Archive of Our Own

It’s two days until the expedition when Erwin finds Levi on all fours, face down and ass up, back arched, and pleading.

He’s cleaning, actually. He’s got this – big white apron, wrapped around his hips, and he’s pulled his bangs off his face with a headscarf, the way the women do when they’re doing their washing. He’s got one cheek pressed to the floor, eyes narrowed, and is scrubbing ferociously at something on the hallway floorboards – Erwin knows what it is, in fact, it’s some beer he had spilt when Hange tripped over the runner, about… oh, a week ago, maybe. He’d been drunk, in his defence. And distantly, he’d been aware that if he left it, it would calcify into something thick and sticky and impossible to scrape. But… he had left it. He’s not perfect.

He’s not minded to tell Levi that, of course. He considers the best way to step around him, aware that telling him the truth of the stain’s origin will earn him glares and scowls for the next week at least. In a way, Erwin’s probably done him a favour – Levi likes to clean, he thinks. Or, he likes to be clean. Oh, yes, he likes to be – so very clean. He tastes like soap. Lemons and mint. Levi is so highly-strung; he seems to get something out of it, cleaning, being clean, the ritual of it. Perhaps it’s better than sex, Erwin thinks, and then chides himself for being mean about it. Levi is many things, but he’s not pathetic; there’s an urgency, and a deliberation, to everything he does. He undertakes nothing lightly. He approaches everything with a clean, neat, precision – sex is no different, Erwin imagines. And Levi truly is very… clean. And neat.

He had felt very neat, Before. The Time Before, or, The Night it Rained, or, ‘When We Smoked Together’. Erwin’s hands cupping his tight little waist, rutting up against Erwin’s thigh. He had twisted his fingers in Erwin’s shirt and hid his face in his chest and had fucked himself with these choking little whimpers until he’d soaked his pants and come with his brows knitted upwards, teeth in his bottom lip.

Well. That hadn’t been so clean, all things considered. But something about the way Levi had kept his moans to himself, had thrusted with these measured, desperate-but-limited movements, had felt very neat. Orderly. And watching Levi now, on all fours and scrubbing at Erwin’s floors, hips swaying, has a sense of that same urgency. Levi doesn’t even realise what he’s doing, or how he looks. He’s immune to his own sexuality, it seems. Although most men are, in Erwin’s experience – even the ones like Levi, who have never looked at a woman in their lives.

Erwin clears his throat. “Excuse me,” he says, meaning, I would like to pass. He has stared his fill. It’s cruel, really, of Levi to put himself here, and look like that, when Erwin doesn’t know if he’s ever going to have the opportunity to try him again. He would like to try Levi – so very desperately, in fact. He thinks, another person might have noticed, by now, the looks Erwin gives him, imagining him naked beneath his clothes, the straps of his gear. In fact, he’s doing it right now; he really can’t help himself. He’s imagining Levi naked on the floor of the hallway, cleaning, back arched. He’s picturing his inner thighs. Or perhaps – perhaps he might be crawling, on all fours, for Erwin’s pleasure alone.

Levi ignores him, however. Erwin has no way of knowing what he thought, truly, about their night in Erwin’s office. The Night it Rained, is how Erwin thinks of it, in his head; truly, it had rained harder than it had for years, the fields had been swamped, as if the heavens had opened in punishment for some as-of-yet undetermined crime. Erwin’s read about that, he thinks. Floods, as punishment. He can’t remember where. And he’s distracting himself, he realises, from the matter at hand.

He clears his throat again, lightly taps Levi’s metal bucket with his boot. “Levi,” he says, and rests his hands on his hips. “If you would be so gracious.”

“No, c’mon,” Levi is muttering, feverishly, scrubbing hard enough to put a hole in the wood. “C’mon, c’mon, c’mon.”

Erwin shuts his eyes, exhales slowly. Levi’s voice has a got a rather urgent quality to it. Fucking hell, Erwin thinks.

“Please,” Levi says, “oh, oh, please.”

Erwin rubs at his mouth. “Levi,” he says again. “If I may – “

“Oh, please,” Levi snaps, and throws his brush down onto the floor, sits back on his heels. “You worthless, shitty, disgusting – “ he catches Erwin’s eyes. “I’m talking to the stain,” he explains.

“Ah,” Erwin agrees. “That’s normal.”

Levi glowers. “Fuck off, then,” he gestures, indicating Erwin should pass. “Try not to trip and die on your way.”

“Would you like that, Levi?”

“Who dropped their beer, Erwin?”

“As you were,” Erwin ignores, blithely, stepping over Levi’s bucket. He’s been rather short with Erwin, since it happened. Since It happened. Or perhaps, his manner towards Erwin hasn’t changed at all; it’s just that you might expect him to be a bit softer, having rutted like dirty puppy against Erwin’s thigh. At the very least, you might expect Levi to have a touch of – fondness, about him. Not that Erwin thinks often about Levi’s fondness. Not that he lies awake in bed at night, thinking about all the ways in which Levi might be fond with him, how warm he would be tucked into his side, how Erwin’s hands had cupped his waist, how he had parted his lips and stared at Erwin, smoke curling past his mouth, with something could only be described as a mix of reverence and humiliation –

Maybe, this is just how he deals with shame, or any emotion at all: pretends they do not exist. Scrubs at the floor, as if to scour them from himself, as well.

Erwin stops himself from moving on, turns on his heel. It rucks up the carpet beneath his feet, just a little; Levi looks at him sharply, as if sensing the disturbance. Well, it’s better this way, Erwin decides. It’s better that Levi is so able to – forget that it happened at all, or at least, pretend. He prefers Levi with this spit and fire. It makes him feel warm.

Erwin steps forward, lays his boots in Levi’s eyeline. He folds his hands behind his back. “Are you… having fun?” He enquires, lightly.

Levi pauses. He stares at Erwin’s boots. “It’s good,” he says, shortly, resumes his scrubbing, rough bristles on the wood. “Keeps me busy.”

“Ah,” Erwin understands, quietly. “Yes, I suppose that makes sense.”

“What?” Levi asks, not breaking his scrubbing, ferocious. The bristles of his brush are bent out of shape, flattened.

“Stress relief,” Erwin tells him.

Levi stops, slowly, like he’s skipped a beat. He frowns, lifts his head, looks up at Erwin like that. It might hurt his neck, Erwin thinks. He smiles down at Levi, gently. And some water drips off the rim of the bucket, into the soapy mixture, with a soft ‘plop’.

“It must feel good,” Erwin ventures, watching Levi’s face. “To put things to right, I mean. Watch them… fix themselves, at your hands.”

If Levi is bothered by their difference in station – Levi on his hands and knees, scrubbing, Erwin standing tall, hands pressed behind his back – he does not show it. Instead, he sits back on his heels, pulls his headscarf off his head to dab sweat from his brow. “Yeah,” he agrees, “that’s probably it.”

Erwin steps forward. Levi looks up at him with a look of what might be confusion, or maybe irritation. It’s hard to tell. Levi is sitting there, ass on his heels, looking up at Erwin with no sense of how this might appear to any passer-by. Is he innocent, Erwin thinks, with a soft swell in his chest? Is that it? No, it can’t be – Levi grew up in a brothel. He will understand the implication of a quiet hallway and pants that are scuffed at the knee.

He had gone under so beautifully for Erwin, Before, on The Night it Rained.

“Sir?” Levi asks, all innocence, with a hint of reproach. He’s questioning, head tilted to the side – Erwin realises, he hasn’t spoken, not at all, he’s just stood there, looking down. “Is there something I can help you with?”

Erwin lifts his chin, slightly. “Levi,” he murmurs, “have you thought at all – that we may be dead, in two days time?”

Levi sets his brush in the bucket, swishes it in the soapy water, slaps the excess off his palm. “It feels good,” he answers, “to set things right,” he agrees.

So, yes, then. They all have their own ways of dealing with it, Erwin supposes. Levi fixes. Erwin destroys.

“Quite,” Erwin nods. Levi dries his hands on his apron, slides back onto his hands and knees, puts the arch back in his spine.

“Do you mind?” He asks, and lifts his head again, lips slightly parted, gaze defiant. “You’re in my way.”

Erwin steps back. “Well,” he says, and nods. “As you were, then,” he says again. “Good work, soldier.” The sound of Levi’s circular scrubbing follows him down the hall.

“Thank you, Sir,” he hears him say, suddenly. Erwin looks over his shoulder. Levi’s watching him, sleeves rolled up to his elbows, gripping the thick, soapy brush in his palm. “For complimenting my scrubbing, I mean,” he clarifies. And Erwin thinks: ah.

