Author's Note: I just realized I posted this on AOW3 but not here. Oopsie! Here you go, another installment of the Bucket List series!

"I cannot believe you talked me into this."

"Corporal, you and I agreed that we would do this. The entire point of the deal was–,"

"As far as I'm concerned, our deal is pointless."

"Look, if you're going to act like this the entire day, we might as well quit now." Eren let out a frustrated sigh and turned on his heel to head back towards the castle. This was not how he'd imagined his Sunday morning – after all, Levi and him had agreed several days ago that they would save the supply division the trouble and go to the central market to purchase a week's worth of food for the squad themselves, thus effectively crossing out the shopping and going out into the town on a weekend part of their lists. However, Levi was turning out to be a pain, and had turned into a right nightmare after Eren had insisted they wear regular clothing. In the end, they had gone outside wearing their full gear, 3DMG straps and all, and Levi's horrible mood was not improving even after he had gotten his way. Eren was growing angry, and he knew that being angry was not a good idea in a marketplace full of civilians, given his… genetic predisposition to turn into a deadly, crazed, blood-lusting giant. He had wanted the two of them to go incognito, and had hoped for civilian clothing to lend them at least some form of secrecy, but Levi seemed to be obsessed with the idea that titans would attack at any second – which they could, of course. The argument slowly transitioned into one about transportation, then the potential purchases, and at this point Eren would rather have gone with Jean or Keith Shadis, for that matter.

"Eren." The sleeve of his jacket was caught between deft fingers and Eren turned to see Levi, his bottom lip caught between his teeth, looking extremely out of his depth. "I… I'm sorry."

"What?"

"I said I'm sorry, all right? This is the first time I've gone out with a subordinate to town without much reason for it and… I don't like new things, you know that."

"You're a routine freak," Eren said simply.

"Watch it, boy. I admit I have a tendency to stick to certain… patterns. No need for name-calling."

They set off walking quietly after that, the sound of their boots on the gravel the only thing disturbing the silence. Eren felt awkward. They didn't really communicate much, Levi and him, even though he'd had his dick up Levi's ass more times than he could count already. The Corporal was incredibly difficult to read, and getting him to be honest was near impossible. Eren had thought that after the little incident they had with him shifting and effectively saving Levi from becoming a titan snack, things would change, but apparently Levi had decided to erase that particular instance from his mind. The older man was just as cold as he had been since the beginning of their… whatever, and though Eren had promised him he would not attempt to get closer than was comfortable, he yearned to learn more about the enigmatic officer. All he knew were bits and pieces that Levi grudgingly let slip, things that Hanji speculated on and things that Erwin might have told him in a rare moment of compassion.

"Don't hurt yourself."

"Hm?" Eren looked up from the ground to see Levi's mocking smirk.

"Your brain capacity is too little to think so hard. Don't pop a vein."

That did it. In a bout of strength that surprised even himself, Eren slammed Levi against the nearest tree and pressed his front against the Corporal's, his hands plastered at either side of Levi's head. The hooded eyes widened for a moment before narrowing more than usual and the smaller body underneath Eren's coiled like a snake, waiting to strike. Eren knew he was doing something incredibly stupid as soon as he felt Levi's breath on his face.

"What do you think you're doing?" Levi said in a whisper that would send any titan packing – were they able to understand human speech, anyway. Nevertheless, Eren leaned even closer in, trying to ignore the fine tremor of his muscles, and touched his nose to Levi's. They had not kissed since their very first time, and Eren hated it. He respected Levi's boundaries, however weird they might have been, but he remembered very clearly just how good it had felt to kiss those lips, and he would be damned if he never got to do it again.

"Why are you being so rude to me?" Eren asked, and slowly, his hands descended to grasp Levi's wrists. In human form, he was slightly weaker than Levi, so he knew that the man would be able to get away if he really wanted to. "Why are you so bitchy?"

