PART ONE

Chapter Four

When Hange awoke the next morning after her Titan hunt fiasco, Nanaba was talking softly to a red-haired recruit in the sitting corner of her room. As her vision slowly came into focus, she lay there silently, looking at Nanaba and trying to take in everything that had happened in the past twenty-four hours. Last night had been dreadful, although she couldn't help but feel that the real trouble has yet to come. It was as if she had orchestrated her own demise and would soon discover the wrath of the Survey Corps brass. Even if there was the slight possibility that Commander Sadies wouldn't punish her, the same couldn't be said for Erwin or Levi. She never expected it would come to this, and yet, here she was, alive and recovering, with nothing to show for. All she could do now was accept the consequences in line with her insubordination.

"Hey, you're finally up," Nanaba said, turning over her shoulder and noticing that Hange was awake. She walked over and sat on the stool beside her. The red-haired recruit followed behind her, carrying a tray of soup and bread. "Just in time too, Nifa here brought this in from the kitchen. Said some soldier asked her to deliver it to you."

Nifa, with her large hazel eyes and sweet smile, wordlessly placed the tray on top of the dresser, next to the photograph of her grandfather and a vase that contained a single lily of the valley.

"Thank you, Nifa," Hange said, flashing an earnest smile of her own.

"You're welcome. Get well soon, Miss Hange." Nifa turned to Nanaba. "I'll come back tonight to serve her food and medicine. Please let me know if there's anything more I can do, Miss Nanaba." After Nanaba simply nodded, she exited the room as quietly as she had entered.

Hange tried to sit up and rest her back against the headboard. "Don't get up too quickly," Nanaba insisted, steadying her by the shoulders. "How are you feeling?"

"Been better," she replied, blasé. "What time is it?"

"Eleven thirty," Nanaba answered. "You've been out for about sixteen hours."

"Shit…" Hange cursed under her breath. She looked at Nanaba, noticing her uncharacteristically dishevelled blonde pixie cut was and her drowsy baby blue eyes. It made her wonder if the others were as exhausted. And it was all her fault. "Nanaba… about last night…" she began.

"…You don't have to, Hange. I know what you're going to say," Nanaba interjected with a tired smile. "I'm just… really, really glad you're alive."

"No, please, let me apologize. I've put you and the others in danger. If it weren't for me… my impulsiveness… my stupid clouded judgment, none of this would've happened. I left that letter for Sadies, but I honestly did not expect that he'd send any of you to find me."

"Hange, even if Sadies never gave the order, I'd go out there and find you. We are a team… and, if any, you're the closest to a sister I've got," Nanaba said reassuringly.

Hange let those words sink in for a second before changing the subject. "How are the others? Was no one hurt?" she asked.

"Well, Mike had encountered one Titan west but managed to resolve the problem himself. I'm perfectly fine, 'cept that I was so damn worried about you. I haven't spoken to Erwin or Levi yet, but…" Just then, Nanaba was reminded of a brief exchange between the two, when Levi had declared he was specifically heading southwest and to rendezvous at the gate in fifteen minutes. She turned her head to Hange. "…I do have one question."

"Yeah?"

"How did Levi know where to find you?"

Hange took a stray lock of hair hanging down her sweaty forehead and swept it aside. "I… I'm not sure. I was so distracted with everything, but I guess, it's because I mentioned my plans of how we could capture a Titan. The day after the meeting, I decided to try and recruit him. He seemed interested and, for a second, I was confident that he was going to agree. Eventually, he didn't."

"Wow. But he cared enough to listen?"

Hange frowned. "Are you saying that I'm boring?"

"Not at all!" Nanaba said defensively. "You're a pretty interesting person, Hange. You've a reputation that got the community talking, for instance."

"Not everything they say could be classified as positive, though."

"And since when did you ever care about that?" When Hange didn't answer, Nanaba decided to change the subject. She lifted the tray from the dresser and placed it on Hange's lap, careful not to spill the soup. "All right, I think I've delayed you enough. You have an audience with Commander Sadies at sixteen hundred, and I strongly believe that Erwin Smith will be coming along. Just brace yourself for their questions. Sorry I couldn't be there to help out."

"Anyone else?" Hange asked with a mouthful of bread.

Nanaba paused, then at the recognition of her question, showed a tiny smirk. "He'll most likely be there, too. I mean, he was the one who saved you, so it's safe to say he might want some answers too."

