Chapter Text
“Get ready, little rat! I need to take care of some business up above, and you’re coming with me.”
The little rat in question widened his eyes and stared fearfully at the man in front of him. “Are you going to sell me?” the boy asked. His voice came out low and weak. Speaking was rare for him. He had spent most of his time alone since his mother died, hidden in that cramped room while trying to learn how to survive without her. The man who now helped him had appeared there after finding her dead in bed, calling her by name with an intimacy that made the boy imagine, for a while, that perhaps he was his father.
Kenny never told him who he really was. He simply began feeding him and taking care of him in his own way. He was not gentle with words or gestures, but he did what he could with the upbringing he had received and the little he seemed to know about children.
“Sell you? Where did you get that nonsense?”
Cases of child trafficking in the Underground had become frequent over the past few months. The amount offered was tempting enough to turn people made desperate by hunger into soulless monsters. There had even been the case of a family with six children that, from one week to the next, suddenly had only three mouths to feed. No one asked where the other children had gone. In the Underground, some questions were too dangerous to ask.
The little rat knew he was a burden to Kenny. He ate his food, took up space in his room and sometimes got sick. Taking a child to the surface, even for only a few hours, also cost money. Kenny would not spend it on him without expecting something in return.
“It’s expensive,” the boy replied, but his voice was little more than a breath.
“What? Speak up, you stupid brat!”
“It’s expensive!” he repeated, almost shouting.
“Tch. Don’t worry about that. I have my ways. You just need to keep your mouth shut and let Kenny handle it.”
The boy hugged his knees tightly against his chest. Perhaps Kenny was telling the truth. It would be an opportunity to discover whether the sky remained blue during the day, whether trees really were green and whether flowers existed in as many colours as his mother described before he fell asleep. She had once told him that she had lived on a very beautiful street on the surface. During one season of the year, flowers bloomed in a field near the house, and she used to pick one of each colour to make the most beautiful crown among all the girls in the neighbourhood.
She always smiled when she remembered it, as though those memories could rescue her, even if only for a few minutes, from the daily horror of the brothel. The smile never lasted long, but it transformed her face. On those nights, she looked less tired.
“Hey!” The empty mug on the table struck the boy’s head and fell to the floor with a dull thud. “Move. I don’t have all day.”
“Does it have to be today?”
“Yes. I need to take care of this today.”
“Where are we going?”
Kenny watched him for a few seconds, as though weighing how much he should reveal. “If you stay very quiet, maybe I’ll show you those trees you talk about so much.”
“I don’t talk about trees,” he replied quietly, hugging his knees even tighter.
“You do when you sleep. I think you’re dreaming, I don’t know.”
“But I’ve never seen a tree.”
“Hell, brat, I have no idea. I’ve heard you talking about trees, horses, flowers, the sky and all that nonsense.” Kenny stood and opened a cupboard, searching for something to drink. He found only an empty bottle and put it back with irritation. “Maybe your mother filled your head with those fantasies.”
The boy did not answer. It was true that his mother had always told him a story before bed, usually about a distant time when she had been a happy woman, surrounded by nature and the warmth of the sun. He was ashamed to admit how deeply he longed for that small taste of happiness. In his child’s mind, he made silent promises. He would be an obedient boy, would not complain of hunger, would not bother Kenny and would never ask for anything again, if only he could enjoy a few minutes of joy and discover what it was like to feel something that did not hurt.
But he would never say that aloud. Kenny would certainly laugh or smack him on the head for being so foolish.
“Hey, little rat!” The toe of Kenny’s boot nudged his shin. “Get ready!”
“I don’t have anything to get ready.” He stood, looking at the older man with a frown. “I only have… this.”
Kenny examined the boy’s clothes, and his expression grew increasingly displeased as his eyes moved over every patch. The fabric had been sewn and washed so many times that the child knew it could come apart at any moment, perhaps with a slightly harder tug or a sudden movement.
“It isn’t dirty,” the boy said, anticipating the criticism. “I washed it.”
“It’s covered in patches. Who sewed them?”
“I did,” he whispered. Fear of being slapped made his shoulders draw inward.
Kenny remained silent for a few moments. Then he took a deep breath, looking around the room as though he expected to find, among the few scattered objects, a better set of clothes that had never been there.
