FicWad

Early December
Levi
I woke up in a mass of duck feather comforters and soft fluffy pillows, the cool winter sun washing over the sheets and my cold skin in a new dawn.
I hadn’t expected to wake up again. I thought the engulfing blackness was the last of my world I would see.
It was time for me to get out of the bulwark and leave everything behind me. I had to leave all of these people to be free, because I was never truly alone and I would only be free if I was alone, alone and capable of doing whatever my heart desired. It was all I wanted. I threw the covers off of myself and felt my shoulder catch fire with agony, and I tried to roll over to get out of the bed.
I thought I was dead before I woke up in the Infirmary. I heard the storm of the new world I had entered.
I dragged my legs off the bed and sat up, but dizziness washed over me in waves with nausea. I couldn’t breathe without pain. My whole body ached and screamed in protest, and my chest and throat burned like cyanide. I had to escape before they knew I was awake; it was illegal to commit suicide as a soldier because it was damage to Crown Property. I would be put on trial and imprisoned until my last breath, held tight in chains. That was not the hell I wanted.
I remembered the salty rain-the tears-of angels, baptizing me. They sang to me of the triumph of my courage to sacrifice everything I had for all that I lost.
I held my sides and saw all the bandages. They had been clean before I started to move, but I saw blood rise red and brown through the white. Maybe I’d bleed out before anyone could find me, before I escaped, and then there would be no reason for me to want to hide away anywhere.
I remembered my angel. She was a sorrowful sight, with tears dampening her face and hair, choking her beautiful songs. She begged me to stay with her, and I promised her I would. She was beautiful and warm, all I wanted from the world that bound me. She was so familiar, like the stars that twinkled above every night for all lifetimes forever before and forever beyond.
I tried to stand on my bare feet. The cream tile was frigid with the winter cold, and as soon as I stood, I collapsed. I caught myself with my arms but they gave out, all my wounds screaming with searing white-hot pain. My ribs ached as my body fell to the ground on them, and I laid there. I hadn’t the strength to get up again as I heard running steps draw near. It was time to give up.

Hanji
Levi was awake. He was alive. Against all odds, he survived.
From the Infirmary, I heard the rustle of sheets and blankets, and, since he was the only patient in the ward, I knew it was him. The military doctor who treated him said it was likely he wouldn’t wake up again, that he would die in his coma due to so much blood loss. He had been so close to opening arteries.
As soon as I heard him shifting around from the hallway, I decided to go talk to him before doctors- or guards- heard him awaken. Then I heard him collapse and groan. He was trying to escape.
I started running and burst through the tall wood ornate doors of the Infirmary to save him.
Levi
The doors slammed open, but I didn’t look up from where I sat on the ground. I accepted the defeat; it was pointless to continue fighting a lost cause; I failed. The footsteps slowed when the person reached me.
“Levi,” Hanji breathed. I looked up at her, and I saw the eyes of my singing angel peer down upon me. “Let me help you,” she said. I was shocked, and I gasped. She held out her arm, but I couldn’t take it up to help myself, so she knelt down beside me.
“I can’t help you unless you let me, and I can’t save you unless you want to be saved.” Her eyes were brown, very common, but I hadn’t noticed them before. They looked like copper, shining in the sun, and wide, like a doe. I saw my reflection in her glasses, and she smiled encouragingly at me. I looked down at my hands. How could I help myself?
Hanji
He looked surprised that I was there beside him, as if he saw me for the first time. I wanted him to trust me, understand I was already by his side to help him before anyone else got to him to take him away.
“Let me help you.” Coaxingly, I put my arm around his waist, and he responded by laying his arm over my shoulders. Luckily, he was shorter than me, so heaving him up was easy. He cried out in pain as I lifted him up, but I kept going until he was back in his bed.
“I’m able to change your bandages. They’re old now.” He laid back down so I went for fresh bandages and cleaner. I needed to hide the evidence that he had tried to escape; it was so obvious that he had from his freshly bleeding wounds. He was so silent, but his eyes never left me; I was keenly aware of it even as my back was turned. Quickly, I returned to his side.
“This will probably hurt a bit, but I’ll try to be as gentle as possible.” I smiled reassuringly to him, and he grimaced as I began to remove his bandages. He winced, but continued to stay silent. For a while, I let it permeate the air between us,
“You’ve been out for three weeks.” I started, deciding to update him on what happened while he was away. “No titan attacks since you’ve been gone, and there are more recruits this year than there has been in the past. Moral is up, thanks to you.” There was a pause of silence again as I applied fresh bandages and pain medication to his wounds.
“What will happen to me now, Hanji?” He closed his dark eyes, and silently a tear rolled down out of the corner of his eye and in to his black hair.
