Work Text:
He’s not decent, at his core, but it’s an easy mistake to read him that way. The method is not to take, for him, but to work at the presumption of decency until he is eventually offered what he wants. He’s not a man of empathy but one of considered manipulation so subtle, at times, that Levi always forgets to hold out, to refuse an answer, to best him simply by goading him.
He’s powerful, logical, decisive. Levi doesn’t want to lose this time. He already did, but that’s hardly the point. “What now?” He growls, marveling that his teeth are all accounted for. The wages of insubordination are high, but apparently not that high. He is still an aesthetic object, after all, and still only as valuable as the work his coordination can manage. Lines are clear and bold and not to be crossed.
Erwin knows ways to hurt without crossing any of them, however.
“Your reward.”
A reward for taking a beating. A reward for the diminishment of his autonomy. It’s called a reward and as much as he might want to deny it, it’s incentive to get through whatever the day might throw at him. It’s been several months since he enlisted and went directly under Erwin’s wing. Not long enough to know all of the man’s nuances, tricks, and certainly not long enough to not still want him.
Lashed to a water pipe, secreted away in the sweating bowels of the building, this would almost be easy if it weren’t that there’s always something. Something makes the pain bite again, beneath Levi’s skin, some body tactic or mental barb. Every time. It’s more exhausting than anything else. But the reward is worth it.
Still, he reminds himself, don’t give in. Not this time. Don’t let it happen. Not even an indication. As much as you want it, don’t let him give it.
Erwin moves to the floor, dropping gracefully between his legs before Levi can think to close them. The grime is already marking his perfect white pants and Levi doesn’t look at Erwin’s face. He glances away and turns his broken and bloody cheek to him as Erwin’s knee slides up between his thighs, presses at the juncture.
Just like always, Erwin waits.
But it’s always like this, so Levi is completely resigned to the fact that something will give him away. Skilled as he’s becoming at showing no emotion, no desire, no shock or indignation, something about his own body will betray him, and because he can be read, he will be humiliated by getting what he wants.
Today, Levi is tired. He still doesn’t look at him. He rocks his hips up into Erwin’s knee, breathes harder at the thought of hands spreading over his chest and the salve of sexual obedience.
“Do you know why I chose you?”
And the fire of the upper hand ignites in Levi’s chest, because Erwin has no idea that he’s not the one who chose anything. It’s a long con, after all. Still, that can’t be his weapon just yet. Smug satisfaction can only spark other flames, and perhaps hitch a ride on the back of arousal to make his dick harder under the shifting weight of Erwin’s knee.
“Why?” He croaks.
“So I can prove how well I break animals.”
Levi doesn’t at all expect the sudden lightness of separation when Erwin moves away, leaves him wanting, choking on a surprised breath, missing the musk of his closeness. A heady thing, denial. His eyes fly open. His nostrils flare like a taunted bull’s and he glares up at the man in the uniform wiping blood from his knuckles with a handkerchief.
He shouts after him, cursing Erwin Smith as he leaves the room. He feels the sting of the pain that always finds a new way to bite when he sees him smirk just before he ascends the stairs and leaves completely, closing the door behind.
The knots aren’t very good. They were tied that way on purpose. Trying to escape during the actual punishment would have been foolish; he’s done it before, tried to steal the balance of the fight, but Erwin pinned Levi’s neck between the floor and his shin that time, kneeling over him. He stared into his eyes and let his weight shift more and more until Levi went light-headed, his eyes rolled back, and he used his last bit of strength to thrash and tap out and beg to be freed before choking to death.
He’s exhausted, though, this time, once the rope falls away and he stretches his aching arms over his head. He snarls as a scowl takes over his face. The scowl doesn’t leave.
Without even wiping his face off, he walks back upstairs, pointing his chin high and forward. He keeps a swagger in his step even though there’s blood on his shirt and his pants and his fat, split lip, and everyone knows what happened but they’ll all just whisper behind his back, laugh about it, think nothing of it beyond the sordid.
The door is left an inch open, which adds insult to injury by denying him the satisfaction of a firm, shuddering thump of his fist against it. So he slams the door behind instead, slipping into Erwin’s temporary quarters with no regard for who else might be inside.
A huff of breath is the only indication of his relief that no one else is. He doesn’t want to entertain jealousy, though. It’s their quarters, really. Levi was entrusted to his care, after all. Still, he wouldn’t put Erwin above the tactic.