“It’ll do. Come on, little rat.”
***
Kenny was good at arguing. The story that the child was his son left his mouth with such ease that, somewhere hidden inside his chest, the boy wished it were true. The man paid the fare without showing any discomfort and guided him ahead, keeping a firm but not overly forceful hand on the back of his neck. He led him like a small puppet through the corridors, preventing him from wandering away or being swallowed by the crowd.
The boy remained silent throughout the journey. The route seemed endless. There were stairs, gates and armed men watching every person who passed. A few times, Kenny pressed his fingers against the nape of his neck, a warning not to lift his head or show curiosity. The boy obeyed, although his heart beat so hard it seemed to want to escape through his ribs.
When they finally reached the surface, the sun was strong. The light struck his eyes with such violence that he recoiled and tried to cover his face with his hands, completely blind for a few seconds. Kenny caught him by the collar before he could stumble.
“Easy, little rat. Open your eyes slowly.”
The order, spoken without shouting, surprised him. He obeyed. At first, he saw only bright spots and blurred shapes. Then, little by little, the streets took form. The buildings were larger than he had imagined, and there were so many people that he did not know where to look. Voices, footsteps and the creaking wheels of carts, pulled by large animals the boy assumed were wild, blended into a deafening noise.
The top of his head began to ache, and his stomach complained for food. Those pains were nothing new, so he knew how to deal with them. Pain had always been his most loyal companion. It never abandoned him for long.
The air did not have the same damp, rotten weight as the tunnels. A breeze touched his face, pushing a few dark strands away from his forehead, and the boy breathed deeply. The streets did not smell pleasant all the time. There was sweat, animals and dust.
He lifted his face before Kenny could stop him.
The sky was there.
It was much larger than his mother had described. So vast that the boy’s chest tightened at the impossibility of finding its end. There was no ceiling, no stone or beams above his head. Only a blue immensity crossed by white clouds that moved slowly, indifferent to everything happening beneath them.
He stopped walking.
Kenny took two more steps before noticing that the child was no longer following him. “What is it now?”
The boy did not answer. His eyes burned, but he no longer knew whether it was because of the brightness. He stood in the middle of the street, his face tilted upward and his lips slightly parted. For many nights, he had listened to his mother speak about the sky, yet none of her stories had prepared him for this.
“It’s blue,” he murmured.
“It is. Usually.”
“She was telling the truth.”
Kenny followed his gaze for a moment. The man’s expression changed so quickly that the boy could not understand it. Perhaps he had recognised who that “she” was, but he made no comment. He merely placed a hand on the boy’s head and pushed him forward.
“Keep walking before someone runs you over.”
The boy obeyed, though he kept looking up whenever he believed Kenny would not notice. He wanted to preserve every detail. The colour, the light, the wind and even the uncomfortable warmth of the sun on his skin. He wanted to take it all with him when he returned to the Underground, as though he could hide a piece of that sky inside his chest.
That was when he saw, across the street, something tall and covered in small leaves swaying in the wind. He stopped again, but this time he pointed with a trembling hand.
“Kenny.”
“What?”
“Is that a tree?”
Kenny let out a long sigh. However, instead of forcing him to continue in the opposite direction, he held his shoulder and waited for a cart to cross the street.
“Yes, little rat. That is a tree.”
The boy watched it in silence. It was more beautiful than in any dream.
“I’m taking you somewhere there are several of those,” Kenny said, bending his knees until he was level with the boy. “You stay there, enjoying the scenery and thinking about those stupid things, while I take care of what I came here to do.”
“What did you come here to do?”
“That’s none of your business.”
“Are you going to leave me alone?”
“I can’t just abandon you anywhere. Someone would end up kicking your arse back into the filthy hell you came from.” Kenny stood and adjusted his hat. “No one can stand people from the Underground. The smell is unmistakable.”
The boy raised his arm to his nose and tried to smell it discreetly. He was clean. He was certain of that. He washed his body whenever he found enough water and cared for his own clothes, even though they were already worn and covered in patches. Kenny, on the other hand, did not smell of flowers either. He always carried the scent of smoke and drink and, sometimes, a strong perfume the boy had learned to recognise on his mother’s friends.
