It took Levi a considerable effort to keep himself from gawking at Annika, just like it took an effort to ignore the unsettling feeling in his stomach or to keep the unease off his face.

Her arm, demandingly interlinked with his, the locks of auburn hair clashing violently with the dull brown cloth of his vest, the pressure of her breasts against his side, her strangely familiar scent - clover, leather, and oil … it was all too real and yet, it felt like an ominous dream.

Annika embodied a debauched life of sin, where there were no rules besides the scramble for survival: take what you can get, never give anything back. Dangerous, ruthless, destructive, where those living right on the edge managed to look like winners even though they were half a tottering step away from falling into the abyss.

It was the life he had lived before he had somehow managed to step away from it.

It was also a life he never ever wanted to go back to. Even being chewed slowly limb for limb by a Titan while screaming your lungs out was preferable to it.

Chattering away as if she had not burnt down half a neighborhood in her crazy rage two years ago, Annika drew him forward into the kind of neighborhood he had vowed to keep Hanji out of. But he could not even muster the fortitude to stop and question Annika about her intentions. That was her effect on him, as if she cast a kind of spell that made his brain malfunction. It should be all the warning he needed and reason enough to step away and yet… saying no to her had always come at a very high price.

At the very least, he should have warned Hanji about the kind of person Annika was, mercurial to the extreme, radiant and beautiful one minute, a merciless killer the next. But he had been completely blindsided by Annika's appearance and now that the wish to warn her became urgent, Hanji was trailing too far behind them, looking at their surroundings with that damn curiosity of hers, squinting at shadows in alleyways, broken windows and gaping doorways like she had never seen anything more exciting.

"She is Mitras-bred," Annika remarked with a disgusted wrinkle of her nose, noticing where his attention had wandered to.

Levi shrugged, like that observation didn't matter, but it did - how did Annika know? It made him acutely anxious. He wasn't sure who had sent Maria to him, nor had he been able to find out why, which put him at a disadvantage.

"She's ugly," Annika sneered. "Is it even female? Kinda hard to tell."

"Like I care," Levi grumbled. He did though. He cared, much too much actually and that made him even more anxious. No, Hanji wasn't ugly, not in the least. Everything else down here was though and that was why he didn't want her to get soiled by it. Good job he was doing.

"So you work with her?"

Levi nodded once.

"What are you up to? How come someone like you associates with the likes of her?" Annika's tone of voice had changed and Levi felt alertness flood his senses at the menace in it. Why did she make this about Hanji? They had wanted him to come down here, hadn't they?

"So why are we on speaking terms?" he asked back, careful not to act on impulse and fling her away even though he veritably ached to bring distance between her and him - a lot of distance. But if he escalated too soon, blood would be shed. Annika was his match with a knife, he couldn't forget that.

"I've forgiven you, that's why," Annika smiled, her eyes glittering dangerously. "How could I stay mad at you?"

"You once stalked a woman who sprayed a little dirt on a new dress of yours for two years."

"Pah," Annika made a dismissive gesture with her free hand. "That was someone who clearly deserved to be punished. You on the other hand…"

She smiled at him angelically, showing a row of teeth remarkably white for someone born and raised in the underground.

"Quit the crap, Annika," Levi let his voice drop low, holding her bedazzling gaze. "We can never be friends again."

She laughed but her eyes shot daggers. "Friends? Who is speaking about being friends? Are you addle-headed?"

He must be. Had he really said 'friends' as if she could even begin to understand what that was? Annika was just as dark and twisted as Kenny. Having Annika by your side down here was like getting a silk ribbon of excellence pinned to your chest. Keeping her next to you meant joining her in the pit of depravity. It was hard work. Once, it had seemed like the only path open to him. But now he had grown dangerously soft, Levi thought, feeling a brief apprehensive twist in his stomach. First Furlan and Isabel, who had insisted on calling him brother. They had weaseled themselves into his heart only to shred it to pieces. And when he had been at his weakest, Erwin had put beguiling notions of camaraderie and loyalty into his head. He stood no chance against the likes of her like this.

"... but you were by far the best fuck I ever had," she added and smacked her lips. "Which quite annoyingly ruined me for everyone else. But I'm not telling anyone."

