Looking back at his old life was laughable. Levi had been thirty, a successful businessman doing successful boring businessman things. He’d had family, money, a nice house. In fact, he had been happy, wanting for nothing. Of course, that was before the zombie apocalypse hit.
Like everyone, he’d seen people that believed such a thing would happen. He wasn’t one of those who believed it. It seemed stupid, a childish notion. With a lack of mythical and supernatural creatures in evidence, how could zombies possibly exist? Oh, he knew ghosts did. He’d seen a few. But that was different. Those were just shades of a person who once existed. Things like demons, zombies, and the like just weren’t real to him. And he continued to believe so... until the day they attacked.
That had been two years ago, and the time had really changed Levi. He was a hardened zombie hunter now, ruthless in his killings. He had a reason. His sister Isabel had been a casualty to the zombies. But they hadn’t simply eaten her, oh no. They had changed her into one of them. Levi had killed her with his own hands. Things like that left lasting impressions.
“Do you think anyone is still alive in there?” Farlan, his brother, asked as he eyed the college ruins. Rubble lay heavy on the ground, but some of the buildings seemed intact.
“If you believe the rumors.” Levi responded, voice cold as he hefted his crossbow, checking the arrow he had all ready to shoot. Rumors spoke of a young man hiding in these buildings. It would be nice if it was a human, but he’d seen zombies posing as humans before to get prey to come to them. Some of them were really quite cunning. “Stay here. I’ll signal if I need help.” At a nod from the other hunter, Levi strode toward the crumbling buildings.
It was quiet inside, but it was a tangible quiet, like the world was holding its breath waiting for something to happen. Levi was alert, looking in every corner and room he passed. He was not about to be ambushed because of carelessness. A sound reached his ears, and his eyes narrowed. Something was in here with him, something bigger than an animal. It had sounded like a shoe on metal. He knew there were a few stairwells in here, so he started for the nearest one. As he came closer to it, he saw a humanoid figure huddled against the railing and one of the stairs. But it was too dark to properly see from this far away. Leveling his crossbow before him at the shape, he proceeded cautiously forward.
Rivarmin Prompt 1: Vampire!Armin and Hunter!Levi AU
Requested By: @itsmarsbar221
It’s finally finished! The first Rivarmin fanfic prompt! (Sorry it took me so long! >.<;;;)
I’m not sure if this is quite what you had in mind... but you have no idea what you have inspired, my friend. xD I might have to make this into a series. It’s just too much fun of an AU to explore. I’ve got some interesting ideas, so if you guys like this maybe I’ll continue it!
Thank you for the request! I hope you enjoy and it was worth the wait!
Pale, slender fingers uncoiled a length of gauze. Water, tinted red, fell from droplets that still clung to his lacerated, freshly-stitched arm and rippled into the metal tub below. Crimson streaks weaved through the clear liquid, spreading and turning the water grotesque and dark.
He began to wrap the gauze around a large gash in his left forearm. A wound that might be unbearable to most, it concerned him little, for it was just one of the many injuries he'd suffered through the years. It could only be expected, considering his “occupation”, but he was the best. And he had his own motivations for hunting these creatures of the night.
After tending to the wound, he grasped the edge of the length between his teeth and tore it off, throwing down the coil as he tightened the bandage and pressed it into place.
With sharp, piercing eyes, he looked into the mirror at himself. His own steel-blue orbs, pin-straight raven hair, and pale, sharp face were unrecognizable to him after nights like this. The faces of those he killed flashed into his memory, searing their image into his regretful mind. But it was their own wrongdoing that sealed their fate. As he stared at himself, he brought up a damp cloth, already stained with red, and continued to wipe the rest of the blood from his bare skin.
He finally turned around to the door and stepped through the darkness. His path was lit only by a single florescent white bulb fixed into the wall. Its reflection giving off a green glow to everything it touched as it bounced off the metal walls around him - tattered a dreary grey-green, stained and scared from age.
As he stepped into the main room, the same harsh white light offered some illumination in the dim area, this time aided slightly by the light of the moon that shown in the window. Around him, hanging from the walls, were an arsenal of weapons. Crossbows, equipped with garlic-tipped, poisoned bolts. Silver-plated swords and daggers. And a small, but powerful UV gun. All excellent tools for hunting the Undead.
Standing there, covered in red-stained bandages and water still dripping from his bare arms and torso, he looked down at what the night had entrusted to him. Lying asleep on his couch was a young man, barely old enough to buy a pack of smokes. He slept remarkably soundly, considering the circumstances, with his lips parted as he let out shallow breaths and his shoulder length blonde hair a mess as it draped over his face.