He lowered his arm quickly before Kenny noticed.
“Stop that, little rat. I didn’t say you stink more than usual.”
The boy frowned but did not answer.
Kenny led him through the streets to the place he had promised. The walk seemed long, although the boy barely felt the exhaustion. When they finally arrived, he stopped.
Before them stretched a field so vast it seemed to have no end. The grass rippled beneath the wind, forming small green waves, and trees of different sizes were scattered across the landscape. There were flowers among the grass, some white, others yellow and purple, exactly as his mother had described.
The boy remained motionless, awestruck, afraid that any movement might make everything disappear.
“I’m leaving you here for a while. Don’t worry, I’ll come back.” Kenny pulled a parcel he had bought along the way from inside his coat. There were a few loaves of bread, pieces of cake and a sweet covered in a white crust that made the boy’s eyes widen with anticipation. “This is for you to eat while I’m gone. And don’t be stupid enough to share it with anyone who shows up around here.”
The boy nodded in silence and held the parcel firmly against his chest.
Kenny adjusted his hat and left without looking back.
The boy followed his figure until it became small in the distance. Then a tight pain appeared at the pit of his stomach, different from the one caused by hunger. What if someone tried to take him? What if Kenny got hurt? What if he took so long that he ended up forgetting the little rat he had left behind? What if someone found him alone and drove him away, throwing him back into the hell he had come from?
What if Kenny did not come back?
He pressed the parcel even more tightly against his chest and forced his mind to be quiet. He did not want to waste the moment of happiness he had longed for so long on dark thoughts. Kenny had said he would return. For now, that had to be enough.
His stomach complained, interrupting his fears, and the boy finally opened the parcel. The smell of bread and sweets made his mouth water. He chose a loaf and took an enormous bite, closing his eyes as the soft dough dissolved in his mouth. It was delicious, far better than anything he usually ate in the Underground. When he managed to eat at all.
After a few bites, he carefully wrapped what remained and placed it back inside the parcel. He needed to save it for later. One never knew when there would be food again, and hunger had taught him far too early that even moments of abundance could end quickly.
After putting the bread away, the boy remained seated for a few moments, observing everything around him carefully. He feared that if he blinked, the landscape would disappear and he would wake again in the damp room in the Underground, surrounded by the smell of mould, smoke and filthy water.
The grass brushed against his legs and moved with the wind, bending in the same direction. He ran his fingers over the long blades, surprised by their delicacy. They were thin, yet did not crumble beneath his touch. Some tickled his palm.
Farther ahead, small flowers grew scattered among the green. The boy stood and walked towards them carefully, placing his feet so as not to crush them. He crouched before a yellow flower and brought his face closer, curious.
His mother had been right again.
Some flowers smelled good.
He touched one of the petals with the tip of his finger and thought of the story about the colourful crowns. Perhaps he could pick a few and take them with him. He could keep them in the room or place them near the bed where his mother used to sleep. Even though she was no longer there to see them, he wanted to show her that he had finally found the place she used to speak about.
He carefully plucked the flower and studied it in his hand.
“You shouldn’t do that.”
The voice made the boy turn quickly. His fingers tightened around the flower, crushing the petals.
A few steps away stood a child around his age. Well, he thought she was a girl. Perhaps she was a little younger, although she looked bigger because of the black overalls and boots stained with grass. Her brown hair was tied high on her head, but a few strands had come loose and danced around her face. A pair of large, thin-framed glasses rested on her nose. She held a small straw basket full of flowers and stared at him with a serious expression behind the lenses.
The boy did not answer. He brought one hand to the parcel of food, making sure it was still there.
“My mother says you shouldn’t pull flowers up by the roots,” the girl continued. “Then they won’t grow back.”
He looked at the flower in his hand. There was no root. Only a thin piece of stem.
“I didn’t pull up the root.”
The girl came closer, examining the flower as though she needed to make certain. “You really didn’t.”
The boy stepped back when she came too close.
The girl noticed and stopped.
“Are you lost?”
“No.”
“Then why are you alone?”
“I’m not.”
She looked around. The field was almost empty, except for a few people in the distance and a man leading two horses along the road.
“There’s no one with you.”
“He’ll come back.”
“Who?”
