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Levi had figured being alone was simply another part of growing old— just like bad joints, or running out of breath too easily. He rationalized that his muscles deteriorated and his hair whitened, it was all too normal that the people around him slowly disappeared as well. After all, in the Underground one rarely got the privilege to live beyond forty. When he was a child, Levi pored over his expression in the mirror, wondering what he would look like were he to live long enough to reach that milestone, old age. Would he have white hair, he wondered, or simply lose it all? (Levi scrunched his nose, thinking of wrinkly heads and wigs.) Would his voice be deeper? More mature?
Would he live by himself? (Levi knew that eventually all people died. The women who worked with his mother gossiped about men who were found dead in alleys, and women carted away limply. He tried asking his mother, what happened after people died, but she only ruffled his hair.) Levi didn't think he would want to live without his mother. He resolved that once he grew older, the two of them could live above ground, both — he giggled a little, thinking about it — wrinkly.
Levi decided it was his fate to live alone. Time after time again, he watched helplessly as his comrades left him. Isabel and Furlan. Petra, and Oluo, and Eld and Gunther. Miche. Nanaba. Erwin. Perhaps it was some cruel twist of fate that mandated he be alone. Some law that ordered every soul who dared to get close to him, dead.
"Hey, Levi. What do you think being old feels like?"
Levi looked at Hange as she swigged the beer stolen from the barracks. "Like shit," he deadpanned.
"I'm being serious." The brunette swiveled to face Levi. "You've seen Pixis practically drown himself in alcohol. And Zachary's always got some fucked-up idea, though—" she paused— "he might have always been like that. Is it just age that makes them crazy?"
Levi scoffed. "Your brain's full of crap, Four-Eyes. Living doesn't make a person nuts."
"True," Hange conceded. "But still. What do you think it would be like?"
"Awful. You'd probably break a couple bones running after those titans you love so much."
"And you'd spend all day cleaning."
"Not my fault if you're still as filthy as you are now."
"I never said anything about living together."
Levi froze as Hange cackled. "Kidding, kidding! But, it's probably not something we'll ever have to worry about. Seeing as we're Scouts, and all. Although," she pointed at the man, "you might. Mr. 'Humanity's Strongest Soldier'." She chuckled, taking another gulp of beer.
"Why'd you bring it up, then?"
"I'm drunk." Hange lifted the beer bottle. "And I'm feeling sentimental. Another year survived in this hellhole, y'know?"
Levi took the bottle from Hange and downed the remainder of the alcohol. He shrugged. "Guess so."
"Hey, Levi?"
"Huh?"
"If we do get to be old, let's stay together."
"Thought you didn't want me living with you."
"Consider that a lie."
Levi's fist rests gently against Hange's chest. He does not, cannot, look at her. He fears that if he does, he will never be able to let her go. Some part of him pleads her to stay, to remain with him for the rest of his life, to never leave him behind. But of course, that is not what happens. Fate — the work of Ymir, destiny, whatever cruel being controls Levi — would never allow such a reality.
Yes, everyone did leave Levi in the end. Even the children he and Hange had tried so hard to protect.
First it was Armin. The boy — the young man, Levi reminded himself — had gotten married. The wedding was (in Levi's opinion) good. The ceremony was simple but meaningful, and the reception was nicely put together. No alcohol, and no noisy guests. Levi had tried to be happy for them. He really did: after all, it was only deserved that the young Commander should get as good of an ending as he could manage But every time Levi saw Armin with his beloved wife, something in his stomach soured.
(It wasn’t that Annie was a traitor. Levi had long accepted the fact that Annie, just like him, was a soldier — warrior, he corrected — who had only been trying to see her father one last time. Ymir knows what Levi would have done to do the same. He had long made his peace with the girl forced to be a murderer. So no. The fact that Annie had killed his team members was not what caused him to recoil.)
It was something about the way they looked at each other. Like they were the only people in the shitty, hell-damned world. Something about their lingering glances and furtive contact-- even as they negotiated with countless officials and governors, even as they thanked their wedding guests. When Armin spoke with that silver tongue of his, Annie watched him with a hawk’s eye. When Annie retreated from the rest of the group, Armin took her hand with a smile and a kiss on the cheek. Yes. That was it. Levi hated the way they existed together, as two pieces of the same whole. (Of course, “hate” probably wasn’t the right word for it. He wasn’t jealous.)
