#erurirenweekend

[cheshirecatlife]

An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works

Eruriren Weekend ~ Future Title: The Odds Are Never In Your Favour Rating: Teen and Up Audiences Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Choose Archive Warnings Relationship: Erwin Smith/Eren Jeager/Levi Word Count: 14,816 Summary: It is the 38th Hunger Games and the tributes are finding themselves far more isolated than usual. Lonely, at risk at death and pining leads to an unlikely trio, a trio that won't fail in making history. Extract: Eren resisted the urge to scratch at his skin under the itchy fabric that was his dress shirt. He had to dress nice, his mother had told him. His father hadn't said a word. Hadn't wanted to say a word. He had entered himself eight times. Eight times for the world's most deadly competition: The Hunger Games. His father was a teacher and Eren wasn't dumb but, still, they were short on food as of late- his mum made little to none making her dresses nowadays. There were plenty of others taking the job and the market was far too competitive. So, Eren got the money from entering and bought them enough food to last a month and maybe more if...if Eren got chosen. He didn't want to get chosen. No one did. Everyone knew your chances of dying if you were chosen was over 90%, everyone knew that it was a massacre, they all knew that it was just a way to keep the rebels at bay. Eren had never dressed up before except for the choosing ceremony. He had never enjoyed it, the woollen trousers scratching at his burnt legs and his uncomfortable shirt now clinging to him far too tight after a few too many years of wear. Fifteen-years-old and Eren was about to be sent to his slaughter. Or, at least, it was probable. 'Eren! Get out here now or we're going to be late!' No one dared be late for the ceremony. Eren, after sprinting down the crooked wooden staircase, stood in front of his mum, presenting his outfit. Although she wasn't entirely pleased, she didn't send him back up. With little time on their hands, they had to go and now. Grisha would meet Carla there whilst Eren went to line up with the rest of the boys from District 8. They walked out, side by side, drawing as much attention as the next mother-child pair on their way to the stage, winding their way through the billowing smoke that the factories pumped out day and night. Eren no longer knew whether his skin was dark by nature or by circumstance. They still had a little time to spare by the time they reached the venue and Eren gave his mum no more than a quick hug before joining the rest of his friends in the line, chattering away to try and cover the morbidity of it all. Eren may have put his name in eight times but no doubt some had put theirs in far more. It was a game of chance now, one that anyone could win. The flipping stomachs could also be heard as each and every child, whether against their will or not, gripped onto the hand of their neighbours and prayed that it would not be them. It wouldn't be Eren. He was safe, he reassured himself. 'Welcome to the choosing ceremony for the 38th Hunger Games!' The commentator suddenly shouted. What was supposed to cause excitement only stilled the audience into silence. It was finally time. Sighing, the lady- her wig as flamboyant as it was every year- went over to the ball, spinning it five times before pausing it with a gloved hand- the gems reflecting eagerly into Eren's eyes, even through the smoke. As she dipped her hand in, Eren expected it to never come out. She spent minutes flicking through the pages, ones that Eren even recognised as his own. Missed. His chances of survival were gaining. And then, with an ugly flourish, the woman pulled her hand out and waved the ticket in the air. 'The male tribute for District 8 will be...' A pause, the speakers that had been set up the night before playing an obnoxiously loud drum roll. '...Eren Jaeger!' He was as good as dead. Eren walked up to the stage as if the floor was poison. His mind reeled, he didn't even have time to comprehend what was going on. As he turned, he saw his mother crying- his father trying to console her. Nothing would work. They had just lost their son. The woman on the stage, smiling with cracked lips- dried from years worth of never taking her lipstick off- took his hand and held it high, congratulating him with a false sense of security before tottering over to the girls' batch of names. Ironic how much it was like a raffle, as if the winner would get something that would change their life. It would. It would end it. 'Mina Carolina.' Eren hadn't realised he wasn't listening until the girl's name had been called out. The girl looked like she was about to cry, her black pigtails falling out of the tight grips her mother had forced them into. Her outfit, charred from smoke- her parents must have worked in the factories if her state was anything to go by- looked torn and muddy but she held her head high as she walked up to the stage, giving Eren nothing more than a glance as she took the woman's other hand as she raised them both into the air. Just like they were already victorious. But, all the crowd knew, neither of these tributes were strong enough to win. A young boy with a life far better than most his district and a girl who let a tear stray just at being chosen. They were going to die and the audience had sealed their fate.