The boy pressed his lips together. Kenny had told him to keep his mouth shut. He did not know whether speaking to a girl counted as disobedience, but it probably did. Everything seemed like disobedience when it came to Kenny.
“That’s none of your business.”
The girl wrinkled her nose, offended.
“You’re rude.”
He did not answer. He had been called worse things.
She examined him from head to toe, letting her eyes linger on his patched clothes and worn shoes. The boy’s body stiffened, expecting her to laugh, cover her nose or say that he should not be there. He had already noticed the looks from people in the streets. Even without knowing exactly where he had come from, they seemed to recognise that he did not belong there.
But the girl merely lifted the basket.
“I’m looking for white flowers. My mother likes them, but I’ve only found three.”
The boy looked inside the basket. There were yellow flowers, purple ones and a few small white flowers grouped in one corner.
“There are several near that tree,” he said, pointing to a more distant spot.
The girl followed the direction of his finger and widened her eyes.
“How did you see them from so far away?”
He shrugged.
“I pay attention.”
She smiled.
“Can you show me?”
The boy looked towards the place where Kenny had disappeared. He did not want to move away. If Kenny returned and did not find him, he would be furious. Perhaps he would leave without looking for him.
“I can’t.”
“It’s right there.”
“I need to stay here.”
The girl tilted her head and watched him for a few seconds. Then she sat on the grass without asking permission.
“Then I’ll stay here too.”
The boy frowned.
“Why?”
“Because you look frightened.”
“I’m not frightened.”
“You are.”
“I’m not.”
“You’re holding that parcel as if someone is going to steal it.”
He immediately loosened his fingers, annoyed that she had noticed.
The girl opened her own basket and took out a red fruit, bright and round. She held it out towards him.
“Do you want one?”
The boy studied the fruit suspiciously. He had never seen anything like it. It looked too beautiful to be eaten.
“What is it?”
The girl widened her eyes.
“An apple.”
He had heard the word in his mother’s stories, but had imagined something different. Larger, perhaps. Or rarer.
“I don’t want it.”
“You haven’t even tried it.”
“I have food.”
“Then save it for later.”
The girl placed the apple on the grass between them, as though that were a simple solution, and began arranging the flowers inside the basket. The boy remained standing for some time, unsure what to do. She did not seem to care about his silence, his clothes or the fact that he did not know what an apple was.
At last, he sat down again, leaving a safe distance between them.
“My name is Hange. Hange Zoe. Some people call me Hans or Hanjiii, with a very strong ‘i’ at the end. My mother calls me little angel, but my father prefers to call me brat. I think it’s because of the clothes I like to wear. All the girls ask for dresses, but dresses are terrible for jumping. No, now that I think about it, they’re actually good because they leave your legs free, but my mother says I can’t let anything under my clothes show. So I always ask for trousers.” She paused briefly, just long enough to push her glasses back up her nose, before continuing. “The boys think I’m a boy. Some girls think I’m a girl. An ugly girl, but still a girl. I don’t think I’m either of those things. I think I’m just Hange.” She finally took a breath. “And what is your name?” she asked.
The boy hesitated. His mother used to say his name fondly, drawing out the letters when she wanted to wake him in the morning. Kenny almost never used it. To him, he was always little rat, brat or idiot.
“Levi. Just Levi.”
The girl smiled, satisfied that she had finally received an answer.
“Hello, Just Levi.”
“No. It’s Levi, without the ‘just’ before it.”
“I know, silly. I’m joking.”
Levi looked away towards the apple resting on the grass and then back at her.
“You talk too much.”
“My mother says that too. She says I start one story and, by the time I finish, I’ve told five others in the middle. My father says I never finish any of them, but that isn’t true. I do finish them, it just takes me a little while because I remember other important things. Sometimes they don’t seem important to other people, but they are to me.”
Levi did not answer.
“Do you always speak so little?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because I have nothing to say.”
“Everyone has something to say.”
“I don’t.”
“You do. You just don’t want to tell me.”
“It’s the same thing.”
“It isn’t. Having nothing to say is different from not wanting to say it. For example, right now you’re probably thinking that I’m annoying.”
“I am.”
“See? You had something to say.”
Levi narrowed his eyes. Hange grinned widely.
“And you must also be thinking about that apple.”
