Chapter Text
Levi opens one eye, and the entirety of the last twenty-four hours fades to the background with the words of Ymir Fritz ringing loudly in his head.
One more time.
It’s a warning and an oath in one, a promise and a death sentence with a time limit ticking away in the distance.
One more time, she says.
Levi blinks up at the darkened stone ceiling he hasn’t seen in years and breathes -- breathes in the fresh, crisp morning air flowing gently from the open window, carrying the scent of sweet grass and wet earth that Marley lacked with their smoky chimneys and burning coal. He breathes, and the nightmares fade back in along with the pain. His knee is at the very least twisted, if not shattered from the Titan’s teeth, his eye throbs with every beat of his heart, and his left side is a mess of muted agony.
One more time.
Can I do this one more time? He thinks hollowly.
The faces of his friends and comrades trickle through his mind slowly like a spring, of all the people that are alive now , within reach and at death's door if he did nothing. Erwin and Kenny, Miche and Nanaba, and his first elite squad, old pains that ache fiercely like a bruised bone. Hange and Sasha, and not much later Connie, all gunshot wounds that are fresh and open, still bleeding. Armin and Mikasa and Eren , a crushing pressure that steals the breath from his lungs as soon as they come to mind because they’re not here anymore, not in front of him to lead and protect, they’re so far away now -- but they’d been so far away for so long already, hadn’t they? From him, from each other.
He’s failed so many times, and each failure has taught him nothing. How can he do this when getting out of bed seems like an impossible task itself? He’s in a castle of dead men and women walking, hidden behind walls made of lies and desperation, across the sea from an entire world that wants to destroy everything he’s ever let himself care about.
His breath seizes in his chest.
It’s...it’s too much.
He can’t do this by himself.
He can’t-
Jean’s face flashes in his mind, young and scared and brave through it all, grimly accepting a fate worse than death because I don’t want those charred bones I saw to be disappointed in me.
Jean, who’d just witnessed friends and enemies die for him, who’d been the one to watch the girl he loved land the finishing blow on the boy he’d spent the better part of his life protecting before she too was taken. Jean, who’d lost every single person important to him in a handful of moments because Connie had disappeared into the maws of a Titan from ages past to give them time, and Armin had given them Ymir Fritz’s blessing with the shadows of Annie, Bertholdt, Reiner, Ymir, Pieck, Zeke, Falco, and countless others flickering behind him even as his last breath left his lungs and his ocean eyes dimmed to a starless night.
Jean. He still...he’s still Jean’s captain, because he’s not alone here. Jean is waking up now too, surrounded by ghosts, just like him. They have a job to do. They have promises to keep. Bones and ashes to honor, a future to shape. He can’t be caught whining pitifully when there’s work to be done, no matter how crushing the weight on his ribs becomes.
The sputtering flame in his chest steadies, a flickering candle compared to the roaring fire it had been most of his life. But it’s a start.
One more time.
He fades in and out for what feels like a lifetime.
The shadows on the walls lighten with the slowly rising sun, the sound of movement and life a steady crescendo with the passage of time, then he hears it.
The footsteps heading towards his door are immediately recognizable -- light, steady, a slight skip every few strides.
Grief tightens his throat for a split second.
Petra.
His former -- current -- subordinate stops in front of his door and knocks exactly three times, a light tap tap tap that hardly echoes, but she’s like that in every action she takes -- purposeful and efficient, but with a tempered grace that had separated her from her cohort when he’d been selecting members for his squad.
“Captain? Sorry to bother you, but you missed breakfast this morning so I brought you a tray!” She sounds chipper. Lively. Young. “It’s your favorite! I even snuck some sugar for your tea!”
It hurts. Fuck, it hurts. It hurts .
He takes a steadying breath and sits up, teeth clenching down on a hiss of pain because despite being stone the walls did a shit job of keeping sound in. “Leave it,” he says simply, because he doesn’t have the words for anything more. He doesn’t think he could stomach it.
