A/N: PART 2 Continuing off the previous one shot!

God this is killin' me

Fathers PT. II

IV

"So, you're a vet, just like me?"

Krueger observed the hefty blond man who sat before him, Oliver wasn't all that tall, not as tall as Reiner, but just a few centimeters above himself. He walked with a limp, had broad shoulders and a face of stone, hardened by his living, and his serving. But there were cracks on that stone, and they revealed themselves whenever Oliver genuinely smiled. So, which to say, that he didn't smile so much. His hair was slicked, his beard trimmed, and the clothes on his back were that of a noble. He lived in a damned villa, if the grand family room they were having tea at didn't scream rich. That was the top of the class, at least for the Eldians. Oliver was even allowed a plot of land to farm his own produce, it was considered a gift from the Marley themselves.

Eren thought spitefully, he probably did smile, when he's spending his money on whores and expensive suits. But that was none of his business.

"You could say that," Krueger looked the man in the eye, blue eyes, blue as crystals, "I've been forcibly resigned from the Marley army for my incapableness."

"You mean handicappedness?"

He sighed. "That too."

"Well…" Oliver gave him a hard-perplexed look, probably thinking of a way to get rid of him, drop him off to another family housing homeless vets, though it was none of that. Oliver turned to Simon who sat the end of the table with a steaming cup of tea in hand, "I can't be the one to turn away a wounded vet, you say he really has nowhere to go?"

Simon placed down the tea, "Just back at the ward for the mentally broken, Sir, and he's much to sane for that place."

Oliver tapped a finger on the smooth table, slow, precise. He looked again to Krueger, who appeared bored, and most of all tired.

"I mean, you obviously can't aid me or Simon here in field work, is there anything you can do?"

"I'll do housework." Krueger put it bluntly. "I'll cook, even."

"You sure, on that leg? I've got a bad leg myself, even I find it hard to move sometimes."

He shrugged, "I'll be tough, but it's not that much of a hassle. And I'm good at tidying up, you can use some dusting in this room particularly." Krueger nodded over to the drawn red curtains, where the sunset's iridescent light streamed through onto the polished wood floors, little dust specs danced in its orange rays.

Oliver followed his gaze, gave something of a laugh and a cough. "As much as I would like a handicapped butler… I'm gonna' have to decline."

Simon seemed about ready to rebuttal, but Oliver held his hand up to the boy. "You can stay here, free of charge… or, eh—we'll figure something out in the long run."

Simon grinned, Krueger leaned into the plush of his seat, too exhausted to even word a thank you. At least now, he didn't have to worry so much for Marley officers snooping about, the villa was as high up as it could get from the other houses, right up on a small hill, not overlooking the wall, but just about so. What a luxury.

"In the meantime, Simon here is just going to have to work twice as hard on the field to accommodate both of you living here."

"Huh?!" Simon's grin vanished. "Wait a min—"

"Oh, and another thing." Oliver laced his fingers in front of him, serious. "You should know that I have daughter, she's about your age. However, my daughter is off-limits. She's a very busy woman, she doesn't need to be pestered by the… infatuations of any man."

The corners of Krueger's lips quirked. "Wouldn't dream of it, sir."

V

Krueger stayed in the Villa for three days, he slept in a room that had probably meant to be a nursery, for it was really the tiniest bedroom in the whole house. There was hardly enough space for him to walk… not that he did much walking. But he couldn't complain, the room did have a bed, a soft bed with feathered stuffed pillows and a mahogany nightstand to put his things. There was only one window, right to the side of the headboard. That window Krueger now made sure to keep shut, and covered with a spare sheet.

In the time that Krueger recovered from his minor to severe injuries, (that he had to continuously force stop his regeneration power for every night, or else he really would grow a new leg by next morning) He'd received a letter, mailed to him by a dove pecking at his window.

