When his head fell forward, Levi's eyes widened. Had he dozed off? He stretched and looked around. Where was Erwin? He was no longer sitting on the bench next to him. Three small children dashed out of the door of the farmhouse next to him. Had it stopped raining? Yawning, he looked up at the sky. Indeed. Levi stroked his whiskers. When he got back, he could finally shave again. Would he manage to remove the beard hairs before Ayumi saw him? "She better not like this look." Smiling, he looked at the children who had run to the swing by the oak tree. But since the wooden board was probably too wet for them, the boys and the girl decided to play with the ball.
"Toni, Georg, Paula," one of the farmer's wives called from an open kitchen window, swinging her wooden spoon threateningly. "You should not play ball in front of the chapel. Don't break anything. Play behind our house." No sooner had the children heard the farmer's wife's words than they ran with their ball to the other side of the farmhouse. Only now did Levi notice the little chapel half hidden behind the oak tree. Mike stepped out of the stable.
"Are we leaving?," Levi asked him tiredly. On their way back they had stopped at one of the larger farms. To avoid contagion, Erwin had forbidden any contact with soldiers from the Krolva gate. At the same time, food transports were delayed. "That's why we don't go to their canteen anymore. That's their food. Not ours. We'll try to find something to eat on the way back," Erwin had explained. Fortunately, the farmer had sympathy towards the Scout Regiment and invited the four soldiers to a late breakfast. However, as the dark clouds increased and the light drizzle had turned into a persistent downpour, their stay became longer than expected.
"The weather is okay. The horses are ready to go," Mike replied. "Where's Erwin?"
Levi shrugged his shoulders. "Maybe inside. With Hanji." He pointed to the farmhouse. Over a cup of tea, Hanji had been talking about Titans since hours. Mike nodded and went in search of the missing two friends.
Levi stood up and actually wanted to go to his horse, but his gaze remained on the chapel. "Twice, maybe almost three times the size of my bedroom," he estimated. It seemed older than most buildings he knew. "Maybe as old as the walls?," he wondered as he walked across the wet grass to the chapel. The soldier put his hand out for the iron ring. But when he felt the cold, he paused. Should he actually go in? He had never been in a church before. Was he even allowed in? When he heard the squeak of the door, he took a step to the side. A grey-haired priest stepped out and smiled greetingly at Levi as he pulled a pipe out of his pocket. Noticing the indecision on the soldier's face, he said: "Anyone can go in there."
While the priest walked towards the farmhouse, Levi looked curiously into the chapel room through the door. There were only three rows. No pews, just old wooden chairs. In general, the chapel's furnishings were made of wood. No magnificent altar he had always heard of in the underworld was to be found in front of the rows of chairs. A simple wooden table stood in front. With a few candles and a few carved wooden figures. "Are these saints?" Levi didn't know anything about them. He had no idea about the church, traditions or how to behave in a church. All he knew was that people got married in a church. "Why not here?," he thought timidly.
"Levi?," he suddenly heard Erwin say. The Commander was sitting in the last row of chairs against the wall. "What are you doing here?," he asked in surprise.
"The weather is okay. We should leave," Levi replied, taking another step into the chapel. Had Erwin been praying?
The Commander nodded and stood up. Smiling, he walked past Levi. "What?," the latter asked as he closed the door behind them.
"Nothing," Erwin said shaking his head and headed for the stable. Hanji and Mike had already led their horses out. "It's just," he began quietly. "If I were the devil, I wouldn't have been able to enter there." He gestured to the chapel with a nod of his head. "Or wouldn't have been able to come out alive. Right?"
Levi couldn't bear to look at the sad eyes in the Commander's bearded face. "There are only humans, stupid humans and Titans. Get over it," he replied emotionlessly and mounted his horse with relief when he noticed a smile around Erwin's mouth out of the corner of his eyes.
***
Again Pieck glanced furtively over her shoulder.
"I'm here," Annie commented boredly on her comrade's action. Pieck glanced briefly to Annie on the other side. "I know," Pieck murmured, looking forward at the altar.
"Who's that?", Annie wanted to know.
"Who?"
"The soldier you keep looking at."
"No one," Pieck answered hastily. Too hastily, because out of the corner of her eyes she could see Annie raising her eyebrows.
"Just Scout Regiment," Pieck whispered. "I don't like them breathing down my neck. You said they could be dangerous for us."
Annie hid her cold hands under the woollen scarf she had been given.
"Did you understand everything?," she heard the dark-haired girl say. Pieck reached for her crutches.
"You'll stay until spring," Annie replied quietly.
"And the operation?," asked Pieck.
Under her woolen scarf, Annie clenched her hands into fists. "Contains another task," she finally said. "We have to find the children of Grisha Yeager." Zeke suspected they might know something about the origin of the Titans.
Pieck nodded. "And Zeke's father is really dead?"
Annie shrugged. "Says Reiner."
"And he really died after the wall was lost? After your attack?" Pieck still couldn't believe that Grisha Yeager had survived and lived here behind the walls.
"Says Reiner," her comrade repeated.
Pieck nodded briefly. "And if you are asked about your origins ..."
"We tell the story Zeke already is telling. Of a small village deep in the mountains. I got it," Annie interrupted her.
"And you remembered it?," Pieck made sure.
"Yes," Annie whispered.
Pieck stood up and, leaning on her crutches, walked down the centre aisle. To her surprise, the soldier from the Scout Regiment was no longer in the church. It had been the soldier who had insisted on taking her home. "I wonder if he didn't see me?," thought Pieck. Just before the main exit, she changed her mind and headed for a side exit. "Or did he? Whether he noticed me talking to Annie? So what if he did. He can't know anything." Pieck pushed the heavy door open with difficulty and stepped out. "He was only in the church to pray." That was the end of the matter for Pieck. But as she turned into the small alley, she stood before him. The bearded soldier with the smiling brown eyes. And his horse. As she was shocked to discover.
