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A man walked down a familiar Street. Above him flickered lights that barely reached the road he walked, forever damned to living in darkness the man offered this world a gentle scoff, for everything was just as he remembered it. Even after all these years away, the suffocating shadows still felt the same. Perhaps he had hoped it would have found betterment in his absence, for despite all logical thought, he was sure he was cursed to bring misfortune to any land he set foot upon, and every person he dared touch. A fool's wish, it had been. those above Had never cared for those down below, pretending they did not exist was much easier on those few who knew of them. Those rich and wealthy turned their noses away from the stench of poverty, nothing else was to be expected of their kind. Levi Ackerman, humanity's strongest soldier, had not offered a gracing light to the people of his hometown, just as he had assumed many of those in charge had called him a monster, a beast. The military police long seemed nervous about him, ignoring him whenever possible, referring to Erwin only.
Erwins words had been his saving grace, one Levi had not asked for, yet it was his word that had paved the way for Levi to remain in the sun, bask in it as the wind carried the most beautiful smells to his nose. Standing by Erwins side, Levi found a purpose he had never before known he lacked.
Whispers had carried themselves through military headquarters since week one, never dying down. Whispers about Erwin Smith’s new miracle named Levi Ackerman. An underground dog that bites harder than any seen before, but Erwin kept a steady hand on him, they said. By Erwin’s side, this dog did not have to be put down despite its forever bared teeth.
Erwin Smith had created many miracles in his time, the greatest of which being the one that had for a moment allowed Levi to believe he was meant for this earth, that his hand alone did not bring pain and suffering. Levi would be forever convinced that one more could have been made. If Erwin had just listened to him-
A place so filthy should not remind him of that man, with forever watchful eyes, blue as the sky and drowning in curiosity like a cat in a bag. Erwin had been too good to be associated with the lazy filth dying like flies down here, yet he had died just the same.
With Levi unable to do anything to stop it, Erwin had died the same.
The image of his limp body in Forster's grip had not left him alone for even a moment. Every time he closed his eyes he saw and felt as he did that day, trembling hands which clung to a cold syringe felt like they were being pulled by a thread, puppeted by some cruel puppeteer above. Yet he had acted just as he would have expected himself to. Was he at all his own master? Or was he a slave to a god above who found enjoyment in his torment?
Acting exactly as he had expected himself to, Levi had offered his commander peace.
Now lifting his head, Levi attempted to find a breath of fresh air, but all that filled his lungs was the clammy stench of the underground. His shoulders rose and sank as he made effort to calm himself, feeling a certain rage surge through his veins and deep into his gut, he hoped to simply will it away.
He closed his eyes, and once more Erwin's dying body flashed before him, now followed by the defeated expression Levi had bared witness To during their last conversation. “Damn-” Levi clenched his jaw and fists tightly together, forcefully prying his eyes open before the imagined scene of Moblit's last breath managed to taunt him. Hange had explained to him exactly what they had seen, and unlike what people might think of him, humanity's strongest had a vivid imagination, especially for all things grotesque.
“You need a hand, boy?” A woman's voice filled Levi's ears, and as the man followed the sound of her with his eyes, she would approach him.
Each step she took sent her stumbling at least half a step back again. Her breath was laboured and rough, her pale skin covered in bruises, especially remarkable was one around her throat, a near perfect handprint. And In her grasp lay what Levi assumed had been cheap payment for a quick favour. Money is good, but perhaps forgetting was better.
“Do you?” At first he had been ready to fight or flee, women down in the underground were often used for one out of two things, luckily this one seemed to be of the non-dangerous kind.
His assumption was solidified as those weak lanterns laid light upon her face, painting the blob she had formerly been in the dark of that alley- with features he knew, a face he trusted. “Hilde?” his voice sounded uncertain as she threw herself upon him, the force of her body against his own had pushed the wind out of him. She wasn't heavy, the man could easily have wrapped his arm around her and carried her away if he had to, but she was sharp.
