Chapter Text
Ruins
Pairings: Mike/Reader, Levi/Reader
Genre: Angst, One Sided, why must I hurt reader, I’m mean I know
Warnings: mention of child neglect, brothel, violence and prostitution
You were just a lonely, sad child with parents who couldn’t care less about her. Even at the tender age of 9, no one cared to feed you, to buy you anything or even acknowledge that you existed. You were just a burden, a nusiance they had never wanted. Even giving you the bare minimum care a child deserved was too much for them, so you were often left to fend for yourself.
Hence, no one even batted an eyelash at the fact that you were out in the dark, wearing a tattered dress and shoes that couldn’t even classify as such. You didn’t feel bothered, used to their shamelss mistreatment. You were all too familiar with no one giving a damn about you.
What you weren’t familiar with was someone actually caring about you.
Mike.
He had felt like an angel to you, a blessing you hadn’t thought you would ever recieve. Someone who cared about you, someone who wanted you to be safe.
You had met him when you were 11, as kids who lived in the same village in Wall Rose. Most of the other kids either avoided you or bullied you, because of your poor appearance. But he didn’t.
He was nice to you. Giving you food, getting you clothes. Sometimes he took you to his house to have a meal. His mother and her kind smile made you warm. Within a few months of knowing each other, the two of you had gotten closer, to the point you spent more time in his house then your own.
One night, your parents hadn’t opened the door to their house for you. You hadn’t been surprised, for it wasn’t the first time they had done so. You liked to think it was on purpose, a way of saying they wanted you to never come back.
You had ended up sleeping out in the rain and had gotten extremely sick. Mike had found you the next day and taken you back to his house. After that, you had never gone back to your parents.
Your parents didn’t care. And frankly, for once in your life, you were glad about that.
Years would go by in this friendship, years of happy memories and softness. You had considered those to be the best years of your life. The two of you had grown up together, spending everyday with each other and having fun.
Until the two of you turned 15. By then you knew very well, that you were in love with Mike.
Too bad you had to learn the hard way that he didn’t feel the same.
When you were 15, Mike set off to join the military. He had told you and his family that he would get into the top 10 and join the military police. His parents had been overjoyed, and his mother had privately told you something that had made your heart flutter.
She thought that Mike would marry you and take you to Sina with him.
It made sense really, after all, you had known each other for years. His parents had treated you as their own, to the point their guest room was your room. Your biological parents had left at some point, selling their house. You had been so happy in your life that you hadn’t even noticed them leave. There had been a slight pang of hurt, one that would always exist at the thought of them, but you had moved on well.
The thing that made you think Mike actually wanted you was the fact that he had kissed you. Several times.
They had been short, sweet kisses. The two of you had been blushing messes by the end of them. Neither of you ever had enough courage to talk about them. But it only served to reinforce what his mother was saying.
Shortly after Mike left, you had found a job as a barmaid in a bar nearby. You hadn’t wanted to inconvenience his family any longer, you already lived under their roof for free. The least you could do was earn your keep. It also helped keep you busy now that Mike was gone.
Mike’s mother had begun to encourage you to write to Mike. She had told you that already saw you as her daughter, and could tell Mike felt something for you. Like a fool, you went along with it, thinking she might be right.
Mike had never said anything romantic to you, but it was always a possibility. Those kisses had been anything but platonic. His mother knew him best and you figured it wouldn’t hurt for you to take the oppurtunity to try to get your feelings across.
So you began to write to him, hoping he would respond back. And he did. Your long, neatly written letters were often responded to, but with brief, polite letters. It was as though your friendship had changed, that you weren’t best friends like before. But you convinced yourself you were wrong to feel that. Maybe he was just too busy to write much?
You often pretended you hadn’t seen the three page letters his parents got from him.
You still kept writing to him, the shortness in your letters growing. He had stopped even bothering to respond on time. Often, you were met with radio silence.
It frustrated you, how the two of you weren’t even friends even more. Your hopes of being his future wife had been far fetched to begin with, but he had stopped even letting you be his friend. Had you done something wrong? You hadn’t even pushed him, only writing him friendly letters.
You got your answer when he was visiting home on his off day, in the form of a love letter for a girl named Nanaba.
The three years he would spend training in the military would fly by really. He only came home five times a year, and mostly spent it with his parents.
