10 | High as Hope

hope (n.): desire accompanied by expectation of or belief in fulfillment; a feeling of trust.

"Do you know what I'm asking of you?"

Camille nodded.

The truth was, of course – I don't know if I can actually repair that boat, she thought guiltily.

Not for certain. Not permanently. Maybe not even long enough to last the rest of the evacuation.

But something had to be done. She met Pixis's appraising eyes again and cleared her throat. "I'll do everything I can, sir."

Pixis stared into her face.

They were alone in the tent again, the Commander having sent the soldier from the 2nd brigade to stand by the lifts so they could talk privately for a moment.

He shook his head. "No, I don't think you know."

Pixis was silent.

Then he sighed – and Camille watched his shoulders sag and the lines on his already aged face deepen, like something about this conversation alone was draining. Not the situation on the Ister, nor the general evacuation; it was having to talk to her that made him look so stretched and weary.

"You heard the report. You said this would be protected technology. This matter would fall under MP jurisdiction."

"I didn't forget, sir. The ODM plans are also under the MP's lock and key. I don't expect this to be different."

Pixis made a dismissive noise. "That's a given. I'm talking about what comes after.

"What it means to be watched by the MP's. What you're about to embark on is an easy way to catch their attention. If you're lucky, this will only cast a shadow over your immediate military career. But it could easily eclipse the rest of your life."

Her eyes had slowly widened as he spoke. Not so much at Pixis's words, but his tone.

"Given your background in Mitras, they'll have every reason to be cautious. It's why there was so much fuss about your recruitment, after all." Pixis crossed his arms. "I'll confess, I was curious too. Why would someone with so much to gain waste it on the military? I thought this person wouldn't be doing this unless they were receiving some kind of benefit elsewhere. It wouldn't be new. The methods of the MP's are varied…"

Click.

A jolt had run through her every nerve and wakened something in her mind. Words slipped before she could remember she was speaking to her commanding officer, "You thought I was working for the Royal Government? The MP's? Like some kind of spy?"

Her chest welled with disbelief. But her mind refused to let go of the thought; the more she contemplated it, the more the loose gears seemed to fit in place – "All those questions about my time in Mitras. About why I enlisted. I thought you just liked to pry."

To her complete surprise, this only broke Pixis out of his seriousness, because he gave a roar of laughter. The motion lifted the wrinkles at the corners of his sparkling eyes. "You're right. I am nosy. You'll undoubtedly recall that our first conversation was about the Walls; you were wary of me until I mentioned that – it added credence to my suspicion that you were an MP plant, tasked to root out troublemaking soldiers in the Garrison.

"It didn't completely make sense – for example, it seemed too obvious and wasteful to send someone like you just to spy on the other branches of the military, but the MP's were never known for their prudence. You stuck out like a sore thumb with your background; I wanted to see what would come out of such an unusual trap.

"If you really were only here to stir trouble for my Combat Engineers, I could have handled you easily because I placed you in Central Command with me. But on the off chance you weren't…"

"…you sensed an opportunity," Camille finished. She lifted a hand to her head as she inhaled sharply. "Commander, you think of everything."

Pixis preened at the open praise, his smile as wide as a cat's. "I do enjoy watching you run around on my errands. An aide does extremely personal work – I wanted to see if the MP's were stupid enough to try and deceive me right under my nose.

"But what I saw in the few months you joined us in Central Command – nothing short of able. I saw someone sincere, earnest to do their best. Like a puppy, really. You could join the theater if this was all an act."

Unwittingly, the hand that had been clutching her hair moved to cover her face because she felt herself flush.

Teacher's pet, she'd been accused of multiple times in university. She'd once been called airhead and the men in her class had made tons of jokes that she'd mistakenly wandered into an engineering course instead of something more traditional for a woman, like literature or music.

Then she began topping exams and the men moved to teacher's pet and more spiteful names like Laplace's bitch.

Her lids were heavy as she blinked and willed the memory away.

"I knew with full certainty you couldn't have been an MP plant when you came back from Shiganshina. Someone working for the MP's would've used the chaos and slipped away the first chance they got. But this only brings us back to my question. Do you know what I'm asking of you?"

Her vision focused around Pixis and the stern set to his shoulders.

Her shock had long worn off since Pixis told her he was sending her down to the Ister.

He'd announced this with no ceremony at all, passing it off casually like he'd been talking about the weather. In truth, he was knowingly breaking the MP's rules and condemning her career to MP scrutiny.

"What would you have done, Commander, if it wasn't me you were asking?"

Pixis tapped his chin and pretended to think. "Hmm. I could have asked the Engineers in the 2nd brigade to make the best of it. Which isn't much, I suspect they've already failed at repairing the engine. The rescue ops would take priority, and we'd have to abandon the ferry line on the Ister."

He mimed at moving the markers on the map that had sat on his table since the beginning of this whole ordeal. "We'd have to stretch us thinner than we already are. We'd be down a vital evac route – the boats on the Ister are the safest way to evacuate the most vulnerable refugees on the western half." The older man cracked a grin. "No pressure."

Camille mirrored it mockingly. "You talk like I have a choice, Commander."

He laughed. "You're right. You don't. But I wanted to see if you'd protest, even just a little bit."

"I appreciate the thought, sir," She resisted rolling her eyes. Instead she straightened her back, and saluted. "I'll be ready when I gather some tools, sir."

Pixis beamed. He turned around, shouted Stefan!, and reached around his desk for his pen.

