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itslieutenanthawkeye · 2 years

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Cowboy like me

Pieck Finger has been a sugar baby for the better part of a decade. After breaking up with her last rich boyfriend, her friend Jean Kirstein offers her the opportunity to meet and seduce one of the richest men in the world during a weekend celebration at a country club. There, however, she meets Porco Galliard, a sugar baby much like herself with plans for his own life. After they meet, however, their plans might be disrupted.

Ao3

“I heard from a little bird you got dumped,”

Pieck rolled her eyes at the sound of that voice, which had become utterly familiar after years working side by side. To be fair, he was not mistaken. The lack of the diamond bracelet gave it away; the one present she’d wanted to keep from was the one he’d taken away. Furthermore, the world of modeling was surprisingly small, and she guessed it wasn’t just the lack of diamond bracelet that had told Jean she’d been dumped by Leonard Walton.

Pieck turned to look at him, forcing herself to smile. She had to keep appearances; not for Jean -heavens knew she cared not for what he thought of her love life– she didn’t want the other models to see her distressed. They already hated her for being much smaller than the rest of them, some had gone as far as to complain to several brand managers. She did not want them to think she’d lost all pride just because of one rich bachelor.

“Mister Walton and I had different ideas of boundaries, Jeanbo, and decided to part ways,” she said, smiling at the girl that came with her shoes. Pieck tapped them against the floor, just in case one of the other models had not decided to tamper with the heels like the last time, in hopes of making her break an ankle mid-runway. She’d gotten fired from the brand the last time, and finding jobs was difficult enough with her height. “How about you? Did you manage to find your lady love in the crowd?”

Jean parted the back curtain only a millimeter, which was enough to get a glimpse of the front row of seats. It wasn’t hard for them to find her; the widowed Ackerman, gorgeous, young, dressed all in a red that accentuated the black of her hair, adorned in simple yet exquisite jewelry. “There she is.”

“Pretty as a flower, as per usual,” Pieck said. Gorgeous, and unattainable. Pieck would know, from that one party in which she’d tried to flirt with the widow. “When are you–”

“We’re not talking about her,” Jean closed the curtain, not before letting out a longing sigh. He was a romantic, and a fool, for allowing the object of his desire to be the most unattainable woman in the entire west end. “We’re talking about you and your plan to be a trophy wife.”

“Don’t talk that loud!” Pieck shoved him away. “Besides, I don’t want to be just a billionaire’s wife. I’d like to fall in love in the process and get my brand off the ground and onto magazines, thank you.”

“Ah, so you are heartbroken,” he teased.

“I’m heartbroken because Walton was my ticket to the MET this year,” Pieck sighed, folding her arms over her chest while she looked at the A listers walk down the runway; the skinny, statuesque women dominated high fashion without any difficulties. “All I wanted was that ticket to the MET. I had the perfect design in my head, as his plus one I could’ve gotten seen the way I want to.”

“Also you wanted that fancy car.” Jean pointed out.

“And the car, yes.” Pieck agreed reluctantly. It had been a pretty car, another unkept promise. If he’d only let her keep the damn bracelet, she could have sold it for a pretty profit, a profit that would’ve allowed her to live comfortably for a year or two.

“Did he at least introduce you to Anna?” Jean asked.

“He was going to, at the MET.” Pieck closed her eyes and suppressed a whimper, certain her make up was not waterproof. Eight months of putting up with constant chatter about stocks and horses wasted in Jonathan Walton. If anything was more painful than losing the bracelet that was losing Jonathan himself before the MET. “The long road will be, but I don’t know how long that will last me.”

“Huh?”

“You’ve heard our workmates,” Pieck scanned the room, feeling a shiver of unease travel her back. “They don’t think it’s fair I’m up here walking with them. It’s only a matter of time before designers get the same idea. I don’t know how long I’ll last.”

“It’s not like modeling is your main source of income,” Jean replied. Pieck knew she ought to have been offended. Mind you, she was no prostitute –not that she thought there was anything wrong with prostitution. She simply had her standards when it came to dating, and the size of people’s wallets was what mattered the most.

It was not her fault these men wanted to give her jewelry and presents, it was not her fault she agreed every time they asked her to come to Paris with them. They thought her pretty and her wit was an added bonus, and she liked their bank accounts.

She’d been reaping the fruits of her looks since the tender age of twenty, but at twenty (and twenty one, twenty two, twenty three and so on) one was not as careful with money as one should be. And so, Pieck had enjoyed the shopping and the pretty things, thinking that by the time she turned twenty-five, she would have made enough as a fashion designer to not rely on her looks and youth.

Alas, she was twenty seven now, and success was now staying on a diet for most of the year. But she wasn’t a supermodel, the type that enters the A list and stays there for good. No, she’d never been a natura. And despite that she had managed to squeeze some luxuries off some of the men she had dated, none of them had put her atop the pyramid.

Because the top of the pyramid is where you wanted to be. It was at the top of the pyramid where you no longer thought if things were a luxury or a necessity before you bought them, the people at the top of the pyramid never had to watch their fathers remain at the bottom of a wait list for a life-saving treatment, the people at the top of the pyramid never withered away and died from strange diseases.

“I’m getting too old for this,” Pieck muttered. “Walton was my last shot at the life I wanted…I don’t think I can take another man talk about the stock market.”

“What does that mean?” Jean asked.

“It means I might just move back home,” Pieck said with a disappointed sigh. “I have a friend that owns a boxing club. I might ask her to let me be a greeting lady, or maybe I’ll report the weather somewhere–”

“No, no, you’ve been working your ass off to get to where you are now,” Jean said, shaking her by the shoulder with the carelessness any good friend could have. “You can’t give up now.”

“I was supposed to be rich at twenty six; I’m middle-class at best. Do you have a rich guy with the right connections?” Pieck asked. “Or do you happen to be close friends with Anna, will you tell her that I make beautiful clothes and convince her to hire me, so I don’t have to starve myself to get a job?”

“I know where to find the guy,” Jean said, wiggling his eyebrows. “Why do you think I came looking for you the moment I heard you and Walton broke up? He’s single just now. A bit older and divorced, but–”

Pieck burrowed her frow. “Didn’t I tell you I’m tired of hearing about the stock market?”

“This guy is old money,” Jean went on. The word gave Pieck a pause. Old money, now that was a phrase she’d heard plenty. Like most everyone in their circles, Anna Darcy liked old money; she was drawn to it like bees to honey. Because old money meant connections that led to the highest spheres of society, blood as pure as water from a spring…people impossible to reach.

“Why would old money pay me any mind?” Pieck asked.

“He saw you in the Vogue issue this spring,” Jean said, putting both hands on his hips. “If I’m remembering correctly, he said you looked like an orchid, cute and delicate and all pink.”

“Wise man,” Pieck said, taking a breath as she looked back at the crowd, at the gorgeous woman sitting at the front row. “Did your lady love tell you what he said?”

“She’s not my lady love,” Jean replied, clearing his throat. “We’ve been friends for a while, and she enjoys my conversations. I-I knew her husband, Pieck, I don’t think she could ever see me as–”

“I don’t care, Jean,” Pieck would apologize for being rude later. For now, she didn’t want to hear about his love for Mikasa Ackerman, symbol of Hizuran beauty, widowed at twenty years old, now twenty five and still single. If he hadn’t made his move, that was his problem. She had bigger interests at hand. “Who’s the guy? Where is this magical, old money man that thinks I’m a water lily?”

“Orchid–”

“Whatever. Where is he?” Pieck insisted.

“His name is Willy Tybur,” Jean said. Pieck scanned her memories, realizing she’d heard the name before. The Tybur family was much more than old money; they were ancient money. Carved from the creations of king Midas’ hands, the Tybur family stood above the pyramid itself. Jean and his family stood below them, Mikasa Ackerman and the Azumabito clan stood perhaps a couple of steps below them, even Ana Darcy remained below them.

Pieck widened her eyes. “Jean, I can’t–”

“You can try,” Jean said with a shrug. “I mean, he did say you were lovely. You’re not losing anything by trying.”

“Where do I find him?” Pieck asked. “Where do you find a guy like that?”

Jean cleared his throat. “There might be a place, but it’s out of the city. And you have one shot during the weekend.”

“Speak, Kirstein, I’m listening.”

___________________

“This is a lovely shade of pink, don’t you think, darling? It would go perfect with my new hair, and those eyeshadows I brought,” the woman loved to hear herself talk. She was a newly divorcée, thirty-two; tall, red-haired and gorgeous, with freckles coating the bridge of her nose and chest…freckles she seemed to hate. Although, to be fair, she seemed to hate a thousand little details about herself. Hence the constant trips to her surgeon and dermatologist.

Porco didn’t think there was anything wrong with her. She’d been gorgeous before the divorce, she was gorgeous now. But her ex husband had drained all of her self confidence, or something like that. In truth, Porco cared little. Her insecurities gave him more room to work on.

“What do you think, Pete?” she asked, turning to look at him. “Pink? Blue?”

Shut up already.

“Both,” Porco replied, forcing himself to smile. Why had he gotten into this again?

The money, dumbass, the money. Money made people act stupidly, and he was the living proof of that. But money was also good to buy yourself a ticket out of mandatory military service, the military service that killed brothers without a care. Despite it being a peaceful time, money was good to keep yourself out of that green uniform.

“Both?” she asked.

“Gorgeous with both,” Porco walked to stand behind her, thinking Marcel would have run out of breath from laughing when he took the scarves and put them over each og her shoulders. Are you a fashion advisor? he would have asked, in between snorts. “Your gorgeous face looks perfect in both,”

The woman blushed and tilted her head, placing a kiss on his cheek. “Why don’t we go for that customized watch? The gold watch with the encrusted diamonds.”

Porco smiled. Money also bought nice things, that part he would not deny. All he had to do? Stand pretty, assure whatever woman he was dating that she was the most gorgeous woman in the room, make her ego grow by knowing she had gotten him for herself. He’d been doing it since the tender age of eighteen; almost ten years, and he was a master at it.

Of course, doing something for so long meant he had a reputation, but Porco did not care. Some of these rich ladies seemed to love the thrill of the chase; they loved knowing they’d been caught in the claws of their blond casanova.

Porco contained the urge to cringe; he didn’t plan to do this forever. He just wanted to have enough money to retire, to buy his brother’s body back from the military and bury him in a peaceful meadow, not leave him in the middle of a military burial site. He was almost at five million; once he had that, he would be able to leave the high society circles for good.

“Martha warned me about your reputation, you know,” she said as they walked back to the vehicle, clinging to his arm as if he would run away at any moment. “She said you could bite…but nobody told me you’d be this sweet.”

“Being sweet is easy around you,” Porco lied, kissing the woman’s cheek before opening the car door for her. He ran to the driver’s seat; this car was what he’d been longing for. Once she gave it to him, Porco would enjoy it and their relationship for a few more months and then he would find her with her other lover (whom he’d had knowledge of since the beginning). Once he sold the car and the watches, he would reach his five million.

“Where to?” he asked.

“Home for a little alone time,” she said, squeezing his thigh. Porco smiled back; he enjoyed this part of his relationships. Every rich lady was so eager to prove they were the best at what they did, he always ended up having the most fun. “And then, we go to the tennis tournament.”

“Tennis tournament?” Porco said, scrunching up his face. “Is that what your friends are doing to start autumn?”

“It was the Azumabito woman’s idea,” she said, shaking her head. “I swear, that poor old woman does everything she can to keep that musty husband off her niece’s head. She knows she likes sports, so she decides to open the season with a tennis tournament. Fucking ridiculous.”

“Isn’t the husband dead?” Porco asked, driving up the road to her seaside mansion.

“It’s been five years, darling,” she replied, leaning against her seat and closing her eyes. “The one good thing about this season is that mister Tybur is going to be there.”

Porco raised both eyebrows. “Willy Tybur?”

“In the flesh,” she laughed. “Single and ready to turn any woman into royalty.”

Porco didn’t like the dreamy tone of her voice. He’d spent too many months dating her to be exchanged for old money. Not now, not when he was close to those five million…but rich people smelled fear, he knew that from trial and error. So, Porco leaned back against his seat and reached out to graze her thigh. “Do you reckon the Tybur sisters are gonna be there?”

“What?” she said, turning to look at him. Porco smiled; he still had her.

“Should we ask one of them to join us?” he said, smirking at her. “You know them, don’t you? You said a while ago you wanted a threesome.”

“With another man!” she laughed, grabbing his hand to kiss it. She shook her head and pouted, a gesture so utterly childish Porco almost let out an annoyed sigh. But that would not get him his car. “I’m not letting anyone take my plaything away from me.”

“I’m sure you won’t,” Porco replied. “But don’t let your plaything out of sight.”

“I won’t,” she said, kissing his hand some more. He didn’t need to be anything more than a plaything; she was the means to an end, and vice versa. Nothing more, nothing less. And Porco didn’t care; things had been like this since the first woman who had bought his ticket out of the military. He just wanted those five millions. That’s all he wanted.

_____________________

“Nicholas is a very smart young man, isn’t he?” Jean said, staring at the painting in front of him with wide eyes. The tennis tournament had been ruined by a stray cloud and while the country club’s staff put up the tent-like thing above the courts, all the rich had gathered in the art gallery. The Azumabito had a back up plan for every back up plan, it seemed, and this one involved selling the youngest’s artwork.

“My brother has always been very artistic,” Mikasa Ackerman replied. Like every occasion, she was the epitome of beauty, a sad doll carved out of marble and dressed in pale pink. “I think your sculptures are better, though.”

“Mine?” Jean cleared his throat, cheeks turning pink when he turned to look at the widow. The suave, charming man that was almost two meters tall and turned women into jelly turned into the most stupid, bumbling fool Pieck had ever seen whenever he was around his longtime friend. It was like a circus display. “I-I do some work but nothing as good as Nicholas.”

“You’re being humble on purpose,” Mikasa pointed out.

Pieck covered her mouth and snorted, drawing Jean’s attention. “What’s so funny?”

“Nothing,” Pieck said, shaking her head when she noticed Mikasa’s gaze on her. The Ackerman were pretty far up in the social pyramid, and she didn’t want her to think she was a lunatic. She’d been the one to tell Jean about what Tybur had said about her, after all. “I think I must’ve swallowed this champagne without care.”

“You need to be more careful,” Jean said, frowning.

“I know,”

“Would you like me to escort you to the bar?” Ackerman asked.

“Oh, please, no, lady, I’m enjoying the art conversation plenty,” Pieck lied. Jean had told her to remain near in case Tybur appeared; he’d brought her as his plus one, and Pieck recognized a couple of the models that hated her in the crowd. Jean was her shield, her viaduct to Ackerman, who was her transport to Tybur.

“Perhaps you should go get something to wash out the burning of your throat,” Mikasa insisted, playing with the silver bracelet around her wrist. Pieck opened her mouth to utter another excuse, but Mikasa stepped forward, standing between her and Jean. “It’ll be good for you, miss Pieck. If some of that champagne goes to your lungs, you could die.”

“Well, water won’t do much if it’s on its way to my lung, will it?” Pieck said, hoping her dark humor would bring a smile from Ackerman. But the widow was as awkward as they came, and she merely blinked, switching her focus between her and Jean until something beyond Pieck’s shoulders caught her eyes.

“Ah, William is here,” she said, letting out a sigh. Pieck turned around right away, recognizing a blond mane at the back of the room, surrounded by a crowd of assistants, bodyguards and his own entourage, which consisted of plenty of beautiful people. Willy Tybur was tall and pale; clearly older, but handsome for his years, his clothes and demeanor shouted old money.

“Mika,” Jean said. The widow turned around, a light shade of pink on her cheeks. “Can you do us the favor? You said—“

“He has a meeting with the close family friends first,” Mikasa said, stepping closer to Pieck to point discreetly at a door in the far back, showing her the layout of the club as an older sister would. “They have their drinks and talk, but not just anyone goes in. I’ll go say hi to him and mention you’re here. I’m sure he’ll want to meet you. He spoke wonders of your looks, miss Pieck”

“Thank you, lady Ackerman,” Pieck said; for all the time she’d been friends with Jean, she had never thought she would do a favor for her. It was a shame the Ackerman widow didn’t seem to have interest in women, Pieck thought, or anyone else. “Should I—“

“You must come with me,” she said, nodding.

“Should I come?” Jean asked. “Just to make sure he doesn’t annoy either of you?”

Pieck rolled her eyes. Ackerman was one of the most important single women in the west end, famous for not taking any man for five years already; no matter what Tybur did, he would not steal her away from Jean.

“Please, do so, my friend, but stay at a distance,” Mikasa said, taking a hold of Pieck to lead her towards the larger doors. They cut through the crowd without issues, with Jean at a wise distance. It was one of the perks of being under Ackerman's protective shadow. Mikasa stood before the doors, flattened the nonexistent wrinkles of her dress, and the door opened for her the moment she knocked.

“Mikasa!” a bearded man said from inside. “I didn’t think I’d get to see you. Rumor says you’ve been spending an awful lot of time in this year’s runway events. Trying to make peace with Ana at last?”

“Ana’s idea of me bothers me not,” Mikasa replied calmly. “Can I come in a moment?”

Ackerman disappeared behind the doors, giving her a reassuring door before crossing the threshold. From the look on Jean’s face, Pieck guessed he would have his ear glued to the door. Kirstein was rich, but not half as rich as Mikasa and the people of her circle. No matter how much he wanted to join her in her chat with Tybur, he would not be allowed to.

Minutes stretched endlessly while Pieck waited by the door. A couple of men passed by and greeted her; all good prospects, but none as connected as Jonathan Walton had been. However, Jonathan himself was nowhere near as well positioned as the godlike Willy Tybur; he was her ticket into her dream life, the ticket to a quiet lie of designing clothes in her studio, leaving home only to attend the events of her brand and fancy dinners.

Tybur wasn’t even bad looking. No, even from afar, Pieck had seen the angles of his face, his blond, soft hair. Older than her, he might be, but not at all bad looking. A recently divorced rich man was a prey for most, however, and Pieck did not want to appear too obvious, not with the A-list models glancing her way. She couldn’t be too obvious while waiting by the door; Ackerman’s favor would only take her so far, it would not protect her from sabotage.

So, Pieck walked towards a window, under the pretense of being distracted by the club’s staff working on covering the tennis court; sometimes, it was better to pretend to be dumb than to show your full potential.

Pieck faced away from the rest of the room, in hopes no one would approach her. The Azumabito had produced a string quartet, and Pieck she her face against the window frame when they began playing a familiar song, closing her eyes momentarily while humming the lyrics.

“A music lover, huh?” someone said next to her. Ah, so Ackerman had sent him her way. It was flattering to know such an important figure had gone through the trouble of seeking for her in a crowd. Pieck only hoped not many eyes were on them.

“My father used to play violin,” she said, eyes closed still.

“My older brother too,” he said. Pieck frowned. She’d studied the magazines well. Willy Tybur had older sisters, but no older brothers; it was part of his appeal, albeit not the eldest child, he was the eldest son of one of the richest families in the world. Was he trying to gauge how much she’d looked into his family?

“Music joins us together, it seems, mister–” her words dried in her throat when she opened her eyes. Although the man in front of her was handsome, with sharp lines on his face and a perky nose, golden hair and eyes the color of honey, he was no Willy Tybur. “I’m sorry…do I know you?”

“You do not,” he said, half sitting on the window sill to look at the court. He eyed the double gates with apprehension. “They’re gonna be a while, you know.”

“I’m just looking outside,” Pieck replied with a polite smile. “I’m not–”

“A…special friend of mine has a friend inside,” he started, sipping on his glass of wine, eyes glued to the door. “She knows by fact they’ll be in there for an hour.”

“Who is this trustworthy friend?” Pieck asked, doing her best to not let her polite smile disappear; she knew people would go to great lengths to get in Tybur’s graces. Pieck was using Mikasa to get near, another one might be using the pretty blond man in front of her as a decoy, to clear the way to Tybur.

“Robin Silverstone,” he said, taking a sip from his glass. Pieck dropped her arms at her sides, eyes wide and lips parted opened. Maybe she was not an A-list model, but Pieck was well aware of the gossip in the upper circles of the west end. Robin had won half of Silverstone’s assets in the divorce, and that included her ex-husband's antique vehicle collections, which she had insisted on taking just to spite him.

But the gossip was that she was dating a former military member, a young man with charm and reputation to spare. She eyed him from head to toe, recognizing the boyish charm in his expression, a face that spoke of a fire lurking underneath a still surface. But she’d dealt with enough men to know she would unnecessarily inflate his ego if she gave away that he was, in fact, rather handsome.

Just a pair of pretty, honeyed eyes, she told herself.

“I heard Mrs. Silverstone had gotten an interesting boy to spend her time with,” Pieck chose her words carefully. In the end, he was just another person of the same bunch, a hustler, a sugar baby, armcandy. She didn’t want to offend him, but she did not want him to think she thought him better in any way. “I can see she must be amused with you.”

“Not as much as she’d have you believe,” he said, letting out a soft chuckle.

“Where is your lovely lady?” Pieck asked in an effort to ignore the shiver his laughter had sent down her back.

“She is…with another interesting guy that does not arouse any suspicion in me, or that’s what she thinks,” he took another sip of his wine, and Pieck had to bite her lower lip to not giggle.

She had been there before, bidding for a rich man’s attention while competing with another young, pretty thing. It wasn’t good for your pride, and it was terrible for the purse. Sharing your boyfriend’s bank account with others was bothersome, to say the least, and she could see the annoyance in this man’s golden eyes.

“I’m glad to know I amuse you,” he said, making her blush in embarrassment. “Where is your date, by the way?”

“I came on my own,” Pieck said, smiling. He’d seen the amusement in her face and he’d gone for the comment that he thought would pinch her pride. Even worse, he’d figured out they belonged in the same group of people. How did Pieck know? Instinct, because she could see the recognition in his face, because it took one to know one and this man wasn’t dumb. Clever men could be so annoying. “Mister Tybur had a special interest in me.”

“You’ll be waiting for a while,” he rested the back of his head against the window frame, looking at the tennis court outside. But Pieck didn’t look alongside him; no, she focused her gaze on his jaw, so perfectly defined. “What’s your name, by the way?”

“Pieck Finger,” she said without qualms. There was no point in hiding her name, not when Mikasa Ackerman herself would pave the way for her to become Pieck Tybur in the near future. “You?”

“You can call me Galliard,” he said.

Pieck snorted. “That’s a last name. I told you my first name and last name.”

“I don’t think–”

“Is your first name weird?” Pieck asked with honest curiosity. Or perhaps her words did carry cheeky intent. She didn’t like clever, overly confident men. Willy Tybur would surely be like that –but Tybur was swimming in a couple of billions, this kid was a bandit just like her. “Is it something like Richard, Dick? Chad? Egsbert? Porco?”

Galliard narrowed his eyes, and this time Pieck couldn’t keep herself from giggling. “I hit the jackpot, it seems, mister Porco.”

She thought that blow to his ego would be enough to cast him away, to send him away to look for his girlfriend and allow her to breathe. She didn’t like it when men made her heart race, and this one in particular would be best to keep at a distance.

“You’re very clever, Pieck,” he said. Blood rushed to her cheeks upon hearing her name said so casually, but she held his gaze. A little blush was nothing to be embarrassed about; if anything, it made her look kinder, more approachable.

“I know, it’s one of my best assets.” she said with a tiny smile.

“Do you wanna dance?” he asked right away, setting his now empty glass on the window sill. His finger traced the edges of the glass once, the movement almost hypnotizing. Pieck forced herself to look away from his fingers dancing over the glass surface. Just a pair of pretty eyes, she repeated to herself. “We’ve got plenty of time to kill.”

“Dancing is dangerous, for people like you and I,” Pieck expected him to understand the meaning of her words. People like them weren’t free to roam and flirt with each other; their stability depended on being available to the right people. And they were not the right people for each other.

“We could dance away from everyone,” Porco suggested, focusing solely on her face. “It’ll take him an hour at least. It’s not like Tybur will come out at any moment.”

“It’s not like your lady love will be done anytime soon, huh?” Pieck asked, tilting her head sideways; his mouth curved upwards, revealing the hint of a dimple on the right side of his cheek, but his eyes remained skeptical. She was amusing to him, a way to kill time, a momentary interlude in whatever plans he had for his life.

Pieck’s smile widened before she could stop herself, which made his own smile become more sincere. He didn’t lose the skepticism in his eyes, though. No; she guessed that had been there for a long time, it was a shield that protected his true intentions, it was what added to his boyish charm.

“What do you say?” he asked, ever insistent. “We gotta kill time somehow.”

So, this was gonna be one of those things. Momentary snapshots of carelessness were dangerous for someone with a dating strategy as organized as hers, but unavoidable even if she recognized them from afar. She hadn’t had many, and rich men did take too long in their stupid meetings. Besides, she didn’t want her competition to see her waiting for Tybur alone; she didn’t want Tybur to think she was the type that was never approached by anyone at parties. And those golden eyes were the ripest honey, and Pieck perhaps was the weakest of bees.

“I’m doing this to kill time,” Pieck assured him. “It’s not going to be ‘a thing’ this weekend, alright? I’ve got my plans, and I’m sure you do too.”

“Same here,” Porco said with a shrug, offering her his hand. When Pieck took it, a shock of electricity traveled her arm.

#pokkopiku #Pkpk #porco galliard #pieck finger #Jeankasa #Jeanmika #jean kirstein #mikasa ackerman #eventual smut?#Cowboy like me #Taylor swift inspired this #escritos

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itslieutenanthawkeye · 2 years

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YEAH KISS THE LIVING FUCK OUT OF HIM u go levi

u both go

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itslieutenanthawkeye · 2 years

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Jeankasa week 2022. Day 7: Reincarnation

Cruel Summer

Mikasa is an extremely famous actress, and because of her fame she has been forced to be in a PR relationship with her longtime and fellow actor, Eren. However, who she wants is another. And the end of their long-running TV series gives her the opportunity to be with the one she loves.

ao3

A meadow was supposed to be tranquil, a place for quiet introspection and soft kisses on the brow. And yet they’d intruded with their heavy equipment, catering services, orders from the director and large canopies to block the view for paparazzi that wanted an exclusive shot of the scenes of the final season.

Mikasa walked out of the set with sunglasses on her face, her clothes stained with smoke and fake blood. She knew the reshoots were important, and they were also scenes that were meant to go on the extra content the final season would have on all the streaming platforms…but she was just so sick of it all.

She loved her character, she truly did. But she’d grown tired of the long hours, the intense training, all the makeup and traveling. She wanted to set her roots in one place and rest. Above all, she had grown tired of having to play pretend outside set. It was getting old, too old for someone as young as her.

Jean was talking to one of the warrior actors by the fruit stand, a blond, young boy that was a rising star, just like they had been, ten years ago. Mikasa smiled at the sight of the tall man, always so kind to the young people that came his way. And yes, she did feel butterflies in her stomach when she walked up to him and he turned to smile at her.

“Having fun, Ackerman?” He asked as soon as she reached his side.

“Kissing a decapitated head gets tiring after the thirtieth take,” Mikasa admitted. Her arm casually rested at her side, just slightly brushing Jean’s. The touch was like a current that traversed her whole body.

“We can switch places,” Jean suggested with a charming smile, his eyes only for her. “I could do with some time in a cabin in Switzerland.”

“You’d have to kiss Eren,” Mikasa said with a half smile.

“I can’t say he’s the one I’d rather be kissing,” he admitted, his head lowered.

If his touch was a current of electricity, his words had been lightning, setting her chest ablaze. Mikasa closed her eyes for a second; this place was far too public, and her contract with the network had not finished yet. She couldn’t; he was her workmate. They’d known each other since fourteen years of age. She—

“Mikasa!” Eren shouted excitedly, coming over to talk to her dressed in a bright green, full body suit. He looked nothing like the maniac he was supposed to be portraying when the cameras were off, but she guessed that was good. Him being the clumsy idiot from years ago was a sign that the Eren he was portraying on screen had not gotten under his skin. “They’re here, Mikasa!” he said, skipping towards her excitedly. “Come on, they’re here!”

“Who’s here?” Jean asked.

“Runway magazine,” Eren said proudly, taking a hold of her arm. Jean raised his eyebrows, confused. Eren gave him a cocky little smile. “What? Didn’t you know about our special?”

“They’re doing an on set special,” Mikasa explained. Looking up at the man next to her without blushing was difficult when he had his whole attention on her. “The network wants to take advantage of spring and the last days of shooting.”

“They’re doing an article on Eremika,” Eren added, resting his arm on Mikasa’s shoulder while reaching out to take a handful of grapes. “We’re the hottest, most profitable couple in the business right now. Also the most popular ship in the show.”

“We aren’t the most popular ship,” Mikasa replied in a low voice. “That’s Erwin and Levi.”

“We’re the second best.” Eren replied. He entwined his arm with hers and pulled her a few steps away from Jean, his movement careful, calculated. “It helps that we’re in such a loving relationship.”

Jean smirked at the two. “Good luck with the interview.”

“Thanks, man,” Eren dragged her away from the table, and from his expression, Mikasa knew he’d guessed she was fuming on the inside. “Don’t give me that look, Mika, you know it’s dangerous to be out flirting. I was not the one giving those puppy eyes at Kirstein.”

“I was not flirting,” Mikasa hissed. “And don’t pretend you don’t have Reiner in your trailer every night.”

“That’s the difference between you and I,” Eren replied, his voice very much in line with the smile he was faking; a set photographer passed by their side, and he lifted her hand to give it a soft kiss. “I don’t flirt with my lovers in public.”

“Jean is not my lover,” Mikasa replied heatedly, forcing herself to not look over her shoulder at him. In truth, he wasn’t. They’d been friends for a long time, and he knew about her PR relationship with Eren, and he teased her about it, when they talked in private. That was all, as far as their interactions went. That was as far as she had allowed things to go. “And you don’t need to be so loud when you tell people we’re dating.”

“One of us has to put in the effort here,” Eren replied. They passed another group of assistants and he entwined his fingers with hers. “People would have found out this is all fake if I were as indifferent as you are.”

“I’m not indifferent,” Mikasa said, rolling her eyes.

“You are,” Eren sighed and pretended to faint, forcing her to catch his whole body, like a woman from a romantic novel. The group of assistants giggled, and Mikasa was forced to smile. “And you don’t even like pretending you love me!”

“I do love you. I love you like you love an annoying cat,” Mikasa whispered. She loved him as a friend, as a brother. He was her Eren, the troublemaker she knew since she was a kid. The idea of going on dates with him, of kissing him, of making love to him…it was as preposterous as the idea of doing all those things with Armin.

Their relationship was not about romantic love, it had never been about that in the first place. And that is why she loved that they both got to play such flawed, intricate characters that suffered from deep codependency.

The public, however, seemed to have an obsession when it came to the pairing. From the very first seasons, they’d loved seeing both in public, even if they were out with their other friends, which was what gave the network the idea of a fake relationship. To be fair, the network wouldn’t have cared if it didn’t give them all that money.

“It’s almost over,” Eren kissed her temple when he stood. Not like a boyfriend would have. No, his was a friend having her back, assuring her the hard times would be over soon. “We’ve gotten enough money for a good life, haven’t we? We’ll be free.”

“You’re starting to sound like your character,” Mikasa pointed out.

“I want to be free from your scolding, mom,” he tousled her hair, and Mikasa pushed him away laughing. There were photographers in the distance, all of them carrying those long lenses, capturing their innocent, friendly banter to twist it into a romance narrative the public would surely eat up.

Mikasa turned to look over her shoulder, noticing Jean was looking at her from his place by the table. She smiled and he smiled back, waving his hand discreetly, stirring the butterflies in her stomach for the fifteenth time that morning.

__________________

The final pages of the story had been released, and people hated her. No, they hated her character, but she had grown with it, and sometimes it felt like public hatred was meant for her. They were calling her character a whore on social media, a traitor for marrying another, while others went on rants on why her character had kept her virginity intact until her death.

Worst of all, the public took refuge in the fact that she was, at least, dating Eren in real life. They will have a happy ending in real life, comments often read.

“If only they knew he’s been fucking Reiner nonstop the moment we finished shootings,” she muttered under breath as she binged another Korean drama that night, alone in her apartment. She could imagine the meltdown once people saw the final pages adapted in the silver screen; plenty of hatred had come her way, and her biggest wish was for the editors and CGI technicians to take forever to finish their work.

Whether she wanted it or not, the final episode would air in summer, and then they would go straight to promoting the show for the award season.

Despite knowing the current state of things was not her fault, Mikasa had closed all her social networks for the time being, and she’d locked herself in her apartment, decided to not face the public until the public became reasonable.

She feared the moment her relationship with Eren came to an end, because she now knew the backlash would fall on her. People didn’t hate Eren’s character, and he’d murdered half the planet. Some even looked forward to seeing the massacre, all those dead bodies and the horror of his actions. And yet, they hated hers, some even hated her.

Pieck, Sasha and Annie had been trying to convince her to go out more, but she didn’t want to. So, she expected to see Sasha’s message when her phone buzzed on her nightstand in the back. She got out of her fortress of bedsheets, and her eyes widened as plates when she noticed who the message was from.

Where are you? This is Jean by the way. New number.

Mikasa answered a second later. I’m in bed. You?

A dive bar, east side. Wanna come?

Mikasa hesitated. Should she go? They hadn’t seen each other in person since the party at the end of shootings, a few months back, and she’d been forced to remain by Eren’s side for most of the evening. Backlash had been heavy for his character, too, and Jean did not have the cover of a fake relationship to hide behind.

Her phone rang again.

You can meet me in the back. Nobody will notice.

She was out of the door in less than thirty minutes, a tight black hugging her curves. Perhaps it was careless to step out looking like she did, and she knew if people took pictures of her and Jean in bars rumors would spark…but she couldn’t go meet him in her pajamas. She wanted to look pretty for him. She wanted to see him.

Nobody noticed her when she entered the bar, which she was thankful for. A black dress went under the radar on a Saturday at two in the morning, when most everyone in the city was too drunk to recognize one face from the other.

She walked across the bar with her head low, ignoring every other guy that tried to talk to her or get her attention, until she saw him by the booths, drink in his hand. He wore discreet dark jeans and a white tee, his hair ruffled as if he’d just gotten out of bed. She caught his attention as she walked towards him, and the smile that spread across his face was enough to turn her into jelly.

By god, he was good looking.

“Ah, here comes the bride!” He said when he hugged her. “Happy wedding day, darling, sorry your husband has been under the radar.”

“You’re a bad fake husband, we did a whole wedding scene and you left town a day later,” Mikasa replied, feeling the muscles of his back for a second before pulling away. He held her delicately by the wrist, and he spun her around, making her laugh. “What are you doing?”

“I’m looking at you,” Jean said, delighted. “You look fantastic.”

Mikasa stopped twirling to look at him. “You don’t look bad yourself…for someone that disappeared for two months.”

“I kind of had to take a step back after I got my car tires slashed,” Jean replied, leading her to the booth in the back. She’d expected a larger group of friends there, but it was just the both of them. For some reason, that made her feel an outburst of joy in her chest. And despite all the room, Mikasa sat next to him, her arm brushing his, her thigh as well.

“Your car tires got slashed?” She asked.

“It’s not a big deal, just your usual, fandom shit,” he signaled for a waitress. “Do you want anything?”

“A beer.” She said, her breath growing heavy by the closeness of his body. “Wait, Jean, what else have people done to you?”

“Ah, someone threw eggs at my apartment, then another guy shouted at me in the showers at the gym. Getting shouted at by a fat, hairy dude while you’re naked is not fun, I wouldn’t recommend it,” Jean leaned back against the chair, his hands resting lazily over his abdomen when they could have been buried between her legs.

“I had to take action when they got a hold of my mother’s home address,” Jean finished saying, a tired expression on his face. “It’s why I left town for a while. I had to move her somewhere different, I had to get another apartment.”

“Jean, I had no idea.” Mikasa said. She had been so preoccupied hiding from the public, that she hadn’t bothered to check on him. The marriage of their two characters had affected them the most, out of all the cast. “Why didn’t you tell us anything? Connie kept saying you must’ve gone away with some model.”

“I don’t like any models, Miss Ackerman, and I don’t have a girlfriend…and you had to deal with them as well, I’m not putting it against you,” Jean said, shaking his head in the most charming way possible. “We still have to promote the show, and deal with the award season, don’t we? I can’t imagine it’s going to be pleasant.”

