"PETRA!"

As Petra's broken body slid down the trunk of a tree, the remaining members of Squad Levi could feel the rage bubbling inside them.

Sweet Petra didn't deserve to die this way.

With a mournful cry, Auruo latched one hook of his 3DM gear onto a branch and tried to make a swing at the Female Titan, his anger and grief clouding his judgement. Gunther, who had enough sense not to let emotions get in the way of his job, saw an arm coming at Auruo to strike him down and was able to swing down and get his teammate out of the way. However, he didn't predict that the arm of the Female Titan would hit the wire of his gear instead and he and Auruo went crashing into a nearby tree before they fell down the ground, rolling away from each other.

"Gunther, are you alright?" Auruo asked with a worried and regretful tone, berating himself while running towards his teammate. He should've seen that coming. He was a member of Squad Levi, for goodness' sake.

"I'm fine. But I think my arm is broken," Gunther assured his team mate, pain visible on his face. He looked at where Erd and Eren were perched on a branch and he could see Eren's wide-eyed expression.

No, this is not the time to freeze up! Get your fucking ass away from here! Gunther panicked internally after seeing the teen's frozen form. When Erd's eyes met his in understanding, Erd turned to Eren to take him away. But before he could do that, Eren jumped down from the branch and bit his hand before they were shrouded in smoke and a roar filled their ears.

The 15-meter Titan let out a mournful roar before charging at the one who killed the first person in the Squad to look past his ability to transform into a Titan and see that he was just a 15-year old boy who wanted to help.

For Eren, Petra was the first person to put faith in him and believed that he could help humankind.

And now, she was gone.

He tried to punch the Female Titan but she was able to block it before kicking him in the stomach. Eren slid back a bit before charging at her once again.

Auruo put an arm around Gunther's waist to bring him to the branch where Erd was standing on. With his arm broken, Gunther wouldn't be able to use his gear properly and was thankful that Auruo knew this without him having to say it out loud.

The three members of the elite squad could only watch the battle between the two Titans in awe, knowing that they wouldn't be able to do anything. Getting in the middle of a fight between two Titans was suicide.

The ground below them shook and they turned to see Eren straddling the Female Titan on the ground, getting ready to bring his fist down on her injured head. The Female Titan made a desperate attempt to block Eren's fist and the three members of Squad Levi put their hands on their ears to block the screech that came out of the Female Titan's mouth.

"What the hell was that?" Auruo wondered, his body filled with a feeling of dread.

Auruo and Gunther, despite his injury, turned to look at their second-in-command, waiting for orders. Erd narrowed his eyes and strained his ears as he heard stomping on the ground. A sound familiar to them.

With wide eyes, Erd turned to his comrades, "More Titans are coming!" They prepared their 3DM gear and swung down from the trees, blades ready to hack at the beasts, trying to get to Eren before the Titans got him.

Titans advanced towards Eren and the Female Titan and started attacking Eren. This gave the Female Titan the opportunity to get away, but not before a green blur came straight at her face and slashed her cheek.

The arrival of Mikasa Ackerman let Squad Levi continue their onslaught on the man-eating beasts and get them away from Humanity's last hope. They've heard stories of her being equal to a hundred men and hoped that she was enough to capture the bitch.

"Erd! Look out!"

The blonde-haired man turned just in time for the 7-meter Titan to grab him. With fingers tightly wrapped around him, trapping his arms, Erd struggled to get free as the Titan brought him closer to its mouth.

The sound of 3DM gear whirred behind Erd before he felt hot blood on his face. Erd maneuvered his gear and sliced the nape of a Titan on his left before landing on a branch beside his captain.

"What the hell happened here, Ginn?" Levi demanded, a frown etched on his face and his shoulders tense, eyes flickering around the forest, as if looking for someone.

"The traitor snuck up on us. One minute we were traveling through the forest, the next the damned Female Titan was advancing towards us. She fucking killed Petra," Erd mournfully explained, regret visible on his face. He saw his captain's face briefly flicker with grief before it was gone. If he wasn't looking intently at Levi, he would have missed it.

At the corner of his eyes, Levi saw Auruo and Gunther struggling with the amount of Titans, especially since Gunther couldn't move one of his arms too much. He also realized that no matter how strong Mikasa was, the Female Titan was too fast for her and she would end up as Titan fodder.

"Go and help Bossard and Schultz. I'll help Ackerman before the fucking bitch kills her too," Levi ordered before swinging towards Mikasa and the Female Titan.

Levi knew that Petra was dead. He saw her body against a tree, blood everywhere, honey-colored eyes open but devoid of life. He didn't want to believe it. His mind couldn't comprehend the fact that one of the strongest soldiers he knew had died at the hands of a Titan, something that she could fight easily in her sleep. But hearing his second-in-command confirm it forced him to face the truth.

Petra Ral had indeed perished.

He wanted to fucking kill the murdering whore, but he couldn't defy orders even when his whole body was screaming at him to go straight for the nape. Capturing the traitor is essential in saving the lives of our comrades and taking back what is rightfully ours was what Erwin said and he wasn't too deep in his grief to blatantly go against them.

Not yet, anyway.

"Levi?"

"Hmm?"

"What are you going to do when all the Titans are gone?" Petra asked, lying down on the bed beside Levi with an arm around his waist and her head over his chest, slowly being lulled to sleep by the heartbeat of her lover.

