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Your clicking boot steps echo uncomfortably loudly in the stone stairwell as you descend into the dungeon. The manila file folder in your hand is the same as any other incident report: bland, boring, full of tactical jargon and legalese, ultimately unhelpful after several readthroughs because you still aren’t sure what the point of it all is.
Some guy can turn into a titan, apparently?
You really do not see how that is anything short of bad news.
You’re not sure why Erwin called you down here or why the Military Police are housing this guy in the first place. “Person turning into a titan” seems like a situation that deserves a pretty straightforward procedure. Find out where he came from and if there are more. Execute the guy and snuff the rest of them out at the roots. Simple. Is there really a debate here? Why is your presence needed?
Perhaps because you’re the only one who could actually torture that much information out of someone that can turn into a titan and then kill the titan afterward, and everyone knows it, including the MP.
The click of your boot steps is less obnoxious in the dungeon, where the cells allow more space for the sounds to die out. Erwin has pulled up a chair in front of the cell at the far end of the hall — the one flanked by a guard on each side — and is staring into its depths absently without acknowledging your arrival, though you know he’s aware of it.
There aren’t any other chairs for you to claim and occupy, but you’re already irritated enough by the fact that his head reaches your shoulders sitting down, and you do not need to sit and be given an additional reminder of how small you are compared to his giant ass. You stand beside him and shift all your weight to one hip, crossing your arms over your chest with the manila file sticking out between your fingers.
Floor-anchored chains lead up to the bed, and once your eyes adjust to the darkness of the cell, you can make out the shape of a person beneath the threadbare sheet and a dark mop of unwashed hair sticking out at the top. The figure’s chest rises and falls slowly with the easy breathing of sleep.
Erwin doesn’t appear disposed to start the explanation, so you guess you’ll have to prod him. You sniff your irritation and don’t care if he notices. “So that’s the guy, huh?”
He nods, shifting to lean back in his chair. “That’s our boy.”
A moment passes, and you discern that’s all he seems to want to say at the moment. Maybe he just doesn't want to say too much in front of the guards, but no — this is their prisoner, after all, so they already have any facts Erwin may be hesitant to divulge — no, this is going to be one of those “teaching moment” exercises, you can feel it in your bones, and you really don’t want to snap your impatience at him because he tends to handle it remarkably well and irritate you further. For lack of anything else to do, you open the manila file and rifle through its contents. The recruitment identification sketch looks familiar, but you’re not sure you can place where. The incident report itself is merely a source of frustration to you, as confusing as it is nonsensical, and you flip through to the legal followup reports.
“They’re interviewing witnesses now?”
Erwin nods. “His friends, mostly.”
You roll your eyes at his vague and feckless response. Yes, you’ve gleaned that from the report; you’re trying to make him give you information you don’t already have literally at your fingertips.
“So what exactly is the deal with this guy?”
Erwin draws a deep breath through his nose. “Looks like he can turn into a titan.”
“Stop being infuriating.”
“You’re the one who flew to his rescue after his friends pulled him out of his own titan neck; you tell me what his deal is.”
You remember leaping over the wall and instantly rescuing three people — a cadet, half drowned and filthy as hell, quadriplegic in the arms of two of his cadet comrades at the Trost gate. You look at his recruitment sketch again. It still nags at you, and you’re sure now that you met him before that moment; in that moment, he'd been so filthy and injured you can't be certain you would've recognized him without Erwin's say-so.
“I had no idea what was happening," you tell Erwin. "I didn’t see him come out of a titan. You would know if I had, because if I’d seen the little shit turning into one of them, I would’ve killed him on the spot.”
“Strike first, ask questions later, eh?”
"When it comes to titans? Absolutely."
In reply to that, he has nothing but a short chuckle through his nose. He’s handling your irritation far too well again, and you stare down at him.
“Why don’t you just tell me what the fuck is going on.”
He makes a flippant smile, but at least he answers you. “We don’t really know what’s going on beyond what’s in the report. We don’t know how long he’s been capable of doing this, or how he does it. We’re trying to figure that out. But, although his control over it seems to be tenuous, he does seem to be willing to use it to help humanity’s cause, as evidenced by his actions plugging the hole in the gate.”
“Of course he’s acting like he’s willing to help humanity’s cause." You have a tone, but you manage to resist the urge to make air quotes. "He’s been caught and doesn’t have much choice but to play along without revealing his entire plot, does he?”
