IMMORTALS • Levi Ackerman

chapter eighteen

018: you're alive

It was a hollow feeling, eating away at his stomach and gobbling up his guts. He couldn't quite pinpoint what the sensation ones. His cold steel, blue eyes gazing upon the corpses of his now, former squad. The details when he passed over them earlier to retrieve Eren were vague, but their eyes weren't, he saw through them. He saw incredible and talented soldiers, who he wholeheartedly relied to in every situation that counted for it.

But there were only four of them, and shouldn't be the case.

There were supposed to be five of them, because he had five strong and reliable soldiers by his side, all which he acknowledged each of their strengths.

So where was she?

He was still waiting for the clean up crew to finish their tasks in tidying up the corpses and collecting the dead bodies that scattered around the forest, but there was still no sign of her lifeless form anywhere, no reports whatsoever, not like he wanted her dead, but if she was, he at least needed to see her body, for reasons he didn't even know.

Levi stared at the horizon, before moving his gaze towards that Mikasa girl who still hovering by Eren's side.

She couldn't be dead. That was what he convinced himself.

He truthfully believed in that too. When he was recovering Eren from that female titan, it was evident to him that there were at least a few big scratches on the titan's body. One perfect slash at the side, another to its left and a bunch of near perfect slashes that littered against that titan's legs and thighs and he only knew one person that could so accurately score that many rips on a titan, with almost pure consistency and excellence at the execution.

And that was her.

So she couldn't be dead. Although Levi would sometimes find her ultimately snarky, annoying and overbearing, she was strong, not easily put out and after so many expeditions she had went on, she couldn't die now, not on this one.

He didn't understand it himself. It wasn't like this was the first time Levi lost one of his soldiers, and certainly this won't be the last one, but why was he so hung up on it. Although, he would never outright show it but thinking about her maybe it even more of a pressing matter.

Maybe it was because of that one night at that balcony he would used to come across to share with his old fellows, Isabel and Farlan. He remembered the words she said, the depth of it, and the way she meant it even if her tone was a bit teasing, Levi saw how genuine it meant.

"Whatever we were before, that's not what we are now. Whatever we went through, we aren't the same anymore. No matter what the people around us might believe, I think you and I know none of that matters. I don't know what decisions you've made in your past, but nevertheless, you've brought yourself to come here, so fuck what they say, you're Captain Levi and I'm Senior Cadet Y/n"

So maybe what he felt was guilt? Right? After all that was the first he saw her, spoke to her as well without any sort of banter and curses. That was a moment where the both of them openly showed each other, more or less, and broke down walls to lightly let each other in, even for just a short moment.

But no, Levi knew it wasn't guilt. It was more than that but he couldn't admit it, not even to himself, maybe because he didn't know what he was feeling himself. It was a foreign yet somehow a strangely familiar feeling that fluttered.

He shook his head lightly from the train of thought, going over to see Erwin who was listening to the reports.

Much like Levi, the blonde commander had something lingering at the back of his mind as well. Slowly distracting him and making him zone out, not only once from listening to the reports.