-

After, they return bone-weary, blood-soaked, sweat-heavy, aching and carrying their dead on splintered wagons.

Erwin debriefs, and showers, and scrubs his hands over his face, and doesn’t think of anything at all, really. In these moments, he feels… or rather, he is liminal, himself – an in-between, in-between Captain and Soldier, and hunter and prey, and monster and human. It’s enough to make you ache for something.

Mike offers him a cigarette, clicks his tongue, hair still damp on his head. He’s stitching up his own wound, a blade nick on his left thigh. “I’m headed into town,” he says, with that heavy way he has. All his words are heavy – he uses them rarely, so when he speaks, he makes it count.

Erwin exhales, lies back on Mike’s bed and rests his feet against the top bunk, the way he used to when they were children. “Alright,” he tells him, doesn’t ask what for.

“You coming?”

Erwin shakes his head, blows smoke. “What happened to – ” he tries to remember her name, the woman in Grier’s squad who had been fucking Mike. He can’t recall, but he can picture her, stout, big-breasted, warm smile. That’s the kind of woman you need, after an expedition like this, Erwin thinks.

Mike stabs his needle down into the thread kit. “Dead,” he says, short enough, and stands. “Don’t tell the little guy,” he asks, standing, brushing down his shirt. What Mike means is: don’t tell Levi I’m headed to a brothel.

Erwin jerks his chin, stares at the slats of the bed over his head. “Alright,” he says again, still feeling not-in-his-own-body. He doesn’t offer to go with Mike. Levi’s never touched anyone, he knows. He calls it – filthy. A filthy habit, Levi had said, that’s what sex is. And maybe he’s right, because Erwin wants so desperately to make him filthy. Erwin would feel alive, if he could do that. He would feel so very human, with Levi in his arms, he thinks. Rubbing warmth into cold limbs, scraping feeling into untouched skin.

Helga, Erwin remembers, inadequately. Mike’s woman. Her name was Helga.

When Mike leaves, Erwin rolls out of his bed, stubs his cigarette out on some bloody bandages, and heads back to the main building. He’ll sit in the mess hall, he decides, and let people’s voices bring him back to himself. He’ll probably feel human after, the numbness will fade down to nothing, and eventually he’ll slip back into Erwin’s skin, rather than whatever it is he is right now. He stuffs his hands in his pockets, knocks open the door with his shoulder. He’s thinking: Levi doesn’t like to be dirty, but if Erwin had grown up where Levi had grown up, he probably wouldn’t, either.

So he won’t go to a brothel. He could find someone, here – it doesn’t mean anything, it’s just sex. Half of the camp will be in bed with the other half come morning, rutting like animals, proving to themselves they’re alive. Erwin would like to feel alive. He imagines… how alive he would feel, if he could touch Levi again, just once. He wonders if Levi would like to feel alive, too. Perhaps he should just ask him. Levi, he’ll say, I know you don’t smoke. But would you like to join me for a cigarette?

He passes down the hallway and hears someone hiss through a cracked open door, a sharp intake of breath. “God,” he hears, and the voice is a croak, it’s Levi’s croak. “God fucking damn,” he’s saying, voice all strained, like he’s on the edge. And his breath is coming in short, sharp pants.

Erwin stops at the door, strains his ears to listen. “Mmgh,” Levi whimpers, and the bed creaks. “Shit. Ah, shit,” he’s breathing. Erwin’s eyes cast themselves through the crack; Levi’s sitting on the side of bunk, leg slung across his knee, picking at his foot with tweezers.

Erwin pushes the door open. “Do you realise,” he asks him tersely, “that you make those noises, in public places?”

“Not in public,” Levi mutters, barely sparing him a glance, seemingly unruffled by his presence. “Pervert,” he adds, and turns back to his foot. He’s still wearing his gear, leather straps and all – they’ve been back for hours. It’s not like Levi, not like him at all, not to be first in line for the showers. He’s washed off his blood, but there’s still mud stuck to his uniform, grass in his hair, skin slightly shiny with sweat.

“Ah,” Levi winces, drops his tweezers. “Fuck,” he spits, and tries to lean down to pick them up. Erwin tries to find the source of his discomfort.

“Oh, shit,” Erwin says, in a rush, drops onto his knees. “Shit. What did you do?”

Levi shuts his eyes, tips back his head, shivering slightly. “A, uh,” he shakes his head, swallows. “It’s not that bad. It’s just – really stuck in there, huh?”

The strap of his gear, the one which loops round the arch of his foot, has dug into his skin. It is all at once not a bad wound, and also an incredibly irritating one; Levi will be limping for the next week. “Let me see,” Erwin asks him, gripping his ankle.

Levi stares at him. “No,” he says, roughly. “We’re not doing this again.”

Erwin raises his brows. “This?” He questions.

“This – this,” Levi waves a hand, irritated. “I take a shower, you – make me feel better. With your hands.”

Erwin feels his lips twitch, despite himself. “I’m sorry,” he says, “I don’t mean to make you uncomfortable.”

“I’m not uncomfortable,” Levi says, and Erwin realises he’s wearing his defiance like a shield. “I’m not anything at all, y’hear me? I’m not your… I’m not some…”

Erwin waists, expectantly, fingers wrapped around Levi’s ankle.

“Whore,” Levi decides.

Erwin nods. “Fine,” he agrees, “that’s settled, then. May I see your foot, Soldier?”

“Tch,” Levi mutters, folds his arms. “Alright,” he says, turning his head away. “Sir,” he adds.

“Don’t call me that,” Erwin murmurs, setting Levi’s heel against his knee, turning it over in his hands. He tsks. “You should’ve gone to medical.”

“Don’t want to bother them,” Levi croaks. “Busy enough as is, then having to deal with my… ouch-y foot,” he half snorts, humourlessly. “Why shouldn’t I call you Sir? I’m your subordinate.”

“Because, I’m not just a solider. You’re like an animal,” Erwin mutters, mostly to himself.

“Oh?” Levi prompts.

“Licking your wounds in private.” Erwin glares at him. “Can you stand?”

“I got here okay, didn’t I?”

Erwin casts his eyes around the room, Levi’s feeble attempts at taking care of himself, bloody bandages, a knife to cut himself loose. He’s ruined his gear. Perhaps he wanted to hide it. Generally, there’s punishment for breaking gear, carelessly. Maybe he wanted to avoid it. He half-crouches, to let Levi throw an arm around his shoulders, and helps him stand, wraps an arm around his waist. It’s stupid, how low he has to crouch, just to let him limp alongside him. “I told you,” Erwin mutters, steering him up the stairs, one step at a time, “you wear your gear too tight.”

“You’re too tight,” Levi replies, childishly, but he leans himself against Erwin’s side, warm, breathing, beating. Perhaps he thinks he’s being subtle – does he think Erwin has forgotten the way he melted against him, in those showers? Or perhaps, that he could ever mistake the feel of his trembling when Erwin had lightly scooped his chin beneath his knuckle, touched him so gently you would think he couldn’t feel it at all. That’s Levi’s problem, he thinks – he carries himself away and winds himself up and doesn’t let a single person in. Tends to his wounds in private. Tries so hard to make everything clean, sterile, like other people might infect him, like disease.

Erwin could be a disease, he thinks. He would like not to be. He would like to be touched, fearlessly, and without restraint. He would like to be desired, and gripped, and begged for. It would make him feel human, again.

“Sit,” he says, pushing open the door to his quarters. “Don’t move,” he warns, turning to find his medical supplies.

“Wasn’t going to,” Levi mutters, petulantly.

Erwin pulls a bottle of whiskey off his bookshelf, rubs a glass against his shirt to clean it, and pours himself a couple fingers. He downs it in one, watches Levi watch his room with some level of fascination. He’s sitting on the side of the bed, leaning back on his hands, chin lifted. Perhaps he’s taking in the books, or the framed portraits on the walls, or Erwin’s dirty laundry slung over a chair. Erwin is not very tidy, but you can tell a lot about a person from their room. He’s seen Levi’s. It’s sparse, and empty, and cold. He has no personal effects. Erwin would like to warm him.

He pours another glass. “Here,” he offers, holding it out. “For the pain,” he explains.

Levi looks at the drink, warily, then at Erwin. Whatever is going on behind those eyes is inscrutable. “Alright,” he says, and knocks it back in one, smears the back of his hand against his mouth. “But you should get me another,” he advises.

Erwin lifts his brows in pleased surprise. “What happened to – filthy habits?” Erwin asks, pouring the whiskey into the glass, near to the brim. He turns, holds it out expectantly. This time, Levi nurses it, fingers gripping the rim and cupping the bottom.