“Oh,” he hears, somewhat uncertain, before, “Alright, Captain. Please enjoy!”
He listens to her footsteps disappear down the hall, not quite as light as before, but he can’t spare a moment to feel guilty. It would disappear into the vast well inside him anyway, and he can’t afford any distractions, can’t let himself fall down that well because the edges of his mind are already splintering from the impossibility of the situation and he doesn’t know if he’d be able to claw his way back up a final time.
Right now he needs...he needs to think.
He needs to get his shit together and not freak the fuck out, and he needs to come up with solid steps to follow.
He and Jean hadn’t had time to make plans, in the other plane. The Paths. That starless, sandy purgatory where Ymir lingered like a specter for lifetimes and where Eren laid out his grand final plan before swiping those memories away as if he owned them.
They’d hardly said yes before they were being thrown through the void that had opened on the god-slave’s command, but if Jean came back the same way, then he’d have no choice but to leave immediately. It would be impossible to explain how a little shit of a trainee had grown into a bloodied soldier overnight.
Life at this moment only consisted of walls and Titans and the slow march of time, and no one would hesitate to imprison or even murder him if he started spouting nonsense like Titan Shifters or a world beyond the walls without irrefutable evidence in the form of thousands slaughtered and a war at their doorstep. Thankfully, Levi knows the other man is far from an idiot and will do the opposite. Jean will have to either disappear into the Underground -- unlikely with his limited experience in that environment, and no real motivation to be there -- or he’ll come straight to the Scouts and Levi will be able to confirm with his own eyes that he’s not just stuck in his own version of hell.
And Levi knows that, even without his injuries, he wouldn’t be able to escape scrutiny. Miche’s nose would notice him, Hange’s intelligence would catch him, and Erwin...Erwin would know immediately, without question.
After all, Levi’s not the same, slim soldier he’d been over five years ago -- before they’d reclaimed Wall Maria, allowing Historia to improve agricultural output to feed her people and their newfound access to coastal food sources, before they’d begun using ODM gear and Thunder Spears and using heavy weaponry in preparation for human warfare instead of their normal attire for scouting and agility. And even beyond that, he’s not the same ill-tempered but stupidly naive soldier that thought life had already taken the worst from him, a vicious attack dog from the Underground masquerading as Humanity’s Strongest Soldier. He doesn’t know what he is anymore, but...
He doesn’t need to look in a mirror to know the person looking back is not the same man he’s replaced.
There are…so many changes to make, and Levi has to focus on his dirtied bed sheets before the scream building in the back of his throat overwhelms him.
He shifts, and the agony in his knee flares like a beacon, smearing more blood on the scratchy material, but the familiar prick of irritation is washed away quickly, sobered by understanding and a bit of clarity. A goal. An objective. He’s useless right now with his injuries. Medical care would be necessary if he wanted to get back into fighting shape as soon as possible and train to compensate for his vision — another thing for him to mourn when he had the luxury.
Step one, fucking get changed. I feel disgusting, he thinks sourly, and ruthlessly shuts away the rest of the memories thoughts nightmares that pound in the back of his mind.
He soldiers through the throbbing ache that’s spread throughout his body, down to his toes it feels like, and painstakingly removes his damaged gear with a critical eye. It’s mostly intact, but some key components are damaged beyond just twisted buckles and frayed material. That’ll be a bitch to fix, but he’ll bully Kirstein into figuring something out with the engineers since the kid was the one to collaborate on its design and functionality in the first place. As soon as it’s all off he feels unbalanced and vulnerable, but he pushes that thought away too and washes up using the cool, cold water in the basin the previous version of him prepped last night.
He doesn’t touch his eye. He’ll leave that for medical.