With a quiet sigh, the stoic hunter turned to grab a pack of cigarettes that sat atop the nearby dresser, shifting to take a seat in an armchair across from the couch as he removed one from the pack and placed it in his mouth. After lighting it, he fell into the chair hard, then carelessly tossed the pack and lighter down on the table in front of him, intentionally making as much noise as possible.
He let himself spread out as he sunk into the chair, watching the young man stir as he took a drag of his cigarette.
“Oi...” The man finally spoke. “You still alive?”
“Uhh...” The blonde blinked his eyes open, and soon two orbs of shining pale blue found themselves resting on the tattered man before him, before quickly becoming wide as his face contorted with confusion and fear. He pushed himself up onto his knees from where he lay on his stomach, his eyes fixed on the man as he shakily pressed himself into the back of the couch, his breaths coming quick and panicked. “Who... who are you?!”
The dark-haired man lifted a hand towards him. “It's alright...” He said, his voice flat and emotionless, but soft. “You're safe.”
“What?” He asked, bringing his shaking fist up to his lips in fear as his mind tried to put the pieces together. “W-what happened?”
“You don't remember?” He asked, expelling smoke from his lungs after taking a drag. The small room was beginning to become blanketed with an opaque fog. “You were imprisoned.” He told him lowly. “By blood-suckers.”
The young man trembled, his breaths coming shaky as he tried not to whimper, and the look behind his eyes showing evidence that the memories were coming back to him. “I-I was...?”
“Yes...” He said again flatly, his eyes narrowing slightly as he stared at the boy, seemingly unmoved by his fright.
His guest leaned further back against the couch, curling himself up into a tight ball as he brought both his hands up to his chin and stared up at the man before him. After a moment, his expression changed and his hands stilled with a look of recognition. “Y-you...” He said with wide eyes. “You're Levi...” His breath shook at the implications of his realization. “The Gate Keeper.”
The warrior before him, Levi, the most renowned Keeper in the city, continued to stare blankly at him as he answered simply, “Yes.”
It seemed the young man had now slipped from a hysterical panic to being frozen with fear. “I-I...” He tried to speak, his pale blue eyes wide and terrified. “M-my family...” The blonde shook, his voice cracking as he spoke. “Where are they...?”
Levi looked down, idly attempting to rub a stain out of his jeans while he answered, “I don't know...” He said flatly. “Dead, probably...”
The blonde gasped quietly, his throat so shaky and tight he could barely breathe. He opened his trembling hands and put them over his mouth, attempting to muffle the whimpers and sobs that were threatening to break through. “N-no...” The young man muttered, and couldn't hold it back any longer. He squeezed his eyes shut as he sobbed into his hands, his entire body shaking and curling in tighter. “No... please...”
The Keeper looked back up at the boy - his stern, stoic expression softening just slightly as he listened to him sob. He had no words for the young man. Nothing he could say could make the pain any less. He knew that all too well.
A somber and uneasy silence went by as the boy continued to sob. The hunter across from him, sitting quietly as he waited patiently for him to stop. He wasn't sure how long it was, but the boys cries finally began to slow into whimpers as he took the last drag of his second cigarette.
He sniffed as he brought his hands down from his face, his cheeks streaked with tears and flushed red with grief.
The dark-haired warrior leaned forward, pushing a box of tissue towards him as he pressed his cigarette butt into the ashtray. “...Wipe off your face.” He said with a stern coldness, but there was a slight hint of compassion there.
The young man looked up at him a moment - distraught, confused and exhausted – then looked down at the box of tissue and timidly took one, gingerly bringing it up to his running nose.
“What's your name?” Levi asked.
The boy sniffed again before answering as he folded the tissue, struggling to find his words as he swallowed his aching throat. “I... I'm...” He said, his voice cracking painfully. “Armin Arlert, sir...”
“Armin...” The Keeper acknowledged. “You're lucky to be alive.”
He watched as his guest took a deep, shaky breath – trying to hold back the cries that still threatened to escape. With the pain in his throat and his hyperventilating lungs, he had not the energy to let them out. The young man closed his eyes and nodded, acknowledging the hunters words and realizing that he was probably the only reason he was still here. “Y-yes... Thank you...”
“You'll have to report to the high council in the morning. Until then...” Levi stated as he reached under the table for a tall, dark glass bottle and sat it on the surface. “Here. Go numb.”
