"You smell scared."

Sitting on top of her horse, staring at the gate, she wasn't sure how she could be anything other than frightened. There were titans out there, she knew. She'd never seen one actively rampaging, never seen the hungry, lost look in their eyes before they crunched a man's bones between their teeth. As the Scouts passed, the townspeople whispered things like, "They always bring back more corpses than answers," their words serving only to heighten her anxiety. Evidently, Mike had picked up on this.

"Really? Does fear smell sexy?" she asked, hardly paying attention to what she was saying.

"You're crude," he chuckled, "I can see why you and Captain Levi get along."

"We don't," she said flatly, looking behind her. "Where is he?"

Mike just shook his head, putting a finger to his lips. She sighed.

"No worries," Hange whispered, giving her a thumbs up.

The gate made a hideous sound as it opened, dirt falling from the stakes at the bottom. When it finally stopped croaking, Erwin's booming voice pulled her out of her dread, announcing the commencement of the 57th Expedition.

Before she could even really process what was happening, the hooves of her horse—affectionately named Ransom—were beating into the ground, pushing her forward with the rest of the formation.

"What the hell did you say you named that thing?" Levi had asked her, brows furrowed in disgust.

"Ransom."

"That's horrible," he huffed, crossing his arms.

"No way. I deal with ransoms for a living—I'm sort of dealing with one right now, actually. The thing with Lewis can be considered ransom, right? But instead of cash, it's like, y'know, your head that they want. Anyway, isn't it a cool name?"

"Horrible," he said again, walking away from her.

Ransom was an unusual horse. He had a dapple gray coat with black eyes, and while he was pretty, he was just weird. He didn't like apples, he was irritable, and he wouldn't let anyone over six feet tall mount him.

He was great. She gently brushed her fingers through his mane. Right now, he was her only comfort.

"You remember the meanings of the smoke flares, right?" Mike whispered, discreet as ever.

She nodded, craning her neck to try to catch a glimpse of Levi.

"Eyes forward," Mike reminded her.

Things went smoothly at first. She was in the center front of the formation with command, so enemy detection wasn't something she'd been tasked with. While she wasn't in the most secure position, she took some solace in the fact that Erwin was unlikely to allow himself to get eaten. Still, she flinched a little every time a smoke signal was fired, the possibility of engaging with a titan becoming increasingly likely. When a red one went off a little too close for her liking, Erwin fired green into the sky. She watched in awe as what she could only assume was the relay team fire off the same color in the distance, the entire formation curving.

"This is genius," she whispered.

"Erwin came up with the entire thing. I have no idea how he did it," Mike admitted.

There wasn't room for much more conversation than that. A little bit more dialogue between the green and red flares occurred before she was close enough to see the silhouette of a titan across the hill.

"Shit," she said to herself, chewing on her bottom lip as Erwin fired another green shell.

From what she could see, the creature was moving rather slowly, dragging its enormous feet across the field at a pace they could easily outrun. Perhaps, she thought, with Erwin's genius formation and the knowledge the Scouts had of the titans, the mission would run quite smoothly.

Her aspirations were quickly diminished, however, when a black flare emitted from the right flank.

"That's close. What the hell is the right flank doing?"

Her lip was bleeding by this point, another loud shot from Erwin causing her to bite down on it a little too hard. She stared at the commander, his posture firm, yet oddly relaxed. This was his plan, after all.

For the next fifteen minutes, there were no more signals from the right flank.

She considered the possibilities. Either they had gotten extremely lucky, or countless soldiers had been wiped out. She hoped the latter wasn't the case, as she still wasn't sure where Levi was, and she could faintly recall Eren mentioning his classmates being located there.

"I'm worried about them," he'd told her, gnawing on his fingernails.

"Don't bite your nails," she said softly, "And try not to worry. They're experienced soldiers, right? I'm sure they're more than capable of protecting themselves."

"Yeah, but I don't like being separated from Armin and Mikasa. Mikasa will be fine—you should really watch her train one day, she's awesome—and Armin is crazy smart, but it's still hard."

"I understand. I'm nervous about being apart from you all, too. Petra is the love of my life. If anything happened to her, I'd have a meltdown."

"Petra is the love of your life? Are you sure you're not worried about—"

"Hah!" she laughed, eyes narrowing at him, "We can talk about that, or we can talk about how you were blushing just a second ago."

For whatever reason, a small smile ghosted her lips at the memory. Eren was right, she was worried about Levi, but she was also worried about the rest of his squad. She was only partially joking about the stuff with Petra. The young woman had done a lot for her. She was so incredibly welcoming that it caught her off guard sometimes, and her faith in Levi was admirable—adorable, even. After spending so much time with them in such an isolated area, she was tempted to call them her friends. For the past several years, the only person she'd spent time with was Lewis, and while she loved and missed him so much it hurt, she was a little bit excited to have made more acquaintances. If everything worked out, she'd introduce her brother to everyone. She was sure he'd be thrilled to know she'd made friends with Scouts.

