IMMORTALS • Levi Ackerman

chapter fifty five

055: you don't need to compete

"Hange, I need your advice..."

The woman raises her head at the statement, eyes training over to me as I stood in front of her desk. She rewards me a strange look of confusion, immersed in the thousands of papers piled on her table.

"With what?" She entertains me anyway, and I take a seat on of the empty padded chair that wasn't used as a stack holder for numerous folders.

There was hesitance, however I felt like it was only Hange fit enough to at least help me with my current dilemma.

"It's about... Levi." I trail off, uncertain.

Hange pauses, looks up, and then back down again, as if she was just trying to make sure she heard me right. "What's wrong with him this time?"

"I think he's ignoring me."

After we had returned from Sonne Village, it was apparent that he seemed distant. It was his behavior, naturally. But something felt wrong about it this time. Levi looked closed off, that was a given, but this time he looked strict. It reminded me of how he was the first few years I was in the Scouts.

Hange laughs. "Levi ignores everyone, he ignores me and I'm the Commander. You probably just broke one of his cups and he's going through his phase. Don't worry, he'll be back to his old self, you're his favorite after all."

The implication made my heart skip a beat. Still, the situation escalated far more than how Hange was picturing it out.

"Hange, he hasn't been sleeping in our room for four days now." I admitted, making the woman halt in her work. The reflection of her eyes behind her glasses made me shiver, she had just realized the weight of the problem at this point. "You know, I did notice he's been too cooped up in his office lately, and extra cranky." She notes, placing a finger under her chin in thought.

Just imagining Levi cramped in his chair burying himself in paperworks made me sigh. He wasn't one to abandon his responsibilities, but he hasn't asked me to help at all, and he used to... at least he'd demand it from me because he wasn't the type to use the word "help" when it came to reviewing countless of documents.

Still, I pictured him out dozing in his desk, and it made my heart hurt. He already has a hard time sleeping, and sleeping in a desk made it all the more of a struggle for an insomniac.

"You got any idea why that is? Did you do something to upset him?" Hange probes, interested now as she gave me her full attention.

I did.

I had an inkling to why he had been that way ever since we came back. It was a mere guess, but one that was daring, and I didn't want to sound too presumptuous. I didn't wanna feel like I was taking things out of context.

But it was the only reasoning that made sense.

I carefully explained to Hange what had happened in Sonne Village. She listened in, animated at all the details I had to share, providing her very elaborate reactions at every careful notion.

"How scandalous!" She exclaims after I had finished.

I nodded. "When we returned, he just... started ignoring me. We don't even eat breakfast together anymore. He comes into our room when I'm not there, and I know he times it right since I always smell his scent lingering when I return."

That was a peculiar fact, but it was true anyway. I had even forgotten about the box Adeline had left me with because I was too busy observing the vast change in Levi's demeanor now. He's in my head too much. I hadn't even open up the box yet and I just realized it now. Stupid!