"I'm no longer that person," Levi heard himself say, as if some part of him felt compelled to explain himself to her. What a fucking idiot he was.

Annika laughed. "That's a lie. Nobody can escape their true nature. But I see that you are trying. For her?"

She jerked her head in Zoë's direction.

"Leave her alone," Levi snapped, feeling his blood beginning to boil.

"Oh my, oh my," Annika grinned again. "Are we a weeny bit protective? I wonder how little it will take to make her run away screaming."

You'd be surprised, Levi thought with sudden satisfaction at the thought of Annika trying to take on Hanji and losing.

"My money is on her," he said, unhooked his arm, took a deep breath of the putrid air and slowed down his steps far enough so that Hanji would catch up to them. Her eyes were glittering golden behind her glasses, showing her excitement.

"Keep up," he told her with a frown, when he really wanted to fold her into his arms and tell her to be goddamn careful once again.

"Have you seen those children who…"

"Shut the fuck up," Levi growled and grabbed her hand to pull her along, pressing it hard in the process. "Now's not the time."

Hanji didn't pull her hand away. She just lifted her eyebrows questioningly at him and shook her head but left it at that. Maybe what she saw in his face made her more compliant than she usually was. He hoped it truly scared her.

###

Levi was as tense as she knew him to get right before engaging Titans. It radiated down his arm and into hers through their interlocked hands, making her own nerves tingle with the echo of it.

He thought they were in danger. That she was. But she did not appreciate his concern for her much. He wasn't the first man to get protective notions just because she had been born female. But he was Levi - and Levi wasn't like other men. Which was the whole point of her fascination with him, wasn't it? In truth, she felt offended. All that 'stay back when I fight'- bullshit was that and only that: bullshit. Why did he think she had wanted to join him? For a holiday? They were in this together. They would go through it together.

It had to be this woman who made him nervous, Zoë surmised. This gorgeous woman who walked next to him with provokingly swaying hips while oozing sex appeal and signalling willingness… definitely a past lover who wished to become a current one. That much for no experience and being shy, the bastard...

They were heading deeper into the muck and the darkness. The shadows around them deepened, the air grew heavier with all kinds of novel smells, and the puddles on the street glittered black and thick like tar. A sudden shudder raced down her spine. This was it! This was how she had always imagined the underground city to be like! Not like that well-lit, proper and tame part their lodgings were situated in.

"He still lives in this shithole despite all that territory he has acquired?" Levi asked that Annika woman.

"Of course. Only you made the mistake of uprooting yourself," she shrugged with a smug sneer. "Don't you know we creatures of the dark lose our power in the light?"

"Didn't you talk about getting away too all the time?"

"That was before I lost the will to dream," she retorted harshly. "Before the one person I trusted with my life betrayed me and crushed my soul."

Interesting. Zoë strained her ears so she wouldn't miss a single word of this exchange. So Levi had dumped her? She approved.

"Don't use me as an excuse for the wretched decisions in your life," Levi said angrily, "you have no soul and never had one."

"Ouch," Annika quipped, "still as vicious as ever with your tongue? Silly me missed it a lot, that little tonguesy."

Levi's face darkened even further and his jaw tightened. Zoë thought she even heard him grit his teeth. Damn, but she was dying to hear the whole story! What could his little tonguesy do? The tale seemed juicy enough to entertain her Squad for many a dark evening.

"Shut up," Levi hissed at her.

"Unfair!" she broke into a wide grin, "I haven't even said anything."

"Stay alert, Hanji," he reminded her sternly, "I really can't babysit you."

Moron.

Wrenching her thoughts away from tongues to the upcoming meeting seemed a good idea though. In the absence of any useful information from Levi, she had to go by what she knew. Which was wrecked little. This Renzo they were going to meet was Furlan's brother. Zoë remembered meeting Furlan for the first time, when Levi and his friends had been presented to the squad. Granted, she had only had eyes for Levi and his haughty face, but Furlan had proved to be a pleasant enough guy later, with a quick, dirty mouth and quite some talent for soldiering. A shame he had died so early. Looking at how tense Levi was right now, she had to assume that Renzo wasn't like his brother. But since she had a bit of personal experience with unpleasant brothers, she wasn't worried. She knew exactly how to handle them.

