When I grow up I want to be shrewd.
"So Reeves died and they blamed us. Why doesn't it surprise me?" Elizabeth asked rhetorically, muttering so that only Levi could hear her. The rest of the team were each busy with their own tasks but a couple of them were particularly curious.
"Because you are more like me than you thought." Levi answered in the same low tone, next to her and with his hands folded to make it sound like a much more professional conversation. And that was born this way but his Vice gave him one of her smiles and everything was diverted.
"There is a reason why I said 'yes', you know..."
Levi swallowed to hold back the instinct to kiss her, every time she reminded him of that answer he felt shudder, but this time to appease his instincts it was Jean's voice that communicated his return with food, while Armin handed him some sheets which, from his words, were delivered to the city by the Military Police.
"If this is true, the Scouts will be disbanded. I heard they'll be hunting for us tonight. They're also putting guards on all the vital roads and it's impossible to get through without a pass. Captain, what now?"
Armin's voice was particularly agitated but they couldn't afford wrong moves and Levi was forced to make them think.
"Calm down. They're using a wagon, it'll take at least a day to reach Reiss' territory. We'll have to use that time to come up with a plan. Liz..."
The blonde kept her gaze fixed on the sheets and Levi needed only a glance to understand that her mind was already at work.
"Yes, just a couple of details."
Sasha warned of the sound of footsteps heading towards them and Elizabeth seemed to wake from her thoughts, assuming a decidedly more serious expression, one that was impossible to violate and it was definitely better not to try...
"Divide yourselves. Armin will lure on the banks of the river, and Levi and I will catch them from behind. Mikasa, be ready in case help is needed."
Following the orders of the Vice Captain, they found themselves capturing two young guys of the Military Police, considering the uniforms they wore, decidedly inexperienced therefore probably recruits.
The two, too sure at first, had pointed their guns at Armin but soon the situation was overturned by the Captain and his Vice, making sure that it was the young man who took their weapons out of their hands, before binding them.
Jean handed some papers to the two superiors, in particular at Levi who began to read aloud.
"Now then."
The Captain took a few steps forward, resting the blade on his shoulder, but with his eyes fixed on the paper he held in his hand.
The two young guys kneeling on the ground, however, seemed terrified by the sight of the two superiors.
"Stohess District Military Police, Private Marlo Freudenberg. Same assignment, Private Hitch Dreyse. As for how we'll dispose of you..."
They are shaking, if I push the right buttons we could also get some information from them... Elizabeth thought bringing two fingers to her chin while she thought. Until the girl, Hitch, turned to her, reminding her of the Stohess incident. She was convinced she was provoking her in some way, that she could leverage her feelings of guilt but she didn't know how much Elizabeth was now used to living with it.
"Yeah, we know that." Levi answered, almost as if, inside himself, defending Elizabeth, who instead raised an eyebrow, looking at her as if she had just said the most obvious thing in the world.
"We were there too, you know..."
Aware of not having solved anything, she decided to remove some other weight from her chest, turning to Mikasa and Armin, speaking instead about Annie, of how closed and unfriendly she was and that, considered dispersed, she was convinced that she had been mutilated by the titans.
"No, I wouldn't say... Liz, do you want to tell her?" the Captain answered when the young woman asked him specifically.
Hitch on hearing Levi's answer turned to his Vice, her eyes widening.
"The titan in hiding was Annie Leonhart herself."
The two Military Police Recruits were completely shocked by the news, which made Levi nervous.
"Goddammit, it makes me sick... Nobody knows a damn thing about this world, not us or anyone else except for those bastards at the center of it all." the Captain began, turning to Elizabeth, before paying his attention to the two again. "We'll release you both as soon as we get out of here."
"Captain Levi! Let me help you! I don't think what you guys are doing is wrong! If I can help correct this world's injustice, I'll do whatever it takes!" Marlo exclaimed instead, giving Elizabeth the final idea. Without listening to him anymore, she approached Jean, leaning against the trunk of a tree and assumed the same posture, leaning on it with her back but very close to the young man so that only he could hear her. If the two guys had heard her words it would have been useless and they would never have been able to find out where the police checkpoint was.
"I need you for one thing. Now they seem on our side; let's evaluate their loyalty... make them talk."
Levi ordered Sasha to free them somewhere, starting in Elizabeth's direction to resume the journey, but Jean, obeying Elizabeth's order, called him.
"Captain Levi, let me do it, please!"
Levi stopped for a moment to look at the boy and then at Elizabeth still leaning against the trunk of the tree; her two-tone look was enough to make him understand that she had had one of her ideas and he wouldn't go against her, he didn't even need to know what it was before he accepted.