“It won’t be…I’m not looking forward to it,” Mikasa sighed. She still had a few months of her contract, and this quiet time after the final episode was just a brief break from her fake relationship with Eren. But tabloids were already speculating; fan accounts in particular wondered why they had not been seen together in public. “I’m sorry they’ve given you so much shit, Jean.”

“It’s the price you have to pay for marrying the most gorgeous woman in the world, even if it was just acting,” The music was louder around them, and he had to lean against her body to be heard. His perfume was like sandalwood and champagne, a delicate, manly scent that sent her imagination spinning. “They haven’t tried attacking you, have they?”

“They haven’t found my mom’s address,” Mikasa replied, not wanting to admit she’d been called every name in the book both on social media and in public. “They haven’t been nice to me on social media.”

“Just so you know, I’ve been fighting every dick who has called you names on my twitter page,” Mikasa smiled. She’d seen it; she’d seen all the little and big arguments he’d gotten into to defend her, to demand respect for her and the rest of the cast.

“I’m sorry I’ve been quiet. I…I’m a shitty friend,” she said, lowering her face.

Jean reached out and held her chin between his thumb and index, tugging her head upwards gently. “Not at all, I saw the edits those assholes did,” he whispered. Despite the loud music, his voice was all she could focus on. “You don’t deserve any of that. You deserve sweetness and adoration.”

“It’s the price you have to pay,” Mikasa said, breathing heavily. He felt so close, it was almost like his face was a magnet . “It’s the price you pay when you are with the most handsome man in the entire cast.”

“We’re not together yet,” Jean whispered.

“Yet?” Mikasa asked, already seeing where it was all going.

“I wanted to wait until your contract was finished,” he tucked her hair behind her ear, tracing the way to her lips with his index finger.

“Don’t,” Mikasa ordered. His mouth was on hers before she could add another word, her hands tangled in his hair, and his hands around her waist…exactly in the place they had been meant to be for years.

________________________

He had never seen a woman more beautiful. He’d been pining on her for years, unable to see another, unable to hold another without thinking about her, wondering how her beautiful lips would feel on his, or how her body would feel pressed against him.

Everyone in their close circle knew about the contract the network had with Eren and Mikasa, their stupid lilttle publicity stunt to sell more of their merch. And while Eren had never been bothered with having secret lovers, Mikasa was too much of a good person to keep someone hidden.

She’d had no boyfriends for the duration of the series, well aware that most people thought love was meant to be shown, a trophy to be displayed to the press. Jean just wished she would have known earlier, about how willing he was and had always been to die for her in secret, anytime, whenever she asked him to.

His phone rang, a message from her. I’m coming.

Jean smiled as he wrote his reply. Can’t wait.

You there?

He replied immediately. He was there, like every night ever since the night in that bar. He always waited by the vending machine, always wore a cap and sunglasses. The precautions were his idea; he’d never considered how obsessed their fandom would be with her and Eren’s relationship, but he’d received enough hate now and was aware.

He couldn’t imagine what they would say if they found out they were…were they in a relationship? Jean wasn’t sure. For the last two weeks of spring, they had not spent one night apart from each other. And it seemed she intended to keep seeing him throughout the summer. And Jean could never refuse her.

Mikasa opened up the garden gate and stepped into the pool of light from the hotel lanterns. She wore a hoodie and tiny shorts that showed her beautiful legs, and also the widest of smiles when she saw him run to meet her.

She jumped in his arms and surrounded his waist with both legs, and his neck with her arms. Her mouth touched his, and all common sense left his mind. Her lips were a dangerous weapon, he realized. If used correctly, they could send him into a mindless, bottomless passion that could only be stopped by getting more.

“I didn’t see you at the photoshoot,” she whispered against his mouth.

“I only got to see you from afar,” he kissed her deeper. “I don’t get why they wanted to photograph us in different groups.”

“You’re here now,” she tightened her grip around his waist. Jean smiled against her mouth when she started caressing his head, rubbing his scalp the way he’d told her he liked. “Jean, I missed you.”

“I missed you too.” He kissed her chin, her cheeks, her forehead and the back of both ears. As he came up to her lips again, Jean guessed the spell of her presence was working its magic again. “I love you.”

And, to his surprise, she kissed him harder before whispering. “I love you too.”

Saying he was happy would have been an understatement. Jean was higher than the clouds, he was a star combusting from all the love in his chest. Mikasa giggled in his arms as he started spinning in the middle of the empty courtyard. Jean knew as well as he knew his own heart that the image of her throwing her head back to laugh would be imprinted in his mind for the rest of his days.

“Hey, Jean?”

“Yes, my darling?” He asked as she straightened in his arms, covering his neck with tiny pecks of her lips. “What is it?”

“Take me inside,” she whispered. “Make me yours.”

Jean smiled like a stupid high schooler. She was his, entirely his, and he cared not that they could not tell anyone, he did not care at all.

________________________

“Oh, shit,” Jean moaned loudly. Mikasa looked up from her place between his legs, where she had been pleasing him with her mouth for ten minutes. She licked his glans and stroked the base of his cock, an unspoken question in her eyes. Jean reached out, caressing her face with the back of his hand. “Please, let me do it to you.”

“You’re sure?” She asked, opening her mouth to take him in her mouth whole. Jean clenched his teeth as he felt his cock prying her throat open, certain that if he put his hand against her neck, he would feel the bulge of his member there, moving up and down. She pulled it out after a few minutes, stroking it as she spoke. “You don’t want to finish in my mouth?”

“I’d rather have you finish in my mouth,” Jean smiled.

“Are you sure?” she asked, putting his cock back in her mouth to suck on its head.

“I’m totally sure,” he sighed, his member throbbing inside her mouth. He pulled her arm gently, urging her to come up. Mikasa crawled up his body, leaving a trail of burning kisses on his abdomen, torso, neck and face. “Come here, use this chair.”

“You’re being silly,” she laughed. Jean laughed alongside her as he grabbed her thighs and moved her so she could sit on him. Mikasa straddled his face with trembling legs; they’d been doing this for plenty of weeks now, and these things still made her giddy.

“Oh , shit,” she squealed when she lowered herself onto his mouth and nose. She rolled her hips, finding a comfortable position, shivering against him as Jean’s tongue worked to give her pleasure.

The secret meetings were his favorite part of the day. Each night spent with her was a gift, a gift he feared would end the moment the final episode aired. Despite what everyone thought, and despite all her hard earned strength, Mikasa was a sensitive woman, and the backlash would affect her. She was too sweet; sweet, with a kind heart that was prone to injury under the right insults. She was—

“So fucking wet, I’m so wet,” she moaned, pressing her pussy against his nose, riding him to orgasm in slow motions. “Jean, your nose…”

“I know,” Jean managed to say underneath her. “I know, just let yourself go.”

“Lick me harder,” she asked. One of her hands was using his hair as reins, while she kept the other against the wall to keep her balance. “Jean, do that thing with your tongue and your lips please.”

“Yes, gorgeous,” he moaned; he began to kiss her as if he were kissing her mouth, using his tongue to stimulate her clitoris softly, but with plenty of intent. Mikasa’s breathing soon became erratic, and she pulled on his hair more. “You like that?”

“Ahhh….Jean,” she moaned, riding him more vigorously. She was about to come. They’d made love enough times by now and he knew the signs of her orgasms better than he knew his own. The squeals meant she was close, but whenever she started moaning his name, that meant the onrush of juices was about to be spilled into his mouth.

And Jean would drink eagerly, always looking to get drunk with the taste of her. This time it was not the exception. “Jean,”

“Please, cum on my face, just cum all over my face,” Jean begged, resuming his kissing. He put his hand on his cock and stroked himself. He wanted to finish at the same time. He wanted to come, and rest in her arms, and then fuck her the rest of their night together.

Mikasa pulled on his hair and gasped, her voice becoming impossibly high for someone that always looked so put together, so quiet and collected. He adored that; it gave him a raw, animal pride to know he was the cause of such noises.

“Jean, I love your tongue,” she shouted. “I love you inside me. I love you.”

That was enough for him to release the orgasm he’d been saving for his moment. She screamed, and he groaned as he placed his mouth against her entrance, his nose against her clit, to catch all the juice that flowed out of her. At the same time, Jean’s orgasm spilled on his belly and her back.

Mikasa fell on his arms after he’d cleaned her. She’d wiped his face and kissed him too, unashamed of tasting her fluids on his tongue and lips.

“We need to get soundproof walls when we get the house,” she told him as she settled into his embrace to watch the city lights shift in the black canvas of the night. “We should ask Reiner the name of the guy that did his house.”

“We will,” Jean kissed her neck and held her by the waist. “Are you sure you want to do it?”

“What do you mean?” She asked, frowning.

“Mika, you know what that contract means,” he said in a low voice, as she turned to lay on her back to fixate her eyes on him. “Baby, I don’t want people harassing you, I don’t want the network to give you shit.”

“The contract finishes when the final episode airs, and Eren and I aren’t together,” Mikasa reminded him. She pouted, and a wrinkle appeared between her eyebrows. “Do you not want to be seen in public with me?”

“You’re misunderstanding me,” he cupped her face with one hand and kissed her lips, hoping she could feel the love radiating from his body. “I want to go out in public, I want to kiss you in public. I adore you, I love you with every fiber of my being.”

“Then, what are you scared of?”

“I’m scared for you,” Jean replied, leaning in to kiss her forehead. “Mikasa, I saw the comments, I saw the videos people made, and I see how people worship this relationship they think you and Eren have—“

“Relationships end, new ones begin,”

“Do you think these people will see it like that?” Jean asked. He didn’t want to think about the atrocities he’d seen about both her and her character; he did not want to think about how the idiots in the fandom would despise her if their relationship was discovered. “They’ll be vicious…and I know you’re strong, but I can’t watch them tear you down and know it was my fault.”

“Then, what do you suggest we do?” Mikasa asked, sniffing. Her eyes were red, and his soul ached by the sight of her being sad. “Do you want us to meet like this from now on? Should we get married in secret, should I pretend that the children you give me are Eren’s?”

Jean smiled and kissed her again, part of his heart elated that she was thinking so far in advance. “I just say we wait until the hype dies down,” Jean suggested, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear. “I adore you, Ackerman, I truly do.”

“I don’t want to keep secrets,” Mikasa said, shaking her head. “I don’t want to keep secrets to keep you.”

“I don’t either.”

“I should’ve never said I love you,” she sniffed, sitting up while covering her breasts with the blanket. “It’s probably the worst thing you could have heard. It’s a burden, a burden that’ll never give you peace.”

“No, no, don’t say that,” Jean sat up and kissed her; he kissed her as this was his last night on earth, as if she could disappear at any given moment. “Your love is the sweetest thing that ever happened to me. I want to go public, Mikasa, I swear. There is no other woman, okay? No one else but you. There has never been.”

“I know that.” She said, her nose red from the tears she’d been holding back.

“Then why are you crying?” He begged to know, kissing both of her cheeks.

“Until the hype dies down,” she repeated, looking at the window as a single tear escaped from one of her eyes. “It’s been weeks since that chapter came out, and people still hate you and me. How long will it take for it to die down? A year? Two years?”

“We will wait,” Jean took both of her hands in his and kissed her knuckles. “Us not telling the press doesn’t mean we can’t tell our friends, our agents, our parents.”

“Our parents?” Mikasa asked.

“I want you to meet mom as soon as possible,” Jean said with a huge smile. “I’ve talked to her about you. She wants us to go to her lake house for Christmas.”

“Why hadn’t you mentioned it?”

“Because I was waiting for your contract to be over to start making all these plans,” Jean said. A fake relationship it might be, but he respected the ties that came with it. He hadn’t wanted to muddle things, not when she was still out on scheduled strolls with Eren when the awards season began, not while she was still giving interviews about Eren.

“Should I bring my parents?” Mikasa asked.

“Yes, please,” Jean kissed her knuckles again. “We’ll be away from the press; it’ll be just you and me, Ackerman, I swear. I love you.”

It hurt him, in truth. As much as he adored their secret love, he still wanted to go out with her to every red carpet, every event; he wanted to post silly videos of them to his social network profiles, he wanted to shout to the world that he belonged to Mikasa and no one else.

But her mental wellbeing came first. He did not want fans harassing her; he did not want her to feel guilty because of the harassment he would face. Besides, he knew how the world was for women. A slip, and their career could be ruined. He didn’t want that for the love of his life.

It would be best to melt in each other’s arms and keep the news in their tightest of circles.

“Are you sure you’re okay with that?” Mikasa asked. This time, she took his face with both hands. “Jean, we will have to keep the relationship a secret.”

“Do I get to have you?”he asked. “Will that mean I’m all yours, and you are all mine?”

Mikasa smiled. “Of course, Jean. I love you.”

“As long as I have you, I am happy,” he assured her, pressing his forehead to hers for a moment before he started to kiss her. “I love you too.”

At some point during their kiss, Mikasa put her open palm on his chest and laid him back down. Her mouth slid across his neck and chest and went back to his cock. She parted her lips and took him whole, sucking the whole length of him until he hardened in her mouth.

“You and I are going to end up dehydrated,” Jean joked as she climbed back on him, straddling his dick. Mikasa laughed breathlessly, her pretty face red and sweaty by the time she put him inside her.

“Why would you get dehydrated?” She asked, a cheeky glint in her eyes as she started bouncing on his cock slowly, her breasts swaying up and down for him. “I just gave you plenty to drink.”

Jean laughed and lifted his hips to meet hers. He was exhausted -a common effect of having made love four times in a row- but he simply didn’t want to refuse her. Their meetings would become more sporadic the closer they got to the premiere of the very last episode, and perhaps there would be even less during award season

“Harder,” she asked, using his pectorals to maintain her balance as she rode him. Jean grabbed her waist and brought her down against him, fucking her harder, just as she had asked. Her walls surrounded his cock in a warm, tight embrace that threatened to drive him insane every single occasion they made love.

Mikasa leaned forward to exchange a kiss with him, moving her hips up and down relentlessly, moaning against his open mouth. His dick slipped out of her, and while she was busy replacing herself, Jean took one of her nipples in his mouth.

He gave it a soft lick, feeling it harden and smiling wickedly as he gave it a tiny bite, making her squeal. “You’re so sensitive here,” his finger found her clit, that sweet button of hers that brought forth her loud, squeaky voice. “And here,”

Jean sat up so they could both move against each other, her legs now enveloping his waist. He kissed her mouth, then went to lick her nipples again, relentlessly stroking her clit. “You’re sensitive all over, aren’t you?”

“You’re much the same,” Mikasa moaned. She pulled his hair back and bit his neck, sucking on it as she grinded against his cock. “You’re a puddle when you’re around me, Kirstein.”

“I am,” he agreed, his voice distorted, mad with pleasure. “I can’t get enough of you. I can’t kiss you enough, I can’t fuck you enough.”

Mikasa smiled and bit his lower lip before licking him. He put his hands in her hair and pulled, drawing out a long, loud moan out of her. Her chest went up and down quicker now, her body taken over by the same animal pleasure as his. Jean smiled; he could have spent a thousand years in these nights.

“Jean,” she said, taking a moment to breathe, leaving his dick inside her. “Stay the night. I don’t want to share you with anyone.”

“You won’t,” he assured her, pecking her lips. “I’m yours, all yours.”

Mikasa smiled and brushed her nose against his, but whatever words she’d been about to say were silenced by her phone ringing underneath the pillow. “Is that Eren’s ringtone?”

“Yeah,” Mikasa replied with a chuckle, kissing him. “Leave it.”

“What if it’s important?”

“It’s never important with him. He probably got into a fight with Reiner,” Mikasa was nibbling on his neck. “I’m going to leave a thousand marks on you tonight. You’ll have to wear a turtleneck for the premiere.”

“Mika, Eren never calls at this time.”

Mikasa sighed in defeat, then showed him her open palm. With a smile, Jean reached her phone for her and put it there. Before she answered, however, Mikasa rolled her hips a couple of times, clenching his cock inside her.

“Wait, you need to pull it out to talk to—“

She put her fingers against his mouth, his cock inside her, and took the call, putting it on speaker. “What is it?”

“Dude, I’ve been calling you for an hour,”

“I was busy,” Mikasa said, moving her hips a little more. Jean bit his lower lip and closed his eyes at the way she clenched her cunt around his cock, forcing himself to not moan too loud.

“Are you with Jean?”

“You’re on speaker, yes,” Mikasa said.

“Hey, Jean,” Eren greeted. “She’s not being too annoying, is she?”

Jean shook his head, as if he were talking to him in person, too caught up with the woman riding his cock to think of a logical answer. “No, no, not at all. She’s…perfection.”

“What is it, Eren?” Mikasa asked, moving nonstop.

“You said you were going to that beachside hotel, right?”

“Yes,” Mikasa said, now starting to jump on Jean’s dick, grabbing his face to press it against her breasts, so he could nibble on her nipples. Jean did whatever she asked silently, trying not to think of all the teasing they’d get from Eren if he figured out what they were doing.

“Ah, shit, you need to get out of that hotel.”

“What?” Mikasa asked.

“Reiner’s reporter friend just told him his magazine sent a bunch of photographers your way,” Eren explained, his voice acquiring an urgent tone of voice. “Someone saw you checking in and now everyone is saying you and I are on a secret getaway. People want pictures, and there’s a couple of fans tweeting they can hear you screaming.”

That was enough to get her to stop moving. “Shit.”

“So, you need to get out of there,” Eren said. Mikasa stared at the phone, her eyes suddenly serious, the inklings of an idea taking over her expression.

“No need,” Mikasa combed his hair back and kissed his mouth. “This is our chance, don’t you think? They want a picture; they can see Jean and I together on vacation, and we don’t need to give any explanation.”

“She’s right, Eren,” Jean said, returning her kiss. “This is our chance. We can–”

“Check twitter, now,” Eren said. Jean grabbed his phone and handed it to Mikasa, who unlocked it and went straight to the app. She didn’t need to search her name –she was already a trending topic, and Jean’s front page was flooded with hundreds and hundreds of tweets about her supposed location.

Romantic Eremika getaway?!

Isn’t Eren in Paris?

Is she with someone else?!?!

She’s a slut, I told everyone since s3.

We should’ve known she’d cheat.

Some threads were accompanied by an endless string of awful names directed towards Mikasa, and his mentions had already begun filling up with questions about his own whereabouts.

She’s with Kirstein, y’all will see.

He was seen boarding a plane just yesterday.

The’ve been dating for weeks now.

Some tweets were scarily accurate, in fact.

“See why you can’t say anything?” Eren said after a minute. “Apart from the network suing Mikasa, those people are gonna get fucking vicious. Is that what you want, Jean?”

“Stop scaring them,” Reiner said on the other end and, from the sounds of struggle, Jean guessed he’d forcibly taken the phone from Jaegar. “Hey, we’ve got Eren’s agent dealing with the Paris rumors, you two just get moving and leave that hotel. Can you do that?”

Jean closed his eyes when she moved away and he slipped out of her. And while all he wanted was to cuddle until dawn, there were more pressing matters at hand. She put her clothes back at the same time as he did, both working like a perfectly synchronized machine, their routine for whenever people tried to catch them learned to perfection.

“Are you two actually in Paris?” Jean asked as he put her clothes in her suitcase, and she got his toiletries from the bathroom.

“What? Are you and Mikasa the only ones that can go on a romantic getaway?” Reiner replied from the other end. “Just make sure you two get to a safe place, away from everyone.”

Jean hummed in affirmation, noticing Mikasa was finished with packing. “Alright, we’ll be off. Wish us luck.”

“Don’t fuck it up, Mikasa,” Eren shouted from the other end. “We need to keep up appearances until the Emmys, understood?”

Mikasa hung up the call with a roll of her eyes, and Jean rubbed both of her shoulders in hopes the gesture helped relieve some of the stress. “Do you want me to punch him when we see him again? Because I can totally do that.”

“No, I don’t want Reiner to punch you,” Mikasa stood on her tiptoes and kissed him on the lips. She turned to look at the balcony window, from where they could already see the flashing lights from the photographers outside. The hotel had a strict security policy, but that wouldn’t stop photographers from sneaking in and trying to get a glimpse of Mikasa and Eren…or Mikasa cheating on Eren. “I think we should leave.”

“Where to?” Jean asked. Both their homes were at least five hours away by plane, and neither could step into an airport, with her name trending on all the social networks. If anyone saw them within close proximity to each other, the onrush of hate—

“Don’t overthink,” Mikasa said, grabbing his face to kiss him. Her tongue brushed his, erasing all thoughts about what could happen from his mind. He hugged her by the waist, bringing her closer to his body in a warm embrace. “You rented a car, didn’t you? There’s places we won’t be found. Just drive up the road, and we’ll figure it out.”

“You sure?”

“I’m not done making love with you tonight, Kirstein,” she assured him, with a flirtatious grin.

Jean smiled as well, brushing her nose with his. More lights flashed outside, which told him they would not be leaving through a door this time, either. Jean brushed his lips against hers for a couple more seconds, hoping they could find a discreet enough place for the night.

“Garden gate?” he asked.

“Garden gate,” she agreed.

__________________________________-

“So, eremika for the win, yes or no?” the reporter asked, his question followed by a round of applause and cheers from the crowd. Mikasa smiled and scratched the nape of her neck, exchanging a brief glance with Sasha, on the other end of the table, who rolled her eyes. Eren, Armin and her had been seated together, and to her left, the producers had placed Jean. She was sure that would give people plenty to talk about. “In the show and in real life, right?!”

“Yes, of course! Screw that husband!” Eren said, putting an arm around her while laughing without a care. Mikasa smiled for the cameras, breathing heavily. Did he not know the contract had days left? One week, and they would announce their break up. She could already feel the winds of freedom and backlash she would receive, and he was adding more fuel to the oncoming fire.

“What about Ms. Ackerman?” the reporter asked. “How is your relationship going?”

“Fucking dick,” Jean muttered under his breath, far away from the microphone so just she could hear him. Mikasa covered half of her mouth with her hand, giggling as the applause in the auditorium died off.

“Ms. Ackerman?” the moderator asked. “Do you want to answer the question?”

“What was the question?”

The reporter smiled. “How is your relationship with Eren?”

Mikasa lowered her hands, pretending to put them on her lap, when in reality she did it so she could hold Jean’s hand. She smiled and nodded, as if remembering the question all of a sudden. “It’s strong, like Mikasa herself!”

The auditorium laughed, and she squeezed his hand harder under the table. The convention had been scheduled two weeks before the award ceremony, which had given them little to no time to spend with each other. Mikasa tilted her head to the side while another reporter asked Levi about his character, now stroking his hand with both of hers underneath the table.

Eren leaned forward, covering his microphone and hers to speak to her and Jean. “It’s just a week, stop putting on a show, you two.”

“We’re not,” Mikasa hissed in return. “I’m just holding his hand.”

“In front of a whole audience,” Eren insisted, tapping his temple a couple of times. “Look, I don’t like this whole thing either, but at least put an effort, Mikasa. There’s so little to go, don’t fuck it up.”

“Fuck off, Eren,” Mikasa muttered.

“Sorry, these three are having a little moment there,” the moderator said, making the audience laugh. Shutters went off, and lights flashed before her eyes when the cameras focused on the three. Mikasa tightened her hold on Jean’s hand, and smiled. “You guys are close friends, are you not?”

“Yeah, we were just discussing what to eat after this,” Jean said with a charming smile.

“Eat me, Jean!” a girl shouted from the audience, making the rest of the auditorium laugh, except Mikasa. She lowered her head to look at Jean’s hand, firmly intertwined with hers and hidden from view by the table.

“Mikasa’s very picky with her food.” Eren pointed out.

“I’m not,” she laughed.

“Is it hard to go out with them, mister Kirstein?” the moderator asked.

“Not at all,” Jean shrugged, squeezing her hand. He leaned back on the chair, smiling at the audience in a way that made several groups of girls scream. Mikasa bit the inside of her cheek, just to keep herself from rolling her eyes. “They are always gracious hosts.”

“Does their love inspire you to find someone, mister Kirstein?”

“Can we go back to the fucking questions about the show?” Levi snapped angrily. “This show isn’t just about who these three are dating, fucking hell.”

The public loved his character’s attitude, so they merely laughed alongside the moderator for a few minutes before going back to the questions. Eren gave an audible, relieved sigh; the public didn’t know, but Levi was the designated member to deviate reporters’ attention from the uncomfortable, personal questions. Mikasa turned to look at him, wishing she could mouth a thank you without people noticing.

“It’s almost done, baby,” Jean whispered, lowering his face so his voice could only be heard by her. “Don’t worry, we’ll be fine.”

The forum came to an end, and she had to hold Eren’s hand as they walked out of the auditorium, as they took the pictures with their fans and signed autographs. The network managers kept Jean by her side, and plenty of Eren’s fandom glared in his direction whenever they passed by him for an autograph.

“When is your wedding?” a girl asked, standing between them to take a picture.

“We don’t know,” Mikasa said, before Eren could answer. “We will see.”

“When, though?” the girl insisted. “We want to see Eren be a dad!”

Mikasa snorted and eyed Eren, who was busy arguing something Reiner was showing him on his phone. “I doubt he’s got it in him, to be honest.”

The girl laughed nervously and walked away, clutching the poster she had signed for her. The queue had gotten smaller after three hours of nonstop work, and she guessed most of the people dressed up as titans were there for Reiner and the other warriors. One of the women in the group even had a fanart of Eren and Reiner kissing in her hands.

She stepped away from the autograph table at the same time as a couple other cast members; she poked Jean’s shoulder twice as she passed by him. He finished another man’s autograph and took his leave from the table, patting Armin and Connie as he passed them by, seemingly distracted by his phone when in reality all he was following her steps.

The backrooms of the convention center were reserved for cast members only, and even there she knew the danger of getting caught was high. So, she moved without turning to look at him, her back straight as she walked aimlessly through the long hallways of the convention center, her eyes scouting the place for the perfect room to talk…and she knew she’d found it when she found the empty dressing room.

She pulled out a pin from her hair, looking around to make sure nobody would notice, and unlocked the door in a couple graceful movements. Jean was casually leaning against a pillar, his eyes still on his phone. She signaled him to move when she unlocked the door, and he went to her without protest.

Mikasa made sure to shut the curtains and secure them so no one could see them from outside. And Jean didn’t let a second pass after he locked the door to take her in his arms and carry her to the vanity table, where he sat her down.

“I was so sick of those questions,” he stood in front of her, lifting both of her legs to wrap them around his waist. A second later, he merged his mouth with hers. Mikasa threw her hands over his shoulders and surrendered herself to their kiss; she’d been holding back from loving him that whole morning, and she’d missed his caresses.

“I know,” she stroked the back of his head. “Your fans annoy me.”

“I like you jealous, but you have no reasons to be,” he chuckled against her lips, unbuttoning her shirt at the same time as she unbuttoned his. She knew she didn’t. Jean’s life was an open book to her; he’d given her free rein to his phone and laptop, and his agent had shared his schedule with her so they could arrange their meetings. “Are you alright? The fans didn’t get under your skin, did they?”

“I just want to be done with it all,” she rested her face on his shoulder, letting him stroke the back of her head with kindness. She closed her eyes and held him tight; music seeped in the tiny dressing room, a soft melody from a romantic series premiering that season. Jean swayed to the rhythm of the music, and she moved alongside him. “I don’t want to hold his hand anymore.”

“I don’t want you to, either,” he whispered, kissing the side of her head. “But you do look good together, I’m not gonna lie. You two are pretty.”

Mikasa straightened to look at his eyes. “You and I look better together.”

“Oh, we do?” Jean asked, arching an eyebrow. Mikasa smiled and nodded, feeling a coat of red permeating her cheeks. “To be fair, any couple you’re a part of is automatically hot, just because you’re there.”

“You love kissing my ass, don’t you?” Mikasa snorted.

“Oh, I love kissing your ass in more ways than just compliments,” Jean bit her earlobe, stirring the memories of their long nights together, and Mikasa spread her legs a little wider. She’d decided to wear dresses for their conference, because of the easy access they provided. He rubbed a hand against her pussy, over her underwear, and sighed. “Someone’s wet already.”

“Stop it,” she laughed, deepening their kiss as she pulled her underpants aside and he unzipped his pants. Jean held her face with his two hands, his eyes on hers as his cock entered her wet pussy, slowly prying her open.

He pressed her against the mirror every time he thrusted inside her, and Mikasa closed her eyes in pure delight when he reached the deepest parts of her; it had taken a while to get used to how big he was, but she’d gotten there. Now, she knew exactly all the pleasure this man could give her, and she adored it, just as she adored watching his contorted face whenever he fucked her, how he tried to hold back his moans and how he always failed at it.

“You two better be practicing lines in there, or discussing your career moves after this,” Levi shouted from the hallway. Jean was startled, but he didn’t stop moving his hips against hers, he didn’t stop sucking on her nipple nor caressing her clit, leading her to an orgasm. “People outside are asking about you two, and I can’t keep snapping at reporters.”

“We’re coming,” Mikasa managed to say, just as Jean placed three fingers against her clit and rubbed. “We’re coming, two minutes!”

“It’s gonna take me more than two minutes, ma’am,” Jean groaned against her breast, looking up at her while he nibbled on her nipple. Mikasa laughed and pressed him tighter to her body as he fucked her, suddenly forgetting all about Levi.

“Is she in here?” a male voice asked. “We just want to ask her some questions and take pictures. Is she with Eren?”

“She’s not feeling well, get the fuck out of here!” Levi shouted.

“I have a backstage pass! I just want to ask her some questions!” the reporter replied, and Jean stopped moving inside her, and Mikasa clenched her fists in frustration. Could she not have a moment of peace with the man she loved?

“We need to tell everyone,” she whispered against his ear. “I’m sick of sneaking around.”

“You don’t mean you’ll go out now, do you?” he asked. “Mika, they’re gonna crucify you–”

“No, not now,” she said, stroking his head to calm him. Jean smiled and kissed her, filling her body with warmth and certainty that this could not go on for much longer. Their contract would be finished soon, and she meant to tell the world that the one she loved was another. She had the right to be happy, did she not?

_____________________________

“Do you think you’ll get it?” Armin whispered next to her.

“I’m not sure,” Mikasa replied with a shake of her head. They spoke in low voices despite the crowded theater; rumors flew wilder in a crowd of actors, and lately discretion could have been her middle name, given that news of her “breakup” with Eren had leaked a couple days ago.

She’d kept her social networks closed, and yet she’d still gotten wind of some of the vicious things being said about her. To her surprise, backlash had fallen on Eren too. Rumor had spread about his affairs with Reiner and other male members of the cast, and now the fans were accusing him of cheating.

Others put the blame on her for being so cold, but everyone had their eyes on Jean, who, on paper, had remained single from the beginning of the show. People had their suspicions, and all their suspicions were on Mikasa…or that pop band singer.

“Do you think I’ll get it?” she asked her friend.

From her seat, she searched the tables; they hadn’t sat them together. The network thought it would be best to wait five months after the award season to allow the public to know about her relationship with Jean, after her break up with Eren. In five months after today, she would be able to tell everyone who belonged to her.

That still didn’t mean she didn’t want to see him now.

Her phone buzzed in her hand, and Mikasa smiled when she saw the sender. Three tables to your right.

She tilted her head forward and there he was, sitting between Zeke and Porco, wearing a black suit and a golden tie, the same color as his eyes, speckled with green and brown. His hair was pulled back but he had not shaved his face, but that made him look more attractive.

You look gorgeous.

Mikasa smiled at her phone. You look gorgeous too, she texted back, staring at him until she confirmed her reply had made him laugh.

“People are saying he’s dating,” Armin said casually. “That lead singer from First Gen.”

“People are stupid and believe whatever you tell them,” Mikasa said, scratching the back of her neck. In truth, she had seen the girl come up to him at parties, but Jean always rejected her kindly. Besides, she had full, unbound access to his phone and all his social networks, and he never went past casual “thank yous” with those that complimented his looks.

“He’ll be taken soon,” Mikasa reassured her friend.

“I’m scared for you two,” Armin replied, not drawing his eyes from the stage. “How the public will react, how the press will react…I don’t want bad things to happen to either.”

“What bad thing could happen to me?” Mikasa asked.

Her phone buzzed again, she looked at and smiled. I’ve made a bet on you tonight.

Hope you didn’t bet much?, she replied.

All my dinner, and a couple thousand more, Jean replied, giving her a discreet thumbs up from afar.

“Remember Diana?”

Mikasa snorted, turning to look at Armin. “I am not princess Diana.”

“I know,” he said, giving her an embarrassed smile. “I’m just scared.”

“You’re quite as famous…and tabloids talk quite as badly,” he added, wringing his hands over his stomach in pure concern. Mikasa rested her head on Armin’s shoulder, who patted her leg as if she were some sort of cat, and her phone buzzed again.

Are you trying to make me jealous?

Mikasa giggled. With Armin???

You’re gorgeous, and I’m a possessive man.

Liar, she replied, scrolling back to look at the pictures they’d taken the night before, when Sasha and Armin had stopped for dinner in their hotel room. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d laughed so hard the night before an award show; she could not remember the last time the thought of being nominated and not winning hadn’t haunted her.

I love you, Jeanbo.

I love you too, Mika of my heart.

The words made her blush, and she was too focused on their conversation to notice the thunderous applause that surrounded the auditorium when the presenter announced her as the winner. Mikasa looked up, utterly confused by the fact she’d just won.

With all the drama surrounding her name, she hadn’t thought that the selection board would even consider her, which pained her, because she truly had poured her heart and soul into her performance. But the board had nominated her, despite it all.

And she had won.

“Come here!” Armin hugged her, given he was the one sitting closest to her. Mikasa stood in a haze, welcoming the embraces from her castmates, first from Eren, then Levi, Sasha, Connie, but all she wanted were the arms that belonged to the only man she loved, who had been sat by the network three tables away.

“Congratulations, kid, one of us had to win something,” Eren said, giving her the widest of smiles despite the backlash that had come his way. Mikasa held him tight and the crowd went wild with applause, but this wasn’t what she wanted.

She let go of him and ran, towards the stage, of course. But her first and only stop was at the table where Jean sat. Her other cast members had risen to applaud, and while she wanted to hug them all, her priority was the man with the hazel eyes.

“Well done, Mika! You are–” she grabbed him by the tie and drew him in, sharing a quick, loving kiss with him for a couple of seconds before going to the stage. Some people audibly gasped, while others applauded harder as she climbed onto the stage and took her award, but all Mikasa could think about was the tingling in her fingers while holding onto the statue, and the tingling left behind by Jean’s kiss.

Love wasn’t for show, she knew. But she wanted the world to know about them. She’d had enough of hiding, she’d had enough of secret meetings and running away from cameras. If tonight marked the end of a period that had held her in the chains of public relations,and this is how she would break them.

“Thank you,” she said in front of the microphone. “Thank you, to my co-stars, who I love deeply. Thank you for letting me play this incredible character…and thank you to the man I love, for helping me get through the craziness of our very last season. Jean, I adore you with all my heart, thank you for existing in my life and all the others.”

The crowd gasped, some of them applauded and cheered -Eren amongst those. Mikasa was focused on the man she’d just kissed, however. Jean watched her as if hypnotized for the rest of her acceptance speech, and she set her eyes on him the whole time, her heart full of warmth thanks to him.

________________________

“Oi, Mikasa!” She was being shaken, harsh, as she came back into herself. The shaking was the first thing she noticed. The second thing was the scorching heat, and the rough fabric around her body. Minutes ago, she’d been dressed in silk and lace from head to toe, and she’d stood in the middle of a crowded room with air conditioning.

Mikasa scrunched up her nose. What was air conditioning?

“She’s waking up!” a familiar voice shouted. “Don’t shake her, Jaegar!”

When she opened her eyes, the summer sun was blocked by the two tall shapes before her. Jean and Eren, she recognized them very well; they’d been in that other room with her, however Eren’s hair had been longer, and he’d had pierced ears and a recently tattooed neck.

“Are you okay?” Jean asked, holding her by the arm to help her sit up. His face was much the same as the man he had been in the larger auditorium. Three, four years younger, and with a lot less beard, but it was the same man she had…Mikasa’s cheeks became red all of a sudden. “You collapsed in the middle of the tracks. It was too much sun exposure.”

She looked at her surroundings, recalling what she’d been doing before. Building train tracks, bringing modernization to Paradis island, where there were no air conditioners, award shows, and paparazzi chasing her down a street. “What’s a tabloid? Shouldn’t you be with Reiner right now?”

