Here's chapter two! I hope you guys enjoy. Feedback is, of course, appreciated.


"Found you."

Erwin didn't stop to think, rammed his fist into the center of that nightmarish face. He shattered the image, the mirror, crumbled the wall behind it. The mirror fell around him in a thousand glimmering pieces but Levi had melted away, avoided his fist, and vanished in the confusion, though Erwin's eyes darted around in an attempt to follow him.

Erwin was left alone in the bathroom, panting, surrounded by shards of mirror, and Levi was nowhere to be seen. His heart was racing in his ears so loudly he could hardly hear anything else. His eyes darted around the room, trying to glimpse anything out of place, something that might possibly be a shifter in disguise. Had the door to that stall moved? Should he break it? He could hardly blunder around breaking everything in the hopes of hitting Levi.

How had Levi discovered him so quickly?

"Erwin?" Rico called from the entrance, stopping at the threshold to the men's bathroom. At the sight of the broken wall she forgot herself and took a few steps in, jaw dropping. "Are you okay? What did you do?"

"I thought I saw something," Erwin said, mind already racing. If Levi was still here – and he assumed the shifter was – it would be too easy for Rico to give herself away, and then Levi would have the alternate identities of two heroes instead of just one. "I just… suddenly felt like something was watching me. I don't know what happened to the wall. Perhaps there was some sort of fault?"

Rico narrowed her eyes. Please get it, Erwin thought at her, hoping she'd play along.

"Come off it," she said, "only an idiot wouldn't figure out that you've got superpowers looking at that wall."

It looked like she was cooperating. Erwin sighed and scratched the back of his head. "I guess," he said sheepishly, hoping his acting was up to par. Fuck this was embarrassing, he hadn't had to do an actual coverup in years. "But I really don't want anyone to know…"

"I didn't see anybody else in the corridor," Rico said. "Are you actually a superhero?" Definitely playing along. "Let's just get out of here and pretend we know nothing about it. I'll alibi you."

Well, it was a solution, if not an elegant one. Though…

"Check that the coast's clear."

Rico stepped out, looked both ways, then nodded.

The bathroom had one outside wall. Erwin wound up and kicked a hole clear through it, ignoring Rico's yelp, then leaped towards the door. To her credit, Rico didn't hesitate, just tore after him towards the coffee lounge down the hall.

"What was that?" she hissed. "Are you crazy?"

"With luck they'll assume somebody either came in or went out," Erwin said. "Won't be looking inside the building."

They both screeched to a halt in front of the door and strolled into the lounge, continuing an imaginary conversation about color schemes for internet page layouts. Erwin wanted more color, Rico said Erwin had no sense of aesthetics and people didn't want politics to have bright colors anyway.

"But constant red and blue is so boring," Erwin said. The conversation was a perfect fallback, being a topic they argued about often anyway, and left his mind free to think of what to do next.

Levi might attack again, and if that happened, Erwin had to not be here. If he left, Levi would probably follow – he hoped. If Levi took it into his head to impersonate Erwin… he shuddered.

Rico noticed. "What is it?"

"I'm not feeling so good. I think I'm going to go home and lie down a bit. Give my apologies to the boss."

She raised her eyebrows. "That bad, huh."

"Yes." Erwin hesitated. "I'm going home right now. If you happen to see me at the office again today, it's not me, do you understand?" And if Leviwas listening, now Erwin had given him the idea. It was seriously a lose-lose. At least he had an excuse not to spill the beans to Rico, but she'd definitely be after him for details later.

"Don't take that tone." Rico searched his face, then frowned. "I don't want to get mixed-up in your heroing. Keep it out of work."

She turned and left the lounge, walking a bit faster than necessary.

Good.

"You listening, Levi? Not here. I'm going outside – then you can attack, we can fight, talk, whatever it is you want."

He paused for a moment, listening to the silence, until he was sure that there would be no response. Or maybe Levi wasn't even there.