Levi wondered, sometimes, what Hange would look like if she had lived long enough to get married. Of course, Armin and Annie were far younger than she had been, but that was beside the point. Dresses — ever the bane for Hange — would have been out of the question. Levi thought that if it were up to her, she would have skipped the wedding altogether, and simply spent the day tinkering on some project of hers. But he thought the look in Armin's face, that pure and unadulterated adoration, would be the same in Hange's.
It was in Paradis that Armin and Annie had held their wedding. The actual marriage had taken place in Marley, but Armin had insisted that Mikasa be present for their ceremony. So— the wedding was held in Paradis. The young Ackerman, seemingly flustered by the sudden influx of people showing up at her home, had nervously but gladly greeted her old friends. After the wedding, the group gathered around a round table outside as if nothing had changed. Jean and Connie bickered over some age-old dispute, while Pieck occasionally threw out comments designed to goad the two men. Reiner looked perpetually done with the trio, though the faint smile on his face told otherwise. Annie and Mikasa conversed quietly, the stoic women finding unlikely solace in each other. Armin and Historia discussed plans for the future, the latter smiling brightly as Armin blushed. Levi watched them, feeling like they had grown up far too quickly.
-
When everything was over, Armin and Annie returned to Marley. Levi understood. Annie was eager to get back to her father, and Armin to get away from the place which reminded him so much of his former friend. Connie and Jean, to Levi's prediction, decided to stay in Paradis. Both of them still had family on the island. Over the past few years, not a day went by where Connie didn’t share some anecdote about his siblings and him fighting over the last bread roll at the dinner table. Rainy days called for stories of how his sister would come to his room during thunderstorms. On weekends, he would comment how his parents would make pot pie for the family. Nobody dared to state the obvious: they had killed his father, his little brother and sister, years ago.
Jean, on the other hand, hardly discussed his parents at all, until a letter from his mother came in through the mail: We are safe. I love you. Please do not worry. The young man wept at his mother’s words. Levi thought to comfort him. A few strangled words of reassurance left his mouth before they were quickly strangled by memories of a certain brown-haired individual. Were she to have children, he wondered, would she have said the same? Hange had never seemed the type to express concern in such a way. He tried his best to picture the letter’s words through the voice of the Commander. He forced himself to be content with his own — paltry — imagination.
Connie and Jean left soon after the wedding. “I don’t want my mother to wait for me her whole life,” Connie explained to Levi. “I want to spend the time I have with my family.” Levi flinched, the comment eerily similar to Eren’s. Truth be told, he still didn’t know what to think of the dead boy who he had seen as an almost-son. Perhaps in 20 years he would laugh (if that was a thing he did, when he was old) and remember Eren Yeager fondly. Perhaps. The two men tearfully embraced the remainder of the Scouts. Jean stopped in front of Levi and saluted sharply. “Thank you, Heichou.” he muttered, voice wavering. The young man had grown far too tall for Levi to ruffle his hair like he used to. He didn’t return the salute, either. He simply nodded and said, “You did well.” And he meant it. Every day Jean looked more and more like the leader Levi had predicted him to be.
With a final wave, Jean and Connie set off together. They walked oddly far apart, leaving a certain space between them — one that, Levi knew, belonged to their lost friend. Sasha had reminded Levi of Isabel— the same passion and fervor, always eager to make another happy. Losing Sasha had hurt the same way as it did when he lost Isabel. Another person he had loved as family, dead.
-
Reiner and Pieck left with Armin and Annie. The night after that last battle, Reiner had apologized to Levi. His head bowed and tears streaming down his face, the man had admitted that he didn’t believe himself worthy of this second chance at life, without the burden of the Titan’s curse. As he watched Reiner break down that night, Levi wondered how it might have felt to be given another opportunity to live. He thought of the body left behind in Shiganshina, and a devil laid to rest. Levi wondered if Erwin had consumed the Colossal, he would look something like the man before him now.
Levi had offered a hand to Reiner, told him to stand up. Both of them were guilty of the same crimes— Reiner as the one who doomed Paradis, and Levi as the monster who failed the rest of the world. They were the same, he announced. Reiner looked as if he might throw up, but he accepted Levi’s hand nonetheless.
“Eren said the same thing to me,” Reiner huffed as he stood. “Kinda crazy, huh?”
Crazy indeed. (Levi should have figured the boy would have a hand in their lives even from the grave.) But Reiner chuckled, and Levi took that as a sign he had accepted Levi’s words.
On the other hand, Levi had held no such discussions with Pieck. The closest they had ever gotten was during one morning, on the ferry to Paradis, as Levi brewed a cup of tea in the kitchen. Pieck had watched him and asked why he took no sugar. “It ruins the taste,” Levi answered somewhat-gruffly. Pieck nodded in understanding.
