#and this isn’t to say that eren is only giving her the scraps of his affection because he isn’t

[strscrossed]

May we have the drafts left out?

okay, here's a huge one. this is completely axed and not a part of the warlord "canon" just take it as a deleted scene. under the cut. also not edited.

The morning sun is already uncomfortable against her skin and the heat is suffocating. Even if the mask makes her stomach turn, Eren’s lucky in that he doesn’t have to breathe in the dry desert air. 

She practically feels the sand and rock particles obstructing her airway. She doesn’t protest as Eren gently lifts her into the rig. 

“There’s a settlement just 30 miles from here,” he tells her. “We won’t go too far.” 

His calloused hands rest on her thigh as he drives. He seems extra handsy today and maybe it’s because for once, Eren doesn’t have to let her go. She’s with him from sun up till sun down. He gets to share her bed. He gets to keep her all to himself and his duties don’t clash with him keeping an eye on her. 

“I don’t remember this road?” she says as he takes a turn. 

Eren hums, “Probably not. No one comes here. Only the Wretched dwell along this road.” 

She recoils at the use of that term. Eren hated that term as a little boy. Technically, they’d been apart of that group as children being forced to fend for themselves and fighting over the scraps. She hated that term because it sums up the miserable state of the world in general. 

And now, she understands her role in actively making it worse. 

“You don’t have to call them that,” she says, quietly. She dares to voice an opinion and purses her lips, waiting for a reaction. She holds her breath as Eren’s grip on her thigh tightens. 

“You haven’t seen them yet, Mikasa. You’ll see what I mean.” 

She shakes her head, “I don’t have to, Eren. They’re still people struggling to survive. Like I had to—” 

She cuts herself off before she says too much but it’s too late. Eren’s grip tightens and she gasps, causing him to withdraw his hand. He doesn’t look at her but he glares into the glass and she sees how much damage her words have caused. 

“Like you had to…” he echoes and she turns away, silently cursing her stupidity. She should’ve stayed silent as she had been. Eren is relentless. It’s one of the only traits he’s retained since childhood. 

“It’s nothing,” she tries, weakly. 

“Don’t,” he warns. “What happened to you, Mikasa? Where were you taken when they took you away?” 

Fuck. Damn it. She holds her tongue, going completely silent as she looks out the window, looking at the moving landscape changing from rock to sand. Maybe, just maybe, he’ll stop if she just changes the subject. 

No such luck. Not today. 

“Answer me,” he growls. The demonic voice that comes through the mask is bone-chilling. It’s a voice that she’ll hear in her nightmares for the rest of her life. 

She stays quiet, praying that he’ll give up. 

She doesn’t know why she expected that because he makes a sharp turn, causing her to bumb into the door before slamming the brakes altogether. 

“Er-” she tries but he turns and reaches for her arm, turning her around so she’s staring into those piercing eyes. 

“I asked you a question, Mikasa. Answer me! Where were you? And what did they do to you?” 

He isn’t budging. He isn’t hurting her but he isn’t going to budge until he gets what he wants. Mikasa knew better than this. She can’t tell him the honest answer of what she endured in the years between being taken and being whisked off to the outpost in the mountains. 

“It really doesn’t matter, Eren. I was just trying to survive when I escaped. I—” she tries to think fast but she’s never been a good liar. Eren can see right through her and he’ll keep her hear until he gets every last bit out of her. 

He narrows his eyes, “It matters to me. You matter to me. You don’t think I see how you hide? How scars cover every inch of your body? They hurt you, didn’t they? I’ll kill them, I’ll—” 

She leans forward. She can’t kiss him with the mask but she touches his face. She gently thumbs the scars under his eyes and she feels him relax under her touch. 

“I’m here, Eren. I’m here. I’m not going anywhere.” 

He leans into her touch, pressing the mask into the palm of her hand. She tries not to pull it away. 

“You are. And no one is going to hurt you ever again.” 

He says it like an oath, the one that he’s kept close to his heart these past several days, Mikasa feels herself relax only slightly — well, as much as she can in the presence of that mask. She’s never had to touch it but now as the teeth pressed into her hands, her stomach twists painfully. 

No one except you, of course… 

The seconds tick by and Eren doesn’t say anything. Mikasa holds her breath, averting her gaze ahead. He’s turned into a narrow canyon road. Like this is the point where the earth is ripping itself apart. Just the sight of it unnerves her. 

“You will tell me, won’t you?” Eren asks, looking at her again, cupping her chin and turning her face toward him.  

“I—” she closes her mouth, not interested in whispering promises she has no intention of keeping. 

“Please,” he pleads. Again, the distortion of his voice makes him sound demonic. 

“Alright. One day. When I feel like thinking about it myself.” 

She doesn’t promise anything and she doesn’t know if he catches that or not. 

His silence comes as solace.

[ficsforeren]

The Last Song - Chapter 5

Series Masterlist

Pairing: Eren Jaeger X Female Reader

Genre: Rockstar AU, Friends with Benefits, Angst, Smut, Fluff, Romance, Hurt/Comfort, Mutual Pining, Slow Burn

Series Summary: Eren Jaeger has two personas, a charismatic lead vocal who has lost himself in fame, and a boy who struggles with depression, seeking for someone to bring him back to where he was twelve years ago. Where he only knew love in the form of your name.

Chapter Summary: Having casual sex with your best friend is exhilarating and Eren knows perfectly how to make you moan his name with his tongue.

Content Warnings:  explicit sex (cunnilingus, blow job, fingering, hand job, car sex, dry humping, drunk sex, public sex, unprotected sex, one night stand, choking, treating women like objects, dub-con, corruption, face-sitting, sex toys, daddy kink, praise kink, slight degradation, etc), substance abuse (use of drugs, alcohol, tobacco), severe abandonment issues, childhood trauma, anxiety attacks, depression, adultery, physical abuse towards men and women, family issues, abusive parents, crude words, dark humor, mention of sexual assault/rape, harassment, car accident and child abuse.

Poster art by the most talented @rainbuniart (follow her on Twitter)

Eren Jaeger has never been this fucking elated in his twenty-five years of living. At first, when you kissed him with a taste of alcohol sitting thickly on your tongue, he was conflicted. He couldn’t believe that you wanted him too. It was so surreal, he thought he was dreaming. But for someone who hasn’t had a good dream in such a long time, how could he tell if he was?

Maybe you don’t want him—not in the way he wants you anyway. What you want from him is his touch, his feverish kisses, and his sultry, obscene moans. You want his beauty. You want his strong arms to hold you. You want his fingers buried in your hair, just as much as you want yours to find home in his.

But Eren wants more from you. He wants your heart, he wants your soul, he wants you to want him in the way you’ll forget how to breathe when he isn’t around. He wants you to need him like he’s the gravity that keeps you standing on your feet. He wants you to love him until you feel suffocated and his kiss is the only thing that keeps you breathing.

Although he was still frightened to his core, afraid that if things didn’t work out, you’d end up leaving him, he was ready to take the risk if you had chosen to take a step further. When he asked you, “Do you love me?”, he was prepared to say, “I’ve been in love with you for years. You’re the only one for me. Always have been.” He was ready to come clean. He was ready to confess that in the last twelve years, he had only known love in the form of your name.

But you didn’t say you loved him, did you? Not in the way he wanted you to.

You were speaking a different language. You told him you loved him, but your love for him had a different meaning. The word ‘but’ crushed his heart into pieces. One word and everything was shattered. One word and he realized he wasn’t dreaming. This is real. This is reality. The reality where your love for him is purely physical and nothing more.

And Eren is okay with that if that’s how far you’re willing to go. He’s so desperate for your attention that he’ll take anything you can give him. He’s begging for scraps and that’s what you’re giving him. As long he can be with you, it’s okay. You don’t have to love him back. He’s satisfied, even if you only give him a sliver of your attention.

It’s all right. He knows he doesn’t deserve to be loved. Not by you, not by anyone. All he has is a pretty face for you to gaze upon. Beyond that, he has nothing else to offer.

But he’s still going to love you, as he has no other choice, and he will love you with all his heart, with everything he has. He’ll love you with every unshed tear, he’ll love you with every hidden smile. And if the only way to show you that is by kissing your lips, brushing sinful strokes on your skin, and drenching your body with pleasure until you sob out his name, he’s going to do just that.

And hopefully, maybe, you’ll finally realize that he wants you more than a temporary bliss.

“Temporary bliss, huh…” He mutters to himself as he gently caresses your cheek, being as quiet and careful as he can so he won’t wake you up from your dream. You look so adorable in his eyes, sleeping on your stomach with your lips separated to release soft sighs. There are little habits he always does whenever he gazes at you—ones that he never notices himself, and that’s the way his delicate smile resurfaces on his lips, the way his eyes droop in adoration, the way his gaze grows tender as he follows your every feature like you’re the most beautiful painting only God Himself can match the beauty. His admiration for you is endless. His love for you is limitless.

If only you knew.

But Eren… he already feels so lucky. Even just by being like this, he feels so lucky. To be able to brush his fingertips over your cheekbone. To be able to tangle his legs around yours underneath the sheet. To be able to breathe the same air of this motel room.

And to be your first.

“Oh man,” he sinks his face into the pillow, his blush creeping up from his neck to his cheeks, all the way to the tip of his ears. Suddenly, he’s no longer Eren Jaeger, the talented twenty-five years-old lead singer of Empire. He’s just a boy—a timid, little innocent boy who turns into a blushing mess over his first love. He tilts his head to take another peek at your face, shy fingers moving closer to fill the spaces between yours. “You don’t know what you’re doing to me, do you?”

Am I even allowed to be this happy?

Eren feels immense joy coursing through his every vein but at the same time, he feels anxious—feels responsible over you. Being your first sexual partner is a huge deal for him, and he knows he would be sleeping with a smile on his face for weeks because of this but he can’t help but think that you should’ve been with someone else. Someone special. Someone that…

Isn’t as fucked up as I am.

No, Eren scolds himself. Believe in her. She said she was glad that you were her first. Just keep thinking about that and let yourself be happy for once.

Because he still deserves to be happy, right? Even if it’s just temporary.

And even if he’s just your temporary bliss, you’re his entire happiness. His lifeline for eternity. And if he was an addict, begging for another dose of euphoria, then you were his—

Heroin.

Feeling a surge of inspiration, Eren quickly grabs the pen and notepad the motel provided from the nightstand. The blanket slides down from his bare chest to pool around his hips, his key-shaped pendant dangling over his pounding heart. He tucks a few loose strands of his hair behind his ear, uncapping the pen with his teeth.

And he begins to write.

I won't try to philosophize

I'll just take a deep breath and I'll look into your eyes

This is how I feel

And it's so surreal

His words come so naturally in his head, fingers moving endlessly on paper. It’s been a while since he can write like this—write song lyrics from the bottom of his heart, instead of the heavy pressure that lays on his shoulders.

I got a closet filled up to the brim

With the ghosts of my past and the skeletons

And I don't know why

You'd even try

But I won't lie

“To me, that only makes you feel more real,” he remembers the words you once said to him, “More you, instead of this perfect persona you try to display on stage. And I adore you for that. I accept you for what you truly are.”

To you, it was just another train of comforting words, genuine and kind but never intended to go beyond that. To Eren, it felt like you were cutting off the anchor that dragged him down to the bottom of the sea. Now that he has emerged, he feels more alive than he’s ever been. He doesn’t feel suffocated. It feels like he’s breathing for the first time after being held underwater for so long. And the air tastes so sweet on his tongue.

And I feel a weakness coming on

Never felt so good to be so wrong

Had my heart on lockdown

And then you turned me around

He hums, eyes darting out to the ceiling as he creates a string of melodies. Even the tunes can flow seamlessly in his head. He thinks of you, thinks of your smile, thinks of the way you look at him, and the way he looks at you.

And he smiles.

I'm feeling like a newborn child

Every time I get a chance to see you smile

It's not complicated

I was so jaded

You caught me off guard

Now I'm running and screaming

“I feel like a hero,” he quietly sings, inventing a new melody as he taps his pen to the paper. “And you are my…” His eyes drift toward you, another word fleets through his head. One’s that perfect to describe your existence in his world. “Heroine.”

You stir a little in your sleep, making his heart race and his ears glow red. The thought of you listening to his words causes his body to stiffen, nervous and embarrassed, and he waits with bated breath. But once you wane back into your dreamland, sinking in the comfort of your pillow, his shoulders sag in relief. His cheeks still burn bright, ashamed at how melancholic his lyrics sound even to himself, but he doesn’t fix them. They feel right. They feel exactly like the way he feels for you.

And before he tears the paper away, shoving it down inside the pocket of his jeans, he adds another line.

Do you know that your love is the sweetest sin?

***

When you asked your one and only best friend, Eren Jaeger, to be friends with benefits, you knew you were walking into risky territory. But if Pieck and Porco could do it despite having insane chemistry, why couldn’t you?

“Eren,” you breathe out, your lips tingling from the aftertaste of his kiss. “It’s three in the morning.”

“I know.” But instead of picking up clues from your words, he hugs your thighs closer with both arms, his lips enclosing your clitoris once again, gently sucking on it until you arch your back in pleasure.

Three in the morning and you find yourself thrashing your head on your pillow, body nude and covered with little love bites. Eren is careful enough not to leave any bruises on your neck, knowing that it will make it hard for you to cover up, but everything else is his territory to mark on.

Your fingers are twisting against the white linen of your bed and he gently removes them. “Guide me,” he says, moving your hand to his hair and with a sharp intake of breath, your start to tug at his roots. Eren emits a sinful moan all the way from his chest and he closes his eyes as he follows your lead, tongue moving up and down your folds as you grind your hips against his face.

“God, Eren, that feels so good…”

It’s been two weeks since you’ve done… well, whatever you define this relationship to be. You have lost count just how many times Eren has laid his hands on you—and you tried to keep count, you really did. But when he was calling you at two in the morning, voice raspy and yearning over the phone, saying, “Can I come over? I can’t sleep and I need you.” How could you keep count when it was already all you could do to stay awake?

He washed your drowsiness away as soon as his mouth found yours, however, and replaced everything with a burning desire and endless craving for his touch. You thought when he said he needed you, he wanted to fuck you senselessly against your sheets until you mewled out his name in the way he liked it. But he was never rough. Always asked you for your consent, making sure that he sent you to cloud nine before he reached his own. He was so selfless in bed, but then again, he’s always been like that when it comes to you. Just like right now, Eren is taking his time gliding his fingers in and out of you, loving the way you’re sucking them in, the way you feel so fucking warm around him. Pleasuring you is his top priority, and he will gladly ignore his needs, no matter how painful he’s throbbing behind his jeans.

“Eren, I have to go to work in five hours,” you beg him, not sure to stop or move his tongue even faster so you can reach your high by the next second. Eren can make you tremble in his hands within minutes if he wants. He has learned and memorized every little spot on your body that can make you curl your toes. But he wants to take it slow, wants to enjoy the moment as long as he can because this is when you need him the most. This is when you’re looking at him like he’s everything you need in your life. You’re a puppet and he’s your puppeteer, and Eren promises himself that he will take such good care of you, you’ll wish he’ll never let you go.

“You can always skip it.” He’s savoring the moment, tongue darting out sinfully to lap at your heat, and sighing in content against your skin whenever you squeeze your legs around him at the sensation. “I can do this with you all day if you let me.”

And God, you want to. The temptation is too much to just lay around in bed with his mouth moving lazily against your skin—any part of your skin. “I can’t…”

His eyes never leave yours as he slowly licks you to ecstasy, marveling at your face like he’s seeing you for the first time. “My break is over in two days, I don’t know how often I can see you again so…” Eren dips his head lower, sucking a little harder and you’re biting into your fist, not wanting to be too loud that you’ll wake up your neighbors. “I’m spending as much time as I have left doing my favorite thing.”

You flinch, stomach tightening. “Performing oral sex at three am is your favorite thing?”

The vibration of his chuckles causes every inch of your skin to tingle in delight. “Right now, yeah.”

Eren is good at everything. Even at this, he’s excellent. But as much as you want to come on his tongue, you want to feel him inside, desperate more for that connection than the friction. You want to have him moan your name as your body completes one another. You know it’s wrong to crave for something that shouldn’t be on the list of a friends-with-benefits relationship, but you need it. “Eren, enough already—“

He hauls you closer, latching his entire mouth on your clit. “I want to make you come first.”

“Well, I want you.”

Those three magic words always do wonder in his head. Say those words and he’s yours, instantly. He breaks away, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand before he climbs up your body. “How do you want me to do it?”

“Can I—“ You chew on your lip, slightly jittery and mortified. “Can I be on top?”

He releases a breath and it’s shaky. “Yes.”

Body completing one another like a piece of a puzzle, you slowly sink onto his length. Eren waits patiently with his breath restrained, eyes going up and down from your face to the part where he’s disappearing inch by inch inside you. “I don’t know if I’ve ever said this before,” he says, gulping hard. “But you’re the sexiest woman I’ve ever been with.”

Even if he was just sputtering nonsense, you don’t care. Even if he was just lying, you want to be lied to. For someone as handsome as him, as popular as him, to call you that. It feels way beyond compliment and it feeds your ego.

“I think it’s best if I face the other way,” you mention, sitting awkwardly on his lap with your hands laid on his chest. You can feel him twitching impatiently inside, as much as he can feel your walls quivering around him.

“No.” He pulls on your hand, drawing you forward until you’re lying on top of him. His hand takes possession of your breast, clamping his mouth around your bud.

“Oh—” You’re sensitive and he knows it, sucking just a little harder on your nipple before he playfully tucks it between his teeth. You try your best not to get swayed, landing your hands on his chest to break free.

“Hey,” he keeps you still by placing a hand on your nape, gently pushing you down to him so he can let his lips draw the words on your bruised ones. “Don’t run away. I want to see your face.”

“You’re always like this—“

Eren moves his hips without warning, slow at first but quickly picking up pace once he knows you’re okay with it. You’re more than okay with it. The stimulation from his mouth and his throbbing length at the same time is overwhelming. “Wait—“ you whimper. “This is not what I meant when—ah—when I said I wanted to be on top.”

He drags his lips to the skin below your earlobe. “You want to move on your own?”

“Y-yes.”

“Okay.” He sits up, his large palms pressing against your spine to keep you close. Following his lead, you wrap your legs tightly around his waist, tangling behind his back. You can feel him hitting deeper inside you as you pull yourself toward him. “Arms around my neck,” he guides and as you follow, you realize that you’re now engaged in such an intimate position where you can keep your eyes glued to him as you ride him to ecstasy.

A blush blooms on your face. “Stop staring at me.”

“I’m not staring at you.” But he is, even smirking seductively as he does it. He nuzzles his nose against yours. “Try to relax, you’re holding me too tightly.” When he feels you loosening your arms around his neck, he chuckles. “No, I meant, down there.”

He’s having the time of his life while you’re wishing you can just hide in a cave forever. “If you call me beautiful,” you warn him. “I’m going to punch that pretty face of yours.”

Eren titters, his nose slightly scrunched up in a playful manner. “I’ll say something else then.” Now that he has easy access to your breasts, neck, and face, he’s making sure he’s hitting all three with both his hands and his mouth. He shifts his lips near your ear, softly kissing you before he whispers, “Use me as you want, baby, I’m all yours.”

Lord, please have mercy on me.

***

The sex is great. It’s so great that it’s reinventing the way you see him, the way he sees you, and the way you spend your time together. During the first few times you had sex with him, it was always about passion. Lust. The two of you are constantly caught up in a frenzy, desperate for each other’s touch like a pair of lovers reuniting after years of separation. But the more you get used to it, sex feels more like a game. It becomes playful, filled with giggles and mischievous remarks.

In these two weeks you’ve been together, it feels like everything has changed but at the same time, it stays the same. You and Eren are still hanging out as friends, doing what friends do in their spare time—binging tv shows, stealing dumplings from each other’s plate when the other one isn’t looking, yelling at each other as you play on your X-Box (Eren always makes excuses about how you’re cheating whenever he ends up on second place).

The conversations don’t really change either. You’re still talking about who would survive a zombie apocalypse from time to time with him claiming that you’d die in the first twenty minutes, which is true, judging from how easily you get tired during sex while he can go on for another hour if you let him. There’s no way you could outrun a zombie for twenty minutes straight. You’re also still arguing about things that don’t matter like, “Eren, did you eat my pudding again?!” Which he’d cheekily respond with, “Oh, you want it back? Wait, let me stick a finger in my mouth.”

The time you spend with him is not always sexual either. You can still go through an entire day without touching him, Well, not an entire day, maybe just for a few hours—because when you see him walking around in your apartment wearing only his jeans, do you really have enough self-control to keep your hands to yourself?

You remember that day when Eren was so busy concentrating on creating a new song that he almost forgot you were there. Three hours went by with him strumming his guitar and you binging a TV series on your iPad, which was okay. Normal. But you could barely pay any attention to the show once you saw Eren sitting there on the carpeted floor with his back pressed against the wall, looking so effortlessly handsome with his eyebrows furrowed in concentration. It had been a while since you saw him like this. Maybe even years ago when you were still in college? Ever since he was signed by his record label, something about him changed. He didn’t seem like he enjoyed making music anymore. He was just doing business, not making arts. Today, however, you caught a glimpse of his old self returning.

And that made him seem… more beautiful, somehow.

Knowing how you just spent the last fifteen minutes staring at your screen while your mind playing another movie that involved a certain young man with striking green eyes, you decided to call it a quit. “What’cha doin’?” You squatted in front of him, taking a peek at his writing but he snatched it away before you could make out a word.

“Hey, privacy!” He shouted, taking the notepad into his lap.

“Privacy?” You had your eyebrows adjoined in the middle, confused. “Aren’t you making a song right now? A song that you will eventually release to the public?”

“Yeah, but it’s not finished yet.” He seemed abashed, slightly pouting. “Also it’s, uh… It’s different.”

“Different how?”

“The song. It’s a different style than what I—even the lyrics, they’re—” He scratched his nape, stammering. “Well, you know, they’re about…” you couldn’t make out his last word.

“About what?”

“About love!” He repeated harshly, the reddish tint in his cheeks growing prominent. “It’s about love and I—I’m not—” He couldn’t finish his sentence, giving up halfway. “Anyway, I’m not ready to show it to anyone just yet so go back to your iPad and leave me alone.”

“Why is it such a big deal?” You wanted to laugh at his attitude but you tried to respect his feelings. He was like a thirteen-year-old girl trying to hide her first dirty fanfiction from her parents. “Well, it is surprising that you’re writing about love but I’m sure it’s good. Can you play it for me?”

“You literally did not hear any word I just said to you, did you?”

“I heard you.” You took a seat in front of him, hugging your knees to your chest. “I just thought that maybe I wasn’t just anyone to you.”

He narrowed his eyes, cursing inwardly at how you weren’t being fair to him with that cute pout and fluttering eyelashes. But it wasn’t like you knew the way to win his heart. Eren was just willing to lose every fight if it meant he could put a smile on your face. “Fine,” he decided, almost in a form of a grumble. “But if you laugh—no, even if you just smile a little bit, I’m never going to talk to you again.”

“Aaw,” you jutted out your bottom lip, “but what about the hot, dirty, endless sex you promised me?”

“I—“ He opened his mouth but nothing came out. Eren took a moment to keep himself composed while you continued giggling at him. It was so easy to get him all riled up, just as easy as it was at making him baffled with your words. “It’s a new style of music I’m trying because our producer wanted us to write something that fits everyone’s taste better, so this one is—

“Just sing, Eren. I’m sure I’ll love it.” You tossed him a smile, genuine and sweet. “As long as it’s written by you, I’m sure I’ll love it.”

“Why?” He sheepishly queried. “Why are you so sure about that?”

“Because you’ve never let me down before. And I’m sure you never will.” Your words feel like a confession to his ears. “And, you know, it’s also because of that thing.”

“What thing?”

“The thing that I’ve told you many times before.”

His frown gradually turned into a scowl as he became impatient. “What?”

“You really want to know?”

“Jesus, just tell me.”

“Fine.” You took a deep breath, exaggerating for dramatic effects before you broke into an impish grin. “You’ve got soul, brother.”

You could actually witness how the joy and expectation that sparked in his eyes wavered within seconds. “I hate you.”

“Hey, you were the one who forced me to say it.” You raised your hands in the air. “I was trying to refrain myself.”

But Eren was smiling, so faintly, you almost missed it. And his fingers were no longer shaking, his breathing even. He was still nervous but it wasn’t unbearable. Slowly, he regained his confidence.

(Eren is singing the acoustic version of this song)

He brought his eyes down to the instrument, focusing on the fingers he laid on the steel strings instead of the way you cutely tucked your hair behind your ear. But he could still imagine it vividly. With his eyes closed or open, in his dream or his wake, you were the only one he could see. Your beautiful soft lips. Your silky smooth hair. And your eyes…

“Your eyes like a shot of whiskey,” Eren sang, a pair of shy jade green eyes slowly finding their way back to yours. “Warms me up like a summer night.”

Eren started slow and he started quiet. It was the first after a long time you had ever heard him sounding this nervous but there wasn’t a quiver in his voice. “Can you tell that I need you with me? Let me drink you down tonight.”

Once he was finished with the first verse, he melted into this persona that was born to be seen on stage. The way he charismatically played his guitar, the little smile and blink of his eyes, he was so riveting, making everything else fade into a blur. When his eyes landed on yours again, he kept them there, where they belonged, lost inside your glassy ones. “No, I don't just want any pretty face,” he smiled, sheepish and sweet. “I wanna wake up next to yours each day. Baby, won't you be my saving grace tonight?”

It was you who glanced away this time, not sure if it was because of the way he was so tenderly staring at you or the romantic words he sang. “With you, we could be the only ones here.” You had to remind yourself that this song wasn’t for you. He was simply singing it, and he only did that because you asked him to. This wasn’t your song. He didn’t write this for you.

I hope you can listen to every word I sing, Eren hoped from the bottom of his heart, and know that every love song I’ve written has your face on it.

“‘Cause I,” Eren strummed the guitar harder as he reached the chorus. “I think you're from another world, and I,” he turned to you, “I couldn't love another girl.” You couldn’t feel your face, it was burning. “‘Cause you make me feel like I'm intoxicated.”

You’re the only one, Eren thought as he sang. Please know you’re the only one who makes me feel this way.

“Feel like I black out, pass out,

every time that we touch.

And if it hurts in the morning,

then it must be love.”

Your every touch, your every kiss, it served as an addiction to him. You were the cause of his euphoria. His high. His ecstasy.

And Eren needed more than that.

“I want your heart, baby,

straight no chaser.

I wanna feel it in my head,

when I wake up.”

He let his strings rang through the room as the song reached its end, and once the silence followed, his bravery vanished just as well. “So,” he scratched his cheek, embarrassed. “Does it suck as much as I think it is?”

You needed a moment to stop your heart from beating so rapidly. There were so many reasons why you couldn’t keep calm about this, and not just because of the lyrics—though it was impossible not to think about how the song wasn’t about you when it felt exactly that way. Eren sang it so beautifully, filled with emotions and such passion, that it reminded you of the love song he sang to you back in college. Why did he always have to keep his eyes on you as he sang these words? He wasn’t just gazing at you, he was telling a story. A story about you and him. His eyes spoke romance, his lips shaped the words that they shouldn’t have spoken. And if this was just a lie, if these lyrics weren’t meant about you then he was just mean. It was cruel of him to make you feel like this. To feel like…

To feel like you were falling in love with him.

“Hey,” Eren snapped you back to reality. “You okay there?”

“Yeah, just…” You exhaled, shaking your thoughts away. “Thinking.”

“About what?”

“How to politely ask you to fuck me against the wall.” Because this was all just about sex. Nothing more. It was just a physical attraction and it should stay that way.

There was a pause where he just stared at you, eyes unblinking and wide and you worried that he might see through your bluff. But Eren tossed his guitar away from his lap, cursing under his breath as he tackled you down to the carpeted floor. “This isn’t the kind of positive feedback I was thinking of getting,” he mentioned as he shucked off your blouse, warm lips immediately drawing designs on your neck.

You started working on his belt. “Are you complaining?”

“Fuck no.” He stood on his knees, yanking his nirvana shirt over his head while you sat up to pepper kisses along with the muscles in his abdomens. His breathing became heavier as he looked down to where your lipstick were leaving stains on his tanned skin, his fingers carding through your strands to encourage you to do more. “Is the song really that good?” Eren quietly questioned, holding back a moan when he could feel your breath, hot and heavy, grazing his pelvis.

“Yeah.” You pulled him down to you by his necklace, pressing your back flat against the floor with him settling down between your legs. “Sing it to me one more time after you fuck me.”

Eren surrenders, grinding his hips down in desperate need of your heat. “I’ll sing it to you a thousand times more.”

As your mouths met again, words ceased to exist and Eren would only pull out moans in the form of his name. To him, it was the song he wanted to hear from you. Only you.

***

One thing that’s noticeably different ever since this friends-with-benefits relationship started is how often your flirty banters lead to… well, sex.

It’s not something you’re doing on purpose. The two of you have been flirting with each other for years and that’s okay because they never meant anything before. So it starts to grow as a habit. A habit that becomes dangerous now that you’re in a sexual relationship with him.

“We’re running out of snacks,” you said one evening as you dragged open your fridge, dragging your eyes from one leftover to another.

Eren, who was sipping coffee with his back pressed against the edge of your kitchen aisle, naturally replied, “Excuse me?” He gestured to his body. “I’m right here.”

You closed your fridge, intending to throw him a judging look but you couldn’t help shaking your head in amusement. “You’re a snack?” You folded your arms on your chest, smirking at him. “With a body like that, I thought you were a full course meal.”

He caught your eyes, and not a second later, he settled his mug on the table, pinning you against the fridge. “Fuck, take off your clothes.” And if you took even a second longer to oblige, Eren would tear your shirt away from your body—which would be the third shirt that you have to toss away to your trash bin with a pout and a prominent glare on your face.

“Wait—“ Eren stopped you, pushing you by the shoulders and you almost whined from the loss of his lips on your neck. “Do we still have that whipped cream I bought you yesterday?”

“Yeah, why?”

He smirked, biting the corner of his lip as he stared you down, lust-filled eyes gleaming naughtily. “Care to make it interesting?”

Eren is… adventurous when it comes to sex. Which isn’t surprising, you must say. What shocks you is that strangely, you’re okay with it. It’s weird at first when he suddenly pours whipped cream and honey on your chest, licking every bit of it away with his tongue, all the way down to your navel. But once you realized just how fucking sexy it was to just watch his tongue darting out, giving you kitten licks around your nipple with that little mmm erupting from the back of his throat, you were done for. Following soon after, you watched him settle himself between your legs, swallowing thickly as you waited in anticipation for him to taste you. “Well,” he said, another seductive smirk decorating his face as he dragged your lingerie away with his teeth. “I think we can lay off the honey for this one. You’re already sweet enough for me to taste.”

