of the shit from back then.

On the nights when the phantom pain in his leg, in his eyes, in his fingers, doesn’t let him sleep, Levi makes lists of all the details of your body that this new existence might have changed. A softer face, less weathered by the filth and the blood and the suffering. Smooth hands: no scars left by Kenny’s ruthless training; no need for the calluses accumulated during two decades of trusting maneuver machines with your very survival; no wars for the recoil of a rifle to form blisters. The kinder body of a kinder life.

He would recognize you, either way, if he saw you on one of his scouting evenings buying winter boots or eating pastries in a downtown bakery or coming out of a movie theater on a miraculous Thursday.

Levi was seventeen when he decided to search for you. His mother had just died.

Again, too young. Her hair was still pitch-black. Levi liked to brush it for her at night; as the bristles ran through her hair, it seemed to shine with an iridescent glow akin to oil in water. He never got the chance to notice it in his first life.

Again, devoured by illness. She hadn’t agreed to shave her head —the drugs were buying her mere months, anyway. So, at the very end, when Levi brushed her hair, he pulled out heaps of black strands. She had bald spots on her head; Levi never told her.

So, newly burdened with grief and custody, Kenny took Levi with him on some sort of bonding trip.

They ended up in some decrepit cabin in the middle of Rose’s woods with cobwebs in every corner and dust on every cobweb. His uncle taught him once again to wield a knife. He took him fishing and forced him to drink a bottle of whisky just to make sure Levi knew how to hold his alcohol.

On the last day, Kenny sat him on a rotting bench in the backyard while lighting up one of his cheap cigarettes.

The dark smoke stung Levi’s eyes. It permeated his clothes. It made him think of the scent of burnt flesh rising above a flattened earth. He was about to go back inside when Kenny started speaking.

“You know you are not crazy, right kid?” He told him.

Levi immediately understood what his uncle meant. The memories were perpetually pulsating in his head.

His mom hadn’t remembered. At home, she used to smile at Levi’s comments about the stale air of the Underground as if he was describing an imaginary friend. Then, she sat him in front of a long line of pediatrists, reciting all the states of brokenness that a child with a somewhat ordinary home life shouldn’t display. Little Levi had violent nightmares about fields, towns, nations of mangled, bloated corpses. Little Levi got startled so easily and clenched his fist and went for the throat. Little Levi was so withdrawn, so quiet —but he was so gentle, so helpful.

“What the fuck, Kenny?” He all but snarled.

Only when Levi kept the memories secret had the onslaught of child psychologists and their shitty dissections of his drawings stopped. But his body made the past so fucking difficult to stifle. The weight of your head on his chest, your callused fingers caressing his thumb, the warm presence beside him on the bed, they felt as real as the delicate hands of his mother lulling him to sleep.

Levi had been so fucking lonely all of his childhood: his mother’s worry, Kenny’s cruel sneer, your absence.

“In that pitiful birthday party Kuchel threw for you, you didn’t go nuts. You remembered.” Kenny was vehement, even if he tried to hide the wide eyes behind drags of his cigarette.

And there was relief in the confirmation that someone else shared the fucked-up loneliness of it all. Because it was real; he could find you now. The grief corralled in the corner of his ribcage would stop pushing in.

“Did you-” Levi asked the only question he could bring himself to think about. “Have you found someone? From back then?”

Kenny laughed with that bitter cruelty of his. He slapped Levi on the back. Hard. So hard that Levi gasped, and the fumes of cheap tobacco stuck to his mouth.

“Us Ackermans, we remember. We awaken to it like we used to back then.” He paused. It was a glimpse, but Levi managed to catch the sad gaze. “But the others…”

Levi understood the despondency and then tucked it into the innermost part of his chest. Deep enough that, two decades after first recalling you, it only comes out in those long early mornings when he hasn’t slept and he finds himself alone in his bed.

For today’s search, he sits at a cafe. It’s new, filled with the rustic signs and nonsensical beverage names that presage overpricing.

It’s already late and dark. He stayed in school two hours after class, letting one of the kids paint his face. Late Yule shopping, the mother explained between giggles when she finally appeared, as if her little girl hadn’t sobbed to death at pickup time.

He parses the streets. Multitudes appear and disappear from his sight, all carrying armfuls of shopping bags —toys and trinkets and candy and all those things of opulence Levi and you never had in your previous childhood.

It’s Yule’s eve and Levi has no reason to leave Mitras. Kenny has performed his routine disappearance; he will turn up in five or six months, lungs even more rotten, just to stink up Levi’s couch for a week.

Tomorrow, he’ll spend his birthday roaming around the boulevards. He’ll brave the frozen, empty streets, and maybe he’ll find you staring at one of the holiday vitrines with their wooden automatons and cotton snow.

Brats running on the sidewalk point at him and laugh. Their parents are mouthing their apologies and half-heartedly scolding them when the waitress arrives.

“Buying the gifts for the kids?” She asks while staring at his left cheek.

Levi lets her believe whatever she wants and orders a tea blend. He keeps the tradition of a lifetime ago and takes it plain.

Two girls are returning from the Yule Market. They reek of mulled wine. They are stubbornly holding hands as they stumble through the sidewalk, choking with giggles. One girl stops solely to kiss the other on the lips; they both grow dopey grins. It’s their first date; Levi recognizes it in the averting gazes.

Levi did the same back then. When he was a teenager, he absorbed every movement you made; he chased you with his gaze and, just when you noticed, he glanced away.

The waitress is all smiles when she returns with his tea. She has a little boy, she says, and he adores this one expensive pastry prepared with chocolate handcrafted in some pretentious atelier in Orvud. Levi says he’ll buy it before realizing that tomorrow he won’t see any kids whose shitty parents forgot to pack them lunch.

The tea is mediocre. A slight bitterness accumulating on his palate reminds him most baristas don’t know how to brew for shit. In the cold air, the steam seems whiter, denser. It rises and disappears in front of the twinkling lights.

He examines another wave of unknown faces. Nothing. Once in a while, a car drives down the street. Headlights drag across the buildings’ facades in one sweep of light.

The cafe is playing some new Yule songs. They haven’t changed much from his first life. The same empty verses about snow, love, and gifts repackaged in a pop melody. Levi doesn’t think you’d like it, but he knows you’d sway at the music, anyway.

His phone vibrates; he knows someone has just called him unhinged somewhere on the internet. Occasionally, after correcting his little students’ attempts at capital consonants, Levi posts about the Paradis of before. He writes about the Underground and the Walls and the Survey Corps and the Fall of Maria and, when he’s bitter and tired and discouraged, he writes about the Rumbling. It is as useless as waiting to see you walking on the sidewalk. Still, he checks the notification.

The waitress returns just to tell him she’s put apart the pastries for him. Levi orders another tea.

When she brings it, she asks how old his child is.

The apron sharply folded in his backpack has borne the grunt of fifteen grubby pairs of tiny hands. They tend to pull at it when they want his attention. It’s smudged with face paint —blue and yellow and red and green— because Levi hasn’t successfully taught them how to clean their hands.

“Five,” he says.

In the Underground, Levi and you were already pickpocketing at that age.

“They are such little monsters then, aren’t they?”

“Yeah.”

You would like the kids; you would like their silly stories and their passion for gifting Levi the coolest rocks they find during recess.

Levi returns his attention to the multitudes on the street. A group of children that certainly shouldn’t be out so late surround a King Fritz impersonator —glued white beard, a shiny plastic crown, and a faux-fur lined tunic with the department store logo printed on the cape. He’s giving out candy. A couple navigates the little congregation. He promises her that the fireworks will start at midnight. Someone has dressed their dog in a tiny winter jacket; the poor animal is quivering, nonetheless.

Then, Levi sees you.

Woolen hat, woven scarf. The most familiar of faces.

His body reacts by instinct. A pulling in his ribcage. Levi stands up. Quick. So quick, he almost topples the table. He has half a mind to stop it from falling over. But you are across the street, merging into the multitude. The teacup smashes against the ground.

The piercing noise of ceramic breaking is always so jarring; then, there’s the tinkling of the sharp pieces scattering. He walks over them. A shard lodges in his boot’s sole. It crunches with every step.

The waitress calls for him. He left his backpack.

He’s already navigating through the crowd. Children and women and men sipping hot chocolate and eating roasted chestnuts and holding enough presents for a lifetime. Levi brushes someone’s shoulder. Hard and fast. They might have dropped their paper bags. There’s crinkling and yells. But he can see you right in front of him. Just a street away.

Levi calls your name, and you turn. He finds relief in looking into your eyes again. Tenderness swells and swallows whole the grief in his chest. And, even if it disappears in an instant, Levi sees it in your eyes —a quick glint of recognition.

The shard continues to dig into his boot as he makes his way across the road.

He does not see the car.

A woman screams when the car hits him. But Levi’s body remembers, even if he’s not a soldier anymore. Reaction by instinct: he lurches forward, he braces.

The car barely grazes him. There’s no blood. The meager impact only makes his shoulder pop. A quick, violent pain; the nausea that rises and the habit that makes him swallow it immediately. It was common back then: a miscalculation of his own strength, a gear malfunction that hurled him towards a tree, an overhasty movement to prevent a comrade’s death.

His head is resting against the cool metal of the bumper. Melted snow is seeping through his jeans. The crowd flocks around him. Bodies squeeze until they form one solid wall. Headlights seem to bounce on the pavement and cover everything in a blinding white light. The same screaming woman keeps sobbing somewhere in the mass of people.

Levi cannot see you anymore.

He tries to stand up. A man holds him down. Someone has already called an ambulance, he says. Levi shouldn’t stand up yet, he says as his disgustingly hot hands, greasy from the sausages he was eating, press on Levi’s shoulders —furious throbbing, like a heart in his fucking arm. The idiot doesn’t notice where Levi’s only injury is.

Levi grabs the guy’s wrist. He squeezes with more force than he should have, but Levi knows it’s not enough for it to break. Greasy hands release their grip. Levi pushes up and through as the man recoils —one step back, hand over his wrist, dumbfounded.

Levi mutters, “Fuck off. My shoulder.” He does not stay to see if the guy understands.

You had been a couple of steps away. Two, maybe three. He had seen you standing on the sidewalk. A woolen hat covering up the tips of your ears. A big knitted scarf that could cover your nose from cold gusts. It was green, and Levi could almost picture it billowing and fluttering like the old Survey Corps’ capes used to. But you are not there anymore.

Stores and cafes have closed up, even if the twinkling lights and jolly dancing figurines of the vitrines stay on. Levi has bruised his leg; he notices a slight tension on his right thigh as he goes down and up the sidewalk, wishing to meet your gaze one more time. There’s a ceramic shard in his boot.

Without the morbid attraction of blood and guts spilling on a busy commercial street, onlookers dwindle.

His wet clothes siphon any form of heat. It’s getting too fucking cold. And the throbbing ache in his shoulder is setting in. The shard fucked up his sole; rubber comes apart under his weight.

The same moronic man gets close to him again. He apologizes. He didn’t realize that Levi had hurt his shoulder, he says. Levi should stop moving, he goes on. He knows because he did a shitty first aid course, he doesn’t stop talking. The car’s driver sees him alive and approaches him. It was Levi’s fault, she yells. There’s a scratch on the bumper that wasn’t there before, she keeps on yelling. Levi has to pay for it; she points at her shitty old car with its peeling red paint.

He answers to shit. His leg starts to hurt. It’s that brutal pain that begins at the marrow and spreads with his heartbeat —the aftermath of the thunder spears’ explosion, of the battle of Heaven and Earth. Eyesight blurs on his right side. He feels the sting of burning shrapnel piercing the skin.

Back then, you had watched as Hange patched him up, shaking hands smoothing his singed hair.

Levi inhales. The ghost of the blazing air in his lungs makes his breathing short. He sits down and tears the fucking shard away from his boot. He digs his fingers into his face —he can only feel eight— and allows himself to howl one painful, sharp fuck .

He stays there until the flashing red and blue drowns all the Yule lights.

Year 831. Thirteen

After the third day of rain, the Underground flooded. Frigid water rose the shit and piss off the latrines to create a nauseating, putrid sludge that swamped the roads. It happened every few years. The flood would wane in a couple of days. And then Levi and you would have to shovel the shit away and hope for the inevitable plague to be merciful.

But for now, you were both locked in the plank —closed windows, all gaps in the frames stuffed with wet rags; food reduced to scraps of stale bread and bites of the canned vegetables that shouldn’t have been opened before the deep winter. The rooms were isolated enough to limit the stench, but the air had become dense, harder to breathe.

Levi counted the coins again. Under the labile light of the oil lamp, the blotched metals seemed to elongate and contort. Most of the money had been Kenny’s. Months after he left, you’d found the wooden box with forty golden pieces under the planks. Odd jobs and the poor pockets of the better-off residents of this cavernous hell provided the spare bronze coins. Levi shared with you a fortune of one thousand marks. Dreaming cost five thousand.

“Here,” you said, placing something on the table. Round and metallic. It wasn’t a coin —the slithering of many linked golden rings followed suit when Levi grabbed it. “I got it before the first night of rain. They’ll give us good money for it. I don’t think it’s solid gold, but it seems nice enough.”

Levi held it in his palm. These sorts of contraptions were relegated to the pages of Mitra’s mail-order catalogs —those scraps of paper that arrived in the Underground years after the ink had set, crumpled and jammed in the boxes of piss-whisky. But he remembered his mom talking about them, the few times she had described her childhood on the surface. A little metal gadget that men from above kept on their chests to tell the hour.

A pocket watch. Levi had hoped to get one someday. It would have made him look more like the gentleman his mother always said he was. You would have been impressed with it. But those ideas were now drowned under a thick film of mud and shit.

“Who the fuck buys this shit here?” He asks. The flickering flame made the watch’s coating gleam; it reflected a distorted circle of white in the splintering wood of the ceiling. “We all make do with the shitty clocks they put on the stairs.”

“A food merchant.” Your voice sounded sick, hoarse; it was the air. You sat down in front of him, all smirks. Across from the flickering flame, your eyes gleamed too. “He probably wanted to brag. He doesn’t think about leaving, it seems.”

“Of course he doesn’t,” Levi spat out. Today started the season of shriveled bodies rotting on the sides of the roads. It was never the cold —not in this shroud of a city; always stifling, always filthy. It was the hunger: by the end of winter, the scarce grains merchants brought from above were too expensive. “Here, he can make us all beg, but he’d be fucking scum in Mitras.”

He looked at the watch again. There was an engraving on the side: some bullshit verse from the Walls’ zealots. He ran his fingertips across the surface, feeling the crisp edges of the fine letters.

“We can’t sell it yet. The smugglers will be even scummier after this shit. They’ll try to give us water or rotten fruit for it,” Levi said.

“It’s better to wait, anyway. The merchant might search for it,” you said.

The machinery was still ticking; it beat against his palm like a mechanical heart.

“Will you get one? When we live on the surface?” You asked.

Levi stashed the watch in Kenny’s little wooden box. It felt heavier. The small hope it would keep that weight once he’d exchanged the stolen artifact with the smuggler’s money briefly lightened his chest. But the trinket would make one hundred marks at most —just five golden coins. It was absolute filth compared to the price of the stairs.

You smiled again. As if this ruin of a house wasn’t surrounded by shit, as if the winter didn’t herald months of stale bread and hunger, as if the citizens aboveground didn’t throw all their disgusting waste through the only breach of this vault that let you have a glimpse of the sky. As if Kenny hadn’t left. As if his mother hadn’t rotten in that cot after a bastard infected her with some vile disease.

“The shit outside is enough. Don’t sputter any more. Citizenship is five thousand marks. And they’ll raise it again.” Levi was harsh when he stood up; the chair screeched against the unvarnished wood while you stared at him with sad eyes. “I can’t get us out,” he confessed.

Levi itched to wash himself, but the scant water stored on the plank was to drink; he didn’t know when he’d get to go back to the well. The overflow of all of humanity’s miseries kept you both trapped inside. He couldn’t get farther than the window.

He muttered a sharp fuck and tried to ignore the reproach in your silence. Levi looked outside, but without the light of the wall torches, there was nothing to watch but the permanent darkness.

You sighed. It was a deep, tired breath —so similar to the one you exhaled when Kenny’s desertion became undeniable. Then you stood up.

Levi followed you with his eyes, even after the shitty lamp didn’t illuminate your back anymore. He saw your silhouette rummaging in a cabinet —cheap tins clashed and clinked.

“Levi, close your eyes.” You weren’t facing him when you spoke; body still crouched and hands still searching for something.

“What for? It’s not like we can see shit in this place,” he snarled.

“Please,” you said, voice softer.

He yielded to the word.

The wooden board’s groans announced each one of your approaching steps. One, three, four, until he could feel the air shift around your body.

“Now what?” He asked just to appease the hairs raising on his nape.

The kiss on his cheek was hasty and warm and the tickling of a thousand feathers. He felt you breathe against his skin, a quick exhale. His eyes widened.

“Happy birthday, Levi. I love you very much,” you say.

The shadows in the room inflated as the oil in the lamp dwindled. A flickering darkness covered half of your body. It elongated your newfound smile —some hopeful thing that made his cheeks burn.

Levi thought of apologizing: it was somehow his fault that Kenny left, and he couldn’t do anything else but break, steal, stab, kill, and you didn’t deserve to live in shit. But he did not have the eloquence for that. Heavy tongue. Tingling belly. Trapped breath.