"You'll need extra hands. The only ones we can spare will be the privates working in the supply squads. Viktor will peel off three for you. Make it someone you know, who'd take your orders as a junior officer."

She already had in mind the three unfortunates who were coming with her. All the graduates from the 99th had been placed on supply squads, after all. "Yes sir."

They stared at each other for a while, as Stefan hurried into the tent, fresh from a visual inspection and putting away his telescope. The adjutant immediately commenced work on drafting her new orders, even as he raised a curious brow when Pixis mentioned where he was deploying her.

When Pixis stood after signing the order and he sent Stefan off again, he again stared with a curious tilt to his head. The ink was barely dry on the paper when he gingerly held it out for her.

"Camille?"

It only occurred to her then that Pixis had been calling everyone in Central Command by their first names.

Everyone, including her. Just now.

And Dot Pixis patted her once on the shoulder, smiling.

"Your parents raised you well. A bit too willing to jump into danger if it means doing the right thing, I would say. But you make a good soldier. I'd worry if you were placed under the command of an officer who was only interested in himself."

Pixis winked. "Luckily, you don't have worry about that with me, do you? Come back to Central alive."

Your parents raised you well.

What an odd thing to say just as she was about to leave.

And yet there was no time to dwell on it now, not when she was riding to the Ister with the motley bunch she'd handpicked from the privates working on the supply squads –

"What's the Commander thinking?" Rico yelled over the furious sound of their horses stomping through the backroads. "We heard that the boat on the Ister had broken down, but to think that he would send you – "

Camille could only laugh as she spurred her own horse. "Does it look like I know what goes on in the Commander's head?"

"You're his aide, aren't you?" Ian groused from her left. "If there was anyone, it'd be you!" Behind him rode Julian, looking both terrified and amused at the turn their conversation had taken.

She'd found the three privates working at the base camp outside Trost. Viktor had somehow even managed to get her four horses, one for each member of the temporary squad she put together on Pixis's order.

Her old squadmates from the 99th Training Corps had evidently been expecting to get chewed out by Viktor – why else would the second in command of the Garrison be summoning them – until they saw her standing beside Viktor with ODM gear and a pack strapped to her back, saying she needed their help.

"They say he drove his last one crazy, you know," Camille mentioned blithely, "He asked for a reassignment all the way in Utopia. The Commander wouldn't give it to him for months until – "

Rico tossed a murderous look over her shoulder. "Quit chattering! Can you fix it?"

Camille glanced at Ian. She'd been apprehensive about him the most, knowing they still hadn't made up since graduation. He and Rico had dragged her to the infirmary when Wesseling gave her that black eye on her first Friday brawl, but they'd hurried off to their posts after that.

But he readily volunteered for this mission. And all she could see in Ian's amber eyes now was the same question Rico was asking.

"I can't say for sure that I can," She answered honestly. Camille looked ahead. They were drawing closer to the forests now, where the broken-down boat was waiting with the stranded refugees. The 2nd brigade would be there too, doing what they could. "But the Commander would try anything now. The evac route on the Ister's too important, and we're already stretched thinner than you'd think."

"So the Commander knows?" Ian's somber voice was barely louder than the wind rushing in all their ears. "Everything? About your – "

Camille clutched her reins. "He knew a little from my candidacy file, but I told him about my mother's repair shop just as we received the report from the 2nd brigade. Just in time, I guess…"

Rico tsked. "You would've volunteered anyway if he didn't know. You're just as reckless as him," The silver-haired girl shot off. "Maybe you do understand him."

She blanched at the thought that she was anything like Pixis. "He's just rubbing off on me, and not in a good way – "

" – I'm not the one who lied on my recruitment form. If that isn't reckless, I don't know wha – "

Camille reached over and whacked Rico on the shoulder.

"Hey!"

"Did you have to say that in front of Julian?"

The scene on the Ister wasn't the frenzied chaos she'd glimpsed when she met Colonel Reinhart yesterday.

Instead, there was a small crowd of refugees lined on the riverbanks, waiting their turn to cross an improvised bridge made of wood floating on the water's surface, flat planks stacked on top, and rope binding the entire thing together. At this section, the Ister couldn't have been more than thirty meters wide; the current was placid for now, and with the time and resources available, the pontoon couldn't have been better constructed than if her own mother had made it. Camille felt a surge of pride for the Garrison.

When she looked across the river, she found the rest of the refugees gathered near the treeline, a wall of weathered and hungry faces with their ragged hands clutching at the persons next to them and their belongings. Surrounding the refugees, including closer to the riverside, were the 2nd brigade's soldiers, wearing their ODM gear and keeping watch.

The first person she was taken to was the commanding officer on the scene – Colonel Winters, who was in conference with his Combat Engineers captain.

Colonel Winters was a thin man and well into his forties; he exhibited none of Reinhart's terror, but the worry was heavy in his eyes when the soldier introduced her and her motley crew. His Engineers captain looked to be just as old as him, and was stood beside him with her arms folded and face crossed with displeasure at the sudden interruption.

Winters spared her a look before fixing his grim gaze on the soldier. "What is this?"

The soldier cleared his throat. "Uh, sir, this is Specialist Leto from Central Command with her squad—" And he looked at her, panic written all over his face, the bravado from earlier suddenly gone when placed under the scrutiny of his own officers.

