Levi runs his hands gently down the horse's hind leg, pressing here and there until the horse whinnies and tries to kick him. He shushes the pained animal with a gentleness that Mikasa finds surprising from a man who is so skilled at violence.

After he calms the horse, he steps away and looks to Sasha, a frown on his face.

"She's gone lame, I can't say if she'll recover from it, and surely not soon enough for you two to go without."

Sasha frowns.

"What would you recommend?"

He sighs.

"You could sell her, and she'll surely be killed," he pauses for a second, "or I could take her off your hands, I have room for her, I'll trade you the more even-keeled mare I have. I wouldn't give her to anyone else because she's still a war horse, but I know you can handle yourselves fine."

Sasha frowns and shakes her head.

"No, that's too generous; a lame horse for a healthy one, you have to accept homemade sausage and a new suit in addition to the horse for it to be fair."

When Sasha gets riled up, her accent starts to come out and Mikasa has to resist the urge to smile – she knows how self-conscious Sasha always was about it, but it's such an endearing trait.

Mikasa can also tell this isn't the first time they've argued about fair trades — Sasha has always been stubborn about this kind of thing, she refuses to be indebted to someone, even a friend or comrade.

He sighs and stands up.

"First of all, she's not just a lame horse, she has a mild temperament, the fact that she's in this much pain and even let me approach her proves that. Maybe it'll rub off on the other asshole horses I keep around. Secondly, I have the space, it's not like I'm going to run out of grass anytime soon, and third, you can't go without a horse, how else are you going to get into town, it's not a short walk. Besides, you took care of the others while I was gone a few weeks ago, so I owe you."

Sasha crosses her arms and looks at him with a stern expression that Mikasa thinks looks more than a little odd, like a school teacher chastising a rowdy student.

"Well, you'll take the meat and clothes, besides, the clothes are free advertising," she says shrewdly.

Mikasa almost snickers when she sees his cheeks flush a little at this comment, so she can't help but poke a little.

"Sasha says you've taken up modeling, should I expect to see your face in the paper?"

He glares at her sharply and Mikasa takes another drink from her wine glass, satisfied with the fact that she has managed to irritate him.

"We don't even need to take out an ad, if he wears one of Connie's suits into the town or the city, he gets so many people asking him where he got it that Connie can't keep up! We should really be paying him."

Mikasa glances at his attire, today a lightweight, brown tweed jacket and a cornflower blue button up shirt and tie.

I can see why business is good.

The thought surprises her. It makes her uncomfortable enough that she looks away and takes another drink of her wine.

Levi begrudgingly agrees to Sasha's terms, but not before Sasha tricks him into staying for dinner.

Sasha and Connie are immensely gracious hosts – Sasha cooks food with her heart, each dish is prepared with care and passion. With the greater access to resources this new era has brought the meal is delicious and flavorful with herbs and seasoning that Mikasa hardly knows how to put a word to.

"You're too generous with your time Heichou, you're gonna end up swindled," Connie says seriously, adopting an expression of a far older man when Sasha explains their horse situation.

"Don't call me that," he says, "and I know a thing or two about not getting swindled."

Mikasa has only heard rumors, but she recalls that before he joined the Scouting Legion he was a thug in the Underground city. She can only imagine what kind of transactions he'd gotten up to.

"Fine," Connie sighs, patting his belly and taking a second helping of dessert.

"Sasha you're going to make him fat with all this dessert."

Sasha laughs and Connie turns red.

"I don't make dessert every night, it's a special occasion with the both of you here!"

Levi glances over at her, his gaze simultaneously lazy and appraising.

"What brings you all the way out here? Your face looks better than I would've expected" he says, addressing her for the first time this evening.

"I could say the same for you," she snaps back quickly. She finishes her glass of wine glaring at him the whole while.

"You guys got into a fight!?"

"Hanji was playing mad scientist and we both let it get a little out of hand," he explains.

"Of course you did," Sasha sighs, clearly exasperated. "How is Hanji, doing well?"

"As well as a four eyed freak can be, happy to have a bunch of government funding for whatever crazy experiment her heart desires," he says lightly.

"Crazy experiments that involve you two?" Connie asks.

"Wants to know why we're so good at killing shit," Mikasa says dryly.

"Ah, really?!"

"I always assumed good diet and exercise," Connie jokes.

Mikasa stabs at her cake.

"Yeah, the expedition I killed eleven titans was because I had a great breakfast and took a brisk walk the day before."

Levi laughs darkly at her sarcastic comment while Sasha and Connie look uncomfortable.

