Levi looked up at the man walking beside him- the one who'd found him on his knees, in the grass- and for a moment, he wasn't sure if the world had truly stopped spinning or if it was just trying to steady itself around him.
The man was tall, taller than anyone had a right to be in a place like this, and a part of him got envious of it immediately, wishing he could share some of that height.
He was broad-shouldered but narrow somehow, like someone who'd learned to fold himself small in doorways. His shirt was worn at the edges, sleeves frayed where the fabric had rubbed too long against something rough. The color might've once been brown or green, but years of sun and wear had faded it into a quiet gray that didn't demand attention.
His face was what held Levi still, a strange mix of youth that had dried out early and age that hadn't finished growing. Lines had started to gather around his eyes, not from laughter like Elena or Miguel, but from squinting against too much light or too many memories.
His hair was uneven, chopped short with a knife or dull scissors, dark blond gone to straw at the tips.
The eyes were what did it. They were blue, but not the kind people wrote songs about. More like the kind of blue that glass turns after sitting in riverbeds for decades- clouded, pale, softened by silt and time. There was a gentleness there, but it felt like it belonged to someone who had run out of words a long time ago. A man who'd seen enough to know silence worked better than comfort.
Victor Kavanaugh. The name formed itself in Levi's mind, and it fit the memories. Even when the one then was nothing but a child. Levi stumbled once, caught himself, and muttered a low, "Thank you."
Victor only nodded, a small dip of the head that said he didn't need gratitude, didn't even know what to do with it anymore. His hands, scarred and rough, tightened briefly on the strap of the blue lunchbox slung at his side- a child's lunchbox, bright against the muted world. The kind of thing that didn't belong to a man like him, yet somehow did.
Victor, without uttering a word, was already turning back toward the forest. "Wait." Levi's hand shot out, not quite touching him but close enough to make Victor pause. "I need to talk to you."
Victor's jaw tightened. "I don't know you."
"Yeah, I know..." Levi swayed slightly, exhaustion and the lingering effects of the memories making his legs weak. "But I think you need to hear this. And I think... I think you might actually want to."
Something flickered across Victor's face, suspicion, curiosity, maybe just the faint echo of what caring about things used to feel like before fifty years beat it out of him. "Not for too long," Victor said finally.
Levi nodded, looking around. They were too exposed here, too visible. His eyes landed on one of the abandoned houses at the edge of town, one he'd already searched that morning. "Inside," Levi said, gesturing toward it. "Away from eyes."
Victor hesitated, then followed, his movements careful and deliberate.
The house was still bright inside, dust motes dancing in the light. Levi found a relatively clean spot on the floor and sat, instead of sitting on the couch or dining chair, his back against the wall. After a moment, Victor did the same, but on the couch, maintaining that distance, yet still confused by the little man's action.
"Talk," Victor said, not in demand or order, but in that way people talk when they haven't communicated for a while. Levi took a breath, organizing his thoughts. Where did he even start? With the nightmares that began years before he arrived? With the tree on the road? With the children that only he and Ariana could see?
"I've been dreaming about this place," Levi said finally. "For years. Long before I got here. Every night, the same town, the same streets. Different people, different times, but always the same nightmare."
Victor's expression didn't change, but Levi saw his fingers curl slightly against his knee. Listening.
"I saw people arrive. Saw them hide. Saw them die." Levi's voice dropped. "I saw your mother. Your sister. I saw what happened that night in my dreams, even before I went to the storm cellar." He revealed, pinching the bridge of his nose. Victor, meanwhile, had his eyes fixed on the door, figure tense and ready to run away.
"The storm cellar, whatever happened in there, reminded me of what happened." Levi sighed as Victor clenched his fists, swaying front and back in impatience.
"That's not possible."
"I know. But it's true." Levi leaned forward slightly. "And it's not just memories from the past. I see things now, too. Children. Pale, wrong, dressed in white and old clothes. They follow me. Watch me. Try to tell me things."
"The boy in white," Victor murmured, so quietly Levi almost missed it.
"Yeah," Levi nodded. "Him too."
