It was decided that the challenge would take place in the servants' dining quarters at the very back of the Scouts' current castle base. It was an extremely bare room, filled only by a wooden table and chairs. It was far enough away that they wouldn't be likely to disturb any of the new recruits or the other scouts.
"Bean Boozled?" Petra repeated the name, her lips quickly curving into a grin. "That's a fun name." She dropped down into the seat next to Hange as the latter ladled some colourful beans into Petra's bowl.
"I thought so!" Hange enthused as they poured a second ladle into Petra's first bowl before reaching around to start filling Levi's bowl, on Petra's other side. "It's a fun word, isn't it? A fun word for a fun challenge."
"Tch," the captain grumbled as he grabbed the chart from the middle of the table, depicting the bean colours and potential flavours. "What's so fun about eating dog food?" He scanned the list again with a distasteful curl of his lips. "Or vomit or…. Seriously, Hange, what's the matter with you?"
Petra wondered how exactly the notoriously disgusting-things-grossed-out man had been coerced into taking part. Had Hange challenged him to? Blackmailed him? The ways of the highly intellectual scout were mysterious indeed but Petra wouldn't deny that it was good to have the captain here.
"I know it's out there," Hange poured the second ladle serving into Levi's bowl. "But it'll build some endurance and, it'll make any kind of meal you have in the future taste that much better than some of these beauties."
"Out there?" Oluo scoffed from across the table where, Petra regrettable noticed, he was mimicking the captain's position yet again: this time he had one arm laid across the back of his chair, his opposing elbow on the table, fist propping up his bored-looking face. "It's barmy. Why would something like this even cross your mind? This is so stupid." He watched as Hange, apparently realizing the nuisance of stretching across the table, rose up to carry the massive bowl of beans instead.
"No one forced you to come," Eld pointed out from the end of the table with Levi, Petra and Hange on one side and Oluo and Gunther on the other. The seat on the opposing end of the table was empty for now. "If you haven't got the stomach-" he added as Hange approached to bring his serving of the beans.
"Shut up. I'm not backing out. I'm just pointing out that it's weird." Oluo's tone was defensive. There was little chance of him staying away when not only all of their squad was taking part but the captain too. Not to mention Hange and the commander, whenever he chose to appear. Oluo had too much pride to leave them all to it and, admittedly for Petra, that was going to be part of the fun.
"Sometimes weird's fun," Eld gave him a grin. "You know, that feeling, Oluo, when you enjoy yourself? Then again maybe not."
"Can't say I disagree with Oluo," Levi mused before Oluo could bite back at Eld. Instead, Petra saw Oluo straighten up in his seat, smugness levels soaring. Oh man he's going to be unbearable. "But Hange's got a point about eating shit." Levi added.
"At least that's not a flavour!" Hange pointed out as they ladled beans into Oluo's bowls.
"I think everyone here would draw the line at that flavour," Gunther remarked, his nose wrinkling.
"Yeah," Hange agreed. "Even I wouldn't go that far." They filled up Gunther's bowl then Erwin's and finally their own before retaking their seat next to Petra. "Anyway, I've tested all of these myself." They reached down to the floor and brought up two bottles of whiskey.
Levi lowered his face into his hand with a growl. "Alcohol, Hange, seriously? Are you trying to give everyone a hangover?"
"Between all of us, we won't get that drunk." Hange waved off his comment with a frown. "And believe me, this stuff is quite effective for chasing the flavours away." They began filling up people's glasses a little bit. By the time they'd finished, the bottle was nearly half empty.
Petra lifted her glass and examined the amber liquid.
"Not had whiskey before?" Gunther asked and she nodded.
"Slow sips," Levi advised. "Unless you like having your throat scorched on your first time."
She glanced at him while Eld and Gunther snickered and began to reminisce about their first experiences with the drink. Levi's eyes held Petra's own briefly. He had such beautiful eyes, Petra mused as he looked away. It was a shame that he spent so much time grumbling and growling at people. She felt her heart flutter and she took a careful breath, trying to smother the feeling that beat away in her chest, looking for any opportunity to escape.
Behind them all, the door creaked open and quietly closed as Erwin finally joined them. "Apologies," he announced as he took his place. He eyed the whiskey and the two bowls in front of everyone - one full of beans and one empty. "Very well, Hange, I think we're all just about ready."