Erwin gives you a quizzical look. “He already has revealed his entire plot. The incident report from Trost says he attacked one of his friends at one point, then gained control of himself and closed the gate. If he wanted to do more damage, he could’ve just done so then and there instead of helping us. I’d say being able to turn into a titan is the punch line of this affair, wouldn’t you?”
Not really; you’d say it depends on what else he’s hiding, and you’re inclined to think Erwin does too and is just trying to discern your viewpoint. “You don't think that was a misdirect to take suspicion off him? You think he’s shown his whole hand, just like that?”
“I think when he’s surrounded by the people who would kill him for treachery, he has no reason to be dishonest.”
Your eyebrows rise. “I think that’s the best reason to be dishonest, if he’s against us.”
“Do you think he’s against us?”
The stupidity of this question causes your arms to drop as flat as the expression on your face. You’re not sure how much clearer you can be on this point, and your voice goes hard and loud. “He can turn into a titan.”
“And that automatically makes him against us?”
You can’t tell if he’s playing devil’s advocate, or if he genuinely does believe the things he’s implying. “Uh. Yeah? Why else was he hiding it from us?” He makes a skeptical face, and you can tell immediately what he’s thinking — for this exact reason, because people would react like this. Or maybe… “You don’t think he was hiding it at all.” He shrugs noncommittally, and you say, “You think he didn’t know he could do it. And that’s why he’s so shit at it, because he’s never done it before. Because he didn’t know he could.”
Erwin brushes a stray bit of dungeon dirt off his lap. “He says he didn’t. His friends say he didn’t.” You snort. Of course that’s what they’d all say; that would be your excuse too. It was in the past, in fact — Oh no, officer, I didn’t realize switchblades were illegal, I didn’t even know I had it on me. I’m a good guy, I swear. You’re making a face, but Erwin pretends to be oblivious to it. He crosses one knee over the other and says, “His past is all accounted for, from birth until this moment, and there’s no reason to believe he’s lying. If you’d check the report more thoroughly, you’d agree.”
You take offense at the implication that you haven’t read it scrupulously enough, partially because you haven’t. “Why would I do that.”
“You’ve met him before, after all.”
You thought you had, but you still can’t place where…
“Look again.”
You open the file once more, and right there on the front page, above the recruitment sketch, is the name EREN JÄGER.
Jäger…
You rack your brain for the source of that name. At last, an image clicks of a little boy who lived with his parents in a humble dwelling, in an old farming city that you haven’t been able to see in five years. You remember him spying on you with childish awe from the front room window when he thought you hadn’t noticed, you remember catching him spying on you in person from under the porch railing, and you remember him dropping a full glass of water and fleeing in panic when you entered his house. You don’t remember his first name, but you’re sure it’s him. He’s matured since then, if the sketch does him any justice — the baby fat melted cleanly from his cheeks and a barely contained rage brimming within his deep-set eyes.
“The Shinganshina doctor’s boy,” you say.
Erwin nods, seemingly pleased with himself for having led you to this conclusion. “The very same.”
With this recognition in place, another memory springs to mind — that of leaving the Trost gates at the start of the last expedition. You remember this boy calling your name from the crowd and pointing you out loudly and animatedly to his comrades. You flip back to the followup reports and recognize their faces from the list of interviewees.
To your shock, you notice the one with the scarf is named Ackerman.
A stone drops in your stomach, threatening rage and panic within you. You try not to think too hard about it, because plenty of people must be named Ackerman and it doesn’t have to mean she’s connected to him… but you were connected to him and you still bear the same surname, so despite how irrational it may be, you can’t deny that the name supports your mounting distrust for this little asshole and all of his associates.
You… decide not to mention that part.
“He pointed me out at the start of the 56th. He knows my name.”
“Of course he does,” Erwin says, “you said it yourself, he’s Grisha’s boy. He’s familiar with all of our names and ranks and reputations.” He turns a knowing smile toward you and adds, “Besides, who doesn’t know your name?”
Well, no one knows your full name. That’s kind of the point of not giving it out. But that’s not relevant; you’re fixating on the thing that’s upsetting you, and getting even more upset at the fact that you can’t mention this bit of damning evidence to support your case without incriminating yourself.
You stare at the sleeping figure in the cell. “The fact that he’s Jäger’s son doesn’t make him trustworthy. It puts him in a position to know a great deal of intel, and that makes him dangerous. And if his father’s example is anything to follow, disappearing without apparent cause and without notice…” Erwin is staring at you in a mildly judgmental way you’re not fond of, and you bristle. “I don’t expect a particularly positive outcome here.”