"You've seen him too." It wasn't a question. Victor's silence was answer enough.
Levi watched him for a moment, seeing the cracks in that fifty-year-old armor. "Where was she going? That night. When she made you and Eloise hide."
Victor's eyes snapped to his. "How do you-"
"I told you, didn't I? I saw them, before coming here, and in the cellar." Levi rubbed his forehead, trying to make the headache go away, as he remembered her action, but the road ahead was dark, void. Levi couldn't see where she was going. "She wasn't just running randomly that night. She had a destination." Levi pressed forward, keeping his voice gentle. "Where was she going, Victor?"
For a long moment, Victor said nothing. His jaw worked, muscles twitching like he was physically trying to keep the words inside. Finally, in a voice barely above a whisper:
"The faraway tree."
Levi's breath caught. "What?"
"The faraway tree." Victor's eyes had gone distant, seeing something fifty years gone.
"What?" Levi repeated, confused. But Victor trailed off, shaking his head. "I don't know. She never explained. Just said to hide somewhere Christopher didn't know, we had to hide, and she had to get to the faraway tree."
Christopher, Levi thought hard. The name belonged to a familiar face, but Levi couldn't get it. It was as if he was catching water with his hands. It was just getting away.
Why?"
"I don't know!" The words came out sharp, pained.
Levi leaned back, processing. The faraway tree. Another piece of the puzzle, but what did it mean? And where was it?
"Do you know where it is?" he asked. "This tree?"
Victor's silence stretched long enough that Levi thought he wouldn't answer. Then, slowly, Victor pushed himself to his feet.
"I know where it is," he said quietly, but his eyes did not look at him. Instead, it was on the opposite wall, but face towards him.
"Will you show me?"
Victor was quiet for so long, Levi thought he'd refuse. Then, without turning around:
"Tomorrow. Dawn. Meet me at the root cellar." His voice dropped even lower. "And bring that mace of yours." Levi nodded until he froze at the words. How did he know he had a mace?
He hadn't seen or even known Victor existed before the assault on his memory. But he pushed it aside. 'People must've talked…' Levi thought to himself, pushing himself up and leaving the house.
Victor had already left him behind.
But on the way out, he glanced toward the door leading to the basement, feeling unease crawl up his spine like cold fingers. If he was right, if there were tunnels right under the town, the question became: who was using them? Did they belong to a loop of people before them? Had previous survivors thought the holes and bunkers, and hiding places weren't enough? Had they tried to dig their own escape routes, only to- ...
His thought froze him mid-step, feet on the porch.
A chill crept down his spine, vertebra by vertebra, as a realization hit him with the force of a physical blow. The monsters should know about the original holes and hidden rooms. They had to know. After fifty years- after longer than fifty years- they should have found every hiding spot, every crawlspace, every desperate hole clawed into the earth.
How could they not know? This town had belonged to them once. Or maybe it still did, and the living were just temporary guests who hadn't realized they were living in someone else's house.
On top of it all, there had been dozens of people before them. Hundreds, maybe. Victor alone had survived fifty years, which meant how many others had come and gone? How many had hidden in the same basements, the same root cellars, the same desperate places that the current survivors thought were secret?
And if that was the case...
Levi's throat worked, trying to swallow, but his mouth had gone desert-dry.
We're their playthings.
The thought landed like a stone in still water, sending ripples through everything he thought he understood.
We're nothing but toys to them.
They can kill us all whenever they want.
The certainty of it was worse than the fear. It meant every night spent hiding, every desperate scramble to survive, every death- it had all been allowed. The monsters weren't hunting them because they had to work for their food. They were hunting them because it was fun. Because watching humans scramble and hide and eventually break was entertainment.
Levi's legs gave out. He didn't fall- just sort of folded, his back sliding down the wall until he was sitting on the dusty floor, staring at nothing. His hands were shaking again, not from the memories this time, but from the weight of understanding.
That's why they smiled. That's why they moved so slowly, so deliberately. They weren't trying to catch their prey. They were playing with it. Drawing out the fear, the hope, the inevitable despair.