Levi shrugs, watches Erwin over the glass as he sips. He swings out his feet, slightly – he’s sitting far enough back on the bed that they don’t reach the floor, both bare. “I was thinking,” he says, “that we might’ve been dead, today.”

“But we’re not,” Erwin says.

“But we’re not,” Levi agrees. “Sir,” he says, quietly. And watches Erwin as he sips, swallows.

Erwin turns to his bureau, picks out a carton of cigarettes, puts one in his mouth. He pulls off his shirt, leaving him in his vest. “Don’t want to get blood on it,” he explains, striking a match. He smokes, then puts the cigarette between his fingers. “You want one?” He asks, and then remembers, feels a smile threatening his face. “Cigarette?” He offers.

A beat. “Not yet,” Levi tells him.

Erwin shrugs. Fine by him. Erwin can only offer; he’ll never force Levi to take something he doesn’t know if he wants.

Erwin drags his footstool over to the bed, sets the medkit on the floor. “Here,” he says, patting his knee. “Scootch forward, would you? Ankle here, please.”

Levi grumbles about it, but he acquiesces all the same. Erwin holds the ball of his foot, gently, between his hands. “I’m going to have to cut you out,” he says, around the cigarette in his mouth. He pulls back to smoke, blows it to the side.

“I was trying,” Levi explains, “with the tweezers.”

Erwin gives him a look as if to say, not your best idea, Levi. “You should have gone to medical,” he mutters, steadying Levi’s ankle and reaching for the scalpel.

“Yeah,” Levi says, this time, but doesn’t elaborate.

Erwin frowns at his foot, tries to think how to approach the problem at hand. “Drink that,” he advises, nodding at the glass. “Take a breath.”

As steady and quick as he can manage, Erwin prises the leather out of the wound and starts to attack it with scalpel. It’s not strong enough to slice through in one go; it takes a couple tries. Levi’s turned his chin to his shoulder, wincing, but otherwise takes it like a veteran. He sighs, when the leather finally snaps, squeezes his toes. “Goddamn,” he croaks, and downs the rest of the glass.

“Better?” Erwin asks, not expecting an answer. He takes the reprieve to smoke, then drinks some of the whiskey straight from the bottle. “Alright,” he says, “that wasn’t so bad, was it? Hell of a lot easier than – picking it yourself, hmm?”

“Tch,” Levi mutters, but he doesn’t meet Erwin’s eyes. Erwin realises he’s been lightly stroking Levi’s ankle with his thumb.

He clears his throat. “Why did you try to fix this yourself, Levi?” he asks, levelly, and reaches for the bandages.

“I do everything myself,” Levi tells him.

Erwin wraps up Levi’s foot and ties it off neatly, pats it twice when he’s done. “Yes,” Erwin agrees. “But you can’t do everything yourself.”

“Can’t I?”

“Some things are better with a partner,” Erwin says, puts the cigarette back between his fingers, inhales. “No?” He asks, and flicks some ash on the discarded bandages.

Levi doesn’t say anything, immediately. He looks down at the empty glass, cupped between his hands, looks up again, chews his bottom lip. When he doesn’t speak, Erwin rests his hand against his ankle and lightly brushes his thumb against it; the skin is so very smooth. You wouldn’t have thought Levi could have such delicate skin.

Levi shuts his eyes. “I,” he murmurs, “like that,” he says.

“Mmm?” Erwin presses, but doesn’t press too hard. He’ll let Levi reach his own conclusions.

“The – the touch, I mean.” Levi’s words are slightly slurred, but Erwin doesn’t think it’s the drink. “You’re right,” he admits, “it is better with a partner.”

“Really,” Erwin says, quietly. “What makes you think that?”

Levi pulls open his eyes. He’s flushing. “What you did,” he says. “In your office, when you – when we smoked, together. The night it rained.”

Erwin smiles, gently. He does not stop stroking. “Ah,” he says, pleasantly. “So, you did like it, then?”

Levi is scratching his thumbnail against the rim of the glass, like he’s nervous. He keeps giving Erwin these shifty little looks from beneath his lashes, guarded. “I thought,” he starts, and clears his throat. “I thought I could get you to do it again,” he admits, and meets Erwin’s eyes, helplessly.

“Oh?” Erwin asks. His heart is thudding in his throat; he wonders if Levi can tell, if he can smell the pathetic hopefulness off of him.

“In the hallway,” Levi mumbles. “I – I thought, I could get your attention. Is that pathetic?” He asks. “No. Don’t answer that.” He lifts the empty glass to his lips to drain the dregs. “I suppose it’s about trust,” Levi says, and lets that hang there. “All the people who have tried, before. They’ve been… dirty. Or they’ve done it to make it hurt. Humiliate,” Levi says, and word sounds ugly in his mouth.

Wordlessly, Erwin fills him another shot whiskey. Levi toasts it, gratefully, and they both drink, Erwin straight from the bottle.

“Could you trust me?” Erwin asks, quietly. He breathes smoke, and Levi seems to inhale it, like maybe he’s remembering.

“You’re my superior officer,” Levi says. “Sir.”

“It’s not like you to be respectful.”

“No,” Levi agrees. He seems to be sitting on something. “I’m – I’m not your whore,” he says again, like he had the first time, except now he means it. “I’m your subordinate. Sex is sex, so… I know how this goes.” He looks at his glass, downs it. “I can’t be that, Erwin,” he croaks. “No matter how good it feels.”

Erwin exhales through his nose, like he’s puzzling a problem. He sits back on his stool, bottle draped over his knee, smoking thoughtfully. Then, without speaking, he takes Levi’s glass and pours himself a finger; the whiskey is running out. Levi really does have an unusually high tolerance for booze for a man his size.

Erwin leans forward, cigarette still smoking between his fingers, and cups the back of Levi’s head. “Here,” he says, gently. “Drink.”

He tips the glass to Levi’s lips. He watches him close his eyes, open his mouth; and he has his answer, as to whether Levi trusts him, or not. Not that there was any doubt, really. Levi drinks greedily at Erwin’s hands. Because of the angle, some of it dribbles out the corners of his mouth.

Levi licks his lips, pulls open his eyes. Erwin keeps him there, does not release the back of his head. “I’m not a whore,” he says again, but this time, his words are slightly slurred. He’s trying to meet Erwin’s eyes, but seems to be distracted, because they keep un-focusing, sliding towards each other.

“Is that what you think this is, Levi?” Erwin asks him, gently. “Is that what you think sex is, really?” He spreads his knees, and Levi slots between them, neatly.

“Someone,” Levi leans forward, his lashes tickling Erwin’s cheeks, “someone always loses,” he says, palms resting on Erwin’s chest.

“Loses?”

“Power,” Levi tells him, “sex is about power. Sir.”

“Then why do you call me Sir?” Erwin asks, and lets his lips ghost Levi’s cheek. Levi’s breath catches, sharply.

“Because,” he croaks. “I’m trying to – to keep a gap, Erwin.”

“A gap?”

“Between us,” Levi explains. “Between this.”

“But Levi,” Erwin murmurs, and Levi is watching his lips, cross-eyed, enraptured. “If there’s a gap between us – “ and he cups the back of Levi’s neck, lets his thumb sweep up into his hairline, “ – how would I ever get to touch you?”

Levi swallows. “Would you?” He asks, and his hand reaches out to grip Erwin’s, on the back of his head. “Would you, touch me? No one ever touches me. Erwin, you’re – “ and Levi’s eyes light up, “ – you’re so clean. Do you even know how clean you are?”

“Clean,” Erwin murmurs, then huffs, lightly. He inhales on his cigarette, blows the smoke onto Levi’s upturned face, and Levi makes a noise like a whimper. “Do you want to smoke?” He asks Levi again, with all laden meaning that entails.

Levi’s eyes are shut. He nods his head. “Yeah,” he croaks. “Mmm hmm. Please.”

“Turn around, then,” Erwin tells him.

Levi watches him. And then seems to decide to obey. He pulls up onto his knees and turns, the sheets rustling beneath him, faces the wall. He calves are splayed on either side of his hips, the soles of his feet pointing up at the ceiling.

Erwin rests his knee on the mattress. The bed creaks. He spreads his fingers in the space between Levi’s shoulder blades, where the gear plate sits. He hooks two fingers beneath the plate, wriggles them slightly. “You wear these too tight,” Erwin tells him again, quietly.

“No,” Levi replies, stubbornly, and doesn’t care to elaborate.