Erwin’s mildly judgmental stare has grown more than mild. “You do know Grisha isn’t connected to the military and isn’t obligated to inform us of his whereabouts, right?”
Yes, you do, and the insinuation of your ignorance is annoying. “If we’re in the middle of a crisis and we need to keep strict tabs on how many mouths are left to feed, especially that of a doctor whose services we frequently employ, why the fuck would he not tell us?”
“Because he’s not obligated to.”
You make a wordless sound of frustration and stare into the cell, knowing this is all the Jäger family’s fault somehow. Or… maybe not knowing. More like hoping. Having someone at fault gives you something concrete to fight against. “Don’t you think it’s possible the son has something to do with the father disappearing like a fart in the wind?”
Erwin’s judgmental stare turns critical, trying to read your body language, but you give him nothing. “Do you mean… you think he did something to his father?”
You shrug one shoulder. “He can turn into a titan.”
Erwin sighs. “Levi, I think you’re looking for excuses to distrust him.”
“And I think you’re ignoring them.”
“I think we should wait and see how this plays out,” he insists, taking the file from you and straightening the pages against his lap. Your hands feel empty and useless without something to do, and you cross your arms over your chest. “We have to be cautious, of course," Erwin continues. "Absolute trust is a terrible mistake. But at this point, where he’s been caught in the worst possible situation and there is no extant family to save him, I think we should give some merit to the idea that he has good cause to be truthful if he wants to stay alive.” You start to say you should give equal merit to the idea that he has good cause to lie his ass off for the very same reason, but Erwin cuts you off. “He’s in the eye of the storm, Levi. It’s only going to get worse for him from here. There is a difference between infiltrating us by feigning assistance, and straight-up cooperating with us. And by all accounts, including Pixis, he’s been nothing but cooperative.”
You pick at the buttons on your sleeve cuffs. “I still don’t like it.”
“Let me ask you this,” he says, turning in his seat to face you better, and you lean back against the wall behind you just to make it harder for him out of spite. He doesn’t react. “What’s your honest, instinctive opinion of him? Ignore the report,” he says as your gaze darts toward the manila file in his hand. “Just focus on him, on what you know and remember of him, what you’ve seen. What does your gut tell you?”
Erwin knows you far too well if he’s asking questions from the gut, not routine and experience and paperwork.
You stare through the cell bars and let out a deep, long sigh.
You remember him being fucking adorable as a child, and you remember him being equally adorable, if not annoying as hell, at the start of the 56th. He’s clearly infatuated with you, and even though you have no idea why he would be, it’s flattering. You suspect it’s some kind of innocent hero worship complex, and you don’t suppose anyone who loved you so much would turn on you.
You saw him half-dead in the arms of two people at once at the wall, after he’d closed the breach. He wasn’t faking that. It would be a strange thing for someone with an agenda of treason to have such little control over their own abilities. Getting caught could have been planned and faked, meaning he wouldn’t truly be as clumsy and ill-prepared as he seemed… but he was. Requiring this long a period of rest and recuperation afterward also belied an agenda of treason.
You know Grisha was never an especially mentally stable man, from your limited interactions, but a traitorous one, you don’t believe at all.
Your training tells you to be distrustful of anything associated with titans, and with the name Ackerman, and the existence of both these things in tandem makes you incredibly jumpy.
But your gut?
You lick your lips.
“I think we should find out what he wants.”
Erwin seems pleased with this response. “What do you suspect?”
“I suspect… if he’s not on our side, he’ll feel the need to insist upon his loyalty, trying to convince himself more than us. If he truly is on our side, he won’t have to convince himself, so he won’t feel the need to convince anybody else.”
“You know that if he agrees to come on board with us…”
“I have to be the one to take charge of him,” you finish. “I know. Only I can handle the execution if he turns out to be a weasel.”
Erwin gives an appreciative nod, and tips his chin toward the inside of the cell. The chains leading up to the figure in the bed jingle as the figure shifts. “Looks like he’s coming around.”
You raise an eyebrow. “About time.”
You and Erwin remain silent as the prisoner groans himself into consciousness. He attempts to roll over and finds his movements restricted, and can’t reach to rub the sleep from his eyes. He registers the chains binding him, and using their counter-pull to his advantage, tugs himself upright to better examine his surroundings. You both watch him in stillness until he notices you, and when he does, he jumps so badly the chains rattle all the way down to the floor.