How long had Victor known? Was that why he'd stopped trying to fight back? Why he'd spent fifty years just hiding, just surviving, never searching for answers because he'd already figured out the worst truth of all- that there was no winning, only lasting a little longer before the game ended?
Levi's breath came in short, sharp bursts. His vision tunneled. The panic attack was coming whether he wanted it or not, his body deciding that now, finally, after everything he'd been through today, was the time to completely fall apart.
No.
The word formed in his mind with surprising force.
No, I won't.
He pressed his palms flat against the floor, feeling the grit of dust and dirt under his skin. Real. Solid. Present. He focused on his breathing, forcing it to slow. Inhale- one, two, three. Hold- one, two, three. Exhale- one, two, three.
"You can't control what happens to you," Dean had said, his hand steady on Levi's shoulder. "But you can control how you breathe. And sometimes, that's enough to get you through."
Inhale. Hold. Exhale.
The tunnel vision started to recede. The shaking in his hands lessened to a tremor.
So what if the monsters were playing with them? So what if every hiding spot was known, every escape route already mapped in whatever passed for their minds? That didn't mean Levi had to make it easy for them. That didn't mean he had to give up and just wait for his turn to die.
But… He breathed out the pain; he had a weak link now. The faces appeared before he could stop them: Miguel, Elena, and most importantly, Ariana. They weren't family, acquaintances at best- shut up. Something inside him ordered and Levi knew what it was.
He had been trying his best to keep his distance, but not so much that they realized. But he had failed. They weren't acquaintances at best. In this place, in this nightmare, they took care of him, fed him, nursed him, and took him in.
Maybe they might not have considered him as so, but to Levi, that's what family does. That's what Dean did for him, and now, Ariana's family did the same. He couldn't treat them as nobodies, because they weren't nobodies anymore.
Fuck! He cursed as another thing popped into his mind. He had feelings for Ariana, and she had feelings for him as well. The worst was, he wasn't ready for it. His focus and concentration should be on getting people out of here, Ariana and her family being the priority.
Romance- it would distract him. But him being with her, wasn't as important as her and her family's lives. So, an idea popped up. Yeah… That'll work… I hope.
Levi pushed himself to his feet, his legs steadier now. The panic had passed, leaving behind a cold, hard determination that settled in his chest like a weight.
He had work to do.
He already had a plan on how to deal with the smiling creatures. Molotov's and gas from all the cars around. Some might have expired, but even expired gas can leave behind flammable residue. If he used it carefully and with a plan, he could safely burn the monsters away.
On top of that, they had a distillation system for alcohol in the gas station. So, instead of letting people get drunk and do stupid stuff, he would use it as ammunition. With his own alcohol, he figured he could take out about two dozen of the smiling creatures.
But that wouldn't be smart. Once they knew that he could kill them, they would go on a rampage. And if they knew every hiding place, they could just kill everyone. Force reset the loop with newcomers who didn't know better.
Second, the faraway tree. Whatever Victor's mother had been trying to reach that night, it was important enough that she'd left her children behind to get to it. Important enough that Victor had avoided it for fifty years. That kind of avoidance meant significance. Maybe she died near the tree.
But even then, why would a mother leave behind her children for it? The only thing that he could think of was, maybe it was the way out. But even then, why didn't she take her children with her? A sigh left him, and he shook it out.
He needed answers to his questions. Just one piece of the puzzle, and he could work everything else out. Was the faraway tree, as Victor had called it, connected to the tunnels in some way?
Third- and this one made his chest tighten in a way that had nothing to do with panic- he needed to tell Ariana. About the root cellar, about Victor, about the realization that they were all just pieces on a board. She needed to know. She deserved to know.
Not only because he needed to confide in someone, but because she was special like him. She could see the creepy children, and she could hear voices in her head. Maybe, hopefully, she had some of the parts that he was missing. Maybe, by telling her, she might remember something, a clue.
Levi left the house, blinking against the late afternoon sun. The town looked the same as it always did- quiet, still, waiting. But now he saw it differently. Every house was a cage. Every street a maze. Every shadow a potential hiding spot for things that already know exactly where you were.