Food play was a yes. A big yes. And noticing that, Eren took a step further.

“Let’s play a game,” he offered one night when he decided to crash on your place—honestly, at this point, it felt more like he owned your apartment. He just got back from a gala, still dressed handsomely in his classic tuxedo with a matching black tie. His hair wasn’t tied up before, cascading beautifully to his shoulders. But he was always annoyed by the way his strands were prickling against his nape so whenever he was around the house, he’d always wear his hair up in a messy bun. Which was still a sight to behold.

You kept reminding yourself not to stare and drool at his looks but it was nearly an impossible task to do. Weirdly, now that you could have him anytime in any way you wanted, you began to ache for him more. Like when you’re on a diet and you crave for something sweet and there’s this smooth, sugary caramel pudding sitting on your fridge, just begging to be eaten.

“I’m not gonna play strip poker with you again, Eren.”

“Strip monopoly, then?” He raised a challenging eyebrow, leering. “You always claim you’re better at it than me, anyway.”

“Fine. But just monopoly.” You agreed to it only because he looked so goddamn irresistible with that salacious eyebrow raise. “I’m guessing the loser has to do something?” It was the only way for him to be interested in playing games. If there wasn’t a bet to win, he wouldn’t play.

Eren took a seat on the coffee table while you were settled on the couch in front of him. He propped his elbows on his thighs, leaning forward. “Well,” he said, taking off his tie with this sexy, cocky grin being showcased on his face. “Loser gets to lay around in bed, while the winner,” he wrapped the tie around his palm, and you gulped at the notion. “Gets to tie them up.”

It was such a generous proposition—a win-win solution in your case. If you lose, he’d tie you up. If you win…

I… get to tie him up…?

Just the imagination of Eren with his suit unbuttoned, his toned chest being revealed and colored by the shade of your lipstick, his wrists bound together by his tie as you pinned them down above his head. Eren, with his bruised cherry lips and half-lidded eyes, begging you to, ‘Please, baby, untie me. I want to touch you.’

“Fuck, yes,” you agreed in a heartbeat, already snatching your monopoly board from the table. “Let’s play.”

Eren had always excelled at games—almost any kind of games out there—so you didn’t put a lot of faith even in yourself. Your chance at winning this game was close to zero and you were okay with that. You were ready for the ‘consequences’. Because when someone as handsome and sexy as Eren Jaeger wants to tie you up and have his way with you, are you sure you want to complain?

So when you ended up winning, both of you were speechless. Well, you were speechless. Eren was completely baffled and utterly betrayed by himself that he sat there frozen for a whole minute, regretting his life choices.

“This game is stupid,” he grumbled with a pout that appeared too childish to be displayed by a man wearing a set of a very expensive tux. “Let’s play a different game.”

Once you had passed your initial shock, you furrowed your eyebrows at him. “What about the bet?”

“What about the bet?” He asked nonchalantly. “I don’t remember making any bets.”

“You’re serious?”

“Dead serious.”

“If you keep pretending like that, you’re just gonna be dead, Eren.”

“Look, I don’t want to be tied up!” He broke down, whining in a way that was almost out of character. “I’ve been thinking about tying you up all day! I was so excited about it—you can't do this to me!”

And it made him cuter. The way he was glowering at you for such ridiculous reason was both amusing as it was endearing. So he had thought about you all day. He was in a gala, meeting hundreds of pretty celebrities, and all he could do was thinking about going back to your apartment just so he could chain you up in bed. Let that sink in.

So you rose from your seat and moved to his other side of the couch, climbing on top of his lap and tangling your legs around his waist. “What are you—” You cut him off by planting your mouth on his, grabbing him tightly by the collar to pull him even closer. “Mmph—”Eren inhaled sharply through his nose, his eyes shutting close in reflex. You nipped at his lower lip and once he gasped in surprise, you sneaked your tongue inside.

“Fuck,” he moaned, his fingers automatically curling around your nape, battling for dominance over the kiss. You tilt your head back, opening your mouth just a little bit wider so he could taste every part of you. The bumpiness of the roof of your mouth. The slickness of the inside of your cheek, and the warm tangle of your tongue. “How could you taste so sweet,” he almost growled. You could tell how much he missed you in that one kiss, and you missed him just as much. You had only been separated for a few hours and you could already feel the need of having him throbbing inside you again.

“Let’s go to the bed,” you whispered, staring up at him with hazy eyes. “I need to have you now.”

Eren’s emerald ones were unfocused. “Yeah…” Little did he know that as you led him to your bedroom, you had a wicked smile on your face. You didn’t want to manipulate him this way, but this was the fastest way to get him to succumb to your wishes.

“Come here.” You took a seat on the edge of the bed, patting the sheets beside you. “I won’t bite.”

“Won’t have any problem if you do,” Eren smugly replied but he stopped once he noticed you were carrying his tie in one hand. “Wait—You’re still gonna tie me up?”

“A bet’s a bet, Eren.”

“Can’t I just make it up with something else?”

“Would you let me go if the roles were reversed?”

“Well… No,” he admitted with a pout, like a boy getting caught with his hand inside a cookie jar. “Fine. Can you just tie up my left hand, though? I still want to touch you.”

“Nope.”

“Ugh!” He threw his head back, groaning loudly into the air. “You and your stubborn little head, I swear to God.” Fuming, he unbuttoned his suit, letting it slip past his shoulders and as much as you liked seeing him strip himself to nothing, you stopped him with a shout of his name. “What?” He asked, startled.

“Keep the suit on,” you told him, somehow feeling a bit diffident once you realized how perverted you sounded. “You look, umm, hot in it.”

“Yeah?” Just like that, his cocky smirk found its way home. “You want me to fuck you with this suit on, baby?”

“Just come here already!”

Maybe this was the reason why being in such a casual relationship could be so fun. You couldn’t imagine having this kind of banter in your bedroom with your boyfriend. Eren surely had his moments where he acted like he was your lover, like he belonged to you and no one else, and that intimacy worried you, afraid that you might be crossing the lines. But there were also moments like this that made you feel like he was your friend again. Like you two were just playing games, having fun.

“Hands above your head, handsome,” you told him, couldn’t stop your cheeky grin from appearing.

“I will hate you forever for this,” he retorted but he did as he ordered. Kicking away his leather oxfords and socks, he settled down on the bed, his head sinking into your pillow as he raised both arms above his head. “I knew I should’ve worn a bow tie.”

“I have some ropes in my kitchen, you want me to use them instead?”

He answered with a mean scowl breaking on his temple and you pecked it away with your lips. “Stop trying to bite my head off. You’re the one who made the bet,” you said. “And with you acting like a sore loser like this isn’t really turning me on, you know.”

“Oh, shut up. You’re literally grinning like a pervert.”

Grabbing his tie, you circled the silky fabric around his wrists, tying them up together before you tied a knot to your headboard. You’re humming a tune, reveling in every second of it. Your giggles were still his most favorite thing in the world and it didn’t take long before his pout disappeared from his face once he knew how much you were enjoying this. Your mouth found his again, teasing him a little by gliding your tongue along his bottom lip, suckling it until it was a shade redder from before. When you broke away, Eren arched his back, chasing after your lips as he wished them to stay longer. “Come here,” he vocalized, “I still want to kiss you.”

“Cute, but no.” You snickered, tapping his lips with your index fingers instead. “You have to earn your kiss.”

There was something about you dominating him that made his stomach somersault but he’d rather die than admit he liked being treated this way. He was still grumbling about how stupid he was for agreeing to this bet when you mapped your way down to his neck, gently sucking at his sensitive spots. Eventually, he lost his words, body relaxing with a sigh.

Eren smelled fucking amazing. And it wasn’t his expensive bergamot perfume that intoxicated you, it was the scent of his skin as you peppered tiny kisses down from his Adam’s apple to his clavicles. Your fingers toyed with his collar, unbuttoning one by one as you kissed him lower and lower, painting more color on his beautiful sun-kissed skin with your lipstick. You could feel his body stiffening when you reached the middle of his chest where his pendant was lying. “What?”

“It tickles,” he timidly answered, his cheeks turning a bit rosy. “The way you’re kissing me.”

“What are you, a virgin?” you snort. “Let me do what I want.”

“You know I’m gonna pay you back for this, right?”

“If you can win another bet.” You cocked your head, sneering. “I’m not gonna be dumb enough to let you trick me, though.” You sat on his lap, marveling at your work. His white shirt had been completely unbuttoned, revealing the body he had concealed under his expensive suit. Eren was simply gorgeous. He had muscles excellently worked out, yet not a single hair marred the perfection of his smooth chest. He reminded you of the statue you saw on a museum once, crafted so perfectly to showcase the top physical form of a man. You wished you had been able to find the right term to compliment him with but when you opened your mouth, all that came out was, “Wow.”

Eren blushed harder under your scrutinizing gaze. “W-what?”

“Nothing, you just…” your eyes went lower, staring at the hand you splayed above his navel. You stroked his skin, feeling his muscles tightening underneath your palm. “…really have great abs.”

Blood rushed to his face so fast, Eren thought he was going to blow up to pieces. “Untie me. Untie me right now.”

“What, you can’t handle praises?” Once the realization hit, a devil took over your smile. “You’re praising me all the time in bed but you can’t handle one compliment?” The little jeer you did make him feel ten times more humiliated than he already was. “This should be interesting.”

You were being mean to him, but it should be fine, right? He had been mean to you all the time—calling you beautiful, insisting to keep eye contact during sex. Even when you were begging him not to out of shame, he was merciless. And now it was your time to show him no mercy.

“Hey, hey, hey,” Eren gulped as he saw the wicked look in your eyes. “Calm down now.”

“I’m calm, I’m calm.” You took a deep breath, trying not to appear too excited.

You stood on your knees to unbutton your blouse, letting the fabric seductively slip off your shoulders before you toss the cloth haphazardly to the floor. Eren was entranced by your performance, eyes captivated as he saw you wearing nothing but your bright red lacy bra—that complimented your skin perfectly—and your skinny jeans that wrapped your thighs like a second skin. Eren’s lips parted in anticipation when your hand found the hem of your jeans, unbuttoning it and let your fingers played with the zipper. You pulled it down, enjoying the way he held his breath to see what lingerie you were wearing that night before you quickly zipped it up again.

“Not yet, Sweetheart.” You threw him a wink.

“Ugh, you’re so—” Eren let his head sink in his pillow again, groaning in protest as his patience was running thin. “The moment we’re done with this, I’m going to destroy you.”

“Well, until then…” You bent down, squeezing your chest to his and making sure to give him enough look of your cleavage. “I’m going to treat you real nice, okay, baby?”

“What did you just call me?” He actually looked insulted.

“I’m calling you baby.” Your sly smirk was brushing against his collarbone. “Didn’t you call me that too?” You let your hips pressed flat against him, your zipper grazing against his growing bulge.

Eren grew rigid, turning his face away so you wouldn’t catch his blush. “Don’t call me that.”

“But I want to,” you whispered right next to his ear, lowly and breathily like he always did to you. You let your tongue dart out to caress his skin. “God, baby, you’re so beautiful.”

Eren nearly choked. “You—untie me!”

“Keep your eyes on me, baby.” You honestly couldn’t stop. You were having too much fun impersonating him. Finally, he got to taste his own medicine. You reached down to unzip his pants, slipping your hand past the band of his underwear, and curled your fingers around his cock. Eren flinched, his entire body nearly jolted in surprise. “Such a cute reaction,” you giggled, letting your teeth grind against his earlobe. “You feel so good in my hand, baby. So fucking warm.”

“Yes, I get your point!” He was an absolute mess, face burning so bright, he nearly matched the color of your bra. “Now, stop imitating me!”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” You rubbed your thumb over his slit, dragging your face to hover above his chest. “I just want to hear you say my name. Want to see your face when you come.” You apply open-mouthed kisses above his beating heart, tasting his skin. “I want to have you moan my—”

A pair of strong hands grabbed you by the shoulder and before you could see what was going on, you found yourself pinned down against the sheets. You gasp in surprise as Eren hovers above you with his cheeks still burning red, followed promptly by a sly grin. “What—why—“ He answered your question by dangling the tie over your face. He had broken free, now chuckling at you as he saw you realize your mistake.

Your eyes widened in horror. “Hey, that’s not fair!”

“Not my fault you suck at tying knots,” he simply retorted, pushing up your bra until your breasts were fully shown to his eyes. Eren licks his lips, a sexy devilish smirk coating his face so perfectly. He lowered his head, his mouth about to enclose your nipple when he spoke, “Now where were we?”

But before he could please you—and turned you into his puppet once again—you slammed your palm against his face, pushing him as far away as possible. “Eren, I won the game!” You complained, whining like a complete loser. “You’re cheating! This is cheating!” You were kicking your legs in the air, trying to make your point. “Cheating! Cheating! Cheating—”

“Oh my God, fine,” Eren said, rolling his eyes as he restrained your hands against the bed. “You can tie me up again as long as you promise that you won’t—“ He dithered, awfully abashed. “—do whatever it was you were doing.”

“You mean, imitating you?”

He took a breath to collect himself. “Yes.”

“You’re cute.” Your mouth was moving before you could filter your words. Something about the way he was so flustered by this, murmuring his little yes through gritted teeth—everything about it was so different than the way he usually behaved around you. He was so endearing, so adorable. “You’re so cute, Eren, you know that?”

Face reddening even worse, he pinched your nose. “That’s it, I’m tying you up.”

But he didn’t. He kept his promise and let you guide him back to his previous position. You did a double check to make sure that he wouldn’t be able to break free this time. In the first ten minutes, his glare never faltered from his face as he kept his eyes glued to the ceiling, throwing ice daggers at it. But as soon as you released him from his confinement, your hand moving up and down his length, his gaze softened, hooded eyes finding their way back to yours.

“Does it feel good, baby?” You questioned him and before he glared at you again for mimicking him, you quickly added. “I’m genuinely asking you that.”

“It’s…” He cleared his throat, trying his best not to land his gaze on the way you perfectly circled your fingers around him. “It’s… fine.”

“Fine?” You snort. “I’m doing my best here, Mister.”

He heaved the loudest sigh you’d ever heard coming from him. “I’m feeling so uncomfortable right now.”

“You are?” You squeezed him a little bit harder and he bucked his hips, a moan involuntarily broke free from his mouth. “Seems like you’re enjoying it to me.”

Eren panted, his teeth sinking on his lip as he watched you stroke him harder. “Fuck, baby—“ He was pleading between soft moans. “You’re gonna make me come if you do that…”

His half-lidded eyes and scarlet cheeks made your stomach flip in response. “T-then come…” You pumped him faster and he groaned so sensually, it should’ve come with a warning.

“Please…” He pleaded, his eyebrows sewn together as he tried his best not to give in to pleasure, “Let me go, I wanna make you feel good too.”

Holy shit. That was, quite literally, the sexiest look you had ever seen him display on his face. Did you look like this too when he was torturing you with his tongue on your skin? Because if it’s true, you could truly understand why Eren liked teasing you in bed so much. The power you had over him, the way he was begging—

“Shit, I think I just developed a new kink,” you mumbled out. “Hey, Eren, what do you think about acting submissive every time we have sex?”

His irritation from before shortly returned. “No fucking way—ah—” But his harsh protest turned instantly into another plead once you stroked him faster. “Fuck, wait—stop—”

“Not stopping,” you said, lowering your head down until your breath fell on the vein that throbbed on the underside of his cock. Eren’s eyes grew wide when he saw you dart out your tongue, giving a tentative lick on his tip and tasting the saltiness of his pre-cum. “Please don’t—” he implored, throwing his head back when you did it again. “Ah, goddamn it—“

This was your first time going down on him as he had never let you do it before and his reaction was impressive. The more you touched him, the more he was trying his best to hold back his moans. You felt like you could do this forever, just staring at his face as you made him reach his high with your hands and tongue.

Ah, you finally realized, so this is why he likes watching me.

Unfortunately for you, before you could do anything, Eren was struggling to break away. “No, seriously—stop—”

“Why?” You encircled your lips around his head, giving him a little suck and his hips bucked. “You don’t like it?”

“I’m—” he flinched, eyes closing shut. “I feel like I’m gonna come—”

“Already?” You pouted, switching to lazy strokes. “Aren’t you more turned on than usual?” You ran your thumb around his slit, pressing until more pre-cum seeped out of him. You smeared it further across his skin with your pad, rubbing him up and down without stopping. You were so lost in the fun of it all that when he called you by your name, you froze.

“If you untie me,” the sudden change in his voice stunned you. “I’ll let you ride my face until you come.”

Your jaw grew slack, just the thought of it made shivers ran down your spine. Facesitting was one of the sexiest sex positions you had ever done with him and he knew that too, which was why he didn’t do it often. Eren wanted to see you beg for it, wanted you to tell him how much you wanted to fuck yourself on his tongue but you never felt brave enough to do it.

And now, he was offering you the chance for free.

“I…” You croaked out, and Eren could see how you were already having second thoughts.

“I’ll make you feel real good, baby,” he cooed, tossing you a smirk even when his cheeks were still flushed and his heartbeat was still buzzing in his ears. “I promise I’ll be good to you.”

But as tempting as it was, this was your only opportunity to have him look like this under your hands, pleading for your mercy. There would be no second chance. Holding to that thought, you shook your head and decided to go even ruthless. “Wait,” Eren’s smirk vanished once he saw you going back to your previous position, tucking your loose strands behind your ear. “What are you planning to do—”

You bent your head down again, separated your lips, and took him entirely inside your mouth.

“Fuck!” Eren had his head thrashing against the pillow, arching his back with his eyes tightly shut at the feeling of how wet and hot your mouth was around him. “Baby, baby, baby—” He tried to squirm away, knowing how he wasn’t going to last long if you kept this up. “You’re really gonna make me come—“

You released him with an obscene pop, a string of saliva connecting your lips to the tip of his cock. “Go ahead,” you told him, pumping him with one hand. “You can come in my mouth.”

His jaw was nearly dislocated from his face. “I—who are you?”

And you laughed. Maybe it’s true, you were turning into a different person. “You made me like this, baby,” you stared down at him, biting seductively on your lip. “This is all your fault. You corrupted me.”

Eren wished he could take his phone to record everything his eyes were seeing right now. The words you said, the expression you displayed, the way your fingers making lewd movements on his throbbing cock—he could watch you for years and he would still be left unsatisfied.

“Come up to me—” His breathing caught as he squirmed away to break free. “Baby, please, I’m close and I need to fucking taste you on my tongue—”

The desperation in his voice was so inviting that you could feel your body succumbing to his wishes before your mind could think through. So you stood on the bed, shimmying out of your jeans and panties, wanting to make a little show for him but your patience was running thin. Once you had torn every piece of clothing away, you crawled up his body, kissing him once, deep and rough where Eren could taste his own essence on your tongue. You turned your body around, facing the other side.

With your cheeks flushed and your breathing turned heavy, you lowered yourself on him. Balancing yourself with your hands on his stomach, you could feel the way he ran his tongue along your folds, tasting you just a little bit with a little mmm breaking free from the back of his throat, causing you to stiffen at the sensation.

“Spread your legs further,” he told you and you did, lowering yourself even more, his tongue dipping straight into your heat this time.

“Eren…” You were going insane, you could feel it. Breathing heavily, you decided to focus on a task at hand. You curled your fingers around his length, thumb brushing against the slit again because you knew how much he liked it before, and you could feel him moan before you could hear him.

You gave a tentative lick on the head, kissing his tip before running your tongue along the vein. Your fingers were stroking the area your tongue didn’t cover and you could hear him purring in content. Without warning, you enveloped him inside your mouth again, going down on him as far as you could until you felt like you were about to choke.

He stopped to groan loudly between a train of expletives, so sexy and obscene. Hearing his moans encouraged you to do better so you tried to swallow him whole again. You could feel his tip hitting the back of your throat, making you tear up a little bit from the discomfort but you hollowed your cheeks and swallowed around him.

“Jesus Christ, baby,” Eren swore, tightening his grip around his tie. “Is this your first time having a dick in your mouth?”

“Mm-hmm,” you answered, sucking on his tip.

“Ah—” He raised his hips, desperate for you to take him inside the cavern of your mouth again. “Then you’re a natural ‘cause you’re fucking good at it.”

“You should’ve let me do this since the beginning.” You smiled, satisfied and proud. You continued with your ministration, bringing your hand into the game this time. It was so exciting, the sensation of having him dissolve into a groaning mess under your touch so you stroked him faster, sucked him harder, and continued even when he was practically whimpering in ecstasy.

“Fuck, I can’t do this—“ Eren gasped, feeling like he was about to break. “Baby, release me, I need to fuck you so bad.”

“Not today, Eren.” You broke away from him, turning around to face him one more time as you positioned yourself on top of his length. “Tonight, it’s my turn.” You placed one hand on his chest, eyes peering deep into his and reached down one hand to hold onto his cock until his tip was probing against your entrance. “And I’m gonna fuck you so bad, you’ll be screaming my name.”

And you lowered yourself on his cock in one try.

Eren could feel bruises forming around his wrist from how hard he was trying to break free. It was too much for him to handle—you were too much. He was panting hard, the muscles in his abs tightening as he reeled in the sensation. You giggled at his expression, even when the friction of having him slide inside you was a bit painful in the beginning. “I can feel you twitching inside.” You leaned forward, pressing your bare chest against his, kissing his neck and running your fingers along the vein in his throat. “You want me to move, baby?”

Eren couldn’t answer. He was in dazed, incoherent thoughts running through his head. You clenched your walls around him to pull another reaction out of him, and it worked almost instantly. He mewled, his dick pulsating inside. “Eren,” you breathed in his ear. “You gotta tell me what you want.”

“I want…” he weakly sighed, surrendering all of himself to you. “I want you to fuck me.”

“Yeah?” You leaned back, positioning your hands above his heart again. “Try to be more specific.”

“I—” Electricity zapped through his body as you swayed your hips against him. “Want you to run up and down my cock—”

“Want me to make you come?”

“Yes, fuck, baby, please,” he pleaded, “Please let me come.”

“Now that wasn’t so hard, was it?” You stood on your knees, letting him slide out of you completely. “Keep your eyes on me.” Eren gulped, taking a moment to process before he nodded. Smiling in satisfaction, you praised him, “Good boy.”

And you pushed your hips down.

***

Levi Ackerman is not one to come late during meetings. In fact, he usually arrives an hour early prior to his appointment to make sure everything goes well. He’s a perfectionist when it comes to his work, and right now, Empire—the latest project his record label has given to him—is his entire life. He’ll do anything to make them known and adored by the world.

A meeting with the band members and several other composers is scheduled to be held at 10 AM, but knowing how terrible Jean and Eren are at managing their time, it will probably start at 10.15 at the earliest. If that’s the case, Levi has prepared his fist for a good beating, like always.

So when Eren arrives at the studio half an hour before ten, looking dapper and doused in his signature bergamot perfume, Levi is dumbstruck. “Why are you here?” He asks the boy, who’s dressed freshly in a denim buttoned-up shirt with his sleeves rolled up to his elbows and white sneakers that are so clean, Levi thinks they’re brand new.

“Umm, for the meeting?” The said male remarks with his thick eyebrows furrowed in confusion. Unlike his usual self, Eren seems wide awake. His hair is slicked back and neatly tied in a bun, one hand carrying a hardcase where he keeps his Fender Starcaster inside. One that’s noticeably different—so different that Levi has to take a good few seconds just staring at it with a frown—is the way his green eyes are looking very much alive. They’re not bleary from the amount of alcohol he put in his system, not bloodshot from the lack of sleep. They’re… normal.

“What the fuck happened to you?” Levi questions as Eren lays his hardcase on a table.

“Nothing.”

“You look happy,” Levi says, narrowing his eyes at him. “It’s disgusting.”

“I do?” Eren slightly smiles to himself, his mind drifts toward you. “I don’t know, I just… had a good sleep, I guess.”

Levi is on the verge of muttering another protest—because seriously, something must have happened to him, and hopefully, it’s not because of another fucking drug. But before he can say another word, Eren retrieves some music sheets from his backpack and offers them to the shorter male.

“Here,” he says, and Levi’s grey eyes hastily scan through the papers that are filled with scratches and scribbles of his handwriting. “It’s really rough for now but I think this could work as our new single.”

Levi pauses, body going still. “You wrote this?”

“Yeah.”

“This is a love song.”

“Well…” Eren’s unsure of what to say—or to react, for that matter. So with a hand scratching his nape, he sheepishly concludes with. “Yeah.”

Levi’s eyes swerve to his teal ones, investigating them like how a suspicious father would look into his son’s eyes. “Four years we’ve been making songs together and not once did you ever write a sappy love song, Jaeger. And now you’re telling me that you’re going to sing about—” He goes through the sheets, “Hero and heroine? Your love is the sweetest sin? The fuck is this?”

Eren’s face turns scarlet within a split second, his hand shortly reaching out to snatch the papers away. “Yeah, I know it’s bad—”

“This is brilliant,” Levi corrects him. “It’s a little bit cheesy, but that’s what the market wants. Magath will be pleased with this. Have you come up with the tunes?”

“Huh? Oh, yeah.” Eren grabs his phone from the pocket of his jeans, shuffling through his recordings. “I just recorded this with my guitar this morning so—”

“Just play it.”

Somehow a little bit nervous, Eren taps his thumb on the screen and Levi listens intently to his voice that reverberates through his phone speakers. It feels like he’s standing in front of an intimidating judge who’s about to sentence him for his crimes. Once the recording ends, Eren nervously wets his lip, his heartrate surging. “So, uh, what do you think?”

Levi looks up, a little smile breaks on his lips—or maybe, a smirk? Eren can’t tell as this is the first time he’s ever seen the man does it. “Well, Jaeger,” he says, landing a hand on his shoulder. “I think we got our new single.”

***

Now that he’s busy working on his new single, your time together has been reduced from days to hours. Eren spends a lot of his time in the studio but whenever he takes breaks, his fingers will be tapping on his phone screen, exchanging messages with you. His texts are never sexual, simply asking you about your day, whether you had your lunch or not, or just telling you about ‘this funny thing that Jean did to Levi behind his back’ (it wasn’t funny, it was a practical joke that could get Jean killed once he’s found out). They feel less like the kind of messages that a friend would send you, and more like ones that come from a… well, lover. But then again, you haven’t properly dated anyone in years so you might be wrong.

It’s a Saturday morning when your phone rings and Eren’s husky voice greets you from the other line. “Hey, you busy today?”

“Well, I have a serious appointment with my laundry in ten minutes,” you joke and he laughs a little. Even if he’s just being considerate—because admit it, it’s a terrible joke—it still warms your heart. “What’s up?”

“Our recording session is almost finished so this is probably my last day being all cooked up in the studio.”

“Nice. I can’t wait to hear your new single. I bet it’ll sound amazing.”

Eren smiles warmly to himself. “Thanks. Why don’t you come over?”

“What?”

“Yeah, just visit the studio. I can introduce you to everyone and we can grab some dinner together afterward. It’ll be cool.”

“But—” Introduce you to everyone? Why would he introduce you to everyone? Introduce you as what, exactly? “You’re sure it’s okay?”

“Yeah. You already knew Jean and Reiner. It’s time you meet Levi and the rest of the gang.”

“Umm… Why?” You frown, a little bit hesitant. “Do you often invite your friends there?”

Eren sinks into silence and it makes you wonder whether you’re asking the wrong thing. “No. I just, uhh… thought you’d like to see how it’s going behind the scene.”

“Oh—yeah, of course—Eren, don’t get me wrong, I’d love to see the studio. No, I’m very grateful that you invited me, I just…” You start to panic as the tension grows even heavier between you. “You know what, never mind. Sorry for making this such a big deal when you’re just being kind. I, uhh, I’d love to go.”

The seconds that pass by with Eren keeping himself reticence drives you crazy, and you’re about to blurt out more words to shake this tension away when he suddenly says, “I’m not being kind.”

“W-what?”

“I don’t—” He heavily exhales. “I never invited anyone else—you’re the only one—and… And the reason why I’m inviting you now is because—” You’re so important to me. I wrote this song for you. I want you to hear it first before anyone else. I want everyone to know that this song belongs to you and only you.

So many words running through his head but none of them make it to his lips. He’s frustrated, itching to say the words but his conscience won’t let him.

“Eren?”

“Because you’re a journalist,” he abruptly finishes. “And maybe someday, you’ll be interested in writing articles about me. So I think visiting our studio in person would, uh, help with that.”

“Oh…” You force out a laugh, shaky and awkward. “Y-yeah, of course. Well, my field of work is more into politics but sure, I’d love to write about you someday.”

“Yeah.”

The air is ten times more suffocating and it’s worse for the two of you because you can only hear each other’s ragged breathing, not knowing the expressions you display on your faces. “So, umm…”

“Right, well, I gotta go,” Eren hastily ends the topic. “I wish I could pick you up but Levi would kill me if I leave the studio so—”

“Oh, don’t worry about it.” You loosen up your collar, feeling like it’s suddenly twenty degrees hotter. “I’ll just, uh, grab a cab.”

“Great. I’ll… see you this evening then?”

“Yeah.” You faked a smile even when he couldn’t see it. “I’ll see you soon.”

“Okay. Bye.”

“Bye…” And there’s disappointment spreading in your chest. Perhaps even regret for not being able to end the conversation on a better note. You expect him to say something else. Something like—

“I miss you.”

Your eyes widen at his words, butterflies fluttering inside your stomach making all the way up to your chest, forcing you to speak the words you’ve been longing to say. Closing your eyes and feeling your lips tilting up, you whisper back, “I miss you too, Eren.”

And when the call ends, there’s no regret. No disappointment.

Only joy.

***

“Hey,” Eren jogs a little to your spot as soon as you step outside the cab. You didn’t expect him to wait outside the building so when your eyes meet, you’re a little bit lost on how to act. “I’m glad you made it,” he says, bending his down to peck your cheek.

“Ah—umm, yeah,” you glance away, nervously tucking your hair behind your ears. “I thought you were going to wait inside.”

“I just don’t want you to get lost,” he jokes. When you laugh lightly in response, he naturally mirrors your expression. “You look nice, by the way.”