Erwin headed out, almost sprinting.

The news agency's large building was set on a busy street, hardly the ideal place if he was trying to avoid people. Erwin craned around looking for anything out of place, a person watching him too shrewdly, a – was he imagining it, or was that crow looking at him…?

Shit.

There was a park a few minutes' walk down the street; he would head there, and hope Levi followed. He would have said something aloud, but there were too many people, people everywhere. His gaze darted between them as he strode by, aiming for the park. A young man hurrying behind him, could that be Levi? Or what if he was a woman (Levi was a male name, wasn't it?), or impersonating one – that lady in a dark red jacket was watching him silently, following him with her eyes.

Above his head a crow called, was it the same one from earlier? Erwin felt sweat under his shirt and resisted the urge to swipe at the trickle on the back of his neck.

He needed to call the others, warn them. The Scouts had a panic button, but if he pressed it everyone would come running – and Levi would have his entire team, and his cover would be doubly blown. Still about ten meters to the park, he could make a quick phone call.

Erwin slid his phone out of his back pocket, pace not abating, and had the presence of mind to hide the screen with his other hand on the chance that Levi was somehow watching and would see the name listed. Fancy superheroes had dedicated secure connections; the Scouts used cellphones.

Please pick up please pick up-

"Erwin. What is it?" Mike was never one to waste words.

"Levi found me," Erwin bit out. "He got me at work. My cover's busted. Tell everyone to stay away, you hear? I don't want him finding you. Don't come to my house, not even in costume. Don't look for me. Try not to call, so he doesn't see the ID."

"Or we could help you," Mike said. A solution, but that meant Erwin disclosing his identity to everyone else. It wasn't that he didn't trust them, but – the more people knew, the greater the danger. He gave a different reason, just as valid.

"And risk discovery? Imagine what would happen if he got to Er-" Erwin choked himself off at the last minute. "-Titan. It would be a disaster." Using the codenames didn't matter, Erwin told himself, all of them were registered as a team anyway.

"You have a point." There was a pause on the line. "I'll tell the others. Stay safe."

Erwin returned the phone to his pocket and decided he wasn't waiting any longer. He jumped the fence into the park, and found himself among trees. He took a few more steps until he had found a reasonable space where the noise from the street was distant and came to a stop.

"Levi? Levi, show yourself!"

Silence. Erwin scanned the area, looking for anomalies. Twisted olive trees surrounded him, their leaves pale green and rustling in the light wind. Sunlight dappled the ground beneath them, and an occasional bird –

Erwin's heart jerked in his chest when he saw the crow hopping along the ground. He planted his legs a bit wider, in case he'd need to move quickly. "Levi?"

The crow flew away without answering. Had Levi become a tree? A bush? Was he even here? Erwin was tempted to leave it, to hope that Levi had had his fun and left, but Levi might be waiting for him to make just such a gamble.

"Fine," he said. "I'll wait."

Erwin crossed his arms and stood quietly. Ten minutes passed, then fifteen, and hell, Levi was probably watching him from far off and having a good laugh. Forget it. Erwin might as well head home, if Levi wasn't going to show. He stomped off towards the exit (forgoing jumping the fence this time), when suddenly something snagged his ankle and he went face first into the dirt. Erwin rolled to his feet, cursing, but no one was there, and there were no branches on the ground he could possibly have tripped over.

"Howold are you?" he snarled at the silent trees. With as much dignity as he could muster, Erwin brushed the dirt and twigs off his shirt and pants and kept walking, this time watching the ground for signs of movement. But nothing happened, until he was practically at the street again and a bird pooped on his shoulder. For fuck's sake.

"If that was you…" But the threat was kind of pointless. He trudged back to his car, glaring at anybody who met his eyes, and yanked the car door open roughly before he caught a glimpse of some writing in the dust on the back door.

That wasn't me. Gross. And your car is filthy.

