Work Text:
"You're going to face consequences for this little stunt, Eren. I hope you know that."
With at least three days' travel ahead of them following the attack on Liberio, the Scouts had taken refuge in an old outpost near the sea. Yelena and the other Volunteers managed to get their hands on enough cots and lamp oil to see everyone through the night, but conditions were less than ideal: Not only had animals occupied two of the three small buildings—and left their droppings everywhere, to Levi's chagrin—but it was unusually cold for that time of year and there weren't nearly enough blankets to go around. No one dared contest Yelena when she insisted that Eren be given additional accommodations, but there was an air of unspoken ire among the remaining Scouts.
Eren had betrayed them. He was the reason they had to dig a grave in the morning. Even Connie, for all of his usual levity and wisecracking, couldn’t bring himself to look Eren in the eye. Jean spent a solid twenty minutes pacing around the room across from Sasha’s temporary resting place, wearing invisible tracks into the airship’s braying floor.
Despite believing that most of his thoughts and feelings were governed by logic, Levi also couldn't deny that he was furious. A few kicks to Eren's face and a handful of scathing remarks hadn't come close to satisfying him. He wanted to break that little rat bastard's jaw; he wanted to grind his bones to dust and watch him snap them back in place like the monster he was.
Of course, it was all so much more complicated than that. Rage and other well-worn coping mechanisms layered over much more vulnerable feelings, hiding them from view. Levi wondered at what point he’d allowed this particular group of subordinates to worm their way so deeply into his heart. Farlan and Isabel came to mind. So, too, did Erwin. Maybe all of these kids were just filling the cavernous hole that his old colleagues and the previous Commander left behind.
After a long moment, Eren made a small, distant noise of assent. His eyes were unfocused.
"I should've finished off the Armored," he muttered under his breath. "Him and the Jaw. Could've had five of the nine—"
"Why did you hesitate, then?" Levi asked, cutting off his quiet rambling. His words were clipped as he continued, "You owed it to your fallen comrade to give it your all, but when shit hit the fan and you overextended yourself, you walked away."
For the first time since he'd entered Levi's room that evening, Eren glanced over at him. A long beat of silence passed. They both knew that Levi hadn't asked because he supported Eren's actions, but because he wanted to get under his skin. Maybe it was for his own sick self-satisfaction—a sort of petty revenge. Maybe it was to coax the fiery cadet back to the surface, or more accurately, to see if he still existed.
"Thought you didn't like needless death, Captain. Or does Reiner no longer count?"
"I'm not the one who crushed civilians. You tell me."
Eren's expression remained uncomfortably blank. He turned away from Levi and stared at the old vanity across the room, seemingly lost in thought.
"Do you hate me?"
Unfortunately, he didn’t.
"You piss me off," he bit out.
Eren's eyes were so green, they seemed unreal.
"Show me. That's why I'm here."
The room fell dangerously silent. The two men’s gazes flitted to the door as a few military personnel stumbled down the hallway, chatting animatedly, but they met again the moment their footsteps faded. Levi tried to bore holes in Eren’s face. The latter looked half-dead.
"Even now, you're such a brat," Levi growled. "You desert the Corps, drag us all into your mess, and still somehow have the balls to ask me to aid in your childish self-harm." He picked up his mug of tea, which had long since gone cold, and pretended to take a sip. Eren cataloged the stillness of his throat. He pretended to swallow, too, and exhaled, running his fingers through his hair. "What's actually going on here, Jaeger? Worried about getting your usual posse involved? You didn't seem to care about their well-being when you ditched them to go fuck around in Marley and play Espionage."
"Are you saying they weren't safe with the Survey Corps?" Eren countered, eerily soft and lightning-quick.
Levi grimaced. "You're deflecting."
"I'm complimenting the organization that raised me. Maybe I just finally outgrew you."
Levi snorted. "As-fucking-if."