Camille didn't flinch. She saluted, "Specialist Leto, sir. Currently the Commander's aide, but I was one of the King's trained engineers before going into service. Commander Pixis sent me to repair the ferry," she gestured at the privates she had behind her and continued to speak in a tone calmer than she felt, "this is the squad accompanying me."

The Engineers captain, Roebling it said on her flak jacket and Camille felt a spark of familiarity at the name, made a noise of extreme disbelief. "You expect me to believe Pixis had a royal engineer hidden up his sleeve this entire time? We could've used your help ages ago – "

"Emily," Winters said sharply. "I've heard of this one. This is that junior officer from the 99th," The brigade commander made no motion to hide the way he scanned her head to toe, "The university graduate. Or so they say."

"You're telling me that incompetent, bald-headed prick put her on his personal squad instead of one of the Engineers squads where she could've been useful to somebo – "

"Quiet," Winters shot her a glare, though Roebling didn't wilt one bit. Gravely, Winters addressed Camille again. "You say you're here to fix that boat? We'll spare whatever help we can. Emily, if you will."

She noted the familiarity in that command. And the way Winters addressed Roebling or the way the captain spoke back to him; Roebling grunted with a nod. She motioned for Camille to follow her, and the younger woman hurried with her squadmates.

"How providential," Roebling muttered when Camille finally caught up to her. "We send a report to Trost about this damn boat and Pixis just happens to have a spare engineer lying around. And not just some two-bit mechanic from the Underground either, but a bona fide royal engineer."

She stopped and gazed at Camille with suspicion. "You are one of those, aren't you? You weren't just lying?"

Camille nodded once. "Yes ma'am. My certification would be three years old by now, though."

Roebling snapped her fingers and continued towards the ferry. Her tone was more distracted than sarcastic by then – "Good. I was starting to think only someone close to the MP's or Mitras could fix it. I've never seen anything like this."

The older woman's voice seemed to attract the attention of the remaining few refugees that still hadn't made the crossing. Camille knew Rico and Ian were also watching the refugees as Roebling only continued to talk loudly, "The machinery is below deck. A gas explosion shook that room up, down, left, right, you name it. All the levers and valves were disturbed – we managed to seal the canisters and tubing that were leaking, but that's about all we could do. You might just be what we need at this moment."

"Did you hear that? Someone's arrived to fix the boat! We can get out of here!"

"Could it be? The MP's – "

" – No, look, they're wearing Garrison uniforms – "

Roebling glared at the gossiping refugees, including an old man staring wide eyed at them that another soldier was currently helping across the wobbling pontoon. "Hey! Watch your step on that bridge old timer, you could've plunged right into the river!"

Camille studiously ignored the whispering and helped her squadmates board the empty ferry. Roebling stayed on the ground, looking up at her on the ferry's deck. "You do know that we've got a joint operation with the Scouts downriver, right?"

Behind her, Rico murmured, "We might be rookies, but we'd at least know that much."

Camille likewise ignored that and signaled her assent to the Engineers captain below.

"Alright. We'll holler if something's gone wrong and we need to clear the area. You holler if you need something. Keep one of those privates you've got with you on standby for advisories, my Engineers already have their hands full."

She looked back at her squad, and like he'd read her mind, Ian met her eye before glancing at Julian. Julian, luckily, seemed to understand this too. "I'll be lookout."

Camille communicated as much to Roebling. The older woman nodded. "All set then."

And thus their work began. Camille squeezed Julian's shoulder – he'd gotten taller and bulked up since that first year they spent together in the Training Corps. His eyes seemed to flit this way and that, a sign of his nervousness, and Camille knew the sudden anxiety was from being reminded that they were on the battlefield, far away from the safety of Trost.

The titans were just downriver after all – where the joint unit was keeping them occupied, while they tried to fix the situation upriver and get all these refugees to safety.

"Don't be too nervous," Camille uttered, "The 2nd brigade's a veteran unit. We're surrounded by soldiers with more experience. But we've got to do our part."

Julian bobbed his head. And he took one deep, shaky breath, before cracking a small smile at her. "You always know what to say."

Camille put her hand down and put one foot into the ferry's only doorway. Before her was a narrow staircase that descended into darkness, with only a dim light at the end.

"Just don't get complacent. I might've put us together again as a squad, but only because it was less trouble than picking people I didn't know. You should be ready to leave at a moment's notice – whether on orders from the 2nd brigade, or because the joint unit failed downriver, or because I failed to repair the ferry."

She didn't see Julian's expression, but she imagined it was sufficiently chastised, because she caught the tail end of a yes ma'am as she went down into the belly of the boat.

"You didn't have to pull rank with him."

The staircase was painfully cramped, considering she was wearing both ODM gear and a pack full of random tools she swiped from Trost. She kept a hand on one wall, the wooden boards smooth and worn beneath her fingertips as she carefully made her way through the darkness and toward the flickering light below.

Ian's light reprimand had come from right behind her, and made the hair on the back of her neck stand on end. The boat was dead quiet except for the sound of their breathing, the rustling of their gear, and their footsteps.

"Don't make me scold you too, Private Dietrich. I'm an officer, I'll have you know."

Camille breathed a sigh as her eyes struggled to adjust to the lack of light before her.

"I didn't tell you guys, but I was near Shiganshina in the early stage of the invasion. The titans tore through one of the vanguard units in minutes. We need to be ready for the worst."

The memory of Kostya, of Reinhart, of Hannes gripping her back as they both rode away from the scene, was raw. It was one thing to give a dispassionate report about the events to Pixis, but it was another to relive the entire thing, that acute feeling of panic and relief, of guilt and determination, in the darkness.

