Archive of Our Own

In this world society is split in two halves. The Civilians and the Soldiers. Those who have a choice and those who haven’t. All is decided when we are born. You either have a soulmark or you don’t. When you are a civilian, you don’t have one. But that doesn’t necessarily mean that you don’t have a soulmate. You just have to find him the hard way. But you are free. Free to choose what you want to be, who you want to love. The other half of the population doesn’t have such luxury. From the moment they are born, their destiny is set. All by that picture on their skin. The mark of the Training troops. When you have it, you’re destined to be a soldier and nothing else. You don’t have a choice, you must join the Training corps at the age of fifteen. And what follows are three years of hell. But in that hell, you find your true soulmark. Either you belong to the Stationary guard, the Military police or the Recon corps. Most people are the guards. Some belong to the police. And as for the corps… It is the smallest part of the trainees, but not a forgettable one.

Everything is decided by the true soulmark. You receive it at the age of eighteen. It is supposed to help you find your soulmate, telling you where you belong. But sometimes, when you are lucky enough, you find your soulmate before that, when you do both of your marks change immediately. And then you know. Those cases are one in a thousand, though. Usually, you have to join one of the three organisations and hope your soulmate is still alive. And sometimes, very rarely, once in a hundred years, a soldier’s soulmate is a civilian. And those often end with a loss and a broken heart.

When you reach the end of your training you are assigned to the appropriate section. If you belong to the Stationary guard you know you have met your soulmate when your soulmark gains colour, the same as your soulmate’s. If you are a part of the Military police you get to see the red string of fate from the day you receive your true soulmark. The police has the easiest way to find their soulmate, they are the chosen from the chosen.

But when you belong to the Recon corps you have to be prepared for suffering because you never know when your soulmate can die, maybe even before you ever meet them… The corps have it tough. The first thing their soulmate thought of you the first time they saw you appears on your skin exactly 24 hours after you’ve met them. And it’s really hard to come up to someone and say: “Hey, did you think I had a nice butt when you first saw me?”

But that’s not everything. The longer you search the more painful it gets. After a week you start to share dreams with your soulmate but you never get to see them in those. And after a month you start to feel what they feel too. The emotions and also the pain. And that stays. Forever. So sometimes, when one of the corps dies, another one who stayed within the walls dies too. Just because the pain is too much…

But all those things happen only after you actually meet your soulmate. It is bad when only one party sees the other, because they don’t know that they’ve just seen their soulmate since their soulmate hasn’t seen them. And hence they don’t know. But the other one does. Because it hurts. It hurts like hell.

Nobody knew that better than Levi. He was hurting for over eight years now. And every year, when the new recruits came he was the first to wake them the morning after the welcome ceremony, looking for the one who would flinch at the feeling of ink on their skin. But nobody ever did. And Levi was alone. He gave up then, after the seventh failure. He started to spend more time with is squad, away from the others for most of the time, just staying alive. For his soulmate.

At least that’s what he tried to convince himself of. Because it didn’t matter how hard he tried, there was this one thought in the corner of his mind. What if his soulmate is already dead? What if they didn’t want him?

He tried to ignore those treacherous thoughts but they still kept hunting him, sneaking into his consciousness when he was alone in the dark, trying to sleep preferably. Despite knowing that they were unreasonable. If his soulmate really was dead how could he dream a dream that wasn’t his own from time to time, huh? But the other one… That kept him up for many nights.

And so as much as he loved the words inked on his skin, he hated them just as much.

What an amazing person.

He loved them because they showed that somebody existed just for him. And he hated them because that was probably what most people thought when they first saw him. This or Wow, that dude’s scary. At least it wasn’t the later. He hated them because they gave him no lead as to who his soulmate was. But he could never hate them more that he cherished them.

They appeared one day, all of a sudden, when the Recon corps where outside the wall on a mission. He felt them burning into his skin in mid-flight. Only after he had sliced up an abnormal did he dare to look at his right hip bone. And there it was. Those four words. His eyes widened, mind short-circuited. How he had managed to kill five more titans and get back to his squad he didn’t know. Or how the mission ended, or how did they manage to get back, or what was its purpose in the first place. But he didn’t care in the slightest.

