“Can I have a reason why it’s a negative?”

I hatefully glared at the blonde commander seated behind his desk, his big hands entwined together as he requested for the response sitting at the back of my dry throat. Those blue eyes of his glanced into my dark flat ones dauntingly while my vile ones glowered back with no hint of fear.

“Because it’s suicidal as hell.”

A sudden uproar was expected from Erwin, but instead, he chuckled lightly at the answer I rashly spat out into the open.

“Weren’t you just as suicidal back then, street rogue?”

My mouth dropped when my eyes dawdled after the piece of item thrown out of the commander’s hand, sliding across the wooden table. The coldness latched onto my finally mended skin again, my mind completely numb with shock as my pupils traced over the fine details of the time worn satchel flung before me.

“H-How…” The words of query couldn’t climb their way out, leaving my tough facade utterly crumbling as my mind denied everything before my eyes. The commander struck to the point before my mind could untangle itself.

“This was once your comrade’s, Ruth Vogel, was it not?”

The silence captured me, my structure completely frozen on the wooden chair as I helplessly outlined again and again over the little sketchy worn-out patterns of the vintage bag.  

"Before the execution of your colleague, these were the items extracted from her."

His big rough hand gently slid another old photograph onto the table within my range of vision. My dark pupils shifted, scanning over the young youthful faces of the picture. The image imprinted on the card was faded due to cheap ink, but the memory in my head would never wash away in this lifetime.

It was a photograph of me, and Ruth, and Clara, and Diablo all together, leaning against a filthy brick wall back in the Klorva district when we were on one of those smuggling jobs together. I was younger back then, but I was happy.

“That was different, I had no other choice.” I finally spat out, defeated.  

“So stealing was one? Emerging into the dark side of society was one? You refuse to show up at the orphanage you were designated to, but you turned to the dimmer corners?”

“Pfftt, what do you fucking know about me, commander?” My voice retorted back harshly, raising my tone slightly when I addressed him sarcastically.

“What a shame the child of the wealthy Lord Clemens Adler was raised with such tongue.”

My hands declawed from the wooden seat as I instinctively crossed my arms, huffing in an annoyed attitude whilst staring past the commander at nothing in particular. Pain started to allocate a position in my head, their throbbing growing and spreading like an internal apocalypse.

“Hazel, I know you’re better than this.” The man in front of me sighed, relacing his hands together as he sat up, facing me directly.

“Do you not trust us anymore?”

“What kind of a question is that?  Bella died. Stefan died. I came close. And then I found out I was just another ‘observation object’ under a bet of a 50-50 wheel, soldier or traitor. What am I to you all? Another titan experiment or some shit?!”

Erwin’s face grimaced up as he grasped onto my words of reasoning.

Yes, the moment I braced onto the collected pieces that built up to why everything turned out so shitty during the mission, I’ve lost my trust bond with everyone completely.

So Stefan could have been saved that day a few months ago if one, just one of the other sevens showed up that morning when the traitor and the titan were both tailing us at the same time. Actually, they were all at the scene, but they never bothered to come to our aid, because their job was to fucking observe me and my 'traitor-like' actions. Apparently I had to be the one to fight that Dieter bastard to prove that I had really given up on my past life of crime.

To prove that I wasn’t another traitor.

Because no one truly trusted me from the start.

And I had no right to be angry? When another life was stolen just like that?

“What more are you going to say, Hazel?” The commander cut my fury speech off, “Why are you still here today? That’s because Levi stepped out of line that day to save you.”

"Now I didn't know if it was because he was doubtful of the choice I made, or if it was something deeper..."

I stumbled upon the Commander’s words, crossing my arms even tighter now as I remembered Levi and how he swept me out of my fall. How close that short stack came to dying from those two bronze bullets that the real traitor shot.

“He’s alright, isn’t he?” I couldn’t help but ask. My angry voice softened a little as I propped my chin up on my knuckle, my elbow up against the surface of the table. The commander smiled faintly at me when he heard my concern.