Her frame was much smaller than it once had been, and so the man suffered the piercing pain of a blunt hit of a shoulder into his chest.
as he breathed through the pain, Levi's focus was absent. Remaining away until the feeling of her hands upon him carried him through it. “Hey-” the way she had tugged on his pants was lazy and far less than excited. “Don't” her knees had buckled in so she was leaning onto him, offering her full weight to him.
the woman's eyes darted up to his as the words he had spoken managed to break through her drunken mind-fog. “I see~” her voice was weak, but now it seemed to hold some sort of amusement as she pushed away from him, standing up as straight as she could before she began a stumbly walk down the street.
He had no choice but to follow her, he feared with every step she took that the next would be the one to send her face first into the rocks.
“Hey! Slow down!” He followed her a path he had walked a hundred times before, one leading to the place he was born.
“Watch out, that step is broken” the woman swayed as she Strode to avoid the middle step leading up to the brothel. It was the same as always, this place.
Levi quickly moved in to offer the taller woman some support, allowing her to yet again lean onto him as they made their way up the old stairs.
It felt like stepping foot into a whole new world, one that despite its location attempted to hide its filth underneath a thick layer of strong incense and atmospheric candles.
His eyes quickly wandered over the room, there wasn't much more to see here, even if he had the interest In seeing it.
An old man stood some distance away from them, smoking a pipe as dark as the eyes that followed each of Levi's movements, but ignoring the woman he had followed here. Levi knew this man as well, and now knowing he was still around, Levi was happy to follow Hilde to her room, away from him before he got the chance to speak.
The room they stepped into was neglected, each surface carried more dust than Levi could recall ever having seen before. The moisture of the underground had caused it to stick so strictly too, clinging to the Wood so hard Levi had for a moment feared it was mold he was seeing.
“Come” The woman's voice reached his ears once more, he had no more time to waste staring at things that should be fixed, for the woman had grabbed him by the arm and pulled him across the room and towards her bed, the only part of her room that seemed properly used. “You're lucky you're cute” her voice was now coming out as a mumble while she straightened her sheets “cocky, but cute. Don't think I'd agree to bringing just any man to bed, I've got my standards too”
Way too late had Levi remembered how her hands had gripped and groped him earlier on. She had Pulled him down before he had been able to clarify that his objection had not been because of where they were then and there, clarify that he had no interest in her, no intention of purchasing her services.
Once more he felt her hands about him. She had been quick to kneel down before him, one boney hand gripping his thighs for support as the other reached out to unbutton his pants.
He stared down at her hands, unable to move an inch as the fabric gave way for the metallic button that kept his clothes up and on him. His heart beat loudly in his chest, deafening to any feeling or thought he would try to lay focus on. A trembling hand moved towards hers, as Levi's mouth hung open an attempt at pushing out a protest stuck in the back of his throat.
His hand finally met with hers, he had intended to push her away gently, try to make her understand- however his hand met with hers, as she allowed gentle fingers to caress him.
his voice finally let go and escaped him, coming out in a burst that had made her jump. And so Levi was back up on his feet, taking deep lasting breaths to keep himself calm.
He could keep himself calm, but he had no control over the feelings of others. He had no way of preventing the woman on the floor from breaking down into tears where she knelt. And as she began whimpering her apologies, claiming that her beauty was not what it once had been, and asking him what had made him change his mind, Levi found it difficult to speak.
Where she got the idea was easy enough to understand, he was a man, and she was a drunken girl of the night. He didn't have the words to assure her of her beauty and dignity, she looked sickly, and though he could lie, he found no words at all as she continued to cry.
Levi instead remained silent, slowly reaching down to grab a gentle hold of her, shaking his head once as he helped her to bed. She had quickly turned to continue her mournings into the thin pillow, one he was sure had often been the holder of her tears, all her secrets and all her dreams.
He turned his back to her, allowing her to cry as she saw fit. He had found no words of comfort to offer her, but he could still do good by her in another way, even if it would prove futile and be just the same again in a weeks time, he could help her out by cleaning the only place she had to call her own.
She had fallen asleep as Levi worked, leaving him to the mercy of his own mind in the silence, however there was much work to have done, so it seemed that for once, mercy was on his side.
Gripping a chipped cup off of the floor, Levi thought for a moment he caught a whiff of a scent very pleasant to him. Pleasant despite-
“kuchel!” A young Hilde had barged into Kuchel's quarters, her eyes red and body shaking all over. Levi's mother had put her son down, and imidiately turned to open her arms for the younger woman, allowing her into her motherly embrace as she let her cry it out.
