RivaMika Week 2 Day 4: Seven Deadly Sins

Title: saints and sinners

Rating: M

Fandom: Shingeki no Kyojin, Attack on Titan

Characters: Levi, Mikasa Ackerman, RivaMika

Summary: No one is ever innocent.

Notes: Apologies for my tardiness, but it was due to circumstances entirely beyond my control (i.e. a pseudo-hurricane!) In any case, I'm here! …With more character death. Try listening to this.

acedia

The hall is noisy and bustling with activity; putting several teenagers into a small space unsupervised will have that effect, no matter how battle-hardened said teenagers are. Technically they are being supervised, but nowadays, Levi isn't much good for anything, not even cleaning.

She knows it worries Hanji and the Commander; it even worries his subordinates, including herself, to some extent. Ever since the 57th Expedition, Levi has been nothing but a shadow of his former self. At first it was almost unnoticeable; through the trip to the capital and the battle with the Female Titan, he'd been his usual belligerent self. Ever since...

Levi was never talkative to begin with, but he began to speak less, not even bothering to give out to Hanji. He doesn't train the recruits with as much energy as he did before; Mikasa even beat him a few times while sparring. His old self would have taken offence to that, but all she got was a half-hearted congratulations and a day off. Recently his obsession with hygiene has subsided; Mikasa even spotted dust on his desk the other day.

Yet the worst part is his eyes. When Mikasa saw Captain Levi, the first thing that caught her attention was not his diminutive height, but how bright his eyes were. They glowed with fire, the burning desire to live and to fight and to survive...

But now Levi's eyes are as dark and gloomy as a starless night. The fire has been quenched and its embers swept way, leaving only charred wood and smoke. Hanji has confronted him, she knows, but their efforts were in vain; all Levi did was stare at them dead-eyed. They took their worries to Erwin, but neither could the Commander shake Levi out of his torpor.

Levi soon retires to his quarters, not even bothering to bid him goodnight. Mikasa doubts he'll sleep; more likely he will stay awake, fiddling with a bloodstained pair of wings.

–

The attack was sudden and unexpected, and as such they were not prepared. With only three miles to go the Titans had come, wreaking havoc on the rear guard. The expedition was going incredibly well up until that; they will return with only two thirds of their force, and less than half their horses. Mikasa's own horse is, however, still alive. With a steaming Eren slung over her saddle she gallops at a break-neck pace, blood splashing up where her mount's hooves land.

She scans the visceral landscape around her, hoping against hope to find a survivor among the many broken bodies, Titan and soldier alike. The sun is setting, painting the plains with soft red and luminous orange, giving the carnage a dreamlike quality.

Among the worst of the wreckage she spots a flicker of movement; she tries to get closer, but her horse shies away. She can't dismount; Eren's position is precarious, and she can't risk him falling and hurting himself. She looks closer and sees-

Levi. He is trapped beneath a decaying Titan leg, but he doesn't seem to care. The Levi of old would struggle and roar at her to get him out of this mess, but her captain now seems to accept his fate.

She moves to get her flare gun so she can signal, but Levi shakes his head, and nods when her hand drops. Something is passing between them, a strange understanding; Levi wants to die, and for once Mikasa will not defy him. Even she will not deny a dying man his final wish.

When she nods silently he smiles in reply, brief and mild. His eyes have regained some of their previous glow, and as she rides on he closes them, slipping into eternal sleep.

–

When Hanji asks her later (did you see Levi?) Mikasa tells her no. (I didn't see him... I'm sorry.)

She wakes up that night from her restless sleep to find tears on her cheeks and guilt in her belly.

avaritia

Dawn is upon them; pale golden light filters through Levi's bone-white curtains to fall upon the bed's rumpled sheets, damning evidence of the previous night's activities. He watches Mikasa as she awakes, eyes blinking upon and squeezing shut against the light. You would not think her to be an adult trained soldier; in this state, she resembles nothing more than a drooling child, what with the stain on his pillow and the tangled nest of her hair. He flicks her shoulder to shock her awake.

