the dream elixir

by vivafiction

this is only a place she goes in her nightmares to fall in love, until it falls inside out -—levi & mikasa.

the dream elixir.
characters: armin, eren, levi, mikasa, others.
notes: for selena, merry christmas. i stole some bullet points to make this.

…

i. a road she has taken before
happening again and again

…

The first time she meets him, he saves her life.

It is hazy and undefined when she looks back on their first time, tries to grasp for clear memories through the shadowy forest where she had nearly met her death. And Mikasa is grateful when she comes back empty-handed, because when she doesn't, she is weighed down with such a heart wrenching sensation of fear that it keeps her from falling asleep at all.

All she can remember is the avalanche of footfalls and the pinch of gigantic fingers around the braided rope of her hair. She has this nightmare for weeks, where she screams her lungs sandpaper-dry, screams for Eren and Armin and her mother and her father.

But no one comes, no one but him.

She twirls by the edge of her hair, her bangs blowing in the stale midnight warmth, moonlight toppling over the misshapen features of what she wants to call human but her brain tells her is not. Round, blue eyes stare at her inquisitively, and its other hand, a palm that could swipe down several trees at once, reaches for her body.

His blades gleam when he slices through thick fingers, a pirouette spiral with serrated weapons. And then her captor wails, steam hissing out of its knuckles, and Mikasa takes a deep, shuddering breath of relief. Her savior has a garden green cape draped around his shoulders and boots that blend into the black of night. She can see his hair whip around his face when he swivels, and there is a name for the instruments strapped around his hips that she cannot quite recall.

But he turns back for her, and gives a solid swipe of his blade through the ink-black of her hair, and suddenly the pressure of her plait unravels into shorn ends of hair. He catches her around the waist and tears her free from the giant's grasp, carrying her away from death with a steel swing like a pendulum.

…

ii. dreaming with eyes open
the indefinite boundary between

…

"It's the same damn dream," Mikasa mumbles into her coffee, dark eyes lost in the swirls of cream. "I have the same damn dream every night."

It haunts her until she wakes up, hyperventilating and snatching at the tangles of her hair and shaking underneath her sheets and crying, sometimes. And Mikasa thinks it will be okay once she realizes it is a dream, but then she tries to fall asleep and it assaults her again, unrelenting false realities. She can't sleep unless she wants to dream, and she can't dream unless she wants to have this dream.

So she doesn't sleep.

And Eren and Armin notice.

"It's the same dream," Eren echoes, "the one with the giant and the vigilante guy?"

"Not a vigilante, Eren. He seems a lot more skilled than just a vigilante."

Leave it to Armin to make sense of this vivid nightmare. It is a nightmare, nearly being killed by some unknown creature, watching blood spatter and blades spinning through a mimicry of human flesh. It is a nightmare when she looks into the eyes of this man who saves her and he recognizes her deep within dark irises.

Eren texted her after the end of the school day and that is why the three of them are huddled together in a corner of a Starbucks, and why her drink remains mostly untouched. Her frappuccino is starting to get cold; Eren's nose is dipped down into the whip of his drink and Armin sips casually from a Styrofoam cup to hide the vivid raspberry pink of his passion fruit tea.

"I've never met anyone who looks like that," she reminds the two of them. Short hair with shaved sides and narrow, icy dark eyes. As a matter of fact, she has never seen anyone with a cape like that, with a crest on the side like angel wings.

"Maybe it's a modern nightmare of Jack and the Beanstalk." Mikasa kicks Eren underneath the table, ignoring the high-pitched yelp he gives in return.

"Maybe it just means you need a haircut, then," he offers, lifting the end of her ponytail and dropping it. Mikasa doesn't kick him for that, solely because she has been contemplating the idea after the seventh night of this dream, where her hair hangs short around her face and slides into her eyes a little more.

"Maybe."

Mikasa takes a sip of her drink and ignores the ensuing argument about whether or not she could pull off such a drastic haircut.

…

iii. now, now, now that you're gone
there's something new here

…

Her dream changes for the first time in a week.

There is nothing around her except for dust and dirt, except for several harnessed contraptions stretched between solid beams. Mikasa is fastened into one of those leather harnesses, dressed in an outfit that looks all too familiar.

