My mind lets go a thousand things
Like dates of wars and deaths of kings,
And yet recalls the very hour-
'Twas noon by yonder village tower,
And on the last blue noon in May-
The wind came briskly up this way,
Crisping the brook beside the road;
Then, pausing here, set down its load
Of pine-scents, and shook listlessly
Two petals from that wild-rose tree.
~Memory by Thomas Bailey Aldrich
-Levi's POV- (Yay for switching things up! It's been a hot minute since I did his POV)
"No more secrets," I had agreed with Emmryn, though part of me really wanted to just yell at her and tell her to mind her own damned business. Whatever that Titan brat and Petra had been talking to Emmryn about had really messed with her head, and I was resisting the urge to punish them both with extra cleaning duties until the next expedition. At the same time, I knew Em had a right to know how I ended up here. I mean I married the damn woman for Wall's sakes.
As much as I told her it was just so we could fuck whenever we wanted, she and I both knew it was more than that. For some reason, I cared deeply for the dark copper haired woman in my arms, and I refused to take any chances that would lead to her being separated from me, like some stupid rule about relationships between squad leaders and their subordinates, especially with her probation not done yet.
"Levi," her low voice called to me softly, knocking me out of my inner rantings as my gaze met her clear blue eye and black and white eye, "Are you okay?" I clicked my tongue in annoyance at my own cowardice before grabbing her hand and pulling it to my lips and kissing her wrist gently before releasing it and placing my hand on her hip.
"You have to promise that you will let me finish the story before you respond," I demanded, my voice not carrying as much of an authoritative tone as it did around the rest of our squad to which she nodded in understanding. I took a deep breath before starting a story that I knew I would hate to relive, steeling myself against the negative emotions I knew I would be dealing with in telling it.
"After my mom died, I was taken in by a guy named Kenny who found me when I was near starvation," I started from the last thing I had told her about my past, "He fed me and taught me to fight and survive in the Underground. After a couple of years, he abandoned me, and I had to figure out how to make it on my own. Within a year, I was challenged by a group of thugs who I defeated and then decided to partner up with their leader, Furlan Church. He became the closest thing I had to a friend and we ran a business as thugs in the Underground, beating up people for those who paid us, stealing from MPs. We became pretty well known down there. Eventually, we managed to steal 3 sets of ODM gear from some useless MPs that were terrorizing people in the streets. That made us even more well known.
A couple of years later, a girl named Isabel showed up at our door being chased by MPs. Long story short, we decided to take her into our gang, and the three of us quickly became a sort of family I guess. We cared for the members of our gang, as much as we could afford to without going insane in that damned place.
Less than two years later, we were approached by a man who wanted us to take a job for a man named Lovof that we refused. Then he took one of our men hostage and forced us to take the job. He had us meet with his boss who told us we would be given citizenship above ground if we completed the job and told us that we would already end up involved even if we didn't want to. I decided that if the target made contact, we would take the job. Otherwise, we'd just continue on as we always had."
"What was the job?" Emmryn interrupted which I answered with a soft glare, not being fully mad at her because I was a bit nervous to answer that question, and pressed my finger to her lips. I sighed, irritated with myself for feeling like I needed to answer this question before I could continue my story.
"Our job was to kill Captain Erwin Smith."
My answer did not have the response I expected. Since Emmryn and Erwin had become much closer, I had expected her to jump out of our bed, punch me, yell at me, anything that would show hatred for me agreeing to take the job. Instead I got a slight widening of eyes before her soft pink lips pressed to mine gently.
"I'm not going to judge anything until you finish your story, Levi. I've seen how much you respect him now. Continue your story. I promise I won't interrupt again," Emmryn responded, her eyes focused on me with a small attempted smile that was more of a grimace, but I appreciated her level-headed thinking. Walls, this woman is something else.
"Basically, Erwin, Mike, and a couple of other officers managed to capture us even with us using our ODM gear. Erwin agreed to spare our lives and let us come above ground, but in return, we had to join the Survey Corps and participate in the next expedition," I continued growling at the memory of Mike smashing my face into the sewer water on the ground, "We had no other option. Besides, this would be the perfect opportunity to carry out our mission. So I agreed, and we were taken above ground to join the Survey Corps.