“What?” Eren asked. “Reiner’s in Marley, Mikasa.”

“Reiner has better tattoos,” she replied in a whisper.

“Armin went to get the cart,” Jean said, hesitating for a moment while giving both her and Eren a look. “D-do you need help getting up?”

She didn’t, not really. She felt quite as strong as before, albeit confused about what had happened, but she was sure she could walk back to their barracks if it was necessary. Mikasa looked up at Jean, at the terror in his eyes, and nodded. The tall boy went to her side immediately and passed his arm under hers, lifting her in a strange, awkward half-embrace that Eren limited himself to look at.

“What was that question?” Eren asked.

Mikasa shook her head, finding she became dizzy whenever she moved abruptly. “I…I had a strange dream.”

“Did you get a headache before passing out?” Jean asked.

“I think so,” Mikasa sighed. She leaned against Jean, letting him carry half of her weight. Her comrade cleared his throat, and she felt tempted to ask him to let her listen to his heart. Something told her it would be beating fast, perhaps the already vanishing traces of what she’d witnessed. It felt like I was looking out of someone else’s eyes…like I was seeing just traces of a larger story.”

“Did you do something?” Jean asked Eren, who’d remained unmoving in his spot. Jean reached out and slapped his arm, urging him to react. “Did you do something with your founding titan? Did you fuck up those paths you’re always talking about?”

“I’m not a god, I don’t know what the paths does all the time just because of my titan,” Eren protested. Mikasa nodded, too overwhelmed with the flashing images of that strange, unknown world to worry about Eren’s wellbeing. “Sometimes, it acts up. It’s like it mixes…with other places.”

“What do you mean, other places?” Jean demanded to know, the hand around her waist tight now. “It sounds creepy, man, was she dreaming of other worlds? Is she gonna get sucked in another world?…Mikasa, what did you dream about? Did anyone hurt you?”

“I think I won an Emmy,” Mikasa said.

Jean frowned. “What’s an Emmy?”

“I’ve no idea,” Mikasa said with honesty. She exchanged a quick look with Jean at her side, and her stomach stirred with a sensation she didn’t recognize. The other Mikasa, the fashionable one who wore fancy clothes and had perfect hair, would have known the sensation better, she guessed.

“Should we take you home?” Jean asked.

Mikasa looked up at him again, but she couldn’t quite put a pin on why the proximity of his face gave her such a strange, nostalgic sensation in her chest. “Yes.”

“Good,” Jean nodded to himself, looking resolute. “You don’t move. I’ve got your back.”

Mikasa felt the corners of her mouth turning upwards. She could allow herself to be vulnerable for a couple of minutes; it wouldn’t harm her, considering she’d passed out from sun exposure. Maybe this way, they would get less hours of work a day, for a little while.

“I know you do,” she said to Jean, offering him a tiny, sincere smile he returned in full.

#Jeankasa #Jean Kirstein #Mikasa Ackerman #JeanMika #Jeankasa week 2022 #Smut warning #nsfw warning #actor AU #ao3 #ff #can you catch all the taylor swift references??

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itslieutenanthawkeye · 2 years

Text

Jeankasa week 2022. Day 6: Royal AU

The lost princess

Princess Mikasa has been lost for almost ten years. When her family in Hizuru offers 80 million for whoever brings her home, her parent’s old squire decides to ser a scheme in motion. What he doesn’t know is that the girl he chooses is the lost princess.

Ao3

She called him Jeanbo. Only her mother had ever called him that, and he tried not to snap against his mother because of all the shit she had to put up with his father. But he owed nothing to the princess. He had been hired as a squire and servant to the heir princess of the Azumabito, Mikasa’s mother. He owed the heiress allegiance, he owed nothing to the little princess.

And yet, he allowed Mikasa to call him Jeanbo whenever she wanted to.

“You fight like a steamed bun!” She laughed, throwing him back on the mud to celebrate her victory from their wooden sword fight. “You are a steamed bun.”

“I’m going to beat you someday.” Jean muttered, wiping the mud from his face.

He knew he ought to be embarrassed that a nine year old could beat him in combat. He was a squire, twelve years of age and on the verge of adulthood, entrusted with the mission to help the heiress of the shogunate in her outings into the woodland. Jean knew his father would have beaten his face bloody if he found out a nine year old girl could beat his ass.

He knew he ought to have been annoyed that she was stronger. But Jean adored it every time she won without effort, without ever losing the grace that characterized her. Mikasa Azumabito was the most efficient warrior he’d ever met,and his twelve year old mind was fascinated by her.

Although, to be fair, he was also fascinated with her hair, with the gray of her eyes, her ability with languages and the delicate way she ate her food. She was adorable, and something inside him knew she would grow to be a gorgeous woman. Marriage offers had already begun arriving at the royal palace. The shogun’s heiress had decided to marry to an eldian commoner who had given up his last name for her, but the granddaughter promised a swift and direct access to the throne.

He didn’t like imagining Mikasa married off to some man as soon as she turned fifteen, gifted to the highest bidder as if she were a horse, which was exactly what her grandfather had been planning to do. Maybe that was why he loved this journey the princess’ parents had embarked on. Albeit dangerous, their trek across Hizuru and into marleyan lands would keep the princess far away from the claws of forced marriage.

“Mikasa!” A voice called, and a lovely woman appeared from the edge of the woods. The shogun’s only daughter, the former heiress to the throne, dressed in her riding gear, with a bow hanging from her back and a set of knives and daggers around her waist. “Your father is getting your things ready. We must move.”

“Why’s that?” Mikasa asked, lifting her wooden sword as if that would protect any of them.

“Wolves, in the distance,” her mother lied, giving her daughter a sweet smile. Jean knew she talked about the shogun’s men. They’d been chasing them on their trek towards Marley for a week now, and they were finally looming over them.

“I’ll keep her safe, lady,” Jean promised, taking Mikasa by the wrist. “You must take care of your health.”

“If anyone is going to take care of anyone, that’ll be me, Jeanbo,” Mikasa replied teasingly, her mind still far too innocent for her to realize the severity of the situation. Smart she might be, but she was still a child. Jean himself was still a child, but he knew enough about fatherly cruelty to understand what the shogun meant to do.

“Let’s go,” Mikasa’s mother urged. “We must go, before tragedy strikes.”

And thus, they had walked towards tragedy.

Growing up with Levi had not been easy, but that was because nothing about the man was easy going. From his obsession with having everything in its rightful place, the need for no dust around his belongings, the need for being clean despite their status, and control of everything about the people around him, there was nothing about this man that was tolerable for normal people.

Mai wasn’t a “normal” person in the strictest sense of the word. And underneath it all, she felt the love this strange father figure had for her. She felt his concern for money, she’d felt it since the tender age of seven, when his marleyan employer had decided to fire all the eldian workers from his factory and they’d had to turn into...Mai didn’t like to call it a life of crime, but she guessed that’s how others would have.

And despite that Levi owed her nothing, he’d still kept her by his side, he’d still taught her the lessons his own father figures had taught him. Through the times when they had a can of tuna to the times when there was pasta with butter five times a week for dinner, he not once let her go to the orphanage.

That was why she hadn’t gone against his suggestion to participate in the selection taking place in the old hizuran theater. She fitted the criteria –she was tall, black-haired, and was around the same age princess Mikasa would have been– and Levi’s leg had gotten just bad enough that their sporadic heists had no longer become sustainable.

There was only so much an eighteen year old could do to bring money to their home without turning to the streets or go further down the criminal world, and Levi didn’t want her to be a full-fledged murderer. Not while this venue was still an option.

“Not that what we’re doing is legal,” Mai said as they ventured through the snow, towards the abandoned building.

“Shut it, kid,” Levi said, limping by her side. “It’s entirely legal, because we’re assuming you are that lost princess, the girl from the posters.”

“It’s a big assumption,” Mai tightened the coat around her shoulders. It was an old, patched up coat that barely kept away the cold, but she’d lined it with newspaper to make it more functional.

“It’s a logical assumption. I don’t know shit about your mom’s side of the family, I barely know anything about your dad, and he was a fucking Ackerman,,” her parents had died when she’d been very young, perhaps when she’d been seven, or eight; and Levi was her father’s distant cousin.

She couldn’t remember them well, she couldn’t remember anything about her life before Levi. Soft caresses and kisses at breakfast, she remembered, but she recalled nothing about their faces, their voices, not even the color of their eyes.

All she’d ever known was that she had woken up one day, shivering and hungry by a lake, and she’d walked with one name in her mind: Mei Ackerman. That was her, or so that’s what her brain told her.

And by the logic of families, Mai had thought that, If she found an Ackerman, she would be kept safe, or at least that’s what her instinct (or half-kept memories) had told her. And thanks to the turnings of fate, she had found Levi, Levi and his strange, fatherly love.

She guessed a girl with a clean memory could pass off as a lost princess. It wasn’t just some lost aristocrat that the Azumabito family was seeking for, it was the lost heiress of Hizuru, the one to take rule of the shogunate once Kiyomi Azumabito, the princess’ great aunt, passed away. The family was looking for her, given that the more the years passed, the bigger their need for a proper heir became.

“I don’t look like a princess, little guy,” Mai muttered as they lined up. Marley had a high number of hizuran migrants, and the queue was full of gorgeous, tall young women of hizuran descent. A couple wore silk, elegant dresses and were wrapped in thick fur coats. “Look at everyone else. Levi, they’re not going to buy it.”

“The only lost wars are the ones we don’t fight in, kid,” Levi replied curtly.

“These people are professional, Levi,” Mai hissed, casting a significant gaze at one of the slender, delicate girls talking to a man that must have been her agent.

“Yes, a reward of eighty million will get plenty of people moving,” Levi said. He grabbed her hair and forced her to focus on him. He didn’t seem mad; no, there was just a permanent annoyance in his face not even the best of teas would erase. “That’s why we’re trying, too. I’m your representative, for all you know. If these guys don’t choose you, they’re assholes and we’ll move on to the next thing. If the Azumabito believe you, then we’ll be rich–”

“And I’ll be a shogun.”

“Who cares? I’ll be with you every step of the way,” Levi said. “I’ll keep your bratty ass from doing stupid shit, understood? Besides, you’ll have a new family. That would be great, wouldn’t it? A rich great aunt.”

Mai looked into her adoptive father’s eyes. He was the only family she’d ever known, she didn’t need anyone else…but Levi’s leg would get worse without medical treatment, and doctors were too expensive in Marley. On top of that, the only jobs she’d gotten so far were running errands for the local brothels, and a waitressing job that got her more harassment than tips. If they did this well, they would be set for life. Levi would not have to lift a finger again; he would be the shogun’s protegée, living an easy life tasting the fanciest teas Hizuru could offer, going to the theater every night and helping her keep her mask up.

“I’ll try my best.” Mai said, nodding.

“That’s all we can do.”

_____________________________________--

Jean sighed as the actress took her leave. She was gorgeous as a sunset, with a curvaceous frame, big eyes, and a long, elegant neck that spoke that she was a royal. She’d told them about her life in Marley, about how her parents had never felt like her parents, how she’d always known she was meant for something more…the typical bullshit he and Erwin had been hearing for the past two days.

“She seemed promising, this Rin.” Erwin pointed out, sitting next to him with the lit cigarette in his lips. He had the girl’s life sheet in his hands, and he was examining it as a doctor would examine a patient. “She speaks four languages, she’s got the approximate height, she’s got the complexion—“

“She does not look like her,” Jean shook his head.

“What?”

“The princess was different,” Jean grabbed the stack of papers in front of him and went through them. “All of these girls, they’re too perfect, too.tall, too thin. The princess had a different air about her. She was perfect in her own way, but she was strong. These girls are too weak. The princess had a roughness about her.”

“You know an awful lot about the princess considering you were just their manservant for what? Five monts? A little less than a year?” Erwin looked at the map splayed out before them on the desk. “Is it a week’s journey from Hizuru?”

“It’s a whole month,” Jean snapped angrily. “And I was not their manservant. I was a squire. There’s a difference, understood, Smith?”

“Did you become close friends with her parents?”

Jean looked away and folded his arms over his chest. “No, I didn’t. But that doesn’t mean—“

“Then there’s no difference,” Erwin said, ending their discussion with one phrase. Jean clenched his fists but held back the snarky remark in the back of his throat. This was a symbiotic relationship, he reminded himself, an equally beneficial relationship between two people that were not necessarily best friends (not that Jean had many friends in the first place). Smith had the contacts, Jean had the knowledge.

It wasn’t extensive, granted. But being a squire for the hizuran kingdom had only lasted six months, and he’d spent four of those stuck in kitchens and running errands for the princess’ mother. Then, on his very last month, he’d spent it on the run.

It hadn’t been the princess’ fault, that her grandfather had begun talking about marrying her at twelve, to a man in his late thirties, and Mikasa’s mother had been well in her right to run away to keep her daughter from that fate.

He still remembered the princess on the road, how she’d cried when they had left the palace behind, how she’d gotten used to practicing her combat skills with him, how they’d become friends as the days went on, how she’d screamed for her mother when they’d been caught by the shogun’s soldiers, right before she’d fallen in the river…

Jean shut his eyes. He didn’t want to recall the ambush. He didn’t want to recall all the blood, the royal corpses being carried back to the castle, while the princess disappeared beneath the water and Jean was left alone on the shore, unable to bring the princess nor her parents back to life.

“Was she your friend?” Erwin asked after a moment, noticing the change in Jean’s breathing.

“Kind of,” Jean lied. In fact, she’d always been too shy to accept his offers to play. She did, however, like to spar with him. Either with swords or her hands, she always proved how apt she was at combat. Jean guessed it was one of the reasons why he’d fallen in love with her. He would curse the late shogun all his life, as much as he would curse the damn river that had taken her life.

“What do you mean we can’t come on the fucking stage? What the fuck do you mean?” A man shouted from the main doors. Jean and Erwin turned around to look at the new arrivals, both walking towards the stage without a care for the security guard Erwin had hired. “This was a fucking open call, was it not?”

“Sir,” the security guard stammered. “The dress code, and your boy—“

“Are you being a classist dick?” The man arguing was short and skinny, with surprisingly tidy hair despite his raggedy clothes. The boy with him was much the same, but his haircut was different, and he was slightly taller.

“I’m asking you to leave if—“

The short man pulled out a knife from his pocket, and was surprisingly quick in approaching the security guard to press it against his neck. “I asked if you’re going to be a classist dick.”

“Holy shit,” Jean shouted. “Holy shit, why do you have a knife?!”

“Sir,” Erwin came to his feet while showing the man both of his hands, as if to prove he carried no weapons. “Sir, there is no need to become violent. It was an open call, I can assure you, your clothes are not the reason why you won’t audition.”

The short man eyed Erwin up and down. Despite that the blond towered over him, the man looked unfazed, not at all intimidated. “And you are?”

“Smith, Erwin. And he is my business partner, Jean Kirstein,” Jean frowned and he looked at Erwin, wondering why he’d just given the short lunatic their real names. “I know you are upset, but it would be ideal if we…know your name, before you slit anyone’s throat?”

“Levi,” he pointed at himself with his knife, then at the boy. “This kid would like to audition.”

“Hi, sir,” the boy muttered.

“Go on that stage,” Levi said, pushing the boy gently towards the steps.

“I’m sorry, sir,” Erwin smiled at the short lunatic, who already had his knife down. The boy focused on Erwin, then on him, and Jean’s chest fluttered at the piercing nature of his gaze. It seemed like he could read him open like a book, also from the scars on his hands, he was sure he could also split him open like a coconut. “The open call was for women sir. I am deeply sorry, but—“

“Child, get a grip,” he reached out and took his companion’s cap off, to then comb his head back with awkward, almost fatherly moves. Then, he slapped his back. The boy immediately straightened, holding the cap in his two hands. “She’s a girl. We keep our hair short because of lice, and she’s just too rough for her own good.”

“She’s a girl?” Jean asked from his seat.

“I am,” the girl said, almost challengingly. “Name is Mai.”

“Mai?” Jean repeated. The girl nodded, her expression stern. There was none of the finesse of the other actresses in this girl. She looked even poorer than he was, and ever since the death of the princess, Jean had always been plenty poor. “What’s your last name?”

“We’re both Ackerman,” Levi said, stepping in front of her, as if trying to keep her safe from his judgemental look. Jean could not help it; the job called for heavy judgment, considering they were going to deceive the hizuran government “She’s my kid.”

“She doesn’t look like you.” Jean replied. Despite looking disheveled, despite that the bones poking out of her skin made it clear she was plenty poor, this girl was too pretty to be related to this tiny, skinny, violent man.

“Thanks for pointing out the obvious, dimwit.” Levi snapped.

“Sir, I apologize for my business partner,” Erwin began, deferent, yet firm. He would take no violence from this little man, but it seemed that he also didn’t want him to storm out of the room in a rage. “Is your daughter of age?”

“She turned eighteen just last month,” Levi growled.

“Ah, just like our lost princess,” Erwin raised his eyebrows in a friendly gesture the little man did not return, and Jean had to wonder what possessed him to treat a lunatic with such kindness. “Miss Mai, do you want to audition?”

Mai nodded, her eyes serious but her expression so adorable, Jean had to bite his inner cheek to keep himself from staring. Erwin invited her on stage and told Levi to sit a few chairs away from him, to his right. Jean didn’t bother to ask him why he was being so nice, however, because now Mai that had climbed onto the stage Jean had a few seconds to focus on the sway of her hips, on her chest, voluptuous and perfect despite being malnourished.

Alright, so underneath the grime and the bad haircut was a pretty young girl. But all the actresses before her had been beautiful, enough to write songs about, and that didn’t mean they were anything special.

“Say your name, please, for the records,” Erwin said on the microphone in front of her.

“Mai Ackerman,” the girl said, clearing her throat. She wrung her hands over her stomach and ran a hand across her short hair, her movements elegant despite her haggard appearance and the worn out clothes.

“Mai Ackerman,” Jean clicked his tongue. “Mai Ackerman, Mai Ackerman…it doesn’t feel right. Did your dad name you?”

“She came with the name.” Levi grunted from his seat. Jean and Erwin turned to look at him, but the little man was too focused on the knife on his lap, which he was polishing with a piece of fabric he’d brought forth from his pocket.

“What do you mean she came with the name?” Jean asked.

“Why are you asking me the questions?” Levi said, without looking at him. “She’s auditioning, not me…or do you think I’m pretty enough to pass as your lost princess, you dimwitted piece of`-”

“Alright, we’ll focus on your child,” Erwin said, opening his eyes wide at Jean in silent pleading. Just don’t say anything, he told him without words, don’t say anything so we can get this over with. “Miss, what is your age?”

“Around eighteen.” Mai replied.

“What do you mean around eighteen?” Jean asked.

“I-I’m not sure when my birthday is.” Mai admitted, lowering her head.

Jean turned to look at Levi. “Did your wife give birth to her or did she just drop her at your door?”

Levi sat up on his chair, eyeing Erwin for a second before he focused on Jean. “I don’t have a wife, you dumbass. I never had a wife.”

Jean let out an exasperated breath. They’d been interviewing people for a full three hours, and none of them had been good enough for their cover story. Apart from the fact that none of the actresses were close to princess Mikasa’s charm, all of them had too much past, too much attachment and background to Marley. “So, your lover, whatever the hell she was-”

“She didn’t drop anyone,” Mai snapped loudly. Jean turned to look at her. “I wasn’t birthed.”

“Please, elaborate, miss.” Erwin asked.

“Levi bought me,” Mai admitted with a click of her tongue. “I was around nine when-”

That was enough to set Jean’s anger coursing through his veins. He stood from his chair, but Erwin stopped him with his body before he lunged in the little man’s direction. “We want no sick bastard here, you heard me?!” he shouted, wishing he’d brought a knife for the occasion. “If you brought your child bride to audition, you’re fucking sick in the head to think we’ll let you go without calling the cops! She’s eighteen, you sick fuck!”

“What the fuck are you implying, you big oaf?” Levi said, unbothered. He narrowed his eyes and twisted the knife over his thumb without drawing blood, and somehow that was ten times more intimidating than Jean’s outburst.

“What your child here said is serious, sir,” Erwin said, unable to hide the anger in his voice.

“I didn’t mean he bought me as a bride,” Mai said, clearing her throat to draw their attention, too constricted with guilt from the misunderstanding to look at anyone as she spoke. “I misspoke…Levi found me at the winter market, a woman was selling me.”

“What?” Jean said.

“She’d found her the day before, in the woods,” Levi said, shrugging. “She couldn’t remember shit, all she knew was that she needed an Ackerman, any Ackerman…and she was lucky she found me.”

“Why were you looking for an Ackerman?” Jean asked. “Why couldn’t you remember anything?”

“That’s none of your business,” the girl said.

“It is my business,” Jean replied a second later. “We’re about to pull off a big job. A dozen others are looking for the princess all across Marley and the Azumabito know it. They know there are gonna be scammers. We need to know all your backstory, not just details.”

Mai took a deep breath, as if preparing herself to punch him. Jean wasn’t sure he had it in him to hit back; not because she was a girl (or maybe yes, partly because she was a girl), but because it would be a tragedy to damage such a lovely, perfect face.

“I can’t remember my parents,” Mai said in the end, deciding to take the peaceful route. “I remember our caravan was attacked by wolves.”

Jean and Erwin exchanged a look, and he knew what his partner was thinking right away. This was interesting; several orphans had auditioned so far, but none without memories, none with a clean slate.

“Whereabouts?” Jean asked.

“I’ve no idea,” Mai said with a shrug. “I can remember a woman screaming, and then darkness…and then I remember the woman’s market stand, and she decided to make a day’s worth of earning with me.”

“Did she sell you to anyone before him?” Jean asked, unsure if he wanted to hear the answer.

Mai shook her head.

“She kept screaming ‘Ackerman’, like it was a prayer or some shit,” Levi said. The room had fallen incredibly silent, Jean noticed, as if the world was paying close attention to Mai’s tale, as if the world were mourning the loss of her family. “It seems her family was related to mine somehow.”

“On her father’s side?” Erwin asked.

“Why the fuck should I know?” Levi asked in retort. “It’s a big family, most of my uncles and aunts like to fuck a lot. I don’t fucking know how many kids they’ve left in the towns they’ve been in. She might as well be my father’s great cousin twice removed, for all I know.”

“That makes absolutely zero sense.” Jean muttered under his breath.

“What was that?” Levi asked.

“Nothing,” Erwin replied, leaning against Jean to whisper. “We’re going to have to give this man an etiquette class.”

Jean nodded, surprising himself with the fact they were both coming to terms with Mai being a more than apt candidate. On paper, Mai Ackerman was perfect to play the part of a lost princess. Orphaned around the same age as the princess’ death, with no recollection of her past, her only family bonds a clan with a common last name…

“What happened to the market woman?”

“Levi killed her.” Mai replied, with such nonchalance Jean had to wonder if Levi killing people was a regular occurance. “She tried to ask for me back. She said Levi had only paid for an hour with me.”

“She was a sick piece of shit,” Levi said with a shrug. “Wanted to sell her to other men.”

“And so you raised Mai?” Erwin asked.

Levi shrugged again. “I did what I could.”

Jean turned to look at Mai. “Do you speak hizuran?”

“A lost princess wouldn’t speak it,” Mai replied.

“She spoke it well at nine,” Jean said. He recalled it well, how easily both eldian and hizuran had been for her. The princess had been brilliant. She’d been nine, a whole three years younger than him, and perhaps she had been years of knowledge ahead of him. “But I guess these ten years were enough for her to forget some words.”

“I can introduce myself in hizuran and I can hold a simple, tiny conversation, that’s about it.” Mai said. Jean raised his eyebrows; that was much more than what he and Erwin would have expected from a street rat. He nodded and scribbled it down.

For each girl, he had a list of pros and cons. With Mai, the pros list was becoming longer. Pretty, stood atop the list. Then, clever, good for comebacks. Strong. Kind?. Dark hair. Right features. No past. A little bit of hizuran in her brain. Pretty. No significant family bonds to bite them in the ass. Tall, about as tall as the princess would have been now. Very pretty.

Extremely fucking pretty, he scribbled down.

“Do you think you’re the lost princess?” Jean asked. He’d posed the same question to every girl on the stage. All of them had given him beautiful speeches on their reasons why they were most definitely the lost princess, and how much they longed to be reunited with their family and be joined in marriage with an Azumabito man.

“I mean, I could be?” Mai replied, shrugging much in the way her adoptive father did. “I can’t remember my parents, and I lost my memory from everything before I was eight. I could be the princess, or I could be just another street rat with parents that got bit in the ass by poverty. It could be either.”

“How can we believe you?” Erwin asked.

“You can believe me, or you can not believe me,” Mai said, not adding anything else.

Levi rolled his eyes; he clearly had expected a better performance from his daughter. Part of Jean feared he would be mean to her afterwards, but the kindness in his eyes when she stepped down from the stage told Jean the little guy was much more understanding of her grief than what he showed on the surface.

“So, did she get it or not?” Levi asked, passing an arm around his daughter’s shoulders.

“We’ll need to discuss your audition and the others’,” Erwin said, stacking the papers in front of him once again. The one yellowed, wrinkly sheet was theirs, however it had been filled with surprisingly neat handwriting. “You didn’t write your number here, to contact you if anything is needed.”

“Does it look like I have a home phone?” Levi clicked his tongue and rolled his eyes. “Look, you guys either give us an answer now, or don’t say shit.”

“Give us ten minutes,” Erwin said. He put his hand on the man’s arm, and the little guy stared at him carefully, surprising Jean when he didn’t grab the big blond and threw him across the room. He and Mikasa walked out of the theater, talking in whispers like a father and daughter would have. “So, what do you say?”

“I say we have three more days of auditions to go,” Jean replied, focusing on Mai’s scribble that was supposed to be a signature. “And they were rough.”

“She fits the profile,” Erwin said.

“I know.”

“She’s around the same age,” Erwin continued. “She’s got no family aside from that man.”

“We’d have to share the profit with that guy,” Jean muttered.

“We’ll have to share the reward with any agent, in the first place.”

“And many girls are the same age as the princess would have been.” Jean added.

“Did you see that face?” Erwin asked. Jean straightened on his seat, trying to scout for any indication of desire in him, ready to punch the blond if he expressed it. Mai was perhaps a whole fifteen years younger, he shouldn’t even be looking her way. Erwin cleared his throat, almost as if noticing his sudden anger. “She’s cute. I’d even bet she would look like that portrait, if we cleaned her up nicely.”

“What are you saying?” Jean asked, hoping he didn’t sound like a hopeful child with his question. “Do you really think it’s her?”

She could not be. Princess Mikasa had disappeared beneath the icy river surface, her body carried to the ocean by the current, lost to him and her grandmother. No normal human could have survived those waters, and the Azumabito didn’t have any supernatural powers as far as he knew.

“I think we won’t find anyone that fits all the criteria,” Erwin crossed a line over most of the names from that morning, then some more from the afternoon. “She’s got the looks, she’s got no family other than that guy. She even talks a little bit of hizuran…I think she’s good.”

“What if we find something better along the way?” Jean asked. In truth, he doubted they would. He looked at his list of pros and cons, realizing he’d written pretty on both sides of the list, about five times in each column. It was only natural to not want to work with a street rat, wasn’t it? There was nothing odd nor strange about his reluctance to accept Mai fit the criteria perfectly.

There was nothing odd in him wanting to keep an impersonal approach to his lost princess. It was normal that he did not want to be attracted to Mai; it would muddle things, and she was already in a vulnerable position, considering she and Levi had nothing waiting for them back in Marley if their plan fell through.

Not that he had anything waiting for him, either.

He looked at the list again. So pretty.

“Erwin.”

“Should I go get her?”

“Please, be quick about it.”

__________________________

The road to Hizuru would not be short, Erwin had warned them. First, they would have to take a train to the continental border, that journey alone last an entire week. Then, they would take a series of buses to reach the ports where Smith had his friends, friends that would take them through the gulf on a five day journey to the northern beaches of Hizuru. From there, they would travel by horse to the capital, which was a whole five days away.

All in all, it would be twenty days before they reached their destination, if the weather was kind to them.

It hadn’t taken much bargaining to get them on the train. In the end, Levi had convinced Smith that he would get to keep a whole twenty percent of the eighty million reward. And Mai guessed “convinced” meant that Levi had threatened the blond man to cut his balls and dick off at the base if he didn’t agree to the deal. And Smith, who was surprisingly calm and patient around her father, had agreed.

If Mai had been Erwin, however, she would’ve kicked Levi in the balls and told them to forget about the whole deal. But she guessed Smith was a businessman, and he saw more profit in keeping them on his side than to let them back in the streets.

“It’s Mikasa, now, Mikasa,” she reminded herself. Jean, the tall, cocky man with the mullet and the stupid little beard, had been the one to give the orders.

“Do you know the princess’ name?” he’d asked as Erwin applied the burning shampoo that would get rid of all the lice and whatever else lived in her tangled hair.

“Everyone knows it,” she had replied

“Own it,” Jean had said without looking up from the notebook on which he was constantly scribbling. She’d noticed it from her audition, and she had the suspicion all he did was write down her flaws and ways he and his business partner would correct them. “From now on, we’ll call you Mika, it’s how the princess’ father used to call her. That’s your name, Mikasa, Mika to your friends. In Hizuru, you will be Mikasa all the time. Remember that. When you think of yourself, think about Mikasa. Mai is dead.”

Mikasa had never been close to the name, in truth. Mai felt fake, like a stupid little mask her brain had come up with in the aftermath of her parents’ end -not that she remembered much more than a woman’s screams, mind you. So, if Mai had to die so she and Levi could reach a more comfortable life, so be it. Mika felt more like her, in any case.

“We have a month, two months tops for you to cram all the information you need,” Jean had said from behind a screen, as Erwin and Levi cleaned off the grime from her body. For some reason, she didn’t feel uncomfortable naked around either of the two. It almost felt like being looked after by two kind, ridiculously moody parents. “I’m not expecting you to behave like a high-society lady, but we are expecting you to know what princess Mikasa knew at nine.”

“Which is?” Mikasa had asked, her expression unchanging. Challenges didn’t scare her. She’d learned how to deceive before, when Levi’s leg was still relatively healthy and they’d scammed people for a living.

“Arithmetics, hizuran and proper eldian, dance,” Jean had listed as the women from the beauty salon combed her hair and fixed her nails. Then, he’d given her more abilities she had to cram inside her as Erwin passed her new wardrobe, a collection of second-hand dresses that had been well cared for to pass off as new. “Riding, obviously, and armed combat. Hand to hand combat, too. Sewing, knitting, music…”

“You seem to have known her well,” Mikasa had pointed out. “Was she your friend? A childhood sweetheart?”

Her words seemed to have sent him into a fuss of sorts, and he’d stopped talking for the rest of the afternoon. His reaction had been enough for Mai -no, Mikasa- to know he had known the princess. In fact, perhaps he’d done more than known her. Perhaps he’d been in love, or at least heavily infatuated.

And her death had caused him to build up a strange, almost god-like image of the late princess Mikasa. In his mind, princess Mikasa was an untouchable, perfect entity, her life cut too short by tragedy, taken away from him before they bonded in adulthood. His grief had been so clear in his eyes, Mikasa had felt the inklings of guilt in her chest.

“We’ll start with hizuran and hand to hand combat, then dancing,” Jean had said as they had climbed onto the train. “A street rat should be able to do that much, am I correct?”

It was hard to not hate him whenever he made those comments. And thus, Mai -no, Mikasa- had decided she would not feel bad about him. She hadn’t planned on doing it in the first place, but she also determined she would not try and be friendly.

She had Levi, and Erwin was plenty friendly to them. She would not put up with Kirstein’s annoying, cocky behavior.

Kirstein.

Where had she heard that name before? Somewhere, somewhere, perhaps she’d heard it in passing at the bar she waitressed at…but her memories were hazy, and Liberio was a huge city. It would not have surprised her if they had crossed paths at a point.

Then, why did it feel like she did not know him from Liberio?

Mikasa knew she couldn’t be the real princess. She wasn’t the real Mikasa, who had been lost to the wilderness far too young. But Jean’s last name rang a bell, an all too familiar bell that told her Jean’s hazel eyes hid much more than what they showed.

Underneath it all, maybe laid a kind boy, a boy who simply was not over his trek from Hizuru to the Marley border, where he’d lost the girl he’d been crushing on.

A boy who had been sweet, playful and always so respectful to the little girl dressed in clothes too big for her, the girl who was always worried about her father’s health and practiced relentlessly with her wooden sword…a wooden sword that had done nothing to stop tragedy, when the girl’s grandfather’s riders had caught up with their tiny group, carrying the scent of death with them.

Mikasa punched the air, opening her eyes just in time to see her fist connecting to a man’s nose. He had been leaning over her, to try and wake her from her dream. “I’m so, so very—“ She stopped talking when she noticed it was Jean the one she had hit. He cursed words that Erwin had forbidden her to say, and fell on his seat, across from her in the booth.

“Oh, it’s just you.”

“Thank you very much,” Jean moaned, covering his nose with both hands. “I’d been wanting a nose job for a while now.”

Mikasa snorted, noticing Levi and Erwin had also entered the booth. The blond had given Levi a new set of clothes that fit him snuggly, enhancing Levi’s waist and his legs. Her father didn’t look elegant or happier by any means, but he was more presentable, which she guessed had been the whole point.

Erwin had two tiny booklets with him, which she recognized as her and Levi’s passport. Being dirt poor, she and Levi did not have any travel documents. Mikasa doubted there was a record of her birth, in fact. That had made it easier for the tall blond to get the false documents they would use to leave Marley.

“You two kids are not getting into any trouble, are you?” Erwin asked. From what Levi had been told, he was one of the most ruthless businessmen of Liberio, capable of sacrificing his teammates and partners for the benefit of his plans.

During the three days they’d all spent together, though, Erwin had reminded her more of a kind, old step father, incapable of harming her or Levi even if he tried. Then again, appearances could be deceiving, and Erwin could stab her father in the back at any time.

“If you are causing trouble, there’s a wagon where they’re carrying coal,” Levi said, handing Mikasa her passport. She leaned against him to see the name in his document. His said Levi Astreides, while hers read Mika Astreides-Smith.

“Are you two going to pretend you’re married?” Mikasa blurted out. “Is that advisable?”

“I’m not gonna eat his ass just because a paper says we’re married, kid,” Levi grunted, putting his cap over his face to lean against the glass, as if hiding his expression from her and their companions.

“Hizuru accepts gay marriage, it’ll be a simpler explanation than to try and come up with a fake business plan. We adopted you and Kirstein as kids, and we are coming to Hizuru so you, young lady, can get in touch with your roots,” Erwin explained as he shuffled through his stack of papers. Something rang of lies there, Mikasa noted, but she did not want to point it out in front of Levi, considering how prone he was to violence.

“Smile, sis, we’re on the same boat together,” Jean said, his nose still red from the punch she’d given him. As much as she didn’t want to admit it, part of her was glad she hadn’t broken his nose. It was a pretty nose, it fit his face too well to ruin it.

“Don’t call me sis,” Mikasa grunted, bringing her legs up to her chest.

“Now, you can’t sit like that,” Jean said, tapping her ankle with his passport. “We gave you a whole makeover, a free makeover. You can’t sit like this.”

Mikasa lowered her legs and sat the way Erwin had taught her, holding back the string of obscenities that passed through her mind. In a way, Jean was right; she needed to get accustomed to the idea of acting like a royal. It was a fine line, the one she was meant to walk. She needed to pretend to have the mannerisms of a royal, but at the same time the roughness of a girl who had spent half of her life as a civilian.

And while the lost princess could be her, Mikasa knew the chances of that were slim. She’d been found in rags, half-starved and half-frozen from the lake she’d fallen into. Royals were born, not made, and Mikasa did not feel like one.

“So, surprise quiz,” Erwin said, clapping his hands once; he dipped in his bag and brought out a black and white picture of a man dressed in royal hizuran clothes. “Kiyomi’s cousin, lord Arisugawa, where did he use to vacation in winter?”

“Does that matter?” Levi asked. Mikasa leaned forward to look at the man, and her head began to throb dully when she focused on his stern expression.

“It matters,” Erwin said a second later. “Princess Mikasa was clever, cleverer than many people years older than her. Her memory was better than the shogun’s. She would remember such a thing.”