Levi
I was scared. I had made a home and I destroyed it again, like a selfish child. I was a monster. I couldn’t fight the tears that overwhelmed me once again, but I was worthless, beneath the sympathy of Hanji. Yet she comforted me. She brushed my hair from my face and looked in to my eyes while I wiped my face clean with the back of my hand.
“I don’t know,” she said, and her brows furrowed, her mind racing a million miles an hour. She paused. “Just know I’ll be with you every step of the way.” She clasped my hand and gently squeezed it. I breathed deep and the massive doors opened once again. Soldiers, doctors, and Erwin Smith entered the Infirmary.
Hanji
I knew they came to take Levi away, off to a prison where he’d rot to his death and lose his mind. Erwin was his friend, so was he here to try to lessen Levi’s sentence? I could only hope that was why the man was here, instead of to drag him away in chains to never see the light again.
They stood at the edge of his bed and Levi attempted to sit up. He was so small, with the blankets and pillows strewn all over the twin sized bed. He looked innocent. Erwin pulled out a paper as the doctors began to check Levi’s vitals along with his wounds. I stepped aside, my eyes drilling holes in to Erwin’s face. He unraveled the yellow parchment and began to read from it.
“Lance Corporal Levi Heichu Ackerman, as Royal Property of the Crown, you have defiled your High Stance and Rank among the Royal Military, the Scouting Legion. You have defiled the Crown by causing damage to His Majesty’s Property, a Crime as so Punishable with Public Execution, but, due to the Circumstances of said Crime, you will not be Executed. Your Punishment shall suit the Crime: to be forced to Survive and Live out the remainder Years of your Life. But you shall be under constant Supervision by a Superior until your Death, whether it be Timely….or Untimely. Until you are deemed Competent to continue your Job within the Scouting Legion, you are stripped of your Status as Lance Corporal Levi Heichu Ackerman. You are under Strict Curfew. You must report daily and at Meal Times to your Commanding Officer in accompaniment with your Supervisor. Your Supervisor shall be named by the Commanding Officer, the Head of the Scouting Legion, Myself, Captain Erwin Smith. Your Competency to return to your High-Ranking position shall also be determined by Myself, Captain Erwin Smith.” Erwin’s words were quick and precise, but he never looked at the parchment. Gently, I stroked Levi’s hand with my thumb as he lost color again and he trembled slightly. It was his worst fear: to have his freedom stripped from him. But it was an easy punishment, and he could not be trusted with his own body alone anyways. He would get better, we all knew it. It would just take time for him to heal.
Erwin rolled up the yellowed parchment again and nodded to me. “Hanji Zoe shall be your Supervisor. Keep a good eye on him.”
His eyes never left Levi’s face and they locked eyes for a moment, Erwin daring him to speak, before he decided to take his leave with the two Garrison soldiers who flanked him on either side. The doctors had Levi settled in, and I jogged after Erwin to keep up after him. I waited to speak to him until we were out of the Infirmary.
As we walked in the hall together and the Garrison guards departed, I spoke in a hushed whisper, “What was that all about? How did you lessen his punishment?” Erwin avoided my eyes, his formidable blue-eyed gaze focused on the hall before us.
“I treated Levi like a prize to be won for the King, and he decided to lesson Levi’s punishment. The King wanted him dead. Levi is lucky he isn’t on his way to the Guillotine as we speak.” We grimaced and I headed back to the Infirmary to Levi.
Christmas Day
Hanji
Christmas was in the air. A light powder of snow fell from the grey night sky, and no star shined through the clouds above. Frost trimmed the windows of the bulwark and within bright colors of reds and greens, golds and silvers danced around the cream-colored walls as lights and glimmering tinsels. Fresh mistletoe was hung from mahogany banisters with twinkling lights, and couples kissed happily beneath. Christmas felt like a breath of fresh air.
We were all happy, even Levi, who had color in his cheeks again and a light started to come back in to his dark eyes. Sometimes I heard him hum tuneless Christmas carols from a childhood long passed. It was Christmas, and time to celebrate the cheerfulness.
I pushed Levi’s wheel chair in to the Dining Hall, careful to go over bumps lightly; he was still banged up badly and had been in the chair since he was released from the Infirmary only two weeks before. He looked around at all the lights and to the massive Christmas tree that towered so high it bent at the ceiling and we couldn’t get the star on top of it, even with the help of 3DM gear. Beneath the tree, it looked like Santa threw up presents; present stacks rose higher than Levi was tall, some almost as tall as myself. Levi started to hum to himself quietly.

Levi
I smiled to myself. It was my goal- well, the goal Hanji made for me- to smile at least once a day. She told me some mumbo-jumbo science about how a chemical is released in the brain when someone smiles that makes them feel happier. I didn’t know if it was true or if she just wanted to make it look like I was getting better quicker than what people expected, but, as much as I begrudgingly admitted it to myself, smiling sort of did make life feel better. I would never admit it to her though, and let that smug little smile of hers pull at the corners of her lips. But, the smile felt nice on my face.
