Between two worlds

by Angie296

Mizuki ends up inside the walls without remembering where she came from. All she knows is that she does not belong to that world, and that she wants to return home. To do so, she has no choice but to rely on the Survey Corps, and on her golden eyes capable of tinging the color of blood, inherited from her father, the last descendant of the Uchiha clan. Levi X OC

5. Chapter 4

Chapter 4: Until the day I die, I'll spill my heart for you - part 1

Story of the year - Until the day I die

November 848

"Miss ... what happened?"

"What do you mean, what happened?"

"I mean... I mean all of this. Why did it happen? Why did they die?"

"It is difficult to explain..."

"..."

"..."

"Why?"

"I..."

"Tell me!"

"I'm sorry, but I don't know."

OOO

The spectacle had repeated itself, pitiful and always the same, every day for the past two months.

The little group made its entrance into the Headquarters mess hall in a hurry when it was barely ten minutes to half past seven, which was the end of the hour allotted to soldiers for breakfast. Mizuki, with messy hair and cheeks scarred by the traces of the pillow pressed to her face until moments before, was being dragged in, sleepy, by a perfectly alert Lavinia, with Theo clinging to her arm. In a hurry the group headed for the counter that distributed the ration, and Mizuki invariably stumbled - every day, without skipping a single morning - into the uneven tile along the way because she was still too groggy from sleep, under the amused eyes of the members of the Survey Corps.

They all knew that Laviania and Theo could have gone downstairs to eat well before that moment, as they both slipped out of bed at the crack of dawn together with Petra, their roommate; but neither of them would have dreamed of doing so without Mizuki. And she, as had become apparent from the very beginning, could work for hours and stay up for an entire night without feeling the slightest fatigue, displaying inexhaustible energy; however, when she finally went to sleep, waking her up proved an impossible task, and only Lavinia, after much nagging and recrimination, managed to throw her out of bed in time to comply with the rigid schedules imposed by military life.

Mizuki stumbled over the tile, raising the usual exclamation of surprise and protest, as if she could not fathom such an affront.

In a way, the everydayness of the scene soothed those soldiers accustomed to the extraordinary and unpredictable, although not one of them would ever admit it out loud.

Some, however, did not think exactly so.

"Tsk," Levi brought the cup of hot tea to his lips. He, unlike the brat, had been up for at least two hours, time he had spent cleaning his room and doing his morning workouts. "I wonder how long it will take you to bang her into detention, Erwin."

The commander did not need to look up from the document he was reading to know who his captain was talking about. That conversation had also been taking place in similar tones every single morning for the past two months. "Come on, Levi. You already do enough to punish her, I think. Plus, she hasn't done anything yet today. She barely seems to be awake."

"There's always a reason for her to be punished."

"You are too harsh on her! I would like to involve her more in my experiments, but every time I try she is always busy with one of the tasks you assign her!" Hanje tapped an open hand on the table, causing the liquid contained in the cup laid in front of her to spill out.

So here was the thing. The little sucker was using him to avoid tasks more undesirable than his own punishments.

"Next time it happens, tell her that my punishment will automatically convert into an obligation to cooperate in whatever folly you have undertaken."

"Huh? I don't understand. Why should this become a punishment?"

Mike Zacharias - the captain of the third team, a veteran, and endowed with the curious characteristic of possessing a rather developed sense of smell - sniffed the air in the canteen, and then bent in Erwin's direction. "It's today, right?"

"Yes, why?"

"Many of them have already figured it out. I can smell it."

"'Have the recruits wet their pants already?" At his captain's words, Gelgar threw back his head and laughed loudly, drawing the attention of a group of girls who were passing by the table, and causing a dry sigh from his teammate Nanaba.

"Nothing strange if they suspect it or figured it out." Erwin stood up. "In the end, this is our job. I'm off to the garden, I'll meet you there."

The veterans sitting at the table watched him walk away in silence.

"I wonder what he intends to do, with them..." murmured Hanje overthinkingly, her dark eyes peering curiously at Erwin's broad back.

"Huh? What do you mean?" asked Nanaba curiously. "They who?"

"Ah, nothing, nothing," the other one hastened to answer, pierced by a steely admonishing gaze.

Levi clucked his tongue. He already considered it a miracle that until then no one had harbored suspicions because of the quirks of the four ninjas; should it be the four-eyes' foul language that screwed up all the efforts made until then, neither he nor Erwin would let her get away with it; and she seemed to think so, too, because she hurriedly changed the subject, bringing it back to her favorite topic of conversation.

"Well, I was telling you. When Albert was still alive, you should know that…"

Fifteen minutes later, the entire Survey Corps - composed of two hundred and seven soldiers, forty of whom were freshly graduated recruits and had been in the army ranks for less than two months - was lined up in neat rows, standing at attention, in the garden facing the building that served as Headquarters; their hot breath, as it came in contact with the frigid air, thickened in front of their unsealed mouths, creating a kind of graveyard mist that floated placidly among them. It reminded many of the smoke exhaling from the body of a freshly slaughtered giant, but no one except Hanje dared to express that comparison aloud. The eyes filled with ambivalent feelings - anxiety, expectation, fear, elation, exaltation - of all present scanned the top of the short staircase that provided access from the garden to the palace atrium. Here their commander stood motionless, hands clasped behind his back and legs spread apart, staring at them one by one from above with an implacable gaze.

"Soldiers!" he erupted out of the blue. His voice - usually so measured, respectful, and kind - crashed down like unexpected thunder on the men who were watching him with trepidation. "Finally last night we received the authorization we had been waiting for so long! The government has agreed to the holding of the last recognition of the year! In a week's time you valiant soldiers who have decided to devote your lives to the salvation of humankind will once again cross the walls to find out as much as you can about our enemies. Some of you have already crossed the walls, throwing themselves unabashedly into the arms of danger; for others - the brave recruits who have made the decision to join the ranks of the Survey Corps - it will be a baptism of fire, the hardest and most difficult of their lives. But, all of you, no matter which group you belong to, let me just say one thing." With a gesture that was determined and elegant in its toughness, Erwin raised his clenched fisted hand - with so much strength that the knuckles glistened white in the pale November sunlight - to his chest. "They won't stop us this time either! No matter how many comrades die, no matter how many atrocities we are forced to witness. We will never stop! Men, let me ask you. Are you ready?"

A compact, unhesitating shout went up as the two hundred and seven soldiers brought up their hands to the chest in response to the salute offered by their commander. Erwin let his gaze wander over the faces of each of them, then nodded his head briefly.

"The primary purpose of the two-day expedition will be to transport more material to the first of the positions being built to implement the plan to recapture Wall Maria! Another small step toward victory!"

Another shout of approval went up from the gathered soldiers.

"Good! In the coming days, each squad will concentrate on going over formation and training! As for the recruits, this morning I will observe you at work under the direction of Captain Finnian, and decide your position in the formation. Although, as many of you will know, this will only be a temporary placement."

It was an established tradition of the Survey Corps, that one: the assignment to a squad of recruits grappling with their first expedition was never final. Only those who returned home alive at least once earned the right to be considered a full member of the Corps and, therefore, to join a squad on a permanent basis.

A bit gruesome and albeit not at all encouraging, perhaps, but certainly pragmatic, like all their rules.

"Break ranks! All but the recruits."

The orderly ranks of soldiers dispersed with a frisson similar to that of a recently stricken beehive, which the instinct drives to pursue and strike the enemy: each person moved through that throng directed toward a specific place and purpose, dodging those who cut them off to head in an opposite direction and greeting those one knew well and hoped to find again at the end of that adventure.

The only elements to remain motionless and fixed , awaiting orders, were the forty young kids between the ages of fifteen and nineteen.

"Let's go, recruits! Get your horses back, we're moving to the woods to slay some giants!" shouted Finnian, the veteran who had been in charge of their training since they joined the Corps.

In less than half an hour they reached the forest of giant trees that stood not far from the city. The commander and Levi, as well as the dummy movers, had preceded them, and they were studying their ride perched in the trees that marked the boundaries of the forest. As soon as in sight of the trunks, Finnian gave the order to prepare for the use of the three-dimensional maneuver to the first group of eight soldiers.

The recruits did not know it, and perhaps some of them - the more intelligent ones - could only vaguely sense it, but the assessment as to their capabilities as soldiers began the very moment the commander told his subordinates the official date of the next expedition. Studying people's reaction in the face of traumatizing events, according to Erwin, was crucial to understand their character and thus make the most of their qualities while neutralizing their limitations. Other higher officers would have laughed at the attention and energy he put into trying to sort out his soldiers and understand their personalities, but he did not care. Considering how few enlisted men the Survey Corps counted at each round, their preservation by every expedient useful for the purpose was an unavoidable duty for the commander, and one to which he lent himself with extreme rigor; not to mention that it seemed to him the minimum honor to be paid to those men and women whom he would shortly send to death.

The groups and recruits darted past Erwin and Levi, hovering in the air. Calls rang out in the atmosphere, the hissing of swords and the rubber of dummies being nicked. At their side Finnian Newman, a stocky man with sunburned skin, was explaining in a pragmatic, colorless tone, quickly and accurately, the characteristics of the ordinary recruits who darted before their eyes, emphasizing his own statements with brief gestures of the hand unoccupied by the dense sheets of notes.

"There, you see? Georgie has good reflexes, but she's a bit slow... maybe the best thing would be to place her in defense of the wagons."

"I see." Erwin nodded thoughtfully. "Sure, I understand."

"Well, and now ... let's come to the main dish of the day: those four."

Finnian moistened his lips and closed the register again. He did not need his notes, to dissertate on the latest arrivals. "I still am at a loss as to where you fished them out, but they really know their business, given that they have not received canonical training."

Levi slightly squinted his eyelids.

"Loki Shindo, Amado Kizuki, and Lavinia Williams. All three of them do very well with three-dimensional movement, although their technique is quite ... peculiar. And by peculiar I mean that to move on close branches they don't use the device but just jump, like frogs. They told me that they were used to playing this way as children. Mah. As a strategy it is clever, of course, because it saves gas; but at the same time it is very risky. What would happen if they fell? By dint of yelling at them, they've lost the habit a little, but during the most excitable actions it still comes out sometimes. Other than that, they are soldiers in the norm. Lavinia Williams boasts an excellent ability to keep an eye on and analyze the situation around her under all circumstances and to devise an optimal strategy to cope with it; Loki Shindo, on the other hand, has earned the trust of his comrades and is an element with a strong cooperative nature, which is essential for group actions. Amado Kizuki has a wide range of expertise in a variety of fields, which could prove useful in the course of an expedition, and all too detailed knowledge about the giants that ... well, if I'm not mistaken he assists Hanje in her experiments, doesn't he?"

Levi merely shrugged his shoulders in a clear gesture of astonishment and disapproval at the idea that someone might spontaneously take an interest in giants, but Finnian did not even notice.

