as long as i am with you Chapter 1: the weaver and the cowherd, an attack on titan/進撃の巨人 fanfic

RivaMika Week 2 Day 1: Legendary Lovers

Title: the weaver and the cowherd
Rating: G
Fandom: Shingeki no Kyojin, Attack on Titan
Characters: Levi, Mikasa Ackerman, RivaMika
Summary: A love written in old scrolls and constellations.
Notes: I'M BACK, BABY... with more Wapanese. Oops. I didn't pick a couple on the listy thing, but you can probably guess who they are from the title!

RivaMika Week 2 Day 1: Legendary Lovers

It is a hot midsummer's day, and the air is sluggish with heat. All the doors and windows of their little base have been thrown wide open in the hope of tempting some stray breeze. Levi, recognising the dangers of heat stroke, has forbidden his team from doing any work, and as such most of them spent the day in the little stream a five minute's walk away, submerging as much of their bodies as possible. It had been most difficult to get Jean out of there; right now, he was 'trying to drown himself' in the bathtub, at least according to Connie.

But the sun has long disappeared beneath the horizon, and everyone else is sound asleep, sheets thrown aside, shirts wide open and pants rucked up. Only Mikasa remains awake on the porch, an empty glass of water perched perilously on the rail.

Or maybe not.

"Ackerman?"

Levi is standing in the door, features barely visible. It is unsettling to see him without his cravat, but the prissy garment would be stifling in this weather.

"Captain." It takes her longer to respond than usual, and her salute is halting. It's too hot.

He waves a hand at her, and she relaxes. Without realising it, she shifts into a defensive position, angling her body sideways to present less of a target to him.

"Why are you still up?" He joins her at the rail, leaning against it heavily.

"Too warm to sleep, sir." After a noticeable pause, she joins him, careful to keep a certain measure of distance between them.

He nods, instead of hounding her like she would expect. "True."

Mikasa glances away and returns to her previous task; examining the sky. It's a clear night, with nary a cloud to be seen, and the dark velvety black of the firmament above is studded with all the stars of the cosmos. It is nothing short of gorgeous.

Levi, she notices, is imitating her. His brow creases. "Look at those two," he finally says, pointing up to indicate two stars, relatively close together, burning brighter than any other. "Vega and... Altair, isn't it?"

The old words, a remnant of the times before the Fall, send a chill down her spine. "Yes, but... I was taught to refer to them as Orihime and Hikoboshi."

Levi's eyes widen imperceptibly, and her throat closes. Everybody knows about her heritage, but none intimately... except Levi.

She brewed him tea in the ways her Kaachan showed her, cursed at him in her mother's language behind his back, and even played a koto duet with him. For some reason she feels ashamed; how could anyone display themselves as openly as that? But on the other hand, it was freeing, even cathartic, to display even a little of her lost culture to him.

"Well?" He isn't looking at her, speaking to the air. "I'm a curious man, Ackerman. Don't leave me hanging."

"It isn't a very interesting story." Her fingers fist in her trousers.

"Tell me." This is an order, she hears.

She exhales. Turning her eyes to the sky, she begins.

"Ages ago, back when the Sky King, Tentei, ruled the heavens and all beneath it, he had a daughter. Orihime was her name, and she was as beautiful as a star, but more beautiful than even her was the cloth she wove. Her father prized this cloth so dearly that Orihime worked her hardest every day to weave as much of it as possible to please her father, but as a result she was stuck working on the banks of the Amanogawa."

"How does this relate to stars?" Levi interrupts.

"Well, the Amanogawa is the Milky Way. If you interrupt me, I won't tell you." She glares at him weakly.

"Sorry, sorry. Please... continue." The words shock her. Levi? Apologising? But she does as he says and keeps going.

"Orihime despaired that she would never meet anyone to love her, and her father shared her concerns. He arranged for her to meet with the cow herder Hikoboshi, who lived on the other side of the heavenly river. When they met Hikoboshi was enraptured by her hair, dark and thick in a ponytail that reached her feet, and fell in love with her instantly, as did Orihime for him."

Mikasa pauses to draw breath, and doesn't notice Levi eyeing her hair speculatively.

"The two married and were happy for a brief while, but in the throes of love they abandoned their tasks. Orihime ceased to weave the cloth her father adored, and Hikoboshi did not attend to his herd, letting them roam all over the heavens. This angered the Sky King, and in a fit of rage he decreed that the two be separated by the Amanogawa, never to meet again."

"Didn't he get them together in the first place?" Levi interjects.

