title - Especially For Them
details - levi takes the time to go through hange's office after they passed away. on a rainy day, he looks back on his memories of them.
warnings - spoilers (obviously) for chapter 132 from the manga!! read with caution.
A/N - my first story is an angst... ideal. there may also be a few spag mistakes, but i hope you enjoy it anyways! thank you! <3
He’d watched Hange walk away from him into the claws of the things they loved, whispering the very words they’d uttered when they met him.
“I’ll be watching over you.” He knew they always bit off more than they could chew. Regardless, he’d done the same exact thing by stepping into this damned office.
The windows of 104th Survey Corps Commander Hange Zoe’s office were poorly holding out against the onslaught of rain.
It was sudden, the way the clouds had loomed over the clear sky. It was sunny, then it wasn’t. The sky was a dingy gray shade, and the shrubbery crowding through the bricks was fighting its way through the cracks. Somehow, the nature smelt familiar to Levi.
The familiar smell was of the days he’d spent as Captain of his own team in the Survey Corps, riding horseback on his midnight mare as rain pattered onto their cloaks. They’d proudly donned the wings of freedom, which seemed to cling to their every breath as they stampeded through the vast land of trees, flowers and forests.
That ‘nature’ smell reminded him of times where he was carefree. He could block out Hange when they rambled about another stupid experiment they were planning, he could watch over Eren and his stupid angry outbursts, he could give a word of advice to Armin, he could…
He’d watched two of his closest friends be killed in cold blood by Titans. He’d watched his comrades get trampled, beaten down and mercilessly killed by the Female Titan. He’d watched the mentalities of the last standing soldiers - Armin, Jean, Connie, Mikasa and the others - crumble before his fingertips.
He’d watched Hange walk away from him into the claws of the things they loved, whispering the very words they’d uttered when they met him.
“I’ll be watching over you.”
He knew they always bit off more than they could chew. Regardless, he’d done the same exact thing by stepping into this damned office.
With the low grumble of thunder, Levi was brought back from those painful memories. His calloused fingers traced over the worn pages of the textbook. Elaborate drawings, small notes, doodles, spider diagrams, and hasty tea stained fingerprints littered corners of each page.
He had half a mind to lift it up and smell the page. Lifting his head, his sharp eyes scanned the room.
Well… no one was here anyways, right?
His head bowed, and he buried his nose into the page he had left open on. It brought him a surprising sense of comfort. It smelled of flames, candlelight and rainy nights, ones that were scarily similar to this one. He smiled gently, lifting his head. He could tell that these pages had been pored over, many a time.
Hange liked to stay up late, and like him, was an insomniac.
There had been many times when Levi had walked in on them poring over a book, nose deep into their notes and doodles. He’d put up his stoic front, and pretended not to care, but actually, he admired Hange for the work they did.
‘Titans are complex creatures’, Hange had told him many times. Levi however, couldn’t bring himself to see past their murderous drive. They wanted to eat mankind, cause years worth of pain and trauma, and most of all, feel no remorse doing it.
Which is why he never understood how Hange could see the good in them.
His dark eyes scanned through the words. Hange was always hasty with their writing. They liked to take down a lot in quick procession, so a lot of it was messy.
Levi chuckled. Of course it was messy.
Most things Hange did were quick, and they didn’t like to take care. Not in a bad way… it was just in their nature. Their hair was never tied neatly, auburn strands falling over their face. Their goggles were always askew, buttons on their yellow blouse were sometimes mismatched.
They were disheveled, but Hange always argued the same, “My hair is like this because I work too hard to bother fussing over it!”
He'd told them many times to get their shit together, to fix their goggles, to button their shirt, but they got so distracted and fixated on other things that Levi just never ended up having the energy to remind them again.
Regardless, he didn't hate it, having to remind them to do the simplest things.
Even now Levi can hear their voice, sharp and enthusiastic, as his eyes scan over the pages that Hange had worked hard to annotate. Taking a sharp inhale, he closes his eyes. He feels dizzy. Their voice resounded so closely in his ears, he could almost imagine they were there.
Being close to Hange, Levi didn’t take their death well. One moment they were there and the next they weren’t. He’d turned his back to their rapid footsteps into the burning heat of Titan skin, but he regrets it heavily. Levi wished he’d turned around and watched them go.
But that would’ve probably hurt even more.
Hange was someone who was an anchor in his life. Even Erwin he found insufferable sometimes, like ants crawling up his neck just by the latter standing outside his door. Which sounds surprising, because everyone and their mother thought they may as well be a married couple.
But Hange was like calm waves, despite their chaotic antics. They knew what to say, how to help, and how to make things better. They always calmed him down, and were there to offer a shoulder to cry on.
Erwin wasn’t exactly the best choice for that.
His eyes were hazy. His cheeks felt cold, like a gentle breeze was blowing onto them. They were cold so suddenly, and when he lifted a hand to his cheeks, they felt wet.
Anyone who knew him closely also knew that he rarely cried. He rarely cried because he didn’t want to show others how weak he is.
Levi is fragile, and he knows that. Hange knew that too, but they never used it to their advantage. They were an incredibly empathetic person, and most of the time Levi didn’t even need to say anything to them to understand.
He loved Hange for a myriad of reasons, but this was probably the biggest reason why.
And he missed them. So fucking much, it hurts.
His heart hurt to be reading through their textbooks, where they’d taken so much care to take down every little thing they found out. Titans, weirdly, was a thing they loved a lot, and even though everyone around him found it weird, Levi had a secret admiration for Hange’s passion. It had brought them forward and advanced them a lot in terms of tactics, strategy and ideas to help them in battle and even after their death, progress humanity forward.
Which he knew Hange would be proud of themselves for doing.
Levi shuts the textbook, placing it down onto the desk by the window. The rain had cleared whilst his head was running through those memories. Looking out of the window, he could see that the grass was a little greener and he could hear the quiet chirping of the birds outside.
Life was difficult without his four-eyed, enthusiastic, savant friend. But he’d made it this far, he might as well continue living for all the people he’s lost.
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