Blue and White - Levi Fanfiction

Ch. 79 - A Strange Homecoming

A quick walk to go get the mail turned into a slightly panicked situation when I noticed a letter from the capital. It was a thick envelope, pristine white but with a few bends on the corners because our mailbox was rather small. I hurried through the house quickly and leaned out the back door, which had been left open considering it was such a nice day out.

"Levi, hon?"

He looked over from what he was doing, which was playing with Emi in the garden. I'd been with them, until we heard the messengers come by and drop off our mail. Right now Levi was standing, and he'd been tossing Emi up into the air only to catch her. It was terribly cute, but right now, the sinking feeling in my stomach took precedence.

"Just a minute," he called out, continuing to toss his daughter up, her giggles almost infectious, if not for the worry in my chest.

With a nod, I began to open the envelope, and skimmed quickly over the documents. And suddenly, all my worry faded away and I let out a quiet laugh as I realized it was a document summoning us to the capital, but not for anything bad: it was for a military ball, one that occurred in the spring each year. When Emi next came giggling down into his arms for a soft catch, Levi lowered her to sit against his hip as he directed his focus to me.

"What is it?"

"A summons from the capital," I answered.

"Oh, fuck," he muttered, briskly making his way towards where I stood, leaning casually against the doorway, the slight breeze shifting my hair. "What'd we do now?"

"That's what I asked myself when I first saw it," I said, holding it out towards him. "But it's nothing bad. Here, take a look." He took it in his free hand, the furrow in his brow shifting from one of frustration to one of confusion instead.

"What the hell is this?" He asked, flipping it over to see if there was a back. His eyes, irritated, met mine. "You've gotta be shitting me."

"It's an official request," I said, crossing my arms. "We can't just ignore it. And I'm sure Hange's copy of it is almost to her, and you know for a fact she won't say no to something like this."

Simply put, he wasn't excited about it. I couldn't exactly say that I was, either. The annual military ball wasn't exactly a secret within these three Walls, but it was something that the Survey Corps had never been invited to, before. As soon as the scouts became the scapegoats for humanity's failures, as long ago as it was now, they'd stopped being invited.

It was a simple event, meant for the higher-ups only, so that the rest of the areas within the Walls weren't left unmanned and unprotected. Another envelope accompanying the first was addressed from Historia herself, and upon reading it, I realized it was an offer for us to meet at the capital earlier than the rest of the forces arrived, so that we could get proper wear for the event. It was also an offer to catch up before the festivities as well.

The queen noted that accompanying the ball would be a general festival of sorts, something she wanted to start to celebrate our island's recent victories and give the people something everyone could enjoy as a singular, united front. That, at least, had the promise of being fun. The ball, however... not so much.

It was not that I didn't like dancing, because of course I did. It was just that having to dance with stuffy government officials and stuck-up heads of the other two regiments didn't sound so appealing to me. A night to dance with Levi, I would take it, but the chance of getting asked to dance by old ass men and watching young bachelorettes trying to steal away my man didn't seem fun.

Despite not wanting to go, a few days later the arrangements had been made, the three of us were packed up, and a gilded wagon came by to pick us up to bring us to the interior for a few days. The event wasn't until the end of the week, and it was Tuesday when we arrived, but Historia managed to transfer most of her duties to her advisors so she could catch up with us.