Levi's mind raced back to the conversation that had taken place between his subordinates and Loki and Amado when they were still stationed at the former headquarters. Lavinia had just fallen while dismounting from her horse, knocking her knees violently, and at the sight of blood spurting from her friend's legs in tears, Mizuki had demanded, with shrieks and threats, a pause to treat her. Eventually, Levi agreed to the request more to shut her up than anything else; so while the life-saving surgery took place upstairs, the others gathered in the canteen to have a cup of tea while waiting.

"What kind of soldiers are you if you can't even ride decently?" commented Oluo annoyed, before getting an elbow in the stomach from Petra, who sat next to him.

"Well, the missions we have always carried out so far are very different from yours. It mostly involved escorting people from one town to another, exterminating handfuls of criminals, retrieving cats from trees. Things like that. The skills that are needed ... were needed by us are a little different. Well, although that doesn't change the fact that each of us has different propensities," Amado answered him, a little piqued at being branded as incompetent.

"Oh! For example?" Hanje leaned in Amado's direction, which earned him a testy look from Mobilit.

Who answered, however, was Loki. "For example, our Amado here is the geek of the group. It doesn't matter what the topic is, or the question: this guy will always be able to provide a textbook answer to whatever theoretical quesiton he is asked. Lavinia, on the other hand, excels at preparing action plans, especially if they involve assaults on enemy positions or hostage rescue. She has a cute little face, but don't be fooled: she has a twisted mind like few others."

"What about you, Loki?"

The summoned blushed slightly at the interest Petra showed in him. "Me? Well, I ... as you've had a chance to see, the other three in the bunch are bamboozles. They don't know how to lie or put on a poker face, let alone endear themselves to people, as I do. And these are fundamental qualities, when you have to gather useful information."

"In short, he's a quack," Amado concluded, wringing a laugh from Petra, and earning himself the second dirty look of the day from his mate.

"And Mizuki is the doctor, right?" concluded Gunther, intent on wiping a cloth over his own sword.

"Well, yes. But not only that. Mizuki is..." Amado paused, uncertain how to continue.

Loki rushed to his comrade's aid with a snort. "Let me put it this way. If only she had wanted to - and by that I mean: if only she had focused on enhancing her combat skills - she could have joined the Village's special militia without the slightest difficulty, and then like hell she would have found herself accepting a mission like this. The blood running through her veins made her one of the students with the most potential in our year, second perhaps only to Terence. In fact, I think that was her goal at the beginning."

At those words, Levi looked up from his own cup. For the second time in a matter of days, the conversation fell on the brat's family.

"And why didn't she?" Petra asked intrigued.

Loki quickly looked away. "Well, various things happened and ... she decided to become a military doctor. To make it, you have to spend a lot of time on theoretical and practical training, which is obviously taken away from military training. It was even harder for her, because her mentor - the best, in the field - was quite strict and demanding; however, in less than three years he made her a kick-ass doctor."

"Bah." Oluo clucked his tongue, producing a sound comically similar to a child sucking up the broth left at the bottom of a bowl. "If it's true what you say, she's really a fool... Ugh, you hurt me, Petra!"

Amado cast a look of gratitude at the girl for shushing him. "Maybe it will be as you say, but that's the way she is, those are her priorities now. And I believe that if this were not the case, the master would never have designated her as our captain..."

Finnian's assessment of the capabilities of the three ninja coincided perfectly with the analysis on the point made by those directly involved. After all, the training of recruits - along with keeping accounts - constituted one of the most delicate tasks within the Corps, and both were entrusted to him.

Finnian's voice brought Levi's attention back to the training demonstration. "And now, we are left with only the last one. Onizuka."

The three men's gaze slid to rest on a petite, hooded figure proceeding through the woods a few meters away from them.

"That girl has something special. At first, she showed the same peculiarity as the other three in using the three-dimensional movement, but she was able to correct it almost immediately. Well, actually, it's not just that. The improvements, in her, can be appreciated not from day to day, but from hour to hour. She has an extraordinary learning ability. Whenever I show them some new strategy or group strategy, she always stands to the side and asks to be the last one to try it. Then she stands there, watching me and her classmates, with that hood over her head. She always keeps it on. I've tried to make her take it off, but it's hard to get her to do something she doesn't want to... you know, she starts beating around the bush, pontificating, being ironic."

Yeah. Levi knew all too well how good she was at pontificating to dodge some unwelcome task, the one over there.

"In any case, it's not really a violation of the rules. It's just an oddity, but it seems to me that Onizuka lives by quirks. After standing there and observing, she attempts the maneuver in question herself, and, you won't believe it, but she pulls it off brilliantly. I wonder how she does it. Well, aside from that, she moves quite quickly, has cold blood in abundance, and possesses excellent aim. She can hit a moving target at least a kilometer away. However, she also has a big flaw."

At that point, Finnian nodded to the dummy handlers standing in the area where Mizuki and three other recruits were darting. She opened the line, and in front of her suddenly appeared two cardboard figures impersonating a giant class ten and fifteen meters. The girl did not flinch: after a nod to the comrades behind her, she veered to bring herself to a safe distance and, at the same time, reach an optimal position for attack. It was then, as Mizuki had just taken a leap to take down the first of the enemies, that the trap prepared for her by Finnian was sprung.

A third menacing figure burst onto the scene from the right side, exactly where two recruits were about to pass so as to outflank the enemies on the main trajectory; both raised a cry of surprise, unable to change direction in time.

Mizuki, as he hovered in the air with his arms gathered to his chest to give the blow more force, realized it. Her head snapped in the direction of the two comrades, and Levi guessed what the fool would do before she even moved.

The girl's arms thundered, but the blow did not land on the back of the giant's head beneath her. The blades sliced through the air and, with absolute precision, thrust into the carved eyes of the silhouetted figure popped out to their right. The recoil resulted in a wobble of the hardback, which tilted backward enough to allow the two threatened recruits to profit from the space and pass by.

Mizuki again moved to a safe distance from the targets.

"There, you see?" sighed Finnian with an irritated snort, an indication that he must have witnessed such performances to the point of boredom. "She should be put to fight alone in a forest. Then maybe she wouldn't screw up. Whenever she notices that someone is in trouble - and it always happens, nothing escapes her - she drops whatever she's doing and rushes to their rescue." After those words addressed to Erwin and Levi, the man puffed out his chest and thundered: "ONIZUKA! How many times have I told you?! Swords cost money, it's not like the commander shits them out every night! You can only throw them when they are broken or chipped!"

The hooded figurine, without even turning around, raised a hand. "Excuse me, captain!"

Finnian sighed again, and turned back to the men at his side. "Well, then she always apologizes. You can tell her anything and she doesn't mind. She apologizes, but then she goes on doing whatever she wants. She keeps the swords, and for the next rescue plans she comes up with something else. A couple of times she has pushed a comrade to the side to move him out of the attack trajectory of the giant-carton, and she ended up there. She's just too reckless."

And that's nothing, Levi thought, still mindful of the time he had seen her disappear inside a giant's skull, surrounded by lightning.

"I can't be sure, but sometimes she must have been beaten, too, because of that; it happened that after the break she would come back with a nice hematoma on her face, claiming she had tripped. She never caused any trouble, though. She gets beaten up, but she keeps quiet." Finnian shrugged his head, then turned to Erwin. " Besides that, she's talented. Very talented," he sentenced in a tone that indicated the end of his remarks.

"Tsk. She's only talented enough to get herself killed, that one."

"Levi is right. For the time being." Erwin muttered that lip-smacking comment as if he were speaking to himself rather than to the two men at his side. Those few words were enough for Levi to realize that the commander was up to something. "All right, Finnian. That's enough. Send them back in. I'll get you the assignments by the afternoon."

As the recruits, on the captain's signal, stopped and headed for the horses, Erwin called one of them back, "Mizuki! Not you! Come here!"

The hooded figurine broke away from the group and reached the branch on which the commander and the captain were standing; as soon as she placed her feet on the wood, she stood at attention bringing her hand clenched into a fist to her heart, legs apart. At least she seemed to have learned how to do the military salute properly, Levi noted.

Before speaking, Erwin waited until the others had gone far enough. "At ease," he then said, with an encouraging smile on his lips. "You have made a lot of progress, Mizuki. My compliments."

"Thank you, sir." An amused voice escaped from under the hood, and white teeth flashed as her lips stretched into a smirk. "Nice speech, that one earlier. It almost convinced me, too."

With an annoyed gesture, Levi lowered her hood. "I thought the rules were clear. Your fucking games are forbidden, brat."

Mizuki's face was hit by daylight and, in a split second, the pupils dilated by darkness shrank into two black dots bathed in a sea of liquid gold. "Don't worry. They all think I'm just a little weird; it never occurred to anyone to look under the hood. This way I learn faster and decrease the risk of getting mauled. I don't want to die."

"From what I've just seen, however, you seem to have a great rush to croak, and a very good chance to succeed."

Mizuki's smile turned into a giggle. "Good morning to you too, sunshine. You look in a good mood."

"Mizuki, I'll be brief. I decided that you alone will come on expedition this time. Loki, Amado and Lavinia will stay here. They are not ready yet."

A moment of silence as the words settled between them and she grasped their meaning. Immediately the expression of irreverent amusement turned into a bright smile, accompanied by an expression of relief, and she spread her arms wide, taking a step toward Erwin. "Commander, may I give you a hug?!"

The man laughed, shaking his head. "I thank you for the offer, but better not. There are already enough rumors flying around about us."

It was true. Rumors, about those four strangers, had circulated quite a bit, about Mizuki in particular. However much they tried to keep it quiet, soon Mizuki's frequent visits to Erwin's office had been noticed, and from their recurrence everyone drew a single and seemingly irrefutable conclusion: the two were having an affair. Nothing mattered that sometimes Hanje was also present at those meetings or in the girl's place, on alternate days, Loki, Amado or Lavinia went.

The litmus test - which the soldiers emphasized in mealtime conversations, with the tone of those who would not be fooled - consisted in the fact that Theo - the brat who lived symbiotically with her - was as blond as a chick; blond just like the commander. And when someone pointed out that Mizuki looked too young to be the mother of a six-year-old, they would shake their heads. "But what does it matter? Don't you see how blond he is, and how he's attached to her? Things can only be that way."

Erwin had tried in every way to make those encounters as transparent as possible, setting them in broad daylight or, if possible, in open air; but this had a counterproductive effect, because the soldiers became more convinced that the commander was trying to cloak his relationship with that girl in an innocence that hinted at something much more shady. Besides, the only option that would have dispelled any doubt would have been to have them attend every session; and that was impossible. In their course, the four foreigners communicated to the commander the little they remembered about the outside world and, in particular, everything they knew about their Village: the number of inhabitants, the administrative structure, the layout of the houses. Everything, even the most insignificant detail. As for her, however, the stories about her and commander Erwin didn't seem to interest her at all.