It feels surreal, now that he’s clean as he can be and changed into the largest uniform he owns -- it still sits a bit tight around his shoulders and thighs, but it’s an afterthought. There’s enough give for him to roll up the pant leg over his swollen knee, already turning a blotchy mess of ugly colors even after blotting away most of the dried blood. After a superficial wrap, more for something to do than proper medical care, he takes a deep breath.
Step one, done.
Now...now.
He should...he needs to talk to Erwin, and Hange, and Miche while he’s at it. They need to know what’s coming, they need to reallocate their resources and prepare for an entirely new world -- a coup, a treaty, a war. They also need to prepare a place for Jean, who will no doubt reach the castle within a couple weeks if he manages to slip away undetected and isn’t too injured to immediately travel.
Sooner rather than later, he absently thinks, wondering if the ticking he hears in the background is just his own fucked up head mocking him or Ymir’s restless ghost pacing, waiting, watching what he’ll do, what decisions he’ll make.
He shakes his head. No time for useless thoughts.
Erwin and the others need the information and experience he has, but he admits, if only to himself…he also just wants to see his friends.
He eyes the sun in the sky, noting it’s around the time Erwin meets with his squad leaders for a brief daily meeting, likely not expecting him if Petra had mentioned what happened this morning and no one else had come to fetch him.
Now or never.
They’ll have a heads up. Levi knows Miche will smell him before he sees him, the fucking freak.
Miche smells him before he sees him, and he frowns. “Was Levi training earlier?”
Nanaba hums and shuffles the papers in front of her, “No, I don’t think so. Petra said he wasn’t feeling well and stayed in his room all morning. Why?”
Erwin looks at him sharply when he grimly says, “I smell blood.”
There’s no more time for speculation before the subject of conversation walks through the door, and Miche’s not the only one who sits up in shock at the sight, horror painting different expressions on each of their faces.
“Holy-“
“What in the-”
“Lance Corporal!”
Erwin rises, blue eyes wide and stormy, “Levi, what-“
“Shut up,” Levi says, quietly but firmly, and the entire room falls silent. “Sit down.”
Hange and Nanaba settle in their seats slowly, not unlike spooked animals, and Erwin meets Levi’s gaze for a long, drawn out moment before carefully doing the same.
Levi keeps his one visible eye on them and Miche can’t read what goes through his head.
As it is, he can hardly wrap his mind around the sight of their most capable fighter looking like death warmed over with a covered eye, bandaged hands, and a limp that becomes very noticeable when the shorter man shuts the door with an ominous click and walks over to his usual seat at the meeting table. He’s seen Levi injured before, but only in extreme situations and outside the walls, and the juxtaposition of their nigh-untouchable Lance Corporal in such poor condition while walking the halls in the safety of their home is jarring enough to scramble his thoughts.
“Levi-” Hange starts, the worst at keeping silent in the face of the unexplainable, but they shut up quickly when Levi merely holds up a wrapped hand for silence, not looking at any of them anymore.
Instead, his gaze is directed out the open windows, eye on the horizon where the sun climbs high over the distant wall.
Miche has to fight the urge to fidget in the cloying quiet, heartbeat loud in his ears, the air buzzing inexplicably with anticipation and energy. He can tell he’s not the only one affected by how tense Nanaba is beside him, alert like a hunting dog spotting a predator with her blue eyes like giant jewels embedded in her pale face, but he doesn’t blame her. He can’t, in their entire acquaintance together, ever remember seeing Levi in such a state -- but more than that, he can’t remember the Lance Corporal wearing such a face. Stony, but not in the quiet, irritable way he’s used to. Dull, almost, without even a spark of that fierce temper and intimidating self-assuredness that had nearly ripped his throat out a handful of years ago.
He hardly has time to gather his thoughts before Levi finally speaks.
And even that sounds...different. Deeper. Heavy. Dragging like the words are physical weights he has to pull from the depths of his chest. “You’re all going to listen quietly until I’m done. Understand?”
Then he begins telling a story – about a slave, and a king, and a curse, and Miche knows nothing will ever be the same.