"You sure?" Eren stood up to his full height, still dressed in sweat-stained tatters. He approached the chair Levi was sitting in, and Levi stared back unblinkingly. Eren had clearly gotten used to people cowering in his presence. When he stood directly in front of him, blocking the lamplight with a scruffy face mired in shadow, he leaned down, gripping both of Levi's armrests. His breath smelled vile. "You look pretty small from where I'm standing."
"I've been killing things five times your size since you were barely old enough to wipe your own ass."
"Does this look like intimidation?" Eren asked, his voice low and velveteen. His gaze darted between Levi’s white-knuckled fists, wary of even the slightest movement. "It shouldn't."
"It's a piss-poor proposition, if that's what it's supposed to be," Levi sneered.
Something in the air shifted. Eren’s eyes glinted in the darkness, vaguely luminous. They reminded Levi of a particular species of beetle that resided in the Underground.
“I can’t ask them to punish me,” he breathed, and Levi didn’t have to ask who ‘them’ referred to—there were only two people in this world Eren Jaeger actually gave a shit about and neither of them were currently present. “But I know you want to kick my fucking teeth in, don’t you?”
Slowly, deliberately, he got down on his knees in front of Levi’s chair. The act itself was submissive, but there was a ruinous defiance in his body language that threatened to burn the world to the ground. He pushed his grimy hair out of his eyes and hissed, “So go on. I’m giving you permission to go all-out, Captain.”
Levi crossed his legs, pushing the toe of his shoe into Eren's chest in the process. Eren held his breath, eyeing the spot where tanned leather soles slipped beneath the unbuttoned neckline of his shirt. He didn't have much hair there at all, and it struck Levi just how young he still was, willing himself to erase the sunken skin and brittle cage of oft-broken bones that now characterized Eren's hulking form. He looked borderline ghoulish.
"And if I don't?" His voice was barely a whisper.
Eren searched his face, replying, with empty self-assurance, "You will." He said it as if it was the easiest thing on earth, and ironically, this was what sent Levi careening over the edge, proving Eren right as he sought out his trachea. He dug his shoe into the sallow flesh of Eren's throat, feeling the hard knob of his Adam's apple protest beneath his foot. Something electric shot up his spine as Eren swallowed against him, his eyes hazy.
"You're defending yours and Erwin's position to Zachary and the Military Police…" Eren croaked out, grabbing him by the ankle and shoving his heel deeper. His next words were hoarse, and he caged Levi against his chair with long limbs, the latter's abandoned foot sliding down the planes of Eren's torso as the filthy monstrosity practically crawled into his lap. "Except now, it's different. Before, you didn't see me as a threat. Now, you know better."
"Get Erwin's name out of your mouth. I'm not into roleplay either, so cut the shit and keep your fetishistic nostalgia to yourself," Levi snapped.
Eren titled his head, hawkish. "Who said anything about roleplay?" he asked coolly. "I'll make it extra good for both of us. I won't even heal." He leaned forward and placed something resembling a kiss to Levi's clothed stomach, but there was no heat in it—just an unmistakable lust for violence as he came up with new and creative ways to provoke him. Levi sucked his stomach in as he tried to kiss him a second time, resisting the urge to gouge out Eren's hollow, algae-colored eyes with his bare hands. "And I didn't kill the Commander," he added as an afterthought.
"But you've successfully forced us into working with the man who did."
"Take it up with Zeke," Eren said defensively, and it was the first time Levi had heard anything akin to real emotion in his voice. "Or if blaming me for all of the bullshit losses we've suffered over the years makes you want to hurt me more, follow through and fucking do it."
The words had barely left his mouth before Levi socked him in the jaw, shivering at the recoil of padded knuckles against bruise-happy flesh. Eren didn't even try to catch himself on his palms, content to fall to the floor in a bout of chittering, manic laughter. He covered his mouth with his fingers. They came away bloody.
"There were some stupid kids in my neighborhood when I was younger," he babbled, tonguing a broken tooth until he pried it free. He rolled onto his side, wiping the back of his hand over his chin, and Levi's heart clenched with something identifiable—an echo of what he'd felt when Eren had first boarded the ship and he'd seen how far gone he really was. "If I'd known how to throw a punch like that, they might not be able to breathe properly anymore."