"Everyone has something they're good at," Sasha says, a little tense, because until now, it's always been something unspoken; her aptitude for violence and the uncanny similarity between herself and the former Captain Levi.

She can't help but think way back to the Cadet Corps when Annie had called her a monster.

Sasha's about to say something but the baby starts to cry from the other room, so she gets up quickly to go take care of her, but not before telling Mikasa to make herself at home in the spare room.

"I still feel like we're getting too good of a deal for Marigold, but since you insist, how do you want to get her to your place?"

"I'll have to walk her, she can't go fast so I can come by tomorrow with that mare."

"Okay, that sounds good, what do you want for a suit?"

He grumbles and says "Whatever you have laying around is fine."

Mikasa starts doing the dishes as the two men squabble over who is getting the better deal in this whole horse exchange and go outside.

Since when was Levi the de facto horse expert? In the Legion they'd had soldiers that took care of the horses, usually someone who'd grown up around them, was a farrier's son or something like that, and certainly not officers; they were too busy doing far more important tasks.

When she's finished the dishes, she goes to the spare room where her things are. The bed is worn and sags a little bit, but she likes it that way; it's a sign of use, like it's been lived in for a while. Something about that comforts her, reminds her of happier times.

She doesn't want to bother Connie and Sasha for long, but being alone is just getting too difficult. It keeps her up at night and creeps down into her chest, leaving her with a terrifying numbness that she doesn't know how to get rid of.

That's a lie.

Fighting helped, for a moment. Helped her feel something besides wrong in her own skin.

And he's the only one strong enough to fight you.

She hears Connie come inside and start getting ready for bed so she decides to do the same. She changes into her nightgown and is about to go outside for a cigarette, but she hesitates before she leaves the room.

She digs down to the bottom of her trunk until she finds her old red scarf and wraps it around her neck. Immediately she feels a sense of calm wash over her, like everything will somehow be okay, at least for a moment.

She knows it's silly, but if she thinks hard enough she can imagine that it smells like Eren, remember what having him near was like as vividly as she possibly can with him gone.

It hurts too much to wear it every single day, but it's also the thing that brings her the most comfort, so she saves it for the evening, usually when she is alone.

I'll wrap that around you, as many times as you want. Now and forever.

She knew that life could end at any moment, but she hadn't truly believed that forever could be so short.

She opens the front door quietly and sits on the steps leading to the house. The sun has set completely now but the moon is half full, so the forest clearing is nicely illuminated.

The smell of sulfur when she lights her match, the sound of the cigarette burning when she inhales, the crickets chirping, her scratchy red scarf and her bare feet on the rough wooden steps; these are things she finds comforting.

She closes her eyes, leans her head against the handrail and for a quick moment her mind is quiet.

Until she hears a twig snap and her eyes fly open, body tensed and ready for anything, only to see Levi walking across the yard, his hands in his pockets.

"How long have you been there?" She snaps.

He looks at her, his gaze lingering on her red scarf and Mikasa can't help but feel embarrassed at his scrutiny. She quickly takes it off and folds it beside her, all the while fighting the flush on her cheeks despite the fact that it's futile. So she settles for looking away from him and taking another drag of her cigarette.

"I was just leaving," he nods his head towards the horse he rode.

She flicks the ash off the end of her cigarette boredly and looks at him as if to say: don't let me stop you.

For whatever reason, he looks amused and this pisses her off.

"What's so funny?"

"You are."

She feels herself starting to flush, but this time out of irritation.

He surprises her by taking a step near her and quickly grabbing the cigarette she'd been smoking from between her fingers. He looks at it thoughtfully, something of a smirk on his face.

"If you think about it, these are a disgusting habit," he says lowly.

She stands up and, just as quick as he was, steps forward off the porch and snags it back from him. She takes a long drag and holds her breath for a moment. The smoke fills her lungs until it burns just a little bit and her head buzzes, then she leans forward and exhales slowly, the smoke fanning over his face in lazy swirls.

"I don't really care what you think about anything I do, hypocrite," she says, this time refusing to break eye contact with him.

His expression is still cool and indifferent despite the fact that she stands taller than him and he has to look up to meet her gaze.

Years ago she had fantasized about pummeling him, but that had been because of the tribunal where he'd harmed Eren. Now she finds herself wanting to smack him around for entirely different reasons. It was thrilling, a reprieve from the mundane and the darkness of her own thoughts.

There's something between them that she hasn't experienced before. Part of her thinks it's because of the pervasive numbness that has become so normal to her, that anything besides nothing starts to feel like lightning.

