26Mikasa ignores the brightness of the rising summer sun from behind her closed eyelids by throwing an arm around Levi and burrowing into the space between his neck and his pillow. Her half awake mind vaguely remembers that he finds the way she does this strange but she doesn't really care.
She loves these moments between wakefulness and her dreams, the hazy intersection between reality and fantasy seeming almost limitless in its possibilities.
Levi hums in his sleep and shifts himself closer to her.
Right as she's about to fall back asleep, she hears the telltale sound of footsteps up the stairs.
No, no, no, she thinks to herself as she hears the bedroom door creak open.
"MOM, DAD! GET UP! MY NEW COMIC COMES OUT TODAY!"
"Maybe if we ignore him he'll go away," Levi murmurs as he rolls onto his stomach and buries his face into his pillow.
The last time they ignored him, he'd ended up covering the entire kitchen in flour and broken a dozen eggs on the floor trying to make breakfast so Mikasa knows that's not an option.
"Moooooooommmmmm," he whines.
"Mom and Dad are still sleeping," Mikasa says groggily, "go do your chores."
Thinking he's left Mikasa almost falls back to sleep.
"Mom," Jacob shout whispers into her ear.
"Ah!" she jumps, surprised at her son's presence hovering over her.
"I want you to get up!"
She sighs and resigns herself to getting out of bed. She sits up quickly and scoops him into her arms, which is becoming more and more difficult since he's nearly eight and growing like a weed. Still, she pulls up his shirt and blows a raspberry on his stomach making him screech with laughter.
"Fine, you win, but let your Father sleep, he needs his rest."
"Put me down! Put me down!" He laughs as he kicks his arms and legs.
She carries the wiggling, laughing slip of a boy downstairs and to the kitchen where she puts him to work helping her measure flour for pancakes and water for coffee.
Jacob likes to help with breakfast. He's an enthusiastic but helpful child, his blue-grey eyes focused intently on measuring the perfect amount of water for the coffee.
By the time she's finished, Levi has dragged himself out of bed for breakfast, though he still looks like he would rather be in bed.
"You didn't have to get up," she says wryly.
"You two are so loud, nobody could sleep through that," he says as he opens yesterday's newspaper.
Jacob happily eats his pancakes, all the while excitedly telling his parents his plans for the day.
"I want to show Elise my new Detective James comic right away after I get it," he says seriously because heaven forbid Elise Springer wait a moment for Jacob to show her their mutually adored comic. "Then I want to go to the Springer house after we're done in town because Elise said two days ago that her mom is making a chocolate cake, can I go please, please, please?"
Mikasa has wondered where he gets all that energy and excitement from. He very often reminds her of Eren. He has dark, scruffy hair and is pale like both herself and Levi, of course, but his demeanor is rather different from theirs. He feels so passionately, so strongly that sometimes it makes his body shake with excitement.
"You should ask them to build you a bedroom at their house, you may as well stay there with how often you want to visit," Levi says dryly as he pages through the news.
"That's because they're more fun," he murmurs under his breath while he stabs another slice of pancake.
"Yeah yeah, don't think I don't know about how Sasha feeds you frosting by the spoonful," Mikasa says disapprovingly. Jacob sits up straight and puts on a brief facade of respect, clearly trying to get what he wants.
"But can I go get my comic then go to the store to show Elise?" he asks again.
Mikasa sighs. "Once you finish your chores, then you can ride into town and abandon us for your preferred family."
Jacob ignores her sarcasm and does his chores in what seems like record time so he can collect his monthly allowance (that he promptly spends on his comic), and take his bike into town. Biking alone to town is a new privilege that he's quite proud of.
"Hey, Dad," he says while he slings his backpack over his shoulder.
"Hmm?"
"In the chest at the foot of the bed–"
Mikasa's pulse quickens slightly and she clenches her jaw. She remembers what's hidden there.
"You're not supposed to dig through things in our room," Levi reprimands.
"I know, I know!" he says warily, clearly trying to avoid anything that may prevent him from going out to get his comic book, "but I was changing my sheets like I was supposed to and there weren't any clean ones where they normally are, and I know you and mom keep your sheets in that trunk. I didn't find more sheets but at the bottom there's all these weird notebooks and papers that say our last name–"
"Did you read it?" Levi asks sternly enough that Mikasa even finds it unnerving. Jacob's eyes go wide and he shakes his head.