“Rikubetsu,” Mikasa replied, before Levi could utter another word. Erwin turned to look at her with his thumb up, and Mikasa shrugged. “He liked the hot springs, and the winter sports.”

“Yes, very good, Mika,” Erwin said.

“He also had a sleepy cat. A big, fat maine coon that liked getting into the hot spring pools for some reason,” the words spilled out of her mouth before she could stop them. Images were an avalanche, and her common sense wasn’t stronger than her mouth, it seemed. “Cats hate water, but mister Kyo loved it. He was always in it.”

“Mister Kyo?” Levi asked.

“The fat cat,” Mikasa replied nonchalantly. “Lady Arisugawa didn’t like it, but her husband loved that cat like his own child.”

It was like coming out of a trance, when she stopped talking. The influx of images stopped as abruptly as it had come; as if some force of nature had closed the tap to her subconscious. Mikasa did not understand what had just happened.

Ever since she’d woken up half-frozen, things sometimes worked slower for her. The woman had said she would probably remain dumb for the rest of her life, given that she’d lost too much oxygen underwater. Levi often said it was just her memories trying to come out. She wasn’t dumb, her brain was just taking longer to catch up to the world she’d woken up in.

And what a ridiculous time her brain had chosen to start working at full speed. All those images had felt so real; she could have sworn she had been in that pool with that hairy cat, laughing with her mother as lady Arizugawa squealed in terror.

“Good work revising, child,” Erwin congratulated her. He looked through his papers, but Mikasa had recognized the clever glint in his blue eyes. She noticed Levi’s careful gaze, too. Worst of all, she saw the shock in Kirstein’s hazel eyes, the tiny spark of recognition there in the field of gold.

No. She wasn’t her. She was not a princess. She was just a girl with a bit of lag in her brain because of the minutes she’d spent under the freezing water. The information, she’d read it in Erwin’s notes, and it had taken her a while to remember it all.

If anything, this was proof that she wasn’t dumb.

“I need some air,” she stood, avoiding any questions that arose in Erwin and Levi as she stepped out of the train booth. How was she supposed to know where all of that had come from? She couldn’t remember anything before waking up in the middle of that frozen forest.

“Oi, Mika?” Jean called.

But Mikasa didn’t turn to look at him. Perhaps her thoughts were too overwhelming, perhaps it was the throbbing pain in her head, or perhaps the fact that the name Mikasa felt too familiar, too much hers.

________________________________--

Seeing her on the audition stage, Jean had known Mai -no, she was Mikasa now- he’d known this new Mikasa was pretty. He hadn’t expected, however, to see just how stunning she looked when showered and cleaned.

This new Mikasa was, simply put, astonishing. A gorgeous flower growing amidst the grime of the poorer neighborhoods of Liberio, so beautiful and smart that it pleased him to know they were taking her away from the poverty in which she’d grown up in…not that she seemed to care. Apart from gorgeous, she was strong. Stronger than himself, than Erwin and her father, combined.

“Stop it,” he told himself as he chased her down the train.

He’d told himself he would not cross any lines. If they had taken this new Mikasa out of the poverty in Liberio, then she was the one who was lucky. They were not running a charity organization, and he had no obligation to be kind.

“Hey, Mika, what’s wrong? Are you okay?” he said, with a much softer voice than he should have, as they both arrived to the very back of the train, to the little outdoor platform that served as an observation deck when the train came to a stop, which was whipped by the gusts of wind when the train moved.

He’d told himself he would not cross the line, and ever since they’d signed the contract with her and Levi, Jean had been forcing himself to be as detached as possible. Treating her sweetly was unavoidable, with such a kind, pretty face.

“I’m sorry,” she said, looking at the mountain road they were leaving behind. “I needed air.”

“This is more like a hurricane breeze, don’t you think?” Jean asked, raising his voice over the howl of the wind.

“It kind of is,” she agreed. Mikasa closed her eyes and rested her back against the railing, facing away from the mountains, unbothered with the rattling of the thin metal bars that were holding her weight and keeping her inside the train.

Jean stepped closer, offering Mikasa his hand. “Oi, come here, grab my hand.”

“Why?”

“Because it’s dangerous there,” Jean replied quickly, eyeing the emptiness behind her, the rocky road she could be thrown against if the metal bars gave in. He didn’t like seeing her against the flimsy metal railing, not when the train was still moving.

The corner of her mouth curved upwards. “You’re scared, Kirstein?”

“I’m not!”

“It seems to me that you are.”

“I’m scared because you’re reckless!” Jean replied, unsure why the conversation felt so familiar. Noticing his nerves, Mikasa rolled her eyes and outstretched her hand until she took his, and he breathed easier when he pulled her closer. “Come on, Mika, or your dad isn’t going to get a dime if you pass away.”

She rolled her eyes again, but she allowed him to lead her back inside the safety of the train, where the wind wasn’t blowing as hard and they were not in danger of being thrown onto the tracks if a curve became too pronounced.

“You’re too reckless,” he told her, resting his forehead against the nearest wall to take deep breaths. Seeing her so close to danger had awakened a primal fear in him, a strange fear that assured him he would do anything to keep her safe, away from any harm, now he had the strength to do it.

But…she wasn’t his Mikasa. His Mikasa had drowned in that frozen river, years ago.

“Why are you being so kind?” She asked.

“Because you’re an investment,” Jean said a moment later. Mikasa nodded knowingly before she began taking steps to get away from him. His body moved quicker than his mind, and he outstretched his hand to take a hold of her wrist. “Wait a second.”

“What is it?” She stepped back until she stood right in front of him, her face close enough for him to see the undertones of blue in her gray eyes.

“I know it might seem weird to you, but I don’t like seeing a pretty woman in danger,” he admitted through clenched teeth.

“And who is the pretty woman in question?”

“Obviously, me. I didn’t want to be thrown against the rocks, thank you,” Jean replied, arching an eyebrow. Mikasa smiled despite her reluctance to, and lowered her head to chuckle. That was better. Smiles were better for her; not that she looked bad with a frown. He just liked seeing her happy.

“Have you ever been to a hot spring before?” He asked, deciding it would be best to stay away from any possible bickering.

Mikasa shook her head. “Mai was poor, remember?”

“Remind me to take you to one, in Hizuru. There’s public hot springs in the capital, almost in every neighborhood,” he said, recalling the few times he’d visited one during his brief period as a manservant. “You’ll love it.”

“Did you used to go with your parents?”

“No, they weren’t with me when I served in Hizuru,” in truth, his father had been the one to send him there, through his various connections in the government. “My father wanted me tougher, a proper man, according to him…I was too chubby before, too weak.”

“You don’t look weak to me,” Mikasa pointed out.

“Not now. What happened in Hizuru made me tough,” Jean let out a breath, unsure why he felt so comfortable talking about his father to another. He could not remember the last time he’d brought him up in conversation. “And when I came back, it bit him in the ass. He never hit me nor my mother again.”

“I’m sorry,” Mikasa said, after a moment of silence. She lifted her hand and put it on his shoulder, squeezing him.

“Don’t be,” Jean shook his head. “It helped me find out about the hot springs in Hizuru, remember? I‘ll take you all to one, as soon as we get there.”

“I can’t say I’m looking forward to seeing Erwin naked,” Mikasa admitted, his words forcing a dry chuckle out of him.

“I can’t say I am either,” Jean agreed, unable to keep himself from staring at the curves of her body for a brief moment and wonder how good she would look only covered by the mist from the hot spring pools. “Let me just say, it’s not like I look any good, all sweaty.”

“Don’t worry. I’ll probably look like a steamed bun.” Mikasa muttered under her breath. Her words brought memories to the forefront of his mind, and Jean could not help but to stare at her face, intently, as if wanting to force memories out of her.

“Do you remember anything about your parents?”

Mikasa stepped back and shook her head. “I’m not her, mister Kirstein. She died, did she not? Did you not see her die?”

“Yeah, I did,” Jean smiled to himself, dropping the subject. He’d seen her go under the water; her hand had slipped out of his, and then she’d disappeared as the current had dragged her away. “I’m sorry, Mai, I should not—“

The gorgeous girl clicked her tongue. “It’s Mikasa now, remember?”

“Sorry,” Jean said. Mikasa took a step back, breathing calmer. “Are you sure you’re okay?”

“My brain acts funny sometimes,” she replied, and Jean had the urge to ask more about it. He wanted to know more about this new princess, so pretty and delicate and strong at the same time. “I can tell you about it, after I put something in my belly.”

“I’ll get us food. Spinach quiche sounds good to you?” Mikasa nodded in response, and Jean hesitated a moment, but ended up outstretching his hand to her. “Friends? For now? Or maybe a friendly truce?”

Mikasa shook his hand right away, as if she’d trusted him with her life all this time, despite the initial awkwardness of their interactions. “Friends,”

Jean smiled widely and let go of her hand. As he walked down the hallway, wondering if their budget would allow them any fancy dinners along the way, an idea came to his mind. It would make her chuckle, and he liked the sound of her laughter. He turned around and bowed deeply, as if they were standing in the middle of the hizuran palace. “Thank you, princess. I’m looking forward to working with you.”

Just as he imagined, Mikasa chuckled, and bowed back. “You’re welcome, Jeanbo.”

Jean straightened, dragged back into reality by that simple word. “What did you say?”

Mikasa, his Mikasa, blinked, confused. “It’s a silly word, isn’t it?”

“No,” Jean shook his head and gave her another smile. “I’ll be back right away.”

He walked as quickly as he could towards the food cart, but the word, the nickname she’d used resonated in his brain as loud as a thousand waterfalls would have. It felt as if his heart was beating against his mouth; only two people in the world had called him that. His mother, and her. His princess.

Jean couldn’t even breathe when the realization hit him. The details fit, the memories fit, even her face caused the same reaction in him now as it had years ago. Mai, Mika, was her. Levi’s adoptive daughter was the lost princess. His lost princess had come back to him…and he was taking her to the very place that had caused their separation.

#Jeankasa #JeanMika #Jeankasa week 2022 #jean kirstein #Mikasa Ackerman #Royal AU #fic #ff #ao3 #no smut today #escritos

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itslieutenanthawkeye · 2 years

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Jeankasa week 2022. Day 5: Enemies to lovers+Criminal AU

The shadow chase

Ao3

He’d followed their track for five months now. Five months chasing whispers, vague hints, mistakes in their way of work, clues left behind, had all led to this moment. Now Jean had them. He had them in his hands; six heists in a row, six times the intelligence department had been left in ridicule thanks to their cleverness. No more.

Jean walked across the streets of the floating city, which was a sight to gawk at all on its own, with rivers of light blue water instead of cobblestone streets, gondolas instead of vehicles, beautifully embellished bridges instead of overpasses for pedestrians. There was a festival taking place, but that didn’t surprise Jean. The rats had chosen the reverie of a festival as big as this one to go unnoticed. Those bastards had no idea what was coming to them, Jean thought with a smile.

“I need you to be alert, Kirstein,” a voice rang in his ear.

“Yes, Commander,” Jean said, procuring to not move his mouth as much.

“These people are dangerous,” Smith said on the other end. “If you get caught, shoot to kill.”

“I will.”

“Don’t die,” Smith said after a moment. “And that goes for you all.”

That was easy to say from his control room, but Jean didn’t say that out loud. Soon, if this task went well, he would be the one inside a control booth, leading the operations remotely and earning a huge, sweet paycheck for himself and his mother.

And he would be a better commander. He would complete tasks to perfection, he would gather an even stronger intelligence team, and he would listen to his subordinates when they told him they felt watched, followed.

For months, Jean had tried to rid himself of that feeling. Smith told him he just needed vacations, Sasha said she needed a cleansing, Connie said he needed a psychiatric ward.

Jean was sure he had a shadow.

“Look like a tourist, Kirstein,” his commander said.

“He looks like an underwear model, sir,” Connie complained on the line. “He’s gonna draw attention even if he walks in socks and sandals and a big blob of sunblock on his nose.”

“That’s very specific, Connie,” Jean said. “Kind of reminds me of you on that cruise.”

“Focus, kids.”

“Yes, sir,” Jean said immediately.

The art museum stood at the very center of the city. A place too blatantly public for anyone to attempt a robbery, the local government had chosen the museum to display the hizuran collections…but the local government didn’t have the information their agency did. If Hange’s predictions were correct, this was the place they would hit next.

He paid for the entry fee and walked in the museum. Even with the festival outside, its halls were fairly crowded with onlookers. Jean tried to be discreet, but his height and body always made that difficult. Everywhere he went, more than a few heads turned in his direction, and today wasn’t the exception.

A group of schoolgirls on a field trip passed next to him, most of them turned to look at him and smiled. When Jean nodded and said “Good morning”, the whole group giggled nervously and walked to the other end of the hall, with their heads turned over their shoulders to look at him as they walked away.

“There’s plenty of time,” Erwin said in his ear. “Make sure you get a good sense of the museum. I’ll give the call.”

Sighing, Jean stood in front of a painting, a beautiful depiction of a black-haired, female knight in battle with a depiction of death. Smith always took into consideration his inability to go unnoticed in a crowd, and yet he still sent him as a field agent every time. Jean appreciated it, he knew it was the viaduct to a promotion as a special field commander, but part of him wished he could go back to being a sniper alongside his friends from the academy.

“You got my students riled up there,” a woman next to him said. Jean turned to look at her, clever comeback at hand, and the words died in his mouth. She wore a lovely blue polka dots dress covered by a white cardigan, and her hair was short, cut to her chin, black as night itself. Her eyes were a combination of gray and blue he’d never seen before; and her pale face was marked right above the cheekbone with a tiny, rose scar. “What is it?”

“I…nice hair,” Jean cleared his throat and looked back at the painting.

“Thank you,” the woman said. Jean gave her a sideways glance and noticed she was focused on the painting as well, taking notes in a paper that seemed to have pre-prepared questions.

“So, I riled up your students?” Jean folded his arms over his chest. “Shouldn’t you be with them?”

The woman sighed tiredly. “They sent us in groups of two. The teacher with me is plenty strict,” she tilted her head forward with an arched eyebrow, and Jean followed her gaze until he focused on an old lady rounding up the schoolgirls around a painting. Jean snorted. “See? She’s scary, and grumpy.”

“Scary enough that you don’t want to go over there and help?” Jean asked with a smile.

“No, I came to talk to the man who got my students excited,” the woman replied. “You looked lonely.”

“Work keeps me busy,” Jean said, giving her a sideways glance. “No time for much anything else.”

“What do you do for a living?” the woman asked, curious.

“Rat extermination,” Jean lied. Missions were not the place to talk truthfully, despite the fact that this was the loveliest teacher he’d ever had the luck to gaze upon. “There’s an infestation in the city and it’s been keeping me up.”

“Now, that is offensive.”

“What is?” Jean asked, turning to look at her.

The woman arched her eyebrow. “Someone like you should not be working with rats.”

Jean smiled. “It pays well, gives me good money if I do the job well.”

“No time to have fun, though,” the woman pointed out, biting her lower lip. Blood rushed to his cheeks; he’d never had the idea that teachers could be this bold. To be fair, her face was too striking for the simple garments she wore; they fit her perfectly, but Jean couldn’t help but to wonder how she would look in tight fitted black. “You’re staring, sir.”

“Sorry,” Jean cleared his throat again. “You’re a lovely woman.”

“Thank you…” the woman wrung her arms over her abdomen, giving him another smile. Ah, Jean could have stared at that smile for hours. “I just realized I don’t know your name.”

“What a terribly impolite teacher you are,” Jean replied.

The woman let out an amused breath. “What is your name?”

“Careful, Kirstein,” Smith said in his ear, through the communication device. Flirting wasn’t forbidden, besides there were still two hours to go before the rats they’d been chasing took their hit, and the woman with him was as lovely as a sunrise, and her attention was all on him. He could spare the time to talk to her, he could spare tiny bits of honesty.

“Shawn,” he said, carefully pronouncing the words so they sounded like Jean.

“It sounds french,” the woman pointed out.

“What about your name?” Jean asked, leaning forward just enough to smell the woman’s perfume. She looked up at him with half-lidded eyes and let out a slow breath, as if his presence rattled something inside her.

“Mimi,” she replied with half a smile.

“Mimi,” the name rolled off his lips, melting in his tongue like butter. “You don’t look like a Mimi.”

“Excuse me, sir, that’s how my mother used to call me,” the woman replied haughtily, losing her prideful stance a second later. And despite the fact she’d been joking, Jean couldn’t help but to think that the haughty, elegant persona fit her a thousand times better.

“Do you have plans after your school trip?”

“I have to round those girls up and take them home, make sure they get to their parents safely,” Mimi waved in the direction of the few students who were looking at their interaction. The girls giggled and looked away, all blushed.

“It seems I’m not the only one they have a crush on.” Jean pointed out.

“They do not have a crush on me,” Mimi replied.

“I would, if you were my teacher,” Jean turned to look at the painting. “Ms. Mimi looks like a model.”

“Oh, I do not.”

“And she pretends to be humble,” Jean added, making her laugh a little more. “Do you have time after this?”

“Maybe,” Mimi replied. “What do you have in mind?”

“I’d like to buy you a nice dinner,” Jean said. The woman pouted, as if disappointed, and his chest swelled with anxiety. She was going to reject him, but Jean couldn’t blame her. She seriously looked like a model, and she could not possibly want to date a rat exterminator. “What is it?”

“I was hoping you’d say something more physical.” Mimi replied in what almost sounded like a purr. Jean had to bury his nails in the palm of his hands to keep himself from dropping at her feet.

“Physical?” Jean repeated.

“Why does he always get the field job?” Connie said in their intercom. “We’re stuck on a rooftop and he’s securing a hookup for tonight.”

“You’re so dramatic,” Marco replied stiffly. “He’s just flirting.”

“He’s gonna fuck a model,” Connie barked.

“Hey, careful, she sounds like a lady…don’t you fuck her, Jean, she’s a lady,” Sasha, the sniper’s team leader, said, like a mother warning a child about danger. Jean rolled his eyes; protocol called for him to keep his communication line open at all times, but it was hard to keep focus on the lovely girl in front of him with all the idiots talking in his head.

“What is it?”

“Nothing,” Jean said, shaking his head. “You distracted me.”

“Do you want to sneak off now?” Mimi asked, reaching out to tug on the sleeve of his jacket, rubbing her thumb against his palm. Women on the continent were outrageously open-minded, he recalled. It shouldn’t surprise him that she was so blatant about what she wanted to do. “My girls will be fine without me for half an hour.”

“I can’t do all the things I want to do to you in half an hour,” Jean said. In truth, he didn’t want to jump to sex right away. He wanted to take her on a fancy dinner, maybe go see one of the festival street plays and have a late gelatto with her…and then fuck her all night. “Let me take you out to dinner.”

Mimi took a step closer, her long, delicate fingers reached out to caress his arm. Jean took a deep breath in, wondering how many men she enchanted with those adorable, huge gray eyes. “I’m not sure if I’ll be able to sneak out tonight.”

“Why?” Jean eyed the group of school girls, already moving to another hall. “Is it a boarding school you work at?”

“Sort of, yes,” Mimi smiled and squeezed his arm, noticing the group was leaving as well. “You’re sure you don’t want to sneak off right now? There’s a bathroom, just down the hallway. I have about ten minutes free.”

“You must think me a feeble man if you’re just giving me ten minutes,” Jean laughed.

The black haired woman stepped back, tilting her head to the side and looking up at him what could only be a badly concealed desire. Jean smiled, thinking that desire was no new thing. It was like the girl knew him from before, from another life or another encounter, maybe.

“I need to get my group. They’re headed to the south garden, it seems,” she sighed, rubbing a single finger across the fabric of his jacket, until she touched his hand and caressed the palm, her nails neatly cut, painted red. “Your rejection hurt my pride.”

“I asked you out to dinner, ma’am.” Jean chuckled.

Mimi smiled and stepped away from him. “I’ll see you around, Jean.”

“See you,” Jean watched her follow the group of school girls, entranced by the swaying of her hips, her curves noticeable underneath her dress. Several other men looked at her, but she didn’t give them a second of her attention. She walked like an elegant feline, slow yet sure of her steps, ignoring anyone she didn’t deem worthy.

“You’re a dumbass,” Connie said through the intercom. “She sounded like a million bucks.”

“He treated her like a lady, Springer,” Sasha said.

“Showtime is over, children,” Commander Smith said, his authoritarian voice tinged with amusement. Jean felt his cheeks heating again as he realized every single person in the squad had heard his attempts at flirting. “We’ve got twenty minutes.”

“Hey, commander?” Jean muttered, walking towards the northern end of the museum, where their intelligence supposed the rats would smuggle themselves out. “Did you see the emblem on those school uniforms? Did you recognize the name of the school?”

Erwin sighed, amused. “I did.”

“Look up their middle school staff,” Jean said with a smile.

“That’s stalker behavior, Jean,” Sasha said.

“I’m trying to be romantic,” Jean replied. This would be a quick operation; they’d gathered enough intel so far to make it quick and simple. This would be these rats’ very last heist, and a promotion would be waiting for him at the end of the day –a promotion and a bonus he would use to take that gorgeous middle school teacher out on a fancy date…and perhaps a trip to a deserted island.

Jean walked with purpose, only allowing a small part of his mind to wander in his musings about Mimi and how gorgeous she would look wrapped in silken sheets only, a goddess, in truth, locked inside the garments of an innocent school teacher.

“Jean, your chemical detector just went off,” the commander said as he reached the northern terraces of the museum, dragging him back into reality. Jean didn’t stop walking; his friends were on the nearby rooftops, ready to shoot if there was danger nearby.

“What do you mean?”

“Your chemical detector, it’s going off,” the commander insisted, not waiting ten seconds to add. “Kirstein, take off your clothes and run!”

Jean didn’t hesitate. He rid himself of his jacket and shirt, threw them out the nearest window, scaring the people around him, who scattered into other hallways with squeals of sudden terror. He took off his pants and, the moment he threw them in the same direction as he’d thrown the rest of his clothes, smoke filled the entire hallway.

“Deploy all units!” Erwin shouted from his observation unit. “Evacuate civilians!”

It was an odorless smoke, however his arm went numb the moment it was touched by it. It spread quickly towards him, carried by the breeze that came in through the large doors and windows that led to the northern courtyard. Jean recalled studying the direction of the wind that morning, and cursed out loud.

The northern courtyard wouldn’t be their place of entry. No, it would be the place to cause raucous, so their actual escape route would remain unblocked. Jean ran back the way he came from, shouting at everyone he encountered to find the exit, with the school group and their lovely teacher in mind. The smoke he would withstand thanks to his training, but he was unsure if a bunch of middle schoolers would.

So he ran, pushing as many people as he could towards the entrance, desperate to find her before his legs gave in under his weight. He had to take them to safety; where had she said she was going? The southern gardens. That was good; the smoke would take plenty of time to reach that end of the museum…

Jean stopped on his tracks, clenching his fists at his sides as the smoke enveloped the hallway he stood in. “That bitch!”

He ran forward, driven by the blind rage that came after being fooled, but he was only able to advance a few more hallways before he succumbed to the numbing agent Mimi had triggered, from a device she’d surely hidden in his jacket when he wasn’t noticing.

______________—----

Three months later.

In truth, the blunder had been all her fault.

The job had been plenty simple: get the navigational charts and hand them to the buyer by dawn. Sneaking in the Bodleian library wasn’t hard, not for her, who had been trained to the bone to become the perfect asset to the Ackerman organization, as her eldest uncle so delicately called it.

The mistake had come when she’d gazed upon his face, that rugged, bearded face with sharp angles and pools of molten gold that mediocre beings would describe as hazel. Three months had passed, and she still felt bad about putting that trigger on his clothes.

She’d wondered about him plenty. She wondered whether the smoke bomb had somehow affected his muscular functions, or if it had messed with his marksmanship somehow. He was so beautiful when he shot to kill (Mikasa had noticed that from the moment her cousin had instructed her to keep an eye on the eldian field agents) and she feared the bomb had affected that.

“Kill him,” Eren had told her plenty of times, annoyed to no end. “You’re a better shot than him anyways.”

“I know,” Mikasa often responded.

“Why haven’t you killed him yet?” Eren would ask. “Isn’t he in charge of the whole team that’s chasing after us?”

“That’s Smith,” Mikasa would say.

“Then kill both of them.”

“Smith is mine to kill,” Levi would say from his desk without looking up, always looking for their next assignment, their next way to bring more money to the organization. “Besides, Eren, you’re not an Ackerman. You don’t get to decide who kills who.”

“Jean is only his right hand in command,” Mikasa would add.

“What is he, your boyfriend?” Eren always replied mockingly. “If you don’t kill him, I will.”

“Kirstein is mine to handle,” was her usual reply. And he was hers to handle. She was always in charge to keep him two steps behind their operations, always away from the danger that implied being in Levi’s direct shooting range.

Why? It just amused her to watch him play cat and mouse; it amused her to watch him visit his mother every weekend, it even amused her whenever he brought men and women back to his apartment -which was a rare occurrence, mind you. She liked manipulating actions to see him angered at his team’s failure to catch them.

He was good entertainment, that was all.

But it seemed that entertainment had made her soft. And that face-to-face encounter three months ago in the museum of the floating city had made her stupid. For some reason, she’d thought a man almost two meters tall would be maimed by her smoke bombs. And when she’d seen him again, walking freely and looking as strong as before, she’d taken too much time to enjoy the relief that came from knowing he was alright.

“You don’t need to tighten those that much,” Mikasa groaned when he did the third knot around her wrists. She’d dropped her guard, and he’d trapped her in one of the reading rooms of the upper levels. He’d tied her to a chair using what he had at hand…which somehow stirred that desire she’d felt for him in the museum.

“Rats are sneaky,” Jean replied. He’d stripped her off her jacket and blouse, leaving her in her black undershirt, without any of the knives she carried, nor the guns. Once he’d adjusted her hands firmly behind her and ensured she wouldn’t produce a weapon, Jean moved to the front of the chair, kneeling before her. “A marriage proposal?”

Jean smirked angrily and reached for her skirt. When he enveloped her thighs with his huge hands, Mikasa feared he would try to assault her before his team came. But Jean simply patted her skin, undoing the holsters around her legs and throwing them aside. “You didn’t strike me as the type to use guns.”

“Anything can be used to kill a man,” Mikasa opened her thighs a bit wider. “Even legs.”

“You’re not going to do that,” Jean procured a plastic type of binding from his pockets and wrapped it around her ankles, spreading her legs a little more so she wouldn’t try anything, leaving her underwear exposed to him.

“Take me for coffee first, will you, Kirstein?” Mikasa said.

His cheeks became pink, making her smirk with pride. Yes, she’d been caught, yes, he seemed angry, but it seemed to her that she had the effect from the museum. “Do you think this is funny?” Jean snapped, leaning forward, his mouth close. “You know my first and last name, and I don’t even know yours.”

“I know a lot more than your first and last name,” Mikasa replied.

“What?”

“I know your address, your mother’s name, her address, your gym. Also that blond guy’s workplace? The guy you fuck every three weeks, when you can’t get cute girls to look your way?I know his address” Mikasa said easily, perhaps letting out a little too much of her frustration when it came to the blond man. “My brother says the blond guy is hot, by the way. He wanted to talk to him once I handled you.”

Jean clenched his fists, and Mikasa had to wonder if he would have the gall to hit her. “Just for how long have you been stalking me, you-you–”

“You can say it,” Mikasa said. “Bitch. How long have you been stalking me for, you bitch? Say it.”

“I won’t call you that,” Jean said through clenched teeth, but his words brought out a tiny smile out of her. This tall, ninety kilogram man was refusing to curse her out loud, even after her stunt at the museum. He noticed her expression and leaned forward again, not as close this time. “This is no laughing matter. How long have you been spying on me?”

“It’s your fault for being the best in your team,” Mikasa said. “And it’s been about six months.”

“Six months?!” Jean asked.

“Perhaps more,” Mikasa shrugged as best as her bindings allowed it.

“More?” Jean repeated.

“My cousin wanted to keep an eye on the special field officers that had good eyes for our mistakes, and you were the best of them,” Mikasa sighed, wondering if he’d put some sort of truth serum in the bindings he’d used. “And it so happens I am the best of our entire squad.”

“So he sent you out to spy on me, to figure out my address, my mother’s address,” Jean snapped and straightened, pacing back and forth between her and the table, growing angrier the more items he added to the list. “You found out about my friends, my friends with benefits, my fucking gym, my grocery store…what else?”

“Your doctor, your dentist, your hairdresser and your pottery club,” Mikasa stopped herself, noticing he’d grown restless. She was aware of the gun on his waist, and maybe he would use it if she kept annoying him. “My superiors sent me to kill you, by the way.”

“What?” Jean asked, stopping on his tracks.

“My cousin sent me to snipe you out on your run with that freckled boy and the baldheaded guy,” Mikasa explained. In truth, she also knew their names and addresses, but they weren’t half as good at their job as Kirstein, and she did not want to upset him more. “He sent me to put a bullet in your head.”

“Why me?” he managed to ask.

“Because you’re the best. You’re Erwin’s right hand for the special operations team,” Mikasa said; he was smart, she knew it, but she could also tell he was one of those men that took a little while to process things. That’s why it had been so easy to use her beauty to trick him in the museum. “You’re smart, and you and your commander Smith almost caught us that one time in Paris.”

Jean frowned, her words had sparked a memory. “D’Orsay?”

“D’Orsay,” Mikasa nodded solemnly. It had been the first time she’d ever seen Levi so angry. It had been the first job where the art piece had almost been harmed in transportation.

“I almost caught you?” Jean repeated.

Mikasa rolled her eyes. “No need for me to repeat that.”

“Why haven’t you killed Smith?”

“He’s a target for someone else,” Jean opened his mouth, and Mikasa noticed his intentions to go further into that conversation. It wasn’t just her loyalty to Levi that would keep her quiet, but it was the fact that she knew nothing behind his reasons to want to catch Smith himself. “No, I won’t say who.”

Jean let out a breath, looking twice as handsome with that tired smile. “You’re very bold, for someone who’s been trapped.”

“All things come to an end,” Mikasa said. She hadn’t wanted to be caught in such a dire place as the library, with so few exits and so many places to be cornered, but she’d gone in knowing the risks, and she accepted her mistakes. Seeing his face had distracted her, and he’d caught her. Their game of cat and mouse was done, she’d lost. “I don’t fear death.”

“I’m not going to kill you,” Jean said, frowning.

Mikasa raised her eyebrows. “You’re not?”

“We work within legality, woman,” the tall man replied, shaking his head in annoyance. “When we catch shady folk, we put them through the judicial system. The system chooses your punishment…how many people have you killed again?”

“Three security guards, I think,” Mikasa thought about it for a moment, then looked at him in the eyes. “Did anyone die from the smoke at the museum?”

Jean shook his head. The government had kept information about their robbery away from the press, and she knew nothing about the aftermath. For the first time in three months, Mikasa breathed easily. She closed her eyes, giving a silent prayer. “Very humane reaction, for a killer.”

“I don’t kill children nor old people,” Mikasa said, letting her mask of impassivity fall over her face. “I might be a rat, but not a monster.”

“Talkative rat.”

“Talkative dog,” her reply made him chuckle, this time for a little longer.

“You’re a clever girl, aren’t you?” he asked, dragging another chair to sit right in front of her, just out of her limited reach. “You’re pretty smart, kind enough to not want to kill an old lady and a group of middle schoolers…you’re gorgeous.”

The tone he’d used for the word made her close her eyes, savor the intonation and save it in her memory for the years to come. “You can say that again.”

“You’re gorgeous,” Jean purred from his chair, tilting his head sideways. “You’re gorgeous and clever and stunning…and you’re making a living out of stealing artwork.”

“I’m returning artwork to its rightful owners, Kirstein.”

“Illegally, by killing people–”

“Three security guards,” Mikasa sighed. This back and forth would not work, not with her situation as precarious. There was no way out of her entrapment; seduction would not do, violence would not do, either. “Can’t you be done with it? Call your commander, imprison me, or shoot me in the face, but be done with it.” “Don’t say that,” Jean said harshly, as if the idea of shooting her in the face was as repellent as the very idea of her killing people. “I’m just trying to figure out things about you.”

“What things?”

“Why were you so careful to set off that bomb in a way that let those schoolgirls get away?” Jean asked, resting his face on his hands. “Someone that killed those three security men, family men, shouldn’t care about school girls.”

“The security guards got in my way. Those girls did not,” Mikasa replied. For someone that had once been a sniper, he was asking too many questions about her morals. And despite the fact that it annoyed her, Mikasa could not help but to want him to not think of her as the libertine criminal his records probably said she was. “And, to be fair, I did want to be a schoolteacher, years ago. I wanted to teach first grade.”

“First grade?” Jean asked. “That’s precise.”

Mikasa smiled. “My first grade teacher always wore colorful skirts, and unicorn ears…I wanted to dress up every day, too.”

That dream had gone to shit soon. She liked playing with children, but she enjoyed money plenty, and Kenny had given her a convincing argument to join their organization. Of course, her mom had not liked her career choice, but she’d never gotten along with Kenny in full —not her mother she knew much, given that she thought Mikasa was an art dealer. Which, in ways, she was.

“Liar.” Jean said.

“I’m not!” Mikasa snapped. She didn’t like baring her soul to someone for them to discard her honesty for a few mishaps of the past. “I’m honest about some things. That dream is an honest thing.”

“It’s hard to consider you honest, after our first meeting,” Jean pointed out. Ah, she could give him that much. He was a special field agent, she couldn’t expect him to trust the thief that had tried to seduce him and then planted a smoke bomb in him.

“I did want to be a primary school teacher,” she said. She didn’t want him to think of her as a libertine, but she refused to let go of her pride in full. “I also didn’t lie about my nickname. My mother did call me Mimi my whole life.”

“Do you have a real name?” Jean asked, lowering his voice until it turned almost into a caress.

“Marina,” Mikasa lied. He nodded, and his expression almost made her feel bad.

“And your last name?” He asked. Mikasa let a minute go by, then another, and then another one until Jean smiled at her. “You know mine, Marina, it’s fair I know yours.”

Mikasa liked how he pronounced her name, albeit it was fake. That one second he’d called her by her fake name, Mikasa had felt like a Marina. “Lascaux,” Mikasa replied in the end. “Marina Lascaux.”

Jean nodded again, then leaned back to take in the full sight of her. She wondered what he thought about her, helplessly tied up to a chair, utterly at his mercy. He’d felt desire last time, in that museum. After the hell she’d put him through, did he still feel the same pull of her body on his?

“Can I ask you something, Marina?”

“You’ve asked plenty, I doubt you’lll stop.”

“Why haven’t you killed me, Marina Lascaux?”

Mikasa stared at him in the eyes. Why hadn’t she killed him? She was entertained by him. But no: she’d meant to kill him the first time she had tracked him down to his apartment. But then he’d seen him care for his hamster and his little black cat, and then the girl with the brown hair and the coconut head boy had arrived, and she’d watched them have drinks on his balcony while talking mindless gossip.

Mikasa didn’t envy that life. She was plenty content with her close circle of friends —Eren and his insanity, the hacker with the blond hair she saw as an appendix of the former, her annoying uncle.

She didn’t envy that life, and yet, she’d stayed to watch Jean spend the afternoon with his friends, drinking beer as they watched the sunset from his balcony, and imagined if she would ever fit in such a context.

“I guess I spent so long watching you, I stopped trying to find the right moment to kill you,” Mikasa said after pondering on it. She spoke slowly, since she couldn’t understand her reasons herself. “I guess I came to enjoy our cat and mouse game.”

“It was not a game,” Jean replied.

“It was a game. You enjoyed the chase as much as I did,” Mikasa narrowed her eyes. This was one of his flaws; he tried to be too righteous. “Whenever you found a clue about our whereabouts, you got excited. You enjoy the praise from your commander, don't you? You enjoy the idea of a raise.”

“You think it was a game,” Jean said. A vein pulsed on his neck, and his whole face was slowly turning red. “It hasn’t been since the museum.”

“This is our first job after the museum. There was nothing for you to chase these three months,” Mikasa pointed out, cursing inwardly. The first job in three months, and she’d gone and fucked it up. “This? Your male ego is enjoying it. You’ve caught me, and I played you.”

Jean came to his feet, quickly, with the agility of a cat, his breath quick, as if her words had outraged him. “I can’t believe you see it as a game. It’s not a chase to me; it’s not a game anymore.”