And there it was, out in the open: The truth of Eren Jaeger, the unhinged child that had grown into an even more unhinged adult. When he followed it up with they used to pick on Armin all the time, the rotten core of his admission hardly changed. He turned toward Levi as he got to his feet. "Gonna do it again? Demonstrate it for me?"
Levi stared at him for a moment, feeling the phantom sensation of his lips on his stomach. He clicked his tongue and reared back, putting much more effort into the kick he delivered to Eren's face. His head snapped the opposite direction from the force of the blow and he sprayed pink-tinged saliva across the wood, cackling once again.
"You're fucked in the head, Eren," Levi said, sounding disgusted. He bent down, straddling him clumsily around the bulk of his too-large, soiled jacket. A practiced clench of his fist; another quick, clean punch before Eren managed to recover from his laughing fit. This one was to the nose, and the splintering of bone and cartilage finally silenced him, his breathing thick as he swallowed the bloody drainage accumulating in his sinuses. Levi made an unpleasant face as he did so, and Eren's strained smile in response was mirthless.
"I'm not the one on top of someone at least ten years younger than me," Eren said with the same intonation Levi had said I'm not the one who crushed civilians. Another thinly-veiled provocation, but admittedly, he'd gotten rather good at it in the past year. "What would the higher-ups think if they caught us like this? What about Hange?"
"They'd think I tackled you to the ground, which is exactly what this fucking looks like."
"Yeah?" Eren's voice was almost sensual. "I could start moaning—put on a show till we get an audience. I learned from the best. Erwin must've really done a number on you to make you sound like that, Captain."
Levi saw red. His hands were around Eren's throat before he could stop himself, stubble scraping his palms as he choked him out. To Eren's credit, he did put on a show, letting his eyes roll back and wheezing performatively. Levi knew his own strength, and Eren was full of shit.
Just as he considered releasing him, Eren seized his wrists, his gaze unnervingly sharp. Levi moved instinctively to knee him in the groin, but Eren was too quick. With a monumental effort on the part of a man who looked like he could've been knocked over by a stiff breeze a few moments prior, Levi found himself splayed out beneath his once-subordinate, his heart pounding. Eren's hands were clammy and so much larger than his own. His raggedy hair swayed like a curtain above Levi, several split ends caressing his jaw. Their breathing intermingled, hot and sticky, between them. Eren's eyes glittered with subdued triumph.
"Well…" he murmured, looking a bit taken aback as his eyes slithered along Levi's prone form. "Color me surprised. I didn't think you'd actually let me get one over on you like this."
Levi would rather die than admit he hadn't let him do anything, and he expected that was Eren's game; either way, he'd lost.
"You smell like a rotting corpse," he said flatly, fighting to keep his voice steady. "Forgive me for having an off day when I have a one-hundred seventy pound sack of shit straddling me."
Eren huffed, and it almost sounded genuine. Levi took the opportunity to sweep a leg beneath his knees, knocking him off-balance.
"Fuck!" he swore, catching himself quickly. His free hand found the short crop of hair at the back of Levi's head and pulled until he was forced to look at the ceiling. The latter reached for him sightlessly and found his forearm, digging his nails into it until Eren's grip on him loosened. A crackle of lightning, like faint static, sizzled beneath Levi's fingertips. When he buried his fist in the hair at the nape of Eren's neck, it was with renewed vigor, terrified at the passive threat Eren had just issued.
"Don't you fucking dare," Levi snarled, his eyes wild as Eren slipped into something resembling his earlier apathy. He smashed his head into the ground, once, twice, three times, twisting their bodies until Eren was beneath him once more. Eren was panting, his hair fanned out beneath him like a tentaculate halo. His hands were strong and steady on Levi's hips, and Levi hated how much the shape of his fingers felt like Erwin's. Eren seemed to pick up on the strange dynamic unfurling between them, massaging circles into his skin.