Our joining of the Survey Corps was approved by Shadis, and we were trained a bit under a squad leader named Flagon. We were on his squad for the 23rd Expedition. I tried to convince Isabel and Furlan to stay back from the expedition because we didn't know what we'd be facing with the titans, and I was confident that I could kill Erwin on my own without them risking their lives. They insisted on coming though, so we all set off on the expedition together. I should have made them stay."
I growled the last part more to myself than for Emmryn to hear; however, she clearly heard it as her soft pale hand cupped my face, stroking my cheek comfortingly with her thumb. No words left her lips, as she encouraged me with a nod and eyes that shined with understanding of what was about to come next.
"Long story short, Erwin's formation got messed up by an unexpected storm. I was separated from Isabel and Furlan, choosing to use the opportunity to go after Erwin alone. After failing to locate him and getting a bad feeling in my gut, I went back to where I had last seen Isabel and Furlan," I continued, taking a deep breath trying to keep myself stoic as Emmryn continued to rub soothing circles on my cheek, "When I reached there, I was too fucking late.
Both of them were killed by an abnormal titan. I had led them on this fucking mission. They died because of my decision to leave them behind. In a blind rage, I decimated the abnormal responsible for taking away the two people I had ever seen as family away from me. Erwin showed up shortly after I killed the titan, and in my rage, I lunged for him but stopped to vent my rage at him. He then told me that he knew about the mission from Lovof the whole time and that the documents we were to take after killing him were fake. The real ones had already been sent to Premier Zachary. He knew the whole fucking time.
Despite all of this, Erwin requested that I continue to come on expeditions and fight for humanity. He told me not to let my regrets dull my decisions in the future and to continue on. You know how he can be when he gets on the issue of philosophical bullshit." Emmryn let a small humorless laugh at this causing me to give her a small smirk. "But I guess this time his bullshit actually served a purpose. I've been in the Survey Corps ever since."
Emmryn smiled softly at me, pulling my face towards hers and pressing her lips comfortingly against mine. There were no words that could fix what had happened to Furlan and Isabel, just like there were no words that could fix what had happened to her in the Underground. We both knew that, and instead chose to find comfort in one another. At least we did until an annoying knock at my door interrupted us. Oh well. At least she knows everything. No more secrets.
"Captain! I have the paperwork you asked for, and the cleaning is done! Everyone is in the briefing room waiting for you and Emmryn," Petra's voice called out to which I called out dismissing her and letting her know we were coming.
I turned back to the woman in my bed. My wife. It was weird to think that way even though I had been the one who filled out and submitted all the paperwork for it to be approved by Zachary and Eyebrows. Feeling as though a bit of a weight was lifted off of my chest, I pulled Emmryn into a passionate kiss which she returned. I could feel her smile into the kiss as we separated. She laid her head on my chest and spoke, her voice soft, but strong.
"Thank you for telling me, Levi. I'm glad you ended up staying with the Survey Corps," she admitted nuzzling slightly into my chest as I wrapped my arm protectively around her before she looked up at me and smiled again, "As much as I would love to just cuddle you the whole night, we have a meeting to get to." I nodded in agreement as we got up and headed to the meeting room since we still had our uniforms on from earlier.
-Time Skip to the meeting (Emmryn's POV)-
I felt so much better after talking with Levi and was thankful for the talk he and I had before the meeting. I was still amazed that he had been so willing to share all of that with me, but it made me really happy and like I understood my lover just a little bit better.
"Hey Emmryn, do you think any of the trainees from your batch will join the Scouts?" Petra asked excitedly once we were all at the table with our teas. I gave her a small smile.
"I figure Eren's two shadows will join us, but other than them, I'm really not sure. I can tell you for sure that there are three I won't be expecting from the top ten," I informed them, earning curious glances from everyone at the table which turned to Eren.
"Your shadows got a name, Greenhorn?" Oluo interrogated and I chuckled as Eren looked confused.