When they reached their destination - a big house with sooty walls and guards in every possible place - and she came face to face with Renzo, she was pleasantly surprised though.

Not a brutish, nasty sort, but an exceedingly charming, very well built, tall and handsome man with blue eyes and tousled sandy hair. The word for this style was 'windswept', she thought. Only that there was no wind in this place. In fact, the air was completely still, almost too warm and carried the unmistakable odor of roses.

"Well," Renzo got up from behind his desk with a smooth notion. "Look at that. The little king of the underworld is back."

"Renzo," Levi grumbled a rude greeting.

"And whom have we here?" Renzo stepped halfway around the desk to smile at her with interest. A dimple appeared on his right cheek and the skin around his eyes crinkled. He wore black, she noticed, from head to toe. She associated that color with clergy. Or henchmen.

"I'm Zoë," she answered with an intrigued smile of her own. "Me and Levi work together."

"I see," Renzo waved for them to be seated, without shifting his eyes from her face. This was his office, Zoë guessed. There were stacks of papers on the table, neatly sorted into piles. The room was illuminated with many candles and their sheen made her notice several pictures with strong colors on the walls.

"Do you like them?" Renzo asked, noticing her interest.

"I've seen pictures like these before," she observed, bending forward a little to see better. Idyllic country scenes, little houses in the middle of a sea of flowers. Children playing along a bubbling creek. Doe lifting its head in the greenest of forests.

And then it clicked. "Oh. I remember! There are several of those at my pa…"

Levi kicked her so hard against her shin she yelped. He glared at her menacingly. What the fuck?

"They fetch quite the price," Renzo nodded and went back to sit on his chair, throwing a wary glance at Levi. "But I have no time to paint anymore. A shame, really. Looking at you makes me wish I could take up a brush again."

"Oh," Zoë blinked. "You made them?"

She had never paid a lot of attention to her family's art collection, but this style was unmistakable. She looked at Renzo with even more interest. Were all crime bosses like him? If yes, she should have come down here much earlier in her life.

"Would you pose for me?" Renzo asked, leaning forward a little.

Annika, who was loitering in the back, hissed. Renzo lifted his eyes with an instant frown.

"If you don't behave, Anni, I'll throw you out," he admonished her sharply.

"You'd be sorry," Annika grumbled. "You know what they say about me and luck. Besides, she's ugly."

"Oh, most definitely not," Renzo smiled, shifting his gaze back to Zoë.

Zoë felt her cheeks color a little and she had to stifle a girlish giggle. Levi next to her radiated so much displeasure it came off him in waves, but what could a woman do? Renzo Church was just too charming.

"She's not available," Levi growled, instantly spoiling her flirtatious mood.

"Does she answer to you?" Renzo asked, narrowing his eyes to slits.

"No," Zoë said.

"Yes," Levi said at the same time.

"Looks like you two have things to work out," Renzo grinned, leaning back in his chair, putting his hands behind his head to show off his sizable biceps. "In the meantime, I have use for you, Levi."

"I'm not available either," Levi grumbled.

"I know why you are here," Renzo's eyes looked decidedly less warm and friendly when he looked at Levi, "but I think you don't know. That must irk you."

"It wasn't you who called me?"

"It wasn't me," Renzo smiled and this time, he looked like a cat that had just found a pot of cream. "But the timing couldn't be better."

He opened a drawer to his right, leisurely leafed through its content and pulled out a sheet of paper.

"This," he drawled, "is a borrower's note. The debt is overdue."

"I don't have any debts," Levi frowned but his body stiffened visibly. "And certainly not to you."

"But you do," Renzo's smile faltered. "My stupid little brother and his good heart… so much money flushed down the drain for medical supplies and the like… so pointless. But here… let me read you this passage." He cleared his throat dramatically and then began. "'I, Furlan Church, will pay back the full amount borrowed from the Henauer Brothers by August in the year 845, including a half-yearly interest rate of 14%. To secure this loan, my gang's future earnings shall serve as collateral.' Etc. etc., signed: Furlan Church."

