Until the Walls Remember (Levi x OC)

1176

My eyes snap open, staring at the white ceiling above me. I rise slowly, not letting myself think even for a second. Stepping out of the bed carefully with my focus entirely fixed on the mirror across the room. I moved toward it with a heavy heart, fear creeping in as I get closer.

When I reach the mirror, my eyes drift to the left side of my shirt. I slowly lift it up...

-

"How's life outside the walls?"

That was the question I had kept asking myself for as long as I could remember. But after turning sixteen, there I was: a brand-new recruit in the 104th Training Corps.

That was three years ago.

Why I decided to become a soldier? I didn't really know. I mean, what else was there for a girl like me to do? By joining the military and choosing the Survey Corps, I could finally see what lay beyond the walls. I could finally fulfill the purpose.

Exactly. The purpose. I didn't actually know what that purpose was yet. I just knew deep down that there was one. I would have found out soon enough.

I couldn't really remember most of my childhood. I only knew that my mother raised me until she passed away when I was thirteen. I didn't know why, but I couldn't remember much of her, either. I just knew how she used to brush my deep golden hair and tell me she used to have the exact same hair color when she was younger. She was so young and beautiful back then, her skin flawless and her presence commanding a room even in our small cabin. She used to stitch up flat fabric whenever she found some, making beautiful dresses for me. This color fits your hazel eyes perfectly, she'd say. Sometimes I watched her pinch and pull on her own cheeks to bring out a natural color. They make a good pink undertone, she used to tell me, smiling at her reflection. We often went to the forest to pick wild berries, and later on, she would show me how to press them against my lips, staining them to make a cherry tone. But it wasn't all just vanities and quiet afternoons. Sometimes, I watched her reach into the dark recesses of a hidden shelf, pulling out heavy, forbidden books whose spines had never seen the light of day. She would read the forbidden words aloud to me, her voice a low, mesmerizing hum, but only after she made me cross my heart and promise her not to tell a single soul. Whenever I remember her, I see a beautiful woman standing totally revealed in a stray ray of sunshine.

But her smile was even brighter.

My dad? I didn't have a clue who or where my father was. I had been entirely alone after my mother passed, trying to survive day by day with the help of a neighbor who brought me food sometimes. But in return, he touched me... inappropriately. So, a completely messed-up childhood, I guess. Maybe that block in my memory was just my brain trying to protect itself.

Now, at nineteen, I had just graduated from the Training Corps. For the first time in my existence, during those three years of brutal, exhausting training, I actually made friends. Friends I grew to consider family.

Jean and Marco basically became my older brothers. Through them, we fell into a circle with Armin, Mikasa, and Eren, who eventually introduced us to Sasha and Connie. Later on, Raquelle and Barbie joined our little group, too. Looking back, I honestly don't know how I would had survived those years without them.

Jean and I became best friends after I made his nose bleed. Not on purpose, of course. Or maybe?

One thing to know about me: I completely sucked at hand-to-hand combat and could never remember the techniques. Keith Shadis—our terrifying head instructor—paired Jean and me together during practice. One thing led to another, and while I was attempting to replicate a move that my beloved friend Mikasa had shown me, I accidentally punched Jean straight in the face. I mean, was it really my fault that he couldn't defend himself? If anything, I taught him a valuable lesson. Marco proved to be the real friend there because he immediately rushed to Jean's side to check on him. What made Marco so instantly lovable was that while he was literally stuffing tissues up Jean's bloody nose, he looked over at me and murmured, "He probably deserved it." God, that smile. Marco was quite literally an angel fallen from heaven straight into these walls of hell.

I couldn't exactly say the same about Jean though.

Meeting Sasha was easily one of the best things that ever happened to me. To this day, I still don't know how that girl managed to stay so skinny, because every single time I turned my head, she was chewing on something. She even managed to traumatize our head instructor—and probably half the courtyard—on our very first day. While Shadis was screaming introductions in everyone's faces, this girl was legitimately eating a steamed potato right in front of him without a single trace of guilt or fear. I knew I liked her from that exact moment. Connie was essentially the male version of Sasha. He was a blast to hang around, and whenever the weight of the military got to me, he was always there to make me laugh. He was the kind of person you could laugh with over absolutely nothing. I appreciated that more than he knew.

Then there was the night I was eating dinner by myself, and Eren was the first one to come over, asking if he and his friends could sit with me. I immediately nodded, and they actually sat down, pulling me right into their conversation. Armin always struck me as incredibly shy, but he was also brilliant and sharp. We had endless talks about the outside world. He even told me about the sea once. I didn't have the heart to tell him back then, but I already knew about it. Still, I felt so incredibly grateful that he wanted to share such a precious, secret dream with me that I chose to keep quiet and just listen. Mikasa was always the quietest of the bunch, but she was beautiful, fierce, and so confident. When it came to Eren's safety, she was always the first line of defense.

Eren and I understood each other on a completely different level, not a romantic one, just something deeper. I always felt like he and I shared the exact same kind of unnamable trauma. I just understood why he was the way he was.

A few days later, after the instructor witnessed me break Jean's nose, he moved me to a training team with Rihanna and Beyoncé. They were much taller and broader than me, so Shadis probably figured they were safe from my stray punches. But Reiner flat-out refused to train with me at first. According to him, it went against his principles to fight 'one of the weakest female soldiers.'

Yes... he actually said that. Well, surprise, surprise: another nose was bleeding by the end of the hour. By accident, of course. And as if that wasn't embarrassing enough for him, Mikasa absolutely wiped the floor with him right after. Despite his big mouth, Reiner really was a gentleman. He often helped Sasha and me lug heavy crates across the grounds or helped me adjust my ODM gear properly. He fit right into our late-night conversations, and we had a lot of fun.

(-b±√b²-4ab)/2a was far more reserved. A quiet, towering guy who was incredibly sweet. He clearly had a massive thing for a cadet named Annie, the second strongest female in our year. It was honestly adorable watching him turn completely red whenever she so much as walked past him.

But then there were the dark nights. Hours after lights-out, the whole group would crowd together in the dark, whispering about the Fall of Wall Maria and the horror that had taken place in Shiganshina. Eren, Mikasa, and Armin had watched it all unfold. They spoke of the skinless titan face appearing over the top of the wall. The gate kicking inward. The titans flooding the streets. The absolute bloodbath.

During those conversations, I never said a word.

Because the truth about me is that I saw things. I saw events days before they actually happened, flashing behind my eyelids like horrific, unescapable nightmares. Days before the actual attack on Shiganshina, I already knew exactly what was coming.

Could I had done something? Could I had screamed a warning? That is the suffocating, agonizing question I had to ask myself every single day. But back then, I wasn't sure how reliable my visions really were, and I was terrified I was just losing my mind. So I kept my mouth shut. After all, who would have ever believed a broken girl like me anyway?