Erwin releases him, pushes his hand down Levi’s shoulder tries to ruck his fingers beneath the leather strap at the cross-section where shoulder meets chest; you should be able to squeeze a finger between the strap and uniform, that’s what Erwin was taught, in the cadets. But Levi taught himself. And habits are difficult to break, he supposes. Like smoking, for instance. That’s a particularly difficult habit to break.

The space between the leather and uniform is damp with Levi’s sweat. Erwin clears his throat. “I should check,” he tells him, and cups his left shoulder, the bare patch of skin that turns into the neck. He rubs his palm there, comfortingly, lets his hand push beneath the Levi’s shirt. “Make sure you haven’t cut yourself anywhere else.” It’s as good a pretence as any. Whatever makes this easier for Levi.

“Yes,” Levi agrees. He clears his throat. “Yeah, I mean,” he says. “I think you should.”

Erwin nods. He lets his thumb trace the leather strap down Levi’s chest, fingers the buckle. He rests more of his weight against the bed, his stomach to Levi’s back. He threads his other arm across Levi’s right shoulder, brackets him between them. And softly, his fingers pull the buckle loose.

Levi’s breath hitches.

Erwin threads the leather over his left shoulder, lets it hang loose. “Good?” He asks, and squeezes the blood back into the skin.

“Yea – yeah,” Levi coughs, clears his throat. “Better,” he says, voice a little raspy.

Erwin does not need to hide his smile; Levi cannot see it. “Well, that’s good,” he says, indulgently, and repeats with the buckle on the right. He pretends he does not feel Levi tipping back his head into his chest, or turning his nose into Erwin’s arm, as if scenting him, or taking in his warmth. It makes Erwin feel giddy, like he’s smoked and drank hard all at once. Some of the ash from the cigarette in his mouth drops onto Levi’s skin. Absently, he plucks it out of his mouth, holds it in front of Levi’s face. “You know how to do it, now,” he tells him.

“Yeah,” Levi agrees, and takes it, smokes with his head tipped back, breathing smoke into the air. He balances the cigarette at the crook of his mouth.

Erwin peels the gear off Levi’s back, reverently, slides his hands along the clothed planes of muscle. He aches to massage them, the way he had in the showers, weeks ago; Levi had stiffened, and then relaxed, all at once. Erwin had known then that no one had ever touched him before – he had sensed it, in his reticence, confusion, and total, desperate longing.

“It’s good to be touched,” Erwin tells him, as the rest of the leather slides off his chest, leaving him in only his button-down, still mud-stained. “You see, Levi, you underestimate how good it is. Like I say,” and Erwin slips a hand beneath his collar, “it’s better with a partner.”

Levi shivers. His brows tip together. “Oh,” he says, voice a little high, a little shaky, like the word has just escaped his lips. Poor boy, Erwin thinks. All that, just for the tickle of Erwin’s fingers against his collarbone.

“I have a question for you, Levi,” Erwin says, quietly. “Have you ever been seduced?”

There’s a pause, like Levi’s trying to understand. And then he shakes his head.

“No one’s ever tried?” Erwin says, disbelievingly.

“I’m not – “ Levi rasps. “I’m cold. I’m like ice. Can’t make me.”

Well, that’s not true, Erwin thinks. You’re so warm, Levi, you’re like fire to me. You make me feel alive. “Shall I show you something good?” Erwin asks him, and his forearms drape over Levi’s shoulders, his fingers pluck the first of his buttons. “A little trick of mine, using my words, Levi.”

He dips his lips to Levi’s ear and holds him in place, against his stomach. Levi is so loose, so pliable like this, at Erwin’s hands. I did that, Erwin thinks, with wonderment. Erwin must be human, to be able to make someone as tightly wound as Levi… unspool, thread by thread.

“Please,” Levi whispers, against Erwin’s arm. Erwin wonders if he feels safe, like this – Erwin’s never been held by another man bigger than him, but he thinks it must feel quite safe, when you can trust them, bracketed by two warm arms, cheek tipped against Erwin’s bicep. Levi curls his hands around Erwin’s wrists. “Sir,” he breathes.

“Shh,” Erwin says, pops another button. “Just listen, yes? You’ve got to – use your imagination, Levi. That makes it sweeter. It’s one thing, to imagine on your own, but listen to what I’m saying. Hear my voice,” he murmurs, in Levi’s ear, “do you feel me?” He asks, and strokes Levi’s hand, earns another soft sigh.

“I had this… notion,” Erwin admits, and picks Levi’s third button. “Of you, out in the hallway, bent on all fours, scrubbing so very hard,” Erwin murmurs. “I thought, after – you had such good technique. But then, you must be well-acquainted with your right hand,” he teases.

“Left-handed,” Levi breathes.

Erwin raises his brows. “Is that so?” He says. “Well, I feel stupid, never having noticed.” He strokes his knuckle down Levi’s cheek, plucks the cigarette from between his lips. It’s almost out. Erwin takes a final drag, cards his fingers in Levi’s hair, pulls back his head. “Open your mouth,” he advises.

Levi does. Erwin breathes into him – breathes for him, in fact, their mouths clamped together. It might be a kiss. Levi’s eyes are shut when Erwin pulls back, and blows smoke out his nose. Erwin smiles, to see it, the indulgence of it.

He releases Levi’s head and it droops down, as if boneless without Erwin’s touch. He undoes two more buttons, and roughly, pushes his shirt down his back, exposing his shoulders, the deep red grooves where his gear had sat. “So, my notion,” Erwin continues, “is you, in that hallway. But in my head, Levi – can you guess, what you’re wearing, in my head?”

He smooths his hand up Levi’s throat, coaxes him to say words with a gentle squeeze. “Nothing,” Levi hazards, words slurred, so perfectly relaxed against Erwin’s stomach. “Pervert,” he calls him, again.

Erwin laughs, softly. “Not quite,” he says. He pushes Levi’s shirt further down his arms, strips him nice and slow. His skin is goose-pimpling, little hairs standing on edge. So very desperate, Erwin thinks, and he doesn’t even know what for. “You’ve got on that little apron, I reckon, because you’re a modest man, Levi. I simply can’t imagine you with an exhibitionist streak. So perhaps I’ve ordered you there,” Erwin muses. “Do you think you’ve been a brat again, Levi? Given me too much lip?”

Erwin ducks his head to press a kiss to the join of Levi’s throat and shoulder. He inhales the scent of him there – sweat, still, and mud, and that fresh-grass scent you wouldn’t think was from riding for your life. “I think,” Erwin murmurs against his skin, “I’ve had to punish you, Levi. And you’re real embarrassed, I reckon. You keep – trying to pull that apron down over yourself, to hide. I think,” Erwin says, with a kind of clarity, “that you want to be desired, Levi. Would you like to be desired? I think that’s why you parked yourself in my hallway and arched your back like a little slut.”

Levi’s breath hitches. He clamps his hand against Erwin’s wrist, where it’s sliding down his chest. “No,” he protests, “no, it wasn’t – like that, exactly – “

“No?” Erwin enquires. “I underestimated you. I thought – Levi doesn’t know what he’s doing to me. I’m his superior officer, he wouldn’t try and… entice me like that. You are,” he whispers, into Levi’s ear, “so desirable to me, Levi.”

Levi shivers.

Erwin shakes off his hand, slips his fingers down to his chest, thumbs at both his nipples. “In my head,” he continues, “maybe you’ve gotten yourself nice and soapy, so I can see these,” he teases, flicking the left one to hardness. They spring to attention, nice and full, and Levi squirms a little. Ticklish, Erwin thinks, fondly. “Or maybe that aprons slipped, slightly. I tell you to stop your scrubbing. You look up at me,” Erwin says, and sees it perfectly in his head, the way it had been, days ago. Levi would sit back on his heels, lift his chin, the perfect height. “If I put my foot between your thighs, Levi,” Erwin says, gently, “do you think you would rut against it, just like you did for me in my office?”

Levi makes a noise like a whimper. “Erwin,” he breathes. “What are you – nngh,” he catches, folding forward, because Erwin’s pinching each nipple between a forefinger and thumb. “Ah – Erwin,” he’s saying his name like a prayer, his hair fallen in his face. Erwin watches the long back of his neck, head bowed forward, squirming against Erwin’s fingers.

“Would you?” Erwin asks him, softly, and kisses the back of his neck. “Do you think you’d do it again? And you’d come all over the floorboards, I reckon. Maybe you’d be pinching these sweet little nipples.” Erwin clicks his tongue. “Look at you,” he murmurs. “You think you’re like ice. You think you’re undesirable. You think – you think this is dirty,” Erwin scoffs. “So, in that hallway, I think I show you that you’re desirable, Levi.” He kisses him, behind his ear. “I get you nice and hot for it, I think,” and he licks him, just to taste his skin, and Levi moans, “and then I make you cause a mess, just to show you how good dirty can feel.”