He searched Levi's face with his eyes and clenched the other man's wrists in his hands. At that, Levi's entire posture changed, relaxing slightly, his eyelashes fluttering as he took a shaky breath. Eren's eyes widened. In a stroke of inspiration, he drew Levi's arms above his head and pinned the older man to the tree. Eren could not quite believe what was happening. He could feel just how much Levi liked this, the thin white uniform pants doing nothing to conceal the older man's arousal. The titan shifter dipped his face to the crook of Levi's neck, irritated by how the uniform collar and the cravat concealed the fine pale flesh he so desperately wanted to mark.

"You want this. You're purposefully trying to get a rise out of me," he whispered hotly, his breath ghosting over Levi's neck.

"You're not a complete idiot, Jäger," Levi breathed back, biting down on his lip to prevent himself from moaning out loud. At that, the younger man looked up and fixed his eyes on Levi's slate-colored ones.

"It's Eren."

The next thing either of them knew, their uniform was being stripped away by grabbing hands. Eren refused to let go of Levi for even a second, which resulted in half of their clothes staying on as he quickly prepared Levi with spit on his fingers and took him roughly against the tree, the Corporal's legs wrapped around his waist. He continued holding Levi in a bruising grip, and he could not help but feel proud of himself when the Corporal moaned out, something between a curse and Eren's name, something so delicious that Eren just wanted to kiss it off his tongue, but when he dipped in to take it, Levi pointedly turned his head, exposing his neck instead. Eren was too aroused to argue and settled with peppering kisses and bites all along the white column of Levi's throat as the man panted and mumbled something incoherent with every move Eren made. As the two of them neared their climax, Eren dragged his nails down Levi's chest, leaving faint pinkish scratch marks on the pale skin. His eyes wide, Levi arched his back and cried out, tensing all around Eren. A few strokes later, the two of them collapsed into a heap right onto their ground, Eren's pants still halfway on and Levi's shirt looking slightly worse for wear as it had been scratched repeatedly against the tree bark.

When they finally drew their breaths, Levi sat up, wincing at the burn in his bottom. During their normal sessions, he would be the one to prepare himself – after all the boy was still very inexperienced when it came to making his partner feel comfortable, clearly, but there had been too much urgency this time. Levi had not felt like this for many, many years. He'd been punished enough, both gently and not, by various customers and non-customers, all around the interior walls, but it had never been quite like this. He'd never asked for it. Until this morning, when he had woken up with a raging determination to get the titan shifter to take him roughly, take him like Levi had been sure he was incapable of doing. It seemed, though, that the boy was able to face this challenge.

"I'm surprised, Eren. Didn't know you had it in you," Levi said quietly when his heartbeat slowed down. Eren looked at him sideways, still panting.

"Why didn't you just tell me you wanted it that way?"

"What's the fun in that?" Levi would never allow himself to be seen in such a vulnerable position.

"Fair enough." Eren did not press the matter. He took another breath and stood on shaky legs, offering a hand to Levi after a split second's hesitation. The moment he did it, he regretted it, as Levi's face darkened. The Corporal hated being offered help. He hated being patronized.

"This is what normal people do," Eren said quietly, not letting his hand down. For a moment there, he thought Levi was going to tackle him to the ground and beat him to a pulp. Instead, however, the man tentatively took Eren's hand and let himself be pulled up. Eren dropped his hand the instant the man regained his footing and looked the Corporal over. He had never seen the other man so debauched before. Sure, he'd seen him naked many times over, but there was something incredibly erotic about the open shirt, crumpled and stained, hanging off of the slim shoulders, market by Eren's lips and fingers. Besides the shirt, Levi was completely naked, and Eren let his eyes roam over the pale expanse of his skin, darkened by the numerous scars and bruises Levi bore due to old battles and the 3DMG straps he insisted on wearing every day. The way these marks criss-crossed and painted his skin was exquisite, and together with the mussed up hair and slight breathiness his voice still carried from their escapade just a moment before, Corporal Levi was a sight to behold indeed. Eren forced himself to look away before Levi called him out on his staring, and focused on finding his clothes. He watched Levi out of the corner of his eye as the older man wrinkled his nose at the idea of putting on his uniform after its unfortunate date with the forest floor.

