a/n: originally posted on ao3 on november 23, 2015.
When Levi was very young his mother told him stories of people who could fly.
He would sit back against her legs, his bony shoulders scraping against her bony shins, thin and shaky even before she fell ill. She would comb the dirt-thickened tangles from his hair and tell him to look out the window as she spoke, guiding him toward a vision he couldn't have begun to imagine then.
Levi had long forgotten the exact pitch and cadence of her voice, but he remembered how her every breath sounded forced, as if it hurt her just to talk. Her rough tone was a mismatch with the sweet words she spoke, painting pictures of mysterious figures soaring past rooftops, evading police as they broke loose of the city, sometimes carrying good children to freedom under their arms.
Sometimes he wondered whether she believed her own stories, or if they were mere entertainment, a blanket meant to shield him from the darkness of the underground. Levi never wondered for long. He found little use in dwelling in the past, save for what mistakes he could learn from.
His aversion to nostalgia didn't stall his fists when he was a trainee and heard a fellow soldier calling a girl whore, but violence had always been a small indulgence he allowed himself in those days.
Once, with a boy his age in a heap at his feet and Kenny Ackerman's bloodthirsty shouts in his ear, he might have thought the idea of flying was almost romantic. It was wrapped up in an impossible mysticism, far enough from the reality of the city that he could imagine he wasn't there at all.
When he still a child on the heels of Kenny's abandonment, he quickly learned there were few choices available to those who blended in with the grime of the streets. The military was the easy ticket most his age and older had taken, some even picturing themselves brave enough for the Survey Corps. Their remains usually crept back in for burial within a few years.
He hated to think of growing lethargic and drunk with the Garrison, didn't have the literacy for anything else. Levi never wanted to follow his mother into the line of work that buried her, no matter loud his stomach roared, no matter how many men leered at him with night-clouded eyes and pockets lined with just enough coin to get him by.
Then he stumbled upon a set of maneuver gear on a body in the street, and he supposed the Wall Cult would call that a miracle.
Levi soon learned flying was a technical thing, a tool one could use to gain a leg up on survival. It was calculating distances and obstacles in split-seconds and knowing everything could go wrong anyway. It was bruises that criss-crossed over the body like chains, beaten into the skin by the heavy straps of the gear. It was nothing like his mother described, and sometimes he wondered what she would say if she could see him in the air.
Flying never felt like the idyllic picture his mother depicted until he was on the ground, leaving the walls for the first time, led by a man he was tasked to kill.
"Are you still planning to keep it to a one-night trip?" Levi asked.
Erwin hummed, nodded, shuffling the papers in front of him aside and pulling out a map. "If we push it and trek through most of the night we'll be in Shiganshina by sunrise. Here."
He leaned toward Levi, who was seated in a chair on the left side of his desk, and showed him his thoughts, drawing paths and talking strategy as Levi listened to his voice as if it was the last time.
Levi could pinpoint the moment in his life when he forgot his mother's voice. Isabel and Farlan's voices were all but lost, those of Petra and his former squad quickly fading. He didn't want to forget Erwin's, too.
He filed away words about formations and cart weight distributions without taking in their meaning, and Erwin looked amused when he realized Levi wasn't really listening.
"Are you tired?" Erwin asked, pulling the map back and bringing out a ledger. "You should sleep."
"You should," Levi said, the reply quick and practiced. He knew Erwin was expecting it, as he knew neither of them would do anything about it but be stubborn and continue to work. It was part of the intimacy that had snuck up on Levi over the years, something he never asked for and was more afraid of the longer it survived, afraid of how it would feel if it was taken away from him.
Erwin made a note to himself, then reconsidered it. "I think I'm getting better writing with my left hand."
Levi raised his eyebrows, and Erwin added, "I realize that's not saying much."
"No," Levi said. "But sure, anything's better than the scribbling mess you made of things at first."
Erwin laughed, resting his chin in his remaining palm. His pen hung between his fingers and got a smudge of ink on his temple that Levi itched to wipe away.
