Okay so I know I should be working on A Second Chance. In my defense, I was studying for a test I have literally tomorrow, and it got late so I opened up my docs to work on the next install, but then I saw this WIP, which was only an idea at the time, and next thing I know I wrote 6k worth of fanfiction.
I promise I'll get back to A Second Chance as soon as I can! In the meantime, enjoy!
Eren Jaeger is weird. This is common knowledge to virtually anyone that has exchanged more than three words with him, and that's not even counting the fact that he can change into a fifteen-meter beast when the mood happens to strike him.
No, Eren Jaeger has been weird since long before he found out he held the power to either destroy or save humanity from it's imminent extinction.
For one, his life goal is to kill every single titan alive, which makes the irony of said fifteen-meter titan residing inside him even bigger. This can be explained by a variety of situations though. Eren is a refugee from Wall Maria, worse, from Shiganshina. If the experience itself didn't make someone vow to never in his life encounter a titan again, then there's little more to do other than join the military to destroy them all. Doesn't mean hearing him speak about killing titans like it's the ultimate wet dream gets any easier, especially while one's eating, but it's understandable, excusable.
The titans took everything from him. No one will fault him from wanting to take everything from them.
But that's not all. No, Eren's obsession with titan killing isn't at all that concerning - most of the time, at least. It gets a bit harder to work with it when works himself to exhaustion while trying to get better using the 3DMG, but what can you do. His seemingly dual personality isn't it, either, though it can be a little bit creepy to watch him go from impertinent, borderline murderous teenager to resident sunshine and rainbows, or worse, mister perfect little soldier (admittedly, this one only appears when around Captain Levi, so maybe it isn't a personality trait as much as some form of weird infatuation).
No, it's something else, something hidden behind bright green eyes a blinding smile, overshadowed by his hardwork and willingness to make himself as useful as he can to this war.
At first, it's nothing big. They are sitting on their usual table, eating dinner after a day full of training. Eren looks about ready to pass out right then and there, but he dutifully shovels food into his mouth, barely stopping to breath.
"You eat like a savage," comes Captain Levi's flat comment, face contorted in slight disgust as he watches his charge eat like the world is ending, even in his half awake state.
"Huh?" Eren momentarily looks up from his food, cheeks puffed like a chipmunk's, and Levi grimaces.
"You know the food won't go away, right? No one will steal it," Gunther says with amusement, and Eren's cheeks turn pink. He looks down on his plate, a contemplative look in his eyes, and hums. He then resumes eating.
No one thinks much of it. The kid just finished transforming into a big ass titan, which is probably as draining as various days of non-stop training. They can't really fault him for eating like this is the last meal he will ever have.
(If Levi makes sure to leave some bread for Eren while he's locking him up in the dungeons, then no one needs to know.)
The first time his new squad notices there is, indeed, something weird going on, is a little after a week after Eren's arrival, just a few days after the rest of his trainee batch has been shipped off to their new barracks. Captain Levi has planned a survival exercise, four days and three nights in the middle of one of the forests near headquarters. If asked, he'll say he's done it so his team can learn at least some competence on how to survive on the off change they get stuck in the middle of nowhere while outside the walls. In reality, he's just that desperate to find a way to get Eren out of Hange's claws and experiments. Poor kid looks about to keel over any second now, and if he has to make his entire squad go around the wilderness for a few days so the kid can at least get some rest from shifting, then he'll do it.
But he will never say it out loud. Ever.
This is how the soldiers in Squad Levi find themselves arguing about just who lost most of their supplies. Eren, bless him, tries to take the blame - I should have paid attention, I'm sorry - but Levi is quick to shut down that particular train of though, since it should be down to the responsible, experienced soldiers, to know they have to check their supplies before changing locations.
Also, he lost the supplies on purpose. If his squad cannot go on without a little bit of inconveniences, then Levi must know so he is at least aware of how many children he's actually leading. And maybe he's still a bit mad about how they have treated Eren since his arrival. The kid is just too precious, alright? Those green doe eyes kinda grew on him.
