Kaya and Mikasa walked down the tunnel in silence, not wanting to cause any trouble for the scouts behind them. Once they neared closer to the doorway, Kaya took a deep breath and tried to decipher the different scents in the room. There were about 30 people, 5 of which being grown men, presumably the guards. Kaya contemplated telling Mikasa about her discovery but decided against it. Slowly the ghoul began to open the door the reveal the room full of starved and malnourished civilians, guarded by 5 of the ugliest creatures Kaya had ever laced eyes on, and she'd stayed titans.

"Please don't shoot me." She feigned her pleads. "The men on the other side said they'd kill us if we didn't do as they demanded and come here." The thief cried. The guards pushed them against a wall and retied their restraints before resting them on the ground with the other poor souls. Kaya closed her eyes and listened for footsteps in the tunnel, once she heard them, she stood on her feet and figured out her distraction.

"Help me I can't breath." She yelled, the guards lowered their weapons and were cautious to approach the ghoul who was screaming in agony. Once she saw an opening, Kaya dislocated her arms from behind her back and fitted them back into place once they were stationed at the front of her body. Then, she raised her tied hands and hooped them around her opponent. The ghoul strangled him with the ropes and used him as a shield for the other guards's bullets that were attempting to pierce her.

Once the body was useless, she threw it to the ground and picked out her next opponent. Her new rival held a knife and had it aimed for Kaya with the intent to kill, the ghoul only smirked as the madman swung his knife and ran towards her. His blade swung in all directions so when the thief saw a chance, she raised her hands and allowed the knife to slice her ropes undone, leading her to be free from her restraints. The man swung again but Kaya caught his knife and tossed it towards Mikasa so she could back her up and defend the hostages.

"Surrender before I kill every last one if you." Kaya warned.

"You don't have the power to be bargaining with us! We're the ones with guns!" A guard shouted.

"So are we." Jean entered the room with the rest of the squad.

"By distraction I didn't know you meant take them down, you could've been shot." Eren scolded.

"You guys willing to surrender now?" The ghoul repeated. Filled with shame, the guards nodded their heads and allowed the scouts to tie them up.

Sasha and Connie tended to the casualties and saw to their needs before they were taken above ground to receive proper medical care. Kaya on the other hand, tried to stay as far away from the innocent civilians as possible, the dreaded feeling of hunger had came back. She couldn't eat now, not with the squad and so many people around her, but with the sweet smell of human flesh persuading her to feed, her task was made extremely difficult.

"You okay? You've been staring at that corpse for a while now." Levi stood beside her. Kaya shook her head, not trusting herself to even open her mouth at this point. "Looks like I was right, you are starving yourself. Just hold out until everyone else leaves and the coast should be clear." Levi advised.

"Thanks." She muttered.

"Armin and Jean, inform the military police of our findings." Levi ordered.

"Yes sir." They said, leaving to complete their task.

"Everyone else, hurry up and get out of here, it'll be safer in the house." The captain added.

Slowly, everyone began to leave the room, the only remaining were Kaya's comrades who were staring at her with questioning gazes. The ghoul sat in the corner of the room, clenching her stomach. 'Of all the times, why now?' She thought. Kaya usually sustained her diet but with all the shenanigans with the scouts, she'd forgotten and had been way too careless.

"Kaya, are you okay?" Armin wondered. The ghoul only nodded her head and didn't have the courage to trust her own eyes to look at him.

"She's fine, she just wants some time alone." Levi tried to motion the squad out of the room, but they resisted and wanted to find out what was troubling their teammate.

Sasha and Connie walked through the entrance and Kaya caught a whiff of blood. "Sorry we're late captain, Connie stood on a nail." Sasha explained.

Kaya's head snapped in Connie's direction, a predator eying her prey. She couldn't resist the sensation any longer. Rapidly, the ghoul jumped towards the new smell, ignoring all of her inner thoughts advising her against it. Luckily, Levi was quick to analyse the situation and dived onto the ghoul, attempting to hold her away from the squad and calm her down.

"Get out of here!" Levi shouted, everyone was confused on the matter but ran away nonetheless. As soon as the squad had left, Levi tried to get through to his friend. "Damn it Kaya! Snap out of it!" He kicked and punched her to see if he could receive any reaction. "Kaya!" He yelled.

Upon hearing him shout into her ear, the thief managed to retake her state and her eyes widened at the situation she had just conjured. Once Kaya had stopped resisting Levi's restraints, tears threatened to pour from her now red eyes. "Shit, I'm so sorry." She backed away, too stunned to find any other words. "I didn't mean to do it, I swear. Oh my god, what the hell have I done?" She began to pace the room, nerves overtook her body.

"I just tried to eat my friends. They'll never forgive me for this. They'll think I'm a monster. They're right, I am a monster." Her words were fast and the thief was struggling to find space to breath between them. She was hyperventilating and scared, she hadn't experienced a state when she was so vulnerable since her parent left. The ghoul thought she'd built strong walls but they were all crumbling around her.