“Tonight will be a nice night, now, won’t it?” I heard the smile in Hanji’s voice, the one that made her nose scrunch up and her eyes crinkle in the corners-not the wild one she had during her experiments.
“Yes,” I sighed in agreement. I let the smile fall. It was the first birthday I’d spent without Petra by my side since we met. I shook my head to banish the melancholy thought from my mind. I didn’t want her to haunt me on Christmas, on my birthday.
Hanji rolled me to sit in front of the tree and she sat at the golden table at my side. The tables were set with fine white china and clear cut crystal glasses filled with hot apple cider, a rare treat after the fall of Wall Maria. She passed me a glass of the gold drink and I held it to my nose. It smelled like fall and pine trees.
“I’m more of an egg nog kind of girl,” she said as she pushed her drink away a little from her plate.
“Egg nog is only good with fire whiskey,” I said briskly. She chuckled at me.
“Yeah, only if you’re in to getting piping drunk.”
“That’s the spirit, Shitty-glasses.” I smirked and took a sip of the drink while she laughed. To think I gave this up a month before.
I looked at the presents, wrapped in crinkling colorful paper that had odd designs and graphics on them. Some had Santa and his reindeer, some Frosty the Snowman, others titans dressed up in ugly Christmas sweaters. I noticed some with birthday wrappings, and I saw my name written on them.
People began to come in to the Dining Hall in drones of groups, loud with excitement and laughter. Connie Springer and that barbaric girl he was so obviously in love with, Sasha Braus, sang a rousing carol of Jingle Bells.
“JINGLE BELLS, JINGLE BELLS-“
“TITANS SMELL-“
“JEAN IS A HORSE-FACED BASTARD!” Jean Kirschstein yelled in bewilderment and rage as he went after Eren Yeager, who decided to join in on the Christmas Spirit.
“Have you noticed no one here is Jewish?” I said to Hanji.
“I think Ymir from the 104 squadron is-“
“Or she’s not here because she’s fucking that tiny little blond girl.”
“You mean Armin Arlet?” I laughed at that
“The little one who’s in love with you?” Hanji turned red and I raised my eyebrows at her.
“He’s not in love with me!” Hanji said indignantly.
“Whatever you say, Four-eyes.” I breathed in the scent of pine as Armin went to the front of the room, very near the two of us, and I nudged Hanji. She flicked my ear and I had to fight back the urge to smack the egg nog she poured in to her glass across the room.
“So guys- settle down please! - Connie please don’t try to put the Christmas turkey on your head- yes, I can see you doing it from here! - okay, guys, quiet down already!” Armin was no leader, and as he tried to yell over the chaos, he turned red.
“Poor little fellow. I’ll go help him!” Hanji got up from her seat and went up to the young boy.
“NOW I’M GOING TO DEMONSTRATE WHAT IT WOULD LOOK LIKE IF A TITAN GOBBLED YOU ALL UP RIGHT NOW!” Everyone in the room quieted down. It was an unexpected thing to say, to jinx the whole room like that, but, then again, it was Hanji Zoe, so it wasn’t too surprising that she would say something like that. She patted Armin’s shoulder and then left him up there, a bit rattled and indignant, but still functioning. She returned to her seat next to me and draped her arm around the handles of my wheel chair above my shoulders.
“Okay, so guys, we’re going to eat dinner and then pass out presents.” Immediately everyone began to eat and Armin returned to his seat. After everyone had settled in again and were all quite full, he returned front and center stage.
“Now, before presents, we have something special to do.” People turned their heads towards me and stared, some smiling and laughing, some waving. I scowled and Hanji chuckled at me again. Then, everyone started to sing Happy Birthday to me. Everyone was very off, and cha-cha-chas were sang awkwardly at wrong intervals, but it was nice. It made me smile, even though I fought hard against it. I locked eyes with Yeager and nodded to him as everyone raised their drink in a toast. People yelled over each other at the end, to wish me a happy birthday, merry Christmas, and an exciting New Years. It was touching to see everyone excited to wish me such good things, and I rested my head against Hanji’s shoulder; I was tired again already. I had done so much damage to myself. Being around so many people took a lot out of me.
Then Sasha Braus started to pass down birthday cake. It wasn’t anything special-just a small piece of dark chocolate cake.
“I hope you like it, Heichu,” she said to me as she gave me the plate and silver fork. I hadn’t realized how young she really looked with her mousy hair pulled out of her face. She reminded me of Hanji when she was younger, when we were all younger. I took a bite, and I remembered how much I would have missed the cake if I hadn’t survived. It was very tasty.
“Thank you, Sasha,” I said quietly. She was taken aback, but she smiled politely and then sat back down next to Springer and Mikasa.
After I finished the cake, presents were passed around to people from the tree, and I looked up to the glass ceiling above. The light snow from earlier picked up with the wind.