“But—“

“I chased your group for months, to get tricked right beneath my eyes when I had you in my hands,” Jean smiled and tilted his head back to then turn to look at her. “And then, when I finally have Mikasa Ackerman in my grasp, she tells me it’s all a game.”

Mikasa widened her eyes, her mouth fell open. This man, the beautiful, tall man she’d been following for months, the man she’d deceived…he knew her name. Not her pseudonym of preference, but her full name. Jean stopped pacing and a clever, insinuating grin appeared on his face when he watched her reaction. Oh, he loved this game, and he just didn’t want to accept it.

“What is it, Ackerman?” Jean asked. “Do you prefer Mikasa? Mika? Miki? Or do you want your full name? Mikasa Ackerman.”

His lips touched at the M, then his throat pronounced the following syllables with enough manly strength to turn her into a puddle. Mikasa Ackerman, how gorgeous it sounded when it rolled off his tongue. It was a thousand times better than Marina.

“How?” She managed to stutter.

“Do you think I wouldn’t try to find you after that museum stunt?” Jean asked, almost as if her question offended his pride. “I knew someone was trailing after me, call it a gut feeling, but Erwin called me paranoid. And after the museum…that feeling went away. I put two and two together, and I looked into things.”

“Your mysterious shadow and the girl from the museum…” Mikasa let the rest of the words hang in the air, certain he would finish the sentence. And like an obedient puppy, Jean continued where she left off.

“Were one and the same,” he finished: that triumphant smile would have made her irrationally angry, if it had come from a different set of lips. This man continued to provide her with plenty of entertainment.

“Does Erwin know?” she asked. “Does Smith know you know my name?”

“I’m not going to tell you that.” Jean smiled.

“A clever dog,” Mikasa whispered.

“I’ve got to say,” he let down his arms at his sides, looking genuinely confused. “I was bummed when I stopped feeling that shadow on me…why did you stop?”

“I thought I’d maimed you,” Mikasa answered honestly. Now this time, she didn’t think she owed him the honesty. No, this time he’d earned it. “I didn’t want to see you maimed.”

“It takes a lot more to maim me,” Jean replied, taking a hesitant step towards her. “You should know that.”

“So, the smoke didn’t hurt you?”

Jean lifted his left hand and showed her a trembling thumb. “This is all it did.”

“I see,” Mikasa said, relieved that she had not injured his dominant hand. Their little game would get a lot less interesting with him being anything less than a perfect sniper. “I should’ve known it would not hurt you.”

“You know plenty about me already,” Jean replied, almost in a charming tone of voice. “Let me have a bit of surprise for you.”

“You know plenty too,” Mikasa said. Jean raised his eyebrows, inviting her to continue. Not even the “My name and my last name. It’s a lot, for a cop.”

“I know a bit more than that,” Jean said. A tiny wrinkle must’ve appeared between her eyebrows; a sign of her confusion that widened his smile. “I know your address, the apartment with the blue door by that french bakery and the fruit stand.”

Mikasa felt a cold wave take over her body. “You–”

“I had three months, I know quite a bit,” Jean went on, taking another certain step towards her. “I know about your cousin, Levi Ackerman, and your uncle, Kenny Ackerman. I know about your best friend and almost brother, Eren Jaegar…also Bobo, your maine coon. I know about your mother, your father, your real brother, Nicky, your foster mother and foster father, that–”

“Stop it,” she ordered through clenched teeth.

“That blond med student you fuck every couple of weeks, when you get bored,” he insisted. Mikasa felt heat rush to her face. “That blond guy with the little brother.”

“Stop!”

“What?” Jean said. “I can play your game, Ackerman.”

Mikasa squirmed in her seat. He was a wonderful player indeed. “You don’t need to rub it in my face. I’ve lost, I understand,” she looked away from him for the first time. “Just stay away from Levi and Kenny.”

“I know you want to protect them, Mika, but I have a job–”

“No,” Mikasa raised her voice, trying to make sure her face didn’t betray her and revealed the sinking sensation in her stomach. “No, if they find out you know about them, they’re going to kill you.”

“Let them try.”

“They’re going to kill you, and kill your mother, they’re going to kill every single one of your friends, Jean,” she said, and while maybe her face didn’t betray her, her voice did. It broke at the end and she lowered her head in shame. “They’re not going to be like me. They’re going to torture you…”

“Like you? What do you mean they won’t be like you?”

“I was a shield,” Mikasa whispered. “I kept you just enough steps behind us so they would not think of you as a threat they needed to handle.”

A quick look told her the smile had disappeared from his face, leaving confusion. “What?”

“I didn’t want my playmate to be killed, when things got interesting,” Mikasa bit her lower lip and closed her eyes. One of the reasons why she’d chosen this job was the lack of human contact, the cold interactions and how unnecessary showing feelings was. “And because, your mother would’ve been sad if you didn’t come around anymore.”

Jean kneeled before her. “Mikasa…”

“Without me, you’re dead,” Mikasa concluded. This would be a good way out, a good escape plan. Manipulate the agent, go free. Then, she would continue to watch him from afar, making sure he stayed far enough from them, alive, well, wondering if the women in his bed touched him how she would.

“Testify against them,” Jean said, drawing her attention to him. He kneeled before her, almost as if he were about to ask for her hand in marriage. “Testify against them, and you’ll get a reduced sentence. I’ll make sure of it. And when you get out, I’ll personally get you a job. A good one, and an apartment. I swear.”

He was a good man. A kind man who wanted to see her out of her uncle’s business. He didn’t want her in the way she wanted him, but that was okay. She’d spent months observing him from afar, it was only logical that she’d somehow romanticized him in her mind. “I’d rather go free.”

“They’re going to kill you, too,” Jean said, through clenched teeth. He reached out and cupped her face with one hand. Mikasa closed her eyes, enjoying the sudden touch, and when she opened them again, she was centimeters away from his face. “If they find you, it’ll be shooting on sight. They won’t hesitate, you’ve already risked civilians too many times. Testify against the Ackerman. I swear I’ll protect you”

“I love my uncle,” Mikasa said, despite it annoyed her to admit it. “And Levi, too. And Eren and that blond geek. I can’t betray them…and I’d die anyway. If it’s not Erwin, it’ll be one of Kenny’s hitmen. I’m too close to the family to testify against them safely.”

“There’s no way out for you, is there?” Jean asked, rubbing his thumb against her cheek. Under normal circumstances, he’d be using his whole body to stroke her. Under different circumstances, he would be the one to bring in fresh bread from the bakery on the corner, she would go with him to his gym and sit on his lap when his friends came to visit…

“There’s a way in for you, though,” she said, her face suddenly alight. Jean shook his head, not comprehending what she meant. Mikasa smiled, which caused his cheeks to acquire an intense shade of red. “Join us.”

“What?” Jean laughed.

“Join us, I’d make sure to convince Levi to take you in,” Mikasa continued. It would be tough going at first, but she trusted he could make things work. He was talented, he was a good leader, and he was wickedly handsome. He’d be a great addition to their group. “It’s great money. Fantastic money.”

“That’s a very indecent proposal, you know,” Jean said, letting out a long breath.

“You’ve no idea about indecent,” Mikasa breathed slowly, thanks to his proximity. She was tied to a chair, hands numb behind her back, and yet all she could wonder about was the taste of his mouth. Jean bit his bottom lip and she tilted her head, eyes half-closed in preparation of what was to come when he began closing the distance between the two.

“Kid, we’re not hearing from you,” Levi’s voice said from the transmitter he’d taken off her. “I don’t want to make assumptions that you fucked up, or that you’re dead. But I’m going to need you to assure me you’re fine in ten minutes.”

Without words, Jean took off a piece from his ear and put it against hers. In the line, she heard the distinctive voice of commander Erwin Smith. “...we can’t wait too long, Kirstein. If you don’t show signs of being alive in ten, we will storm the library. Sasha and her snipers are prepared. I repeat…”

“I heard it.” Mikasa sighed, nervous for the first time. She watched him place the communication device behind his ear, his thumb trembling every few seconds. Now, it was the time.

She’d squirmed enough throughout their conversation to loosen the bindings around her ankles. With one last push, she could hit him in the groin, use the distraction to wiggle out of the bindings around her hands, and escape. The window was there, no more than ten meters away, waiting for her to reach it. Just one kick to the groin, and she would be…

“This must be tight,” Jean wrapped his arms around her and the chair, and began to untie her wrists with so much kindness, one would think he was touching a dying flower. “I learned to do these knots at thirteen. I have great practice.”

“W-what are you doing?” Mikasa whispered, his ear excruciatingly close to her mouth.

“I’m being a fool.”

He finished untying her hands and Mikasa took a hold of his face immediately after. She held him in place, but she didn’t see fear in those hazel eyes. He was worried, but not because her hands were free. What worried him were his team’s snipers.

“You’re going to get into trouble,” she whispered, her nose grazing his, her lips inches away.

Jean pulled back, leaving her empty, longing for more as he finished untying her ankles. Once he was done, he grabbed one of the knives he’d taken from her and put it in her newly untied hand. He angled it slightly and Mikasa knew what he planned to do before he even did it. He was fast, and all she could do was squeal when he sunk the blade in his ribs, right beneath the heart.

“What the fuck are you doing, Jean?!” she shouted, grabbing his arm before he twisted it further. Her chest was tight with fear. No, the cat in their chasing game could not pass away this easily, by his own doing. “Jean! We need–”

“It didn’t touch any vital organs, Ackerman. I’m not gonna die,” Jean grabbed her hands and pushed them away from his injury, staining her undershirt with blood. The blade was firmly stuck in his flesh, and he smiled at it before smiling at her. “I know my anatomy well. This injury and your fingerprints on the blade will get me out of trouble.”

He took some of the blood spilled out of his wound and caressed her face and neck, leaving bloody stains on her skin. “And that will get you out of trouble.”

Jean came to his feet and outstretched his hand to her. Mikasa took it in a haze, unsure of what she ought to feel, and followed him to the nearest window. She didn’t like seeing him injured, she realized; if the numbing smoke had made her worried about him, the sight of blood coming out of him was beyond torture. And on the other hand, his gesture had been so utterly chaotic that the idea that took up most of the space in her mind was tasting the fountain of madness she’d just met.

“This will be a good route to the Hayes gardens,” Jean said, opening the window. It was a tiny thing, but it would be good enough for her to wiggle out. A cold breeze blew in the room, stirring the papers on the desk. Jean clicked his fingers and limped his way to the table, taking one of the old wooden boxes and bringing it to her. “Here, this will keep you out of trouble, too. I’ll keep the other, just to make it believable.”

“Why are you letting me go?” Mikasa asked.

Jean lifted his hand and caressed her cheek. “Because you’re gorgeous. And I’m an idiot.”

She reached out and grabbed him by the shirt. Their lips crashed against each other, and a burst of heat permeated her chest when the realization came to her: this was what the chase had been leading up to. Deep down, she’d known it, from the moment she decided to watch him drink and talk senseless things as he watched the sunset, she’d known she wanted to kiss him.

Jean moved his lips with the same urgency, his tongue dancing against hers as they shared the same breath. She threw her arms around his neck but was careful to not press herself against him; she was aware of the knife poking out between his ribs, she could hear the half-concealed pain every time he groaned against her lips.

“Kirstein, you’re not an upstanding man.” Mikasa whispered, pulling apart from her.

“I can’t say I am entirely.” Jean smiled and kissed her again.

“Come with me.” Mikasa said, caressing his hair.

Jean shut his eyes and grimaced, gazing at the window briefly. It was too small, simply too small to let him pass. Even if he hadn’t had a knife stuck between the ribs, Jean wouldn’t have wiggled out of the room without at least two kilos of butter.

“The chase isn’t over,” she whispered hotly, joining her lips with his again. “And don’t you dare fuck that blond guy again.”

“Likewise,” Jean laughed, and his words made her chuckle. “I mean it, Ackerman, I don’t want you with anyone else.”

“I won’t be,” Mikasa bit his lower lip, drawing a tiny bit of blood she sucked on. “I promise I won’t.”

“I promise too,” he grabbed her by the hair and tugged her head up gently, so she could look at his eyes. “I still need to put you in jail.”

“I know,” Mikasa smirked and stepped away from him. It pained her heart to move away from this force of a man she’d met by pure chance. Both stood on polar opposites of the spectrum of work they’d built their lives on, and yet all she wanted was for him to run to her, to tip the balance and destroy everything that was not the two of them.

But Jean was still too much of an upstanding officer. He was too good. He was her enemy, still. Mikasa smirked as she went to the window, wondering if it was normal that bodies ached so much for their rivals. “I’ll see you around, Kirstein.”

Jean took a deep breath and gave her one final, longing look. “See you around, Ackerman.”

Mikasa wiggled out the window, and Jean turned on his communication device. She could hear him complain about how he was down, giving his team his exact location, and she stepped into the shadows.

_______________________

Jean understood very little Spanish, but the instructions left for him through tiny clues and whispered words while undercover in crowded markets had been plenty clear. When the male singer began repeating the word “voy”, he was to go to the dance floor, right in the middle, and wait for the white lights to go off.

Women tried to pull him in to dance, but Jean pushed them all away with gentleness. I’m taken, he would say with a smile. Sorry, looking for my girlfriend, also. Some would walk away, some were insistent. All of them, he rejected. Connie would have called him a stupid idiot, but no matter how pretty, Jean knew there was one that was the most gorgeous of them all.

Could she be even called his girlfriend, though? Ever since that kiss, five months ago, all they’d done was communicate through hidden messages.

Jean had kept following her around. She’d moved out of the apartment by the french bakery -a fact that made him feel guilty, after all, he’d been the one to figure out the secrets of her personal life she’d guarded so closely. Now, she lived near a taqueria she visited often; a discreet place where they could sit at nearby tables and have indirect, shared meals and quiet conversations.

It was the weirdest relationship he’d ever had.

Also, the hottest.

He had not touched her, but the grazes of her hand when they casually encountered each other on the street, or did groceries in the same supermarket…it was exhilarating. It made the need to kiss her stronger.

Five months, they hadn’t kissed again. First, he’d had to recover from his injury, and then neither had felt safe to do so in their city. That’s why the cruise idea had been so perfect; he was still on leave, and the ship would be in international waters for long enough for them to have a quiet vacation all to themselves.

The whole first day, Jean had spent it preparing their room for her. Then, she’d boarded in the next port a day later.

“You look lonely again,” a familiar voice said. Jean turned around and almost choked on his saliva. She’d cut her hair in a pixie cut for their trip, which revealed the slender shape of her neck. The dress she wore was made of silk, with tiny straps that hugged her shoulders, and it was tight. So tight, it hugged the curves of her breasts and waist to perfection.

She was dancing when she found him, her movements fluid like water. Men were looking at her, he noticed. Of course, how could they not? She was perfect. And while Jean knew she had no eyes for another -proof of that was that she’d ended things with that blond college kid right after their library encounter- Jean wanted them to know she was his.

“Come here,” he grabbed her by the waist and drew her closer. She moved her hips and he followed her, grinding against her body while pressing his forehead to hers. He didn’t know Spanish, but he did know how to dance songs in Spanish. So, he swayed his hips and put his hands on her body, enjoying the smooth sensation of the fabric, the curves it covered, the sweet mouth pressed to his lips as they danced against each other.

At a point, she turned around and danced with her back pressed to his chest. He put both a hand on her waist, and another over her navel, and buried his mouth in her neck as he felt her ass grinding against the bulge between his legs.

“You’re like a highschooler,” Mikasa said, pressing her ass a little tighter against him. He turned her around, grabbed her leg and lifted it. She didn’t fight his touch, however. She wrapped his waist with a leg, then put both hands on the nape of his neck to pull him against her lips. He put both hands on her ass and squeezed, pressing her tight against his hardness.

He wasn’t even sure what they were doing could be called dancing anymore. In paper, it was. In truth, it was the final droplets that would fill their threshold of desire. It was a reunion, and the culmination of months of longing and pining for each other.

Eight months ago, all Jean wanted was to catch the rats that kept him away from his promotion, lock them up for twenty years and throw away the key. Now, the prospect of hurting her was unthinkable, as strong and capable as she was. She was the woman his heart had chosen, and he didn’t care what happened, but he would do his best to keep her safe, even if she killed a hundred more security guards and stole a thousand more art pieces.

“Come here,” she untangled herself from him and pulled him out of the club. Jean followed without protesting, hypnotized by her soft smile and the longing in her eyes.

The ship was quite big, too big for them to walk fifteen minutes to his room without quenching some of the fire first. So, Mikasa took him to the bathrooms outside the club, the ones near the pool, where another party was taking place. They entered the woman’s lavatory and she hung a sign that read CLEANING SERVICES, locking the door behind her.

“Mikasa…” Jean groaned when she pinned him against the wall.

“Fuck, you’re hard,” she said, unzipping his pants to stroke his cock.

“We were supposed to have our first time on a bed, Ackerman,” Jean groaned. Mikasa stopped kissing his neck to look at him, her cheeks red even in the neon lights of the lavatory.

“Look at you, all romantic,” she said teasingly.

“I’m a romantic man,” he combed her hair away from her face, kissing her beautiful mouth. “This face calls for romance. This face, this woman deserves all the romance in the world.”

“Weren’t you the one that called me a crazy bitch eight months ago?” Mikasa asked.

“I was,” Jean laughed. “And you are a bit crazy.”

Mikasa giggled. “But I’m not a bitch?”

“No fucking way,” Jean kissed her again, lifting her dress until he saw the reflection of her ass on the mirror. She wore a beautiful lace g string, and he could only imagine what that would look like in the proper lighting of their room, when he undressed her with his mouth. “I need to see you naked, fully.”

“And I need you to fuck me,” she replied without breath. “We have a whole night, Kirstein. What will it be? Do we walk those fifteen minutes to our room, or do you fuck me right here, right now.”

Jean took her in his arms and pinned her against the wall. With his mouth, he lowered the straps of her dress, revealing her beautiful chest to him, her nipples already hard when he took them in his mouth. He stroked his cock against her entrance and nibbled on the skin of her neck. “Can I fuck you in the room too?”

“You can fuck me anywhere…you…” she gasped when he pushed inside her, and her words turned into moans of bliss. “You can…fuck…me anywhere you want to, Jean.”

Her walls wrapped around him like a snug glove. He moved his hips against her, their lips joined in one as well as the rest of their bodies. Mikasa moaned against his open mouth every time he thrusted deeper, rolling her eyes every time, clenching the muscles of her pussy to give him more pleasure.

“When we get to the room,” Jean moaned, pulling her hair. “You’re going to sit on my face.”

“Yes,” she breathed.

“You’re going to suffocate me with these thighs,” he grabbed the thighs in question and squeezed, thrusting deeper. Then, he put his thumb against her clit and stroked. The moan that came from the back of her throat was guttural, animal. “I know, baby, I know you like it.”

“You cocky bastard,” Mikasa gasped, biting his lip harsh enough to draw blood. Jean didn’t care, though. “You cocky, cocky bastard…I fucking love you.”

“I fucking love you too,” Jean said, already at the edge. Mikasa closed her eyes and threw her head back when his thrusts became faster, deeper. “I’m going to cum, Mikasa, I’m going to cum so hard.”

“Me too,” she shouted, pulling his hair harder than how he was pulling hers. Jean sucked on her breasts as he came inside her, and Mikasa moaned his name in a high-pitched, adorable voice he’d been dying to hear for months now. They breathed against each other, her body trembling as the aftershocks of her orgasm traveled her body.

“Kirstein…”

“Yes, darling?”

“I love you,” she looked up at him as he put her onto the floor again, hands wrapped around his neck and her pools of liquid silver focused on his. “I really do. I mean it.”

“I know you do,” Jean said, taking her chin between his index and thumb. He gave her a sweet look, mesmerized by her face, by the bliss their orgasm had caused in her. “I meant it too, Ackerman. I love you, with all my heart. And I can’t let you go.”

“I can’t let you go, either,” she said in a whisper.

“But I can’t steal these tiny moments every five months. I can’t go from cruise to cruise,” the elation in her face disappeared for a moment, as Jean rearranged his member back into his pants. His beeper was vibrating in his pocket. They were here. He took out a communication device from the back pocket of his pants. “Come in, we’re both in here.”

“You bastard,” Mikasa said, her voice shaky with a mixture of rage, pain and heartbreak as Jean approached the unlocked door. Her hands trembled when she rearranged the straps of her dress, and tears pooled in her eyes. “You bastard, you played me, I’m going to kill–”

“Mikasa come on,” Jean opened the door, and her expression froze when she saw the two people waiting in the middle of the hallway. Her chin fell open, and she wiped the tears with the back of her hand, giving him a confused, adorable gaze. “What? I’m a bastard, but I’m in love with you, I wouldn’t hurt you like that.”

“But–”

“Yo, are you gonna stand there looking scared all night?” Eren asked, arching a pierced eyebrow at her mockingly. “You’re being such a pussy, Mikasa.”

“Stop it, she just thought he’d turned her in, you dumbass,” Levi said, slapping the back of Eren’s head in reprimand.

“What is going on?” Mikasa asked in a whisper.

“I’m not letting you go,” Jean explained, folding his arms over his chest. “And I’m not going to wait five months to touch you…I had five months to make all the arrangements I needed to make before this..”

“What?” Mikasa asked.

“I’m taking you up on that offer,” Jean said with a wide smile. “I’m going rogue. I’m coming with you and your band of rats.”

“Careful, tall boy,” Levi warned.

“You fucking scared me,” Mikasa’s voice broke and she had to hold onto the wall to find some balance, and Jean ran to her side, wrapping her in an embrace, bringing her closer to his chest. “You stupid bastard gave me the fright of my life!”

“Shhh, I’m sorry, baby,” he kissed her temple and caressed her hair, feeling like the biggest bastard on planet earth. “I’m sorry, I wanted to give you a stupid surprise. I never thought you’d cry–”

“Of course I’d cry if I thought you betrayed me!” Mikasa grabbed his face and kissed him once. “I hate you”

“You do?”

“I don’t, dumbass,” Mikasa shook her head and kissed him again, this time their kiss was longer, softer, and Jean didn’t even care about the two men watching them. “Don’t you ever frighten me again, Kirstein. I swear I’ll kill you.”

“I promise,” Jean laughed.

“Now, congratulations, kid, you got the cop to fuck you and kept him alive,” Levi said dryly from the door, disgusted with their sudden exchange of affection. Mikasa rolled her eyes and Jean guessed the passive-aggressiveness was part of their routine. “I gotta say, I’m surprised things went your way.”

“Is he really coming with us?” Mikasa asked. “He’s joining us?”

Levi nodded. “Seems so.”

“And you just took him in?” Mikasa asked.

“He’s a link to Smith,” Levi answered dryly. “I want a link to Smith.”

“And why is Eren here?” Mikasa asked Jean. “He didn’t try to punch you, did he?”

“He said he’ll introduce me to that blond friend of his,” Eren said, biting his lower lip as if the man with the huge pectorals and light blond hair was standing right in front of him. “He gets me a date, and I don’t punch his face in for messing with you.”

“Gross,” Mikasa turned her attention to him. “Why are they here? This is our vacation.”

“Of course it is,” he tucked her hair behind her ears, then lowered his face to kiss her. When they pulled apart, Jean gave her a wicked smile. “Also, rumor has it the captain of this ship comes from money, and he’s got an original Rembrandt in his quarters.”

“Aren’t you scared? You used to be a cop, you–”

“I’ve got the best shadow in the world to teach me her ways,” Jean kissed her cheek, then her chin, then her forehead. “Besides, the bargain I struck with Kenny will make us both free of his grasp after ten heists together.”

Mikasa smirked at him and grabbed his face to kiss him again. “You’re mad, Kirstein.”

“I’m mad about you,” he replied breathlessly. She’d said he wasn’t a fully upstanding man, and she’d been right. A look from her was all it took to send his career down the drain; he didn’t care. He’d enjoyed their chase, the game of cat and mouse, but this cat wanted to enjoy his prey for all the years that were to come.

#Jeankasa #Jeankasa Week 2022 #Jean Kirstein #Mikasa Ackerman #Jeanmika #Criminal AU #enemies to lovers #Smut #eventual smut #ao3 #fanfiction

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itslieutenanthawkeye · 2 years

Text

Jeankasa Week 2022. Day 4: Changes

Starry night

AO3

The incident and aftermath of the time Mikasa was forced to cut her hair really short.

She had never enjoyed training in the winter, but she preferred it rather than working in the heat. Summer heat was a different sort of animal altogether, and she guessed her team -particularly Connie and Jean- hated it too.They had all complained relentlessly about Eren’s suggestion to build the train line, and part of her agreed with them to a degree.

She liked spending time with her squad; she didn’t speak as much as the rest, but she enjoyed Connie and Sasha’s bickering, Jean teasing Eren, and Eren and Armin’s endless talks about their future travels after the war…Mikasa just wished they could spend time under different circumstances.

“I’ll need a shower after this,” she heard Jean say to Connie. “A long one.”

“You need it, man,” Connie replied. “You fucking stink.”

“Fuck off, Connie.”

Mikasa smiled to herself, careful to not turn to look at them. She didn’t want Jean nor Connie to think she was making fun of them. She often thought of herself as Jean, Sasha and Connie’s most attentive audience. She liked listening to their banter, so equally distributed that it made her jealous sometimes.

“Oi, Mikasa!” Connie called. Mikasa turned around, a questioning expression on her face. Connie grabbed Jean by the arm and pushed him forward, as if to send him in her direction. “Come here. Jean smells, doesn’t he?”

“Leave her out of it, idiot,” Jean shoved Connie aside, face red, then he gestured in her direction. “Can’t you see she’s the only one doing a good job here? All you and Sasha do is fight about who gets to drink more water.”

Connie grinned, his eyes on Mikasa. “Come on, you need to smell him. It’s disgusting.”

“Leave it, coconut head,” Sasha ventured, leaving her hammer aside to join Connie. “I think I smell worse…Mikasa, come on, tell us who smells the worst here.”

“I’m not gonna play stupid little games, you two!” Jean snapped.

Mikasa put the steel beans she had on her shoulder on the ground and walked up to her three friends…although she was not sure she could call them that. Sasha was her very best female friend, perhaps closer to a sister than anyone else, but all Connie did was joke around, and Jean…Jean did not talk to her for long whenever they were alone.

“Here, here,” Sasha took her arm and dragged her closer to Jean, who stood awkwardly by Connie’s side, his face red from the sun. “Sniff him first, then do me.”

“Nobody should be sniffing anyone,” Jean said, stepping away.

“I think we must all smell,” Mikasa said. Her voice drew Connie and Sasha’s attention, as well as Jean’s, who gave her a questioning look. Mikasa cleared her throat, realizing she’d barely spoken a handful of phrases throughout the afternoon. “We’ve worked in the sun for an hour now, have we not? We must all smell pretty bad.”

Silence followed, for a full minute. Then, Connie and Sasha exchanged a look. A second later, their chests erupted in laughter, although MIkasa was not sure if they were mocking her or not. Her companions laughed freely, eyes closed and cheeks red, as if a war did not loom over their heads.

“Did you hear that, Jeanbo?” Sasha laughed, shaking him by the arm. “Mikasa thinks you stink like ass!”

“I didn’t say that!” Mikasa hurried to say, unsure if it was the heat or Sasha’s teasing what was causing her own cheeks to turn red. “We are all sweaty.”

“Jean here said you smell like strawberries,” Connie said, wiping the corner of his eye as he avoided Jean’s slap. Mikasa turned to look at the tall boy, who had begun to rub his forehead with both hands, clearly tired of trying to keep his friends in check.

“Did you?” Mikasa asked.

Jean looked away, folding his arms over his chest. “You don’t smell, you don’t smell bad at all. Not like Connie here, in any case.”

Mikasa took her ponytail without thinking, staring at it for a second before speaking again. “This is getting longer again. It gets sweatier than before.”

“Still, you don’t smell bad,” Jean said, now burying both hands in his pockets. He spoke awkwardly and his head was lowered, but Mikasa heard every word. It was then that she noticed Connie and Sasha had stepped away; they’d resumed laying out the railings, sparing a couple of glances their way every few seconds.

“I think it’s lovely, by the way, if you don’t mind me saying it,” Jean cleared his throat, drawing her attention. She widened her eyes, confused. “Your hair. It’s longer. I-I think that it looks lovely.”

“Oh,” Mikasa stroked the ponytail quicker, unsure what to do with her hands. She didn’t think anyone beside Sasha and Historia had complimented this new, longer hair. “It’s growing quick, too.”

“It is.”

“It makes me warm,” Mikasa looked sideways, noticing Sasha was smiling in their direction. Her friend looked away the instant her gaze caught Mikasa’s. “I didn’t think I could do the maneuver gear properly with long hair, but it seems I can…I also think it’s soft.”

“It looks soft,” Jean agreed with a smile.

“You can feel it…” Mikasa looked at the ground, dropping her ponytail. Maybe she was being too friendly. “If you want, I meant…it’s just very soft.”

She feared Jean would call her weird, or perhaps he would look at her funny, use her words to make fun of her alongside Connie. Instead, Jean smiled and raised his hand, reaching out to hold her ponytail in his palm.

“It is very soft, perhaps more than mine,” he said thoughtfully. Mikasa nodded in agreement, glad that someone else other than Sasha recognized how petty her hair had become. “It’s softer than I thought it would be.”

His thumb stroked her hair, slowly, as if he were touching a flower petal. Jean’s eyes switched from her hair, to her eyes, his golden color almost shimmering when he focused on her face. “I think it feels nice,” Mikasa said, the memory of Jean’s compliment about her long hair taking over her mind. “Better than short hair.”

“Oi!” Captain Levi called from his horse. He was there to escort them back to the home they all shared. “Gather your things, brats, we’ve got dinner waiting!”

“I think it’s pretty either way. I bet you’d look good bald, too,” Jean let go of her hair and put his hands back in his pockets, as if he’d just felt the heat of a stone. Mikasa nodded and took her ponytail again, unsure why her hands felt so clumsy. A strange, unnatural sound left her mouth. A chuckle, dry laughter.

She could not remember the last time she’d laughed in front of someone that was not Sasha; she looked around, just to confirm Sasha nor Connie were still making fun of her. However, Captain Levi’s voice call had forced everyone back to their work, and both Sasha and Connie were focused on tidying everything for tomorrow. Not even Eren was looking at her; he seemed too focused on his discussion with Levi to notice she was getting along with Jean.

Eren was the one who always pushed her to talk more to the hazel-eyed boy; so, she would make sure to inform him they’d had a full, five minute conversation without her scaring him away. Eren often said her behavior scared Kirstein away, alongside every other member of the survey corps.

“I don’t plan on cutting it again,” she said, crouching to help Jean gather his things and put them in his bag. He crouched a second later, following her lead.

“You don’t?”

“Not anytime soon,” Mikasa replied. She liked how her black hair framed her face; it was one of the few things that made her feel like a normal girl, albeit she was everything but a normal girl. “It might look silly, though.”

Jean shook his head. “Not at all. Not at all. It’ll be lovely.”

Mikasa stood, throwing Jean’s bag over her shoulder. “You really think so?”

“I'm sure of it,” Jean tugged one of the straps of his bag. “I can carry this.”

“This isn’t heavy,” Mikasa said nonchalantly, then realized what she’d just said. “I’m sorry.”

“Why?” Jean asked, bewildered. “Why apologize because you’re stronger?”

Mikasa’s cheeks burned again, but she did not want to recall the thousand little times in which her physical progress had been the source of anger from the people she cared about —for one of the people she cared about.

“I-I don’t know?” She said sincerely.

“You shouldn’t apologize for being better than everyone,” Jean said as they walked to the cart that would take them back to Shingashina. The routine had become familiar; wake, work on building the train line until sunset, war councils, dinner, sleep. They rotated place with other units, and Connie often complained they were treated as slaves all because of Eren.

And despite that she hated the heat, Mikasa had grown to enjoy the long hours of work alongside her friends. They gave her an inkling of normality, of a routine alongside her most beloved people.

“This is the longest we’ve talked in a while, Jean,” she pointed out suddenly. “And all you have done is compliment me.”

Jean smiled, as if he knew he had no other choice but to admit she was right. “I’m sorry…maybe that idiot’s speech from last night got in my head.”

He was talking about Eren’s words, last night on the road home, when he had told them they were all special to him. “What do you mean?”

Jean shrugged. “We’re all special to each other. I don’t like seeing anyone doubt themselves, especially you.”

“Why?”

They were approaching the cart, and both Eren and Armin were looking at the two now, their conversation with Levi and Hange seemingly finished. They would be proud of her, Mikasa thought, they would perhaps congratulate her for having a full conversation, a long interaction with Jean by herself.

“Because you are the best of us all,” Jean answered, as if it were the most natural statement in the world. “You are single handedly carrying that tool bag and you’re not even breaking a sweat! You’re fantastic, Mikasa, and that’s just the least of all you can do.”

Mikasa looked away. “You’re being too kind.”

“I’m being too honest.”

“Are you two turtles, or something?” Levi grunted. “Or maybe sloths?”

“Sloths?” Mikasa asked.

“Ignore him,” Hange said from their horse. “He’s been cramming those zoology books the Azumabito brought over. Hop on! Dinner’s waiting.”

Mikasa went to queue by Eren’s side, who greeted her with a tight-lipped smile. He’d become more pensive the past years, more introspective, as if the weight of his responsibility had locked the old him inside his own mind. “Tired?”

Mikasa shook her head. “You?”

“A little,” he admitted.

“You must be mindful of your health, Eren. Don’t overwork yourself,” she said. Eren hummed in agreement, looking at Jean over his shoulder. Mikasa imitated him and noticed Sasha was tugging his shirt and wiggling her eyebrows at the tall boy; just mindless teasing, but it made him frown nonetheless.

“What did you two talk about?”

Mikasa shrugged. “He said he likes my long hair.”

“Oh,”

“And that I’m strong,” Mikasa added, a little more shyly this time. Eren hummed, and she guessed that was the most she would get out of him. He spared Jean yet another glance.

“Too soon,”

“What do you mean?” Mikasa asked, although the tools that fell out of Jean’s bag caught her attention before he could answer. Mikasa turned to look at Jean, who was looking in her direction. “I’m sorry. I should’ve given it to you.”

Jean muttered something about helping her, but Mikasa was quicker, and she crouched next to the cart to grab his things. A screwdriver had rolled under a rail, and she had to press her face against the dirt to reach it.

“I’ll do it, Mikasa,” Jean said hurriedly.

“Are you not getting on?” Armin asked.

“Mika dropped something,” Sasha said. Mikasa stretched her arm further, thinking she perhaps looked ridiculous on all fours. The screwdriver was stuck under the rail, and no matter how hard she tugged, it would not come loose. So much for the strongest of them all, she thought as she struggled.

“Is everyone on?” Levi asked.

“No, wait,” Jean said.

“We need to go, kids,” Hange exclaimed happily.

“Wait!” Jean insisted. “Mikasa is on the ground.”

“Armin, get the lever.”

“I said wait,” Jean crouched at her side, close enough for her to smell him. Mikasa arched her eyebrows, unsure why Connie had said Jean stank. There was nothing foul smelling about him.

“The lever, Arlert!” Levi shouted. “Watch the lever!”

“It’s loose!”

“She’s still here!” Jean reached out for the screwdriver, his long limbs better for the task. But Mikasa heard the clicking of metal, and Jean cursed a second later. “Her hair is stuck! Stop! PULL THAT LEVER BACK!”

“Stop what?!” Eren asked, panicked.

“Her hair is stuck!” Jean shouted. Another lever clicked, and the searing pain in her scalp made her cry out loud.

____________________________

“Ouch,” Mikasa said. She held a cold piece of meat against her forehead, which remained red and slightly swollen, while she thanked Hizuru silently for the cooling machines they had sent from across the sea.

“I’m sorry,” Sasha said, rubbing the part of the scalp she’d pulled. “I’m not as good as you when it comes to cutting hair.”

“You’re doing well,” Mikasa assured her.

“It’s already at your chin,” Sasha pointed out. The lights were low in the immense room they both shared. Once, the space had been built to house four more girls, but now it was a half-empty nest, her and Sasha were the room’s last inhabitants. “You sure you want it shorter? You were telling me you liked it long.”

“Hange said the preparations for our journey are almost finished,” Mikasa said after a moment. “Short hair will help me go unnoticed. If they want me to pose as a boy, short hair will help me too.”