"Good to know!" Erwin said, louder than he should, causing people to glance at him strangely. He got in the car and slammed the door behind him, sat down and put his hands on the wheel, when sudden tiredness overtook him. He wanted to lean forward and put his head down, close his eyes, but couldn't give Levi the satisfaction.

What did Leviwant? Aside from money (which he wasn't going to get harassing Erwin), aside from the supposed attraction of villainy for its own sake – what did he gain from this? Erwin didn't know, because they knew nothing about who Levi actually was. Had Levi wanted to kill Erwin, presumably he had ample opportunity to try, so what was he waiting for?

"If you'd just tell me what you're after," Erwin said, "maybe we could figure something out."

He had little hope that Levi would answer, so Erwin wasn't disappointed when he didn't.


The rest of the drive passed without incident, though Erwin's nerves were frayed by the end of it. He was still berating himself for not checking for a car bomb before starting the engine, though luckily that didn't seem to be Levi's style. Maybe he should skip going home and check into a hotel? That way if Levi trashed the place at least it wouldn't be Erwin's house. On the other hand, who knew how long it would take Levi to make his move, and the expenses from a wrecked hotel room were sure to be high.

The outside of Erwin's small house in the suburbs was deceptively quiet. Nothing stirred at the windows of the one-story building, not a blade of grass looked out of place from Erwin's vantage point in the car. Nothing for it. He parked and headed up the drive.

So far so good.

He inserted the key into the lock and it turned with a click, but when Erwin pushed the door he encountered resistance. He shoved against the door, propping his shoulder against it while keeping his strength in check so as not to break anything. The door moved a little, but didn't open.

"This isn't funny, Levi!" Erwin shouted. His only answer was a loud crash from somewhere inside. Shit, shit-

Erwin took a step back and threw his shoulder against the door again, only this time the asshole must have let go because Erwin encountered absolutely no resistance and went flying. He got himself under control, but not before he had managed to leave a few dents in the floorboards.

The living room, when he saw it, was a disaster. Levi must have gotten here only a scant minute or so before him, but he'd evidently made good – if uncreative – use of the time. He'd basically upended everything. The sofas, including Erwin's reading chair were all wrong-side-up, and while the sofas were cheap and kind of ugly (though comfortable), Erwin loved that reading chair. The bookcase he'd only bought a year ago had been toppled over, tossing books every which way. The broken lampshade and lightbulb left shards of glass sparkling all over his carpet. True, he'd hated that lamp and never used it, but now he'd have to clean it up.

The vase on the coffee table was broken, its flowers strewn around and water pooled on the table, streaming down and dripping onto the carpet. Most of the pictures had been torn off the walls, and the glass from their frames joined the lampshade all over the carpet and floor.

"You…" he began, but a knife flying at his head from the kitchen made him leap out of the way. He nearly wasn't quick enough - the knife missed him by scant millimeters and buried itself in the wall behind him. Evidently Levi was no slouch with knife throwing, either.

Erwin stormed over to the kitchen, eyes peeled for anything moving, keeping his fists clenched and arms loose to attack. There was no sign of movement, no disturbance along the way, and when he looked into his kitchen everything seemed in place, except for the knife missing from the magnet nailed to the wall above the counter. That was now decorating his living room. Even the few dirty dishes from this morning didn't seem to have moved, sitting innocently in the sink where he had left them.

A split second of intuition and the hint of breath on his neck was all the warning he had before he whirled and lashed out with his left fist. Levi dodged away, still too fast for him, leaving Erwin to punch a hole through the kitchen's doorpost and into the concrete wall.

Now, at least, Levi was visible – a black shadow with red eyes, like he had appeared before. Erwin attacked again, upping the speed, but it wasn't a match for Levi's slippery avoidance. He didn't even engage, just let Erwin bang his own house to rubble with every missed blow. Erwin could feel rage starting to cloud his thoughts and make his movements sloppy with the desire tojust land a hit on that grinning face, so he forced himself to leap back and still. Levi stayed across from him, on the other side of the living room, and at least he wasn't wearing that infuriating grin any longer.