On one hand, he was incredibly happy. His soulmate had finally showed up. But. On the other hand, there were more questions than answers. Who was it? Had he seen someone new? When exactly did they meet? Had they even met? So many questions, going unanswered.

And so he searched. He went to every member of the Recon corps, looking for strange behaviour. There were some cases but not in the strange way he was looking for.

A week later he started to have those dreams. Of huge waters, stretching from east to west, sparkling madly in the sun. Of unbearable heat and sea of sand. Of deserts of ice, wind blowing in his face and warm clothes on his body. And never in those dreams was he alone. There was this other person beside him, his soulmate. Yet he never got to see their face. Never got to see them at all, he just knew the other one was there. And it went on and on.

And all Levi knew was the pain. It started a moth after his ink appeared. The pain that feels like a knife is being stabbed into your flesh. It started from his ink, waking him up in the middle of the night. He thought at first that he was bleeding, since that was how it felt. But no, nothing. Just inked skin. He fell asleep eventually, ignoring the pain.

It was spreading slowly. From his hip bone to his tight and waist, going on and on. And so the pain became a part of who Levi was. It was always there, ever present, never leaving him. And so it slowly became his most faithful companion.

But in 845 something changed…

He was just out on a mission with his squad when he felt it. The incredible, unbearable, unstoppable pain. It made him bend to his horse’s neck just from how intense it was. He needed a while to blink the tears away. Tears that weren’t his.

It wasn’t a physical pain, no. This was much more powerful. His soulmate’s heart had just been crashed into pieces.

The corps ran back as fast as they could, reaching Shiganshina within a few hours. Just because Levi told them. As much as he trusted Erwin, the man trusted him the same. And so when Levi said something was wrong, they headed back.

He saw the titans from far away. And he was raging. How many had he killed he didn’t remember. How many they had lost he didn’t know. How many people had died he didn’t want to know. What he wanted to know was if one survived. Or was slowly dying somewhere. The pain was unbearable. He collapsed when they finally made it past the walls. Blackness surrounding him, giving him shelter from the torturing thoughts. But not from the pain.

Five years have passed since the incident in Shinganshina. Levi was the most feared man in the military, in his own way. Because apparently, somebody did count how many he had kill on his own. And the number was terrifying. At that time, Levi had screamed. He had screamed because his soulmate, the other half of his heart, was hurting so much. He had screamed and nobody had heard him, nobody but the ones he had been about to kill. Since that day, he stayed as quiet as he could. Because sometimes, the pain came back, in the dreams. In those dreams he was suffering. And when he woke up he was suffering as well, because someone out there was alone to the pain.

It had happened again one day. The titans came back. And this time, Levi wanted to make sure no more people suffered the way his soulmate had. And so he fought. Just as he had five years ago. With the same vigour. Maybe he had already given up. Maybe he had lost hope that his soulmate will come around one day. Maybe he had thought himself alone. But nobody could ever say that he stopped caring. Not ever. Not for a single day. He cared for people more than most of them. And there was this silent, tiny voice in the back of his mind, telling him that his soulmate would like that side of him. The caring. That they would think him an amazing person. Because that’s what he truly wanted to be. An amazing person. For the one who would love him the way he was. And still be an amazing person…

When the battle was over, something happened. Levi wasn’t there but you know, soldiers talk. Somebody had emerged from a titan. Interesting.

He stood in the basement beside Erwin. No idea why, really. But since he had asked him to, he was there, waiting for the brat behind the bars to wake up. And when he did, Levi was surprised. The kid’s got really green eyes.

The day of the trial came. Erwin had come to see him earlier, giving him vague instructions. Hell, that guy could share more from time to time. But Levi followed those half-assed orders anyway, he chose to do so many years ago. He stood by the left side of the room, waiting for the Yeager brat to come by. When the tribune started eventually, he was already bored beyond belief. And the wall priest was talking shit again…

He saw the kid flinch suddenly, his eyes widening. Did he really take that so much to his heart? There was silence for a while and then a huge mess. That was the time for Levi to shine. He kicked the brat a couple of times, no emotions involved really. But then, when he was aiming for his head, he rubbed against his left collar bone by sheer accident and the brat spasmed like he had just stabbed him. And Levi could see it. The little bit of black that was to be seen. Interesting.