"Why do you like it, being treated like that?" Eren asked quietly as he finished dressing, brushing off the last of what he was able to get out of his uniform. Levi made quick work of his clothes as well and stood to his full height, dressed almost impeccably (which, for him, was not impeccable at all), fighting a losing battle with his messy hair. At that, he gave Eren a disdainful look.

"You think this is rough, kid? You were clearly coddled as a child."

"Levi," Eren sighed.

"Fine," Levi put up his hands defensively. "I like it on my terms. When I make the other person do these things to me."

"So, it's about control?"

"It's always about control, Eren."

Eren nodded thoughtfully. They set off towards the town again, knowing they would have to be quicker now so that no suspicion arose as to where they had been if they were to come late. Leaves were beginning to crunch wetly underneath their feet, and the entire forest was settling in for its winter sleep. This area was much warmer than the one they'd gone to for the recon mission, and Eren was thankful for that – the nights in the castle basement would have been unpleasant otherwise. He knew that sooner or later he would have to ask for a room or at least another blanket to keep himself warm, but he was reluctant to do so, seeing as most of the Survey Corps outside of his squad still saw him as a burdensome child.

"Have you ever had a crush on someone?"

"What?" Eren turned to look at Levi, surprised. The man never asked questions first. In fact, he'd made it clear that he wanted to know as little as possible about his subordinate on more than one occasion.

"Well, since you're a hormonal brat, I assume you've had some interest in other brats like yourself." When Eren didn't answer, gaping at Levi, the Corporal sighed. "Look, it's boring if we just keep quiet the entire time, and we still have some way to go, so… Let's try your little thing where you like to ask inane questions and fill your head up with unnecessary information about people."

At that, Eren laughed.

"Charming as always, Corporal."

"I don't try."

"Obviously," Eren teased and then looked up thoughtfully. "I think the first crush I had was on Mikasa, naturally, since she was the first girl I ever came in contact with… But then again, she is also my adopted sister, so I dismissed it, and soon enough she actually started irritating me more than making me feel, um, stuff."

"Eloquence is not a virtue of yours, Jäger."

"As if you didn't know that," Eren said flatly. "Then the attack on Shiganshina happened and I was too caught up in wanting to kill every titan imaginable to have these sorts of feelings, although for a moment there was, um…"

"Why do I have a feeling this is going to be pure gold?"

"Oh, come on, you know I'm a kid, as you so love to emphasize, so you must know it's hard for me to admit these embarrassing things!" Eren exclaimed, his cheeks reddening.

"It was Jean, okay?"

"Kirschtein? Really? Eren, I would doubt your tastes if you had not gone after me," Levi said lightly, looking around absent-mindedly. "I assume it goes without saying that you had a crush on my modest person?"

Eren coughed.

"What gave you that idea?"

"Well, we are having sex on a regular basis, and you are the one who came to me for it, so…"

"Yes, okay? Yes. Yes, I had a crush on you," Eren said hurriedly before Levi could press any further. The older man hummed but said nothing. "What about you?"

"Me?" Levi lifted an eyebrow. "I've had my fair share of crushes as a kid. Even nursed one hero-worship crush on Erwin, the Walls forgive me."

"I… I could see that. I mean, he is a formidable Commander," Eren admitted.

"Hung like a horse, too."

Eren stopped short at that and the burst out laughing. Levi looked sideways at him as if he'd grown a second head.

"Don't tell me you don't look at your fellow soldiers in the communal showers. Because that would be a lie," he said softly. He had to admit to himself that thinking of Eren watching other men did unpleasant things to his stomach. Especially when he considered that Eren and that Kirschtein kid were in the same schedule group for showering. He would have to make some subtle changes to the lists when they got back.

When Eren's laughter subsided, he glanced at Levi and took a deep breath before he asked something that had been bothering him for a while. It was one of those things he felt were important to understanding Levi's character, so unaccepting of affection.