Erwin sits forward in his chair. “Hello, Eren.”
Eren blinks wide, startled eyes at you, and there’s nothing enraged or bloodthirsty about those eyes now, just confusion and terror. If he had made this face in his recruitment sketch, you would’ve recognized him in a heartbeat.
He doesn’t respond to Erwin, or even look at him.
Erwin doesn’t seem fazed. “Shall I tell you what you’ve missed?”
Eren’s gaze shifts to him, and he takes this as his cue to continue.
“It took us a full day to clean up all the titans that had been sealed in Trost when you blocked the gate,” he says. As Erwin speaks, Eren looks around his cell, his eyes flicking to you every few seconds. He seems desperate to look at you, yet terrified of doing so in equal measure. “Most of them were taken out with explosive projectiles from the rampart cannons, and nearly all of the rest were eliminated by the Survey Corps. The last two remaining were taken alive by us, as test subjects.”
Eren shakes his head, as if warding off a troublesome thought. You realize his hair could be quite pretty once it’s washed, and you attribute this intrusive thought to boredom.
“That’s all the important things that have happened during the three days you’ve been here in a comatose state. So, Eren…” He makes focused eye contact with Erwin at the mention of his name. “Do you have any questions?”
His body trembles, but not as badly as his voice, higher pitched than you expected. You realize this is your first time hearing him speak. His question is simple. “Where am I?”
Erwin interlaces his fingers. “You’re in a dungeon, as I suppose you can tell. I’m sure you can understand the need for caution. We can’t say much more than you’re in the custody of the Military Police. Levi and I were granted the rights to see you only a few minutes ago.” As he speaks, one of the guards flanking Eren’s cell makes a repulsed face, and his finger twitches for the trigger of his rifle. You turn your head to look at the guard directly; if he’s thinking about making a move on Eren or either of you, he’s got another thing coming. He notices your death glare and snaps back to attention.
Eren is waking up more by the moment, and urgency begins to leach into his voice. He’s sneaking sidelong glances at you again. “What’s going to happen to me now? Where are my friends?”
Erwin sits back. “We’re talking to them. Not just the two you were found with, but anyone who might know anything about your past. As for what’s going to happen now…” He reaches into his coat, into the breast pocket of his shirt, and withdraws a shiny brass key. “Is different than anything we’ve ever done.”
At the sight of the key, Eren makes a sound of recognition, sitting bolt upright. “Hey, that’s—”
“Yes,” Erwin cuts in gently, “it’s yours. You can have it back when all this is settled. It’s the key to your basement, right?” Eren nods, and Erwin elaborates, “That basement, in your father’s house, holds the secret of the titans. Is that correct?”
Eren nods again, more forcefully this time. “Yes— or… at least, that’s what my father said. Before the wall fell. I never got to see inside it, and… I don’t know where he is to ask again.”
Irritation has your mouth open before you can stop yourself.
“So the only person who can corroborate all aspects of your story turns up missing, and reports say you’ve lost your memory of his departure… how convenient.”
Erwin turns a disapproving stare toward you sidelong. “Levi, we’ve agreed he has no reason to lie.”
You didn’t agree to such a thing, actually, but you recognize this as Erwin's way of telling you to be quiet. This is his show, after all, not yours; you're still not quite sure why you're here, as you could’ve confirmed to Erwin that you’d kill the little shit anywhere. You deign to let Erwin continue uninterrupted.
“There’s still so much we don’t understand,” he says, “and we’d like to try, if we could. But for right now, what we think is most important is to ask about your intentions.”
The word seems to discombobulate Eren, and he furrows his brows at it. You don’t miss that his eyes are still flicking over to you. “My intentions?”
Erwin nods sagely. “In order to investigate that basement, we need to reclaim Shinganshina. But we would have to plug the wall there the same as was done in Trost. We would require your titan form, and its strength. So you see, no matter what happens to humanity, our fate rides on the actions of a titan — whether the Colossal and Armored types, or you.”
Eren’s eyes glaze over and drift down to the foot of his bed. It’s hard to tell from this distance in the poor light, but you think he’s faintly shaking his head in distress.
Your suspicions toward his friend for her name haven’t budged, but you’re having a hard time holding onto your suspicions toward Eren. Now that you’ve seen him awake and interacting with you, the idea that he could be a traitorous or dishonest person is almost hilarious. He’s clearly in shock and overwhelmed, and you can tell from his words and mannerisms that he’s the type of person who has a terrible poker face. You don’t think he’s capable of faking his current state, or anything, for that matter.