Hilde cursed men, sobbed into Kuchel's chest about how cruel they were. She had been beat, even the child on the floor could tell, and the child shared the woman's sentiment, even at his young age.
Hilde had stayed with them til it was no longer possible. Kuchel had been called for, the director had once again needed a word with her. Levi, had promptly been put in Hilde’s arms, left to reach for his darling mother as she walked away from him.
The younger woman was good with children, she had been by Levi's side since he was born and had never showed any annoyance with him. She was the only woman Kuchel dared leave him with, and the only one that could keep Levi silent when it was needed, Putting him to sleep within a makeshift bed within his mothers closet. He was a small child, best that way, easier to hide.
As the man finished cleaning the woman's room, he decided to take his leave. She was sleeping now, curled up much alike how he himself had slept when he was a child. He had nothing more to offer her, so leaving her now was the only thing that felt right, the only thing he could do to avoid further misunderstandings.
“Hey” a voice had called out for him from behind as he reached towards the exit door, a voice that had caused him to freeze. “Levi” amusement painted the voice of that old man. “Finally returning to your roots?”
“What?” Levi turned to the man, shooting him a glare, daring him to go on. What Levi had not expected was for the man to get all up in his face, he had moved way faster than Levi assumed he could, and now he had him cornered right by the door that would have taken him out of there.
“Would you look at that” the man's eyes had began scanning each of Levi's features. he should have pushed past him, should have told him to back away and leave him alone, but just the same as he had when Hilde had been about to show him her tricks, Levi felt as if his body no longer belonged to him, floating through air way too thick to breathe. Even as the man's hand, one stinking of tobacco, had reached for his face, he didn't manage to move an inch, not even his fingers obeyed him.
“Been waiting for you, you know. Always knew you'd end up back here, no matter what you've accomplished up above. Those pricks could never see you as one of them, you'd have to come home one day” his hand was rough, far from gentle as he pat his cheek the same way you'd pat an obedient dog.
Then his thumb, slowly caressing Levi's skin, felt like a fire being set ablaze upon him, burning away what little sense of self and reality had been left with Levi.
The beating banging of his pulse was giving him a headache.
The rough and wrinkled thumb met with Levi’s lips, first at the corner, dwelling there like a snake waiting for its prey. “You always looked like your mother” the man's words now held a far more sinister tone, one that made Levi's stomach turn. “Do you still bite? Levi.” the soldier has seen many deaths in his time, seen guts spill from the humans they belonged to as dying men desperately tried to put themselves together, but this? Humanity’s strangest was certain he would vomit. “It's good behaviour. For a boy to protect his mother the way you did, I think I still got a scar from ya~” Levi could remember now, how he had once sunk his teeth into this man's forearm after he had struck his mother.
“Answer me, do you still bite? boy.” he didn't answer. “Would be a shame if you did, her mouth was always better than her-”
By Erwins side, the dog did not bite.
Erwin wasn't here.
“Boy?” Finally Levi found his voice again. His body felt all calm once more as he moved his head out of the disgusting old man's grasp. “Don't touch me, who knows where you've been” he kept his calm for just a moment longer, but he had no intention of making it last.
A vase of withered flowers stood by the door, Levi had not allowed the man to speak again before the glass object had been broken against his head. He had not allowed him to react, had grabbed the vase way too quick for that.
He had collapsed imidiately, that filthy vermin. His body had given in underneath him and sent him crashing into the shattered glass below, the water the flowers had once stood in, now red upon the wooden floor.
Humanity's strongest stepped over the director, decided to stick around anyway, just for a bit.
Hilde was awoken to the scent of tea, a dark figure standing above her with a tray in its hands. “Kuchel?..” perhaps she had forgotten that her friend was long gone, or perhaps she hoped she had died in her sleep.
“Oh Levi” her tired face lit up as she realised who stood before her, a man she had not before recognised. “My boy, that smells divine. where did you find that?”
He answered her only with a hum as he sat down besides her.
“Thank you” she whispered, taking her cup from the tray on his lap. “For refusing me, I apologise dear.. I have no clue what came over me, don't ever think I'd forget you, kid” from her, as before, he let it pass. “You look good, Levi. Your mother would be so proud of you.”
“... thanks.”