Why did the higher ups want us to go to so many balls? I groaned as I lay my head on the table in the mess hall. Hange leaned against me, fake crying, making a few people laugh.

"Knock it off you two, you both are going, end of discussion." Hange and I both pouted up at Erwin, who scoffed and rolled his eyes. "It won't work."

"For the love of all things holy, you've been around Levi too long." I teased as Erwin tried to not give in. He smiled, patting us both on the heads before walking out of the mess hall to do whatever commander duties he had. Levi kicked me under the table playfully.

"Don't complain, you like how I am." I couldn't help but smirk. Levi actually being playful…that was a new sight, even for me.

"So you think." I teased, getting up from my chair, heading to the door, Hange on my heels. By now the entire Survey Corps knew about Levi and I, and thankfully, no one acted weird about it. It was easier to relax at the HQ now. Hange and I entered her room, rummaging through her wardrobe yet again. "I don't want to wear something so poofy this time." I pouted.

"What about this?" She handed me a gorgeous dark green dress. It was lace up in the back to yet another corset type, except now the rest of the dress flowed into different layers. It wasn't as heavy as the last one either. I smirked as I saw the Survey Corps emblem embroidered on the cinch at the waist.

"You may never get this one back." She laughed shaking her head.

"Keep it; honestly I have too many dresses."

"Yay!" I exclaimed running to mine and Levi's room to get changed. Levi was again going t show up later, so I had the whole preparation to myself. I slipped the dress on, smiling as it hugged my curves perfectly. The front was tight and corset like, except it dropped semi low, exposing a little extra cleavage. He was going to have a heart attack seeing how amazing this dress was. I proceeded to do my make up accordingly, in a dark forest-green smoky eye and pale lip gloss; my straight brown hair completely down, except for a small section to the side that I pinned up with a black flower. I quickly made my way to Hange's room after getting ready. She whistled eyeing me up and down.

"You may want a shawl; otherwise Levi won't keep his hands off of you." I shrugged.

"It's no worries, can we leave yet? We're going to be late just waiting on you." She stuck her tongue out, grabbing a couple last minute accessories before running out with me to the waiting carriage.

"Why must you both wear dresses that will attract so much attention?" Erwin sighed loudly as we got comfortable in the carriage.

"Enjoying the view Erwin?" Hange nudged Erwin's side playfully, making him blush.

"As much as I'd rather not, I am." I shook my head smiling as we headed to the ball. When we arrived, the place was packed worse than it had been last time. Hopefully they stocked enough alcohol because Hange and I were going to b-line right to the bar. As we slipped inside, Hange and I tried to make our way to where the alcohol called for us like sirens atop the shelves.

"Oh no you two don't." Erwin grabbed both of our shoulders, leading us away from the bar. "You will not be drinking whiskey tonight, at least until we get back. For now…" He turned, grabbing a few wine glasses from a passing server, "you will be drinking like ladies." We both death glared Erwin as he shoved the glasses in our hands. "Don't look at me like that, the higher ups are making a personal appearance, and since you two are higher ranked, and in relation to the higher ranks," Erwin smirked at me, "you both will be on the spot light at some point. Now backs straight, shoulders back, and sip your wine slowly, otherwise I'll take you out back and kill you both." Erwin was so funny when he was serious. Hange and I nodded, putting on our lady-like act. I took a small sip of wine, practically jumping for joy as it was a sweeter wine and not something horribly dry like they usually have at events like this.

Over two hours had past as Hange, Erwin and I all made our rounds within the ball, meeting and greeting quite a few higher ups. This was becoming more of a chore rather than enjoyable in any sense. Eventually, on my third glass of wine, I stood staring off in the crowd, completely bored out of my mind.

"Wow, Ahna you look amazing." I turned smiling at Damien, as he bent down, kissing my hand like a gentleman was supposed to.

"Thank you Damien." I nodded, curtsying. A few other people made their ways on either side of him.

"Ahna, this is Maria," He pointed at a slender blonde girl dressed in dark red, "my girlfriend." I nodded, smiling, though her frown stayed in place, she nodded back. I take it she heard about the break up. Damien pointed at the man on his other side. He was tall with dark brown hair, and amazing blue eyes. He smiled warmly, bowing. "This is Thomas. He's a new recruit like Maria." I smiled back, returning his bow with a curtsy. The way he kept his eyes glued to me as Damien talked started making me quite uncomfortable.

"Um…I don't mean to be rude, but what happened there?" I tilted my head confused as Maria pointed at my chest. Looking down, I realized she was pointing to the bruise that was partially showing where Levi bit me a few nights prior. I blushed like mad and covered my mouth embarrassed. Damien and the Thomas guy seemed to be the only ones who realized what it was once I blushed, both looking away. Thomas cleared his throat, stifling a laugh as Damien looked a bit upset.

"Um…" I laughed nervously trying to find the words to explain.

"If your dress got any lower, I'd be tempted to take you where you stand." I jumped a little as Levi made his way forward. His remark made me blush even more while Damien and his companions got a little uncomfortable. Levi's hand caressed my shoulder as he made his way behind me and to my other side. I couldn't help but shiver as his fingers lightly ran down my arm before he moved it to the small of my back. He nodded at Damien, who could only nod back. Levi still made him completely uncomfortable. My eyes met the serious glare that Maria was giving Levi. Oh…yep she heard about the break up. I blushed a little, turning a little to look at Levi.