"Knock yourself out."
After a short time Jean came back, again with the two Military Police Recruits, but they were ready to tell them everything starting right from the position of the least guarded checkpoint.
Elizabeth's next order was for Sasha, Connor and Jean to get on a wagon and go full speed right against it so as to create havoc.
The last point was, for Levi, to capture one of them and take him away from his companions to be able to question him, one influential enough to know what was going on and where Eren and Historia were.
Elizabeth was still leaning against a tree trunk, feeling particularly tired. She had had similar symptoms when she was guarding Minister Nick, but this time she couldn't give in and then she knew perfectly well what it was that caused them. According to Hange, they were a positive sign.
The rest of the squad stood on high alert to guard, armed and ready to attack. When they heard footsteps approaching, they pointed all the guns in the direction from which that noise was coming but Elizabeth would have recognized it among a thousand and she didn't even need to open her eyes to see it.
"It's Levi, don't worry."
"Captain, is he...?" Armin began to see the Captain take a man with him, dragging him.
"With the Interior Police, I've got a few questions for him. Let's move."
The night began to fall and with it came the darkness but for none of them it was a problem, although they were still in the woods and the air was starting to get stiffer than in the brightest hours.
Levi kept beating up the man, giving Elizabeth a particular sense of dejavù, but no one dared to breathe. Of all, however, what shocked the man was to see those two eyes of different colors look at him with such coldness; eyes so beautiful but so scary.
"Stop it!"
Levi kicked him in the face so he stopped moaning.
"Where are Eren and Christa?"
But he didn't answer, on the contrary he laughed.
"Oh, you're so brave. That checkpoint back there was just recruits who could barely wipe their own ass. You think you're some sort of hero, beating them down?"
"What an atrocious thing we've done.." Levi began by giving him another kick, but stopping the toe of his shoe in his mouth. "But what's more atrocious is this mouth of yours. I recommend you start talking while you're still able to use it. Elizabeth, would you like to help me?"
"Why not. It's good to have some practice sometimes."
Levi pulled his foot away from his mouth just to give the blonde the freedom to act as she preferred. She was as dangerous as him, and two weapons are always better than one.
Elizabeth stepped in front of him, pushing her foot against his chest with such force that he was out of breath for a moment but not enough to cause him any real damage.
Her gaze was so cold that the man almost felt like confessing everything he knew, just to get her to stop looking at him. Levi's kicks still hurt him and his body was filling with black bruises, but those eyes seemed to dig into him with ferocity.
That same foot came hard on his jaw, hitting him hard and bleeding his gum but he still didn't speak.
If Levi's movements were quick and full of anger, Elizabeth's were slower and more controlled, she wasn't torturing him, she was studying him to make him speak with the worst persuasion he could suffer.
"You're two idiots if you think I'll tell you something." he murmured, lowering his gaze and then looking up again, regretting it immediately because the blonde in front of him was smiling at him, she had very sweet features and almost did not seem credible as a soldier when she was cheerful, but when she got angry she was even more frightening and that was just that sweetness in the gaze to arouse fear.
Elizabeth's foot came down with a sharp blow to the center of his legs, pounding hard on his member and making it double in his pain, while his breath caught in his throat.
And she, meanwhile, continued to smile with that sweetness of hers, noticed it by the corner of his eye despite being clouded by the pain.
"I wouldn't make her an enemy." Levi murmured, loosening the arms that he had kept folded up to then, definitely satisfied with her work on him.
"Captain Levi asked you a question, answer."
"It's no use... All that's left for you now is to run and hide inside these walls, covered in mud and shit! If you don't turn yourselves in, every last Scout we captured will get the noose, starting with the one most guilty of all, Erwin Smith. And you will be the next Blossom, by their hand or mine."
Levi, on hearing his death threat, saw everything red and with a fluid and lightning gesture lifted the man from the ground, turning him towards the trunk of the tree and pushing his face against it, while holding him still with his hands, a hand, however, locked behind his back so that he cannot move.
And that position was favorable to Levi because he began to apply pressure, twisting his arm a little more.
"Shut up. That's for not answering my question." and then he tightened his grip, not even hearing his screams of pain at how angry he was. "And this is for threatening Elizabeth."
With that gesture, although not enough, he managed to regain mastery of his thoughts, and he loosened his grip until he let go. "Some Scouts' lives are more valuable than others. Only those dumb enough to acknowledge that join us. Tell me where Eren and Christa are at."
The man burst into tears under the astonished gaze of the younger ones and that of Elizabeth who instead the only thing she could think was 'how pathetic'.