"What do you want?" Erwin asked, dropping his arms deliberately and straightening his back. "Talk to me. You're a criminal, but if you surrender, I could tell them-"

Levi interrupted him with a rough sound that could have been a bark of laughter. Erwin had the feeling diplomacy was going to fail. "Maybe I just want to hurt you," Levi said. His voice was scratchy and choppy, setting Erwin's thoughts spinning – was it an act? Scarring on his vocal chords? Disuse?

"Why? What have I done to you?"

"You found me."

"I don't know who you are. I haven't told anyone about your powers." A small lie – if Levi succeeded in killing Erwin, his teammates would surely have no compunctions about making sure everybody knew, so Levi could be taken down.

"Then you're an idiot."

Erwin kept on waiting for him to lose focus, to start pacing, to start grandstanding, but Levi did none of that. He kept his red eyes on Erwin and his body ready to attack if Erwin moved.

"Maybe. I wanted to have the chance to talk to you." Was it better or worse to convince Levi that this was part of a plan? "I want to know what you're after. Why do you want to hurt me? Why do you hate me?"

"Why aren't you scared?" Levi retorted.

"Worst case, you'll kill me," Erwin said and immediately regretted the misstep, because Levi straightened up and the slight softness that had developed around him vanished as he snapped back to attention.

"You'll wish you were dead," Levi hissed, and vanished down the corridor to Erwin's room. Leaving Erwin alone in his trashed living room, surrounded by pieces of broken glass and furniture, and with a growing headache. He hadn't expected Levi to take it as a challenge, and he had the strong feeling he'd be regretting it.


Erwin spent the next few hours trying to restore his living room to some semblance of order. He straightened the sofas and swept up the glass, then vacuumed the carpet. The bookshelf got straightened, but at that point he was too tired to make the effort to rearrange his books by size and topic the way they had been before, so he just haphazardly stuck them on the shelves wherever he found space. A strange lethargy dragged at him, something deeper than physical exhaustion. After all, he hadn't done anything extreme today. There was no reason for him to be tired. But just looking around his living room was enough to drag his spirits down.

When he took out the trash, he considered just getting in his car and getting out of there. Maybe Levi was watching and maybe he wasn't, but at this point making a run for it didn't seem like such a terrible idea. That was when Erwin noticed that his tires had been slashed.

"Fuck you," he muttered, and reentered the house.

Might as well have dinner. He was lucky his house was reasonably stocked. Erwin put together an omelette with vegetables. Where normally the routine of chopping onions and mushrooms would have relaxed him, it did him no good this time.

In a burst of crazy inspiration, Erwin made one big enough for two, cut it in half, and set another place at the table.

"Levi!" he called. "Dinner time!"

He wasn't surprised in the least when Levi declined to show up. Still. Erwin left the cooling omelette on the dining room table when he went to wash dishes.

It wasn't late, yet, but Erwin just wanted to go to bed at this point. He stood at the edge of the hallway, feeling reluctant. Down the hallway was the direction Levi had vanished in.

There was no guarantee Levi was hiding out there, Erwin told himself. None at all. He wasn't going to stay out of his own room because of the fear that Levi had become a potted plant. He didn't have potted plants in his room anyway.

Erwin squared his shoulders, turned on the light – and found out Levi had taken out the hall lightbulbs.

"Immature," he grumbled, and walked down in the dark.

Luckily, the bathroom seemed quiet enough. Erwin stood for a moment, squinting suspiciously at the shadowed corners before deciding there wasn't much to do about it and he badly needed a shower. He stripped, tossing dusty clothes onto the closet toilet seat, and let out a sigh of relief when he stepped into the hot water.

The problem was, he realized, nervousness cutting through his desire to relax, the sound of the water masked anybody else that might be moving in the background, and the water running down his face decreased visibility. Well, no use in imagining trouble.