"No, no, I didn't, promise," he laughs a little nervously, "Well, except the first page and I saw that it was Ms. Hanji's notebook. Is it a science experiment or something? Is it about your parents? Elise has a grandparent and I know I don't but–"
Mikasa rests a hand on his shoulder gently, trying to seem calmer than she is.
"You're not in trouble. Those are just records from when your Father and I were in the military. Since Hanji was in charge, she kept notebooks like that on all of her subordinates," she lies smoothly. "I'm surprised your Dad hasn't thrown them out, you know how much he hates clutter!" she laughs.
Mikasa and Levi share a glance that clearly says we'll discuss this later. Jacob doesn't notice this as he's too relieved he's not in trouble.
He hops on his bicycle with a hasty goodbye and pedals madly to the end of the drive and down the road, his excitement radiating off of him the whole while. The road leading to town curves, and Mikasa always watches him pedal his bike to the curve, until she can't see him any more.
She sighs.
"He'll be fine," Levi leans up against the post on their porch, his arms crossed and feet bare in his pajamas.
"I'll never stop watching, I'll be looking after him until the curve when he's a man," she says quietly, her voice tinged with the bittersweet feeling of a mother watching their child grow.
She remembers the early hazy days of motherhood with a surprising clarity. The sleep deprivation had been a little shocking and the crying frustrating, but in many ways she can't recall a happier time; it'd been just her and Levi taking care of Jacob in the dead of winter.
Well, truly it had been her taking care of Jacob and Levi taking care of her. In those early days a baby truly only wants their mother, and the trials of childbirth had left her feeling weaker than she would've expected.
How she had ever doubted her ability to love her son will always perplex her. She closes her eyes for a moment, letting the warm summer breeze blow across her face and she can remember what he'd looked like all those years ago: tiny fisted hands, squishy little feet and big blue-grey eyes. She can remember the way he would drift off to sleep at her breast, his whole body relaxing in a way that only one who knows nothing of the world's cruelty can, how it had made her heart swell with so much love, so much feeling she was unsure it was possible.
You're gonna love it so much it feels like you'll die.
Levi had been right about that. And it had scared her, still does because loving someone that much means that losing them may kill you.
But she reminds herself there's no reason to think she'll lose him. Over and over again, and each time she believes it more and more; that Jacob is safe, happy and whole in this life they've created.
She opens her eyes and glances over to Levi.
"I'd bet money that he asks to stay over with Sasha and Connie."
"Probably," she agrees, still looking far down the road.
The research Jacob accidentally found is still nagging at her. Despite this, they finish their morning coffee together on the porch in silence, the warm summer breeze carrying birdsong and the scent of grass the only thing they need in the moment.
"I'll go take care of the horses and over lunch we can discuss Jacob's discovery," Levi says in his usual no-nonsense fashion before he heads to the stables.
Mikasa dresses herself in a blush-colored dress that buttons up the bust and ties at the waist. She puts on a floppy brimmed straw hat so her skin doesn't burn and heads out back to the garden.
They usually spend their mornings alone. They both need space, her to sort out her thoughts and him very likely to do the same. This is the time of day she allows herself to think about Eren.
Nowadays, she only allows herself a few moments a day to think about him, to remember him fully. Then for the rest of the day, she focuses on the here and now, the people around her as opposed to those she has lost. Compartmentalizing it like this helps her feel more at peace while still remembering the things she feels she needs to.
With remembering there's always a tinge of sadness, but it has faded to a more bittersweet feeling, a warmth that fills her instead of taking from her.
And that's because of Jacob.
Loving him felt natural, similar to the blind, intuitive devotion that she'd had for Eren.
Her feelings for Eren never fit into a neat definition – they had always been simultaneously familial and romantic. She'd never say that she'd loved him as her son all those years ago, but the connection she'd felt to him had, in hindsight, transcended that of romantic love. It makes the kisses and embraces she'd fantasized about seem almost shallow and girlish, like a completely separate thing from the devotion she'd felt towards him, the connection she'd shared with him.
Maybe Eren had always known that, known that they were more than the romantic feelings she'd had towards him.
She's spoken to Levi about this feeling before.
"I once told Erwin I'd break his legs to keep him from the expedition to Shiganshina," he'd said wistfully.
"Do you wish that you had?"
He'd smiled sadly and replied: "Every single day of my life."
She supposes that love has always been a volatile emotion for the both of them, that they experience it differently from others.
She already feels Jacob pulling away, striving for independence the way that all children do and she has to resist the urge to hold him closer, to cling to him like she has clung to life because she knows that that's not fair to him. His mother's love shouldn't be a burden.