“Now extend your hands,” you told him.

He obeyed.

You were hiding something behind your back. He only realized it when the object was revealed and placed in his palms.

“This...”

Smooth ceramic of a glossy white. Brushstroke flowers adorning the body. A loopy, thin handle. His mother had taught him to drink tea. She sat at the table, set with an old tablecloth pristinely washed and ironed, and in the most regal of postures, she showed Levi how to hold the cup correctly.

“It’s not a pocket watch. But you need to stop drinking tea from that tin mug,” you said.

He stared at the precious object.

Two years ago, Levi broke his mother’s cup. His new unforgiving strength and the dried blood on his nails and the porcelain crumbling in his hand. The handle was still hanging from his fingers as Levi fixated on the shards scattered on the floor.

“No. I’ll break it again. I’m too much of a beast-”

“Don’t say that.” You slid your hands under his. They were warm. Levi could feel the scars left by knives he’d never wanted you to wield. Something tugged at his heart. “You are gentle with me. Aren’t you? You can be gentle with a cup.”

You had once stolen an encyclopedia —one of those clandestine books that people from the surface died for, but that abounded for the apathetic, famished eyes of the Underground. Levi didn’t care much about it, not like you did. But he enjoyed reading about the birds: rare celestial creatures, so far above the putrid stench of the earth. Unrestrained. They flew because their bones were hollow, amazingly light.

And, as he stared at the cup, Levi had the stupid thought that maybe it was, too, made of an aerial material.

“Thanks,” Levi managed to mutter.

“I could only get the cup. But we’ll buy an entire set when we live above.”

The paramedics catch him tightly clutching his leg and Levi wins a useless ride to the radiology department; they insist on pushing him in a wheelchair. The nurse behind him is too cheery to be working on a holiday. She chatters about her New Year’s plans, her —honestly deadbeat— boyfriend, and the poor kid she shouldn’t have had with him. She’s too much like Gabi.

And, although the floors of the Hospital exude alcohol and bleach instead of the all-consuming scent of carrion and scorched earth, Levi is almost back to the refugee camp where he lived for two years back then. The phantom ache in his leg exacerbates.

“It’s just the shoulder. I only popped my shoulder,” Levi repeats to the radiologist. But once again, he’s fucking ignored.

He’ll go again to the same cafe tomorrow. He can be there early. The street will be empty; most people don’t buy their gifts on Yule Day. Levi will get his bag back, and he’ll pay for the tea and the broken cup. He’ll take the fancy pastry if it’s still there. He’ll try to map your movements from today while surveying the street. And he’ll hope for you to come back and look at him again.

The same nurse takes him to the treatment bay. The room is empty enough that the voices of the other patients rebound off the walls. After forcing him to lie down on the gurney, she wishes him a happy Yule.

There’s a chair next to the hospital bed —black plastic, a flat cushion upholstered with some burlap-like fabric. He spent months sitting in one like that while looking after his mother. She would collapse inwards, whole body contorting towards her stomach. Sallow face. Shaking hands. The rattle started weeks before her death. When she heard herself breathe, she would stare at Levi with this frightened expression. He could only readjust the cannula and wipe the pink froth from the corner of her mouth. Then the palliative doctors assessed her stable enough to return home; Levi and his mom stayed there until the prescription of morphine wasn’t enough, or until a fever didn’t break, or until all food became unbearable.

The fireworks show starts. Crackles and booms are dulled by the hospital walls. Some patients, those well enough to walk, gather around a window to catch glimpses of the falling sparks at the very center of Mitras. The lights must seem so far away from the emergency room.

He had also spent entire nights watching over you. A lifetime ago, in hospital beds made with wooden frames and mattresses stuffed with cotton batting. Broken ribs. Torn abdominal muscles. Head injuries that required you to stay conscious. You two would talk about foolish shit for hours. Levi would tell you about the terribly ugly boots that were fashionable in Mitras —some sad taxidermized rodents that very much looked back when Levi stared down at some noble’s feet. And you would laugh and let the resentment against those fat bastards make you feel bad for the animals. Then, you would tell him about the latest love triangle between the new recruits —teenagers that should have been stealing the apples of their neighbor’s orchard but that, instead, were fucking behind the canteen while the fear of monstrous hands and monstrous teeth kept them awake. By morning, you were tired enough to bring back your and Levi’s childhood dreams. The quietest of voices talking about a cabin in the woods with two horses and a cow and an icebox for fresh food —with snowy fields in winter and a lake to swim in summer.

Levi sees the doctor arrive: the shitty dividing curtains are translucent. She is wearing white scrubs with some red pattern, and a yellow Yule crown made of cardboard. She has a cheery smile and his imaging results under her arm.

“Well, Mr. Ackerman. I have good news for you,” she says while rolling the lightbox closer to the bed. She points to a luminescent bone creepily floating in his arm. “You only dislocated your shoulder!”

“I know.” He’s already sitting up, body bracing for the one push that’ll set the shoulder back.

He will take the tramway home. He knows now that you are in Mitras —maybe he’ll get another chance today.

“I will move the shoulder into position. But first, let me relax those muscles!”

It’s almost three when Levi is discharged from the hospital. The doctor’s readjustment maneuver is smooth, painless. Nothing like the brute protocol of pushes and pulls he grew acquainted with; the Survey Corps’ Medical Team did not have any wonder electromagnetic machines to see people’s insides nor had alchemized poisons to make the muscles weaker.

“You were awfully lucky, if you ask me. It’s such a Yule miracle!” The doctor exclaims before finally letting him go. “But no more running on the streets without watching!”

He’s tired. The sole fucked up by the shard seems unsteady, and Levi knows he’ll have to watch where he steps if he doesn’t want to drench the sock. His entire arm feels boneless, loose, as if the only thing keeping it from flapping around was the shitty sling.

And yet, he does not think he’ll sleep. A galvanic undercurrent rushes alongside his blood; giddiness accumulates in his gut.

He throws on his coat. He can only put on one sleeve; the garment merely drapes over his bad side.

Then Levi steps outside.

You are there, a few meters away from the ER’s glass doors. Green scarf covering up to the bridge of your nose. Eyes glossy from the cold.

You startle when you see him. You straighten your back; you fidget with the lapel of your coat. The scarf falls down to your chin, and Levi gets to see your face once again —the same slope of the nose, the same cheeks, the same mouth.

You totter a bit as you walk towards him. It’s the cold; you’ve probably been waiting for him outside. You give him a nervous smile.

“Hi.” You don’t raise your voice much. It’s faint, cautious.

He knows it, that voice. It’s been woven in his daydreams for decades. It wraps around his heart and squeezes.

“Hello,” Levi replies.

There’s a slight rasp in his voice. That stupid yell must have fucked up his throat somehow. He wants to step closer, to let his fingers prove your skin is still as soft; he doesn’t move.

“A waitress gave me this. She said it was yours,” you tell him.

You are holding his backpack. He hadn’t even noticed. When Levi grabs the carry handle, his fingers touch your palm. You don’t jerk away. The skin is glacial, and Levi wants to hold that hand between his to warm it up.

You used to do it for him after the morning drills for vertical maneuvering. In winter, frozen wind pelted exposed skin to numbness; fingers stiffened around the gear’s triggers. You would seek him after training. You would rub your hands against his. Then, you would hold them close to your mouth and have your exhales surround them in warmth before kissing him once on each palm, right under the thumb.

“Yeah,” he says. He lets the bag hang from his side. The weight is enough to remind him of the slackness in half of his body. “Thank you.”

You smile at him again, a half-happy, half-nervous gesture; there’s no recognition. Still, he revels in it —the overwhelmingly real, corporeal, alive wrinkle of your eye.

“Yes,” you answer to nothing in particular.

“Yeah,” he echoes.

Then, none of you speak anymore.

Tardy fireworks burst in the distance. You are inspecting his face, brow so slightly furrowed. Levi lets you stare; he does it as well. He wants to keep looking at you, count your lashes, and itemize the little changes brought on by this new life.

An ambulance rushes to the vehicle entrance. You flinch at the loud wailing. Levi stops himself from moving you further away from the driveway.

After staring at his face one last time, you lower your gaze. Then you chuckle.

“What?” He can’t help but smile back.

“You have a sheep with a green hat here.” Your hand reaches for his cheek. The motion seems all so natural. But your hand falls before it can touch him.

“It’s a goat with a wreath crown,” he replies. “The kids had a face-painting party today. To celebrate the last day before the winter holidays.”

“Your kids are very talented.”

“That specific girl is.”

She loves gifting Levi her little drawings. He always takes them home, puts them in plastic sleeves, and adds them to a binder. He’ll show them to you one evening after work.

The weight of the bag starts to sting. So, Levi lets it fall to the sidewalk.

“Is it serious?” You ask, unavoidably focusing on his sling.

Levi wishes to tell you that he’s seen worse. That you had to cut the shredded leather straps away from his chest so that Hange could estimate the damage. That after the explosion, his lungs were raw. That every time he breathed, his whole chest burned.

“No. It’s just sore,” he replies instead.

“That’s good.”

There’s genuine relief in your expression.

“What about you? Are you sick?”

“No. I-” You pause, slide your thumb across your scarf, toy with the fringe. “A man with sausage sauce in his jacket told me they would bring you here. He was the one that called the ambulance, I think.”

The ambulance drives by again. This time it’s slower, silent.

“And this is weird. But is it maybe-” You go on, cadence faster, as if you wanted to fit every word in one long breath. “Maybe it is your birthday?”

There’s this wretched bliss in hearing you came here for him.

“Yeah. It is.”

You smile fully this time. Eyes bright, as if you found some sort of revelation in his answer.

“Well. Happy birthday, then.”

“Thanks,” he replies with a half-whisper. “Thank you,” he repeats, choking on all the devotion that you wouldn’t understand.

He sees you shiver and try to huddle yourself. So, he bares his heart in the only way he truly knows how.

“It’s cold. We should warm up somewhere.”

“I-” White air leaves your mouth. Levi wishes you’d let him adjust the scarf over your face. “Yes. Where?”

You go to the hospital’s cafeteria. It’s a drab, almost empty room with shitty plastic tables and too bright lighting, but it’s warm enough for you to stop shivering. The beverages are shitty; the tea bags barely tint the very much clear water. But they’re hot; Levi sees you wrap your fingers around the cheap paper cup.

“You can get something to eat,” Levi says. He knows it’s a paltry offer; they only have hard cookies and day-old sandwiches with soggy bread.

“It’s fine.”

Some nurses are chatting at a faraway table. Their words arrive as a low buzzing.

It seems familiar. Evenings in the Underground, when food was scarce, and Levi and you filled your stomachs with water to appease the hunger. Early mornings in the canteen before the survivors of the last expedition came for their breakfast. Late nights in his office, when you helped him sign a massacre of death certificates and condolence letters.

“I’m sorry but-” You doubt for a moment. Your eyes examine his face once again. “What’s your name?” You ask a question you’d never asked back then.

“Levi.”

“Levi,” you repeat. “Of course.”

Hearing you say his name feels like second nature.

#levi ackerman x reader #levi x you #levi x reader #leviweek24 #happy birthday to our beloved capitain #leviweek24 day one #again and again

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bi-focal12 · 7 months ago

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🌻Excerpts from my bkdk WIP: Trophy Husband, Who?🌻

1- Todoroki and Bakugou are (fr)enemies interning at Endeavor Law together

2- Todoroki, Ochako, and Izuku are roommates

3-Izuku just wants to introduce Todoroki to his new boyfriend (who is the only reason Todoroki has experienced cleanliness in their apartment's shared spaces in years).

(feel free to interact with this post!)

Todoroki makes a point of bringing out the brownies while all of the interns are gathered in the little conference room, quietly working. He’d packed a plastic bag with the four best-looking ones from the bunch and hands one to Yaoyorozu and then to Iida, both of them pleased and surprised, before keeping the last two for himself.

Bakugou throws a pencil that bounces off of Todoroki’s forehead. “What the fuck?” he complains.

Todoroki finally makes eye contact with the man. “Oh, did you want one Bakugou?” he asks pleasantly and his rival freezes, caught between his entitlement and his ego.

“This is delicious Todoroki, thank you,” Yaoyorozu supplies into the tense silence, winking with the eye Bakugou can’t see from where he’s sitting and Todoroki quickly decides that he’d marry Yaoyorozu if she asked.

“Hey!” Izuku calls happily. “You’re home early.”

Todoroki pauses halfway to his bedroom and levels his roommate with a blank stare. “I think my father might be God,” he says, dread dribbling from the syllables and spilling at his feet next to the popcorn crumbs.

Izuku’s smile wavers. “O-oh,” he replies uncertainly. “At least there’s always hell?” Then he visibly cringes.

“Deku, what the hell is this?” Katsuki asks. He’s standing in his boyfriend’s living room with his hands on his hips, much like the first time he came over except this time Round Face is nowhere in sight and the space itself has upgraded from complete pigsty to teenage boy’s bedroom.

It’s not that much of an improvement.

Deku, meanwhile, is sitting pretty on the couch with the brightness of his smile cranked up so high Katuski has no doubt he’s trying to distract him.

“Why is there popcorn all over the floor?” Katsuki presses because pretty-boy smiles can’t distract him if he’s stuck staring at the abandoned kernels in dismay, several of them already smooshed into the rug below where unlucky passersby didn’t see them. “And that blanket looks too weirdly placed to not be hiding some oblong mess.”

Deku straightens, less strategically cute and more genuinely nervous. “The popcorn is there for moral reasons, I swear,” he tells Katsuki.

Katsuki just raises an eyebrow and says, “Uh huh.”

“No, I promise!” Deku continues. “It all started with this little argument I had with Ochako that, you know, it actually had really very reasonable grounds and it’s technically her job to pick up the popcorn so I can’t do it because that would be giving in and- and we’re supposed to resist the establishment-”

“Deku,” Katsuki says flatly, because whatever justification he’s concocted for leaving the popcorn on the ground is complete and utter bullshit and they both know it. “What am I gonna find beneath the blanket?”

#izu and ocha are MESSY #todoroki is tired of it #bakugou doesn't let that shit slide #Bakugou “will not kiss if there's popcorn on the floor” Katsuki #lawyer AU #bkdk #my hero academia #writers on tumblr #fanfic #bakugou katsuki #shouto todoroki #izuku midoriya #ochako uraraka #modern au #bnha

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tatsumessy · 2 years ago

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HELLOO HOW ARE YOUU I hope youre open with requests, im obsessed with your writing, could you please do the bllk boys(with sae preferably) finding their s/o in the kitchen baking for them, it was a huge mess (i mean like batter all over the counter, dishes everywhere, ingredients that was spilled) so he tries to help s/o but they refused and when he finally tastes it, it was suprisingly delicous.

Ive been thinking about this for a while now bc i often bake messy id love to see their reaction TvT

THANK YOUU LOVE U SM <3

a/n: I’m doing so great my love 💕 I’m so glad you like my writing, I know I can be self conscious sometimes soooo thank you ☺️

ft: sae itoshi::rin itoshi

if you have any request for just ask, I don’t bite I promise 🤭

sae itoshi

you and sae had been dating for a few years and he’s always treated you like a princess. thankfully his birthday was tomorrow and you wanted to bake some brownies for him. now your oldest sister got the cooking and baking genes but that didn’t mean you didn’t know anything. while sae was taking a shower you were in the kitchen mixing everything together, when you dipped your finger in to taste it, it was lacking flavor. A LOT OF FLAVOR. spitting out the batter in the sink you grabbed your trash bag and threw it away. rolling your eyes you looked at you phone staring at the recipe your sister sent you for the sixth time.

“whatcha doing kitten?” sae asked wrapping his arm around your waist and pressing a kiss on your neck. he glanced down at your phone seeing the recipes then finally took notice to the mess around the kitchen. broken egg shells, flour all over the counter tops, oil on the ground. the kitchen looked like a pigsty but the only thing he was worried about was why you were so upset. “I’m trying to make you some brownies but they just aren’t coming out right.” you whined setting the phone back down in it’s former position. “why?” he asked moving from behind you to grab the bag of flour, sugar, eggs and every other ingredient. “it’s your birthday tomorrow, I just wanted to do something special for you.” his frown disappeared and he stepped away from you and grabbed the bowl full of old batter and cleaned it out along with the other dishes you used.

“what are you doing?” you asked watching him finish with cleaning, “since this is so important to you then I’ll help you with it.” you immediately stopped him and forced him to go do something else while you redid the brownies one last time, if this came out horrible then you’d just give up. once you finished with the brownies you took them out the oven and cut them into squares. sae was sitting on the sofa watching a soccer game when you appeared right next to him with one brownie on a napkin. “here, try it.” he glanced down at the brownie then back up at me, “no.” he resumes the game, you grab the remote and turn the tv off shoving the brownie back in his face.