It is the same intricate uniform of her midnight savior with straps winding around her chest and thighs and tucking into her knee high boots. Mikasa's hair is shorn at the tips, too, because when she turns to look around some more it brushes up against her jaw comfortably.

Eren and Armin hang in harnesses around her, soundless, motionless. Eren's harness is tipped over so the tips of his hair brush against the dirt, face frozen in an empty expression. And Armin looks unsteady, but he doesn't move, except for when the wind catches his blonde hair.

"Armin?" Mikasa fidgets, but she can't crawl her way out of the harness as much as she tries. She twists herself to the opposite side where Eren is flipped. "Eren?"

Neither of them respond, but her voice echoes around her, infinite syllables blending together.

…

iv. how can you neglect this?
don't act like it is nothing at all

…

Mikasa slumps down outside of the auditorium just as Armin pokes his head into the hallway, looking down at her curled against the wall. He doesn't say anything and she is grateful for it, so she scoots over as he drops down beside her without a word.

She adores Eren; he has been everything for her over the years, her best friend, her family, her protector. But Armin is so much more of a subtle comfort, a hand on her back and silence surrounding, a smile in the middle of an exhausting day, a cup of coffee wordlessly handed to her in the early morning. And that is precisely what she needs right now.

"Come inside," he cups his hand on her shoulder, peeking at her with worried blue eyes, "there's an alumni recital and it'll get you out of the rest of your classes for the day."

That doesn't have to be thought about extensively. Armin helps her up and leads her into the auditorium, stage lights dimming overhead. Students pour into the front rows with their instrument cases, and the stage itself is littered with music stands and adults rolling things along the tattered wooden floors.

Armin and Mikasa scoot down a row of seats until they are at the end of the row, settling into the rickety fold down seats. Mikasa is aleart for an entire minute until the curtains sweep across the stage, closed, and the lights completely blink out. Then, she is a firm weight against Armin's shoulder, tucked underneath his jaw and closing her eyes.

She can't sleep, she doesn't dare sleep. So she simply closes her eyes to rest them, because she has been awake so long.

Resonating strings sound around her, violins and cellos being played as a gentle, sharp lullaby. An orchestra, her mind connects, and she doesn't need to open her eyes to enjoy the music. But Armin hums quietly beside her and she enjoys it even more, because these are the things that keep him occupied, that make him happy.

There is a stunning interlude of other instruments, something that sounds like a flute (but Mikasa knows a flute is not an orchestra instrument, thanks to Eren and Armin arguing about it a few weeks ago), so it must be something else. The score floats on, melodic pieces of music that keeps the entire audience silent except for intermittent claps.

"How do you guys know," her voice is heavy and drugged with sleep deprivation, "when to clap?"

Armin laughs, but he doesn't answer her, as if it is some musician's secret. She isn't curious enough to ask again.

It is the piano that wakes Mikasa up because its first notes are startlingly asymmetric to the rest of the beautifully arranged piece, heavy low notes that force her eyes open. And even though it sounds like a mistake, the cacophony slowly slips into gorgeous, sweeping sections rivaling only an angelic harp being played. Mikasa doesn't have much interest in music, but there is something about the sharpness of the piano in her ears that keeps her awake during the rest of the recital.

And it is all over before she can truly enjoy it.

Mikasa blinks and Armin is tapping on her shoulder repeatedly, calling her name. "Mikasa," he drags the syllables, and he jumps when she jumps in response.

"Sorry, sorry, Armin," she rubs her eyes and wobbles as she stands, sighing heavily.

Students are filing out of the auditorium, but Armin takes Mikasa's wrist and leads her in the opposite direction of the crowd, flowing towards where a small portion of people are slipping away. The band room.

"I'm just going to grab my violin," Armin mumbles, still shy, even though he has been playing the violin since they were little (and Eren still teases him, but they both still attend his performances).

She wrests her hands free and makes a point to move to the side, standing still in the first row of seats, and Armin nods. As much as she wants to slide down in the chair and sleep, she doesn't know what will meet her in her dreams this time around.

"Hey." Sharp, authoritative voice. It catches her attention to the point of her gazing around and looking for the owner.