"I see…" Hange muttered, averting her gaze from the food on her lap to the petite white flower on the vase.

"If I do get to the chance to see Levi, I'll thank him too," Nanaba suddenly said. "Of course I'm grateful that he found you and rescued you, but I've also noticed that ever since Erwin recruited him in the Scouts, a lot of good things—better things—happened, one after the other. I mean, sure, we still all live in this hell hole, but he and Erwin really did make us feel that the Scouts still had a chance. That humanity could still win."

Hange suddenly felt her cheeks grow warm, energy rising within her. This was like the first time she had witnessed Levi take down an abnormal Titan—his first Titan—and had done so with sheer finesse and speed. That moment had given her the epiphany that extraordinarily gifted soldiers do exist, and they can rise above the Titans.

All those months ago, as everyone advertently avoided their group, she wanted to meet them the first chance she got.

"I get what you mean," she replied, grinning weakly. "When I first saw him fight, it was as if a euphoric sense of enlightenment awakened in me. I believed there was hope for humanity. That there was going to be a future for the people within the walls and that we didn't need to struggle forever. He reminded me of why I joined the Scouts in the first place."

Hange leaned forward in her burgeoning excitement, and the half-finished soup on her lap almost spilt over. Her throat suddenly felt dry and she began coughing vehemently. Nanaba gasped at the spontaneous line of action happening before her and cautioned Hange to take it easy.

"Right, as much as I'm glad you're feeling better, maybe now is not the time to go all enthusiastic," she said, setting the tray aside and helping Hange rest her head down. "You're burning up, Hange. You should get some sleep. I'll have Nifa bring you some medicine."

"Great, now I remember why I'm here. Damn it…"

Nanaba could only give a weak smile. "Would you feel better if I told Sadies you had a crush on him when we were cadets? He might go easier on you."

"Oh, go fornicate elsewhere, Nanaba."

"Hange, darling, do try not to stare outside so much. We're almost there."

The little bespectacled girl pulled herself away from the curtained window of the carriage, and rested the small of her back against the velvet cushion. Seated across from her was her mother, wife of the Chief of the Military Police and a celestial beauty, the lady Aimée Zoë.

At times, Hange liked to look at her mother from a distance and she had thought her quite beautiful, but as she knew very little of her, she could scarcely have been expected to love her or miss her when she was gone. At least this year, on her sixth birthday, she would be accompanying her mother in one of those parties she favoured so much.

Every first of May, the Vicomtesse Nathalie Déboire—matriarch of one of Wall Sheena's great merchant families—would host a lavish ball that was the highlight of the spring social season. This year, as Hange stepped off the carriage and followed her mother as they entered the arched passageway that led to the splendid mansion, she was handed a delicate sprig of flowers by a footman in smart white, blue, and gold livery. She was fascinated by the petite, pendant bell shape of the flowers, and she took a whiff of its sweet scent.

Hange made the long walk to the banquet hall where her mother told her to wait while she mingled with the other bureaucrats, each of whom had an equally exaggerated sense of their own value. At the tender age of six, Hange wondered why the adults around her always liked to talk about themselves—how many servants they have, how much they knew about economics, what bloodline they belonged to. She wondered why she never grew interested in her mother's hour-long directives of which social events were best to attend, nor in her father's narratives about his service to the nobles and the king.

Perhaps because she was the disagreeable, peculiar Hange Zoë.

All of a sudden, she found herself ensconced into a corner, holding her little white flower, watching the flock of silk and top hat ensembles, flashes of gold and silver shining even in the brightest of rooms. She noticed a rotund woman with very red cheeks with sharp dark eyes glimpse at her direction before turning to her confrère who had on a very purple dress and a black hat with purple velvet flowers which stuck up and ruffled when she moved her head.

"My word! She's a plain little piece of goods!" said the stout woman with red cheeks. "And to think that her mother is such a beauty. She hasn't handed it down, has she?"

"Perhaps she will improve as she grows older," the woman in the purple dress remarked. "If only she were not so gangly and did not have to wear those horrid spectacles. She does have a nice expression and her features are rather good. Children alter so much."

"She'll have to alter a good deal! If only her ladyship would pay her more attention. Although, I've heard the professor intends to take the girl with him into Wall Rose."

The purple woman gasped. "How unfortunate! There's nothing likely to improve children at the outer walls—not when everything they worry about is Titans!"

"Indubitably. Raising a proper young lady would be improbable as well."