Pain branched through her heart, and to her head; Camille blinked slowly, laying a palm on her chest for a few moments as she continued down the stairs and her heart calmed again. She almost didn't hear Rico's gasp.

"You were there?"

"Barely. I was ordered back as soon as things looked bad."

All was silent for a moment.

Then came Ian's somber voice: "If we're lucky, it'll be the same for us."

They reached the bottom of the stairs. The three of them carefully made their way toward the candlelight, which illuminated the dark engine room enough to show the outlines of the unlit lamps on the walls of the boat.

One by one they went about and lit them with their matches, until enough of the yellow-orange glow filled the room to reveal the damage done to the ferry.

Camille put her pack down carefully, turning about the room in dazed wonder.

There were rows upon rows of tall gas canisters. Pistons in varying points of ascension in their cylinders; meters and meters of rubber piping; giant gears and wheels attached to cranks and levers; weights and chains and valves controlling air pressure –

– the sheer scale of it all, this massive behemoth of steel and iron, just sitting underneath the ferry's deck, converting compressed gas into movement so powerful it could ferry thousands of passengers up and down the river every day, every hour –

Camille laid a gentle hand on the machine. Its iron was old and rusted in some spots; it flaked off at the giant gear's teeth, and only then did she feel a true sense of its age. She'd known even at first glance that this engine was old, but touching it felt like touching history.

"What's wrong?" Ian's voice broke her out of her thoughts again. "Can't you fix it?"

The question startled a laugh out of her. "No, I probably can. Might even be easy, in fact."

When she continued to be silent, only staring at the iron machine in front of them, Camille took a deep breath.

She pointed at the gears. "The Royal Government doesn't manufacture gears like this anymore. We don't use this way to arrange the gears anymore either…" Everywhere she looked, she could imagine something smaller, stronger, faster. Newer. Less wasteful. "…this engine has to be at least forty years old. I've seen its kind once. My mother took me to see a dam near Quinta. It was huge enough to need its own building, and they used it to pump water out of the land and make some canals."

She knit her brows and left the rest unsaid. These boats were neglected. They could be built differently – better, in other words, and maybe this ferry wouldn't have broken down, and more people could have been evacuated by now.

But the real question was why.

Why was she the only one here who understood this? Why couldn't have Roebling fixed this? Why had the government ignored these boats while the military held the latest tech?

The ODM gear she had strapped on felt heavy and incongruous, despite being made of the lightest aluminum alloys and the most refined ultrahard steel.

What was it? Did only the military deserve the latest inventions, while the civilians had to suffer with 40-year old engines?

Camille shook her head.

Later, she resolved. One thing at a time.

"This should be quick," She reached for the inside pocket of her flak jacket, where she'd stashed her black book of Pixis's appointments and her pen. She motioned at Rico and Ian. "Come over here, you two."

She flipped the notebook to a blank page and drew as she observed the engine. The gas canisters were supposed to be connected to the motor through a mass of pipes, and it was the air pressure from the gas, controlled through a series of valves, that powered the motor's movement. Two pneumatic cylinders did the work of converting the gas into a force that moved the hulking iron gears in cyclical, rotating motion.

The gears were further connected to the chains that went up the room's ceiling. The momentum from the gears travelled through these chains; they pulled the rollers on top of the boat in continuous motion, nudging the boat forward along the rails that guided the vessel through the river.

A closer look upon the crankshafts connecting the huge gears to the pistons looked like they'd been blasted open at the bolts – as if the force from the explosion had blown them apart. The valves that sealed the air pressure in the cylinders had also been disturbed; lastly, the gas canisters had to be reconnected to the pistons.

The cranks were easy enough to fix with Rico and Ian's help – they made quick work of holding up the cranks while Camille bolted them back together. Resealing the cylinders was easy with some rubber rings they scrounged in the engine room – leftovers, Camille guessed, from the last time the engine had been officially retrofitted.

"Now comes the tricky part," Camille uttered, slightly out of breath, and staring at the gas canisters as Rico inspected them.

Ian came up to them, face glistening in the candlelight and jaw-length hair sticking to his forehead. The engine room was hot after all, with little to no air from the outside coming in; none of them had shed their flak jackets, let alone unbuckled the ODM gear from their bodies as they went about fixing the engine.

"Time for a haircut, eh?" She teased as she lifted one of Ian's sandy brown locks with a light hand. "You should've tied it back at the very least."

Ian huffed while he stretched his spine. "I'll cut it when you cut yours. We can even go together if you want."

"Deal," Camille agreed instantly. "When I get my head shaved, you're getting yours shaved too."

Ian raised a brow. "Like hell we will. You never cut your hair once when we were in the Training Corps."

Camille tossed him a spare hair tie from her jacket's front pocket with a wink. "Got me there. Rico, what do the canisters say?"

Her silver-haired friend stepped out from behind the wall of metal cylinders. "Military compressed gas on the yellow ones," She said, wiping sweat off her forehead as she rejoined the other two. "I wrote down the label on the blue ones in the back." She handed Camille a note. On it was an acronym – ATG – that Camille recognized as the government designation for a different compressed gas.

This, Camille knew, was what made the engine so dangerous and why the government had decided to hide it from the public – the fact that it was being powered by the same military compressed gas that went in the ODM gear.

