Freedom Fighters League of the Exiled

Spar to Settle a Wager

"Asshole," he mumbled when he was finally able to take a deep breath.

"I know I'm so sorry." I was a moment away from telling him that I will stand back from the mission just because I put him through that. I won, but by playing dirty it's not a way I want to win ever, especially not against Eren.

"Don't be," he sighed sitting up, "You won, you proved you could do it," he looked up at me and nodded. "Even if you did play a little dirty to do it. However, fighting dirty isn't always a bad thing. This is war, we need a little more of that in the field. We need to be willing to do anything to win." he nodded before letting out an annoyed sigh. "I hate to say it, but you convinced me," he rolled his eyes and looked at everyone else.

Hanji, Shadis, and Pixis were dead quiet. I could tell they were convinced as well, Mom on the other hand was shaking her head. "I still don't like the idea of you going out there injured." She finally said and everyone turned to her. She let out a soft sigh before continuing, "but I know there is nothing I can say that will stop you. So all I will say is that you better make it back safely because if not I will go there myself and die trying to kill the sons of bitches who hurt my kid," she said before walking away without another word.

"To be fair, he should be safe, that was him fighting against another person who has powers most of the assholes they will be avoiding don't even have those," Hanji yelled after her. I couldn't tell how she felt about what Hanji said she had her back to us as she walked away and she was too far away for my powers to reach her.

"Alright, well I guess it's decided," Pixis nodded. "Levi's staying on the mission."

"Seems like it," Shadis mumbled. I could tell he still wasn't too crazy about this decision, but he knew he was outvoted in this matter.

"You two, go get dressed in your costumes and meet us for practice, I will go grab the others," Pixis said before walking away.

Eren and I headed back to our room and the whole way there I felt so guilty. He was just silent and thinking about how practice was going to go, but I still felt like an asshole. I don't care if he thinks it was necessary that I did that, I took advantage of something I knew he struggled with for personal gain. Nothing about that sounds necessary, let alone something you should do to the one you love.

When we got to our room and got changed I finally got up the courage to apologize for it. This time more sincerely than just a ushed I'm sorry.

"Eren, before we head to practice can we talk?" I asked sitting on the edge of the bed.

"Sure, what do you want to talk about."

"The match just now, I'm really sorry about-."

"Hey look, don't sweat it. I know you had to," he cut me off and gave me a smile.

"But Eren, I feel really bad about it. I shouldn't have-."

"Look, I know that you feel like it was a shitty thing to do, but trust me it's not that bad. I'm fine and you know I don't hold grudges."

I raised my eyebrow at that last part. He is one to hold a grudge.

"Okay okay, maybe not that last part," he laughed, "what I mean is I don't hold grudges against you. Not about something as stupid as this. It was a sparring match we both went all out and you did what you had to to win, nothing wrong with that. That's what those sparring matches are supposed to be. Just because we never actually do them that way doesn't mean I'm mad at you for doing them the way they were intended," he said, placing a kiss on my cheek.

"But still it was a dick move."

"It was, but hey I would prefer that then getting hit with another one of Jean's fireballs." he laughed. "Besides, a part of me is glad you won. I would hate for us to break a promise over a stupid spar that was pretty unfair, to begin with."

"Is that why you let me win?" I asked.

"Yup," he said with a smile. "In all seriousness, no you did that yourself."

"But you did throw the match a little," I said and he looked at me a little confused. "I mean it might not have been intentional but you did. You kept your attacks basic. Normally you would be thinking harder about how to strategically throw me out, but this time you were just brute-forcing it which is never your style."

"I guess I figured because you were weaker I could get away with it, but I'm going to be honest I think I was just too frustrated that I wasn't really thinking that much. My only thought was that I had to win to protect you. For a moment I even thought about fighting dirty. Which is why I don't blame you at all for doing what you did. I was going to do it myself too."

"Oh really?" I asked. I wasn't watching his thoughts for the last bit of the match since I was too busy trying to figure out a way out of his hold that I guess I must have missed this thought.

"Yeah, I was going to put a gravitational field by your bad arm and when you were distracted by the pain I would throw you out of the circle, but last minute I decided that was too much of a dick move. I realized that if I wanted to protect you so much then why would I purposely hurt you."

"That would have been a dick move," I nodded.

"I guess we were both too worried about winning that stupid match that we both didn't care if we hurt each other."

"Sorry," I mumbled.

"Hey don't be sorry. At least your way didn't directly cause me physical pain. Well not intentionally," he shrugged, "just promise me that neither of us will be so hellbent on winning a spar again that we go that far."

"I promise," I nodded.

"Good, now let's get to practice before Pixis thinks about kicking us both off the team," Eren suggested and I nodded.

"We don't want that, after fighting so desperately to stay on," I laughed. We got up and started heading to practice.