“Oh—” You look down with rosy cheeks, smoothening your lace dress just to keep your hands busy. “Thank you. I wasn’t sure what to wear—You said we were going to have dinner so—”

“You’re perfect.” Eren’s tender praise sends goosebumps all over your skin. You’re not sure whether he’s referring to your choice of clothing or just you entirely, but he takes you by the hand before you can think about it too much. “Come,” he invites, “Everyone’s waiting.”

You follow him with your heart beating thunderously, eyes sneaking glances at his broad shoulders as he leads you further into the building. He’s only dressed casually in a black button-up shirt and jeans, his sleeves pushed up to show the wolf tattoo printed on his inner forearm. You can’t help but wonder if you’re too overdressed for the occasion but when he throws a smile over his shoulder, playfully telling you, “Don’t be nervous. Just stay close to me,” you return his smile and say, “I’m not. But keep me around, just in case.”

It’s your first time stepping inside a music recording studio and although you’ve seen how it looked like in a documentary show you saw once on Netflix, it feels different when you’re seeing it with your own eyes. Their in-house equipment is impressive and contains a lot more than you expected. There are separate rooms in the building, setting a relaxed and inspiring environment with a choice of digital audio workstations, MIDI controllers, and a wide range of monitor speakers that, you guess, musicians like Eren could only dream to have in a home recording studio. Eight people are in the control room including you and Eren—two sound engineers, a record producer, Empire’s manager Levi Ackerman, the drummer Reiner Braun, and the guitarist Jean Kirstein.

“Hey, guys, I wanna introduce you to someone,” Eren announces and six pairs of eyes head toward your direction. You fidget on your feet, your hand unconsciously gripping Eren’s palm tighter as you desperately seek something to calm you down. He squeezes your hand back, gently tugging you forward, and states out your name for everyone to hear. “She’s a close friend of mine. A journalist working for PMC.”

A close friend, you notice him said, which is true. Nothing’s wrong with that. You just wish your heart understands that too. “H-hi, I hope you don’t mind me tagging along,” you greet, shaky and anxious as you cast them your best smile. Eren fondly stares at you, a proud look on his face as he introduces you further to everyone. You can’t concentrate on what he’s saying because Levi, who’s standing not far away from you with his back leaning against the soundproofed wall, is scowling at you, his grey eyes drifting to where your hand is connected to Eren.

The shorter male folds his arms on his chest, calling Eren’s name to stop him mid-sentence. “You two aren’t sleeping together, are you?” He questions and both of you go stiff, face flushed. You’re quicker at reacting than Eren this time, already blurting out words before he can even take a breath. “No, Sir, of course not. We’re just—we’re just friends.” Your friend does nothing, neither acknowledging it nor disapproving it. Eren just keeps his face blank. The three seconds that pass by in silence feel like they’re strangling you. It’s until Levi sighs and waves a hand that you get to breathe again. “Well,” Levi says, “Your romantic life isn’t any of my business. Just make sure to always have your head in the game, Jaeger.”

You nibble at your lip, worried that you might have done something uncalled for but Eren lands a hand on your head. “Don’t mind him.” He softly ruffles your hair. “He’s got a stick up his ass for God knows how long.” You nod, still feeling uneasy,

“Play it again from the top,” Levi orders, and the sound engineer shortly follows. With a press of a button, he plays the recorded track on monitor speakers.

“Is this the new single?” You ask Eren, standing right next to him as you listen intently to the song.

“Yeah.”

“This isn’t the song you sang to me a few weeks ago, is it?”

“No, it’s a different one. I feel like this one suits our style better.”

“But it’s still about love?”

“Yeah. I told you, didn’t I? The higher-ups wanted me to write love songs from now on.”

“Right…” You reach for his hand, curling three of your fingers around his pinky. “I’m sorry, you must have felt forced when you wrote this.”

Eren gazes down, making your heart drop to your stomach when he snatches his hand away from you. “No,” he says, recapturing your hand only so he can lace it better with yours, his fingers perfectly filling the empty spaces. “Turns out it’s much easier for me to write love songs these days.”

I feel like a hero

And you're my heroine

Do you know that your love is the sweetest sin?

“Yeah?” You swallow your breath, trying not to act bashful around him even when Eren’s deep voice is reverberating through the speakers, enunciating romantic words that feel foreign to your ears. “And—and why is that?”

The music is probably a little bit loud for him to speak or maybe he has his own reason but Eren is now bending his head down to lean close to your ear, his lips nearly brushing against your skin when he whispers, “Because I’ve found my muse.”

***

“No, I think we should start with Typhoon first and Lights Out second,” Jean protests for the third time that night, slamming his hand down to the table to make his point. You’re at a restaurant—not too fancy, but it’s also not the kind of place you’ll visit unless it’s for a special occasion. You’re supposed to have dinner with all three members of Empire and their manager, but due to a sudden meeting with the producer, Levi is running late.

It’s a couple of hours past dinner time so there aren’t many customers in the restaurant, which makes it convenient for the team as they don’t have to deal with fans taking candid pictures or coming over to their table to collect their signatures. You’re sitting beside Eren who’s currently slouching on his seat, watching his bandmates bicker in front of his eyes with little to no interest.

Reiner, who has also known you since college, looks uncomfortable at the ruckus Jean is making. “But,” he says, his deep voice is as gentle as it always has been. “Levi said that we were gonna start with Come On Over—”

“I don’t give a fuck what Levi says,” Jean spits back—literally spits back as you can see Reiner dragging a thumb below his eye to wipe something off. “Typhoon is a crowd pleaser!”

“Sorry,” Eren speaks to you, dragging his seat closer until your shoulders nearly brush against one another. “He’s always like this when Levi’s not around. Can never be brave enough to shout it to his face, though.”

“Yeah…” You can taste the scent of his sweet perfume in the air, making your head swirl a little. “He’s always been like that since college, I’m not surprised.”

It’s weird. Ever since you heard the song���the new single about him being a hero and someone being his heroine—you can’t seem to keep yourself composed. Every time he gets a little too close, or if he talks in that gentle voice of his—that he never uses with anyone else but you—your heartrate immediately soars, blood rushing to your face.

“You okay?” Eren asks.

“Yeah.”

“You seem kinda quiet ever since we left the studio.” So he notices. Eren always notices. “Something in your mind?”

There are a lot of things going inside your head that you’re not sure whether you have the time to lay everything out in the open. No, not time. Bravery. You’re probably just reading too much between the lines. His producers wanted him to write love songs, so he did. It’s just as simple as that. It wasn’t because of you. None of his love songs are about you. Stop being so delusional, you scold yourself. But how could you not be when Eren kept smiling and stealing glances at you as you tried to focus on the song? How could you not feel that way when he told you he'd found his muse only for your ears to hear?

This is not good.

“Eren, back me up on this, man,” Jean calls, and it feels like he’s splashing cold water to your face. You straighten up on your seat, bringing your head into the topic.

“Dude,” the green-eyed boy flatly replies. “Do us a favor and shut up.”

“I’m not gonna shut up!” You thought he was going to feel insulted by Eren’s words but it appears that Jean has been dealing with that attitude for years. He doesn’t even flinch. “Between Typhoon or Come on Over, which one would you pick?”

Eren sighs, obviously tired of arguing. “Doesn’t matter what I pick. Levi and those jackasses are the ones who get to decide.”

“Yeah, but you’re their golden boy,” Jean reminds him. “You’re Eren Jaeger—the pretty boy of Empire. You’re important. You’re an asset.” He doesn’t say his lines as a compliment and with the way Eren is reacting, utterly annoyed and insulted, you realize that they never meant to be a compliment at all. “You’re like Beyonce in Destiny’s Child, bro. You have your own gigs. You’re doing photoshoots. You've got your own commercials. We’re just basically your backup dancers at this point. Might as well dress us up in leopard-printed bodysuits and have us dance around you as you sing.”

Reiner, while being utterly shocked by the horrifying mental images Jean is giving, joins in. “I would’ve chosen better phrases but unfortunately, it’s true. If anyone can change our setlist, it’s you, Eren.”

Eren doesn’t mutter anything back but you can see him clenching his jaw. “I want to know too,” you chime in, smiling sweetly at him. “Between Typhoon and Come on Over, which one do you prefer?”

“Yes, listen to the pretty lady,” Jean says and you shoot him a glare, knowing the last time he flirted with you ended up with Eren nearly choking the life out of him. “Or—or not,” Jean finishes, looking away.

You’re about to take a sip of your cocktail when you feel Eren’s palm landing on your thigh. You hastily spin your head toward him, expecting his scowl to still be there on his face but he’s smiling—no, smirking at you in that mischievous manner of his that often leads to something—and you confirm this as your eyes drift down to see his fingers slipping underneath your dress—sexual.

“I like…” Eren drawls out his word, taking advantage of the way the hem of your dress is riding up your thighs. He glides his fingers further up, rubbing against the sensitive skin of your inner thigh. “Hmm, I don’t know,” he coos, propping his elbow on the table as he faces you. “What would you pick if you were me?”

Stop, you try to convey with your glare. Jean and Reiner are right there!

Eren grins, impish and sly. Just play along, Sweetheart.

“Personally, I like Come—” You cut yourself short when he reaches your panties, sliding two of his pads over the fabric, right against your folds. “C-Come On Over better.”

“Yeah?” Eren lands his chin on his palm, casually enjoying his new entertainment. “You like that one?”

He repeats the movement, pressing just a little bit harder but enough to make you squirm. “I just—“ You take a deep breath, clearing your throat. “I just think the riff is pretty sick.” And you’re pretty sick for doing this in front of people, Jaeger.

“Oh, come on,” Jean mutters, rolling his eyes. “Eren, give me your call.”

“Hmm, let me think.” He trails his fingers to the side, slipping behind your lingerie, his digits pressing against your heat. “Well, Typhoon is certainly fun to play,” he emphasizes the word as he toys with your clit and you tighten your grip around your glass. “But I think I’m gonna go with—” But he doesn’t get to finish as you hurriedly stand up on your seat, face flushed at the feeling of him probing his fingers against your entrance earlier.

“Excuse me,” You say, breathing heavily. “I think I left my phone in the car. Eren, could you help me look for it, please?”

“Me?” He leans back on his seat, smirking with a twinkle in his eyes. “Right now? Our food is almost here.”

“Now,” you repeat through gritted teeth, throwing a menacing glare and Eren chuckles lowly in return.

He jumps back to his feet, always keeping his smirk intact. “Well, gentlemen,” he says, dragging his chair back. “I believe the lady here needs my help, so if you’ll excuse me.”

You lead the way, stomping your heels and the clicking sounds bounces off the room. Eren follows closely with his hands inside the pocket of his leather jacket. Faintly, you can hear Jean murmuring, “The fuck is up with them?” With Reiner shortly answering with, “They’re probably gonna have sex in the bathroom.”

And you don’t care what they’re saying, ‘cause it’s true.

You two are like magnets, drawn to each other like you can’t live without physical contact. “You are unbelievable,” you fume against his mouth, and Eren—this little prick—actually giggles in response, tongue slithering in to swirl around yours in a mind-numbing kiss. “Did you think it was funny?”

“I thought it was a little bit funny, yeah.” His smirk is so goddamn annoying and you want to wipe it off his lips but the more you’re worked up about it, the more it spreads wider on his face. Eren pushes you inside an empty bathroom stall in the men’s room, sliding his hand inside your dress. He trails his fingers up your thigh, rubbing you over your lingerie.

“Don’t you fucking tease me again,” you warn him and he pouts.

“Then what shall I do for you, Princess?”

“Just hurry up before anyone comes in.”

“Hurry up and do what?” He raises a brow seductively. “Do enlighten me.”

Two can play at this game and you already have very little patience to begin with. You grab him by the collar and whirl him around until his back is pressed roughly against the cubicle’s door, hitting his head by accident. “Hasty, are we?” He asks after a groan breaks free, feeling a little bit of pain spreading from the back of his skull. You grind your hips against him before you slide one hand down to the front of his jeans, palming the growing bulge.

“Acting like that when you’re just as turned on as I am,” you snort and as he chortles lightly, he soothes you down with a little peck on the nose.

“I just wanted to tease you a little bit.” His mouth is on yours again, licking every bit of cocktail that sits on your tongue. “Baby, I’d love to fuck you right now, but I don’t have a condom with me.”

“Then just do it without.”

“You mean I can come inside?” He grunts, not sure if it’s from the thought of fucking you raw and spilling himself inside you or from the way you’re biting on his lip. Probably both.

“Yeah,” you say, kicking your lingerie off your legs. “I’ve been taking pills, so—”

“You—what?” He stops, eyes wide and eyebrows furrowed. “You’ve been taking birth control pills?”

“Well, yeah,” you shrug, blushing a little too now that it seems like a big deal to him. “I figure it’s easier this way since we do this often and—”

“Fuck, turn around,” he cuts you off, changing position until you’re the one with your cheek pressed flat against the door. He pushes down his jeans until they pool around his knees, spitting into his palm, and strokes himself twice. “I’m putting it in.”

“Wait—” You’re forced to take in a sharp breath as he slides in without waiting. You’d think that by this point, your body would remember his shape but it feels like he’s stretching you out like the first time. “Jesus Christ, Eren—calm down—”

“How do you expect me to calm down,” he stops short as he lands one hand between your shoulder blades, keeping you still as he rams inside. “When you’re saying things like that—fuck—” he hisses, head thrown back at the sensation of you tightening your walls around him. “You don’t know how much I’ve been thinking about doing this to you all day.” His lips are on your nape, his breath felt hot and heavy on your skin. “You look so fucking beautiful in this dress, I want to tear it apart.”

“Don’t.” You bend down, both hands on the door as you push your hips back against him. “It’s expensive.”

Eren shoves your dress further up, places his hands on your bare hips as he straightens his back. “If I promise to buy you a new one, can I?” He slides out of you completely before he slams back in with so much force, you nearly knock your head against the door.

“When—when we get home, sure.” You muffle your moans with your wrist. “Shit, yeah, right there.”

He’s hitting the spot so good, you can’t help but sob and Eren turns your face around, enough for him to kiss you again. His tongue delves inside to taste, stroke, and explore—owning your mouth in the way no one has ever done. Muffled moans echo through the air until a sudden creak of the door stops you both and you stand there in such a compromising position, eyes widening as you stare at each other in shock.

Someone’s here.

You can hear the faint tapping sounds of boots meeting the marbled floor. Eren has broken off the kiss but he keeps himself near as his ears perk up, trying to observe the situation. And you’re doing the same thing, keeping yourself mute.

Until you feel him move.

You elbow him hard on the stomach. “What are you doing?!” You hiss, almost inaudibly but enough for him to notice the panic in your voice. “Are you insane?! He’s going to find out!”

“He’s not going to find out.” And he moves again, giving you shallow thrusts but the friction is enough to make your breath caught in your throat.

The man is now turning on the tap, water pouring to drench his hands. He’s clueless about what you’re doing and you hope it can stay that way because you’re sure Eren is not going to stop.

His dark chuckles resonate to your ears, “Ah, this is turning me on.” He puts more force into it, slamming his hips a bit deeper. “So fucking much.” He slaps his palm over your mouth before you can let out your whimper and you’re thankful for it. Otherwise, you’d be found out for sure.

But Eren is so lost in pleasure that he no longer cares about what’s happening. Not knowing his own strength, he pounds harder into you until your head knocks against the door. Your movements come to a halt and the silence follows right after.

One, two, three seconds have passed, and then—

“Eren, for God’s sake, man.”

Your jaw hangs low, turning your head around to face Eren in sheer horror. That’s Reiner!

“Hey, Reiner,” Eren greets, a mix between being playful and awkward. He shushes you down when the other male turns the water off.

“I had a hunch you were going to do this but I expected better of you, bro.”

“Sorry, uhh—“ Eren awkwardly laughs. “Let’s just pretend you didn’t hear anything, yeah?”

Reiner sighs like a disappointed father. “You know what you should do more often instead of having sex in a public restroom? Go to church.”

“Nah, I think I’m gonna stick with sex.” Eren breaks away but before you can breathe in relief, he tightens his grip around your hips, spreading you wide open. He nips on his bottom lip as he watches the way you’re taking his cock, the way he slides in and out of you so easily like you’re just made for him. You reach out behind you to stop him but he brings your wrist above your head, pinning you to the door. “Besides,” he tosses you a smirk when you throw a look over your shoulder. “I don’t believe in God.”

“Well,” Whether Reiner is clueless or he just doesn’t care that Eren keeps fucking you as he talks, you’re not sure. “With the way you and Jean keep committing sexual relationships out of wedlock—which is a sin, by the way—you should. If you’re planning to go to heaven, that is.”

Eren bends down, pressing his chest to your spine as he whispers in your ear, “Why should I? I already got my heaven right here.” He emphasizes the word by moving his hand to your chest, squeezing one of your breasts. "You know what they say, baby? They say all good boys go to heaven, but bad boys bring heaven to you.” He slides his fingers down, stopping only to play with your clit. “Think that’s about right, isn’t it?”

You quiver, feeling much more aroused though you’d rather die and admit it. “Fuck you.”

“I’m doing my best, Sweetheart.”

“I don’t know if you know this, but I’m still here,” Reiner says, absolutely disgusted. “Anyway, don’t take too long. Levi’s here.”

“Yeah, I’ll be there in a minute.” Eren focuses back on his thrusts, his nails sinking into your skin. “Oh, wait, Reiner, one more thing.”

Oh my God, are you serious?! “Eren—” Your complaint is answered by his two fingers sliding inside your mouth, pressing on your tongue. You growl in protest but he only smiles, both innocent and merciless. He’s playing around, loves seeing your reaction, and you surely can stop him if you muster enough strength to push him back. The problem is, you don’t want to. You hate to admit it, but this? This is turning you on just as much.

“What, man?” Reiner sounds like he really wants to escape from there. “I can hear slapping sounds from here and it’s—it’s gross, dude.”

“For our setlist,” Eren ignores him, his eyes following the way your saliva is dribbling down your chin. “Let’s start with our new single. No one would expect it coming.”

“Whatever you say, man.”

Once Reiner leaves, closing the door behind him, you quickly break free from his hold. “Are you fucking kidding me?!” You land a hard punch him on his chest but Eren answers by laughing wholeheartedly against your mouth.

“Having sex in public is kinda hot, huh?” He snickers, spreading your legs and hoisting one in the air. He guides his cock inside you again, kissing your lips sweetly as he asks, “How are you going to face Reiner after this?”

“I hate you, Jaeger.”

It’s your luck that no one else enters the restroom when you’re sobbing out his name in pleasure. Eren comes with his teeth sinking into your shoulder, his hand pressed against your throat until you choked on your breath. You can feel him twitching inside you, his hips moving slow but deep as he releases everything inside. He groans lowly from the back of his throat—almost like a growl and just the thought of him reaching his high while he penetrates you so deeply, drives you over the edge as well.

“You okay?” He breathes out once you’re finished, and you nod. When he releases you, your legs are so shaky, you can’t handle your own weight. He wraps his arms around your waist, pulling you close to his chest. “Tired, Sweetheart?”

“That was… intense.” You breathe out and he titters, peppering kisses on the side of your neck. “You kinda choked me there a little, by the way.”

“Did I? Sorry.” He doesn’t sound sorry. Actually, you can feel his smirk growing on your skin. “Did you like being choked?”

“Surprisingly, yes.” You gather your lingerie from the floor, fixing your dress. “Do you?”

“Do I like being choked?” He frowns, a bit startled that you asked such question. “Well, I’ve never had someone done it to me before so—”

“Shall we try?” You sweetly smile at him, reaching up a hand and curling your fingers around his throat. You apply pressure on your fingers, your palm pressing flat and Eren coughs once, tapping the back of your hand as his eyes get a little teary. “How was it?” You release him, genuinely curious.

“Well,” he rubs his throat, nothing but discomfort is written on his face. “If you’re just choking me and I feel turned on, isn’t that gonna make me weird?”

“Ah, right.” He rolls his eyes seeing how you just realized that now. “Well, true, but—”

“I didn’t say I hated it,” he corrects you, smirking. “Maybe you can choke me again later tonight as you ride me.”

“Yeah?” You giggle. “I can’t wait to get home then.”

After sharing another chaste kiss as a way for him to show his gratitude for… going along with this, you both focus on fixing your clothing.

“How do I look?” You ask as you comb your hair hurriedly with your fingers. Eren pulls up his zipper, smoothening down his jacket before he runs a hand through his thick dark hair. He smiles, affectionately this time, as he brushes his thumb over the corner of your mouth, erasing the lipstick stain that has rubbed off to your skin.

“A bit fucked-out,” he jokes, pecking your lips once. “Kidding. You’re beautiful.”

It’s funny how he has called you that countless times already and it still makes your heart leap a little inside your chest. “Is this your payback for that time when I tied you up?" You can't stop your pout from showing. "Can I consider us even now?”

“Oh no, Sweetheart,” he coos. “I’m still going to tie you up, you have my words on that. Just wait until I got my hands on those handcuffs.”

You gulp. “You’re joking, right?”

“Wait three more days and you’ll see.” He winks, taking your hand. “Now, come on. Let’s go back. I’m hungry.”

***

Next Chapter

Thank you @justasketch as always for reviewing this for me. You're a blessing. I hope everyone else loves sub!eren as much as you do 😏

Tagging: @tasteless @l6ffys @vivi-et @halparkebitch @fwess @littlemochi @thebeardedmoon @luvtaromilktea @didiyogo @xximthefoolxx-blog thanks so much for reading, lovelies! ❤️❤️❤️ Let me know what you think!

[intotherumiverse]

ship your moots !!

I’VE BEEN WAITING FOR THIS ONE!! TURN IT UP

I got everyone of my mooties in clutch <3 p = platonic

Edit = this is so long I can’t. I have everyone that are my mooties (or I think that are my mooties) and I hope y’all like ‘em. They took so MF long

@katsumiiii + aomine daiki — cocky girlfriend with even cockier boyfriend. They’re playful banter is god-teir and for what? Daiki tries so hard for mira and she just plays it off. @katsukissy + bakugou katsuki — it’s >:) + >:/ moxie is such a menace to society and Bakugou is just taking it. plus they’d be such a power couple I can’t @koishiguro / @lvrgrlkoi + kise ryota — but like whipped boyfriend + “I don’t give two shits ‘bout your little fan club” girlfriend. kise tries so fucking hard for koi’s attention it’s funny. and she’s just 🤨 you done the entire time. @artof-apollo + p! denki kamanari — they the 2 pretty best friend. They are also crackhead x crackhea, with rare smart boy moments <3 @spike-this-ass + gojo satoru — dumb himbo boyfriend with secret smart partner <3. They’re the 🙄 +🤨. Gojo getting into the dumbest shit ever and Sunni’s just like “okayyyy? Tf you want me to do about it?” @myhoodacademia + power — cocky gf + cocky gf. Dee’s just like “I know you love me and power refuses to acknowledge the hint of the fact. But anyone else look at dee, she’s drop kicking someone

@lilsparkyswife + armin arlert — himbo + bf who tries to keep himbo safe. Von’s getting into the dumbest shit ever and armin’s just there like “ 🤨 didn’t I tell you fighting eren is never a good idea?” @katsuflossy + shiggy — I mean I guess he loves her. With them puppy dog eyes he makes everytime he want sum it has to be love. Ni on the other hand is just like 😐 tf you want now?

@noirstoxin + p! itadori — “yo ita. Try feeding sukuna hot sauce and see what happens” enough said.

@solar3lunar + megumi — quiet kids in the library vibes (even though nova isn’t really quiet per say) but megumi loves he and her antics. Would take on cafe date

@minruko + mirio togata — them nigh as would be so loud together I can hear it from here. Mini’s just daring Mirio the stupidest shit and Mirio’s like “okay!! I’ll do it for you <3”

@combat-wombatus + kirishima ejiro — soft gf + even softer bf <3. They are so sweet to everyone around them it’s crazy. Also parent couple me thinks!

@yuujisbby + itadori yuuji — dumb bf + smart gf. Ita’s doing the dumbest shit to impress Sasha and sash is trying to not let himself get himself killed by not letting him do the dumb shit

@bubblime + sukuna — it’s just overexcited gf + tired bf. Bubs is always down for anything and sukuna is the tried boyfriend telling her to come take a nap with him

@silkylious + shoto todoroki — analyst couple ; y’all can’t do anything around them unless you want to be roasted in the most blunt way. Just “is that why you make your daddy issues your whole personality? 😐”

@mypimpademia + taiga kagami — OKAY HEAR ME OUT BUT juice and taiga would make sense. Over excited bf with bf who’s seen it all. Will hit him if he over worked himself. also matching necklaces??? Yes.

@kunikida-kun + keigo tamaki — show off bf + ion care gf. He tries soooo mf hard just for rei to give him a blank stare and continue on with her day. @whipped-cream-writings + bokuto. Softest couple ever. Matching jersey hoodie and cafe dates before practice. @dragonsdreamoffire + shinra (fire force) — himbo + soft girl <3. Shinra loves dream with his soul and never leaves a mission without giving her a kiss @fatgumshoneybun + joker (fire force) — cocky bf with confused/shy partner. He tries so hard with princess and they’re either too confused or sleepy to make head or tails about it. They have the most amazing cuddle seshs though.

@tobi-momo + kageyama tobio — they’d be perfect together. Do doubt. kags always a stuttering mess when momo is in a 5 mile radius of him and it’s so cute I can’t

@angiebug101 + kirishima ejiro — himbo +even bigger himbo. They sound like they‘re on drugs half the time but they love each other. Always taking photos together.

@xetou + aki (chainsaw man) — she broke through him and now he’s stuck with her for life. He doesn’t even know how or when they got together in the first place. Xetou just popped up

@vilbabywritess + bakugou — angry boy with angrier girl. Vil will not hesitate to fuck Bakugou up but they in love I guess.

@lvvrboy + denji (chainsaw man) — seven will fuck over Denji so much he has to fall in love with him. The himbo is so clingy for him is terrifying

@sanemiya + sanemi — angry boy + soft girl. They are legit the “I hate everyone but you” trope and it’s so cute. Miya the only one he listens too with no doubt

@moonlit-xio + p! Denki — it’s the way he’d bully her with love for me. But they would scrap in the streets for some griot no doubt

@kazescartier + genos (opm) — confused bf with chaotic gf. With kaze’s high paced energy she needs someone to mellow her tf out. Genos <3 @myamuraaa + Shindou (Bnha) —flustered sim is the only way to go and shindou has no restraints with that. Also they would come through with the matching fits . @sassi-sunflower + p! Mina — the most chaotic pair ever and I’d love it so much <3

@mads-fairy + kenma — loud gf + quiet bf. Kenma is always so confused on how Maddie has so much energy while after talking to one person he’s drained. But he knows how to settle maddie down

@oikawaplssteponme + hanta sero — they are so flirty and lovey to each other it’s disgusting. They’re are always touching in some way shape or form and kisses are frequent with them

@sobaluvr / @katsupremacy + hitoshi Shinsou — :| + >:) Shinsou is so tired of theo’s antics it hilarious. But like the banter and funny quips? Hand them over to me now!

@fuckasslesbian + p! Bakugou — they’re are menaces to societ when put together. Enough said

@reject-human-return-to-elefante + tenya iida — >:) + :^). They’re a really good match, the right mix of chaos and sameness?? Tenya is so calming for Bat it’s insane. @tododekukisses / @tomiokariceballs + Metal bat — angy couple. They fits? Immaculate ✨✨✨. Will fuck up anyone and everyone. @hvnlymha + shoto todoroki — soft couple ever. They are so cute with each other. Soft kisses and rain shower dates

@miashimaa + denki — the most chaotic, off the hinge, high as fuck couple ever. It‘s a walking dumpster fire and they love it. @vodrea + Reo Mikage — Drea is a clingy mess and Reo loves it. They are so cute together and it’s full of loving looks and kisses @cloudytamaki + tamaki (Bnha) — soft nervous couple. Picnic dates, and late night star watching for them <3 @izukulus + izuku midoriya — match made in heaven. the cottagecore vibes in this are amazing, and they’re so MF cute I can’t @kozumeslove / @kozu-zumi + kenma — soft gf and soft boy >:3. Cat cafe and roller skating dates galore <3 @morosis-haze + neito monoma — asshole + snarky gf. They’d be at each others throat’s 25/8 and it’s so funny to watch it @cubbluv + Mirio — he’s so softtt??? And for what??? Sorry but they’d be a top tier couple @r0manz + yui (Bnha ; class 1b) — it’s legit 😩 + 😐. Roman simps so hard and yui doesn’t know how to react to it. She’s really soft and hate when Roman flirts with anyone else @izukxnnie + Tamaki amajiki — they’d be so cute together. Love letter in lockers and holding pinkies in the hallways omg @rosetheshapeshifter + Bakugou — rose is drop kicking this MF ever, punting him across the fields and having a smaller the entire time @ickyjiki + dabi — the “I hate everyone but you“ trope on clutch with them two. His gaze is softer around Juno and she loves it <3 @ryuvanaka  + denki — friends to lovers trope? Denki is so whipped for yves I can’t. Denki just fizzled out whenever they’re near it’s crazy. @shotos-noodles / @kuroos-ramen + kuroo — the science flirt jokes he would use to try and bag zay. And she’s laughing at his nerdy self. Best couple I say @asaincy + Shoji — Shoji is so nervous around quincy it’s insane. He tries to flirt but it’s so funny. But quincy is so head over heels for him it doesn’t matter. @dollops-of-delusion  + Izuku — Analyst power couple. Delusion knows so much it’s insane and paired with Izu? Off the walls

[itslieutenanthawkeye]

Three Firsts

Day 2 of Jeankasa Week 2021: First Kiss

Ao3

There are different types of first kisses: The one at the beginning of a relationship. The one to seal a relationship forever. The one to welcome a new life into a relationship.

Another nightmare. Three years, and they haunted him at least thrice a week –the faces of his fallen comrades, the millions of children stomped into the ground, the thousands of families left without a home to return to. He faced them in his nightmares; they accused him of not having seen the signs in Eren earlier, they accused him for not running after him the day he’d left, for not forcing him to tell Mikasa -once and for all- how he felt about her.

Perhaps this was why he’d become so dead set with Armin’s ideals of peace. He wanted to help the world and the island, yes, but above all, Jean wanted absolution.

“Jean,” a voice called, and in the crowd of millions pointing fingers at him, Jean recognized it immediately. His friends’ voices anchored him to sanity, but this particular voice was also anchored in his heart. “Jean, wake up.”

Jean came back onto his senses. He’d fallen asleep at his study table in the royal library, where most of them spent their time now that the negotiations had started. He rubbed his eyes with the back of his hands and stretched against the chair; budgeting wasn’t his forte…nor was it to try and convince a rich western president to spare scraps for the refugees. But Armin had trusted him with the tasks and Jean couldn’t let him down. Besides, he didn’t have the heart to leave all the work to his negotiations partner, who had surprised them all with her abilities with numbers.

