Chapter Text
Once he had the ODM gear they lifted from a caravan bound for the old MP stockade in the center of the underground city, the first thing he did was go to one of the holes high above, to look up and out. At first, the sun was blinding and he couldn’t look up at all, but had to sit, head down, eyes squinted closed, and progressively widening them.
“Damn artificial light. You’d think they’d at least get the right kind of things down here so our eyes wouldn’t need to adjust to the sun,” Farlan commented, sitting next to him, doing the same thing.
“Why waste the resources, when we’re not meant to see the light of day, anyway?”
The opening’s earthy ring was too soft to anchor onto, and there were no structures within a proper angle to where they sat to attach. It was painful, being so close and yet not being able to actually reach. Farlan had tried a ladder a week previously, but the crumbling ring collapsed more, and Levi became concerned about it going to far and creating a larger problem for the people far below.
The ladder was still sitting on that ledge nearby them, and likely would remain so until the sunlight that made its way in deteriorated wood and shattered it. It was no good to them, after all, so there was no point in making the clumsy trip back down with it.
“At least now they’ll know what it’s like to have a roof over your head that you don’t want, eh?” Farlan said with a somewhat victorious laugh. “Sure, they’ll still have the sun, but the rain’s never coming back. The wind’ll be a nice, faint memory.”
Levi didn’t say anything, even though he was clearly listening. He would always listen to Farlan or any of his people, even if he didn’t respond.
Instead, his eyes were cast high in the sky, where the clouds seemed to disjoint unnaturally as slowly, progressively, the Wall Sina dome appeared and grew larger, moving in high about, where it would eventually connect to itself.
The first of three stages, in an attempt to prevent the Colossal Titan from repeating its attack from just a year prior. The Colossal had gripped Wall Maria, as if for balance, and thus the genius plan was to remove that grip from the walls.
It was a dumb plan, if that was the true purpose of it, if one asked Levi. That was why he was pretty sure that wasn’t the purpose of it, but speaking out about it wasn’t his style. Even if it was, he wouldn’t, because people who spoke out against the official word of the King signed the death warrant of either themselves, or of everyone they knew around them. Farlan knew, and a couple of his other closest confidants, but even they wouldn’t speak outside of closed quarters.
“Hey, Levi.”
“Yeah.”
“Do you think it’ll even be worth trying to live up there once the domes are all complete?”
“Yeah.” Levi moved to stand, stretching out his shoulders. “If for no other reason than to prove it can be done.”
The blond with him smirked and moved to stand as well. “Besides, the sun’ll still be out there. I was reading that they think there might be some weather patterns still, due to how large and high the domes’ll be. So maybe they’ll still get something.”
“Maybe.” Levi popped the ODM controls off his front, lapel straps. “We should get going. The next transport should be at the bottleneck soon.”
“Right. I’m with you, Levi.”
***
The transport in question was clever. It wasn’t common to find the vehicles that they could hear above that hole, and could see on media, but occasionally, vendors and merchants would bring vehicles into the underground, thinking that would make their trove more secure. It did, too, as most thieves and raiding gangs had skills to work with wagons and slow convoys.
Richer businesspeople, using the underground as a faster way to move cargo due to the lack of traffic, would use large semi trucks, and would speed at a brutal pace. There were often deaths in the form of the street urchins who were too crippled to get out of the way in time. The drivers were more mindful of the cats and dogs that roamed the underground, than the actual people living there.
Since the government did its best to isolate those who lived down there from those above ground, even their internet connection netted with heavy censors that blocked them from communicating with any IP addresses on the surface—and vice versa—the people there were others. Inhuman. Valueless. They were Wall Sina’s dirty little secret.
Which made stealing from those trucks a priority, and why Levi and his gang organized a raid on MPs taking ODM gear from one vehicle lift to the other, a year ago. Why they continued to hold MPs hostage to take their gas canisters. They made sure not to kill them, as tempting as it was. Wounded pride was less likely to make them come back for another go, versus a thirst to avenge fallen comrades.
Not to say no man returned to avenge his bruised ego, but it was less often.
The bottleneck was a carefully organized location that involved payoffs and covert planning, and a number of hands to make possible. Levi’s gang was a large one, by the standard down there anyway, so the manpower required wasn’t difficult to mobilize.
In the case of that day, it was to take place just after an intersection, with crates stacked up starting before it, decreasing in distance from each side of the street. Most the crates were empty, but the ones at the end of the bottleneck were packed in rocks, as were the ones on each side if the intersection. In a panic at the potential of an ambush, the driver would back up and start turning, knocking a few of the empty crates.
Then, he would pull back faster, thinking only the front of the bottleneck was weighted, and slam the truck into the filled crates at the intersection.
It was simple and effective, with a high success rate. Occasionally, they would hire much more talented drivers who could figure a way out, and that was where Levi and Farlan came in.
The only other role they had was to be at the front of the bottleneck, atop the crates, to let the driver know he was in trouble.