"What's so funny?" Eren yelled at me, jumping up irritated before sitting down following what I could only assume was a glare from my overprotective husband. I leaned back in my chair and stared at the ceiling before drinking some of my tea.
"I'm talking about Armin Arlert and Mikasa Ackerman. I'm pretty sure we almost got to witness a fight between her and Levi in the courtroom if Armin hadn't held her back," I explained with a small laugh at the thought, "That could have been pretty entertaining come to think of it."
"Enough, Emmryn. Quit instigating shit. We're not here for a gossip session. Walls. Two years with these brats and you're acting too much like them," Levi scolded, irritated by my obvious entertainment with the Shiganshina trio. Meeting Levi's steel gray eyes, I saw how serious he was and decided not to tease him anymore. Everything that had happened in such a short time, along with reliving a difficult part of his past, was wearing on him, and his already small level of patience was quickly wearing thin. I nodded and sat up straight in my seat, sipping my tea silently as the meeting began.
-After the meeting-
We were all sitting at the table still. The meeting had ended, but Levi had not yet dismissed us. He had informed me during our walking to the meeting that Hange was coming to meet with Eren. Almost on cue, there was a bang on the long door, indicating that the crazy scientist was here. Petra removed the bar from the door, and Hange bursted through holding her no doubt aching head.
"Good evening, Squad Levi!" she greeted excitedly before turning to me and Levi with a suggestive wink, "And a special congratulations to the newlyweds! I see you two took my advice and fucked and made up!" As I was about to yell at her, Levi's voice interrupted.
"Obviously. What of it," Levi confirmed bluntly causing my face to turn scarlet and glare at my raven-haired lover who seemed unaffected as Petra and Oluo stifled giggles, and Eld and Gin just gave uncomfortable smirks at my embarrassed expression, "And, you're early." After that, I was too busy glaring at Levi who was flashing me small smirks from behind his teacup as Hange spoke with Eren. I finally tuned back into the conversation when I heard a phrase from Hange that told anyone that knew her to get out, now.
"I see you too have a similarly curious mind, Eren! I'm so delighted!"
At that statement, the entirety of Squad Levi, minus Eren of course, gave the poor boy sympathetic looks as we all returned to our barracks. Levi walked on ahead of me giving me a chance to be teased by our squad mates.
"I knew you two were fucking!" Oluo started smugly while leaning on my head, earning a swift elbow to the rib as I glared up at him before smirking. Two can play at this game.
"Honestly, Oluo if you needed an image in your head to jerk off to that bad, I'm sure you could have done a bit better with your imagination than just picking the two strongest members on Squad Levi to imagine banging," I teased causing his face to go red, "Besides, I never denied being with Levi except when we weren't actually together. All I did even before we got together was stand up for your obnoxious ass. I'll be accepting a thank you at any time for that by the way." The rest of the squad laughed at this as Eld placed his hand on my head and affectionately ruffled my hair.
"It really is great to have you back, Emmryn," the blonde smiled as he continued, "And we all wish you and Levi many happy years together." Petra and Gunther nodded in agreement with kind smiles, and even Oluo gave me a kind smirk despite his blush.
"Thanks guys. I missed you guys a lot while I was at training," I admitted shyly with a small smile earning chuckles from everyone.
"Oi, quit monopolizing my wife and go the fuck to sleep. We have an early morning tomorrow, and I will not tolerate anyone being late," the baritone voice of my lover rang out in the hallway as we all turned to see him with an almost unnoticeable smirk that allowed all of us to give him a salute before the squad members continued to their respective barracks and I to my lover.
Yeah… It really was good to be back…
Song: So Ist Es Immer by Hiroyuki Sawano
A/N-
I am fully aware that Levi's description is not 100% in order with the way the events were in the No Regrets OVA. I was just trying to get a bare description of it and surely missed some details and got some wrong. I also know that the dialogue that I use in the various meetings and such will not be word for word like the anime. Frankly, I write most of these at 2 or 3am when my daughter and husband are asleep, so I use the time for looking them up to sleep. Sorry. I hope you all are still enjoying the story anyways :)