"How's this for a proposition?" he asked breathlessly, rolling his hips up into the man sitting astride him. To Levi's horror, he felt something firm press against his ass. Eren wet his lips. "You ever think about it before?"
Levi leapt to his feet as if he'd been burned. Eren watched him without further commentary, bloodied up, half-hard, and unnaturally at ease. "You're a literal goddamn child," Levi spat in response. "You said as much a few minutes ago, back when it was more convenient for you."
"I said you were older than me, actually," Eren corrected him. "And you're avoiding my question."
Levi's expression was a stone mask. "I'm not obligated to answer."
"A bit damning though, don't you think?" Eren pushed himself onto his elbows. "I could just sit here and make a bunch of assumptions instead, if you want. My ass was definitely tighter when I was fifteen."
Levi growled before kicking him in the face. Eren smiled around a mouthful of blood, spitting out a few more broken teeth. When he looked up at Levi again, his cock twitched in his pants.
"You'd be surprised, the sort of things they do to people in those Marleyan hospitals," he said, his words slow as he took the time to properly enunciate each one. Talking was obviously difficult. Levi watched him lick a trickle of blood from the corner of his mouth. "There was this one orderly there. Big guy. Can't remember his name. I shared a room with a kid a lot younger than me, and he reminded me a little of Armin because he was so skinny. The orderly would visit him every single night. He didn't care that I was in there, and honestly, I think he got off to the idea. Sometimes he'd even come see me when he was bored afterward." Eren trailed rough fingers over his trousers, careful to avoid the growing erection in his pants. "He liked the fact that I was missing a leg, I think. What we did was sloppier because of it, but I couldn't really run from him. Or he didn't think so, anyway..."
Levi stared down at him. His feet, which were supporting the stunned weight of his small, dense body, had gone numb. The gentle flutter of Eren's eyelids as he met his gaze made the pins and needles that much worse, and when he tilted his head, Levi felt like he was looking into the eyes of a demon—one with a cherubic face and a vast ocean of carefully-concealed motives.
"... Why the fuck are you telling me this?" he asked quietly. "What's your actual aim here, Eren—for the umpteenth time?"
Eren licked his lips. "I dunno," he said, and Levi's bullshit siren was blaring loudly. "Maybe I just felt like saying it."
Levi moved to kick him again, but this time, Eren caught his ankle. He blinked up at him, his expression neutral. "Or maybe I wanted to see if you were capable of taking me back to that same place he did." He pushed Levi's leg away and stood up in the middle of a pocket of fizzling steam, rolling his neck and shoulders as he finished healing. Levi took a reflexive step back.
"Capable of assaulting you? Really?" he asked, turning his nose up at him. Eren scoffed.
"Is it rape if I could've killed him? Gotten away as easily as breathing?" He stepped forward, back into Levi's orbit. "I was also bored, you know. I wasn't a victim."
"You had a whole scheme cooked up, didn't you? Zeke and Yelena arranged for your stay there. You couldn't leave."
"There was always a choice. Just because one plan was more important doesn't mean I couldn't have come home if I really wanted to."
Home. Something about Eren still calling Paradis his home made Levi feel both fond and simultaneously raw.
"My bunkmate didn't have that choice. I didn't lift a fucking finger to help him, either," he continued. "Honestly, part of me wished I could be that orderly. He reminded me so much of Armin…"
He crowded Levi against the wall, and there was a heaviness in Eren's gaze as he examined him beneath long, dark eyelashes.
Levi grabbed Eren's wrists, calculating how best to disarm him if he tried to make a move. His grip was borderline vicelike as he hissed, "Back the hell off before you make me do something we'll both regret."
Eren leaned in even closer, challenging him. Levi could count the individual flecks of blue in his irises.
"There's always room for regret," he whispered, glancing at the older man's hands where they held him in performative bondage. "Isn't that the whole thing about choices, Captain? There's never a right one?"
Levi tried to throw Eren off of him, but he encroached even further into his personal space as he recovered, biting his jaw. "God— fucking—!" he swore, attempting to shove his knee into Eren's groin, but the latter stopped him between deceptively strong thighs, immobilizing him mid-kick. His groan against Levi was animalistic and full of grit. Ugly. Loveless.
