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After finishing their mission briefing for their upcoming confrontation with Rod Reiss' titan, Hange, Levi and his squad had some downtime in the military resupply barracks to relax in the wake of the day’s events.
Well, relax might have been a stretch.
As the others were taking off, checking over and resupplying their ODM gear, Eren, still recovering from his recent hardening effort, got a panicked look in his eyes. Excusing himself from chatting with Mikasa, he proceeded to bend over double and retch violently, hacking up what looked like blood and a shiny fragment. Mikasa started striking his back, attempting to help open his airways. Though possibly too forcibly as Eren looked to have trouble remaining standing under her onslaught.
Levi sat over to the side on some crates, throwing a look of disdain at the mess being created. "Eren seems to have problems drinking things like a normal person," he drawled, looking over to Hange who was studying some charts. "On that vein, Hange, remember the spoon incident?"
"Yes, it was glorious! Well aside from him nearly being murdered..." Hange trailed off, looking contemplative.
"What!?" Mikasa cried incredulously, accidentally giving Eren an extra strong hit and sending him to the ground groaning. The rest of Squad Levi inconspicuously edged closer to listen in.
"I left this brat to have a nice drink with my squad and he blew up the damn table." Connie and Sasha were beside themselves laughing, Jean's expression was partway between exasperated and mirthful.
"Eren- how!? I swear you find chaotic new ways of screwing up." Finally getting his breathing under control, Eren staggered to his feet looking defensive.
"I was having trouble transforming at the time! The squad didn't trust me, I'd just been on trial with Levi saying he'd end me if I couldn't control myself and uh, focusing on a transformation goal was hard!"
"Yet amazingly all these problems were solved by summoning a titanic arm to pick up your teaspoon,” Levi scoffed. “You succeeded by failing grandly. Hange still has a framed illustration of that screwup in their study. Moblit is worried about their macabre taste in art."
“So, when he picks up a teaspoon, is Eren considered ‘armed and dangerous’?” Connie asked, his expression partway between smug and constipated.
“Sounds like it Connie, and he got in trouble for not having the right to bear arms,” Sasha replied with an expression equalling Connie’s. While Eren was looking at those two, scandalised and stupefied, Levi was happy at least that they could now all joke about that event. Jean playfully bumped shoulders with Eren.
"Yep humanity's hope; hopeless without a Levi squad to keep you in line. I’ll have to check out Hange’s office someday." Eren bumped him back looking faintly annoyed.
"Back on the drinking, I heard a pretty good story from Hannes set just before the reclamation of Trost." The look of betrayal Eren sent Armin’s way went wholly ignored. "He said, just before Pixis' moving speech endorsing Eren, commander offered Eren a drink from his flask and he spat it everywhere. Likely showered soldiers below. Let’s just say the Garrison’s Elite Team didn’t look impressed when, while they both reeked of alcohol, the commander assigned a cadet to them, saying he was the ‘saviour of humanity’.”
"I still think the bigger problem is that the garrison commander carries hard liquor on him," Eren grumbled. Although reflecting on those events, this understandably didn’t help win over that team’s faith in him.
"I don't know Eren, sounds like you have a drinking problem." Connie jested.
"That doesn't mean what you think it means." Sasha bluntly replied.
"You know what I mean."
"I really don't."
Levi sighed. "I can't believe I have to say this but after today; Eren, I order you to not consume any more non-food or drink items. I don't care how good your healing capabilities are. I'm never going through watching Hange enjoy picking glass one-handedly out of your teeth again."
"I kept samples!"
A short pause.
"Never again. You’re going to be drinking from a wooden cup. And no alcohol; you're brash enough sober."
“His dietary habits used to be a lot more normal from what I saw as a kid,” Mikasa reflected, “Although there was this one time I had to force-feed him bread.”
“I’m honestly torn between wanting and not wanting to hear the context of that.” While Jean was still occasionally jealous of the attention Mikasa gave Eren, this wasn’t one of them.
“He wasn’t eating.”
“I figured that!”
Armin pitched in to diffuse the two. “While I did agree with your sentiments Mikasa, people have actually died choking on bread.” Her caring nature was appreciated, although the execution of said care borderline deadly.
“He didn’t refuse food after that.”
“Really.”
"Maybe all these abnormal tendencies come from his titan physiology?" pondered Hange, "Not too long ago we saw him eat a log cabin." Levi’s brows furrowed at that.
“I rescind the wooden cup command.”
"Yeah honestly that behaviour left us stumped."
"Connie, I'm not above making you run laps after all this."
"Sorry Captain."
"But still," Hange went on, "It's odd; even when out of control, Eren's titan only seems interested in screaming, punching things and eating trees."
"Not too different from his normal self." Jean remarked. Mikasa made a noise at that which sounded like a gas canister bursting. She then busied herself burying her face in her scarf.
"At least he hasn't tried to eat humans. Well aside from himself. Bit of an odd habit as none of the other titan-shifters we've encountered attempt this, yet you do it instinctually. Maybe it is an innate desire to eat humans." Hange didn't seem to be aware that this chat wasn't supposed to be educational, but farcical.
Armin was now standing beside Eren smiling at him guiltily. Eren had gone red with thinly veiled mortification. He felt a little bad for contributing to the terrible conversation before them, but the discussion was quite hilarious. And maybe a tad scientific?
"Armin, they're picking apart my life like it's a bad newspaper article," Eren whined. He'd deny any claims it was a whine though.
"It's purely team bonding I'm sure," Armin placated.
"...Titans have no internal organs, maybe we should check-"
"Hange, you're not gutting the kid."
“Now this is getting slightly out of hand," remarked Mikasa, standing much closer by and casually forming a barrier between Eren and Hange.
"If this prompts Hange to conduct invasive tests I'll make sure the whole squad suffers alongside me."
Sasha looked mildly uncomfortable at that. "Sorry Eren, we're friends and all but we're not that close. I've seen enough of your butt-naked Titan and I don't need to see any more of human-you than I've seen today."
"It's honestly disturbing how anatomically proportional your titan's physique is, makes it feel almost inappropriately realistic. Hell, the skinless ones look less nude than yours." Since their trainee days, Jean always knew how to get under Eren's skin.
"Guys don't make it weird!" Eren looked like his life was a choice with whole regrets.
"I don't think it looks too bad..." Mikasa asserted.
"And now it's weird," stated Jean.
"At least the head doesn't look like yours, easy to disassociate. And luckily other parts are missing." Connie and his smug grin now officially joined Jean on Eren's shit-list.
"Connie please stop, I don't want these images in my head." Sasha looked pained.
"All right lay off Yeager before you lot give the brat another complex." Glancing at Eren, the kid looked like he wanted to 'Annie' himself. And he probably could now too. Finally, he had been able to see what his titan form looked like, albeit hardened, and already he seemed self-conscious about it.
Hange slung their good arm around Eren, probably going for supportive but Eren was filled with dread. Their fervent attention and fanatical gestures at this range always worried him. "Don't worry Eren; you can work through this misplaced modesty by running on top of the wall in front of all of Orvud district! Oh, they'll be sorely disappointed with all the titans they see after you! I know I am!"
At that terrible moment, in Eren’s heart, he knew, that the peace of mind of livestock may not have been so bad compared to having to listen to his 'friends'.