Ten more minutes went by, but the lack of flares made her feel more uneasy than relieved. When a soldier from the relay team finally arrived, she tried to listen.

"Heavy casualties in the right flank. Ness and his team are dead. I don't think there are many survivors from the rear, either."

Erwin nodded, and she watched the young woman's shoulders tense when he didn't switch to a blue shell. Instead, he fired another green one, telling her, "We're changing course to the forest."

None of these people had any idea what was going on. All of the dead right flank soldiers wouldn't ever know of Erwin's plan. She shuddered a little at that, trying to keep her posture confident as they altered their route again.

Levi wouldn't have been in the right flank. Erwin wouldn't put him there—or would he? If Levi was supposed to lure the suspected spy into the woods, then could he have been placed there? Perhaps Erwin had known that the titans would be coming from that direction. If that were the case, though, she figured he would've been a little more panicked by the prospect of having lost Humanity's Strongest.

No more signals came from the right. Oddly enough, she thought she heard one come from behind them, but at a great distance away. She brushed it off.

Admittedly, she was a little awestruck when the forest came into view. The trees were unlike anything she'd ever seen before, so tall that not even a titan could reach you on the highest branch. Her experience with forests was lacking, considering where she'd grown up, so she wondered if she was just easily impressed. The atmosphere was notably darker now, the leaves providing a great deal of shade. Had she not been in an area with several man-eating monsters, she might've enjoyed riding a horse through the woods like this.

Another shot rang out from behind her, she was sure of it this time.

"If the rear end of the right flank was nearly wiped out, that has to be coming from—"

"The rear center, yes," Mike replied with a nod, his jaw setting.

They started moving faster, and she felt a small ounce of gratitude for Ransom's stamina. The deeper they went into the forest, the quicker their pace became, and she was growing exhausted from the speed. Then, suddenly, Erwin raised his hand high, and everything came to a stop.

They dismounted. At last, she was able to observe her surroundings. She noted that not many soldiers had entered the forest with them, only the supply wagons and command squad present.

"Get the capture weapons ready. Hange, have your squad preload those cannons. Pull out every stop," Erwin ordered sternly.

She did some heavy lifting before he called her over to him, handing crates off to other soldiers. Anxiously, she approached him, his expression unreadable.

"Our spy has already infiltrated the center," he told her, "That's where Levi is."

"Oh," was all she had to say in response.

"They'll be here shortly. His squad will advance and try to get Eren as far away from here as possible, but I'm going to have Levi extract the target. You need to be ready when he does."

"I will be," she promised, "But I have one question, first. I know the Female Titan was the most likely candidate, right? Well, it's been bothering me a little, 'cause I'm pretty sure the person I encountered was male."

"I know," he said, brows furrowing, "I have my suspicions about what's going on, but nothing sound enough to share yet. I'm sure you've concluded that I like to develop my inklings a little before acting on them."

She rolled her eyes at that, watching as Erwin angled his body towards a high tree limb and pressed down on the trigger. Unsure of what else to do, she followed him, checking to make sure that her knife was still safely on her person when she landed.

"I'm not encouraging you to kill whatever it is we encounter, but I'm curious as to why you'd use a blade so small when you're equipped with two military-grade swords," he mused, watching over the Scouts as they prepared the trap.

"I like the precision," she replied smoothly, running her fingertip across the blade.

"Ah," he mumbled, "I see."

Just then, another shot was fired. There was no smoke this time, only the impossibly loud echo of an acoustic shell traveling throughout the forest.

"Into your positions!" Erwin yelled, raising his arm.

The ground was shaking, causing her to stumble a little on the limb. In the distance, she heard faint screaming. The sound of people dying, she realized.

Her stomach burned so much that she wouldn't have been surprised if her intestines were twisting and turning like snakes, their incessant hissing causing bile to rise in her throat. She swallowed hard, doing her best to keep her expression stoney as they waited.

The shouting, the impossibly large footsteps, the racket of hooves hitting the dirt—it was suffocating. When they got closer, she finally saw what must have been the Female.

It was enormous, its strong, lean figure not all that different from her own. Hange was right about the proportions being so human-like, but that's where the similarities ended. No human being moved that way. No human being had such a look in their eyes. Her gaze shifted from the titan to the small group of people it was chasing, the outline of their captain coming into view.

The next few seconds seemed to drag on, but time stood still when Erwin Smith dropped his hand and shouted, "Fire!"

Wires whirred, hooks shot out, and there, right in front of her, was a monster.

"Fire!" he yelled again, more sharp edges penetrating the flesh.

The wires creaked as it tried to move. The creature was protecting—no, she was protecting her nape. There was most certainly a person in there.

Before she had a chance to consider what that could even mean, someone else was on the branch with them.

"Levi," she whispered, crushing her urge to reach out and brush the tangles from his fine hair.

Her surroundings seemed to blur as she stared at him, realizing that she'd never seen him quite like this. He was a strange medium between tired and on edge, between calm and furious, mumbling something about some soldiers being massacred. In an instant—or maybe several minutes had passed, she wasn't sure—he was in the sky again, hurling towards the titan with unmatched speed. Mike and someone else accompanied him.