Suddenly, she felt two arms wrap around her. Normally the ghoul would have backed away, but this embrace was kind and warm, unlike any dangers she would have assumed. "It's okay. No one was hurt, you're safe. Pull yourself together." Levi spoke softly as he hugged the girl to try and calm her down from her panicked state.

"I'm so sorry." She whispered again.

"It's okay." The captain repeated. "I'm going to wait outside with the squad while you finish up in here." He pointed towards the body that the ghoul had previously been starring at.

"Ok." Kaya released herself from the hug and watched Levi leave the room, giving the ghoul a chance to end her hunger, consuming what remained of one of the guards she had killed earlier.

After her meal, she walked outside to see the captain leaning against a wall waiting for her. The ghoul looked down, she was embarrassed to say the least, but mostly, she was erupting with the guilt she carried for almost killing her squad mate.

"I thought I told you not to worry about it." Levi gripped onto Kaya's shaking hand.

"What do you expect of me. I almost killed Connie, I completely lost it." She admitted.

"That's because you were too busy looking out for the squad and forgetting to look after yourself. You're not unbreakable and you need to take care of yourself, I thought we talked about this after we lost our squad." The captain scolded.

"How can you be so calm about all this? I just ate a person and you're lecturing me about taking care of myself?" The ghoul asked.

"Seriously? It was obvious you had no choice but to eat him, everyone saw how hard you tried to resist the urge." Levi responded. The ghoul paused for a moment as she thought of what to say.

"Have I ever told you how lucky I am to have you." Kaya smiled as she spoke her mind. "Sure, you were a pain in the ass when I was trying to hide my secret, you were way too persistent. But I feel like this is the closest I've ever been with anyone."

"At first, I was cautious of you, but I think I had my reasons considering you were the notorious fox of the underground, but I guess you're a lot more tolerable now." The captain returned.

"Been a while since I've been called the fox." Kaya laughed. "I might steal something just to keep my wanted posters up for a few extra months." She joked.

"As your captain, I'm afraid I can't allow that." Kaya frowned and the two continued their walk until they reached the squad who were carefully distancing themselves from the ghoul.

"Sorry about that little episode in there, I don't know what came over me." Kaya lied. She knew exactly what had came over her but she wasn't going to tell her squad that she had tried to eat them based on pure animal instinct.

It was clear that the squad wanted to press further into the situation, but when Levi shook his head, they stayed silent and saved their questions for a later time. Kaya was thankful, she wasn't in the mood to deal with their questions, not after her minor panic attack.

The scouts journeyed home after their mission, relaying the information they had gathered to the military police, who they hoped would take down the rest of the traffickers that they had discovered. The whole ride back was agonisingly awkward, for everyone, Kaya had contemplated just getting it over with and telling them but she didn't have the courage.

"Erwin sure is taking his time planning our retake of wall Maria, I wouldn't be surprised if he'd been spending most of it taking a shit." Levi broke the ice.

"Why is that always the explanation you go to?" The ghoul laughed, while the rest of the squad stayed silent. "Well, you're a talkative bunch." She said sarcastically.

"Are you a titan?" Mikasa asked out of the blue. It was true that the whole squad were thinking it, but Mikasa was the only one with the guts to be upfront about it. "We've all seen you do things that no human should be capable of. You caught my blade, you don't eat, you dislocated your own arms and reset them without an ounce of pain. But worst of all, your eyes, were dark and red, abnormal." She continued.

"It's unheard of for a titan to have such abilities but after all the things we've been seeing lately, I wouldn't put it past fate." Armin added.

"It's complicated." The thief muttered.

"After everything we've been through, you don't trust us?" Jean asked.

"Yeah, I thought we were a team." Eren stated.

"It's not that I don't want to tell you, I just can't." Kaya tried to discreetly explain.

"What's stopping you?" Sasha questioned.

"I just don't think you'd understand, to be completely honest, I don't really understand it entirely yet either." Kaya replied.

"I'm sure if you explain it then we'll hear you out." Connie encouraged.

"I'll tell you after we retake wall Maria, that way, your trust in me won't cloud your judgments during the mission." Kaya theorised. She mainly didn't want them to know about her secret yet because she wanted to make up for all the death she had caused before they found out. Helping humanity would be her way of proving her redemption to her friends and squad mates.

"Does the captain know? He's been awfully quiet for a while now." Mikasa accused. The ghoul didn't understand why Mikasa was so cold towards her and Levi, at first she speculated that it was because of the incident when they fought Leonhardt, or maybe because they both openly bullied Eren. Either way, they needed to improve their relationship, after all, they were supposed to be a team.

"What's it to you?" Levi reversed the question, letting her know that it wasn't her business.

The rest is of the ride was silent and they arrived at the orphanage to meet with some of the children they'd saved from captivity. It was late at night and most of the area were sound asleep, Kaya however, couldn't sleep, not yet. Her stressful day didn't correspond with her need to sleep in her bed so she went back to her old ways and climbed onto the roof. If anyone caught her, she'd probably get into trouble for encouraging dangerous risks to the children but the ghoul felt pretty certain that no one would find her until morning. Hence, Kaya looked upon the constellations above her and drifted off to sleep, thinking about what could have been.