"It's alright though," Eren intervenes when it looks like the rest of the squad won't stop arguing like toddlers.
"Hah? What do you mean it's alright?" Oluo sneers, but Eren ignores it, instead turning to look at the Captain.
"We only lost our food, right? It's not like a little bit of hunger will kill us, we can just wait until we have to get back," he says it like it's the most natural thing in the world, like they aren't supposed to be inside the forest for two more days. Levi raises an eyebrow, contemplative, but doesn't comment.
The other's don't have the same idea though, and their reactions vary from mild horror to bull blown outrage (well, Oluo is outraged. The other three go more for the horror).
"Eren, that's—" Petra doesn't know how to express how wrong that whole sentence is, so she just ends up changing tactics and sighs. "Aren't you even tired?"
"Well yeah, of course I am. But it's not like I can't do anything, I'm just hungry," Eren shrugs if off, missing how Petra's wide eyes communicate with Gunther's. What the fuck?
Finally, it's Eld who offers another solution. "We can find something to eat here, there must be some animals around."
"Oh. Yeah, I guess that works too," Eren humms, apparently not minding either option. "Is that okay with you, Captain?"
"Yes. Petra, Gunther, you two go find something. Eld and Oluo can find some wood to make a fire, and Eren and I will set up the tents," jobs distributed, they all split up, and it doesn't take much for them all to forget about Eren's comment.
(Once the rest of the squad leaves, Levi takes out a ration bar and a piece of bread, and asks Eren is he wants to share with him. When Eren asks where he got it, Levi gives him a small smirk before shoving half the bread in the shifter's mouth.
Just because most of his Squad are rude shits doesn't mean he'll let his brat go hungry, no sir.)
After that, everyone starts worrying about the preparations for the oncoming expedition, and their training as the Special Operations Squad, who now have to account for a possible fifteen-meter titan in their formations. Understandably, it's easy to forget about small things like a stray comment here and there when you have to plan for a massive organization of troops on how to not die, or try to at least.
That doesn't mean they don't notice, though, oh no, they certainly notice.
Most days, it's Levi who's in charge of locking Eren up for the night, as well as opening up his cell during the mornings. But there are times when matters of greater importance - though Levi will certainly say that everything takes precedence over paperwork, or goddesses forbid, a tactical meeting with Erwin and the other Squad Leaders, ugh - and so the task falls to one of the other members of the squad, since Eren technically still has to be accompanied by at least one of them if Levi is not present.
One particular day, said task falls onto Eld, who unfortunately lost at poker the night before, so he now has to babysit a early riser, teenage titan shifter. Honestly, waking up before nine am on a free day should be punished by law. But here he is, awake at fucking seven and a half in the morning, getting down to the dungeons to unlock Eren's cell because his Captain is another one of those weird beings who like to wake early, and so he expects Eren to be ready by seven on the dot.
A shudder goes through Eld at the thought of waking up this early every day. He swears, he's surrounded by monsters, and he's not even talking about the fact that one of them is a superhuman and the other can turn into a titan.
With the help of an oil lamp, Eld quickly makes his way down the stairs until he gets to the dungeons, where Eren is already waiting for him, dressed for the day and not looking tired at all. He even looks cheerful, the freak. No one should be this happy in the mornings.
"Hey, Eren, sorry I'm late, I'm not used to waking up this early," as if to prove a point, a yawn makes its way up Eld's throat, and Eren smiles.
"It's alright, I know you're doing me a favour by letting me out this early. You can nap on the fields while I work on my hand to hand if you want," Eren offers, and it sounds so fucking fantastic Eld doesn't have much trouble agreeing.
As he goes to unlock the cell though, he notices's something peeking from under Eren's bed. He can't be sure, since the only light he has comes from the oil lamp he brought with him, but he would swear those look like ration bars.
He must be mistaken though, because why would Eren have those in the first place? They do give them with every meal, but it's planned as part of their actual food intake, not for storing. They have a share of those specifically for long term expeditions.