Another part of her feels like it's something magnetic, something drawing her to him in a way she doesn't really understand, an attraction that she can't dismiss as easily as she would like to.

She drops the cigarette to the ground, not breaking eye contact with him.

"I wanted to kill you two weeks ago."

"That was the point."

His bored response irritates her. He's not afraid of her and that bothers her. It makes her want to make him afraid of her, if anything just to exercise a minute amount of control over something in her life.

So she takes a step closer to him, and another, and another and she pushes him against the side of the shed. She's felt this way before; a focus that has an edge of something slightly animal that keeps her alert, keeps her ready for whatever comes next.

He doesn't look afraid but rather amused.

"I want to fight you again."

"Are you gonna try to kill me again?"

"Can't be sure, why, are you afraid?"

He's fast and she's riled up so she barely dodges the punch he throws.

"No, it's honestly exciting," he replies, his fist still clenched.

It's instant. That same exhilarating, electric feeling she'd felt last time. It spreads through her body and she can breath again, the world suddenly clearer.

He lands a punch to her face and she stumbles backwards, hand reflexively moving to where his hit landed. She moves her tongue along her gumline and tastes blood, but nothing's loose.

He walks toward her slowly and takes off his suit jacket, letting it fall to the ground in a careless heap.

Her senses somehow feel heightened. The throbbing in her cheek, the grass under her bare feet, the shadows cast by the half moon in the cloudless sky, the sound of her breathing; everything is sharper, more vivid than normal, like she's seeing the world as it is and everything else is some sort of strange, depressing dream.

Whatever it is, she wants more of it. She's tired of feeling so disconnected and frustrated with everyone and everything around her.

He is fast, but she is too. She feints to the left and lands a hard kick to his temple with her right foot. He's disoriented for a moment and that's all she needs. She grabs his tie and pulls him down into her knee. She lands three more hits in rapid succession and with each one she can swear her world goes sharper, clearer and her body feels full of power because she knows that she's winning, that this is something she is good at because he's Humanity's Strongest but that doesn't matter because she is in control.

She grabs him by the hair and pulls hard, pushing him to his knees, just like he had done to her two weeks ago. He spits out blood on the grass and she can hear his breathing coming in labored pants.

It's unlike her; she's not talkative and she gloats even less, but she can't resist because she wants to get back at him for what he had said, how he'd mocked her.

"Look at you, I'm not sure I'd say you look pretty," she pulls on his hair again just because she can and this time he groans, "but I'm okay with it. Do you like being like this? Forced onto your knees by–"

The words stop in her throat completely when she feels his hands on her legs, but he isn't grabbing her. No, instead it's his fingertips and palms smoothing over her calves, slowly up to the backs of her knees.

"I wouldn't say you've forced me to do anything," she hears him say.

What?! He…

Her hand slowly lets go of his hair and falls to her side.

She's frozen in her place, like her feet have sprung roots and burrowed deep into the ground.

He can't be–

But then he has a hand underneath her nightgown and on the inside of her thigh.

"Ah…I…You–"

"Do you want me to keep going?"

His words are sarcastic and dry, what she would expect from him, but the look he gives her is challenging, asks her if she's going to stop their fight here. She feels heat creeping up her neck, she's sure that her ears are bright red and who knows, maybe her hair will turn red too. He doesn't seem too concerned with her face at the moment though.

I'm not backing down.

She takes a deep breath because she knows that she shouldn't be doing this, that this isn't what she signed up for, but at the same time, she still feels it; still feels the electricity, that lightning in her veins that lifts the clouds away and ignites a fire in her chest. It's the same sharp clarity of simply knowing what to do without thinking about it that she used to get when felling titans or fighting other scouts, she feels it right now with every part of her.

"Shut up and finish what you started."

She can't see that well in the moonlight, but she can still see that this makes him smirk, his eyes alight with excitement.

There's a commonality between the way he fights and the way he touches her. His touch isn't rough, but it's certain. Everything feels natural, like all of it was somehow predetermined by some unknowable force. Some people would call it fate, but she knows that that's bullshit – nothing happens for any reason, everything just happens. No, it's not fate that has brought them together like this, but she still can't deny that something has been pushing them to this moment – an undeniable, powerful force that she thinks comes from deep inside of herself, whispering, praying that she'd end up fighting a different kind of battle with him.

His mouth is on the inside of her thigh and she lets out a short gasp of air. His hands smooth their way up the backs of her thighs, up to the swell of her hip, grasping at her tightly. He's seems content like this, content to kiss and bite at the insides of her legs, up to the edge where her panties meet her thigh. He's lazy about it, his thumbs tracing patterns on her hips and flirting with the elastic on her waistband.