The letter held no words, just a lop-sided cross painted in ink, what looked like a scrawl of the letter X. But Krueger knew better, it was more than that. It was the symbol of the Eldia restorationists. Upon receiving the letter, he had felt as if he were being watched, from the inside, and out. He had ripped in half, and then the halves into pieces, then he had thrown those pieces into the fire place of the lounging room.

Someone out there knew who he was, but the frightening bit was, he knew nothing of whether it could be a friend, or a foe. If someone from Paradi had crossed the sea, just as he had. Then they were probably as inconspicuous as he. They wouldn't attempt to contact him, less it was the right time. They certainly wouldn't let him know of their presence by sending a dove with a forbidden symbol, a dove that could be easily tracked down, or even captured by the Marley themselves.

But then again, how could Krueger really know. It probably was a friend, but how could he know? He didn't, and that's probably why they sent that message to him. Nobody could know, that was how the original Krueger did it as well. Trust no one.

Bastards. He seethed, clenched the leather of the armrest chair he occupied, steeling his sight to the dancing flames of the fireplace where he burned evidence not a day prior. He could do nothing but wait, wait for a for signal, a sign, that's what he'd been told. But how the fuck, was that a signal?

He felt his teeth might crack under pressure with how roughly he was grinding them together. Had he had his right leg, it would've been doing that anxious bouncing it always did whenever he went other elevated levels of stress.

He would've stayed brooding in that chair all night, watching the flames crackle, and spark. If not the for the sudden slam of the front door making him jolt up in his seat. It was the middle of the night, Oliver and Simon called it a day after field work, had supper with him, then retired to bed. So that must mean—Krueger reached for his crutch, now made of stronger material—that the daughter had finally come home.

He hobbled from the lounge into dining room, becoming drowned in darkness, the only light flickered from the threshold of the kitchen at the very end of the table. He kept as discreet as possible limping his way there, though the wooden floors creaked with even the slightest pressure.

His hearing picked up on a faint hum, a melody that grew softer as he approached the kitchen. It was Oliver's daughter, for sure, he couldn't wait to greet her.

He turned and stepped through the threshold. Immediately encountering the silhouette of a petite woman, she dug through a cabinet, completely distracted with retrieving something, that she failed to sense his presence right away. Krueger noted the civilian clothes she wore, a long skirt and blouse. So, she wasn't a soldier, he assumed.

Krueger cleared his throat, loud enough for her to hear among the rummaging of tin cans. She startled, as he expected, but what he didn't expect was her throwing a can of fucking tomatoes at him. He just barely ducked when it came soaring pass his head, crashing into the wall, knocking down a full dish rack. Krueger glared at the mess, out of breath, from irritation, mostly. His head swiveled back to the daughter, ready to tell her off, but he found he couldn't get a word out. They became stuck in his throat, so he swallowed it down, then he opened his mouth to speak again. But still, not a sound came.

"You." Annie gaped at him, and the shock on her face mirrored his own. He should've known. Why didn't he—

"What're you doing here?" She hissed, and there was this… trepidation in her eyes, eyes as blue as Oliver's. He should've known.

He wanted to ask her the same thing. But no questions were answered, because Oliver, or rather Mr. Leonhardt came barreling into the kitchen with a pointed rifle in his hands.

"NOW WHO THE HELL—" He stopped short, realizing just who had barged into his home. One second he was ready to strike, but in the next, he let out a choked sob—"Annie."—and in next he had tossed heavy rifle into Krueger's arms, blindly walking by him, Krueger clumsily caught the weapon. In the seconds after, Oliver had enveloped his daughter in an embrace that even Krueger—no, Eren felt envious of.

"Oh, Annie! Annie, my sweet girl, you're back, you're finally home!" He sniffed into her hair, shuddered as he cried. Cried like a parent missing their only child would. "I'm… so glad."

Annie said nothing, just wordlessly wrapped her arms around her father. But in truth, she was lost in the smoldering emerald gaze of the man who stood behind him.