"Yep," Hange reached into their bowl and plucked out a white bean with coloured bits on it. "Birthday cake or dishwater," they read out before tossing the bean into their mouth. After a moment munching, they grinned and shoved both their fists into the air at once. "Birthday cake!"
Hange's enthusiasm seemed to encourage everyone else to begin eating their beans. Petra plucked out a peach coloured one and eyed the chart in revulsion. Peach or vomit. She brought a hand to the back of her mouth and swallowed back the bile that threatened to rise up her throat. Here goes. She lifted the bean and cautiously bit into it. As soon as she did, her mouth was flooded with a vile, burning flavour. She grabbed her empty bowl and spat her bean out with a gag.
"Vomit," she choked, lowering her bowl so it was directly within spitting distance. Taking Hange's advice, she took a large sip of her whiskey - too large a sip as it turned out when her throat was assaulted by an unusual burning sensation. It wasn't unpleasant but she did gag.
Levi's hand moved to her back, giving it firm pats. "Slow sips," he reminded her. Petra's eyes watered as she nodded. Watching the captain, she saw that he was still chewing his bean. "Toothpaste," he murmured.
"Hmmm, the pear one is quite tasty," Oluo declared pompously with a smirk in Petra's direction. Petra scowled, hoping that he'd get a nasty one next.
"Chocolate," Gunther declared in approval before plucking another brown one from his bowl. He tossed it in his mouth and began to chew. He promptly spit it back out, snatching his whiskey glass and swigging from it.
"Dog food?" Hange giggled, receiving a glare in return.
"Fucking hell," Eld croaked after spitting out his yellow bean. "Rotten egg." He stared at Hange, like he was about to ask what possessed them to use rotten egg but then he appeared to think better of it. "Holy Walls," he grumbled, A sip of his whiskey later and he was still grimacing. "Not enough." It took two more sips before his face returned to a neutral expression.
Erwin lowered his drink and eyed his discarded bean with some amusement. "I'm not even going to ask whose boogers these were, Hange."
Grimaces spread across the table at the thought. No one wanted to point out the obvious answer that they were Hange's.
Petra fought back another sick feeling in her throat. Why, why, why did I agree to this again? It wasn't the most disgusting experience of her life (pissing herself on her first expedition still claimed first prize for that) but now the commander's comment was quickly rising through the ratings, along with her vomit bean.
Levi cast yet another glare at Hange as he was already picking his next bean. He chewed it for half a second before spitting it out. "Dead fish." He took a sip of whiskey. "Hange, you are disgusting. I should drop one of these in your fucking tea."
Hange irritated him even more with their easygoing smile. "Now now, hang in there, Levi."
"Shut it, shitty glasses."
Oluo's smile was even more smug after his next bean. "Birthday cake."
Petra flipped him off after she spat out a bean that had unleashed the lingering taste of dirty socks on her tongue.
Gunther and Erwin simultaneously threw up their beans. "Old bandage," Gunther croaked. "Hange, what's wrong with you?"
Even Erwin's face had a tinge of green to it as he sipped from his drink. "What exactly possessed you to have vomit ones?" he asked, voice remaining calm.
"Or booger ones," Gunther joined in.
"Or rotten egg," Eld called from his end of the table.
"Come on now, guys. This is good resilience training for your tastebuds," Hange told them, chewing on a strawberry and banana one. "That's what we scouts do right? Go big or go home."
"More like go straight to the infirmary with a stomach bug," Eld choked as he glared down at his booger bean.
Petra finished the rest of her glass with a careful sip. She could already feel a pleasant buzz entering her brain.
"The blueberry's pretty tasty," Hange remarked. They plucked out another bean and leaned back in their chair to enjoy it. Their expression soured instantly and a brown bean dropped into the waste bowl in front of them. "Bleugh," they complained after a sip from their glass. "The dog food aftertaste really lingers doesn't it?" they asked, only to be met with glares of varying severity.
"I wouldn't know," Oluo boasted which drew more of the glares to him instead.
Petra adjusted in her seat, reaching out her foot in a swing to kick Oluo but her foot met a much closer target instead. Embarrassment painted her face as Levi grunted next to her. As he spluttered mid-chew, that embarrassment immediately evolved into mortification and she reached up to pat his back.
"I am so, so sorry, sir." She bowed her head at once.
"It's fine," he murmured, gently shrugging her hand off. "Watch your aim."
"Yes, sir."
"Let one off did you, Petra?" Oluo snorted. "Dear me, that's not ladylike at all."