“Nngh – stop,” Levi gasps. “Stop, I – I’m going to – please,” he begs, hangs his head, panting. Levi’s flush has spread up his back. Going to come? Erwin might tease, untouched? It’s unlikely; Levi’s not a boy. But it must mean so much to him, being touched like this, after all this time. He’s shivering, still, his words falling flat in the room.

The bed beneath them creaks, slightly. “So,” Erwin says, leaning back off the mattress, all at once. He brushes down his hands. “What do you think, Levi?”

“Think?” Levi slurs. Erwin sees him lift his hips off the bed, to rearrange himself between his thighs. He’s still wearing his gear. It must be awfully tight.

“Have you been seduced?”

Levi moves like a new-born foal, all shaking limbs and wet-soaked eyes, lashes clumping together. He turns, achingly, onto his ass, sits on the side of the bed, thighs splayed open, shirt half-draped off his shoulders, nice and debauched. The tip of his nose is red. “Yeah,” he croaks, and swallows. There’s a bulge between his legs. “Could you – would you touch me, still?” He smears his words. “Could you?”

He sees Levi working up to it, trying to find the right combination of words that might make Erwin continue. “Erwin,” he says, and looks up at Erwin with those soft eyes. He reaches out; his hands curl, tentatively, in Erwin’s shirt. “Is this – is this alright?” He asks, quietly.

Erwin nods. Truthfully, he can’t talk; he’s momentarily speechless. Levi is touching him, softly. It had been a hard expedition, but Erwin’s just come back to himself, suddenly – he is Erwin again, thank God. He had almost forgotten what he felt like, had stopped waiting for it, but he’s a human again, he’s alive. He hides his sharp intake of breath, forces himself to breathe slow as Levi curls his fingers in the material.

“Erwin,” he says, reverently, and rests his brow against his stomach. “I – Sir,” he croaks.

Erwin crooks his finger under his chin. “Don’t,” he says, and then corrects: “You don’t have to. I don’t have to be your superior here, Levi.” He wants to say, don’t think of yourself as my whore. He doesn’t want Levi to tarnish this, the beautiful touch.

“Will you touch me?” Levi whispers. He lifts his chin, presses it to Erwin’s stomach. “Please?” He asks, and his brows knit together. “It’s the best thing I ever had.”

Erwin breathes, strokes the back of Levi’s head. “Shh,” he says, distractedly. “Shh,” he soothes. He crouches, picks up the bottle of whiskey off the floor. “I’m – not drunk,” he feels compelled to say.

Levi shakes his head. “Neither am I,” he says.

“It – “ Erwin swallows spit, throat dry. “It was a hard expedition. I think – I’d quite like to be. Drunk, I mean.” He takes a swig.

Levi reaches out, grips the neck of the bottle, prises it from his fingers. “Me too, then,” he says, and drinks. “But I want to remember this.”

Those words make Erwin so fond, they warm his chest, although that could be the whiskey. “Here,” Erwin whispers, “open your mouth, Levi.” He slides his fingers through Levi’s hair, pulls back his head. “Does this make you hot?” He asks him. “When I do this to you? When I put smoke in you?” He fucks two fingers into Levi’s mouth, sloppily, just testing how far back he can go. Levi gags, swallows around them. Erwin takes back the bottle, takes another swig, swishes it around his mouth. He bends, hovers above Levi’s face, watches him tremble, eyes half-lidded. He spits into him.

Levi swallows, licks his lips, chases some of the drops down his chin with his tongue. “Gah,” he heaves, eyes streaming, slightly. He blinks them free of tears. “Sharp,” he says.

Erwin kisses him, then, sucks it right out of his mouth. He tastes like the whiskey, arching his back as Erwin leans to fuck his tongue into him. Levi’s making all this little sounds, moans and sighs, curling his fingers in Erwin’s shirt. “Thank you,” he breathes, when Erwin pulls away. “For touching me, I mean.”

“Well, Levi,” Erwin croaks, slightly, and absently buffs an unshed tear from Levi’s eye, “it’s my pleasure.”

“No,” Levi disagrees. He’s shaking his head. “No, Erwin,” he tells him again. “Idiot,” he breathes, and sniffs, rubs his nose with his hand. “It’s mine, Sir. The pleasure is – mine.”

He slips down off the bed, onto his knees. Erwin almost stumbles back, but doesn’t; like this, Levi’s trapped between Erwin’s knees and the side of the bed, bracketed by Erwin’s legs. Levi’s gear clinks, the leather and buckles shifting, as he arranges himself. His nails catch in Erwin’s belt loops. He looks up at him – and it’s the same way he’d watched Erwin in that hallway, days ago. “May I?” Levi croaks. He turns his cheek and presses it to the hot, hard swell beneath his pants, rubs against him. Erwin chokes, exhales slowly, gently cups the back of Levi’s head.

“Hey,” Erwin says, softly, draws him away. “Do you know how?”

Levi licks his lips. “I figure – “ he sniffs, brushes his eyes with his arm, “I figure I know what’d feel good.” He presses forward, closes his wet lips around the bulge, mouths at Erwin through the material leaving little drips of spit against his pants.

“Goddamn,” Erwin breathes, strokes the back of Levi’s neck. “Eager?”

Levi shuffles on his knees. “Can I?” He asks again.

“Have you ever, before?” Erwin replies.

Levi shakes his head, like he’s ashamed. “Dirty,” he says.

“But not me,” Erwin states.

“But not you,” Levi agrees.

Erwin hooks his knuckle beneath his chin. “Let me teach you,” he says, softly. He rests his thumb against Levi’s lower lip. “Exactly how I like it, hmm?”

Levi opens his mouth accommodatingly, lets Erwin slip inside, run the pad of his thumb along his gums, feel out his teeth. He nooks it against one of Levi’s canines, watches it catch his lip in a snarl, worrying the tooth with his nail. “Like this,” Erwin advises. “Use your fingers. Pull me out, gentle like.”

Levi obliges with eager little hands. They make quick work of Erwin, as easy as they make work of his gear. Erwin’s cock is already hard; it springs out, nudges Levi’s bare shoulder, wet at the tip, feels heavy in the air. He groans, slightly, at the sensation. “Now,” Erwin says, hand curled in the back of Levi’s hair, “look at it. You can press yourself against it, if you like. Get acquainted.”

Levi nuzzles his nose in at the base of Erwin’s cock, tentative, like he’s not sure what to do. His chin knocks Erwin’s balls. “Should I – do I – “ Levi pulls back, just a little. “Should I kiss it, Erwin?”

It’s takes something like supreme effort not to moan. Instead, Erwin clears his throat. “You can kiss it,” he says, magnanimously. “Taste it. I’m clean.”

Levi does. He kisses Erwin’s pelvis, lips soft against the wiry brown hairs there, then gently moves his lips along Erwin’s length, making him sway. Erwin grunts; he twists his fingers in Levi’s hair, braces the other on his hip.

“Good boy,” he says, not particularly thinking about the words, just knowing they’re the right ones to use. “That’s it. Good boy, just like that.”

Levi reaches the end of his cock. He pulls back, watches Erwin’s face; then places one single kiss at the weeping head. A bead of precome smears his lips, makes them wet, shiny. He licks it clean. “Salty,” he says.

Erwin’s smiles. “You ever tasted yourself, Levi?” He laughs, to see the look on his face. “What,” he teases, “you’ve never sat alone in your bed and sucked yourself off your fingers?”

“Disgusting,” Levi mutters, but his eyes aren’t focused on Erwin’s face. He’s chewing his bottom lip, cross-eyed staring at the tip of Erwin’s cock. “You’re big,” he says.

“Thank you.”

“Wasn’t a compliment.” Levi shifts on his knees, tilts his head as if deciding how to approach the problem at hand.

“Grip me,” Erwin advises, gently. “Hold me. Put the tip in your mouth.”

Levi obeys, although it wasn’t exactly an order. He opens his mouth, rests his tongue beneath the head of Erwin’s cock, then closes his lips around it. His tongue is – ah. Erwin doesn’t want to hurt him, tearing his hair like that; he grips his neck, instead.