“Hey,” Mikasa said to his right, reaching out to graze his arm with the palm of her hand. Jean jolted in his seat, confused at the sight of her. Mikasa drew her hand away and recoiled, and he wanted to slap himself in the face for his stupid reaction. “I’m sorry I woke you.”

“No, I thought I was dreaming when I heard your voice.” He hurried to say. Mikasa’s lips formed an O and nodded, looking more relieved that he hadn’t been terrified of seeing her. Jean smiled, noticing her rucksack lying on the table…and the empty tables around. “What time is it?”

“Midnight, almost.”

“Huh?” Jean said, rubbing his eyes. “What are you doing here? Wasn’t Armin leaving at six today?”

Mikasa shook her head. “He left at five,” she corrected, giving him a sideways glance. “I was waiting for you to wake up. I didn’t want you to walk back alone.”

Jean’s heart leaped in his chest, and he pictured a small rabbit bouncing inside his torso. He shouldn’t be surprised, his mind reminded his heart. They’d exchanged letters before his arrival, they’d been comrades at arms in the battlefield, they’d stopped the end of the world together. Of course, she would be concerned about him. That didn’t mean she felt anything special for him.

Friendship love was still love. He didn’t aspire to anything else. Five months had passed since their arrival, and he was content with just spending time by her side, seeing her smile come onto her more and more naturally.

“Buses aren’t running anymore, are they?” Jean guessed.

“Last one must be leaving now. Historia took the last royal car about an hour ago,��� Mikasa said, looking at the pocket watch Armin had brought for her from the continent. “It’s going to be a long walk back.”

Jean sighed and gave her an apologetic look. Historia had given them rooms in one of the newest buildings in the district, with beautiful views of the countryside and rivers and only a fifteen minute drive away from her own residence…and a whole hour walk away from the royal palace. “I’m sorry, Mikasa. You shouldn’t have waited for me.”

“It’s alright.” Mikasa replied, coming to her feet, grabbing the pink cardigan she’d laid out on her table. “We need to get going, though, before all the drunk people come out of the pubs.”

“Allow me,” he said, standing from his chair and taking the cardigan from her hands. She blinked up at him, almost startled, and Jean had to chuckle. “Turn around, please.”

She did as he requested, and Jean helped her put her arms into the sleeves, then flattened the wrinkled fabric on her shoulders. Mikasa looked at him over her shoulder, locking her eyes with his for a moment that stretched an eternity. “Thank you,” she whispered, her low voice creating a pocket universe around them even in the empty room.

“We need to get going,” Jean said, clearing his throat and reaching out to grab her backpack from the table. He focused on the books he’d laid out and began stuffing them in her bag. “Can I put these books in here? I’ll carry it for you. Mine’s already full.”

“I can carry it.”

Jean shook his head. “No, let me. I’m the one that’s taking all these books home.”

“We’re both working the budgets, Jean, I can carry my own backpack.”

“I can do it.”

Mikasa pressed her hand against the paper he’d been about to stash away, stopping him midmotion, narrowing her eyes as if examining a new life organism. “Are you alright? You look like you just saw a ghost.”

Not a ghost, but the outlines of his desire for her, which he’d worked so hard to suppress the past months. The impulse of kissing her overcame him whenever they did their runs to Historia’s orphanages, whenever he saw her smile and play with little Ymir and her friends (who loved clinging to her three at a time, since they knew she was the strongest around), when she was focused doing calculations he was too dumb to understand…when she spoke to him.

She’d grown so talkative the past month. At first, it had only been with him and Armin. But the more time passed, the more he noticed her opening to people. The other night, he’d seen her having dinner with Pieck, Hitch, and Annie. From their table, he and Armin had heard her laugh alongside for something Pieck had said about Annie. Later that very night, she’d walked back to their apartments with him, talking about the littlest matters and court gossip Historia filtered down to them whenever she felt bored.

Being her friend was his most precious treasure, and Jean didn’t want to ruin it by putting his romantic love for her first.

“I’m fine,” Jean replied, turning to look at her after a deep breath, counting to ten as he always did whenever he felt the urge to kiss her. The curiosity in her deep eyes pierced through him, and in the enclosed space, Jean’s almost felt as if an invisible force drew his body to hers. He straightened before he got any closer, clearing his throat yet again, ignoring the pink tint of her cheeks. “We need to get going.”

_________________________________

In the end, she hadn’t let him carry her backpack for her. He seemed tired enough as things were, and a couple of extra pounds on his back would do nothing to help his health. He ate well enough, but he never got many hours of sleep, and it concerned Mikasa. She wanted to wake him up before, at eleven, when Historia had sent her errand boys to let her know the last car was leaving the royal library…but he’d looked so cozy on the chair, she hadn’t had the heart to wake him. She’d decided to wake him until the nightmares started, certain they would catch the night bus.

Not that she didn’t enjoy walking the whole way back with him. They’d done it plenty of times these months, when their work extended long hours into the night. In most occasions, they’d walked back in a group, accompanied by the banter of Pieck and Reiner, or by Connie’s longing remarks for his girlfriend at the continent.

Besides, she’d taken a liking to dinner with Annie, Pieck and Hitch the past couple of days.

All in all, it had been a while since the last time it’d been the two of them alone on the road home. She liked being alone around Jean; his presence gave her reassurance. At first, it had been like a firm, sturdy ship that had pulled her out of a sea of monsters and terribly high waves crawling with corpses. But now he was a tree; a tall tree overflowing with beautiful ripe fruit, perfect words for any situation, with astonishingly wide branches to cover her from the searing pain of guilt and grief.

It had taken a while for his roots to take hold in her heart. But they were there, growing deeper with each day, cementing themselves further and further into her soul.

She’d felt this before, when her first home had been ripped away from her, when that little boy with the green eyes had reached out to her and offered her a new one. Back then, they’d been surrounded by so much horror that she hadn’t figured out exactly what the boy with the green eyes had meant for her. Now she was an adult, however, well past her first heartbreak, her first lost love. And she recognized the same warmth in her heart whenever she looked into the hazel speckled eyes of the man walking by her side.

“The moon,” she said, pointing at the sky. “It’s really pretty tonight, isn’t it?”

“It is,” Jean said, looking at her instead of the sky. “Are you cold? Do you need my sweater?”

“I’m fine,” Mikasa shook her head and rubbed her hands together. “We just need to walk quicker.”

“I can carry that for you.”

“Jean.”

He hunched his shoulders. “Alright, alright. I’ll let you carry it,” he said with a kind smile. “But if your back is sore tomorrow, don’t blame me.”

“I won’t.”

“Because I’ll tell them the truth, Ackerman,” Jean said, chuckling as she turned to look at him with her brow furrowed. “I’ll tell them you’re as stubborn as the will of kings, three times more stubborn than the queen of Paradis itself…I know, I know what you’re going to say. ‘You’re an idiot, Kirstein’.”

“You are. And you’ve learned from the best,” Mikasa quipped back. “I mean Connie.”

Jean laughed, his voice mingling with the echoes and faint music coming from the pubs around them. Mikasa covered her mouth to laugh; she’d never thought anyone would ever consider her funny…no, she had never thought she would ever feel compelled to tell a joke, or just act her age, ever again.

Her friendship to Jean was her most precious treasure after those three years. Her love for Armin had not wavered, he was still the only family from her past she had left, but Armin would have his own family soon, at the continent. And she couldn’t blame him or force him to stay. She wanted him to move on from the pain, even if that meant leaving her behind.

The thing was, Mikasa didn’t want Jean to leave her behind.

“You look thoughtful.” He pointed out as they passed another pub.

“I’m thinking about Armin,” she replied. “About the wedding.”

“Are you excited about it?”

“Not more than he is.” Mikasa said. “I’m just shocked.”

“Shocked?”

She nodded. “We fought so much against them, the Marley warriors, the titan shifters. And now we’re dining with them, and Armin is marrying Annie.”

“Strange turn of events?”

“It’s weird how life doesn’t go as you imagine it,” Mikasa replied, tilting her head back to look at the moon, its surface rough and damaged, and still the most beautiful sight in the sky. “If you’d asked me five years ago how I imagined my life, I would’ve told you…”

Her voice disappeared gradually as she realized she’d almost mentioned Eren. Jean didn’t mind talking about him; in fact, that’s all they had done the first couple of weeks, reminisce about the past, about their time as soldiers. However, the more time they spent together, the less she liked bringing him in conversation. Why, she didn’t understand. He’d been Eren’s friend, after all.

“You would’ve said you wanted to spend the rest of Eren’s years by his side.” Jean finished saying. “You don’t need to be ashamed to say it. You love him.”

“I loved him.” She corrected, not wanting to look at Jean. Her love for Eren was there, of course, but there was only so much love she could give a dead man. “And you’re right. That’s what I would’ve said…and I would’ve had no idea of what to do afterwards. That would’ve been the end of the line for me. I never thought I’d be alive after Eren’s death.”

“What do you think you’d say now?” Jean asked. There was no hidden message in his words, just genuine interest for her wellbeing, for assurance that she would not drown in grief again, as they’d found her upon their return. “If someone asked you how you imagine your future now, what would you say?”

“I’d say I want to keep living,” she said, with much more certainty than what she’d expected. “I want to keep living with you guys. I want to see little Ymir at school. I want to be at Armin’s wedding, and at Connie’s wedding. I want to keep hearing Hitch’s jokes. I want to keep walking home with you after work and make dinner together.”

“I wanna keep making dinner with you too.” Jean replied, with the longing look she’d come to recognize so well the past few weeks.

Mikasa brought her hands up to her face to blow hot air into her palms, hoping the gesture would cover the color in her cheeks, thinking perhaps she could blame the cold, if he asked, or if he stared too much –he did tend to stare at her every now and then.

“Hey. The skin in your fingers is cracking,” Jean said. He grabbed her hands to examine them, stopping in front of another pub. “I know you’re saying you want to keep living, but catching a cold isn’t precisely going in that direction.”

“Are you going to scold me like a kid for forgetting my gloves?” Mikasa asked, her gaze threatening to turn into a glare.

Jean gave her a playful smile. He brought out a set of bandages from his pockets and began wrapping her fingers with the soft fabric. “Exactly. Papa doesn’t like when children forget their winter clothes, especially when it’s starting to snow.”

Mikasa snorted again. “You’re such an idiot. Please don’t call yourself papa.”

Jean laughed, and they wrapped themselves once again in their little universe. It happened often, when they cooked, gossiped about the court or simple when they worked their budgeting books in the library. One look from either of the two, and they became separate entities from the reality around them, with their attention solely on the other. It was a nice little trick they had; it was what had turned this friendship of theirs into her treasure.

“Put my gloves on, please,” he said, putting them in her hands. “I don’t want you hurt.”

“Jean, a cold isn’t deadly.”

“Still.” He said, his face growing serious. “I don’t want to see you hurting.”

Mikasa opened her mouth to say something, but the crowd coming from the pub to their right was louder. A group of twenty people or so, all their age, surrounded them in a circle of drunken laughter and cheers, their voices too loud for her liking, their faces red and bodies oblivious to the snow that had started falling from the sky. A man older than the rest had a violin in his hands, and despite his efforts to play the cheery little melody, Mikasa and Jean cringed at the dissonant sound from his strings.

“We need to get home. They’re not dangerous, but they’re too loud.” She told him, huddling closer to him. Jean put a hand on the back of her head and the other to her waist, as if to shield her from the crowd. A group of girls pulled the violinist to an empty stretch of street. The man, emboldened by being in front of the crowd, stood on a bench near him and played even more passionately.

Jean turned to look at her, laughing. “He’s really bad, isn’t he?”

Mikasa felt her chest moving in laughter. She closed her eyes as another set of high notes pierced the night. “He’s awful,” she laughed, huddling closer as two couples began to jump nearby. She opened her eyes, cringing still. “Take me home, please.”

Her eyes met the hazel in his; he was staring at her again. There were snowflakes on his hair and face, and his cheeks were more blushed than the cheeks from the people around them. She felt herself relax in his arms and the stupid little tune from the violin became muffled in her ears. “You have snowflakes,” she pointed out, lifting herself up on the tip of her toes to run her thumb along his eyebrows.

She traced a line with her finger down his jawline, wondering when he’d grown into such manly shapes. He leaned in, barely half a centimeter, and her body took that as all the invitation she needed. Mikasa grabbed his face with both hands and touched his lips with hers, moving them in an awkward, simple motion she’d seen other people her age do.

She thought he would push her away that second he held his breath; she thought he would reject her advance, tell her he saw her as nothing more than a friend –a possibility that, she was shocked to realize, made her feel as if an iron fist squeezed the blood out of her heart.

But after that moment of initial shock, Jean wrapped her waist with his arms and lifted her in the air, kissing her as a longtime lover. Whoops and cheers surrounded them, and the violinist stopped playing for the blessed seconds their lips moved against each other.

He put her on the ground and pressed his forehead against hers once they’d finished, catching his breath while the drunken crowd clapped and cheered. He closed her eyes and so did Mikasa, both at a loss for words of what they’d done.

“Oi!” the violinist shouted, and the crowd quieted around him. “Aren’t you the Ackerman girl? The titan-killer? Stronger than a thousand men?”

Mikasa tensed in his arms; she was accustomed to being antagonized by some groups in the island, but she’d hoped the alcohol would keep them from recognizing her. She didn’t like the idea of getting into trouble with Jean there.

“Yes,” Mikasa said, lowering Jean’s arm, which he’d begun wrapping around her protectively. If this was going to be an argument, she didn’t want them to antagonize Jean. “I am. Why?”

The violinist smiled, playing an out-of-tune chord in excitement. “I knew I recognized ya! I didn’t know you had a sweetheart!” he shouted happily. “I saw you in Trost! You saved our lives and you were just a little teenage kid! I never thought I’d see the day I’d see you happy and married.”

“Oh,” Mikasa said, relaxing. “We’re not married yet.”

“Yet?” Jean asked suddenly.

“That’s a lovely sweetheart you’ve got there, boy. Take good care of her or she might as well will rip your balls off,” the violinist half-shouted, half-laughed, putting his instrument under his chin and bowing in their direction. “For the happy couple.”

“For the happy couple!” the crowd cheered on. The violinist resumed playing –or rather, he resumed murdering the song— and the crowd resumed their celebration, forgetting about them as soon as another couple began kissing. Mikasa pulled him by the shirt, leading him into an emptier street. They stood under the shadow of a tall building, away from the crowd but near enough to still hear the violin, although this time the song didn’t sound quite as bad.

“They didn’t take anything from your backpack, did they?” she said, clutching on the floor to inspect hers.

“Did-did you say yet?” Jean managed to stammer. Mikasa looked up at him, and a smile came to her at his shocked expression. It was just so easy to smile when he was around. “Did you say we’re not married yet?”

“You’re going to get a nosebleed, Kirstein.”

Jean laughed and dropped his backpack next to hers; he clutched, close enough that she smelled his cologne. He inspected the contents of his bag for a brief second and then gave her another look. “Can I kiss you again?”

“Do you want to?” Mikasa said.

“I’ve wanted to for a whole month now. You don’t have to do it if you don’t want to, though, Mikasa. Just tell me to fuck off if I’m being pushy.” He said in an urgent whisper. The raw intent of his words took her breath away; he’d grown into such a good man, he’d become such a good friend. She couldn’t deny him another kiss. No. It wasn’t that she couldn’t deny him a kiss.

She just wanted another kiss. From him. Not anyone else. “You’re not.” Mikasa said, cradling his face with both of her hands. “Your kiss did wonders to cheer up the night.”

_________________________________

Mikasa waited for the music to begin while tapping her slipper on the cobblestones, ripping another flower petal off the bouget to rob its soft surface. At this point, she’d walk in with nothing but skinny branches in her hands. She fanned herself with the bouquet, thinking should’ve cut her hair beforehand; It was late spring, but the heatwaves were already upon them. Her dress was light enough, but Mikasa guessed the nerves were playing against her.

He liked her hair long, though. And she loved feeling his hands running through it.

“Are they ready yet?” she asked Armin the moment he walked around the corner.

“Historia’s ready,” Armin said, then scratched the back of his head. “Jasper is tuning the instrument.”

“We’re just signing those documents,” Mikasa said, crossing her arms over her chest and leaning her back against the wall. “None of this has to be this grand…he can just play that silly little tune of his and be done with it.”

“Weren’t you the one who got insisted on getting this violinist guy? You went all the way into the inner districts to find him. Something about it being special?” Armin said, arching an eyebrow. Mikasa gave him an icy look, but that didn’t erase the knowing smile on his face. “You’re going to get your dress stained against that wall.”

She straightened and turned around, allowing Armin to shake the dust of the back of it, her eyes set on the birds flying overhead. “Was he nervous?”

“He had to change his suit twice from sweating so much.”

Mikasa lowered her head to snort. “I’m not surprised.”

“Turn around,” Armin asked. Mikasa did as he requested and allowed him to wrap her up in an embrace; she leaned her face against his shoulder and took a deep breath, steadying herself. Her feet had been trembling in anticipation for a good hour. “I’m so happy you get to smile like this.”

“Me too.” She said, coming apart from him, tucking her hair behind her ears. Soft, mellow notes drifted to them from inside the greenhouse Historia had provided for them and Armin gave her an excited smile.

Mikasa sighed in relief; the violinist had assured her he was good when sober and she hadn’t doubted him, and she was glad Connie had kept him from any pubs until the ceremony. She wouldn’t have minded to hear the same stupid tune from their first night together, but the prospect of queen Historia officiating a wedding ceremony with a drunken violinist…Connie aand Reiner would’ve found it hilarious, to be fair.

“Are you ready?” Armin asked, offering her his arm. Mikasa looked at the birds once more before focusing on her childhood friend.

“Yes.” She said, intertwining her arm with his. Armin kissed her cheek and looked away to wipe a stray tear from his cheek against his shoulder, Mikasa guessed. “Thank you, Armin. I love you.”

It was so easy to tell the people she loved that she loved them. He’d done that for her; he had managed to open her constricted heart by just being there with her. He’d saved her from herself in such a kind, gentle way, and it was something she would forever be grateful for. It was one of the many thousand reasons why she’d fallen in love with him.

She felt like a giddy schoolgirl by seeing him at the end of the hallway, hands clasped in front of him, staring at her with tears in his eyes. The feeling grew as her friends turned to look at her, all smiling, even Levi. And while she knew her head ought to have focused on happiness, Mikasa was reminded of all the horrible things they’d seen together as Armin walked her down the aisle. All the people that were missing in that crowd of friends, people they would never see again.

It made her wonder. what was it about her that was so special? What was it about her existence that had given her the right to keep living, make new friends, fall in love with this wonderful, perfect man waiting for her at the altar…why was her heart so full of happiness now. Why couldn’t she share this happiness and her love for Jean with Sasha, Hange, Mina, Marco, Eren?

“Hey,” Jean whispered as Armin let go of her arm. “Are you okay?”

“Huh?”

“What’s the matter?”

Mikasa lowered her head. “Not everyone’s here to celebrate with us.”

“They are here.” Jean said. “They’re all watching over us.”

He took her arm in his gently, not to lead her to the altar, but to hold her steady. He’d noticed her change of expression, a change not even Armin at her side had seen. And, putting his own desires aside -as always when it came to her-, he spoke in the low, caring voice she adored so much. “We don’t have to do this right now, Mika.”

“I want to.”

“Are you sure?” Jean asked. “If you want to call it off—”

“No,” she said, shaking her head. Her hand went up to caress his cheek. “I love you.”

He smiled at her, looking as charming as the princes from little Ymir’s fairytales, awakening that childish giddiness in her heart that had escaped her so quickly at the thought of her fallen comrades. “I love you too, Mika. But I mean it, if you don’t feel—”

She kissed him in the lips for a long couple of seconds, uncaring about the curious gazes from their friends on the seats. “You’re mine, and I’m yours. It’s been like that for a while. It’ll be like that forever,” she whispered in between kisses. “It’s time we make it official.”

Historia cleared her throat from the other side of the altar, and she and Jean turned to look at her serious gaze. A childish giggle echoed across the place, and Mikasa guessed that was little Ymir, delighted to see someone other than herself had gotten in trouble with her mother. “You’re not supposed to have your first wedding kiss yet.”

“Let’s go,” Jean whispered. “She’s gonna bring firing squads back.”

“I heard that.” Historia replied, not without a hint of annoyance. Mikasa giggled, intertwining her arm with Jean.

“Are you sure?” he asked her in a low voice as they finish making their way to the altar.

“I told you before, haven’t I?” she said without looking at him. “Your kissing works wonders.”

_________________________________

Jean knew he shouldn’t have left for the coastal towns with the welcoming party for the Hizuru commission at this point. But she’d insisted. And she was as stubborn as the will of kings.

Luckily, the little influence he had had gotten him an overnight train ride. And then, he’d found a horse. Few people used horses at the island anymore, but it’d been the quickest way to avoid the traffic of the newly built roads. And since he couldn’t take a horse into the grounds of the royal hospital, Jean had had to run.

He stumbled into the hospital room with sweat running down his forehead, hair sticking to the nape of his neck despite his ponytail, out of breath, but just in time. Armin was at her bedside, his face purple due to the pain of having his hand being squeezed by her.

“You’re here!” Mikasa sighed at the sight of him, then looked at Armin. “Make room for him.”

“I’ll let your mom know you’re here, Jean.” Armin informed him, running out of the room. Something in Jean suspected he was just relieved to have the chance to get some ice for his hand.

He ran to her bedside, brushing hair away from her flushed face. “How much longer?” he asked, his chest aching from seeing her twisting on the bed from the pain.

Mikasa cringed as another contraction came over. “You came just in time.”

He kissed her forehead. “Is it bad?”

“I could say I’ve felt worse,” Mikasa said, closing her eyes as her pain increased. “But I’d be lying.”

“You’re perfect,” he said, kissing her forehead one more time. “I wish I could do this for you.”

“You’d be crying like a baby by now, Kirstein, you and I know that.” She teased, and Jean laughed in relief. If she had energy to give him snarky, serious remarks, she would be fine.

“Ah, this is dad?” a woman he guessed was a physician asked, coming in the room escorted by two young nurses. Mikasa nodded, and the doctor acknowledged Jean with a polite nod. “You made it just in time, sir, she’s all ready to push.”

Jean swallowed hard, exchanging a look with Mikasa, noticing fear in her face for the first time in a long time. “We’ll be fine,” he said. “You can do it.”

“I know I can,” Mikasa said, taking a breath through her mouth. “Just hold my hand through it.”

He took her hand into his and suppressed his squeal of pain when she began pushing, thinking he would look like a complete dumbass if he complained from some hand squeezing when his wife was giving birth right in front of his eyes. Despite her quiet nature, it didn’t take long for her to start screaming as their child came out of her, and Jean could only whisper encouraging, love-filled words to her as she brought forth the life they’d created. The life she’d grown and carried for a whole nine months.

Jean had never thought his love for her could grow larger, but he’d clearly been mistaken, he thought as Mikasa crumbled back onto her chair and tiny little squeals filled the room. The physician and two nurses began cleaning their child, and Jean fell to his knees at the side of her bed. “Are you okay?” he asked, kissing the hand that had almost broken his just a moment ago.

Mikasa nodded, kissing him once on the lips. “And our baby?”

“She’s fine! A perfect, healthy baby girl!” the doctor announced, bringing her over to them wrapped in a yellow-colored blanket. “Want to hold her first, dad?”

“Let mom have the honors,” Jean replied, staring in awe at the tiny human crying in the doctor’s arms. “She just did all the work, didn’t she?”

The doctor placed their baby in Mikasa’s arms, who grabbed one of her tiny hands and kissed it while making shooshing noises. Jean stared, mouth wide open, at the sight of his wife and his child. Two perfect beings living comfortably in a peaceful world; his family, all he’d ever wanted. He swallowed hard, wondering what he’d done to deserve such a beautiful, perfect sight, what he’d done to deserve to be loved back by her.

Jean looked away, wiping the tears spilling down his eyes with the back of his hand as their daughter fell asleep at the sound of Mikasa’s voice. “Hey, dad,” she called gently. “Come see her, don’t cry.”

He leaned forward on the bed, and Mikasa kissed his cheek, using one of her hands to wipe his eyes. “She’s so beautiful. Look, she has your black hair,” he whimpered, running a careful finger across her soft arm. She gave him another smile, the type of smile he’d grown so accustomed to see these past years, a smile that people had doubted it even existed during their years at war. “Mikasa, I love you two so much.”

“I love you too,” she whispered while kissing his neck. “I love you so very fucking much.”

“Hey, language,” he said, kissing her lips and then grabbing their baby’s tiny hand again, speaking with a silly, childish tone of voice he’d heard other fathers use with their newborns. “We’re gonna need to get a swear jar or something. Mom and uncle Levi will fill that one up nicely.”

“Want to give her a kiss?” Mikasa asked.

Jean nodded eagerly, leaning forward to give her a small peck on the top of her tiny forehead; their baby stirred in her sleep, and it didn’t take long for her to begin crying. “It’s okay, Jean. Don’t be scared. Do you want hold her?”

“I’m fucking shaking here, I’ll drop her.”

“Language, Kirstein.” She reminded him, faking that serious expression from her teenage years. “Give her another kiss, come on.”

“She’s going to cry.”

“Just do it?” Mikasa said. “I want to see something.”

Jean sighed and leaned in to place a peck on her daughter’s cheeks, copying Mikasa’s shooshing noises as he neared her. Soon after his lips touched her, their baby quieted down again, closing her eyes as she settled against her mother’s breast. “Hey, how did you know that was going to happen?”

“She’s just like her mom,” Mikasa said, setting her eyes on the baby girl they’d created, the baby girl they would pour their love onto for the rest of their lives. “Your kisses do wonders to cheer up the women in this family. Remember that.”

[theotherackerman]

Invisible String

Summary:

Reincarnation AU

Everyone is connected someone by an invisible red string of fate, including Mikasa and Eren. This link become very important as they are reincarnated into their new lives 100s of years later. Mikasa has no memories of her past unlike Eren. Eren has been cursed with his memories of all of his past lives. With the help of an entity who takes the shape of Founder Ymir, Eren begins his journey to keep a promise he made in his previous life.

RATING: MATURE

Ships: Eren x Mikasa, Gabi x Falco, Past Levi/Petra , past Levi/Kiyomi, yeah I know it's weird, but you'll see

Other Tags:   Reincarnation, Red String of Fate, spoilers for chapter 139, Does not include extra pages for 139

COPYRIGHT DISCLAIMER: Any recognizable elements belong to Attack on Titan.

NOTES: I have changed the chapter names on this fic from the original

CHAPTER ONE: EIGHT TIMES

Die.

Live again.

Die.

The first time he dies, he comes back in the form of a bird. He watches over Mikasa. Day and night. He finds ways to let her know that he's here.

Then he is a blue butterfly. He lands in her hair and follows her so she knows it's him. He can't wrap the scrap around her but he does what he can.

Then he is a bird again. Flying so high. He's free.

But none of that matters.

He's never human again.

Not until this time.

Knowing you caused the Rumbling from birth is a struggle.

The first time Eren sees her is in a dream when her half sister’s mom died. He doesn't know why he knows that or how. He just does.

He's here though.

She's crying.

At first, he just watched her. She looks the same as the first time they met.

"You're going to keep missing chances," a voice sang. There stood Ymir Fritz, just as he had seen her all those years ago.

"You're free.."

"Oh. I'm not actually her. I just took this form so it would be easier to talk to you. I'm the opposite of her."

"Are you the one who cursed me?"

"Nope. Not them either. I'm just a watcher. I've been watching you for a long time, Eren Jaeger. That was your name the first time you were born. That is who's soul you are. And she is the other half," the girl smiled up at Eren. "Oh. Right. You can't see the string."

The girl reached up and pressed two of her fingers to his forehead.

Eren felt a surge of power run down his spine.

"That should help. Look,” Ymir Fritz said as she pointed to the long red string that connected from Eren’s finger to Mikasa. “Soulmates,” the girl beamed. “Two halves of the same whole. It’s so amazing to me that they exist. You know they say you were one in some stories. You were too powerful that way. But I don’t know if I believe that. I just know the string exists regardless of anything we believe. Those people are destined to be with one another. That to me is beautiful. Don't miss any more chances."

The Ymir disappears.

Eren sits down on the beach. He looks the same in this human form as he did the last time he was human. Eren looks and sees her staring at him.

He smiles at her.

Neither of them can be more than nine.

“I was wondering when I would get to see you again,” he says as she sits down next to him in the sand.

“Where are we?”

“Paradis. Are you on Marley too?" He asks her, unsure of where she is. It's a large planet and she could be anywhere.

She nods.

"Well that's pretty funny. I don’t think you remember that though. You’re not cursed like me to remember all of it. It’s funny because...well that's not important. I'm just glad we have this time together. I've missed you,” he smiles at her.

There’s something familiar about him that she can’t place. There’s something comforting about him. She knows if anything happened to him, she’d take vengeance on the one that did it.

“At least I'm not a bird this time,” he mutters as he closes his eyes.

She stares at him like he’s grown three heads.

“Why are you crying?” he asks her after a moment.

“My stepmom died,” she mutters before she pulls her legs up to her chest. “I’ve lost my mom...again...now my sister doesn’t have a mom either.” She wraps her arms around her legs, making herself into a tiny ball.

Eren wants to comfort her more than anything but what good would that do? She doesn't know how he is. She doesn’t even know his name and he doesn’t know her name either.

So they sit there in the sand, watching the waves go in and out until Mikasa is woken from her dream.

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The second time the entity using Ymir Fritz’s form appears to Eren is when he is thirteen. Eren is having trouble fitting in at school. When you realize that you are responsible for the rumbling and you killed everyone around you, it’s a little hard to make friends. It’s even harder when a girl asks you out but you see her red string is connected to someone else.

Eren sees them everywhere. Red strings.

“Why did you do this?” Eren asks.

“What?” the entity asks as it moves around the room that is nothing but white light.

“Why did you make me see these? Have I not suffered enough for you? What more do you want from me? I set Ymir free. I brought Mikasa to her. I gave up everything for my friends, my family. Why is that not enough? I just want to be normal! Why won’t you let me be normal?”

The entity sighs, “Eren, you’re not normal. Neither is Mikasa. You’re heroes. You’re the sort of people they write legends about. You’re anything but normal. You’re special!”

“But I don’t want to be special! Why can’t you leave me alone? Let me just have this! Let me just have her!”