If you're going to do this, do it.

So she reaches beneath her nightgown and tugs her underwear down her legs and steps out of them.

Her inexperience is getting the better of her. She knows what she wants, knows that she's the one in control, that all she has to do is take what she wants.

He must sense this.

"Tell me what you want," he murmurs against her thigh.

She feels like she's surely going to burn up and for a moment things get hazy again, she loses that razor edge of clarity that she's been chasing all evening and that's not okay.

So she threads her hand into his hair again and pushes his head between her legs.

Before she can prevent it she lets out a moan because his tongue on her like this is almost too much. That feeling of power – seeing him there, on his knees, his mouth on her and pleasing her, is giving her that same, heady dose of adrenaline she's been chasing all evening.

He's taking his time because his tongue moves slowly over all of her, but barely grazing where she wants him. So she clenches her hand that's still fisted in his hair and growls: "stop teasing me."

This time he glares up at her, his gaze equal parts aggression and defiance, but she doesn't back down and jerks her hips forward against his mouth because it's what feels good and that's what she cares about right now.

He moves faster now, his mouth more purposeful than exploratory and in a minute she's starting to gasp, her hand clenching at his hair, her other on his shoulder, gripping so hard that she's sure it'll leave a bruise.

It's surprising how it sneaks up on her, like suddenly with the right gesture, the right motion of his tongue, that she's so close that it feels physically painful. She knows that if he stops she may just die on the spot from frustration. He grips her ass hard with his hand and she's coming harder than she ever has in her entire life, a steady stream of curses leaving her mouth, her hips grinding up against his face.

"Fuck," she cries, her voice broken and wanton sounding.

She pushes him away because it's too much when she's coming down and he wipes his mouth on the back of his hand. He's still on his knees, hair mussed from all her grabbing and his tie loose, but his expression is calm.

She can't stand that look, that cool confidence, that blank, expressionless face. She feels something snap inside of her again, her pleasure clouded mind gaining focus again. She tackles him and pins his shoulders to the ground. She mindlessly pulls off his tie and rips the buttons of his shirt apart and smooths her hands down his bared chest. When she undoes his pants and pulls his cock out it's like she's watching someone else, some animal part of herself that is content to take take take because all she wants is more.

Fucking him is easy; easy because of the way he moves his hips in time with hers, easy because now she can see him starting to unravel – a gasp here, a clenched fist there, it's all perfect to her, because she is going to win this. She's going to take what she wants from him, she's going to best him.

So she leans forward and bites at his neck, smooths her tongue over the pulse she can feel beneath her mouth, clutches at him while she moves against him, taking pride in every sound she wrings out of him.

When he finishes he grips her hip hard and presses his head back into the ground, his eyes shut tight, a low moan of relief the only sound he makes.

Suddenly she feels tired and uncoordinated, like she's either drunk or extremely sleep deprived. She rolls off of him and onto her back, her head in the grass, her cotton nightgown still rucked up to her hips as she catches her breath.

If at any point in the past she had thought of fucking Levi Ackerman in Sasha and Connie's lawn, she probably would've thought herself crazy, submitted herself to an institution and felt intense embarrassment.

But she's surprised that there's none of that. She doesn't feel embarrassed, because honestly how different was any of that from fighting him? Most importantly, she feels more grounded, more sane, than she's felt in years. That feeling of giving in to the intuitive, trance-like state that she'd lived in during her time in the Scouting Legion feels like coming home, like she was always meant to be this way.

After about a minute of laying there, not touching but next to each other in the grass, he sits up and starts to right himself.

"You ruined my shirt," he says, clearly annoyed.

She props herself up on her elbows and looks at him, torn shirt and rumbled appearance, and she can't help but think to herself that she does find something about him attractive, though perhaps not pretty.

"Sorry about that," she says, but her tone says that she's anything but.

He runs a hand through his hair (which Mikasa remembers is softer than it looks like it should be) and glances over at his horse across the yard. He makes to leave, but before he leaves, he glances over his shoulder and looks at her.

"Next time, I'm not going to let you win."

The look he gives her makes her hair stand on end and sends a shiver through her body.

Next time.

She gets up slowly, conscious of his eyes on her. She grabs her discarded panties off the ground and puts them back on slowly, making sure that she doesn't appear rushed because she wants him to look at her, watch her, want her. From the look on his face, she can tell that she was successful.

"Looking forward to it."

When she goes to bed that night, she sleeps better than she has in years.


