A/N: FlightlessLeaf: Thank you for the nice words! And I don't know if you've read this on tumblr? But in any case there will definitely be a short sequel after this chapter as I was asked multiple times to add a little something that isn't as sad. So yeah, there will be a short bonus. :)
I'm so sorry this is late again, but life has been keeping me busy. Anyway, enjoy!
He doesn't visit her father's home when she leaves. He doesn't for months because he is a coward and he can't face the man's judging and knowing look when he already hears his voice shout "You liked fucking her, right? It was good, right? You loved it, but the moment she needed you because of something you've done, you didn't fucking try to support her at all. I'll fucking kill you."
Levi thinks about it all the time, wonders how she deals with the pregnancy and everytime he sees a woman walking down the street with her hand over her round belly, he wonders if Petra does the same, if Petra lovingly talks to the growing life inside of her and if Petra thinks that it's Levi's flesh and blood, too.
He wonders if she sleeps at night, if there is a man who holds her in his arms when the pain is unbearable and showers her sweaty forehead with kisses while he knows she's suffering because of someone else's child.
The thoughts are too overwhelming, and in the dead of night they turn into shadows, various shapes that leave his eyes wide open, or clenched shut, breath caught in his throat as he waits for them to strangle him but they never do. They brush against his forehead and he gets so cold, they breathe against his neck and shivers run down his spine and it isn't a pleasant sensation at all.
So one night, he gets drunk and Hanji finds him; they always do. They expect him to throw up when his features violently twist but what comes out of his mouth are words, words that tell them his blood is cursed because he's bastard and an asshole and his kid is a bastard, too. Words that explore the possibility of Petra falling in love with one hell of a handsome guy, with a sharp mind and big sky blue like eyes, the same ones you could lose yourself in –nothing like his cold eyes, icy and narrow and intimidating. Like Erwin, she should have ended up with a guy just like Erwin because Erwin could have been a great lover and husband if it weren't for his actual position. He's responsible, he's stable, he's not broken because of his childhood and he's smart. How could a man like that soil her like he did?
That's how Hanji learns about Petra's pregnancy, and they listen to him howl like a wounded animal on their shoulder, grab his hands when he's about to pull his hair and tell him it's okay. They tell him Petra loves him—he corrects them with the past tense—because he is simply him, because Petra knows Levi more than he'd like to admit, for the way his eyes may look cold but she knows it's a façade, and they tell him he deserves that love.
When Hanji wraps blankets around him, they whisper "I love you, Levi, I really do," and maybe he can believe that, but when they tell him that the kid will love him too, he cringes.
Alcohol doesn't seem like a good option to chase the shadows away, because even drunk, Levi can't believe crap like that.
When nine months pass—he had been counting—he finds the courage to head for her father's house. He doesn't want to see him, and he doesn't want to see her and he doesn't want to see the kid's face. He doesn't want to do anything but his feet still lead him to the front door of the small house and he stands there for hours, staring at the wooden door with nothing in his hands, and his face as a lame excuse.
When he feels his neck burn because of the sunlight, he knocks once. He nearly swears when it's not her father that opens the door for him.
A tall, handsome blond man with blue eyes and a warm expression stands before him and he grits his teeth before he knows it, fists at his sides and he wishes the look he's giving blondie could kill him.
"Hello," the man greets him as if Levi's expression went unnoticed, "May I help you?"
"I—I want to—"
"Honey, who is that?" a muffled soft feminine voice stops him right in tracks and as the man turns his head towards the source of the sound, Levi wonders if she is going to show up. Is her hair longer? Does she wear sundresses? Does she still smile as often as she used to by his side? Or does she smile and laugh more? Does she dream of him the same way she haunts his nights?
He thinks blood has left his face when the woman joins them and stands next to her husband, a bundle cradled in her slender arms.
She's not Petra, and he feels the tense in his muscles disappear, his shoulders dropping as relief washes away all the effect the dreaded scenarios of how her life must be right now left on him. Petra's not with that man.
It would have been fine if it were just for that, but now he has no address.
He comes back from another expedition.
He walks, following Erwin and he doesn't feel like he owes the eyes that feed on his shell—questioning, blaming him—shit, so he ignores them and just walks forward, involuntarily tugging at the reins of his tired horse.
He stops when a kid falls just in front of him, probably pushed by the crowd who pays no attention as to whom is standing where. She's wearing a skirt and the moment she starts to cry, hands still on the stony ground, Levi guesses she must have scraped her knees.
He bends down and offers her a hand.
"Kid," he tells her so that she'd look up, "Kid. Hey, kid. You okay?"
The child glances up and her crying stops, sniffing instead and nodding. She places her little hand in Levi's and he gently pulls her up as he asks her, "Where are your parents?"
"Dada's not here, dada's at home," the girl tells him and he thinks he can discern guilt in her voice.
"Then why aren't you with him?"
"I told him I'd play with my friends and he said I shouldn't play far away from home but this really cool guy in my neighbourhood said the Wings of Freedom would walk down the street," she stops and looks at her wounded knees, "I don't know what the Wings of Freedom are, but I wanted to see anyway."