"Tch, what the hell brought this on, Petra?" Levi asked in a low voice, a hand gently running through the copper strands of her hair. No one had ever asked him that question before. When he was living in the Underground, thoughts like those were fleeting, pushed back to the back of his mind. Survival was his priority and it remained his priority even when he lost Isabel and Farlan and went up the ranks of the Scouting Legion.

Survival of the fittest. That was how life was. If you weren't strong enough, you would be eaten by the fucking Titans. If not by the Titans, then you would be fucked over by shitty humans.

That was one of the reasons why he kept his distance, why he never made friends. He'd lost people before and he wasn't a fan of the feeling of losing someone close to you.

In a world where it was fight or be eaten, it was better to be lonely than to be surrounded by people and lose all of them in a blink of an eye.

So when Erwin ordered him to pick soldiers for a Special Operations Squad to be led by him, he contemplated telling Erwin to fuck off. He didn't want to be responsible for the lives of other people. But because he was still grateful to Erwin for taking him under his wing in spite of him trying to assassinate his commander in the past, he sucked it up and picked only the best for his squad. That way, he wouldn't have to worry about them. He would maintain a professional relationship with them and that was that.

It was like that for the first year of "Squad Levi" as Hanji called them. Gunther Schultz and Erd Ginn listened to his orders and trusted his judgement. They realized immediately that he wasn't the kind of guy to open up to other people, so they left him alone for the most part. At first anyway.

When they went on a particularly hard expedition where Erd would have lost a leg if Levi didn't cut off the Titan's arm, things changed.

Erd and Gunther started to talk to him more, told him jokes and basically did things that a person would normally do to forge some kind of friendship but only served to annoy him.

He initially thought that they, particularly Erd, were just grateful that he saved their lives. But as days turned to weeks and weeks turned to months and they still approached him with smiles and jokes, he resigned himself to make conversation.

Well, not really conversation. It was more like yelling and cursing, while asking why they fucking care.

Erd happily replied, "People shouldn't have to be alone for the rest of their lives. Everyone needs a friend or life wouldn't be worth living!"

Levi stared at him blankly before replying, "Do whatever the hell you want."

After that, he grudgingly talked to them and made shitty jokes in a deadpan voice. He knew they were shitty because Erd and Gunther looked like they didn't know whether to laugh or take his words seriously.

He swore that they were the last people he would let in.

But fate had other plans.

When the squad leaders supervised the training of the new recruits from the 100th trainee squad that chose to be in the Scouting Legion, a girl with copper hair and amber eyes caught his attention. She was smaller than him, something that was rare and she held herself with confidence and wasn't afraid to take on people twice her size.

He later learned her name −Petra Ral− and found out that she had already killed 3 Titans by herself in previous expeditions but was better in team work, something that seemed to be lacking as more ambitious people joined their branch and boasted about their ability to single-handedly kill Titans.

He didn't know what it was about Petra that captured his interest, but he found himself being aware of where she was in a formation or on whose team she was on. Maybe it was the determined look in her eye or it was how she cared for her team mates no matter how much they annoy her.

So when during an expedition, she was almost Titan fodder trying to save a comrade, he swooped in and saved her. And when she found out that the comrade she was trying to save still ended up in the Titan's stomach, he gave her words of encouragement.

Sometimes, all we can do is to continue fighting. Don't let their deaths be in vain and continue to live. No matter how hard life gets, always fight.

She and Auruo Bossard, whom he picked because of his high Titan kill count, were obviously surprised when they found out that Humanity's Strongest chose them for his squad. And of course, they slowly broke down the walls that he put around himself –they already had cracks from Erd and Gunther's attempts at friendship, not to mention Shitty Glasses also joined them most of the time− he gave up and fucking let them in.

But it was obvious that Petra was the only one that he allowed to really get to know him. She made his coffee in the mornings and made his tea in the evenings. She adjusted fairly quickly on how he wanted things to be clean and rarely made a complaint when he ordered them to redo everything until he was satisfied.

She smiled when he finally asked –more like told− her to stay and keep him company while he did the mountain of paper work that his work entailed. And that routine continued until they couldn't take the tension anymore and one thing led to another.

She agreed that they should keep it a secret, agreed that Erwin would have their heads when he found out that something happened between them. They both agreed that it was just a one-time thing and would never happen again. But of course, when had he ever kept his promises to himself.

One time became two times and two times became three until Petra spent most of her nights in Levi's room and their friends-with-benefits situation quickly escalated into a relationship, something that they knew they both wanted but denied themselves until Petra made the first move, blurting out the three words while they were arguing about an expedition where Levi put himself in danger to help a rookie.

Petra Ral slowly wormed her way into his heart and he knew that he was fucked up. He was in love with her and he wouldn't let her go that easily.

"Levi?"

Levi blinked and looked down at the person that brought some happiness into his life, "What I want to do?"

Petra nodded with a confused look on her face, wondering what he was thinking about. It was obvious to her that Levi's mind wandered for a while there and she was happy that she was the only one who was allowed to see him with his guard down.

"When all of this is over, marry me."

Levi tightened his grip on his blades and charged at the monster who betrayed them. He should've kept his promise. He shouldn't have let anyone in. He shouldn't have chosen Petra for his squad.

If he didn't choose her, she might still be alive and he wouldn't feel pain.

But he knew that he also would have regretted not choosing her. Regretted letting go of the opportunity to be with her. The thought that he at least made Petra happy, even if it was for a short time, stayed on his mind.

And as he quickly hacked at the arms of the Female Titan, he decided to heed his own advice. He would continue to fight, continue to live.

For Petra.