A/N: Hello, readers! Another chapter is here! Enjoy!

edited on july 8th, 2021 @ 9:08am

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𝓒𝙷𝙰𝙿𝚃𝙴𝚁 𝙴𝙻𝙴𝚅𝙴𝙽,
𝓣𝙷𝙴 𝙳𝙴𝙵𝙴𝙰𝚃𝙴𝙳, 𝟻𝟽𝚃𝙷 𝙴𝚇𝙿𝙴𝙳𝙸𝚃𝙸𝙾𝙽 𝙱𝙴𝚈𝙾𝙽𝙳 𝚃𝙷𝙴 𝚆𝙰𝙻𝙻𝚂, 𝙿𝙰𝚁𝚃 𝚂𝙸𝚇.

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"HE'S ALIVE. THE TARGET APPEARS intelligent, and it's goal seems to be capturing Eren. If it wanted him dead, it would've crushed him. The target is fighting to escape after going through the trouble of putting him in its mouth." Mikasa explained.

"It's goal may have been to eat Eren. If that's the case, he's in its stomach. It's more reasonable to assume that he's dead." Levi stated.

"He's alive!"

Levi looked back at her. "I hope you're right." He said.

"If you'd only protected Eren, this wouldn't have happened!" Mikasa said.

Levi fully turned to face her. "I see... You're the one from back then. Eren's close friend?" He guessed. "We'll limit ourselves to a single goal. First, give up on killing the Female Titan."

"It killed many of our comrades!"

"As long as it can harden its skin, we can't kill it. Do as I say. We'll pin our hopes on Eren still being alive, and rescue him before it leaves the forest. Jude and I will tear away at it... You draw it's attention!" Levi said.

Mikasa headed in front of the Female Titan while Julian and Levi were right behind her. The Female Titan turns to face them both instead of Mikasa. She balled her fist up and goes to punch them but Levi reacts quickly and cuts her arm up all the way to her eye. The Female Titan falls back onto a tree while Levi reloads his blades as he looked over at Julian who just smirked in reply.

Together, the two of them attack the rest of her body, leaving her legs limp as the Female Titan is unable to move. Mikasa watches her higher-ups in awe.

"They're fast... so fast that it has no time to harden its skin!" Mikasa thought as Julian and Levi go to cut her arms.

"We can go for the neck... It's tired... I bet it can't move. I can kill it!" Mikasa thinks to herself as she goes to cut the Female Titan's nape. That's when Levi noticed something.

"Stop!" He warned.

The Female Titan raised her hand to stop her. Mikasa is surprised on how closer her hand is getting and realizes she doesn't have enough time to get out of the way.

Levi comes in and pushes the Female Titan's hand down with his foot, breaking his ankle in the process. He cuts open her mouth, revealing Eren who was covered in saliva.

"Eren!"

Levi grabs Eren, leaving the Female Titan leaning on the tree as the trio took off.

They landed on a branch as Levi looks down at the brunette. "Hey! We're getting out of here!" Levi informed.

"Eren..." Mikasa said worriedly.

"I think he's okay... he's alive! But filthy. Forget about it... We'll retreat. Don't lose sight of the core objective. Is it more important to get what you want? Isn't he an important friend?" Levi questioned as he took off without waiting for a reply with Julian right behind him.

Levi glanced behind him and noticed the Female Titan had tears running down her cheeks.

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Eren laid on a wagon as the Scouts were returning from their mission. He was bandaged up and wrapped in Mikasa's green cloak as she sat beside him.

Meanwhile, Isabella Claridge's eyes sparkled with excitement. "Mama! Papa! Nee-san's coming home!" She exclaimed.

"That she is. We should welcome her back." Elizabeth Claridge, Ida's mother, smiled as she thought of her eldest daughter finally returning home safe.

Armin and Jean load a body onto a wagon as they sighed. "This is the part I never get used to." Jean commented.

Armin looks down. "No one does." He replied.

"How are my friends going to die? How am I going to die? It's all you can think about." Jean said.

"I try not to dwell on it. If I pictured how I'm going to die, I probably wouldn't be able to fight." Armin stated.

