Chapter Text
After the Survey officers had left, Eren became relatively accustomed to soldiers coming to stare at him, though it grew no less uncomfortable. At first he tried desperately to reassure each one that he wasn't a threat, that he'd be no trouble, but that had only gotten him blank and hostile stares. One man, wearing the roses of Garrison, had spit at him, so violently that Eren had been forced to scramble back from the bars as far as his chains would allow him to go. He'd huddled, shaking, in the corner of his tiny cell, his mind whirling, warring between fury at his treatment and terror that the next person to come along would simply decide that they'd all be better off if he died, here and now.
He wanted to cry. He wanted Armin, and Mikasa. Hell, he would've even taken Kirstein, if only for the distraction that the ensuing argument would bring him. The cell smelled like old nightsoil and rotting straw, and there was a wet trickle in one corner, the limestone bleeding dirty water out onto the floor.
It wasn't as though he done something willfully wrong, he thought, staring through the bars at the torch that flickered on the stone wall beyond. He'd saved people. He'd sealed the Wall.
I'm not a monster, he told himself, clutching with angry helplessness at his knees. I'm not, I'm not, I'm not.
“Do you want water?” said a voice from the shadow of the stair by the cell door, just out of his line of vision.
Eren started, his head jerking up with a rattle of chain. “What?”
“Someone soiled your water bucket out here,” the speaker went on, his tone implying with icy precision exactly what he thought about the sort of person who soiled anything, “So I got some fresh.”
Eren hesitated.
“You're just going to throw something at me,” he said, unable to keep the accusation out of his voice. “Or dump it on me, or something. Well, don't. I just wanna be left alone.”
The speaker huffed with apparent impatience. “Listen, you little fuck,” it said, without particular rancor or derision, “Just come here. If you get all dehydrated it'll really fuck everything up.”
The voice was familiar, Eren realized, and that was enough to bring him cautiously forward in a creeping sidle, his head held high and alert for any sign of hostile movement. When he arrived at the bars, however, any thought of attack left him completely.
“Captain Levi,” he gasped.
Levi did, indeed, have a bucket of clean water in one hand, and a gourd dipper in the other, which he held out, dripping, without comment. Eren took it and drank it all in one go, just as he did with the next dipper-ful, and the next.
When he was sated, Levi turned and set the bucket down behind him. Eren watched him, a little starstruck despite himself and the anxious thunder of his heart.
“We need to talk,” Levi said.
“Okay.” Eren did his best to look agreeable and attentive, swallowing the lump of nervousness in his throat. “Whatever you like.”
Levi paused, and then he reached into his uniform jacket, drawing something out from a hidden inner pocket.
“I'm sorry,” he said, “About your mother.”
Of all things, this was not what Eren had been expecting to hear. Hurt rose up in him, suddenly, beyond his control; for a moment all he could see was his mother, dangling, struggling, her blood in a terrible final spray.
“What do you know about it?” he snapped, suddenly furious, no longer caring who this man was or what he had done for humanity. “It's not like you knew her. It's not like she was anyone who would've mattered to you.” No one had mourned or even remembered his mother but him and Mikasa and Armin; his chronically absent father was hardly more than a distant memory. He had no advocates here, no matter what Commander Smith or anyone else said, and what he had lost was no business of anyone else's. The world had made that much clear. Deep down Eren knew he was being unfair, but the wounds of loss still festered, badly infected by the lack of recognition or sympathy.
But Levi only blinked, an odd look in his eyes. He didn't flinch at Eren's outburst at all, only went on gazing at him, placid and untouched. He stepped forward to the bars, and held out his hand, uncurling his fist.
In his palm was a small cloth draw-string bag, stained with age and grime. The ribbon that bound it closed was badly frayed, and it had been knotted several times to prevent it coming apart entirely. The smell of sage and lavender was strong in the little cell, suddenly, pricking at his nose.
“I take it with me when I go out,” said Levi, as Eren stared at him, memories surfacing, churning. “It reminds me that there's hope in the world.”
“I remember you,” Eren whispered. “You were – you were a cadet. You were swallowed by a Titan.”
“Yeah.” Levi nodded, and drew his hand back, tucking the little bag carefully back into his jacket again. Despite his small stature he seemed larger in the torchlight, the calm on his face like the reassurance of some stern archangel. “We're here to save you, Eren. But you're going to have to trust us.”
“Yes,” Eren said, breathless now. "Anything.”
“Good,” said Levi, leaning against the bars and folding his arms. “Then, here's the Commander's plan.”
*
i walked with the river in kind of a dream
hand in hand, the all-knowing river and me
to the clamor of rushes and deeply barren trees
a drunk making blossom, the blush to be seen
i told him my sorrows and broken-down dreams
confessed every lie, replayed every scene
he openly wept as he listened to me
and then, with the sun in the west, he showed me the sea.