“Porco was the opposite with coffee,” she explained. “Always needed heaps of sugar and milk or he couldn't stand the drink.” Levi noted the despondent tone in her voice.
“I’m sorry about him,” he said.
"Don't be." She shook her head. “We knew what would happen when we became Warriors. Same as you Scouts.”
Levi thought about that. Sure, the Survey Corps was famously regarded as an open death sentence. But at the same time, wasn’t the whole purpose of the Scouts to discover the truth about the outside world? Every death a willing contribution to that eventual future? Hange’s voice filled his mind— countless late-night conversations, theories, about what might have existed a hundred years ago. They had no information, she complained, about anything. She pledged to do her part in making that statement obsolete. If she were still here, Levi mused, what would she think of the new world they had created?
Levi shook his head. “Beyond death by titan,” he answered, “no. Hange wanted to change that.” He fell silent, not sure how to continue.
Pieck’s expression was gentle. “She was better than the rest of us, then.” Levi nodded.
The two warriors left after two weeks. They hugged Mikasa, and shook Levi's hand, before returning to their home country.
-
And then it was Levi and Mikasa, blinking awkwardly at each other, the last two remnants of a family line fated to suffer. Levi knew, as sure as anything, that Mikasa -- just like him -- was doomed by the force called fate. She had lost her parents, her friend, and the boy she loved most. And yet, Levi knew she would never move on. Ackermans just weren’t made for that. They clung to those they loved with all their might, their powers a means for them to protect others in the cruel world which sought to end them. Levi had seen it in his own mother, in Kenny, and in Mikasa as well. As cursed the Ackerman bloodline was, it was also blessed with a love transcending all else.
Mikasa spent her mornings by Eren’s grave, and afternoons helping Historia run an orphanage nearby. Her hair had grown longer, tied back by a simple ponytail. Grief, though tempered by hard determination, clouded her dark eyes. On more than one occasion Levi had found her asleep by Eren’s grave, fingers intertwined with a past memory. Levi would bring a blanket out and cover her gently, making sure not to startle her. He felt for the young woman. Her burden was different from her comrades'. She, too, had lost someone dear to her— and by her own hand, no less. Privately, Levi resolved to care for Mikasa for as long as he could.
-
The Yeagerists were a problem. How could they not be? Just a few years prior, Levi had been Humanity's Strongest Soldier, and they his inferiors. Until, at least, he betrayed their god and turned his back on Paradis. While Levi walked back to Mikasa's house one day, he saw two men with rifles slung across their backs. Levi's breath caught. Quickly, quietly, he made his way back home. He and Mikasa discussed the situation over tea that night.
"There's more and more soldiers in the village these days,"
Levi began. Mikasa nodded."They're looking for more ex-soldiers to recruit."
"We can't be seen."
"They won't hurt me. They have no idea what happened." No, Levi thought, they don't. But I still don't trust them. "What if they try to make you a soldier again?"
"I won't let them," she countered.
"You could be hurt."
"Heichou." The two Ackermans frowned at each other. Mikasa exhaled slowly. "You don't need to protect me. I'm more than capable of doing that by myself."
"I know, I—" I don't want to lose anyone else. If Mikasa noticed how Levi stopped himself from continuing, she didn't comment. "I'm strong." Mikasa took a breath. "Very strong. I can do this."
The look in her face made Levi pause. It was the same expression that Hange had always worn when she needed to play the role of Commander— a mild yet piercing stare. The government officials never really accepted Hange. Because she — a nobody with no background — had succeeded the illustrious Erwin Smith. Because she was awkward, and hyper-focused on her research. Because she was too smart for her own good. Because (and Levi scowled to think of it) she was a woman. So Hange adapted. She asked for approval less and less, trusting her own judgement. The look on her face showed it all: that she was strong enough to be depended on, someone who had the means to rebuild a trampled world with her own hands.
"I know you are."
"Then trust me." Face-to-face with Mikasa's determination, a reincarnation of Hange's, Levi could do nothing but agree. It appeared that maybe she didn't need anyone to care for her after all.
Levi left two months after the rest had gone. As capable as Mikasa was, Levi was no longer the soldier he had once been. The explosion from the thunder spear had ensured he would never be strong enough to fight. He would be a ghost of his former self against the Yeagerists. Onyankopon had written to Levi of a house in Marley he could live in. After some thought, Levi had agreed.
”Promise to write if you need anything,” Mikasa said haltingly.
”I will. You too."
Beneath the simple words, the Ackermans smiled. They understood.
