The thudding of many pairs of soggy boots clamored down the halls of the Survey Corps. Screams echoed loudly down the empty pathways; today was the mandatory legion-wide training day, which had ended up in a massive rainstorm. Despite the raging weather, Erwin refused to let anyone inside until all the drills were finished. Thus, they had trained hours into the torrent, which only seemed to get worse as it progressed. Everyone was soaked, recruits, squad leaders, Captain Levi, and even the Commander. And the moment the stubborn, blond-haired man announced that training was over, it was a free for all to the showers.
The boys and girls had branched off, the females noticeably calmer than the males. Throwing aside rank, everyone stampeded to the restrooms, which there were only two of in the entire place. One for the girls and one for the boys. The doors were slammed open, Jean and Eren scrambling at each other to be first followed by the other recruits, the elder members of the Corps a little less eager than the newer soldiers to be drawn into a wild boxing match for a shower. Poor Armin was nearly stampeded over, only saved by Mike as he grabbed his arm before he could fall.
"Hey! I got here first horse-face!" Eren snarled at Jean, pushing at him with his shoulder. They had both simultaneously chosen the same shower head. Most of the males clumped together with their familiar groups, leaving the 104th in the rightmost corner of the area.
And of course, leaving a bunch of teenage boys to roam free to fight for a bath would end in nothing but chaos. There was only about one waterspout for every three heads, and everybody was chilled to the bone. Whoever was last would get no hot water. To save space, Erwin had torn down all the stalls, but being in a mass of drenched men arguing naked in front of each other didn't seem to bother them as much as not being able to wash off all the filthy rainwater and mud.
"I'm freezing!" Connie whimpered, covering himself.
"Come on guys, why can't we just all take turns?" Reiner tried to separate the Eren and Jean, who were about to start throwing punches.
"He started it!"
"Try that again, you suicidal maniac!"
"What the Hell did you just call me?!"
Meanwhile, the shy Bertholdt just tried to quietly sneak under a showerhead without being shoved into a wall, all the while pieces of soap started flying in the air as Jean and Eren started going at each other, ignoring Reiner and Armin. Connie, the shortest male there, was nearly trampled to death as other teenagers joined in, desperately brawling for a shower.
The older soldiers weren't having much better luck either.
"Gunther! I got here first!" Olou growled as the two had a stare-off. Eld, who had managed to get there before either of them, just sighed as he water poured over his head watching them bicker.
Captain Levi and Commander Erwin were the last to make it, though immediately two showers opened up since no one wanted to face the short man's wrath. He already looked murderous, with deeper bags around his eyes than usual, probably from shouting at all the recruits and rescuing them from breaking their necks the entire day. Erwin didn't look much better; his usually neat golden hair was in disarray, and he too looked exhausted. Neither of them even bothered to comment on the chaos. People were wrestling on the floor, and objects flew around smacking random people in the face.
Mike, who was lucky enough to get a shower since he was so large no one wanted to fight him, stood gazing at the wall, not seeming to be leaving anytime soon. Another soldier, Gelgar, was in a heated debate with Hange's assistant, Moblit, both under the same shower as another pair of soldiers tumbled at their feet.
The younger soldiers were beginning to push into their superiors' space, but Levi still didn't spare them a second glance. As long as they stayed the Hell away from him he didn't care, he just wanted to get out of the damn monkey house as quickly as possible. After watching a good portion of them fail in ways he never thought possible during training, he was more than ready to retreat to his private quarters and settle down with a steaming cup of tea. Their shrieking was tolerable, for now. Either way, he could just give them a punishment sometime later when he didn't feel like collapsing under a flood of water. It had been so busy lately, preparing for their next expedition that he hadn't slept a blink in four days. Most of the higher-level officers had barely slept, too.
Their fighting still hadn't reached him yet, since everyone gave him and Erwin a wide berth. Levi still had enough energy to glare at them after all. Still, there were other things he would have rather done than stand completely nude in the middle of a bunch of aggravated soldiers fighting each other for a goddamn shower. And the people who had won their showers didn't seem to be wanting to leave anytime soon, since it had been a good fifty degrees outside, pouring frigid water on everyone. Eventually, the disagreements began to cease.