[cheshirecatlife]

An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works

HAPPY BIRTHDAY ERWIN!!! Eruriren Weekend ~ Present Title: Only Those Who Had A Reason To Remember Rating: Teen and Up Audiences Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Choose Archive Warnings Relationship: Erwin Smith/Eren Jeager/Levi Word Count: 8018 Summary: It's the present day and Eren is plagued by dreams of a life long gone. He is stuck between the present and the past but when he meets two people from a familiar place 2000 years ago, he feels more grounded than he ever has. Extract: Eren had finished college last year; he hadn't visited his parents since. It wasn't that he didn't want to. He always wanted to. For the length of his childhood, his father had been too busy with work to spend prolonged periods of time with him and his mother was a missed stability in his life. He was driving down for christmas: his foot gently pressing on the gas pedal and the windows rolled down despite the harsh breeze. He welcomed the noisy streets, it was dark and if his sight was lessened, he would rather his ears be heightened. It brought back balance. Eren had had enough chaos for lifetime, he was ready for some piece- and maybe later, some quiet. The icy roads, despite Eren not finding them all too hard to drive on, had caused a few accidents and the highway only minutes from his parents house was no longer road, the once empty concrete replaced by the colourful plethora of cars, full of bristling children, steaming adults and bored teenagers. All on their way home for Christmas. Eren had to admit that Christmas was his favourite time of the year, the lights, the giddiness and bringing the family back together after a long time apart was his dream. He had hit homesickness hard when he first went to college and even his mother's phone calls had not been enough to solve it. But, he had gotten on with his life. After months of moping, he finally made it outside and into the college life. He had gained sudden popularity, most likely because of his large pranks on his roommate Jean, which were no less severe when being thrown back at him. That didn't lessen his excitement to going home. Despite his boredom, he was still trying to quell that buzz in his stomach as he thought of returning. Along with his parents, Armin would be there- with his grandfather- and Mikasa too, who lived near enough to their parents that she visited every Christmas. And never, ever, managed to make Eren not feel guilty about not going. He inched forwards, his car jolting as he gave it another shove. Another half an hour later, he had finally managed to pull out onto the smaller roads and down the few blocks it took to reach his parents house. It was a small home at first sight but, as child Eren had believed, was a TARDIS on the inside. With three bedrooms, it already managed to impress most visitors, seeing as the exterior consisted of a door and four windows over two, rather thin, floors. The old brick building was crumbling but his mother never failed to make the inside immaculate. She liked cleaning, it passed the time for her now that she had retired. It was a long time now since she had worked at The Survey Corps, retired now for around five years or so, but she never failed to go to the work do's. She had a lot of time on her hands and she was insistent on filling it. Eren liked that about her, she never busied herself with pointless task, everything she did have a meaning but nevertheless, her calendar was packed with things that would be useful to her. At the business dos, she would make new friends and question if there were any small jobs that she could help out with. At home, she made sure the home was always in a perfect state yet warm enough that visitors didn't feel scared to touch things. In the streets, she would compliment strangers and make there day and then go to the far away shop and get the freshest produce for the best dinners. Carla's cooking was a dream. That didn't change a thing, though, when it came to how strict she was. 'Eren Jaeger! Where have you been for the last three years! And here I was saying come at four, expecting you to be a little late and then you come at ten anyway!' She stormed up to him, tugging at his ear. 'You mister are not getting any lasagna.' His mother's lasagna was his favourite.