Armin blinked as he looked down at the bottle, half full with liqueur and the label removed. He looked away after realizing it was alcohol. The young man had never so much had a sip of the stuff in his life.
“...No, thank you...” He said quietly, lowering his eyes to the floor.
“Suit yourself.” The dark-haired man said before picking up the bottle, tipping it back and taking a drink for himself.
“Sir...” Armin said, timidly looking back at him. “If it's all the same... I think I'd like to just go home...”
“No.” Levi said after bringing down the bottle, causing a watery, clinking sound as the liquid sloshed around inside.
“What?”
“I can't allow you to leave.”
The blonde leaned back into the couch a bit more, tensing up to the man's stern words. Despite the fact that he'd saved him from certain death or slavery, he found the hunter almost more intimidating than the vampires that had taken him. “...Why?”
“I am required to bring you to the High Council in the morning so you can tell then what happened. It's protocol.” He explained. “Believe me. I wouldn't keep you here if I didn't have to...” He said and took another drink.
“I... I see...”
“I would offer you something to eat, but... I doubt you have much of an appetite...” Levi stood and walked towards the windows. The morning sun had begun to peek over the horizon, it's first rays of light shining through the left window where the curtain was already open. As he spread the other curtain, the light spilled inside, brightening the room a bit more.
He stared out at the dystopian city before him. The place he called home. The place he swore his life to protect. Despite it's crumbling buildings, and thick, smog-filled air, this was it. The last bastion for human survival. The only place humans could be 'safe'.
“Ah!” A sudden cry behind him jarred him from his thoughts, and he turned to see the young blonde, now on the other side of the couch, holding his arms and staring at the light landing on the couch in confusion.
Levi furrowed his brow and immediately went for one of the swords that hung on the wall, stepping over swiftly with heavy stomps and pointing the blade directly at the boy.
“Ahh!” Armin yelped again at the sight, his eyes getting wide as he looked up the shining silver shaft, the tip of it's sharp blade just inches away from his face. “Wha...?!”
“Where were you bit?” The hunter demanded.
“W-what?!”
“Where were you bit?” He said more firmly, his voice raising as his expression became more angry.
“I-I wasn't!”
“Then why does your skin burn in the sunlight?”
“I don't know!!”
Levi reached down quickly, passed his blade, and grasped the boy's shirt, pulling him up by his collar and forcing him to stand up. He shoved him away from him, causing the blonde to stumble backwards, before raising his blade once again.
“Take your clothes off.”
“What?!!” Armin yelped, shaking in terror.
“Now!”
“No!”
“Do it!” Levi shouted forcefully. “Or I'll kill you where you stand.”
Holding his arms to his chest, Armin's breath shook as he looked at the sharp, intense eyes across from him. He felt his throat begin to ache as he once again held back the urge to cry, but the tears he could not stifle. As the droplets of liquid rolled down his cheeks, he closed his eyes and reached his shaking arms down to the brim of his shirt and gingerly pulled it over his head.
The hunter stood there a moment, staring him down, eyeing a spot on the left side of the boys abdomen where two clear puncture marks were plain to see, then looked back up at the blondes face.
“You're a night-walker.” The man said.
“No, I-I'm not...!” The young blonde cried desperately, his eyes still closed and his teeth clenched. His expression betraying his words, revealing in it's painful contortion that he knew the truth.
“Tch...” Levi scoffed. “Letting a blood-sucker into my home. How careless of me...”
“I... I'm not...” Armin whimpered, again breaking out into weak sobs as he turned his head down deeper towards the floor.
“How long ago where you bitten?”
“Please...” He begged. “I'm not a vampire...”
“Hmph... Not yet...” Levi huffed coldly.
“P-please...”
“How long.” Levi demanded again.
“I don't know!” Armin burst out, finding himself coming to his breaking point. All he wanted to do was wake up from this terrible nightmare.
“What do you remember?”
“I don't know...” He whimpered again, his voice becoming more and more pathetic, and he kneeled on the floor, wrapping his arms around his knees as he trembled with nothing else left he could do. “P-please...” His voice came out in cracking sobs. “I just wanna go home...”
Levi paused, narrowing his eyes a bit at the cowering boy before him, and couldn't help but feel pity for him. “Unfortunately...” The hunter said lowly. “That's no longer up for you to decide...”
Armin whimpered and silently cried as he held himself in a tight ball on the floor. “...A-are you going to kill me..?” He muttered between sobs.
“...No.” Levi answered. “Not unless you give me a reason to.”
The blonde shivered as he looked back up at the hunter, eyes red with tear stained cheeks.