Mikasa sleeps later than usual, waking to the sun streaming in through her window and the birds singing in the trees outside. She can hear the baby in the living room playing and someone in the kitchen.

She picks a simple cream white blouse and a navy pleated skirt. She folds up her red scarf and places it at the bottom of the trunk, where it always goes these days.

Sasha is finishing up dishes from breakfast while Elise plays with her blocks on the ground.

"Morning Mikasa, I set aside some breakfast for you!"

Sasha is cheery and kinder than Mikasa feels she deserves, but she gratefully accepts the food and coffee.

Motherhood suits Sasha well, and Mikasa can't help but feel a slight pang of jealousy. Everything about it is so mundane, so delightfully normal and it brings back memories of a time so long ago that it's starting to fade from Mikasa's memory. Of gathering flowers with her mother, helping her father skin rabbits and even bedtime stories with Carla.

Elise already seems as mischievous as her father, so when Sasha stops paying attention for even a moment the little girl is crawling and attempting to pull herself up on the furniture and break things, so Mikasa gets on the ground and plays with her so Sasha can take a minute to put her feet up.

"Gah, thanks Mikasa, it makes me sound like a bad person but I honestly get tired playing with her all the time!"

Mikasa smiles softly and shakes a stuffed rabbit in front of the girl, her eyes lighting up in excitement as she reaches for it.

"It's okay, take a rest."

So Sasha sits and reads the morning newspaper with her feet up on an ottoman.

After about a half hour, Elise starts to rub her eyes and fuss because she's hungry and tired, so a rejuvenated Sasha picks her up to feed her. Mikasa stays on the floor and gathers Elise's toys neatly into a pile.

"So, what do you have going on today?"

Sasha sighs and rocks back and forth a little as she feeds Elise.

"I have a lot of meat to preserve because we're low on dry ice and I don't want it to go to waste, and Connie has a huge backlog of work, so I was going to help him out with cutting fabric. He definitely didn't know what he was getting himself into with this whole thing. Then Heichou is coming by to take Marigold," Sasha sighs again, a sad expression on her face "I really like Marigold, she's a sweet animal but I know it's for the best, it's just not practical for us to keep a lame horse."

The mention of Levi makes her stomach flip a little awkwardly, the memory of his hands on her legs, his mouth between her thighs, his quick breathing when he came apart beneath her…somehow in the daylight hour, the whole encounter feels a little dreamlike though she knows it was anything but, she has the soreness in her limbs to prove it.

"Mikasa?" Sasha asks, concerned.

She must be staring off into space.

"When did he get so into horses?" she asks, trying to sound as uninterested as possible.

"Oh, after the war and everything, a bunch of the horses from the Legion didn't have anywhere to go. You might not know this but they were bred very specifically for the Legion, so they're too mean and need too much exercise for casual horse owners, and they make terrible work horses because they won't plow," Sasha shrugs, "so I think he just decided he needed something to do. Connie and I help when we can because we know how to handle them, but gosh, some of them are pretty mean, Commander Erwin's old horse in particular, that grump only listens to Heichou," Sasha pulls up her sleeve, revealing an ugly, yellowing bruise the size of a fist, "did this to me while we were taking care of them for a couple weeks, bah!"

For some reason this doesn't fit with whatever image of Levi Mikasa has. It seems oddly sentimental – taking care of his fallen comrade's horses – for a man so stoic, so severe in both language and action.

For the first time, Mikasa considers that maybe he feels just as aimless as she does.

She shakes her head, dismissing the thought.

"I can help Connie, I know how to sew," she says, changing the subject deliberately.

"Really?"

Mikasa frowns.

"Yeah, why is that so surprising?"

"Oh, no reason!" Sasha sputters. Elise chooses that moment to pop off of her mother's breast and start biting and pinching her out of boredom.

"Ah!" Sasha yelps and pulls the baby away, sitting her upright, "No! Don't do that!" she admonishes sharply.

At this, Elise frowns and bursts into tears.

"Gah," Sasha's shoulders slump and she bounces her. "There's no need to cry, just don't bite Mama, that's all!"

Obviously such a detailed instruction is lost on the infant, but her mother's kind voice seems to help and instead Elise just continues to pout and rub her eyes.

"I'm gonna go lay down with her and hopefully she'll take a nap. Connie is out in the shed if you want to help him, but please don't feel obligated."

Mikasa doesn't want to sit around doing nothing, so she does go out to the shed. Connie looks a little frazzled with patterns and fabric all around him, patterns hung over dress forms every which, way pins tucked into his mouth and a slight sheen of sweat on his forehead.