“Yes,” Erwin sighs, through his teeth. “Like that, good boy, Levi, tsk.” He strokes his nape. “Such a – good boy. Use your tongue on it. Nice and slow, that’s it,” Erwin hisses, resists the urge to fuck forward into the warm, wet heat of Levi’s mouth. Levi’s tongue is probing at him, delicately, like he’s curious – he runs it around the head, then draws it back, pushes the tip up against Erwin’s slit –

Erwin makes an ignoble sound, arches his back. “Ngh,” he chokes, puts a hand over his mouth, then drags it down his chin, worries his jaw. “Alright,” he says, still gripping Levi’s neck, “just – don’t worry, shh,” he feels obliged to soothe. Levi’s still got his fingers curled in Erwin’s belt loops. “I’m not going to push forward and choke you, Levi – you take only what you can, you hear?”

Levi widens his mouth, testing, starts to move his head forward. Erwin watches his lips stretch, exhales slowly, rubs Levi’s neck encouragingly. “Just up and down, that’s all it is,” he says, “just focus on that, Levi, that’s all. Tsk, good boy,” he murmurs, wiping the first errant string of drool from the corner of Levi’s mouth. “That’s it,” and the word falls out his mouth without thinking, “darlin’, that’s all it is.”

Levi whimpers, and slurps. He lifts his eyes, chokes; Erwin feels the moment he’s taken too much, his cockhead hitting the spongy back of Levi’s throat, he can feel Levi’s tonsils when he tries to swallow around him. He pulls himself back, quickly, while Levi coughs. “What’d you call me?” He slurs. “What’d’y’say?”

“Darling,” Erwin says, softly. “Do you not like that?”

“Darlin’,” Levi repeats in his earthier voice. It sounds rough, from him. “Nah, I – I like it,” he sniffs, and wipes his chin. “I like it,” he says again, and takes Erwin in one.

Erwin moans, unashamedly this time. Levi is fucking his head back and forth. It sounds wet, messy. Levi pulls back to spit on his cock, come dribbling down his chin. He looks up at Erwin as he works it, briefly, with his fist – keeps staring at him as he goes back down, glucking against the length of him. Erwin shivers, and bites his lip, and moans anyway, in that order, while Levi – with seemingly instinctive skill – twists the base of his cock, milking Erwin into his mouth, drooling around him.

“Such a beautiful fucking mouth,” Erwin sighs. “Goddamn, Maria, Rose, Sina. Your fucking mouth, it was made for this, Levi.”

He feels Levi relax his throat, push deeper, until his nose is nestled in the wiry hairs at the base of Erwin’s cock. He makes a sound like – ngh, God, God-fucking-damn-it, he’s choking himself on Erwin, swallowing against him, and it’s a move which would be considered too much even by the most veteran prostitute in Sina. Erwin slips his hands to cup either side of Levi’s head, fucks into him, and fucks spit out of him, glistening thick come and drool escaping out the corner of his mouth. Levi lifts his eyes, red-rimmed and shining with fat, unshed tears, his nostrils flaring, trying to – trying to take in air, against the bulk of Erwin pushed so deep inside his mouth – his fucking – this fucking hole in his face, with a pretty pink tongue for licking, and a neat little throat for fucking –

Erwin pulls him off his cock, gasping, dribbling down his chin, tears on his cheek. “Nngh, nngh,” Levi is breathing, rasping each breath, head tilted back. “Again,” he demands, licks his lips. “Please, again.”

“Again?” Erwin enquires, but his own voice is weaker than he wants it to be, his knees trembling.

“I want – to do it right,” Levi croaks. He tips his chin up, panting, come-slick and sweating. “Please,” he begs, reaches out with that pretty tongue, licks the underside of Erwin’s cock. “Talk to me again. Like you said. You imagined me, in that hallway. Keep – keep talking to me. How do you touch me, after?” He asks, earnestly, voice like chalk on stone. Touch, touch, touch. Poor boy – it’s all he wants, really. “Please, Erwin,” he says, and Erwin thinks he really can be sweet, when he wants to, can use his words to be all sugar-spun and kind, or maybe the come has set in some rot in his brain. “Please, Sir.”

Erwin shuts his eyes, tenses his jaw, has to look away. Wordlessly, he kicks Levi’s thighs apart, sets his foot between them. Levi arches, drops a hand off Erwin’s pants to palm himself, grip himself, moaning so softly at his own touch.

“Beg for it,” Erwin says lightly.

Levi pulls open his eyes, licks his lips. “What?”

Erwin grips himself, wet with Levi’s spit. “For all of it,” he says, and feels a madness overcoming him. He wants to see Levi beg. He realises – this is what it’s been for, all of it. His teasing in the showers, weeks ago, the smoking, that slow, beautiful kiss. Levi, who had fucked himself against Erwin’s leg while Erwin held him steady, let him take his pleasure, and now: Erwin wants to be desired. He wants to be human, Goddamn. He wants someone, one person – he’s not greedy – to need him, and crave him, and plead for his touch. To need me, Erwin thinks, deliriously. Just me.

Levi swallows. His hand unhooks from Erwin belt loop; his shifts his weight on his knees, leans back against the side of the bed, blinking up at him. Erwin shuts his eyes. He has, he realises, asked too much of him. Levi, who’s never even been fucked, who – who hides himself away to tend to his wounds, prickly, tightly wound, snarling and spitting and encased in an ice even Erwin can’t melt –

“Please,” Levi croaks.

Erwin looks down, sharply; Levi’s folded his hands in front of his chest, slipped his fingers between each other, knotted them like thread. He shuffles on his knees. “Please,” he says again, simply, helplessly. “Just touch me. Please touch me. You don’t fuckin’ know – how bad I just want to be touched.”

Erwin cups his cheek. “Darlin’,” he says again, softly.

“Please,” Levi begs, and his voice cracks. He sniffs, and buffs his folded fingers against his nose. “Please,” he says, with unshed tears. “Touch me, Erwin. Show me. I know you can, I know – I know. Sir. You’re so clean,” he croaks. “Let me – suck you. Did you like it? Did I do it good enough? Please,” Levi croons, lifts his fists, bows his head. “I’ll beg for it, I will. Just – just – nah, my words are – are no good.” He raises his chin, slides out his tongue. “P’eas,” he slurs around it, “use my mouth, Sir,” he swallows, and sticks out his tongue again, “p’eas, ‘uch ‘ee.”

Erwin doesn’t use his words. He fucks back into Levi’s mouth like it’s all its there for. There’s a relief in this, he thinks; it’s his relief, to spend himself in someone’s body, to be held by warm hands, and wanted. It’s Levi’s relief, perhaps, just to be touched, finally – to fulfil some basic human need. “In that hallway,” Erwin grits, fucking him sloppy, pulling out to smear himself against his cheek, get loose precome on his skin, “you would’ve come against my foot,” Erwin tells him, but keeps his voice gentle. He slips a finger into Levi’s cheek, hooks it, just to hear him gargle when Erwin slaps his hips against his face.

“Ugh,” he grunts, keeps up his steady rhythm, holding Levi’s cheeks. “Made yourself all messy, just like you did in my office. I’d say to you, Levi – tch, what a desperate little slut, hmm?” Erwin says gently, strokes one hand over Levi’s hair, to brush it out of his eyes. He wants to see them, whatever it is he sees there – it’s not the same kind of shame he’d had in Erwin’s office, that reluctant humiliation at his own desperation. This is purposeful. It’s touch-driven. Levi seems to know what he wants, because Erwin has taught him. “You’re gonna learn, Levi,” Erwin groans, driving deep, Levi’s nose in his pubic hair, “what it takes to pleasure a man, and I’m going to teach you how to be pleasured. You have more than one hole,” Erwin tells him. “But I’ll bet you knew that, already.”

Levi’s eyes roll back into his head, spitting slick down his chin. Erwin rucks his foot beneath Levi’s balls, weighs them; he presses the tip of his boot against the seat of Levi’s pants. “I’ll bet,” Erwin chokes, feels sweat drip down his temple, “you think it’s real dirty, hmm? Don’t you, Levi. Someone touching you there. I’ll bet you think it’s even dirtier, having to touch someone there. That sweet little hole of yours, tch,” Erwin spits on him, smears it into his hair, a wild impulse that Levi takes with a shiver, fucking down on his boot. “But I’m showing you, aren’t I darling? Look at up at me, darling,” he urges, and Levi does, with these trusting eyes, all blown. Erwin pulls out of his mouth, sudden, leaves a long string of drool between the tip of cock and Levi’s swollen red lips. “Tell me,” he asks, softly.

Levi blinks sweat from his eyes. He looks dazed, desperate. He brings up a hand to absently pinch his own nipple, arching his back, licking his lips. “I want to be dirty for you, Sir,” he nods, brushing some come off his cheek. “Nah, no,” he frowns, stares at it on his fingers, “Erwin,” he says, and looks up at him. “’Cause – ‘cause – “

“Because?” Erwin whispers.