Whatever, he must be too tired. With another yawn, Eld lets Eren out of his cell, and together they make their way to the training grounds. Breakfast will be served at nine thirty, since it's a free day, so for now Eld thinks he will indeed take that nap Eren talked about. The grass does look incredibly appealing in his sleepy state.
He would notice later though, how Eren would save his ration bars during breakfast, lunch, and dinner, leaving it uneaten even as he wolfs down the rest of the food, and taking it with him after he's done. He relays this information to the rest of the squad once Eren has left to hang out with his friends from the 104th before bedtime.
(That night, when Levi is once again there to lock him up, he gives Eren a big bag, big enough to fit all the rations stashed beneath his bed and leave enough space for more.
"If you're going to save them, do it on a clean space. I don't want you catching any weird diseases because you ate something from the floor," he says, even if both of them know it would not be a first for Eren.
"Thank you, Captain," is the soft response Levi gets in return, and he leaves after one nod, features softened by the lack of good lighting, leaving the oil lamp behind as he closes the cell.)
Next, there's The Boar Incident. While not bad, it certainly deserves capital letters, because damn if it wasn't a surprise.
It is a widely known secret that the existence of the Survey Corps is hanging by a thread. That means, among a lot of other bureaucratic things, low founding, which can be a pain in the ass when recruits have just joined and they haven't yet have an expedition, because while it means they have more manpower, it also means they have to arm, clothe, feed and house said manpower, and with the exceedingly high rate of recruits this year - twenty! They have twenty new recruits, almost twice as they normally have! The sudden influx from the Southern Training Camp can be easily explained by the Trost Battle, though why would the trainees get the sudden urge to join after seeing the titans remains a mystery - it means something's gotta give.
Between ordering blades and 3DMG equipment and keeping the castle up and running to Captain Levi's standards and expectations - which, with the amount of bleach he orders, one would think he cleans the whole of Wall Rose, rather than just the castle - during times like these, food often gets the smaller end of the stick. In English, they don't get food.
Or well, they do, just not enough to have a large group of physically active men and women well fed three times a day.
Most of the Survey Corps are used to this - they do have to get through this once a year after all, so they either get used to it or very well die on the closest expedition, which would certainly help the problem with the food shortage but also defeats the purpose of having new recruits - but of course the newly appointed recruits from the 104th regiment have never experienced this. As trainees, they got bland food and porridge, sure, but at least they got plenty of it.
The most vocal about their predicament is, predictably, Sasha. Girl complains about food on good days, let alone days like these ones. It gets so much that, during lunch, Eren gets fed up and stands up in the middle of eating his food - something he never does because he doesn't even stop to breathe while eating, let alone stand up - leaving the mess hall without another word.
Huh. Weird. Oh well, it'll pass, and he has a free afternoon anyways. He has been working hard these last few days, and nothing has happened with his titan powers, so as long as he's back before dinner, no one will say anything if Levi and his squad leaves him alone to cool down. Better than having him rage in the middle of the mess hall, anyways.
They do not expect him to come back an hour later, appearing from somewhere in the woods near the castle, dragging a boar bigger than himself like it weights nothing - and damn, don't some of them feel lacking now that they're seeing this strength demonstration by a fifteen year old - going directly to the kitchens, where he shoos away whichever squad's in charge of making dinner that night.
"What is the brat doing?" Oluo asks out loud with wonder in his voice, having actually witnessed how the squad was kicked out of the kitchen. "Hey Captain, can he even be alone in a room full of knives?"
Levi keeps quiet for a moment. In truth, he hadn't thought about that - Eren may look a bit scrawny, but damn does that brat have some muscles there, maybe he can pinn him to a wall, is that an actual possibility? - but Oluo makes a very good point.
"No, he cannot. I'll stay with him, you can go back to yout duties," with that, Levi enters the kitchen… only to leave almost a second later, looking disgusted and mildly horrified. "There's no way in hell I'm staying in that room. Oluo, you do it. Just— don't let the brat stab himself by accident," with that, he leaves, most definitely to take a shower and try and wash away the dirtiness that overcame him with the image he just saw.