It was shocking, really. So often it was ridiculous, they used that trick, and it worked every time. Levi was under no impressions that it would always work. He and the smarter members of his gang were already devising new ways to do things, but they would use the bottleneck as a deceptive start when the time came.
As it was, the trick still worked, and Levi and Farlan arrived just in time to take their seats atop the front of the bottleneck.
When the massive semi, unmarked because the whole point was to try to not get looted, pulled up and to a stop before hitting the front crates, the driver leaned out the window and leveled a glare on the duo. “Move your boxes!” he shouted, over the sound of his running engine.
“Can’t do that!” Farlan called back. “These are good boxes—they’re expensive! You know what it costs to get nails around here?” He slapped the top of the crate he was seated on, smiling wildly.
“I’ll ram the damn things, get them out of here!”
Farlan continued a back-and-forth with the driver, trying to compel him to drive forward or to back up. Levi observed in silence, until he noticed someone darting for the back of the truck. Medium height for an adult, built well, and moving well. Not one of his. His stomach twisted.
“Farlan. Yellow.”
The blond looked at him for a split second, then rolled to his feet and shot out his cables to launch into the air. He shouted out, “Yellow!” as he moved, and although it was slight, Levi could see the others starting to move, scatter to further points back.
Levi allowed one cable to shoot out, locking into the hull of the semi’s carriage, and the driver wasn’t remotely happy about that as Levi pulled himself to the back roof. “Hey! Don’t you damage my shit!” the driver shouted.
He probably wasn’t made aware of his cargo, which was typical. The merchant probably didn’t even want to do it, but sure enough, as Levi streaked to the end of the semi’s cargo hold, there were MPs stepping out, let out by the medium height man.
Attempts to quell the looting gangs wasn’t uncommon. Levi’s color system allowed for quick communication. Green for clear, all good to proceed. Yellow for warning, pull back to second positions. Red for abort, retreat.
Last was, “Black! Not the driver!”
He launched out of the way as the gunmen of his group, stationed in the second stories of the buildings on each side of that bottleneck, popped out of their respective windows to start opening fire on the MPs. That was an acceptable time to kill the greedy bastards. Being killed, being taken alive, both were dire when it came to the MPs, particularly of Wall Sina.
Perching at the corner of a building across the intersection, Levi turned and started tracking the firefight. The MPs brought their bulletproof armor that time, so it was taking longer for them to drop, though he could tell his gunmen were attempting to hit their heads and necks, which were unprotected outside of helmets that did nothing against crackshots.
“How did they know?” Farlan asked as he zipped in, next to Levi.
“Did you make sure none of them had wearables or phones?” he asked.
“I didn’t cavity search them, but I checked just shy of that,” Farlan said, eyes wide.
“Someone’s got something on them, or we have a tattletale around here,” Levi said darkly. He didn’t flinch as a bullet zipped past him, though Farlan sure as hell yelped and ducked down. It was only a second before he was grabbing Levi around the waist and dragging him down as well.
Levi allowed him to, deep in thought as he watched the massacre of those men. Farlan was one of a very limited number of people allowed to touch him, because the blond knew how serious he was about cleanliness.
Something registered in his head as he was yanked, his eyes going into the open semi. There was no storage in there at all, which was predictable, but… it looked too short inside.
Like there was a false wall. A second attack if the first failed, and Levi’s people lowered their guard.
He shrugged Farlan off then, diving off the building and swinging right down into the fray, which wasn’t so much a fray as it was a single man under the truck, between the tires, holding his own. Levi spent a moment to rip off the chest guard and helmet of one of the deceased. It was disgusting, but necessary. The front plates locked onto the same harness system as his ODM gear had, so he was able to slap it on easily, over his ODM controls. The helmet was thrown on as he stealthily stepped into the truck bed and moved to the back wall.
From afar, it would look like a convincing wall. Up close, it was a sideways shutter door, that rolled in towards the cabin when shoved to the right, and Levi unceremoniously shoved it sideways and stepped inside.
There were obvious disadvantages to being short. He spent his whole life forcing dominance on larger men through violence to prove his stature wasn’t a testament of weakness. He had to crawl up on counters to get things that were on upper shelves. Things like that.
The advantages was when he was in closed quarters with a bunch of unsuspecting MPs, all taller than himself.
They didn’t even see when he unsheathed a set of knives—both different, both serving their own purposes—from his belt. Not until he started ducking under attempts to grab him, and slashed the smooth blade in his right hand across their arms and hands.
He thought about killing them, too. It’d be easy. They couldn’t get a hold of him. The few grasps that were successful ended with missing fingers, sliced muscles and ligaments.
However.
It was real funny to think they’d have to explain what happened to superior officers and peers. No doubt, the typical insults like ‘tiny man’ and ‘midget’ would be left out when trying to explain it.
And that was why the worst injury was to the largest man, Levi dipping down from his attempt to strike him, and slamming the serrated blade in his left hand right into the man’s leg, the inner thigh. It dropped him and struck an artery, that fact highlighted by the rush of blood that flooded over Levi’s blade, hilt, hand.