"Yeah." Jean agreed. "You're right."

"Jean!"

Jean looked up to see his older brother running to him with his squad right behind him.

"Nii-san!"

Jean hopped down from the wagon and crashed into his brother, hugging him tightly.

"Thank the gods you're okay." Julian sighed in relief as Jean released him. He then looked around, seeing his brother's squad had an eerie atmosphere around them.

"Wait... Aren't there supposed to be five of you?" Jean asked.

"Ida's dead."

Jean widened his eyes before hugging his older brother once more. "It's not your fault, Nii-san—" He began.

"It's entirely my fault." Julian interrupted. "What kind of Section Commander am I to just let one of my squad members die like that?"

Julian pats Jean on the shoulder before walking away to regroup with Levi.

"You okay?" Levi asked him.

"I should be asking you that, idiot. Your squad was the one who was slaughtered." Julian responded.

"It's nothing new for me." Levi mumbled.

It was silent between the two of them. "Don't you die on me. Those were always the same five words that you would always tell me before we left on expeditions." Julian finally spoke up.

"What point are you trying to get across, Jude?" Levi questioned.

"For as long as I've been in the Survey Corps, I never knew why you would say that to me. But after the deaths of your squad, I finally understand." Julian replied before looking at his mentor.

"You're scared of losing me, are you, Levi?"

Levi let out a long sigh before walking over to Julian. "I've lost a lot of people that I care about in the past. As I mentioned, I'm used to it. But you? I can't lose you, Jude. Dare I say, you're special to me." He said.

Julian blushed as he looked away. "Well, I'm not going anywhere, Levi. I promise." He told him. "You can't get rid of your favorite student that easily."

"If anything, you were a pain in the ass."

"Hey!"

The two of them walked over to where Erwin was, as Julian caught a conversation going on between a soldier who wanted to bring Ivan's body back.

"Squabbling kids?" Levi spoke up.

"Captain Levi... Section Commander Julian..."

"If you confirmed he's dead, that's enough. Whether you have the body, dead is dead. It won't change anything." Levi said.

"Everyone dies at some point. That's the disadvantage of being apart of the Survey Corps." Julian added.

"No..."

"We'll say Ivan and the others went missing. That's my final decision. Give it up." Erwin informed as he walked away with Levi and Julian following him.

"Don't the three of you have any human feelings at all?!"

"Hey, Dieter... You're going too far!"

As the Survey Corps began moving out, Julian was on his horse with Lyon riding right next to him and the rest of the squad was behind them.

"Titans!"

Mikasa looks behind her and sees two soldiers with their friends corpse on their back with an Abnormal Titan right behind them. Levi groaned and slowed down his horse. Dietar continues to gallop when the Titan's hand comes down and tries to grab him.

Dietar ducks his head out of the way but by doing so he drops Ivan's body. He gasped and turns to see Ivan's body getting picked up by the Titan. He stops in his tracks and goes to kill the Titan.

"They're going to catch us!" Armin exclaimed.

"Do we have to fight?" Jean asked.

"Maneuver Gear has limited utility in open areas! And look... They just keep coming!" Armin said.

"Then what do we do?" Jean questioned.

Armin looks towards the dead corpses wrapped in the bloodied cloths. "We..." He trailed off.

Jean looked over and gasped. Mikasa watched as Dietar got caught by the Titan, she uses her ODM gear to fly off the wagon and kill it. Moments later, Dietar steps out of the dead Titan's hand, clutching his shoulder.

On the wagon, a soldier turns to Levi, expecting an order. "Just abandon the bodies. They'll reach us." Levi ordered as the soldier looked at him as if he was insane.

"B-But..."

"In the past, many bodies haven't made it back. These guys aren't anything special." Levi informed.

"Are we doing this? Are we really doing it?!"

The soldier looks at the Titans approaching them and then looks back at the corpses.

"We have to!"

He opens the small door at the end of the wagon and begins pushing the bodies out. Julian looked over to see a familiar body with dark brown hair tumble out as he quickly looked away.

"I'm sorry, Ida..." Julian thought, clenching the reins of his horse.