He did not answer.
“You’ve been looking at it since I put it there.”
“I’m making sure you don’t take my food.”
“But the apple is mine.”
“I’m talking about the parcel.”
Hange looked at the bundle he kept close to his body.
“I’m not going to take it. I have food at home.”
“Then why did you bring an apple?”
“Because I like eating apples away from home. They taste better when there’s wind.”
Levi frowned.
“That makes no sense.”
“It does. Everything tastes different depending on the place.”
“Food tastes the same anywhere.”
“It doesn’t. Cake eaten in secret tastes better than cake eaten at the table.”
“Why?”
“Because when you eat it in secret, it feels like you’re committing a crime.”
“Do you like committing crimes?”
Hange seemed to consider the question seriously.
“It depends on the crime.”
Levi stared at her.
“My mother says taking cake before dinner is a crime,” she explained quickly. “But my father says it isn’t a real crime, only bad manners. I think that if no one notices, it makes no difference.”
“That’s stealing.”
“It isn’t stealing if the cake is in my house.”
“It isn’t yours.”
“It belongs to my family.”
“Then it belongs to you too?”
“Exactly.”
“That still makes no sense.”
“You say that a lot.”
“Because you say a lot of things that make no sense.”
“Maybe you just don’t understand.”
“I understand.”
“Then it isn’t nonsense.”
Levi scowled. Hange laughed softly and picked the apple up from the ground, wiping it on the fabric of her overalls.
“You’ve never eaten one, have you?”
Levi remained silent.
“Then you haven’t,” she concluded. “You can admit it. I’ve never seen a real river. Only a small stream near my grandmother’s house, and my father said that didn’t even count. I’ve never seen the sea either, but I know it exists because it’s in books. Have you ever seen the sea?”
“No.”
“Do you want to?”
He remained silent, still afraid she would realise that he was not from there.
“I want to see hundreds of things I’ve never seen.”
“Like what?”
Hange’s eyes shone behind the lenses.
“Everything.”
Levi regretted asking before she even continued.
“I want to see the sea, I want to see mountains covered in snow, I want to enter a forest so large that no one can see where it ends, and I want to find animals I don’t know yet. My father has a book full of drawings. There’s an enormous animal with a long nose, and another with a neck so tall that it looks as though it could touch the clouds.”
“That’s a lie.”
“It isn’t.”
“It is.”
“It’s in the book.”
“Books can contain lies.”
“But they can contain truths too.”
“How do you know which is which?”
Hange opened her mouth, but took a moment to answer.
“I find out.”
“How?”
“By going to look.”
“And if you don’t find it?”
“I look more.”
“And if it doesn’t exist?”
“Then I come back and say the book was wrong.”
Levi watched her face. Hange spoke with such certainty that she seemed to truly believe she could cross the entire world merely to confirm an illustration.
“Aren’t you afraid of getting lost?”
“I am.”
“Then why would you go?”
“Because being afraid doesn’t mean you can’t go.”
Levi looked away.
“It does. If something is dangerous, you stay away from it.”
“But what if there’s something important there?”
“It’s still dangerous.”
“Then you take someone with you.”
“And if that person runs away?”
“You take someone who won’t.”
“There’s no such person.”
Hange stopped speaking for a moment. The silence was so sudden that Levi looked at her again.
“There is,” she said, more quietly this time. “They’re just difficult to find.”
Levi did not answer. Hange seemed to realise that she had said something too serious and soon returned to turning the apple between her hands.
“Do you live near here?”
“No.”
“Far away?”
“Yes.”
“How far?”
“Very.”
“On the other side of the city?”
“Farther.”
“Near the Wall?”
“No.”
“Then where?”
Levi pressed the parcel of food against his chest.
“That’s none of your business.”
“Does the man who brought you say that too?”
“He says it because people ask too many questions.”
“Do I ask too many questions?”
“Yes.”
“But how am I supposed to find things out without asking?”
“Find out by yourself.”
“That’s what I’m trying to do.”
“Then stop asking me.”
“But you’re here.”
Levi looked out at the field, hoping she would finally fall silent. Hange stayed quiet for a few seconds, swinging her feet over the grass. Then she brought the apple close to her face and examined it carefully.