"Oh get fucked, Oluo!" Petra fired back, redness spreading down her neck.
"Is that an invitation?" he smirked, unfazed.
"Dude," Gunther cringed. His face suddenly began reddening as he bit into another bean. "Holy Rose, Hange, did you make spicy ones?!"
"Oh yeah!" Hange snapped their fingers, "I did."
Gunther's eyes jumped to the chart nearest him. "That wasn't on there."
"Huh?" Hange picked up their own. "I'm sure it… oh," they remark, "I guess I missed it."
"Oi, shitty glasses, you've missed a few more." Levi had picked up his chart and irritated eyes were switching between the chart and the bowl of intact, untouched beans on his left.
Hange began to sift through their own bowl, examining the chart in their other hand.
"This butter one is quite tasty," Erwin commented.
Oluo suddenly choked, spitting his bean out. "Is that mud? Tell me you didn't make mud ones, Hange." He made gagging motions with his mouth, poking his tongue in and out in disgust. "This game is fucked up."
Hange wasn't listening and continued their examination.
Petra, chewing on a pomegranate bean, watched Oluo. "Careful, Oluo," she warned him. "Keep flapping your jowls like that and you're going to-" Seconds later, Oluo cried out a curse and Petra sighed. "-bite your tongue."
"Tch," Levi had lowered his chart and took another bean. A yellow one ended up in the impressively growing pile in the waste bowl while he rinsed his mouth with whiskey. Petra thought she heard him muttering about where Hange could shove their rotten eggs.
"Ah yes," Hange interrupted them all and there was a slight flush in their cheeks as they spoke. "I did the charts last month. However, I remember earlier this week I was working on some new flavours. I must have forgotten to add them to the chart."
Erwin sipped from his drink. "You've been pulling a lot of late nights this week, Hange running experiments with Eren and Levi Squad. You should rest earlier tonight. It's one thing to miss something for this game, it'd be another thing if it impacted your work as well." Although he spoke with a firm tone, his eyes held compassion as he looked into Hange's. He reached out to touch their arm.
They nodded once. "You're right. You don't need to be concerned."
"That's debatable," both Levi and Oluo commented at once. While Oluo looked thrilled, Levi simply shot his subordinate an irked look.
Hange ignored the comment and turned in their chair to address everyone. "I can't remember every new flavour I added so…" they grin sheepishly, "we'll just have to see what comes up."
"I thought you said you've tested them all," Petra questioned
"Mayybe I did," Hange swayed from side to side. "There are a lot of flavours and I've been pretty busy." They patted Petra on the shoulder. "It'll be fine. I haven't poisoned anyone so far have I?"
"So far being the operative word," muttered Levi.
"I hope you know, Hange," Erwin teased with a soft smile, "the Scouts don't have the funds to get you a lawyer if this all goes south."
There was more than a flicker of regret in many faces around the table yet despite this everyone continued eating their beans. Perhaps no one wanted to be the first one to back out of the challenge. Many minutes passed with pleasant hums of surprise mingled with spluttering curses and gripes along with questions about Hange's sense of propriety. All the while Hange just grinned at them all, taking all the amusement out of their tastebuds being assaulted while somehow managing to pick out very few of the bad ones themself (which provoked accusations of cheating from Eld and Oluo).
Petra hit a streak of good beans, enjoying the taste of pear, mango, chocolate, cheese, birthday cake and blueberry. Levi's mood lifted once he tasted a tea-flavoured bean but he was loathe to concede to Hange's fishing for compliments beyond telling them that the tea one was "decent enough".
The whiskey glasses had been topped up again and then again. Erwin reluctantly allowed the retrieval of two more bottles after experiencing a bad run of beans. He also sent for two jugs of water to be brought as well after picking two spicy beans on the trot.
Petra let out a hiccup as she picked up another bean. Two thirds of her beans had been eaten and the buzz of enjoying sweet things was wearing off. She examined the white bean with interest.
Levi glanced at her with a raised eyebrow then at her nearly empty glass. "You're new to whiskey and on your fourth glass already? Slow down, Petra. I'm not carrying you back to your room."
Petra pulled a face at him, stubbornly lifting the glass to her lips again. "Don't need you to, Captain. I'm fine." She raised the bean to her mouth again but faltered when an ear-splitting yell cut through the room followed by the sound of wood scraping on stone.
