Angel With A Shotgun [Levi Ackerman x OC] / Attack on Titan / Shingeki no Kyojin

Code XLIII: Xora's Theory

The four were silent, brooding over their limited options for several minutes before coming up with nothing.

"We should take suggestions from Vinicio, Eren, and Mikasa as well," Esfir suggested. "Perhaps they have some insight we may be lacking." The others nodded in agreement; if they were this close to moving a step forward, everyone needed to be on the same page.

Minutes later, the three had arrived and Levi explained the rather... complicated situation. They were left as boggled as the four who had witnessed the projection, each of them desperately searching for some kind of opportunity to create more evidence.

"Wait... didn't Xora steal a large amount of intel from her trips to that Titans facility where Levi was held?" Vinicio suddenly chimed.

"...Yes," Eren said slowly, his eyes widening as realization dawned upon him. "If we merge the information we got, we could possibly find a match between our traitors and their current agents. Didn't the Isolde woman say she was the chair of the Interrogation and Torture Unit? If they found out that some Titans were former agents of the IE, they probably extracted whatever information they could from them. They most likely interrogated any IE agents if they ever got their hands on one, so I'm sure—"

"Yes!" Hanji cried, hastily typing away at the control panel. "Vinicio, Eren, you guys are geniuses! Why didn't I think of this earlier?! Oh my, if I extract the files of interrogated persons from the Unit's archives and pull up a list of any Iridescent Empire agents, and if I merge them with our current suspects list, I can eliminate outliers and find stronger—"

"That's enough talk, do more," Levi cut Hanji off, shaking his head. "If your hands ran as fast as your mouth, we'd be done sooner." Less than a minute later, Hanji had successfully followed through and tapered the list down to four women. It seemed that the mission had finally found a new path to follow—except for one small problem.

"All four of them are dead," Mikasa muttered flatly. "How can this be? Captain Levi did tell us that Xora's savior was most definitely alive and well in the projection."

"And Eagle was one hundred percent alive when they attacked us!" Eren exclaimed, his voice shaking. "No—no zombie or whatever could've taken out—could've taken out the others, Xora, and myself, just like that."

"Let's see... only one of these women were unconfirmed if dead," Hanji pointed out. On the large computer screen, the portrait of a sullen-faced woman. Her eyes—a lighter blue than Xora's and Esfir's—slanted slightly upwards, and a broad nose sat upon her defined face. With Blonde hair wrapped in a low bun, she looked to be of quite muscular build. "She was initially was reported dead, but that status has changed to unknown. Her name is Neina. Neina Ageel. Supposedly, she left the Iridescent Empire only about seven years ago, disappearing after an encounter with a few hostile Titans. Originally, she was presumed dead, but she was spotted nearly two years later at a Titans' facility in South Africa we were able to successfully bomb and destroy. It's said she was caught in the blast, but her body or any trace of her was never found, or has been found ever since."

"Is it possible that she could've survived?" Esfir questioned. "I mean... she looks like she could've been the woman we saw in the projection."

"There's an extremely low probability, but there's still a slim chance," Hanji responded in an amused tone. "If she really did survive, then she has been avoiding discovery quite skillfully for a long time, now."

"She's our best lead, then," piped up a cold voice. Everyone's heads to whip around and a collective gasp emanated from the agents as they spotted an exhausted Xora by the doorway, holding onto the frame to support herself. She was pale and she looked entirely drained, but the fire in her eyes was inextinguishable. "Hanji, tell me anything you can on this Neina woman. I'm going to find her."