"Levi..." she mumbles, slapping his shoulder lightly.

"What?" He sits up, indignant.

"Do we really gotta get up?" The words are slurred, and her grammar is degraded by drowsiness.

"I do. You don't." He rubs his face in an attempt to rid it of the sleep that has formed around his eyes, cursing whoever thought it a good idea to hold a meeting in a town three hours' ride away at nine o'clock.

"No, you don't." Her words, though unclear, are firm.

"Yes, I do." He begins to get up, dreading the moment when his bare feet hit the cold stone floor-

But it never comes. He is yanked back forcefully, rolling over sheets and blankets to land flat on his back on the bed, Mikasa pinning him down. Her hands hold his wrists with so much strength he fears they'll bruise. He wriggles, trying to get out from under her; this is in no way cute, he needs to leave in ten minutes...

She distracts him the best way she knows how, lowering her lips to his neck and beginning to kiss down his jugular, close to the beat of his pulse. The sheets have fallen from her body, leaving her bare; the junctions of their skin feel electric.

"Mikasa, no..." His protests are less than emphatic, and they die altogether when she rolls her hips into his with vehemence.

"You wouldn't leave me to take care of myself, would you?" Her words are low with the promise of peril. "Stay." He acquiesces, closing his eyes as her fingers trail down his body.

But they stop, her hands jumping away from him as the door slams open, setting alarm bells off in his brain. He turns his head to see none other than Erwin in the door, eyes wide with shock.

The rules and regulations run through his mind (fraternization within the Survey Corps is strictly prohibited) and all he can say is "Shit!"

Mikasa hops off the bed, gathering her sheets around her and fleeing, brushing past a motionless Erwin. Levi stands up to face him, to accept the condemnation that is sure to come, judging by the Commander's face, and ignores the guilt weighing upon his shoulders.

gula

The attack is almost over. According to Armin's calculations, a wave of four-meters were supposed to reach north-eastern Wall Rose. Instead of sending a full expedition, Erwin decided to send his two best soldiers to head off the group and take them out.

It had gone even better than expected. When the Titans entered a forest, Mikasa and Levi attacked them and made short work of them. Out of fifteen, Mikasa counts eleven kills. Levi really didn't pull his weight.

Once she's done she drops down to the forest floor to land in a Titan lung. She grimaces and wipes the gore off herself. They need to leave now, before the dead Titans attract live ones. Where the hell is the captain?

Her question is answered by a faint moan of pain. She follows it to its source, only to find Levi crumpled beneath a tree, shattered blades discarded on the ground beside him. A Titan lies not three meters from him, its body mutilated and scored; obviously, Levi had some trouble dispatching that one.

"What the...?" She approaches him, noting the red splashed down the side of his face, the way he is cradling his arm to his chest.

"So now you turn up?" His words are bitter, spat out with venom.

"What do you mean, now? I killed almost all of these things for you!" The slight angers her.

"Well, you did a great job protecting me, didn't you? I was screaming for fucking help, Ackerman, except you were too busy 'killing all the Titans!', so you could go back and tell everyone that you pulled all the weight so you can get all the glory." He pauses to throw her a filthy look. "Don't even try to tell me that wasn't it. I know. I've been there."

She stares at him, speechless, realising that he is right yet refusing to admit it. The stand-off goes on for five minutes until Levi swears.

"Look, just get me onto my horse so we can get back and I can get fixed up and clean all this shit off me." When she remains immobile, he barks "That was an order, Ackerman!"

She complies, helping him to his feet and onto his horse, and spends the ride back watching the sky burn as the guilt presses down on her lungs until she can barely breathe.

invidia

"Are you sure it isn't love?" Hanji peers over their glasses, grinning like some stupid monkey.

"God, no. Who do you take me for? Kirschtein?" He swears, and Hanji begins to laugh outright. "Why I am I even telling you?"