Oluo had pushed his chair far back from the table, his face a picture of revulsion. "What-what was that?!" he demanded, pointing at his waste bowl. "What was that? That tasted like fucking sweat!"
Eld burst out laughing. "How do you know what sweat tastes like, Oluo?"
Oluo's face, already pink from drinking a lot, began to turn crimson. "I- shut up. That's not the point. Hange, why would you put sweat as a flavour?"
As faces turned towards the scientist, Hange had gone very still. The humour had left their face and their eyes were widening slowly, as if something terrible was entering their vision. Their cheeks were paling. Erwin leaned in, placing his hand on their wrist, blue eyes focused on them intently.
"Hange?"
"Oh Titans," they muttered. "Holy fucking titans…"
"What's wrong?" Petra popped the bean into her mouth and blinked as saltiness immediately embraced her tastebuds. It wasn't a bad taste, just unexpected. There was a kind of creaminess to it but it didn't taste like any cream she'd ever tried before.
Hange leaned their elbows on the desk, "Ah, I got it wrong." They mutter.
"What did you get wrong?" Erwin pressed, squeezing their wrist.
Hange continued to stare ahead, as if barely aware of the attempt at comfort. "Those flavours I was working on," they begin to explain, rubbing their temple with their free hand, "they weren't all supposed to be used. I… I was drunk when I made some of them."
"That's reassuring to know," Eld teased.
"I… it was the day after I was taking samples of everyone," Hange reflected, their brows furrowing deeper and deeper. "Erwin, you thought you might be falling ill because you were sweating too much-"
"Oh my fucking god, you didn't?" Oluo slapped a hand over his mouth. He looked on the verge of being sick. "Oh that's vile, Hange."
"Please tell me you didn't." Erwin's face was contorting now.
"I… I'd hoped that I dreamed it." Hange's breathing hitched as they spoke, shame colouring their face. "I fell for my own trap. The next day I saw a jaw of beans that had similar colours to the others and I…"
"…assumed you'd left some out by mistake," Gunther filled in.
"So I just tasted Erwin's sweat?!" Oluo gagged. He rose to his feet and downed the rest of his whiskey. "That's it," he declared. "I've had enough! That's my line!" He practically charged from the room and no one made a move to stop him.
Eld and Gunther wore matching sickening expression which Levi had disgust battling exasperation over his features. Petra's stomach churning was somewhat offset by the salty aftertaste left by her own bean which she had already swallowed. Although now she was beginning to question what flavour she'd been given.
"Fucking hell, Hange," Gunther exhaled. "You need to be locked out of your lab when you drink."
Hange held their head in their hands. "I may do," they mutter, "because… I think it gets worse."
"You said you drew the line at shit beans," Eld argued.
Hange nodded. "And I do. But around that time I took the usual… semen samples from the men, didn't I?"
Levi stiffened, his hand tightening on his glass. His body was completely taut, the muscles in his forearms (the sleeves having been rolled up by now) stood to attention, straining against his pale skin. Petra eyed him with growing alarm. He'd ducked his head, dark bang hiding his eyes from her view. "Tell me you really weren't that fucking stupid," his growl was so low, it was barely audible to Petra.
"Oh fuck no," Eld covered his own mouth. "Hange no."
Hange's head was bent so low that their forehead was almost touching the table. "If I was sober, I could say yes for certain but… when I woke up the next morning, one of the little jars was empty."
Erwin exhaled heavily, saying as seconds of a silent, terrible silence passed."Whose?" he asked finally after a number of deep breaths.
Hange lifted both hands to clasp the back of their head. They mumbled something.
"Whose?!" Levi suddenly snarled, voice cutting like a whip. "Speak up, four-eyes."
Again, Hange muttered something incomprehensible.
Levi lost his patience. His chair dragged against the floor before he stormed over towards Hange, yanking their chair back. His chest heaved with raging breaths.
"Levi!" Erwn snapped at him. "Calm down."
"Not until I get a damn answer!" Levi shot back, his fingers digging into the back of the chair so hard, Petra thought he might actually break the thing.
"Hange," Erwin pressed again.
Petra could hear Hange's deep breaths before the brunette slowly began to sit up straight. Bitter shame was painted over their face. "Levi's," they admitted.
Erwin bowed his head as he, Gunther and Eld exhaled in relief.
With a growl, Levi shoved himself away from the chair and strode across the room. "Of all the crazy things you've pulled, shitty glasses, this takes the fucking cake!" he practically roared. Eld and Gunther flinched and exchanged grimaces.