Erwin does not turn around, just continues the work he is doing. Squad leaders didn’t need to do so much work. Erwin Smith was a kiss-ass and a pedant, Levi had thought at first, going above and beyond just because it made him look good. Then Levi saw what he did with the favor he curried, and it was all so artful that it was crystal clear only to a criminal who specialized in deception.
The desk is old and rickety but Levi jumps onto it, planting himself just in the way enough to interrupt. Erwin moves his hand in time, and calmly sits the pen down at the ledger’s side. “That was how long, forty-five minutes?”
“I got out,” Levi deadpans back, and doesn’t look at him.
A minute passes. Almost another. Erwin reaches for the pen again.
“You owe me.”
He doesn’t pick up the pen, but rests his hand calmly beside it. “Really? You’re toeing the line toward reprisal right now, as a matter of fact.”
“Will you fight me here? Will you take me on without ropes on my fucking hands?”
The snarl is still in his scowl and it bleeds over into his voice (quite literally, because his mouth still tastes of copper). Erwin fixes eyes on him and shakes his head subtly; the infuriating expression of disappointment is a condescension Levi only barely tolerates.
“We’re not sparring. That’s not what anything is about.”
“What’s that tone? What are you doing? You’re sadistic and it gets you off. You said it yourself: you’re breaking an animal. So why not? Let’s go. They won’t think anything of it. Everyone already talks about us.”
“And they don’t say anything about it in plain sight because they’re scared of you. And they’re scared of me more because I caught you, because I’m with you.”
“With you.” Levi tosses a piteous chuckle into the air. “What does that even mean?”
But he catches sight of Erwin’s piercing stare and stops. He knows, he always knows, and that’s why Erwin is bold enough to condescend to him. Levi isn’t stupid, he’s just proud. Proud and unrefined.
“You’re so eager to fight, but do you want to fight for anything?”
Levi holds the stare for another challenging moment, and then looks up and away, sniffling hard and sneering in response.
“You lost everything, that’s all I’m saying,” Erwin points out, referring to something Levi has told no other soul. The people he lost, and how he lost them; that’s something he’ll never stop running from.
“Shit happens.”
It’s enough to drive Erwin to be rash, so frustrated that it goes beyond disappointment and turns to outrage. He barely stays his hand after it slams on the desk, and he rubs his fingers together and makes a fist, rubs them together again and waits until Levi looks back at him.
“You’re going to fight for something.”
“You’re free to try and make me your thug. You know I see what you’re doing, and it makes sense. I’m just saying that you’ll have a lot more trouble changing my mind if you keep basing everything on—“
“It’s not that!” His interruptions are always blunt, always louder, calm because they are completely assured. Then, his voice drops again. “Start thinking for a second. You’re not just a means to an end for me, you’re a means to an end for everyone, and—“
“Then why aren’t you giving me what I want? Why aren’t you giving me an incentive to do this?”
(“You’re the sort of person who requires an incentive to help people.”)
“I’d rather you fear for what would happen if you didn’t do it.”
(“So instead of selling your body, you’re selling your ideals.”
“That’s the way life works out. You find what’s disposable and you find someone who’ll pay you for it.”)
“There is only one thing on my mind right now and it’s absolutely your fault because you’ve succeeded. I want you. You already fucked me up, isn’t that enough?”
Erwin reaches around him, ignores the warmth of his body, grabs a letter opener. “You can squirm in that discomfort for all I care, but if you change your tune right now just to get what you want I’ll believe even less of what you say to me in the future.”
Levi stops him, grabs his wrist, holds it even though there is a tense moment of struggle there. “So fuck everything else, fuck the process of grooming or training or whatever the fuck this is. Maybe that doesn’t have to be part of it.”
For a second, Erwin lets down his guard, because maybe he desperately wants to read Levi’s offer as logical. He turns the letter opener in his hand and holds it sideways. “You don’t want me as a lover, Levi.” It’s the only warning he will offer on the subject, and firm though it is he knows it will go unheeded.
“Too late.”
Levi watches the way Erwin’s hand tightens on the handle of the small, dull blade.
He adds, “It’s affected you, too. I think you need to stay impartial, wouldn’t you agree?”
Erwin grabs him then, unable to let aspersions on his authority be cast. The chair tips off its front legs and clatters to the floor behind him as he stands up. “Let’s make one thing fundamentally clear.” His intonation is dangerous, more dangerous than Levi has ever heard him. Papers flutter as Erwin pins him to the desk, but he does nothing in the brief pause as Levi’s legs rise to wrap around his waist. “I’m in control.”