"I don't know, I'm not allowed to know. Kenny Ackerman is a very cautious man."
Elizabeth and Levi snapped internally to that statement, while maintaining all their self-control so as not to let others see anything.
"Ackerman?" the Commander asked himself, intrigued by that precise statement.
Elizabeth clenched a fist, hidden by her folded arms position, hoping Levi wouldn't notice. She now understood why Kenny, on the roof, was so amused to see them together; it wasn't because they were Captain and Vice, or because he had raised him, but because they were related and he knew it, but he didn't bother to inform Levi. He had attacked him for fun, exploiting the knowledge he had; he was really smart.
"Is this Kenny's last name?" Elizabeth asked stiffly and seriously.
"It is, but..."
"True, there's a lot of things he doesn't divulge. Especially the important stuff." Levi said feeling guilty. He knew he had nothing to do with it and that she would never accuse him of anything, but somehow he felt dirty. Dirty inside himself because Kenny was a relative of him and dared to get his hands on Elizabeth, hurting the very one person he loved more than anything else in the world. Until that emotion merged with anger and frustration, which he would never show anyway. "But you must have a rough idea. You best try to remember."
"Stop it..."
"You still have plenty of bones left to break."
"You- you're insane!" exclaimed the man in tears, then turning to Elizabeth, of whom everyone knew how much esteem she felt for the Captain for having accepted to be his Vice. "And you are no less in supporting him!"
"Maybe." the Captain answered before Sasha warned everyone to be on guard because she had heard footsteps approaching.
"I told you Captain. It's all useless! One way or another, the Scouts will soon come to an end!" exclaimed the man after being thrown to the ground by Levi, all convinced that it was the Military Police that wanted to arrest them, but Elizabeth saw them coming and it was not them that it was.
"Stop!" exclaimed the Vice Captain, standing up. "It's Hange and Moblit."
With their arrival there was new information for the Special Team of the Survey Corps, which Hange took care to give them directly from the source, showing them a well detailed article already made public. Everyone gathered behind the Captain's shoulders, while Elizabeth sat on his legs, so that they could all read together what those papers said.
"And there you have it. The coup d'état was successful..." Hange explained, smiling and satisfied, in front of them. "General Zackly has control of the capital and administrative district. For the time being, the nobility hasn't rebelled."
"What about the Boss Reeves incident?" Armin asked as Elizabeth and Levi scrambled to their feet.
Hange informed them not only that she had managed to find witnesses to testify on their behalf but also that the truth about the central government and that Fritz was a fake. "All our actions were justified self defense. In other words, we're free people now."
At those words a surge of joy exploded among all the younger ones, who jumped happily, while Elizabeth turned to the Captain. Her eyes were brighter and she wanted to be able to embrace him and express that strong emotion. But she finally decided that, at least with them, there was no reason to keep keeping the secret.
"Oh fuck it." she murmured raising a hand up to the height of Levi's chest, taking him by the shirt and kissing him, then immediately captured by the hip by the free hand of the captain.
The excited and happy jumping of the young people stopped when they saw the two kissing, opening their mouth wide in amazement. The first to recover was Sasha, who started jumping again until Levi's voice made her stop, scaring her a little.
"Oh my God! I knew it!"
"Try to keep your mouth shut, brats." Levi murmured with his lips still close to Elizabeth's and continuing to hold her tight. Yet that gesture had lightened him. It was nice not having to hide anymore, at least in front of them. And then that smile... for that smile he would have done anything, this was only the smallest one. She leaned over again, giving him another quick kiss.
"Yes sir."
"Looks like the gamble paid off." he then exclaimed when Elizabeth stopped kissing him, but without moving away from her. Hange was in seventh heaven in front of them, she was bursting with happiness from all pores: she had been the only one to have seen them kissing and only because she had entered Levi's office without knocking; even if it had to be considered that if it happened a few minutes after the kiss wouldn't be the only thing...
"Yeah. It wasn't just Erwin though. The lone choices of many managed to change the world." Hange answered, already looking forward to a chat between women with Elizabeth who had made the most daring gesture of all. The rest of the team were still partially in shock but they all had such a sweet look on their faces, they seemed so excited about all those discoveries.
"And I managed to kill the three people you loaned me. I'm sorry." Levi then added, looking up at the squad leader as Elizabeth hugged him more to support him. He in response tightened her grip on her side but continued to stare at Hange, too happy to be angry. Besides, she knew perfectly well that it hadn't been done on purpose. "The thing is, part of the Interior Police, their leader, Eren and Historia are somewhere else. If we don't find them soon..."
"I may have a clue about that. All we need is a plan of Elizabeth's and we will put an end to this battle."