Meanwhile Petra's cheeks were doing an excellent impression of tomatoes at the thought of how close she'd come to actually consuming her captain's… She took another sip of her drink and welcomed the distraction of the feel of it down her throat.
"I'm really sorry, Levi." Hange pushed themself to their feet and looked her shorter comrade in the face. "I would never have done something like that sober. It was a drunken fuck up. I'm sorry."
'"You're a fucking idiot," Levi snarled, folding his arms and forcing himself to lean against the wall to calm down, head bowed.
"It was an incredibly stupid thing to do," Erwin agreed patiently. "But it was done while Hange was drunk and overworking themself. We can't change what's been done. We don't know if anyone's even eaten any of those beans anyway. Hange, do you know what colour they were?"
Hange was still watching Levi with guilt shining in their eyes. "White."
Petra's face turned ashen at once, her mind freezing on the image of the white bean she'd just eaten. The one she'd just enjoyed very much. Heat burned through her, restoring pinkness to her cheeks and then inflaming it. Oh god. Oh god. Oh god.
Levi was still breathing heavily. "I didn't eat any white ones."
"Neither did I," Eld said with Gunther offering his agreement too.
"I didn't," Erwin remarked although there were two of them sitting at the top of his bowl now.
"And I didn't," Hange spoke with forced composure. They eyed Petra. "What about you, Petra?"
Petra's hands clutched at the edge of the table, knuckles whitening under her grip. The words were slow to come, crawling up her throat like they were fighting to stay inside. "I…. I ate one."
Gunther flinched in sympathy while Eld groaned slightly. Hange lowered themself into their seat with an apologetic stare. Erwin closed his eyes, pinching the bridge of his nose. Petra didn't dare to look around for Levi's reaction but seconds later, she heard him mutter, "Shit".
"I guess it was too much to expect all of us to dodge them," Hange murmured. "And Oluo may have had one too." They leaned their face into their hand for second or two before lifting it out again, brown eyes growing larger. "Wait, there were still two flavours," they pointed out. They rounded on Petra again as Erwin opened his eyes and Levi raised his head. "One was buttercream. You might have had that one instead. Did it taste like buttercream? Buttercream would be very sweet and… well, Levi's…" their speech faltered on registering Levi's dirty look, "would have been quite salty. Which was it?"
Petra lowered her head, welcoming the way her hair swung in front of her face like a shield. "It-it wasn't sweet." Silence met her words and shame began to thread through her, intertwining with the heat. She heard her squadmates suck in harsh breaths and her hands dropped into her lap, nails digging into her palms. Again, she couldn't bring herself to look Levi in the eye. How fucking awkward was this? Some harmless fun game night this was. Hange's error in judgement had just dropped a horrific wedge between Petra and her captain now. How could they hope to navigate something as shameful as this?
"Are you sure you ate a white one?" Gunther's voice was quiet and gentle. "I can't see one in your discard pile."
Petra could swear the redness in her face had spread down her arms now. "I… I didn't spit it out."
You could have heard a pin drop in the aftermath of that confession. The silence weighed on Petra like carrying a fallen comrade. She hunched over, clenching her fists so tightly that she was on the verge of drawing blood but right now she didn't care.
"So you liked it then," Hange spoke. There was no malice or teasing in their words but bright curiosity. Far perkier than they'd been in the last few minutes. "You liked the taste of it enough to swallow."
Even without the teasing note, hearing those words just compounded Petra's humiliation, pushing her over the edge of how much she could sit here and put up with. So she leapt to her feet and slammed her fist over her heart in a feeble salute. "I don't want to-" the words broke up as they left her mouth. "I'm-" When they failed again, she gave up and ran towards the door, throwing it open and ignoring Hange's called out apology on the way.
Racing through the castle helped to chase away some of the high from the alcohol, lending her more focus for navigating the hallways and staircases.
It wasn't until she tripped halfway up one staircase and landed hard on her knee that she realized that she was crying. Tears dripped onto her hands and with them, quiet sobs slid from her. Her chest shook with the outpour and so she stayed where she was for now, with one hand and knee propping her up and the other hand pressed against her mouth, muffling her cries.
A few minutes passed before her cries subsided and she began to scrub at her face with the back of her hand.
"Petra."
She turned towards his voice with a horrified expression. Why did he have to come along and see her like this?
"Are you hurt?" Levi questioned, advancing on her.