"More than half of the recruits we just observed in action are not ready, and this little dickhead is included in the roster," Levi observed coldly, giving Mizuki a slap on the back. "We still send them out to croak, though."

"This is true. But they are different."

"I know it, although I don't agree with the decision. But the others don't."

"I am aware of that."

Erwin sustained Levi's gaze. The latter read deep in those blue eyes something, a flicker of intelligence, of concealed awareness, which by now he had come to recognize as a clue that the commander was up to something. "I understand. I'll trust your judgment."

"Thank you, Levi." Erwin turned back to Mizuki, who had remained observing that brief exchange in silence. "The cover story will be that Loki and the others have to travel to the capital to carry out a representative mission with our backers. I will explain this to the various captains; Mizuki, will you take care of communicating it to your comrades?"

"Yes!"

"Be aware that the news will not be received positively, and you may suffer some retaliation."

"Don't worry; I'll take care of it!" asserted Mizuki firmly, in a tone that seemed to suggest the commander not to inquire further about her intentions, because otherwise he would have to take action.

"Great. We can go back in, then."

Levi had already moved to a branch not far away when he heard, despite it being spoken almost in a whisper, a question coming from the brat. "Commander...did you happen to consider what I asked you?"

Out of the corner of his eye, he watched as Erwin turned in his direction and gave his back to Mizuki, to prevent her from catching sight of the twinkle that flashed in his gaze; the same twinkle that, moments earlier, had convinced Levi not to protest further about his decision. "Yes. I will inform you of my decision when the expedition is over."

Mizuki nodded, apparently satisfied, and operated the three-dimensional movement to rejoin the other recruits. Levi watched her move away in precise, rapid movements. She used too much gas, made unnecessary movements, and was a reckless fool; but in spite of himself, he had to admit that Finnian was not entirely wrong in saying that she had talent, and perhaps with a little wrist she could have been straightened out.

Erwin darted past him, not giving him a glance. If previously the fact that the commander had a plan to wrap the coils of his control around the brat's neck was no more than conjecture, now Levi had no doubt about it.

Not that it particularly concerned or bothered him, in truth.

Erwin was just doing what he had to do to keep the shack running, and to keep things going.

Like everyone else, after all.

After those brief remarks, Levi operated the device to reach him.

OOO

The arrival of the four strangers had caused no small amount of astonishment and discontent in the Survey Corps on that September day just two months earlier. Nothing unexpected in that, and Erwin had warned them from the start that this was the way things would go.

Those people had spit blood and tears to get there and get a permanent job. Clearly they were not going to look kindly on four young kids swooped in among their ranks who, however gifted, did not even know how to use the device decently.

"Bah," muttered Loki, shaking his head. "I don't understand them. A job secured? But do they realize that their job is no different than going out there and getting devoured by a bunch of huge guys running around naked?"

"Shut up, Loki, do me this favor."

The cover story concocted by the commander, even in its simplicity, prevented the soldiers from asking too many questions, due to the risk of getting involved in a complicated and dangerous affair: Mizuki and the others had previously served with a nobleman, known to be an unscrupulous man, as private bodyguards. Everything had gone smoothly up until one day two months earlier, when a member of the group was suspected of making an attempt on the life of the one they were supposed to protect, which is why the traitor and his supposed accomplices were were in danger of being hanged. Rumors began to circulate among the corps' simple soldiers that the trigger for the mercenaries' retaliation against the nobleman in question was the latter's attempt to take advantage of Lavinia and that, therefore, the culprit for the ambush could only be Mizuki.

Loki's father, however - so the cover story would have it - knew Erwin, and so had begged him on his knees to save their necks by enlisting them in the ranks of the Survey Corps in return for the payment of a large sum of money, even though no one who knew the truth had the faintest idea of the origin of the money that actually transited through the army's coffers. Thus, Zackly - albeit with the mathematical certainty that it was a fabricated story out of thin air, and without even the real pretense of convincing him - gave his approval to the operation.

As for Theo, he officially held the role of Mizuki's younger brother. The embarrassing amount of the bribe was of such a high amount that the supreme commander agreed without batting an eyelid that a mute child barely six years old was stationed with the Survey Corps.

Of course, the soldiers did not turn out to be as understanding, not least because they saw not even the slightest shadow of that money. Most of them simply ignored the four newcomers except when required by military activities; some, however, those whom life had hit the hardest and taught early on that nothing in the world is given for free, gave them far too much attention and in terms that were not particularly pleasant. Caustic comments, spitefulness during drills, tripping in the canteen followed one after another without a break. What saved them from heavier anguish was the unquestionable fighting ability of Mizuki and Loki - which everyone, for better or worse, had experienced in the course of hand-to-hand training - and the good relations between the group and Levi squad, whose members had made it clear that they appreciated the newcomers.

However - to the enormous surprise of Erwin and especially Levi - that state of things lasted only for a month. After that, on the morning of the thirty-second day, without anything in particular happening, as if in the course of the night the first act of a play had ended and the technicians had hurried backstage to make the scene change to advance the story, the four became full-fledged members of the Corps. Most of the ordinary soldiers, minus the recruits, in one way or another accepted them as their fellow soldiers and ceased to look at them with suspicion. They finally approached them as people, willing to get to know them, and attracted - even if unconsciously - by the diversity that exuded in the gestures of each of them.

Lavinia and Amado, in truth, encountered no particular difficulty in blending in. The former, in fact, was a girl of exceptional beauty: the pale skin contrasting with her long raven hair and charcoal-colored eyes, the elegant and calm gestures, the slender and well-proportioned figure, and the sweet smile enraptured the hearts of more than one soldier, although no one even dreamed of concretizing their feelings for fear of reprisals from Mizuki, who guarded anyone who approached her friend too casually like a rabid guard dog; so, mindful of the risk taken by the lascivious nobleman, the boys turned away from her, and merely spied on her from afar, sighing.

As for Amado, he fit in because he did not seem to have any intention to do so at all: the only activities in which he showed any kind of interest were those proposed by Hanje and her team; thus, he was soon labeled as a peculiar type tending toward the insane, and the Corps - accustomed to anything out of the ordinary - accepted him as such, swallowing him up.

Loki's hot-tempered and proud nature, on the other hand, made it impossible for him to resist provocation, and more than once he ended up getting into fights with recruits and some older soldiers; at the end of each brawl, however, the combatants would help each other up by laughing, apprehensively informing each other of their wounds, and commenting admiringly on each other's fighting techniques. That same evening, then, they would leave HQ and go to hang out in some of the city's pubs. At those displays of violent brotherhood, Mizuki would simply shake her head, tightening her lips.

Mizuki, for her part, had succeeded in a short time in making herself well-liked by everyone, although this did not fail to arouse some puzzlement in Levi.

The first impression of a person with an ill-tempered, rude, and aggressive nature had been, indeed, only a first impression, already overcome, in fact, by her conduct immediately following the first two weeks spent in the Former Headquarters, and confirmed later in the course of cohabitation in the new headquarters of the Survey Corps.

Erwin, one evening, observed that Mizuki behaved exactly like a bear with its cubs: she became violent and aggressive only if she felt her cubs were threatened; Even her inclination to disregard orders, everyone noted, seemed to be related to that: she would not follow directives wherever, according to her personal and sometimes wacky assessment, it would go against her fellow soldiers or third parties in need. Otherwise, although she made irony out of tasks she considered unnecessary - especially when related to cleaning places that, to her ears, were perfectly neat by the standards of normal people - she fulfilled them rigorously, and in this regard even proved herself to be particularly precise and perfectionist.

She could easily have been defined by one word: energetic. She never stood still, and any time one had the opportunity to cross her path one would inevitably find her immersed in some physical or intellectual work. Sometimes she would even forget to go down to the canteen to eat, so immersed was she in some project, and then it would be up to some of her fellows to go and fish her out wherever she was. Tiredness, too, she did not even know what it was.

One of her few pastimes, besides giving people a hard time, was reading, which she took up during her day off and usually in the middle of the night, when the rest of her comrades had sunk into sleep. Right from the start, this small detail had helped fuel suspicions about her alleged affair with the commander: indeed, throughout the Corps, soldiers who cultivated the same passion as her could be counted on the fingers of one hand, and these included Hanje and Erwin. Mizuki would regularly assault them to visit their respective private libraries and borrow a few volumes; after devouring them, she would chase them through the corridors between meetings and training for a confrontation, intending to dissect every comma of the text and hear their opinion on it.

One morning, Mizuki popped up in the canteen at seven o'clock, a time when she had never been seen on her feet, and, with a determined stride, reached the veterans' table, where she took a seat with a leap, clutching a brown leather-bound volume to her chest. "Commander!" she exclaimed with her slightly glazed eyes gleaming. " You were right! This book is... It is indescribable! I was up most of the night finishing it, and even afterwards I was so excited that I couldn't get to sleep! I couldn't wait to see you so I could talk to you about it! I was going to break into your room!"

The adults sitting at the table - Erwin, Mike and Dita Neiss - stared at her with a mixture of astonishment and amusement; all except Levi, who, clucking his tongue, stood up and, grabbing the brat by the collar of her shirt, lifted her up. "Ohi, you little cretin. Do you think this is the way to address the commander?" he hissed in her ear.

Mizuki looked at him as if he were speaking another language. Then she raised the book she held in her hands as if the sight of its cover provided an adequate justification. "You cannot understand, captain! Until you read it, you cannot understand!"

"You make me feel like hitting you over the head with it," Levi, exasperated, snatched the volume from her hands.

"I won't let you ruin it!" Mizuki outstretched her arms as if to take it back, but Levi still maintained a firm grip on the collar of the shirt, and pulled her away from him with a tug.

Hanje laughed it off, sitting at the table. "It's no use, Mizuki. He is not a reader. He only thinks about tea, and cleaning."

"'Do the formal greeting, you fool! What's in that head of yours?"

She huffed, listlessly bringing a hand to her chest. "Can I have my book back now?"

"What a pathetic greeting."

If any punishment was dodged, it was only because the canteen was deserted, and few witnessed the scene and were definitely convinced that the girl with the petite body and curly head was missing a few marbles.

The commander, however, threw back his head and laughed, inviting Mizuki to sit down with a wave of the head. "I figured you would appreciate it, but I didn't think I would elicit such a reaction. We have very similar tastes."

Levi clicked his tongue. "You too, Erwin. Stop stringing her along, or she'll jump on your lap next time. There are enough rumors about you two already."

And besides, she was joyful, and she really was. Her happiness at being alive, healthy, and her enthusiasm for every discovery and every single event of the day were not forced and artificial attitudes - like those of many soldiers in the corps, who tried in this way to overcome the horrors of the outside world by pretending to be cheerful, or by knocking themselves out with alcohol. Mizuki really was like that, and it took little to make her happy: for example, that the day's menu included tomatoes, one of her favorite foods; or that the seeds planted in the garden sprouted in spite of the cold and rain; or that Theo would put on an expression she thought was particularly funny.