Levi lives in a house at the edge of a small town in Marley: far enough to avoid the city, and all its troubles, and close enough to the sea to visit daily. Days pass, then weeks, then months. A year passes, then two, then three. Connie and Jean visit occasionally, bringing news of the outside world. Armin and Annie stop by with their newborn son. Reiner and Pieck, along with Gabi, Onyankopon, and Falco, come to Levi's home when they could. Mikasa’s letters arrive in the mail once a month.
As Levi grows older, his body — once the epitome of fitness in the Survey Corps — began to fail him. His arms and legs become useless and weak, trembling with the slightest exertion. His vision worsens. (Hange would joke that they had both become 'four-eyes'.) His hair whitens, then thins, leaving a wispy cloud of hair atop his head. As his body abandons him, so do the people around him. Visits grow less and less frequent, letters arriving less often. Levi tries not to feel betrayed. Life was like that. (He should have been grateful to get to live this long, after all.) But another, more selfish, part of him cries for his children to not leave him like everyone else had.
-
One day Levi wakes up and just knows. The feeling is the same every year. Levi often loses track of the days, but never is given the respite of forgetting this particular one. He struggles out of bed and out the door, to the newspaper a mailman tosses by his porch every day.
September 5. Sometimes Levi pretends Hange is hiding, waiting outside the door while he prepares a birthday gift for her. He imagines she is closing her eyes and guessing the identity of the gift aloud. He closes his eyes, too, and pictures a Hange as old as he is. She would lose her glasses, and spend hours looking for them, squinting. She would burn eggs and curse, the expletives strange from the mouth of someone so frail. Her hair would still be tied up in a messy heap. Levi thinks he would help her fix it. He almost hears her voice, and opens his eyes again.
No. It is a stranger, walking by, donning a forest-green coat.
Levi wonders what Hange would think were he to ask that stranger to swap places with her. Reach through time and make it so instead of this person, it would be Hange, strolling past his house like nothing had ever gone wrong.
They would probably think him senile.
-
Levi makes an effort to make a birthday gift for Hange every year. One year, Levi spends the day attempting to bake a cake: chocolate— a sugary-sweet taste he had never heard of before Marley, but one he was sure Hange would love. Another, a new eyepatch. Another, a set of notebooks. This year, he decides on a trip.
"Let’s go to the beach, Four-Eyes,” Levi says aloud. He imagines Hange standing beside him and agreeing.
-
Levi takes the bus to the nearest train station, then rides that down to the beach. It is a sun-less day, clouds masking any trace of light. Levi unpacks the basket he has packed. He spreads a blanket out over the sand, and takes out a teapot and two cups of tea. (There is no real way to make tea, surrounded by sand and sea and salt, but Levi likes to pretend.)
The teacup by his side, Levi stares out at the sea. If Hange were here, she would be in the water already, complaining of the cold but splashing in it all the same. “Look at this shell!” she would shout to Levi. The man would try his best to remain by the shore for as long as possible, but eventually Hange’s wheedling would win him over. He’d dip a tentative foot into the waves before Hange drags him to observe some filthy sea creature
"Hey, Hange." Levi sighs. "Been a while, huh? Don't worry— I didn’t forget your gift, Four-Eyes." He rummages in his basket, and pulls out a thick tome. “It’s an atlas. I got it from the store nearby.” Levi sighs. “The world’s changed a lot, Hange.” He looks down at his wrinkled hands. “So have I.”
Levi wonders what life might have been like if she were to have survived. He fancies that they would have bought the same house that he occupies now. Hange would still messy as always, and Levi would be forever exasperated by the never-ending piles of books slowly encroaching their room. She would drag him to museums and different cities, exclaiming over each new bit of information. Maybe they would start a garden together (though Levi shuddered to think of the dirt and bugs). They could adopt a pet. Hange had always loved her titans, but perhaps her curiosity would settle for something smaller instead. Perhaps she would retire her eyepatch as the wound healed. Would she still be as wild as she was before? As brave?
"If we survive long enough to be old, let's stay together." Levi almost objects but, seeing Hange's face lit up with contented glee, thinks better of it. Maybe just this once, he wouldn't be left behind. Levi dares to hope.
You broke your word, Four-Eyes.
Levi walks over to the edge of the ocean. Somewhere out there, Hange's dead body lays, her heart dedicated to the one person cursed to carry it forever. Gently, Levi drops the atlas into the water. It sinks almost immediately, its pages tearing in the water, and Levi pushes it out to the sea.
”Happy birthday, Hange,” he says. In the corner of his eye, Hange smiles.