Now, Oluo is a brave man. He has taken down many titans, has stared down death in the face and survived countless of times, but even he is apprehensive if whatever awaits for him on the other side of that door can make Captain Levi of all people, turn around and leave without a glance back.
But he has orders, and Oluo will be damned if he doesn't follow them. And so, he takes a deep breath and enters the room.
He is not expecting to find a very focused Eren, covered from head to toe in blood, cutting down the boar he had dragged from the forest as he positions it so the blood falls on a bucket and not on the floor.
Small mercies, Oluo guesses.
"You look straight out of a murder scene," he says in greeting, leaning against the wall - not because he needs support or anything, it's just more comfortable this way, yes that's it.
"Hmm?" Eren lifts his gaze from where he was cutting the boar down some more, and then looks at himself. "Oh. Well, I wouldn't say so, a murder scene isn't that gross, but maybe that's just because the clothes stop the blood rush a little."
Okaaaay, then.
"I'm going to pretend I didn't hear that. What are you doing anyways?" Oluo is a little curious. It's not always you see a bloodied teenager draining a boar in the middle of a kitchen, after all, even if said teenager is rather strange. Whatever kind of ritual he's doing seems like a little overkill, if he needs so much blood.
"Well, I know we don't have a lot of food right now, I noticed now the portions got cut down after the rest of the recruits got here," he starts, leaving the bloodied knife on the sink - thank the Walls - as he holds down the boar so it drains faster. "And I know how to make meat last, so I thought if I could catch something, like this one right here, I could make something sustancial tonight," he finishes with a slight smile, which would be kinda nice - the kid does have an aesthetically pleasing face, after all - if it weren't because of all the blood on his face. As it stands, it looks kinda creepy, but Oluo tries not to take it to heart.
Oh, so he's actually going to cook? Well, that does seem more likely than the ritual Oluo was thinking about, even if the thought of Eren I'll-kill-all-titans Jaeger cooking is admittedly forheign.
"And where'd you learn how to do that," he points at that whole mess Eren is holding, and surprisingly, Eren laughs.
"I'm from an outer district town, so we didn't get a lot of meat from the woods in the interior. Most of the stuff we ate was fresh, and it's cheaper if you buy the animals alive. My mom taught me how to do this when I was, I don't know, six, seven years old? Somewhere around that," Eren then lifts the boar with surprising ease - or maybe not, given how he brought the whole thing by himself in the first place - and places is on the table before grabbing the knife again. "Most of the blood should be gone by now, so I'll skin it and then I can prepare some stew with half of this and dry the other half," he turns to Oluo, who still has his eyes on the boar. "Do you like stew?"
"... Sure. Yeah, I do," he says distractedly, unable to take his eyes off the animal as Eren begins to cut it open with practiced ease. It's morbidly fascinating, how he doesn't struggle to cut the thick skin off the boar, making clean cuts that gush out little to no blood. "You're really good at this."
"I've just had practice with a knife, that's all," Eren shrugs it off - and isn't that reassuring - and the boar is skinless in minutes. "Hey, I'm going to wash out all the blood and clean this so the Captain doesn't have a fit," he doesn't have to ask for permission, but Oluo does have to watch other him, so with a sigh he straightens up and motions the kid to come with him to the showers. They get a lot of stares while they walk, most definitely because of the horror show Oluo has trailing behind him, but no one dares to stop them, not even Mike, who looks both puzzled and intrigued, most likely having smelling the blood not to be human.
Later that night, they're having stew for dinner, and Oluo can hear Sasha Blouse sobbing from the other side of the mess hall. He doesn't blame her though, because damn if this isn't the best fucking stew he has ever had, hands down.
"Why isn't that you haven't cooked before, Eren?" asks Petra in between mouthfuls of stew, and yes, why is that?
"Um, well our squad doesn't get tasked with kitchen duty, and you guys freaked out when I held a spoon, I'm surprised you even let me near the knives in the kitchen," he says it like a joke, but the hurt is still there, and all the other occupants in the table sans Levi cringe at the memory.