"So," Levi said, switching his attention to an upside-down sheet. "You're still assuming that Rei-that the Armored will go for the horses?"
Like a lot of things he set his mind to, reading came easily to Levi once he had the opportunity to learn. Early in his tenure he had Hange patiently detailing the characters in their reports, had Erwin tracing soft words between his shoulder blades, and it came together soon enough for him to feel he could contribute.
Being unable to read had reminded him of being trapped below Sina, and Levi could still taste sickness at the back of his throat when he thought of that place. It made his limbs restless until he could scrub his hands and teeth and make sure Erwin was doing the same.
Erwin made a noncommittal sound, scratched his jawline thoughtfully. "It's hard to say. All of Reiner Braun's test scores in training were quite high, including strategy. He may be expecting a trap."
"And he may expect that you expect he's expecting a trap," Levi said, putting the pieces together.
"That's one way of putting it."
Levi gave a huff of a laugh through his nose. "So there's no telling what'll happen."
"Well now." Erwin smiled, the sad, self-deprecating sort Levi had grown too used to seeing recently. It settled deep into the small lines around his mouth, the lines Levi was sure weren't there before his promotion to commander. "In that way it's not much different than any other expedition we've ever been on."
Levi acknowledged that he had a point. Erwin always had backup plans, and backup plans for his backup plans, and they still spent half the time improvising. When it came time to engineer ideas from nothing there was no one Levi would rather fight behind than Erwin, but it was never easy going into a situation blind.
At some point the planning always came to an end before an expedition and a nervous lull settled over the entire ranks, knowing there was nothing more they could do, knowing their chances were as good as they were ever going to get.
He knew they had reached that point now. He knew Erwin was continuing to pore over his desk solely out of obligation. Erwin only let himself be human when he felt he had earned it, and too often it was up to Levi to decide when that time had come.
"What was it like when you first went beyond the walls?" Levi asked, settling back in his chair.
Hange once told him agoraphobia was a common affliction in the population behind the walls, deeply set but rarely realized except by those who joined the Survey Corps. Those who didn't recoil in horror from the titans instead shrank away from the vast expanse of land, the endlessness that overwhelmed and frightened those too used to limited space.
Levi remembered meeting Erwin's eyes on his first expedition and seeing no fear. He wondered if it had always been that way. There were a lot of things Levi wondered about Erwin, and the person he was before they met. It could be too late to learn everything now, but at least he could make a start.
Erwin put his pen down, exhaling slowly as his eyes went somewhere Levi couldn't see.
"At the time I hadn't felt that happy since before my father died. Getting to use my gear out there was so much more than I could've imagined in training." His mouth twitched into a rueful smile. "Twenty-seven people were killed that day and all I could think was that I was one step closer to the truth."
"So you've always been weird like that."
Levi kept his tone even, but it made him think uncomfortably back to their conversation from the day before, when he tried and failed to convince Erwin to remain behind.
He understood now there was nothing he could have done. Levi could threaten him, break his remaining limbs, let go of every shred of self-restraint and tell him how much he really felt, and none of it would keep Erwin away from the truth he sought.
Some things were more important than the small space they occupied in the world. Erwin knew it, and it was one of the first things that drew Levi to him.
There were words that wanted to be said, but they wouldn't change a thing, and so Levi kept a quiet lock on his heart.
"I guess so."
Erwin leaned back, tilted his head to reconsider some aspect of the plan, and Levi was filled with a possessiveness that thrummed warm under his skin. Levi wanted to lean in, bite him, mark him up so bad he wouldn't dare leave his quarters for days.
Oh, he thought, but then he would have to miss the expedition. What a shame.
Instead he set his hand on Erwin's leg, fingertips tracing light patterns on his thigh while Levi pretended to be engaged in a supply list in front of him. Erwin allowed it for nearly a minute before taking Levi's wandering hand in his own, bringing it up near his face and finally looking away from the desk.