“As long as you don't threaten mine or anyone else's life...” The man explained. “It's up to the High Council to decide your fate...”
Armin took a shaky breath, then looked down at the floor. “Ohh...”
After a moment, the stern Keeper finally eased his frightening demeanor and lowered his sword. Placing it down on the table, he stepped over to the trembling, half-naked boy crouched on his floor and kneeled in front of him, offering him his hand. “...I apologize for frightening you.” He said, his tone now surprisingly soft. “Stand up.”
The young man looked up at the hunter before him, his face a mixture of surprise, relief, exhaustion and pain. He slowly uncoiled one of his arms and placed his shaking hand in the one offered to him. Levi stood, pulling him up with him. The blonde continued to watch him with curious eyes as the man reached down and picked his shirt up from the ground, then handed it to him. Armin glanced down at it briefly before timidly taking it, a bit taken aback by the sudden compassion he was now receiving, and looked back up at the man.
Their eyes hung on each other, fixated with cold steel against pale blue. Levi looked down a moment, then glanced back up briefly before turning away, stepping back towards the window.
Armin stood there, quietly frozen. Still terrified, though his nerves had begun to calm. He looked down, finally laying eyes on the puncture marks on his stomach and he trembled, suddenly feeling sick and violated, and his heart sunk as the reality of this situation he'd suddenly found himself in got deeper.
With a quick jerk, Levi pulled the curtains closed - causing the young man to jump slightly at the sudden movement - then turned back to his guest. As the boy looked up, his eyes were caught in the others sharp, steel-blue gaze; through their dark coldness, seemed to be an unspoken apology. It was a look that made the boy fear even more for what was to come of him.
Armin held his shirt tightly and close to his chest, “...W-what's...” Then asked with a weak and frightened quiver, “...going to happen to me now...?”
It’s nothing more original than that. He’s hungry. It reaches beyond his stomach, which is a cold pit bracketing his spine. It’s a hungry that makes him lick his teeth, fangs sweating against his gums. Arms shaking so he has to roll his shoulder to loosen the constriction of veins. He’s hungry and he wants to put his mouth on someone, anyone -- this one.
A wolf in sheep’s clothing but that isn’t right, because Erwin inst a sheep. Maybe its foxes and hounds, that’s a little better. But this ones a hunter, gun a bulge at his side, hidden deftly by leather. Dear me, too hungry to work up a proper metaphor.
Gun oil, hot tarmac, beaten leather, Dial soap. Erwin can smell him across the bar. This hound of a hunter, low to the ground like some terrier, nothing but black on him. He’s beautiful, cutting to look at, face a few sharp lines. Bottom lip bright pink and teeth ivory stones.
Hunger must be eating his mind because Erwin imagines making this man a permanent fixture of the night. He’s made of it, made for it. One would think Erwin would have lost the daredevil in him with his Turning, but the long stretch of years waiting for him makes each crash-hit of trouble that much better.
Swallowing a mouth of spit and forcing his fangs back into his gums, Erwin crosses to him just in time to catch the ricocheting quarter. “You’re playing a lonely game.”
The hunter eyeballs him, not an ounce of shame in the sweep. Jesus’ emaciated body dangles from his neck, slim and silver. God love a traditional man. Erwin slides into the barstool with a smile, hoping this man isn’t too traditional.
“Beats your company,” the hunter finally says, folding a hand around his shot glass when the bartender refills it without a word. The hunter knocks it back, throat throwing off light like water, rippling with a swallow, tendons a soft tease.
“You don’t know that,” Erwin purrs, all but salivating and spreading himself out like he wants to be made a meal. All his charm lives in his eyes, and unfortunately for the hunter, that’s where he politely looks, snared up in bottomless blue. “I’m Erwin.”
Bunching his lips, the hunter waves down the bartender and sets Erwin up with a drink. “Levi.”
Levi, Erwin thinks, clenching his body around the word. “That biblical?”
Another eyeballing, corner of a cat’s eye. “Yeah,” Levi grunts. “Ain’t interested in talkin bout the bible, though.”
Erwin puts a hand over his heart, mock aghast, lip curling up and fangs pounding an ache inside his skull. “Oh, I wouldn’t dare. Cross my heart.” He drags his finger over his still chest, a perfect X.
Levi looks him over again, from his wide open legs to the pebble of Erwin’s nipple, his smiling lips, his baited eyes. “I bet,” Levi smirks, voice a slow searing. He knocks his knuckle to the shot, nudging it Erwin’s way. Honey whiskey licks the glass rim. “Drink up.”