"The show's over, kid. Go find your friends and go back home," he tells her and a huff leaves the girl's chest.
"They're not here anymore. And—" she looks away and chews her lower lip, "I never came here before. I think I don't know where I am," she confesses with tears pooling in her eyes.
Great, Levi thinks as he runs a hand through his hair, sighing.
"Let's take care of your knees first," he decides and lifts her off of the ground to put her on his horse before joining her to prevent her from falling. The child must be six or seven, he thinks, and he just doesn't want to take risks until they get to the Recon Corps HQ.
Hanji quickly takes her under their wing, gently cleaning the wounds on her little knees, cooing as they do so, "You're a brave girl, aren't you? Look at you, what a big brave girl! I bet you don't even need candlelight when you sleep at night, right? Such a strong darling girl!"
Levi's leaning against the opposite wall, listening to their ramblings and he can't help the little smile creeping on his lips as the kid reaches out and strokes Hanji's hair.
"You're nice, thank you," she tells them and the sound that Hanji makes isn't even one that could be qualified as human, and Levi smirks to that, shakes his head and looks out of the window, thinking about the multiple excuses he could give Erwin when seeing the kid but Hanji figured that out before it even crossed his mind, and they leave him and relieve the burden of explaining the situation to the Commander; Erwin is most likely to listen to them anyway.
So he sits next to the child and waits. The kid is not very talkative, she does not initiate conversation at all, too busy staring at her knees or playing with her fingers, and for a long moment he just looks at her.
She has long black hair reaching past her tiny shoulders, big blue eyes and a little button nose in the middle of a face heavy with full rosy cheeks.
"Kid," he starts, "What do your parents do for a living?" he asks her.
"My mommy and my daddy have wings on their backs like angels."
That leaves a sting in his heart and it's a reminder that somewhere between these Walls, there's his kid and he only has his mother and it isn't because his father is dead. It's because his father chose this over his mother.
"I'm sorry, kid," he means it and he slowly ruffles her hair.
"It's okay, they're heroes. The best ones are always the ones who leave first," she looks at him, trying to pull off her most convincing and serious look but she doesn't succeed and it is clear to him that she is confused, speaking words older than her little mouth, "I don't really understand what it means but dada says so, and dada's right," she stops and pouts, "He's right most of the time, he's not right when he tells me I need naps. I don't need naps. I don't like sleep."
He blinks at her, wants to laugh and tell her that if she were to stay here, she wouldn't sleep for the rest of her life but she's just a kid and he may be a helpless case but he knows better, so he just tells her the thing that seems right to his ears, "Just listen to your… dada? Grandad? He knows best, I guess."
Hanji joins them later and tells Levi they must give her to the Garrison: they will take care of her and bring her back to her family. He shrugs, tells Hanji he has things to work on and pats the girl's head before heading for the door.
"Would you mind telling me what your name is, princess?" He can hear Hanji asking from where he is in the hallway, still walking, and he doesn't know if it is just his mind that wants to fuck with him but it sure must be an even bigger fucker than he is for choosing the name "Isabel" to play in his ears.
Later that night, Hanji tells Levi that, surpringly enough, Erd knows who the little girl is and he has proposed himself to bring her back home. The same night, he can't help but feel that there was some kind of sign at some point he should've grasped but he doesn't ask Erd about a thing the next day.
He should have asked Erd back then, though. Isabel loves Erd, and she spends more time with him than any trainee spends time with an elite soldier.
Isabel is a strong young teenager, she's smart, fast, gracious and efficient.
And something about her smile makes him feel sick because she may not have Petra's obvious features but she is all Petra. She's just as soft, she smiles just as much and Levi starts wondering if he isn't going mad when a little voice in his head affirms that she might just be his kid.
He starts doing unprofessional things, things like observing her from afar for different reasons than establishing her strengths and weaknesses. His eyes look at her small form and she is just about the same height as Petra, and she speaks the same words as the strawberry-blonde. She's a happy virus walking among death and sadness and sorrow and she reminds him of her so much but he knows her parents are dead because she told him so, years ago.
She survives her first expedition but doesn't cry; he's never seen her cry, if she isn't smiling then she is just pulling one stoic expression and it is such an impossible door to break through that he can never guess what she is thinking about when he always, always, knows what goes through the newbies' minds.
She doesn't cry and disappears the same night and he finds her in front of his door, knocking at a slow, awkward pace, her fist dragging down the wood and he wants to swear but the moment he opens the door the words die in his throat because first: it is her, second: her eyes aren't the same and third: there is a bottle in her hand.
"Levi," she smiles and runs a hand through her short black hair, "S'rry, Captain Levi. Why are you in my room?"
"This is my room, cadet. And you're drunk."
"No shit?" she blinks and narrows her eyes the moment his hand tries to grab the bottle but she moves it right away, "Don't fucking touch my bottle. I'll kill you. I'm not kidding."
His lips part and he takes her by the elbow, gently tugs so that she comes in to close the door behind them.