Whenever she turned a corner of the building, and something new or unexpected appeared before her, her eyes would assault it as if to eat it, flickering like flames on a warm summer night. When talking to her, one had the impression of being swept away by a wave of optimism and cheerfulness that, inevitably, ended up being transmitted to the interlocutor. After spending a morning next to that little girl with sparkling eyes who was always looking upward, and who was constantly talking about the future - as if the soldiers of the Survey Corps still had one - even the veterans, whom the hardness of service had made dull and pessimistic, could not help smiling and thinking that that was, after all, a good day.

Some found her attractive: in the eyes of her fellow soldiers, she was not only and simply pretty - she had regular, fine facial features and an impressive head of hair - but neither was she beautiful in the canonical sense of the term because she was endowed with too few curves; she had her own way of being that was quite peculiar, unconventional, and that lay somewhere between any abstract categorization and prevented her from being precisely defined. On the street, at first glance, no one would turn to look at her; but then, something in her attitude, that magnetic and charming aura that made people naturally gravitate around her, that soft light that profused from each of her gestures, would inevitably end up attracting attention. That is, at least, until, noticing the person staring at her, she would open her mouth to target the person with a few biting phrases, before laughing smugly, thus breaking the spell in an instant.

Mizuki, in fact, was characterized by two features even more salient than the previous ones: she never took anything seriously and, moreover, possessed an unexpectedly sadistic nature.

As for the first aspect, whatever remark was addressed her, she always had an ironic response on the tip of her tongue, irreverent but at the same time light-hearted to the point that it did not result in insubordination. She was never angry, and she did not take seriously anything she did not have the will to treat seriously, especially if it concerned herself.

The commander's cover story and their preferential entry into the ranks of the corps, of course, attracted, at first glance, the dislike of many soldiers, especially the recruits, and so at first the jokes and taunts towards the newcomers flourished.

"See that you make less of a fuss, you scum," a young recruit once told her, irritated because Mizuki had just landed him in hand-to-hand combat. "You're only here because now we need meat for the slaughter."

She looked at him in silence for a few moments, then burst out laughing and clapped a hand on his shoulder. ""Oh my, yes! Why not, that sounds like a good plan to me!"

When her friends were involved, however, things turned out a little differently. Mizuki never provoked a fight, nor did she explicitly oppose any of the various bullying that took place in the first month; but her mates' detractors began, one after another, to suffer strange incidents. Some were forced to leave the bathroom in their underwear because their clothes had magically transferred to the highest top of a tree; some vomited their souls after a meal eaten next to Mizuki; and some - after probably committing an unforgivable crime against Lavinia - found Hanje hot on their heels based on a tip about their hidden but burning passion for giants.

As for the second aspect, Amado was not lying when he had said that Mizuki loved to make people mad, especially if she liked her. She would study her prey until she identified its weak points, and then she would attack mercilessly. She did not do this with malice, but simply because it amused her to see people's embarrassed and furious reaction. Few were saved from her blows - Hanje and Gelgar, for example - and it was not because of any special leniency on Mizuki's part, but for the simple reason that those two constituted a source of amusement au naturel.

Her favorite victim, however, remained always and only one.

Captain Levi.

"'Hard bark, tender interior.'" she would invariably comment, in a phlegmatic tone, at each new demonstration of the contrast, obvious to her, between his neurotic, standoffish attitude and kind, caring soul toward his fellow man, loud enough for him to hear and cast her a murderous glance.

"I don't hear scrubbing hard enough, brat. The floor won't clean up by itself."

Their relationship settled on a kind of tacit compromise: he tolerated her existence, and she respected him. But that did not stop her from teasing him to the point of crying with laughter.

She had an easy job with him. Practically any word that came from her lips managed to irritate him, and bring out on his face that expression of deep contempt and sufficiency that so delighted her.

She would start as early as the morning, addressing him in the canteen with a trilling "Good morning, sunshine!"; it was enough to turn the captain's nuts and make her, who seemed never to tire of that appellation, crack up with laughter.

At first, Levi reacted to those exuberances by pulling her ears and inflicting punishments, to the point that many began to suspect that Mizuki, far from being sadistic, actually possessed masochistic inclinations ; after a while, however, the captain realized that he was playing a losing game, and that in the long run there would be a real risk of transforming Mizuki from a soldier to an earless cleaning lady. Thus, he simply ignored her as much as he could, and when he got over his limit of tolerance, he locked himself in silence for a few days, without her actually being the least bit upset; fortunately for him, their respective activities kept them busy in different places of the building and at different times, and so it was rare that they met or had to work together.

On one occasion, after the umpteenth irreverent outburst, Loki personally apologized for his partner's behavior, even though his eyes betrayed relief that he was no longer the main object of Mizuki's anguish. "'Hold on, we've all been there. She'll get tired at some point." Loki's participation, far from lifting his spirits, had no effect other than to increase the captain's irritation; he was nearly incredulous at the idea that he had fallen so low as to become the object of a brat's compassion.

And yet, after two months and against all odds, Mizuki seemed not to have gotten tired yet. Hanje particularly appreciated this aspect of her subordinate. "Oh, I haven't had so much fun since you came along! If only you would help me capture a giant..."

"We've already been through this. I miss Albert, and no one can ever replace him. I don't want to besmirch his memory."

"Me too, what do you think! But I'm sure a new little one would allow us to get over the grief..."

"The commander has fully overcome it, though. And he is the one who decides."

It was true. Erwin had made a series of stark and unappealable refusals to Hanje's pleas to organize another mission to capture a living giant; this, however, had not stopped her from almost obsessively reiterating her request whenever the conversation or circumstances allowed.

Amado, for his part, fully shared Hanje's outrage, and hoped with all his heart that the commander would go through a mystical mid-life crisis and change his mind on the issue, or be replaced, whether by a coup or sudden death, he cared little. "It's for science," he repeated intransigently, whenever the subject was brought up.

Soldiers ended up accepting even the most absurd novelty of all, namely, that a six-year-old mute child would move to Headquarters on a permanent basis. After all, for those men accustomed to the idea of dying at any moment, many of them with no family and no expectations for the future, catching a glimpse in the corridors of a petite figurine hovering behind the hurricane that was Mizuki instilled high spirits. Theo made no trouble: if the request came from his paladin he would help, by putting in the maximum amount of effort demanded of a brat, the other comrades to carry out tasks, and in the evening, before retiring to Mizuki, Lavinia and Petra's room he would play with them. Before long, he became the mascot of the entire Corps, and at the same time for each of the soldiers an unspoken reminder of what they were fighting for, a loved and lost person, or the child they would never have.

As for the matter of kidnappings, Erwin - questioned periodically by Mizuki on the subject - reported that after the adventure in Tiburtina no more noteworthy events had occurred: no reports of disappearances were filed, despite the civilians left to croak in the streets of the abandoned city; no reports of suspicious movements were forwarded by the men posted to guard the mountainous areas of the innermost circle of walls, the place of origin of the plant used for the drug administered to Theo; nor did their source tip off about the organization of more horror shows.

Thus, all was silent. But Mizuki - as well as Erwin - was certain that sooner or later they would act again, because human madness and cruelty stopped at nothing, and certainly the fact that they were almost discovered would not be enough. It was just a matter of waiting, patiently, like a lurking hunter patiently expecting a moment of distraction from the prey to ambush it.

OOO

"I disagree. I strongly disagree. It's crazy, it's meaningless. If you go, I'll go too."

Mizuki sighed, continuing to pound the mint leaves freshly picked from the garden with precise, mechanical gestures of the hand holding the mortar. "Lavinia..."

The girl threw her raven hair behind her shoulders with a determined and nervous gesture, and turned her face impatiently toward the window. They were in the HQ infirmary, at that hour completely deserted. The corps' medical officer - a cheerful old man deaf in one ear of almost seventy years gone by - had been gone for at least half an hour. At the end of each day's training, between five-thirty and seven o'clock, when all the other soldiers were carving out a space of time for personal activities, Mizuki would retire there and take care of drug production and more complicated checkups. Erwin had promised her that if she survived her first expedition, he would finally grant the old doctor - Dr. Michaelson - the retirement he so longed for, and turn the office over to her.

"No, Mizuki. You are going back out there, back to that hell. Without us. And I know the way you are. I know you. You're going to do some crazy thing to help an idiot who maybe spit on your plate at breakfast!"

Silence fell between the two girls. Theo, perched in the chair next to Mizuki, shifted his innocent childlike gaze - watchful, though unaware - from the girl bent over the table, his muse, to the one nervously strolling around the room.

"Lavinia..."

"Should I stay here waiting for you to come back? To pray that you come back? That you won't be devoured? No way!"

Mizuki dryly slammed the mortar on the table, and turned a fiery glance at her companion. The communication of the news to Loki and Amado had not caused her so much trouble. Of course, they had protested. They had argued about how it was not appropriate to send her out there alone: they were a team, after all, and they had to share the risks. But Mizuki, in the course of the conversation, had observed their shifty, relieved eyes, and understood: they were relieved at the idea of not having to go out there again so soon; and that even if it meant letting her go back into that hell alone. She understood them. Fear, and the desire to survive, were feelings she understood.

Lavinia's stubbornness, on the other hand...

Well, she understood that too, of course, because she knew its origin.

Until the day I die...

The words that neither of them uttered, but which crossed the minds of both of them, rumbled in the empty space between them like the sound of stones sliding into a chasm to the ears of the wretch standing on top of it.

The feeling of an invisible weight pressing down on her chest prevented Mizuki from catching her breath for a few moments.

"That's enough, we've discussed this before," she then hissed slowly, carefully articulating each syllable. " First, I am not the one deciding here. If the commander does not want you to go outside the walls, you will not go outside. He specifically said that you and the others are not ready. The man is a veteran, one of the elite soldiers of the Survey Corps; and after two months in this place, you also know what it means. He has a good eye, and experience, and if he judges that you would get killed putting your nose out there, I trust him."

Lavinia huffed, her eyes shooting flames. "I..."

"Secondly," Mizuki continued undaunted, standing up. "It would be ten times more dangerous for me to know you outside the walls and unprepared to face the experience. If it's anyone else, I can restrain myself from going crazy, but not if it's you who's involved. And you know that perfectly well!"

The two girls faced each other in silence, each firm in their position and affection for the other. Theo continued to stare first at one and then at the other, enraptured by the tension hovering in the room.

"You know." continued Mizuki, sitting back down, but without taking her eyes off the other. "So stop it. For my safety, you'd better stay here."