They thought Hange was not listening because she was standing a little apart from them at the long banquet table. She was watching the big passing people come by and set their plates with crêpes and tarts and refill their glasses with more red wine, but she heard quite well and was made curious about her grandfather and his place in Wall Rose. What sort of a place was it? What was a Titan? She had never heard of or seen one. Perhaps there were none in Wall Sheena.

Since she had been attending parties, ceremonies, and gatherings of the sort, she had begun to feel lonely and to think queer thoughts which were new to her. She had begun to wonder why she had never seemed to belong to anyone even when her father and mother were around. Other children seemed to belong to their parents, but she had never seemed to be anyone's little girl. She had servants, and food and pretty clothes, but no one had taken notice of her. She did not know that this was because she was a disagreeable, peculiar child—but then, of course, she did not know she was disagreeable or peculiar. She often thought other people were, with the sumptuous parties they held snuggled within the high walls of the elite circles, but she did not know that she was so herself.

A soft knock on the door broke Hange from her dream. It was as Nanaba had said: an audience with Commander Sadies et al at sixteen hundred hours. As she notified her visitors she was awake with a hoarse "come in," three men stepped inside the room dressed in their civilian apparel. Erwin Smith was the first to enter before holding the door open for Keith Sadies and Levi, respectively. The commander took to the couch on the edge of the bed, and Erwin sat on the stool next to her. Levi quietly leaned against the wall on the left side of the dresser that displayed the photograph and the flower in the vase. From this angle, he couldn't see her face, but he noticed that her customary ponytail was down and that she was wearing the same pyjamas from that night.

"Good afternoon, Hange," Erwin greeted, breaking the ice. "How are you?"

"Been better," she answered, slightly more nonchalant compared to when Nanaba had asked.

"Nifa told us you're feeling sick. Do you remember anything that happened yesterday?" Commander Sadies asked, his tone unusually calm. It felt eerie.

"Uh, yes, I remember everything, Sir."

"Good. Then that means you can answer our questions. Don't worry, we'll get straight to the point so you could get enough rest."

Hange raised her head gingerly. "You're not… going to punish me, Sir?"

"Oh, of course, we are. But at this point, we need to focus on your recovery. You may not be in the penitentiary, for now, rest assured you're kept under strict surveillance. Do you understand?"

"Yes, Sir."

"Now, let's proceed. My affiliates here may have their own questions, but I only have one: Has your most recent operation produced anything beneficial, Hange Zoë?" Hange blinked, slightly confused with the question. She parted her lips to ask for clarification until Sadies beat her to it. "Let me paraphrase: Did something—anything—good for humanity result from your departure? You were willing to risk and sacrifice your own life, and that is not something to take lightly. Was it all for nought?"

Hange could feel her eyes start to water as her blood rushed to her face. The air around them grew pregnant with a heavy and awkward silence. Her hands clenched tightly on the thin blanket. "It was all for nought, Sir…" she painfully confessed. "I was impulsive and foolish. I did not listen to my comrades who had strongly discouraged me. It was all my fault and I am prepared for the consequences…"

Keith Sadies bent forward. "Something tells me you still want to say more, Zoë. Go on."

Hange gulped, her glance momentarily catching Erwin and Levi's indecipherable gazes. She folded her hands on her lap and looked at Sadies. "I just wanted to say that I did what I had to because it was all for humanity, Sir. Everything I do, everything I have done up until now, was all for the sake of moving forward. We know that the truth lies beyond those walls and we have tried to seek it out over and over to no avail. Our mistakes costed lives—hundreds of it! If we continue making the same faults, if we never try the risk of something different, if we allowed our arrogance and selfishness to consume us, then we might as well live out the rest of our lives as fucking decrepit livestock!"

Hange could not suppress the tear that fell down her cheek, the cold sensation a stark contrast to her hot face. Commander Sadies stood from the couch and drew nearer to her. His dark eyes torrented over hers, and Hange felt trapped under his gaze, like a firefly inside a glass bottle.

"Do you know why I had Erwin and his squad go after you? Do you know why you are here now, and not a pool of rotting flesh outside the walls?" he asked her, hiding his arms behind his back. "I had sent Erwin, my successor, Mike and Levi, our strongest soldiers, and Nanaba, an experienced mentor, and risked their lives. I know full well what it means to lose even just one of them. Yet, I had full faith and trust that they will succeed, because I know that they are special. Hange, you are here because you were saved by someone special. You are here because I believe you are special. I cannot afford to lose anyone of you; as I've said, I know full well what it means to lose even just one of you."