He made his proposal. And he knew it would be accepted. He had reputation after all. Nobody doubted that he would be able to kill the kid. That was his not-so-secret weapon.

And so they got the brat under their custody. Well, Levi squad got the custody, really. Ahh, who am I kidding, Levi got the absolute custody. And he tried to be nice, he really did. But the brat seemed to jump three feet into the air every time he spoke to him. Maybe it was the beating…?

He was interesting, though. That entire titan thing, sure. But Levi really wanted to see his ink. Just to know who his soulmate was. But asking about it seemed a little bit inappropriate. So he remained silent. Just waiting for the right occasion.

One day his squad had to leave, Erwin’s orders or something, leaving him and the brat behind. Great. Well, at least he could ask him about the ink now, couldn’t he?

Turned out he didn’t even have to. Really, the kid was hopeless. He managed to spill the cleaning water all over himself while Levi was cleaning the library. He saw him taking off his shirt and laying it in the sun to dry off. Levi let out a sigh and descended the stairs and outside of the building, grabbing a dry shirt along the way.

“Oy, brat!”

The kid flinched visibly at his words. Really just what was the problem?

“How come you’re so hopeless? I can’t believe you spilled it all over your shirt, you’re all dirty now, you brat.”

He looked sheepish, his head bowed, eyes locked to the ground.

“Ahh, I’m s-sorry, sir.”

Levi glared at him.

“Here, wear this.”

He threw the spare shirt at him. The kid caught it, lifting his head finally.

And Levi saw it.

Who are you?

He froze for a moment.

What the actual fuck?

“Eren,”

He said, voice low.

“Y-yes?” The kid responded, the shirt halfway over his head.

“You found your soulmate already?”

It came out of his mouth before he could stop it. Well, let it be damned, he wanted to ask that anyway, so.

Eren shrugged a bit. Gaze downcast again.

“Ergh, no. I-I haven’t, sir.”

“Oh, I see. “

He turned around a headed for the tower again.

“Finish the cleaning, brat.”

It wasn’t possible. Absolutely not. Many people must have thought the same thing when they saw him right? Right?

He was a strange kid after all. Half human, half titan.

But he flinched during the trial.

That was one day after their first encounter.

No, that’s bullshit. He had met many from the corps. It can’t be him.

It… It just can’t.

Levi was distressed, honestly. Because maybe, maybe, that little kid, the strange, hopeless, confusing, adorable brat down the tower… Maybe he was the one who had thought him an amazing person so many years ago.

Levi swung the door to his room open and marched inside, shutting them after himself with probably more force than necessarily needed. He sat on his bed, his face in his hands.

This can’t be…

Wait…

He snapped his head upwards and looked to the window. He got up reluctantly and walked over to it, leaning out the slightest bit. Eren was there, brining and hanging the freshly cleaned laundry around. And Levi could swear he was smiling. It was light and almost invisible. But something within Levi told him that, indeed, it was a smile. A genuine one.

Eren was happy to be there. With Levi.

His breath hitched.

This can’t be. This… He… I…

What if I hurt him?

The dreams became more frequent recently. Levi found himself wide awake in the middle of the night more often, musing about those damn souldreams, his fingers tracing the ink absentmindedly.

In those dreams, all he ever saw was a figure. Never the face, never the voice. Just a figure clad in some clothes. And something Levi hated… He knew the other person was sad. But not in those dreams. There, Levi could feel them smiling. Well, him, really. He had figured it quite fast, that his soulmate was a bloke. He couldn’t say that he minded, though. Not at all.

His soulmate was sad all the time, somewhere deep in his heart. But when he was with Levi, he was happy. He couldn’t believe it. That something as simple as the souldreams made this wrecked person so incredibly, undeniably happy.