Lavinia did not immediately reply. She stood in front of the infirmary table like a fury, beautiful and furious, her usually soft and submissive dark eyes twinkling in the heat of the argument. "You're not really thinking of offering your heart, I hope," she then sentenced coldly, and in making that accusation that only the other could understand, she let out a short, bitter chuckle.

Mizuki imperceptibly contracted her hands, annoyed at the mere prospect of such an eventuality. "I can't. You know very well yourself that I can't. I keep the commitments I make."

For a split second, both remained silent. Mizuki felt suffocated. Since when had things between them taken that turn? Since when was the mere idea of arousing Lavinia's hatred, or knowing her to be in danger, enough to make her lose her bearings?

Involuntarily, she found herself thinking about the day they had met, on a distant day eight years earlier.

OOO

"Moving from a distant place to a new reality is never easy, so try to get along!" the teacher concluded, opening his arms in a sign of invitation to the class to conform their behavior to that recommendation.

Mizuki, slumped on her own desk and crushed by June's stifling heat, lifted her head slightly in a bored manner to scan the figures standing beside the teacher's desk. It lasted for a moment, the attention her tired mind and empty eyes paid to the teacher's words, then she went back to resting her cheek on the shelf, half-closing her eyelids. She resumed thinking about what she would be served for lunch that day. Meals and sleeping were the only activities that aroused her interest, those days, for it was only from there that she drew the energy she needed to persevere in her purpose.

"Well, then... I'd say there's room next to Onizuka, in the back row!"

It took Mizuki a few moments to grasp the meaning of those words. Had she been faster in doing so, she would certainly have elevated a protest to the proposal that had just been made, draining what little strength she had left in her body. She liked being alone, and she needed her space, to feel safe. She would never allow anyone to sit beside her, disturbing the passive quiet she had so painstakingly created around her.

But the apathy that exuded from her every gesture had begun to corrode her mind as well, and so she was not quick enough to realize what was happening.

She succeeded only when it was too late. She raised her head sharply, and her field of vision was invaded by the image of a smiling, chaste face framed by a mass of dark hair.

"Hey! Nice to meet you! You're Onizuka, right? Sorry to bother you! The seats next to you are free, right? I'm..."

OOO

No, it had not been at that point that the friendship between them had blossomed.

The door to the infirmary swung open, bringing Mizuki back to reality. She immediately turned her attention to the female soldier who had just stepped into the room, as if fleeing from the clash of glances that had awakened vivid memories in both of them. Lavinia, on the other hand, continued to stare at her, completely uninterested in the interruption; as always, when Mizuki stood next to her, she did not care about anything else outside of her friend.

"Onizuka, am I disturbing you?"

Mizuki stood up. "No, of course not. Uma, right? I have your ointment ready. First, though, I want to take a look at your leg to make sure of the state of the erythema."

"Ah, yes..."

The girl followed Mizuki's instruction and approached the crib somewhat uncertainly, after studying Lavinia for a few moments.

"I have to work now," Mizuki quickly snipped, turning her back on her friend.

"We'll talk later, then."

"No. The discussion ends here."

Lavinia tightened her lips slightly and, after reaching the door, waited for the other to turn around. Despite the dry tone with which Mizuki had dismissed her, she knew her friend would turn to look at her. Mizuki never left her side, nor did he allow her to walk away without first casting an apprehensive glance at her, filled with mixed feelings. As if she feared that each separation would be the last.

Mizuki looked back.

"Just promise me you won't do anything crazy," murmured Lavinia in a broken voice. For a moment, she saw again the image of a younger, petite Mizuki enveloped in flames. "These are the last words you will hear from me on the subject."

Her friend did not respond. She merely shrugged her shoulders in silence - a gesture that could signify acquiescence to the request, or a refusal to make a commitment she knew she would not be able to keep - and then pulled back the curtain surrounding the bed on which Uma had settled.

Lavinia sighed and closed the door behind her back.

Until the day I die….

OOO

The week leading up to the expedition passed in a flash.

Lavinia did not broach the subject again with Mizuki, because she knew her well enough to know that she would not change her mind for any reason in the world, and she did not intend to upset her in those days to let her concentrate on training and preparation activities for the expedition.

The news that Loki, Amado, and Lavinia would not be taking part in the expedition circulated quickly and elicited, as expected, some protest. Ultimately, however, and contrary to the commander's estimate, no one attempted to attack them, nor did anyone retaliate in any striking way against them. In fact, as is typical of human beings, each soldier focused only on the danger of death hanging over his or her head, and was absorbed in trying to develop and enhance in the short time remaining before the expedition the skills required to survive. No one had time to recriminate, pontificate and complain that three Corps members would remain safely inside the walls.

Sooner or later, if they intended to remain soldiers, they would have to go out themselves anyway. The rendezvous with the giants, for them, was postponed only a few more months, and nothing more: from the moment one decided to wear the cloak on which the wings of freedom were emblazoned, one's fate was inevitably sealed. To be a member of the Survey Corps meant becoming an army of dead people still walking toward hell.

The afternoon before departure Loki, Lavinia, Amado and Theo left HQ for the destination of their fictitious mission. On that occasion, Lavinia failed to maintain the stoic attitude she had displayed over the course of the week, and burst into desperate weeping on the edge of the garden surrounding the building, throwing herself into the arms of Mizuki, who along with the commander and Hanje was there to bid them farewell. Theo - perhaps sensing at that moment that Mizuki would not be going with them - began sobbing in turn, clinging to her legs. Even Loki and Amado, faced with that sight, were overcome with emotion, and it was with moistened eyes that they detached the child and Lavinia from Mizuki to load them by weight onto the cart waiting for them on the street. She did not say a word for the entire scene; she merely ran a hand wearily over her face as she returned to take hold of her arms again.

Erwin, Hanje and Mizuki waited for the cart to pull away and disappear beyond the corner at the end of the road. The two adults respected the silence of the girl who, having stepped forward at the departure of the cart as if in pursuit, gave them her back, and whose expression they therefore could not discern.

The echoes of Lavinia and Theo's sobs haunted her throughout the evening, rumbling in her head like a dire prophecy. If Mizuki had not felt particularly nervous until then, the scene, against her better judgement, shook her. What would happen to her teammates and Theo if something happened to her? Who would protect them? While giving the commander credit for not harboring hostile intentions toward them, Mizuki was too intelligent not to realize that every decision he made pursued one and only one goal, which did not contemplate - and indeed sacrificed - the soldiers' safety. The thought stuck like a thorn in her brain.

Although she let nothing transpire outwardly of the anxious feeling that gripped her stomach, the members of Levi squad, with whom she dined, noticed her nervousness and, while attributing it to the prospect of a new encounter with the giants, tried in their own way to distract her. Eld, as vice-captain, took pains to repeat to her over the course of the meal the essential information about the formation, smoke signals, and how to behave in case of an encounter with the giants. Oluo, on the other hand, teased her constantly, letting her know that no one would be surprised if she chickened out during her first expedition, and that she could relax because he would have her back. Gunther, who knew how little she liked dealing with the maintenance of the device, a task in which Amado usually helped her, convinced her to let him take one last look that everything was working perfectly; "trust me, better to find out now if there are any problems than tomorrow," he assured her as he fiddled with the gears. Meanwhile, Petra cheered them all up with light chatter, jokes, and shushing Oluo when he became too irritating.

Mizuki felt herself overflowing with gratitude.

After that, the two girls went to the women's baths to take a shower, where they waited patiently for their turn. Mizuki was the first to slip under the stream of water and finish; as she waited whistling for Petra in the hallway, leaning against the wall, a tall, lanky boy with thick red hair and full of freckles shyly approached her.

"Um, hi Mizuki…"

She frowned in an attempt to remember his name, a feat she found quite difficult: if she wasn't mistaken, that ginger had been part of the Survey Corps for at least a year, so they hadn't had much opportunity to interact. However... but of course! One night he had shyly offered to exchange his ration tomatoes for Mizuki's loaf of bread. What was his name again...? "Good evening, Willy."

"Good evening," he repeated mechanically, embarrassed. "I... um... I was wondering... that is..."

"Ah, don't worry. I'm leaving soon, and you'll then have a free field to spy on the girls in the bathroom." When her words had the desired effect and Willy's face turned the same shade as his hair, Mizuki burst out laughing. "Don't worry, I'm just kidding! So what can I do, for you?"

Seemingly calmed by the smile that had lit up her face, Willy cleared his throat and continued, "Here, do you have something to do...tonight?"

"Tonight?" Mizuki crossed her arms, making up her mind. "Why, is there any activity planned in view of tomorrow?"

"No..."

"Well, then I guess I'll go to bed. I want to respect the curfew for once. If the captain catches me wandering around at night again, he might really take advantage of the expedition tomorrow and feed me to a giant."

Willy allowed a moment of silence to pass. "Don't worry. I'll protect you tomorrow."

Mizuki took a few moments to grasp the meaning of those words. "... Thank you, you are very kind."

"So... in short, yes... would you like to spend this night together with me?"

For the first time since the conversation had begun, Mizuki really gave him her full and complete attention, certain that she had missed or misinterpreted the meaning of those words. Yet his attitude and, more importantly, the color of his cheeks seemed to confirm her suspicions. Willy kept his face downcast, and fiddled nervously with the hem of his shirt.

"Ah, my roommates are out, so we can stay at my place," he hastened to add in a whisper. "We won't have to go to the garden or the storerooms."

Mizuki's mouth opened wide in surprise. "Um, Willy, I don't know what to say."

" No need for you to say anything" Willy, interpreting Mizuki's silence as shyness, took courage and reached out a hand to grasp the girl's.

She, however, moved one step out of his reach. "Your proposal honors me, I mean it. But I... I'm not really interested in such things at the moment. I'd rather get a good night's sleep before tomorrow. Sorry."

Mizuki clearly distinguished the expression of disappointment mixed with embarrassment painting itself on Willy's face. He gasped for a moment, uncertain how to reply to such a statement. As for her, she wished that the floor under her feet or the wall would give way and make her sink, as long as she could get herself out of that awkward situation.

Fortunately for both of them, Petra chose that moment to exit the bathroom. Mizuki hastened to take her under her arm and, after an awkward greeting, to walk away at a brisk pace.

"Well, Mizuki, but that's normal!" exclaimed Petra when, once in the room, the other told her in a half indignant, half surprised tone what had just happened.

"Normal?! I barely know his name, and that redhead offered me to have sex with him!"

"Things work like that here, the night before an expedition. Of course, clandestine encounters happen all year round, but at such times even those who don't normally indulge in such activities do so," Petra continued, intent on rechecking the contents of her backpack for the umpteenth time. "I mean, we might die tomorrow, right? It's natural to want to spend your last night in someone's arms."

Mizuki, curled cross-legged on the bed, huffed. "I don't agree. In fact, to be more precise, I don't understand it. I would rather spend it outdoors watching the stars than locked in a room sweating with a person whose name I barely know, in uncomfortable and unnatural positions."