"N-no, captain. I'm fine," Petra quickly rose to her feet and stepped backwards so that there was room for him to pass her. "I'll get out of your way."
"I was coming to find you."
Petra ran a hand over her face again. "Please sir, no. I- Can we not? Tonight was humiliating enough."
"We're not letting this fester, Petra." Despite his firm words, Levi's voice was amazingly softer. "Let's go to my office." Climbing to her position on the stairs, he placed a hand on her back and steered her to walk beside him.
It was, thankfully, a short walk to his office and Petra was grateful to sink into his chair and not rely on her legs for a bit. She clasped her hands, resting them in her lap while Levi brought out two glasses and a decanter of whiskey. He poured some into a glass and held it out to her. She shook her head.
"Do you want some tea?"
Again, she shook her head and stared down into her lap. She heard him settle into his seat across from her.
"None of tonight is a reflection on you," Levi pointed out. "This is all on Hange and their stupid experiments. You don't need to be ashamed."
"I can't help it, sir. The last thing I want is for things to be awkward between us."
"It needn't be," Levi leaned back in his chair and sipped from his tea. "It all comes back to Hange. As long as we focus on that, there'll be nothing to dwell on."
The way he said it with such confidence was a little disheartening. As soon as she recognized that, she felt stupid for thinking it. Wasn't that the smart way to go about things, the quickest way to getting back to normal? To forget this had happened. To reclaim their bond as teammates. He was offering her a way to ignore that great, stupid wedge altogether. Ten minutes ago, isn't that what she would have wanted?
She was not so sure now. Why did she feel so disappointed? Because he could dismiss it so easily and his lack of discomfort or embarrassment (not that he was prone to showing much of either most of the time) suggested a lack of interest in something else. Something she had wanted for a long time. Could this be the hint she needed as to how things stood one way or another. She wouldn't expect him to reveal his feelings back there in front of the others but here, now, where he could see that she was affected? Would now not be a good time to test the waters? Could he not even suspect that her upset over this might run deeper?
But that was assuming that Levi would see and handle things the way she did and he wouldn't. He was too different, too guarded. They were right back where they'd always been and Petra began to realize just how frustrating that was. Tonight had moved them no further forward in either direction, even with Hange drawing attention to how much Petra had liked that stupid bean. But Levi hadn't seemed to latch onto any implications that that may have had, at all. Admittedly, it was a weak implication to begin with but still, it pissed her off.
The prospect of keeping her feelings bottled up was not a pleasant one. For a daring moment, Petra seriously thought about telling him, about getting all the awkwardness over in one day. Then at least she could move on. She wished that she'd finished her drink. It might have given her the liquid courage she needed.
Instead, she just sighed. "Whatever you say, sir."
"Petra." The word contains hints of command and concern in equal measure.
She couldn't bring herself to look at him. The disappointment was too heavy and she wondered if any of it showed on her face.
"Petra."
Petra's fingers played with each other over and over, providing a good focus for her stare.
"If you've got something else to say then say it." His blunt tone, normally a source of amusement for her, now cut into her, aggravating her frayed nerves. Her fingers continued to toy with each other, pressing harder each time. As she inhaled, she heard him sigh once again. "Petra, just come out with it," his tone softened.
She raised her eyes to his grey-blue ones and knew that now was the moment, if there was going to be a right time tonight. This could all be over by tomorrow. She clenched her fists as she embraced that thought. No regrets was the advice that he generally gave out. Strong advice for someone like him who didn't like socializing all that much beyond the people he respected. Advice that might mean short term disappointment but would mean more long term focus on her duties.
"I… can't…" Petra exhaled hard, stifling a frustrated growl at herself. "I can't just brush tonight off, Captain. Things just got too close." She tucked hair behind both of her ears as she steeled herself. "I've been holding back for a while now and tonight, things could have come out in front of the others. I don't want that so I need to say this now and-and I'm sorry if this is inappropriate, Captain, okay?"
Although Levi's expression remained neutral, his eyes blazed with flares of curiosity and suspicion. "Spit it out then."
"I'm in love with you."
It astounded Petra how easily the words tumbled out of her mouth now that she'd committed to saying them. As she exhaled, she felt so much of her nervous energy fly out of her, making her smile. Not all of it escaped though. Bubbles of it remained in her stomach, latching onto the fact that she had completed her end of what needed to be said. Now it was up to Levi to respond.