The real chemical source of the military gas was of course a mystery – Pascal College had never discussed how the gas was extracted, nor even if gas was its natural form. The only things she knew about it came from Laplace, and only because he had once mentioned it to her in one of their afternoon chats.

The common assumption is that the military gas is a natural gas with properties similar to other natural gases like, shall we say, propane. Then Laplace had tapped his nose, smiling knowingly.

All rubbish of course. The military gas is a perfect resource. More stable than any other gas known to man, and lends itself to so many uses. One wonders how humanity was blessed with such a material.

Naturally, Camille added with a wry twist to her lip, the government put it under their lock and key. And now only the military seems to have access to it.

"We need to balance how much military gas the engine gets," Camille announced as she folded Rico's note and hid it in her pocket. "And how much ATG it gets. This is a two-cylinder engine, I'm sure we can figure it out fast. I'll teach you guys how to reconnect the tubes."

The engine roared to life when Camille finally flicked open the valves on the gas canisters a little while later.

First came the low whistling of the pipes filling with gas, then the groaning of the pistons grinding awake, as they began their first cycle of pumping gas in and out of the cylinders; the great gears soon joined in, as they spun and completed their slow, powerful revolutions. Everything hummed that droning, monotonous hum of a machine working the way it was meant to.

The humming poured in everyone's ears; it was less loud than Camille expected given the size of the engine, but it was a comforting racket, like the sound of a clock ticking.

Tick-tock, Camille imagined the familiar noise, as she closed her eyes and listened in to the engine working.

Tick-tock.

Tick-tick-tick.

Beside her, Ian breathed a loud sigh of relief and Camille felt him slap her on the back, accompanied by the smallest of his laughs. Rico whooped, and Camille couldn't hold back the grin on her face any longer.

Orange seeped into the edges of the blue sky when they emerged from the depths of the ferry, not even a full hour since they arrived at the Ister that afternoon.

Colonel Winters and Roebling were already on deck, apparently having heard the sound of the engine starting. A terrified looking Julian stood off to the side, intimidated by the officers' sudden appearance – "Well?" Roebling almost shouted; Winters had that same pinched look of worry from earlier, but now Camille could see a glimmer of hope in his eyes as well.

Camille helped her squad out of the stairs first before replying. "Engine's fine, ma'am," She then turned to the colonel, "But the boat's not moving. There's a problem with the rail – the line that keeps the boat on track – it's slackened, and the rollers on the boat aren't getting any traction to pull the boat forward."

Roebling nodded quickly, but a grin had already split her face open. "Thank god! That'll be easier to fix than the engine – but we need to start organizing the refugees again – "

" – My squad and I'll handle it, ma'am," Camille interjected quickly. "We stopped the engine to save gas while we find the nearest winding station on the river. One of us is going to stay behind to start the engine again after we fix it. We can use signal flares to let you know when we've wound the rail and it's safe to start – "

Winters shook his head. "You can't. We're using signal flares to communicate with the joint unit in case of emergencies. You'll have to send someone with the message manually."

Roebling snapped her fingers again. "Henry's right. The nearest winding station is downriver – stick to the riverbank, you can't miss it, it's only five hundred meters away. You send a rider back here so we can start the ferry again.

"We'll send the rider back when it's all clear on our end, and you get out of there as fast as possible. Downriver is no place to be, unless you've got the Scouts with you."

They had already picked Rico to stay behind and start the engine when they fixed the rail – but now they had to pick someone else, as the rider between the two communication points.

"I'll do it," Julian volunteered again. "I'm the lightest. Ian's stronger than me too, so he'd be more useful to you."

Camille found no complaint with this – and soon enough they were hauling themselves back on top of their horses and bidding goodbye to Rico.

"Eye on the sky, Specialist," Roebling said before they left. "And keep it pointed towards the south. Only two colors you need to watch out for: red for titans, black for titans and a prayer. If you see either of those, you need to hightail it north as fast as you can."

They were off; there was no time to waste, not when they were so close to getting all the refugees out of the area. Fixing the engine had been quicker than anyone expected, and Camille was keenly aware of the hope that had suddenly risen in the air when she, Ian, and Julian left to find the winding station down the river.

But success with the ferry or not, this was dangerous territory: the further south they rode, the closer they were to the joint unit. Winters had told them the joint unit had so far contained the titans in a valley to the south, but there was no accounting for chance, or a titan that happened to wander this deep into the mountains.

They spotted the winding station easily enough. It took the form of three towers – two on each side of the river, and one that rose out of the water, connected to the other towers by a stone bridge. Boats were meant to pass below the bridge, in the spaces between the towers; the towers themselves housed extra cables that made up the rail guiding the boats.

They decided to let Julian standby with the horses while Camille and Ian climbed up the nearest tower.

"I don't like this," Ian said behind her as she hoisted herself into the tower interior. It was an old thing, and reminded her of the stone structures in Wodan; the windows were little more than openings in the walls, and let in plenty of sunlight. Camille stepped out of the tower and onto the stone bridge, walking towards the tower in the middle.

"Me neither," Camille readily agreed. "Imagine how Julian feels. He's down there with the horses. I'd pee my pants if I had to do that, knowing the titans are close by."

The cables that made up the rail had unwound more than they thought. The boat being idle for so long had let the cables slacken out of the hold of the rollers on the boat, to the point that there was a pool of cables submerged in the water below the towers, carried there by the current.

