Hiya everyone! I am back with new chapters and from summer vacation! Now I know I have been away for sometime but it wasn't all my fault this time! For one my main way of writing broke so I had to find other ways to type up these chapters. Then I went on vacation to Hawaii for nine days shesh. But I did manage to write over there and now I have a couple chapters lined up! So I hope to get them out once a week I really do. Thank you so much for all the support you bring to this story it really makes me happy to see it all! I do hope you continue to enjoy!
"Petra nee-chan! Petra nee-chan!"
The woman looked behind hearing her name being called loudly by the one she knew all too well. "Eren? What is it?"
Coming up to her, Eren took hold of her hands. "Petra nee-chan can you help me please?"
"What do you need help with Eren?"
"I need help with learning how to clean right."
"Clean right?"
"Yeah! I need to learn to clean right so I can clean with Levi! Or at least clean for him!"
Petra tilted her head a bit. "Why would you need to clean for him?"
Eren rubbed his head looking up at her. "B-Because...I-I want do do this for him...please Petra nee-chan please?"
It was hard to resist that pouting face of the boy's, even if it was on a 16 year old's face. "Well...I mean..."
"What's seems to be the problem Petra?"
The woman turned seeing the other members of her team come up to her, more or less. "Auruo, Edl, Mike, Gunther, well yeah there is a problem...sort of. Eren here wants to learn how to clean."
"Clean? What for?" Edl looked over at the boy seeing him look at the group with big puppy dog eyes pleading to them.
"He wants to clean for Heichou."
"Why would you clean for him?" Auruo almost sneered over at the brunet.
"B-Because! I wanna! Please help me learn!"
Mike looked at Eren studying him for a bit, he could tell that the young boy was serious, though his reasons for learning very vague. "Alright we'll help you."
"What?!"
Petra smiled at the tall blonde before turning to face Eren once more. "Well okay then we'll help you learn to clean properly. But then you'll have to listen to us and learn to properly do it, or Heichou won't be pleased at all. You understand Eren?"
He nodded his head furiously hands clenched into fists in front of his chest. "Yes! I'll do what it takes to make Heichou happy!"
The five of them saw that spark of determination in the boy, the one they saw in their training before he became a little kid. Some form of a smile came on each of their lips. "Let's get started then."
"No no no! That's all wrong Eren! There can't be any streaks on the floor! Do it again!" Auruo yelled at the boy when he saw all of the streaks on the floor.
Eren wet the rag again going back over the floors again moving across them.
"Whoa whoa! You can't clean the floors like that! Your feet are going over the spots you already cleaned! Now you have to redo them! Start at one end of the hall and work your way back! Once you properly dry the floors can you walk on them!"
Falling back on his butt, the boy sniffed as tears formed in his eyes.
The man crossed his arms looking down at him waiting to see if he would give up. "You ready to give up on one of the easier tasks? And the first one no less! What kind of determination is that?"
Eren sat there staring at the ground few tears slipping. Sniffing again he wiped his eyes of the tears they once more showing determination. He wasn't going to quit, especially not on the first task. He got back on his feet taking the bucket and rag going to one end of the hallway. Dipping the cloth in the soapy water, the brunet started again doing how Auruo told him.
A grin came on Auruo's lips seeing that the boy indeed had some fight in him to do this. But it was only the beginning.
"Come on Yeager! The horses won't bite you!"
Eren slowly moved towards the horse as it stared at him. "D-Do I really n-need to c-clean t-them?"
"They're part of the stables," Gunther came up petting the horses. "Just wash them carefully and they will let you, they know when they have to get washed."
Taking a deep breath, the brunet dipped the brush into the bucket, he went in with the horse gently putting the brush on it. He slowly started to scrub the horse, he saw that the horse wasn't trying to hurt him. Instead it leaned its head over pushing playfully at him. A laugh came from him as he smiled brightly.
Gunther smiled as well watching him clean. "Now remember when you are cleaning or feeding the horses hay you have to stay calm. They'll sense your nervousness and get restless themselves. Be calm, happy, and not nervous, they're perfectly harmless. Clean them gently too and don't over feed them."
Eren nodded enthusiastically continuing to was the horse; rinsing it off he quickly moved onto the next one.
The man put his hands on his hips smiling, another one down for the boy, three more to go.
"Now most of the floors need to be wiped down especially the first few floors where people come and go bringing in mud and dirt from outside. But more for the upper floors you tend to just dust and sweep. If too dusty, or the dust got crusty that you have to scrub, then you'll need to wipe it down." Mike handed him a broom and hand duster. He also tied on a handkerchief around his neck and on his head.
"What are these for?"
"They're to keep you from breathing in the dust and getting it on your hair. You always work from top to bottom. Use the stool if you need to reach higher on the walls, dust windows down to the floor, then you sweep up the rest."