The entity changes the room.

They’re watching the Wall Titans move. The Rumbling has begun.

“NO!” Eren yells.

The scene changes.

They’re back in the room of white light.

“Oh! Now that’s interesting. You sure do catch on fast.”

Eren grabs the girl and slams her against one of the white walls. “Stop it. I’m not some toy for you to play with. I’m a human!”

“Are you? Or are you a monster?”

The entity disappears.

Eren is alone in the room with the white light and the white walls.

It feels like a century later when Mikasa finally shows up.

“What is this?” she asks him as she pulls on the string.

“Red string of fate. Have you never heard of it?” he asks.

“I thought it was a myth,” she says as she pulls on it. “I don’t even know who you are.”

“Yeah, that’s the problem. See, I get to know everything. How many times we’ve done this. I get all our past history and you get...nothing. Well, I guess not nothing, you’re having these dreams with me. Curses are funny. I broke one and got another. Well, technically, you broke it. Why don’t you just pick someone else? Move on from me?”

She stares at him. “I don’t want to.”

Where did that come from?

She doesn’t even know the boy in front of her.

But the idea of moving on from him makes her very soul hurt.

She can’t do this.

She can’t.

There will never be anyone else.

There never has been anyone else.

It’s only him.

“Oh,” he replies. “I told you to. Then again, you never did listen to me.”

“Probably a good thing I didn’t,” she replies as she crosses her arms across her chest. “You’re stupid, you know? You tell me this is a red string of fate and then you ask me why I haven’t moved on. A red string of fate represents destiny. Soulmates. Why would I want anything else?”

“Because it never works out.”

“Well stop messing it up then,” she tells him as she uncrosses her arms.

He laughs.

“It’s not funny!”

“No, you’re right. It’s not. You mind if I change the scenery?”

She shakes her head.

He waves his hand and it changes.

They’re somewhere in a garden in summer.

There are fireflies flying through the air.

Mikasa looks around amazed by the view.

“Wow, have we been here before?” she asks.

“No, it’s from someone else’s memory I got back then. I’m not even sure where this is.”

And it is. The flowers. The gentle breeze. Trees swaying in the breeze.

Some of the fireflies land in Mikasa’s hair causing her to laugh.

“This is beautiful,” Mikasa says as she holds her hand out and a firefly lands in it.

“Yeah, it is,” Eren says.

But the boy isn’t looking at the landscape.

He’s looking at her.

She picks a flower and hands it to him.

It’s a white hydrangea.

“Why this one?” he asks her as she takes it.

“I think it represents gratitude,” she replies.

How did she know this?

She didn’t know.

He smiles at her.

“Can we just sit and watch the fireflies?” she asks him.

He nods.

And they do.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

“Eren…..” the entity calls to him.

He doesn’t answer.

“Oh come on, you’re not being any fun for me. Besides, I have good news for you.”

Eren looks over at her, clearly annoyed.

“So you are cursed, just like you thought. But not by me. Actually, I’m here to make it a little easier on you.”

“And why would you do that?” Eren asks as he crosses his arms across his chest.

“Consider it a favor. This will be the last time you’ll see me for a long time as I’m changing things just for you. I won’t have any power to keep this form. So I’m going to send an old friend of yours to you. I think having a friend will be good for you. Plus, I’ve always loved a little chaos. Besides, it’ll be much easier to break your curse this time. All you have to do...is get it right,” the entity explains.

“Get what right?” Eren asks, confused.

“....you’ll see. Look out for your friend. In the meantime, enjoy your time with her. She’ll be arriving soon,” the entity says before giving a wave and disappearing.

Mikasa shows up hours later.

They’re nowhere fancy tonight.

Just her bedroom.

At least Eren guesses its her bedroom.

“What’s wrong?” he asks her.

She explains that she’s in trouble in the first semester of her freshman year of high school for an outburst in her history class.

She hates it there.

She hates hearing about all these titans.

She hates the slander.

Wait, how does she know it’s slander?

Why is she so angry?

“I don’t think what Eren did was right but there has to be a reason for it. I don’t think you can just dismiss him as a monster. He did monstrous things but didn’t Marley do it too? I don’t get it. Why is it okay for one country to do it and not the other?” she asks him, completely frustrated with the situation. “Marley and Paradis are both to blame. Or maybe it’s King Fritz. Either way, we can’t just dismiss Eren as evil no more than we can dismiss Reiner as evil. He broke the wall, didn’t he?”

“So you’re the angry one this time,” he says as he sits down on her bed.

“What is that supposed to mean?” she asks as she crosses her legs.

“Nothing. It doesn’t mean anything,” he tells her.

She nods.

“Who are you?” she asks him.

“Just...someone. Your soulmate,” he answers.

“Do you have a name?” she asks, her bottom lip trembles.

“Eren, I’m Eren,” he answers her before he stands up. He examines the bookshelf in her bedroom. There’s a picture of her and someone who looks like Levi. There’s another little girl in the picture. She looks like Gabi. What a strange family, Eren thinks.

“Maybe that’s why I feel like I have to protect Eren because you share a name with him,” she tells him as she stands up and walks over to him. “I’m Mikasa.”

“I know.”

“You know? How?”

“It’s a long story.”

“I’ve got time.”

“I don’t. I’m sorry. I’ll see you again,” and Eren leaves Mikasa alone as he wakes up in the real world.

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The fourth time they meet, they’re back on the beach.

“It’s been awhile,” he says.

“Not that long,” she answers him as she sits down next to him in the sand.

“What happened?” he asks her.

“I got stood up. My prom date. He..uhh...he stood me up and I got to cry myself to sleep.”

“He’s an idiot, you know?” he tells her. The reality is that Eren wants to find this guy and punch his face in.

“I feel like an idiot. Did I know him before?”

He shakes his head. “Dunno who he is..”

“Maybe I’m just not good enough. I feel like I always get left behind,” she starts crying again.

He holds her until her tears cease.

“Get up,” he says as he stands up and offers her a hand.

Music begins to play.

She takes his hand.

And they dance there on the beach.

Together.

Until she’s awoken from her dream and fades from the scene.

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The fifth time they meet is in person.

Mikasa is far from home, touring a college that has been recommended to her.

She bumps into him as she’s walking.

“Sorry,” she calls back to him as she is late to meeting up with the touring group.

Her head aches afterwards.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The sixth time they meet is when Eren bumps into her in a hurry to get to a job interview.

“Watch where you’re going!” she yells at him.

If only she knew the irony.

She gets another headache that afternoon.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Her art is on display at an art show.

She sees him for the briefest of moments.

The words get caught in her throat.

She wants to make her way towards him.

She has to make her way towards him.

But there are too many people trying to talk to her.

She should be networking but all she’s thinking about right now is getting to the boy who has been haunting her dreams since she was a child. She has to talk to him.

But by the time she made it where he was standing, he was gone.

And she is heartbroken.

She has a migraine that night.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The eighth time she sees him is the night after her graduation from college.

He’s in her dreams.

They’re back in that white room.

“I tried to find you that night! Why did you run?”

“I...I...couldn’t face you yet,” he tells her.

She tugs on the string again.

“Stop!” He yells at her.

“Why? Clearly, it doesn’t mean anything to you!”

“What if we’re doomed? What if that’s part of this new curse? What if you die because of me?”

“What if I don’t care?”

“You do. I should go.”

“But we’re meant….”

He’s gone.

She’s alone in the white room.

The memories of him disappear.

She awakes feeling empty but couldn't figure out why.

[recentanimenews]

Attack on Titan – 62 – Looking Past the Hell

If you like Reiner Braun, you’ll love this episode. If you’re an anime-only watcher wondering where the hell Eren, Mikasa and Armin are, well…you’ll have to settle for flashback cameos for now. When Reiner saw the latest (and possibly last) generation of Titan candidates as his own candidate circle last week, that was a prelude to the episode we get this week, in which the story of his generation of candidates unfolds.

Reiner, Annie, Bertholdt, Pieck, and the Galliard brothers Marcel and Porco make up that previous generation. Back in the day, Reiner was extremely unsure of himself and his talents, much like Falco is in the present, and was bullied by Porco. Marcel kept his bro in check, but Annie is too busy smushing grasshoppers into goo to get involved in the scraps.

Unlike Falco, Reiner towed the company line without hesitation, and the Marleyan commanders valued his loyalty. To Reiner’s shock and Porco’s outrage, Reiner ends up inheriting the Armored Titan. He and the others (minus Porco) end up in a parade, which he leaves when he spots his Marleyan dad. Unfortunately, his dad wants nothing to do with him.

The new Titan Warriors are sent by Commander Magath to Paradis, and on their first night there, Reiner learns that Marcel set things up so Reiner would get the Armored Titan instead of his brother. Like Falco intends to do with Gabi, Marcel wanted to protect his brother and give him a longer life. That morning the group is ambushed by Ymir, but Marcel saves Reiner at the cost of his own life.

When Reiner stops running later that morning, Annie and Bertholdt eventually catch up with him, and he’s a blubbering wreck. Annie has no time for his cowardice and starts to beat the shit out of him, insisting that their new priority should be to retrieve the Jaw Titan and head home.

As she beats him, Annie says both Marleyans and Eldians are a bunch of lying bastards, so who gives a shit, but Reiner rises like a creepy zombie from behind her and puts her in a chokehold. He insists they continue the mission. If they tried to go home now, they’d be fed to their successors.

After this scuffle, we know what happens: Reiner, Bertholdt, and Annie attack Shiganshima as the events from Titan’s very first episode are repeated from the Titans’ POV.

The three mix with the district’s refugees and join the 104th Cadet Corps with Eren & Co. We know that story too. Fast forward five years, and Annie tracks down Kenny Ackerman, but is unable to get any info about the Founding Titan (i.e., Eren) from him, and he doesn’t buy that she’s his long-lost daughter.

Annie wants to head back to Marley, certain that the intel they’ve amassed these five years will be sufficient, but Reiner knows better: They don’t have the Founding Titan, which means their mission isn’t complete, which means they won’t be welcomed back.

As Reiner’s memories of his undercover mission on Paradis progress, we see watch present-day Reiner prepare to commit suicide by placing a rifle in his mouth. He only hesitates when he overhears Falco, probably the candidate most like him in his candidate days, discussing his problems with one of the wounded veterans at the hospital.

Falco could be one of the last Titan warriors, and he needs all the help he can get from those who served before him. Reiner decides he won’t end his life today. His life might be hell right now, but he’s still able to look beyond that hell to, in this case, the hell that awaits Falco and his comrades.

By: braverade

[ghostmartyr]

SnK 114 Thoughts

This is going to be done a little differently than my usual chapter posts, because I can. Or I guess a nerve got struck or something, who can say.

Attack on Titan is about humans and monsters.

It’s about the monsters humanity faces, and the monsters that humans can become.

It’s about fighting those monsters at both ends.

It depicts this fight as never-ending. You might not see the end. Your children might not see the end. Your grandchildren might not see the end. But for the generation that does see the end, for time that you’re here, you’ll play your part.

If you beat down one monster, another will take its place.

If you’re in the wrong place at the wrong time, you’ll be the monster.

There is too much wrong in this world for it to ever be right.

“I remember the pain again... Do I... have to... start all over again? This is a... cruel world. And yet... so beautiful. It was a good life.” Mikasa, 7

“They would all be happier... if I wasn’t alive.” Historia, 52

“They said just killing you would solve everything, but...” “I’m the same way. I thought it would be better if I’d never been born. The world hated me for just existing. To bring happiness to many people... I died.” Ymir, 40

“I... never needed to happen. Do it... At the very least... I want you to end it all for me.” “It’s bad for everyone if I keep on living!! Please, just hurry up and eat me!! I can’t go on living like this!!” Eren, 65, 66

“If Marley decides to exterminate all Eldians... I will accept it. That is how grave the crime of us Eldians were. They could never be atoned for. Eldians... Titans... they never should have existed in the first place.” Willy, paraphrasing Karl Fritz, 99

“Of course this danger now facing our world... can all be traced back to the existence of Eldians. I... would choose to have never been born, if it was up to me. I’ve hated my blood. More than anyone else... I wished for the extinction of all Eldians." Willy, 100

“I... can’t stand this anymore... Just... kill me, I beg of you... I want to vanish.” Reiner, 100

“You don’t really think ‘I don’t want to die.’ Youve always tried to think of a way to martyr yourself so everyone will praise you!” Ymir, 40

“I became a Warrior... because I wanted to kill myself in the grandest way I could. That’s all.” “How much better would it have all been... if I was never born into this world?” Xaver, 114

“If we’d never been born in the first place... we never would have had to suffer.” Zeke, 114

Death is nothing new to Attack on Titan. It’s everywhere. The very concept of the heroic group the protagonist wants to join is founded on the belief that their soldiers’ deaths will pave the path to a better future. It isn’t a kind future. Eren’s called a suicidal bastard for dreaming of being a Scout.

From the very start, though, that’s what the chosen protagonists are going to represent. The wings on their backs stand for freedom. Going outside the walls, even if it only leads to their deaths, is what it means to be free.

Death is a side effect.

It’s an inevitability. The world is too cruel to bypass it for the things you value, so you fight for the hollow spirit of your beliefs without seeing them ever come to fruition.

Endlessly.

Uselessly, darker thoughts start to argue.

For Eldians with a fuller history of the world, they’ve been aware of it on some level for all their lives. They have a monster waiting to be unlocked inside of them, and the longer they live, the greater the risk of that monster being exploited. They grow up hearing the horror stories of what they’re capable of.

The people of Paradis know it first-hand. Their lives for the past hundred years are forged through fear of the titans, with an entire branch of their military devoted to going out and dying in attempts to make the world less scary.

Even in the renewed version of history Willy Tybur offers, Eldia is full of tyrants until Marley becomes the tyrants. Using the same power Eldia did.

Xaver’s wife kills her son. She specifically kills her son before she kills herself. She has a man she loves, and in theory a child she loves, and the moment she understands that her child has that monstrous, tainted blood, she kills both of them.

In response, Xaver kills himself.

As slowly as possible. Learning as much as he can.

But he becomes a Warrior to die, the same way Krista Lenz joins the military to die.

A generation and a world apart, and still these things come up. Only Historia’s mother is the one who doesn’t have the courage to kill her child. Historia’s mother dies by someone else slitting her throat.

This world eats apart most of the characters we’ve seen. They’ve suffered losses and hardships, and the only release they have left becomes continuing forward. Developing their tactics, learning what they can, but living on. Killing themselves and their comrades again, and again, all for a small scrap of progress.

It’s behavior Zeke can’t stand.

“I’m sure that by the end, they’ll be sending every person inside those walls off on a suicide charge, from their elders to their children... they’ll go on saying if they’re going to die anyway, might as well make it a proud death. ...It only proves how unimaginative and set in their ways they are. ...The little fools.” Zeke, 81

All this suffering, and for what?

Titans are still going to exist.

People are still going to be terrified of them.

People still should be terrified of them.

It would be so much better if none of them existed. The memories of baseball and research can stay, but it stops there. No one will carry it on. No one’s life will be shortened so they can be someone else’s tool of destruction.

From the very beginning, there’s been a loud cry to exterminate all the titans.

Eldians are just embryo titans. All of them. For their own sake, as well as for the sake of the world around them, it’s better off if they just don’t exist anymore.

Zeke’s plan won’t cause them much pain, really. Yes, most of them will probably die in the coming war, but a few will surely live out their lives to their natural expiration date, childless, and then the threat of the titans will be a distant memory. How awful is that, really, compared to the atrocities their powers have played party to?

It’s preventing so much future pain, and the cost is what? The selfish joy of having your bloodline continued?

Zeke knows how perverse that joy becomes. Children only end up inheriting their parents’ sins and problems. He escapes them by a man he has no blood relation to coming in and saving his life.

It’s practically humane.

It’s one person deciding to rewrite the infrastructure of his entire race because the world has been so incomprehensibly cruel he can’t think of a solution that isn’t death.

Zeke’s not a character I ever expected to identify with. He’s a hypocritical jackass who’s so arrogant about his own life’s purpose that he’s turned off his ability to evolve. He isn’t responding to the world around him and seeking to change it; he’s already decided what he’s going to do.

This cycle ends. No one is coming after them. There is never going to be another Eldian Empire. There is never going to be another person who suffers from the existence of Eldians.

That fixes it, right?

If it all just stops, somehow that will make it okay again. You don’t have to fix it. It can’t be fixed. It is impossible to fix, no matter how hard you try. Trying just casts more ruin upon the world. Give up, stop, and it will all be better.

The content of what Zeke’s doing could be an interesting discussion all on its own, but that isn’t what makes this chapter hard to write about, for me. It’s that one screencap above that sea of quotes.

So now let’s make this awkward.

I’ve wanted to kill myself for months.

The thought has been present for years, but the want has mostly been since this summer. Am I out of good things that might happen? No. There are plenty of baseball games I could enjoy. There’s more to learn and experience. There are definite things I’ve lived through that brought me joy that I wouldn’t have had if I killed myself when I first had the crushing want to.

There isn’t one grand, unifying way to feel suicidal. You’ll get similar stories if you gather people into a clump, but people always insist on doing everything differently.

But since the very start of not really caring about Zeke, his conversation with Reiner and Bertolt on the wall stuck out.

He doesn’t talk about the suffering he’s experienced. Or caused. His aims are very straightforward.

“We have one goal, right? Regain the Coordinate here... and put a stop to this cursed history. Let’s just... end this. I want us... to end this.”

Three times in one page, he just talks about things stopping.

It’s something exhausting, to feel that tired. To look at the world around you and decide it’s beyond salvation. It isn’t always sadness or pain. Sometimes it’s just... being done. There’s no will left to fight, and could it please, please stop now. The ride isn’t fun, it’s not going anywhere fun, it’s not going anywhere at all, so isn’t it better if it just doesn’t exist anymore?

Living stops being the point. Cutting things off before they get even worse is the best you can hope for. Everything is just that bad. Surviving in hopes of changing it? That will only make it worse.

At some point, every avenue of thought in your head turns into thinking that everything would be so much better off if it died. Sometimes it isn’t even about you. It’s about random strangers on the news, and thinking that if whatever injury they got in some fire killed them, they won’t have to worry about finding a new place to live, and wouldn’t that be better?

Living is hard.

Stopping it all... that sounds good. It is the only thing in the world that sounds like hope after hope stops existing for you.

That makes this chapter such a pain to go over.

Because whatever the hypothetical merits of Zeke’s grand solution, all I can see is one more voice added to this series’ suicidal idiots. One more person who is so done with life, he’s decided to make sure everyone else will be done with it too.

I’ve said a few times that this is a series about genocide and how it’s bad. I still feel that is a correct statement, but in a very frustrated comment I made to a friend earlier this evening, I said this series is about suicide.

Most substantially, it’s about, fuck suicide.

Fuck it right off a cliff.

Over and over again, we see characters pushed to the brink. We see them give up, and hate themselves. We see them begging for death.

Then they get back up.

“That’s right... I still have... them...” Reiner, 97

“I’m keeping my name as I live this new life! Living this way is my way of getting revenge!! I’m going to be living proof that your fate isn’t decided at birth!!” “So what about you?! You’re going to kill yourself, the ultimate act of submission. Is that how much you want to please the people who treated you like a nuisance?! Why are you trying to hurt yourself?! If your will is that strong... then shouldn’t you be able to change your fate?!”

“...I died. But--when I did, I wished for something from the bottom of my heart. If I could be born again... I wanted to live my next life for no one but myself.” Ymir, 40

“It hit me that living was like a miracle.” “I can’t... give up. If I die now... I won’t even be able... to remember you. So--no matter what... I’m going to win! Whatever I have to do, I’m going to live!!” Mikasa, 6, 7

“When I see someone crying, saying... no one needs them... I want to tell them... It’s not true. No matter who! No matter where!” Historia, 66

“I want you to let me do it... just once. Let me believe in myself.” Eren, 66

“...But. I do not wish to die. Because... I was born into this world.” Willy, 100

“When we’re born... all of us... are free. People who reject that, no matter how strong they are... don’t matter.” “It doesn’t matter... how terrifying the world is. It doesn’t matter... how cruel the world is. Fight!! Fight!! FIGHT!!” Eren, 14

Zeke rejects that fight. He’s done with the world. He alone sees the truth, and that truth is that the only way to save Eldians from harm is for them all to die out.

Chapter 114 is called, “Sole Salvation.”

It isn’t a hard thing to fall into the belief that the only net good waiting lies in death. It’s very, very easy, and for my part, that makes reading this narrative, which this chapter specifically calls home, difficult.

Zeke is not unsympathetic in his life’s hells. The little boy who so badly wants to spend some free time with his father who only sees him as a tool--he is a child, and what he goes through at the age of seven is enough to call the tragic backstory a wrap.

He’s pretty clearly an antagonist.

The themes the story has allied itself with are that of fighting for better, even if that better can never be yours.

Zeke’s sort of there, except his entire strategy hinges on the idea that better can never exist while Eldians walk the world. Their entire presence is a blight. Zeke’s decided that the only better that can happen is one that doesn’t include Eldians.

Thematically at least, the story so far isn’t so chill with that.

Zeke is still working towards a goal, and he’ll sacrifice everything to get there, fighting his heart out, but he’s given up. He’s looked at an entire race of people and decided that there’s nothing but pain to be salvaged in them.

Part of me resents arguing against that, because yeah. Even just reading the manga, I’m looking at all of the possible happy endings I can come up with and they’re laughable in their optimism. Calling it quits and wiping your hands of the whole mess doesn’t sound like such a bad deal, really.

Only that’s not the mindset this story operates on.

If you don’t fight, you can’t win.

It isn’t about not losing.

It’s about winning.

It’s about living.

Laced through quite a few of the quotes up there is a concept that Carla puts rather nicely in the 71st chapter.

“He’s already great. Because he was born... into this world.”

Life has meaning the second it starts. Not what you do with it. Not what you contribute to the world. Those things matter--of course they matter--but that’s not the driving spirit that keeps on coming through.

So many characters talk about being born. When they look inside themselves for their reasons and beliefs, they start there. They start before they’re even cognizant.

Life has meaning because it’s life.

You don’t have to be worthy of it.

You don’t have to deserve it.

You’re allowed to have it because you are a person.

Zeke wants to deny that for Eldians. The ones who are around can stay, but the very concept of life for its own sake is one he’s given up on for his people.

I’ve never really gotten people who feel a need to have themselves continue on, but it isn’t a choice anyone else should get to make for them. Their lives should belong to them. They should be able to live them how they want.

Zeke the only way to justify the lives of Eldians is if their genetic code is altered so that more of them can never exist.

Because he wants the pain to stop.

The pain never stops.

That’s why Mikasa’s line is so iconic. There’s always pain. That doesn’t mean there can’t still be beauty. Heck, the other one she says is almost better; “It hit me that living was like a miracle.”

Zeke’s ripping out a rosebush because it’s covered in thorns. The beauty of the roses is less important to him than the cruelty of the thorns.

Relatable.

Deeply, deeply fucking relatable.

And I hope the narrative does what it’s done every single time with this kind of thinking and kicks it bloody.

Beauty means more than cruelty. If it doesn’t feel that way, that’s all the more reason to fight for it, until it feels like it matters as much as something that glorious should. The cruelty is not the end of the story.

Zeke wants it to be, because he can’t see how there will ever be a different end.

Fantastic. Good luck, Eren. Fuck knows you aren’t the gold standard for dealing with this in a healthy way, but maybe enough of your friends will be around to kick you in the head that you’ll think of something clever.

-sigh-

I guess I’m done. Even if this is more of a series post than a chapter post, but I guess technically these are just my thoughts on a chapter, and heyo, my thoughts.

Though one thing.

One thing I will mention.

Is that Zeke shouldn’t want Historia to be pregnant.

Like, he’s generally very anti-pregnancy already, but if he does his Founding mojo, he’ll still die, and the current generation will still be around, and as long as there’s someone of royal blood, said Founding mojo can be undone.

Geez I need a drink.

[kdtheghostwriter]

SNK #111 Recap

Guys. I feel truly blessed to have found a mangaka that seemingly operates in a near-constant state of existential angst just like me.

The fridge horror of this series has always intrigued me greatly, tied directly to the overt body horror that comes along with humans turning into giant monsters and regenerating from the most grotesque injuries. The real horror of "titanization" of course is the loss of autonomy. Ymir wandered the Island of Paradis for six decades - describing it as a nightmare without end. We’ve only seen one method of reversing this curse, so it’s safe to view titan transformation as death until shown otherwise. And now, we have a man of royal descent who is able to activate this ‘death’ inhabiting an island full of people susceptible to the transformation.

Welp. There’s that Circle of Hell. Descend just one level further and we see Paradis’ military pointing fingers per usual. “Just a bunch of jackasses standing in a circle.” Which is how we got here in the first place, isn’t it? Commander Hange points that out as the Military Police bring in the Survey Corps for questioning, as does Pixis when he makes his entrance.

Eren and his pals have officially been branded the “Jaegerists” and Pixis continues his streak as the smartest bloke in the room by announcing his intent to surrender to the Restorationists. He isn’t giving them anything obviously; it’s simple math.

We are days, if not hours, away in storyline from Marley and her allies raining down a fiery vengeance on The Usurper and his Island of Devils. They have exactly one chance (an outside chance, mind you) of surviving this offensive and that chance will be shot if any more officials are killed which the Jaeger Faction has made very clear they are willing to do. Pixis also correctly pointed out that Zackley only came to power by way of a coup. He himself being overthrown isn’t exactly surprising.

Now, Dot Pixis is Commander-in-Chief of the military government and his first order of business is finding all the available pieces on the board: checking on the Queen, getting in touch with Levi, negotiating with Eren with regards to his brother’s location. This is all very sound logic and the correct course of action even as we gain knowledge Pixis doesn’t have regarding the tainted wine: Zeke’s new bargaining chip. For someone on his last legs, nobody knows how to not die like he does.

We skip away from political machinations, smack dab into a thick helping of interpersonal drama. Cheery, I know! And can I say quickly, as choppy as his pacing is and continues to be, Isayama’s paneling and the framing of his establishing shots is positively cinematic. My guess is he spent some time with a camera before picking up the pen and paper. It shows.

In what can only be described as A Series of Poorly Timed Events we see Gabi and Falco arrive with Sasha’s family to receive Nicolo’s special meal. The occasion is a tribute to Sasha, who died on the mission to retrieve Eren from Marley. By total coincidence, Hange and Squad Levi appear at the restaurant to question Nicolo about his friends in the Volunteers. Before they can, he ducks away and is approached by the two runaway prisoners.

Falco puts two-and-two together quickly about Nicolo’s relation to the others but is unable to stop Gabi from proudly announcing her role in the death of Sasha Braus. Being from Marley like she is, Gabi expects Nicolo to respond positively. Congratulate her, even.

He...does not.

Isayama is pretty good with melodrama. You need to be at least competent when you’re writing a serialized story that updates this regularly. The best and worst part of this is the characters he writes and how they pop off the page. They are super dynamic, sometimes to the point of unbelievability, and rarely dull.

Nicolo assaults the two ten-year-olds, turning them over and encouraging Mr. Braus to take revenge on the person that took his daughter’s life. He refuses: citing Sasha’s childhood as a hunter and adulthood as a soldier. Taking part in such a dangerous and deadly operation, there was always a chance she might not return. The world is a scary, confusing place. An adult’s main job is making sure the younger folks benefit from their experience and find the easy path through. The ‘I Suffered So They Should Too’ gimmick? That ain’t it, Chief.

This all leads to the most important point: Gabi. Is. A. Child.

She’s got blood on her hands, no doubt. You know who else does? Sasha. And Eren. And Armin. Even Mikasa, who intervened before Kaya could use the discarded knife to strike down Gabi in a fit of grief and rage. Mikasa is so very tired. Who would know better than she the feeling of having your family violently ripped away? She’s suffered through it numerous times. As tired as she is of losing her loved ones, she’s even more tired of seeing other people broken by the brutal circumstances they’ve been born into.

Every SC member present saw Gabi and said, ”Ah! Look! The one who killed our comrade!” Mikasa saw Gabi (whom she knew killed her friend) and said, “Ah. Look. This child is hurt.” You see, because Gabi is a child, friends. A child who has been systematically brainwashed and abused not only by her government but also by her family. And keep in mind, Sasha and Mikasa were roommates for an extended period. If anyone should be triggered by Gabi’s presence, it should be her. But she wasn’t. Why?

I won’t take this moment to say ‘I said so’ because the story still needs to play itself out. But damn it all if Mikasa isn’t clinging with everything she has to even the barest scrap of humanity.

Momtaku brought up an excellent point in regards to the characters and how they react to trauma. Isayama tends to have them go to one extreme or another. On the one hand, given recent events in America, this isn’t exactly far-fetched but for a piece of narrative fiction it can be extremely jarring.

I still like the scene of Kaya lunging for Gabi, not because of who the players were. I enjoyed seeing Gabi get a moment of true realization of the pain her people have been living in. The pain she’d caused.

The moment in every person’s life when they realize there is no protagonist. There’s just a great many people doing a lot of suffering. And there isn’t much to be done about it.

Stray Thoughts

- Still no Tiny Queen, although she’s mentioned. What are the odds of them finding her at the residence they left her? Slim, I’d say.

- Eren has truly replaced Bert as the monolith of the series. He never gets a panel and is only mentioned by name once, but his shadow looms unmistakably across this entire chapter.

- Nicolo saved Jean from drinking the tainted wine by lobbing a slur at him. Easily the most tsundere thing I’ve seen in the past month. And I saw Venom!

- Speaking of: most of the military’s top brass partook of that wine. (Nicolo how you doin? I said so etc) Once he can confirm this knowledge, I predict Zeke’s negotiations will turn into demands very quickly.

- No offense intended to my friends who partake in adult beverages, I do not. And even though such a scenario is actually impossible, boy do I feel better knowing that for me it’s even more impossible. But if you happen to find yourself in SNK world and are given the choice...

[lady-bluebird-luv]

Downriver

I got impatient waiting to hear about Hange and her bff so I wrote something. It’s also on AO3.

Levi’s already heavy when he can move himself. Limp and soaking wet in the tumble of the river, Hange can barely both hold onto him and fight against the current. Their mind races with a calculated evaluation of the situation: Levi and they have nowhere to go. Exiled from Paradise, Hange’s capacity to give their best friend emergency care is crippled. Hange doesn’t think that Floch will come after them. They're just scum now, after all, and the Jaeger brothers probably believe whatever plan they have will take care of them as soon as its implemented. Zeke is smart, and Eren is increasingly worrying, but even though the younger shifter knows how dangerous Hange can be, and both Eren and Zeke are very much aware of the danger Levi poses, the two of them are insects. Not worth trying to hunt down in the island’s dense forests. They’re left for dead, and Hange can’t say it’s an improbable prediction.  