Erwin presses on, “If you would, think of your will as the key,” and he holds up the brass key in his hand to make his metaphor clear. You resist the strong temptation to roll your eyes again. He’s an eloquent and persuasive person, but he can be way too heavy-handed with figures of speech. “The key to freeing the human race from its current fate. So… what do you want to do?”
Either Eren isn’t focused at all anymore, or his answer is too staggering for him to spit out, because he stutters and falls silent, his head drooping toward his lap unseeingly.
You wait for him to snap out of it, and when he doesn’t, you become impatient.
“Hey,” you bark, and to your surprise and irritation, he doesn’t react. “We don’t have all day, you little shit. Answer the man. What do you want to do?”
Slowly, his head rises, and the look on his face causes the hairs on the back of your neck to stand up in a thrilling way few things can. Now you can recognize him from the recruitment sketch in his file — the unbridled hatred boiling over from an endless hellfire of rage inside him. You know that look. You know that rage. You’re far too familiar with it, and for a split second staring into those eyes the same shade of grey as yours, you feel as though you’re staring into a mirror, and it scares the shit out of you.
His voice shakes with anger, and it isn’t high-pitched anymore. “I want to join the Survey Corps and butcher some fucking titans.”
His response stirs recognition within you, and something else too: intrigue.
You perk an eyebrow at him. “Oh?”
It’s exactly what you would never have said in his place, what you refused to say in his place until your people were threatened with death and Erwin held your face in raw sewage, and you’re fascinated by it. He’s so much like you, with his unquenchable injustice and outrage, with his insatiable bloodlust and warlike temperament, but he’s not you. He hasn’t been tainted by evil. He’s seen it, been touched by it, and knows what it does, and for that, he won’t fall to it. He seeks to rip evil up by the roots, even if it costs him his life.
You have no doubts anymore concerning his loyalty.
You're still not sold on the Ackerman girl, but Eren's response has drawn your approval, even if against your will and all your expectations.
You murmur, “Not bad.”
You step toward him, and instantly, his demeanor begins to shift back to fear and consternation. Traces of the rage remain at the core, though, unable to be snuffed out. Erwin watches you move, and you call out to him over your shoulder.
“Tell the Military Police upper brass I’ll take charge of him personally,” you say as you step up to the bars. Eren’s expression has you reaching out toward his face before you’re aware of what your arm is doing, and in an attempt to conceal your behavior, you seize one of the bars of his cell. “Don’t get me wrong — it’s not like I trust him.” It’s true, to a degree. As Erwin said, you can’t trust him completely, even if your distrust has faded. But Eren and his guards need to believe you’ll be able to handle taking charge of him. “If he betrays me, I’ll put him down instantly.” Also true: you don’t tolerate dissent, and especially won’t from a person who turns into a titan. “The brass shouldn’t have a problem with it, since I’m the best one fit for the job.”
Eren stares at you, his expression altogether too readable and honest, frightened to the bone at the prospect of his childhood hero-slash-crush-maybe ending his life. Good. You need him to be scared of you, because fear is how you’ll keep him in line until he’s released into your custody fully.
You stare right back, addressing him now.
“Welcome to the Survey Corps.”
He keeps staring at you, his body still trembling, and you can clearly read in his face that his is not at all how he’d hoped his first conversation with you would go.
You step back from the bars as Erwin rises from his chair. “We’ll ask around with the Military Police and see what we can do,” he says, holding the manila file under his arm. “Please do your best to endure this cell for a little while longer. We’ll try to handle this as quickly as possible.”
Eren nods, eyes flicking between his lap and your face, and you turn away without another word, following Erwin up the stairs and onto the main floor of the justice hall.
You're well clear of the stairwell before he speaks, and still he keeps his voice low, in case you’re overheard. “I suppose you can figure out that I’ve already got a plan.”
“Yep,” you murmur, squinting against the bright blocks of sunlight streaming through the windows, “and I’m already sure I’m not going to like it.”
“I’m going to talk to Pixis,” he says, “and see what can be done on the side of the Garrison, but they're owned by the MP so it's likely we’ll need to handle this on our own. And we’ll have to do it with a little show.”
You stop in the middle of the hall and close your eyes. The urge to groan at him is strong, but you let out a long, silent sigh instead. His “shows” generally involve you living up to your reputation as his personal bloodhound, a barely-contained monster in your own right. “What do you want me to do.”