They passed through a stone doorway. Inside the middle tower were two giant reels of cables, and two cranks that felt disproportionately small in comparison. Camille immediately understood: one crank was for winding and unwinding the rail for the ferries going south. The other was for the ferries going north.

"Lend me a hand, will you?" Camille rubbed her palms together, then put it on the grimy old crank for the north-bound rail.

Ian mirrored her actions. They were shoulder to shoulder, with all four of their hands on the crank as they began pulling. Camille guessed that the crank was indeed meant to be operated by two people with the way the reel eventually began winding the rail, lifting the cables that had been submerged in the water.

It was still a ton of effort however, and because they were still wearing their ODM gear, they kept bumping into each other as they pushed and pulled, slowly, languorously, while the winding reels clattered and screeched in their ears –

Camille felt a vein in her neck throb. She had possibly split one of her fingernails as well, because the crank had the most abysmal texture from decades of use, and because she positioned her hands wrong when she pushed the crank downwards – "This would be easier if you weren't so damn tall, Ian – "

"Shut it, midget," Ian snapped, and she his envisioned his teeth grinding themselves into dust with the way he was clenching his jaw.

"Careful," She panted. The crank was giving more resistance now, signifying they were almost done winding the rail. "Bite your tongue now, and I think you'd die from the blood loss."

They reached a point where the crank refused to move. Camille spotted a second lever near the reel and hoped for the best – "Hold it down! I need to lock the reel in place!"

When she slowly relinquished the crank, Ian's eyes bulged in their sockets as he stood rooted in place, two hands on the crank, pulling it toward him with all his might and holding the cursed rod in place.

"FUCK! HURRY UP, CAMILLE!"

She began pushing the lever into the opposite position with all the strength she could still muster.

"Camille. Camille. Camille!"

"I'm – " She huffed, putting all her weight forward, " – trying, you – " her arms burned and screamed in exertion, "jackass!"

"Ca – shit!"

And suddenly, the lever snapped into place. Camille practically dove into the ground, not expecting the sudden loss of resistance. She hit the stone floor cheek and shoulders first, but she sat up immediately, wanting to see if it had worked.

It did – Ian had already let go of the crank and the reel didn't budge.

Wide-eyed, Ian rushed to the tower's window. "Julian! TELL THE 2ND BRIGADE TO START THE FERRY!"

Camille collapsed back into the floor, a near-soundless laugh spilling from her lips.

She placed a filthy hand over her eyes as she continued to giggle breathlessly, her whole body wracked with overwhelming relief and joy.

"We did it," She breathed, "we did it. We did it."

She felt Ian's hands on her shoulders. When she lifted her hand again, she was met by Ian's reluctant grinning. She held his cheek, huffing and puffing as she patted him on the face. "We did it."

He helped her sit up. Then Camille saw the drop of blood on his lip – and her laughter doubled. "You idiot. You bit your tongue, didn't you?"

"My cheek. And look who's talking," Ian scowled, though she could see he was also fighting a smile. "You broke one of your nails."

The river water was cool on her hands.

They'd taken a few minutes to observe the giant reel in the tower, knowing Rico would be starting the ferry engine soon; when the cables only vibrated but nonetheless stayed in place, they knew that the repairs had been a success. They climbed out of the tower not soon after, Ian readying the horses, and Camille crouching by the riverbank as she washed her hands.

The Ister's water was slippery and cool on her fingers as she rubbed her grimy palms together, wishing to get rid of the grease and dirt that had accumulated from the day's work. The tower machinery had been particularly squalid, betraying how it had been left untouched for years, possibly decades.

Ew, she winced. Her finger had turned into an unpleasantly dark shade of purple, with some blood seeping from beneath her torn nail. I better not be getting an infection from this.

"I hope you can forgive me," Came Ian's voice again.

"What's there to be sorry for?" Camille rubbed a stubborn smear on the skin of her wrist, then gave up and dunked her hands in the water again. "I would've felt the same way. You worked hard and got to be top of the class. I came in second, but I'm the one who ended up becoming officer."

"Still. I shouldn't have taken it out on you."

She paused.

"You wanna apologize that bad? Fine, I accept your apology."

She stood, shaking out the water from her hands. Ian stood some meters away with the horses, reins already in hand; her pink-nosed filly neighed as Camille continued to shake her hands dry.

There was nothing left of the blue sky now, which signaled the imminent sunset. For half a second, Camille could almost believe that they were still in the Training Corps; they were on a training exercise again, and she and Ian had gotten separated from the squad – he waited impatiently while she cleaned a wound she'd gotten out of clumsiness, and he was about to suggest that they move southwest or something, so they could rejoin Rico and everyone else…

"I didn't have a lot of time to dwell on it, I'll be honest," Camille sighed, smoothing her damp hands over her hair before gazing into the distance, watching for Julian's returning figure. "The Commander has been keeping me busy. I haven't even gone back to my hometown since we graduated."

A rider on horseback appeared on the horizon, sticking close to the riverbank. Julian. Camille turned to scan the sky, and when she was satisfied that it was clear, she faced Ian with a smile. "I'm happy I got to see you again, even if I had to pull you and Rico out from the supply squads and drag you down here to do it. Thanks for agreeing to this."

The corner of Ian's mouth twitched. "Any time, Specialist Airhead," they both turned to gaze at Julian's approaching figure, "I hope you get to see your family soon."

Their youngest squad member drew close enough for them to see his face, and Camille was about to shout for what news, until he pointed – "LOOK OUT!"

