After dinner, there's another lecture on titans. It's only an hour, but it's still far too long for your liking. By the time it's done, you're exhausted. You're not even sure if the Survey Corps are still here; Hange had mentioned a briefing with Shadis but you weren't sure how long that would take.
You can't help but wander back to the mess hall, wondering if they'd really left without saying goodbye. You don't want to overestimate your own importance, but it's unlikely that they just left without saying anything.
Someone's in the mess hall, but it's not any of the scouts- it's one of the cadet instructors, Wystan Baine. "Cadet Logan," he greets when he notices you. "What're you doing here?"
"Looking for the scouts, sir," you say, saluting him quickly. "Have they left?"
He frowns. "I'm not sure. But you should be headed to the barracks anyways."
You deflate, visibly disappointed. "Yes, sir."
You turn, and your brain is already turning its gears to concoct some sort of plan to snoop around and see if they actually left when Baine calls your name again. You swivel back towards him. "You used to be in the scouts, right?" he asks.
You purse your lips. Erwin said the instructors were informed about your situation, but none of them have tried to address it besides Shadis's conversation with you earlier today. "Not that I can remember," you say with a weak smile.
It's a lie, because you do remember. Isabel's terrified eyes and Farlan's final smile.
"Ah," Baine says, and he straightens up. "So your... your memory hasn't improved."
"No."
Not exactly a lie, but not really the truth, either. Although you haven't had any specific memories return besides that vivid reminder of the deaths of your friends, you've been picking up little things. Like how easy balancing in the vertical maneuvering gear is for you, how naturally hand to hand combat comes. It's not memories, sure, but you're positive they're skills you excelled in before coming above ground and joining the scouts.
"Alright," he continues, eyeing your warily. "Just wanted to make sure you wouldn't be trying to scare any cadets off from future options."
By 'options', you know he means that he's worried about you saying the horrors outside the walls and you'll scare anyone from wanting to join the Survey Corps.
You press your lips in a thin line. "No one knows about who I was before training," you say firmly.
Baine nods. "Ah. Good, then. Dismissed, cadet. Get some rest."
You nod, saluting one last time, and pivot on your heel to march out the door. You take your walk slow purposefully, hoping that you'll see Levi or Hange, and you're within sight of your barracks and about to lose hope when someone calls your name.
You spin and grin madly when you see Hange. They jog towards you, grinning. "I thought you left!" you say brightly, giving them a hug.
"Not without saying goodbye!" Hange replies, and your heart swells. "We're leaving soon, though. Mason wanted a private word with Shadis, but we'll be out of here in, like, ten minutes."
Mason must be one of the other scouts. "Where's Levi?"
"Probably cleaning the training equipment," they say, and you both nod knowingly. The training equipment is never is great shape, and if Levi got a glimpse of it, he would definitely disinfect the whole building. "Why?"
The words are posed on the tip of your tongue: you want to see him, you want to talk to him, you just want to reconnect after three months. But if he's busy, then, well, he's busy. You shake your head. "No reason."
Hange frowns like they don't believe you, then changes the subject. "What're you up to tonight?"
You shrug. "I'll go back to the barracks. Climb on the roof, watch the stars. The usual."
"That sounds familiar." Before you have a chance to figure out what they're talking about, Hange's eyes widen. "Wait- that reminds me! Uh, Levi wants to meet you! On a roof!"
You ignore how your heart rate picks up and dig your fingernails into your palms to calm yourself down. "He- he does?" you say, trying not to bite your own tongue. "Why? What does he want?"
They shrug. "No clue. What roof do you normally go up to?"
"Roof of my barracks," you reply, pointing at your building. "That one. How- how's he going to get up there?"
Hange's eyes follow your finger, and then they nod. "Got it. I'll let him know. Don't worry, we brought gear! Didn't know if Shadis wanted an ODM gear demo or not." They grab you in a tight hug. "We'll be back soon! I don't know when, but maybe another month."
You hug them back. "Bye, Hange."
Hange skips off, humming some sort of tune under their breath, and you practically sprint back to the barracks. When you get in, no one's asleep; people are playing card games or just chatting, perched in other people's beds. Someone waves hi to you and you wave back, then climb up the ladder to your bed.