He steps from behind the piano and Mikasa's face falls with stunning recognition, of that narrow face with shadowy eyes, that vigilante, that man who saved her. But he is real, not a dream, because he snaps his fingers and Mikasa shoots up into straight posture.

Fuck, she's not even an orchestra student. But still, she saunters over to where he stands. He looks too elegant to have ever graduated from this hellhole of a school, with a loose kerchief tucked around his neck and a suit jacket buttoned at his waist. He's shorter than her, a few inches, but it doesn't seem to bother him at all.

"Pack up this sheet music in order and then file it away for next week."

Who does he think she is? Mikasa slides over to the sleek, black grand piano, staring at the disheveled array of papers. She glances over her shoulder, but all she catches is his back as he exits the auditorium.

…

She tries not to think about that stupid pianist as she clutches the straps of her backpack and stands with the crowd of kids crossing the street to go home. She had picked out the page numbers and sorted the sheet music, even though she had no business doing any such thing, but when Armin reappeared, he dragged her from behind the grand piano and led her out of the auditorium again.

Mikasa barely notices that everyone has crossed the street, not until she takes two full steps into the road and nearly gets hit by a car.

Nearly, because someone's fingers catch in the handle of her backpack and drags her back towards the walkway. It doesn't stop her heart from hammering around in her chest, and she whirls around to pour gratitude on, well. There are those steely eyes again, glaring up at her.

"Stupid brat," he mumbles, pulling his hand back and folding it across his chest, "you need to stop spacing out in traffic."

…

"He saved me!"

She can sense Eren's exasperation across the dinner table as the two of them attempt to do their homework, but she ignores it.

"He saved me, Eren, just like he saved me in my dreams. That has to mean something, because I can't—"

I can't just let it go.

Eren looks up from his calculus problems, his brows furrowed together. "It's just a dumb dream," he says tirelessly, "and he's just some guy with basic decency."

…

v. don't look yet
things will get worse for you

…

Mikasa doesn't feel this dream the same way the other dreams are; this one feels as though she is contained within her own body twice, watching herself do something that looks so natural, and yet is not quite her. It almost doesn't feel like a dream because she can feel wrath and hurt and impulse explode in her veins, and a crowd of people, comrades, standing behind her as she leaps off of the building.

It feels like flying when she fires off her gear, soars through the air and between the streets. This is something that has always come naturally to Mikasa, and she hurls herself higher and higher until she freefalls, gas sputtering out of the back of her tank.

Eren, her mind thinks angrily, and tears choke their way up her throat until her gas gauge empties out and she crashs, dragging down shingles and skidding along the ground, scraped and bruised and hurt on more than just the outside.

Her breath is a stitch in her side and she doesn't want to move from where she has finally stopped rolling on the ground. It would be better if this distress, a heavy stone in her heart, would just kill her right then and there.

The last thing she thinks of in that moment is Armin's face.

…

vi. i want you to remember me
so please, please try

…

The pianist's name is Levi and he is doing an observation with the orchestra for the next week. Mikasa tries not to let that information stick, but she finds herself going to visit Armin more in the band room in the hopes that she runs into him again.

It takes her three days to catch him in the auditorium, playing a smooth, slow rendition of Clair de Lune. Mikasa knows because it is the music in his folder when she slipped the sheets away the last time they met, and she has listened to it once before.

He plays with his eyes half-lidded, but not completely shut. Mikasa stands in the doorway and watches the stretch of his small fingers over the keys, leaping from each ivory press to the next. Musical inclination has never come to her, so she doesn't quite feel the enjoyment she is always hearing others speak about. But his playing is seamless and comforting at the very least, she can acknowledge that.

Levi stops suddenly and picks his head up to stare directly at her.

Mikasa stares back. "Do you like coffee?"

He snorts, swiveling his head to sweep his bangs out of his face. "None of that shitty, Starbucks candy coffee."

…

Mikasa brings him black coffee with sugar the next day as she catches him playing the tail end of Clair de Lune, his fingers picking off the final notes at the end of the beautiful grand piano before he peeks up at her. She doesn't say anything, just hands him the paper cup and stands away as he takes a sip.

She forgets to take off the paper part with her name scrawled on the side, so when he calls out her name, "Mikasa," she nearly rears back and slaps him for an indeterminate reason.