Another body with a familiar bite mark on its hand followed soon after.

Levi watched as the body rolled away as the wagon began to get faster and lighter. Soon, they were able to get away, saying goodbye to their friends and comrades.

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The Survey Corps had finally made it back to the walls as everyone had grim faces as Julian could hear the civilians talking about them.

"Aren't there fewer than there were this morning?"

"Man... Far fewer..."

"Another disaster."

"Just this morning, they left raising a ruckus, but they're already back? What was the point?"

"Who knows? But judging by the gloomy expressions, they managed to waste more of our taxes, if nothing else."

Eren gets up but then something catches his eye. A kid was standing on a few crates was peeking his head up from the crowd. Eren gets reminded of when he was younger how he used to watch the Survey Corps return back from their mission with Mikasa.

"So cool! The Survey Corps is so awesome! They got the crap kicked out of them, and they still fight!"

"Section Commander Julian!"

Jean looked up at the mention of his brother's name. Julian froze as he turned and saw Ida's younger sister running up to him with her parents following right behind her.

"My Nee-san is apart of your squad! I think it's so awesome she goes out there and fights for our freedom! I want to be just like her when I join the military next year!" Isabella exclaimed.

"Where is our daughter?" Elizabeth asked, looking around for her eldest daughter. "We wanted to welcome her back."

Julian closed his eyes as he let out a long sigh and got off his horse. He reached into his pocket and took out Ida's Wings of Freedom badge before kneeling down next to Isabella and putting it in her hand.

"This is all I could retrieve from her body. I'm sorry." Julian said.

"Nee-san is... gone? She's not coming back?" Isabella muttered as she broke out into sobs.

James Claridge, Ida's father, clenched his jaw in anger. "You bastard! Ida respected you and you had to let her down like that! What kind of leader are you?!" He shouted bringing his hand to smack Julian.

Lyon reacted quickly and caught his wrist. "It would be wise of you not to hit Section Commander, Mr. Claridge. If you want someone to blame for your daughter's death, blame me. Section Commander left me in charge." The red head informed as Julian stepped onto his horse once again.

"Once again, I'm sorry." Julian said before him and his squad continued on.

Commander Erwin was being bombarded with questions from the civilians.

The expense and casualties from the expedition were more than enough to discredit the faction that had supported the Survey Corps.

As those responsible, including Erwin, were summoned to the capital, it was decided that Eren was to be handed over.

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Night had fallen as Julian was in his office. He had an important meeting with Erwin soon but he needed to collect his thoughts.

He looks up to see a picture of his squad that they had taken together. He grabs a black marker and takes off the lid before making a huge "x" over Ida's face, covering it completely as he capped the marker and threw it on his desk before throwing a vase to the wall.

"Damn it!"

Julian fell onto his bed and sobs. He didn't understand why Lyon stopped James from hitting him. He deserved it after all.

It was his fault that Ida was dead.

"I'm so sorry, Ida! I'm so fucking sorry!" Julian screamed out. "You respected me so much and believed in me as your leader, and I let you down."

"Hey, Jude."

"Go away, Levi."

"Oi, if you think I'm leaving you here alone. You're mistaken." Levi said, closing the door behind him.

"I don't want you to witness me having a breakdown. Especially since I don't deserve to have one." Julian mumbled.

"We all handle death differently, Jude."

"Yeah, I guess you're right."

Levi was about to leave until Julian grabbed ahold of his hand.

"Stay with me, Captain."

"Jude—"

"Please. I really need someone right now."

Levi sighed before turning back around and laid down next to Julian who immediately cuddled closer to him.

Levi ran his hand through Julian's hair, trying to calm him down a bit. Soon enough, he heard light snores coming from the male.

"I wasn't lying when I told you that you're special to me, you know." Levi mumbled. "I may act put up a cold and heartless persona around you. But the truth is, I don't want to get too attached."

"Because if I do, you might be gone too."

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A/N: I kinda wanted to add soft Levi into this? I feel like he's a bit OOC, so I'm sorry for that, oops. Thanks for reading!

Word Count: 2378 words.