“You do care about the right people, even when you act like you’re against the whole world. That’s enough to earn my trust.”

Impulsively, I rolled my eyes at the commander before relaying them back on the old picture set on the table of us three girls and our black Corso, my glare unstiffening a little as I mentally sketched over our happy young grins.

I really missed them all.

“You have heard about the parable of the all-piercing spear and the shield that simply cannot be pierced. How would you think everything will end if they fought against each other?”

“How am I supposed to know? Tell the author to write something less controversial.” My answer came out rudely, completely objective in what he had to say.

“Wouldn’t they make the toughest existing team if they cooperated, you think?”

“I couldn’t care less, honestly.”

“We could never imagine what it’ll be like to have you and Levi against each other one day, and we don’t hope that’ll ever happen. Instead of constantly competing for the best, have you both ever thought of just collaborating for once? You and him are more than efficient of being humanity’s strongest pair.”

“And?”

“He proposed for you to join his squad, I propose for you to join his squad.”

“And do you plan to leave me out to dry? Or do I just sit around and watch everybody else die?” The edges of my mouth lifted into a bitter smirk,

“Or are you all just going to kill me off at the end of the day?”

Erwin shook his head frustratingly as he listened to my mockery, rubbing his temples in pure hindrance as he tolerated my stubbornness.

"You're forgetting who the real enemy is, the one against mankind. It isn't about grudges and mistakes anymore."

He finally managed to stack up his words that paused my hateful thoughts.

“Didn’t you always desire for a family, Hazel?”

My eyes widen in astonishment as I listen to his somewhat substantial words, my figure shifted a little as I attended with a hint of attention and concern.

“Your mother committed suicide, didn’t she?”

I stopped breathing as the deepest grieves within me resurfaced back, disrupting the calm surface of my deep pond. My heart slowly weighing down with sorrow and mourn. Erwin paused a moment before he continued,

“Your father went insane.”

“Your family was horribly brittle and broken.”

“Shut up.” I growled, my dark pupils looking up furiously at the blonde man in front of me, my voice trembled and choked with hate and uprising tears of stress.

“Shut up…”

That tough lilt of mine had finally dissolved down into a little faint one, slightly muffled out as I buried my face in my arms, slouching down onto the wooden desk of the commander.

I thought I was finally unshakable, invincible. I thought that no one could hurt me anymore because everyone close to me was already dead. But the mention of them was just as painful, and they were my weakness.

And when you have a weakness and someone finds out, it was like rubbing salt into your wounds.

“But I see you as close to a daughter. Mike is pretty much your brother now-”

“Save your bullshit, Erwin.” He stopped to my sudden aggressive outburst. What does he know about me? He was just another man of war that played around with words too much. Deep intakes of air drew in, calming me down as I pushed myself up from my hunching position, eyes gleaming at the commander with fresh anger and wrath.

“I’ll give you a fair choice Hazel, you can choose-”

“Is resignation on the fucking list?” Erwin frowned at me as I butted in coarsely, stopping him midway.

“You can chose to join Squad Levi without any force…” He began again.

My eyes drifted off his stern face and onto the ground below, mentally chanting to keep myself level-headed and supress that uprising urge to kick my commander in the face.

Erwin paused, making sure that everything got through into my stubborn head, and finally uttered the other choice steadily, his voice even and stable.

My mind raced in denial to the commander's last words. The grey matter of mine can't be fucking me this time, no matter how hard I've hit it before.

So this was how Levi turned himself into the Survey Corps, huh?

My dark eyes flared up, daring my commander to repeat those solid words again. 

“Or I’ll have to hand you over to the Military Police… as one of the most wanted criminals on the list.”

 "Don't force me, I'm sure no one here would want to lose a face like yours, perhaps not even Levi." 

Your choices shall reflect on the outcome.