“please…” he sighed grabbed the napkin quickly taking a bite out of the brownie. sitting there anxious he took another bite and in that second you could see a light blush on his cheeks. “it’s good sweetheart.”

rin itoshi

“why the hell are you destroying our kitchen?” rin spoke walking into the kitchen, and setting his bag on the ground and picking up a batter soaked napkin. “I was trying to make you a cake, and it didn’t turn out the way it’s supposed to look on the box.” you quickly responded accidentally wiping flour in your cheeks. rin unzipped his jacket and threw it on the couch while bunching up his sleeves. “what kind of cake?” he looked at the table then back at you waiting for your response. “Strawberry, your favorite.” rin’s cheeks started to heat up and he turned away covering his face and mumbling curses. “let me help you, you know baking is not your strong suit.” “you are an ass rin. we’ll see if I make you anything else, ass.” you responded throwing down the paper towel and starting to walk out the kitchen, but rin’s grip on your waist stopped you. “okay I’m sorry y/n. I appreciate everything you’re doing for me. just forget about the cake.” you shook your head in agreement and the both of you left the kitchen to spend time with each other.

once rin was fast asleep you quietly got out of the bed to try the recipe once again. granted you messed up three more times but by the time rin woke up in the morning for workouts you just finished decorating the cake. “y/n what the hell. I thought we agree to forget the whole ca-” you shut him up by stuffing a small piece in his mouth. staring at him, you watched him chew and swallow then grab a cup of water to clear his throat. “so? do you like it rin?” he set the cup down then placed both his hands on your cheeks and pulled you in for a kiss, you could taste the remaining cake crumbs in his mouth.

“I love it.” he said pecking your cheek then bidding you goodbye before he left to go workout.

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fraugwinska · 6 months ago

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Chapter 10 - Showstopper

Showstopper (noun) 1. a song or other performance receiving prolonged applause from the audience 2. an obstacle to further progress 3. computing: a bug that needs to be fixed before a piece of software can be used or released

Tags & Warnings: Sexual Harrassment If you see this symbol ♫ I highly recommend to listen to the song "Take a hint (Demo from Victorious)" by Meghan Kabir (https://open.spotify.com/intl-de/track/1TOT8O90bvTp81n2N4XjzW?si=b73d3f9d435446ea)

“Gotta give it to 'ya, sugarjugs - Your tail is damn squishy.” Angel was lazily lounging on the ground, his back settled against his bed and his pig in his arms. It took you over an hour to get him manageable and down enough from the high of the weed cookies. You had done anything you could think of – put him in a cold shower (you would never ever talk about the things you saw to anyone), made him drink water (“I don't drink 'ya stupid watah, I'm not six.” - “It's not, it's ...vodka, the expensive kind, the one that doesn't burn.” - “Uh! Gimme, gimme!”)... you even let him play catch with your tail for twenty minutes while he laid in his bathtub, eyes full of childish glee. Once he got coherent enough and the typical foggy eyes cleared up, you dragged him out of the bathroom and, frustrated with tip-toeing around, started to tidy up the floor – sans the colorful, abhorrently shaped toys. The trash was packed with empty cardboard, plastic bags and greasy wrapping papers as well as the rest of the space cookies, which you buried down deep enough for Angel not to notice. You had piled Angels clothes next to his dresser and folded away, huffing.

“You'd know better than me, I had to spray you with roomspray to let it go once you got a good grip at it.” Angel snickered, caressing Fat Nuggets back. “Ah, that's why I smell like a russian whorehouse.” He stretched, bones cracking, and yawned. “'Ya know that whatcha' doing right now is useless, right? In a day, it'll look the same again.”

You untangled a very complicated black harness...dress...bodysuit...something as you glanced back at him, ears flicking. “Fat Nuggets might be a sow, Angel, but that doesn't mean you have to live in a pigsty.” You gave up with the... whatever, and just rolled it up, shoving it in one of the drawers.

“I prefer the term 'eclectic maximalism', thank 'ya very much.” He tickled the piglets nose, it squealed happily in response. “While you're at it, that black dildo has it's own case, right over there.” “I'm not touching that.”

“Oh sure, get picky now. You folded my kinkiest BDSM-slave-harness but draw the line at a friggin' dildo.”

“Your what?”

Angel burst out laughing at your disgusted look. “Chill, Rocky. Man, you really are a vanilla girl.”

Angel stood up, picking up the toy and threw it in a bejeweled box. “But.. 'ya know, thanks for the effort. Niffty doesn't come in to clean anymore since the 'Electro-Play-Wand'-incident last month.”

“... I won't ask. And I certainly don't want an explanation. Please.”, you sighed. He butt-nudged you, winking. “Fine, I'll spare 'ya delicate sensitivities. But only if 'ya tell me if I'm right.”

“With what?”, you asked, relieved to pick up the last item of clothing – a white, fluffy sweater with pink hearts.

“Being a vanilla girl.”, he smirked and wiggled a ball gag he picked up at you. You rolled your eyes, closing the drawer. “I couldn't tell you, even if I wanted to.”

His eyes widened. “Shaddup, don't tell me 'ya a virgin. Rocky, no one with an ass like that is that prude.” “I'm not.” He continued to stare at you, eyebrow high, arms crossed and tapping his foot. “Let's just say, the men I was with were not the types to have around long enough to really find out what flavor I am.” “Really bitch, sounds like you scraped the bottoms of some barrels then.”

You looked around the room, pleased to see the floor was visible again, and while it wasn't sparkling clean it was a massive improvement. Angel came to your side, all four hands on his hips, and grinned at you. “Now what? 'Ya wanna learn a few tricks to bump you up to chocolate?”

You dramatically shuddered, giving him a strained look. “Please, I've seen enough from you for one day.” “HA! I knew 'ya were lookin, 'ya sicko!” he clapped, snickering, then, in a spur, he quickly gave you a surprisingly gentle, quick hug. As he released you, he scratched his neck, still smiling.

“Seriously tho, thanks Rocky... for 'ya know... dealin' with me. Staying.”

You stilled for a second. His smile reminded you of something, or someone, you just couldn't place a finger on it. But you felt a sentimental twang, like some kind of deja-vu, making you almost smile. Almost.

“Don't mention it. I'm just glad you're okay.” You butt-nudged him playfully like he did before. “Now, we'll have to start getting ready. Charlie has an evening out planned. Weekly teambuilding at a bar, the 'Lava Lounge... and thanks to these damn cookies we only have an hour.”

“Aw, shit, that's today?”, Angel groaned, clawing his eyes. “Fuck. Okay, okay, we can make it. Whatcha' gonna wear?”

Odd question. You move your hands, presenting your work attire with a confused frown.

Angel looked horrified. “No.”

“Yes?”, you say, still confused.

“No. Nope, Nu-uh! Over mah dead body you ain't. Bitch, it's a night out in a bar, not 'ya great-aunts church picknick, by satan's left ass cheek.” You rose your brows, a little offended. Angel scoffed, a dangerous glimmer in his eyes. Oh shit.

“Let's doll 'ya up and give these sinners some eye candy to chew on tonight, yeah? I have just the thing.”

He had settled himself on one of the plush sofas in the foyer, a little away from the bar where Husk had filled his silver flask with cheap booze ten minutes ago before he, too, had retreated to his room to prepare for the evening trip.

He hadn't seen her since he came back, just sent an eager Ozul to catch him up with what she's been doing.

On his way home he had stopped at the antique store in Cannibal Town, buying Rosie a new set of china to be delivered to her.

Alastor had summoned a book to read – he was always dressed for the occasion, unlike the silly residents of the hotel and even though he had no real interest in these weekly boondoggles of the princess, today he was more than willing to participate.

Rosie had given him a lot to think about. The walk back to the hotel had been used to contemplate whether she had been right in her statement that he was bending his own moral code too much. Truth be told, she had been right that he never used something like lust to wring something he wanted out of one of his subjects – and he could proudly say he had many subjects under his beck and call. But that was because one, he never had to, as his victims without a fail feared him and the things he could do to them too much for him to resort other means. And two, Alastor never had any interest or desire in these indulgences. He had his fair share of offers, men and women alike (the ladies in cannibal town were especially persistent), lowly sinners and powerful demons, even the poor souls he made deals with, mostly looking for an easy way out of their bounds. He faced it all with cool disinterest paired with mild disgust. He was above them all, above the whole subject matter. So why did he decide to use it on his gem? And the more urgent matter was: Why hadn't he felt the expected disinterest or disgust when he did it, riling himself up so much he even lost grip on his neatly maintained 'harmless' form instead ?

When Ozul came back to report, he had to smirk in amusement at the state of him. The shade was clearly agitated, and reported hurriedly.

“I am not putting it on, Angel.” “C'mon, you barely see the nipples in it.”

With a scoff at your defiance, the spider threw the silver washcloth with strings on it back into the drawer. “Why even have tits if you're not showing them.”

“Because I'd lose balance.” you deadpanned, crossing your arms. “No to this... thing. End of discussion.”

“Fine, but I'm all out of nun costumes. So stop being an uptight bitch and meet me halfway here, Rocky.”

Angel threw up two of his hands and ruffled through the neatly folded clothes with the other two. The vein on your forehead was dangerously pulsing. He pulled out a close-fitting burgundy red skirt, holding it up in contemplation. It was short, but not skimpy, crushed velvet, with gold buttons along the front. He held it to you with outstretched arms and a challenging look.

“Tame enough for 'ya?”

You sighed and nodded, catching it as Angel threw it at you, his head back in the drawer.

“Thank fucking god. Now for the twins...”, he bickered, all four arms now rummaging through the clothes. “You are so lucky I keep a lot of Cherri's old clothes here, you'd practically burst my outfits shoving 'ya booty in there. AHA!”, he shout out in victory. The top was almost boring compared to the silver abomination from before, just a black neckholder top with a heart cutout at the neck, but you shook your head nonetheless.

“OH COME the fuck ON! It covers your boobs, it doesn't even show cleavage. Give me one good reason why not.”

Your tail swished nervously, and you bit your lip. For a moment, you wanted to stay silent. But you decided to explain, reminding yourself of the rules. Be vague with information.

“Because I don't want people to see my scar.”, you calmly say and open your blouse, pulling it loose wide enough to show the perplexed demon the bite scar on your neck.

“Oh shit, Rocky...”, he just said, eyeing the mark, his look became instantly softer. “What did 'ya do?“

You thought for a second, “... I was bitten and eaten by an animal, that's how I died.” Not a lie, technically. You were getting good at this

Angel put the top away without another word while you closed your blouse again. The next thing he chose was a formfitting, simple black turtlenecked shirt with long sleeves. The top section was made out of black mesh, covering the chest in a sweetheart neckline, shoulders, and upper back. A compromise, and definately his way of being considerate of your revelation. You held your hand out, and he grinned as he put the shirt in it.

The thought of stepping out of your room in the outfit Angel provided took every ounce of courage you had, even though it fit you well. You had paired it with the only other pair of shoes you had, the ones Alastor had gotten you for special occasions – simple, T-strapped black leather heels, a similar style you had worn in jazz dance classes, which had you feel a little more comfortable. Still, this was... a lot to take in. You felt like you were wearing a costume, a skin you once shed and now tried to fit back into again. Too personal. Too human. The skirt felt so short, even though it barely rose above your knees, and it hugged your thighs tightly, allowing little space for your nervously flicking tail. At least the shirt was relatively modest, the mesh on top was soft and opaque enough to conceal your scar. BUT... Was this okay? Were you even allowed to dress like this? What the fuck would Alastor everyone think?

How mad would Angel be if you just changed back into your work ensemble?

You were still panicking in front of your mirror when you heard Angel knock on your door for the third time, threatening to pick the lock if you wouldn't come out on your own. To your absolute horror, another voice joined him. “Now what seems to be the problem here?”, you heard Alastor muse on the other side of the door, a slight mocking edge to his tone. “Everyone else is downstairs, waiting to depart.” “The problem is 'ya stubborn, self-conscious play doll, Smiles.” A few more bangs on the door. “Rocky, I swear to god, I didn't give 'ya a makeover for makin' sweet eyes at 'ya shower head tonight!” Two softer knocks. Him. “Come now, kitten, open up, let's see the damage.”

With your eyes on the floor and shaking hands you reached for the handle, unlocking the door and opening it in defeat. “Finally!” Angel moaned, smirking at you, his gold teeth glimmering. “I don't see the problem, dollface, 'ya look bomb. You're welcome.” He crossed his arms and gave you a triumphant giggle. Alastor took you in, his heavy-lidded eyes wandering from your open hair down over your figure to your shoes. You felt his static cracking around your ankles, like sparks on your skin. “Well, I've never thought I'd see the day where I actually have to compliment you for a job well done, my frisky friend.” Your head shot up and you stared at them both, Angels' smile almost as wide and smug as Alastors' at this compliment. All the way down to the foyer you felt his gaze fixated on you, only disturbed by the rumble of the crew ready to take the short walk through town to the bar. Charlie and Vaggie lead up front, deep in conversation, Angel prattled along, talking with Niffty and Husk shambled behind them, you and Alastor followed last. When he offered you his arm with a mischievous sounding “May I, darling?”, Husk threw an ugly look your way, taking his silver flask out to take a chug and turned his back to you quickly. You took it nonetheless, idly aware of the feeling of the fine cotton of his suit under your fingers and trying to ignore the closeness for the sake of your composure. Alastor had other plans – with a snicker, he suddenly tugged on your arm, making you stumble and almost falling into his side. He laughed, and rose a brow, smiling non-nonchalantly down at your flushed face. “Relax dear, tonight, you'll be off official duty. You certainly earned a bit of fun, don't you agree?”

You caught your step and wondered if you did.

Staying with the theme, the 'Lava Lounge's interior was draped in hues of burnt blacks and molten oranges, mimicking the fiery heartbeat of a volcano, casting a warm and oddly inviting glow. In between the carved, obsidian booths, suspended fixtures resembling actual molten lava cascaded from the ceiling, acting kind of as a divider or privacy shield, providing a soft, ambient light that flickered like glimmering ember. The air was thick and hot with the hum of the sinners around, broken in between by laughter and the occasional clinking of glasses. Other patrons had fled the booths on the whole side of the one where you went to sit in, and you found yourself nestled in between Alastor and Niffty. You eyed the bartenders and waiters curiously, each and everyone seemed to have flaming heads, or at least fiery hair. Behind the sleek, onyx bar a bulky female demon with piercing green eyes in blue flames and a LOT of tattoos was mixing cocktails that seemed to erupt with hot ash as she poured it out of the shaker. “Me and Charlie are doing drink duty first.”, Vaggie said, glaring at Alastor. You looked at him questioningly, watching him chuckle with delight. “I tend to scare the poor waitresses away, dear, that's why we take turns in getting drinks. Whiskey, no ice, if you may.” “Yeah, that's real funny, buckboy. Love that, doing their job every fucking time you decide to get jiggy with us.” Angel groaned, ordering a “Drunken Lover” from the cocktail menu. A few minutes later the two girls came back with their drinks on a tray and news of tonight's program. “They canceled the band that was supposed to play tonight.” Vaggie said with an eye roll, handing you your ordered “Persephone's Passion” (an overly-fancy name for plain pomegranate ice tea). “Apparently, the lead singer got in trouble with loan sharks. They are still searching for several limbs.” Charlie grinned cheerfully and waved a bright orange binder. “Buuuut they decided to have a spontaneous karaoke night instead! Yay!” “If 'yo going to sing 'Walking on sunshine' again, I'm leaving.” Husk growled. “Third time's not the charm.” You were torn between genuine excitement – you always loved singing your heart out at karaoke bars – and unsettling worry. You didn't want to make a spectacle of yourself again, in a packed bar, on your first time outside, in front of.... everyone. Sure, everyone... “Oh I know I'm gonna bring Britney, bitch! Yo Rocky, you up to it?”, Angel asked, playing with his swirly straw. His white face has already gotten pink around his cheeks... what the hell did they put in these drinks? ”Um, we'll see, maybe if they have the right song...”

Charlie was nagging Vaggie to sing a duet with her, and while the others were distracted Alastor leaned over to you, his voice low and teasing. “I wouldn't mind hearing you again, little gem. Just don't play too much on your heartstrings this time, yes?” You opened the binder and pathetically hid your smile in it, but you were sure he saw it, as he flicked your ear tufts and leaned back with a sneer.

“AH! That was amazing! Am I glowing? I feel like I'm glowing!” Vaggie had caved, and her and Charlies performance of 'Time of my life' had left Vaggie embarrassed, Charlie overjoyed and the whole bar befuddled. Your ears shook with inner laughter as you congratulated them both. Vaggie shot you a tortured look.

The lounge was buzzing as as the winged demon girl who moderated the songs called for a demon named Travis to sing “Tequila” with a clearly pained face, resulting in a collective groan and various boo's from the patrons. “Alright, that's the cue I needed to get another drink.”, Angel said and grabbed your hand. “We're getting the next round, on-the-rocks, come on.” You were pulled from the table in a swift motion, but you didn't miss the tightened corners of Alastor's lips as he watched you were weaved through the crowd. Angel rattled down the list of drinks, then he turned to you. “Hey, I'm just gonna powder my nose quick while hot stuff over there”, the spider shot a wink at the lean, blue-skinned bartender,”mixes our drinks, just wait here for me and make sure they don't skimp on the good stuff!”

Even if you wanted to protest, Angel was too quick, slithering through the crowd to the bathrooms. You sighed and leaned your arms against the onyx bar top. You let your gaze wander over the busy bar, trying to remember when the last time was you went out like this.

Out with friends. Having fun. Or something like that. The whole atmosphere was lighter this evening. Of course you still felt the tenseness of the past day, and you still had to deal with whatever the... experiment had let loose in you. But right now, you felt not as numb and exhausted as you usually did.

“Hello there, sweetheart.”

A slippery-smooth voice ripped you from your thoughts, and you turned to head to come face to face with... a screen? A slender, yuppie-type demon with a flatscreen for a face and a tailored electric blue suit stood beside you, an empty glass in hand and a sly smile on his... lips? You hardened your face and blinked. “Hello.”, you answered politely, but regretted that instantly when you heard his next line.