There's a window next to your bed, which is what you've been using, and you've mostly been trying to use it when everyone's asleep so that you don't draw attention to yourself. For the most part, everyone seems wrapped up in their own conversations, so you open the window and slip outside.
Using the windowsill and overhanging ridge for handholds, you clamber up the wall, making sure to close the window before you get too far out of reach. It's a little bit windy tonight, but not enough to make the temperature unbearable.
You pull yourself up on the roof and fall onto your back. The first stars have started to come out, but other than that, it's mostly clear skies.
You only have to wait about two minutes before you hear the familiar whir of ODM gear. You sit up and turn towards the sound as Levi lands gracefully on the roof, still dressed in his grey shirt and pants from earlier but now wearing his green Survey Corps cloak.
"Well?" he asks, crossing his arms.
You raise an eyebrow. "Nice to see you too. Well, what?"
"Well, what do you want? Hange said you wanted to talk."
You blink. "Hange said you wanted to talk."
Silence ensues as you both digest what's going on.
Levi groans, raking a hand through his hair. "I'm going to kill them."
You snort. "So talking to me is such a chore now."
"No, but Hange didn't have to- they didn't have to set something up," Levi protests, glaring at you. "Besides, if you wanted to talk to me, you could've come to me yourself-"
"Would you have said yes?" you counter. "You would've just brushed me off for trying small talk and that would've been that."
"You didn't even try, how would you know?" he retorts, but his shoulders are starting to dip.
"Educated guess," you say with a roll of your eyes.
Levi snorts. "So training's taught you how to use your brain? About time."
You smile thinly. "No wonder you skipped it, I think your brain would've overloaded," you mock.
His eyes flash, and you're wondering if maybe you've overstepped, but Levi still looks relatively relaxed, so you assume he's okay. "Look, can we not argue, for once?" you say in exasperation, waving a hand in the air. "Just- you know, sit out under the stars."
"Fine."
Levi tips his head back to look up at the sky. Your eyes linger on him for much too long- c'mon, idiot, don't stare- and you look back up to the sky. There's still not that many stars, but the ones that are out are bright.
You glance back at Levi and sigh. "Would it kill you to sit?"
He doesn't reply or even acknowledge you.
"So you're doing it just to spite me now," you say with a roll of your eyes. "Glad to see you haven't changed."
"You have," he remarks.
You frown. "How so?"
Levi settles a hand on his hip, and glances at you quickly before looking back up at the stars. "Your confidence," he says after a beat of silence. "You're moving better."
"Well, it turns out I'm actually good at this stuff," you say with a grin, thinking back to some of your combat training sessions. "I wish- I wish you'd told me a bit more," you add when he doesn't say anything else. "I mean, I understand. I get it. But, well..." you trail off. "Never mind."
You hear a soft sigh. Then, Levi takes a few steps backwards and sits down on the roof next to you. He pulls his knees up to his chest and rests his arms over them, then turns his head sideways to look at you. "Fine," he says. "You win."
You blink. "What? What did I win?"
"You get three questions," Levi continues.
"Three questions about what?"
"Whatever you want."
"Wait- I can ask you stuff? About my past?" You grin. "Actually?"
"Yes and yes," he replies. "That's three questions. You're done."
"Hey!" you protest, glaring at him. "That's cheap! 'Actually' hardly counts as a question!"
Levi shoots you an irritated scowl. "Fine. You've got one question."
"Come on, at least two."
"Fine. Two questions. What you want to know?"
Oh, so many things. You want every little detail Levi can give you, everything he knows. But you've only got two questions, so you've got to make them good. Ironically enough, every single question that you've brainstormed seems to evaporate from your brain. Of course now's the only time that I can't think of anything.
"Well?" Levi asks.
"Combat training," is the first thing that comes to mind. "How do- how do I know how to fight- wait, how do we know how to fight?"
"The underground is kill or be killed. If you want to stay alive, you have to be able to fight." Levi looks back to the stars. "Everyone picks up street skills at some point."
"So everyone from the underground is really good."
"No. But we are."
We. For some stupid reason, him using we instead of referring to you or him separately makes your heart flutter.
"One more," Levi warns, like this is a chore for him.
The obvious one hovers at your tongue, but you're worried he's just going to give you a vague answer. You study him, watching his form and how tense he is. Is he petty? You haven't known him to be, but then again, how well do you really know him? You exhale, deciding to trust that Levi won't jerk you around and he'll actually give you a decent answer.