Yeah, not their proudest moment, Oluo will admit that.
"From now on, I don't care what chores you're supposed to do, I want you to cook at least three times a week. Got that, Eren?" the shifter looks up in surprise when Captain Levi speaks, and after a moment, he nods, a small smile on his face. "I'll make sure that damned Four Eyes doesn't try to take you away for experimenting, so don't worry about that either."
"Thank you, sir," Eren looks, understandably, relieved with that new information, and the rest of dinner goes by without any hitches, only interrupted by the new recruits stopping by to thank - or more accurately, to sob out their gratefulness - for the food.
Eren just laughs and waves away the gratitude, but his gaze turns downright murderous when Sasha tries to take some stew from his plate.
"Sasha, how many times do I have to tell you to leave my food alone?" his eyes are dark, and he looks seconds away from committing homicide, but Sasha, and consequently the rest of the Southern Trainee Camp's recruits, just pout and roll their eyes respectively. Obviously, this is of usual occurrence.
"Fine, fine, I won't do it again," evidently, she will, and Eren knows that, because he just sighs and goes back to his food.
"One of this days Sasha, you'll try to take my food and I'll bite your fucking fingers off," he says, and Sasha giggles, but Oluo is not amused. Has she forgotten this kid can, in fact, pierce human skin with his teeth?
In the end, by the time everyone is done eating - and there are seconds, Eren managed to make enough for everyone to have fucking seconds, how? He knows the boar was big but it wasn't that big - they can all agree this is the most filling meal they have have in ages, even before the recruits got here their food wasn't so good.
Eren looks pleased with himself, and he informs Captain Levi that there is plenty of meat left that he set out to dry so they can preserve it, and Oluo swears the kid fucking beams when he receives a pat in the head as a reward.
(When Levi comes down to lock up for the night, he brings a pot of hot tea and a couple of teacups with him, alongside a small pouch with dried meat he got from the kitchens with his officer priviledges.
They share it. Levi doesn't leave until the sky is clear again.)
Unfortunately, having three evenings free of chores to cook means Eren has to make up for them when he's not feeding their army. Levi tries to control how much Eren is allowed to shift per day, and how many other things he has to do when he's not actively training his shifting. When he's not running experiments with Hange, he turns Eren into his personal secretary, all in his efforts for his brat to not overexert himself. He tells exactly that to Erwin when he asks, suggesting that maybe Eren's abilities could be used elsewhere.
"You and Hange are already running him thin, I won't contribute to making Eren pass out from exhausting. If that means having him staple all my paperwork and making me tea, well then, when he's not turning into a fucking titan, that's the only thing he'll do under my supervision," Levi's tone leaves for no arguments, and Erwin leaves the Captain's office with a pleased smile on his face.
Even then, the increased shifting starts to take a toll on Eren's physique. It's barely noticeable at in the beginning, but after the first three days even Hange is worried enough to get out of their titan frenzy, checking on Eren's weight and sugar levels.
Of course, the results come out awful.
Coming as a surprise to absolutely no one - Levi told them, didn't he? He fucking told them to be careful of how much they pushed his brat, but did they listen? No, of course not, they fucking didn't - Eren has lost more than thirteen pounds in three days, and Hange's guess as to why he hasn't passed out from lack of sugar is purely because of his titan abilities holding him together, somehow.
After a very long conversation with Hange, one which may or may not have involved various threats to maim and or kill their precious titan pets, it is decided by Levi - fucking finally, someone listens to him in this damned place, it's not like he's the one in charge of Eren or anything - that Eren can't shift more than three times a day, and that he cannot, under any circumstances, shift two days in a row. Hange - and Eren, that self sacrificing idiot, does he not think of his own health? - is predictably disappointed, but Levi pays it no mind.
(He also makes sure Eren gets double servings for each meal, watching in satisfaction as he eats everything.
His brat won't go hungry on his watch, oh no, he won't.)
