And now for the next chapter...
Disclaimer: I own nothing but Zoe.
Warning: Craziness, giggles, and Cinderella. Seriously.
Before you read this I want to make something perfectly clear—my Zoe and Hanji Zoe are two completely different person. This story was mostly written for the readers to laugh. And all my other fellow LeviHanji fans, I'm sorry, but it doesn't happen.
You probably would've shared my astonishment when I found out that I'm in the world of Shingeki no Kyujin. I used to attend a prestigious boarding school all the way down in soak-up-the sun California. Now let me explain the situation in a more detailed way. I'm not just a girl heading over to a very large boarding school. I'm going over there because I value my education.
But when I get there, everything was totally different from what I've imagined.
Either the girls turned out to be a total slut and wanted to get into all the boys' pants, or the girl was at her breaking point and couldn't take it anymore.
Pft. Pansies.
I survived there, without touching anyone and without befriending anyone, except for Leon. It didn't take me and Leon long to become friends. My unrefined and perverted ways against his ethics? We are totally the opposites of each other. But what can I say, the opposites attracts.
The school didn't seem like a big thing to me, nor did the fact that I would be the only girl on their age in the whole school. Guess I really didn't really give it much of a thought. Personally, boys don't give me much interest, yes that must have sounded a little weird. And no, I'm not a lesbian, although I respect people's wishes on their orientation.
Eh, a big new school, new places, new friends, a whole daily routine? No biggy, right?
But this world is so different.
I nervously glanced up at the Captain in front of me. Eren was staring at the close distance between me and Captain Levi, I glances his way while he simply chooses to ignore me. I was at my edge and the Captain knows it, he gets further away from me and the kiss. My fucking first kiss ends up with him.
FML.
"You..." I heard the Captain mumble, with his right hand he covers up his mouth as if he had just tasted something awful.
Well, it was fucking awful for me too that I'm almost sure that I'm gonna puke.
This is definitely not how I picture my first kiss.
"What the fuck you just do, you fucking piece of shit?"
"Why did you bump into me, you...you prick!"
"You were the one that turn into that corner first!"
"Well, if I'd known you were there I would have ducked, asshole!"
"Whatever bitch, you leave a sour taste in my mouth."
This caused me to growl before he leaves the hallway, not looking at anyone around him. I don't want to look at him. That evil, sinister asshole. How can he get that kind of rank anyway!
I despised him.
"Get back here prick!" I hollered at his retreating back.
"Shove it."
Now that made me mad, I was already angry. Eren told me to sit back and calmly count backwards from ten.
Ten; I'm going to wring his little neck and shove it down the toilet. Nine; I'm going to flush it. Eight; I'm gonna take it back, put it back in place and beat him again down to the pulp. Seven; I will find a hungry, rabid titan and throw his body at the it. Six; this isn't helping at all.
"Die Levi! DIE!"
I'd like to say that he scampered off in fear at the sound of my obvious anger, but no, that would have been far too civil of him. He stopped still and then turned and glared down the hall at me. His eyes...glinting with fire.
Is that even possible?
"Are we forgetting once again, who is in control of whom here?" He asked in an icy tone, calmly walking towards me. He stopped when he was close enough to be pretty intimidating.
My lips pursed, and I got ready to throw another punch at him, but he grabbed my fist before I could got any momentum."Zoe, I don't believe in hitting girls, don't make me wish that I did."
What the heck! I'm not alone in thinking that was a threat, am I? That creep!
"Why you little—" I stated but he cut me off.
"—Watch yourself brat, we don't want to start name calling, because I'd beat you every time you twit."
"Would you now, brainless git?" I asked coyly, an eyebrow rose in obvious disdain.
"Yes, you insufferable tomboy."
"Ice cube block!" I yelled glaring fiercely at him.
"Idiotic airhead!"
"Stubborn mule!"
"Animal references now?" he muttered beneath his breath, and then shifted his ice bag. "Ugly cow."
I gasped.
Oh.
No.
He.
Didn't.
Nobody called me an ugly cow but me!
"Sexist pig!" I hollered back at him. Yeah, I know it got nothing to do with what we were fighting about.
On the other hand, I mused. He do knows how to clean a room and keep it tidy.
"You are lower than a dog." He shot back, breaking me away from my musing.
All of a sudden, he stooped down, scrutinizing a little more closely to the room I just cleaned.
His eyes drifted towards the window I had just cleaned and it suddenly went dark.
"...And pray tell what in the bloody fucking shit is this?"
I gulped as he prodded the window leaf with a finger, affixing his hawk-like stare into your eyes. His ominous tone stuffed the reply I was about to give him back into my throat to the bottomless pit of my stomach.