She's filled up her basket with tomatoes and herbs. With her time up for the day Mikasa goes inside for a glass of water.
Levi has just come in from his morning chores and she nearly smiles at him. She still loves seeing him like this; his hair slightly mussed, cheeks warm with the summer sun and sleeves rolled up to his elbows. It reminds her of the past, of the summer they'd been brought together.
He looks like he's about to say something but the phone rings and he walks out of the room to go answer it.
"Mikasa," he shouts from the next room, "are you fine with Jacob spending the night?"
She sighs and walks to the next room with the phone.
"Let me talk with Sasha."
He hands the phone to her.
"Are you sure it's okay? You have a lot going on right now, I wouldn't want him to be a bother."
Sasha is currently pregnant with her fifth child and the youngest one is more of a handful than the rest of them combined.
"Psh Jacob is always welcome Mikasa, you know that, and besides, what's one more when the house is already chaos with or without him?"
Mikasa smiles a little and sighs.
"It's okay then, we can swing by with an overnight bag for him."
Sasha laughs, "Oh there's no need, he clearly had plans because he came with a set of pajamas and his toothbrush."
Mikasa rolls her eyes. "Of course he did. Well, send him back whenever you get sick of him."
"Will do!"
Childfree for the rest of the day, they decide to take the horses out for a ride together. They eat lunch deep in the forest near the lake in their usual, companionable silence, still not speaking of what to do about Hanji's notes on the experiment years ago.
She knows that to an outsider their relationship may seem odd, perhaps even distant or cold: two people brought together by an unintended pregnancy and circumstance. Perhaps there is some truth to that, but why they are still here, still together years later, is something far more than that.
He's the only person she's ever felt she can truly be herself with, the only person who not only understands everything about her but also loves and accepts her for it.
She rests her hand on his while they lay in the grass and the afternoon sun shines down on them.
The sun is setting by the time they get home.
"It's funny Jacob found those notes today of all days. It's been eight years today, since Hanji's experiment," he says.
"Is it? I'm not one for remembering dates."
She thinks back to the time when darkness had been her only companion and loneliness her curse, and how Levi's presence had jolted her awake for the first time in years, of feeling almost forced together by something unknown.
The feeling that Hanji's science had been able to explain.
She may not remember specific dates well, but she does remember events with sometimes shocking clarity.
It'd been a slushy, thawing early spring day when Hanji had come to see Jacob for the first time.
Hanji cradled him like he'd been made of glass when Mikasa passed him to her. She remembers the way Hanji had studied his tiny little face, like she would any sort of project or test-subject, trying hard to commit it to memory.
Hanji sniffled and Levi groaned when he saw her wiping away tears.
"He's just so beautiful!" she'd cried. "It's all Mikasa's doing, of course because you're so rude and freakish, I'm only certain he's yours because of this frown," she had said, her voice still thick with emotion.
"You calling me a freak is absurd."
Hanji had spent another minute or so simply staring at the baby, commenting here and there on his various characteristics. (Look at that hair! Attached earlobes, that's an interesting recessive trait! And a dimple too!)
When Jacob was sleeping, Hanji had showed them what she'd been working on. Pages and pages of research that explained that the Ackerman family was connected to the power of the titans, that early on their people had been experimented on and that their abilities were the end result of that experimentation.
Hanji had explained it with scientific language Mikasa had a hard time following, about genes and variants shared with titan shifting humans.
"That moment you and Levi both had growing up, that's the nexus for your power, your titan serum, if you will. That's what changed both of you. Because it was internal, there's no ailment to accompany it. It gave the two of you your abilities; physical strength, coordination, even better eyesight, but most importantly a heightened instinct. It's similar to what animals have, the way that certain fish know to return to where they were born to die, things that have been dulled as humanity evolved."
Mikasa still remembers the way Hanji had pushed her glasses up the bridge of her nose and the way she'd clenched her skirts while she listened to her.
"But we don't want anyone to know about all of this, so I'm leaving all the research with you two, to do what you will with it. I have fake stuff saying you're both completely normal for if anyone ever asks," she'd said.
Something about that had shaken her, because she knows that pure instinct is what eventually brought her and Levi together.
"What do you think we should do?"
He's blunt as blunt as always, though she suspects that he already has a plan in mind.