"Wh—Yes?"

His eyes are on the side of the cup and her heart skips around in her chest, because what could he possibly want to ask her? "Have I met you before?"

There are half a dozen answers on her lips. Do you mean before yesterday or before you pulled me out of traffic? Before you made me put away your sheet music?

"Maybe, if you've ever been in a forest."

Mikasa wants to open the piano and crawl into it for answering that way, but Levi doesn't seem to immediately spurn her ideas. But he doesn't respond either; he just sips his coffee, apparently pleased with the taste of it, and stares at her with those silver-grey eyes.

"I mean, sorry, I just—"

"Shut up." It comes out clipped, but Levi's features are surprisingly soft, the rim of his coffee sitting underneath his lips. "You don't strike me as an orchestra student, Mikasa."

Mikasa's nails bite into her clammy palms, suddenly nervous. "I'm not an orchestra student, Levi, sir."

He takes a sip, his eyes pinned to her. Mikasa doesn't feel very confident about this because all she can think about the way he gripped her around the waist and hauled her to safety for a week of intense, sleepless dreams. "You seem to appreciate the piano just fine, however."

There is no way she can confess that it is him that she appreciates. So she smiles, and nods, and in a few minutes, he returns to playing a brand new piece altogether.

…

"You didn't do so badly on the coffee," he says as she shrugs her coat on, "get me another."

Mikasa's fingers freeze on the buttons of her peacoat, eyes wide, mouth open to oppose, when, "and hurry up, I'm ready to go, too."

…

They have coffee together. There is nothing to be self-conscious about, but Mikasa orders a latte with whipped cream, until she remembers that she doesn't like the whipped cream (she is entirely too used to Eren scraping it off and eating it), so she sips around the froth.

"Do you normally have coffee with the orchestra students?"

"I'm not a teacher, Mikasa," he says pointedly, sips, and then, "and you are not an orchestra student. Having coffee is not anything special, anyway."

Mikasa tucks her hair behind her ear. Ever since those dreams, ever since he sliced it into halves and yanked her away, it has felt so troublesome and messy falling over her shoulders. "Well, I suppose I can treat you for saving me the other day."

Levi's eyes widen, but then they fall back into impassiveness. "You should watch where you're going, you little shit."

She snorts, almost as if she is incensed by his words, but then she laughs. Nothing about his expression changes, but there is something different about his eyes that she can't quite place.

He finishes his coffee, but he waits until she finishes hers, too, to say, "Coffee would be great as long as you don't start calling it a date."

And then he leaves.

…

vii. i just wanna be loved
that's just the way it goes

…

Mikasa wakes up and her neck is stiff, rigid from slumping over. It's a terrible habit to wake up in Levi's bed, mostly because he is always gone before she wakes up, mostly because she hates waking up alone when she falls asleep beside him. And she sleeps with him because he doesn't deal with things as well as he should, he doesn't mourn, he doesn't cope, he doesn't move on because he doesn't acknowledge these things in the first place.

But Levi steps in through the door, completely dressed and staring over at her with those narrow, storm-grey eyes, and doesn't move from the doorway after he closes the door.

"You're still here," he says.

"You left."

He shrugs and moves over to sit on the edge of the bed, boots thumping along the floor with each solid step. "You didn't have to stay, you know."

She is starting to wake up more because she crawls across the space of his bed, tugging her bare legs up behind him and twisting herself so she can lean her head against his back, listen to the sounds of his breathing evenly. He is always trying to stay calm, always trying to mask everything that could give away his feelings.

"I'm not going to ask you," she mumbles against his back, and he tenses for a split second, almost unnoticeable.

"Good, so don't bring it up, Ackerman."

Levi's use of her surname is supposed to prickle at her nerves, but it only makes her sigh deeply, makes her press her cheek against the space between his shoulder blades. It used to, yes, but she knows that he does it to distance himself from her, and that should prickle at her nerves.

But she knows she must be close if he wants to push her away, and being close is good enough for her.

…

viii. i'm starting to feel something
there is something to feel here

…

Mikasa promises not to call them coffee dates, but it doesn't extend to anyone else. Armin is immediately excited about the prospect of having coffee with the talented musician, but Levi quickly nixes the idea of one of the orchestra students getting involved in his private life while he is still under observation.