“What's a cute thing like you standing here all alone?”

The demon put his elbow near you and leaned casually into you. Too near, you shuffled yourself slightly away. He reminded you too much of the former... clientele you had to entertain for cheap money. Overly confident, overcompensating, overly touchy. A big fat walking ick with too much money. But in contrast to before, you weren't paid to deal with those kind of men now.

“I'm waiting for a friend, actually.”, you said coldly, hoping Angel would return soon.

“Well, what a friend to leave you stranded. Why not ditch them to join me and my friends?”, he nodded to a raised plateau, separated with red, thick rope on golden barrier cords and a sign “VIP”. Several other, expensively dressed demons lounged there, you saw a girl in a black pant suit snapping photo after photo on her phone. You rose a brow, and he added with a suggestive wink “Free booze and a nice warm seat all night, baby.” “Tempting,” you dripped of sarcasm. “but I have to decline.” This guy was getting on your nerves. Fucking sleazeball.

“Mh, a feisty feline. I like a little fight in a girl.”, he laughed, slowly, deeply. Fake. You scrunched your nose, but then you heard Angel calling out to you. Thank fucking god. “Hey Rocky, are the drinks... “ Angel froze, wide eyes on you and your unwanted suitor. “Wait, wait, wait.”, the demon snickered loudly. “Angel Dust is your 'friend'? Well, that makes it much easier, then. Name your price babe.” You furrowed your brows, anger pulsing in your temples. “Excuse me?” The spider next top you awoke from his paralysis and quickly scanned the VIP section before stepping in front of you protectively. “She's not a hooker, Vox.”

Oh shit.

OH SHIT ON A STICK.

“Not? Ah, my bad, but can you blame me? What are the chances?”, Vox mocked with a sneer, pushing Angel away and caging you in his frame. You cross your arms defiantly, steeling your eyes even though you're boiling inside. “Listen, Roxie - that's your name? You should really choose your friends better. Why don't we have a little private chat, get to know each other a little. Maybe I can even offer you a position under me.” he chuckled at his poorly delivered ambiguous phrase. The air around you sparked with the familiar feeling of static. Fan-fucking-tastic, now the doomsday clock was ticking. From the corners of your eye you saw your saving shade slither around your feet, like a snake ready for the bite. You took a deep breath, monitoring your venomous tone to be as steady as you could be. “I think I can decide best which company to keep, and I am fully and extraordinarily satisfied with my current employer.” As if on cue, Ozul slithered up to your shoulder and hissed, making a few bystanders jolt in surprise and fear and Vox stumble back, freeing you from his presence. Angel snorted, quickly hiding it behind a cough, and grabbed the tray full of drinks for your table while Vox's eyes darted over your shoulder. He blue screened for a second, then he burst out in bellowing laughter. “The Radio Fucker? That's rich, now I know you are both underpaid and underfucked.” His look was murderous, even with the plastered smile on that stupid monitor of his. You turned to leave but he caught your wrist, gripping it firmly in cold, metal claws. His other hand wandered into his suit and pulled out a small, digital business card. “Tell you what, sweetcheeks. Call me when you're ready for the future, or when you're choking from the dust off that fossil. Whatever happens first.” Before you could react, he shoved it in your back pocket, intently pinching your ass. For a moment, your vision turned red, but he was already gone and you heard Angel pressing a strained “Motherfucker!” through gritted teeth. You were seething as you practically shoved Angel through to your booth, letting yourself falling onto the bench with a loud thud. “Classless prick.”, you hissed. Charlie immediately hovered over you, worry in her eyes. “Are you okay? Did he do something? Oh man, (Y/n), I'm so sorry. He never came here before.” Alastor was silent, his eyes dark and his lips pressed in a tight smile. Threatening. Oh yeah. He was mad mad. “Fucking Cheese on a cracker, Rocky. 'ya got big balls for a girl.” Angel breathed, absent-mindlessly pushing back his white headfluff. “Vaggie glanced over her shoulder, glaring at the dimly-lit silhouettes on the pedestal. “I can't stand that dick... Should we go?” she looked at you, eyebrows furrowed. “But kitty didn't sing!”, Niffty pouted, completely oblivious. You scoffed. “Ha, have just the right song in mind to sing to that TV-asshole.” Then, you sighed. “But that would only cause trouble, I guess.” “Why not go for it, dear?”, Alastor said suddenly with a melodic voice, a revived glint in his eyes. All eyes turned to him. “Why should we let this... insignificant loudmouth spoil our wonderful evening? Let's dare a little, what better time than tonight?”

Vaggies mouth dropped open, Husk and Angel just looked at him like he lost his marbles. Charlie and Niffty were the only ones who seemed to eagerly agree with him. “You know what, he's right, (Y/n), it's your first day out, that sucker wont ruin this!” You looked at Alastor, for the first time today, really looked at him. There was no trace of maliciousness, it was almost... challenging. A look as if to say: Show me what you got. You stood up and felt your lips bend into a smile.

You walked up to the winged demoness as she shuffled through her laptop. She looked up, curiously eyeing you. “Hey girl, you wanna sing something? Slow crowd today... I'm Lola, by the way”, she gave you a crooked smile. “(Y/n), and oh, you bet I do. Can you do number 403?” She quickly typed on the keyboard, raised her brows and laughed happily. “Oh my god. Girl, I love that song. I'm hyping right now, get on that stage, let's see if you can burn the house down!” she giggled, grabbing her headset.

“Hey Lava Lounge, get ready for some really hot stuff. Give it up for (Y/n), cause she's got a big fat fucking message to tell 'ya.”

You stood on the stage and took the mic. The intro began, louder than any song you heard this evening, and a quick side glance to Lola giving you thumbs up while singing the background girls and bopping her head told you why. Fuck yeah.

You shook your hair back and let the music take over your body. It moved to the rhythm like you had trained it to do for so long, and it felt like a starved dog getting a steak. Your hips dipped just the right amount to stay classy, and you reveled in your anger.

♫Why am I always hit on by the boys I never like I can always see 'em coming, from the left or from the right I don't want to be a bitch, I'm just try'na be polite But it always seems to bite me in the♫

You looked straight to the VIP section, the display of the TV demon shining through the dim indirect light. He was watching, and it brought you a sense of impish glee to see the picture glitching.

♫Ask me for my number, yeah, you put me on the spot You think that we should hook up, but I think that we should not You had me at "hello", then you opened up your mouth And that is when it started going south♫

Pure energy filled you when you heard Angel shouting to you, his “Fuck yeah, Rocky” clear in your ear through the music, and you gave him a wink as your body moved like it had a mind on it's own. Charlie and Niffty hollered at you, and many other patrons started to clap to the rhythm, bopping their heads.

♫Oh!

Get your hands off my hips, 'fore I'll punch you in the lips Stop your staring at my hey! Take a hint, take a hint No you can't buy me a drink, let me tell you what I think I think you could use a mint Take a hint, take a hint ♫

If the song would've allowed it, you would've scream-laughed when you saw more and more glitches. The heels were perfect to dance in, you felt powerful and full of chaotic energy. You've always had the tendency for theatrics, and you relished in acting the next verse out, imagining yourself back at the bar, saying all the things to the flat-faced idiot who sat across the room, furious.

♫I guess you still don't get it, so let's take it from the top You asked me what my sign is, and I told you it was "stop" And if I had a dime for every name that you just dropped I'd be buying everyone a shot Oh!♫

The next chorus was filled with whistles and voices of girls from a few booths joining with the background singers. You felt something hard on your back, and remembered the stiff business card in your back pocket. And you remembered his filthy claws on your butt. The lounge was tinted in a red hue. You were already at it, why not make an unmissable statement?

♫What about "no" don't you get? So go and tell your friends I'm not really interested♫

You pulled the card out of the pocket, fanned yourself provocatively with it before you wrapped your fingers around it and crushed it into glass shards and metal wires, shrugging your shoulders as you fixed your gaze on Vox, a derisive smile on your lips. The girl in the pant suit stood next to him, holding her phone as if she filmed you while giggling, clearly knowing you were addressing Vox and highly amused by it.

♫It's about time that you're leavin' I'm gonna count to three and Open my eyes and You'll be gone♫

You stood at the edge of the stage lifting a finger. Alastor's static crept up your legs, making you shiver.

♫One Get your hands off my♫

Another finger. The prickling feeling rose to your waist, tingling over your skin like ice rain.

♫Two Or I'll punch you in the♫

The third finger went up as you were fully enveloped, feeling every inch of your body with an intensity you've never felt before.

♫Three Stop your staring at my hey! Take a hint, take a hint♫

You broke from your stance and danced with the last lines of the chorus. Every note and word was like a punch, like a release of your temper. Your ears were filled with the singing of the girls, with Angel wooing, with the bangs of each claps and the beat from the music.

♫I am not your missing link Let me tell you what I think I think you could use a mint Take a hint, take a hint Take a hint, take a hint♫

♫Get your hands off my hips, 'fore I'll punch you in the lips Stop your staring at my hey! Take a hint, take a hint T-take a hint, take a hint♫

When the music stopped, the lounge erupted in applause and more whistles, your face hot, you could only nod. You had caught sight of Alastor, head tilted with intense glowing eyes and a satisfied expression, leaning deep into the back of the booth, clapping.

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#hazbin hotel #hazbin alastor #alastor #alastor x reader #hazbin hotel fanfiction #fraugwinskawrites #ao3 fanfic #method to madness #angel dust #charlie morningstar #hazbin hotel vox #hazbin hotel velvette #hazbin niffty #hazbin husk #habin hotel vaggie #metoma #radiogem

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happyanderes · 1 year ago

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⚠︎𝙷𝚘𝚖𝚎 𝚜𝚠𝚎𝚎𝚝 𝚑𝚘𝚖𝚎⚠︎

☎︎001-001

Yandere!housekeeper x Artist!reader

⚠︎Warnings: Yandere content, drug usage(for sleep), non-consensual touches, reader is a famous artist

Word count: 1.8k

Still getting the hang of writing shorter stuff👉👈

“I can’t believe you got me a housekeeper!” You yell into the phone at your agent.

“Oh come on! When’s the last time you cleaned your room?” They replied.

“I just removed distractions from my life to keep a clear head! Steve Jobs wears the same-“

“-I’ve heard the same thing enough times already, yes, he removed choices from his life to focus on greater things with that brilliant brain of his, and I’m sure he has a housekeeper to clean out that pigsty of his.”

They say with a sigh, then before you can say anything, they continue.

“I saw how you work before, and you are distracted by your stuff all the time. He’s coming at 3 o’clock.” You check the clock, that bastard, it’s three minutes from now!

You hear the locked door click open.

As you glance at the doorway, you find yourself surprised to see a young male, who looks boyish, as if he’s fresh out of college. His pearly whites are almost glowing as a bright smile can be seen.

Your eyes trail to the bag of cleaning supplies in his bag.

“Great, he’s here……he looks so young, you sure he’s the right guy?” you mutter into the phone.

“Glad that those spare keys work! Now be polite, being a famous artist doesn’t mean you get a pass to be mean to others.” You turn away from the young man and stick your tongue out towards the phone secretly.

“That means no blowing raspberries, see you tomorrow.” And like that, they hung up.

You turn towards the young man, who looks energetic, excited, even, about working here.

“Pleased to meet you! My name’s Kyle!” with a peppy voice, his bright red hair bouncing along with his vivid movements. His pretty green eyes remind you of the shade of sunflower leaves. He reaches a hand out for you to hold.

You did not budge.

All he could do was awkwardly retract his hand.

“I’m looking forward to working in this lovely place!” He still says, with a bit less energy than before, making you almost feel pitying him. Almost.

“My room,” you point at it. His eyes trailed down your arm and to your pointer finger, then to the closed wooden door.

“It’s off limits.” That’s all you said before you sat down in front of your easel and continued working on your piece.

“Make yourself at home.”

You say absentmindedly and insincerely as a yellow stroke of paint spreads on the canvas. You lean back and a frustrated sigh leaves your lips. The phone call gave enough time for your acrylics to dry, thus making it hard to work with to get the result you wanted.

You’ve only laid the base color down, but it’s already clear that you’re drawing a field of sunflowers under a bright blue sky. Fluffy clouds and an ocean of gorgeous yellows simply waiting to be refined and brought to life.

Completely opposite from what you’re feeling.

“Okie dokie!” He said with a little salute, then his eyes scanned the room.

“Well, where should I start?” He asks you.

“Do whatever you want,” you answer. “If you don’t feel like cleaning you can go get a drink to have or something.” You say. You are actually hoping he’d listen and slack off so you’d have a quiet working space, and a reason to fire him, he doesn’t look like someone who’d really do his work anyways.

“Got it!” And then as soon as he said that, he left your house.

You hum now that it’s silent and continue working, thank goodness that went smoothly.

What you didn’t know was that twenty minutes later, you’d have a cup of ice cold coffee pressed to your cheek.

You squeal, as you didn’t expect him to come back, Kyle laughs softly and places the drink in your palms, you wrap your fingers around it out of instinct and look up at him, silently questioning.

“You said to get a drink,” he chuckled as he wiped the sweat on his forehead off with his sleeve, his chest heaving up and down as he puffed out those words. He seems to have run to and from the coffee shop.

“Sorry I was late, had to call your agent to ask what to get.”

You just stare at him, as if he’d grown two heads, then you look back at the coffee, and then to his bare hands.

“Where’s yours?”

Now it’s his turn to be confused, his lips form into a confused little smile.

“Mine……? I thought you wanted the drink.”

All you can do is blink, and look into his eyes, they’re filled with admiration, and an eagerness to please you. Almost like one of your fans you’d meet once in a while. Those fans who want to pry you open and see everything inside. Your frown deepens, but he doesn’t seem to mind as he watches you sip on your drink, with that cheery smile.

You only shrug and ignore him completely as he got to work, touring the house himself because you didn’t bother to.

Through time, you learned to tolerate him, you can’t fire him, not with your agent under his spell and him doing more than he’s paid for, but you begin to spend more time in your own room than outside of it, working nonstop, and by the time the three month monument hits, you finally start to open up just a little bit, mostly because he makes good food.

“Dinner time!” You hear Kyle shout from out of the room, breaking you out of your focus, you did not answer, only washed your brush and headed to your dining room. You always preferred sitting at the bar while you eat your food, the feeling of solidarity is nice. But Kyle tends to take his seat next to you, you don’t know if it’s appropriate, since you’ve never had a housekeeper before, but you’d just listen to him talk and talk and talk as you eat.

You know what your food is going to be, since he came to you this morning about the menu, apparently it’s a rich people thing, to have your personal chef decide the menu depending on your mood. He made you something light, a simple sandwich with freshly made juice on the side as you requested. It’s nutritious, as he says.

You take a bite of the sandwich as you listen to him rambling on about little things he has to say in life, sometimes about his life outside of your house, sometimes about his life inside of your house, but what he says the most is about you, how he’d ask you little questions and tell you some things you might’ve not noticed about yourself.

You usually listen to his ramble absentmindedly, creepy as it is, that’s probably how he became such a good housekeeper anyways. He has the eye of an artist, at least that’s how you write it off as.

The sandwich is on the drier side, so you have to mix it with your juice. It's mixed fruits, tastes like mango and apples, but the color is a bit more on the red side. You wonder what paints to mix to create this lovely shade, almost fitting to draw a sunset.

You feel his gaze on you as the liquid inside your cup decreases, as the drink is finished, you yawn.

Perhaps it’s because your body is getting used to this new balanced and healthy eating habit, you get terribly tired after dinner.

“You can go home for today, I have to—“ you pause for a yawn, “—get some more work done……”

He only chuckles.

“Oh, but you look tired.” He says, holding your arm as you stand up from the chair rather wobbly. You notice a little cut on his wrist, and you mindlessly trace your finger down it. He jolts a bit, but doesn’t pull away.

“This should’ve healed long ago……” you mumble.

“I have a bad habit of picking it.” He laughed it off and places his other palm on your back, it feels unnecessarily intimate, but is what you need when your legs feel so wobbly. What did you do to feel so tired all of a sudden?

“What was in that drink……?” You say, words dragging on.

“Well—“

He wasn’t able to finish, as you fell in his embrace, eyes closed and your breathing even.

“Love, and a special ingredient, might’ve put too much in there this time.” He whispers as he wraps his arms around you and picks you up gently, holding you tightly in his arms and burying his nose in the crook of your neck. He’s in ecstasy as he realized that you are using the shampoo and body wash he got for you. Now the two of you share the same scent.

Slowly, he carries you to your bedroom, this is an emergency, surely it’s good enough of a reason to break your rule?

And he walks into your room with caution, watching his feet as he tries to keep you in a comfortable position in his arms. He loves it when you need him, even though you’re sleeping. As he puts you on your bed, he observes your sleeping face, everything else in the world seemed to have just melted away.

“It’s so worth it, that secret ingredient. I get to see your face so close every night!” He almost squeals, carefully climbing on top of you and brushing his fingers along your jawline. There isn’t any light, only the light from outside of your room, illuminating the rim of the both of you. His breath grows heavy as he feels his cheeks turn hot. Leaning down, Kyle faces you, the distance between is so small to the point he can count your eyelashes, he would if he doesn’t have something else important to do.