Everything was de-escalating until someone had the genius idea to twist a wet towel and deliver a stinging blow to some unfortunate soul's behind. Levi was still scrubbing the soap out of his hair with his eyes scrunched shut when a loud slap echoed across the bathhouse, seeming to emitted from the corner with Eren and the others. He wasn't sure exactly who did it, but once he found out he was going to shove it so far up their ass that they'll be shitting pieces of it for a week. The slap was immediately followed by a shrill screech, and then everything fell apart. Every boy under the age of seventeen decided that wet towel blows were the only way to go, and scrambled madly for their linen.
"I'm not dying here!" Connie howled, waving it around him wildly, hitting a few people who couldn't dodge fast enough. Unfortunately, Armin happened to be standing close enough with his back turned to be hit directly across the thighs, and he tumbled down wailing.
Jean and Eren were still locked in battle, this time trying to strangle each other with towels instead of fists. Several unlucky people who were close enough got caught in the crossfire, and everyone began invading each other's spaces. Moblit slipped as he was backing up, falling backwards onto Levi who was then pushed into Erwin, the latter who seemed to be dozing off under the showerhead.
Hurling obscenities at the terrified assistant, the quick-tempered captain thrust him off and stormed towards the middle of the conflict, leaving Erwin extremely confused as to how he ended up flat on his back on the floor and Moblit on the verge of fainting.
"Hey you pieces of horseshit, cut it out!" The senior members all shrunk back when he passed, but most of the younger ones didn't seem to notice him over all the hollering. He was nearly knocked over when Bertholdt tumbled backwards, dragging Reiner with him when he stumbled over someone hunched on the floor.
"I said," Levi inhaled, and his squad all held their breaths, wincing as they prepared for what was coming. "SHUT THE FUCK UP OR I WILL GIVE ALL OF YOU SOMETHING TO SCREAM ABOUT!"
That was when a sharp, stinging pain erupted on his ass, undoubtedly from someone's stray towel.
The entire room fell silent as he processed what the Hell just happened. Even Eren and Jean had stopped quarreling to gawk in horror at the fuming man standing in the middle of a pile of wet bodies. At that moment anyone in the room would have preferred to be devoured by a Titan than to wait for what was to inevitably come.
We're so screwed, was the only thing that flashed through everyone's mind at that instant.
"All of you shitheads," He said dangerously low, anger radiating off him and killing every hope of survival they ever had. No one had thought it was possible that someone that small could ever hold that much terror. "ARE GOING TO BE SHITTING TOWELS FOR THE NEXT FUCKING MONTH!"
None of the recruits from the 104th Cadet Core had ever felt the agony of being whipped by a wet towel going one hundred miles per hour, and no one ever would since that day.
"Why are they all standing?" Christa whispered to Ymir, who just shrugged nonchalantly.
"I dunno. When are they not being weird?"
"And why is Captain Levi scowling like that?"
The Titan-slayer had a good thirty feet radius around him, and even the Commander was a bit fearful to sit within that distance. They had seen horrors that would haunt their nightmares for all of eternity that night. Some of the older Scouts who had not been fast enough to escape his reach also fell under his rage, and most were grumbling cautiously to the ones lucky enough to be able to sit down without feeling like someone had set fire to their backsides. All the girls could only stare curiously at the males, most of whom were standing up with their meals and wincing with every move.
"Hey Connie," Sasha leaned over to him, talking softly. Even she was affected by the unusual atmosphere. "Why did most of you guys limp in here? What happened?"
Connie could only mumble something about towels and the devil, and none of the other boys seemed any more responsive to the probing.
"Let's just say, none of those brats know how to really whip a towel," Levi stalked past, smirking smugly as he went to go wash his plates.
And no one dared to place their towel within his reach in the bathhouse since that day.