Instead, she shares the stories of what Levi is like; those interest Armin the most and please Eren the least. The two of them seem to be on opposing ends of the spectrum when it comes to her interaction with the pianist. Eren thinks he is an egotistical jerk with a Napoleon complex while Armin sings his praises over his talents with the piano and suave appearance. (Mikasa thinks the two of them are right, but she doesn't do anything expect laugh.)

…

"You look like shit," he says when she sits down, and Mikasa levels a terrifying glare in his direction.

"Shut it, shorty. I'm just here for the coffee." She closes her hands around the cup and takes a sip, eyes fluttering closed to relish in the taste of it. But it takes her a few more seconds to will them open again, and Levi seems to pick up on her exhaustion.

"Skip this and go to bed, seriously."

For a moment, she thinks he might be concerned. And that mistake gives way to an unnecessary confession. "I keep having a dream, a lot of dreams, and you're in them. They're nightmares, really."

Her heart lurches with nervousness but she can't take it back, so instead she swallows as much scalding coffee as she can, hopes that it welds her throat shut. Levi arches an elegant eyebrow in her direction, and he is quiet for what feels like an eternity.

He reaches his hands across the table suddenly, cups them around her hands that still tremble over her cup of coffee. His eyes are clear, like a cloud. "This is the dream, Mikasa."

The braids on either side of her face unfurl, slips of black hair sliding to the floor with shorn ends.

…

ix. the wound inside your heart
and all of the ghosts inside

…

"Stop!"

Mikasa wakes up with Armin's hands braced on her shoulders, shaking her back and forth gently. Her lips are parted on another scream, and she stares at him with empty eyes before she folds herself into his arms. She doesn't cry, but Armin holds her tight, and that is all she really needs.

"You were screaming again, Mikasa," Armin says softly, fingers brushing through her hair gently. She wants to stay here, glued in his protective grasp, but she twitches slightly to move away. "Do you need to go visit Captain Levi again?"

This routine is so tiresome, because the dreams are so pleasant. Mikasa remembers the brisk scent of coffee in her father's kisses as a little girl, remembers pressing her head with Armin's and talking about what they might learn about in school, what would be out in the big wide world for them.

Mikasa has never heard a piano play before but she bets it is as beautiful as the one Levi plays in her dreams.

…

He doesn't flinch when he opens the door and she is wrapped in his blankets. Mikasa does this often, infiltrate his private room and make his problems her problems as a distraction. And he looks exhausted, but she knows he won't sleep because it is far too early and the kind of tired he feels is not one from sleepiness.

"More of those dreams, Ackerman?" His question is not really a question; he knows she has been having those dreams, so Mikasa burrows herself further into his sheets and watches him flit around the room.

"If you're not going to be ready to fight, then you're going to be useless in the next few days you know."

Right, Mikasa thinks, this stupid plan. She hates this plan because Levi is the one who sacrificed himself first, stretched the width of his label as Humanity's Strongest to encompass the weight of the world. He is the one who promised to die serving humanity.

And she was stupid for going along with him (and at the same time, she couldn't just watch him leave).

That night when he told her they would be sent into the woods to fight, that was the night she had her first dream.

…

x. you're talking in your sleep
i'm hoping you'll wake up soon

…

"Corporal."

Levi barely manages to lift his head to acknowledge her, but the small hint of recognition is more than enough from him. He is stripped of his cape and shirt, leaning his back against the wall, knees drawn up, but not close.

She moves until her cape is pulled from her own shoulders, crawling across the side of the bed to sit next to him. They touch, just barely, shoulder to shoulder. He tips his head to the side to look at her and his eyes look almost clear, vulnerable, instead of that hardened grey she knew once.

"This is our last night, Ackerman," he says in that familiar deadpan, but there is something soft in his voice, "I don't want to talk about it."

Her hair brushes the tops of her shoulders now, but is still remarkably short as she turns her head to him. Mikasa kisses his cheek, a somber action, before she rests her head on his shoulder, body curled beside him.

"Tell me about your dumb dream," he says lazily, "the one with the coffee shop."

All she can do is smile.

…

notes: ...they're both dreams, they're both real, whatever you want to believe, you believe that.