Hange wiped away her tears and tucked away the strand of hair that fell over her face once more. "I'm truly sorry, commander." She didn't know what else to say.

"Right. As I am needed elsewhere, I'll be taking my leave. Erwin will debrief you. Seems like there's more of this business for you three."

A minute passed after Sadies firmly closed the door behind him, and only then did Erwin choose to break the silence. "We all share the same sentiments, Hange. We have a common goal. But the pathways towards reaching this goal may differ among us, and so are the motivations why we want to achieve our goal. Those are subjective. However, we can't always rely on our own dispositions. Others will always be involved. Need I remind you Hange, that you are still a soldier, and must follow orders. That is your training. Regardless of your brash and reckless tendencies. You are also a Scout, and what you do is tied to the name of the Survey Corps. Right now, the higher-ups hold us by the neck and if we slip up one more time, there may no longer be a future for us. I hope you understand what I am saying."

Hange nodded slowly like a scolded child, then she forced a smile. "I never got to congratulate you, Erwin. You'll be the commander soon. Bet you'll work me to the bone, huh?"

Erwin smirked, somehow amused. "Of course, Hange. In fact, I was planning on appointing you as a Section Commander. Perhaps having additional responsibilities would make you more mature and less impulsive."

Hange made a flippant face. "If can't trust myself, Erwin, what makes you think I could lead—"

"You wouldn't know for sure unless the opportunity is presented to you. I know you enough to say that you will do it," Erwin interjected. "I won't take back what I said years ago. I don't intend to take Commander Sadies' assessment of your intelligence and talents for granted, either. We need you, Hange. We're a team." Erwin's eyes shot her a tiny smile, then standing up from his seat, turned his attention to Levi. "We'll have dinner at the mess halls. Meet us there when you're done here."

"So, you're not going to stay and watch me beat the heaping shit out of her?"

Hange, clearly perplexed and suddenly mortified, almost leapt from the bed. "W-Wait! What?!"

Levi craned his neck to her. "I made a promise to Erwin that if I find you before a Titan kills you, I'm going to teach you a lesson. You may be a woman, but you're also a soldier. And it just so happens that you're in no position to fight back."

"Erwin, wait! Levi, y-you can't possibly be—! ERWIN!"

Too late. Erwin was out the door, and Levi was slowly approaching her with a pernicious glare. "Levi, no, please! I said I was sorry!" she squeaked. He towered over her, cracked his knuckles, and Hange clamped her eyes shut. She raised her hands up, defensive yet still helpless, bracing herself against the blow of humanity's strongest. Still, she found it oddly exhilarating that if she were to make it out unscathed, she would have gathered some experience points (and data) on Levi's strength relative to physical human-to-human combat.

His middle finger met with his thumb, and in a rapid motion, flicked her square in the middle of the forehead. She whimpered as his finger made contact, but her eyes were still closed and she expected more pain to come; but when ten seconds passed and nothing happened she slowly opened her eyes, and the first thing her short-sightedness focused on were those indifferent blue-grey eyes, Levi's face mere inches away from hers. She blinked multiple times. "Huh…? Wait, so you're not…?"

Levi sighed, then backed away. "I'm not fond of pointless violence. I could beat the shit out of you, make you bleed and cry… though I doubt anything I do to you now would really make a difference. And the thing is, I don't disagree with you. After listening to all that you've said back there, about why we fight and why we take up chances even if we're uncertain of what lies ahead, made me think of why I decided to stay in the Survey Corps."

"I meant it when I said sorry," Hange suddenly said, turning to Levi. "I lost myself yesterday… I forgot my duty to the Scouts, and I was careless with my own life. All of those, I've done out of personal reasons…" She averted her gaze. "I'm really sorry, Levi."

Levi watched her for a silent moment. She was looking at the photograph on the dresser. He followed her gaze. "Was it because of him?"

Those words caught her off-guard. Hange turned her head towards Levi. He was looking at her now. Was she being so transparent? Or was he watching her, trying to see if she'd show anything else…? Show him something he was searching for?

"Professor Lewis Zoë. Once a veterinarian, his unstoppable pursuit of knowledge had transfigured him into a brilliant scientist, renowned and respected even by those pigs under the royal government. He's your late grandfather, right? So, was it because of him?"