“I doubt it,” Sasha muttered. Mikasa frowned, and her friend shrugged. “You got a pair of attributes that won’t be easy to pass off as a boy’s.”

“I want it short, in any case.” Mikasa said, blushing at the insinuation of her big breasts. They’d grown the past years, and she often caught boys and higher officials looking in her direction when her shirts were too tight.

From Sasha’s expression, Mikasa knew that her lie would not convince her. But Sasha was too sweet to not call her out, to convince her to not cut her hair, too kind to tell her what they all knew. Mikasa was all muscles, her body a machine more powerful than most men around her, with abs marked to perfection and veins that stuck out every time she strained her arms.

A pixie cut would make her look more like a boy.

That did not matter though. Today’s incident had convinced her that long hair was useless in battle. She was not fashionable like Sasha, or elegant like Historia; if her hair became tangled in such a simple context like this afternoon, she did not want to think of all the things that could go wrong with her maneuver gear.

Still, it was hard to say goodbye to one of the few things that made her feel feminine.

“We could try and braid it,” Sasha suggested, reading her thoughts like only a close female friend could. “If we tie it really tight, it won’t get tangled. It’s what I do with my hair.”

Mikasa shut her eyes and wrung her hands. “Cut it all off. Just do it.”

“Mikasa, you clearly don’t want to.”

“It will be fine,” Mikasa sighed, although she was not sure who she was talking to, Sasha or herself. “I’ll let it grow out when the war is finished.”

When would that be? Maybe a few months, or years, depending what they found on Marley, what the international commissions said about the eldians of Paradise island. Mikasa sighed; a pixie cut would do no harm to her. Nobody would be shocked to see her, no one would question her reasons. Besides, the welts on the back of her neck and on her forehead were enough reminders that she would be better off without it.

_______________

The dining hall was far too crowded for Jean’s liking. It wasn’t that he did not like crowds. He was simply too tired to put up with all the questions from the new recruits, and all the flirting. The flirting became more of a constant as the years passed. It was a consequence of being one of the heroes of Shingashina, Floch often said, although Jean did not consider himself a hero, he was a mere survivor of the massacre.

But most people did not understand that, and many comrades in the army didn’t understand either. Any other eighteen year old would have been flattered from all the attention, or perhaps reciprocated some of it. But Jean didn’t care for it. He had no interest in what bodily pleasures had to offer, at least not with people he didn’t know nor cared about.

And who was he kidding? There was one person and one person only whose attention he desire.

“…like a fucking man, I swear,” a boy said said as he stepped out of the dining hall with his friend. “Who told her she looked good?”

“Probably that stupid friend of hers,” the other boy chimed in. “You know these females clap like seals whenever another does something.”

They’d stopped to smoke outside the hall, meters away from the patch of grass he’d decided to sit on. They were kids, barely sixteen, but they already spoke like bitter old men, angry at women for no reason. It made Jean want to punch them in their mouths. But it would be best to stay away from trouble; he didn’t want to traumatize new recruits, and he was sure Levi would do all the work for him eventually.

“Someone should’ve told her it was a mistake,” the first one went on. “She loos like a fucking guy, I swear. What kind of girl wears her hair like that?”

“Jaegar should’ve said something,” the other said. “She’s his little lapdog, is she not? He should’ve told her she looks like a man.”

Jean stood from his patch of grass,still warm from the midday sun, and walked in their direction, blood rushing angrily across his arteries, ears ringing loudly. He shouldn’t involve himself in the ridiculous ramblings of teenagers, yes, but when the ramblings involved her, things changed.

“A great figure, though,” the first idiot said. “Big tits…too bad he’s gonna have to call her Mankasa from now on.”

Jean grabbed the idiot by the neck of his shirt and pulled back without him noticing he was behind him in the first place. The idiot squealed like a child as he stumbled down the steps and onto the ground. He landed on his back, ready to start a fight until he recognized Jean.

“Captain Kirstein,” he stammered, and his words made Jean roll his eyes. He was a veteran, yes, but a captain just in name. He had led no battle missions with that title, although he was certain he would have the chance soon, with the war looming overhead.

“Who the fuck were you two babies talking about?” He demanded to know. The two idiots exchanged a look, and Jean kicked the boy in the abdomen. “Fucking answer me! Who the fuck were you talking about?”

“Sir—“

“Shut the fuck up!” Jean hissed. The boy atop the steps dared not to move; Jean was their superior officer, and the military was far too lenient to its superior officers. He abhorred how often superiors abused their power, but he guessed this was one of the limited privileges that came with the title. “I’m your captain, idiot, and if you were talking about who I think you were talking about, you’re going to have a very unpleasant evening, I swear to Ymir—“

“Jean,” a serious, lovely voice said from the door. “Leave them. It’s okay.”

Jean looked up and encountered Mikasa’s lovely outline bathed in the yellow light from the dining hall. Her hair had been cut short, in a pixie cut like the ones his younger cousins had gotten whenever there was a lice infestation at school. It framed her face differently; it made her cheekbones stand out, it made her mouth rounder, her eyes kinder, her neck slightly longer. It was a huge change, even in comparison to the short style she’d had for years.

She looked undeniably, totally gorgeous.

“I-you….you heard them, didn’t you?” Jean said, his jaw clenched involuntarily. “I’m beating them up for being assholes. You should help me out.”

The two idiots squealed, but both remained frozen in their places, despite that only one was being restrained. The threat of being beaten by him was one thing, and being beaten up by Mikasa Ackerman –that was a different kind of fear altogether.

“They’re kids.”

“They’re disrespectful idiots.”

“Kids can be idiots,” Mikasa pointed out calmly, her significant gaze forcing a smile out of him. Remember yourself? Remember Eren? Her gray eyes said.

“What do you want me to do with them?” He asked, certain he would fulfill her every wish, even if they were violent, selfish…but that had never been Mikasa. For someone as strong as she was, she’d never been overly selfish, even if she tried to deny it.

“Let them go,” Mikasa said. “Don’t beat them up.”

“Beating them up was the least I was going to do,” Jean replied angrily. Mikasa waited a moment in silence, her gaze enough to undo all the rage, all his plans of violence. Jean stood reluctantly, and forced the young idiot soldier on his feet. Before he moved away, however, Jean grabbed him by the neck of his shirt. Mikasa did not make any movements to stop him when he forced the kid back up the steps to the dining hall; she’d made a request, yes, but that didn’t mean she would force him to abide by it.

“You two,” Jean grabbed the other, then he forced both to look at her. “You will apologize to Captain Ackerman.”

Mikasa’s eyes widened. “Jean, they don’t have to.”

“They were being disrespectful to you, their superior,” Jean said, wondering briefly why someone so strong could be so patient, so kind, so willing to allow people to disrespect her so. Maybe it was a learned behavior from having withstood Eren for such a long time.

That made Jean angrier than before.

“Apologize!” He said, shaking both recruits.

“We’re sorry, Miss Ackerman!” Both idiots shouted at the same time.

“That’s not her whole name!” Jean shook them again. “Respect your superior officer! Title, idiots, the title!”

“We’re sorry, captain Ackerman!” Both said in unison. Mikasa blinked, apparently at a loss for things to say for a whole minute.

“I forgive you,” she stammered in the end. “Ah, dismissed.”

Jean loosened his grip on them and the two recruits scurried away, their expressions showing just enough constriction for him to not grab them again. They hurried towards their barracks, leaving them alone, their figures lit only by the light that spilled from the dining hall.

“You scared them,” Mikasa said, but there was no accusation in her voice. “Thank you.”

“Anytime, captain,” Jean said, making her roll her eyes. She hated the higher rank; she did not like the attention that came with it. It was a silly apprehension, given she was the Mikasa Ackerman. Attention was hers all the time, and she deserved it without question.

“Hey, Mikasa.”

“Yes?”

“You should’ve let me beat them up a little,” he sighed, leaning against the wooden handrail. “They were jerks. You can’t possibly tell me they were not.”

“They were.”

“They’re not Eren,” Jean ventured, hoping his words did not sound harsh. He’d stopped talking harshly about her relationship with Eren years ago. “I don’t mean you should take their crap, but they aren’t your family. You absolutely shouldn’t take crap from them.”

Mikasa leaned against the handrail, next to him, barely one step above Jean. He thought she would remain quiet, or perhaps that she would tell him to not get himself involved in her business. “They were right.”

“What?”

“They were right,” she repeated. “Kind of. I do look like a man.”

“What?!”

“With my hair,” Mikasa ran a hand across her head in an odd moment of vulnerability. “It’s way shorter than before.”

“Why would that makes you look like a man?” Jean asked. Mikasa looked at him, and the confused expression on her face made him chuckle. “Mikasa, there is nothing about you that says ‘man’. Nothing, I swear that.”

“They thought differently.”

“They’re idiots, virgin assholes. Their thoughts don’t matter,” Jean laughed. He’d always seen her as such a strong, unbreakable force, that it had never crossed his mind she could also experience doubts about her appearance. “Mikasa, you do not look like a man, at all. You look…lovely.”

Mikasa frowned and looked at him. “Really?”

“Beautiful, actually,” Jean corrected himself. Mikasa widened her eyes, and he regretted his words right away. They were comrades, friends, but Mikasa had never heard so many compliments from him before. Heavens, he didn’t even compliment Sasha as often, and surely Mikasa had noticed.

Jean did not say it out loud, but he always made sure to keep a healthy distance from her whenever they were alone. He feared she would find out about his love for her, and then she would never speak nor look his way again. He was certain that if she were to find out about his feelings, she would never be comfortable around him. And Jean didn’t want to lose her. He already did not have her as a lover, he would not lose her as a friend.

“And you are sweet,” Mikasa said with a tiny, soft smile on her lips that took him aback. This vulnerability of hers, he had never seen, not until today. He liked it when he learned new things about her, when their interactions gave him a larger insight into what went on inside her mind.

“I’m only saying the truth.” Jean shrugged, trying to remain as composed as he could when, in truth, that tiny smile had melted his heart into a puddle.

“What were you doing outside?” She asked, and he barely held back the need to squeal like a schoolgirl. She was making conversation, asking him questions. That was enough to get him to ascend heavens with elation.

You’re so pathetic, his mind noted.

And so what if he was?

“I was just stargazing. Most lights are off at this time, and summer skies are best for that.”

“Stargazing?” Mikasa tilted her head back to look at the sky for a moment, then looked back at him. “Do you know constellations?”

“Sort of,” Jean admitted. “I’m not the best, but I know some because I read those books the Azumabito brought over.”

“From where were you stargazing?” She asked. Jean gestured at the empty stretch of grass to their right, hidden from the pools of light that spilled out of the dining hall’s windows. Mikasa nodded, then lifted her hands as if she were going to hold her ponytail, forgetting her hair was now short. She blushed and looked up at the sky in silent anticipation. And even an idiot like Jean knew she was curious about his stupid hobby.

“Do you wanna come along?” Jean asked.

“To stargaze?”

“We can lay six feet apart, if it’ll make you comfortable,” Jean blurted out. Mikasa raised both eyebrows and looked at the sky again. Ah, she was going to say no, and he could not blame her. They were comrades, but he’d made sure that neither had private moments throughout all this time of peace, out of fear she would hate him for loving her.

“Let’s go,” Mikasa said. “Show me.”

____________________

“If you squint, you can see the dragon’s tail.” Jean was saying. “They call it Arashi’s tail.”

She liked it when Jean explained things to her. Because everyone in the military knew she was stronger, whenever a man tried to explain anything to her, they liked to reaffirm that they were smarter than her, at least…which they weren’t.

Jean was different. He explained things with passion, without getting exasperated when she could not see a star or when she couldn’t recognize the shapes he was talking about. He didn’t talk down at her, he never bragged, he never laughed at her.

It could be simply because Jean was passionate about stargazing, or maybe he was just good when it came to treating women as equals. More people in the military should take their lessons from him, she realized.

“Wait, I thought the warrior was a male?” Mikasa asked. She squinted and indeed, she made out the blurry shape of the tail Jean had spoken about for the last fifteen minutes.

Jean rested his head on his hand, looking at the sky. “Yeah, but the guy died for her, so in the end she owns the constellation.”

Mikasa hesitated and turned to look at him, but Jean was focused on the stars.

They’d been lying like this for the past hour, a whole fix feet away from each other, like he’d suggested. Not that Mikasa would have hated lying closer. He was respectful, their Jean, and he was the one man she trusted fully, perhaps sometimes he trusted his moral compass more than she did Eren or Armin’s.

“Do you think it’s a good love story?” Mikasa asked, looking at Jean. “That he died for her.”

“Well, it was a prophecy that he’d die for the girl he loved,” Jean said thoughtfully. “To be honest it’s a hizuran legend, so it’s not like my opinion matters…but I hate it when someone dies and everyone takes that as an expression of endless love.”

“You do?” Mikasa asked. She had never stopped to think about love stories. Her mind had no time for them, in truth. There were too many responsibilities for someone like her to pay mind to the workings of a love story.

“I don’t think choosing to die for someone is romantic. It’s depressing,” Jean put both hands behind his head and rested on the grass, this time his eyes were on her. “The idea of living, or choosing to live for someone…now, that’s romance.”

“How come?” Mikasa asked.

“Because the world is cruel, and depressing and sad and unfair,” Jean said, not drawing his eyes away from her. Mikasa nodded as he spoke, that truth about the world had been clear to her since her childhood. “But deciding to stay and live to be with someone, despite how shitty the world gets? That’s admirable.”

“Having someone as a reason to live?”

“Not necessarily. It’s not like you should kill yourself if you’re not with them,” Jean shrugged, unable to find the right words. Somehow, that seemed correct. Love seemed like too much of a deep subject for teenagers that had never experienced it. “Just to decide to power through all the shit alongside a special person…it seems more poetic.”

Mikasa nodded. “I don’t understand poetic love.”

“Me neither.” Jean chuckled.

It seemed he understood it a lot better than she did, at least. “Do you have someone like that, Jean? Someone you want to power through with.”

Jean turned to look at the sky, his eyes distant. And just when Mikasa was about to apologize for being so intrusive, Jean turned to look at her with a smile. “I think so.”

“Oh.”

“But it has to be a mutual decision, powering through all the crap from the world together. In my case, I’m all alone on my side.” He said with a sad expression that moved her heart. She’d once told Historia that there were limited people in this world she truly cared about, and as the years passed, the more she came to realize that Jean, Sasha and Connie were included in that category.

And hearing that Jean was suffering because some woman was not reciprocating his feelings made her irrationally angry. Jean was a fantastic man, matured and mellowed after so many years in combat. Apart from that, he was easy on the eyes, way too easy, if she considered all those looks he got from the women in the military and from civilians.

She’s insane, she wanted to tell him. Find another, find someone better.

“Now, but it’s not her fault,” Jean continued, now resting his head on the soft grass, his cheeks pink in the moonlight. “I know what you’re probably thinking. And no, there’s no one better. I know it very well.”

“I didn’t say anything.”

“I haven’t said anything to that person, to be fair. And I doubt I ever will.” Jean sighed. She could tell how much it pained him, to have that affection so deeply burrowed and not saying anything. It irritated her, to see him so sad about a girl she didn’t know. She didn’t like the girl, she didn’t like seeing a comrade in love.

“That is stupid.” Mikasa said.

“Not saying anything?” Jean laughed.

“Maybe,” Mikasa laid on her side to look at him, and Jean did the same. They were six feet apart from each other, but she could still make out the color of his eyes from where she laid. Pools of molten gold, even in the moonlight. “But you’ve changed quite a bit. I’m sure you can continue changing.”

“Changed?” Jean asked. “What do you mean?”

“You used to be loud,” Mikasa said sincerely. “And annoying.”

Jean snorted when she spoke, his face relaxing for the first time ever since the subject of love had been brought up. “You can say it. I used to be a little shit.”

Mikasa shook her head. “I used to be obsessed about protecting Eren. I used to be quieter. I used to not have any friends besides Eren and Armin.”

“You’ve changed too,” Jean pointed out calmly.

“My changes aren’t as obvious as yours,” Mikasa admitted. In truth, it felt as if something broke away from her soul every time she tried to change, and she hid from it. She didn’t want to see the Mikasa that would be left after her outer layers peeled. She wasn’t ready. “I’ve changed my hair more than my personality.”

“That’s not true,” Jean chuckled. “You’ve grown, too. We’re all more mature.”

“You’re more mature than all of us.” Mikasa said thoughtfully. He wasn’t afraid of change. He embraced it, he grew with it. Perhaps it was one of those things that made him such a great leader. “I’m sure you’ll keep changing until you can say something.”

“You think so?” Jean asked.

“I know so.” Mikasa gave him a sideways glance and looked at the sky, feeling blood travel to her cheeks. “I’m rooting for you.”

“Thank you, Ackerman.”

Mikasa smiled to herself. But, deep down, she knew she had lied. Part of her didn’t want him to tell this girl about his feelings. He didn’t want Jean pried away from their team by some woman she didn’t know. And she hoped she turned him down, she hoped she turned him down so Jean could stay with them all, working to become Levi or Hange’s successor.

“What about that one that looks like a spoon? Is that a real constellation?” She asked, preferring to focus on his passion for the sky than on a future in which Jean gathered enough courage to marry and leave the military.

“Ah, that one is interesting.” Jean began talking and Mikasa focused on him.

She didn’t want things to change. She wanted all of them to stay as they were; she wanted them all sharing the same dorms until they became too old to use the maneuver gear, she wanted her tight-knitted group the same, forever. It was wishful thinking, she knew, especially with the titan curse. And while change could bring equally beautiful and awful things, at least for a moment, Mikasa allowed herself to picture that they would all stay the same, like the stars in the heavens, forever.

#Jeankasa #JeanMika #Jeankasa week 2022 #Jean Kirstein #Mikasa Ackerman #Ao3 #canon compliant #mikasa cut her hair #i had no idea what to do for this prompt and i have sooo many unfinished wips #escritos

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itslieutenanthawkeye · 2 years

Text

In due time

Jeankasa Week day 3: Firsts.

Goth Mikasa and Jean have their first pregnancy scare.

(Yes, I went ahead and decided to give them their first pregnancy scare >.<)

AO3

She liked seeing her parents cook dinner. The synchronization of their movements, the little displays of affection. —the pecks on the cheeks, the way her father rested his hands on her mother’s waist, the way her mother rested her head on his shoulder. Their love had been her favorite to observe for the first years of her life.

Of course, that had changed since her last year of school. And oh, how it had changed.

Mikasa hugged the teddy bear he’d given her. She’d wanted them to exchange vials of their blood to each other, but the woman at the store had claimed that would break their sanitary regulations, so Mikasa had opted for a teddy bear for each, each carrying locks of their hair inside their heart.

“You two are borderline cringy,” Eren had said when she’d shown hers to him and Armin, but she hadn’t cared. This was one of the thousand tiny little details they shared, expressions of love he didn’t shy away from. Anything she suggested, he said yes to -of course, within reasonable limits. He hadn’t wanted to participate in that demonic seance last full moon, and she could not blame him. In the end, she’d preferred to spend that night cuddling in his room.

“There’s enough chips for the three,” her mother was saying. “Make sure Eren eats the vegetables.”

“There’s extra toilet paper, too,” her father said, undoing her mother’s apron while giving her a fleeting kiss on the neck. “I swear that boy needs to see a doctor.”

“He does,” Mikasa replied, fidgeting with the locket in her hands. “Every four weeks.”

“Miki?” Her dad asked, clicking his fingers in front of her, bringing her back to reality. “I know you miss him, sweetheart, but you gotta pay attention. Last time Eren had indigestion he was so dehydrated he stayed at the hospital for three days..”

“Dad, Eren is an adult,” Mikasa replied, holding her teddy bear tight against her chest, as close as she could to her heart. She missed him so much, sometimes it hurt. “He knows the spicy cheese is bad for him, I don’t need to tell him. He seeks divine punishment for his previous sins without knowing it.”

“Previous sins?” her mother asked.

“To me, to Armin and to the world,” Mikasa replied solemnly.

“I know, but the last time he made a mess in our bathroom, honey,” her father said, unable to hide the hints of disgust in his face. “I just…are you sure you couldn’t go to his house this time? Let her mom handle his recklessness.”

“It’s my turn,” Mikasa said. “We went to Armin’s last time, and before that we went to Eren’s.”

“Shouldn’t you be studying for your exams?” Her father asked.

“That’s all we did when we went to Armin’s,” Mikasa protested.

“I’m only saying, it’s no good to cry about a boy all the time,” her father warned, reaching for his jacket, resting on the chair next to her, his face concerned and slightly jealous. She was his only daughter, after all, and the school’s bad boy had gotten them into plenty of trouble at a point. “You’ve got other responsibilities, young lady.”

“Leave her,” her mother kissed his cheek. “This is the first time they’ve been apart for so long.”

“Honey, it’s three weeks,”

“Weren’t you the one that cried when I went on that three day retreat?” Her mother asked, arching an elegant eyebrow. A second of looking at her expression was enough for her father’s cheeks to be colored red.

In truth, she’d been hanging out with her friends far too much these two weeks; movies with Sasha, dinner with Eren and Armin, quiet hikes with Annie, it all kept her distracted for a little while, but she always missed him. It was getting old, spending time watching movies with her friends instead of kissing her boyfriend. It wasn’t that she didn’t love her friends, she adored them. But she loved her Jean, too. She missed him.

“Is that the door?” Her mother said.

“Was it?” Her father asked. “Did our taxi get here early?”

“I’ll go check,” Mikasa said, jumping from her stool. She understood her father did not want to see her sad, but there was romance in the longing caused by distance. Talking for an hour before their bedtimes, sending each other letters, talking of all the things they would do once he returned…it had an air of ancient romantic plays. And Mikasa had always had a taste for the dramatic.

“Hello, lady,”

Mikasa froze for a moment when she saw him standing at the door, a bouquet of black and purple roses in his hand. There were tired bags underneath under his eyes, and he wore dark jeans and a clean white shirt. His hair was different than when he’d left; it was longer, long enough so he had it pulled back in a tiny ponytail, which gave him a tired, older appearance. Also, Mikasa could have sworn he had grown at least five centimeters.

“Aren’t you going to say anything about the surprise?”

“When did you get back?” Mikasa asked him.

Jean smiled. “About an hour ago. I had to shower, I didn’t want to come see you looking like a mummy. Should I have come right away?”

Instead of replying, Mikasa threw herself at him. He caught her when he jumped, and she enveloped his waist with both legs, holding onto him as if he were a tree. She’d grown stronger than him this past year, and she used that strength and the momentum to push his back against the nearest wall as her mouth clashed into his.

Jean kissed her back fiercely: first, with both of his hands tangled in her hair. Then, when their tongues touched and they opened their mouths more to each other, his both hands went to grab her ass. He squeezed it, making her groan out loud as she held him by the neck.

“You should have said you were coming!” Mikasa gasped between each kiss. “I could have prepared better.”

“Prepared?”

“Jean, I look like a mess!”

“That’s bullshit,” Jean pulled apart from her to look at her, biting his lower lip in pure unhinged desire. “You’ve no idea how cute you are. I’ve missed you so fucking much.”

“How was the trip?” Mikasa asked, combing his hair back to look at his pretty face. She’d been so eager to kiss him she hadn’t even asked how he was.

“The team is annoying as always, but we won for most of the competition,” he said, placing a kiss on each of her cheeks as he spoke. “I’ve missed you so fucking much.”

“My delinquent man,” Mikasa said, pressing her lips against his. She gave his lower lip a quick lick, which brought forth an animal groan, it made him squeeze her butt harder. Mikasa felt his hardness against her thigh, and was thankful for having worn a skirt that day. “You’ve no idea how much my soul has longed for you, troublemaker.”

“I have a surprise for you,”Jean said, kissing her neck.

“Oh?”

“It’s nothing big.”

“Can I see it?” She asked.

“You need to get me naked.”

Now that was a surprise she was sure would enjoy. The moment she and Jean had become something serious, they hadn’t been able to stray far from each other. It was as if their souls and bodies called each other, anxious to become one at every chance they had. “I was about to suggest that we should be naked within the next five minutes.”

“Your parents are not home, are they?” Jean groaned lowly and pressed her against his body, so she could feel the outline of his arousal on her thighs. “Fuck, I could take you right here against the door right now.”

Mikasa giggled. “They’re in the kitchen, actually.”

Jean put her on the floor in an instant, his face turning red as a beet in the lapse of two seconds. She didn’t have to feel his pants to know that his arousal had floated away from him at the mention of her parents. “Babe, we can’t make out like that with them in the other room!”

“They’re not going to hear anything!” Mikasa said, stroking his cheek with the back of her hand. “I swear, I’ve missed you so much.”

“I’ve missed you too, gorgeous,” he kissed her cheek, but Mikasa was quick to move her head and catch his lips in hers again. Jean moved his mouth, but his tongue was gentler this time, as if he was trying to slowly seduce her…and by heavens, it was working. Her knees trembled, and this time, she turned so she could be the one pinned against the door. “I needed you, Mikasa.”

“Honey?” Her mother called from the end of the hallway. “This is a shared space, honey.“

Jean pulled apart from her and stood with his back straight against the closed door. Her mother hid half of her face behind her hand, laughing as she waited for her father to come out of the kitchen. “Jean,” she tapped the side of her own chin. “Clean yourself.”

Her boyfriend muttered a curse and ran the back of his hand across his face, where her purple lipstick had stained him. There it was; another reason why he ought to have informed her about his return. As much as Mikasa adored this surprise, she could have made preparations for a proper welcome.

“Is that Jean? What are those two doing?” Her father asked. When he stepped into the hallway, his eyes fell on Jean, Jean and his attempts to clean the proof she’d eaten his mouth moments earlier. “Mimi, you’re going to give me gray hairs before time, I swear.”

“I’m deeply sorry, sir,” Jean stammered, clearing his throat, his face still carrying the purple smudges. “I had to kiss her, I…I just hadn’t seen her in three weeks. I missed her. I’m-I’m I’m sorry.”

“You know, for a problematic kid you’re very apologetic,” her father enveloped her mother’s waist and smiled. Mikasa decided to copy the gesture; she put both her arms around her boyfriend’s waist and rested her head against his body. “Welcome back, by the way.”

“Thank you, sir,” Jean wrapped her shoulders with one arm. “Three weeks is far too much.”

“Does Julia know you’re back?” her mother asked.

“I went home to shower before I came here,” Jean replied with a smile. “I just did it so quickly I forgot to bring the souvenirs I brought for you guys.”

“You’re too kind, Jean,” her mother said. “I’m sure you’ll be around quite a lot. You can bring them any time.”

“I’m expecting those salt water taffies we talked about?” her father said.

Jean smiled. “I think I brought a kilo of that.”

“I’m liking you more every day, child,” her father joked, which widened Jean’s smile. Their relationship had never been bad, but her father enjoyed teasing Jean, which often turned him into a bumbling mess.

“I swear I’ll bring them over tomorrow. I was in a hurry to get here,”

Mikasa hugged him tighter, looking up at him like an excited child. “You’ve brought us presents from your journeys, then?”

“Of course I did,” Jean said, looking at her with a sweet expression. “I wouldn’t come home to you empty handed.”

“He kind of just did,” her father chuckled.

“Honey, stop it!” her mother said, although there was not an ounce of anger in her voice. “You’re always getting Jean into these nervous fits, and the boy just got here.”

“He brought flowers, too,” Mikasa said to her father, picking up the bouquet from the floor, where it had landed the moment she’d thrown herself at him. “See? He brought exactly the ones I like. He’s a gentleman through and through.”

“Yes, Mimi, we all love Jean here,” Her father smiled and walked closer to her to take the roses from her hands. “Don’t squeeze them so much, you’ll suffocate them. Here, give me, I’ll put them in a vase and leave them in our living room.”

“Really?”

Her dad saw the black flowers and then exchanged a helpless look with Jean. In their tiny family, her father was the one who liked dark, scary things the least. “I’m sure they’ll brighten up the place, don’t you?”

Mikasa nodded eagerly, then took Jean’s hand in hers, leading him across the hallway. “We’ll be upstairs while you guys–”

Her mother stepped in front of her, arms folded over her chest. “Mimi, darling, please don’t make your father more concerned.”

“No boys upstairs, remember?” her father said calmly.

“You let Armin and Eren go upstairs!” Mikasa protested. In truth, she acknowledged her parents were quite perceptive. They knew why she wanted Jean in her room. “What’s so different about Jean? We’re moving in together in three months,”

“Exactly, kid,” her father said from the kitchen. When he came back, the flowers were in a transparent vase, one of Jean’s various gifts for her home. He was incredibly good with his hands…which was why she wanted him in her bedroom. “When you’re in your home, you two can do whatever you want.”

“We know you’re adults, honey,” her mother said kindly. “But, no boys in the room, okay? It’s just three more months. You can do that, right? You two have been good so far”

Mikasa leaned her back against Jean. She would’ve kept arguing if it hadn’t been for Jean’s curfew. After all the trouble he’d gotten himself into in their last year of high school, Mrs. Kirstein’s rules had become more strict, and although she became lenient when it came to her (she adored her daughter in law), Mikasa herself didn’t want to worry Jean’s mom.

“Understood,” she said, feigning defeat. “Can I at least go out to have dinner with him?”

“Of course, sweetheart,” her mother kissed her face and Mikasa grabbed Jean’s hand to lead him back to the front door.

“Wait, aren’t your friends coming over?” her father asked.

“I’ll tell them to come at ten,” Mikasa grabbed her coat and her purse, not giving Jean a chance to get into any conversations with her parents. Three weeks was too much time apart. She needed him now. “We’ll be back at eight, I promise!”

___________________________

Jean followed her without protests and questions, as usual. He was happy to follow her lead, to do whatever his beloved wanted to. He’d only seen her on the tiny screen of his phone for the past three weeks, so having her near enough to hold and kiss was like an ointment that healed his every wound.

“Did you bring your car, darling?” she asked, standing on her tiptoes to peck his lips. “Your motorcycle?”

“I know how your dad feels about the motorcycle,” Jean hadn’t gone to her house to lock himself in her room, but he hadn’t expected to go out on a date. “I asked my mom to drive me over, and I…we can get a cab, if you want.”

“No, that’s even better, less things to hide,” Mikasa turned to the narrow alleyway between her home and her neighbor’s, and found the bush she’d so often used to sneak out through in previous occasions. “Come on, hurry.”

“What are we doing?” Jean asked.

“We’re sneaking into my room,” Mikasa grabbed him by the shirt and kissed him deeply, stirring every naughty thought she’d provoked in him by the door. Jean didn’t think he’d ever missed someone so badly. “Our meadow is too far away, and your mother is home. I don’t want a hotel, and I want a bed. So we’re sneaking back in.”

“But, your parents–”

“They’re leaving in a few minutes,” Mikasa moaned against his mouth, then gave his buttcheeks a soft slap. “Go on, Kirstein.”

“You love this whole sneaking around, don’t you?” Jean chuckled, crouching to part the bush open for her.

Mikasa gave him a complicit smile, looking so pretty even in the dark, that Jean’s eyes almost watered by the sight of her. “I like sneaking around with you.”

He followed her across the garden as they avoided entering the kitchen window’s field of view, where her parents waited for their taxi to arrive. She led him towards the tree that grew by the fance, the one with branches that sprouted all the way to her bedroom window and the roof.

Mikasa climbed up it with the elegance of a cat, her long, limber legs took her high enough for him to see the shape of her underneath her skirt. It hypnotized him, it made him wonder how in the world he’d spent three whole weeks without his girlfriend by his side.

“Are you coming?” Mikasa hissed from above, already at her window, which she’d pried open with one of her hair pins. “Or will you stare at my underpants all night?”

Jean laughed and followed. He’d climbed up to her room plenty of times by now; he knew the route, the branches that held his weight better, the ones that only worked as momentary support. The most mature part of him thought this little habit of them would one day end up in a broken leg…although Jean had had plenty of broken bones by now to be scared of that.

“Finally,” Mikasa grabbed him by the shirt when he came to the ledge, dragging him inside until he was lying atop her on the bed, their bodies pressed against each other. Jean looked up, but Mikasa grabbed his face with both hands before he focused on the door. “It’s locked.”

“You’re such a clever woman,” Jean whispered. He kissed her again, certain the purple lipstick stains would take a while to wash off. Walking around with stains and bruises on his neck had become a habit by now; she tried her best to not pour all her love on him in public, but those attempts always ended in them melting into each other’s arms.

They were eighteen, fresh out of school, and they were in love. Of course, they wanted to spend every waking moment fused in each other. Ever since that first time in their moonlit meadow, their desire had increased.

Soon, they would move in with each other and start school, and surely their responsibilities would take the center stage. For now, he would make sure to give in to all the pleasure her body requested from him.

“Wait, protection,” Jean looked in the pocket of his pants. “Shit, I fucking left them in my other bag. Shit, shit–”

“I’ve got my daggers there, don’t worry,” Mikasa pointed at the shelf where she kept her collection of blades.

“You know what I mean,” Jean laughed and kissed her cheek.

“You left a couple behind that last time,” Mikasa said, sinking her teeth on the soft part of his neck. Jean groaned as her hand went to unfast his zipper and pulled out his hardening member. “Besides, I started taking those pills, remember?”

“Good,” Jean said, relieved, and bent down to kiss her neck this time. Mikasa craned her neck back, giving him more room to work on as her hand worked steadily. “I’m going to show you what I got.”

“Oh, your surprise,” Mikasa said, as if the kissing had deleted all the memories of what he’d said. Jean sat on the bed; his hands trembled when he removed the shirt over his head. The wind from outside stirred the hairs on his neck, but her warm, open palms on his abdomen were the one thing his mind focused on.

“Kirstein,” a sultry, delicious smile spread across his girlfriend’s face, and the expression was enough to get him completely hard in an instant. “Oh, dear, Kirstein, you got them too.”

Jean looked at his chest, feeling his cheeks burn. “I think they kind of look cool, don’t you? I got different ones than you, so they wouldn’t get tangled when we…you know.”

Mikasa stared at his torso and ran a thumb over his pierced nipple; Jean gasped, amazed from how good that felt. “This is a good present,” she said, her breathing slow, heavy. She leaned closer to his body and gave his nipple a lick. “This will be good. I like what you brought me.”

“I brought you a real present, too. This is just me being a pervert,” Jean said. Mikasa bit her lower lip, and licked his nipple again, while she ran her thumb over the other. Jean leaned forward and took her face in both of his hands. “You’ve no idea how much I’ve missed you.”

Mikasa smiled sweetly at him, surrounding his waist with both arms. “Three weeks is too much time. Take me on your trip next time.”

“Next trip is in summer,” Jean brushed her hair away as he laid back on top of her. He’d forgotten all about protection now that Mikasa had parted her legs and slid her panties aside. Jean pushed into her with a groan, and she held onto him as he began to move slowly. “It won’t interrupt your classes, will it?”

“Not at all,” Mikasa’s hands went back to his nipples, but her eyes were fixated on his. “I want to be in the crowd, cheering you on.”

“That lucky charm you gave me worked wonders,” Jean groaned, moving his lips at a steady rhythm. He knew she wouldn’t feel that comfortable, considering the time of the month, so he made sure to not go as fast as usual.

“It is the bearer who infuses its energy,” Mikasa informed him, stroking his nipple. “And this one bearer has so, so, so much energy. This one bearer is particularly strong.”

“You’re doing that sexy voice,” Jean groaned in return, burying a hand in her hair to pull on it. When she craned her head back, Jean buried his face in her cleavage, undoing the buttons of her black crop top with his mouth. The gesture made her moan loudly and lift her hips to meet his. “We need to be quiet, Mika,”

“I want you,” she groaned, grabbing his face with both hands. “Now, Kirstein. Go hard.”

“And your parents?”

“We’ll be quiet, first,”

“And Armin and Eren?”

Mikasa grabbed her phone from her pocket and texted Eren quickly. “I just told him to bring Armin at ten. They won’t annoy us.”

“You have a solution for everything, don’t you?” Jean smiled, pressing himself against her, kissing her deeply again, penetrating her in long, slow movements. “That’s why I adore you so much.”

“I love my Jean,” she purred, and Jean knew he could’ve died happy in that moment. He knew they were a couple, but the part of him that had harbored so many unrequited feelings for so long somehow had feared she would no longer want him upon his return.

But she wanted him, she longed for him as much as he’d longed for her.