Ian reacted first. He looked behind them, and only until Camille saw the shock on his face did she also turn back to see what he was staring at.

Several things happened at once:

Her vision coalesced on figures coming from the south.

She heard Ian's yell as he swung himself on his horse. Her pink-nosed filly, not understanding what was happening just like her master, whinnied in surprise.

A black flare billowed above their heads.

Roebling's voice flashed in her mind: red for titans, black for titans and a prayer.

Green to signal the all clear…

Red to signal titans. We should steer in the opposite direction in that case.

…and black? Hmm, I've given it some thought…

I thought we should use black for emergencies, Camille.

What do you think?

She instantly recognized that other voice in her head as Erwin's, digging up the fragments of a long-ago conversation.

She wondered why it was his voice at that moment that had sprung from the depths of her mind.

"Camille! Get on!"

There wasn't any time to run towards her horse – an impenetrable wind rushed against her, and she felt herself being swept up in the air.

"Leave the horse! We need to get these Garrison idiots out of here – split like we planned, just don't lead the titan north!"

Camille struggled to breathe. She recognized that voice too. And she'd glimpsed something chasing them – something impossibly large, brown, and fast, crawling on all fours.

She clawed at her neck, dimly aware that she'd been hoisted up by the collar of her flak jacket. The blades in the boxes hanging by her hips had rattled with the movement, but they didn't slide out, because she'd just as quickly been lifted to sit behind someone on horseback.

After almost falling off the horse once, she scrabbled to grip the leather saddle, though one hand still searched her neck for whatever invisible pressure was crushing her windpipe, crumpling her lungs, and making her heart beat so loud she could barely think.

"I didn't grab you by the throat, shithead," The rider hissed in front of her, his close-cropped black hair buffeted against the wind, because the horse was galloping lightning quick, zipping past forest and hill alike, "Stop choking in my ear and shut up."

Despite his biting words, Camille coughed, her eyes burning. She knew that invisible pressure now – terror. She'd never seen a titan run on all fours before. She hadn't even known it was possible.

"We were just warned there was a Garrison squad nearby," He muttered. "What the hell were you doing this close to the joint unit?"

She tried in vain to swallow the fear, her throat and mouth as dry as ashes.

She chanced another glance over her shoulder, but all she saw was a blur of brown and green. He was steering them around the trees and hilly terrain so deftly she could barely make out if the titan from earlier was still following them.

It was horrific, not knowing. To add insult to injury, a stray branch whacked her on the face and she knew should've huddled down in the saddle, the way he was.

She eventually managed to remember that he'd asked a question.

"Repairing," She belatedly replied.

They were out of the shade of the forest and into open sunlight. Camille blinked and she saw that he'd steered the horse into a meadow, covered in swaying grass and dandelions.

"The boat broke down. We were sent to fix it."

The horse didn't stop once – they were crossing the meadow, flowers and grass trampled afoot, mud and soil thrown up by the horse's powerful strides, but he'd stiffened upon hearing her voice, and his head swung to gaze at her.

"Cami – ?"

The next thing she knew, she was being thrown up into the air again.

Instinctively, Camille reached for him.

She curled her arms around his head as they were violently propelled forwards – the meadow caught them, but not before the ground hit her shoulder and her hip with a crack so loud that she was sure it had resounded through the field and into the trees.

They rolled in the dirt together, a mess of grunting, limbs, and her ODM gear, until they lost momentum. Then she let go of him, her back throbbing, her hip practically jumping in pain, spitting dandelions and wiping grass off her face –

She struggled to get up. She hadn't taken a blow to her head, thankfully, but she couldn't put much weight on her left side – the side that had made contact with the ground – nor even lift her arm too high.

Her gaze wandered up, and met his wide grey eyes.

Vaguely, she was aware of the blades of grass tangled in his hair, and the mud smeared on his chin. But at that moment, she was relieved to see that he didn't seem hurt, because he was crouched in front of her with no apparent sign of pain.

She flexed the grip on both her hands: her broken nail was bleeding again and still sporting that ugly violet, but at least it had been her left hand, which left her right arm fully functional. The horse had evidently tripped on something... a stray root, a rock, a branch, a tangle of grass. Who knew. They were going too fast for her to tell, and the terrain too treacherous.

She faintly wondered if this happened to him often, because that had been the first time in her life that she'd ever been thrown off a horse.

"Fancy seeing you here," She rasped, double-checking to see if her gear had been damaged. Her ears were ringing, but she strained to listen for the sound of heavy footsteps anyway.

Blades; handles; wires; barrel –

"I'm out of gas," Levi snapped humorlessly, grey-colored gaze cutting into her, before scanning the meadow. How was it that he'd come out of that unscathed? "My blades are blunt, too."

"Take mine," She reached for the box on her left side. There was still some dexterity in her left hand; she could shoot her hooks, but not swing a sword. Pity. That drastically reduced her chances of survival if that abnormal titan from earlier decided to… "I can't swing my left arm, but I can operate the hooks."

Abnormal, Camille remembered. That's right – Corporal Zoe called them abnormals.

As if to reward her, the trees shook.

She found the horse instantly, somewhere off to the side. It was still collapsed on the ground, and braying in pain.

Camille felt cold; terribly cold, even in the middle of the meadow, where the waning orange sunlight still hit her and the dandelions in full bloom, and wholly illuminated the grim expression on Levi's face.

She pulled three blades from her left side with shaking fingers.