He started walking, his destination clear in his mind. Miguel and Elena's house. Where Ariana was probably helping her mother prepare whatever passed for dinner, where she'd look up when he knocked, and her face would do that thing where worry and relief and joy mixed together.
By the time Levi reached the house, his head was pounding with questions and possibilities and the weight of too much knowledge crammed into too short a time. He raised his hand to knock, then paused, seeing his reflection in the window glass.
His face was pale, streaked with dirt and sweat. Dark circles shadowed his eyes. And there, catching the light, more gray in his hair on his once dark hair that shone in the light. Not just a few strands now, but patches. Like the memories he'd remembered were aging him from the inside out, stealing years with every remembrance.
In short, he looked like shit.
He knocked.
Footsteps inside, quick and light. Then the door opened, and there she was. Ariana, her dark curls pulled back in a messy bun, flour dusting her hands and a smudge of it on her cheek. Her eyes widened when she saw him.
"Levi…" She reached for him, then stopped, her hands hovering like she wasn't sure if he was real or if touching him might make him disappear. "What happened? You look- " old, haggard, and many other things were left unsaid.
"I know." His voice came out rougher than he intended. "Can I come in?"
"Of course, of course." She stepped back, ushering him inside. Her mother appeared in the kitchen doorway, her expression shifting from curiosity to concern.
"Mijo," Elena said softly, already moving toward him. "You need to sit down. You need water, food-"
"I need to tell you something," Levi interrupted, his eyes on Ariana. "All of you. It's important."
Miguel emerged from the hallway, taking in Levi's appearance with the quiet assessment of a man who'd seen people pushed to their limits before. "The living room," he said, gesturing. "Sit. We'll listen."
They settled in- Levi on the couch, the family arranged around him like they were preparing for bad news. Which, Levi supposed, they were.
"I found a root cellar," he started, and then the words came pouring out. Victor. The closet. The memories. The faraway tree. The realization about the monsters, about the game, about everything being so much worse than they'd thought.
He talked until his voice went hoarse, until his hands stopped shaking and started shaking again, until the sun outside had shifted, and the shadows had grown longer. Dinner was forgotten as they took everything in.
And through it all, Ariana watched him with those dark eyes that saw too much, that understood too well. When he finally finished, when the words ran out and left only exhausted silence, she did something that undid him completely.
She stood up and left, coming back with a glass of water from the kitchen. "Drink." She ordered, and he obeyed. He didn't see his own eyes soften and lips turning upwards. But Elena and Miguel did, communicating with their glances before turning back to Levi.
"What do you want us to do with all this new information?" Miguel asked, and Levi shook his head. "Nothing, but Ariana," he turned to her, and she tensed, sitting straight. "The voices? Did you hear anything that might have given a clue?"
She thought hard for a few seconds before shaking her head. "They only mock me, us, now." She revealed, Levi and her parents frowning. "They laugh and laugh. But nothing that connects with you found out."
"If anything, what you said explains why they mock us."
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DUH DUHH DUUUUHHHHH
Hope this was a fun read. It's a long chapter, about 3k to 3.5k words. I could have cut it after 1.5k words, but I said, Nah, I didn't want to ruin the tension of this chapter.
As you've read so far, Levi is getting pretty close to some things. This is still before Boyd finds the talismans and all that.
For character appearances, I honestly don't know how to describe them physically, so hopefully, I did a better job with their actions and mindset. If you want Ariana, though, that I do know. She's inspired by the actress who's in the LandMan show, same name. I really liked her curly hair and her strong personality, so that inspires mine. But the face, someone else holds that.
Let me give you guys a fun fact about my OC, Levi.
When I was writing this fanfic, I didn't pick a name, so in draft, his name was [x]. Until I got tired of it and sent all my docs to ChatGPT and told it to give me a top 10 list of names for my MC. Levi Harker was on number 9. I found it extremely funny because it sounded a lot like Levi from AOT, so I just took that.
Anyway, I have mapped out the next 15 chapters, so hopefully, we'll get there. It's fun writing this so far. And I hope you guys enjoy reading it.
PS: Spread the word, that there's another FROM fanfic on this site!!