[cheshirecatlife]

An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works

Eruriren Weekend ~ Past Title: Until The Bombs Drop Rating: Teen and Up Audiences Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Choose Archive Warnings Relationship: Erwin Smith/Eren Jeager/Levi Word Count: 9045 Summary: It's Leningrad 1942 and Levi, perishing on the wounded streets, finally follows the path he had never wish he had taken. The army. But, along the way, a few people make it all that more bearalbe. Suddenly, war doesn't seem to matter as much. Extract: Levi had never found a reason to stay in the house, now more so than ever. It was just cold in there, anyway, he thought as he sat on the stairs- thawed with cruel ice. Inside was frozen, outside was frozen and the streets of Leningrad were bare. People were gone, dead or fighting. Starved to death or shot. A bullet only took one hit to kill, infections were spreading like wildfire and even a small cut could cause the severest of illnesses. That was if the cold didn't get to you first. Hunger or cold battled for the deaths of millions, picking off each one by one yet so rapidly that it looked like they were dropping in unison. Dying so quickly you could mistake it for bombs if not for the distant crashes. The bombs were still far, obliterating the outskirts of the city. But they were approaching. Quickly. Levi was starving but he didn't want food. He didn't have the energy. His hunger-riddled brain was muddling needs with wants until the lethargy dragged him into the state of unconsciousness. Sleeping with his eyes open. Sleeping whilst walking. Sleeping when you couldn't bear the cold any longer. Dead when you couldn't bear the hunger any longer. Levi shivered, his woollen coat doing little to protect him from the biting Leningrad winds. They were always like this in winter but with a warm home, the fire blazing, he had never found it much of a problem- that was until he caught a cold, at least. But, now, with his fingertips blue and his nose such a violent red you could mistake it for food. People thought anything was food now. Animals were food. Plants were food. Pets were food. Leather was food. Clothes were food. Everything. Was. Food. The rest of the slum had scurried off to the defenses but Levi hadn't budged. If he was going to die, he was going to do it here, not on a lonely battlefield under a foreign sky. He had never left his home, never walking further than three streets down where the furthest shop, the grocers, was. The one that was now empty, out of stock and ransacked. The store owner had passed whilst still at the till, he had been giving any spares to his family- not enough for himself. The slum was dead anyway, literally and metaphorically. The people were gone, the ones that stayed barely alive, maybe not even. His apartment block, which used to hold dozens of people, now contained just him. As did the next. Families didn't live here. Families were some of the only people who bothered to stay behind. That and cowards. And Levi certainly didn't have family. He had been searching for food, he remembered suddenly. His energy had been lost on him and he had sat down to rest. They all knew that a rest meant nothing of the sort. He saw the woman on the set of steps next to him, frozen over- her rotten corpse portraying the shards of ice like an art piece. With food on his mind and nothing available, he set for wallowing in his hunger, feeling the tearing of his stomach as it searched for food that wasn't there. That wouldn't be there. Not for another couple days, anyway, when one of the supply trucks finally made it over the icy stretch of the river and rations were given out again. Most people had saved their rations. Most people were living off what was few but there. Levi, he was living with nothing. Nothing at all. No bread stuffed in his pockets, no hidden honey jar for emergencies. Nothing. The grips of death clutched on him like a vice, the shadowy figure blocking his vision- black spots gradually filling his vision. He was dying, he realised. And, it didn't feel too bad. Except, he was a coward and cowards don't die. Cowards live for fear of death. The brave ones accept it. Levi wasn't brave. Levi was afraid. He was a strong coward, a contradiction that made too much sense in a time of confusion. Everything was contradictory now. A whole city was living off nothing, corpses walked and the fed still danced. The people were scared but they didn't give in. They lived. They lived with nothing to let them live. He wants to pity himself for being stuck in this state of starvation but he can't, the only ones who have food are the rich and even then, they hardly have anything either. Some of them still don't have anything at all. The clever ones are the ones living the best. The ones that know how to steal, how to con and how to persuade. They are the ones who live. That was not Levi. That was not brash, crude Levi whose aim before this was to at least get a job, for his country. For Stalin. It still