“Now you may kiss the bride……” he can hear his own heart pounding in his ears, even if he knows it’s not possible, he imagines you to open your eyes and jump, he’s sure that your budding feelings towards him would perish as soon as you see him straddling you.

Slowly, shakily, he closes his eyes and places a kiss on the lid of your eyes, then on your cheeks, your nose, the corner of your mouth, then finally, your lips. His tongue enters easily, toying with your unresponsive one, the pink muscle almost skillfully maneuvering around in your mouth, something only experience can bring. His grip on your jaw tightens by a fraction as he tugs your jaw down a bit more for better access.

After what felt like forever, he pulls away, desperately gasping for breath. He wishes he doesn’t need to breathe at all, so that he can simply kiss you for the rest of eternity, or at least until you wake up.

He stole a few more kisses, then, he leaves your room, secretly taking note to add less of the special medicine and a bit more of the other special ingredient.

“See you tomorrow.” he says with the biggest smile as he closes the door, leaving you completely in the dark.

#yandere #yandere x reader #Yandere housekeeper #yandere writing #yandere stories #yandere oneshot #soft yandere #yandere headcanons #yandere fic #yandere oneshots #yandere oc #OCKyle #he’s a creep #but he cooks good stuff #Smiley writes

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laviethepooh · 2 years ago

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summary. when you’re burnt out, alhaitham is there for you, even though he’s just your roommate.

ft. alhaitham x y/n (no kaveh this time </3)

cw. modern!au, (optional: gifted kid) burnout

wc. 1.8k

notes. burnout sucks especially when you love academic validation :(( senioritis is coming for me soon and i’m trying to stay as motivated as possible to do work but even with college application results coming out well (i’m not letting digital footprint ruin anything for me but hey only 1 rejection and a deferral) i can feel that i’m losing energy to work on school. anyway a mid story for a mid feeling :((

on a tuesday night at 2am after a long day of work, alhaitham walked past your bedroom door. although it was dark, he could tell that your desk lamp was still on by the faint glow that shone from under the door. you had spent the past several days up this late working on some sort of project.

you looked miserable these days. your eyes were puffing, signifying that you had been crying recently and the bags under your eyes were so deep that he was certain that you had gotten an aggregate of an hour of sleep that week. during the rare times that you shared a meal together, you barely spoke and barely ate.

although school in general was a struggle, your major was significantly more demanding than the others. it wasn’t uncommon for you to stay up late working on an essay or finishing other homework, but this past week had been killing you and he could clearly tell.

however, he didn’t feel like it was his place to be saying anything to you. sure, you probably saw him more than your friends, especially since you were his roommate, but that didn’t mean the two of you were extremely close. other than the occasional grocery run together and conversations in the living room, you never spent much time together outside of the house.

but that night as he walked past your room, he heard sniffling. he paused, lifting his headphones to check if he heard correctly.

“i’m so tired of everything,” he heard you say from beyond the door, muffled by your sleeves.

he pursed his lips as he considered what he should do. on a normal day, he would have ignored it and gone to sleep since it was none of his business, but this time something was pulling on him to interfere, even if it was rude.

he took in a deep breath and knocked on your bedroom door.

“hey, are you in there?”

he heard nothing but silence on the other side of the door. then he heard some shuffling and the door clicked open.

as expected, you looked terrible. your eyes and cheeks were wet with tears and your nose was runny. your clothes and hair were disheveled and from beyond you, he could see several empty cups of coffee strewn all over your desk indicating that you were running on nothing but caffeine. your floor was covered in papers and pencils as if you had thrown them at the ground, perhaps out of a fit of anger.

“sorry, i must look like a mess right now,” you said, your voice thick, “but did you need something?”

haitham’s heart dropped after hearing your voice. he had never been so concerned for an almost stranger crying, but the tears threatening to spill over and the way your lips quivered slightly made him want to comfort you.

“i guess it would be stupid of me to ask if you’re alright.”

you gave him a small smile before looking at the ground. “it’s the thought that counts. but i’m sure you already know the answer. i know it’s a pigsty in here, but would you like to come inside?”

“if you don’t mind,” he responded as he stepped inside. besides there being a lot of stuff thrown around, it wasn’t nearly as bad as you made it out to be.

you ushered him onto the end of your bed and you sat beside him before letting out a long sigh.

“when did you start working today?” he turned to look at you.

you thought for a moment. “i woke up at around 6 this morning.”

“and went to sleep when?”

you went silent.

“i’m concerned for you. this isn’t healthy.”

“i know that, haitham. if i could, i would be sleeping from 9 to 6 everyday.”

he was confused. you were more than capable of finishing your work quickly and he had seen it done before. it was strange that you were even spending so much time on a project that he knew others had already finished a while ago.

“i’m just,” you started, “losing all my motivation. i don’t feel like doing anything. but the tuition is what’s preventing me from just dropping out entirely.”

you flopped onto the bed and covered your face.

“i don’t know what’s wrong with me. i used to love doing projects and writing essays for classes. but all of a sudden i just can’t do it anymore. i’m so tired.”

it was silent for a short moment as haitham considered what he should do. he knew that he was supposed to comfort someone in this kind of situation, but he didn’t want to cross a boundary that wasn’t meant to be crossed between roommates. despite this, he wanted to hold you in his arms in a way that wouldn’t be done between just roommates, even if it would make things awkward later.

he gently grabbed you and pulled you up so that you were in his arms. when he noticed that you were shaking from your sobs, he instinctively tightened his arms around you and stroked your head softly. you weren’t pushing him away, so he assumed he was making the right decision by doing this. with no comforting words to say, this was the most he could do for you.

after a long time, you finally pulled away from him, wiping your tears away.

“‘m sorry you had to see that,” you apologized although alhaitham was more sorry that he couldn’t do anything to help you. “i think that the lack of sleep has put my emotions into whack.”

he shook his head profusely. “i remember a friend of mine once saying that it’s important to release any kind of emotion you have.”

alhaitham followed your eyes as you stared up at the ceiling. “i’m not sure what it is. i feel like i’m such a disappointment. my grades are slipping at an exponential rate and i feel like i’ll never be able to catch up to them.”

he thought for a moment about what he could say to you. you got this and you’re doing great felt shallow and were probably very inconsiderate responses, even if he believed in them. asking you to take a break would be fruitless and telling you that your grades weren’t as important as your health would obviously not get through to you.

“do you want me to make you some food?”

you looked at his face for the first time in a while. it seemed that his offering was something that interested you. “what kind of food?”

“just some comfort food that my grandmother used to make for me. i could make some for you if you’d like? i’m not as good of a chef as she was, but i can replicate it pretty well.”

“well, i am actually kinda hungry,” you thought to yourself out loud. “i’d like to try your cooking! do you want me to help with anything?”

he shook his head in response. “just sit on the couch and try to relax. we can go back to your project after we eat, but take a break for the time being. i’ll help you with getting inspiration.”

you looked at him with wide eyes as you followed him out of the room and sat on the couch as he instructed.

“hey, why are you being so nice to me all of a sudden, though?” he heard you ask while he was getting some of the spices from the cabinet.

he paused mid-movement, hand frozen in the air. why was he being so nice to you? he knew he wasn’t a heartless person by nature, but he wasn’t very caring either, especially to someone who was just his roommate. he thought about your crying face and felt a literal pang in his heart. he didn’t even feel this way towards his friends (not that he had many).

“i’d rather see your face smiling than crying,” he finally responded simply.

you went quiet for a moment as if to try to take in what he said. “thank you. i don’t have many people i can turn to whenever i’m going through, i dunno, burnout or whatever. you were the first person who listened to me in a while.” he then heard you mumble something else afterwards.

“what was that? i didn’t catch the last part,” he said as he leaned around the corner to look into the living room.

you pursed your lips as if you didn’t want to say anything, but your eyes looked like they wanted to say it. you urged him to come closer and he set down the onion powder to sit next to you. you urged him again and he leaned in so that you could whisper into his ear.

“i said, it feels extra special since it’s you,” you said in a hushed voice before covering your face.

alhaitham froze again and started to feel heat creep up his neck and face. what a strange reaction to just nine words. however, you also seemed to be reacting similarly as you looked like you were about to die of embarrassment.

“you don’t have to reciprocate those feelings or anything,” you clarified. “it’s more than enough that you listened to me today and had to deal with everything.”

“but what if i do reciprocate those feelings?”

“what?”

“i said, what if i do reciprocate those feelings?”

you looked at alhaitham strangely. “well, i guess that would mean, uh, one of us asks each other out on a date or something. i don’t really know.”

“then would you like to have a dinner date with me right now?” he offered. his face was still very warm, but he was smirking regardless of it.

“wait.” you held up your hands in front of you. “wait, wait, wait. are you saying that you like me?”

he didn’t say anything but his expression remained the same.

“oh. well then, i guess i would like to go on a dinner date with you.”

alhaitham broke out into a smile. he never expected a confession would come out of a night like this. “we can go on a date after you go to sleep though. i wouldn’t want you falling asleep while eating dinner.” and he went back into the kitchen to put the finished dish into a bowl.

“hey haitham?”

he turned to look at you again. “yes?”

“thanks again.”

“anything for you.”

#lavie.txt #alhaitham #alhaitham x reader #genshin impact #genshin impact x reader #alhaitham x y/n #al haitham #genshin x y/n #genshin impact x y/n #i hate this one lowkey i never know how to end thesejsdfkjs #also this was supposed to be really angsty actually and be completely different #but i couldn't figure out how to start OR end that one so it changed to burnout #i might post the middle section though because it's funny #not really #but i think it'd be easier than figuring out the rest of the fic

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leahnardo-da-veggie · 7 months ago

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A Perfectly Normal Schoolgirl, part 9

Part 1 here, Part 2 here, Part 3 here, Part 4 here, and Part 5 here, part 6 here, and part 7 here. Part 8 here too! I'll be done in 1 last bit (I hope)

“So,” I said, “You said you felt your parents nearby?”

He nodded. “They have to be nearby. I just know it.”

I jerked my head at L. “You've got the senses for it, and you've yet to be any of the help I was promised,” I said bluntly. “Get to sniffing, brother.”

L rolled his eyes. “It's obvious, little sister. Follow the reek of flesh, and you will find the prey. Or have your years of hanging amongst mortals dulled your senses?”

I bristled at the obvious reference to what we were, but did not respond. It shamed me to admit that I had indeed been going native, with the softness that conferred. There was hardly a need for me to hunt and track, so I let my scent-sense rot.

With blithe arrogance, L located yet another secret door. “Whatever is it with blood-suckers and hidden crypts? I swear, I have yet to meet one who did not adore them,” he commented, rapping his knuckles against the concrete.

“It's good for hiding things,” Dane replied, sotto voce. There was a tenseness in him, anxiety and hope and fear all churning beneath his skin. I ruffled his hair, futilely hoping to calm him.

As L finished tapping the last of a code onto the wall, it slid open, revealing… Yet another dark hallway. I had to say, Mrs C's lack of creativity disappointed me.

There were corpses scattered about, dessicated and rotting, as though the mouldy old crypt was not cliche enough. Brittle old bones crunched underfoot, and I felt Dane cringe in discomfort at the feeling of his kinden's dead being desecrated so. L and I, however, had no such reservations.

“A feeding room,” he noted as we ventured deeper into the passageway. The scent of raw, fresh flesh grew stronger. There were living humans nearby, living humans in agony. For Dane's sake, I prayed that his parents numbered amongst the bleeding. It was better than the alternative.

“Kat,” Dane said, hurrying to catch up with us. He winced at every step, trying and failing to dodge the bones scattered across the floor. “Kat- I think my parents are here. I know they are. I can't explain it, but-”

“You sense it,” I finished. “It is a good thing. Your intuition is blossoming. Someday, you will make a fine man.” And I hoped to all my enemy-gods that I would be there to see it, to see the first thing I had cared about bloom.

He smiled faintly at that praise, but greater matters occupied his mind. Despite his unease, he quickened his pace, hurrying towards the source of the blood-scent.

I suppose something must have smiled upon us, for his parents yet lived. They lay amongst dozens of other mortals, half-piled atop each other like a pigsty. How had Mrs C gathered so many, and with no notice from the authorities? It troubled me, the same way the gelato-fae troubled me.

But I digress. Dane was the centre of attention, and his parents the grand jewels of his crown. Ruby blood glistened from their throats, and I could see the deathly paleness of their skin, but their chests moved. No recognition stirred in their eyes, even as Dane knelt beside them.

“Look at them,” L growled beside me, grimacing in distaste. “Nothing more than livestock. How can you dote upon them, care for them so? No sensible being could see them as more than playthings.”

I glared at him. “In case you have not noticed, I have never been one for sense.” With a flick of my wrist, sharper than necessary, the blood on Dane's parents' throats dried, and their eyes fluttered open.

Instantly, he was all over them, not caring about the groggy shock of the other bloodless humans. I watched him for a moment more, then turned away. “Our deal is concluded,” I snapped. “Let's go.”

We walked back through the hallway, and in the clearing where Mrs C's ash filled the air, I turned to face him. We were hardly more than an arms-width apart, enough for him to lunge and grab and drag me home. “I'm still not going, you know. Even if you haul me all the way back, I'll crawl to the surface again. This is where I belong.”

“I know.”

“Fine, then. There's nothing left for us to say.”

“I agree.”

We both knew he would be fast enough to pull me away. We both knew that if he did, Dane and everyone I cared for would be long dead by the time I returned. We both knew that trapping me again might just work.

There was a grim set to his face, a harshness in his eyes. It mirrored mine. We might as well have been back home, with that chasm between us, youngest and eldest butting heads for the thousandth time. I could feel the words stuck in the back of my throat, unable to demand he go for the last time, incapable of bridging the gap between us, powerless to break away from the last of my past.

Finally, L shook his head, lips twisting into a humourless smile. The wheels in his head grinded to a halt, at the same conclusion I had come to seven hours ago. He liked it no more than I did. “I can see you are happier here, for whatever reason. I cannot say I am happy, but I will not stop you. I love you too much for that, sister mine. Enjoy your life with these mayflies.” He began walking away, shoulders slumped in a defeat I had never seen before.

“Wait.” Before I could stop myself, I had a hand on his shoulder. Up close, I felt his regret as if it were my own. In a way, it was. He was sorry he could not convince me to stay with the pack forever, with my siblings in our home far away from prying, foolish mortals. I was sorry I could not show him that it was not his fault, that I loved him and the others no less for it. “Farewell. And I love you too, just as I love Ari, and Cere, and Ter, and all the others, ‘kay? Visit me again someday.”

He froze, mouth ever-so-slightly open. Then he grabbed me. Instinctively, I reached to scratch him, to stop him from dragging me home. But it was only a hug, in the end, an icy, bittersweet, goodbye hug. “You can visit us, too, if you ever wish,” he whispered. “And if that little boy of yours ends up down with me, I promise to take good care of him. Have a happy eternity, you strange, strange girl.”

I nodded, and pulled open a way home. The words had deserted us both again, and we held each other tight silently. Finally, he pulled apart from me, and walked through the door that I made, the door to a place I had sworn to never return to.

My brother went home without a backward glance. And curse my heart, but I thought of following. The room was dusty and reeked of a dead woman's failure, the corridor beyond holding none of the emotion that so horrified Dane, and the mortal world so very peculiar to me.

(This was longer than I wanted it to be but Kat is grabbing me by the throat and pulling me through miles of plot)

Taglist:

@coffeeangelinabox, @dorky-pals, @calliecwrites, @kaylinalexanderbooks, @shukei-jiwa

@thewingedbaron, @pluppsauthor, @cowboybrunch, @wylloblr, @possiblyeldritch @ramwritblr, @urnumber1star, @fortunatetragedy, @bigwipscholar, @ratedn

@vampirelover890, @possiblylisle, @illarian-rambling, @the-ellia-west

@finicky-felix, @evilgabe29, @glitched-dawn, @rivenantiqnerd, @dragonhoardesfandoms

@drchenquill, @everythingismadeofchaos, @owldwagitoutofyou, @dimitrakies, @beloveddawn-blog

@riveriafalll, (Anyone else who wants to get added can tell me in the comments, pm me, or send me an ask about it!)

#writeblr #writing #my writing #creative writing #writerscommunity #writing community #spilled ink #fantasy #short story

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fairytail-whathesays · 4 months ago

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Natsu x Gajeel x Laxus, Part 3 of ?

I have let this spiral out of control.

Part 1 and Part 2

The next sign of movement on Naxjeel Island is when Natsu and Gajeel basically, after a week or two of threatening to break out into fights again at the sight of each other, they agree to a truce: maybe they aren't gonna both be able to date Laxus, but they will not be fighting over him. No matter what stupid shit they fight about, they are not gonna squabble over a man of all things.

Speaking of, Laxus has basically been unheard of since he shot Gajeel down. No one's seen him, not even his bodyguards aka Freed/Bickslow/Evergreen. So when they finally find him and get him alone, they have a lot to talk about.

Does he let them down again? Well, yes, but he's polite about it. He's barely ready for a romantic relationship, let alone one that has to be all tense and complicated, so even Natsu's throuple idea gets shut down. And besides--when he asks that crucial question "why do you two even like me?" they have some dumb looks on their faces when they try to answer. You know. Strong, handsome, etc.

It isn't that Natsu and Gajeel are shallow, they're just not good at this stuff. But what they are good at is using their noses. See, no one knows where the hell Laxus has been and what he's been up to...because no one else could smell the remnants of those chemicals Laxus was working so hard to wash off.