Instead of insisting he doesn't need help like she imagines he normally would, Connie has no reservations about putting her straight to work cutting fabric and pinning pieces together while he operates the complex new sewing machine with focus that surprises her considering he's always been a little spastic.

The work is calming, she likes that it occupies her hands and is detail oriented enough that she needs to focus on the task at hand, but not so tedious that she finds it tiring.

After about two hours, Connie says he needs to take a break so he doesn't go cross eyed, so they go outside and sit down with some glasses of water, but not before Connie grabs a few swatches of fabric, explaining that he wants to see what they look like in natural light.

Sasha comes outside and joins them with a freshly rested baby, setting Elise on the ground to play with the grass and a stick.

"Ooh, what are these swatches for?" she asks excitedly, resting a hand gently on his shoulder and peering over his shoulder casually.

"Heichou's suit, he told me to just use whatever I have on hand and you know how much I hate that."

Sasha sighs. "Stubborn," she picks up two swatches and immediately tosses them aside.

"Definitely not those two, they'll make him look washed out and tired," Sasha looks at three others, picking them up and looking at them at different angles.

Mikasa sips her water as they talk about the merits of each swatch, not really listening as she runs her finger around the rim of the glass.

"What do you think, Mikasa?"

She thinks about saying she doesn't care what kind of outfit that Levi wears, but she doesn't have the heart when she sees Connie and Sasha's animated expressions, genuinely interested in her opinion.

So she glances at the fabric, one an olive drab color with a slightly grey hue, and the other a brown.

"This one," she says quickly, choosing the olive one.

"Awwh come on you're just agreeing with Sasha!" Connie complains.

"No she's not, she's just got good taste!"

"Whatever!"

"He has a cool complexion, so the brown is too warm, it'll make him look sick, the green has a cool undertone so it's more suited to him," she explains.

They look at her as if she's sprouted antlers.

"Just my opinion," she mumbles.

As if she needed to feel more awkward, she hears a horse galloping down the road and she knows it's him.

Sure enough he's walking the horse that he's trading them over to where they're sitting. Instead of a suit he's wearing just a white shirt with the sleeves rolled to his elbows, pants and suspenders. She can tell that he was working before he got here because a light sheen of sweat coats his body and she has to stop herself from blatantly staring at him.

"Hey Heichou!" Sasha waves, scooping up Elise from the ground and propping her on her hip.

He clenches his jaw "don't call me that," he says tiredly.

"Sorry, force of habit," Sasha says lightly though Mikasa is pretty sure she and Connie do it to irritate him.

Levi glances at Mikasa and sees the fabric swatches, still in her hands.

"What are you three doing?"

Connie smirks and glances wryly at Mikasa.

"Oh, Mikasa was just telling us about your cool toned complexion."

Mikasa's eyes widen for a moment and she drops the fabric swatches like they burn her hands.

"I–that's not–"

But Connie and Sasha cut her off with their laughter. Levi crosses his arms in front of his chest, clearly amused at her discomfort.

"Ugh," she stands up irritatedly, crossing her arms in front of her. "You make it sound weird, I just learned my colors as a kid!"

Sasha and Connie calm down, Sasha even wiping a tear from her eye.

"I'm sorry, you're right, you're helpful, it's just funny seeing you get all worked up, it's just not like you."

She fumbles with the band she wears to cover the mark of her mother's family irritatedly, frowning all the while.

"My complexion aside," Levi says, glancing at Mikasa with an air of condescension that makes her want to punch him right in the face, "This is Fiona, she's a good horse."

Mikasa takes this as an opportunity.

"I can take Elise while you deal with all this horse stuff," she offers.

"Oh, thanks Mikasa," Sasha smiles and passes the baby over to her and leads Levi and the Springer family's new horse to their stable.

She goes inside the house and sets Elise on the ground, takes out some of her toys, and Mikasa watches her passively as she starts to chew on a toy horse.

Thank goodness.

One more minute of that and she was going to die of embarrassment; teased by Connie and Sasha, of all people in front of…Levi.

Whatever the hell he is to me.

He definitely wasn't her beau, the thought makes her feel completely uncomfortable. In her trashy romance novels that she hides in the bottom of her trunk, their relationship would be described as lovers and something about that sounds so silly that she can't even begin to think in terms of that.

He's just the guy I'm fucking.

That's probably the most accurate way she can describe it.

Yeah, the guy you're fucking that's your former commanding officer, that in the past you sometimes hated, and that you enjoy beating the shit out of who is fifteen years older than you.

Still, she can't regret what's happened because seeing him again a day later, she already feels that same pull, that same, inexplicable feeling. He represents something to her, if anything a return to something simpler, something intuitive that she can just do without thinking.

