Beneath Quiet Strength
Levi had never been able to stand by and let someone suffer in silence.
000
She watches him from a distance as she's kneeling in the soil among the small plants she had planted, her face sunburned underneath her straw hat and dirt under her nails. The breeze that never seems to cease blows and brings dust and the promise of rain, dark clouds at the horizon. Her hair tickles her face, and she wipes away the strands. Gabi watches as Levi, almost shyly, holds out candy to one of the many kids in their temporary camp.
A smile touches her lips, albeit it's a bit sad.
000
I miss you all.
I'm sorry.
The whispers are on the tip of his tongue, yet they get stuck somewhere behind his teeth, clinging to the back of his throat and choking him. Tendrils of despair wrap themselves around his chest slowly till the oxygen is thin in his lungs. Levi curls up a bit tighter on his side. Outside the tent, the wind blows, bringing more dust and the scent of death.
Maybe it was the darkness that cloaked him like a blanket that made it easier for his pain to swell to the surface, almost spilling over and trickling out. Warm and sticky. Sharp and bitter. Perhaps it was because he was just so fucking tired and hurting. The thin military mattress did nothing for his back, after all.
Levi slowly lets out the air in his lungs and squeezes his eyes shut tightly. And so, the dark trades places for red, so deep and blindingly bright it burns - a phantom heat scorching his skin - voiceless cries echoing in his ears. The sound of shattering rocks, the low hum of an airplane-
With a shiver, his teeth find the delicate skin of his lower lip; sorrow, and the bitter tang of iron.
000
The child was sobbing, and Levi was panicking - just a little bit.
A small boy, face dirty, arms too thin.
Levi cowered under Kenny's gaze, knuckles bloody and beaten, side aching. "Get up. Do it again till you get it fuckin' right."
He jolts out of his thoughts when slender fingers enclose his own, teary eyes staring up at him in question. Levi wants to pull away and tell the boy, No. No, I cannot do this. He is not good with people, after all. He is fucked up in ways others cannot even imagine. All twisted and wrong and out of place. Levi wouldn't be able to provide this child the comfort it needed.
Violence and destruction; that's who he is. That's how life shaped him. That's all he knows. From growing up in the Underground trying to survive day by day to slicing flesh Above to save humanity from its own destruction. And yet-
Yet-
Grumbling and feeling old, he takes the boy on his knee and fishes a candy from one of his pockets.
000
"You're good with kids."
Levi almost drops the apple he's peeling.
He turns to the girl sitting next to him and stares, throat suddenly dry. "What?"
Gabi shrugs, her hair falling loosely in waves over her shoulders. "I mean, just an observation."
Levi turns back to his plate with apple peels to stare at it unhappily as if it had all the answers to his problems. He looks away then, eyes distant and cloudy. "No, I'm not."
The silence stretches out, the sounds of the camp washing over them, a flock of birds flying by.
"I'm violent. I'm only good for destruction."
The words tumble out without his permission, and he looks down at his hands - sees the emptiness there - and recalls how it feels to slice up titans. Perhaps Levi's getting old, just spouting bullshit whenever he feels like it.
Gabi shakes her head, suddenly looking sad. "No. You're kind."
He focuses on the shift from green to red of the apple peel. Levi remembers Hange muttering these words to him during a time that now seems so long ago now - another lifetime.
000
Hange is drunk and warm and pushed up against Levi's shoulder. He should find it repulsive, all those germs and bodily odors. But he finds that he's too tired to care. Too empty.
"You're kind."
Levi closes his eyes. He cannot deal with Hange's shit right now. "Hange..." his voice is stony, a warning beneath.
"Many see you as invincible - this indestructible force. But I know you are not. You are so much more than that, Levi. You are human like the rest of us, hurting beneath those layers you have pulled up. You bleed and shit like the rest of us unfortunate souls." Hange wiggles her hands and sighs deeply. Levi feels it in the way her shoulders drop.
"You done?" His voice is tight, something coiling in his chest. It aches - the way it always does.
Hange sniffs wetly and nods, sags even more against his shoulder, heavy and spent, smelling like wet leaves and blood.
Levi closes his eyes, the inside of his eyelids searingly red.
000
Gabi finds them fast asleep. A young child draped across Levi's lap, his arm wrapped protectively around the small shoulders. Gabi smiles, wiping away a stray tear. For once, Levi seemed somewhat close to content. He seemed relaxed, with none of the lines between his brows that appeared to have carved themselves permanently there.
000
Levi looks up at the pale face encompassed by dark hair. A tired smile and kind eyes greet him. A hand finds its way onto his head and into his hair, fingers softly weaving through the dark strands. "Never forget who you are, Levi." And Kuchel smiles once more down at her son.
000
Levi had never been able to stand by and let someone suffer in silence. He reached out a hand, hauling someone who had fallen up and back into the light. He lends them some of his strength, the wings of freedom at his back.