Following these events, the fall of the reigning government was proclaimed; the announcement was made after the military occupation of the capital and the administrative district, right on the platform where Erwin was to be hanged. And Elizabeth was ready to give him a good lecture for not asking for her help.
On the wagon, finding some of the refreshment their bodies deserved after so many emotions, the night air began to make their skins shiver. Elizabeth sat sideways, stretching her legs over the Captain's so that he could sit too; her dizziness started again but she didn't want to alarm anyone. The only one who knew everything was Hange, the first to have insisted that she take her place, but in the end the blonde had opted for a solution that would suit both of them. And Levi had found himself participating in a small discussion without even understanding the subject: he had not escaped Elizabeth's malaise, which seemed even worse since the previous time, but Hange did not seem worried so he shouldn't have been either. As if it were easy...
"Miss Hange, you might know where they are?" Mikasa asked, drawing attention to more serious things.
Hange began to tell the Reiss family again, but this time about the incident that occurred five years earlier, just when the Wall Maria was destroyed; of how Rod Reiss was the only one to survive the attack of some bandits inside a heavy stone chapel, where he had gathered with his family to pray, of the latter's reconstruction at his own expense and of the fact that he had sought Historia only after the accident, when she found herself forced to look at the murder of her mother at the hands of the Military Police with her own eyes. "There must be a reason he and his lackeys are after Historia."
"The same bloodline? Is there some secret to their blood?" Levi sayd, with Elizabeth agreeing perfectly.
"I don't know for sure yet, but what really makes me curious is that parts of the chapel are completely wrecked. The chapel itself is stone, it would take tons of time and effort to destroy it. Bandits would take what they can and make a quick escape. Plus, the only one who saw those bandits was Rod Reiss himself. Soon after, he used his own fortune to rebuild the chapel. But why?"
"Very comfortable isn't it? No witnesses." the Vice Captain murmured, focusing on the detail of the material the chapel was made of. Difficult to knock down with bare hands or with a few shots.
"I see you understood that too." Hange answered. "It's actually stranger that there were no traces of titans. Even if I'm jumping to conclusion something this suspicious deserves us checking it out."
"I think ..." Elizabeth noted, placing her elbow on her knee and then her cheek on her hand, looking at an unspecified point in front of her, immersed in her own thoughts. "That this chapel might just be where Eren and Historia are."
"Instinct?" Mikasa asked, smiling slightly and earning a smile in response.
"Then we have a goal." Levi stated before Elizabeth came up with a plan.
Plan that was not long in coming.
The only thing that remained was to make sure everyone was fully aware of the danger they were about to face.
"Understand?" Levi really asked. "He's Kenny the Ripper, he'll be our biggest obstacle. In terms of how much a threat he is, equate him to me and Elizabeth as enemies. No... With those weapons of his he's deadlier than us."
"Then he's unbeatable, at least for us..." murmured Sasha on horseback, flanked by Connie, who, however, only managed to make Mikasa nervous.
"If we could meet up with the troops-"
"Absolutely not."
"I know, absolutely not. If we wait until morning Eren might end up getting eaten!" Connie concluded in awe, now not only by the news but also by his teammate. Armin, on the other hand, preferred to analyze every aspect of that particular danger.
"Though, if what the captain said is true it's not like he has no weak points. I'm sure he's trained plenty but having combat experience is something else."
"I wonder, how is it that you lived with Kenny the Ripper but know almost nothing about him, Levi?" asked Hange, but Levi was honest about this part of the story, he really had no idea and was still furious about everything. He hated that story, he hated the fact that he had kept it from him, but most of all he hated that he couldn't do anything about it.
"Sorry but I only found out his full name not too long ago. Apparently it's Kenny Ackerman. He's some relative of yours?"
Mikasa thought about it for a while but she had never heard of anyone by that name, she knew nothing about it.
"I heard from my parents when they were alive that my dad's side, the Ackermans' were persecuted in the cities. My mom's family was oriental, so being a different race meant they didn't fit in anywhere. Both were people chased deep in the mountains near the edge of the walls so that's how they met and married. But I never found out why the Ackermans were persecuted. My dad didn't seem like a different race like my mom was."
"Has ever been a moment where it's felt like power suddenly awakened inside of you?" Levi asked. Elizabeth looked at him for a moment, feeling particularly proud. She hadn't revealed to him that she was a relative of hers but she was still taking a step forward.
"There was." Mikasa answered confidently but curiously.
"Kenny Ackerman had a moment like that too. One time, out of nowhere, he felt an absurd amount of strength surging within him and he knew exactly what he had to do. I've felt moments like that too."