(That’s what you said the first time we met, you practically chased me down and it wasn’t to apprehend me or confiscate my livelihood, it was to drink with me. Like you didn’t stand out in a crowd. Like I hadn’t seen you before. Like you weren’t trying to convince yourself of something.)
(“Is it dead in here? Is it all a graveyard yet?”
With another hand on your heart, you said something about the future.
“But we’re safe right now.”)
Relief softens Levi’s face. “Show me,” he whispers. It’s ephemeral as supplication, the way he says it, a different person taking over only for as long as his hands are clawing on Erwin’s back, scratching against pads and pulling hard at the straps.
(You just want to feel like you can stop it. But in doing that you want people to understand. Either you want calamity, atrocity, something to justify everything you’ve bought into, or you want to keep pretending you can change it until people validate you, call you a hero. That’s not control, that’s fear. So take power over something that
yields.)
Their fingers are everywhere for what feels like ages as words are abandoned for breathless preambles of desire, moans and gasps thrown between bodies, more intense for each buckle unfastened, sharper for every section unbound. Levi’s hands splay on Erwin’s chest and he grips the fabric, watching until their eyes meet. But that’s when Erwin’s hand slides beneath the intersection of straps below his waist, palm pressing hard on his cock, grinding against it. Levi’s eyes slide shut, and for every touch he knows there will be one more bruise below his uniform where no one can see, but this is a fact he is willing to accept.
He will allow himself to be broken. It’s all part of the plan.
(“Do you want this?”
“Yes.”)
The plan is sometimes just a glimmer that he remembers like a bad memory repeating itself.
Because textiles are not cheap, his blood-stained uniform will be bleached, and the yellow spots left over will be reminders until the budget allows a replacement. Otherwise, he knows Erwin would simply rip into the shirt, because he turns brutish and destructive when he wants, when he likes himself enough to allow himself a desire or two. So instead he unbuttons it carefully and runs his hand up to part the fabric and expose the flesh of Levi’s body. Erwin shuffles out of the harness at his waist. He starts to kiss down Levi’s chest.
(“You’ve had lovers in the underground, of course.”
“We’re in the underground now.”
“That’s not what I meant.”
“I know. And don’t be so sure about that.”
“Is that a no?”
“Yes, that I had them. No, that I would call them lovers.”)
What they both exhibit is impossible for them each to comprehend when removed from the passion of the moment; that they are in their own way tender, and that even with the presumption of violence in every movement, every movement is still tempered by the caress of mutual need.
Erwin anoints him with kisses, indiscriminate between the delicate, muscular landscape of Levi’s abdomen and the musky juncture between his thighs. Levi’s cock grows to a rigid salute from his attention, and even if it’s the only honest salute Erwin will ever see, he welcomes it thoroughly.
It’s not boredom, precisely, that sets in and makes Levi buck his hips, jab his dick further into Erwin’s already welcoming mouth, but it’s almost that. It’s a test. He said he was in control, after all. This wasn’t exactly what Levi had in mind when he asked him to make it apparent.
After a gag and a brief cough, Erwin rights himself, rolls his head on his shoulders, and pushes a hand up through Levi’s hair. Anticipating the throbbing moment of being hauled up when Erwin makes that hand into a fist, Levi closes his eyes and cries out. Before he knows it he’s dropped off the edge of the desk. When he falls, he barely avoids the legs of the toppled chair, and pushes it out of the way once he’s on his knees.
If anyone walked in it would be an extension of the rumors, nothing more. Erwin looks down, watching as he guides Levi’s rhythm, pushing and pulling those lips on the length of his cock. His voice is husky when he tells him to spit more. He’s breathing as evenly as he can and Levi’s lips slip easier; he’s waiting for the moment when Levi’s gaze flicks darkly up to his and he can see the fact that his eyes are watering.
Even on his knees, his composure never breaks. His gag reflex seems nonexistent , but the truth is he’s simply adapting as he goes. It’s just another challenge, it’s just another way he sees that Erwin still isn’t doing what he said he would do. The filmy look of incredulity in those eyes: is that all you’ve got?
Levi still has control over his own hands, and it feels good to have that for the first time in hours. He lifts one and latches it on the firm curve of Erwin’s ass, brandishing his fingernails and dragging them roughly down. Erwin barely grunts, barely surges at the sudden scraping touch, but Levi is in a position to feel every intimate movement. He almost smirks around Erwin’s cock.
He’s still wearing his boots, so Levi reaches down for them, playing into his role for a moment, running fingers up and down the warm leather, arching his back.