"I hope you didn't just tell him that…"

"No, I just told him I'd rather get a good night's sleep in view of what lies ahead tomorrow."

"Poor Willy..."

"Rather, the information you just gave me is very interesting!"" Mizuki stood up and, after reaching Petra, grabbed her by the shoulders, forcing her to interrupt. "'Cut it out with that backpack! That's the fourth time you've checked that you have everything, with you, and even if you forgot your handkerchief, I feel quite comfortable in saying that the giants will get over it! If it is true that the night before an expedition everything is allowed, then what are you still doing here?"

Petra blushed to the tip of her hair, resembling Willy to an almost comical degree. "Don't joke..."

"I'm not joking, in fact! It's a great opportunity! You bring him tea every night anyway, right? He won't get suspicious."

"It's late..."

"No later than usual, and that guy never sleeps anyway! He's your superior, it seems normal to me that you want to be useful to him!" In uttering those words, Mizuki began to push the girl toward the door. "Bring him tea and then, sighing in a broken manner, let it slip that you'll have to spend the night in the shelter. Make up that I freaked out because I got separated from Lavinia and Theo, and so you can't go back to the room; or that I took Willy there. Whatever. Maybe he'll offer to let you stay with him, and, you know, one cup of tea leads to another…"

Petra broke free from Mizuki's grip at the threshold of the room. "Come on! That could never happen. He is..."

"...he is a man, just like everyone else! And until you try, we'll never know, will we? Look, I'm not telling you to jump on him, just bring him tea and try to create a romantic atmosphere. That's all." Mizuki opened the door and pushed her friend into the hallway.

"Always the same old optimist..." sighed Petra who, however, seemed heartened by being thrown out of the room and pushed toward the staircase.

"Someday you will thank me, Loki number two. Mind you, don't you dare come back without trying!"

Petra seemed to be taking her words seriously, and did not return for the next two hours. With each passing minute, confidence grew in Mizuki that their plan, this time, had succeeded. Complimenting herself on her own ingenious stunt, she finished packing her backpack and supplies for the next day, crawled into bed, and closed her eyes.

Fatigue and tension weighed down her body, as if boulders were hanging from the ends of her body, similar to the rattles that hung at the entrance to certain stores or in the window well of children's rooms. Her head throbbed, and the darkness stretched her arms to envelop her in a silent embrace.

Still, she could not get to sleep.

Just promise me you won't do anything crazy.

Well, she just could not do that, and Lavinia knew it. Although she had tried to hide it by sinking her face into the pillow, Mizuki had heard her crying every night since the day of the discussion in the infirmary. What would happen to her if she did not return?

I mean, we might die tomorrow, right?

Her eyes wide open, Mizuki watched the ceiling above her, trying to make out the outlines of the stones that composed it, but the darkness was too thick. Suddenly, it seemed as if the walls were closing in on her; she curled up, as if to protect herself, but the boulders hanging from her limbs made it difficult for her to move.

She felt suffocated. She felt pinned to the bed, with no way of escape.

It is natural to want to spend your last night in someone's arms.

With a sharp gesture, Mizuki freed herself from the blankets and slipped out of the room.

OOO

The week that had just passed had not given him a moment's rest. Endless, exhausting, full, busy; no matter how much he reduced his breaks and sleep periods, time slid inexorably forward, and the twenty-four hours of which each day was composed often proved insufficient to allow him to complete the day's goals. Preparations for the upcoming expedition, while draining all his energy and the already meager patience with which he was endowed, also had some beneficial effects: they kept him sufficiently busy so that he could avoid thinking.

Yet, the time had finally come when, by now, nothing remained to be done, and his mind - finally and fatally cleared of work - could wander at will; thus, thoughts kept at bay or, rather, ignored until then, emerged from the surface of the still waters of his consciousness, assaulting him.

The night before an expedition, for him, always stretched on endlessly, oppressive, and filled with foreboding. Each time, he thought he would go mad. And each time dawn came, freeing him from uncertainty. Because by nightfall, many of those he had seen consuming dinner more boisterously than usual would not survive. Of the bodies of some, perhaps, they would manage to bring a few pieces back home, snatched from the giants' jaws; of others, the less fortunate, nothing would remain but their memory, an abandoned bed in a room, the emptiness in the heart of someone who would mourn them.

There was but one way not to succumb to that suffocating feeling.

Levi unlocked the door that opened onto the building's terrace. He always spent the sleepless nights before an expedition up there. Contemplation of the night sky and the stars that brightened it brought back memories, painful and comforting at the same time, bitter and sweet like certain orange marmalade cookies that circulated before the fall of Wall Maria. Memories of nights spent with two indistinct shadows, to which he struggled not to give a name... Although he had been living those moments in complete solitude for a long time now - to be precise, since February 844 - he did not feel lonely. Because they - as well as all the other fallen comrades - in a sense, still stood there, sewn on his chest, at the coat of arms depicting the wings of freedom.

Wings of freedom, which, however, weighed like rocks on the chests of the survivors, of those who still fought, and did not forget.

Enclosed in that emblem, all the dead they had not buried were crowded together. He was not alone, yet he was alone. And that was okay.

As he slipped the key to the roof door into his pocket, a gust of the frigid November wind hit the captain, forcing him to half-close his eyelids for a few moments.

When he raised them again, there she was.

Obviously, out of bed, in the middle of the curfew. Nothing surprising about that; indeed, he would have been surprised at the opposite.

He clucked his tongue, yet that sound, lost in the soundless stillness of the night, did not come out with the usual annoyed intonation; it echoed in the darkness more like a kind of call.

He first glimpsed the shapeless mass of curly hair whirling in the wind, and then the rest of the body, crouched cross-legged on one of the turrets that dotted the edge of the terrace. The torso swayed dangerously forward, lulled by the sharp wind that blew violently.

Levi, with a furrowed brow, approached without making a sound. At any moment he expected her to burst into her usual irreverent laughter, before rattling off a ridiculous excuse to justify her presence there; incidentally, he harbored a vague suspicion that she had climbed all the way from the window using one of their lizard techniques, considering that only few among the officers possessed the key to the access door. Even when he reached the parapet, however, the brat gave no sign of noticing him. If possible, her body tilted even more dangerously toward the void.

What the fuck was she up to, the brat over there? Had she decided not to make it to the departure alive?

Was she asleep, perhaps?

Levi leaned forward so he could catch a glimpse of her face.

"Ohi..."

He froze mid-movement, because on her face he did not discern the amused expression he had expected. He didn't glimpse anything at all.

Yes, Mizuki was always energetic, cheerful, and boisterous. She didn't take anything seriously if she didn't want to.

And yet, there were moments when she would switch off.

At a first and superficial glance, one might have thought she was asleep, even though she kept her eyes wide open, as if she had just witnessed an unexpected event. But looking more carefully, one realized that those golden irises did not reflect the surrounding reality, and wandered over objects without seeing them, while she remained motionless, an impassive expression like that of a statue, and on her lips an imperceptible breath.

It never happened in front of other people. She was careful that this did not happen, perhaps so as not to cause concern in others, perhaps because she did not want to be bothered at such times.

Levi had seen her in that condition before, during one of his sleepless nights, as he wandered the halls. Mizuki was curled up in the hollow of a window, an open book on her lap illuminated by moonlight. The only transgression of the rules for herself, in fact, happened when she really liked a book and, therefore, she decided to sneak out of bed, into the hallway, in search of a remnant of light that would allow her to continue reading. Yet, her gaze was not on the pages. She stared at a spot in front of her, at the height of the rafter that surmounted the recess in which the window was set.

He had approached her at a leisurely pace with the intention of giving her an earful, but when he found himself close enough to catch a glimpse of Mizuki's eyes he was forced to stop.

The emptiness.

Those irises always so bright and full of life, overwhelmed by the nothingness of absence.

There was no trace of the energetic, inappropriate, boisterous girl in that gaze. Before him sat an empty doll that shared only features with that girl.

That night, he had decided to retreat. He understood that he had brushed against one of her most intimate secrets, one of the moments when, stripped of her weapons, she curled up to face the enemies she normally pretended to ignore. Even to someone like him, who had always been accustomed to the worst, such a vision had sent a shiver down his spine.

But now going away was not an option. That dumb brat had decided to retreat to that private and inaccessible dimension of hers, abandoning her own envelope composed of flesh and blood, on a fucking parapet meters above the ground.

Levi extended a hand in her direction.

A lock of curly hair, blown by the wind, brushed against his skin, and he felt himself shiver.

OOO

She was once again standing on the rooftops of that abandoned city. She was running forward, seamlessly, as if she were running along a road traced with invisible slabs, in the direction of a definite place. No matter how much she struggled, however, the goal seemed out of her grasp, unreachable. She could keep running for the rest of her life, and still she would not make it in time. She felt it, she knew it.

Yet she had to try. Otherwise they would die.

The mammoth figure, very close to her and yet unreachable lowered an arm toward the roof of the house in front of which it was feasting. It raised the hand again, and between its tree-thick fingers sprouted a tiny little head topped by two braids of black hair.

She accelerated as an inarticulate cry escaped her mouth, and it was at that moment that something grabbed her by the ankle. She collapsed to the ground.

Her sensei's corpse climbed along her leg, wrapping its icy arms around her. She felt the fingers devoid of all warmth creep along her thigh, the splinter planted in his stomach rub her knee, and the man's breath tickle her neck. "Cora...I love you...don't leave me..."

"Leave me...I am not Cora..." she struggled, trying to free herself from that iron grip. "I am not my mother!"

"No... you are one of them. His daughter... one of those filthy..."

"I am not my father either! Leave me!"

The crackling of the fire forced her to draw attention away from her own battle with that grip of ice, and to lift her head.

Now she was no longer standing on the rooftops of a city within the walls. She was once again a fourteen-year-old girl in a burning house, staring at the fire devouring the life that had lit those walls, and its inhabitants. Helplessness nailed her feet to the ground. She cursed her age, her being just a child. She wanted to grow up, to grow up as fast as possible because, as an adult, she would surely know how to behave, what to do to prevent certain tragedies from happening.

Amid the sparks, at the back of the room, a little head topped by a mop of dark hair came into her field of vision.

"Why did this happen? Why did they die?"

That relentless question, the answer to which she did not know, haunted her.

She opened her mouth. But she found that she lacked air, and she felt herself being sucked backward, as if someone had grabbed her by the dress and was pulling her.

"Oi, you brat!"

OOO

The biting cold hit her like a fist. Mizuki gasped, searching for air. Into her field of vision, to the right, came a wrinkled, annoyed face that was dangerously familiar.

Levi watched the life slowly reconquer the brat's irises. Only then did he let go of her jacket collar, allowing her to breathe again.

Mizuki adjusted her clothes.

They stood staring at each other for a few moments in silence.

