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Erwin stopped washing the blood off his clothes months ago, there was no point in it anymore. But as he stands in the aisle of an abandoned supermarket facing a little boy whose eyes won’t stop flickering down to look at his blood-stained outfit, he wishes he had.
But before he could so much as think about what to do next, he felt the barrel of a gun pressed to the back of his head.
“What took you so long? Did you stop for McDonald’s or something?” The words had barely even registered before he was turning and throwing his arms around the man behind him. God, he thought he would never get to hear that voice again.
“Levi. God, Levi.” He whispered into the shorter man’s neck where he had tucked his face in. “I was too late. I went to your apartment but you weren’t there, I looked everywhere, I swear. I knew you weren’t dead. You couldn’t be.” Levi tightened his arms around Erwin. He had waited till the last second, till the dead were crawling through the door and he couldn’t wait any longer. Suddenly Levi started pushing against Erwin’s chest, forcing him to loosen his arms from around Levi. As soon as Erwin’s arms gave way Levi lurched upwards pressing their lips together, pouring months of uncertainty and anger into the kiss. “I thought you were dead you piece of shit.” Levi breathed into Erwin’s mouth before crushing their lips together again. “Don’t do that to me again.” Levi pleaded.
“Mikasa, stop.” A voice whined from behind them.
Erwin suddenly remembered the little boy and turned to see a little girl with her hands wrapped around the boy’s eyes not budging despite the boy’s best attempts. Behind both of them another little boy, this one blonde, was nervously wringing his hands together.
“It’s not fit for young eyes, Eren.” The boy in her arms, Eren apparently, let out a huff and momentarily dropped his arms from where they were trying to pry the girl’s hands from his face.
“You’re not even a full year older.” He said with a pout before continuing in his daring escape. This time Mikasa lets Eren remove her hands. Eren turns around to stick his tongue out at her.
“Oi, brat what did I say about annoying me.” Levi scolds, moving away from Erwin’s embrace to squat down next to the three of them. The little blond boy finally moved from behind the two to stand closer to Levi, one hand latching back onto his sweater and the other to Eren’s hand. He should’ve known better than to let it go when they entered the store.
Levi tugs on Eren’s ear. “How many times have I told you not to wander off, huh? Why do you insist on making my life difficult?”
“I was watching him.” Mikasa pipes up, pulling Eren closer to her by his unoccupied hand. Erwin finally catches sight of the knife hanging from the girl’s other hand. She turns her sharp gaze towards him. “I had the situation under control.”
Levi watches her for a second before letting out a tsk at both of them and shaking his head as he stands back up, ignoring the way Eren was squirming around trying to get his hands back from the other two unsuccessfully.
“Brats, this is Erwin Smith. Erwin, this is Mikasa, Eren, and Armin; they lived two doors down.” Erwin nodded, nothing more needed to be said. He saw the condition of the apartment building by the time he got there, if Levi had put it upon himself to take care of three little kids Erwin didn’t even want to think about the circumstances that pushed him to make that decision.
“Nice to meet you kids-”
“Are you Mr. Levi’s husband?” Eren interrupted having given up on trying to free his hands and instead mildly swinging them back and forth.
“Alright. That's enough. Let’s finish looking for what we came here for and go.” Levi said giving Eren’s bangs a not so gentle tug before taking Armin’s hand to lead the trio down the aisle. Erwin stared in amazement as they followed behind Levi like little ducklings; dirty, heavily clothed, backpack carrying ducklings. It was quite a sight.
“Are you just gonna stand there or are you coming, Eyebrows?” Levi asked, not even turning around. Erwin let out an incredulous laugh before following them. “I’m going. I’m going, no need for insults.”
Both Levi and Erwin chose to ignore the small ‘why are his eyebrows like that? They look like calipiters,’ from Eren and the following sound as both Armin and Mikasa smacked Eren on the back of his head.