Hange doesn’t know how far they and Levi drift along. They don’t hear horses, so they probably aren’t being chased. But they’ll have to get away from the river as quickly as possible. Otherwise, if anyone chases them, the pair will only have to follow the river to find them. Hange grits their teeth and tries to push away the nagging cold. This is bad, very bad. (“No shit, dumbass” Levi would say if he could. “What’s new?”).  

In the quiet moments late at night, siting in the commander’s study, Levi has a look in his eyes that’s become more pronounced recently. If a feral dog, backed into a corner and bleeding out, was personified, they would look something like the captain. Hauling the two of them out of the river, Hange understands where that feeling comes from. They need dry clothes, which they don’t have, food, which they don’t have, and sleep, which they might not be able to afford. Hange needs to find a safe place to evaluate and treat Levi’s wounds as best as they can. they try to slow down their thoughts, to be pragmatic. It doesn’t matter if they die out here or not, so they may as well try to survive.  

There’s no way to be subtle about the path they make through the woods. Any half-decent tracker will see the scuffed leaf litter and broken branches that Hange leaves behind as she tries to carry her best friend through the vegetation. After an agonizingly long time, when their arms and back scream in protest against the slumped weight on their back and their legs feel like rubber, Hange stops. Their exhaustion is bone-deep. If anyone finds them where they are now, so be it. Neither of them can put up much of a fight.

Finally, bracing themselves, the scientist evaluates the captain’s wounds. There isn’t much good news. Levi is alive, and some of his cuts are surface scratches from shrapnel. But he might not be alive for long, and most of his injuries may not be salvageable. The gash across his face rent one of his eyes open. He’s missing two fingers, and Hange is neither going to try to retrieve them, nor sure an attempted reattachment would be successful this long after the injury. Levi lost a lot of blood. There’s nothing they can do to sew anything together, and Hange sure as hell won’t attempt a blood transfusion. Hange can’t even begin to imagine what sort of internal injuries the soldier has. The most immediate threat is infection. Thankfully, there might be something Hange can do about that.

The survey corps ponchos are watertight. Hange leaves Levi and tries to retrace their steps from the river. They don’t want to leave the captain unattended. Something might try to carry him off, or he might die – Hange has to accept that reality – alone in the woods. But Hange also doesn’t have a choice. They manage to scoop some water from the river into the poncho, and to not spill that much on the return. Finding a dip in some stones to store the water without spilling it, they make a fire. It's long, tedious work without matches, but they have their glasses and some tufts of feathery, rubbed-soft bark to ignite. For a while, Hange fears the sparks won’t catch, but they soon have a small fire going.  

´Hange boils the water as best they can without setting the poncho on fire, reduced to holding the makeshift bowl as far away from the fire as they can while still heating the water enough to bring it to a boil. It’s long work, and Hange thinks fleetingly that it’s the sort of thing Shardis would use to punish new recruits for being too mouthy. The thought makes Hange ache. The old teacher is beaten bloody now, if he survived the ordeal. A snide comment about karma comes to mind, but Shardis doesn’t deserve what Eren’s survey corps did to him.  

It’s a blessing that Levi is unconscious when Hange washes his wounds out with the boiled water. They check his pulse periodically. It’s noticeable, but stuttering. Hange washes his wounds again. Then a third time, like a tired ritual, to prevent catching infection in the wound when they do what they do next. The commander hopes they aren’t washing a corpse.  

Hange’s never treated injuries this serious in the field. Usually, injuries like Levi’s would be a death sentence. The brunet feels a wash of relief knowing there aren’t any titans left roaming around the island. Not the mindless ones, anyways. But this field treatment is a joke. The only metal Hange has to cauterize Levi’s wounds is a scrap of shrapnel from one of his cuts. They almost burn their fingers heating it, and fumble it with makeshift wooden tongs. The smell of burned flesh and hair turns their stomach, both sickeningly and insistently. They haven’t eaten in a while.  

Flesh hisses. Levi’s definitely going to lose the eye.  

Work done, Hange sits back and watches their friend. He's alive, and they’ve done what they can. The full extent of his injuries remains unknown. Hange can’t know if he’s bleeding internally, or what kind of organ damage the thunder spears inevitably caused. The final diagnosis is undetermined, the prognosis poor. Levi is strong, the strongest – but he also doesn’t have a titan’s healing abilities, and he endured massive trauma. Hange doesn’t know if any human, Ackerman or not, can come back from something like this.  

There’s no good reason this should have happened. It’s not a new thought – that's just war – but Hange feels cheated. Death’s lottery feels once again unfair, the house about to win another time. They don’t know what they’ll do if Levi doesn’t pull through. It’s bad enough to be usurped by a teenage mass-murderer surrounded by zealots and warmongers, but this is adding insult to injury.  

The commander glances down at Levi’s sleeping features, the slightest rise and fall of his chest. Hange feeds the fire. They scan the darkening edges of the clearing for any plants that look edible. There are a few that might be, and likely more options deeper in the woods. They look up at the pieces of night sky peaking between the treetops. Their neck and back are sore from crouching for so long, but the commander settles in to keep watch in the long night.  

[dammitadolfnomorecake]

🏰⚔️🐲🐲👑 DMODT- 52 update

It was as Eren had said. Herbal teas, fluid, food and rest. His vomiting had dehydrated him, and his smaller meals in Marley had left every scrap of nutrition going to the baby. A baby which really wasn't being welcomed by the soldiers of the barracks, not that Eren was either. Everyone was whispering about their new prince and his lack of prominence in Eldia. Or how stupid he was given the type of man Zeke was. It wasn't his fault that he was currently stuck in bed and unable to leave his room. He'd wanted to, and was in a foul mood for being denied. He knew how powerful public presence was, and that the people couldn't believe in a prince who never made time for him. He was just simply too ill and fatigued. Erwin and Hanji had both been shocked as the healer had examined him, Erwin having to leave the room, while Hanji now refused to leave his side until his condition improved. In Marley, he'd avoided looking in mirrors as he didn't want to see who he'd become, but in the room he was now in, the dresser sat just a few steps from the bed, and when he'd set eyes on himself he'd been so beyond disgusted. He looked like a living doll. His sharp cheek bones, pale complexion, and dim eyes all came together in a way that made him seem barely human. Why had no one told him how sick he looked? He doubted that just two days at sea could have left in his such a condition. Was this what Zeke had seen? And was that why they were in Eldia? Because the alpha didn't want him dying in Marley before they got their hands on Eldia's resources? At this point, he didn't know. He just wanted to get out of bed. He wanted to talk to the soldiers, and the people of the port town. He wanted to show that he wasn't a weak omega simply because he was pregnant, and that he still had their best interests in heart despite being now residing in Marley. Letting herself into the room Eren was using, Hanji smiled happily. In her hold was a breakfast tray piled high with food, which immediately caught Luca's attention "Good morning! How are we both this morning?" Eren rolled his eyes at Hanji. She'd literally only left to get breakfast half an hour earlier, giving Eren privacy as he showered. There were guards at his door, and Zeke had already stopped by to enquire about his health. He was sick of people asking. He was already self conscious over his pregnancy, and the fact he didn't look 6 months along. Hanji's smile widened "No need to give me that look, Prince Eren" Huffing, Eren crossed his legs, keeping both hands around Luca's rather large waist so the dragon wouldn't attempt to jump on Hanji "I'm fine. I'm sick of this bed, and Luca is sick of being trapped inside" Hanji rolled her eyes back at him, before placing down the breakfast tray on the bed in order to sort Luca's breakfast out for him "You know we can't let you..." "I'm pregnant. It's not the end of the world" "It's not a typical pregnancy" "And I'm not exactly the typical royal? The whore who screwed his way to the top? Being named prince for being the bonded mate of the prince, then marrying the prince of the enemy nation, and now showing up pregnant?" "Someone's grumpy" "Because you have no idea what it's been like" They both knew that was a load of shit. Armin and Mikasa had both debriefed Hanji and Erwin over every little thing that'd happened in Marley, including his being attacked "I do. I really do. You had a drop, and you're still recovering" "A what?" What the fuck was a drop? "Your depression. Mikasa and Armin said you shut down completely. An omega drop is an omega so thoroughly distressed that their body simply gives up. You're a shell of yourself. It lowers your bodily functions to nearly non-existent, so your mind can focus on healing your mental health. It's particularly dangerous as when an omega drops, they often forget to eat or drink" Eren hissed. His omega flooding him with the feeling of having been insulted. He'd been pretty bad. He couldn't deny there weren't breakdowns, or times he felt like nothing mattered without Levi. But it hadn't been a drop... not that he could remember. If he'd had one of these mythical drops, it would have been when Levi had deserted him "That's... not what happened. I am depressed. But you know what, I think it's pretty fucking normal given everything that's happened. You all had no right labelling me, or my mental health without asking me about how I feel" "We only want what's best for you. The letters you have sent us have made very little sense, even before you announced your pregnancy, and now you have Zeke protecting you?" "What do you mean they made no sense!? I've been doing everything I can for Eldia, or was until my morning sickness got too bad for me to keep on top of things. And as for Zeke, he's trying. I don't trust him. I don't love him. But he is trying for the sake of the baby. He's not touched me badly. He hasn't slapped me, or punched me. He hasn't been physically violent with me. If you want to know why I look so shit, it's because in Eldia, they give their omegas even less than that bowl you're preparing for Luca. Omegas have to wear collars. They can't drink wine unless their alpha gives it to them. I have bars on my windows thanks to Queen Dina and I'm not allowed to wander around in case I'm injured. I'm sick of collars and I'm sick of being in bed. I want to walk around and talk to people. I want to feel the sun against my skin, then I want to visit Historia" "Zeke's given you permission?" Releasing Luca, the dragon dived for his bowl of breakfast. His son still needed milk, yet milk was no longer enough. Shifting the way he was sitting, he accepted the breakfast tray from Hanji. Boiled eggs, toast, game meat and leafy vegetables. It was practically a feast after what Marley had to offer "I don't need to ask him for permission. He knows something isn't right with the pregnancy, given how little I'm showing for how far along I am. I told him I want to speak with Historia and he told me to do what I needed" "Eren, we only wish to help. You've taken in such a huge burden" "I knew what I was getting myself into. I knew it wasn't all going to be roses and honey. I know you don't think I'm telling the truth, but he really hasn't done anything awful to me outside of the times we had sex" "That's alright then. I know you always see the good in people, so I guess I'm worried you're trying to see the good in Zeke, and missing everything else going on" "Like the letters?" Hanji nodded "They make no sense. In one you demanded rice and grains be sent at once, and in another bear meat" No. He'd never once demanded anything be sent over "I didn't say that" "We have the letters, all signed with your name" "Do you have them here? I want to see them. I don't remember making demands" "You did. Levi soon realised something was wrong when you're replies didn't match what he asked" He knew they had to follow the pretences of Levi being Erwin's bodyguard, and yet it still fucking hurt to hear his name "I want to see those letters. Queen Dina is acting and moving on her own. She openly loathes my being wed to Zeke, and I'm sure she's praying for something to happen to this child. I also wish to leave the barracks later. I want to know what's been happening since I left, and I want to know what else we could be doing in order to help the people" "Eren, the healer said you need to rest" "I know what the healer said, but lying in bed is only causing me more stress. I need to be up, and I need to be doing something" "You need to take care of yourself and your baby" "I'm not just an oven for the baby to rest in until it's ready for birthing. Being pregnant doesn't make me weaker, and I'm sick of being treated like it does!" Yelling, sparks of magic shot from his fingers. One breaking Luca's breakfast bowl, while another set the dresser across from the bed on fire. Feeling rather annoyed, Eren gathered up a small portion of his magic in order to put the fire out. Still sitting on the bed, Hanji gave him a disappointed look "Don't do that. Ok. I know you don't understand, so stop talking like you know what's best for me. You may leave" "Eren..." "Hanji, leave" He didn't want his magic to blow up again, and he was insulted that everyone seemed to think they all knew best for him, without going to the effort to ask him what he needed. He was nearly 21, he knew well enough what he wanted and he needed. He'd done what they wanted, simply to keep the peace, but keeping the peace was starting to cost him his sanity. He'd kept his mouth closed when Levi's birthday passed without his being allowed out of bed, he'd dreamed so vividly of Levi that his heart felt like it was breaking all over again when he woke to find no one mentioning the alpha, and no one understanding why he was so upset. Surely they could just give 5 minutes of their time where they listened to him, rather than treating him like this? There was barely five minutes between Hanji leaving and Erwin arriving. Of course she'd run to him. She'd probably told him all about this "drop" theory of hers, where he wasn't mentally sound. Walking over to the bed, Erwin sat down with a heavy sigh "Hanji's just been to see me. Is there anything you'd like to explain?" "Would you listen if I did?" Raising an eyebrow at him, Erwin made a gesture to continue with his hand "I want to get out of bed for longer than using the bathroom" "The healers here feel it's too soon" "I know that. But this is my body, shouldn't that count for something?" "Hanji said your magic flared..." "Because I'm stuck doing nothing. If you're going to lecture me, lecture me. If you're going to listen to me, then listen" "We're worried about you" "You don't need to be" "You're pregnant" "No shit. Really? I hadn't noticed. I thought I was just getting fat from all the food in Marley" Jumping straight to defensive wasn't the best plan "Eren, you're pregnant. Your mate is missing, and your husband is suddenly concerned for you welfare. If you're sleeping with Zeke, or if you love Zeke, this is something we need to know about. It could be another form of manipulation, given your pheromones are screaming out that you want and need an alpha to protect you. If we do let you walk around, there will be a number of alphas..." So that was it. They didn't give two shits about his health, they just didn't want him riling up the soldiers "A number of alpha's who need to see that omega's aren't weak, simply because they're pregnant. You won't even let me work, or read any of the reports and correspondence for Eldia. Hanji said something about my letters not making sense. I want to see them, and I want to take a walk outside" "Eren..." That tone. He hated that fucking tone. Like Erwin understood what he was going through. Like he had the right to tell him everything would be ok. That it would all work out in the end... at this point, Eren didn't see how things could work out, when he wasn't allowed to do anything "No. Don't. You don't get to play the sympathetic friend, then keep me in here! I can't sit still, and you know I can't! It's like you said, my mate is gone! He's gone and none of you even said anything about his birthday! I'm sick of this! If you'd manned up, none of this would have happened. If you'd done your job, or pushed your own ego aside for longer than 5 minutes, he wouldn't be gone! I'd be with him, and I'd be happy. You all can get fucked!" Erwin let out a low growl, his voice increasingly pained with each sentence "How long are you going to keep rubbing our mistakes in our faces?! This wasn't what we wanted for you! You know it wasn't, and now you're pregnant when you swore you couldn't get pregnant. Why can't you see that we want to protect you?!" The door to Eren's room burst open, Zeke standing there with his hand on his sword "Eren, are you alright? I heard yelling..." For possibly the second time in his whole life, Eren was happy to see Zeke. Or maybe it was the first, given he didn't remember much of what he was feeling during the attack "I'm fine, Zeke. Levi was just a little worried giving that I've decided I want to return to the castle today. He thinks I should rest, but I think I should return the castle as soon as possible, then head up to Draecia to make sure the baby is truly alright. I don't think I can calm down until I know for sure" It was a cruel card to play, turning Zeke's concern for their unborn child against him, simply so he could get out of the barracks. Releasing his sword, Zeke nodded "If that's what you want, then we shall leave as soon as we can" Moving to his side, his husband dropped a kiss atop his head. Eren trying not to squirm with discomfort at the action. He knew things had changed again between them as Zeke had help him protectively upon the ship, but he hadn't thought they were onto random kisses, unless it was Zeke's way of warning Erwin not to stick his nose into his and Eren's relationship... Why the fuck did alpha's have to be so complicated? "I'll have our belongings packed and moved at once" "Thank you, Zeke. Levi will assist you. I will need to ride with both him and Hanji, as we need to discuss Eldia politics. Will this be alright?" "No. You'll be staying with me until we reach the castle" "But..." "Eren. No. This is not up for negotiation. I bought you home, but I fon't trust you to not run, nor do I trust that Eldia has your best interests in mind. You shall ride with me, Yelena, Pieck and Porco. Levi shall ride with the driver" Too many alphas... way too many alphas... nervously he asked "May Armin join? Given he's a beta?" "You may have Armin by your side" Oh thank god for that. And thank god Zeke thought himself so far above Armin that the thought of being jealous hadn't come to mind "Thank you. I need to prepare to leave, and to finish my breakfast" Erwin wasn't pleased, but Zeke stayed by Eren's side until the alpha finally rose off the bed "Fine. We'll see to the preparations" Porco and Pieck had soon grown bored of riding in the royal carriage not even lasting two days before switching out to ride with the rest of the guards, leaving Yelena, Zeke, Armin and Luca to continually watch over him. It wasn't like riding in the royal carriage was the hardest thing in the world to do. It literally involved sitting until his butt had long since gone numb, then Erwin would decided that wherever they were was where they'd make camp for the night. That was it. For all the fanfair, and attention the carriage brought it was boring as hell inside. Armin would make sure he ate and kept his fluids up. Luca would sit in his lap with his front feet on Eren's shoulders as he slept. Yelena would gaze at him like there was something humorous with a smile on her lips that never left, leaving Zeke to watch over him like he almost content to do so. As boring as the trip was, it was nice to see Eldia all over again. It was nice to see the people still going about their everyday lives, the children playing in the streets, blissfully ignorant to the world around them. It was while watching them that Eren finally felt movement in his own stomach. What he'd thought was gas over the weeks, now smacked him in the face as kicks from his child. It'd brung tears to his eyes all over again, Zeke the first to take his hand and ask what was wrong. Pulling back from his husband, Eren buried his face against Armin's neck and sobbed himself dry. It'd been real enough before, but now he could feel them. They were now truly alive to him. He couldn't go back. He couldn't abort the baby, not now he felt it. He was thoroughly stuck in his situation. * Zeke didn't push him to stay with him once they reached the castle. Eren not staying long enough in the carriage to hear the alpha even if he had. Sweeping into the castle, there was just one place he wanted to be, and that was in Levi's old quarters. Making his way straight to Levi's old room, Eren let himself in with no problems. It'd been locked, but that was hardly an issue when you had magic. Slipping into the room, the omega's knees gave out as the door closed. Levi. His scent was faint, or would have been to anyone but him, yet for Eren it filled his senses. If he could just let Levi go, he could be happy. If he could just leave this all in the past... Engulfed in the memories of the time they'd spent together in this room, the secret whispers and heated moans. The promised cried out in the heat of passion, for the first time since Levi left his body started to respond. Slick all but gushing as he stumbled up and over to Levi's bed. Since laying with Zeke, he hadn't wanted to be touched, even by himself. The shame of laying with an alpha that wasn't his own continued to stain his heart like an ink stain that ran soul deep. Starved of affection and attention, his body acted while his mind drifted, almost hearing Levi's voice as his hands dipped below the waistband of his pants where his leaking dick throbbed with the need for attention. When Eren's orgasm hit, his body fell limply against Levi's bed. The lack of knot left him feeling hollow, especially when he thought of how many times he and Levi had lain together in the most intimate of ways within the walls of Levi's chambers. He missed him. He missed him so fucking much that it felt as if the only way to ease his pain was to tear his own heart from his chest. What would Levi think of him if he could see him like this? Naked across his bed and pregnant with Zeke's child. Eren hated proving Hanji right, especially after he'd protested that he was fine. Waking up in Levi's bathtub, the room was filled with red rose petals, and his body covered in blood. Sitting at the side of the bathtub, Luca was howling. His son's trills filled with pain. Pushing himself out of the bath, whatever he'd done to himself had healed. Yet he felt sluggish and sick. Gathering Luca up, the dragon dug his claws into Eren's shoulders, small diamonds crusted against his scales. He'd never seen Luca cry diamonds before, whatever he'd done couldn't have been good "What happened?" Trilling softly, Luca hid his face against Eren's neck. His small chest heaving as he "sniffled" "Ok, baby boy. I'm sorry. Mummy is sorry... let's take a shower? Then you can help me clean up?" Whatever Eren had done, he'd done away from Luca. Luca had torn the door between Levi's bedroom and bathroom to shreds, while Levi's room was filled with white roses that seemed to be splattered in with his own blood. Cleaning the mess away, he tried as hard as he could remember the previous night only to draw a complete blank. After jerking off, he couldn't remember anything, and Luca was too small to let him know what he'd done. Dressing in Levi's clothes, the alpha's tunic clung to his belly as he wrestled into the place, his stomach was definitely bigger than it'd been the day before, yet he hadn't felt much movement since he'd woken. Hanji may just be right. He may very well be on the edge of a "drop" if he was acting without memory of the incident. It was ahead of schedule, but he needed to see Historia. The last thing he needed was to "drop" when Zeke was in the castle, and no one cared about his desires or needs other than the alpha. Pulling his hair up into a pony tail, he dressed semi-casually. His pants a loose pair he'd picked up traveling, while his shoes were skipped completely in favour of simple socks. So maybe he didn't look royal or distinguished, or even semi-casual like he lied to himself about, but it was the most comfortable clothes he'd worn in months, and better yet, he'd somehow lost the ridiculous collar from Marley. If he was still married to Zeke when Zeke took the throne, that was the first law of Marley he was overthrowing. Wandering down to breakfast, everyone stared as he let himself in. It seemed as if only their visitors form Marley were still eating. Zeke was quick to rise, striding over to greet him "Prince Eren" "Prince Zeke. I'm sorry I'm so late" Zeke's eyes were firmly on his stomach. If the alpha was staring like that, it was probably much more prominent than he thought "I know. They seem to have grown. I'm sorry if it disgusts you" "No. No. It's not that. Are you alright, after last night?" Last night? Had he done something? His mind leapt slightly in the hopes that Zeke would be able to clue him in if he had "I'm sorry, I don't know what you mean" "Sleeping in... Prince Erwin's room. Did it help?" That was a disappointment. Zeke didn't seem to know anything about his blanked out breakdown "I know what you want to hear, but I don't know. I must have slept hard as I can't remember much after hitting the bed" Zeke's lips thinned into a pained smile "Perhaps we should eat? Are you hungry?" No. Maybe. He really didn't know, especially not with everyone watching them. They had to have the perfect marriage to maintain peace. Leaning up, he kissed Zeke's cheek "A little, maybe. My stomach isn't feeling great. I need to head up to Draecia as soon as possible, if that's alright" Zeke nodded "I understand. Please come eat with me, I'll be accompanying you there and back to make sure you aren't meeting with him" Reaching his hand out, Eren let his husband take it. "Perfect marriage" repeating in his mind. Only, when Zeke's hand touched his, Eren felt as if he'd been zapped by lightening. Tearing his hand away from the alpha's, he knew he'd just hurt Zeke's reputation in front of everyone "I'm sorry. I don't feel... I... I need to go" "Eren..." "Zeke, I'm sorry. I need some air. We'll talk later" Running from the dining room, Eren smacked straight into Mikasa. The female alpha growling as she caught him before he could land on his arse "Eren!? Where have you been? I came to get you when you didn't show at breakfast..." Propping him back up on his feet, Luca trilled like he was trying to dob Eren into Mikasa for bad behaviour. His son's claws were firmly digging into his shoulders far too hard, crying out in pain, he twisted awkwardly as he pulled Luca off him and dropped his son into Mikasa's hold "We've talked about this. Your claws are sharp, and they hurt" Luca huffed at him, not giving two shits as he nuzzled into Mikasa, who'd only just set eyes on his bump "You're bigger" "You're the second one to say so" "But you weren't that big yesterday" "Mikasa, eyes off my stomach. I'm going up to Draecia in a little while with Zeke. I was just talking to him about it" "So you ate breakfast" "Uh... not exactly" Mikasa scowled. She'd taken weeks to accept that sometimes Luca's claws left him bleeding, yet it was kind of obvious that that wasn't the cause of the scowl. Healing himself, he sighed at his sister "I'm not hungry" "You need to eat. I know you didn't eat yesterday afternoon or evening" "But I'm not hungry" "You need to eat. For both you and the sake of the baby. I know you had a rough night in the prince's old quarters, I could smell your distress in there. Even now, you don't smell right. Please, Eren. Don't let yourself fall ill again" Didn't smell right? All Eren could smell was Levi, and blood thanks to Luca "I didn't let myself fall ill in the first place" "You know what I mean" First Zeke, now Mikasa. He really should have stayed in Levi's room. At least there he wasn't being insulted, even if those doing the insulting hadn't meant it that way "Mikasa, I never intended to fall ill, morning sickness is not something that can be controlled, and it's not something that magic can "cure". Neither is depression. Zeke and I will be heading to Draecia later today to talk with Historia, about the pregnancy. I'll eat later" "Historia won't let Zeke into Draecia" "She's going to have to. He won't let me leave alone, in case I don't intend to return" "Then why not leave Luca here with us?" Eren grabbed his son back. He wasn't leaving Luca anywhere. Zeke might have deemed him "useless", but that didn't mean others would. Kissing Luca's forehead, his son cooed at him "He stays with me. I want him to see Draecia, and I want Historia to examine him given his magic is so weak" "Then take someone else along with you. I'll come, or Armin. Please don't go alone with him. Why don't you write to Historia? Have her and Ymir come down here instead?" "I'm not endangering them both. Besides, Historia is pregnant" "You're pregnant too!" "Really? I hadn't noticed the way everyone is staring at my stomach. I'm not hungry and I don't want to talk about this any longer" "Eren, you're foolish for trusting Zeke" Not once had he said he'd trusted Zeke "I never said I trusted him. He's just the only one taking the time to ask me what I need and what I want" "Because he's using you! He doesn't care about you, and I doubt he cares about the baby. He just knows that that is the easiest way to bring you under his thumb" "I know!" Yelling at Mikasa wasn't how he'd thought the conversation would end, but he was so done. Groaning, he hiked Luca up as the baby decided to kick and make its presence known. Now he was yelling in front of both his children. Storming away from Mikasa, Eren marched back to Levi's room... to find Erwin waiting. Glaring at Erwin, Erwin raised his hand like he was surrendering "I don't want to fight. I've been thinking about what you said. We were all shocked over how close you'd become with Zeke. I also know you're not ok. This room smells of your distress, and your scent is calling to Levi, which gives me hope that you haven't fallen for Zeke" "I'm so not in the mood for this. I've just had the same lecture from Mikasa" "No lecture. I brought those letters for you to check. I thought you might prefer to go though them here than in the sun room" Still suspicious, he stared at Erwin until Erwin pointed to the piles of correspondence on the dining table "That... would be nice. I don't mean to be so agitated, but my dynamic isn't making any of this easy, and you're all making me feel useless. I know I chose this path, and I will stand by it for as long as I can. I just need you all to give me space to breathe? And I need you to listen to me" "Maybe you'll understand once you see the letters?" "We should have enough time. Zeke and I are heading to Draecia. Before you say it, I know my stomach's grown overnight" "I wasn't going to mention it. How is your nausea?" "Better? It's hard being in his room. Knowing how much he wanted this makes it seem that much crueler" Placing Luca down, the baby dragon huffed at him. Stalking off, Luca walked over to the bed, leaning up to dig his claws into the bed like a cat using a scratching post "Is he alright?" "He's been in a mood all morning... fuck, I forgot to get him breakfast" "Have you had breakfast?" "I tried?" Erwin didn't believe him, Eren's mouth betraying him "Zeke wanted to eat together, but when he touched me it set my omega off. Then Mikasa thought to lecture me about how I let myself get sick. Morning sickness isn't something I can magic better. I'm hungry but I'm not, and I really don't want another lecture" "I'll send for some food. If you're hungry, help yourself, if not, it's there for when you are. What does Luca like to eat?" "Milk, and some meat" "I'll organise it" Erwin was being suspiciously nice. As the alpha left, it struck him that the alpha probably missed Levi. How many times had Erwin visited Levi's room? How many times had he come here to remember the greatest fuck up of his life? Why did all these alphas make it so hard to be mad at them? Levi left because he was going insane. Zeke was a product of a fucked up childhood. Erwin was a great big coward who'd lost his best friend, and Mikasa wanted the best for him.

