Chapter Text
Mornings were Hange’s least favourite part of the day, for they came with expectations of what the day ahead would reserve her.
Sometimes she would wake up shivering, trembling in front of the idea of what would happen in the next twenty-four hours.
Sometimes, even, she would wake up crying, the dreams and the memories of the burden of being alive pressing onto her chest, making her heart ache.
Sometimes… she would wake up with a sensation of numbness she could not explain.
That day, she didn't even register she had woken up until she found herself standing against the window, her brown eyes staring at the early lights that imprinted shadows in the city.
It is early in the morning, probably not even five, she noted as she looked at the silent streets, the tranquility of the hour contrasting with the confusion and traffic there'd be in few time.
Hange stood tall, her arms crossed against her chest, her eyes fixed on something yet on anything at all.
She was staring at the void, the ache in her head growing stronger every second that passed.
She brought her hand to her forehead and caught the bridge of her nose between two fingers, lifting slightly her glasses in order to achieve that motion.
It was the kind of headache that came when she was tired or hadn't had a proper sleep, which was most likely the case.
Over the years she got used to staying awake for nights and nights non-stop, so not being able to go to bed due to her work wasn't a new thing at all, but as she became Commander the amount of work tripled, if not even more.
She let out a loud sigh, her mind wandering on the thought of her late comrades, and especially on the face of a certain tall blonde guy, with thick eyebrows and a gaze so piercing that sometimes could scare even her.
Erwin was one of the things she thought about most in the morning.
It was no rare thing for her to fall into the memories she had of him, of the time she spent babbling about titans and researches in his office while he tried to complete paperwork and to find a kind way to tell her off.
She had been following him for years, since before he became Commander, even before he was promoted as Squad Leader.
She never once, in all those years, questioned one of his orders.
Never.
But now that he was dead, she kept questioning his choice of her as the 14th Commander of the Scout Legion.
“Hange.”
She snapped back to reality as soon as her name was called, and turned around with a quick motion that left her stumbling on her feet.
Luckily she was near the wall and was able to stabilize herself, or else she would've probably fell under Levi's icy gaze.
He was in a position in between sitting and laying on the bed, the sheets enveloped around his body fallen slightly due to his change of position, making them reveal the bare chest hidden beneath them.
Seeing him awake, his eyes fixed on her, made Hange stumble again even though she was just standing.
She cleared her throat and looked away quickly, guilt rising in her chest. If someone could comprehend the difficulty Levi had in falling asleep, that was her.
To be the one responsible for having awakened him… she felt kind of terrible.
“Oh, Levi. Did I… wake you up?” She asked, catching a lock of hair between her fingers and curling it against them.
He scoffed aloud and shifted entirely in a sitting position, making the covers creak with his movements.
“Tch. Of course you did, dragging yourself to the window like that,” he replied. She glanced at him and met his gaze. “I’ve also been calling you since I woke up, but you heard me only the fourth time. What, is having bad eyesight not enough for you, shitty glasses? Must you also be deaf?”
A tender smile made its way on her face, though it was not her usual creepy or too happy one.
She was too tired for it.
“Sorry, I was lost in my thoughts,” murmured she. Under his gaze she brought her index finger up to her glasses, pushing them back to rest comfortably on the bridge of her nose.
He brought a hand to his hair and pushed them back from his forehead, sighing slightly.
“Come back to bed, It's too early even for you.” His voice had softened, just as his features. His eyes no longer seemed to pierce her, no, now they simply rested upon her figure, with that tender gaze he reserved her one too many times.
Hange chuckled softly.
“Even if I do, I don't think I'll be able to sleep more. The same goes for you, I'm…” she interrupted herself, the words resting on her tongue.
I'm sorry for waking you up again.
He waited patiently for her to continue, however, when she did not, he sighed again.
“Just come back here, will you?” He gestured to the empty spot beside him, where she lay asleep not much ago.