After that, things seem to quiet down some. Everyone seems to finally get back to their routines, once the novelty of Eren the Titan Shifter starts to ware off, and it becomes just oh, yeah, Eren is training right now, huh, I guess that's a good way to use a titan, we've been needing to change that roof anyways. Which is why when Eren makes a comment during dinner one day, his squad becomes livid.
"Sleeping in the dungeons isn't so bad, actually," he's saying, and they don't even know how they got into this topic of conversation in the first place. "I mean, it gets a little cold sometimes, but I run hot anyways, so I barely notice. It's a lot better than how the MPs were treating me before my trial either way," he keeps chewing on his food, not noticing how the rest of the table has stopped eating, and are now staring at him.
Petra watches as Captain Levi slowly sets downs his spoon, looking at Eren with a blank mask that she's sure hides a lot of fury.
"What do you mean? Did they do something to you?" his voice is deceivingly calm, and Eren must not notice the obvious edge it has, because he swallows before answering, happy to be able to do something for his Captain.
"Oh, nothing much. They just wouldn't give me food. Said it was a waste on a monster. They did give me water though, and they left me alone for the most part, I think they were scared of me or something, so I guess it wasn't all that bad."
"They what ?" Petra gasps, because obviously Eren is missing the part where he was held captive by the Military Police for a whole week before his trial, out of which he spent the last four awake. "Eren, why didn't you say anything?"
"Oh, it's alright. It's not like I was expecting much from them, to be honest. They've never been all that helpful, even when I was a kid," he half smiles, like he remembers an inside joke, but Petra keeps gapping.
"Eren," he looks back at the Captain again, who stares at him with such an intensity, Petra wonders how Eren doesn't cower from it. "I want you to describe every single guard you had during your stay at the courtroom for me. Every single one. Alright?"
"I— yes, of course, Captain. I don't know their names though," the kid looks confused, and Petra supposes she would feel sympathetic for him - the Captain can be really unexplicative when he wants to, after all - if it weren't because she's still horrified from what she just heard.
Isn't he just fifteen? A kid, barely legal only because he needs to be to graduate the Training Cadets? How could anyone do that to a child?
"A physical description will do. Come to my office after dinner," the topic is closed after that, and no one dares to speak up again.
That night, Petra thinks over what Eren has said to them since he joined, and wonders.
(During the next couple of days, some of the higher ups from Military Police end up with a series of broken bones and bleeding wounds. When asked about it, Erwin just raises an eyebrow, and questions if they really think the Survey Corps has the manpower and the motivation to go through such an attempt at another branch of the military, specially so close to their expedition.
Levi allows himself a smirk as the pigs they sent leave with their tail between their legs, before he sets off on finding Eren. He needs him to sort some paperwork with him, and maybe make them a cup of tea so they can eat the pastries he bough in Trost the other day.)
Things finally reach their breaking point three days later, exactly a week and a half before their expedition. They're having breakfast before setting out to train on some group maneuvers for when they get to the forest during their expedition, and because their Captain is a weird kind of monster that can survive on four hours of sleep, willpower, and spite, they're all up an hour before usual, so the mess hall is deserted besides their table.
Gunther looks at his plate, holding a single bread loaf, some porridge, and his usual ration bar, and grimaces. It's not bad food, but after a while it just gets boring.
As if reading his thoughts, Oluo speaks up.
"Why must we always have this thing for breakfast?" he moans as he looks at his plate. Almost immediately, Eren scowls.
"At least you have food on your plate every day," he says on a low voice before shoving another spoonful of porridge into his mouth.
"What'd you say?" Oluo sneers at him, but the shifter doesn't cower, and stares back.
"I said," Eren forcefully says. "That at least you have food three times a day, every day. So what if it's not the best food in the world? Food is food, appreciate it," he huffs, and then adds in a lower voice. "Not everyone is that lucky, you know?"
The other occupants on the table - except Levi, who's too busy staring at Eren, like he usually does these days - share glances. What is that supposed to mean?