"Someone's really happy to see you, Lucky," said Ron to his horse and patted it, while Lucky neighed.
"What are you doing here?," asked Pieck in confusion.
"Just making sure you're staying with your little friend. Or if she's taking you home or if you're going back alone." He pointed to the sky. "The weather is not so good. You might have trouble with the mud."
Pieck focused on her crutches. He had seen her with Annie. "He noticed we were talking. But he was sitting too far away. He couldn't have heard us. Now what?" Her palms were getting damp.
"Can you hold this?" Ron held out Lucky's reins to her and took one of the crutches in exchange.
"Why?" Pieck didn't understand his behaviour.
"I have to let Louis know I'm gone," he called to her.
"What? What?" Speechless, Pieck looked after him. "Does he want to accompany me again? Why?" Startled, she pulled her hand back. Lucky had licked it.
***
Ron jumped over a puddle while Lucky went through it. "Is she also a refugee?" The soldier looked up at Pieck. "Your friend from the church? Are you from the same village?"
Pieck bit her lower lip. "The horse wouldn't escape with me. It listens to him too well for that. Besides, he knows where we live." Pieck looked stubbornly straight ahead. "Just so you know, I don't like you."
"I know," Ron grinned, patting Lucky's neck. His horse walked slowly beside him.
"Oh yeah?," inquired Pieck in surprise, looking down at Ron.
"If you liked me, you would have asked by now what my name is."
"That makes sense," Pieck pondered and narrowed her eyebrows. "Why didn't you ask me about my name?"
"Are names important?," Ron scratched his cheek.
"Isn't that how you start conversations?"
"We do talk," the soldier said with a smile.
"Is this some confusion tactic they' re learning here?" For Pieck, such a situation was new. How was she supposed to behave? "Was your father like that too? I bet he sent your mother to her grave with this behaviour," she finally said, annoyed. Furtively, she watched the soldier of the Scout Regiment. His gaze had become more serious.
"My father is really responsible for my mother's death," he replied. "Shocked or searching for the right words to express your pity?," he added, noticing her uneasy eyes. Ron grinned at her. "Or do I get an apology?" Ashamed, Pieck looked down at the horse's back.
"Lucky!" Ron had gone to the other side of the path and called his horse to him. The stallion obeyed and trotted alongside his owner again. Pieck looked back. "Did he change sides because of the holes? So his horse wouldn't hurt itself?" She stroked the stallion's dark mane. "Then what's important?," she asked softly.
"What?" Ron looked up at her.
"If names aren't important." Pieck looked into his eyes.
Ron thought for a moment. "Having your heart on the right spot," he replied.
"Is that what your mother said?" Pieck bent down to avoid the lower hanging branches.
"No," Ron smiled sadly. "My father said it. He was also a soldier from the Scout Regiment. Then one day he didn't come home. That broke my mother's heart. And within a month, I buried both of my parents."
"And then you were alone?," said Pieck in surprise.
"No. I had Paul," Ron explained with a matter of factness, as if everyone knew Paul.
Pieck's eyebrows narrowed. "Paul?"
"Paul," Ron nodded. "My best friend. His family took me in. And when we finished school, we joined the military."
Pieck shook her head. "So, you didn't learn anything from your father."
"Yes, I did," Ron said. "The dead shall not have died in vain."
Pieck looked at him uncomprehendingly. "That's the stupidest thing I've heard in a long time. You go outside the walls, you're going to die out there one day. It's all for nothing."
"Is it because she is one of the refugees? Because she has experienced the Titans? Because she lost everything?" Ron squinted at the crutches that lay across in front of Pieck, attached to the saddle pommel. Finally he shook his head. "I can't die out there," he said calmly.
Pieck pricked up her ears. "Why not?"
"I hate standing in front of empty graves. My father's grave is empty. Paul's grave is empty." He shook his head again. "No. That's not a proper ending. If I'm going to die, I'm going to die with a proper funeral. That's an end. I can live with that. This is how I find my peace." Ron held out his hand to her. Lucky had decided to take a break and was grazing. Pieck looked back and forth between the soldier and the chewing mouth in confusion. "He's not seriously letting his horse decide now?"
But when Ron made no effort to get the stallion to move on, she sighed and accepted his help. Pieck sat down on a fallen tree trunk and watched as Ron took a piece of bread out of the saddlebag.
"Does it really matter where your body rots?," asked Pieck, chewing on a blade of grass, but Ron took it away from her and gave her half of his bread.
"No, no. I want to be cremated." He sat down beside her. "One part will then go into the grave, so that my friends have a meeting place and I always get all the news. And the other part shall be scattered in the winds."
"Why?," asked Pieck, biting into the bread.
"Isn't that obvious?" Ron looked at her with wide eyes. "So, I can see the world. Because I probably only know such a small part of it," he explained, holding his thumb and forefinger in front of her face. Only a blade of grass fit between his fingers.
Pieck looked sadly at her piece of bread. "Who actually decides whether one's heart was on the right spot?," she muttered.
"Everyone decides for themselves," Ron replied, chewing.
"But with all the different opinions and views ...," began Pieck.
Ron shrugged his shoulders. "How about this then? Live and let live." He pointed at her trembling fingers. "Are you cold?" He stood up. "No wonder. You can't really move, can you? Wait, I've got a blanket in the saddlebag," Ron explained, leaving Pieck alone. She was grateful for the wind that blew her hair in front of her face. Thus the single tear remained undiscovered.