You clearly recalled the first time he came back to visit. You had helped his mother make a feast for him, it had consisted of all of his favorite foods. But he hadn’t so much as thanked you, or even made eye contact with you. All your attempts at a conversation with met with pauses and a cordial tone.
It had made you feel unwelcome. As though you were just a guest in his house and not the best friend he had grown up with.
His parents had noticed of course, and once they thought you were asleep, had confronted him about his behaviour. It hadn’t gotten anywhere, with Mike just insisting he was tired and not really feeling up to chit chat.
His strange behaviour towards you carried on everytime he visited in that year, to the point you began taking up late nigth shifts to avoid him. You would cook with his mother and make your excuses and leave.
Once his second year started, you had saved enough money to move out. Once his parents found out, however, they wouldn’t let you go. They had never taken a cent from you and would continue to not. But they refused to let the girl they considered their daughter live by herself, finding it too dangerous for you to be on your own.
You had argued but accepted that they wouldn’t let you go. A part of you wished they had let you go, because the next time Mike came home, he brought Nanaba with him.
When Mike was in his final year of training, you moved out.
It hadn’t been an easy decision, nor a very welcome one for his parents but you had made it nonetheless. He and Nanaba were an actual couple now, much to his parents despair.
Maybe they didn’t actually like the girl or they just didn’t like how their son had been treating you since he had met her. But you had understood that you needed to leave. They were too stiff with Nanaba, making her feel unwelcome. It had led to several fights after she left, with Mike feeling justly angered at their treatment of his girlfriend.
By then, you had learned to live with the heartbreak he had caused you. So, with promises to keep visiting, you left to live in your own apartment.
You thought that was the end of that really. You would live on your own, visit his family from time to time, slowly grow apart from them and live out the rest of your life on your own. You had made peace with this and thought that it would end the conflicts between him and his parents.
But somehow, despite not being there, you had still continued to be the reason he fought with his parents. The last time you would hear them argue, he would tell them to stop letting you visit. Because it made him uncomfortable. He and Nanaba would get married someday and if they kept letting you be around, they would live somewhere else rather then with them.
You had been standing outside the door, ready to knock when you heard that. And without a second thought, despite your heart wrenching painfully, you had turned back around and walked home.
You were determined to never come back, so you had packed your bags and then gone into work. After informing your boss that you were quitting, you finished your last shift. You were planning on heading out to Wall Maria the next day, hoping to just cut contact with Mike and his family and start over with your life.
It hurt you more then you were willing to let on, his family had been the only parents you had ever had. And now, you were the reason they were losing their son. It wasn’t fair, but what could you do? He had made his decisions and now you had made yours.
Just as you set your apron aside, and prepared to leave, there was a sudden pain in the back of your head.
And then, everything went dark.
The underground.
That’s where you were.
You had been kidnapped and sold to a brothel in the underground, as if you were a piece of meat.
You had woken up, chained. Three middle aged men had leered at you with twisted grins, uncaring that you were sobbing in terror.
No matter how much you begged and pleaded, there was no turning around. You had been forced to shut up, after one decided you were too annoying and had slapped you. The other man had been in favour of beating you black and blue to teach you a lesson, but the third one had argued you wouldn’t sell enough in that state.
After that, you had gone quiet as a mouse. You felt numb that this would be your end.
Your life had started out in ruins, with your parents shamelessly neglecting you. It had begun to build back up once you had met Mike and his loving parents, only for Mike himself to give you no choice but to walk away.
You thought you could walk away with your head held high a little, after all, at least you were capable of taking care of yourself now. But no, now your life was even worse then before.
When you had met Mike, you had been starving for food. He had offered you an apple and that was how you became friends. Now, as you sat locked in a room, dressed in rags, waiting for your first ‘customer’, you wished he had left you alone.
If only he had let you die back then, everyone’s life would have been easier. Your parents would have gotten rid of their burden earlier, Mike and Nanaba wouldn’t be struggling with his parents right now.
You snapped out of your misery as you heard a thump and sounds of someone screaming. You ignored it, having grown used to hearing weird sounds in the three days you had been here. Then you heard someone inserting a key into the door.
You gulped, as the knob turned and someone began to walk in.
It was a short man, with black hair and steel eyes. He looked at you neutrally, showing no emotions.
Once he shut the door, you began to back away on the bed, only to struggle against the handcuffs you were trapped with.
He began to walk forward and you began to cry.