He moans, in a purposefully exaggerated way.
(“You don’t have to pay.”
“That’s good, because I can’t afford to pay.”
“Make it up to me somehow.”)
“Stop.” Erwin pulls him back and Levi’s mouth continues to hang open, hand still fisted in his hair as spit dribbles down his chin. He’s not sure how to get his jaw to close again. “Stop acting that way.”
“What?” The word is slurred as his tongue reacquaints itself with its primary occupation. “Like I’m enjoying it?”
“No, stop acting like you’re still a whore.”
He rolls his head under Erwin’s fist, cracks a crooked smile at the implication, and squints mercilessly. “Are you fucking serious right now?”
Erwin is silent. His cock is still hard, the sheen of Levi’s saliva drying quickly in the relative cool of the room. And that’s what Levi can’t ignore. So he goes on. “No, I’m still a whore, I’m still every single bit a whore, so at least let me enjoy the one part of being a whore that agrees with me. The part where you fuck me? That part? You love that part as much as I do, so let’s just get on with it.”
He’ll do nothing tomorrow. It’s a day of classes for trainees like him, after all. Even the delinquent criminal cases require the standard military brainwashing, even if the only sort that ever sinks in for Levi is dealt with Erwin’s knee to his stomach. But tomorrow he’ll sit out the classes. He’ll be ill. He’ll be bedridden. The truth is he’ll be unable to move, not just from the beating but from the reward. The beating, he can usually recover from, but right now he knows this is not the end of the reward, not by a long shot. He opens his eyes wide, bracing himself against the desk, grabbing the sides; the velocity of Erwin’s thrusts make the legs lift and fall back with every pass. Levi closes his eyes and stretches toward him, struggles to push against him, bites his lip and grunts.
“Don’t make any noise,” he is instructed, even though the rickety old desk sounds like it’s going to fall apart, joints whining and legs thumping on the floor as the edge of it keeps hitting the wall in a dull staccato rhythm. “If you make a noise I’m not letting you come.”
Erwin squeezes the base of his cock, and Levi claps a hand over his mouth, tells himself at the last second not to squeal against it, bites softly at the inside of his palm.
Softly turns to sharply when Erwin pulls out and spits, tickles Levi with his fingertips before thrusting his cock back in. You’re used to screaming, is the thing. You’re used to acting like you enjoy it even when you don’t, so actually enjoying it…
They move to the bed, and Levi strips out of his pants and straddles Erwin's lap, because that’s how Erwin always liked it best, and now that Levi has a taste of the control he was promised, he’s happy to give back just a little bit of gratification. He reaches back and primes his ass more, slightly more, however much he can manage with what he has, and Erwin rolls his thumb cruelly to spread the precum on the tip of his dick. Again, Levi’s desire to cry out is tested. He bites his lip and looks at the ceiling, maintains his composure as he spreads his knees further and screws himself down on Erwin’s cock.
But he’s still a trainee.
Erwin steals the victory when he pushes up from his position and jabs him in the perfect spot, and Levi knows the moment he lets go of a low, ragged whimper that the consequences will be dire.
First of all, he loses his hands again. The straps of his own gear are turned against him. His wrists are almost used to the feeling of being bound, his arms stretching obediently between the short posts of the uncomfortable bed.
He closes his eyes and refuses to look, refuses to even catch a glimpse of Erwin Smith because he’d rather think of anything terrible and repulsive and vile, anything to render himself disgusted instead of aroused. Anything to win.
“You can close your eyes but you’ll still have to listen,” Erwin says, getting unfairly close, brushing Levi’s still-bloody chin and neck with his fingertips, brushing the shell of his ear with his lips. “You still have to feel.”
Easily, he is astride Levi’s body, but Levi only knows because he feels the shift of weight, the heat of long thighs trapping him. Several moments pass. Erwin’s condescending chuckle is broken by an unexpected sigh. Any progress Levi has made in calming himself is rendered moot immediately by that.
“Are you sure you don’t want to open your eyes?” It’s practically a bedroom whisper, as if pride and authority aren’t on the line; as if Erwin hadn’t pushed Levi’s chin back and nearly wrenched an arm out of socket just to succeed in tying him to the bed at all. “Just for a second?”
He does, only to give Erwin a death glare, and in the split second his eyes wander they catch the movement of the arm behind his back, the slight arch to his posture. Erwin’s expression is smoldering and it’s what Levi sees right before he closes his eyes again. The image is already indelible, and more arousing than he would have expected.