“Did you know there are tiny creatures inside some fruit?”
Levi slowly turned his face towards her.
“What?”
“Larvae.”
He immediately looked at the bread he had put away.
“Not inside every kind of food,” she added. “Usually only in rotten fruit.”
Hange lifted the fruit and examined it from every angle.
“This one doesn’t have any holes. Try it.” Levi looked at the apple, still afraid to accept food from a stranger. “It’s only an apple. Just one bite.”
“Stop.”
“You’ll like it.”
“How do you know?”
“Because everyone likes apples.”
“I might not.”
“Then spit it out.”
“That’s wasteful.”
“Then swallow it.”
Levi gave her an irritated look.
Hange held out the apple again.
“Take it.”
He looked at the fruit, then at her insistent smile. At last, he snatched the apple from her hand.
“Only so you’ll stop talking.”
Levi took a small bite. The fruit cracked between his teeth, and a sweet, slightly tart flavour spread through his mouth. He chewed slowly, trying not to show his surprise.
Hange watched him expectantly.
Levi bit the apple again, a little more deeply this time, only so he would not have to answer.
“I knew you’d like it, Just Levi.”
“Don’t call me that.”
“All right, Just Levi.”
“Stop.”
“Fine, Levi Without the Just Before It.”
He stared at her with such irritation that Hange began to laugh. Levi thought she was, without question, the strangest person he had ever met.
He also realised, with a certain discomfort, that he did not want her to leave.
“Will we always meet here?” she asked, watching him carefully from behind her glasses.
Levi did not want to say that he would probably never return to that place. He did not want her to know where he truly came from, nor to discover that the sky, the trees and the flowers were all new to him. Perhaps Hange would begin looking at him as the other people on the surface had, with suspicion and contempt.
“Yes,” he answered, lying because he was afraid of being despised.
Hange smiled so widely that her eyes nearly disappeared behind the lenses.
“Really?”
Levi nodded.
“Then we can always come to this tree. It can be our place.”
“Our place?”
“Yes. Every friendship needs a place.”
“Who said we’re friends?”
“I did.”
“You can’t decide that by yourself.”
“I can. I just did.”
Levi rolled his eyes, but Hange was already pointing towards the tree’s lowest branch.
“We can leave something here as a marker. A ribbon, a flower, a different stone. That way, even if one of us arrives first, they’ll know the other has been here.”
“That’s useless.”
“It isn’t. It’s a kind of message.”
“A message without words.”
“Exactly. You’ll like it because you don’t have to speak.”
Hange removed a thin ribbon that held part of her hair and tied it around one of the branches. A few brown strands fell over her forehead, and she blew them away.
“There. When you come back, put something beside it.”
Levi watched the ribbon sway in the wind.
“What if someone takes it?”
“We put up another one.”
“What if the rain carries it away?”
“We put up another one.”
“What if the tree falls?”
“We choose another tree.”
“Do you have an answer for everything?”
“Almost everything.”
Hange held out her little finger towards him.
“Do you promise you’ll come back?”
Levi hesitated.
The truthful answer lodged in his throat. He did not know when he would set foot in that field again. Perhaps never. Perhaps Hange would come many times, wait for him and, little by little, understand that the strange boy would not return.
But at that moment, she was still smiling.
“I promise,” he lied.
Hange linked her little finger with his, satisfied.
Year 838
Hange kept her eyes fixed on the lowest branch of that tree. The ribbon she had tied there so many years before no longer existed. It had disappeared during the first winter, carried away by the wind, the rain or the hands of some child who had found it swaying among the leaves. She recognised the small curve of the branch, the dark crack in the bark and the place where she used to leave new ribbons whenever she visited the field. For years, she had replaced each one, choosing different colours so Levi could see that she was still waiting. The last one, however, had been tied there a long time ago and had disappeared as well. At some point, Hange had stopped bringing others. She had begun to feel ridiculous for nurturing a promise made by a child she had barely known.
The place did not seem as vast as it had in her memories. As a child, Hange had believed the grass stretched to the end of the world and the trees touched the sky. Now she could see the road on the other side, the fences marking the neighbouring properties and the houses built where there had once been only wildflowers. Even the tree seemed smaller, although she knew it had grown over the years. Perhaps she was the one who had become too big to continue believing in the same things.