“I love you, Mika,” he whispered, his mouth trailing to kiss the back of her ear. “It’s not too uncomfortable, is it?”

“We’ve done it a million times after that night,” Mikasa laughed, moving her hips at his pace, meeting him half way each time he pushed into her. “Of course, it won’t be.”

“And you won’t feel uncomfortable if I eat you out?” Jean asked. “Are you sure it won’t hurt if I go fast?”

“Why would it?” Mikasa said. Using much more strength than what she seemed to have, she pushed him against the bed and sat on top of him, a leg on either side of his body, rocking her hips slowly as she continued kissing him. “I’ve missed my night chair.”

“I mean because of your period,” Jean laughed.

Mikasa straightened, with his cock still inside her. “What do you mean?”

“It’s just going away, isn’t it? I remember you don’t like it when I eat you as it’s going away, but I really don’t mind if you sit on me,” Jean looked for the phone in his pocket and unlocked it, showing her the tracking app she’d installed there. “See?”

“No, it’s supposed to…shit,” Mikasa grabbed the phone from the floor and held it up against his phone. The apps were synchronized, but it seemed she’d forgotten to check hers. “I, fuck, I should’ve gotten it a week ago.”

“Then it’s all okay, isn’t it? You won’t be sore, or anything,” Jean asked, sitting up on the bed. She’d unbuttoned the rest of her shirt, leaving her lovely dark underwear exposed. He kissed her breasts and lowered the bra with his teeth, catching a pierced nipple in his mouth as he kept making love to her. “We can have fun and you don’t have to be worried if you sit on my face. Come on, sit on my face, then you can make me come.”

“I don’t have to be worried?” Mikasa repeated, almost in a panicked squeal. Her voice stopped him right away. One look at Mikasa’s concerned expression told him what was happening. The consequences of having sex a thousand different times were finally catching up with them. “I…I, did I get my period last month?”

Jean moved away from her breasts and looked up at her. “Did you? I can’t remember.”

“Didn’t we get the app to keep track of it?” Mikasa whispered, her voice panicked for the first time in a long time. The glint of fear in those deep gray, blueish eyes, he’d promised himself he would never cause that in her again. “Jean, this could mean that–”

“I know,” Jean surrounded her with his arms and held her closely. He thought about all her plans for college, the tiny apartment they would share for the first months, their talks about getting a bigger place, a place proper for a family, once they earned a little more money, and closed his eyes. “It’ll be fine. I swear.”

____________________________

Both had been too nerve-filled to be able to drive to the clinic. In the end, they’d convinced Sasha to drive them. The girl had done it, not without pestering them about how irresponsible they were every five minutes. Their friend spoke without brakes, in a mixture of panic for their plans and excitement because, according to Sasha, their baby would be the most adorable creature on earth.

“We don’t know if I’m pregnant,” Mikasa had muttered. She’d sat by his side, quieter than usual, her lovely hair tied in a side braid and wrapped by his jacket in both the car and while the nurse took her blood sample.

She had not wanted to take a home test. “Only blood will reveal the truth,” she’d said in her usual ominous tone of voice, that mysterious, fancy talk he adored so much.

“How long will it be?” Sasha asked for the third time, pacing up and down the waiting room with her hands wrung behind her back. The other couples in the room barely spared them a glance, but when they did, their attention was on Sasha, who seemed more outwardly concerned about their results than them. “An hour? Two hours?”

“They said about a couple hours,” Jean replied calmly.

“How long has it been?” Sasha asked.

“Barely an hour,” Jean said. Mikasa leaned against his arm and hugged him, closing her eyes. She wasn’t talking as much as usual; for the first time, Jean could not make out if she was angry or concerned.

“Do you think it’ll look like Mikasa?” Sasha asked, standing before him. “Or like you? How is she going to carry the baby to term if it’s like you?!”

“What?!” Jean asked angrily.

“You’re huge, Jean! HUGE!” Sasha gestured in his direction with both arms. “She’s not going to have a child, she’s going to have a watermelon! Have you seen her? I bet you can lift her up with both hands.”

“Sasha, keep it down,” Mikasa asked, her cheeks burning fiercely red. That’s exactly what he’d done the very last time they’d made love before his trip; he’d lift her by the waist and made love to her with his own back against the wall, moving her up and down at his will while she moaned in pleasure.

Jean shook his head. This was not the time to think about how much he wanted her again. That lust they had for each other was precisely what had caused this situation in the first place. Jean didn’t understand it. They’d used condoms, she’d taken pills…they’d taken all the precautions they’d learned at school.

“How are you so calm?” Sasha asked. “Mikasa, Mikasa, you’re going to college, both of you. And you’re acting like this isn’t going to turn your world upside down…it’s easy for a guy, but do you know all the shit your body will go through? It’s gonna–”

“Here,” Jean said, taking out money from his pocket and putting it in Sasha’s hands. “There’s a cafeteria outside. Can you get juice for Mika? You buy yourself a crepe, or something.”

“Do you want me gone?” Sasha asked, narrowing her eyes.

“No, I want a juice,” Mikasa said, clearly better than him at calming Sasha. “I really do.”

“Pregnancy craving?” Sasha asked, stepping back when Jean straightened on his seat, ready to shout at her. She walked towards the door, shaking her head like a disappointed mother. “Alright! I’ll go get you something. I won’t bring anything with sugar, understood, Ackerman? Your dad is gonna kill Jean, he sure is.”

Jean watched Sasha walk away with her words burning in his brain; in that regard, she was right. Mister Ackerman liked him now, and Jean had left behind all the aspects of his life that had given him the bad boy reputation, but he’d gotten his daughter into enough trouble before for him to think he was harmless.

Mikasa wrung her hands over her lap and sighed, drawing his attention without meaning to. Jean looked at her expression and felt as if a hand squeezed his heart. The one who he ought to be worried about was his girlfriend, the girl of his dreams and his life.

“I’m sorry, Mika,”

“Don’t be,” Mikasa shook her head and hugged his arm tighter. “We’ve surrendered ourselves to lust every time we could. Carnal desires have consequences, and this is ours, a life brought to the world before its deemed time.”

She didn’t have to admit how scared she was for him to know. Every time the overtly fancy talk began, Jean knew her mind was a whirlwind of concern, perhaps fear. “Can I hug you?”

“Always, my love,” she said. Jean enveloped her with both arms and brought her closer against his side. He kissed the top of her head as she wrapped his waist with one arm, sighing deeply. “Jean, what do we do if it’s positive?”

He’d been thinking about that since the previous night, when Mikasa had canceled their plans with Eren and Armin to cuddle by his side the rest of the night, when he’d climbed off her window and walked back home, as his mother asked about his evening with his girlfriend.

A child was an earth shaking event, it changed everything. Their plans would turn upside down or put on hold indefinitely. The more he thought about Mikasa, the more he realized that he didn’t care about putting things on hold for her, he didn’t care about uprooting his life. All of those things, he was willing to do, to care for the life they’d made together.

He just…he just didn’t know if she wanted to do it, and he could not blame her if she didn’t.

“What do you want to do if it’s positive?” he asked.

“I don’t know,” Mikasa admitted, shutting her eyes. “We’ve got several choices, but…I’m scared you might hate the choice I want to take.”

Jean held her closer, already guessing what was in her mind. She wouldn’t want to have it, of course. They both had plans for their future, an apartment they would move into together. If she did not want to go through with the pregnancy, then he would accept it.

“You know I love you, don’t you?” he asked.

“And I love you as well,” Mikasa lifted her head and kissed his neck. “I don’t know if I’ll be able to not have it, if it’s positive.”

“Huh?”

“I’ll carry it, figure things out,” Mikasa moved away from their embrace slowly. “I know the agency has big plans for your art, Jean, and I plan not to get in the way. If it’s too much for you, I can–”

“No, no, don’t be silly,” he held her face in both of his and drew her closer. He gave her a slow, sweet kiss, then pressed his forehead against hers, caressing her face gently, as if touching a flower. “I’d love it if you had our baby, Mika. It’ll make me so happy.”

“Jean, your plans, they–”

“My plan is a life with you,” he said. Perhaps the words sounded silly from an eighteen year old, but he truly meant it, all of it came from his heart. He wanted no other, he wanted nothing else. “I don’t care what happens apart from that.”

“What will we do with a baby?” Mikasa asked.

“The apartment has two rooms, doesn’t it?” Jean said with a smile. “I know we’d say we would use it as an office, but it’s big enough for a nursery, isn’t it?”

“It is,” Mikasa agreed. “Your mother will be so angry.”

“She won’t be,” Jean laughed, kissing her lips again. “Mom will be happy I’m giving her grandchildren, even if it’s young…your dad will want to kill me, though.”

“Mother won’t let him,” Mikasa said with a tiny smile. That was a better sight; smiles were the only thing he wanted to cause in her. “I won’t allow his wrath to harm you. I’ve protected my Kirstein before.”

“Now, it’s my turn,” Jean replied. He grabbed her hands and brought both up to his face, to kiss them briefly before he searched in the pocket of his jacket. He brought out a soft blue case, his fingers shaking slightly. “This was supposed to be a birthday present…but I think our circumstances have changed. The store clerk said they couldn’t do vials of each other’s blood, sorry.”

Mikasa’s eyes widened when he opened the case, which carried a heart-shaped lock that hung from a silver necklace. “It has your name written on it,” she said with a smile, her eyes suddenly teary when she took the lock in her hands delicately. “What are these tiny, sparkling bits?”

“They’re supposed to be amethysts, your birthstone,” Jean laughed, then leaned forward to trace a route across the silver surface. “And, if you look closely…you can see the night sky.”

Mikasa neared her face to the lock; the smile that appeared on her face was enough to erase any remaining doubts he had about their situation. This is what he wanted; he wanted to make her smile forever, he wanted to make her happy, he wanted to stay by her side. “I recognize this sky.”

The corners of his mouth curved upwards. “I thought you would…it’s the stars from that night, remember?”

“When I said I loved you,” Mikasa threw her arms around his neck and kissed him, smiling against his mouth even as her mouth merged with his. “You are a romantic man, Jean, even if you say you are not. Is this your heart you’re giving me?”

“My heart has been yours forever, Mika,” he took her by the waist and sat her on his lap, making sure her leather skirt didn’t rise up. “Let me put it on for you.”

She moved her braid away, exposing her lovely nape. Jean placed a kiss on her pale skin, taking in the scent of her perfume before securing the necklace there. He kissed her again, tracing his way to the back of her ear. “Even if it’s not positive, I want to spend my life with you,” he whispered. “I adore you, Ackerman, my sweet, beautiful girlfriend. You’re my love, forever.”

Mikasa turned around on his lap. “I don’t want you to regret things later.”

“I will never regret choosing you,” Jean chuckled, kissing her braid. “It’ll always be Mikasa in my heart. There’s room for no other.”

“You’re the king of my heart, Jean, I swear,” she neared his face and kissed him, ignoring the curious gazes from the other couples in the clinic. Jean hugged her and leaned back against the chair, while she rested her head on his chest. “It won’t be easy.”

“I know,”

“We might be broke.”

“I know,” Jean said, kissing her head. “I can always go back to fight–”

“No jokes of the sort, Kirstein,” Mikasa warned, looking up to him to kiss his chin. “And you are sure you want to be with me if I decide to keep the baby?”

“Positive,” Jean said with a smile. “I know it’s going to be hard, babe. But I don’t care. I want to be with you, and if we need to start our family beforehand, it doesn’t matter.”

“Beforehand?” Mikasa asked with an arched eyebrow. “Did you have plans before?”

“Sort of,” Jean let out an amused breath, blood rushing to his cheeks. Mikasa tilted her head, inviting him to continue. “I had plans for a house, two floors and a big backyard. A place where you could do your midnight seances at peace, a place where I could paint in the sun, where we could–”

“Play with our children?” Mikasa asked. Jean nodded, the image of their future didn’t feel out of reach at all, when she leaned forward and joined her lips with his, her smile large and lovely even as they kissed.

“For that we need to be married,” Jean said, giving her a significant look. For a moment, he feared she would recoil, telling him his dream had gotten out of hand. But Mikasa cupped his face and smiled, all the love in the world spilling from her eyes.

“Are you suggesting anything?”

“This isn’t as romantic as I want it to be,” Jean said. He needed a ring for a proposal, a proper setting. This wasn’t what Mikasa deserved; far from it, this was the bare minimum. “I want to give you a lot more, you deserve romance. I don’t want to say it here.”

“My Jean is a bigger romantic than I am,” Mikasa kissed his neck, then his chin, then his ear, licking the earlobe before whispering hotly. “I love you, my Jean.”

“I love you too, Mika.”

“Thank you for loving me,” she replied softly, stroking the back of his head. “And when we get home, I’m sitting on your face. It’s your punishment, for that joke about you returning to fighting.”

“You’re threatening me with a good time, aren’t you?” Jean said as she buried her hand in his hair, making him sigh in delight. The night before, both had been too shocked to do more than cuddling. But now, with their cards on the table, with the only certainty that they wanted to remain by each other’s side, all of their repressed desire had come back in full force. “Don’t get me hard here, Mika.”

“I’m not trying to,”

“You liar,” Jean laughed.

“Ackerman?” a nurse called from the reception desk, drawing their attention. Mikasa straightened on his lap and Jean combed his hair back, noticing that Sasha had returned from the cafeteria, carrying a large plastic container filled to the brim with what seemed to be orange juice. “Ackerman?”

“Come on!” Sasha said. Their friend sped towards the reception desk and he and Mikasa stood a second later, reaching the desk at the same time as Sasha, who was nervously tapping on its wooden surface. “Ma’am, so what is it? Is it a girl or a boy?”

“What?” the nurse asked.

“The baby!” Sasha said excitedly. “Is it a girl or a boy?!”

The nurse’s expression didn’t change at all. She looked from Mikasa, back to him and then to Sasha once again. She shook her hand and handed Mikasa the paper without another word, and Jean could not blame her. Few people managed to understand Sasha’s logic when nerves took over her.

Mikasa grabbed the folded paper and pressed it against her chest; she held his hand and led him out into the hallway. She stood in front of the window, chest rising and falling quickly, paper firmly held in one hand. “I think I might be wary of what fate awaits us if I open this, Jean.”

“I know, I’m the same,” he leaned in and kissed her cheek, warm at the touch.

“But we can’t stay ignorant to what the future beholds, if it’s bright or dark,” Mikasa continued, giving the paper a brief look before focusing on his face, her eyes wide. “What I’m trying to say is, I’m scared.”

“I know,” he held her face and gave her a brief kiss. “Do you want me to look at it?”

“You try to pretend but you’re the same as I am,” Mikasa pointed out. Jean smiled in defeat and wondered at what point she’d gotten this good at guessing whatever feeling went underneath his surface. “We should’ve just gone with what the cards said.”

“Now, you’re sounding like Sasha.”

Mikasa smiled at him. “I’m nervous.”

“I can open it,” Sasha said behind them. He and Mikasa turned around to look at her, innocently watching their interaction as if they were in some sort of romantic book. “Come on, I’ll see it first. I’m going to be the kid’s aunt if it’s positive anyways, right?”

Mikasa exchanged a look with him, as if to verify if he agreed, and Jean nodded. In truth, he didn’t want to be the first one to see the results. And, despite her mood swings from deep terror for their future and tremendous joy from the possibility of babysitting their nonexistent child, Sasha was truly there to support them whatever the outcome.

“Alright, you guys ready?” she asked, holding both ends of the paper in her hands.

“Just open it and tell us,” Jean said urgently, passing an arm around Mikasa’s shoulders and pressing her to his side. “Sasha, please, can’t you see our faces?”

Sasha nodded and unfolded the paper and her eyes scanned the page quickly. Mikasa put her hand on his abdomen, underneath his shirt, and pressed nervously, while Jean kissed the top of her head.

“It’s positive.”

Time seemed to slow down when she turned to look at him. The corners of her mouth moved upwards hesitantly, and Jean had the idea she wanted to scout his reaction before she allowed him to see hers. He admired her ability to hold back, because all he could do was smile, widely and sincerely. Returning the smile in full, Mikasa threw her arms around him and held him tightly.

“It’s all going to be fine, we’ll be a family,” he whispered against her ear. “I love you.”

“I love you, Jean,” Mikasa kissed his neck, then his chin, then his mouth. “I love you,”

“I’m kidding, it’s actually negative,” Sasha said. Mikasa parted from his lips and turned around to look at her best friend. Sasha was holding up the paper for them to see the black and bold letters on the page that read NEGATIVE. “Before you slap me, I-I just wanted you guys to see!”

“You wanted us to have a heart attack!” Jean snapped.

“Not at all!” Sasha snapped back. “You two were happy, weren’t you?! This way, if you do get another pregnancy scare, you two don’t have to worry about your reactions. Genius, right?”

Mikasa closed her eyes for a moment, as if to gather her thoughts and round up as much patience as she could. Considering Sasha had been her best friend for almost a year now, she’d gotten used to that habit quite easily. In the end, his girlfriend outstretched her arm towards Sasha, inviting her to join their embrace.

“I can’t be mad at her,” she whispered to him when Sasha jumped in her arms, on the verge of tears of gratitude for Mikasa’s forgiveness. “But listen, Sasha, if you pull another thing like that, I swear I am hexing your boyfriend. Niccolo’s hair is going to fall out, understood?”

“It’ll be cute to see him bald, though,” Sasha cried, holding onto her, more relieved that she got to keep her friend than concerned about her boyfriend’s hair. Jean laughed at the same time as Mikasa, who lifted her face so he could peck her on the lips one more time.

“Everything alright?” Jean asked in a whisper, although he doubted anything could be heard above Sasha’s incessant chatter of her ideas not being appreciated. Mikasa stretched and kissed his cheek. “I kind of got excited there.”

“All things in due time, Kirstein,” she said with a smile. “We have a whole life to make babies.”

#Jeankasa #Mikasa Ackerman #Jean Kirstein #JeanMika #jean kirstein #fanfic #ao3 #smut #Gothkasa #School Caste AU #smut and fluff #escritos

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itslieutenanthawkeye · 2 years

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Jeankasa Week 2022. Day 2: Muse and Arist. Rock Band AU.

Modern, Band AU. Jean, the bassist and lead member of his band, has lost his inspiration to write songs. When he runs into a girl who seems to have a feud from the past with him, however, his spark ignites again.

AO3

The final lyrics of the song enveloped every corner of the stadium. The crowd swayed back and forth, following whatever the lead singer ordered. The lights in every corner of the stadium had turned red to announce the end of their set.

The bracelets, carefully programmed to create patterns on the highest decks of the venue, given to everyone at the beginning flashed in white, formed the shape of a thousand different giants walking across the crowd. Mikasa didn’t like the concept, but she’d heard from their manager that the lead singer of the band had a bit of a strange taste when it came to aesthetics. That didn’t surprise her in the slightest.

“It’s gonna look great!” Annie shouted over the music. Mikasa nodded in agreement and panned the camera to capture the final moments of the concert. These moments were important; her pay depended on getting them right.

Her uncle had introduced them to their boss for the summer; they were an old friend that worke directly with the band. She and Annie had been hired by the band’s team as support in audiovisuals, with the promise of accompanying everyone on tour if their final products pleased the team; Mikasa trusted her camerawork, but it was hard to focus with the song that resonated all around her.

From the first time she’d heard their songs, Mikasa had liked this band. Her initial anger at the lead singer had dissipated the moment he’d sent the first album to her house. It wasn’t something she would admit, but she’d bought all their records from the very beginning…and she was proud of him, like a mother would be, or like a teacher would be.

“It’s about to finish!” Annie announced. Mikasa set the larger camera to automatic movements and grabbed the rest of her equipment. She ran to get a closer angle of the members of the band as they closed their set. Her equipment was beginning to hurt her lower back, but one more push would be all she needed. She trusted her work and she wanted the check.

Music rose and rose, finding its peak in the crowd’s screams for more. Mikasa smiled as she took snapshots of the members of the band; the long haired lead singer, who was performing awfully close to the blond, muscular guitarist and, finally, the bassist with the undercut, his right arm covered in tattoos, his eyebrows pierced and his eyes painted with dark eyeliner.

Mikasa walked down the staff passageway to get closer to the stage, taking pictures as she advanced, feeling a little jealous of the dancing groups in the VIP section of the stadium. Maybe part of the reason why she’d accepted the job was because she hadn’t been able to get online tickets on time, university exams be damned.

“You’re doing a great job!” Hange shouted when she was near. Mikasa gave them a thumbs up as she changed her lens. The lead singer was too focused on running his hands across the guitarist’s blond hair, but that didn’t matter. It would be good material. Fans loved pictures of Eren and Reiner all over each other, that was no secret, and perhaps Mikasa also liked them, but she would never admit it out loud.

“Get Jean!” Hange said, pointing at the bassist. “He just finished his sleeve last week!”

Mikasa nodded and turned to take pictures of the bassist. Jean, so that was his name. Most of the band members went by aliases, so it was strange when Hange used their real names. Mikasa snapped another picture, and another, making sure to get the tattoos on his arm clear as day.

The bassist turned to look at her camera and smirked as the song finished, stretching his arms over his head, showing off the muscles and tattoos. He winked at the camera and smiled before focusing again on the crowd, and Mikasa rolled her eyes.

We’ve got a cocky one, she thought angrily. He had some nerve to act flirtatious, knowing how easy it was for him to ruin relationships, bonds, friendships and everything in between. He hadn’t changed one bit from the cocky brat who was too talented for his own good.

“Concert’s done!” Hange told her. “Get some stuff from the crowd and then we’ll see you guys at the meet and greet!”

Mikasa blinked, shocked. “You’re letting us in the meet and greet?”

“This is a favor for your uncle, remember? He wants you out of the house for the summer,” Hange laughed. “Our most experienced photographers can’t be bothered with these handshake events, they’re too long!”

“So, you are hiring us for the summer?” Mikasa asked. “You’re really taking us on your tour?”

“That was a yes from the beginning, child!” Hange said, tousling her hair as if she were a preschooler. “Your material tonight determines if you just come as assistants or as part of the audiovisual team!”

“Pay is different for those two, right?”

“A big difference,” Hange said, already focused on their phone. As their manager, Mikasa guessed they rarely rested on tour. “Go on, tell your friend. You’ve got your backstage pass, I’ll see you in an hour.”

Mikasa nodded and ran back from where she’d come from. She took her phone out and wrote a quick text to her uncle.

You didn’t tell me we’d been hired right away.

A moment later, Levi replied. Congrats. It’s a month’s long tour.

Her fingers moved quickly across the screen. Exactly long enough for you to go on your trip with that tall man of yours.

What a coincidence. His reply made her chuckle. She hadn’t been looking forward to spending her summer months with Levi, but her parents were renovating their home, and they hadn’t wanted her there with all the repairals taking place. Levi had agreed to her father’s request, but it seemed he’d had plans on his own.

_____________________________________

Jean laid on the couch with a towel on his head. He could hear Reiner and Eren laughing in the other room, but he couldn’t be bothered to get up and see the source of their amusement. He enjoyed concerts, he loved hearing women scream his name -albeit most of the time it was Reiner who they went mad for– but the pressure for the year was too much.

The end of the tour would mean six months worth of downtime, downtime they would use to create the songs for their new album. After that, they would have seven more months to record and produce it. That’s what they’d agreed with the record label; five albums, they would give them, and then the contract would be renegotiated.

“It’s the price to pay for a comfortable life,” he repeated to himself. He hadn’t minded playing in smaller venues, making the songs on their own time, but they’d all had bills to pay and families to help, and the contract had been too good to refuse.

Jean enjoyed the life, he couldn’t deny that. He enjoyed singing all throughout the night, he liked having enough money to keep his mother comfortable, he enjoyed having a vast array of women and men at his disposal, not that he ever made use of such an array…the pressure now that he didn’t like.

“You okay?” Galliard asked, walking in the room with his hand on his girlfriend’s waist. Out of all them, he was the only one with a steady partner, the only one with any plans of marriage. “You’re still stressing out about the songs?”

“What do you think?” Jean said, putting the towel back over his face.

“You know, it’s teamwork, right?” he replied. “We can all write–”

“Hell will freeze over by the time you write a good song.” Jean replied.

“What the hell, man? Are you–”

“Leave him,” his girlfriend said. They’d been dating even before Galliard joined the band; the model was the foil to Galliard’s personality, the one person that kept him from getting into fist fights with everyone around him. “He’s stressed out, can’t you see?”

“Since when are you on his side?”

“I’m not!” he heard the distinct sound of kissing and shuddered. He couldn’t imagine women wanting Porco. What a stupid name he had, besides. “I’m on your side, and because I am, I don’t want to see him break your pretty nose.”

“My nose is pretty?” Porco asked, clearing his throat.

“Of course, it is,” more kissing sounds. Jean rolled his eyes and turned to lie on his side. Pieck had no idea about stress, she had no idea of the pressure on his shoulders. Every single song of their previous albums had been written by him. It had always been like that; he wrote the lyrics, then Eren, Reiner and Porco composed the melodies.

He’d been a prodigy. One of the best, since the tender age of twelve. The best bassist of his class, of his generation of musicians. Most years, lyrics had flown easily out of him, inspiration had been everywhere and in everything. And now, it seemed that the fountain was dry; his talent as a lyricist a carcass in the middle of the desert, ready to nurture vultures flying overhead, devoid of inspiration, devoid of words good enough to form coherent lyrics.

Porco had taken him on a week-long hike, but none of the mountain top landscapes had inspired him. Reiner had begun composing some music, to try and squeeze lyrics out of him, but it hadn’t worked. Eren had introduced him to his philosopher friends -one of whom was his half-brother- and he’d tried to get him to go out on dates, none of it had worked.

“It’ll be fine,” Pieck said, and Jean knew she was trying to console him. She was like the band’s oldest sibling -for everyone except for Galliard, of course- and her words were often said in soothing tones. “I’m sure you guys will come up with a great album.”

“I’d love it if you were right,” Porco replied softly. “The idiot has a whole six months.”

“Why don’t you try and write one, huh?” Jean replied angrily.

“Didn’t you just say only I can do it,” Porco’s mocking tone of voice finally made Jean sit up and remove the towel from his face.

“Alright, time out for you two!” Pieck said; she grabbed her boyfriend’s arm and dragged him to the sofa on the opposite side, where she forced him to sit down. “You’ve got a whole six months, understood? There’s no need for either of you to lose your mind over, what? Eight songs?”

“Twelve.” Porco corrected.

Jean fell back on the couch. “Please, don’t remind me.”

“I don’t know what he was doing there!” Eren laughed, coming into the room alongside Reiner. The tall blond’s face was red in its entirety, despite that he only wore an undershirt. Jean rolled his eyes, thankful he hadn’t been curious to inspect why they’d been laughing so hard. The last thing he needed was to see them make out in front of him.

“What’s going on with horseface?” Eren asked. He lifted Jean’s legs from the sofa and sat next to him, placing them over his laps. “Who ate your tongue this time?”

“Shut up,” Jean closed his eyes.

“Is it the songs again?” Reiner asked.

“It’s the songs again,” Pieck confirmed.

“What is the girl doing here?” Eren asked. “Didn’t we agree backstage was boys only?”

“You made that rule, because all you care about is dicks,” Porco replied, the annoyance in his voice permanent for whoever wasn’t Pieck. Jean snorted at the comment, and chuckled when Pieck began scolding Porco for talking rudely to his friends.

“Hey,” Reiner said, sitting on the sofa’s arm. Jean looked up, but he could barely look at his face in that angle, given it was hiding behind his chest muscles. “You’re in a small ditch, it’ll be fine. Give it a couple of months, and you’ll be writing like you used to…maybe you should try painting again?”

“Thanks for the advice, Reiner,” Jean took a deep breath. “But take your massive tits away from my face, your boyfriend’s gonna get jealous.”

“He doesn’t like horse faces,” Eren replied, tapping on his legs with hands. “Why don’t you go with that guy I told you about? He paints, too, and he–”

“I’m not using sex as an inspiration,” Jean huffed. He’d tried, in fact. But he was not going to admit that in front of so many people, let alone in front of a girl. “I’m going to die without ever writing a song again.” “Is Kirstein being dramatic again?” Hange asked, knocking on the door. “Is it the songs?”

“When isn’t it the songs?” Reiner sighed.

“Artistic slumps are no big deal. I’m sure he’ll get the hang of it,” Hange replied. “If not we can always get a ghost writer–”

“None of that,” Jean snapped angrily, almost kicking Eren out of the way. Nothing he wrote satisfied him, nothing seemed good enough, the lack of depth mortified him, it was a physical weight on his shoulders that threatened to send him to the deepest levels of hell. But he was not going to hire someone to do the job for him.

“We need to get going,” Hange steered away from the subject. They knew how delicate it had become. “There’s about a hundred people out there that want autographs.”

“Send Reiner, girls will have enough with him.” Jean muttered. “Make sure Eren doesn’t kill anyone.”

“You’re being so bitchy, Jean,” Eren replied. He laid on top of him on the couch, purposely trying to get laughter out of him. “Do you want Reiner to give you a massage? Maybe that’ll loosen you up a little.”

“You’d know about loosening up to Reiner, wouldn’t you, Jaegar?” Jean growled, struggling to contain the deep chuckle that wanted to escape his throat. “You know all about that.”

“I'm sure you’re gonna like it too,” Eren replied, grabbing him with both arms to try and tickle him. Jean kicked, but Eren had him firmly pinned to the sofa with his whole torso.

“Let go, idiot!”

“Not until you let Reiner massage you,”

“You’re so fucking weird, Jaegar!”

“We only know him because of Hange here,” Jean looked up, realizing Reiner was talking at someone at the door. “I didn’t know he had a family.”

“Nobody wants to associate with him,” Hange said, chuckling to themselves. “The only one that wants to deal with him is Erwin and that’s not saying much.Isn’t that right, Mikasa?”

“Hey, you!” Eren exclaimed, sitting up straight, the smile on his face large, as if he’d just encountered his mother, or perhaps a long lost friend. “What are you doing here? Weren’t you at your fancy college?

“I’m working to pay for the fancy college,” the woman replied right away. Jean had never seen Eren smile so much at a woman before, not sincerely, at least. Driven by curiosity, he sat up to look at the source of his friend’s happiness.

The girl wore a black top without sleeves that enhanced the muscles on her arms. Her hair was short and straight, black as night itself. Her face…her face was the prettiest vision Jean had seen in a long time.

“Are you finally being polite?” Reiner asked, tousling his hair. Jean slid away from him, not wanting to look like a child.

“Now that everyone is being polite, I wanted to inform you boys that these two will be at the meet and greet,” Hange patted Mikasa’s back and then the other girl’s, the blonde one that looked to be in a permanent bad mood. “They’re good kids, and talented. It’s their first formal job, so you all need to be polite.”

“What happened to the agency?” Jean asked, crossing his arms over his chest. “Doesn’t the agency send its photographers? Why did you hire two freelancers? And why are you introducing them to us?”

“Oi, she’s my friend,” Eren replied, slapping him gently. “I told Levi to call Hange, okay? Visit her website, she’s fucking talented.”

“This is a nepotism hire, Jean, can’t you see?” Hange replied, laughing. The black haired girl turned her attention to him, and Jean had to focus his gaze on Hange. Her face was perfect to look upon, but her irritated expression was perhaps the most adorable sight he had seen in years. “They’re talented, and Mikasa’s uncle also told me to not let anyone get too clever with them, so I’m here showing them to you so you don’t go hitting on either.”

“Hange, I’m not into women,” Reiner sighed, leaning back against the couch. “Porco’s taken, Eren is taken and Jean is a virgin, nobody is crossing the line here.”

“I’m not a fucking virgin, hey!” Jean snapped angrily. Reiner turned to look at him over his shoulder, laughing, getting on his nerves as he so usually did. “Stop saying fake shit in front of new people!”

“Why do you get so riled up?” he teased. “If you’re itchy, scratch.”

“I hate it when you make rumors about me!” Jean protested heatedly. He spared a glance for Mikasa, but she was busy talking to Hange about equipment. Jean grabbed Reiner by his shirt and pulled him closer. “Don’t make up lies in front of new people.”

“I can’t make promises,” Reiner laughed.

“Yo, Ackerman,” Eren put his legs back to their previous position and ran to the door, where Hange had huddled with the two girls. “Oi, come on, I haven’t seen you in ages, stop being all stuck up, give me a hug.”

Eren took her into an embrace that she returned in full, her smile growing big when their eyes met again. She signaled at the blonde girl and she shook Jaegar’s hand, raising eyebrows as Mikasa told her something in hushed tones. At a point, Eren put his arm over Mikasa’s shoulder and both laughed, telling the blonde girl some story from their past.

“What are you two staring at?” Porco asked. Jean blinked, realizing he and Reiner had frozen in their places to stare at Mikasa and Eren’s little conversation. Jean cleared his throat and sat away from Reiner, trying to keep his eyes away from the two, unable to do so.

“Enough down time, kids,” Hange announced, clapping their hands twice. They leaned against the door and adjusted their glasses before focusing on the couch where Porco and Pieck sat. “Miss Pieck, are you coming?”

“I don’t know,” Pieck rested her face on Porco’s shoulder and bit her lower lip. “Won’t it be boring for me?”

“I can always keep you company,” Hange replied with a smile.

“Don’t you have a boyfriend, huh?” Pieck said, arching an eyebrow.

“Don’t you have a boyfriend?” Porco said heatedly. Pieck smiled at him and placed a kiss on his cheek, focusing all her attention on him, assuring the blond that there was no one else in her sight. “Let’s get going, and stop flirting with my girl, Hange.”

“I never do” Hange replied, and Porco slapped their hand away when they offered it to Pieck. The small girl laughed as Porco led her out of the room.

“On that note, your fans are waiting,” Hange said, taking their leave from the room a minute after.

When Eren stepped out, his arm was still resting on Mikasa’s shoulders. Jean and Reiner followed their little group a few feet behind. A sideways glance told Jean the tall blond was watching their conversation carefully, the narrowing in his eyes also told him he was feeling particularly jealous. “Do you know her?” Jean asked in a whisper.

“She’s his friend from school,” Reiner replied, clearing his throat. “Also, his ex.”

“His what?!” Jean hissed, shocked. “He used to date girls?!”

“It was a high school thing,” Reiner shrugged, trying to take importance away from the matter and failing. “They’ve always been good friends, but from what he’s told me, he used to be an asshole to her, though.”

“Is that a surprise?” Jean shook his head; she had such a sweet face, Jean couldn’t understand why anyone would ever dare to be mean to her. “Aren’t you the only person who he hasn’t been an ass to?”

“I’ve mellowed him a bit,” Reiner admitted. He scratched the back of his head and gritted his teeth, closing his eyes. “Ah, shit. I promised myself I wouldn’t be this guy.”

“What guy?”

“Hey, Eren!” Reiner walked forward, putting a heavy arm around him and dragging him towards his body, away from Mikasa. “Did you forget about me all of a sudden? You see a pair of pretty eyes and leave me stranded, huh?”

“Why are you being jealous, man? It’s Mikasa!” Eren laughed, stumbling against him without protests. He wrapped both arms around his waist, then turned to look at Mikasa. “You’ve met Reiner before, haven’t you?”

The black haired girl smiled at both. “Only in pictures.”

“Nice to meet you, Ackerman,” Reiner replied, hugging Eren tighter against him. He bit on his ear for a moment, making Eren laugh. Then, he looked in Jean’s direction. “Oi, Mikasa, could you keep Jean company for a little while? He was saying he could use a pretty bodyguard.”

His cheeks became ablaze the moment Mikasa turned to look at him and arched her eyebrow. Jean cleared his throat and flattened down his T-Shirt; he had too much on his mind to let Reiner and a pair of pretty gray eyes turn him into a fool. He had his share of recognition, too, he was a talented musician, he’d dated plenty of women, he was not going to act like a teenager just because–

“You’re Jean?” Mikasa said, suddenly standing by his side.

“I am. N-nice to meet you,” Jean cleared his throat again to keep himself from stammering. He rubbed his face with the back of his hand; she was standing close enough for him to smell her perfume. “I’m sorry about earlier, I…it’s just strange, Hange always gets the agency to send us people.”

“I understand,” she said. “No offense taken.”

Jean put his hands in his pockets, realizing a second later how weird it would look. He pulled them out and dropped them by his sides, then put them back on his waist. What in the world was happening and why couldn’t he find a place to rest his hands?