Levi's hand darted forwards and took them from her grip without a second thought; he locked two into place on the handles of his ODM gear, the movements swift and unflinching, and slid the remainder into the box that hung from his right.

"It'll be here soon," He spoke. His voice was low and solemn.

"My gas – take it – I know how to use the ODM gear one-sided – "

Levi shook his head. "You need it more."

She gaped at him. "You can't fight that thing without any gas!"

He stared at her for a moment.

Then he ignored her and stood, blades at the ready.

His eyes darted around the periphery of the meadow. It was eerily silent, even with the horse's cries of pain.

"You need to get up," Levi uttered. "The trees aren't that far. When it gets here, you need to get out of its line of sight. Use your gas."

She attempted to stand, feet wobbling, but she ended up falling on her side. Her body exploded with pain, but she grit her teeth and ignored it in favor of talking: "You can't! You can't fight it alone – Levi, I can't let you fight it alone and with no gas – "

The trees shook again. This time with much more force. It was closer. Coming from their left.

Levi shifted his stance, and shielded her left.

"Stop it – please, you can't fight it!" She hated the tremble in her voice, the panic and the pleading –

The ground shuddered. Birds took flight from the tops of the trees on their left – and she clenched her fist, willing her left leg to support her weight, get up, get up, get up, you'll both die here if you can't think of something.

"Camille," She looked up.

Levi rolled his shoulders, eyes pinned on a pair of trees on their left. "You heard what I said, didn't you? Get up." He tossed her one last look over his shoulder: "Worry about yourself."

Then the titan burst into the meadow, mowing down the trees in its way and landing perfectly on its hands and feet, the same limbs unnaturally bent around its torso to poise it like a cat that had just found its favorite prey.

The sound it made when it landed was like cannons booming, an explosion of the highest order; the stench of rotting flesh was immediate, and she could see the viscera still stuck on its teeth when it grinned at them both.

Camille stifled a scream. Levi crouched in front of her, his green cloak and the emblem of the Scouts – those famous wings of freedom – filling her vision.

He flipped the grip on one of his blades.

"Go – I'll kill it."

Her body angled itself on its own; her hand pressed the trigger on her handle like she herself was a machine. The hook shot into a tree on the right, and as she pulled away from the scene, Camille watched him work:

The titan snapped forward with its mouth like an animal, and Levi jumped out of the way with inhuman speed; another burst of movement, and Levi had cut the tendons on one side of its jaw.

Now its jaw hung lopsided and spilling copious amounts of drool, but Levi hadn't finished – just as quickly, he stabbed one of his blades into the titan's cheek, and used it to swing himself on to the back of its neck, relinquishing the embedded blade from its handle at the very last moment.

The titan didn't even have time to react – Levi unsheathed his extra blade, and slashed its neck open.

It had only been a matter of seconds.

She was distantly aware of her own awe.

Perfect timing, perfect speed, perfect precision – he moved with his own animal grace, fearless, and mostly soundless. He'd told her I'll kill it, and meant it.

Camille pressed a trembling hand to her mouth, then on her eyes, feeling something hot run down her cheek. She wasn't sure why she was crying. She only knew that she was grateful.

Thank you, her voice, even in her mind, was a quiet whisper. When she could crack one eye open, Levi was still in the meadow, standing over the titan's smoldering carcass, wiping his borrowed blades clean.

I wish, she gathered her wits about her as best she could, and retracted her hook. She heavily favored her right side when she landed on the grass below the tree with a thump. The pain felt immaterial now, not compared to what she just witnessed. I wish I could be so fierce.

I wish I was even half as strong.

Levi only raised a thin brow when she approached him, like he hadn't just cut down a dangerous titan with all the ease in the world.

You bastard, she suddenly wanted to say. You don't even know how incredible you are.

The smile that appeared on her face was small, and her heart wrung, but it was genuine. You just saved my life. I couldn't even help you.

"Thanks," She bit her lip. "Levi. You – "

"Don't."

He'd given a small shake of his head and turned away from her.

But she looked down and saw that he'd stuck his hand out with the borrowed blades, as clean as she'd first lent them.

The rejection stung. And yet she was oddly comforted by this small gesture.

She decided to follow his gaze.

Impossibly, the horse was beginning to get up. Muscular as it was, and bigger than the average horse now that she got a closer look at it, it had somehow recovered from tripping on its feet earlier.

"Doesn't look like it's carrying people on its back any time soon," She said as she gently batted his hand holding the blades away. "You're better with them."

He was watching her now, and had watched the motion of her hand push his own away. His pensive expression didn't let up once. "We should – "

Camille stuck her hand in her mouth and whistled, hoping for the best.

She gave a small laugh at Levi's dumbfounded look when a high whinny responded from amongst the trees. "That'll be my girl with the pink nose."

Notes:

a line from the iliad:

You are the man I honor most in war

or any other area of action.

next chapter concludes the titan invasion arc. hopefully it'll be up in 1-3 weeks.

(1) camille talks about an "engine" that was used to "pump water out for a canal"; those things did exist, and i modeled the description after the dutch cruquius pumping station built in the late 1700s. we'll talk more about engines later. for reference, we get a good look of the boats in snk in annie's OVA eps ("lost girls," which are eps that are insanely good on their own).

(2) chapter title taken from the florence + the machine album of the same name; this is the first chapter title that doesn't use a mathematical concept.

feedback is always a joy to have, so if you enjoy / have criticism for this fic i'd love to hear it. see you guys soon!