Silence. Zoë blinked slowly. This sounded like trouble.

"Did he forget to tell you? Silly Furlan. He idolized you so much, he thought you'd get insanely rich with those artless little stunts you pulled. He probably thought you wouldn't mind and it wouldn't matter. But it always does in the end, doesn't it. There's nothing you do down here that doesn't come back to haunt you."

Levi sat completely frozen.

"By the law of the underground, you, the head of his former gang, are now the debtor. Because Furlan is dead. He won't be able to pay back this debt."

Levi exhaled slowly.

"Oh yes, I heard about his death," Renzo continued. "It's useful to be well informed in my position. Not that you felt a need to tell his family."

"He wanted nothing to do with you and your family business anymore," Levi said very quietly. "I buried what was left of him and vowed he could rest in peace."

"Yes, well… sometimes there's not much of a choice, is there. Do you think I wanted this life?" Renzo made a dramatic pause. "Of course I didn't. I wanted to be a painter and drink and smoke myself into a stupor every day. But then I suddenly was the only brother left, tsk."

"You look happy enough," Levi remarked drily.

"Oh, I am, I am," Renzo pursed his lips. "But I couldn't know how wonderful life as an underground kingpin would be before I tried it. The part I like the most is collecting debts. And sending Annika for emphasis."

Annika giggled.

"You got the borrower's note from the Henauers?" Levi's voice was still uncharacteristically soft and Zoë felt a sudden urge to take and press his hand.

"No," Renzo chuckled. "They came to me. Since you were nowhere to be found and they really wanted their money. I decided to settle the bill … and to inherit the debt."

"I don't have that kind of money," Levi said darkly.

"Oh, that much is clear," Renzo grinned.

"What do you want?"

"Well…," Renzo interlinked his fingers and put his chin on them. "First, I want to gloat. You little shithead, you always behaved like you're something better. But you're a gutter rat just like the rest of us and the gutter wants you back. I will enjoy seeing you squirm in the dirt so much."

Zoë opened her mouth to say something but Renzo looked at her with eyes so cold she thought it better to shut her mouth again.

"Second, I want to thank you for bringing your own collateral with you. It will make everything so much easier."

"Leave her out of it!" Levi pressed out.

"Do you think I got to where I today am because I'm a nice person? Pleased to meet you, Zoë Hange. Glad to say you're worth your weight in gold."

Oh no! Zoë groaned. He knew who she was. Being the child of rich, entitled assholes was not what you wanted to be down here.

"There are people down here looking for you at present, Miss Hange," Renzo continued smoothly, "but I will make sure they won't find you. Yet."

Theodor had made good on his word then? Fuck this. She hadn't seen nor spoken to her family in years, and now they suddenly developed an interest in her whereabouts?

"I'm sorry, Levi!" she said quietly but he seemed beyond caring, stewing in his anger like a pot about to boil over.

"Good, now that we understand each other, here are my terms, Levi. I'm not interested in money, I have plenty. But I'm interested in your notoriety. Tonight, you will gamble for me."

"Gamble."

"Oh yes, you heard correctly. It's the event of the year, really," Renzo smiled. "And I understand you used to be quite good at swindling rich nobs? Annika told me all about your scams."

Levi groaned in misery while Annika clapped her hands somewhere behind them cooing happily.

"There's one particular person I want you to focus on. Milk him dry. And when he is destroyed, bring him to me."

"What else?" Levi demanded to know.

"I'm sure you can guess," Renzo drawled. "I'm interested in your body."

Waitaminute… Zoë threw Levi a worried look. That little juicy body…?

Renzo laughed.

"I see Miss Hange thinks like one of us. I do not have that kind of interest in his body, precious Zoë, though I'm sure he'd fetch a handsome sum. No - this is about fighting. There's a series of matches coming up, organized by yours truly. I want you to be my champion, Levi. And I want you to win as long as I tell you to. Are we clear?"

Remarkably clear. They were in deep shit. And it had happened so quickly! Excitement began to bubble in Zoë again. What a challenge. What a goddamn challenge. This adventure… it was certainly worth it.