Eren nodded as he slipped the handkerchief over his mouth and nose. He took the stool to stand on as he worked from the top.
"Do it hard you need to knock all the dust down to the ground."
The brunet coughed when some of the dust got into his mouth from the top of the handkerchief. Next it got into his eyes as he went back too much falling back to the ground.
"Eren! Hey are you alright?" Mike got down helping the boy sit up. "You can't stare directly at it or the dust would surely get in."
Sniffs came from him once more, eyes watering up from the dust or his own tears, probably even both.
"Hey you can stop now, you don't really need to-"
"No!" Eren looked over at him. "I-I have to do this! I can't stop half way already!" He wiped his eyes standing back up; getting up on the stool the boy tried again this time not looking directly at it. Eren moved around the hall knocking the dust down to the floor. By the end of it he was covered in dust, he shook himself letting as much as possible fall to the floor. Next he took the broom sweeping up, having remembered when Levi taught him that.
Mike watched him work that determination once more returning. He really is determined to do this...most kids don't have that fire in them...is it the body remembering...or is Eren actually starting to remember himself?
"Picking up after ourselves help reduce the amount of food, trash, any other items that would leave a bigger mess later on, or even getting in the way for people to trip or slip on hurting themselves. So we'll go around picking up any trash we see. Then we'll do the windows next."
Eren nodded picking up a bin where the trash would go into. He walked with Edl to all the room picking up any trash they saw.
"You know with wiping the floors and dusting they are applied to the rooms too not just the halls right?"
"Uh huh, we did the rooms too, Mike nii-chan and Auruo nii-chan told me how to do those too. Though at one point Auruo nii-chan bit his tongue again."
"Of course he did...Well usually people know to clean up after themselves. So picking up trash isn't big of a deal, besides the kitchen you'll get a lot there. Now we do windows. They're like the floors but a lot more delicate because you don't want to break the glass." Edl gave him the materials as they went up to the windows.
Eren looked at them. "So like the floors but with this spray instead?"
"Yeah you use that to spray the window, wipe it down, then dry them so they don't leave any streaks."
The brunet nodded as he got to work, he was close. Just one more after this one and then he would have learned to clean. And then maybe Levi wouldn't be mad at him any more. They haven't talked since the shorter man threw him out of the room practically; the boy didn't know if it was that Levi was really busy or he was avoiding him. Either way he was close and then they would talk again!
"Wait Eren you'll shrink those clothes!"
"Uwah they're so small! I-I'm sorry!"
"It's okay but now you need to-ah! Eren! You didn't put the clothes on right they're gonna fall!"
"Eeeep!" He got up running over grabbing the clothes before they fell to the ground.
Petra took hold of the basin keeping it from tipping over when the boy hit it, she softly sighed looking over. She saw that Eren was sitting on the floor the clothes having been thrown back over the string line poorly. Getting up she went over to him. "Eren? Are you okay?"
The boy started to softly cry hugging his knees to his chest. "I-I c-can't...I-I can't Petra...I-I just m-mess up e-everything..."
"N-No Eren you haven't messed up! Sure you've gotten confused and made some mistakes but you've made a lot of progress in just one day! The others said you've done so well! You can't let one more slip up defeat you when you're at the end!"
"T-Then why does L-Levi keep i-ignoring me?! I-I'm doing this f-for him but he doesn't s-seems to care a-about me at a-all!" He looked up at her tears falling down his cheeks.
Petra was shocked by how the brunet was acting. She never would have thought that this would be the real reason he asked to learn to clean. Though the ginger could believe that both reasons were true, but this one was just a bit more on his mind. "Captain Levi has his reasons Eren, but he stills very much cares for you. He cares for everyone in his own way, if anything he puts blame on himself for things. But he makes sure that everyone is safe." She gently ruffled his hair. "He does care."
Eren stared back at her sniffing. "R-Really?"
"Really." The ginger smiled wiping his tears. "Now come on, the finish line is just there, let's get these clothes done."
A smile came on his lips as he wiped the last of his tears. "Okay!"
"Thank you for the report Petra, everything is in order then?" Levi sat at his desk looking over some paper work.
She nodded to him. "Yes sir everything is in order and even cleaned."
"Really now? I never ordered any cleaning."
"I know sir, but Eren insisted that he cleaned."
Levi stopped writing as he looked up at her. "Eren cleaned?"
"Yes sir, under our supervision, but he cleaned up mostly all by himself."
The corporal stared back down a the paperwork tapping his pencil on the desk think about if everything was really clean properly, that it wasn't a big mess. But most importantly, did Eren really clean it all by himself?
"He did it all for you sir, maybe you should pay attention again."
Levi instantly looked up seeing Petra winking to him. He watched her salut him before walking out. "She...can't be serious...can she?"