Turns out the old man's birthday is coming up and Laxus has been in the cellar...cleaning it. Yep, by hand. Why? Because he wanted to do something nice for his old man. Maybe kinda make up for all those times he left it a pigsty, etc. They don't tell Laxus they've figured this out, so he only gets to know when he sneaks down there one evening and they're in there--already having finished the half he hadn't gotten to yet.

Gajeel brought beer. Natsu is so ready to make fun of Laxus for ten thousand years over this. All mature and shit, just like a reformed thug punk should be, lmaoooo. Laxus makes them swear on the spines holding them up not to tell anyone and they just laugh his shit off.

And they chat about all those other times Laxus has been unexpectedly sweet, except he always has to be a badass about it. Stories get swapped--Gajeel has a lot to say about that time fighting Tartarus where Laxus showed up, 90% dead to rights, and all but made him a cheerleader while he pummeled Tempester. Natsu has similar things to say about the fight with Hades.

Laxus isn't interested in hearing that shit. He wants to be more than strong, now. If he's a hundred or a thousand times stronger than someone else, or anywhere inbetween, he doesn't care--and Gajeel gets...a little sentimental.

Like he's just sitting there talking out loud about how worried he was when Laxus was fighting Tempester. Something different than just being worried for his life. That feeling that he might lose someone he really admired and felt like he could maybe connect with. And how Laxus' skin was all cold and clammy but it felt like touching fire when he touched his bare body. It's this stream-of-consciousness that just kind of overflows him and he's basically like. Coming to terms with liking men and liking Laxus right there at the table with Laxus and Natsu both listening. Summarily ruined when:

"I don't think I've ever screamed someone's name that many times." "I have that effect on people." "Shut the fuck up, asshole!"

Because they really do connect well. It prompts similar purgings from Natsu and Laxus. Natsu isn't as bothered by it being a man as Gajeel is, talks about how Laxus has always kinda been his hero a little bit, and is still ready to crow to this day about how he was right, how he knew Laxus better than anyone thought, knew he had a big heart in there somewhere. Laxus is all embarrassed and he comes clean about how he still isn't great at social stuff and hesitates to try and bond with people, but that he's come to admire the both of them a lot and, well. He's not gonna deny that Gajeel is a hunk and a half or that Natsu has a smile that could replace the sun.

There's a very honest conversation about how all three of them see things in the other two that they really want to be and be around, little details and charming things that make them like the others more. But they don't get together. Not yet.

The truth is Laxus just isn't sure about relationships yet. He's still very much a reflective type who has doubts about his own flaws. He worries he might not be a good boyfriend, especially to guys like Natsu and Gajeel who he actually admires. But he never tells anyone that.

I truly couldn't create the scenario that gets them to come together, at least not in a tumblr post where i try to limit space. Let's say it's Alvarez, or something that comes after. Some big huge event that puts Natsu and Gajeel on the line, and Laxus is forced to fight again. Come to terms with how much he wants their love almost as much as their safety.

But when it happens, it happens gently. The climactic fight scenes are one thing, but what I picture is a relaxed air, and just letting the love breathe, letting the affection surface. Maybe there's no words at all. Maybe Laxus just finds himself in a hammock, drifting off, not caring all that much that Natsu and Gajeel joined him on either side. Natsu's the brave one, so his lips find Laxus' first. Laxus turns and kisses Gajeel, too. It takes a little nudging but Gajeel gives Natsu that kiss right back.

Gajeel gets to be vulnerable, Laxus gets to be needed, Natsu gets to be honest. It all works out.

Alright so this farce has gone on long enough, I definitely did not need to make 3 whole parts to a single ask about relationship headcanons. No one asked for all that.

I will be doing one more post and getting to what the ask was probably actually about, which was general headcanons about their love life and sex life if no one is opposed. And it will be worth it to get to that point.

#laxus dreyar #natsu dragneel #gajeel redfox #laxeel #laxsu #naxjeel #headcanons #fairy tail headcanons

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writertitan · 1 year ago

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Perennial // Part 3

a/n: i hope everyone's new year has been so lovely! 2024 has got a lil kick to it.

pairing: levi x fem!reader

overall themes: fantasy AU, strangers to lovers, traveling through realms, explicit content

part 3 themes: mental breakdown from reader, hange introduction, some hurt/comfort

read part one here

read part two here

Hange wasted no time in stepping away and kept the door wide open for the two of you to step inside, and you immediately took in your surroundings.

Hange’s house was a disaster. Papers, shoes, empty cartons, and other items were scattered all over the floor. Clothes and quilts were draped over every possible piece of furniture, and candles were everywhere. They’d been lit so many times that pools of hardened wax surrounded the candlesticks, and the wax clung to various things, whatever the candle had been set on, really.

“This place is a mess,” you muttered, and Levi seemed to have the same sentiments.

“Your pigsty is as disgusting as I’ve ever seen it, Four Eyes,” Levi quipped, his monotone voice holding an edge to it. “Don’t you ever clean?”

“I haven’t really had the time. You know I’ve had much bigger fish to fry,” Hange answered, voice bubbly despite Levi’s cutting words.

Then, Hange turned to you, glasses gleaming as they scanned you from head to toe.

“She’s Embla,” Levi said, and Hange’s eyes glittered behind their glasses.

“That’s right,” they breathed, eyes wide like saucers. Then, under their breath, asked, “And how the heck did you get your butt over here?”

“I have no idea how I got here,” you admitted, standing a little straighter under Hange’s scrutiny. “That’s why we’re here. Levi said you might be able to help get me home.”

“Hmm, did he? I don’t know how much help I’ll be. This may be something more up Erwin’s alley,” they said, though they looked completely saddened to have to admit it.

“You’re the goddamned scientist, Hange. Are you really telling me you’re willing to pass this up to Erwin?” Levi said, grey eyes hard as ice. Clearly, there was a lot of complicated history there that was going unspoken between the two of them.

At that, Hange tilted their head, considering. Outside, you could hear the first waves of families coming back to their homes. Young children were laughing, and the adults were chatting animatedly, though you couldn’t make out specifics.

“On second thought, I call dibs! Erwin’s got a brilliant mind, but you won’t have half as much fun with him as you will with me, Embla! It’ll be nice to drop everything and focus on you,” Hange declared.

Levi seemed to loosen up a little, and then he turned to you, arms folded over his chest.

“Any more questions you want to ask, direct them to Hange. Four Eyes is the only person I can think of who asks more questions than you do, and they’ll be happy to be on the receiving end for once.”

You glared at him, not appreciating the little dig, but you did light up a little bit at the thought of someone finally being excited to offer insight into this realm and quell your curiosities.

While Levi went to make some tea, Hange guided you to their study, which was even messier than the living space of their home. Hange merely shoved some stacks of papers and books off a chair for you to sit in, and they immediately grabbed a very big, very old book off a bookshelf behind you, sitting at the desk that sat in the study and opening up to flick through some pages.

“Do you really have the power to send me home? Like, a spell or something?” you asked, hands in your lap.

At that, Hange let out a wild, loud laugh, going as far as slapping their knee.

“Oh, you kill me. I don’t have the power to do anything like that – it’s a wonder you’re even here! You really are our own little Embla. I can certainly try and figure out how to get you back, though. You’ll just have to share your story. Spare me no details, please!”

You were about to, but then you stopped, giving Hange a curious look.

“How come you both refer to me as Embla?” you asked. “I’ve pretty much gotten used to being called that by Levi, but I don’t understand why you both seem to like referring to me as that name so much. I feel like I’m missing out on some inside joke.”

Hange gave a small smile, leaning back in their seat.

“Embla isn’t exactly a name…it’s more of a very old term.”

You suddenly remembered when you’d originally asked Levi, and he’d given that strange response.

It’s what you are.

“What does it mean?” you pressed.

“Despite an entire war happening between humans and Eldians, only a handful of human men ever crossed into our realm. There’s no record of a regular human woman crossing over. That’s what you are. You’re the first woman to step into our realm, the Embla. It’s significant to us, but I promise to tell you more about it some other time, if you’re interested,” Hange explained. “For now, let’s get back to you. Tell me everything. Remember, spare me no details!”

And so you did.

You let it all out, starting with the fact that you were very sad prior to the gas station, and how much your life was changing, and how you’d felt compelled to open that door, and how terrifying it was to suddenly be in a different world and not knowing, and how Levi had helped you and was constantly teetering from being so gentle to entirely made of stone.

It was therapeutic, spilling your guts like this. And Hange was a great listener, despite Levi warning you that they loved asking questions. Not once did they interrupt, and they even seemed completely enraptured in your story.

“Wow,” Hange breathed when you finished. “Quite a journey so far indeed. But I would love for you to go back a little bit. You told me about your friend who was helping you with your move. What was her name again?”

“Oh, Pieck? What about her?” you questioned.

Hange’s eyes flashed, as if recognizing the name.

“How long have you known her?” they asked.

“For a few years now. I met her when I first moved into my apartment. She’s one of my closest friends now,” you answered. “I’m confused on why you’re so curious about her.”

You were starting to feel defensive again, even a little cagey. It was one thing to spill your guts about yourself, it was another thing entirely to speak about someone else, especially a close friend.

Before Hange could even give you an answer, you spoke up again.

“Pieck doesn’t have anything to do with this. I just mentioned her because you said not to spare any details. I don’t want to involve her in this,” you said, trying to keep your voice firm.

“On the contrary, my new friend. She has more to do with this than you think,” Hange said, their tone light despite saying such a controversial thing. “Let’s go meet up with Levi again. I think he needs to hear this, if he hasn’t already. Which I don’t think he has, otherwise he would have brought you over to me a lot sooner.”

Your heart raced in your chest as you followed Hange out of the study and into the living room, where Levi had cleaned up a little bit and was sipping on some tea on a couch you could now see. He looked up from under his lashes when the two of you appeared again, though he didn’t move.

“The Marleyans are good on their word, Levi. Sounds like they made it over to the human realm. Our friend Embla here told me that Pieck Finger is apparently a very good friend,” Hange announced, slumping down into an armchair that had also been cleared of Hange’s mess.

Levi froze then, and you could see that his grip tightened on his mug as he processed the news. His eyes flashed to you, scrutinizing you for a long moment, before he eventually moved to set his mug down on the coffee table in front of the couch, also recently cleaned. Damn, he worked fast. You hadn’t realized he was something of a neat freak.

But Levi’s cleaning abilities weren’t really at the front of your brain.

You were starting to tremble as you struggled to process the possibility of Pieck being involved with Eldians somehow. From the little you managed to gather, it didn’t sound like Levi or Hange were very fond of her.

“Do you know Pieck?” you asked feebly, struggling to keep upright.

Did she really have something to do with your sudden arrival in Eldia? It seemed so impossible. Then again, nothing was impossible anymore.

Instead of Hange answering you, it was Levi.

“She belongs to a faction of Eldians that we call Marleyans,” he said, his eyes trained on you. “About a hundred years ago, some Eldians split off into their own territory, called Marley. They’re a dangerous lot with very dangerous beliefs. I can’t believe they’re actually trying to pull their mission off.”

Mission? What mission? Why were they dangerous? What was so dangerous about your sweet friend Pieck?

You wanted to ask these questions so badly, but they simply wouldn’t come out. You were frozen in place, much like yesterday, but this time without the risk of your very soul ripping itself out of your physical body.

Pieck was Eldian?

You thought back to all your memories with her. She’d never really brought up the myths at all during the time you’d known her. You had to be fair, though; there’d never been an occasion to bring stories of Eldia up. Nowadays, in the human world, Eldia was hardly talked about, save for some podcasts and college essays.

But the most frightening possibility of all was weighing heavy on your heart. Were Hange and Levi insinuating that Pieck had befriended you for a reason? Had your years of friendship been a lie, a farce?

But why? You weren’t Eldian. Why was this happening to you?

“You look a little green,” Hange noted, and you had no response.

Your bottom lip quivered and your knees finally buckled under your weight, sending you to the floor. You curled up into a ball, leaning against a wall for support. Here it was, the mental breakdown you’d been anticipating.

You hid your face in your hands, ashamed at the fact you were acting like this in front of Hange and Levi, but you couldn’t stop even if you tried. A sob escaped and you allowed yourself to let go and let your emotions take over, the sadness unbearable.

Your surroundings disappeared and it was just you in a void, no company other than your fear and misery. It felt like there was no coming back from this. You felt so untethered and couldn’t find it within yourself to cope with all these changes.

All the loss you faced back home had nearly been too much. You’d been hanging by a thread, and nobody was there for you except for Pieck. She’d been the one holding you together.

Those problems had seemed so far away when you’d crossed into the Eldian realm, like a fog had settled in your brain. It had made you focus on the here and now, with only one goal: get back home.

Now, it was like the fog had lifted. You had to deal with your problems in the human realm, as well as your problems in this realm. Maybe they were more enmeshed than you realized.

Pieck wasn’t here to hold you together. Nobody was going to be there for you now. You were alone.

You were all alone.

“Hey.”

You jumped when you heard Levi’s voice and felt a hand on your shoulder, and you were surprised at how quick his actions made the void around you disappear.

You lifted your head and opened your eyes, taking in your surroundings between your ragged breaths.

No vast emptiness or darkness.

Right. You were in Hange’s home, in the living room.

But you were far away from home.

You looked at Levi, expecting to see steely grey eyes and a set jaw, but your heart thudded when you were met with a gentle gaze underneath thin brows that were knit together in concern.

“Just take a deep breath,” he whispered, his hand still on your shoulder. He even gave it a small rub, which admittedly did help loosen you up.

You did as he said, taking a deep but incredibly shaky breath.

“Hold it for a second,” Levi instructed, and you again did as told, holding your breath until Levi eventually instructed to exhale.

The air whooshed out of you, and some of your fears did as well.

“Can you stand?” Levi asked. “Let’s get you to the couch where it’s more comfortable.”

But you were still a trembling mess. You tried to stand but to no avail, eventually dropping back to the ground as another shameful sob left you.

“I can’t,” you choked out, not daring to look at Levi.

“Can’t what? Can’t stand? That’s fine. We’ll just sit here until you can,” Levi said.

True to his word, he got himself situated next to you on the floor, his shoulder bumping against yours.

“Not just about standing,” you eventually said, trying again to express how you felt. “I just…can’t. I can’t deal. I can’t do anything. I think my mind is finally breaking.”

Levi was quiet but stayed where he was, and it meant more to you than you could express to him in your state. You still felt like you were spiraling and there was no one to catch you, but you felt a little better knowing you weren’t totally alone, even if Levi didn’t consider you a friend.

Hange, as you’d come to find out, had gone to the kitchen to make you some supper and some tea, which you ate on the floor with Levi never leaving your side.

“I’ll be in my study,” they said softly, offering a little smile. “I’m going to look through some old texts that may point us in the right direction. I think to figure out how you crossed over to Eldia, we’ll need to figure out how the Marleyans could have crossed over to the human realm. You should rest for the night. You can help me out tomorrow.”

You merely nodded in response and sighed deeply when the door to the study opened and closed, leaving you alone with Levi in the living room. He cleaned up after you were done with supper, the only time he left your side, but he was back in no time.

If you were being honest with yourself, his presence was very calming. Despite him sometimes being a complete dick, he also just felt…safe. And that was something you hadn’t felt in a long, long time.

“Hange has a guest room. It was filthy, but I did my best to clean it up. You can use it and I’ll take the couch,” Levi said. “Think you can stand now that you’ve had some food in you?”

“I think so,” you whispered through the knot in your throat, but your wobbly legs barely worked as you tried to stand on them.

Instead of making a snide remark or getting angry with you, Levi wordlessly took it upon himself to scoop you into his arms, saving you the trouble of having to walk.

The suddenness of it and his gracefulness in lifting you up and carrying you left you breathless. You watched him with wide eyes, lips slightly parted, and you clung to him for dear life.

The window in the guest room was big, silvery moonlight pouring in and illuminating the room. It was a simple room, not much in it but a bed and a wardrobe. As Levi gently set you down on the bed, panic shot through you the moment he tried to pull away.

Your hand shot out to grip his wrist as hard as you could, your eyes pleading as they met Levi’s inquisitive grey ones.

“Please don’t go,” you pleaded with him, voice just above a whisper. “Will you stay?”

“You want me to stay?” he asked, as if not fully comprehending.

“I want you to stay,” you breathed out. To further confirm it, you shifted until there was enough room on the bed for the both of you, an invitation for Levi to lie down with you. It may have been a trick of the moonlight, but you were certain that he looked a little nervous.

“Are you afraid I’m gonna compromise your purity or something?” you joked, offering a weak smile.

Levi gave you a deadpan stare but was more confident as he moved to lie down next to you on the bed.

“Seems like you’re feeling better if you’ve got jokes,” he remarked, his eyes staring pointedly at the ceiling.

But you were looking at him and you didn’t take your eyes off him.

“Thank you for staying,” you whispered. “Thank you for helping me.”

At that, Levi turned to look at you, scanning over your face.

“I’m sorry about Pieck,” he said.

Your heart sank at the thought of her, but you shook your head lightly, pushing her to the back of your mind once more.

“I’m sorry you’re stuck with me,” you sighed, tears welling in your eyes. When you felt them sting at your eyes, you turned your head away from Levi, staring at the ceiling like he had been doing before.

“Emb. Look at me.”

You turned your head again to look at him, a little embarrassed.