"Because I'm the doctor!" They push their glasses up in a way that is probably intended to make them look intelligent. "Well, Captain, it sounds a lot like love to me. You feel sick around her?"

"Yes," Levi confirms, "unfortunately. She keeps beating me in sparring sessions."

"And you want to be around her?" Hanji continues.

Levi nods, taking another swig of ale. "God knows why. I'm just a glutton for punishment."

"But... you don't love her?" Hanji grabs the glass of him and takes a gulp.

"No... I don't even like her. I don't want to touch her, I don't want to see her smile, I... I want her to fail." The glass clatters against the polished wood as Hanji lowers it.

"You're jealous," they say quietly.

"Jealous? Me? Have you lost your mind? I'm stronger than her!" He stares at them, mouth ajar.

"Now, you are...but who knows what the future holds? She has all her friends, all these people who love her. She's young, strong and beautiful. You want what she has. What you've lost." Hanji's words are low, strange as opposed to their usual loud tone, and their eyes glitter with something he's never seen before.

Condemnation.

He drains the glass and thumps it onto the table with such force that it fractures, a crack splitting it up the middle. Moments later it shatters, shredding his hand and splashing red all over him.

"Beware of jealousy," Hanji sighs, taking his hand to examine it. "It is the green-eyed monster that mocks the meat it feeds on. Namely, you."

He snorts derisively, yanking his hand out of their grip. "Get a grip. Me? Jealous? Not in a thousand years." With that he exits, leaving Hanji to pick up the pieces and clean up the blood.

–

The next time he sees Ackerman, he has a sudden, brief image of wrapping his hands around her smooth white throat and strangling the life out of her; no sooner is it gone than the guilt begins to set in.

"What's wrong, captain?" she questions him, head tipped to the side. She's so vital, so young. It sickens him.

"Nothing," he mutters feebly. "Get back to work."

ira

She can't hear anything.

Armin's skinny fingers are curled around her biceps, his voice whispering logic -no, stop, Mikasa, it won't be worth it!- but she cannot hear his words, only the forceful buzzing of her rage in her ears and the thwack of heavy boots against pale skin and the snap of bones breaking.

"How dare he?" she mutters, nails digging into her palm as she watches this short bastard brutalise Eren. "My brother... how dare he?"

"Mikasa, no!" Armin grabs her by the waist and yanks her back; he is weak, always has been, but all animals gain strength when they are desperate. "If you go up there they'll think Eren's a...a..."

"A Titan?" she snarls, shrugging free of his grip. "Armin, I don't care if he's the Colossal Titan. That short bastard is not allowed to lay a single finger on my brother!"

And with that she swings herself over the barrier to land on the cold granite floor; the shock of impact sends spears of pain up through her calves, but she disregards it to run towards him. The court has erupted into roars and screams, yet the man beating her brother seems impervious, continuing with his gruesome task.

But no longer; Mikasa lunges at him and they crash into the stone floor powerfully, his head cracking against the ground. She pins him, wrapping one hand tightly around his throat and using the other to punch his face into pulp.

The violence feels good. Mikasa has spent so long confining her anger, cooling it and using it as a weapon to slash Titans' necks open. Doing this, doing what her blood impulse tells her (smash, tear, choke, break) feels cathartic, even as her brothers scream her name and implore her to stop. She can't. She won't.

The release is short-lived; it takes three men combined to pull her off the midget, and five altogether to restrain her after. They pull his unconscious body away, leaving a trail of blood along the grey stone. She hopes it stays.

Her brother screams her name as they drag her away down to confinement. She doesn't reply.

Later, when the lamps have been quenched, leaving her in total darkness, she receives a visitor. He brings no lamp, so she cannot see his face; instead, she judges both gender and identity from his grunts of pain. The short man from the Survey Corps. He halts in front of her cell, dragging his fingers along the bars.

"Well?" he wonders out loud. "Was it worth it?"

She doesn't reply. The rage has burned her out, leaving nothing behind but cinders and guilt.