He rubbed the window leaf between his fingers. "You left behind a layer of dust that's exactly one inch thick, one freaking inch!"
"Holy fuck with your OCD! What the hell is your problem?"
"It wasn't good enough. Do it all over."
I groaned at his command. God, this guy is so infuriating.
"If it wasn't good enough why don't you do it instead?" I retorted.
He scoffed. "Are you kidding me? I have cleaned the entire basement and the second floor on my own. Or are you incapable of doing such an easy job?"
The fuck?
He strode right up until he was nose to nose to you, firing off steel-cold stare at point blank, "Erwin told me that I should train you before we went onto the expedition but seeing that you can't even clean a room properly..."
Did he...just...
Did he just pointing out that I couldn't clean an entire room because I missed a spot that was about exactly an inch thick?
That bastard!
He eloquently pushed down my buttons in a few minutes just by his foul-mouthed language that was no doubt ingrained in his brain since he was born.
"You know what?" I got to Eren and snatch the cloth away from him, "Challenge accepted, you clean freak."
"Tch. You're just going to mess up everything anyway."
Like a vicious rabid beast my brow twisted with discontent. It almost seemed as though he wanted to get me all worked up over a simple dust. But being me, I was an easy target and without me knowing, I had taken the bait just right in front of his face.
"Watch me."
"It's not my fault that he's such a hot head. Seriously, if you want to blame someone, blame the people who loaned him his chromosomes, because if you ask me, that's where the troubles began—the conception of Levi."
"Zoe—" Eren started, but I of course interrupted him, already knowing where he was heading. Dumping the cloth to the bucket beside me, draining the water out of it. How I wish It was that Shorty I drained.
"Don't even try to deny it, Eren."
"No, I would never even dare to dream of stopping you while you're in the middle of your ranting frenzies; I just wanted you to know that you're killing me over here."
I set down the cloth and turned to look at Eren. He was covered in dirt and while he narrowed his eyes at the obvious mirth, a smile slowly slid across his face making his jade eyes twinkle.
"I'm sorry Eren," I choke out, he rolled his eyes at me.
"You do understand that the window is that way, don't you?"
After that little confrontation with Shorty, I had gone straight cleaning this room to take my anger—and fear—to the poor window and floor of the room. Eren, who had been watching the entire scene, had sincerely helped me start over. For the fucking third time.
So, I'm a little upset—I can't help it. You didn't see the look in his eyes! Though it's not like I'm afraid of him or anything—who would be afraid of that little sonofabeyotch? What could he do to a person, other than beat them down with a few choice of words?
Certainly not me.
And then I remember, he beat the shit out of Eren until he lost a tooth just to make it look convincing to the politicians.
I shuddered inwardly.
"You know, you shouldn't call him a sexist pig." Eren stated, grimacing after running a hand through his hair.
"Well, he is one!" I retorted, sending another trail of dirty, wet streak through the window. It splattered against his shirt.
He glanced down at his shirt, and then looked up at me. Sighing, he shook he head. "Well Zoe, when you really think about it he isn't that bad. He's loyal to his team, and even if he knows he have super soldier strength, he didn't brag about it." He stated calmly, his jade eyes never leaving mine.
If there's one thing I hate about Eren, it's this; he is always right. From the first day I come here, he can't seem to be wrong just once. Not when he's analyzing people and never when he's thinking of others before himself. He's tranquil water to my typhoon.
I sighed and stepped away from the window, "You're saying I should apologize to him aren't you?" I asked, but I already knew the answer. I wiped the window for one last time and headed for the door out of this room. "Fine, I'll go apologize for calling him a moronic, narcissistic idiot of a man. And for calling him a sexist pig."
"But you didn't call him..."
"In my mind I did. Just call it a day, I cleaned this room three times already, I don't think it has anymore dust to be eradicated."
Eren smiled, "You know that your willingness to do this shows that you were subconsciously feeling guilty about what you said."
"Shove it. And stop smiling like that, that's totally cheating!"
It really bites when he's right! Why can't I ever be the right one? Even if it was just for a little while.
I guess that is nature's way of balancing the world.
There were so many things I could tolerate that as I child I probably couldn't. Solitude was one of the things that don't bother me in the least; I could deal with being alone, no problem. Explosions and medical emergencies, no problem! I'm tranquil; I can take charge and whatever needs to be done, done. I may be loud and obnoxious when handling a bad situation with a level head if needed.
What I can't handle were awkward silences and non-life threatening social activities. I'd rather be held as a hostage with a gun pointed at my head rather than having a civil conversation. Hell, I'd be the titan than deal with long unending silences.