Honestly, she wanted to refuse his offer, wanted to tell him she could not go back to sleep and that she should take the opportunity of having woken up earlier to get back to work… except she didn't want to anymore.
Not when his voice sounded so sweet and so caring, not when he was explicitly asking for her to get back to her bed— no, their bed, as to rest a little bit more, away from their duties as Commander and Captain.
And she knew that, if she were to refuse, he'd get up from the bed as well, not letting her be the only one to go back to work.
If not for herself, she should do it for him, to give him a few more moments of peace.
Without further hesitation, she found herself walking towards him, the bed shifting against her pressure as soon as she put her knees on it, crawling back to her spot as he made more room for her.
She lay down again, the pressure on her chest slightly disappearing as soon as the back of her head touched the pillow.
Hange closed her eyes and sighed, the little and tender smile not leaving her lips as she enjoyed the comfort of the bed.
When she opened them again, she found Levi staring at her with apparently no intention of changing the trajectory of his gaze.
She blinked twice, surprised, and felt her cheeks burn a bit in embarrassment. Luckily, due to the dim light he could not see it clearly, or he would most likely tease her for it.
“W-what?” She asked, trying hard not to look away from his eyes. He would always stare at her that way, with softness and over protectiveness, but why he did that she didn't know.
He frowned and, without interrupting the eye contact, brought his thumb to her cheek, wiping something wet from it that she didn't even know was there.
Only then did she understand they were tears.
“You’ve been crying again” he stated, sounding more gentle than he always was.
He always was way kinder during mornings, especially in the last few years, especially with her.
“Oh.”
She was struck speechless, unable to come up with something to say, which was utterly strange and very rare.
The two of them looked at each other in silence, his hand still cupping her cheek and his thumb drawing soft circles against it, in a motion too affectionate to even be real.
Hange wanted to lean in onto the touch, to be held dearly and to listen to his heartbeat while her head rested against his chest…
But it was too late.
Soon his thumb was not on his cheek anymore, and he took some distance as he adjusted himself under the sheets, going from sitting to laying again next to her.
Hange observed his movements for a few seconds, trying to restrain the sadness and emptiness she felt as soon as his hand moved away.
Before he was done laying down she had turned around, laying on her side and giving him her back, her heartbeat growing faster and her cheeks burning hotter as she recalled his touch on them.
She bit her lower lips with force and closed her eyes, trying to push away the nervousness in her due to Levi's gesture.
It wasn't uncommon for them to do such things, however it was inappropriate of her to think more of the reason behind them.
She hoped that, one day, Levi would reciprocate the feelings that she'd been growing for him in the last decade, that he'd look at her with love…
But there was no way in the world Levi could be in love with her, and she wasn't foolish enough to believe his affection towards her was backed up by some deeper feelings—
No, it was ridiculous of her to even think about something like that.
They were just friends, and it was enough.
Even though they've been sleeping together for the last four years, they'd never kissed or touched each other that way, nor did they ever brought up the topic of what exactly they were doing.
But she knew, in the depths of her heart, that if she ever were to address this thing (sleeping in the same bed every night and holding each other with care) with the hope of having something more, he would reject her harshly and mock her, then putting a stop to this arrangement they had.
Her eyes opened suddenly as strong arms wrapped around her body, one going under her flank and pressing slightly on her stomach, the other moving from her sides to envelop her in a hug, resting against the bindings on her chest.
Her heart beat faster and faster as his arms brought her closer to him, so close that now she could feel his breath on her neck—
So close that her back pressed against his muscular chest, and his chin against her shoulder.
“Levi…” Hange managed to say, a murmur escaping her lips as she tried to make order of the chaos in her mind.
He moved one arm away, making her tense with the fear of that touch ending so soon, when she suddenly felt the warmth of the sheets above her.
He covered her carefully, avoiding leaving even a small part of her body out of it, and then his arm returned to his initial position.
If possible, he brought her even closer to his chest.