"How do you…? Did Erwin tell you things?"

"Yeah, sometimes, he tells me things. Guy's talkative as shit."

"Oh… I see."

Hange chuckled lightly. Her mind was hazy, but the memories of her grandfather were vivid. Good memories. "I'm not going to say that I did what I've done because of my grandfather, but I'm not going to deny that he's influenced me in a lot of ways. But the recent news about his death triggered something… something vestigial within me…"

Her voice was tender when she met his eyes.

"I guess I didn't realize that I was grieving him… and I somehow felt compelled to take on his goals of seeking out the truth. I wanted to become a soldier after he died because I never wanted to go back to Wall Sheena. I…" She trailed off, realizing she was beginning to divulge so much.

"Erwin told me that it was likely he died because the government wanted to permanently silence him. Like his own father," Levi interjected, bringing the subject back.

"Yeah. Erwin was adamant that the Military Police had to do something with it. Couldn't blame him, though. Good thing he was old enough to enlist in the Cadet Corps when they did it…"

"But is it true? Was your grandfather killed by the scumbags in the MP?"

"No, he wasn't," Hange answered simply. "Grandfather stepped out off the Walls on his own. No one was with him—no team of colleagues, no military escort, no one. Just him. That's what my mother had written in her letters, anyways."

"So, you're still not a hundred percent sure." Levi made sure he sounded more like he was arriving at a conclusion than making an inquiry. "Right. Sure, let's say finding proof of your grandfather's death is going to settle that internal conundrum that's been haunting you forever, but Hange, that doesn't mean you lose sight of the game. You're distracted."

"Because it was relevant!" Hange maintained. "Or so I thought… Yes. I had a really hard time coping after my grandfather died years ago, but it wasn't just that he died—it was also that I've only gotten to realise some of the harder truths. Nothing would be accomplished if we allow others to hinder us. His primary interest had actually always been the Titans, despite the royal government's incessant dissuasion on the subject. But that never stopped him from moving forward. We know how to kill Titans because of him. We could predict their behaviours because of his theories."

Levi leaned and looked toward Hange, saw the faint pink on her face. Either it was the late afternoon haze or she was catching a fever. "That's just the thing, people have always something to say. Look, Hange, I'm not disregarding the old geezer's contributions nor am I going to harangue you on how to make decisions, but you've got to think about whose opinions do matter, and if they do make sense, use that damn brain of yours to come up with a judgment you'd least regret."

Just then, the sound of a soft knock came from the door and Nifa timidly entered, bringing Hange her dinner of wheat bread, chicken soup, and some medicine. They've been talking for some time, even Levi wasn't able to notice it was getting darker outside.

"Pardon, Miss Hange! I thought you were asleep so I let myself in—" Nifa glanced at Levi. "Oh, I d-didn't mean to interrupt anything!" she stammered, considering she might have walked into a private, intimate scene. Hurrying, she crossed the room and placed the tray on the dresser next to Hange, similar to how she did earlier that afternoon. Her attention moved to the grimacing man sited on the stool with the ankle of his right boot resting on his left knee. "Um, I was able to deliver the soup you asked me to, Sir…?"

"Levi."

"Sir Levi." She piped gauchely, overtly uneasy with his intimidating deadpan. Instead, she turned to Hange's more approachable face. "Please excuse me, Miss Hange. I'll come by again tomorrow morning. Rest well."

Levi let out a grumble the moment Nifa was out of the room. "Tch. That's the second time that nuisance asked my name." He quietly stood from the stool. "I didn't expect we'd talk this long. Erwin and the rest have probably finished off. I should probably be heading out too…"

Before he could take a step further, Hange grabbed on his sleeve. "Hey, um, it's not healthy to head to bed on an empty stomach. It'll wake you up in the middle of the night and probably ruin your circadian rhythm…" Disarmed with Levi's glaring and lifted brow, she reluctantly continued. "It's my fault you didn't get to leave sooner. I talked a lot. The least I could do is offer you some dinner."

Hange took the plate of bread off the tray and handed it over to Levi, smiling as she did so. She always smiled. Somehow, whatever the circumstance, she always found a reason to. With a huff, Levi received the bread and tore off a piece, only realising how ravenous he was after he took a bite.

They shared the meal of bread and soup in comfortable silence, and for some reason, the act of eating together—as the sun outside began to fall beyond the horizon—almost seemed to resemble the peacefulness they had felt twenty-four hours ago.

…