"I know that coming back from your first expedition is a hard thing, but this isn't wise, cadet," he calmly tells her and by the way her eyes try to focus on him, he knows she is making an effort, "Give me the bottle, I can help you."
She does say something, but it's nothing like what he was expecting.
"What makes you think I'm drinking because I just came back from an expedition?" she nearly shouts, bottle falling to the floor and liquid spilling all over it, "What do you know? Huh? Look, my grandad is somewhere inside these Walls and he hates me. He hates me because I killed my mom by coming to this world and my dad is the biggest asshole you could imagine, he's such an asshole that my grandad claims he is dead, but I was such a little brat. What could I understand when he told me that my dad is dead to him? How could I know that he just meant that my dad used my mom and ditched her? And I've had to look like him and remind him everyday, because why else can't I be as pretty as my mom, with honey hair and golden eyes? What is my life? I joined this because I don't know what to do, I joined this because my only family doesn't want me and the only person who I can call family is in your Squad and he actually talks to me about my mom and he tells me my dad is a hero and I'm just lost in a world full of bullshit."
He doesn't know how to react but the look in her eyes scream Petra and in his ears he hears both of their voices, he hears Petra tell him it's best that they end this, he hears Petra tell him that she decided on the baby, he hears Petra tell him she loves him, and he hears Petra cry, and he thinks he can take the ramblings of a young raging girl and it would be okay if she'd shut her mouth, but she doesn't.
"You may think I'm dumb, but I know you. I know who you are. And I fucking hate you, dad. I fucking hate you because all of this is because of you. You piece of scum. Do you know that she wrote letters to you? Do you know she wrote about every kick I gave her and do you know that she smiled even though the pain was too much? Do you realize she said "I love you, Levi" in every letter? And she was sorry that you couldn't experience happiness because she has, she was happy, and she loved me. She loved me enough to nearly fill the void you left. And now she's dead. And I don't know why I feel like it's your fault and not mine."
And just as blood left his body years ago when Petra left him, it leaves him again and his mind goes blank. Something within him is unleashed and he doesn't realize he's next to her until she falls to the ground with her hand on her cheek and a strangled cry in the air. She slowly lifts her head until her scared but defiant blue eyes stare deep into his and he starts feeling pain spreading in his palm.
He just slapped her.
"Did you just—"
"I loved her, okay? I fucking loved her and I—"
"Don't you fucking dare tell me it's not your fault and that you're sorry! You can shove sorry up your ass for all I care," she stands up quickly, the spot in her cheek reddening with each second passing by and she stands so close to him that he feels her ragged breaths hit his collarbones, "It takes two to do this, and it was your responsibility but you chose this over her—you chose this over me, and I—" her lower lip starts trembling at the last words, and she repeats "I" twice again with tears on the verge of her eyes, "I have every right to be selfish."
He doesn't know what to say and he doesn't know if the pain he feels is physical, but he is damn sure that something inside him is tearing his flesh off, sticking needles in his beating heart and he just doesn't know what those are; those aren't hunger, they aren't the deep cut of a blade, they aren't even Petra's words years ago but somehow they've reached the core that Petra reached when she left and they managed to break through, hit an unknown ground and awaken something completely different; he wishes all of this was just a nightmare. Petra's dead. And his kid, that Petra named Isabel for some fucking reason, prefers fighting titans to the reality she lives in.
He feels shaking arms snake around his body and for the first time in his life he feels the beating heart of his own child against his, and he wonders if it's any different from the little kicks she must have given Petra and he wonders why he didn't leave the Recon Corps for them.
"I don't know if I love you, I think I do, dad. But I think I hate you more than I love you, Levi," she sniffs and he doesn't mind her wetting his shirt, "Mom wouldn't be proud and I know she wanted me to love you just as much as she loved you."
He doesn't know how many hours pass but they're on the floor and her head is still under his chin, fingers playing with her hair and for a moment he allows himself to close his eyes and imagine he's home; Petra is somewhere in the kitchen, probably cooking something for them, and Isabel is safely tucked in his arms and she's a teenager who's had enough love to drown the whole world and she doesn't have to worry about a thing. The smell of alcohol brings him back though, and he lifts her off the ground to put her in his bed.
She stirs and her fingers reach for his hands, but she's still sleeping as they curl around his forefinger just like a baby's would and that's it, that's when he feels something warm roll down his cheeks but it is so weird because his breathing is steady. Maybe those tears were the only thing left inside of him because he feels empty; he isn't angry, he isn't sad. He doesn't feel a thing anymore.
"I don't know about bedtime stories, I don't know shit about them," he tells her with a small voice just so she wouldn't wake up, "I know they start with "Once upon a time" so I'll just start with that and figure shit out eventually…"
He thinks he's heard many refer to him before they die. It usually is "Captain!".
Some scream for help, others claim that he will lead Humanity to success and peace. Some, under the deadly press of fear—and Titan's teeth—scream his name.
Once, he even heard "Big brother!".
It's the first time that he hears "Daddy!".
And he doesn't try to fight the Titan when it finally grabs him.