There she was, standing up against Levi, blade drawn and up against all the other squadmates with their blades also drawn. They were pointing it toward Eren, who had just transformed, "Calm down," Levi spoke to the rest of the squad, "The situation is complicated, now calm down!"
Elysia felt strange going up against her squadmates with Levi as she did, but she was never going to stand against him, and she knew that. However, at this moment she genuinely wondered how she ended up in this position, going all the way back to the day she met him when she was asked by Erwin to join her underground, even though she was a Garrison back then.
The Underground...
"This man is highly dangerous, and we don't know what he is capable of. We know that he has the ability to use ODM gear, but we do not know to what extent. Everyone be on alert when on pursuit. We will have to use the environment to our advantage in order to capture him. Elysia will stay behind me at all times. Protect her at all costs."
"Sir." they all confirmed, giving a salute, fists held to chest, including the young girl.
"You're lucky all you are is an archivist." Elysia heard from behind her, looking to see Miche behind her.
"Don't belittle me, Miche. Don't you have some other shit to sniff right now?" she retorted, walking away. He would have retorted, but nothing had come to mind before she'd walked out of sight.
Down in the underground, the Scouts positioned themselves accordingly, waiting for the alert to pursue. Elysia stood behind the Commander, not necessarily meaning to squeeze right up against him, but she didn't feel exactly safe in this type of environment. The place was littered with thugs, and litter. Not to mention the pests running about all over the place looking for food or shelter from becoming food.
"Stay behind me, and don't get too close to him." she heard, still looking around as she basically hugged the man.
"Damn it, they got us again! Somebody call the MPs!" they heard in the not far distance, immediately leaping into action. Rounding a few corners, it didn't take them much time at all to finally come behind the man, who had two accomplices with him.
Up ahead, the man had started to pull off some maneuvers with his ODM gear, managing to pull back past the cloaked MPs, and managed to catch a glimpse of the Section Commander.
After the two behind him had gone down separate routes, a couple of their own members had followed in pursuit of them while Erwin and Elysia continued on.
The man had suddenly swiveled into an open entrance, jumping and twisting through the corridors and hopping out the other side, but was caught off guard by a Scout cutting him off, if she was even old enough to be one, but she hadn't done anything to him other than distract him from his escape.
"Elysia!" she'd heard from in front of her, landing on the building right in front of her. She took a breath and looked back at the man, now zooming off, "Are you alright?" he asked her.
"Shut up." she retorted, jumping off in pursuit of the black-haired man, but by the time she could catch up to him, Mike had just crashed through the tunnel above, bringing the thief down from flight. She watched intently as he'd managed to catch his fall and pull out a small knife, slashing at the Corps member and knocking away one of his blades, but before the two could try to hit each other again, Erwin had jumped in and parried the man's attack, moving again to attack him, but was caught by the wrist as he grabbed the man's wrist as well.
Determination flashed in the man's eyes as he begun to push back against the Section Commander, refusing to go down like this, "Stop," Erwin warned the man, "Look around you."
He did so, and noticed that his two friends had in fact been captured by the Survey Corps. With all of them defeated, the man opened his hands, letting his weapon fall freely.
With that, Erwin let go of him and took a step back and the man let his own arms finally fall to his side, "Seems you're possessed of sound judgement."
With that, Miche had come around and grabbed both of his wrists, tying them together before leading him away with the other two.
Once they'd all been lined up, slapping the metal cuffs onto their wrists, they were brought to their knees, Erwin was ready to start talking to them, "I'd like to ask you a few questions, if that's alright with you," he begun, looking at them. Seeing their predicament, it didn't really seem like they had any other choice, "Where did you get these?"
No answer.
"This equipment is called ODM Gear. You're very skilled at using it, too. Who taught you that?"
The man kept his head down, unmoving. No answer.
Erwin walked up to him and stared intently, "I'm assuming you're their leader. Have you had military training?"
The man looked up at Erwin, a glare in response before Mike grabbed his head, yanking it back to rush forward and smash his face into the puddle in front of him. Elysia moved to help the man, but the Section Commander had held his arm out, preventing her from getting too close.
"You jerk!" the redheaded girl who was knelt and chained next to him yelled out. Was that the man's girlfriend?
He turned his head out of the puddle to get air and looked up at Mike, angry but clearly suppressing himself.
"I'll ask again," Erwin tried once more, "Where did you learn to use ODM Gear?"
"Nobody taught us, we learnt to do it ourselves!" the other chained man yelled out.
"Self-taught? I don't believe it." the Commander deduced.
"We will do whatever it takes to rise out of this filthy dump! People like you who get to bask out in the sun wouldn't understand!" the man elaborated.
"Tell them to let Bro go! You can't just do as you please!" the redhead finally spoke up.
Erwin looked at the Squad Leader and after a few seconds, he had lifted the man's head from the water.
The man took in a deep breath, his eyes meeting the young girl's once again- the girl who had cut him off when he exited the building.