"You shouldn't talk that way with ladies present." His grey eyes met mine and for a second I could almost see a humored look to them. I smiled trying to contain a small laugh. Sometimes I couldn't take him seriously, no matter how serious he was.

"What's so funny?"

"You." He rolled his eyes, pulling me close.

"Go ahead and laugh, 'cause you'll be crying later." His free hand came around, caressing across my collar bone lightly, poking the bruise once his hand reached it. My smile cracked as I started laughing, making Levi nod his head, indicating I was in for it. Damien rolled his eyes while Maria glared hard at Levi.

"You're a pig." The voice of Maria scoffed at mine and Levi's back and forth. Before Levi could make a remark, I turned to Maria, the smile still on my face.

"Look I get it, you don't like us because Damien opened up about what happened, but if you keep poking the sleeping lion, eventually he's going to bite, and when he does, it will be immensely painful. So please, head my warning, think carefully before you continue." Levi stared from me, then at her, his look completely cold once it met hers. Her mouth opened to speak, but instead she shut it, looking at Damien, who avoided any and all eye contact.

"That would be our cue." Levi stated simply, pushing me gently away from the small group. Once we were a decent ways away, he brought himself from behind me, now up next to me, his hand resting on the small of my back again. "Why protect the girl?" I shrugged.

"Because I don't care if she hates us for what Damien told her, but I'd rather her not cry and kill herself because you tore her to pieces." Levi rolled his eyes, taking us straight to Erwin and Hange who were in deep discussion with Commander Pixis and a few other higher ups.

"Ah, Captain Levi, glad you could join us." One of them spoke as we approached. Levi said nothing, staring at all the higher ups with disgust on his face. Erwin glared at Levi, making Levi roll his eyes.

"Ah, Ahna, nice to see you." Commander Pixis smiled, bowing before taking my hand and kissing it lightly. I smiled, curtsying back. All this curtsying was driving me crazy.

"Ah yes, nice to meet you dear, Commander Erwin here has told us much about you." One of the other higher ups nodded at me. I smiled warmly, tipping my head slightly. "How is it you are able to handle being Captain Levi's lady?" I blushed, a little embarrassed.

"It's not too difficult. He's normal like anyone else really." The higher ups laughed, as if I was trying to polish Levi's look and make him into someone completely different. Thankfully they didn't push the subject, but rather continued talking to Erwin about the rest of the Survey Corps. I could feel myself fidgeting to leave, my eyes continuously scanning for ways to bail out of there.

"Let's go. This has been overly boring and tedious." Levi whispered, pulling at my arm. He nodded once to Erwin, completely ignoring the higher ups as he dragged me away from them and out of the ball.

"You sir, are a life saver."

"I know." I giggled at his serious face. "Let's head back to Headquarters, I'm sick of all the people." I nodded, following him to the carriage. I had practically nothing to drink, and it was frustrating. Being lady-like was more of a nuisance than anything else. We made our way inside the HQ, heading up the stairs and into the room. It was nice to finally get the dress off and get into comfy clothes.

"Why do we have to keep going to those boring ass balls?" Levi shrugged, laying partway on the bed; his coat and cravat off, and his button up now mostly unbuttoned.

"Supposedly they don't think any of us get along well enough anymore. Apparently, we don't trust each other and the Survey Corps has been getting a lot of heat with Eren being a titan and them finding out there were others within the military. The fact that, that Annie girl was a titan and was part of the Military Police, they feel even more threatened with Eren around." I sighed loudly, plopping next to him.

"Let's start skipping those. Every time there is a ball, let's leave before anyone notices and go get wasted at some bar." He chuckled lightly.

"Definitely." Levi sat up finally after a while, finishing undressing.

"This expedition, is it only for us to find Zoe more titans?" Levi looked back at me, a little confused by my question.

"Why?" I shrugged.

"Well there is still the armored titan out there and the colossal. Do you think we may have to find them?" Levi stayed silent a moment, thinking deeply.

"There's a possibility, but Erwin would have told us otherwise. If we run into one of them though, it'll be really bad." I nodded, shuddering at the thought. We could potentially lose so many people if we ran into them. "Don't get nervous. Our only objectives are to find her more titans, and let her experiment on Eren a bit. Just focus on that, we'll be fine." Levi could be so comforting. Too bad he wasn't a publicly nice guy.

"I haven't seen the old HQ in a long time. I bet it's really dusty." Levi rolled his eyes.

"That's why everyone will be cleaning when we get there." I giggled.

"That's okay, we'll leave the cleaning to you Mr. Expert." He shook his head walking over to the bed getting under the covers with me. He leaned over, resting his head on my chest.

"If you don't clean, I'm going to make you so miserable while we are there." I couldn't help but smirk.

"You may be intimidating to everyone else, but to me you're just a big softie." He grunted.

"Well I'll have to change that." I laughed wrapping my arms around his shoulders, letting one of my hands roam into his hair. We stayed like that for a while, his light snores pulling me from my random thoughts. He must have been really tired to fall asleep this early. With no place to go and nothing needing to be done, I finally drifted off with him.