“’Cause touch is dirty,” he seems to be puzzling out, working it through his come-drunk head, “and – it’s a filthy fuckin’ habit,” Levi croaks, “I don’t want – I didn’t want none of them touching me, hurting me like that. But Erwin, you’re – you’re clean,” he says, with amazement, “you taste like – “ he chases the come on the end of Erwin’s cock, sucks on the head, “ – clean,” he repeats, swallowing, and Erwin thinks it’s the highest honour, in Levi’s vocabulary. “So, if touch is dirty, I want to be made filthy, by you, Sir,” he breathes, “’cause that means I’ve been fuckin’ touched, you hear me?”

“You want to be dirty?” Erwin asks. “You want me to make you dirty?”

“More than anything,” Levi says, like a defiance.

“Open your mouth,” Erwin orders. He spits in it, thrusts back it. “You want to be dirty, huh?” He huffs, fucking Levi’s throat. “Let me tell you what you do, in that hallway, you little slut. Waiting out there for your Commander’s cock. Once you’ve squirted on the floorboards, once you’ve cleaned it with your pink little tongue, you realise, I’ve got to punish you, don’t you? You broke orders, because I ordered you to clean my hallway naked, except your pretty apron, but then you go and come everywhere and make a mess. Filthy,” Erwin spits, “filthy boy. You ever crawled for anyone? No, ‘course you haven’t. You’ve never begged a single person in your life before me. You ever had a boot-print on your bare ass? You’d get one, crawling down that hallway.”

Levi seems to have ascended somewhere, cross-eyed and dazed as Erwin uses his mouth, one hand teasing his nipples, the other cupping himself, squeezing, hips twitching into his palm. His gear is getting in the way – his legs must be stiff by now.

“Now, this is important, Levi,” Erwin explains, “because I know you’ve never shown your hole to anyone, but that’s okay. That’s because, your hole belongs to me, understand?” Levi moans, against him. “D’you like that, Levi?” Erwin asks. “You wanted me to talk, do you like the way I’m talking to you, about all the different ways there are to be touched?”

Levi nods, so Erwin continues. “You don’t even know,” he says, “how many ways there are. I think, you’d crawl straight into my office, head down, ass up, and I’m going to have to show you. But I think you’re eager enough for it, aren’t you? So – imagine this, Levi, I need you to picture it – you pull open your tight little hole for your fuckin’ superior officer to look at. You think it’s dirty,” Erwin teases, “oh, oh, you’re going to get so hot and squirmy on my carpet, Levi. But when I’m fucking you open with my tongue – “

Levi’s eyes widen, he whimpers, palms himself with urgency.

“ – you’ll know what dirty really means, huh? Or maybe I figure, that’s not enough for such a brat, hmm?” Erwin grips the back of Levi’s hair, shuts his eyes, think he does not have much left in him. The pleasure is building like – lapping water, against the lakebed. Levi’s mouth is better than a woman’s hole, even, tight and wet and warm. “You want touch, Levi? You want to be dirty? I get you on your knees, fucking your face between my ass, and you spend your afternoon like that, warming my cock and licking me where I want, when I want, hmm? You’d be good at it. You might even look like this, after,” Erwin says, and softens his voice. “Shh – shh, d-darlin’,” he starts to choke, feeling his orgasm building in his gut. “That’s right. Imagine that. You’d look just like this,” Erwin tells him, strokes his cheek, gently. “There’s not a thought in your head, is there, darling?” He soothes, even as he feels his pulse spike, his words get jagged. “There’s nothing there but me and my cock.” He feels himself out against Levi’s cheek. “L-look at me,” Erwin pleads. “Look at me, Levi.”

Levi does, and Erwin comes.

It fills Levi’s mouth, and he pulls out, finishes on his face in long, hot, drawn-out spurts. He groans, holds himself through it, legs trembling, head thrown back in rapture. He can feel the muscles of his neck cording, ass clenching, painting Levi’s face with ropes of it. His mouth is still open. He’s rolling it around his tongue, like he doesn’t know what to do with it, and Erwin thinks – of course he doesn’t. No one’s taught him.

Erwin stands there, just trying to breathe, but Levi is patient. Some come drips off his face, from his jaw, trails down his chest. Levi doesn’t know whether to spit or swallow, but he sticks out his tongue, and lets it drip from there, too.

“You keep it,” Erwin tells him, breathlessly. “You understand? Tsk, no, no,” he says gently, “you’re wasting it, darling.” He scoops up an errant glob off Levi’s chest, feeds it back into his mouth, dries his fingers on Levi’s brow. “Goddamn,” he croaks, exhausted, spent, having done nothing but fuck his subordinate’s face. “Just – just wait there, darling, hold on.” He carelessly tucks himself back in, flaps around for his cigarettes. “Don’t swallow, now,” he calls over his shoulder, tossing his clothes aside, pillows, to find his coat, pull out his cigarettes. He picks the matchbox off the table, strikes up, inhales and breathes out smoke. Fucking blissful, he thinks, and steps back between Levi’s spread knees.

“C’mon,” he says, and holds out his hand. Levi blinks up at him, placidly. Some come drips off his eyelashes. “C’mon,” Erwin says, and in the cold light of day, he feels a little guilty for making a mess of Levi’s face – he’s wrecked, all spit-shining and come-strewn, it’s in his hair, his swollen lips.

Erwin crouches, picks at the hem of his vest, cigarette smoking between his lips. “Here,” he says, cups the crown of Levi’s head, and carefully wipes the come from his eyes. “Better,” he says, and Levi blinks, wordlessly, eyes still dazed. So Erwin grips his chin, and gives him what he wants: a long kiss, gentle. It’s good to be gentle, Erwin thinks. After all the horror of what they do.

“Shh,” Erwin soothes. He swallows himself out of Levi’s mouth, holds him there at eats it out of him, fucking his tongue against his gums, his tongue, curling and pulling himself out. Levi smacks his lips, when he’s done, exhales something heavy.

“Thanks,” he croaks.

“No, darling,” Erwin says, softly, and he lightly pushes Levi’s bangs out of his eyes with his ring finger, cigarette balanced in his hand. “You’re not finished yet. No need to thank me.”

He stands and holds out his hand again. “C’mon,” he says, “I know that’s not comfortable.”

Levi stares at his hand, then at Erwin. He takes it, lets Erwin pull him to his shaky feet. Newborn foal, Erwin recalls, watching Levi stumble around the bed. “Here,” Erwin shows him, sits himself nice and comfy up against the headboard, pats the space between his legs. “You settle right here. Look at you,” he says, when Levi lays his back against Erwin’s chest, “perfect fit, hmm?”

“Tch,” Levi mutters, like after everything, the notion that he and Erwin were built to cuddle together is what offends him. Erwin holds the cigarette out over Levi’s shoulder, offering; and Levi accepts, smokes, bracketed by Erwin’s thighs.

“Look at you,” Erwin mumbles, reaching around to pop the button of Levi’s pants. “You know what you are, Levi? Fuckin’ – come-sick, is what.”

“Come-sick?” Levi asks, warily.

Erwin laughs against his shoulder, starts his fingers on the buckles of the gear on Levi’s thighs. “Next time,” he says, boldly, “I’m going to make sure there’s a mirror, so you can see the look on your face, darling.”

“Don’t,” Levi shivers. He blows smoke, and his voice his worse than a croak, it’s pure rasp. “You don’t need to – to call me that.” He coughs, slightly, a wet sounding thing, and tips his head back onto Erwin’s shoulder. “Oh,” he breathes, softly, almost a whimper. “Look’it me,” he slurs, “’m so – so dirty – “

“Mmm,” Erwin agrees, lightly presses a kiss to string of come on Levi’s cheek. “Shh, yes you are,” he soothes, letting the leather on Levi’s thighs fall to the bed, “you’re filthy, Levi, you’re a slutty, messy boy, is what you are. So fucking tightly wound,” Erwin says, and twists his fingers in the gear of Levi’s thigh, uses it to drape his leg across Erwin’s knee, “taking yourself away like that, to lick your wounds in private, always so clean, and tight, and pristine, and look at you now.”

“Mmmgh,” Levi nods, helplessly. “Yeah, I am,” he croaks, tossing his head against Erwin’s shoulders, “I’m so – so – “

“So?” Erwin prompts, hooking his thumb behind the button of Levi’s pants.