After bristling at the feeling of a slow, possessive mouth mapping out the valley of his throat, Levi managed to tangle a few fingers in Eren's hair and leash him by it, pulling him backward. There was something rotten in his glare as he bucked his hips forward in response, seeking out Levi's stirring cock for friction and paying no mind to the way his spine bowed. The mixture of desperation and anger in the motion was almost flagellating.
"You snot-nosed piece of shit," Levi addressed him, twisting his fist in his hair. "I don't know who died and made you king in your own head, but I'm not interested in playing these masochistic games with you."
Eren pushed himself out of Levi's grasp, but the two men still collided like opposing ends of a Newton's Cradle. Levi was all bulging knuckles and finely-honed combat skills; Eren was all tongue and teeth, nipping at his old mentor like a rabid dog. At one point, he caught Levi's open mouth, licking into it, and Levi bit down, punching him squarely in the jaw as he recoiled.
"Eren, stop," Levi demanded, and to his surprise, Eren hesitated, staring at him with doe-like eyes. His stomach lurched at the sight, reminded of the 15-year-old boy who trailed after him like a lost puppy on missions. He opened his mouth to say something else, but just as quickly as the familiar sight came, it vanished, replaced with the husk of a man who'd stolen everything beautiful and spirited from Eren Jaeger.
"Hit me," he breathed, looking fragile even in his utter indifference. His skin was battered red. His hair was unkempt. "All I want is for you to stop asking questions. Stop stopping me. Either do that or give me a solution. Tell me what the fuck it is I'm supposed to be doing right now. Tell me if I made the wrong move."
Levi watched Eren's mask of stoicism fall away, his expression becoming harder and more angry as he continued speaking.
"What the hell should I have done?" He wet his lips. Something in his eyes shattered in slow motion. "Huh?" he prompted Levi, his voice cracking. "Do you really think sitting around with our thumbs up our asses will save us?"
Levi understood Eren's frustration, but his actions were reckless and beyond the pale. There were so many moving parts in this conflict between Paradis and Marley—with Eren's abilities at the helm of them all—that conversations like the one Eren was trying to have with him were virtually impossible. They needed to make cautious, well-thought-out decisions. Declaring war on Marley impromptu and conspiring with Marleyan insurrectionists made Eren a liability—one that Levi was almost positive the Premier wasn't going to overlook.
When Levi didn't reply, Eren's chest rumbled with silent laughter.
"Guess we'll all rot," he said quietly, and his gaze was frigid. He searched Levi's face for a moment before pushing himself to his feet. Levi maintained pointed eye contact, and suddenly, they were in a bit of a pissing contest, Eren towering over him and Levi content to affect relative ease from his position on the floor. Finally:
"Get the fuck out of here."
Eren smiled bitterly. "Okay. Sure," he said. "But hey, when Zachary tells you to rip every last piece of meat off my bones so the Scouts can retake the Founder, do me a favor and make it quick."
Levi was, for perhaps the first time in years, dumbstruck. As Eren moved to leave, he paused at the threshold, angling his head over his shoulder and spitting a glob of blood, mucus, and saliva onto the floor of Levi's temporary lodgings. Levi was halfway across the room in an instant, ready to indulge him in one last beating, but Eren slammed the door behind him.
Levi pounded his fist against it, seething.
"And don't fucking come back here, Eren! You hear me?" Another brutal punch for emphasis. "You were a waste of time and resources from the very start, and if I could take it all back, I would!"
Eren was slumped against the wall a few steps from Levi's door, tracing the beginnings of a bruise blossoming across his jaw. He didn't have the energy to laugh or cry. The only thing keeping one foot in front of the other was the promise of feeling something again someday, and so—until death, even after death—Eren followed it. The darkness of the hallway beckoned him deeper, and he ambled toward his room with a subconsciously uneven gait, checking the first of many loved ones off his list.