"How'd we meet?" you ask quietly, lacing your fingers together.
"I was hired to steal something from one of the gang leaders underground," he says. The lack of hesitation to answer your question almost startles you; he's being surprisingly open. You don't want to say something wrong and ruin his good mood. "When I went to steal it, it was gone. The people I was stealing from didn't even know it had been taken."
You grin. "I took it," you say. "Didn't I?"
He nods.
Laughter bubbles up in your throat. He shoots you a weird look and you swallow your giggles. "So you tracked me down?"
Levi nods again. "Yeah."
"Is that when you stabbed me?"
"That's an extra question." He shifts so he's balanced on the balls of his feet. "I said three."
You're so close, literally sitting on the edge of a cliff, the answers right in front of you, and this fucking asshole is going to tell you that you only get to ask three. "No, wait," you say quickly, reaching for Levi's sleeve.
As soon as your fingers close around Levi's shirt, he grabs your wrist. You're confused for a split second before he twists your arm and you yelp, falling sideways onto the roof. Levi raises an eyebrow at you, unimpressed.
Fine then. Scowling, you grab him back, swinging yourself upwards and trying the same move he pulled on you. It doesn't work- Levi's much physically stronger than you and he'd been expecting it- so you slide your hands down to his wrist and twist.
He jerks sideways, like you'd intended, but Levi uses his momentum to pull you with him. Much like your sparring match in the training grounds today, you go flying over Levi, and your momentum sends you rolling to the edge of the roof.
Levi's grip tightens and he tugs you sharply back towards himself. He stops you from rolling, leaving you at the edge of the roof, overlooking the fall down. Levi's grip on your wrist is tight and is sending fire shooting through your veins.
"You were going to throw me off the roof," you say, turning your head to glare at him.
"You need better training," is all he says in reply. "You're going to get yourself killed."
You scowl, sitting yourself up and scooting away from the edge. Levi lets go of you and backs himself up. "Well, I hardly think I'm going to be fighting anyone on rooftops any time soon," you say with a roll of your eyes.
"You just did," Levi points out, "and you lost."
"I'll be fighting titans," you object, crossing your arms. "Not people."
"You think that's it? The only enemies are titans? You know how much shit we had to deal with underground?" he retorts.
"No, I don't know," you reply icily, "because you won't tell me!"
"I just told you shit-"
"You barely told me anything!"
"Fine, I just won't tell you anything next time!" he snaps.
You shrink back. "No, that's..." you exhale, pressing your palms into your forehead. "I don't want to fight with you," you mutter, avoiding his eyes. "It's just that... well-"
"I'm it," Levi says.
You blink. There's several ways you could interpret that. "You're what?"
"I'm the only connection you have," Levi continues, his eyes trained up at the stars. "And I..." he trails off. You wait with baited breath. "I'm withholding information from you," he says, and he finally meets your gaze. "So I get if you're pissed."
"Yeah, I'm pissed," you agree, and Levi's eyebrows rise. "But I always assumed you had your reasons."
He shrugs. "I didn't."
You frown. "I don't believe that."
Levi thinks, then says, "no reasons that you'd accept."
Something personal, then. Something that didn't warrant Levi hiding everything from you but still kept him from telling you regardless.
"If I promise not to ask about your reasons," you say carefully, "will you tell me everything?"
Levi's expression is unreadable. "You trust me to tell you everything?"
You ponder that for a moment. Do you? He could easily lie and you'd accept it without hesitation because you've got no way of knowing otherwise.
But Levi's never given you a reason not to trust him (...besides not telling you anything about the underground and who you used to be) and you've never known him to lie. Levi always speaks bluntly; he says what he means and you can't recall him ever telling you something that turned out to be false. Plus, he'd dropped everything to come save you months ago at the farm. He might not tell you, but you know he cares.
"I trust you," you reply.
He stares at you for a while and you do your best not to drop his gaze. Eventually, his shoulders roll back and he nods. "Alright."
"Okay," you agree, lacing your fingers together to keep yourself from fidgeting. "So you stabbed me?"
"Yeah."
"How? Who stabbed who first?"
