Mikasa only dreams in black and white.
It started only after the death of her family, as though their deaths took the color from her life. Normally her dreams are nightmares, plagued with reoccurring memories. She hears her mother's voice, telling – no, begging – her to run. Even in her dreams she stands stone still, afraid and lost, watching her mother and father die. These dreams are reoccurring and happen no less than once a week, sometimes more, but they always linger around her for hours after she's woken up. She can never go back to sleep afterwards.
It's one of these nights that she's woken up, panting and sweating, in Eren's bed. He'd finally gotten his own room – mostly, she'd later learned, at the complaints of everyone else that he was constantly screaming in his sleep and scaring the others. Lately, it had crossed her mind to question when he'd developed his own night terrors. His were less frequent than hers but seemed to shake him more profoundly. He was always in a sullen and irritable mood the day after.
She brushes hair from her eyes and glances over at his sleeping form, relieved to see he's still asleep. She reaches over and puts a hand on his forehead and a chill runs through her – he's cold, too cold for a human body.
"Eren?" she whispers, shaking his body to no avail. She rolls him over, places her ear near his heart, trying to listen for a sound, only to find there is none. The panic in her rises and she's shaking him, screaming his name, when she sees her world darken; his skin color fades and the room turns to neutral shades of grey. She stops shaking him and crawls to the end of the bed, wrapping her arms around her body. Her eyes close tightly and she's crying, the same scared, helpless child she'd been before.
"Mikasa? Mikasa?"
There are strong hands on her shoulders, shaking her gently. She feels her lungs gasp, hears the deep breath she takes in as Eren wakes her. She's aware that her face is streaked with tears and her body is shaking. Eren attempts to pull her into his arms, but she puts her hands on his chest and shoves him away. It's humiliating for him to see her like this, weak and vulnerable.
Even in her dreams, she dreams of nightmares.
But her terror is diminished upon seeing Eren alive and well; she instantly regrets pushing him away moments earlier. Moonlight from outside creeps through the window and illuminates his worried face. She steadies herself before inching closer to him, letting his arms wrap around her; relief floods her as she hears the rhythmic drumming of his heartbeat. He's warm, he's soothing, and he's alive.
His hands hold onto her waist, his chin resting atop her head, and he says, quietly so as not to startle her more, "Another bad dream?" She nods her head and leans into him more, her hands sliding up underneath his shirt. The heat from his skin is reassuring.
He rubs her back in small circles and asks, "Do you want to talk about it?"
She shakes her head and wraps her arms around his torso, sliding her legs around him too. She hides her face in the crook his neck. An earthy scent rolls off him in waves, mixed with sweat, dirt, and now her tears. He struggles to find an even balance for a moment before he rests his hands on her lower back and now they're both leaning into each other – fitting, as they've always been each other's biggest supporters.
By now he's used to waking her up from these terrors. Most of her nights are spent in his room and she's often done the same for him, waking him when he's thrashing about, but his nightmares are less frequent than hers. He often dreams that, as children, Mikasa doesn't make it out alive with him, that she's been trapped under the wooden beam with his mother. Those are the worst, imagining what might've been if she had stayed home with her that day.
When her lips start to pepper kisses at his neck, her hands tickling the skin on his stomach, he's aware of what she's trying to initiate. He twists their bodies to be able to lay her down, straddling her. With the small light filtering through the room he can see her wet eyes are closed. He leans down to brush them off her cheeks and sighs. She's done this before, attempting to use him for comfort after a particularly bad dream; it took him a couple of times to realize she was using him to pacify her worries.
Her hands lace into his hair as he's kissing down her body. His lips trace the outline of her breasts through her shirt, one hand supporting his balance and the other teasing the inside of her thigh. When her breathing begins to pick up pace again, he knows that it isn't from being scared. Her eyes peek open to watch him and he offers her a sheepish smile. He leans up and touches their noses together before he kisses her.
"Better?" he asks, nipping at her lower lip, tugging at it gently between his teeth. He feels her mouth curve back against his lips, her head nod in agreement.
"Better," she replies. He lies down and opens an arm for her, waiting till she's settled before turning his body sideways and draping his other arm across her body. He pulls her closer to him, his lips lightly touching her forehead as he tries to fall back asleep. Mikasa curls her body as closely as she can to him, waiting for his arms to loosen around her and let her know he's drifted off before she allows herself to close her eyes and slip away too.
Deep in sleep, for the first time in many years, she dreams in color again.