Seeing Captain Levi take his blade out I got into stance. The reflection on his blade showed the red lines on the side of my face running deeper.

'Should I take my tail out?

Would I even be able to fight all of them?

What happens after I beat them?'

I read the entire room.

*CLAP* *CLAP*

"Levi, put your blade down already." Commander Erwin said in his happy voice.

"Tsk, you were the one who asked me to show him his reflection." With the sound of the blade hitting the hilt, everyone breathed out a sigh of relief.

"You were supposed to get a mirror, like a normal person."

The sudden lightness in the atmosphere caught me off guard.

"What's going on here? Weren't you guys gonna fight me?"

"Huh? Why would we do that?" Nifa slapped my back.

"Because you know? You just found out that I'm a monster and all."

"Just found out? Boy, we already knew." Erwin took the chair from under me and sat down.

.

.

.

"Eh?" I did a pretty great job of hiding it. There's no way they could've found out.

"Levi saw you when you were trying to save your mother two years ago." That news was like a brick hit the back of my head. I think those words gave me a concussion.

'Ahh... that made a lot of sense.'

"Is that why?"

"Yes, that's why we picked you. We thought that you'd serve as a great weapon against the titans."

"So you used my father's favour as a disguise, mom as a hostage, and pulled me into this."

"Both of us gained something from this, did we not?"

...

"...we did." I pitied myself for not even having a proper reason to not argue against him. But the world was always cruel.

'Use others and others will use you.'

"How much do you know?" I asked the group.

"That you can't eat normal food, can eat humans, and your eyes turn black when you want to fight. You are also stronger than a normal human I presume." Hange listed. "If you want our cooperation, tell us all you know about yourself."

"Do you really have to back me into a corner like this?"

"You aren't a normal person, so think of this as a precaution from our side."

I let out a deep sigh.

"Before I tell you the rest, why are you guys trusting me to this extent? If it was any other unit, they would've killed me on the spot two years ago. If not, then when they found out that I ate humans."

"You said that you ate humans, but all you did was eat corpses out of necessity. You didn't kill anyone. You just ate the discarded victims for your own survival." Commander Erwin explained. "And... you've been trying your best to take care of your family. It would be wrong for me to condemn you."

"We would've probably done the same if we were in your situation." Nifa smiled at me.

These people are strange. But for some reason, I couldn't keep my guard up against them.

"My appetite came from the combination of a titan's tendency to enjoy human meat, and the human requirement to eat food. I am basically a titan living inside the body of a human. That being said, I don't have to eat humans anymore, I can feed on titans. "

"Feed on titans?"

"Eat them whole. They don't taste good, but are edible."

"Yep, titan meat is pretty tough." Hange nodded.

'Why the heck does she know that?!'

"Anyway, as far as my powers are concerned. If my appetite is fulfilled, I can manifest another appendage." A short red tail grows from the back of my spine. "This is pretty short now, but it can grow enough to be the size of a building."

Their eyes were torn with either amazement or horror. I thought they saw me back then. Oh well.

"I want to try something."

Out of nowhere Captain Levi took his blade out and swung it at me.

I compressed the tail and shielded myself. The blade broke into two.

The meat shield that I made wasn't like the crystal that the female titan formed, it was like thousands of muscle fibres wrapped together. If I were to use a word for it, it'd be a chain mail.

"This is insane." Nifa stepped back.

Bewilderment was written across everyone's faces.

'Are they just going to forget that Captain Levi just went for the kill?'

"How did you get this power?" Hange was studying my tail.

"Father injected me and told me that he would take control of me. But, I killed him after he said that he wanted to kill Mom. So I got the power, and no one can control me anymore."

The room went silent.

'Was that too dark?'

"If this is over now, can I head back to my room? I've been fighting all day, and almost died twice. I hope the interrogation waits."

"Uhh... sure." Commander Erwin pointed at the door.

I could hear murmurs behind me as I left the group behind. That ending sure was abrupt. But I desperately needed time to recuperate.

::XXX::

"I'm back." I announced while entering the new room allotted to us.

Inside there were Mom, Mikasa, and the two kids we saved.

"What kept you so long?" Mikasa asked.

"They found out..."

She instantly took the hint and looked at the kids for a moment. "Can you two stay here? We'll be back in a bit."

I took the cue and left the room, towards the roof. The new accommodation was a decent bit bigger than the last one, but it was still in terrible condition.

I bumped into Reiner and Historia heading back after reporting. Both looked grim. The group fighting the armoured titan must have taken quite a hit.

The roof wasn't all that far away and Mikasa followed right behind me.

Going out into the cloudy midday sky, I leaned over the railing and saw the same sight I had seen two years ago. People running around looking for a livelihood. It was just that our situation was a lot different than their's now.

"So... explain." She said.

And I did.

At first, she showed astonishment, then sorrow, then fright, then sympathy, and finally understanding.

We never looked each other in the eye even once throughout the exchange, but as soon as it ended, Mikasa wrapped her arms around mine and leaned her head over my shoulder.

"W-What are you doing?" I tried to hide every bit of fluster in my voice but failed miserably.

It felt warm and unexpected. Like getting burnt in all the right ways.

"I just felt as if I let you go, you'd just disappear somewhere or fly away..." Fly away, huh? That was an appropriate analogy. A cheesy one but appropriate nonetheless. I did try to do that just a while ago when I accepted my death. "And I'm angry too."

Her second phrase caught me even more off guard than before. She did exclaim anger when I outed Armin that one time, but never did she actually verbalise it. She was growing more human as time passed.

"Why were you-"

"Because you were trying to do everything by yourself. Even back then, you tried to save us by yourself, and even now you lived two years in hiding without saying a word to us. Don't you trust us?"

"I was just wo-"

"Well, we're worried about you too! Did I not make it clear enough? I never left you alone since that day... but you still..."

I never had a reply for this. Nothing but an insincere apology. If it was for her sake, I would hide the truth as many times as it took. I'd do anything. Even put my life on the line.

"Sorry."