Hange raised a hand and ran her fingers over the rough bark.
“You lied, Just Levi,” she murmured, feeling foolish as soon as the words left her mouth.
A breeze crossed the field, stirring her carelessly tied hair and carrying with it the scent of damp earth. Hange closed her eyes for a few seconds. She could remember almost everything about that day. The thin, dark-haired boy, the clothes covered in patches, the way he held the parcel of food against his chest and the suspicious gaze that seemed to follow every movement around him. She remembered the irritation on his face when she talked too much, his reluctance to accept the apple and the slight change in his expression when he tasted it. She even remembered the sound of his voice saying he would return.
It was strange to preserve such a vivid memory of someone she had known for so little time.
During the first few months, Hange had returned to the tree almost every day. She would sit in the grass, with a book or a basket of fruit beside her, waiting for the boy to appear along the road. Then she began coming only once a week. Later, once a month. Her parents began asking questions, and she invented excuses, saying that she liked observing insects, that she was looking for particular flowers or that she needed to be alone to study. In part, all of it was true. Hange really did find interesting things in the field. The problem was that none of them was what she was looking for.
With time, she began to wonder whether she had imagined the encounter.
Perhaps Levi had never existed and was merely a figure created by her childish mind. But the memory of his little finger linked with hers was far too tangible.
Hange lowered her eyes to her own hands. They were no longer small. They bore calluses from training, recent scratches and ink stains on her fingers that never disappeared completely. Little remained of the girl who had run through the field with her glasses slipping down her nose and a basket full of flowers. She still talked too much, according to everyone she knew. She continued asking questions until she irritated teachers, classmates and superiors. She also remained convinced that almost everything in the world deserved to be investigated, even when others judged her ideas useless or dangerous.
Perhaps Levi had been right to call her strange.
“You missed a lot,” she told the tree, brushing away a dry leaf caught against the bark. “I learned to ride a horse. Not very well, because the first one tried to throw me off and my father said it was my fault for wanting to examine its teeth before climbing on. I also discovered the name of that animal with the long nose. Elephant. I was right, it exists. At least the books say it does. I still haven’t found a real one, but I will.”
The lack of an answer did not stop her from continuing.
“My mother still says I talk too much. My father stopped calling me a brat so often, but I think it’s because I wear a uniform now and he doesn’t know whether he can insult someone who decided to join the military.” Hange gave a brief laugh. “They didn’t like the decision. My mother cried for three days. My father went a week without speaking to me and then asked whether I had lost my mind. I said I probably had, but that it changed nothing.”
She rested her back against the trunk and let herself slide down until she was sitting in the grass. The uniform still looked too new on her body. The jacket was clean, the boots freshly polished and the symbols sewn into the fabric seemed heavier than they should. In a few days, she would leave that region to begin a new stage of training. She did not know when she would have another opportunity to visit the field and, because of that, she had felt the absurd need to say goodbye.
Not to the tree.
To him.
“I’m leaving tomorrow,” she said, pulling a few blades of grass between her fingers. “Maybe I’ll come back in a few months or a few years. Or maybe I won’t come back. I still don’t know how these things work. Adults like to pretend they know exactly where they’re going, but I think most of them simply choose a direction and keep walking so they don’t have to admit they’re lost.”
Hange tilted her head back and watched the patches of sky between the leaves.
“You would have hated training. Everyone shouts, no one properly explains the reason for the rules and, when we ask questions, they tell us to run. I run a lot because of you, did you know? I think I’ve already run enough laps to cross the entire Wall. But I didn’t give up. You said I didn’t think enough, so perhaps now I’m trying to make up for it.”
The memory brought a smile to her lips, but it vanished quickly.
“I’ve met many people too. Some talk almost as much as I do. Others are like you and seem to believe every word costs money. None of them is exactly your friend, in case you’re worried.” Hange paused and frowned. “Not that you have the right to be worried. You promised you would come back, and you didn’t.”
The hurt in that sentence was old and childish, but it still existed somewhere inside her. It was not anger at having been abandoned by a boy who probably had no control over his own life. Hange understood that now. Perhaps the man accompanying him had forbidden him from returning, or Levi had been taken somewhere else. Perhaps he had fallen ill or simply learned that promises made underground survived there.