“You're shivering, four-eyes. Just rest a bit and shut up that fucking brain of yours for a little more.”
And so she did.
She pushed away the doubts, the questions, the fears and just lived the moment of being held so dearly by the person she cared about the most.
She remembered when it all began.
She was being childish, stubborn, irrational and a perfect idiot, but she couldn't stop anyway from punching that stupid chest of his.
Levi stood in front of her with emptiness in his eyes, and no clear will of stopping her from hitting him.
Apparently, her punches did nothing to him.
Not that she really wanted to hurt him… but it was pretty offensive seeing him unfazed by it.
He had found her crying and kicking things in her room a few minutes before, and had the audacity to enter and stand in the middle of the room with his silence and his stupid eyes—
She asked him why.
She pleaded him to tell her why on earth she was alive and not Moblit, not Erwin, not the hundreds of soldiers that went to Shiganshina with them and never returned…
He was too slow to reply, and before she could process her actions she found herself punching his chest, tears running down her cheeks.
She never cried in front of him. She never wanted him to see her hurting, because she knew perfectly he was hurting too, and now…
Hange suddenly stopped with her punches and stared at the ground, her body shaken by her sobbing.
He remained silent, maybe hoping she'd calm down by herself or wishing she'd just stop with this fuss… She didn't know exactly what thoughts crossed his mind, but she could guess he was irritated by her behaviour.
She would've never expected him to wipe her tears away, or for him to take the fogged up glasses from her face just to put them away on the side table near the bed.
She would've never expected him to look at her with those eyes, shining from the light of the room and slightly corrugated, but full of comprehension.
Not that she could see his expression exactly, having been denied her glasses.
“Four-eyes…” he murmured then, the first words ever he told her since he entered the room.
Her lips trembled slightly as she heard those words. She looked away.
“You should stop calling me that, you know,” she said, her voice less broken and her body less trembling.
He replied fast, without hesitation.
“You're still my four-eyes, the mad, stinky and eccentric person I know. That patch above your eye doesn't change anything.”
She looked at him with shock, his words echoing in her ears and her heartbeat growing faster.
You're still my four-eyes.
“Th-thank you, I think,” she managed to say, curling a lock of hair around her finger.
Silence fell between the two once again.
It was devastating, and scary. There was never silence between them, she would usually start rambling or he would crack a shit joke or something like that.
She needed to do something about it.
“Well, I think it's time for me to go to bed, you know, tomorrow's a long day… right now, every day's a long day… anyways! I should get some sleep, yep, definetly…”
Levi raised an eyebrow at her.
“Cut the crap, Hange. I know you don't get enough sleep. You'll probably start whining again as soon as I leave this room.”
“Then don't leave.”
It came out naturally, almost as a joke, yet carrying too much hope and tension for it to be so.
Levi stared at her with too much seriousness in his features, it was almost scary.
Her cheeks were already red due to her cry, but if they could've turned redder, they would've.
“I was joking!” She hurried to say, letting out a small embarrassed chuckle. “There’s only one bed, it's not like you could sleep on the ground… or I could… we could sleep together tho… that i-if i wasn't joking, obviously! But you wouldn't sleep in a shitty room like this, would you, Levi? Haha, I'm just tired, I really should—”
“Okay.”
Hange shut up immediately. She blinked a few times, speechless, then proceeded to ask:
“Eh? ‘Okay’ what?”
“‘Okay’ as in ‘I will sleep with you’.” He turned around and walked until he reached the bed, her bed, just to lay on it right after.
She stared at him astonished.
“What…”
“Shut up and come here, shitty glasses.”
And so she, despite her hesitation, lay down next to him, careful enough not to touch him even slightly.
The next morning she woke up entangled with him, legs between legs and chest against chest—
She never moved so fast in all her life.
She quickly turned around and escaped from him, not only waking Levi up, but also falling down the bed.
