The orders were clear.

Levi, Furlan, and Isabel had one job: infiltrate the Survey Corps, earn their trust, and when the time came—steal classified documents and eliminate Commander Erwin Smith. It was a suicide mission dressed as a golden opportunity, and Levi hated every second of pretending to play soldier.

Especially the part where you caught him.

During the ambush in the Underground, when Erwin’s team came to drag them out of the shadows, it was you who knocked Levi to the ground. You who pressed his face into the filth with a boot to his back, obeying Erwin’s wordless nod. He’d never been handled like that before, and it lit something volatile inside him—rage, mostly. And something else he didn’t care to name.

He still remembers it. Your silhouette stepping out of the shadows, hair slicked from the damp, uniform spotless despite the filth. You looked small, almost delicate—until you weren’t. Until you had him face-first in the mud with your knee in his spine before he could blink. You weren’t stronger than him, not physically. But the speed, the precision, the sheer nerve—it stunned him.

He’s never been stunned before. And he hated that too.

Now you’re his captain.

Erwin said it like it was final. That you would take charge of the three new recruits—criminals, barely tolerated by the Corps—and turn them into something useful. You didn’t flinch. Just gave Levi that unreadable, steel-hard look before turning to follow the soldiers escorting you all to the lift.

And now you’re crammed together in a military transport, the wooden carriage creaking as it bumps across uneven terrain. It’s Levi’s first time on the surface. The light feels wrong. The air feels wrong. Like too much space pressing down on his lungs.

Furlan watches the passing trees, thoughtful. Isabel gawks at every bird, cloud, and clump of grass with wide-eyed wonder.

Levi sits across from you, arms crossed, eyes sharp. He hasn’t stopped staring since you left the gates.

“You don’t look like a captain,” he says finally, voice dry, sharp-edged. “Let me guess. Daddy had a position to hand out?”

You raise an eyebrow, silent.

He keeps going, mouth twitching like he's entertaining himself. “Or maybe the Corps needed a poster girl. Something to boost morale. Young. Pretty. Not bad to look at between Titan encounters.”

Isabel shifts awkwardly. Furlan mutters under his breath, “Levi, drop it.”

But he doesn’t. He leans forward slightly, tone dropping, smile razor-thin. “Don’t get me wrong. What you did underground? That was impressive. For someone like you. But you expect me to take orders from a girl who looks like she’d snap in half if a breeze hit her wrong?”

Still, you say nothing. You don’t rise to the bait. You just look at him the same way you did down there—in total, clinical control. It drives him crazy.

He scowls, shifting back in his seat, as if your silence is louder than any insult.

“I don’t follow blindly,” he mutters. “Especially not because someone stitched a fancy patch to your jacket.”

The carriage rattles over a rock. Isabel giggles and presses her face to the glass. “You’re just mad ‘cause she made you eat dirt.”

He shoots her a glare, but she’s not wrong.

He didn’t expect this. Didn’t expect someone who looked like you to be fast enough. Strong enough. Brave—or reckless—enough to throw him down like he was just another thug with a knife and nothing to lose.

And now? Now he’s stuck with you.

He tells himself it’s just the mission. Just observation. He needs to know everything—your patterns, your weaknesses, how close you are to Erwin.

But then you shift in your seat, light catching your lashes, and he hates how his eyes follow the movement without asking.

Above ground feels strange. Open. Dangerous. Exposed.

And you?

You might be the most dangerous thing here.

Levi exhales slowly through his nose, then glances your way with a smirk that doesn't reach his eyes.

“Next time, I won’t let some pretty little captain put me on my knees.”