The moon was already rising when we finished cleaning that room, and I was on my feet circling around this huge castle looking for a certain Shorty.
Given the chance, I would've whistle at the size of this place. However, any admiring thoughts of the scenery or architecture were quickly abandoned when I saw a shadow moving outside the castle. When I came close enough, I spotted practice log, dressed with a targeting board and knives, if not nearly all embedded itself at the center of the bull's eye.
Impressive, typical Ackerman standard I suppose.
I bit back a groan. Great, I get to talk to a prodigy—no, scratch that. I need to apologize to a prodigy instead of talking to him.
Better thicken my skin to take whatever insults he throws at me.
He knows I was there, I swear, if there's a Guinness World Record in holding awkward silences in the company of others, I think He'll be the winner.
"...You must be a riot to talk to." I said after we spent the entire five minutes in silence. It was a record for me. Unless I was watching a movie with someone or alone, it was nearly impossible for me to keep quiet for so long. The silence drives me nuts.
Levi said nothing as he gave me a passing glance.
"Are you always this quiet?" I asked sarcastically. "Or are you just talking to spite someone? I think it's a horrible practice and considering that you should do into your rebellious phase right now and prank the crap out of everyone. I'll help, it'll be funny."
Silence.
Well, if you did listen closely you will hear the crickets in the background. Damn those crickets are assholes, I can totally hear you, bastards! Stop mocking my existence. I'll end you and all your descendants! I'll kill you all with fire! Yeah... the silence was getting into me.
I'm losing it.
I sat down and swung my legs back and forth to the garden facing veranda. There wasn't much I could say as an icebreaker. No cartoons, no video games, no internet, man I miss the internet...here they talked about the weather, the only thing I could do right now was spamming him with loads of questions and hope he'll answer one of them.
"I saw you throwing knives, that was awesome. How did you become one of the soldiers? Do you have to go to school or something? Or did they recruit you? What is this place called? I've never been here before." I rambled.
I said whatever pops out of my head. Hell, I even talked about the weather and the grass to the point I was sick of hearing myself talk. I would do anything to stay quiet for the rest of the day
When was the last time I spoke this much?
I can't remember.
Before I came here, learning and understanding language had been a priority over anything else. It never occurred to me that I could have a normal conversation with anyone here. How could I? I'm just an outsider. What could I talk about?
Oh, hi Eren and Levi, I'm not really from here. I'm actually from another world that somehow teleport into your world. Not only that. I have intimate knowledge of your world that could very well topple the entire world and end all life as you know it.
Yeah, that would go so well during snack time.
I sighed in frustrations, giving up the conversation with Levi and plopped backwards onto the veranda floor with my legs still dangling off the edge. If he's not going to respond, I'm not going to bother either.
When I looked up I could see the sky, glittering with stars. Come to think of it, I never lay outside and stared up at the sky even once in my world. I couldn't have, I'm always busy.
Speaking of busy... my thoughts drifted to the twins...Martha and Mike...my brother and sister that I loved and raised on my own, not knowing that their parents work their asses off to feed us all, not knowing I'm here. Not knowing that I might have very well disappeared from their lives. I loved them, and I do anything to keep them safe, to give them a chance to take different paths from their parents.
They gave me everything, and I greedily took it all without ever giving back to them even once.
Guilt gnawed me. I was dead, I couldn't even see them if I wanted too. And, as much as I joked about everything and everyone, I couldn't humor the thought that I might still be alive, that I can still get the chance. But I couldn't, not when I heard the screeching tires and saw the desperation on Leon's eyes when he screamed at me.
I took a deep breath as I felt an uncomfortable lump at the back of my throat, but it hardly mattered when a hot pressure build behind my eyes. I release a shaky sigh as I pressed the back of my hands against my eyes, desperate not to make a sound or curl into a ball. Why was my body choosing now to deal with this? Why couldn't it done this when I was alone?
I know it usually takes some time for trauma to set into my mind. I have a bad habit of repressing and ignoring things that bothered me for a long period of time. The last time I'm doing this was when my dog passed away; it took me months before one day I just woke up crying.
Probably it wasn't the healthiest way to cope with the strings of destiny, but it is what it is.
Think about something else, just think of something else.
What about Leon? Did he manage to get away? No don't think about Leon either. Thinking about him would just get me worked up again. Stop thinking. Just stop thinking!
"You're a strange one," murmured Levi, his voice pulling away from my thoughts. "You rambled endlessly on things you could care less about, but when you stopped to your own thoughts, you look like you were ready to cry."