[092219archive]

I just got this idea so feel free to ignore if it's dumb or something similar was already there but: before Eren and Ephraim are official, Eirika and Tana get together for a tea party and invite Eren with the goal to get some more info on what's going on. Maybe saying they're gonna talk about weapons or battle plans if Eren doesn't wanna do a tea party. -cottoncandyships

@cottoncandyships​

that’s such a great idea thank you lulu holy moly :O

orignally this was supposed to be a fic but… lazy and not creative

eirika and tana decide to meet one day, just to converse about their lives since they have the time for once.

i always see tana the one bringing up ideas of “love” and all, since that just seems very… tana to me. she just gives off that kinda vibe to me and if i’m wrong about that, then i’m sorry and you’re more than free to let me know that tana wouldn’t react that way. i haven’t studied her character at all aside from what i know in her ephraim support.

eirika doesn’t actively think about relationships since she mainly focuses on bettering herself as a person, but she doesn’t mind thinking about it or being in one. she don’t need a person in her life, but it’d be nice to have someone by her side, you know? yes, she has ephraim and ephraim supports her, but ephraim can’t be there forever (which is shown in his “sacred twin lord” dialogue where he says that he doesn’t know where eirika has gone since his claim of the throne and focus on his people, i believe). “are you sad about that, eren?” yeah… i am……

they’re chatting, and then eren comes up in the conversation. woah, how did that happen?

i definitely think eren would be a topic of conversation after they end up joining ephraim’s army because… suspicious. it’s not so easy that “ephraim said that he trusts eren, so everyone should trust them” because that’s not how things work, and that’s definitely not how things should work! the fact that members are suspicious in the first place is something that’s very important, because that means they care about the well-being of the army.

aNYWAYS, this is probably a little after their recruitment (or maybe a little more after), and both the princesses are kinda like… “hey, so there’s something going on with ephraim and eren and that’s just not me noticing, right?”

and they call eren in for “business” even though they’re not actually doing anything combat related, because eren only ever answers a messenger if it’s something important.

tana: do you think eren likes ephraim?eirika: why don’t you ask them?tana: because you know how they are! [imitates eren by putting on a stern face and crossing her arms] “if your conversation isn’t important, then i don’t care about what you’re talking about.”

that was going to be actual dialogue in my fic had i not scrapped it.

the two of them end up inviting eren anyways… because it’s something they wanna know-

they start out by telling eren some dumb lie, like, “hey, we’re working on a strategy for an upcoming battle. you should give us your input since you were a general once.”

and eren’s just, “okay.”

and they get into details about what should be done with the given enemy and ally positions, the terrain, etc. before tana is like, “actually, eren, i think you should be placed here.” and puts a chess piece (or something idk) next to ephraim’s position.

eren doesn’t know tana’s motives for that and thinks tana’s stupid since eren’s a flier and not a ground unit - there’s no reason for them to be next to ephraim if there’s a major advantage of being positioned else where.

eren: tana, have you ever created a strategy before?tana: no, i usually leave that to innes or another strategist.eren: then why on magvel would you suggest an awful position like that?tana: i thought you’d wanna be next to him!eren: who’s “him?”tana: ephraim! you know, our leader.eren: but why?tana: i thought you liked him?

the conversation wouldn’t go like that word-for-word, but hopEFULLY YOU KNOW WHAT I MEAN-

eren malfunctions, like? tana, what the fuck? why would you ever think that?

basically:

tana doesn’t take the bait and neither does eirika, because… you know. that’s denial right there, happening right in front of their eyes.

eren decides that the conversation is gonna be a waste of time and eirika convinces them that it won’t be a bad conversation to have.

eren is like, insanely stubborn though. stupid stubborn. it’s not the fact that they could be attacked at any second (but they could), and it’s definitely not the fact that they can’t face their own feelings because they don’t understand their feelings. no, absolutely not. what makes you think that?

after trying to get eren to put their walls down (like… their three walls. you know, like aot/snk? those kinda walls), they succeed in getting eren to kinda confess about it (with given patience and understanding).

it’s not that eren’s stupid, but eren’s stupid.

but it’s really? weird? it’s not a direct confession but you kinda know that it’s a confession given context. eirika and tana have probably encountered reserved (maybe not like… severely emotionally damaged people bu t) characters in their life - they’re royals and i’d think that they interacted with a lot of people. kept to themselves, but interacted with people nonetheless, especially with the scenario they’re in.

and yeah, i still dunno who confesses tbh i never thought about it that deeply but… yay for best friends \o/

[leviplease]

First of all, nobody except my best friend asked for Digital Devil Saga/Quantum Devil Saga crossover, but I did it anyway. Second, I tried to write something short and make it about MikaAni, but it's 3:30 am and I cannot say how it turned out.

Warning for mentions of blood and injuries, because this is set after a messy battle. Also, DDS is a vore game so there's some talk about eating people and some blood drinking.

A trail of blood leads her to Annie. The woman is propped against the remains of a wall, one hand clutching her other arm which is hanging too low from her shoulder. Her chin is resting on her chest and there's blood everywhere, soaking her clothes in its crimson colour and pooling on the ground. It's hard to tell how much of it is her own and how much belonged to the enemies she fought.

For all Mikasa knows Annie could be dead. It would fall upon her to bring the news to Jean and he would let it affect him more than he should. Whenever the leader of the Embryon has gotten so concerned with the lives of his comrades — it's troublesome. At least that's what their bishop, Armin, would say. Mikasa, however, thinks she's starting to understand as she stares at yet another fallen ally. She doesn't want this, she never asked for this.

A cough shakes Annie's body, weak and violent at the same time. Mikasa rushes to her side and wraps one arm around her shoulder. She winces as Mikasa pulls her close, the arm she's holding slipping down her torso more than it should be possible. Considering all the blood and how torn her sleeve is it dawns on Mikasa that the arm is at least partially severed.

"Shit," Mikasa mutters under her breath. Then, louder so that Annie can hear her: "Hang in there, I've got you."

Annie gives a faint groan, her voice getting caught in her throat. Mikasa tries to be gentle as she adjusts her grip on Annie's back and nudges Annie over to rest against her chest. The first time they met — when Jean proposed an alliance between the Embryon and the Maribell — Mikasa could tell that Annie is a skilled fighter who can hold her own in battle. Now that she's resting in Mikasa's arms she feels so frail and weak. Mikasa hates the thought.

"It's okay," Mikasa assures either Annie or herself. Her mind has gone blank and it leaves her with a swelling sense of panic. Never before was she unable to think of what to do. She always came up with something — it's the only way to survive on the battlefield. If you hesitate you die.

"You're going to be okay," Mikasa continues though she isn't sure how. The arm shouldn't be a problem — none of the wounds should. Annie can regenerate those, just like Jean recovered from Eren biting his arm half off before they made it all the way back from Maribell HQ to their homebase. It's something that comes with the new abilities everyone in the Junkyard received not too long ago. But much like the magic and transformation they're capable of now it comes at a price.

"Star-ving…"

As expected, Annie used up all her strength. If she isn't able to appease her hunger soon she'll most likely start consuming herself. Mikasa has seen the black tar that remained of most of the Vanguard troops, she nearly melted herself and joined them had she not cast aside her own disgust and fed on the enemy she defeated together with Jean and Eren. It has become a matter of survival to all of them.

But not everyone is able to accept that. If Ymir as the leader is anything to go by, then most of the Maribell if not the entirety of them might have refused to feed on others. Half of them already lost their mind from hunger and yet Ymir and her tribe held on to pointless morals without hope until Jean offered an alternative to them. And even then what the Embryon have is just a small alleviation which doesn't actually solve the problem. If Mikasa agrees with Eren on one thing then that there is no high road to be taken here. They eat or they get eaten, they consume or they will be consumed. It's the new laws of the Junkyard as the battle for who will be allowed into Nirvana continues on.

"Just a moment…" Mikasa rummages in her pocket with her free hand. "I should still have my ration of pills."

Before they went to attack the Solids, each member of the Embryon and Maribell received a pouch of capsules containing blood. The small dosage normally would be far from enough to satisfy any of them if it wasn't for its donor being special. Historia appeared at around the same time in the Junkyard as the demonic powers manifested. The Embryon just happened to be lucky enough to find her first and take her in. It was her presence that allowed them to keep their sanity even as they struggled to accept their new fate. It was her blood that kept the monster inside them at bay so they didn't tear out each others throats from hunger.

Before Mikasa can find what she's looking for, Annie voices meak protest: "Don't gimme that crap. I need something proper."

She's right of course. The blood only suppresses their need to feed, it doesn't actually sustain them. Or maybe it could but they would have to consume it at a higher quantity and they don't have enough for that. Historia was already pale and weakened from giving blood for the limited supplies they have. The girl might be a mystery that makes them wonder with the things she says — like when she talks of concepts like night and stars and friendship — but she is mortal just like them.

"Okay." Mikasa turns her head and looks around on the battlefield, hoping to find a body to get Annie through. With all the blood in the area you'd think there were at least some torn off limbs lying around, but she cannot make out a thing. Either the others were already consumed or they dissolved or got away. "Damn, where did they all disappear to…?"

An elbow bumps into Mikasa's stomach. It lacks force, but it catches her off guard and topples her over. Her back hits the ground and she blinks in rapid succession to shake off her surprise. Annie is on top of her, uninjured arm pressing against her breasts. By the time she realises what is happening, she can feel teeth scraping the skin on her neck.

It doesn't take much force to push Annie off. Unlike her, Mikasa has already recovered from the fight with a fair share of enemy flesh. She groans again as she rolls onto the ground. Mikasa has only a little sympathy for Annie as she sits up and reaches for her neck to inspect the damage. It seems Annie drew a little blood, but it's nothing serious and should heal up soon enough.

Mikasa sighs. She wasn't even in favour of this alliance and agreed with Armin that they should backstab the Maribell as soon as the Solids are defeated, because in the Junkyard there are no cooperation between tribes and only one of them can make it to the promised Nirvana by defeating all the others. Yet here she is with one of the Maribell who made it close to the bottom of her sympathy list after just two encounters — and not only did she get attacked by Annie, despite it all she's still concerned. She cannot wrap her head around it.

Next to Mikasa Annie lies motionless on the ground, too weak to move after being denied by her chosen meal. It's almost pitiful if it wasn't for Mikasa believing that she gave her all in battle. Or at least Mikasa wants to believe, even though she remembers Annie saying that this entire fight was pointless and she would rather just sit it out.

Mikasa pulls out her knife which she still carries for emergencies. While guns and most other weapons have lost their use when everyone can transform into demons and wield magic, she couldn't give up on this one. She's glad she didn't as she slits her wrist with the blade and holds it out to Annie.

"You can have some of my blood to help you recover," Mikasa agrees. "But not one piece of flesh."

The offer alone is enough to get Annie moving. Mikasa knows just too well the hunger that drives her as she fumbles to her knees and makes several attempts to position herself in a way that allows her to easily ingest Mikasa's blood. The arm hanging limply at her side doesn't seem like much of a help — if anything it makes things more difficult — and even when kneeling she's swaying dangerously.

Mikasa cannot stand to watch the clumsy display. She circles around Annie and wraps her uncut arm around the other's torso. Annie sinks into her and begins licking the blood off her arm which she is providing so willingly. Her approach was a pragmatic one, but now that she's sitting on the ground and supporting Annie's slim frame it's something different. There's nothing she can do but wait and grow conscious of every inch where their bodies touch.

As Annie's greed drives her to consume more and more blood, Mikasa is growing uncomfortable and impatient. She has no sense for how much time passes, but it feels like an eternity before she allows herself to pull her arm away. Why she is even concerned with Annie's wellbeing when they aren't of the same tribe and they talked maybe once so far is a mystery to her.

"That's enough," Mikasa declares and ignores Annie's huffed complained. "Once we regroup with the others we'll see about finding you some scraps from the battle."

"Fine." Annie pulls out of Mikasa's loose embrace, leaving the cold to spread where she rested just a moment ago. Mikasa tries to ignore that she took notice.

Getting back on her feet turns out to be a challenge for Annie while she's trying to hold her injured arm in place. By the time Mikasa gets over herself and moves to help her, Annie succeeds in standing up. Mikasa pulls back her hand, just in case Annie spares a glance over her shoulder. She isn't sure what transpired between them, she just knows that this shouldn't have been possible a week ago.

"Just so we're clear: this was an exception." Mikasa doesn't want Annie to get the wrong impression. They're not allies, she cannot let herself slip into thinking that they are. One of their leaders just has to change their mind and they're back to being enemies again.

Annie gives Mikasa a look that is hard to read. "Don't worry, I didn't think you were the generous type."

The remark is impassive and yet Mikasa thinks she saw the hint of a smile on Annie's lips before she turned away.

[glass-throat]

la vie en rouge ii

so after editing this one i remembered that members of the ackerman clan have that person of importance that they cherish or whatever. what if levi cared for mikasa like that? i think that’d be cute. i tried to establish more dialogue into this chapter but dialogue isn’t my strongest point. lmao i can’t even tell the difference between a noun verb and pronoun and shit like that. i just like writing sometimes. 

i may have written the first half when i was kind of buzzed but there’s a lot to go through and it’s almost 5a rn so i’m posting this with fingers crossed, hoping that there aren’t too many mistakes.

levi had returned with plans of permanently remaining by mikasa’s side. having left the underground circle, levi followed her to the boundaries of wall rose only to witness the infamous armored titan destroy it. he had never seen a titan break through the wall like that. 

when they reached the dump off area for refugees, mikasa had clutched onto his arm and almost cried. he thought she was crying because she was scared. 

“why would you do that? what if you got hurt? what if someone saw you?” she sounded more angry than sad but she was one of the weirdest people he’d met.

“your home was just invaded by titans and the only thing you can think of is my safety?”

“yes! you shouldn’t risk yourself for me! i don’t know what i would’ve done if something happened to you!”

“i saved you and your family and this is how you talk to me?”

“i think you as my family too!”

“why? you don’t even know who i am.” he didn’t understand why she would think of him like that, but he was thoroughly pleased. 

“i may not know anything about you but there’s something good in you and i want to see more of it.”

he had been introduced to her friends - armin, the blond, who was as nice as he looked while eren wasn’t as kind but was more curious about his relationship with mikasa. since they’ve only ever met at night or early morning, it would make sense to assume that she was bound to them.

levi wasn’t sure how they would react to him suddenly a part of their lives but he wasn’t going anywhere.

“when did you meet him?” armin asked. mikasa paused. she hadn’t thought of  an excuse, which levi had to help with by jumping in.

“we’ve met at the market and talked a few times.”

something in his stomach told him the blond boy was going to be troublesome in the future with the suspicious looks he was giving him. eren blew past the explanation and seemed as if he was attempting to gain levi’s attention.

even though there was more to worry about, mikasa still had a hard time sleeping. levi, of course, noticed because he was usually awake on those nights with her. the first few weeks after the fall of wall maria, they have long conversations. 

one night, mikasa had grown comfortable enough to talk about her past. though levi was very curious, he didn’t want to push her. he certainly wasn’t ready to tell her who he was before he met her.

he asked if her lack of sleep had to do with her past. she sighed in exhaustion. he almost wanted to tell her that she didn’t have to tell him anything, but she told him she wanted him to know.

mikasa didn’t have anyone to talk to until eren came to visit. she had said that the first time she met him was after she was kidnapped. levi didn’t feel it was right for her to tell him about herself. in a way, he felt he hadn’t deserved her trust. he had questions but he kept them to himself. he let her talk about how they thought it was going to be a doctors visit, how her mother had taught her to sew and the last thing she asked them was where babies had come from.

levi almost chuckled. he wasn’t sure how they were made, either.

then she told him after they killed her parents in front of her, she was taken to a shack where they were waiting for the buyer. she also mentioned that they were going to send her to the underground circle.

of course it was someone from underground. from levi’s experience, anyone that came from there were pigs. he wasn’t excluding himself because he had made the decision of sticking with her without asking her if she was okay with it. if she was okay with him. he had wanted to ask but he was afraid he wouldn’t like the answer. he figured if mikasa didn’t want him there, she wouldn’t hesitate to let him know.

she continued on with telling him how eren came into the picture. he was her savior. he had killed two of the three men. 

“what happened to the third one?” he asked but he had a feeling he knew the answer.

“I killed him.” he couldn’t tell how that made her feel. she didn’t sound sad or upset at all. she was too good at keeping a straight face. he attempted to console her.

“you did what you had to do. if you didn’t do it then, he was going to kill you guys.”

“the knife went straight through his heart.”

“we don’t know who’s capable of anything when someone is cornered like that. i’ve killed before but i understand why i had to do it.” mikasa glanced at his eyes and nodded in understanding.

“eren had told me that the world is cruel but it can also be very beautiful.” levi wanted to roll his eyes. of course, eren would say something like that.

levi didn’t like eren. he was the kind of boy that would act before thinking. a lot of what mikasa had told him led him to believe that armin and herself were usually behind eren to keep him safe. how much trouble could he get into? 

two days after the fall of maria, eren was picking a fight with a couple of garrison officers. mikasa had gotten him out of trouble but levi was pissed. there was no need for his friends to take care of him as if they were his parents. everyone had their own problems and eren was just giving everyone a hard time. he had wanted to ‘talk’ to eren, but mikasa had highly discouraged him. she had threatened him with violence. if anyone was going to hit eren, it was going to be her.

levi was slightly worried that she might’ve been enamored by eren but with how she described eren, he figured out that it was not the case. mikasa realized how she was more of an annoyance to eren and eren was the type of person that didn’t appreciate what he had until it was taken away from him.

not levi. levi had lost everything before he had a chance to appreciate it. the only person he really talked to was kenny. it was hard to find people to talk to when they were from underground. if somebody wanted to talk to him, they had bad intentions. levi had been making a name of himself. he didn’t care much for the attention - he hated the looks that were tossed his way.

he was tired of going back to the empty shack he called home. day in and out, it felt as though his actions were never getting him anywhere. even though he was fast on his feet and he was able to bring down men twice his size, levi still felt like he was at rock bottom. he knew how to use a knife but that was it.

since he made his way above ground, he had an easier time breathing. the air was cleaner and not everyone was out to get him. even after the invasion, the citizens were nowhere near as cruel as what he was used to.

despite armin’s questioning looks, eren’s poor attitude, mikasa’s overprotectiveness of the boys, and levi’s dependence on mikasa, the four remained together. when they were of age, they enlisted. levi had tried stopping mikasa from following the two of them but she was stubborn.

“where eren goes, i go.”

seeing how she wasn’t going to budge, levi decided to join as well.

“don’t follow me. i owe eren since he saved my life.” levi almost smiled. she had no idea that he was doing the same with her.

“i don’t have anyone else in this world but you. i don’t have a home. i don’t know how to explain it but you helped me. if you died because of that shitty brat, i’ll kill him.”

mikasa’s eyes widened slightly. then she smiled at him. it was one of the biggest smiles he had seen from her. she laid her hand on his shoulder and wrapped her arms around his neck.

there were many things levi disliked but this wasn’t one of them. 

“what are you doing?” mikasa didn’t let go but she let out a questioning sound.

“what do you mean?”

“touching me. this. what are you doing?”

“i’m hugging you. is that why you’re so stiff?”

“what does a hug do?”

“i’m trying to express my affection for you.”

“ugh, i know where you’ve been the last few days.” even though he had seen her get in a scrap fight with another boy from the trost district, he couldn’t help the slight twitch in his arms.

“do you want me to let go?”

“no. am i supposed to hug you back?”

“yes.”

levi and mikasa had silently agreed to keeping levi’s abilities a secret. initially, mikasa had wanted to tell armin and eren, but with eren’s strong dismay for titans, she wasn’t sure how he was going to receive the news.

in the training corps, mikasa and levi remained at the top of their class. in the duration of their training, it was no surprise that levi hadn’t made any new friends. he hadn’t seen the point if they were going to end up probably dying. it sounded pessimistic but he wanted to save himself from the most pain he could.

levi didn’t like how eren was annoyed with mikasa. it was a pattern - eren messed up, mikasa came to help him, and eren yells at her about it. mikasa was a stubborn girl so she doesn’t back down until he hurts her feelings and their relationship is further strained. levi, on the other hand, is perpetually admired near and far by eren and the other trainees.

mikasa wasn’t normal. levi noted that she was too strong for her size. the same could be said for himself, but he reasoned that he was older. because of her strange strength, she had received a lot of attention from other guys. many of them wanted to spar with her; one of the reoccurring boys being reiner and jean. levi suspected the latter to be one of her admirers. usually, jean would attempt to challenge her but levi would somehow intervene and end up dissuading the boy or fight him himself.

levi was practically inseparable from the shinganshina trio - more so mikasa. he walked out with mikasa when the first fight between jean and eren dissipated. jean had stopped mikasa (right in front of him no less) and complimented her hair. mikasa had thanked him and walked off with levi next to her.

to others, their relationship was rather strange. the air around levi demanded respect and fear while mikasa seemed to resemble this to a certain degree. sometimes shadis was hesitant to confront levi should he be caught skipping training.

on the first day, all the trainees were standing out in the sun, waiting for the infamous rite of passage. while they were waiting for shadis to finish his rounds, he noticed that he weeded out the ones that didn’t belong here. he witnessed the man harass armin and found himself taking some joy out of it. he glanced at mikasa from the corner of his eye. when they first met, he was taller than her. now, she was getting closer to his height and it felt like he hadn’t grown an inch.

mikasa had a relaxed face, almost as though she were in a daze. he had scanned the area for eren but he wasn’t able to see him from where he was standing. he had heard mikasa mention his last name but he was still in the process of learning his alphabet.

levi still hadn’t made an effort to get to know the two boys that were now his friends as well. he couldn’t care less and seeing as they still didn’t fully trust him, he didn’t see any reason to feel bad.

when shadis had finally walked past them, levi felt the need to scoff. there wasn’t any reason for him or mikasa to be there since this was just a game to weed out the weaker brats. some of them had already left camp. there were a few that the instructor had left alone - one being a blonde girl. something didn’t feel right with that one. there was something weird about the look in her eyes. it was too early to see what this girl was about, so he kept this information to himself. there was another boy: a tall sweaty one. it wasn’t a very hot day and he wasn’t on the heavy side, so he didn’t see a reason for him to be sweating so hard. he looked too nervous for shadis to walk past.

for the rest of the day, the trainees were thrown in classes to further educate them on titans and what their purposes were. it wasn’t hard to see that they were trying to inspire the other kids to get them eager enough to kill these monsters. levi took another glance at mikasa. she wasn’t engaged in the lesson since most of it was common knowledge.

if it were up to levi, he wouldn’t have joined the military. he had wanted to start over and live a civilian life. he had hoped that mikasa would want the same but she had already made up her mind. since she was so stubborn, he had planned out what would happen if she were to choose the garrison, military police, or the survey corps. if she were to choose the garrison, he’d fight tooth and nail to ensure they were in the same district. he had wanted her to choose the military police. despite the government being so corrupt, he had thought that to be better than what they were dealing with now. he’d do his damn best to convince the dumb bitch to be smart and work in the inner walls. 

it was most likely that she was going to end up joining the survey corps with eren. anywhere eren went, she was going to follow. anywhere she went, levi would be right behind.

levi realized this might be their only shot of getting into the inner walls. levi only wanted her safety - he didn’t have anyone else he cared for so he definitely didn’t give two shits about humanity. he wasn’t going to save the world if she wasn’t going to be a part of it.

when it came to learning how to use the gear, it was no surprise that levi and mikasa had exceeded all expectations. it was also no surprise that eren had managed to mess up. with eren attempting to blow off his steam by provoking jean into another fight, levi led mikasa out of the dining area and back into the dorms. levi enjoyed doing side projects every now and then. not long after they had arrived into camp, he had asked mikasa if she could teach him the native language of her clan. before the passing of her parents, her mother had taught her the basics of kanji, a strange language he had never seen before. he had wanted to embrace every part of mikasa since she was his important person. 

levi wasn’t good at writing so mikasa had him practice writing his name and everyone else’s name in the general language most people understood until they were somewhat legible. admittedly, was embarrassed that he was older than her and he needed her help with something so basic but it couldn’t be helped.

“do you still want to join the survey corps with the shitty brats?” he suddenly asked. his hand cramped from the unnatural position he forced it in the last hour.

“you shouldn’t call them that. you don’t know them like that,” she replied cooly while looking over his paper. “my answer hasn’t changed.”

“i don’t have to know them when they’re all you talk about.” he cringed while he spoke. he hadn’t meant to say it like that.

“if you’re so annoyed hearing about them, you should say something. i’m sure it’s not hard for you,” she bit back.

“that’s not what i meant,” he sighed out. “you know how i am with words. i mean, you don’t talk about yourself unless you’re asked about it. even then, you’re so fucking vague about your answers. i’ve known you years and i still don’t know a lot about you.”

even though they had been attached by the hip for the last few years, he still felt like they were strangers sometimes.

“you never ask about me, either,” he continued. “weren’t you scared shitless back then? are you still scared now?”

there was a short pause between them. mikasa let out a small chuckle. 

“i was joking. i know what you meant but i didn’t know you felt like that. there are times i want to ask you about your past but i thought you’d be uncomfortable sharing that with me. i shared a piece of my past with you of my own accord. i’m not expecting you to share everything with me.”

levi folded his arms. he leaned further back into his chair. 

“when you say it like that, i sound like an asshole. but you still didn’t tell me if you were scared of me.”

mikasa placed the paper back on the desk and gave a smile. 

“i was afraid at first, but after that, i got the feeling that you were more afraid of me than anything else,” she replied with a smirk. levi threw a smirk of his own. he decided to save the military police conversation for another day.

before mikasa lived with the yeagers, she would have a hot cup of tea if she was stressed. her mother used to make the tea using the herbs from the small garden they grew. she frowned at the thought of her mother. that was only possible if she could find them but she remembered her mother had told her that they were only found on the mountainside.

the pained expressions of her mother and father filled her head for the last few days but mikasa kept to herself. living with the yeagers was nice, but she still felt alone. the family had welcomed her with open arms and warm smiles. she was beyond elated to have a family again.

she felt sick to her stomach from even looking at the men in the shiganshina neighborhood. she tried her best to avoid eye contact with any of them since all she could see were the callous hands that had secured the rope binding her wrists to her back - the same hands that enclosed around eren’s throat. she would usually leave the scene at this point but when she remembered how his arms fell to his side, swinging from the momentum, she could feel her own throat constrict.

she still wasn’t getting the amount of sleep she wanted, so when it was dark out, she went for a stroll throughout the camp. mikasa felt the gravel collect in the gaps of her toes, but she continued walking on. she was grateful for the prickling sensations on the balls of her feet and the wind for blowing the scent of old alcohol and the roaming presence of what smelled like the stew from dinner. 

she found herself near the watchtower. there were walls surrounding the campsite and she found a grassy patch to sit on. mikasa knew she wasn’t supposed to be out at this time but she needed to take her mind off of her parents.

though she never showed it, mikasa was beginning to have second thoughts about joining the military. she had wanted to live in a small cottage out in the open, similar to what she lived in with her parents. a small nagging voice had told her that she was not going to accomplish that with eren and armin. they both wanted to see the ocean. armin had shown her the books that described the salty waters and at the moment, she felt a sense of motivation swell within her. she too had wanted to experience the feeling of freedom, but she had assumed that she was going to die before she would ever see anything like that.

several times before, mikasa had pondered leaving camp to start a new life. she had no desire to kill titans but if she had to, she knew she could do it. the only thing that frustrated her was how unstable things were. there was no guarantee that she would even see half of the people she trained. she had no idea what the future would bring so any plans she had wanted to make had to be short term.

before the incident, her mother had told her that she would find a man to marry one day and he would work for the both of them. they would find a home of their own and she could spend her days tending to plants, chores, children, or even make her own money. she had been told that she was going to be given a life of security when she got older. as time passed, she realized that not everything would come to fruition.

mikasa heard footsteps in the general area behind her. without moving her body, she angled her head to where the footsteps were coming from. she wasn’t surprised to see that it was levi looking for her. she had gone outside so often in the past that it had become a part of his routine as well. almost as though he could feel her eyes on him, his head snapped to her direction.

“don’t lay there. there’s fucking bugs everywhere.” he made his way to her. even though he had a strong dislike for dirt, he found the cleanest area next to her and sat down.

“don’t you care that your dress is going to get dirty?” he inquired. mikasa rolled her eyes.

“i’ll just wash it after. it’s fine. i could say the same for you.”

“i’m only here because i’m trying to get you back to bed.” a small part of mikasa felt guilty for dragging levi into all of this. if she was having doubts about the future, she couldn’t imagine how he felt. she had assumed he had goals of his own that he wanted to see accomplished. she was forever grateful for their friendship. she just didn’t want to make him feel like he had to stick with her like this.

“i couldn’t sleep, so i figured some air would be nice.” she could hear levi sigh in irritation.

“can i ask you something?” levi didn’t respond. she would ask him anyway.

“why did you come here?” she turned her head to him to indicate her full attention was on him.

“because you’re here.”

“levi, you don’t have to be here. you can-”

“shut the fuck up. i don’t need you to tell me what to do. if i want to leave, i’ll do it. but since i’m here, there’s no need to ask me to stay.”

“i don’t want to make you feel like you have to stay.”

“i’m here because you’re here. i don’t know what kind of sugar colored shit you want me to say for you to get it. if you leave, i’m going with you. before i met you, i didn’t know what i was going to do with myself. i didn’t have any plans so i was just going through the day, looking for the next meal. i don’t know why i am the way i am. if anyone else saw me, they’d lose their shit. but you saw me. you didn’t react the way you were supposed to. those nights when you told me about yourself made me feel better. it sounds fucked up but it made me feel like i wasn’t alone because you were going through shit too. i trusted you enough to show you what i really looked like and i was scared shitless before that.

“then you asked me for my name and where i came from like you gave a shit about me. i didn’t understand why you wanted to be friends with me then, and i still don’t understand why now. but i’m glad. but i also don’t want to be because what if you change your mind? i don’t know how to deal with that. you’re the least shittiest person i know on this bitch of an earth.

“i don’t know what the extent of my strength is but i don’t want you to get hurt by it. if i can keep you safe, i’m happy with it. if you’re not happy here, we can fucking leave and start a shop or something and be civilians. if you want to stay, then we’ll stay.”

“i understand that,” mikasa said slowly, as though she were chewing through her words. “there’s so many other people out there that you can form a bond with. i don’t want you to hold yourself back for me. you may not have the best attitude but - “

“did you hear what i just fucking said?” levi interrupted. “i just gave you a long ass speech about my feelings and that’s all you have to say? i just need you, that’s it. you don’t need to be dramatic and sacrifice yourself for my happiness. i’m fucking grown so i can make my own damn decisions.” levi found it unbelievable how stupid mikasa could be. she was on top of every activity and subject in the camp but she had no common sense.

he understood what she was saying, though. she had wanted him to be free and live his life the way he wanted to. she really wasn’t in any position to tell him anything about living his own life since her hold on eren is keeping her from living a normal life. they’d both be safer in the inner walls, levi thought. by the time they graduated from training, he needed to convince mikasa to go into the military police with him. she deserved better than having to prove her worth in the survey corps.

[itslieutenanthawkeye]

A Knight’s Oath

Day 6 of Jeankasa Week 2021: Royal AU

AO3

Sir Kirstein aids the princess of Hizuru escape a coup d’état organized by the marleyan Jaeger brothers.

There isn’t one inch of my body that isn’t yelling this is wrong, not one bit that isn’t shouting at me to return, to go back to my chambers, cover my ears with both hands and ignore that letter until the signal comes from within the palace. I came here to do a job: become her close guard, infiltrate the institution, take down the royal line.

That one job could have me swimming in silver. One job would be enough to buy myself that lifestyle I can only dream about. One job, and I could leave knighthood behind, buy myself a castle, a royal title and a woo wife to go with it. A pretty young wife with dark hair and big eyes and a whole army of servants to fulfill our every wish.

And yet here I am, walking with more purpose than ever before in my life, heading towards her.

Like most upper class Hizuran structures, the Azumabito royal palace is built atop a tall stone base. It’s an intricate maze of buildings, rooms and sliding doors that I’ve spent two years memorizing. I should know, better than anyone, how hard it’ll be for us to sneak out. Even if we do it without anyone being aware, even if nobody knows what the princess has found out.

“Jean, over here.” her voice calls from behind one of the doors. I follow like a bee searching honey. I enter the place where she’s been waiting for me and encounter her wearing the peasant clothes I procured for her a couple of days ago. She’s as lovely in them as she was the first time I saw her, sitting atop a high throne next to the regent, Kiyomi Azumabito, wearing a wonderful kimono of red fabric and golden threads.