She doesn't need to think about her pain, her grief, about Eren, his rejection of her feelings, his death…none of it matters when she fights, because everything is instinctive. She doesn't have to think about it and there's nothing she needs more than that right now.

She'd also be lying to herself if she didn't admit that the way his forearms looked with his sleeves rolled up made her think about what it'd be like to have him lift her up and have her against a wall.

The thought surprises her. She's never been one to fantasize, to spend hours dreaming of things that could be. That was Armin, he was the dreamer.

Still, she can't help but wonder when next time will happen.


The series of events that lead Mikasa to Levi's bedroom four days after their last encounter are surprisingly mundane. Connie finishes the suit that he owed to Levi, and Mikasa, as casually as she could, offered to deliver it to him.

Very quickly, almost shockingly so, the two of them came to blows. And he was serious about not letting her win this time, she could tell he was determined to best her, to make her bend to his will and she almost feels slighted at how last time he'd allowed her to win.

The line between fighting and when she starts taking his clothes off is blurry; when they're stumbling into his house from outside, she still picks up a broomstick and swings it at his torso hard enough that it breaks in half, but then she pulls his t-shirt over his head and tries to push him up against a wall.

It remains a struggle, all the way until they're in what she assumes is his bedroom and he pushes her hard against the wall, his left hand squeezing her wrists together and pinning them above her head.

She struggles against him but she doesn't have the momentum to break free from his grasp.

"Let me go," she growls.

He presses his hips up against hers and she can feel his cock straining against his pants.

"Is that what you really want?" he breathes against her ear and bites her earlobe. It's so unexpected that she can't help but let out a whimper that she's sure she'll feel embarrassed about later.

"That's what I thought, so," he's pressing open-mouthed kisses down her throat and down her collarbone, "when I let go of your wrists, you're going to take of your dress, mm?"

His other hand squeezes her breast and she groans, but then she feels him pinch her nipple through the dress and she yelps.

"I asked you a question."

As a leader, Levi wasn't one to bark orders. He preferred to trust his subordinates to make their own independent decisions that were in the best interest of the group. But when he did give orders, they were authoritative and carried a weight that made it difficult to defy. Still, she'd defied him many times in the past. Submission is not in her nature, it's not who she is.

But she doesn't want him to stop, doesn't want to leave this perfect, easy way of existing. And even if it frightens her, there's a part of her that wants to have him tell her what to do; to let go, to submit herself to what he wants because after all, they are the same this way. They simply do what feels right.

Still, it takes all of her strength to quietly say "Yes."

"Yes what?"

"I'll take off my dress."

He lets go of her wrists and Mikasa feels the blood rush back into them as she flexes her hands to regain sensation back.

He sits down on the end of the bed and watches her. There is no trace of his normally present indifference but instead an intense, almost predatory gaze watches her as she slowly unbuttons the front of her dress.

Just because he told me to take off my dress doesn't mean I have to be quick about it.

So she doesn't let her eyes leave his, she stares right back at him as she undoes the sash and slowly steps out of her dress. It falls off of her shoulders into a green and white pool on the floor, leaving her in her underwear and stockings.

"Come here."

She walks toward him and slowly palms her stomach, like he's trying to catalogue every freckle, each ripple of muscle. He reaches behind her and unclasps her bra and pulls it off of her shoulders and onto the ground with her dress.

His mouth is on her breast, his tongue on her nipple and she bites her lip to prevent herself from making a sound. Very quickly, she feels him pinch her side and she yelps again.

"Don't do that, hold back any sounds you make, I can tell," he says sharply, then more gently, "I want to hear you."

Any sort of ill-formed sexual fantasies she'd had in her teens, any sexual encounter she'd had as an adult, all of it pales in comparison to how turned on she is by the fact that he wants to hear her.

If he didn't have her before, he had her now. This feels right just like the last time when she'd had him on his knees in front of her, when he was her's to command. It's different, she's not the one in control, but there is a freedom, a kind of power in surrender that feels just as natural, though she hadn't seen that until now.

"Okay," she agrees.

"Good," he stands up and undoes his pants and she swallows when she sees him completely naked for the first time. It had been dark the first time, and he'd still had his shirt mostly on the whole time despite the fact that she'd ripped it.

"Get on your knees."

She knows what he probably expects, and hell, what she wants, but she waits for him to say something, wanting to know what he'll say.

"Have you done this before?"

She smiles softly and can't resist running her hand up the corded muscle of his thigh, letting her finger linger on the permanent divot made by decades of wearing 3DMG, only for him to sharply slap her hand away as if to say who said you could touch?