"I'm not." I retorted childishly. Didn't dare to lower my arms, I'm quite sure my eyes were red by now.
"What are you thinking about?" asked Levi.
"Why should I tell you?" I said. "You ignored everything else I talked about."
"It's because you're not interested in talking to me,"
Okay, shit. He got me there. Talking just for the sake of talking, I wasn't being fair. No amount of emo back story would justify my actions.
"Then why are you talking to me?" I asked, lowering my arms slightly to peek at his reaction. His attention stayed on the wooden target in front of him, not giving up anything on his face. He had one heck of a poker face.
"You don't like the quietness," he repeated. "That's why you kept on talking, to keep away things you don't want to think about."
I gave up peeking and stared at him openly. I just got ousted by the asshole Captain. Was I that obvious?
"There wasn't anything better to keep the silence away."
"There are," he noted. "If you can't stand it."
"Like what?"
"Cleaning," he answered honestly.
I rolled my eyes. How typical, that clean freak. I swear if he wasn't such a stoic asshole, he would fit in very well with the Disney Princesses. Can you imagine him singing, "Oh, sing sweet nightingale, sing sweet." While moping the floor with his headband. Like that would ever happen. Hell would freeze over first.
Yet...I found myself fighting a giggling fit at the thought. I pressed a fist against my lips to silence myself. My body shook as I curled up on my side, clutching my stomach firmly. Trying desperately to stop the roar of laughter threatening to spill from my lips.
Oh God, I think I'm going to die.
"You know, I'll get Eren for you." His voice tinged slightly with a hint of worry, but I didn't notice. I was trying so hard to pull myself out of my thoughts.
"No," I squeaked out, gasping desperately for air as I fought the urge to laugh.
"...Do you want me to do anything?" he offered, his placid voice showing signs of concern.
I fought against a smile as I bit my lower lip. Should I have him do it? He might not...but it doesn't hurt to try, at least.
"C-can..." I took a gulp of air to keep my voice stable. "Can you say the word sweet nightingale?" My voice cracked near the end.
"Would it help?" he asked puzzled at my request.
I gave a jerky nod, biting my fist, not trusting myself to not die laughing at this point.
"...Sweet nightingale," he said in the most deadpan manner possible.
Nothing could have stopped me as I burst out laughing like a maniac. My chest heaved with each laugh; my body trembled as I tried desperately to stop. I couldn't help it; my fist pounded the ground, my legs flailed in the air. I laughed until I cried, I laughed until no sound come out. I laughed so hard that I'm sure the whole castle would hear me.
There was nothing I could do to end this. And there was nothing I wanted to do to end this.
"Oh shit, you're killing me!" I laughed, clenching at the pain of my chest from laughing so hard. "That was awesome!"
"What exactly was so funny?" asked Levi, unmoving from his spot as he watches me with confused frown. "I only repeated what you asked me to say. How is sweet nightingale hilarious?"
"You are one heck of a riot!" I giggle uncomfortably, still rolling around on the ground like the idiot I am.
"Zoe?" Eren confused voice came from down the hall before he and Hanji turned around the corner.
"What happened?" asked Hanji as she frowned in confusion at the sight of me laughing my ass off.
At the lost expression on his face, I found myself dying another fit of laughter.
He had no clue what was going on with me!
"I believe our new recruit might be crazy." He noted, his bluntness throw me into another fit.
"Eren, save me!" I wheezed. "He's trying to make me laugh to death."
Eren brows rose in surprise at my words, probably the last thing he expected to hear about his Captain.
"I didn't." Retorted Levi, confusion runs clear on his face.
"Zoe, you need to calm down," suggested Eren as he helped me up. "Can you do that?"
"I-I'll try." I gulped in air, struggling to calm down. I can't even sit up on my own with how hard I'm laughing.
I found a grin sneaking into my face. I guess he had a heart...somewhere...buried beneath the mountain of emo and OCD issues...hmm.
Well, these silliness aside I probably scared the whole Recon with my laughing fit. A smile rose up my thought of a traumatized Eren, however before it went any further, I felt a hard tap at my forehead.
"Ow!" I retorted with a hand to my head as I snapped out of my thoughts. It took a second before I realized what happened. Did Levi just...I glanced up at him, in time to see two retreating fingers pointed out.
"Captain!" Hanji scolded.
"She was going to laugh again." Levi said as he backed away from us and walked away.
Eren snorted and started laughing, I puffed out my cheeks in annoyance. Oh, that bastard. Of all the things he could've done, he did a forehead flick on me! A forehead flick! What the fuck?
"This fucking means war." I muttered under Eren's and Hanji's disbelief.