“It’s okay to cry and to be upset,” Levi reminded you. “Don’t try and hide it from me. Don’t hide it from anyone.”

“I’m weak,” you lamented, but Levi gave you a stern look.

“That isn’t weakness,” he said.

“I bet you never get emotional like this,” you countered, but Levi’s face remained composed.

“Stop comparing yourself. Just let yourself be who you are,” he said.

The words struck a chord in you.

It was true, you were constantly comparing yourself, looking for yourself in other people. Nobody had ever clocked that about you so fast, and what’s more, called you out on it. The urge to cry had left you, tears drying up, and you even felt a little elated.

You couldn’t help yourself. In one quick motion, you were nestled up against Levi’s side, smiling a little at how it had made him tense up. But he didn’t pull away.

That feeling of safety overwhelmed you now. The closer you were to Levi, the safer you felt.

You shifted a bit to get comfortable and some hair fell over your eyes, but you didn’t mind. Fed and exhausted from the day’s events, you felt sleep coming quick.

“Good night, Levi,” you yawned, eyes closing.

The last thing you registered was the sensation of Levi’s fingertips brushing the hair from your eyes.

----------

You awoke the next morning to the sound of people outside, pieces of your dream still flitting through your mind.

With a big yawn and an even bigger stretch of your limbs, you felt a little more awake. Turning to the window, you could see that sunrise was imminent, but only tiny rays of sunlight had begun to peak over the horizon. Crowds of villagers were hurrying along the streets, most likely to get to their temple where they’d be resting for the day.

As you stretched again, it was then that you realized Levi wasn’t around. Strange, the way your heart sank. Part of you really believed he would stay the whole night with you.

You shook those thoughts out of your head and straightened yourself out, making a mental note to ask Hange where you could clean yourself up. As you left the guestroom, the smell of eggs and toasted bread filled the air, and your stomach twisted with hunger.

“Smells good,” you complimented to no one in particular, heading over to the kitchen to see none other than Levi in the kitchen, frying up another batch of eggs.

“Levi?” you asked incredulously.

“Good morning,” he said flatly, his eyes on the pan full of eggs. “Hange’s still asleep. How many eggs do you want?”

“Two. No, three!” you said, excited at the prospect of real food. Your snack stash was getting low, and you hadn’t really been fond of the food Levi had given you in his little mountain hideout.

Levi slid some eggs onto a plate for you, and before you could thank him, you jumped at a loud screech that filled the air. Moments later, Hange was racing into the kitchen, hair a mess and glasses half off their face, like you’d seen yesterday.

“Man, oh man, do I smell eggs?!” they exclaimed.

Levi clicked his tongue in dismay as Hange barreled into him and scooped up most of the eggs to pile onto their plate, only leaving a couple left.

“You’re so disgusting,” Levi sneered, but he didn’t retaliate any further. He took the remaining eggs and some toast, sitting across from you at the table while Hange chose to sit right next to you.

“How’d you sleep?” Hange asked you between bites of their breakfast, and you gave a polite smile, sneaking a glance at Levi.

“Very well, thanks,” you answered, tearing a piece of toast to munch on. “Hange, do you not celebrate the Three Nights?”

“I see Levi’s been telling you about our customs! Very moving,” Hange cackled, fixing their glasses before turning to look at you. “Most Eldians celebrate the Three Nights, it’s true, but us Scouts have too much on our plate right now to be able to take the time to alter our schedules like that.”

Scouts.

Levi had mentioned something about Scouts before, when you’d moved through the verse mirror together.

It can be taxing to move through the verse mirror for even the most experienced Scout.

“Scouts?” you asked, but you caught the way Levi was glaring at Hange as you asked, like they’d divulged too much information.

Why did he want to keep you in the dark so badly?

Hange looked like they wanted to say more, but one look at Levi told them not to.

“We’ll talk about it another time,” they told you dismissively, then strategically changed the subject. “I may as well have been partaking in the celebration last night, though. I hardly got any sleep while I was looking through all my textbooks to figure out how you could have gotten here. My hypothesis of the Marleyan Warriors targeting you specifically in the human realm is getting stronger and stronger the more I research.”

Marleyan Warriors.

Warriors and Scouts. There had to be some correlation.

Was Levi a Scout?

You tried to sneak a glance at him, briefly watching as he took a sip of his tea, and you looked away before he could catch you watching him.

Your thoughts made their way to Pieck, and it made your heart hurt. Was she a Warrior?

And why would she be targeting you?

You were slowly losing your appetite the more you danced around these thoughts. You shook your head slightly, brows furrowed, as if the physical shaking would remove the thoughts from your head.

You could also feel Levi’s eyes on you as you did so, but this time you chose to ignore him and forced yourself to take another bite of food.

Hange didn’t wait for anyone else to speak up and continued talking.

“After breakfast let’s go back to my study, Embla. I want as much background on your history with Pieck as you can give me. I’m almost sure that there’s going to be pieces to the puzzle sprinkled in, things that you, as a human, probably didn’t think twice about.”

The thought of hashing out your past, knowing you’d be bringing up so much of your pain, made you physically ill.

“Okay,” you whispered, eyes cast down at your eggs.

You swallowed thickly, pushing those dark thoughts back, and focused on the now uncomfortable task of finishing your plate.

Again, you felt those piercing grey eyes on you, but you didn’t meet his gaze. As you finished your breakfast and brought your plate to the kitchen sink, you turned to Hange, who was doing the same.

“Do you have a bathroom I could use? I really need to take a bath and get cleaned up,” you said, tugging at your clothes. “And maybe I could get some laundry done so I can wash these clothes?”

“Let me show you to the bathroom!” Hange said, tugging you along.

You walked past the guestroom and study, all the way down the hall until you reached the door to the bathroom, which Hange swung open.

“Go ahead and get cleaned up in there. There are already some charms in place to keep the water hot and whatnot. Set your clothes outside the door and I’ll work on those for you!” they said. “They’ll be spotless by the time you’re done.”

“Oh, Hange, no, you don’t have to wash my clothes—” you started, but Hange let out a cackle, head thrown back as they laughed.

“I forget how hard things can be for humans sometimes. You guys really don’t have a speck of magic left in your realm, huh? Clean clothes are a simple charm, too. Most cleaning can be done that way,” they explained.

From behind Hange, Levi appeared, his brow raised in annoyance.

“Exactly. Which is why it boggles the mind that you choose to live like a pig,” he said to Hange, arms folded over his chest. “Maybe take a bath after Embla is done.”

Hange rolled their eyes and waved their hand in Levi’s face, clearly so used to his moods that they never once looked perturbed at his attitude.

“Have fun in there!” they told you, slamming the door in your face.

You sighed and peeled off your clothes, catching a glance of yourself in the mirror as you did so.

“Boy, I look rough,” you complained quietly, leaning in closer to inspect yourself even more.

Your hair was a mess, almost as messy as Hange’s, and your skin was dull and clearly in need of moisturizing. A whiff under your armpit made you scrunch up your nose, and you hurriedly folded up your clothes and opened the door just enough to slide the pile outside before closing it again and locking it.

The pipes were very old school, but you figured them out soon enough and watched the water fill up the tub, steam rising from the tub and soothing you.

Eventually it was filled enough to get in, and you fiddled with the pipes again until the water stopped spouting from the spigot.

An audible moan escaped you as you lowered yourself into the bath, your body relaxing with the warm water. Hange had a nice collection of soaps and bath salts and oils, and you helped yourself to them, dropping some salts and oils in while you decided which soap you were going to use. You used a small, rolled up towel as a guard between your neck and the edge of the tub so you could get comfortable, and as soon as you got situated, you closed your eyes and let yourself relax. There were no thoughts allowed – you just wanted to let yourself feel the warmth of the bathwater, feel the way the salts moved in the bath, smell the lovely scents of the bath oils, and forego everything else.

You’d put in a few drops of lavender oil, and it calmed you down heavily, nearly lulling you back to sleep. Snippets of the dream you’d had came back, and you allowed yourself to indulge in those false memories, mostly because Levi had been the center character in your dream.

You’d fallen asleep easily last night, comforted by his warmth and firm body next to yours. The scent of him had permeated your dreams, and you’d dreamed of him in a forest of fir trees as it rained down on the two of you. Such a lush, fresh scent. In your dream, he’d looked sad, and he was standing far away from you. And you remembered calling out to him, hand outstretched, unable to touch him. It all felt so familiar.

A knock on the door made you slowly open your eyes, half expecting it to be Levi. The thought made your heart skip a beat and your body heat up despite the already warm bath. Just the image of him coming in and raking his eyes over your bare body was enough to make you squirm a little.

You smiled a little when you heard Hange’s voice on the other side of the door, ignoring the disappointment that overtook your heart.

“Your clothes are clean!” they announced, and that was that.

Charms worked fast and well, it seemed. You remembered yesterday, how much cleaner the house looked after spending just a little bit of time in Hange’s study. You’d surmised that Levi was just a quick and diligent cleaner, but you had failed to remember just how different this realm was compared to yours.

There was magic and sorcery and lush landscapes and strange but delightful people. It surprised you just how wrong the myths were. Eldians looked just like humans. They had their own customs and their own stories and their own lives. Many stories said they were shifters and could shift into Titan form at will, but those same stories made it sound like Eldians were constantly in Titan form, just waiting for the opportunity to catch a lost human and eat them for supper. The entire time you’d been in this world which, granted, hadn’t been that long, you hadn’t felt the immobilizing fear that human myths often talked about. There was nothing sinister here. How ironic. The place where you should have felt cruelty and loss and fear was not at all what it seemed, and the place you should have felt safe and at peace was the place that held all that cruelty and malice. The human world had a lot of work to do.

Maybe it was a mistake to go back.

No.

You couldn’t think like that. There was still so much to do at home. There was still so much grief to process and so many situations to resolve. There was still so much life to live there.

And one thing seemed to ring true. In your world, there was no magic. In this world, magic was rampant. Eldians had surely taken it all and never given any back.

The thought soured your mood a little bit. But hell, it kept your bath warm while you sulked.

-----

By the time you got out, got dressed, and made yourself presentable, it was late morning. Levi was nowhere to be found and Hange was in their study, perusing through books.

“Where’s Levi?” you asked, sitting in the chair you’d sat in last time.

“He took off to get something is what he said,” Hange said distractedly, their eyes never leaving the page they were reading. “He’s always so vague. Getting him to reveal details about anything is like pulling teeth.”

“I thought it was just me,” you grumbled, but felt relief at the thought Levi was like this with everyone.

Hange bookmarked their page and shut their book, which closed with a heavy thud, and then their attention was on you at once.

“I’m sorry to have to ask this of you, but we need to delve into your human life in more detail, especially around Pieck. It sounds like a sore subject, but we can take breaks,” Hange said.

You thought back to yesterday, the way you were spiraling, and the thought of risking it again today was horrific. But Hange was right, it needed to be done. If you wanted to go home, it needed to be done. You couldn’t be scared of things anymore.

“I’ll guide you through it,” Hange promised. “Let’s start with how you met. You mentioned it was a few years back? At your…what did you call it?”

“Apartment,” you clarified, your gaze on the wall, but staring at nothing. In your mind’s eye, you were looking at the drawing of the flower on the top of your door. “I was just barely moving in, and she was thinking about moving into that same building. We became fast friends and she joked that meeting me that day sealed the deal for her. She moved in with…she had – she had a roommate.”

This was where it was going to get really hard.

You swallowed thickly, feeling that knot start to form in your throat.

Would you even be able to get all of this out? It was still so fresh. Even just the thought of having to say it all out loud had your heart sputtering and your mind spinning. Tears stung at your eyes as you tried to think of the best way to say everything.

“We can take a break, Embla…,” Hange offered, their eyes full of concern, but you shook your head firmly, your hands gripping the edge of your seat.

“No,” you breathed out, “I have to admit it eventually. I have to remind myself that it’s real.”

Hange waited patiently, still as a statue as you collected yourself.

“Pieck moved in with a roommate. One of her closest friends she’s known since childhood. His name was Porco, but he went by Pock. I became friends with him, too, and then we started hanging out with one of his best friends…Reiner.”

The knot in your throat was loosening up. Suddenly, it felt like you couldn’t get it out fast enough. You were so terrified that you wouldn’t physically be able to even say the words, but now it was like you had to say it all, and tell someone, anyone, about your anguish.

“Reiner and I started dating,” you revealed. “We were all inseparable. Reiner and I were actually going to move in together. I lived alone, so he was going to move in with me, I should say. We were always all hanging out at my apartment…”

You took in a shaky breath, feeling that void start to form around you again. You tried to push it back.

“He died, Hange. Reiner died.”

You didn’t know if you’d ever actually said it out loud.

Reiner was dead.

Tears were coming in full force now. Squeezing your eyes shut, you struggled to piece together the rest of the story for her.

“I lost everything when he died. I just couldn’t function anymore. I couldn’t go to work anymore, and I had to move out of that apartment because it held too much of him in there. I had to leave. I just moved out of that place, right before I got here. I was going to start fresh, somewhere new. It’s been nearly eight months and I just feel…lost,” you finished, hanging your head.

It was quiet for a few minutes. As much as it had hurt to reveal such a painful recent history, it also felt strangely good.

Finally, you opened your eyes to meet Hange’s gaze. They held a very gentle look in their eyes and gave you a small smile when you looked at them, but there was something beyond that gentleness.

Hange knew you had noticed it and spoke up before you could ask any questions.

“Emb…I know all of them. Pieck, Pock, Reiner…they’re all Marleyans,” they revealed. “They’ve all been missing for over three years now.”

At first, it was hard to process what Hange was saying. It didn’t sound real.

“All of them?” you choked out, your entire body slowly filling with dread.

“Yes. All of them. Even Reiner,” Hange whispered, though it sounded as though they really didn’t want to say it. “And we believe they all hold the Power of the Titan.”

There it was again, that strange phrase. Power of the Titan. Try as you might, you couldn’t recall ever hearing that in your human myths.

But that wasn’t what was concerning you right now.

All you could think about was Reiner.

Reiner had been Eldian. Marleyan. He wasn’t human. He had lied to you, and Pieck and Pock had lied, too. They were liars and they had picked you for whatever reason. They were all a part of something that you hadn’t been privy to. It all felt like some big joke suddenly.

“Why?” you asked, mostly to yourself, but Hange hummed and shook their head.

“I hate to say it, I really do, because I know they’re your friends. But they sought you out for a reason. And we have to get to the bottom of it,” they said.

You knew Hange was right. Logically, it was a solid point of reasoning. Still, those feelings of denial dredged up in you, and you almost wanted to get angry.

Hange was wrong. They had to be wrong. Your friends wouldn’t betray you like this.

You thought back to all your memories together. They had all been there for you in ways nobody else ever had been.

You thought back to Pieck making you spill your wine on your carpet when she hugged you too hard.

And Pock, drawing that stupid flower on your doorframe because he didn’t know how to draw mistletoe and he was hellbent on making you and Reiner finally kiss each other, before you got together.

And Reiner.

Your bottom lip trembled.

Reiner, buying your groceries for you whenever you were too tired.

Reiner, orchestrating your first ever surprise birthday party. Nobody had ever done that for you before.

Reiner, the man who died two weeks before moving in with you.

Reiner, the man who had been lying to you.

“I think I need a break,” you admitted, wiping furiously at your eyes.

“I’ll go make you some smokeroot tea,” Hange offered, but you were out of the study before they could even finish their sentence.

You stalked back to the guestroom, throwing the door open and immediately sinking into the bed. Your entire body was trembling and you feared you were on the verge of another breakdown.

“I’m so weak,” you mumbled to yourself, crossing your arms over your torso, as if hugging yourself.

You hated being like this. It often seemed like you felt all these emotions and there was nowhere to put them. You just had to feel them and juggle them all at once.

You didn’t even notice when the door opened. Only when you heard the footsteps did you tense up, thinking it was Hange with some tea.

But when someone sat at the edge of the bed, you finally lifted your head to take a peek, surprised to see Levi there.

“Hange told me,” was all he said, and you let your tears flow again.

“I don’t want it to be true,” you confessed, peering at Levi through your tear-soaked lashes.

He said nothing, but he kept his gaze on you, a mask of calm over his face.

“I’m sorry,” he finally said, and you just shrugged, sitting up a bit.

You remembered how safe you’d felt with him last night, the closer you were to him.

And again, without thinking it through, you pressed yourself into his side, your arms wrapping around him.

You thought it would be strange, allowing yourself to be close to another man after Reiner’s death, even in a non-romantic sense, but that hadn’t really been the case with Levi. He had helped you so much, and you had never felt like you were in danger with him around. Plus, you were just so drawn to him. You had been since the moment you’d met him. You weren’t expecting Levi to offer any sort of comfort, other than letting you cry on him, but you were pleasantly surprised to feel his arm wrap around your shoulders, keeping you close to him.

The tears dried up a little quicker after that, but even after, you stayed like that with Levi. You listened to the steady beat of his heart, basked in his surprising warmth, and let yourself bask in the smell of him, that soothing scent of rainy pines and tea leaves.

Part of you felt it was wrong to be like this with Levi, for many reasons. He wasn’t even human, for starters, he was Eldian. You were still distraught over the death of the man you’d loved. The two of you hardly knew each other. So why did it feel so natural?

But it couldn’t be romantic feelings. That would be insanity.

Yet, the thought of it not being romantic also made you sad.

“I’m a mess,” you muttered under your breath, not really thinking Levi could hear you.