hadn't happened. He didn't fit in right. He didn't try hard enough. He fought for what he believed in. At the moment, he couldn't think of anything that fits into that. Levi doesn't know how he manages to stand after that, how he managed to blink the black from his eyes. He pries his hands away from the ice and into the whipping wind, not an improvement- at least the ice had numbed his frail fingers. He looked down at himself, concentrating on his legs. They were barely there anymore. He looked like a skeleton, a living skeleton. He looked ill. He wasn't self-conscious, though, he fits in perfectly alongside everyone else. Stumbling on the ice, he gained his balanced and trudged along the abandoned streets. It was desolate, the wind his only accomplice as it whipped him from head to toe. It scratched at his dry skin like sandpaper and burned his eyes like fire. The wind was cruel, battling hunger in its want for death. What draws Levi eye, though, is no longer his own living corpse but the flyer fluttering around, barely remaining pinned to the crooked-stone wall. On it, in huge letters, wrote 'JOIN THE ARMY' and underneath, in letters hardly legible to his weak eyes, it continued to explain why he, just he, was needed. This was for him, he thought, some self-obsessed part of his mind taking over. He was no longer in control of himself. His mind or body. He leaned forward, squinting to read the print that would have been so clear only a year before. They told him of his fighting comrades, the wicked enemy, and the saviour that he would be if he were to enlist. He almost forgot of the death he had heard of. Forgot this was a lie. He didn't understand why the propaganda posters were still around. Everyone who wanted to go had gone. Or so Levi thought. 'Mikasa, why won't you just let me enlist! See this! They need me!' Levi wasn't the only self-obsessed person, it seemed. The boy, a combination of shaggy, brown hair and undefinable eyes, raved on to the girl who stared at him with a heavy gaze, one word exuding from her: no. They both looked starved, faces like skulls and muscles reduced to bone. But, they looked far more alive than many. They were some of the well-off. He could see it, in both of them, they were clever ones. He watched them, following the story in his mind. The boy was the basis of the operation, stealing and conning as if his life depended on it- in fact, it did- and then, the girl, she reigned him back before anything could go wrong. She was just as strong but far more subdued, she would do anything for him. That much, at least, was clear to Levi. This girl would put the boy above her, she would die for him. She was dying for him, Levi realised. Where she keeled over, he stood straight. Where her eyes were dim, his shone. She was feeding him her own food. She had just enough to live, just enough to be able to protect him. But, the rest went to him. He used to fight it, Levi imagined, and then he had begun to give in. All from a still image, Levi had gained so much information. His mind was so muddled that it was seeing the impossible. It was seeing a false reality. He didn't realise they were looking at him until he moved his eyes back down the where the poster now lying in his hands. 'You joining too?!' The boy shouted with far too much excitement. Levi resisted holding his hands over his ears to block out the noise, it hurt so much. His ears were fragile, only adjusted to the distant booms. Everything was distant now. Why did this boy sound so jovial about something as grim as the army? Levi didn't question, though, as he shrugged. He wasn't ready to speak, not yet. He wasn't even sure if his lips could move. He hadn't moved them in days and the ice had probably frozen them together. There was no need to move them, he didn't eat, he didn't speak. He just survived. Not lived. Survived. 'Look, Mikasa! I'm not the only one! I need to go, I need to help them!' The boy argued to the girl whose name must have been Mikasa. The boy was delusional, it seemed. Even Levi realised that even if the poster was persuading him, he wasn't needed. He would become canon-fodder. Useful, he guessed. But not important. This kid's sense of self-righteousness was a little too much. 'I can go with you...' He trailed off awkwardly, the eyes of indefinable colour staring straight into his, dull upon bright, a contrast that fit together so perfectly. 'Levi.'

[cheshirecatlife]

Today!!!!

At last! Eruriren Weekend is here and I can’t wait to see what everyone’s done.

My one shot will be out this evening in GMT!!!

Past AU- WWII AU

[cheshirecatlife]

Eruriren Weekend

Can’t wait to enter!!! I have my ideas all planned out and I’m so excited to begin them! They’re admittedly long so I’m not going to write them on the day but they’ll be posted Friday, Saturday and Sunday!

1~ Past: WWII Russian AU

2~ Present: Reincarnation AU

3~ Future: Hunger Games AU (in which I have to fit a 100,000 book into less than 20,000 words whilst also writing it from three points of view 😂)