Eren wasn't sure how, but he was up at the crack of dawn. Actually, he knew why. Because when you have to sleep on the streets, you don't want to be asleep when everyone else gets up. Or when the owner of the stall you're using as a makeshift shelter gets there. So Eren was up and awake, though a little groggy as he looked around his and Armin's room.
It was simple as all hell. A desk, two beds, and two chests for personal belongings. In Eren's case, this meant one spare outfit that Hanji had so lovingly forced upon him.
And Eren was happy. He was happy to be in a room with a roof, four walls, and a floor that wasn't half rotted or completely missing. He was happy to have an actual bed. He would have loved to stay in it, but again, the years on the street kept him from doing so. So Eren started to clean his side of the room quietly, so not to wake Armin.
And Eren made sure he did the best he could. If cleaning was going to be his job on this ship he should at least do it right. So he made his bed, swept the floor, and wiped down his chest, the desk, and the port hole that allowed some light in from the sun.
Once he was done there, Eren changed, put on his bandanna, took his dirty clothes to the washing room for later, and went to the kitchen to see if any of the kitchen staff was up. As soon a he opened the door, the smell of fresh tea settled in his nose. Eren stepped in and saw that Mike was at the stove, finishing setting up a tray that would be heading to the Captain's quarters.
"Eren?" Mike asked after he sniffed the air. Eren was completely confused on how the man knew it was him. "It's your smell." Mike answered, as if he had read Eren's mind. "It's still earthy from sleeping on the ground. But you smell clean enough to be able to go to the Captain's quarters." Mike turned with the tray in hand and gave it to Eren.
"And I doubt Erwin told you, but it's best to get the quarter deck clean before Gunther and Farlan get there with the other navigators. And you don't need to clean the crow's nest. That's rigger territory." Eren nodded with a smile.
"Thank you Mike." The tall blond man nodded before turning to begin making breakfast for the crew.
Eren headed up to Levi's cabin and debated all of ten seconds on if he should knock or just barge it. Needless to say that the door opened with no knuckle contact and Eren was met with a very pissed off Captain glaring at him from his desk looking over maps and letters.
"You ever heard of knocking you shit? If Shit Specs didn't tell you, fucking Eyebrows did. You do not, under any circumstances, just waltz into my damn cabin without fucking permission. So why don't you fucking try this again." Levi growled out. Eren just looked at him for a second.
"If I leave this room, I'm not coming back for an hour." Eren said. "So if you want your tea, just let me give it to you. You can return to whatever it is pirate captains do, and I'll start cleaning the ship." Eren walked into the room more and placed the tea on a small table next to Levi's desk, having at least shut the door behind him and trying not to let the glare from that ice blue eye to bother him.
"You have been on this damn ship all of one fucking day, and you think you can fucking do as you please?" Levi asked, standing from his desk and stalking over to Eren. "Well let me give you a fucking news flash, cabin boy." Levi grabbed Eren by the collar. "I'm the captain of this ship. You will listen to my fucking rules, or you can walk the damn plank." Eren kept Levi's gaze.
"Excuse me, Captain, but if you want the ship clean, I need to go." Eren said. "I wasn't told I need to serve you your tea, so as far as this job is concerned, I'm done for at least another hour."
"Cheeky shit." Levi said as he let go of Eren's collar. "Get the fuck out of my cabin. And the next time you come, remember to knock first."
"Neptune forbid, I may walk in on you doing something indecent." Eren said before leaving and shutting the door harder than needed. And needless to say, every hour, more or less on the hour, Eren continued to NOT knock on Levi's door. And needless to say, Levi needed a LOT of tea that day, and the days following.
This relationship between Levi and Eren continued for a month. In that month, Eren had made friends with most of the crew, had rekindled the friendship with Armin easily, and might as well have adopted Petra and Hanji as his new mothers and Mike as his new father. And Isabel might as well become his sister because the two got in more trouble than the entire crew thought was possible, and Hanji loved every second of it.