"Eren?" he looks up from his food when Petra calls his name. "What do you mean by that?"
Eren just stares at her for a moment, then he looks at the rest of his squad. He leans back on his seat, like he honestly can't believe what he's seeing, before laughing humorlessly.
"I'm from Shiganshina. You know, the city that was first overrun by titans?" still no reaction. Eren sighed again. "I didn't think I'd ever have to explain this to anyone, but oh well. When the titans kicked in the wall, they didn't exactly give us time to gather our stuff before they started to eat us. My house was— it was destroyed by rubble. All our documentation was in the city hall, and obviously no one stopped by on their way to the boats. I'm an orphan, my mom— she was eaten by a titan, and my dad, well I don't what the fuck happened to him, but I haven't seen him since. I escaped with the clothes on my back, nothing more."
He looks up from where his eyes had strayed to the table, meeting gazes full of horror and pity. He ignores them.
"Do you know how it was for undocummented refugees? And that was before the famine started. I bet you all were already in the military, if not the Survey Corps, then the Training Cadets," they all look down, because it's true. They've all been at least six years in the military, and were already enlisted by the time the titans made a hole in Wall Maria. "Well, I was a ten year old on the streets, and after the first week, the MPs stopped giving out rations for everyone. After the third week they stopped giving rations at all, saying people without papers didn't get food. Armin's Grandpa took care of us for a while, but then the culling that was the effort to retake Wall Maria happened, and he got sent away to die, so it was just me, Armin and Mikasa, and then winter came, and there was no food, and people started killing off the pets, and the corpse merchants appeared, and we were all so hungry," there's something in Eren's eyes, something primal that speaks of survival and trauma, that sends shivers down their spines. "During our second year, we went inside the forests. It was easier that way, since it wasn't like we had somewhere else to go, and the corpse merchants didn't wander that far from the alleyways, so we didn't have to worry about being killed off in our sleep, on top of everything else. In the end, we were just praying we would all make it by the time I was twelve and we could join the army."
"Eren, I'm—" the words get caught in Petra's throat, and Eren scoffs.
"I didn't tell you so you can pity me. I just want you to value what you have, because even now there are still people out there who don't have food, or warm clothes, or a roof over their heads, and when I was on the streets, I would have given anything to have this same meal every couple of days, let alone every single one," with that said, Eren gets back to his food, topic closed, but they now notice a lot of things that make much more sense. How he eats like the food will be taken away from him, how he never complains about the portions, how he talks so nonchalantly about going hungry.
It has all happened to him before, when he was barely a kid.
They never speak of it again, but Eren still finds himself with extra food from time to time, every time he mentions being hungry. Eren would smile - a small smile, but a real one - and keep it, missing the satisfied expressions of the squad who has come to consider him one of theirs.
(When he's called to Captain Levi's office three days later, he is given two certificates.
"These are citizenship papers for Ackerman and Arlert. We tried to get you some too, but the pigs wouldn't let us registrate you under anything other than weaponry for the Scouts," he looks angry, but Eren smiles and closed the gap between them as he kissed his cheek.
"It's alright. At least that way they can't complain about fraternization issues, since I'm technically not a soldier," Levi stares at him for a moment, before a scoff makes it out of his mouth, a slight smirk forming on his lips.
"Cheeky brat," Levi murmurs as Eren rests his chin on the top of his head.
"Yeah, yeah, you like it anyways.")
Hi, I just wanted to say that there are no fics with starved!Eren, and I? Need them? I ended up making this a lot less angsty than I originally planned to, but this trope has so much potential, and I have such a hard time finding fics from the time before they joined the military.
If you guys have any recommendations on that (like similar to Morally Unethical, The Shit Eren Does, Bang-Up Job, Shall His Blood Be Shed, that kinda stuff) please tell me because they are my favourite kind of fics!
A always, you can con talk/yell/whatever at me in tumblr, I'm patolemus there as well.
I'll be back with the next instal for A Second Chance soon. Until then!
Stay safe! Kudos!
Pato