And so sometimes, when he woke up from one of those dreams, Levi would stay wide awake.

Tears collecting in his eyes, threatening to spill over.

He cares about me. Somebody loves me…

One day, late in the afternoon, Levi was lounging on a sofa in his office. He was so tired that day. Mostly maybe because of the last souldream he had had. In that dream, he and his soulmate walked through a landscape made only of sand, it was hot and the sun was burning. But his soulmate was beaming. He was running a few steps before him, that beautiful smile Levi had never seen never leaving his face. He stopped then, all of a sudden. And he ran back to Levi. He grabbed his hand and dragged him forward until they reached the peak of the dune before them. Levi saw this beautiful ocean then. Glittering in the sunshine. Singing a song full of life. His soulmate laughed. And Levi heard it. And his heart cried from joy. He never heard something so beautiful.

He couldn’t sleep anymore, after that stupid, wonderful dream. He stayed awake the entire night, and hence taking a nap in his office.

He fell asleep quite soon after he had closed his eyes. And he dreamt again.

Somebody is knocking on the door. He can’t hear it though, fast asleep. Then a thatch of brown hair appears in the door.

“Heichou?”

Eren walks in reluctantly, somehow unsettled. Then he spots the one he is looking for deep into sleep on the sofa. A small, warm smile appears on his lips. He walks over to a cupboard, pulling a soft blanket out and then heading over to where Levi sleeps. He unfolds the blanket and lays it over him. He stops halfway through, though. Looking at Levi’s right hip bone his eyes widen. And he smiles again, still so warm, but this time with a hint of pang. He covers Levi whole and lets his eyes linger on him for a little while.

“Sweet dreams, heichou,”

He left the room, that soft smile still plastered on his face, a tiny dust of pink on his cheeks.

Levi smiled in his sleep.

When Levi woke up, it was already dark outside. He was covered up in a soft blanket.

“Tell us, Eren!”

“Oh, come on, don’t be such a prude. Tell us,”

“You’re the only one of the squad who still hasn’t found his soulmate yet, after all.”

Levi stopped in his track upon hearing those words.

“You- You think I am a part of the squad?” asked a tiny, self-conscious voice.

“Of course you are! You would end up here even if it weren’t for the titan thing.” Oh, that one was Petra talking.

“She’s right, you know. You’d definitely end up here too.” That voice was definitely Erd’s.

“How-How can you tell?”

“Because we know Levi, he likes people like you.”

“Is that so?” his voice sounded hopeful.

“Hell, yeah.” Another voice laughed, Gunter’s.

He could basically feel Eren smile, a soft blush on his cheeks, as the squad laughed. He came closer, stopping just behind the corned. Why, he didn’t know himself.

“Come on, then. Tell us already.” Oh, yeah, Oluo, too.

There was a momentary silence. And then a single voice spoke up.

“So…It started like with a strong sunlight. It was so strong I couldn’t see a thing at first. But then my eyes adapted and I saw I was in a desert. That’s a place made completely of sand. It was incredibly hot and no wind blew. My soulmate was a few steps behind me. I was really happy, because I wanted to see desert ever since Armin told me about it. And there I could share the happiness with my soulmate. So, ehh… I ran beforehand a bit, reaching the top of the dune, and I saw that beautiful ocean. I had this irresistible urge to show this to him-“

“Him?” came from all four.

“Ehh…” Levi could hear Eren shifting nervously.

“Your soulmate is a man, then, right?” Petra asked in a gentle voice.

“Y-yeah. I figured it quite a long time ago.”

There was another brief silence until Eren continued to tell his souldream.

“So, I-I ran up to him, grabbed his hand and dragged him to the top. And he seemed… Surprised. Awed. And maybe…”

Levi stiffened involuntarily.

“Maybe a little bit happy. Like I was.”

Levi’s heart stopped.

No way…

“Awww, that’s just so cute, Eren!” Petra squealed.

Levi heard Eren chuckle a bit.

“Any ideas on who your soulmate is?”

Damn you, Erd.

Levi stood there, his back to the wall, not breathing at all.