"I'll answer it; no. You just signed your brother's death warrant. They've ruled that he's a danger to humanity and he'll be shot in the head at the crack of dawn because they're too scared. He isn't even doing anything; all he asked was if you were okay. I couldn't answer." He sighs, fingers tapping against the ground. "You're not going to get put of this cell any time soon, and any promise of a career you had in the military is dead as your brother. You're pretty, so they won't kill you; most likely you'll be sold as a servant to some noble house." He snorts. "It would have been better if you were ugly; they would have killed you outright and been done with it. Pretty servants become homely mothers." She hears his knees crack as he stands up. "As for me, you've ruined any possible chance the Surveys Corps could have gotten. You also broke my nose and made me come down here to this filthy place. Was it worth it?"

"I already know."

"What?" He sounds nonplussed, and she cracks an invisible smile.

"I knew what I was doing. I knew the consequences. I still did it."

A small silence follows, broken by a laugh. "I almost regretted your loss, Ackerman. From what Instructor Shadis told me, you were quite promising... but I do not tolerate insubordination."

He begins to walk away, steps uneven. "Goodbye, Ackerman. It was not my pleasure to meet you."

The next morning, when she hears the gunshot, she tells herself; "I don't regret it."

When she hears that unmistakable roar a few seconds later, she says it again.

luxuria

Why is he looking at her?

Let it never be said that Levi is inexperienced. His misguided youth led to many incidents, enjoyable or otherwise. He thought that phase of his life was well behind him and was not sorry to see the back of it, but...

Back when she was fifteen, Ackerman was an irritation, solely for her impulsiveness and impudence. At eighteen she is a full-blown nuisance... and not for the reasons he'd like.

Logically, he wonders why it wasn't someone else. Historia is every man's dream, innocent and nubile, and Sasha's cheerful smile and full form would enthral any man. Mikasa, however, is solemn and flat-chested and almost more muscular than he is. Deep down, he knows why; Mikasa is strong.

Not to say that the others aren't, but Mikasa is full of anger and power and skill; the very strength of her is intoxicating, and half his desire is due to that. The smell of her sweat does not disgust him as it should, and he is in no way averse to brawling with her in the dirt, no matter how filthy he may get.

(and one night, after debriefing Eren, he pauses outside her door (he doesn't think too hard about why, doesn't want to find what lies there) and he hears her gasping. At first he thinks it is in pain (had he hurt her earlier while they were sparring?), yet the longer he listens the more obvious it becomes, and his blood rushes to one place. He doesn't leave, instead staying crouched at the door like the dirty old man he is as her breathing accelerates, as her pants becomes more guttural and her moans more... animal until he hears her shriek-

Hears her shriek his own name.

So he takes a peek inside the door and sees her spread-eagled on the bed, eyes unfocused, shirt unbuttoned, boxers pushed aside, with one hand muffling her mouth and the other at her centre, as she whimpers "Levi, Levi, L-Levi!"

God, he almost loses it right there.

But he manages to keep it together until he reaches his quarters and cleans up after (he has to keep some semblance of dignity) and when he falls asleep he dreams of guilt.)

superbia

The courtroom is far smaller than she remembered; with its marble pit and raised pews, it feels like an arena. It may as well be.

She stands beside Levi, who is in difficulty; his leg finally gave way in the final battle. The court did not feel the need to provide him with a chair, and as such he is shaking slightly. He does not lean on Mikasa; he is entirely too prideful for that.

Before them the judge reels off a list of their crimes. There is no defence attorney to explain away their crimes, and the prosecutor barely speaks; he knows his job is already done. They are the last ones left, and as such they must carry the blame. This trial is nothing more than a formality.

The judge speaks of genocide. The Titans were human at their core, and what they did in the line of duty was not self-defence; it was mass murder. Mikasa and Levi, as humanity's strongest, were most guilty.

The judge begins to raise his gavel and asks for objections; none are offered. He pronounces his sentence: "Private Mikasa Ackerman and Captain Levi are found guilty, and hereby sentenced to death by firing squad at dawn." He slams the gavel down with finality, and the bailiffs come to take them away.