Their attempts to sever her fingers, however, were stopped when the skin on her hands appeared to crystallize. Their blades shattered upon coming into contact with it.

"What the hell? Did she just turn her hands into rocks?" Blake asked, frowning.

"This won't work," Erwin mumbled, not acknowledging her, "Keiji, prepare the explosives."

Levi was standing on the titan's head now, looking even smaller as he walked across her scalp.

"Hey," he said, "Come on out and stop wasting our time. Don't think about stalking. Don't think about trying to escape. All you should be thinking about are all of the good men you just killed."

He sounded so different like this, his voice much colder than she'd ever heard it before. This was the real Captain Levi, she supposed, a force of nature all on his own.

"Not that I would expect you to. I don't think you're capable of remorse. You enjoy it, don't you? Killing, that is. I guess that means we have something in common."

A shiver passed through her body as she watched him, his demeanor becoming even darker as he continued.

"Which reminds me, I guess I should go ahead and ask you. Is it okay if I cut off all of your limbs?" he asked, his words making her wince, "They'll grow back, right? Your human ones, I mean. I'm not allowed to kill you just yet. Timing wouldn't work."

Without warning, the titan let out the most horrendous scream she'd ever heard in her life—which is saying a lot, considering she killed people for a living. The sheer force of the sound caused Levi to shake, but he otherwise remained perfectly still.

"Nicely done. I almost lost my footing," he deadpanned.

Beside of her, Mike made an appearance. Urgently, he said, "They're coming, Erwin. I smell them."

"From where?" the commander asked, eyes widening.

"Dozens, from all directions."

"Faster on the artillery!" he exclaimed.

The ground was shaking again, this time much more intensely than before, and she knew that this wasn't Erwin's plan. The realization made her sick.

"They're closing in from the east," Mike revealed.

"Wagon defense squad, intercept!"

"Three titans have broken through!" someone cried, the dreadful creatures becoming visible, "Captain Levi!"

Puzzled by the call of his name, she turned to look at him again, horrified to see that he was just stomping on the titan's head.

"You bitch, what did you do?" he growled.

"Levi, what the hell are you doing?" she cried, watching the three run straight towards him.

Without thinking, she aimed her hooks to the tree across from her, fully intending to sweep the captain up in her arms and bring him to safety. Before she got the chance, though, he raised his blades, angling them in a way she was unfamiliar with.

In an instant, all three titans were dead.

"Christ," she whispered, the reality of his ferocity setting in.

"Engage!" Erwin commanded, "Defend the Female Titan at all costs!"

Whether it was because of instinct or recklessness, her feet left the branch. Perhaps Erwin's tone had driven her to take action. Perhaps it was the need to prove to Levi that she understood what it was like to be lethal. Whatever it was, she was weightless as the beasts from her nightmares swarmed the area.

"This won't prepare you well for a moving target," she recalled Levi saying when he'd first tried to give her combat training.

"I hit moving targets all the time," she muttered to herself, "This one is just a whole lot bigger."

As it would turn out, titan flesh was much sturdier than man's. She used the strength of her entire body as she hurled herself towards one of them, her grappling hooks sinking into the creature's neck. With great effort, she swung her blades into its nape, gritting her teeth as the steaming blood hit her face. Only when she was safely in the air again did she allow herself to look at her handiwork, absolutely overjoyed when the titan crumpled.

"Shit! Yes!" she exclaimed, trying to quell her excitement. Being reckless would do her no favors.

The sight of Levi slicing through four at once was humbling enough, she decided. He moved with both grace and urgency, each stroke of his blades faultless. The fact that she'd once fully intended to kill this man made her glad that Erwin had intervened when he did. Somehow, her eyes met the captain's, but his gaze wasn't familiar to her at all. The man who made lavender tea in his bedroom was nowhere to be found.

A smaller titan entered her peripheral, a size she was sure she could conquer, and she dipped down quickly. This one was much easier to slaughter than the last, especially considering that it wasn't trying to actively eat her. Instead, it hopelessly stumbled towards the Female Titan. When its corpse hit the ground, she looked up to see Erwin's eyes fall shut.

"Retreat!"

The fighting stopped at once. Erwin's word was final. They watched in terror as the remaining titans cannibalized the Female, sinking their teeth into her flesh and shredding her to pieces.

"We're going back to Calaneth District," Erwin ordered solemnly.

But even amidst the chaos, she didn't miss the much quieter command: "Replenish your blades and gas, Levi."

She loathed the implications of his words.

a/n: hi! sorry that this chapter is over a day late, but happy belated bday to levi and merry christmas to you guys!

blake's first titan kill...good for her tbh! also im sorry but the scene where levi is stomping on the female titan's head is so funny like why is he throwing a tantrum??? and everyone else is like "he needs to move before he's eaten!!!" bye he's so adorable i love him so much

anyway, as always, thank you for reading! hopefully you enjoyed. my chapters are gradually getting longer oops lol