And indeed, it seemed that no trouble would find him, as he just stood there with hot water running over him, washing away soap and exhaustion, until he felt his wariness spiral slowly down the drain as well. He stood there longer than he should, though normally the waste of water would have bothered him. A reprieve, just for a few minutes…

Erwin had only the barest warning before something coiled around his ankles and jerked, stealing his balance on the smooth tiles and sending him headfirst into the wall, the faucet catching him in the nose and forehead in a bright explosion of pain. Luckily it was the faucet that broke and not his head.

Anybody else might have died.

"Asshole!" Erwin gasped, trying to get his feet under him, braced on his left arm while he used his right hand to prod at his throbbing nose. It came away pink, the still-running water washing away the blood quickly. Not broken, though. Just very painful.

When he got his feet under him, he saw that his knees had gone through the tiles when he'd fallen. And how was he supposed to turn off the water now? Erwin stuck his fingers in the hole and fiddled with the broken mechanism until he managed to coax the water off. He stood there, naked and dripping, not exactly clean but he didn't care anymore. His shoulders ached with tension, the need to punch something – preferably Levi. He should run for his secret weapon stash and find something to zap Levi with once and for all, because it didn't look like there was anybody to talk to. The vain hope he'd had of a shifter joining them seemed silly, now. Though, he couldn't help but remember Levi's almost childish question – why aren't you scared?Erwin pushed the thought away.

"Asshole," he said again. "You know how much fixing up my house after this is going to cost me?"

"Assuming you're alive to fix it," Levi said.

Erwin threw open the shower curtain, but there was nobody there. He got out and dried himself roughly, and didn't even bother wrapping the towel around him when he went to his room to get underwear and a change of clothes.

Clothes… shit. He'd left his clothes in the bathroom, and in his pants pocket was –

Erwin ran, but when he reached his pants he found that Levi had gotten to it before him. His phone was crushed. He thought again of where he kept his weapons stash, but almost anything there could be used against him as well. Assuming right now Levi didn't know how to find the secret cache in his bedroom, did he want to risk being watched while he opened it? Was it worth trying to get his hands on a taser?

Erwin decided to leave that option open. He could risk it later, if things got too bad. As of now, Levi seemed more interested in terrorizing him than in actually killing him. On a whim, Erwin checked the hall phone, which was silent when he pressed it to his ear. Levi had cut the line.

He just had to get his hands on Levi, and it would be over. Erwin wouldn't hesitate to crush him this time. Even if Levi could grow armor, he wasn't a match for Erwin in brute force.

But the shapeshifter didn't show himself again, so Erwin decided to go to sleep. His bedroom looked mostly undisturbed, which was suspicious in and of itself. Erwin scrutinized the heavy chest of drawers (carved wood, inherited from his grandparents. If Levi broke it…) with the small knickknacks and cologne sitting on top. Nothing had been tampered with here; he could tell by the marks in the dust. He opened his closet and tugged at the hangers, riffled through the underwear drawers, rubbing his fingertips over everything to see if they encountered an odd texture. He went and got a broom and started banging on the ceiling (if Levi could flatten himself into a mirror, he could flatten himself to the ceiling…), but nothing so much as twitched.

His bookshelves seemed undisturbed. Erwin looked at the small rug beside his bed contemplatively, then poked it a few times with his foot. It didn't move, but he decided to roll it up and toss it outside the door just in case. He waited a few moments, breath stopped, but there was no sound.

What else? Erwin got to his knees and checked under the bed, poking around with the broom to make sure. He lifted the pillow, but it was the same lumpy thing he always told himself he had to replace and never got around to it.

Shame he hadn't brought a knife from the kitchen to keep on hand. Though at this point he didn't want to risk leaving the room, because then he'd have to check everything again. Erwin flopped onto his bed with a sigh, the give of the mattress a relief from strain. He crawled up the bed and reached over the headboard to flick the lights off, then slid in between the slightly warm sheets.