He waits for your full attention, for you to open your eyes and face him, before he responds.
“You’re going to have to hurt him.”
You look away, pulling out a clean linen from your coat pocket and rubbing it into your hand where you touched the prison bar. The image of Eren’s face, childlike and terrified in the dark, won’t leave your mind’s eye. It seems strange and amusing and altogether too fucking predictable that just a few minutes ago you were ready to lobby for the right to torture and execute him, and the moment he opens his big pretty eyes and bats them at you a few times, you’ve melted. You’ve always been a sucker for a protégé looking up to you, even though it's the last thing anyone would suspect of your gruff demeanor, and that Eren reminds you so much of a younger more innocent you is magnifying the issue beyond your imaginings.
Your imaginings, maybe… but not Erwin’s.
A thrill of understanding rips through you as you realize the sheer depths of Erwin's manipulation, why he wanted you down there in the dungeon just now. If you've figured out Eren harbors some affection for you, Erwin must've figured it out ages ago, and your inevitable reaction to Eren's affection would've been as plain a target to him as a titan's kill spot. He remembers Isabel and knows the deeply buried fact of your soft spot and wanted you down there not because he wanted your assent to taking charge of Eren and killing him if necessary, but because he was counting on you getting attached to him.
Because if you’re attached to him, you’ll want to save him, and you need to be invested in saving him because you're the only one who can.
And damn Erwin to Hell and back, it worked. You do want to save Eren.
But on the other side of the same coin…
“I don’t want to hurt him.”
Erwin gives you a hopeless shrug and a resigned face. “You have to prove that even if he’s dangerous, as you can be sure they’ll say he is, you can still control him. Didn’t you just tell him you’re the only one fit for the job?”
“This isn’t what I wanted,” you hiss as you step up in his personal space, “to put on this costume of a brutish dog of war and do an intimidation dance for you in front of the MP. This isn’t what I signed up for. I left that bullshit behind when I agreed to stay on, remember?”
“You stayed because you see how important it is to protect humanity,” he says, unfazed by your closeness, “whatever it takes. And right now, this is what it takes. We need him, his strength, his power, if we want to save ourselves; we need to harness the enemy's power and use it for our own, and he's the only one we know of who can. They’re going to try to kill him, and if they do, they'll damn all of humanity. We have to save him. He trusts you, he adores you — don’t shake your head at me, you can see it as well as I can, he’s adored you for years — you’re the only one who can do this without damaging his trust in the Corps. If anyone else tries, he’ll start doubting his opinion of us. But you? He'll forgive you in an instant. You can save him, and only you. I need you to do this. Humanity needs you to do this.” He pauses, examining your face. “Eren needs y—”
“Don’t you fucking dare,” you snarl, the sudden red-hot outrage of offense whipping out like a solar flare. “Don’t try that emotional manipulation bullshit on me. I'm so far beyond a point where you can pull my strings like a god damn puppet, and you know it.”
Erwin drops that particular act with an abrupt deadening of his face. “You're right, and I apologize. Trying my usual tricks on you is an insult to your faculty.” You nod, and he shrugs. “Potential emotional impact aside, though, the dry fact still remains. We need him, and he needs you; you can't abandon him now.”
You want to touch a hand to your face, rub the irritation out of your eyes and hold your chin, but your hands are still too dirty from the cell bars and you can’t. You groan, and your shoulders slump with assent. “Fine.”
He beams at you as if you’ve just told him what you’re getting him for Christmas. “Excellent. Thank you, Levi. I can always count on you to take up th—”
“You're still doing it, Erwin,” you say, and he nods, leaving that bullshit thought unfinished.
“Fair enough,” he says, his voice flat again, the mask of paternal geniality dropped for good. “If you'll excuse me, though, I have to find Pixis. You should go talk to Hanji and get hir in on this.”
“Oh why,” you gripe. “Haven’t you punished me enough today?”
He laughs and turns his back, departing with a wave over his shoulder.
You grunt wordless irritation in his wake and stalk off in search of your least favorite biologist, historian, and all-around turd nerd. You wonder what pronouns Eren will end up using for Hanji. You kind of hope he goes with the ones you use.
More than that, though, you feel dread sinking deeper and deeper into the pit of your gut with every footstep as you hope against hope that Erwin is right and Eren will still be willing to talk to you at all after what Erwin is about to make you do to him.
Maybe he’ll even let you wash his greasy hair.