“You’re not,” he murmured back.

In a bout of courage, you reached up to grab his hand that dangled off your shoulder. He didn’t pull away.

------------

Hange hadn’t needed any more information from you after you’d spilled your guts about what had been happening to you back in the human world.

After Levi had comforted you, the two of you had left the guestroom to have some tea and let Hange do some digging.

“Where did you go off to today?” you asked Levi, outstretched on Hange’s sofa.

“Had to get something,” was his reply, which made you a little upset. Always so cagey.

“Get what?”

Levi shot you an annoyed look over his mug, and you could tell he was debating whether or not to even answer you.

“Will you ever stop asking questions?” he grumbled.

“Will you ever start answering them?” you shot back.

His mood swings were starting to give you whiplash. He was so caring and helpful, but also a complete dick sometimes.

Levi gave you a hard stare and you met it as best as you can, lifting your chin a little, and he finally grunted and put his mug down.

“I went to grab some things to work a new charm,” he revealed. “And before you ask, I’m not going to tell you what the charm is. Hange’s got their suspicions about something, and so I went and grabbed things I knew we would need.”

You pouted a little but made do with his half-answer, taking another sip of your tea.

“Is it going to take me home?” you asked. “Today?”

Levi couldn’t answer, however. Hange was bounding into the living room before you could really process their quickness, interrupting you and Levi, and you could see a glint in their eyes.

“I think I’m finally getting somewhere!” they exclaimed, hands in the air.

“Care to share?” Levi asked, an eyebrow raised.

Hange took their sweet time, though, choosing to pour themselves a mug of tea and plop down on a chair before answering.

“I believe they’re using a very old conjuring technique,” they said, the steam of their tea fogging up their glasses. “This won’t make much sense to you, Emb, but Levi, follow along. The Marleyans are practicing sigillary.”

Si-what-ary?

You honed in on Levi’s reaction, the way he tensed up, a storm cloud rolling over his eyes.

You were honestly getting frustrated. Here you were, divulging all sorts of information, and you weren’t getting any back. It was very kind of Hange and Levi to be helping you, a strange human in their realm, but you were getting a little fed up with being so in the dark.

“Damn it,” Levi sighed. “I guess we should have guessed that.”

“Can someone please fill me in?” you cut in, nearly slamming your mug down on the coffee table. “I don’t know if you guys are trying to protect me from something or what, but I need to know what this is all about. What exactly did I accidentally get involved in?”

Levi and Hange exchanged glances, but you sighed impatiently, looking between the two of them.

“Please tell me,” you begged, sitting up straight. “I need to know what’s going on.”

“Alright,” Hange conceded. “I guess that’s fair. You’ll need to know as much as you can, just in case.”

You nodded once, indicating that you were ready, all while ignoring the glare Levi shot Hange's way.

“We mentioned that some Eldians created their own sect, the Marleyans. Well, Marley was founded upon a very specific belief, that belief being that Ymir, and especially her daughters, should not have sealed the gates to the human world. This is because they believe that we not only left behind some magic in the human realm, but also that…” Hange took a breath before continuing. “Marleyans believe that Eldians can turn into mortals, and mortals can turn into Eldians. It’s very powerful magic and Eldians believe it is impossible. Really, the only human to have ever become Eldian is Ymir, and that was purely an accident. The reason all of this is important background is because that was also around the last time sigillary was practiced.”

You blinked a few times, trying to absorb what Hange had just said.

Ymir becoming an Eldian, the first Titan, was an accident?

“W-what’s sigillary?” you stammered out. It was better to push through and get as much insight as possible before beginning your real questions.

“Sigillary is what humans used to harness their magic. It’s what turned Ymir into the first Titan and Eldian,” Hange said.

Levi’s eyes were on you, and it felt like they were boring a hole into you.

“Levi mentioned that humans have been…retelling our history,” Hange spoke up after a minute, cocking their head to the side. “I would love to know just how skewed it’s gotten, but that will be for another time. Right now, we need to focus on just how the hell the Warriors were able to find the ancient sigils and master them. I’m really doubting that they have that type of power, even with all of them combined.”

“You forget how many of them stole the Power of the Titan,” Levi reminded them, and you furrowed your brows.

“What do you mean the Marleyans stole the Power of the Titan?” you asked. “And what is the Power of the Titan? You two have said it before, but I don’t understand. I thought that all Eldians were Titans.”

At that, Hange burst into laughter, grabbing their sides as they threw their head back and cackled.

“Sounds like our history is really skewed for the humans!” they snickered. “Oh, Emb. Thanks. I needed that.”

To your surprise, Levi spoke up.

“All Eldians have the…necessary genetics, I suppose, to turn into Titans,” he said. “However, not all Eldians have the Power of the Titan.

“The Power is passed down. Do you remember what I said about the Three Nights, how we celebrate Ymir’s daughters? That’s because they all inherited Ymir’s Titan power, and they inherited it in gruesome ways. You can only inherit Titan abilities in certain ways, and they’re not pretty. In total, there are nine Eldians with inherited Titans. The only way to inherit those powers is for the one possessing the Titan to die and pass it on to their successor. When the Marleyans rebelled, they took six Eldians with the Power of the Titan and they killed them and took the Power for themselves.”

“How do those powers get inherited?” you asked, though you dreaded the answer. From the dark looks in Hange and Levi’s eyes, you knew you would likely regret asking.

“That’s where your stories ring a little true,” Levi said solemnly. “Ymir’s daughters had to eat her. Their mother died right before the height of the war began between humans and Eldians, and Ymir was the only one with the Power of the Titan. They knew that the true advantage would be becoming Titans themselves. The eldest, Maria, went first. She spent the first night with her dead mother. On the second night, it was Rose who took over. Then, on the final night, it was Sina, the youngest, who finished Ymir off.”

You felt sick to your stomach.

“But why?” you choked out, afraid you might gag. “How did they know that eating their own mother was going to let them inherit the Power of the Titan?”

“Because of sigillary,” Levi answered plainly. The story didn’t faze him at all. It was just part of his history. “When Ymir was made into a Titan, it was done by humans who performed a type of magic that would etch sigils into her bones and her blood. By consuming her body, her daughters were able to have those sigils in their bodies. Once you have them in you, you can’t reverse the process. It’s a kind of magic that is so intense, it has spanned millennia.”

“And now people have to eat each other to get those powers?” you breathed out, horrified.

“Thankfully that barbaric practice started and ended with the daughters of Ymir,” Levi said. “We’ll never forget their sacrifice, of course, but we’re not going to grind up bones and drink blood and chew on ligaments.”

Now you were really feeling queasy. Why did he have to be so blunt about it?

“You look green, Embla,” Hange commented. “Not a fan of cannibalism?”

“Is anyone?” you countered, but there was no bite in your tone. You were just trying to keep yourself from throwing up.

You shut your eyes to stop the room from spinning, referencing what Levi and Hange were telling you to compare with what you thought you knew.

“I thought Ymir made a deal with the devil,” you squeaked. “That’s what we’ve always been told. And we were told there were originally 10 Titans.”

“Humans are all imbeciles,” Levi snapped.

“Levi,” Hange chided.

You took deep breaths, the nausea slowly fading, and when you felt better, you opened your eyes again.

The room wasn’t spinning anymore, and both Levi and Hange had their eyes on you. It was then that you saw how Eldian they were. So used to their history, so much older than you. Though they looked young, appearing only a little older than you, you remembered that Levi was at least a couple hundred years old. And now, you could almost see it. You saw it behind his eyes, how he’d seen so much and had been through so much. Now, even with lively Hange, you could see the years in their eyes as well. You wondered briefly if they’d been there when this story had begun.

It was strange, knowing that the myths you’d been told were really just myths, not founded on much truth at all, other than the fact that the Eldian realm existed and some of the characters were right. But Hange was correct in that you couldn’t dwell on that too much right now. It would have to wait.

“I’m guessing sigillary isn’t just used to turn people into Titans. What have you been able to figure out?” you asked.

“For one thing, I’m not sure Eldians even have the resources to master it. Well, I wasn’t sure, until we had our little chat. Sigillary was often used to transform things, or create things, like with Ymir. There is much speculation even in Eldia how the portals between the human realm and the Eldian realm came to be. Maybe it was due to sigils? And many of the texts referencing sigillary suggest that it can only be done in the human realm. Though it’s our realm that has all the magic, the sigillary performed on Ymir happened in the human realm and has lasted for two thousand years here in our world. I’m guessing the fact that these sigils exist within Eldians with inherited Titans, in the Eldian realm, give those sigils even more longevity than, say, the human realm.”

That made some sense. You nodded to show that you were following along.

“Some portals to the human realm still exist, though, right?” you asked, and Hange nodded.

“Yes. In Eldia, there’s really only one portal and it’s heavily guarded and warded. Eldians don’t really visit humans anymore and it’s extremely difficult to get approval to cross into your realm anyway. However, I have a hunch that Marleyans founded Marley where they did because there was a portal there, too,” they said.

There was so much history to wrap your brain around.

“When was Marley founded?” you asked.

“It was over two hundred years ago now,” Hange answered. “They had a rebellion and took six of our Titans, then retreated to some unused land. Marley is heavily guarded and warded as well, it may as well be a separate realm entirely. Not even the Scouts can push through. There’s been a lot of unrest ever since.”

The Scouts.

“Are you a Scout, Hange?” you asked, eyes lighting up as you turned to Levi. “Are you, Levi?”

“We are! The Scout Regiment is one of our military factions. I’m a section commander,” Hange said proudly.

Levi kept quiet, but your curiosity outweighed your slight intimidation.

“Are you a commander, Levi?” you pressed, but he glowered at you.

It would make sense. He held authority, and you felt that he could take control of any situation. Plus, he was kind of scary sometimes.

“He’s a captain,” Hange answered for him.

“Captain Levi,” you said with a grin. You expected him to double down on his glaring but, to your delight, he merely rolled his eyes and looked away.

“He must like you,” Hange continued, a sly grin on their face. “When people get on his nerves, he whacks ‘em.”

As if to show the sincerity of their words, you watched as Levi, quick as a cat, swatted Hange over the head and elicited a yelp from them. You pursed your lips together to hide your laugh, hoping to escape Hange’s fate.

But, as Levi left the room, grumbling to himself, Hange hanging off their armchair and whining, you let out a little snicker.

***

The rest of the day passed you by, with Levi working on something with whatever he’d gotten today, and Hange back in their study.

You were largely left to your own devices, unless Hange had a question for you, but you filled the day looking at some history books that Hange let you borrow.

What you uncovered was gruesome and fascinating.

There had definitely been a time when magic was rampant in the human realm, but it was hard to harness, and most humans didn’t have what it took to handle and control it. However, eventually certain humans were able to learn how to use magic and passed that knowledge down to their descendants. They found that magic had its own language, and thus sigillary was born. Entire lineages were born to be dedicated to witchcraft, mostly using magic to become healers or alchemists, but their all-encompassing term was “witches”.

Eventually, the humans who didn’t have these capabilities grew wary of those who did, and some even sought that power for themselves. One in particular, a King Fritz, eagerly and brutally captured witches, and tried to take their magic from them. Ymir was among one of those witches.

King Fritz wasn’t a name you were familiar with, so it was safe to say that he had been lost to time or that humans had purposely rewritten the stories to exclude the evildoings of a particular human being. Even in Eldian texts, there wasn’t a lot of background on him. There wasn’t much history available on Ymir’s early life anymore either, but it was heavily assumed that she was a “runt” in her family, the weakest of her lineage. Her own family passed her up to King Fritz when he attacked her village. She had been abandoned – betrayed – by everyone she’d ever loved.

That part struck you hard, and you felt a heaviness in your heart as you learned about Ymir’s cruel fate. You had to stop reading for a while, choosing instead to sit with your sympathy. It was strange, feeling bad for a character that had been humanity’s antagonist for so long. But now, knowing her story, about to uncover the whole truth, you had never related to a person more.

Images of Pieck, Pock, and Reiner filled your head, and you clenched your jaw as your heart clenched in your chest. Had they really betrayed you like this? What was it about you that made them target you? That was the biggest mystery of all. You weren’t anything special. You were just some anxiety-ridden girl who spooked too easy and couldn’t even kill a spider on her own.

There was something you were missing, some piece of the puzzle you hadn’t found yet. It felt like it was at the tip of your tongue, right in your peripheral vision, but it was escaping you, always just out of reach. If you could just get to the bottom of the reason they’d found you and latched onto you, part of you just knew that you could get the whole picture.

***

Before the sun started to set, you decided to go for a walk. It wasn’t fun being cooped up in a house all day, and you were starting to get antsy. The idea of taking a little stroll and exploring didn’t seem so scary, not when you knew the village would still be empty and that the likelihood of running into a Titan was apparently slimmer than you had originally been made to believe.

Not wanting to disturb Hange and Levi, you left the house as quietly as you could, walking down the street and making mental notes so you wouldn’t get lost. You also needed to remember to start heading back before nightfall, as to not attract unwanted attention. That seemed like a far off worry, though.

Ragako was small but peaceful and well-structured; much of the architecture reminded you of Germanic influences. The streets were desolate and it was exceedingly quiet, but it wasn’t eerie or lonely at all. Maybe there was some sort of charm over the village, but it felt full of love.

You did a lot of window shopping, peering into bakery shops and clothing boutiques, enthralled by what you saw. The style of clothing was old-fashioned, so different from what you were used to. You looked down at your outfit, noting how plain and modern it was, just jeans and a long-sleeved shirt, and you frowned a little bit. Maybe this was why Eldians were able to clock you as a human right away. Maybe Hange and Levi could score you some new clothes, if it came down to it and you’d be here for a while.

You stopped for a moment, mulling over the thought. What if you were here for a while? What if you couldn’t make it back ever? Surprisingly, the idea wasn’t as anxiety-inducing as you would have thought it’d be. It still wasn’t lost on you that you hadn’t gone fully insane upon learning where you were; really, the only time you’d lost your mind was having to think about your painful past, and the fears associated with that. Traveling across realms was apparently easier than dealing with your normal human experiences. And, before all this, you’d been on the cusp of starting fresh back home anyway. Perhaps this was the universe’s funny way of granting you that wish.

Definitely something to think about. But you’d have shove those thoughts back for later and let yourself just be right now.

Looking up to the sky, you admired the deep blue of it, only some wisps of clouds blotting it, then caught how low the sun was. It was going to dip into the horizon soon, which meant you needed to start heading back.

As you turned around, however, you jumped a little when you realized you weren’t alone. Levi was making his way towards you, his eyes hard as steel and his stride purposeful.

“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” he called out to you.

“I just wanted to get out of the house and stretch my legs,” you said, shrinking back. Was it really so bad to do that?

“You should have at least let me know before you snuck out, you little shit. You have Hange freaked out thinking you somehow transported back to your own world. Don’t you ever use your brain?” Levi scolded.

“Nobody’s even in town! I thought it’d be the safest time to go for a walk,” you argued, walking towards him. As the two of you met in the middle, Levi’s hand shot out at you to grab your elbow. He was going to actually drag you back to Hange’s place.

You struggled in his grip, but he was exceptionally strong, and you eventually relented and let him guide you back, both of you clearly angry.

As soon as you crossed the threshold into Hange’s house, you tore away from him and took a breath as Hange rushed to you, eyes wild.

“Emb! I was so scared we’d lost you! Not to be selfish, but I didn’t want you going home without solving this crazy mystery of ours!” they exclaimed.

As angry at Levi as you were, you did feel bad for making Hange worry.

“Sorry, Hange. I just wanted to go outside for a while,” you apologized, then turned to glare at Levi over your shoulder. “I didn’t realize I would be reprimanded for it.”

“Insolent brat,” Levi grunted, his grey eyes hard as metal.

You clenched your hands into fists and turned back to Hange, giving them a nod.

“Excuse me, Hange,” you said hurredly, skirting past them to head to the guestroom.

You slammed the door shut behind you, heart pounding. Angry tears welled up in your eyes as you sat by the window, the world outside blurry as you cried.

Stupid Levi. He didn’t need to be so mean like that and make you feel like some bratty kid. You wiped your eyes, clearing your vision so you could take a look outside and calm yourself.

The sun was setting quickly, that golden glow of sunset drenching the village. The sky that had once been a deep blue was now bleeding with rich hues of orange, scarlet, and rose. It was beautiful, but you could hardly admire it.

Again, you thought of Ymir and related strongly to her, going so far as to equate your situation with being trapped and imprisoned like she had been. It wasn’t nearly the same, you knew that deep down, but you had little to no control over your situation, just like Ymir. You were powerless right now. At least Levi was no King Fritz.

To distract yourself and make yourself calm down, you thought back to the other things you’d learned, especially about King Fritz and Ymir’s transformation.

King Fritz had learned a lot about sigillary from his brutal conquest for magic and believed that he could etch some very powerful sigils into Ymir’s deepest parts, her blood and her bones, and then consume those parts of her. He hadn’t killed every witch that had crossed his path – he had actually enslaved some of them in order to help him understand and practice sigils and ordered them to be the ones to cast this powerful spell on Ymir. It surprised you and disgusted you to think of how far he would go for power, but humans were still like that to this day. The lengths a person would go for even the tiniest possibility of gaining power made you sick.

But you were snapped out of your thoughts when the door to the guestroom opened. You kept your face neutral, expecting to see Hange, but you did a double take when you saw who it really was.

Levi.

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