The Section Commander knelt in front of him, his knee dipping into the puddle but wasn't moistened due to his boot guards, "My name is Erwin Smith. What is yours?"
After a few seconds of more silence, it was broken by an answer, "Levi."
"Levi, will you make a deal with me?" Erwin spoke.
"A deal? What deal?" Levi asked him.
"I'll overlook your various crimes. I'll need your strength and skill, as members of the Scout Regiment.
Levi looked shocked at his offer, assuming that's why he had to ask, "And what if I refuse?"
"You'll be arrested for your crime against the MP's. You've been a thorn in their side for quite some time, and I doubt you or your comrades will receive fair treatment." Erwin explained. It wasn't looking very good for Levi at all, "The choice is yours; pick a path." Erwin urged him.
"Alright, fine." Levi spoke, whisking away what water he could, "We'll join the damn Scouts."
And with that, they took off back to the Castle to settle Levi and the rest of them in. Elysia was very suspicious of him and wouldn't leave him alone. At one point, she was going to wipe away water from Levi's face, but he turned and bit her finger, but she never reacted to it because nobody had ever done that to her before, so he ended up with her flesh between his teeth and causing tears to fall from her face from pain. But she was hooked. She made her transfer over to the Scouts and left the Garrison, joining Levi and the rest of his team under training.
Her thoughts were pulled back to the situation at hand, "Eren!" Eld yelled out, "What the hell are you doing?"
"Sir, please!" Eren tried to say, "Nobody gave you permission to transform, did they?!" Eld just continued. "I said, 'Calm down'!" Levi tried to speak as well, but he somehow managed to not get heard, either.
"Answer the question, Eren, what got into you?!" Oluo began, that's when Elysia tried to say something, "We said to calm down!"
"LEAVE IT! EXPLANATIONS CAN COME LATER!" Gunther yelled out, getting closer to Eren, "First things first, you need to persuade us you're not hostile like your life depends on it!" He continued. It was hopeless, they weren't listening. "Prove it, or we kill you! The burden of proof is yours, kid!"
"And what are you gonna do, go against Levi and I?" Elysia spoke out again, but was stopped by Levi, after he noticed Oluo was speaking over her.
"SO MUCH AS TWITCH AN ARM AND I'LL LOB YOUR HEAD OFF! THIS IS THE FIRST AND ONLY WARNING YOU'LL RECEIVE! ICAN END YOU IN A HEARTBEAT, DO YOU UNDERSTAND ME BOY!"
"Oluo how many times do I have to say it!" Levi spoke out, mainly because he managed to interrupt Elysia. Then Petra started, "Captain! I need you to step away! You're too close!" God, she couldn't stand Petra. She always seemed like she was vying for Levi's approval. That wasn't necessarily bad, but it wasn't necessary to go to the extent she did for him. That was Elysia's job.
"Right now, I believe you're the ones that need to step away. Do it!" Levi spoke out again.
"WHY ON EARTH–"
"A gut feeling," was Levi's only response. The argument went on for a bit longer, but the team against Eren did eventually step down, Hange being the main one to dissipate the tension, especially one Eren had disconnected himself from the arm and fell away.
Later That Night…
Levi was standing, against the wall of the castle back in Utgard Castle, Elysia in his arms, while Eren was sitting up against the stairs at the bottom. "That was quite a wakeup call, let me tell you," Eren spoke up, "Until their blades were drawn, I had no idea how little they trusted me."
"What did you expect?" Levi spoke up, "A suspicious nature was at the top of my criteria, though the only one who was ever suspicious of me was this one here," he continued, referring to Elysia as he gestured with a nudge of his arms. "But traditionally, you're not a scout until you come back alive, but out there, there's always so little Intel to go on, so many uncertainties and unknowns, it's a miracle any of us come back alive. You have to be reactive, quick, hit the ground running while anticipating the worst. It doesn't make them heartless, though, they're just a bunch of mindless machines, whatever that might've looked like today, I can promise you every single one was conflicted."
Then Gunther came down and informed Levi that Hange was ready, so they all followed, where they were shown the spoon which Eren had reached for when he had transformed earlier. Hange deduced that it might have been the reason Eren wasn't able to transform in the well earlier before the transformation. She had also realized that having an objective could be the goal to transform as well. Then it was finally spoken that Eren never meant to transform in the first place, receiving a sigh of relief from the rest of the squad. Levi and Elysia had to smile at that, knowing they were right as well. Then everyone except Levi and Elysia sunk their teeth into their own hands, apologizing to Eren for being able to withstand that and transform, apologizing as well, admitting that they were also scared in the process of everything happening. And then Petra had to ask him again to trust them.
But that was then, and the Female Titan was chasing them now, and as Eren remembered what Petra asked, he decided not to transform and kept going. He would come to regret that decision, as they all did. But there was no going back, and no room for regrets. Not here, not now.