"Have you ever been in love?"

Levi's expression did not change, as much as Eren squinted to see whether the man would react to his question in a way that would give away something about his feelings. Instead, Levi just shrugged.

"I thought I was, once."

"You thought you were?"

"Eren, do you really think love exists?" Levi asked impassively.

"I believe in it," Eren said with conviction.

"But it's all in our heads, isn't it? We think we love someone, so we must love them."

"Um… Yes?"

"Well, how do we know we're not just convincing ourselves that we are feeling love? Love is not a feeling, it's a thought. We can think what we want."

"Not in this case."

"Oh? And what makes you such an expert?"

"I've seen love."

"You keep telling yourself that," Levi said quietly. "It is nothing more than a thought. And it's bad for you to think about it, Eren. Nothing good ever comes of it."

"How do you know?"

"I've also seen love."

Levi glanced at the boy and sighed in resignation. "I suppose you want to hear the story, don't you?"

"You don't have to tell me, I–,"

"Don't we have an honesty policy or some shit? Look, what I'm about to tell you is not public knowledge, but some people are aware of, let's say, the general outlines of my story. That is to say, you go blabbering about it to your little friends and I will anchor my 3DMG in your balls. Got it?"

Eren nodded, eyes wide, keen to hear more.

"Well, Erwin, the humongous dick that he is – both literally and metaphorically, – already told you he found me in the underground town of the capital. You think Shinganshina was rough? I would have killed to live on the outskirts, it would have been a luxury compared to what we had down there. No sunlight, no water supplies sometimes, and food was scarce, so we slept with our eyes open. Some people tried to follow the titans' example when they got hungry, if you get what I'm saying." Eren winced. "All the scum that took care of things for the higher-ups in the town overhead lived there, and they recruited people for their purposes. Paid quite well, too, if you survived."

"So there was this one piece of shit by the name of Kenny, huge name in the smuggling business, and I worked for him for a while, he taught me everything I knew back then. Had a crush on him, too, the guy was fucking gorgeous, you should have seen his arms, like columns, strong as fuck, and for a little pussy boy like I was back then, he was a god. Long story short, I thought I was in love with him, and he did not shy away from taking advantage of it. He figured smuggling did not cover all of his extravagant lifestyle, so he started dabbling in human trafficking. And who better to sell off than the kid that was practically hanging off of his every word. He knew I could suck cock, he knew I was good at it, too, so this one time I come back to our little makeshift home, or whatever I thought we made for ourselves, and he's there with these three other guys, stinking of alcohol and money, and next thing I know I was hit over the head and carted off to a different side of town. Those guys, they treated me okay, made me all pretty and shit, even gave me one day off each month so that I could heal."

"Then Kenny decided to pay me a visit one day. Paying customer, all that. I lost my temper when I saw him, he knocked out one of my teeth, and that was the end of that. Told me everything thought about me on his way out. That I was a worthless whore and shit."

"I got my revenge. Earned enough to buy myself out. Then Erwin caught me and brought me here. I went back to see him after I got my uniform. These blades are not only good for titan flesh."

Levi finished his story thoughtfully, lost in his memories, before he realized that all he got in response was complete silence. He turned to look at Eren, and was surprised to see the boy's impassive face. He'd expected a violent righteous rage, or another murderous rant on how he wanted to eliminated fucking everyone, but instead, Eren stared at him blankly.

"I never realized you've gone through so much."

Levi shrugged.

"It's in the past."

"I hate that guy for making you feel this way about being in love," Eren said quietly. "But I guess he was one of the things that brought you here. Where you belong."

Levi laughed.

"You think I belong here, kid? That's one big jump from what the others thought when Erwin first brought me in."

"You do belong here. You're Humanity's Strongest! You're not what… what that man said you were."

Levi shook his head and gave Eren a small smile.

"Just because I take it up the ass doesn't mean I can't kill a titan or two."

"I wish I could kill him." Ah, there it is.

"Beat you to it."