Levi's nose scrunches up, like he'd rather not remember. "I stabbed you," he says, eyes flickering to you briefly. "I thought you'd stay down after that. You fucking lunged at me with my damn knife still in your stomach."
You start to laugh, which is bizarre, because it's not a laughing matter at all. "And I got you," you say.
"Unfortunately."
"What happened after that?"
"Farlan wanted to recruit you. Said that we could finally take on one of the bigger jobs that we'd been thinking of trying to do for a while. I said no. You were too unpredictable, too smart, and you worked on your own. You'd be shit for team jobs."
"You didn't trust me."
Levi snorts. "You tried to kill me. How could I?"
"So what happened next?" you say eagerly, shifting closer to him.
He notices you moving, and you watch his shoulders rise slightly as he stiffens. You freeze immediately, not wanting to push your luck. Levi tips his head towards you. "You sure you want to know?" he asks.
In the moonlight, his grey eyes look silver.
You smile softly and nod. "Everything you're willing to tell me."
Levi holds your gaze for a moment, and maybe's it your imagination, but the corner of his mouth twists slightly. "Fine. You asked for it."
And so he does. Levi tells you about how he had been considering Farlan's proposition until you stole their ODM gear. There was a four month period where he stole it back from you, then you managed to steal it back from him, and back and forth until you managed to steal your own set and didn't need to take theirs anymore.
He tells you how he only agreed to work with you when you saved Isabel from a run in with a gang- completely by coincidence. He tells you about how you clicked with Farlan and Isabel immediately but he remained skeptical of you. He tells you about how the four of you pulled off a huge job, and afterwards, they invited you to stay with them.
"So you never trusted me?" you ask, raising an eyebrow.
Levi shakes his head. "Not for a second."
"Why?"
He considers his response for a minute, looking back up at the stars like they hold all the answers. Your eyes drift across his face, admiring his jawline and his cheek bones.
"You were too good to be true," Levi says finally.
You don't have time to try and decipher what he means because there's a loud whistle that draws your attention. Hange is off in the distance, waving to you from the ground. "Oi!" they said. "We were supposed to leave ten minutes ago!"
Levi stands and tightens the straps of his ODM gear. You frown to yourself. "Do you never say goodbye?" you ask, noticing the trend between your encounters with Levi.
"I don't like saying goodbye," he replies, walking down to the edge of the roof.
You straighten up. "How about 'see you soon'?"
He pauses, then turns to face you. A breeze ruffles his hair in front of his face. Levi's eyes linger on you, and he murmurs, "fine. See you soon."
Levi steps off the roof and swoops away.
You watch his retreating back until he meets up with Hange. The two of them fall into step and vanish from your line of sight.
You stare at the last spot you saw him for another few seconds, then let your eyes drift back up to the sky.
"Hey," you say to the stars, a stupid smile spreading across your face. "I don't know who I used to be, but..." you laugh. "I sound pretty cool."
.
He wonders if, by telling you everything from your past, he'll finally have some sort of inner peace. Maybe that's why you're bothering him so much, because he's holding back information he knows you desperately want.
So, in an effort to drive down the burning feeling in his chest, Levi tells you everything. The short version, at least. It hurts something in his chest to talk about Isabel and Farlan, but somehow, the eager look on your face counteracts the pain.
There's something in the way the moonlight reflects in your eyes that makes Levi want to give you every little detail until the sun comes up.
It's a stupid feeling. He thought telling you everything would make himself feel better, and it hasn't. Levi grits his teeth, wondering what's gotten into him and how he can destroy whatever's eating at his heart.
"So you never trusted me," you ask.
No. You got along too well with Isabel and Farlan, you made a problematic mission look like child's play, you picked up ODM gear so fast that he'd thought you were secretly military police in disguise. "Not for a second," Levi replies.
"Why?"
He could give you his reasons, all your talents and how you were just too good. Or he could tell you about how dangerously intoxicating you were, about how he was becoming attached to you in a way unlike with Farlan and Isabel: in a way that would likely destroy him if he couldn't control himself.
No. Levi relaxes his jaw, closing and opening his eyes. Those feelings don't exist anymore- can't exist anymore. He'd squashed them down. For his own safety and your own.
"You were too good to be true," Levi says finally.
And under the stars, with your wide eyes and the moon illuminating your hair, he knows you are too good to be true, in so many more ways than one.