Levi pulled to his feet and slid back, watching the stunned remaining men who, though injured, weren’t going to die unless they didn’t receive care in a few days.
“He’s going to bleed out if you don’t help him,” he advised, before sweeping out and slamming the door shut on them.
As he dropped out of the back of the container, he called out, “Remove the bottleneck. Let them through.”
Calls of acknowledgment broke out.
Levi, meanwhile, looked at himself and had a small crisis at all the blood on his clothes and skin. He ripped the chest plate off just as Farlan arrived and grabbed his arm. “Alright, time to get you back for a good bath,” he said cheerfully.
“Wait.” Farlan paused, though he didn’t let Levi go. Levi looked over to a couple of the gunmen as they stepped onto the street. “Salvage everything off the dead you can. Get it all cleaned up, and bring it to me. It won’t be hard to sell it all off to the right buyers.” The gunmen where good, so he had no doubt they could salvage most—if not all—the armor pieces, and there were plenty of groups at war with one another who would be happy to have surface quality protection for those fights.
“What about the weapons?” one gunman asked. Well. Gunwoman, really. Christina, around the age of Farlan, with the same experiences he had, leading to his vouching for her recruitment. It wasn’t a bad decision, either.
“What about them?” Levi asked her, to force her to speak more.
She huffed and rested her bolt-action on her shoulder, watching him with careful, green eyes. “They’ll be worth more than the armor, but we could really use them, Levi. We’re using antiques at this point. These things are so old, they’ll even go for a good price.” Her partner, a man named Josef, nodded behind her as he looked over one such gun at his feet. “We could support you and Farlan on your tightropes better with practice. Their ranges are longer, the power stronger.”
“It’ll cut into earnings.”
“But it’ll help in the long run. I can show you when we get to your place. The filters don’t take into account gun sites.”
Levi nodded at that argument. “Fine.”
“Give him a couple hours!” Farlan requested, helping Levi once again. He didn’t need to explain why. It was only a matter of time before Levi outright told everyone to leave him alone for the rest of the week, all because he couldn’t get home to clean up. That was why Farlan had to go with, to clean the floors and whatever else got bloody on the path to the bathroom. It might’ve seemed rather subservient from the outside, but none of them would have clothes on their back, warm beds or food to eat if not for Levi, so he didn’t mind in the slightest. He hadn’t just risked his lift a moment ago for himself, when he could have flown from the scene and left the rest to rot.
***
After a rather dramatic few hours and two baths from Levi later, the haul they picked and cleaned was brought in and laid out in demonstration for Levi. As he paced around the display, the gunmen made their point about keeping the military-grade pieces and selling their old guns. Christina used her laptop—held together by tape, but protecting expensive bits and pieces she’d stolen here and there to make it—to lay out solid comparisons of price versus benefit.
“Fine,” Levi finally said to the presentation. He turned to the group, glancing at the so-called front-line operation of their gang as well. “But we’re not selling any of this at-cost. Reduce it sixty percent and go west to sell it to the territories up there.”
That caused more than a few confused expressions, and objections, but Levi acted as if he heard none of it.
“Today shows the MPs are targeting us specifically, so we need to focus them elsewhere. Imagine if Francesca’s ring had the bolt-action’s and the armor. They would lose absolute control, wanting to fight MPs head-on. Since they’re cock roaches, they’ll go into complete chaos but won’t fall easily. The lift there is the common one, most MPs and merchants descend there. I want at least two of your guns to go to Rodney, though.”
“Rodney?! You serious?” Farlan exclaimed, looking more than a little mortified. “That pimp—”
“Is a massive asshole, yeah, but he’s protective of his girls,” Levi interrupted, looking at him. “And more than a few MPs use those girls. He’ll benefit from the guns, and we’ll benefit from him having the guns that close to the lift on the east. Sell them on discount to shield us in chaos.”
“Well the merchants be inclined to route through all of that, though?” a young man, no older than sixteen, asked in concern.
“They’ll load up on bodyguards,” Levi said confidently. “Cannon fodder. Some will fall in the chaos, and we’ll deal with the rest.” He turned to look to another young man, clutching his own self-made laptop to his chest. “Find out targets for us starting in one week. See if you can’t get into the base system down here for the MPs and find out their routes, but don’t do it if it looks like they’ll detect you.”
“Right,” the young man agreed, despite his wide eyes.
“If the military police want to have a war, we’ll give them a war,” Farlan declared, finally understanding what Levi was going for. He stood up and looked around. “We know this place better than those surface-lickers ever could, and they’re the only reason we could break through the barricades, but wouldn’t be allowed to live up there. Let’s make ‘em hurt!”
His energy versus Levi’s domineering presence was enough for the gathered group to get excited about the plan. It was dangerous, but they knew Levi would do everything in his power to keep them safe through it all, and that was all that mattered to them.