"Levi," he said, forcing himself to calm because there was no point in being angry, no point in letting it interfere with his goals. Levi was a royal asshole, that was certain, and a dangerous one. But if Erwin could just get leverage… "I know you think you're doing this because you have to. I want to offer you another option. You're not my enemy. We're not like those bigwigs who waste time and energy being rivals and cackling. You're angry at me because I got close to you, and you're lashing out." The room felt very, very still. Erwin stared up at the dark ceiling, eyes wide and straining against the shadows. "I know what the world is like for shapeshifters. I'm willing to cut a deal. Go to jail, serve your time, and I won't tell them you're a shifter. If you don't run, I'll have no reason to tell anybody, will I? I'll keep your secret. You have mine, after all. Nobody else knows my identity, except for one of my teammates. It's a fair trade, don't you think?"

Erwin didn't receive an answer. He waited in dark silence, but the clock ticked away and he was getting bored, getting sleepy…


He dreamed that he was drowning. He had gone swimming in the ocean, which stretched beautiful and blue to all sides, fish always off in the distance. Sunlight shone down through the water, the sunlight burning where Erwin could see it, floating on his back underwater. But soon enough he realized that he couldn't breathe, and tried to swim back to the air.

The water turned viscous around him, sucking at his arms and holding them back. Erwin struggled, he had superstrength, how was water stronger than him? He kicked, tried to make his way to the surface, but it grew ever farther. The bright blue sea was darkening around him. Erwin couldn't think beyond the pressure in his chest, the need to draw air—

And he jerked awake, tangled in sheets that had wrapped to tie his arms down, in a bed that he was sinking into, and something was covering his mouth and nose. The bed the bed Levi had turned into the damn BED. Erwin's lungs were screaming for air, sheer panic keeping him from mustering his strength to break Levi's hold.

Erwin kicked down and felt the bed shudder; evidently Levi could feel pain in this form. He kicked again, brought his arms together and tried to tear at the sheets. His vision was blackening, but he managed to draw his body together and tear his arms free, and then was digging fingers into the material – oddly solid, more like flesh than sheets – and pulled.

It came away in a burst of oxygen and Erwin surged up, getting enough leverage to land a few more solid kicks in the "mattress" beneath him, then his elbows, and Levi was melting away from him, taking a humanoid form again. Erwin managed to land a kick to his chest before Levi could materialize blades, sending him crashing into the wall. Levi nearly collapsed but became something that looked like an armadillo with spikes in every direction, forcing Erwin to dodge away lest he get cut to ribbons.

"I don't get you!" Erwin rasped. "What's your problem? You could have just cut my throat while I was asleep. What are you playing at?"

Levi rolled to his feet and absorbed the spikes back into his black shadow of a body, then gave a rippling shrug that annoyed Erwin possibly more than anything else Levi had done until now.

"Why?" Erwin asked, again. All Levi needed to do was give a stock answer and Erwin would leave him alone ("do I need a reason", "it's part of my complicated bullshit philosophy about the nature of Man", etc.), but Levi wasn't. Which meant Levi hadn't been around enough to absorb standard supervillain lingo, or hadn't reached the point where he'd said it so often he believed in it.

"I want you to know what I really am," Levi said. His voice was smoother this time, the intonation surprisingly normal, strengthening Erwin's hypothesis that Levi didn't hang out with other supervillains much.

"A bully?" Erwin snorted. "Or do you mean a dick?"

"No!" Levi burst out. "You-" He cut himself off with clenched teeth and just stood there, entire body tense and fists tight. Internal struggle or no, Erwin wasn't going to pass up an opportunity to get the jump on him. Just as he was shifting his feet, however, Levi suddenly threw himself out the window, the burst of shattering glass unnaturally loud in the silence. Erwin dived for him but missed, and by the time he slammed his hands on the window frame and leaned out, Levi was gone.

His back yard was dark and the same as ever, except for a misshapen, jagged pile of something under his window. At least now he knew where his real bed had gone.