–

Her final hours pass quickly; she spends them in recollections both pleasant and unpleasant. She hears nothing from Levi's adjacent cell until dark, when she witnesses her final sunset.

"Private?" His voice is as assured as ever.

"You can drop the formalities, sir. We are about to die."

He laughs harshly, but it ends in a wheeze of pain. They did not treat his leg properly, and it pains him more with every day that passes. "You were always optimistic."

"No, sir. What I was was a realist."

His silence answers any queries she may have had, but apparently not all of his have been settled. "Ackerman... do you have any regrets?"

She thinks for a short while, counting the stars that gradually appear in the sky. "Very few, sir, and none that I could have laid to rest personally. I am proud of the life I have led."

"That makes one of us."

"Are you unhappy, sir?"

He does not answer her question, but moves onto something else entirely. "This isn't the first time I've faced the business end of a rifle, you know."

"Sir?"

"It was back... oh, I don't know. I was around your age. They caught me stealing from some merchant, and he managed to spin the story so that I killed one of his guards. I was sentenced to death."

"How did you escape?"

"Don't bother with hope, Ackerman. As luck would have it, I had a friend in the firing squad; he missed, shot his superior in the foot and I fled. I joined Erwin shortly after."

"Would you happen to have any friends left here?" She can't help the small flicker of hope in her voice.

"I'm sorry, Ackerman." His voice is almost gentle. "All I have left is you."

–

Dawn seems to be late in its arrival; when the guards come, Mikasa has been ready for twenty minutes. They handcuff her and lead her out, Levi soon joining them; he does not acknowledge her.

When they reach the yard Levi is too weak to even walk to the blood-stained end of the yard; he collapses in the dirt beside the door. They drag a chair in and bind him to it, tying the knots twice just in case, even though Levi is having trouble lifting his head.

They escort her to the opposite end of the yard and tie her to the pole there, pinning a white target to her breast. The soldiers line up in the centre of the yard, spinning and snapping in rigid formation, shiny boots marred by dust.

"Captain Levi! Have you any last words?" It is the man in charge who utters this, judging by his heavily embellished epaulettes.

Levi looks up, and meets her eyes. "I am proud of the life I have led."

The man's scowl is easily visible, and everyone hears him mutter bastard underneath his breath. "Very well. Soldiers!"

The men swivel to attention, rifles ready. The captain marches in front of them, tapping one fair man on the shoulder; when the soldier asks a question, the captain jerks his head towards Levi. He recoils in shock, but steps forward when the captain yells at him.

He takes his time readying his rifle; each second passes like a year. Finally he raises the gun, aims, and-

Mikasa shuts her eyes.

When she reopens them Levi has slumped sickeningly sideways, kept up only by the ropes that bind him to the chair, the white target on his chest soiled with red. Her knees begin to shake. The young soldier is on his knees, vomiting; his fellows avert their eyes. The captain calls them to attention as the young soldier is escorted away by two friends, and the line of shiny soldiers turns to face her.

"Last words." The captain is prompt. Mikasa tries to think; she has so much, yet so little to say. Finally, she settles on one thing.

"The world is cruel and unforgiving, yet so beautiful."

The captain nods in satisfaction; he was expecting more insubordination. He selects another soldier, who steps forward haltingly and readies his rifle with hesitant hands, dropping bullets into the dust. Finally, he is ready; he aims, and Mikasa notices tears in his eyes. His finger pulls, and she closes her eyes, there is a bang-

She opens her eyes to find that she is not dead. She looks up; the soldier has dropped his rifle, and when she looks to her right she notices a smoking hole in the ground. The captain yells at the soldier until the poor man bursts into tears; muttering ominously, the captain picks up the rifle, and aims so quickly Mikasa does not have enough time to shut her eyes. She hears a bang, sees a bullet and feels-

Nothing.

She sees nothing.

She has no regrets.