"Royalty rarely make sense." One notorious example is their king, a useless figurehead who lets the military and the moneyed run his domain.

"You can say that again." He inclines his head, telling her to go on.

"Despondent, Orihime begged her father to let her see her husband. Seeing her tears, he permitted her to meet Hikoboshi on the seventh day of the seventh month, but only if she finished all her weaving first. Orihime agreed and worked fiercely to finish her work, but on the first occasion they could meet, she found that there was no bridge spanning the Amanogawa that would allow them to cross and meet."

"A river without a bridge? Wouldn't she have checked first?" Levi wonders.

"She was working very hard all the time, remember?" Mikasa reminds him.

"Ah... Come on, finish it. We're close to the end."

"Orihime cried so much that a flock of magpies were summoned by her tears. Moved, the magpies formed a bridge with their wings, and thus the two lovers were finally able to meet, on the day called Tanabata. Unfortunately, if it rains, the magpies won't come and poor Orihime and Hikoboshi have to wait until next year. Worse than that, the magpies might get lazy and forget to fly up to the heavens and make the bridge, so if you see one on Tanabata you have to scare it off." She takes a deep breath. "There. Told you it was boring."

"No... It was... nice. Sad, though, which is strange for a fairy tale." He is looking at her straight on, eyes not as sharp as usual.

"I liked it a lot as a child... My mother would always put my hair up in a ponytail. I can't do that now." She slides a hand through her hair, cropped short. Mikasa would never grow her hair out again, though. Something about it would feel wrong, as if she were unfit to wear that badge of femininity. In any case, she prefers her hair short.

"You could manage, though." Levi's voice is low.

"Hmm?"

"You could- you could do a ponytail. It'd be short and stubby and pathetic, but..." He sighs. "Ignore that. It's hot. I can't think."

"Thank you, Captain." He rolls his eyes and mumbles, but Mikasa is being genuine.

"I'm off. You might just have bored me to sleep."

"Wait."

Levi halts, hand braced against the door-frame. "...What?"

"There's one more thing. For Tanabata."

He turns around slowly. "Yes?"

"...Follow me." She pushes past him to get through the door, and she hears him hiss. It is worth it, for the momentary gratification.

Levi pads after her as she collects pen, paper, needle and string. She can feel his gaze heavy on her back. Like he said earlier, Levi was a curious person by nature, and impatient too. Mikasa likes this, getting to the chinks in his armour and exploiting him. He does the same to her, so why shouldn't she?

She waves him over to her once she has made the tanzaku. She hands one of the slips threaded with string to make it hang to Levi.

"You have to make a wish," she explains. "You write it on paper, and you hang it on a tree."

"Who grants the wish? The tree?" He snorts derisively, and makes as if to throw the paper away, but Mikasa catches his wrist.

The contact is electric, and Mikasa feels inexplicable rage burn behind her eyes. "Don't," she manges to say. He blinks, and she is so close she can see his pupils dilate. "Please."

They stay like that for too long. His elevated pulse sets off a strange twisting feeling in her belly. After what feels like an age, Levi lowers his hand. Her hand slides away to fall limply by her side.

"I will." His voice is rough, and even though he speaks in a whisper it sucker-punches her in the gut. He grabs a pen and scribbles a few words on his tanzaku; haltingly, Mikasa does the same. Their elbows knock as they write.

Once done, Levi strides off outside. He picks the tree that stands beside Mikasa's bedroom window, the one that constantly rattles its branches against the glass and wakes her up in the dead of night. He picks a branch at random and ties his tanzaku on; he has to stretch up and go on tip-toe to reach it, she notes with amusement.

Mikasa ties her further down the branch. Once done, she steps back to admire their work. The two tanzaku flutter lightly in the weak breeze, and Levi sighs beside her.

"Look, now I'm really bored." He stifles a yawn as he turns to look at her, and his eyes rove down her body; Mikasa's muscles lock up. "Don't stay up too late," he finally says, voice gentle, and without ceremony, leaves.

Mikasa stays up for a while, admiring Vega and Altair, before following Levi's example and going to bed... but not before she makes a stop in Sasha's room.

–

When Eren wakes her the following morning, her hair is not scattered all over the pillow, like usual, but scraped up into a scant ponytail. He doesn't notice the two scraps of paper dangling from a tree branch outside. Even if Eren had seen them, he would only be able to read one, the one that says 'To live.' Mikasa alone knows what the second one says, and that is:

勝つ

(To win.)