He looked at her with annoyance, probably not ready to have to put up with her crap so early.
Then, he said a single word. “Tch, idiot.”
Hange chuckled softly at her memories.
A big hand covered her mouth in a quick and smooth movement.
(How he could have such big hands while his body was so tiny, she didn't know).
She chuckled again, lips pressed against his skin, but the sound came out muffled due to the hand covering her mouth.
“I thought you were over laughing like a maniac over things that are in your head” he murmured against her neck, his breath sending shivers throughout her body.
She didn't answer, not that she could've with her mouth covered, but simply leaned against his touch, finally relaxing herself a bit.
Levi's hand moved away from her lips and went down a little, until his arm was above her chest and his hand caressing her other shoulder.
Honestly it didn't bother her that he touched such private parts of her body, she knew he didn't have those perverted thoughts.
In fact, she could be walking naked in front of him and he would not spare her a glance.
He probably would just take the opportunity and lift her up just to put her into a tub, bathing her.
It already happened too many times.
“Didn't you tie them too tightly this time?” He asked out of nowhere, his hand brushing against the bindings in a touch that could pass as unintentional. “Can you even breathe properly?”
She chuckled and, with a sudden determination, put her hand on his.
“Well, look at it this way: if I accidentally die you'll live a long, quiet life knowing the main cause of your problems will be gone.”
It had been a joke, an innocent one, but it didn't get the reaction she was expecting.
He suddenly hugged her tighter, held her closer and whispered against her ear:
“Don't you dare fucking die before me, shitty glasses.”
This sentence of his had been surprising enough to shut her up for the next few hours.
~
Hange was trying to do paperwork in the loneliness of her office when a knock interrupted her.
She looked up from the paper on her desk with too much excitement, happy to be able to stop reading all that crap for a few seconds.
“Come on in!” She exclaimed, crossing her legs and leaning back into the chair as she watched the door open.
From it entered the guy who always delivered her new letters and new paperwork she'd spend days working on.
A sigh escaped her mouth unintentionally.
“I know, Commander Hange, that you didn't wish to see me again so soon,” said the guy, coming closer to her desk.
Even though he'd been doing this for years, she was never able to catch his name, nor did he ever introduce himself, and as time passed it always felt to her it’d be utterly embarrassing if she were to ask for his name after four years.
She laughed softly and shook her head slightly.
“After the pile of work that came with you yesterday, I sure thought you wouldn't come again for a while. But it's alright.”
He opened the bag he put everything in and picked an envelope from it.
“Today it's just this, if that makes you feel better,” said he, giving it to her. She took it from his hands and gave it a quick glance, expecting to give it more thought later on, when something caught her attention.
“Thanks…” she replied in a murmur that was barely heard by herself.
Hange frowned as she read the location from which the envelope came from: Liberio.
A sudden bad feeling grew in her chest as she stared at the envelope in her hands, trying to figure out who might've sent it.
Could this be… Eren!?
No… she shouldn't let her hope go high like that, not without further information. It could be anyone.
But if it was Eren, then…
The guy cleared his throat, catching her attention as he clearly wanted.
“That being said, I believe you're a very busy person, Commander, so… I'll just excuse myself. I'll see you soon.”
Hanger grimaced. “Not so soon, please. I have a lot of things to do already. I don't need more paperwork.”
The guy broke into a soft laugh and waved at her, walking away right after.
When he exited the room, she didn't hesitate before opening the envelope. However, as soon as she had to pick the letter from it... she stopped.
Her fingers brushed against the paper, uncertain.
This could be from anyone.
Sure, they didn't have any allies from Liberio, the confinement district for Eldians in Marley, but that didn't mean it was strictly Eren… they didn't even know where exactly he'd gone!
With a sigh she forced herself to pick the content of the envelope: a few papers all written with a familiar calligraphy…
Her eyes fell onto the name at the bottom of the last page, before she even read the letter.
It was signed with the name Eren Jaeger.