It extremely rare for anything to fluster or faze the captain and, in truth, whenever Petra had thought about this moment, her imagination had lingered only on the potential negative responses: scoffing at the idea, irritation at the impropriety of her feelings, discomfort at the position she was putting him in, or just being outright dismissive of the idea. Sometimes she'd even imagined harshness coming from him, paired with rebuking remarks about her acting like a lovesick child.
Reality painted a different picture.
A tiny wisp of air passed from his lips that was not quite a gasp (he was far too controlled for that). His eyes were what drew Petra's focus. For some lingering seconds, they seemed wider, taking years out of his features as he gazed at her in undisguised disbelief. His jaw had loosened just a little, making him appear as though he was frozen in the midst of something to say.
Nothing was said and silence began to fill the room instead. Petra's hands continued to fidget as she resolved to give the man as much time as he needed to process her confession. She lowered her eyes to her fingers again, her shoulders hunching as anxiety drew her into its clutches.
"Do you?" Levi's sudden question rattled her. There was no anger in it nor was there any irritation, mockery or cruelty.
Petra's head jerked up in her own disbelief. Of all the questions he could have asked, she hadn't expected him to doubt her. Or was he giving her a chance to back out? To blame her confession on the whiskey and give them both an escape. Five minutes ago, she might have been tempted but not now. Not now she'd finally said the words. She felt stronger for it and she wasn't going to walk backwards from that.
So she fixed him with her most determined look and shuffled forward in her chair. "Yes," she told him emphatically. "I love you. I've loved you for a long time."
Something in her voice must have convinced him because he rose from his chair, moving around his desk until he was in front of her, leaning slightly on the corner. Petra couldn't entirely suppress the tremble of uncertainty and desire she felt when her leg brushed his thigh. His hands moved to her elbows, guiding her out of her chair. She stood up and his hands clasped her arms tighter.
"Sir?" Petra murmured as he leaned in, head tilting. Her heart began to pulse faster and harder with every inch he closed between them.
Levi's lips parted as they brushed against hers, silencing her question. She leaned into it, eyes closing as she returned the kiss. Her soft sigh was swallowed up by her captain's mouth caressing her lips with a tenderness she'd hardly expect Humanity's Strongest to be capable of. It was remarkable how good he was, how each touch flooded her with contentment and joy. He tasted of whiskey, thankfully, though there were hints of some of the nicer flavours he must have had before everything kicked off. Petra tasted pear and peach in particular. His fingers on her elbows slid down to her waist, holding her with similar care, not venturing too low or too close to her breasts. Her hands moved upwards to rest on his shoulders - strong shoulders that carried so much more than people thought.
A tiny whine escaped her when he broke the kiss though she was in too much of a haze to care about it. He brushed his nose against hers, eyes on her lips.
"You…?" she questioned.
His mouth curled into something halfway between a smirk and a smile. "Isn't it obvious?"
Her cheeks coloured. "Wasn't obvious until now," she murmured, drawing out a chuckle from him. He reached up to cup her cheek.
"You still need to hear it?"
"Please." She didn't intend for it to come out so begging but she had to shut down the possibility that this was just a moment for him.
His lips brushed hers again. "In love with you," he spoke against them.
That possibility vanished and Petra's smile widened as she kissed him more fully.
Her arms looped around his neck, his around her back so they both balanced against his desk. Not the best position but right now neither of them cared as they lost themselves in their kisses. Gentle smacks of skin and satisfied sighs filled their space as their hands roamed, securing them against each other.
"How long?" Petra asked eventually, leaning her forehead against his. Her chesty felt dizzyingly floaty and euphoric - the earlier embarrassment pushed out of her mind for now.
"A while," Levi murmured against her cheek.
"I couldn't guess. You didn't…"
Levi huffed a little. "I wasn't going to be that creep who tries it on with his subordinates," he grumbled.
She giggled quietly. "I just pictured you and Oluo."
"Are you trying to ruin the mood?" Levi sounded nauseated. He stroked the back of her hair, tangling his fingers in the strands. "You waited a long time too."
"Mm," Petra agreed. "I was trying to suss you out first. Turns out you're a pain in the ass to suss out."
"Tch. I should write you up, talking to your superior officer like that."
"Go ahead," Petra's voice turned playful as she nudged her nose with his. "I might even look forward to my punishment," she whispered between kisses.
His hands pressed her harder against him. "You'll be lucky."