“Have you known Eren for a long time?”

Mikasa let out an amused breath and folded her arms. “You don’t even remember me, do you?”

“Huh?” Jean scouted his memory quickly. Pretty eyes like those, he would remember. That lovely voice, anyone would remember. That face, that body…maybe Jean was a fool. “Did Eren introduce you to me, somehow?”

“Not quite,” Mikasa lowered her gaze and sighed. “You were a musical prodigy in high school, don’t you remember?”

“You knew me in high school?” Jean stammered. “I-I went to an all boys’ school, though.”

“I can’t believe you don’t fucking remember. You’re just the same cocky jerk from that night, you–” Mikasa took a deep breath and closed her eyes, as if to keep herself from choking him. Jean disliked it when people directed their anger towards him, but he didn’t think he would be particularly angry if this woman choked him -with either hands or thighs.

“L-look, if I went out with you and never called you–”

“It wasn’t that at all,” Mikasa snapped, taking a step back.

“Is everything alright?” Annie called from the end of the hallway.

“Is Jean bothering you?” Hange added a second later. “Are you bothering Jean?”

“Nobody is bothering anyone!” Jean shouted, shaking a hand in the air to dissipate any concerns from his manager. Nepotism or not, snapping at a band member could cost Mikasa her summer job and he was not willing to put her in that position. He’d angered her enough already -albeit he didn’t know why. “We’ll be there in a second!”

“Stop trying to convince her to go out with you man, it won’t work!” Eren called from the end of the hallway, and Jean made a point of getting back at him for the comment later. A kick to the balls, or a punch in the nose would suffice. God knew it wouldn’t be the first time.

Jean turned to look at Mikasa, hoping to apologize for making people think he was flirting. When he focused on her again, her cheeks were red and shock radiated from her eyes. She opened her mouth and closed it again, at a loss. “Hey, are you alright?”

“Thank you,” she mouthed. “I…I need to get back to work.”

She sped down the hallway and met Annie halfway, leaving him more in awe, and in more confusion than before. What had he done to upset her so? And why couldn’t he remember anything about it?

_______________________________________-----

Mikasa worked with robotic efficiency, recording snippets of the band’s interactions with its fans for their documentary, as the crowd of those who had paid hundreds for the meet and greet lined up to take pictures and hug the four men in their dark make up and ripped jeans.

With Eren’s kind greeting, she’d forgotten just how big they’d gotten the past years. This was a good paying job, and she’d let the emotions get the better of her, so it would be best to stay on the sidelines and limit herself to the photographer role.

The problem was Eren, and his constant smiles for her, his endless chatter. He’d changed since the last time they’d seen each other; he was kinder, softer-mannered…Reiner seemed to have a good effect on him, which pleased and surprised her plenty. She’d not once thought that Jean would have introduced him to someone that would mellow him.

“So, he’s been dating her for how long?” he no longer spoke to her harshly; he seeked for conversations with her, without ill intent nor hidden intentions, without the anger that characterized him before.

“About three years?” Mikasa eyed Annie, too busy taking pictures of Porco and a group of girls with titan masks. “He convinced her to come along with me for this…she’s more talented than I am.”

“Don’t sell yourself short, Ackerman, I’ve seen your work,” Eren replied, enveloping a girl by the waist so her mother could take a picture. “We need to meet up, just the three of us. How long has it been again?”

“About five years,” Mikasa repeated, biting down on the rest of what she’d wanted to say.

And it’s your fault, she knew she couldn’t blame him; he’d followed his dream along a more certain path, one that had left her and Armin behind.

“You should call him, we should go for drinks tonight,” Eren proposed, smiling widely as he signed a guy’s stomach. “Do you want a picture, too?”

Mikasa walked down the line, recording and snapping pictures automatically, preferring to focus on the present rather than reminisce. Women and men alike melted into puddles by the sight of these men; and she couldn’t blame them. Hange had done a fantastic job at making the group as attractive as possible. There was not an ounce left of the awkward teenagers she’d met that night, when Jean Kirstein had been on a search for a new guitarist–

“Mika, come see!” Eren shouted from his end of the line. A redheaded guy was holding up a postcard with a pixelated image printed on it. “Look! He’s got a First Gen image! Come see!”

“First Gen?” Jean asked, who had been too busy entertaining a group of young women who had squealed nonstop from the moment they’d looked at him. “Why does that ring a bell?”

Mikasa held back the need to roll her eyes. He’d saved her job less than two hours ago, hadn’t he?

“Mikasa!” Eren called again. “Come over, Mika! It’s First Gen! I thought I’d lose those pictures.”

Sighing, Mikasa walked back in his direction; it was still difficult to not pay heed to his requests when he said them so politely. Driven by annoying curiosity, Jean walked behind her, but Mikasa held back the need to snap and tell him to go back to his place…the last thing she needed was for him to see the postcard the redheaded was holding up to Eren.

“Look!” Eren said excitedly, reaching out to grab her arm and drag her towards him. “Look, the uniforms and–”

“Dark knight,” the redhead said, his shoulders tense, his voice charged with badly hidden irritation. “The autograph, please.”

“Dark knight?” Mikasa repeated. “Didn’t you have a different alias?”

“He changes it every other week,” Jean replied, shaking the hands of two men that were headed straight towards Reiner.

“I like Dark Knight,” Eren laughed, then poked Mikasa’s arm. “You used to call me that, don’t you remember?”

Mikasa eyed Jean, her cheeks burning red. “Don’t remind me.”

“Who’ this?” the redheaded fan snapped, startling her with the irritation in his voice. Eren, Jean and herself turned to look at him, and she realized just how much their tiny conversation had drawn everyone’s attention. “You keep talking to her like she’s your best friend.”

She noticed Reiner’s attention on them, too. Irritation and kindness were entwined in the fan’s voice, as if her presence were some sort of pebble in his shoes he didn’t want to kick right away out of fear he could offend the band. Eren chuckled with his reaction, making the fan blush despite his irritation.

“She’s my girlfriend, man, didn’t you hear?” he laughed. There was a gasp from the crowd; Reiner shook his head, annoyed, and Jean called Eren an asshole under his breath, but it was the redhead’s reaction that startled her the most.

“What?!” he snapped, the veins of his neck sticking out.

Reiner stepped towards them. “Eren, come on…”

Mikasa cleared her throat. “He didn’t mean to–”

“THIS?” the fan snapped again, gesturing at her with both hands. “This is your girlfriend?! H-How can this be? She, she–”

“Hey, careful, buddy,” Jean growled.

“She’s ugly as fuck!” the guy finished, gesturing in her direction with both arms. “Look at her! She’s got more muscles than I do! And she looks like a fucking man with that haircut…what is her mouth made of? Gold? Because the blow–”

Jean’s punch threw the fan on the floor, but shutting him up was not enough for the bassist. The crowd shouted loudly when the fan fell, and Jean climbed on top of him to slap him hard across the face three times before punching him twice, and then finally grab the neck of his shirt to shake him.

“You’re going to apologize!” he shouted, above the sudden roars and gasps of excitement and outrage from the crowd. “She’s a girl! And she’s beautiful, you heard me? Fucking apologize!”

“He can’t apologize if you don’t stop hitting him!” Eren shouted.

The boy grabbed Jean by the arms and twisted their bodies, trying to change positions so he could get a better angle for their fight; the strategy helped, for the redhead managed to land a couple of punches across Jean’s face. Soon, the crowd of fans went wild with hoots, some people rooted for Jean, while others asked for the redhead to give the bassist some bruises to make him look hotter.

Eren pulled Mikasa away and asked her to stay away from the fighting, but her eyes were glued to the honey-eyed man, fighting on the floor to defend her name. Jean was a jerk. The last time she’d seen him, he had been a cocky, foul-mouthed prodigy, oblivious to everything that wasn’t his direct sphere of benefits…why was he fighting this guy?

“That’s enough showing off,” Eren said as he walked back to the two men twisting on the ground, pulling the redhead away from Jean. “Our Jeanbo has a pretty face, don’t– holy fucking shit!”

The fan stopped struggling a second after he’d elbowed Eren’s nose. “Dark knight?!” he squealed, panicked. “Are you alright?! Here, let me lick some of that blood–”

“Don’t be such a creep!” Reiner shouted, throwing himself on the fan. People shouted louder, some cheering for the redhead now, some others even threw themselves on the pile, fighting both Reiner and Eren, who’d jumped in to defend the blond.

“You really know how to make trouble, don’t you?” Annie said, suddenly at her side, snapping pictures with her phone she would surely sell to a tabloid later. She wasn’t the only one; most of the fans were on the verge of hysteria, although she wasn’t sure if it was because they were scared or because they loved the spectacle.

“That’s plenty!” Hange shouted, grabbing the first pair of legs they found. “Help! Mikasa, come on!”

Mikasa bent forward and pulled until Jean came out from the fighting pile, wide eyed, red-faced, his lower lip bleeding. He breathed heavily when he sat up, full of intent to return to the pit. “No!” Hange shouted, calling for security. They forced Jean on his feet and pushed him towards Mikasa. “I know this isn’t part of the job description, girl, but take him! Leave the venue!”

“Why me?!” Mikasa asked, more focused on the tiny chaos of fans and band members fighting a few meters ahead.

“Because I’m your boss!” Hange shouted, clearly more focused on the fighting. “Take him away, I’ll get the other ones out! Fucking, go, Mikasa, get the fuck out of here!”

____________________________________

Jean held the ice bag against his lip, the rest of the world laid behind a shiny, changing curtain of bright lights, and his one point of focus was the black haired girl that had dragged him out of the stadium and driven him to the tiny ramen place on the riverside. It was late, and thus the only people there were salarymen who’d just exited their shifts. No fans around, no loud managers or preppy interviewers…it was a nice change of air.

“Tell me again, where are we?” Mikasa asked.

“Ramen, good ramen bar,” Jean said, slurping on his third bowl that night.

“Do you know the date?”

“March something,” Jean muttered, his mouth stuffed with noodles. “It’s hard to keep track.”

“Look at me,”

“That’s such an easy thing to do,” Jean said, giggling like a little child. Mikasa stood from her seat across from him on the table and went to sit next to him. “You smell like champagne, did you know that?”

“I smell like ramen,” Mikasa replied, shining a white light into his eye for a brief moment. “It doesn’t look bad, if you ask me. You’re going to be a bit confused for a while, but you didn’t lose consciousness. That’s always a good sign.”

Jean leaned his head against her shoulder. Her breathing became quicker, but perhaps that was due to anger. She seemed to hate him, although he didn’t understand why. “Why are you so smart?” he asked, grabbing a strand of her hair and putting it over his upper lip, pretending to have a mustache.

“I’m not,” Mikasa giggled and moved him gently to lie against the window. “I’m a med student, I know the basics.”

“A med student?” Jean rested his chin on his hand, blinking to get a clearer view of her. Little by little, his head cleared, but that was nothing to be grateful for. He enjoyed having her as the only clear element of his line of sight. He enjoyed her pretty face as the main focus of his brain. “What year are you on?”

“I’m just starting,” Mikasa replied, shrugging.

“How old are you?”

“Just turned twenty-two,” Mikasa said, dragging her bowl to where she sat now. The action gave him a little burst of happiness; she would remain by his side for the remainder of dinner. “How about you?”

“Twenty-one,” Jean said, tilting his head a little to the side, giving her his best smile. “I am out with an older woman.”

“Shut up, your birthday’s in april,” Mikasa said, rolling her eyes.

Jean sat up straight when he heard her words. “How do you know my birthday?”

Her movements became slow, calculated. He’d caught her in a corner but, instead of feeling proud of himself, tiny heaps of guilt accumulated in his chest. He didn’t like making her uncomfortable, he realized, he didn’t like trapping her in corners she couldn’t talk her way out of.

“Everyone knows it,” Mikasa said, slurping on the noodles without looking at him. A minute went by, then another, then she turned to look at him. “What is it? Finish your food. I’ll tell Hange if you don’t finish it.”

“I just…I kind of need to know,” Jean said, pushing his plate away. “Why do you hate me? And why does it seem like you remember me from somewhere, and I don’t?”

“Why does it surprise you that you don’t remember me?” Mikasa replied.

Jean scoffed. “I wouldn’t forget a face like yours.”

“Don’t try to be charming, it doesn’t suit you,” she rearranged her hair and picked it up in a small ponytail, pointedly looking away from him. The movement made him stare at her lovely face with more intent; she didn’t need to try to be gorgeous. It was a natural thing, like flying was to butterflies.

“I’m sorry, for whatever I did,” Jean sighed.

“I…you really don’t remember the Fuji Rock festival?” Mikasa asked. Jean sat back on his chair, opened his mouth as he rubbed his chin. The words rang a bell; they caused an itch in the back of his mind, they brought him back to when he was seventeen years of age, before the screaming fans, the sold-out stadiums and the tours. He remembered playing at the festival under another alias, when he was the lead member of SIDE A, another all-boy band he’d created at fifteen years of age, when he was the prodigy musician of his academy.

The memory made him cringe. “I used to think of myself as the hottest little shit in the room,” he scratched the back of his head. “I got into a fight with them after our set, I didn’t think they were good enough, and I left the band…I was perhaps the biggest asshole in that festival.”

“I won’t argue that,” Mikasa replied dryly.

“I’m sorry if I didn’t sign your merch,” Jean remembered storming past the few fans SIDE A, ignoring each and every one of them, thinking himself too important to please fans. His friends’ incompetence had made the performance subpart at best, and Jean had never felt so angered, especially considering Hange’s offer of representation.

Not everything had been bad that day, however. In his rage, Jean had ended up walking into a distant corner of the enormous practice hall…and there, he’d heard him play.

“I met Eren that day,” he recalled. “He was on his own, angry as fuck as he used to be.”

“Was he?” Mikasa asked, her voice barely a whisper.

“He was going on and on about his dumb band,” Jean laughed alongside the memory. “I think we were both assholes back then, each in our own way.”

“What was he saying?” Mikasa asked.

Jean reached out and stuffed takoyaki in his mouth. “I can’t even remember that well…he was annoyed at his lead singer…it was this gorgeous girl with pink hair. He didn’t want to perform that night and I convinced him to dump the dead weight and join me.”

“He left the band without a guitarist that night. The lead singer had a whole choreography that could not be performed with a guitar, but would look lame if she stayed still and just played and sang” Mikasa said. “She couldn’t find a replacement and they didn’t perform in the end.”

“I can’t say it was the most ethical thing I did,” Jean recalled seeing the pink-haired girl backstage, asking about their guitarist to everyone she found, as he and Eren walked out of the festival venue, off to make a new band under Hange’s offer for representation. “Ah, what was his band’s name?”

“First Gen, wasn’t it?” Mikasa asked.

Jean turned to look at her, and his mind cleared in an instant. Mikasa didn’t have a pink wig nor the purple contact lenses anymore, and she didn’t wear the purple, goth dresses anymore, but it was the same gorgeous face. He recalled her disheartened expression from that night as she asked around backstage, and all the guilt that should’ve struck him at seventeen washed over his heart and soul.

“Fuck, I was an asshole to you,” Jean whispered, looking away from her in shame. “I-I didn’t even remember you from back then. I was…shit, no wonder you hate me, I was the biggest asshole in the entire world.”

“I don’t think you were the biggest asshole.”

“I’m sorry, Mikasa, I’m honestly sorry.”

Mikasa cleared her throat and adjusted her position so she could look at him, but Jean refused to turn to look in her direction just yet. “Jean, you–”

“I was an asshole,” Jean shook his head, gathering courage to return her gaze. “Even now, I’m being an asshole. I couldn't remember you from that night. I don’t even know if I would feel this bad if you weren’t so…”

“So what?” Mikasa asked.

So ridiculously gorgeous.

“So kind to me,” Jean finished saying, clearing his throat. “I got into a stupid fight and you’re looking after me like a true doctor.”

Mikasa snorted, and the sound of her laughter drew his attention. It was an adorable sound, which made him feel worse. How long had she been sad because of his actions that festival night? How hard had she worked to get a spot, for him to ruin it all?

“It’s not as if you fought for nothing,” Mikasa replied, sliding his plate closer to him again, asking him without words to eat. “That guy said I looked like a man, didn’t he? Our agent used to say nobody would like a muscular idol, either.”

“He was an asshole, and your old agent too,” Jean said hurriedly as another wave of guilt washed over him. He closed his eyes and craned his neck back, wishing it had been her the one to slap him across the face. “I’m so sorry, Mikasa. I had no idea…no, I did have an idea of what I was doing. I knew I was screwing your band over, but I didn’t care. And I’m sorry.”

A long moment of silence went by, adorned by the occasional chuckle from the salarymen by the bar, the distant whistling sound of an ambulance, the drunken singing from the karaoke in the dive bar next door.

“You weren’t the one who abandoned us that night,” Mikasa said in the end, sighing deeply, as if not wanting to put the blame on Eren. “I’m sorry I put the blame on you.”

“I have the blame.”

“No, you don’t, not entirely,” Mikasa shook her head, sending more of that delicious champagne-like smell his way. “He didn’t want to be there, I could tell…I could tell he didn’t want to, and I pushed, and pushed, and pushed. And we broke up that night, before you ran into him. Well, no, he dumped me.”

“Oh, shit.”

What a fucking idiot he was.

“He’s better now, he looks happier,” Mikasa smiled to herself.

“We can thank Reiner for that,” Jean chuckled, unable to remove the image of the sweet girl in the dark clothes and pink wig, ready to perform, abandoned just before her set. “I’m truly sorry, Mikasa. I didn’t know you, and I screwed you over.”

“I was angry when I saw you, but it’s in the past,” her words didn’t sound convincing to him; maybe she didn’t hate him, but Jean had grown to recognize the emotions in others the past years. It was still a painful memory, perhaps it would be painful for the rest of her life. “I’m a medical student…and I guess you guys’ photographer, thanks to Levi.”

“I remember hearing you rehearse,” Jean said, taking a leap to circle around the previous subject. “Your voice was pretty.”

“I know that,” Mikasa’s cheeks became a pretty shade of pink, but she didn’t lose a shred of the grace in her posture. “We were at that festival for a reason.”

“I’m sorry,” Jean repeated, thinking he would be saying those two words for the rest of his life to her.

“Stop it, what’s done is done,” Mikasa said. “I-I couldn’t help myself earlier. My teenage self needed to snap at you. I’m fine now.”

Jean knew what dreams meant, how important and valuable they remained within the heart. And a crushed dream meant a crushed heart, that much he’d always known, even back when he’d been cockier, louder, devoid of any ethic that would stop him from stealing a guitarist away from a band at a crucial moment.

“You wanted to be big, right?” Jean asked.

Mikasa shrugged. “It’s done.”

“Is your voice still good?”

She gave him a sideways glance, brief, recognizing the intent in his voice. “I’ve lost practice.”

“Mikasa?” she turned to look at him without waiting a moment, encountering a smirk on his face. She lowered her eyebrows, turned to look away, then turned to look back at him. The vision of the girl in the pink wig became clearer the more they interacted; she’d been adorable, and that strong type of innocence remained even after five years and the worst type of heartbreaks.

“I don’t understand that face you’re making,”

Jean dipped into his wallet and pulled out enough money to pay for their meal. He slid out of his chair, but he still didn’t have the courage to grab her hand, which almost brought a chuckle out of him. He was a famous musician, women and men had thrown themselves at him for two years now, and he didn’t dare to take this girl’s hand in his.

“Come with me, please?”

Mikasa eyed him carefully. “Where?”

Another smile appeared on his face; for the first time in months, Jean felt excited. “Next door, where else?”

_________________________________-

She didn’t understand why she followed him so willingly out of the restaurant, into the dive bar next door. Despite its cheap drinks and the neon decorations on the walls, the karaoke section was not as crowded as she would have expected. People were more focused on their drinks, in any case, or in sharing fluids in secret corners. “Have you ever been here before?”

“It’s been a while,” Mikasa replied. Armin, Annie and her tended to limit themselves to the ramen bar, and the few times she’d been there with Armin she’d avoided the stage like the plague. This time, Jean was pulling her straight towards it, his childlike excitement almost contagious.

“What are you scheming?” she asked as they approached the stage.

“Rehearsals,” he leaned over the computer, ignoring the man dozing at his workstation, and found the song he was looking for in a second. He went up the steps towards the stage, but Mikasa pulled away reluctantly.

“I’m not singing,” she shouted over the first chords of the song. It was an upbeat tune, the type of song that happy girls danced and sung on saturday nights, the kind she’d shouted before while drunk in her apartment. “I can’t–”

“Everyone is drunk,” Jean looked at his wristwatch and showed it to her. “It’s two in the morning, everyone’s either too drunk or too horny to notice us. Just sing with me, come on.”

“Is this your way of apologizing?” Mikasa asked, narrowing her eyes.

Jean’s smile widened. “No! This is just my way to get you to be my friend!”

“What?”

“Friendly acquaintances?” Jean proposed, his smile unwavering, his hand still outstretched towards her. He loved making people nervous, it seemed.

She eyed him up and down; sure, his selfishness had destroyed her band five years ago, but also had Eren’s attitude. She’d given Eren a second chance, despite that he’d abandoned them willingly, she could give this man a second chance, right? He seemed to have evolved from the cocky teen she’d once seen perform, the one who had ignored her when she’d asked how he’d gotten so good.

“I can give you workmate, at first,” she said as she took her hand in his and allowed him to lead her to the stage.

“I can work with that!” Jean said, taking her to the microphone, which he took as soon as the lyrics began playing. “Ready?”

“I’m not singing!” The song was already on its pre chorus by the time he grabbed the microphone, but that didn’t seem to bother him. He was a performer, and if he started a song late, then the people in the crowd should be glad he’D started singing at all.

“I come home, in the mornin' light. My mother says "When you gonna live your life right?" Jean sang, dancing along the music. Mikasa watched him, surprised at how light he was on his feet, how good his movements were despite the fact that he was one of the main components of an alternative rock band.

He put the microphone close to her face, and maybe it was his face, or the changing neon lights overhead, or the attention his lovely voice drew towards the stage…maybe all of those things dissipated the traces of bashfulness in her, and Mikasa began singing. “And girls, they wanna have fun. Oh girls just wanna have fun!”

The next verse came a second later, and Jean danced closer to her, making her sway to the rhythm of the old song. The lights above them changed to pink and purple as she and Jean sang the rest of the verses, and the people left inside the bar approached to the stage, to watch their buffoonery and mock it, surely.

“Some boys take a beautiful girl and hide her away from the rest of the world,” Jean sang, pointing at her to indicate it was her turn.

“I wanna be the one to walk in the sun!” she put her back against his, and they both came closer to the microphone to half–shout, half-sing the next chorus. “Oh girls, they wanna have fun!!”

It didn’t take the crowd long to begin singing alongside them; both her and Jean and the tiny audience coursed through the following verses, loud enough for them to be heard across the river, or at least it was how it seemed in her ears.

It had been such a long time since she’d sung for so many, she’d forgotten how easy it was to get lost in lyrics. One by one, people followed their words, all cheering loudly when Jean took her by the hands and twirled her around, as if she were a damsel from a romance book. Despite his lengthier stage career, Jean stepped back, allowing her to finish the last lines.

When the beat faded into the atmosphere, the room was quiet for a whole five seconds before erupting into cheers and applause; Mikasa smiled, turning to look at Jean, who was clapping alongside everyone else. Her cheeks were ablaze one more time; she’d spent such a long time under the veil of anonymity and introspection, she’d forgotten how good a round of applause felt.

“Another one!” shouted a girl from the back of the room.

“What?” Mikasa spoke into the microphone.

“Another one!” a group of guys shouted.

“Another one!” a couple shouted, too.

“Looks like they like your singing,” Jean said, suddenly standing at her side.

“They probably recognized you. We should get back to the hotel before…” Mikasa looked away, recognizing the background voices from the next song. I've had the time of my life, and I owe it all to you, the female part of the song rang, the voice beautiful and sultry, nothing at all like hers. “...is that the time of my life? We really should go!”

“Let’s do one more,” Jean said, taking a microphone that was handed to him from one of the men at the sound box. He neared his microphone to the phone, but he couldn’t utter another word as the counterpart lines came on. I've been waiting for so long, now I've finally found someone to stand by me, the background voices from the track echoed, finding no support in Jean. He was red faced, as if the lyrics had made him embarrassed somehow.

“Sing, handsome!” a woman shouted.

“Get more booze in him!” someone else said. She noticed the crowd growing restless; she’d helped at the hospital too many times and knew how easy it was for a crowd of drunks to become dangerous. If she came back and Jean’s nose or arm was broken, Hange would surely fire her.

“We saw the writing on the wall, as we felt this magical fantasy,” Mikasa sang, reaching out to grab his hand and shaking it. He merely stared at her face, blushing like a primary school child, and Mikasa took wobbly steps in his direction she hoped resembled dancing. She put her arm around his shoulder, then leaned against his eat to half-sing, half-whisper. “If we can’t finish this song, let’s just go fucking home.”

“No, no,” Jean shook his head, his face even more ablaze than moments ago. He tightened his grasp on her hand, and continued dancing, his voice deeper now, manlier as he took up the song without caring about the verses they’d skipped. “ Just remember, you're the one thing I can't get enough of. So I'll tell you something…this could be love, because”

He twirled her again, and again, as they both shouted the next part of the song. “I've had the time of my life. No, I never felt this way before! Yes, I swear, it's the truth. And I owe it all to you!”

His stage persona came back as quick as it had disappeared. He twirled her across the stage again, infusing her with energy she thought had been lost to the years she’d spent so far studying. At first, Mikasa had merely followed his lead, but one chorus in, and she was taking the centerstage again.

_________________________________________-

Mikasa tilted her head back to gulp down the hot coffee, enjoying its undertones of caramel. She didn’t usually take coffee, given that her uncle despised it, but this morning it was a necessity. The tour bus left the city at nine in the morning, and she still couldn’t remember the exact time at which the crowd had been satiated.

She hadn’t seen Jean ever since she’d handed him over to an angered Hange, around four in the morning, but she guessed he would come to the lobby right before the time for their departure. And if he didn’t, he would surely catch a train or a plane to the next city, right? Mikasa shifted uncomfortably on her seat; she thought they would get to talk about their previous night.

They weren’t friends, by any means, and Mikasa hadn’t forgiven him fully for stealing her guitarist five years ago, but…it had been fun. The singing had brought memories back from her teenage years, when she’d thought she and her own group would become idols after two years of performing.

“Hey, doctor Ackerman,” Eren said, tumbling onto the couch she was sitting on.

“Shit, Eren, my coffee!” Mikasa exclaimed, flinching in pain when droplets of the hot liquid landed on her bare legs. It seemed that the shorts that showed off her long, well-toned legs had been a wrong decision after a night with barely any sleep.

“Shit, sorry, Mika, sorry!” Eren grabbed a napkin and cleaned the hot liquid off her thigh, and it was then that she noticed the bandages around his nose.

“Are you…shouldn’t you be at the hospital?” she asked, pointing at the bruising around the bridge of his nose.

“The doctor says it’s not fractured,” Eren shook his head, still cleaning the liquid from her legs. He looked up at her and grimaced. “I think I found a new kink: redheads that punch me in the face.”

“Your blond is not going to like it,” Mikasa replied, making him chuckle. She smiled back at him; it was nice seeing Eren like this. He’d been so full of anger before, she almost felt tempted to ask Reiner what in the world he’d done to rinse all of that from his body.

“The blond doesn’t like his hand on a girl’s leg,” Reiner said, holding two paper cups full of steaming liquid. He wore sunglasses, which she guessed hid whatever bruise he sported on his eyes or nose. “What’s up with you and this woman, Jaegar?”

“Jealous busty man,” Eren muttered under his breath as he handed him his coffee. Reiner sat on his other side, looking impossibly nonchalant despite the night they’d had. “Did you put two sugars in this?”

“Two sugars, four creams, yes,” Reiner said as he stirred his own coffee. “I also got you a burger for later.”

“Seems you got yourself another mom,” Mikasa muttered under her breath.

“What was that?” Reiner asked.

“Shouldn’t you be in your VIP lounge?” Mikasa asked them.

“Eren wanted to wait with you,” Reiner shrugged. His nonchalance was a good mask, almost too good. But she could see the tiny cracks on its surface, in the way he surrounded Eren’s shoulders with a hand, or the way he eyed her with irritation every few seconds. “I’m keeping him company.”

“We also wanted to ask you something,” Eren said.

“Where did you go last night?” Reiner asked right away.

“Huh?” Mikasa blurted out. “Why do you ask?”

“Yo, Ackerman!” Annie said, running across the lobby to reach her in less than thirty seconds. This time, Mikasa put her coffee on the table in front of her before more of it spilled on her legs. Annie pressed herself against her on the sofa, forcing a space to open for her. “Did you fuck Jean last night?”

“What?!” Mikasa almost shouted. “No, of course not!”

“Didn’t you see the stuff I sent?!” Annie asked.

“I haven’t checked my phone,” Mikasa replied. She was still too tired from last night to bother herself with emails and messages, and Annie’s question had shocked her too deeply for her to want to check her messages. Had she fucked Jean? No; singing was all they’d done. He hadn’t even tried to kiss her on their way back to the hotel.

“Look, idiot!” Annie shoved her phone in front of her face. “Look at this!”

Mikasa grabbed the phone, her eyes growing wide upon noticing the tweet the blonde showed her. DARK NIGHT BEING CHEATED ON? MYSTERIOUS GIRLFRIEND SEEN LEAVING BAR WITH BASSIST, STALLION.

“What a lame alias you’ve given Jean,” was the first thing she was able to say, perhaps out of shock. Someone had taken pictures of them leaving the bar, as they’d both sang as they skipped their way to the taxi waiting for them, too drunk on the rush of an impromptu performance to be discreet. “Why does this guy say I’m Eren’s girlfriend?”

“Because this idiot himself said it last night,” Reiner said, holding his anger back. “He said you’re his girlfirend in front of a crowd, and you’re on tour with us…the rumors are going to spread like hot fucking bread.”

“That’s not good, is it?” Mikasa asked, turning to look at Eren, who smiled and shrugged.

“It makes shit fun,” he said, his immature grin perhaps the strangest thing of them all.

“It doesn’t make shit fun,” Reiner snapped tiredly. “Eren, it complicates everything. Rumors are not good, they are problematic…where the hell is Porco?”

“He’s in bed with Pieck whenever he has free time,” Eren rolled his eyes and hugged the blond, muscular man with an arm, giving him a brief kiss on the temple that seemed to irritate him further. “Get the stick out of your ass, blondie, it’s just a rumor. Mikasa went out and fucked Jean, and now people think we’ve got some sort of love triangle, it’s funny! People are gonna call us erejeankasa or something now.”

“What the fuck are you going on about?” Reiner snapped.

Eren laughed. “We’ll be fine, it’s just a rumor. We can have fun with it.”

“Nobody is having fun with anything,” Hange said, sitting on the couch in front of them. They looked years tired, and they also had a pair of sunglasses over their eyes. “You didn’t sleep with him, did you, Mikasa?”

“We just drank and came back home,” Mikasa cleared her throat before continuing. “We didn’t even kiss, or anything.”

“Good, that’ll make things much easier,” Hange rubbed their temple with a deep sigh. “People are expecting news from the next album, not love triangles and certainly not a goddamn fight with your own fans.”

Eren smirked. “Hange, relax, this–”

“Shut the fuck up, you weirdo,” Hange snapped angrily. “You all almost got in serious trouble, you could’ve injured yourselves, you could have–”

“Hange,” a raspy, familiar voice said. Mikasa turned to see Jean walking towards them from the elevator. He wore dark Jeans and a white T-shirt; that combined with his messy hair and bags under his eyes made him look…handsome. He carried a stack of papers that he handed to Reiner and Hange right away, before he sat on the carpeted floor, right in front of her. “Please, just…tell me they’re crap so I can get the tune out of my head.”

“Have you slept at all, Jean?” Hange said, concerned.

“Just read them,” Jean replied, giving her a side glance, his cheeks and the tip of his nose red, as if he were drunk. “Read them and tell me they’re crap.”

Hange focused quickly on the papers Jean had given them, while Reiner and Eren read over the lines, repeating them softly.

“Is it true you two gave a mini concert last night?” Annie asked, taking advantage of the moment of silence.

“Kind of,” Mikasa said, at the same time as Jean. They exchanged a glance that traveled deeper in her heart than it should have.

“Jean,” Hange called, drawing their attention. “Jean, holy shit.”

“They’re not good,” Jean said.

“They’re fucking amazing,” Hange covered their face with both hands and wept into their hands. “Holy shit, Jean, When I fold, you see the best of me? Take this sinking boat, and point it home? Three songs! Three fucking songs! Why did…why– in one night, you–”

Hange couldn’t continue their questions, overwhelmed by their own whimpers, their soul apparently moved in its very core by whatever lyrics they’d just read. The sniffing drew Mikasa’s attention to Reiner, who was wiping his eyes with the back of his hand. “Who the fuck hurt you man, these songs are all so gorgeous...what the fuck did Mikasa do to you?”

Jean shook his head vehemently. “No! It wasn’t her, it was…last night, we sang in front of a bunch of drunk people,” he stammered, not focusing his gaze on her in the slightest. “It was the feeling, yes.”

“The feeling?” Annie repeated sarcastically. “The feeling in the performance, you say?”

“Yes,” Jean turned to look at her to finish his thoughts, his honey eyes kind, sweet. “The feeling, I…I wrote all fucking night.”

“And you came up with love songs,” Eren said. Out of the three people Jean had showed his lyrics to, he was the only one who hadn’t teared up in the slightest. “Why did you come up with these corny lyrics. We can’t play this. I can’t sing this.”

“You can’t,” Jean said, his gaze fixated on hers. “But she can.”

“Me?” Mikasa blurted out.

“Two of these are great for a duet,” Jean said, taking the papers from Hange and Reiner to lay them out across the table in front of them. Jean had terrible handwriting, but from the little notes on the sidelines of the paper sheets, she figured his head was bursting with thousands of ideas. “I’m sure we can adjust a few things to fit Eren’s voice, but these verses here, they’re meant for a female singer.”

“I’m not singing these corny lyrics,” Eren folded his arms. “You do it, you’ve got one of those soft, sexy voices.”

“Did you just call him sexy?” Reiner asked.

“I called his voice sexy, you jealous, toxic blond,” Eren replied. “He can sing these songs with Mikasa, and like a couple with me, if Jean insists.”

“That’ll fuel the ‘love triangle’ allegations,” Reiner pointed out.

“Won’t it make it more fun?” Eren asked.

“Why hasn't anyone asked her if she wants to do it?” Annie asked before Eren continued teasing his partner. She was squeezed between her and the end of the sofa, with her head resting on her shoulder casually. “I get this is a nepotism hire, but we’re just part of your audiovisual team. And now you’re holding secret meetings in front of us, asking Mikasa to participate and help you record songs without offering pay. It’s a lot, don’t you think?”

“Of course, we’d pay her,” Hange said as they cleaned their lenses with a handkerchief they’d pulled out their pants. “And it would be such a shame if Jean’s venture into love ballads is twisted into the love triangle narrative.”

“Hange,” Reiner called, noticing their manager’s intentions right away. “We’ve never been the type to play with rumors from the press.”

“Of course we’re not,” Hange exchanged an amused look with Eren. “The entertainment value of doing it would be high, though.”

Reiner opened his mouth to protest, but Mikasa focused on the honey eyes that were on her once again. Despite the puffiness of his face and the bags beneath his eyes, Jean smiled at her awkwardly, looking like a teenage boy. “Do you wanna do it? It’s great pay.”

Charming he might seem, but Mikasa took pride in not letting herself be convinced into things right away. She’d become pragmatic as the years went by, and one night of silly karaoke would not sway her. They weren’t friends, not in the strictest sense of the word. And, in truth, she didn’t want to be friends with him.

If she didn’t want to be friends, however, what did she want to be to him?

“I can think about it,” Mikasa said.

Jean’s smile grew wider. “Can I try to convince you?”

“You can try,” she tried to remain as impassive as she’d always been, but Jean’s grin was contagious, it made her own mouth curve into a tiny smile. As selfish, arrogant and stuck up he might have been, he wasn’t half as bad now.

#Jeankasa #JeanMika #Jean Kirstein #Mikasa Ackerman #ao3 #fluff #Band AU #Jeankasa Week #Jeankasa week 2022 #karaoke #pining #escritos

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