"Captain!" She looked embarrassed, an occurrence more unique than rare for a shameless girl like her. In all likelihood, she was wondering if he had noticed the condition she was in just now. Perhaps she was not fully aware of how she looked when she decided to retreat within herself, but it certainly did not please her that her secret had been violated in such a way. She certainly did not expect that anyone other than her would ever sneak onto that terrace in the middle of the night.

Levi pulled her ear, but without applying any particular force to the gesture. "You really want to kick the bucket, huh? Do you think that's a good place to sleep?"

"I wasn't sleeping, I was reflecting!" Mizuki gave him a look somewhere between suspicious and relieved, uncertain whether he was faking it or really hadn't noticed anything. Then she seemed to decide on the second option, and brightened her hair with one hand, more relaxed than before.

"And you couldn't do it in your fucking room?"

"Before you start with the lecture, I warn you that if you intend to punish me for violating the curfew, you cannot limit it to just me. More than half of the Corps is out and about tonight, and you know that very well." Mizuki drew her legs up to the chest, and rested her cheek on them so that her face was turned in Levi's direction. Now all traces of discomfort were gone. She was challenging him. "This could be our last night. I don't feel like spending it in a room, in the dark. I want to look at the stars. You're here for the same reason, aren't you?"

The captain did not answer. He merely uttered a low, dry sigh, and then hoisted himself onto the parapet, sitting down beside her.

A few moments of silence elapsed, during which Levi felt himself studied by those amber eyes, in which hovered a strange mixture of suspicion and curiosity.

"Captain?"

"What do you want?"

"Where is Petra?"

"Ral? She brought me tea, around eleven, and then left."

Mizuki clucked her tongue, then turned her face toward the sky ahead. "Damn you." It was unclear whether he was referring to Petra, him, or both.

Exactly as he suspected. When his subordinate had lingered in the room before he, impatiently, kicked her out, babbling some story about the impossibility of going back to her own bedroom because Mizuki had freaked out, and that she would have to sleep in the hallway, he had immediately assumed that it was some scheme masterminded by the little bitch. Had she perhaps taken him for an idiot?

"Did you get over the crisis instead?"

"What crisis?" Immediately after formulating those words, Mizuki gasped, probably realizing her mistake. "Ah, of course. I had a bad moment. Really bad. I was so out of my mind that I barely remember it now that I'm lucid again. It was really embarrassing."

She really was a bad liar. Levi enjoyed her disconnected mutterings for a few more moments, studying from the corner of his eye her profile and the slight blush that colored her cheeks. It was not common to see her in distress, and every now and then that little pest deserved to be paid back in the same coin with which she usually tormented others.

Eventually Mizuki tightened her lips and shut herself up in silence, perhaps realizing that all those justifications were more to her detriment than anything else.

It had been a while since they had been alone.

The spectacle of the sky quilted with a myriad of bright gems above them made both of their heads spin.

"I wonder how it is possible to prefer a dark room to this vision and..." Mizuki froze in mid-sentence. She had blushed again. "...and the rest."

"That's because you're a brat."

"But you're here, too, and you're an adult."

Levi ignored the answer. He shared her view, but he would never admit it.

Silence fell over them again. Yet neither felt uncomfortable. They each tried to follow the thread of their own thoughts, but the awareness - vague but cumbersome no matter how hard they tried to ignore it; disturbing, even if able to fill that emptiness they both felt in their chests that night - of the other's closeness brought those remnants of thread to intertwine. They conversed with each other without speaking, their eyes pointed skyward.

It had already happened that they had the impression of being able to read - sometimes, and under optimal conditions - each other's thoughts.

Levi wondered to himself how she felt about the prospect of leaving the walls again. Mizuki imagined that he - always discreetly attentive to others, hard bark and soft interior - was coming up with such a question. She imagined answering him that, as before any mission, she felt no particular fear; and this lack of perception of danger - which he caught in her every gesture - Levi judged to be one of the most risky aspects of her character.

Mizuki, for her part, sniffed in the air the anxiety that gripped him, not for himself, but for the fate of his comrades. She tried to convey her optimism to him, bending imperceptibly in his direction: all of them had trained so hard, they were ready, and the giants were behaving like stupid pigeons, and the expedition would last only two days.

Almost at the same instant, their eyes dropped off the stars and slid to the person sitting beside.

"I like talking to you," Mizuki said. "We should do this more often."

"Should I ask Erwin to put you on the front line tomorrow?"

"I wasn't making fun of you for once. You don't need to talk... to talk. Now, for example, you're thinking that when I keep quiet I'm even bearable, eh? And that it's a pity that I can't last in silence longer than five minutes."

Mizuki stared at him with an amused smirk on her lips. Levi's hand moved automatically to her ear poking invitingly through her curls; he pulled, as before, without impressing any force on the movement. "You wouldn't be you if you could keep your fucking mouth shut for more than five minutes."

"And you wouldn't be you if you didn't pull my ears."

They stared at each other for a few more moments, in silence, and more words that, this time, neither of them understood - the words of the body, a twitch of the hand, a shudder down the spine, the flash of a furtive glance - were exchanged by their respective gazes.

Levi's mind was flooded with a sudden, disorienting image. Mizuki stared at him with the same blank expression that had chilled the blood in his veins. This time, however, what gave her that look was not her decision to retreat into some private part of her own mind, but the foot of a giant that had just come down on her like an axe.

His hands abandoned on his thighs contracted.

" Rather than that, while we're on the subject of bullshit: The heartbreaking screams of your little friends this afternoon have shattered the eardrums of the whole Corps. They were almost worse to endure than the four-eyed ones when that shitty giant kicked the bucket. And they were just separating from you for a couple of days. While getting back to the walls, we will already have enough problems, including convincing Hanje not to capture any giants along the way. I will not tolerate adding to the list that we have to deal with those two because you've turned into giant shit. Is that clear?"

The girl chuckled. "Are you asking me to return home alive, if it is not too much trouble?"

"I'm ordering you to follow the instructions of your superiors, you unconscious little shithead."

"It sounded better the way I put it down."

"I'm serious. No bullshit, brat."

"All right, Mom, I get it. I won't run and I won't sweat," she promised, putting her hand over her heart.

This time she was faster, and bent her torso back before Levi's hand reached its target. Mizuki laughed loudly, as happened every time she saw his irritated expression. That sound, the simplicity of that gesture, for a few moments, made him forget where they were, and what would happen the next day, freeing him from the oppressive weight that was his daily companion, and his reason for living.

It was only a few moments, but it was enough. That feeling of serenity he had not felt in a very long time now, and certainly, it had never happened the night before an expedition.

"You can relax, captain! You won't get rid of me tomorrow! Trust me!"

But he had not trusted sentences like that for a very long time.

Life had taught him all too early that a soldier in the Survey Corps could never keep such a promise; no one, in fact, could. He had learned it on his skin, and the hard way: he had trusted, in a few but significant situations, and reality had screwed him.

Still, she was sincere, in uttering those words, and the fire of her optimism - or her stupidity - drew him toward the abyss, like a siren's song, at once alluring and dangerous.

Levi rebelled against the feeling that radiated from the tiny body huddled so close to his own. He wore his harshest expression, the one that could silence whatever person was addressing him, regardless of gender, age or social standing.

"Your stupidity disgusts me. You give air to your mouth, but you don't know what it means. You have no idea."

His voice vibrated with anger. An exaggerated reaction, and inappropriate, given the context and his interlocutor. He only knew that he wanted to grab her by the shoulders and shake her until she realized, until she too saw the vision that had camped in his mind just before. Show her the emblem he sported on his uniform and force her to realize, to become aware of what it represented. The dead, the emptiness, the sense of helplessness.

Mizuki, however, did not seem impressed or bothered by that display of ferocity. "'You're wrong,'" she said quietly, as if they were talking about the weather. "I know what it means. I've seen it. I've seen that, and many other things, and I've come to a conclusion. Do you want to know which one?"

He sighed, not bothering to respond. Was there anything in that world that could intimidate her?

"Now, going out that door both you and I - any of us - could get hit by a piece of wall that came off the wall and die. Or take the stairs, trip and break our necks."

"Are you trying to jinx me?"

"With all due respect, I don't think a bit of stone would be enough to send you to the other world; but anyway, that's the concept. It could be a tree, a wild animal, another man. We are full of natural enemies, if you think about it. There are not only giants."

He looked away, because he thought he understood what she was trying to say.

"My mother, for example, died of illness. After risking her life for much of her youth in battle, it was a stupid disease that cut her down. Ironic, isn't it?"

Mizuki turned her head toward the valley, an indecipherable expression on her face.

"After the war ended, she stopped fighting and set up a flower store. Plants were her great passion. My father, on the other hand, continued to go on missions, very often far from home, for months on end. The one most exposed to death was him, and it was for him that we were afraid. Yet it was she who left us first." The girl's hands twitched slightly; an imperceptible movement, but one that did not escape the captain's notice. She said no more, but turning her head slightly, she turned back to him. Her eyes were filled with unspoken understatement.

He had already noticed it in the course of her stay at the former HQ, but Mizuki spoke very little about herself. It never happened that she would engage in a conversation about her private life and antecedent to their arrival at the walls, and whenever she was asked a personal question she usually gave a joking or, at most, neutral answer. The few times she had taken the initiative or provided more in-depth details, she had never done so to arouse others' sympathy, gain comfort or vent. No, that brat - now he realized it - dealt with the emotions that gripped her chest hidden from the gaze of others, in solitude. If she opened up, the decision was dictated by the need to be understood by the people around her, or to communicate something to them.

"Once one understands this, one has two ways to deal with it: to spend every single moment thinking that you might die at any moment, or the opposite, that is, that you might survive " Mizuki resumed, and stretched her arms in front of her. "I chose the latter, as you can guess. I am not saying that it is the right answer and constitutes the solution to all problems, of course. I am well aware of that. Many people will die tomorrow anyway, and there is nothing I can do or say to change that reality. I may fit the number; but it may not. And my follies might not save anyone; or they might. And it is in this second scenario that I want to believe."

She was not trying to empower herself through positive, optimistic thoughts. He was the one she meant to reassure.

The presumption of that clueless brat sent him further into a rage.

Part of him wished to leave that place, not after finding a way to shut her mouth that seemed capable of spewing only nonsense.

"What a fucked-up philosophy."

But it was only one part of him. Another, despite his revulsion at the prospect, wished to believe her.

"That may be so. Why, though, don't you try to think that way yourself? Just for tomorrow."

No, screw that; he wished he could tell her, before he left, and abandon her there.

But he didn't leave.

He let it rub off on him. He squinted his eyes and decided that - for the space of that night - he might as well allow himself to accept that goofy invitation that a pair of golden eyes were offering him on a silver platter. For one night, nothing would happen if the weight pressing down on his chest was a little more bearable; if the wings of freedom finally unfolded lightly on his shoulders.

