Guns and Cigarettes [Levi/Rivaille x OC]

Chapter 13: Life is a Gamble

It glimmered flirtatiously, an ancient form of seduction. My eyes narrowed suspiciously, sharpening on the weird looking lump that exposed itself shamelessly behind the pane. The wind, on the other hand, barged furiously through my locks, forcefully trying to rip me away from the bait, which we all know as claw machines.

Curiosity licked my heart. I strayed from my path where the others marched on, wandering drunkenly towards the glass littered with scratches and hieroglyphic-like graffiti etched in. Leaving behind a trail of fingerprints, the pads of my fingers loitered across the translucent windowpane, marking it my territory. The broken light of the claw machine illuminating the scene flashed on and off periodically, mimicking lightning.

A myriad of fabric faces sneered back. One stood out in particular.

"God," My eyebrows knitted together in confusion, "What is that?"

I had witnessed a Satan spawn. No doubt it was a plushie, alright.
Tracing along the mass trail of embroidery, the poor stitching that lined its lazy, fleece eyes. My vision followed along the line of eggs that appeared to be its teeth, the harsh angular scaffold that framed its shredded abdomen. The assembly of ivory lines swam in a sea the colour of flesh.

Was that supposed to be a skinned human? They could have at least given it some hair.

"What are you looking at now?" A grumpy voice puffed over my shoulder. Typical Levi.

His vision was eventually aligned with mine, and I could practically hear the scrunching of the boy's brow like autumn leaves as he announced in unfiltered disgust.

"That has got to be the ugliest thing I've ever seen."

A nod followed in agreement.

"It's kinda cute actually." I dropped an acknowledgement in revelation, tapping on the glass gently, "It even has its own set of little abs, see? You can wash clothes with a rack like that."

"Tch. I have those."

"No, you don't." A light poke at his stomach that hid self-consciously behind his sweater, accompanied by my exaggerated tone, "It's a blackhole here from a stomach that is permanently hungry."

My joking lilt was seized from my gorge when a sharp jab pierced into my ribcage. It took me a few seconds to recover from that streak of pain that sliced across my visual field. If he had aimed any higher, I would have slapped that sonuvabitch all the way to Morocco.

"How much is it?" The charcoal-haired boy stepped up to window now. Artificial light with its detached, cold tints carved into his face, embellishing his pale tones. His eyes remained fixed on the God-forbbiden lump of textile.

"Obviously out of our budget." I began to tug him away, "These machines are rigged."

He cocked that twig of an eyebrow at me. Sometimes, I want to outline them with a sharpie marker for him, but something tells me he wouldn't be happy with it. Those slanted eyes which were a bubbling soup of cobalt glinted at me like a knife's edge, challenging, "Adler, are you underestimating me?"

"Ha! Underestimating?" The ground which reeked of trash and piss whimpered under my firm stance, "I have absolutely NO faith in you! Come on, let's go. Our museum tour is over."

Those crude words skidded right off of him. The side of his lip twitched rebelliously upward into a muffled sneer as I watched the male carefully hike up his sleeves. We would all think he was preparing for a knife fight or something. Not clawing a plushie out.

"Ten bucks says I can. Within five minutes." Those predacious eyes watched me with amusement.

Challenge accepted, bitch.