It was silent again.

“No…Not really…”

Levi pushed away from the wall then. He left, leaving the squad to themselves.

Levi was nervous.

Something he hadn’t been in ages.

But this was something completely different. Just how was he supposed to approach Eren?

How do you tell somebody you’re their soulmate?

Levi was pacing up and down his office, stopping occasionally to look out of the window.

What do I do?

They were returning home after the mission to capture the female titan failed so horribly. His entire squad was dead, his ankle broken. Eren half-dead.

Eren was all he had left now. And he promised himself he would do anything, anything, to keep him alive and safe.

Nothing will ever hurt his soulmate so much as it did five years ago. He’d make sure of it.

“It’s lonely, isn’t it?”

Eren flinched.

They were standing in the dining room, empty. It seemed so much bigger without his men in there. His heart hurt. Twice as much. He felt it. Just as he had back there in the forest.

At first all he felt was worry, and he knew those emotions weren’t his. They were his soulmate’s. And his soulmate was worried beyond belief. About him, about Levi.

“Oy, brat!” He had screamed that day. “Stop worrying about me and try not to die!”

The face Eren had made, he will remember for the rest of his days. That was for sure. It was surprised, but glad. And Levi could swear he had saw the inner conflict. Eren had thought he felt something for someone who wasn’t his soulmate… And yet… He hadn’t known how Levi had guessed what had he been thinking of…

He felt the deaths of his men, then, too. Eren suffered. Just as he was suffering now. He didn’t say a word. Levi came closer.

“They were great soldiers.”

Eren just nodded numbly.

“And even greater people,”

“They were, sir.” He answered this time.

“Just call me Levi, Eren.”

It escaped his lips without thinking. His heart was just aching for his soulmate.

The younger man’s head snapped up and to his superior. His eyes were so wide, Levi kind of worried they might pop out of his head.

“Have you find your soulmate yet?”

Eren was still struck, unable to make a sound. So he just shook his head slowly.

Levi rolled his shirt a little bit up, revealing his right hip bone.

“This is why I want you to call me Levi.”

He swallowed.

“But only when we’re alone, for now. It will be a shock for people once we tell them, so it would be better if we work it out first.”

He looked up, only to meet a very confused and shocked face of the other man.

“Do you recognise those words, Eren?”

Eren’s eyes travelled lower until they landed on the ink eventually. He looked up again, green eyes meeting steel blue. Levi could see that Eren refused to believe it, thinking,
maybe, that Levi was pulling a mean joke.

Well, he has to prove him otherwise…

And so Levi took advantage of the younger man’s frozen state and launched himself forward. Hot lips meeting warm, breaths mixing, hitching. And suddenly, Levi wasn’t hurting anymore. Because finally, finally he had his soulmate in his arms. And he was kissing back.

When they broke apart, Levi looked him in the eye. Eren looked shaken. He just lost his comrades and found his soulmate, that’s a hell to deal with. So Levi just hugged him tight. And Eren broke.

He gripped Levi’s shirt tight, tears spilling from his eyes, desperate sobs escaping his mouth, half-happy, half-mourning. And Levi hold him close, a couple of tears leaving is eyes too, one for every member of his squad, one for his love. And at that time, they felt the same, they were mourning their fallen friends, and they were joyous about finally finding each other.

Eren’s white, innocent and hopeful wing and Levi’s blue, experienced and determined, creating what the Recon corps meant. Embodying humanity’s glory.

Everybody’s breath hitched when they saw them. Captain Levi and Eren Yeager. Humanity’s strongest and humanity’s last hope. In the Recon corps’ emblem was it both, white for the hope, blue for the strength. They walked thought the crowd, green capes on their backs. And people felt it, the hope. The fate.

But people didn’t see one thing. The silent I love yous whispered every time they had a chance, the lingering touches that comforted and gave strength. The strength and trust they had in each other.

They were soulmates after all.

And the Recon corps knew. And everybody agreed on one thing- they fit.

They were there to fight, by each other’s side, watching each other’s back.

For the Glory of Humanity.