“ – touched,” Levi shivers, as Erwin pushes his pants down his ass, arching his hips to let him. “Nngh, I’m fuckin’ – come-sick, Sir – “

“That’s right,” Erwin agrees, quietly, “darling. Levi, darling, you – “ and Erwin hooks his arms beneath Levi’s knees, pulls them back so his feet hang limply in the air, exposing the soft backs of his thighs, Erwin’s arms crossed around the backs of his knees. The belt of Levi’s gear, hanging loose around his calves, pants pushed hastily down to his ankles, clinks gently. “There,” he finishes. “Is this touched enough, Levi? You’re so warm. There, there, darlin’,” he soothes, rubbing his nose into the side of Levi’s head, peppering him with little kisses. “I’m going to hold you and make you feel so good, Levi, it’s only what you deserve. Humanity’s strongest, hmm, but who ever takes care of you? Who have you ever trusted enough just to take care of you like you deserve?”

“Only you,” Levi croaks, voice reedy and raspy. It breaks when he says: “Only you, Sir. Just you, Erwin.”

“Shh, shh,” Erwin says, but does not mean it; he wants Levi to make all the sounds he pleases. Levi is trying to cover his cock with his hands, weeping, red-tipped and dribbling as it bounces against the ends of his shirt. “Tsk, and look at it,” Erwin says, resting his chin on Levi’s shoulder, “you’ve been so patient. But I think – you’ve waited all these years, what’s an extra couple minutes, hmm?” Erwin turns his nose against Levi’s cheek, kisses him, come sticking to the tip. Levi, who up until now was so clean and unreachable, save for those small times when Erwin could pick beneath his skin. “I think you begged beautifully, before,” Erwin says, and tells him what he wants to hear. “I think you begged the best I’ve ever heard, it was perfect, Levi.”

Erwin slides his hands apart, and in doing so, pulls apart Levi’s thighs, exposes him. His toes are curling in the air, and Erwin wants to spread him so wide he’s loose and open for it, but his pants are getting in the way, and Erwin doesn’t want to hurt his injured foot taking them off. Levi squirms against him, though, rubs himself back against Erwin’s spent cock, like he thinks Erwin could slip inside him just like that. “Beg again, then,” Erwin tells him, gently. “Tell me what you are. Your turn, Levi, let me hear you now, darling.”

Levi lifts his hand, still holding the cigarette. The room is quiet. The sheets rustle. He takes a shaky inhale, puffing, breathes the smoke through his nose, head tipped back against Erwin’s shoulder. He opens his mouth, as if to speak – and then loses his words, eyes hazed, heavy-lidded. “Wait,” he croaks, asking for patience. Erwin obliges. Levi smokes again, takes it in deep this time; and when he exhales, he tips up his chin, does it over Erwin’s face. Erwin breathes it in – is there anything more intimate, he thinks, than breathing the smoke from someone’s body?

His eyes, Erwin thinks. His pupils are all blown up, expanded, so the grey around them is just a ring. He’s seen Levi like that before, out on the field, when he moves with such purpose, fearlessly, without thought, like an animal bred to skill. It’s not exactly the same, though; they’re softer now. They’re looking at Erwin with a kind of familiarity beneath the daze of his swollen eyelids, fondness, or perhaps something else. Who would look at Erwin like that? Who would dare expose themselves to him, beg for him, desire his human touch above all else?

His come is drying on Levi’s skin – hysterically, deliriously, Erwin thinks he looks like one of those sticky buns you can buy at the baker’s. Both of them are drunk on something, he thinks – the booze, the touch, post-adrenalin nerves, each other. “I’m – “ Levi is slurring, cupping the back of Erwin’s head, “I’m – I feel real hot, Erwin. Inside me, like. Like…” he shivers again, “’M all sticky. You gonna touch me, Sir? You gonna put your hand on me? Please, c’mon,” he chokes. “Put your hand on me. Put your hand on my c-cock,” he gets out. “It’s drippin’ everywhere,” he shudders, tenses his thighs to fuck his hips in the air. “Please, Sir. T-t-touch me,” he stutters, when Erwin slides a hand down his thigh. “Make me d-dirty, make me – use me, even. Use my mouth, you’d use my hole, wouldn’t you? I bet you’d do it real good, I’d be… I’d be… oh,” Levi moans, exhaustedly.

He’s trying his best. Erwin bends him in half, Levi’s knees skimming his shoulders, watches him shakes his ass helpless, tip of his cock rubbing against his stomach. “Here,” Erwin tells him, “let me finish for you, darling. When I fuck you,” Erwin tells him, and Levi whimpers, “I’m going to open you up nice and slow. You’ve never had a person put their fingers inside you before – no one but me, Levi. Do you like being my own, personal come-dump Levi? Is that what this is? No, shh,” Erwin soothes his agitation, “it’s alright. It’s good. Do you think you never touched a man because you were waiting for me to take care of you? Tsk, look,” Erwin observes, detachedly, and he lets one of Levi’s legs drop so he can scratch his thumb into the weeping head of Levi’s cock. “It’s dripping off you.”

Levi digs his heel into the bed, pushes back into Erwin’s hips. “No – no,” he squirms, “if you – if you – “

Erwin clicks his tongue, lightly, in his ear. “It’s alright,” he says, “this’ll be our secret, Levi,” he tells him, gripping Levi in his palm rubbing the pad of his thumb against his slit.

Levi’s legs shake. “No,” he croaks, “you don’t – I’ll – nngh,” he pleads, eyes screws shut, tears springing at their edges. He’s fucking up his hips, helplessly, pushing himself into Erwin’s palm. “I’m gonna – I’m gonna – c-c-come – “

Erwin ignores him. “You see,” he says, “this is stress relief, Levi.” He doesn’t stroke him, or play with him at all, except to rub his thumb around the end of his cock, smearing his precome against the skin. “It’s why you were in that hallway, cleaning. It’s why you’re so damn good at scrubbing hmm? But I’m good at scrubbing too, in my own way.” Erwin kisses his jaw, listens to his thready little whimpers, the clasps of his gear rattling with his thrusts. “You don’t have to clean, Levi,” Erwin whispers, in his ear. “There’s a relief in being made dirty, don’t you think? And look at you,” Erwin tsks, presses the lightest of licks against some dried come on Levi’s cheekbone, “you are so dirty, aren’t you?”

“Mmmgh, mmgh, Sir,” he rasps, coughs, jerking his hips. “I’m fuckin’ filthy,” he breathes, “I’m so – I’m your dump, I’m your fuckin’ dump, Sir. This is so good,” he pleads, “I’m not – I’m not – “

“You’re not?”

“I’m not thinkin’!” Levi cries, fucking his cock into Erwin’s fist. “I’m not thinkin’ of anything at all!”

“Relief,” Erwin tells him. “That’s all we want, huh? Just a bit of fucking touch, Levi, make us human again.”

“I’m gonna – I’m gonna come!” Levi sobs, voice breaking. “Shit, Erwin – I’m gonna – you’ve got to stop – “

“Come,” Erwin tells him. “I’ve got you. Look, look, Levi, I’ve got you so good,” he croons, “I’m not letting go. I’m going to hold you, and you’re going to come for me, darling. My sweet soldier, under all that – bravado, hmm? My darling. My own, personal come-dump.”

Levi spills into Erwin’s hand, spurts up onto his chest, catches some on his drooping head as he shudders apart in Erwin’s arms. He’s making the most unbelievable sounds – you couldn’t imagine them, what they would sound like with Levi’s voice, but here he is, making them for Erwin’s ears alone. “Shh, shh, shh,” Erwin is saying, rocking him through it, through Levi’s sobs, his shivering, his wet, sweaty skin. “Oh shh, darling,” he croaks, and presses his nose into Levi’s hair as he crawls into his lap, tucks his chin into the crook of Erwin’s neck, pants around his ankles, gear tangled round his legs, shirt crumpled and rucked down his arms.

Erwin cups the back of Levi’s skull, holds him there while he sobs, these gasping, rasping things, like he’s been carved open, split in two. Erwin holds him. No – he touches him. He touches him all the way through it, whatever breaking, or loosening, or great, unwieldy After Levi’s trying to process. It must be so much, to be touched after so long. It must – it must be cracking inside him, cracking him open. What more could Levi have to hide from him, now? What more can either of them hide, after this?

After, Levi lies there, exhausted, dozing. Lazily, Erwin strokes his thigh, pets him gently. He smokes. The cigarette is down near to a nub. He trails his nails around Levi’s soft skin, the spare black hairs on his inner thigh. He thinks – well, there’s nothing liminal about this, having this man in his lap, alive and breathing and warm. It’s real, and solid, and it’s tangible, beneath his touch.