For a moment he thought Erwin might even touch his lips to Levi's fingers, a show of tenderness that had no place this side of an expedition, where every move had to be quick and desperate and detached, just in case. Tenderness was for when they stumbled back behind the walls with wounds to lick and limbs to deliver to expectant mothers. Tenderness was for when they knew they would be both be alive for a little longer and could take their time reminding each other of that.
There was no time now, and there was nothing more to say. The plans were set.
Levi stood, tugged once at their joined hands, his eyes already on the made bed in the corner of the room.
"Come on," he said.
Erwin rose, let Levi take over and be the one to guide him.
Later Levi thought this was what the dwindling hours before an expedition were for. They were meant for feeling so alive he could almost forget they might die tomorrow.
He turned his head to the side where he lay, burying his nose in Erwin's pillow, surrounded by the smell of him.
"You need to wash your sheets when you get back," Levi told him, as if he could tether him to life with a promise.
Erwin smiled, eyes closed and already half-asleep beside him. He reached for Levi's hand, linking their fingers together, lazy and loose. "I will."
Levi never stayed. This was always the time when Levi crawled out of bed, slipped back into his uniform, stole out into the halls with little more than a good night. He never wanted to risk someone seeing him leave Erwin's room in the early hours, never wanted to deal with the questions, never wanted to think about how much he wanted to stay.
He ran a countdown in his head, an unnaturally slow three seconds in which he memorized everything from the room temperature air to the evened sounds of their breathing. Then he made to get up, a shuffle toward the edge of the bed.
For the first time he was stopped. It was a nearly imperceptible tightening of Erwin's hand in his, just enough pressure for Levi to be certain he hadn't imagined it.
Erwin didn't open his eyes, but when Levi tested his grip again, he knew.
"You're sure?" Levi asked.
It was to be Erwin's first time beyond the walls without his good arm. Levi knew how much Erwin was putting on the line to be there for the moment of revelation in Shiganshina. Erwin must have known it, too. Something had to be different for him to finally extend the invitation.
Erwin didn't reply, only continued to hold on. Slowly Levi relaxed his uncertain limbs, settling back in.
Normally he slept little, an hour here and there before something inevitably woke him. Sometimes he would remember something he wanted to bug Hange about, other times he felt the urge to go train in the dark before anyone else could bother him. Sometimes he dreamt of faces long dead, and that more than anything made him need to move.
Levi rarely slept long enough to wake to sunlight, but he did so on the morning of the fifty-eighth expedition, with an ease in his mind and Erwin's face closer to his than it had been the night before. The lines of his face were softened and made young in sleep, and Levi took in the sight until Erwin began to shift. He withdrew, not wanting to be caught staring.
"Alright, get up," Levi said, already sitting straight and flattening down his hair. "Apparently we've got something going on today."
They dressed and donned their gear in silence, Levi watching a crowd gather in the distance outside the small window.
"What's going on out there?" Erwin asked, hearing the murmur of noise.
"Probably a dog having a shit in the town square."
"I should know by now not to ask you questions," Erwin said, but Levi could hear the laugh tucked away in his voice.
He turned to watch Erwin pulling on his boots, seated behind his desk. Levi let him finish, then crossed the room to stand in front of him, never letting an opportunity to have the height advantage go to waste.
"Ready?" Erwin asked, sitting back and meeting his eyes.
"Just about." Levi braced his hands on the wooden arms of Erwin's chair and leaned down for a kiss, long and slow and he tried so hard not to think this could be it, this could be it.
When Levi pulled away Erwin ran a hand through Levi's hair and smiled at him like they had all the time in the world.
"It was nice," Erwin said. "Having you here."
"Then let's do it again sometime," Levi replied.
The sadness returned to Erwin's smile. Levi kissed him again, quickly this time, so he wouldn't have to see it.
Soon they would be ascending the walls one final time, but Levi was really looking forward to riding out of the gates afterward. Seeing the world they were fighting for always felt more like flying than anything else.
They fastened their cloaks and Levi followed him out the door, his eyes fixed on the wings of freedom on Erwin's back.