Levi cast a glance at her out of the corner of his eye.

"I have had the opportunity to admire your ingenious gimmicks during training, so it is impossible for me to hold out hope."

"Ah! And I've restrained myself today!"

They lingered on the rooftop - side by side - until dawn. For most of the time, they remained silent or - as Mizuki preferred to emphasize - conversed through their thoughts; every now and then, she would make some remark devoid of any relevance and receive in response a sharp comment, or an annoyed look, and then she would laugh.

One by one, the stars faded and the first rays of the sun lapped the horizon.

The day of the thirty-third expedition had finally arrived.

OOO

Trost's main street, which crossed the entire city in a straight line, dividing it into two perfect halves, teemed with soldiers and horses near the gateway facing the outside world. In the clear, frosty morning air resounded shouts, calls, sounds of hooves and wagons on the pavement, the clangour of weapons, the last cries, laughters of mockery, whispers of love that were lost in the confusion. The sounds the citizens now recognized as the prelude to any expedition.

The wings of freedom dominated the scene; similar to those of mighty white birds soaring through the skies, the supporters sustained with eyes that glittered; identical to those of pesky gnats that would soon be crushed, sneered detractors.

The soldiers of the Survey Corps waited for the signal: only when the giants hovering near the walls would be lynched by the cannons placed on top of them would the commander give the order to get ready. The veterans - believing it was still some time before the signal - granted license to subordinates to leave their horses in position and move off to chat with comrades or greet family and friends gathered for departure.

Mizuki had been assigned to Captain Finnian's squad, deputized to pass communications and placed in the second line of the formation, in the third row. Slipping between the chariots and horses, she joined Levi squad, positioned on the same side of the formation, but along the outermost border and three rows further back, tasked with spotting the approaching giants.

"Guys!" she greeted them, raising her hand.

"Hey, Mizuki!" Gunther smiled affably at her, continuing to brush his own horse. "Everything okay with your device?"

"Look who's here. I thought you'd run away by now." Oluo reached out to muss her hair, gathered tightly in a bun that topped her head like a mushroom, but Mizuki turned away with a grimace.

"Don't you dare, it took me forever to style it this morning without Lavinia's help. And Captain Sunshine wouldn't do it anyway."

Petra laughed at that remark. "You see, Oluo? You don't have what it takes to act like him!"

"Si ... silence, women!"

"The captain would not need to speak, to impose silence on us. One of his murderous looks would be enough for him. You still have a long way to go. Right, Petra?" Mizuki searched her friend's gaze, seeking reassurance.

That morning, at dawn, when she had returned to the common room, Petra was already there. After she had closed the door behind her, they peered at each other for a few moments in silence.

"Where have you been, Mizuki?"

"Me? Where have you been, rather!"

The other lowered her head to the backpack she was checking for the umpteenth time.

"I know the captain kicked you out of the room after you brought him tea. So you didn't spend the night with him."

"How...?"

Mizuki slipped her shirt on, taking a few moments before answering. She had made the decision not to lie about what happened that night. First, because she believed she hadn't done anything wrong: after all, all they had done was stand around and stare at the sky, he tolerating her presence and she, more out of habit than anything else, hurling irreverent and irrelevant comments. Secondly, because their meeting on the roof had happened by pure chance, without being planned; and she certainly was in no position to chase him away, so she had had to accept the captain sitting next to her.

"Because last night I did what I said I would like to do. I went to the roof to look at the stars, and after a while I felt an ominous presence come up behind me and make an attempt on my ears. Well, somehow I convinced the captain not to push me off the roof, and to let me stay there. Then..."

...then we stayed talking until dawn. But those words wouldn't leave her lips.

"Then?"

Mizuki's fingers stiffened on the buckles of the device she was fastening around her thighs. The vague whiff of suspicion she sensed in her friend's voice sent her into a panic and made her stupid enough to do the one thing she had promised herself she would not do. "...then he left I don't know where, and I just stayed there," she lied with a lump in her throat. Because of the other's persistent silence, she shyly turned in her direction. "What about you?"

"I did what I said I would do, too. Just not with him."

Mizuki felt the muscles in her shoulders relax, in realizing that Petra had cut short, on the subject, only because she was embarrassed by the situation, and that every trace of suspicion and accusation had vanished from her voice. She did not understand the reasons for her shame. She certainly did not judge her; on the contrary, she admired her, marveling at how a girl of her own age could be so different from her and already launched into the mysterious world of adults.

Yet, the relief was short-lived. Immediately, she regretted lying. This was not like her, especially since she truly believed she had done nothing wrong. What if someone saw them? What if, in talking to the captain, Petra discovered the lie? She shook her head. No, impossible; even without a solid foundation on which to base such a belief, she felt that he intended to keep the meeting as secret as she did. The thought soothed her, and she finished preparing herself in silence.

"Look at that damned man." Oluo's voice brought her back to reality, and Mizuki followed the direction of his wrinkled gaze. Not far from them, Eld held a beautiful blond girl in his arms.

"Uh, and who is that?" she asked, intrigued. " He treats himself well, the vice of your team. What a beautiful woman!"

"His girlfriend. They've been together for a few months," Gunther explained.

"Ah! They won't last!" with an annoyed gesture Oluo better adjusted the saddle of his own horse who, however, seemed not to like his master's lack of delicacy, and turned his muzzle to snort in his face.

"You shouldn't let envy do the talking, Oluo. When it happens you really sound ridiculous," Petra snapped back at him.

"Envy? If I am not engaged, dear Petra, it is only because I have such a line of suitors that choosing one would be really impossible."

"Yes, yes of course..."

Mizuki, laughing, reached out to pet Oluo's horse. The acknowledgement that her friend was behaving as usual soothed her.

"Hey, scum!"

Something hard hit her on the shoulder. Mizuki turned toward the source of the voice and the apple core that had just centered her. A few steps away from her stood the other members of her team - Lucy, Charlie, and Henry - all three newly graduated recruits; "they still wear diapers," Oluo had said over dinner, in a dismissive tone in a vain attempt to imitate Levi. Among the cadets, they were the ones who accepted less willingly the inclusion of outsiders within the Corps, and the already fairly deep-seated rancor grew out of all proportion when they found out - to their dismay, regret and surprise - that three of them would not be taking part in the expedition, and the only participant would end up no less than in their squad.

"Do you need me, Henry?" asked Mizuki politely, bending her head to the side. The three Levi squad members, petrified, shifted their outraged gaze from the three cadets to Mizuki.

"Do you need me, Henry?" mimicked Charlie. Lucy remained aloof and silent, but the smirk on her lips suggested that she shared her teammates' attitude.

"You are so stupid," Henry rejoined.

"Ah, you're not the first person who's said so."

"Then I'll explain it to you in a simple way so that even a fool like you can understand it. Having someone on our team who has never seen a giant is a real torment. I bet you'll wet your pants as soon as you see one. Try not to get in our way today. And stay away from us, I don't feel like smelling shit for two days." Henry's face contorted into a grotesque grin.

Oluo advanced menacingly by one step. "Ohi, you little..."

But Mizuki quickly stepped between them and, with her best smile, exclaimed: "Thank you for the warning. I will try my best to be helpful."

Mizuki's reaction displaced her own torturers: even though she had been reacting in the same tone to all provocations for the past two months, given the special occasion Henry overdid it, hoping to hit the already tense nerves of a newcomer about to enter the giants' territory for the first time. Realizing that they had failed miserably and noticing the obvious intention of the Levi squad members to interfere in the discussion, the three hurried away. At that scene, Mizuki let out a laugh.

"Mizuki!" Petra forced the girl to turn in her direction. "Don't you think you're being too condescending?! Those guys just insulted you, and you laugh?"

"But what else am I supposed to do?"

"Well ... well, for example, break their noses!"

She shrugged her shoulders, and shook her head. "And that would only make him even more nice to me. Nah, that's okay. I don't like to get angry for no good reason - in fact, I can't even get angry. It would be pointless, and I've never liked wasting energy. Not to mention that by now I've heard the wetting the pants thing so many times that it doesn't even make me laugh anymore. Besides, to be honest, I'd be pissed off, too, if I were in his place: just imagine, they're teaming up with a chick who entered the army by privilege and who has no special skills or has never seen a giant!"

Petra opened her mouth to protest, but a glance from Gunther was enough to shut it again. She renounced saying what she had been on the verge of pointing out - namely, that Mizuki had not only seen but also taken down several giants -, so she vented her rancor by continuing to mock them. "Well, for that matter, those three have never seen one either!"

"I don't know if that's really the case... those three are childhood friends, and they're from Shiganshina."

Oluo clucked his tongue, heroically persevering in his imitation of Levi. "They haven't seen them, trust me. You can tell by the look."

"In any case, that one there is quite a jerk!"

"I know, Petra, you're right. He looks so much like…"

Before Mizuki could complete the sentence, a stun grenade was fired from the top of the walls, and soon after, the commander's voice - rising from an unspecified point in the assemblage of men, horses, and wagons - overpowered the hubbub of the street: "MEN! IN POSITION!"

Mizuki's heart leapt into her throat. Like a spring-loaded soldier, the hand thunderbolted to her chest, clenched into a fist without, in fact, any need for it, and she turned sharply to return to her place. While still spinning around, she began to run headlong, and it was in this way that she failed to notice Levi, who was coming up behind her, and crashed violently into him.

Mizuki staggered backward. For a moment, she felt herself being pulled in two different directions, as if caught in a vise between the steely eyes aimed at her own face - and, in that split second, she was curiously aware of how much darker they appeared, in the sun, than when only the light of the moon and stars lavished on them, as well as the annoyed thought that surfaced, "this fool does the military salute, only when she doesn't have to" - and the brown ones, behind her own back. Confusingly she understood that the annoying feeling constituted the first of the consequences of her own thoughtless lying of that morning.

"Tsk. Always getting in the way."

Those words hit her like a slap in the face. How stupid I am. I'm about to go outside the walls and I might become a toothpick in a few hours, and I'm panicking over such nonsense.

With the usual smirk on her lips, Mizuki clapped a tightly clenched hand on the chest. "I am proud of my gift of always being in the way, sir! And you will see, I will continue to torment you for a long time to come, I assure you!"

For a moment, she feared she had gone too far, for Levi's face hardened; then he huffed, and passed her with a single step. "Get out of the way."

He said so, but it did not escape Mizuki's notice that - though imperceptibly - his glacial eyes, in settling on her, had softened.

OOO

OOO

Good morning everyone, and thanks so much to those who have made it to read this far and saved the story!

At long last, the "real" life of Mizuki and companions in the ranks of the Survey Corps begins, unraveling between organization for the next expedition, confrontations with Lavinia that will shed some light on the relationship between the two, and Levi's attempts to evade plans to settle him down and to straighten out- unsuccessfully- a certain over-exuberant underling.

I wish you a good read, and see you next time!