Her mother, a pure-blooded Azumabito royal, fell in love with an eldian man, and in the process of marrying him, she also fell into disgrace and was expelled from the balance years before conceiving the princess. After a wave of plague that caused the death of the shogun and his closest relatives, however, Kiyomi had sent a contingent to bring back the princess’ mother to serve as regent until the princess came of age.

Stories say Kiyomi found a ten-year-old princess orphaned, living of scraps she found in the field near her home. Her parents were also killed by the plague. Some people say they starved, some others that they were murdered. However they died, the princess came back to the ancestral home of the Azumabito alone and Kiyomi took her into her care. Even I am aware of the love the woman has for her adoptive daughter, how much she cares for her safety.

It was her the first to find out about Marley’s plans to overthrow Hizuru’s royal line, of the spies sent by Marley in the shape of knights for Hizuru’s princess. It was Kiyomi who came to me, asking for help for the princess. She knew my involvement in Marley’s plans gave me a lot more intel than any other servant could’ve collected…and because she saw the way I looked at the princess that day our delegation arrived, two days ago, and how I’ve seen her every day since. She figured out quickly how much affection I carry for the princess and knew, barely one year after my arrival, that I would never leave her adoptive daughter behind.

“Are you ready?” I ask, putting on the peasant clothes, hiding the katana Kiyomi left in my room in the folds of my own hizuran clothes. “Your highness, are you ready?”

“I don’t want to leave.” She says; she’s turned away from me, giving me what little privacy she can while I change. “I can’t leave Kiyomi. I can’t leave the people of the palace behind.”

“Many of your servants are traitors, princess,” I remind her, tapping on her shoulder to indicate I’m decent again. A slight tremble travels her back and I curse myself; I’d forgotten how reserved hizuran people are when it comes to physical touch.

She turns around and faces me, resolution clear on her face. “Traitors or not, a ruler owes herself to her people,” she says, more dignified than any other royal I ever saw in Marley. “Traitors or not, I cannot leave them alone. And Kiyomi—”

“You heard their plans, princess,” I say, wondering how many times I’ll have to repeat the same thing to get her to forget that commitment to the people the Azumabito care so much about. “The moment the clock hits twelve, the guards will be at your doors. Zeke plans on executing you at dawn, on the morning of your eighteenth birthday. It’s either that or be forced into marrying his brother.”

“And I must let Kiyomi’s head hang just for the sake of escaping?”

“Mikasa,” I say; using her name feels strange. It’s a lovely name, but also forbidden. No knight is allowed to address the princess by her name, nor try to give her orders, let alone try to convince her to follow a plan she doesn’t agree with. The princess widens her eyes in brief shock, but nods, inviting me to continue. “You’re the last of your line. Kiyomi is willing to sacrifice her life for you.”

The princess lowers her head. “I can’t leave her.”

“If you can’t respect her wishes, at least do it out of pity for me,” I say, in a last attempt to get her moving. Time is slipping away from us, and Eren’s retinue must be making its way across the mountain roads already. “I’ve given up everything by just being here. If you stay, I hang with you, dishonored, tortured first.”

The princess looks up at me, her eyes stone-cold. “You came here under false pretenses, betraying mefirst. And now you’ve betrayed your country by being here. How can I be sure you won’t betray me again?”

Ah, how can I assure her without looking like a lovesick fool?

“I’ve served your palace for two years now, haven’t I?” I say. Mikasa nods, her gaze softening somewhat. In an act of boldness, or perhaps a leap of faith, I take a hold of her hands and fall to my knees. “I’m well acquainted with you now, princess, I cannot bring myself to leave you behind or betray you even if I should wish it.”

“Why, though, Jean?” she asks, and the mention of my name from her lips wraps me up like a warm blanket. Suddenly I remember again why I don’t care about the lost wealth, about that castle and title, about the group of nameless women I could’ve wooed into marriage. It’s her. Just her.

“Because you deserve to live. A great leader deserves to live,” I reply, bringing the back of her hands to my lips. I graze them briefly; a royal courtesy from Marley, never performed hereabouts. Royalty in Hizuru barely touches each other, and I can feel her trembling at the mere touch of lips against her hand. “I mean it when I say I won’t betray you, princess. I’m devoted to you as I haven’t been devoted to anything in my life. All I can hope for is that you believe me.”

“I believe you, Jean,” she says after a moment of quiet introspection. “I’m not sure why, but your face always seemed honest. From day one, even when you were scheming against me.”

I can’t help but to smile. “I’m willing to use my whole life to convince you I’m no longer scheming.” I say, standing to face her, holding her hand still. “Are you ready, princess?”

A sad smile adorns her face as she nods, and I’m forced to not focus too much on her face as we sneak out of the castle. Apart from being well-educated, she’s been trained extensively in martial arts and acrobatics, so sliding across the various rooftops of the palace and jumping from one terrace to another proves an easy task for her. She looks back at me at a point, her pale face illuminated by the moonlight, and I manage to give her a tight, ridiculous smile in encouragement.

I’ve seen plenty of women before, but she is by far the most beautiful sight my eyes have ever witnessed. But her beauty is just one of the things that have drawn me to betray my homeland’s coup d’état against Hizuru. I met her when she was sixteen, and I nineteen; these two years, I’ve seen her grow into a fair, kind ruler, one that cares more about the wellbeing of her subjects than the wealth of the family mines or the expansion of her land.

At seventeen, she convinced the council to abolish arranged marriages for women, recognize divorces requested by wives as legal, increase taxes for royals and establish a free education system for the entire country. I know she had in mind to establish free healthcare within her fifteen-year plan. All in all, she is a great leader.

Then there’s the fact that she’s extremely good at sparring. And I’ve always had a soft spot for women that are good with swords, especially women who can beat me in a fight.

I guess, in a way, spending my days with her, being with her…it all makes me want to be better. Before Hizuru, before the princess, all I thought about was ways of getting a comfortable life. My whole childhood, I’d spent it scamming people. Then knighthood had seemed a good way to find myself a relatively wealthy wife or become rich by taking down a king, or by plundering a town.

Just being by her side makes me a better man.

I want to keep being that better man.

I also want to keep seeing that pretty face of hers. I want to keep hearing her rants. I want to keep sharing my thoughts with her. I just want to be with her.

___________________________

Hizuru’s capital is surrounded by tall mountains. It’s thanks to my military training that I know which rivers the Jaeger brothers will use to invade the city, and which ones will give us safe passage to the sea, where a boat provided by the queen of Paradis Island awaits. Hizuru is a large nation, however, and the possibilities of our escape plan going sour are high. Still, I cannot let any of my insecurities show on my face. I took it upon my shoulders to protect the princess, to take her to her new home to keep her from being executed, forced into marriage, or tortured to death by the royals who had aided the Jaeger brothers conspire against the Azumabito.

By the time the sun begins to climb the mountains, we are miles away from the capital. And yet, we can hear the execution bells ring across the watch towers. Heads are starting to roll in the palace, the bells across the Hizuran Mountain Pass tell us, and one of them must be Kiyomi’s. Mikasa sits next to me on the motorboat, crying into her sleeves, leaning slightly against my arm.

“I’m sorry.” I manage to muster. “I wish I could’ve done more.”

She shakes her head, not looking at me. “Why did your people do this to us?”

I say the first few words that come into my mind. “Greed…I’ve never interacted much with the Jaeger brothers, but I know that the eldest wants power, and the mines in Hizuru are too rich to ignore. And the youngest cannot stand monarchies. He says people in them aren’t free.”

“Why decide to impose a dictatorship instead? What kind of hypocrisy is that?” she asks, although it’s clear she doesn’t expect me to answer her. “Why kill the council members? Kill Kiyomi? Our people are happy, and I wanted to work to make their lives better. I really wanted to. Why invade a foreign land that has rightful rulers with the excuse of freedom?”

“I wish I could explain it all,” I say, and the sight of the tear streaks on her face turns me into a rambling idiot. “I’m sorry, princess. I’m sorry I was with them. I’m sorry I didn’t do more to stop them. I’m sorry I came into your palace with—”

“You’ve already said you’ll spend your whole life making it up to me, won’t you? It is a promise, isn’t it?” the princess replies, and something inside me tells me she might be too tired to hear my apologies. She took the news of my original plan badly and stopped talking to me for a whole week, not being able to just look at me in the eyes, with fair reason. We spent so many days together with me as her guard, we became friends over those long nights of study, our few sneaky expeditions outside the palace, the times when I brought her street food for dinner in our chambers, the times when she’d sung for me and Kiyomi from behind a white canvas…

All those memories of friendship are stained now, covered with the mark of my initial plan to help the Jaeger brothers with their coup d’état. “I mean to fulfill that promise, princess,” I say, more convinced than I thought I would. “I’ll do anything to redeem myself from the initial betrayal.”

“What if I ask you to raise an army for me?” she asks, wiping the tears off her eyes with the back of her hand. “What if I say that you will prove you’ve redeemed yourself once you help me gain my throne back?”

Her face has acquired that solemn expression she uses whenever she addresses the council. And, like the council members, I cannot bring myself to say no to her. “I-I will try my best, princess. I do not have any influence, and I’ve no money to offer. But I will raise you an army, I will do my best.”

“Do you promise?”

“I could swear on my knight’s honor, princess, but you and I know I don’t have any. I’m a traitor to you and to my own homeland, remember?” I admit with an awkward smile, scratching the back of my head. “I’m lucky enough as it is that you trusted me enough to come with me.”

Mikasa smiles, then wraps my hand with both of hers. “There is one way you can assure me.” she says, her eyes not meeting mine. The sunlight is bathing us both; we’ll enter the lowlands soon, and speed will be of essence to avoid getting captured. Perhaps my concern for speed is what keeps me from realizing her face is dangerously near mine for the first couple of moments.

“What way?” I manage to stammer.

“An oath on your soul,” she explains. “It’s not a thing we do often here, though.”

“Is it like a blood oath?”

The princess shakes her head. “It’s something a bit deeper than that.”

I swallow hard, wondering if she’s going to force me to cut my finger off, or something worse. I don’t have any gripes if that’s what it takes to convince her I would fight to gain her trust back, but I can’t help being concerned about the health implications of cutting a finger off in the middle of a river.

“I’m not going to ask you to cut a finger off, Jean,” she half-sobs, half-laughs, guessing my thoughts. “It’s nothing as ghastly as that.”

“From the way you’re talking, it seems like a big deal.”

A soft blush travels her cheeks. “It is,” she says. “It’s a soul promise. We don’t touch each other here, not after you’ve left childhood behind. Let alone if you’re from a royal family. These oaths only happen behind closed doors, or at weddings.”

“What kind of oath is it, princess?”

“Kiss,” she says, closing her eyes. “You close the oath with a kiss, and your soul is bound to that person.”

“A k-kiss?” I manage to say, realizing at last how close she is sitting to me. If I must be honest, for the most part during my first year on the job, I paid little attention to hizuran traditions. It wasn’t until she started talking to me more that I began to care for the country I was hired to take down. And despite paying more attention to the country she loves so much, I have never heard of such an oath. Could it be that she just wants to feel someone else’s skin on hers?

A smirk appears on my face, and she seems to guess what thoughts are going through my head. She withdraws from me, narrowing her eyes dangerously. “It’s not like I want to!” she says, her cheeks burning red, her murderous expression only increasing my smile. “Stop looking at me like that!”

“I’m sorry!” I say, coughing to clear my throat. Her hands are still holding mine. “I didn’t mean to disrespect you, princess. Please, tell me about this oath.”

“No.” Mikasa replies, shaking her head. “You are clearly not mature enough for it.”

“Please, princess.” I say, and she gives me a serious glance before sighing in defeat.

“If you do it, it’ll be important. You cannot back away from this; you must fulfill it even if it takes your life. Your promise will be bound to your soul; and your soul is bound to me.” Mikasa hunches her shoulders and exhales, her eyes set on the mountains we’re leaving behind, her eyes longing for the warmth of the castle, the voice of her caretaker.

Her home crumbled in the lapse of a few hours; all her friends in the palace, her adoptive mother, the members of the council that cared for her…they’re all dead by now, or tortured, perhaps, to get information on her whereabouts. Kiyomi is probably getting the worst of all. And that’s when it hits me: I’m all she’s got left. Me, one of the knights sent to infiltrate her palace, gain their trust, and stab them in the back.

What a grim scenario that is.

“Princess, please look at me,” I say. She turns to face me, and my lips press against hers for a couple of seconds. When we part, her eyes are as wide as plates. “I promise I will not fail you.”

She nods, her hands clutching mine, her cheeks tinted pink. “Thank you.”

I let go of her hands and wrap her face with both of mine. Then, I press my lips against hers. This time, when we part, her eyes are closed. “I promise I am bound to you, blood, bone and soul.” I say, then kiss her again, a little longer this time. “I promise I won’t rest until you get your throne back.”

She smiles at me. “You’re splitting your soul into a lot of little pieces there.”

I kiss her again, and this time her lips move against mine, her arms wrap around my shoulders. Many times these two years I dreamed about kissing her –no, I’ve imagined doing a lot more with her, if I must be honest. But it was all fantasies, half-built while I looked after her during royal events, while I guarded her in her sleep, while we had our quiet dinners.

“I swear, my princess,” I say as we come apart once more, grazing her cheek with the back of my hand. “I swear my soul, heart and body are yours, from now until I the day I’m ripped from you.”

“That sounds a lot like a wedding vow.” She points out, holding my hand in place against her face.

I smile. “I’m sorry, princess.”

“Don’t be, please,” she says, then places a quick kiss on my fingers. “You can call me by my name from now on, you know. I’m not a princess anymore.”

“You’re always a princess, though.”

She shakes her head. “You and I are fugitives,” she says, setting her eyes on the mountains again, a fire burning bright behind the grey curtain of her eyes. She wants revenge; she wants to gain her throne, her homeland, back, and rain fire upon the ones who dared to lift a finger against Hizuru.

And all I want, I realize with a bit of embarrassment, is to keep her safe, stay by her side.

“I’ll raise an army for you, Mikasa.”

“We’ll raise it together. I believe in your oath,” she assures me, leaning forward to press her lips against mine for a long moment. “And I swear to you that when I get my throne back, I will give you all the lands and wealth you desire.”

“I could do without all that.” I say, shrugging, eliciting the first smile I’ve seen from her in a while.

I want to protect that smile, I think as our boat picks up speed. We’ll enter the lowlands in a couple of miles, and it’ll be a race to get to the ocean. The island is the only safe option for the princess now; the only safe place for the both of us. Despite my oath to her, all my mind can think of is a peaceful life with her. No luxuries, no armies, no grand schemes for power. Just the princess and I, sharing our lives in a quiet cottage by a river, hidden away from the world on Paradis Island.

It’s a fool’s dream, I know.

“I’ll keep you safe.” I assure her, giving her hand a little squeeze, hoping this isn’t too much touching for someone like her.

To my surprise, she squeezes my hand in return. “And I’ll keep you safe.”

[pickalilywrites]

Take Care

A/N: People were really nice about my last ereani fic and it made me super happy ;~; Here’s a little drabble that I was thinking of putting into that last fic. I ended up scrapping it though because it didn’t quite fit the rest of the tone.

Word Count: 869

“Annie! Annie, wait up!” Eren calls.

Most people would take a hint after someone ignores them but Eren Jaeger isn’t like most people. Annie knows that if she doesn’t turn around right now, his voice is only going to get louder and louder. She thinks she’s pretty obstinate, but that Jaeger kid has got her beat when it comes to stubbornness. 

Annie stops walking and turns around. “What?” Her tone is not quite annoyed but it’s not a quite friendly either.

He almost bumps into her because he’s walking so fast but stops himself just in time. “Hey! I almost caught up to you during this practice!” He’s pretty giddy about it. After struggling to master the 3DMG and finally getting good enough to whirl through the air with ease, he’s gotten pretty good. Not that she’d tell him that.

“Hm,” she says. She admits that she’s pretty impressed, especially since she, like most of the people in their trainee squad, had believed that the 3DMG course would be the downfall of Eren Jaeger. “You’re not quite there yet though.”

Still, he grins and tucks his thumbs under his belt. “Maybe not, but I’m getting there!” He lowers his voice. “I want to be better than Horse-Face eventually. I hate that bastard but he’s pretty damn good with 3DMG.” They start walking again, catching up with the rest of the trainees heading back to their cabins.

Annie snorts. “Good luck with that.” She may sound dismissive right now, but she doesn’t entirely doubt the notion of Eren surpassing Jean. The kid has an amazingly stupid amount of determination.

“Thanks!” Eren says, completely ignoring her tone. He’s done that enough times that she’s wondered if he just didn’t mind or was too dense to notice. They walk for a moment in silence before Eren – of course it’s Eren because the guy couldn’t shut his mouth for even a minute – leans towards her and asks, “Annie, what’s this?” and points to the left side of his cheek.

“What?” Her hand flies to her cheek.

“Take your hand off,” he says. She does so and he frowns after taking a closer look. “It’s a cut - not too deep - but you should get that taken care of when we get back.”

“A cut,” she repeats, frowning. She usually got through training without so much as a scratch. She’s getting careless. “I must have been brushed too close to a branch during practice,” she mutters.

“It happens all of the time,” Eren says, waving a hand around to indicate that it isn’t a big deal. “Hey, but make sure you wash it when we get back, alright? Warm water might be better but cold water feels nicer against your skin. It looks like you only bled a little bit so that’s good. I wouldn’t worry about it too much, but get it cleaned right away so it doesn’t get infected.”

It’s strange hearing these words, partly because she’s had to patch up her own cuts and scrapes since she was a child but also because she can’t remember the last time anyone cared to actually offer such simple advice.

Her confusion must show on her face because Eren gives her a sheepish smile and rubs the back of his neck in embarrassment. “I got into a lot of fights as a kid,” he explains hurriedly. “My mom had to, ah, patch me up a lot because I was kind of shit at throwing punches.” His voice catches in his throat when he talks to his mother and he looks away from Annie for a second .

A voice calls his name from the distance and Eren scowls, muttering about how Mikasa always needs to have him in sight 24/7.

After the fifth call, Eren rolls his eyes and sighs. “I should probably go before Mikasa freaks out,” he says to Annie. He’s already jogging a little bit ahead. “Take care of yourself, okay, Annie?” He points to his cheek again before giving her a final wave and then running off to where Mikasa and Armin are up ahead.

“Right,” she says even though he’s too far away to hear her response.

The first thing she does when she gets back is wash her cut. It stings a little because it’s not fully closed up but the cold water makes it a less painful, she thinks. Annie is about to just leave the cut as it is and allow it to close up on its own but remembers Eren running ahead of her, saying “Take care!” and she finds herself carefully applying a small bandage on the side of her face anyway.

She wonders the last time someone cared about her like that. Her father, maybe, but he trained her until her body ached the next day and only told her the wounds she suffered would make her stronger, telling her to bandage herself up on her own. He probably cared about her as much as Keith Shadis did, if not less. Not that she particularly cared about her uncaring father. She could take care of herself.

But, she thinks as she traces the bandage on her cheek with her thumb, having someone care about you isn’t unpleasant. 

[dammitadolfnomorecake]

It was as Eren had said. Herbal teas, fluid, food and rest. His vomiting had dehydrated him, and his smaller meals in Marley had left every scrap of nutrition going to the baby. A baby which really wasn't being welcomed by the soldiers of the barracks, not that Eren was either. Everyone was whispering about their new prince and his lack of prominence in Eldia. Or how stupid he was given the type of man Zeke was. It wasn't his fault that he was currently stuck in bed and unable to leave his room. He'd wanted to, and was in a foul mood for being denied. He knew how powerful public presence was, and that the people couldn't believe in a prince who never made time for him. He was just simply too ill and fatigued. Erwin and Hanji had both been shocked as the healer had examined him, Erwin having to leave the room, while Hanji now refused to leave his side until his condition improved.

 In Marley, he'd avoided looking in mirrors as he didn't want to see who he'd become, but in the room he was now in, the dresser sat just a few steps from the bed, and when he'd set eyes on himself he'd been so beyond disgusted. He looked like a living doll. His sharp cheek bones, pale complexion, and dim eyes all came together in a way that made him seem barely human. Why had no one told him how sick he looked? He doubted that just two days at sea could have left in his such a condition. Was this what Zeke had seen? And was that why they were in Eldia? Because the alpha didn't want him dying in Marley before they got their hands on Eldia's resources? At this point, he didn't know. He just wanted to get out of bed. He wanted to talk to the soldiers, and the people of the port town. He wanted to show that he wasn't a weak omega simply because he was pregnant, and that he still had their best interests in heart despite being now residing in Marley.

   Letting herself into the room Eren was using, Hanji smiled happily. In her hold was a breakfast tray piled high with food, which immediately caught Luca's attention

"Good morning! How are we both this morning?"

Eren rolled his eyes at Hanji. She'd literally only left to get breakfast half an hour earlier, giving Eren privacy as he showered. There were guards at his door, and Zeke had already stopped by to enquire about his health. He was sick of people asking. He was already self conscious over his pregnancy, and the fact he didn't look 6 months along. Hanji's smile widened

"No need to give me that look, Prince Eren"

Huffing, Eren crossed his legs, keeping both hands around Luca's rather large waist so the dragon wouldn't attempt to jump on Hanji

"I'm fine. I'm sick of this bed, and Luca is sick of being trapped inside"

Hanji rolled her eyes back at him, before placing down the breakfast tray on the bed in order to sort Luca's breakfast out for him 

"You know we can't let you..."

"I'm pregnant. It's not the end of the world"

"It's not a typical pregnancy"

"And I'm not exactly the typical royal? The whore who screwed his way to the top? Being named prince for being the bonded mate of the prince, then marrying the prince of the enemy nation, and now showing up pregnant?"

"Someone's grumpy"

"Because you have no idea what it's been like"

They both knew that was a load of shit. Armin and Mikasa had both debriefed Hanji and Erwin over every little thing that'd happened in Marley, including his being attacked

"I do. I really do. You had a drop, and you're still recovering"

"A what?"

What the fuck was a drop?

"Your depression. Mikasa and Armin said you shut down completely. An omega drop is an omega so thoroughly distressed that their body simply gives up. You're a shell of yourself. It lowers your bodily functions to nearly non-existent, so your mind can focus on healing your mental health. It's particularly dangerous as when an omega drops, they often forget to eat or drink"

Eren hissed. His omega flooding him with the feeling of having been insulted. He'd been pretty bad. He couldn't deny there weren't breakdowns, or times he felt like nothing mattered without Levi. But it hadn't been a drop... not that he could remember. If he'd had one of these mythical drops, it would have been when Levi had deserted him

"That's... not what happened. I am depressed. But you know what, I think it's pretty fucking normal given everything that's happened. You all had no right labelling me, or my mental health without asking me about how I feel"

"We only want what's best for you. The letters you have sent us have made very little sense, even before you announced your pregnancy, and now you have Zeke protecting you?"

"What do you mean they made no sense!? I've been doing everything I can for Eldia, or was until my morning sickness got too bad for me to keep on top of things. And as for Zeke, he's trying. I don't trust him. I don't love him. But he is trying for the sake of the baby. He's not touched me badly. He hasn't slapped me, or punched me. He hasn't been physically violent with me. If you want to know why I look so shit, it's because in Eldia, they give their omegas even less than that bowl you're preparing for Luca. Omegas have to wear collars. They can't drink wine unless their alpha gives it to them. I have bars on my windows thanks to Queen Dina and I'm not allowed to wander around in case I'm injured. I'm sick of collars and I'm sick of being in bed. I want to walk around and talk to people. I want to feel the sun against my skin, then I want to visit Historia"

"Zeke's given you permission?"

Releasing Luca, the dragon dived for his bowl of breakfast. His son still needed milk, yet milk was no longer enough. Shifting the way he was sitting, he accepted the breakfast tray from Hanji. Boiled eggs, toast, game meat and leafy vegetables. It was practically a feast after what Marley had to offer 

"I don't need to ask him for permission. He knows something isn't right with the pregnancy, given how little I'm showing for how far along I am. I told him I want to speak with Historia and he told me to do what I needed"

"Eren, we only wish to help. You've taken in such a huge burden"

"I knew what I was getting myself into. I knew it wasn't all going to be roses and honey. I know you don't think I'm telling the truth, but he really hasn't done anything awful to me outside of the times we had sex"

"That's alright then. I know you always see the good in people, so I guess I'm worried you're trying to see the good in Zeke, and missing everything else going on"

"Like the letters?"

Hanji nodded

"They make no sense. In one you demanded rice and grains be sent at once, and in another bear meat"

No. He'd never once demanded anything be sent over 

"I didn't say that"

"We have the letters, all signed with your name"

"Do you have them here? I want to see them. I don't remember making demands"

"You did. Levi soon realised something was wrong when you're replies didn't match what he asked"

He knew they had to follow the pretences of Levi being Erwin's bodyguard, and yet it still fucking hurt to hear his name 

"I want to see those letters. Queen Dina is acting and moving on her own. She openly loathes my being wed to Zeke, and I'm sure she's praying for something to happen to this child. I also wish to leave the barracks later. I want to know what's been happening since I left, and I want to know what else we could be doing in order to help the people"

"Eren, the healer said you need to rest"

"I know what the healer said, but lying in bed is only causing me more stress. I need to be up, and I need to be doing something"

"You need to take care of yourself and your baby"

"I'm not just an oven for the baby to rest in until it's ready for birthing. Being pregnant doesn't make me weaker, and I'm sick of being treated like it does!"

Yelling, sparks of magic shot from his fingers. One breaking Luca's breakfast bowl, while another set the dresser across from the bed on fire. Feeling rather annoyed, Eren gathered up a small portion of his magic in order to put the fire out. Still sitting on the bed, Hanji gave him a disappointed look 

"Don't do that. Ok. I know you don't understand, so stop talking like you know what's best for me. You may leave"

"Eren..."

"Hanji, leave"

He didn't want his magic to blow up again, and he was insulted that everyone seemed to think they all knew best for him, without going to the effort to ask him what he needed. He was nearly 21, he knew well enough what he wanted and he needed. He'd done what they wanted, simply to keep the peace, but keeping the peace was starting to cost him his sanity. He'd kept his mouth closed when Levi's birthday passed without his being allowed out of bed, he'd dreamed so vividly of Levi that his heart felt like it was breaking all over again when he woke to find no one mentioning the alpha, and no one understanding why he was so upset. Surely they could just give 5 minutes of their time where they listened to him, rather than treating him like this?

 There was barely five minutes between Hanji leaving and Erwin arriving. Of course she'd run to him. She'd probably told him all about this "drop" theory of hers, where he wasn't mentally sound. Walking over to the bed, Erwin sat down with a heavy sigh

"Hanji's just been to see me. Is there anything you'd like to explain?"

"Would you listen if I did?"

Raising an eyebrow at him, Erwin made a gesture to continue with his hand 

"I want to get out of bed for longer than using the bathroom"

"The healers here feel it's too soon"

"I know that. But this is my body, shouldn't that count for something?"

"Hanji said your magic flared..."

"Because I'm stuck doing nothing. If you're going to lecture me, lecture me. If you're going to listen to me, then listen"

"We're worried about you"

"You don't need to be"

"You're pregnant"

"No shit. Really? I hadn't noticed. I thought I was just getting fat from all the food in Marley"

Jumping straight to defensive wasn't the best plan 

"Eren, you're pregnant. Your mate is missing, and your husband is suddenly concerned for you welfare. If you're sleeping with Zeke, or if you love Zeke, this is something we need to know about. It could be another form of manipulation, given your pheromones are screaming out that you want and need an alpha to protect you. If we do let you walk around, there will be a number of alphas..."

So that was it. They didn't give two shits about his health, they just didn't want him riling up the soldiers 

"A number of alpha's who need to see that omega's aren't weak, simply because they're pregnant. You won't even let me work, or read any of the reports and correspondence for Eldia. Hanji said something about my letters not making sense. I want to see them, and I want to take a walk outside"

"Eren..."

That tone. He hated that fucking tone. Like Erwin understood what he was going through. Like he had the right to tell him everything would be ok. That it would all work out in the end... at this point, Eren didn't see how things could work out, when he wasn't allowed to do anything

"No. Don't. You don't get to play the sympathetic friend, then keep me in here! I can't sit still, and you know I can't! It's like you said, my mate is gone! He's gone and none of you even said anything about his birthday! I'm sick of this! If you'd manned up, none of this would have happened. If you'd done your job, or pushed your own ego aside for longer than 5 minutes, he wouldn't be gone! I'd be with him, and I'd be happy. You all can get fucked!"

Erwin let out a low growl, his voice increasingly pained with each sentence

"How long are you going to keep rubbing our mistakes in our faces?! This wasn't what we wanted for you! You know it wasn't, and now you're pregnant when you swore you couldn't get pregnant. Why can't you see that we want to protect you?!"

 The door to Eren's room burst open, Zeke standing there with his hand on his sword

"Eren, are you alright? I heard yelling..."

For possibly the second time in his whole life, Eren was happy to see Zeke. Or maybe it was the first, given he didn't remember much of what he was feeling during the attack

"I'm fine, Zeke. Levi was just a little worried giving that I've decided I want to return to the castle today. He thinks I should rest, but I think I should return the castle as soon as possible, then head up to Draecia to make sure the baby is truly alright. I don't think I can calm down until I know for sure"

It was a cruel card to play, turning Zeke's concern for their unborn child against him, simply so he could get out of the barracks. Releasing his sword, Zeke nodded

"If that's what you want, then we shall leave as soon as we can"

Moving to his side, his husband dropped a kiss atop his head. Eren trying not to squirm with discomfort at the action. He knew things had changed again between them as Zeke had help him protectively upon the ship, but he hadn't thought they were onto random kisses, unless it was Zeke's way of warning Erwin not to stick his nose into his and Eren's relationship... Why the fuck did alpha's have to be so complicated?

"I'll have our belongings packed and moved at once"

"Thank you, Zeke. Levi will assist you. I will need to ride with both him and Hanji, as we need to discuss Eldia politics. Will this be alright?"

"No. You'll be staying with me until we reach the castle"

"But..."

"Eren. No. This is not up for negotiation. I bought you home, but I fon't trust you to not run, nor do I trust that Eldia has your best interests in mind. You shall ride with me, Yelena, Pieck and Porco. Levi shall ride with the driver"

Too many alphas... way too many alphas... nervously he asked 

"May Armin join? Given he's a beta?"

"You may have Armin by your side"

Oh thank god for that. And thank god Zeke thought himself so far above Armin that the thought of being jealous hadn't come to mind

"Thank you. I need to prepare to leave, and to finish my breakfast"

Erwin wasn't pleased, but Zeke stayed by Eren's side until the alpha finally rose off the bed

"Fine. We'll see to the preparations"

     *