"You know Eren." Armin said as he, Hanji, Isabel, and Eren were all in the medical ward, the former three working on plans for a communication system for the ship while the latter was collecting dirty clothes and a message for Erwin from Isabel about needing seven more bags of nails and new sandpaper the next time the ship docked. "You really shouldn't continue stomping on Captain Levi's toes." Armin continued as he began some calculations for one of the systems they were working on.
"When he stops treating me like a kid and like he's better than me, I might." Eren said as he scrunched his nose at one of the cloth bandages he picked up.
"He's top of the food chain on this ship." Isabel said as she looked at her blueprints of the ship.
"And you're at the bottom!" Hanji chirped as she clutched a piece of pipe and a wrench in her hands.
"That doesn't mean I deserve to be trampled over!" Eren snapped back. "He's insufferable. Degrading me, yelling at me, treating me like the shit you find on the bottom of your shoe after walking through the poorer parts of a shitty village." Eren growled. "And I don't know how many times he's yelled at me for not cleaning the ship right! I'm already on my hands and knees with a scrub brush on the floors and walls and only using the mop after sweeping to get the first layer of grime off the floorboards!"
"He's a bit of a clean freak." Isabel said with a small smile.
"I noticed." Eren pouted. "And Erwin fucking lied to me. He said the Captain's tea made him happy. I don't think that man CAN be happy."
"Probably not." Hanji said with a shrug as she put two pieces of pipe together. "But things have been a lot better since you got here."
"How's that?" Eren asked as he balanced the laundry in his arms as he tried to reach for Isabel's message.
"Captain Levi doesn't yell at us as much anymore!" Hanji says with a huge smile.
"Gee, thanks. Glad I could help." Eren said in a slight monotone. "I'll see you all at dinner." He said before leaving the room. Eren dropped off the laundry from Hanji's room in the wash room before going to find Erwin, only realizing that the blond man was in the Captain's quarters and it was also time for Levi's tea to be checked. So Eren did what Eren had been doing best, and just walked into the room.
"You see this shit." Levi said from his desk. "The fucker has learned nothing."
"Well all you do is swear at him." Erwin said as he looked to Eren. "You need to learn how to knock Eren."
"Yes, well. I have a message for you, Erwin, from Isabel." He handed the paper to Erwin before going to Levi's tea kettle and checking it, finding it still pretty full. so he wouldn't need one for a while. Eren heard a tapping on the outside window and heard Levi groan.
"The fuck is it." He said as he opened the window to allow a dove in. The bird quickly finding it's way to a perch by the window. It had a letter held in it's beak that Levi took. "It's from Krista." He said.
"Krista?" Eren asked. Erwin turned to him and nodded.
"She's a merchant that has allied with us and lives on our island with one of our riggers, Ymir. They're actually engaged if memory serves me right." Erwin said with a fond smile.
"Well, apparently she has some supplies for us. I'll go give Gunther and Farlan the coordinates and we'll be heading there. She apparently has a map for us. Fucking finally!" Levi said as he stepped out. "We can actually find something fucking worth it!"
"Hopefully she also has what Isabel needs." Erwin said as he quickly wrote a response for Levi to check as Eren left the cabin.
"All right you shits." Levi yelled, getting everyone's attention. "We're meeting up with our merchant. She's finally got her hands on a treasure map."
"We're meeting up with Krista?" Ymir called from where she was on the middle mast.
"Yes, we're meeting with your fucking wife." Levi called back.
"No married yet, Captain." She said again, and Eren just sort of smiled.
"Hey, Cabin boy." Eren's eye twitched as he turned to glare at the captain.
"Yes Captain?"
"Could you lose the fucking attitude? I need you to relay that we're meeting with our merchant to the crew below deck, preferably without being a shit." Levi said as he returned to his cabin to finish looking over maps and documents with Erwin, as well as look over their supply logs.
"Fuck you too." Eren growled before heading to do the task he had been handed, as well as finish collecting laundry.
I feel great writing this right now. And I'm liking having Eren and Levi sort of at odds.