There was also one possibility she avoided considering. She pushed the dark thought away.
“You must be enormous now,” she said, trying to banish the thought. “Or perhaps not. You were very small.”
Hange smiled as she imagined the irritation that sentence would provoke.
“Don’t be angry. I was small too. I only looked bigger because of the overalls, remember? You looked at me as though you didn’t know whether I was a girl or a boy. I noticed. I always notice when people try to decide what I am before they even ask my name.”
She brought her fingers to her glasses and adjusted them on her nose, repeating a gesture she had made since childhood.
“I said I was just Hange. I still think that was a very good answer.”
Hange remained beside the tree for a few more minutes, observing the field and allowing the memories to occupy a space she rarely granted them. Then she said goodbye in silence, returning to the barracks before her absence was noticed. She would keep that visit as she had kept all the others: in the same secret place where she preserved the memory of a thin, suspicious and irritable boy who had promised to return.
Year 844
The Survey Corps courtyard was busier than usual. Soldiers were scattered through the corridors and along the stairways, pretending to carry out their duties while exchanging quiet comments about the criminals Erwin Smith had brought from the Underground.
Hange had heard the rumours too.
They spoke of three thieves who used vertical manoeuvring equipment without any military training. Some swore they were murderers. Others said the smallest among them had taken down several experienced soldiers by himself and moved at a speed impossible to follow.
Naturally, Hange needed to see them.
She crossed the corridor with hurried steps, dodging two recruits and ignoring someone calling behind her. By the time she reached the courtyard, a small crowd had already gathered near the gates. Hange squeezed between the bodies until she could see the three newcomers.
First she saw a girl with reddish-brown hair, observing everything around her with curiosity that was poorly concealed. Beside her stood a tall, blond man whose expression was far too calm for someone surrounded by armed soldiers. The third remained slightly ahead of the other two, facing Erwin with tense shoulders and a closed expression.
He was short.
Far shorter than Hange had imagined after hearing so many stories.
Black hair fell over his forehead, and his expression showed a silent contempt for everything and everyone around him. There were deep shadows beneath his eyes, but it was the way he analysed every person in the courtyard that made something tremble inside her. The man in front of Erwin held his body rigid and his gestures precise, as though prepared to react to the slightest sign of threat. There was a restrained violence in every movement, a strength that did not need to be displayed in order to become evident.
Hange felt her heart quicken, but scolded herself. Many men had dark hair and carried in their gaze the expectation of finding danger in every corner. It meant nothing.
Erwin stepped forward, and the conversations around them diminished until they disappeared. The soldiers turned their attention to him, although many continued observing the three strangers with curiosity.
“They will become members of the Survey Corps,” Erwin announced, indicating the newcomers. “They came from the Underground and, beginning today, they will receive the same training and follow the same rules as everyone else.”
A few murmurs crossed the courtyard. The tall man seemed little bothered by the stares, while the girl examined the barracks with interest. The shortest of the three merely raised his face, visibly impatient with the attention he was receiving.
Erwin turned towards them.
“Introduce yourselves.”
The tall man was the first to speak. He took a step forward and offered the group a discreet smile, although his eyes remained alert.
“Furlan Church.”
The girl stepped forward next, resting her hands on her hips.
“Isabel Magnolia.”
When it was the third man’s turn, he remained motionless. His eyes moved over the assembled soldiers as though assessing a group of possible enemies, not future companions. For a few seconds, Hange thought he would simply ignore the order.
Then he clicked his tongue in irritation.
“Levi.”
Erwin waited, perhaps imagining that he would add something, but Levi closed his expression again.
“Just Levi?” asked a nearby soldier, unable to contain his curiosity.
The man gave him a cold look.
“Do you need anything else?”
A few nervous laughs arose among the soldiers, but disappeared as soon as Levi turned his eyes towards them. Hange, however, ceased hearing anything around her.
Just Levi.
Those words crossed the years and brought with them the scent of grass, the taste of a shared apple and the memory of a boy too small for the patched clothes he wore. She saw again the fingers tightened around a parcel of food and the furrowed brow when he had needed to correct the joke of a girl who talked more than she breathed.
Levi. Just Levi.