"Mm, right. So, have you done this before?" he repeats himself.

She can't resist the opportunity to play dumb here, maybe with the hope that he'll hit her again because something about mixing pain and pleasure speaks to her, because she's not sure if anyone can truly escape pain anyways, so why not embrace it?

"Done what before, Levi?"

"Oh so now you want to play the virgin," he laughs darkly, "Have you ever had a cock in your mouth?"

Hearing him say it like that, so direct, so vulgar makes her squeeze her thighs together, trying to relieve some of the tension she feels.

"No," she says honestly.

"Hmm, I'm sure you'll figure it out, you're a smart girl," he says dryly, threading a hand through her hair.

Being called a girl makes her bristle.

I'll show you how much of a girl I am.

With little difficulty, she has him gripping her hair tightly, his hips starting to jerk into her mouth as she runs her tongue and lips up and down his cock.

Something about this makes her feel she's the powerful one again, like she's able to reduce him to some baser, animal version of himself.

He pulls her away from him and she's sure it's because he doesn't want to come and she moans at the sensation of him tugging on her hair, the pain of it heightening her senses to that same, animal focus that she craves.

He doesn't ask anything of her this time, instead he shoves her onto the bed, on her stomach and he quickly pulls her panties down so they're around her knees.

She moans loudly when he's inside of her, not expecting him so quickly, not expecting it to feel so differently from this angle.

"Fuck, did you get this wet sucking cock? I didn't peg you for a cockslut."

Anger floods her at the insult despite the fact that some part of her enjoys it.

"Fuck you," she growls and pushes herself against him.

He grabs her hair again and yanks, then he slaps her hard with an open palm on her ass, making her shout.

"Don't get mad at me for speaking the truth," he says. "Besides, if you haven't noticed we are fucking right now."

He picks up the pace and it's harder, more punishing than before but something about it feels so good.

"Touch yourself," he demands, this time his voice sounds a little more breathless, like he's starting to unravel.

She does what he says without thinking and it feels different with him inside than it does by herself and so much better.

For a minute, she's reduced only to the things she can feel, his hand in her hair, his cock inside of her, her fingers rubbing herself in tight circles and it's all too much and she's gripping the quilt and crying out as he thrusts into her through her orgasm.

She doesn't know if it's a minute or five before he groans and collapses on top of her, his chest slick with sweat, his breath quick and hot on her neck.

She presses her head back into a pillow and stretches her arms above her head, closing her eyes tightly and just lets herself enjoy that boneless, relaxed feeling.

He's apparently doing the same thing because she can hear him breathing. She feela the bed dip next to her.

After a minute, she sighs and gets off the bed. She's still wearing her knee high stockings and underwear, so she's sure she's an interesting sight to behold; topless and disheveled, but she doesn't particularly care.

She grabs her clutch and takes out a cigarette.

"You want one?" she asks.

He pinches the bridge of his nose and sighs.

"Fine."

So she lights her own with a match and then lights his with the tip of her own. She grabs a saucer from the bedside table that she assumes he'd used to have his morning coffee for them to flick their ashes on and sets it between them.

He's put his boxers back on, so they're both just sitting there, topless on the bed smoking cigarettes.

"You're a bad influence on me, I hadn't touched one of these since I was a teenager."

She exhales smoke.

"Sorry," she says tonelessly.

"For some reason I think you're less than sincere."

"Smart man," she drawls, flicking the ash of her cigarette boredly onto the saucer.

When she's finished her cigarette, she extinguishes it on the saucer.

She glances over at him, shirtless and relaxed and is shocked she finds him handsome to a degree that almost irritates her. She'd never found him particularly attractive before, but now, all she wants is to go back to bed, pin him down and map every bit of his torso with her mouth.

She sees the welt on his obliques caused by the broomstick she'd hit him with and can't help it when she reaches out and traces the mark with her fingertip.

He winces, likely just out of surprise, his muscle twitching beneath her fingertip.

"Admiring your handywork?"

She doesn't answer him, instead placing her hand flat on his side, smoothing her hand over his obliques, noting how it feels when the muscles tense at her touch.

She glances up at him and meets his eyes, his gaze observant.

"Do you want to see me again?" she asks softly.

She doesn't know why, but for some reason it seems important that she asks. She wants to know if this is going to continue, with some element of consistency or if she needs to find something else to occupy her time.

He places a hand over her's, and she notes that it's probably the first time he's ever touched her so gently.

He looks away from her when he replies.

"Yeah."