Not that Levi ever expected to see Erwin fingering himself, stretched above him as if he presumed to…
The rule of silence obviously does not apply to Erwin, who lets out a luxurious moan as he lowers himself slowly.
A minute passes, then another. An eternity passes, and Erwin hardly moves. He takes Levi’s cock completely, rocks on him, moves very slightly but never enough. Levi’s eyes are still closed and this Erwin takes pleasantly in stride, only speaking up when Levi dares to dig his ankles into the bed and try thrusting up into his ass.
“Don’t you move a fucking muscle, whore.” Erwin says heavily.
Levi catches his breath after those words, after that tone of voice, but only just.
Erwin begins to move, a slow rise and a slow fall at first, gaining rhythm as he speaks. “Now, then, is this what you wanted? You want to feel me riding you? I’ll bet it feels good; I’ll bet you haven’t felt this before. In fact, part of me wonders if this is the first time someone did you like this, because I’ll bet every scumbag in the underground just wanted to pay for your ass.”
The veins in Levi’s neck bulge as he struggles to stay focused on anything else, screaming inside of his own mind to drown out Erwin’s words. He can’t ignore Erwin completely, though. This same man smiled at him, wrapped him up, cleaned him up, took risks and spat in the face of the Military Police for him. He earned enemies for him. Erwin seems willing to do anything for him. Even if it’s not him. Even if it’s just the commodity of him, his skill, and what that can do for some vague ideal of hope. Even if Erwin has no idea why Levi agreed to any of it.
(Dead man.)
A dog. An animal. In some ways, it’s better than before. In other ways, it’s even dirtier. But Levi knows when to heel. And Erwin is extremely skilled at breaking animals.
A cry rips from Erwin’s throat and Levi wonders if it’s a tactic at the same time that it sends a tremor through his cock. And he’s felt it before, but he won’t give Erwin the satisfaction of knowing it. He’s had men in this way before, but not men like him.
And then Erwin keeps going, bounces faster on him, lets himself get just sloppy enough that Levi thinks maybe, maybe it was an empty threat. Maybe this is it, and his head can stop spinning and he can let go. Maybe…
He opens his eyes and looks after daring himself to do it. For a moment the world turns on its nose because Erwin is stroking his cock and fucking himself on Levi’s, and Levi watches, feels it long enough that he starts to cringe and his toes just barely twitch to curl. His mind races up to the peak and starts to spin out of control.
Please, he wants to say, because a very soft voice of reason in the back of his head tells him that it’s all he needs to do. But Levi is still in training.
Erwin stops moving all at once and reaches in, grabbing the base of Levi’s throbbing cock like a steel trap. He looks at Levi’s face, watches it screw up in pain as he lifts off of him, squeezes him hard, holds him there silently. Tears of exertion track down Levi’s cheeks. Erwin smiles.
“I told you, didn’t I?”
“Fuck you,” Levi chokes out, and he turns his head away from the direction Erwin moves off the bed.
“Get angrier at me next time. Feel that and twist it around until you realize what that anger is all about, and how you can get out of this.”
I already know how that happens.
(“Will you trust me?”
“Will you think less of me if I say I already do?”)
“You need to commit yourself. We need to win,” Erwin says. “Then we can find out where you end and I begin. But until then…”
Levi wants to know where broken is, and how much stronger he will have to be before he can crack apart completely before Erwin Smith.
Erwin puts a knee up next to Levi’s face and Levi whimpers, but the whimper can be read, and even if he’s not about to find any relief of his own he wants the heat, the muscle, the mark of a connection. Erwin knows, just by the tiniest crack Levi shows.
He strokes himself to orgasm and announces himself with a hard sigh. He comes on Levi’s face where the color has risen to his cheeks and isn’t fading, where the cuts are still open over a growing bruise. A deep breath fills Levi’s chest.
A strong hand grabs his chin, the thumb smearing come over his skin as Erwin leans in to look at him. Levi finally opens his eyes. “You’re mine,” Erwin says. “Every bit of you, until you see this out, is mine.”
“I know,” Levi replies.
After he’s finally unbound… the morning after, once he’s cleaned up and presented with a laundered uniform, massaged in Erwin’s lap, by Erwin’s suddenly gentler hands to relieve his aching muscles, but nothing more lascivious… After all that, Levi is terrified. Terrified that he didn’t think immediately about the incentive of killing Erwin Smith, but rather the satisfaction of eventually earning his trust in return. The day Erwin takes him on without ropes on his hands, literally or otherwise, is the day he shudders to know he looks forward to the most.