They haven't spoken about it for the last eight years. The notes sat in the bottom of the trunk at the foot of their bed, seeming taboo to speak of. It's strange to think about how they had been drawn to each other in such a way, that almost every meaningful relationship either of them had had was due to some sort of primal desire.
No better than a feral dog at my worst.
"I think we should destroy them,"he says interrupting her before the thought can go anywhere else.
She can't say she's surprised at his conclusion, but something about it gives her pause.
Maybe it's because she fought so hard for the truth all those years ago that destroying knowledge of any kind seems wrong, that Armin would be up in arms about harming such research, but she knows that that's not it, not entirely.
That research, those files are what brought them together. Their shared loneliness, their instinct to survive — it saved her, it kept her going.
Eight years and a child later a small part of her still wonders what they are without it. How different was she from that fish dumbly returning to where it was born? How in control is she? Have either of them made any real choices?
He shrugs and glances outside at the nearly set sun.
"It just seems like time, don't you think?"
He looks to her, his expression soft in a way that's for her and her alone.
It feels dangerous, almost rebellious in a way that she would've never expected.
"What about Jacob?"
"I think it's what's best for him. He's not like us, he's never going to be like us," Levi says calmly.
It's something of a mantra between the two of them, because frankly nothing terrifies either of them more than the thought of their son turning out like either of them.
Jacob is safe, he won't experience what they have. Jacob trips over his own feet, Jacob can hardly kick a ball right, Jacob is a normal child. She says these things over and over, sometimes to herself and sometimes to Levi and he does the same.
She still worries about the day he's bullied at school and it goes too far, the day he's an adult and he gets mugged and accidentally kills a man, or–
"Mikasa."
She shakes her head, snapped from her gradually spiraling thoughts in a way only he's ever been able to manage and feels a sense of resolve wash over her, because somehow she knows that this is the right decision.
For Jacob, so he can be normal.
She won't let the past loom over him, not her own, not his father's and not their people's.
They go upstairs wordlessly and grab all the books, Hanji's messy scrawl peeking out on loose pieces of paper and they go outside.
They drop the books into the fire pit with an unceremonious thud and she can't help but stare at them. Part of her thinks it's a shame to do this to their friend's hard work, but Mikasa knows that Hanji probably expected this outcome all along.
Levi takes a match and right before he's about to strike it, she stops him.
"Wait a moment," she says. She opens to the flyleaf where Hanji has written "Levi and Mikasa Ackerman" and tears out the page, folding it up and placing it in her pocket.
She doesn't know what sentimental part of her makes her do this, but for whatever reason she wants to keep something, keep something tangible representing the things between them.
The way it's written it sounds like they're married even though they aren't, and something about that makes her smile.
She inhales deeply, because she knows that this is somehow a significant moment, that this is yet another point that they can't go back from before she nods and breathes "okay."
The flames curl the paper slowly, consuming the words that describe their pasts, their connections, their lives, words as fragile as the first snowflakes of winter.
They sit on the ground together, his arm slung around her waist, her head on his shoulder as they watch it all burn.
The sun has set by the time Levi throws a log onto the now dimming fire of the past.
It's all gone. It's really gone.
She knows that it was just paper, that the feeling deep inside of her that draws her to him is still there, always will be, but there's a finality to it that feels significant. She feels a sense of relief that she didn't expect, a weight that she hadn't known she'd been carrying suddenly lifted off of her shoulders.
She looks up at him and places her hand on his cheek, her thumb running over his cheekbone.
The firelight dances on his face, shining in his eye as he looks at her. She'd tell him that she could look at him for ages but that's too flowery, too silly sounding for her to voice. Besides, she knows he knows what she feels, he feels it in her presence, in her expression, the same way she knows how he feels about her.
She kisses him softly and lets herself sink into him, losing herself to the same feelings that brought her to this point. Each pass of his mouth over hers, each touch from his hands brings her closer and closer to him, the way that they always have been, in many ways since that day eight years ago.
The smoke of their past rises up into the air as they love each other beneath the night sky. It goes deeper than those burning papers, than their time in the Survey Corps, than the generations before them and whatever shared feeling has drawn them together.
Because they're here and that's all she needs.
Lying beneath the starry night sky wrapped up in his arms, sharing breath with one another as the fire burns low she finally understands.
She has resigned herself to loving this life in spite of its cruelty. She loves it for her memories of Eren, for her memories of Armin, for the time she first heard her son laugh.
But, perhaps most of all, she loves it for the feeling she has when she is with Levi Ackerman.
And that's enough for her.