###

They kept them apart zealously for hours afterwards. A standard procedure for prisoners that you did not want to sync their escape plans - nothing unexpected. But the dress coat one of Renzo's cronies handed him fit him so well that Levi had to wonder: Had Renzo perhaps planned this some time ago? He should have paid more attention to the happenings in the underground after joining the Survey Corps. He should have known they didn't want to let him go. Nobody escaped. Ever.

Then he'd just have to make sure he'd be the first. After cleaning up this mess and cutting all ties to this hovel of shit for good. He had better things to do now. Which was killing Titans.

He was ready for anything once another of Renzo's men came to fetch him and took him downstairs to the entry - apart from Hanji sauntering down the steps in an elegant dress, jewelry and a coiffure that made her about ten inches taller.

"Shut your trap," she hissed at him, turning an alarming shade of pink everywhere down to the round mounds of her breasts that looked ready to pop out of the bodice at any minute.

"What… h… have… t… they...," yes, it was better to shut his mouth than to stammer like this. He felt his cheeks heat up. Damn, how embarrassing!

"If you say one word of this to anyone, I'll kill you," she pressed out, staggering in his direction on what appeared to be silk slippers with heels.

Oh no. He'd keep this image to himself. Always. This was Hanji how she would have looked in a different life. A life so removed from his own he would never have set eyes on her. The green of the silk hugging her body brought out the milky color of her skin, made her hair shine like his favorite burnt sugar dessert his mother had used to make for him, and her eyes…

Levi swallowed compulsively. No glasses. Her eyes shone like stars from her eyes.

"Do you think those are real?" Hanji whispered, fiddling around with the emerald necklace around her neck.

Levi nodded, still at a loss for words.

"If we run away, will this be enough to clear the debt?"

Levi groaned. "Don't."

"Don't run away?"

"Don't do anything stupid."

"Asshole," she hissed, "Can't you see I am on my best behavior! Do you know how tight this fucking dress is here?"

She pointed to her waist and breasts.

"And do you know I see close to nothing without glasses? See this?" she pointed at a beautifully adorned reticule dangling from her wrist. "They're in here. Who would willingly put an indispensable object into a stupid little bag like this? I'll tell you who. Women. That is stupid. Running away with an obviously expensive necklace - not stupid."

"Just… don't…," Levi took a deep breath and briefly closed his eyes. Okay, telling Hanji not to do things would probably only result in her doing them to anger him. This was Hanji after all, even though she looked… she looked… "I'm sorry for dragging you into this, this is not your battle. I will clean up this mess and then we're out of here."

"Oh yes," she grinned at him. "I have no doubt. But you know what, Little King of the underworld? I'll be with you all the way. Get that into your head!"

A sudden warmth flooded his belly. He recognized the feeling: Someone had weaseled themselves into his heart again. Erwin's beguiling notions of camaraderie and loyalty… they had taken root.

"Hanji…," he began, but before he could make a fool of himself and say something emotional he'd be much ashamed of later, a chipper voice behind him made him jolt out of this sentimental folly.

"Are we ready?"

Annika. Looking her finest, radiating murderous intent in a dark red dress. That red dress. It had been soaked in blood when he had last seen her wear it. She had forgiven him, she had said? Never.

She stepped forward to take his arm possessively.

"You look very fine, Levi," she cooed. "I can't wait to gamble with you by my side again."

He remembered all their tricks. How could he not? They had practiced until they had dreamt of nothing else.

"You make a fine pair," Renzo chuckled, stepping from a door to the side, five bulky guards behind him. He was wearing black velvet and a hat with a red feather. How foppish.

"And you…," Renzo's eyes glittered when he offered Hanji his arm. "You are just gorgeous."

Levi recognized the look in his eyes. It was the kind of look men gave women they wanted to possess. But nobody would ever possess Hanji as long as Levi would be around to prevent it. Hanji had to be free. Free to do what she wanted.

"Gorgeous?" Hanji echoed and laughed heartily. Then she looked over at him and winked.

He wouldn't want to be down here with anybody but her, he realized. Whatever was going to happen now… it would be epic.