Chapter 24

"I'm so ready to relax!" Hanji shouts as they walk into the decently sized cottage, "Whoa there's three bedrooms!"

"I have to buy cots from the village, but there's  three beds and a couch." Crystal looked at the house full of scouts. She had invited Hanji, Levi, Eren, Armin, Mikasa, Connie, Sasha, and Jean. That meant that she needed to at least get four cots.

"Shall one of us accompany you to the village?" Eren asks and Crystal shakes her head before looking at Sasha.

"There should be some old candy in the cabinets. Chances are its still good, so keep yourself occupied while I'm gone. I'll be back." Crystal turned and left, getting on her chestnut horse before whipping the reins to go towards the village.

"Wow this place has so much food." Sasha says as she finds the jar of candy, "There's so much candy! And its definitely still good!" Sasha pops open the jar and tosses a piece in her mouth. Connie and Jean both helped themselves to a few pieces.

"Oi." Levi says as he walks out of Crystal's room, "This place is rather dusty. While Crystal is working her ass off to buy you guys beds, grab a rag and clean." Levi says harshly and the group all groans. He took the bathroom and wiped it down, feeling more relaxed now than he ever did before.

It truly felt like he had come back home, not really understanding why. Was it because he loved Crystal?

As they finished up cleaning, they heard the sound of a cart coming up to the house and Levi walks out onto the small porch to see the cart plum full of stuff.

Crystal got off her horse tiredly and started stacking crates before lifting three of them.

"Oi. Need help?" Levi asks and Crystal looks at him as he noticed she was without her jacket, her muscles now protruding due to the weight of the crates.

"Could you help carry in the cots? This is just some basic food stuff." Crystal walks past him on the porch and puts them down on her dining table.

"Sheesh showing off much?" Connie says with a smirk, "Shall I go get some of the cots too?"

"Yes please." Crystal pulls the top crate down to the floor and uses a flat metal piece to pry the top off. Revealing bags of flour and rice, alonf with some vegetables.

"Oh you got food." Hanji says leaning over her, "Do you even know how to cook?"

"I'm just going to ignore that." Crystal says, a slight jab in her words as she unloaded the food into her cabinets and put the vegetables in her preserving bin.

She repeated that process until the last Crate which she cracked open and Sasha instantly jumped over to her.

"MEAT!" Sasha shouts excitedly and Crystal laughs at her before pulling out a few sticks of jerky and handing it to Sasha, "Wait... For me?"

"Share with Connie and Jean." Crystal says with a deadpan expression before she opens the small hatch door in the floor to her ice box that was still effectively frozen before throwing the raw meat in there, keeping out one roll of it for dinner.

As she tosses the empty crates outside by her porch for later use, she smiles to find that all the cots were brought in but Levi stared wide eyed at a small box she recognized.

"I knew I didn't have a teapot." Crystal says as she walks up next to him, "Since you'll be here, I thought I'd get one for you with some fresh black tea leaves."

"Tsk..." Levi smiles slightly at her, "Of course you got it for me..." Crystal smiles before giggling and grabbing the brown packages that was plump before walking back in.

"This is a bunch of blankets and pillows for those on the cots." Crystal put it down on the floor, "The package on the bottom has some casual clothing you guys can borrow. Everything else in the cart is farming stuff." Crystal sat down on one of the dining chairs and groans quietly as her muscles scream at her.

"Are you okay? You've not relaxed since you got home.." Armin asks softly and Crystal waves him off.

"Pft. I still have to cook dinner here soon or Sasha will end up eating Connie." Crystal leans her body over the dining table and rests her head in the palms of her hands.

"I could always help." Jean offers and Crystal yawns tiredly.

"No offense Jean, but I wouldn't trust you to cook with my stove." Crystal smirks a little as he gasps.

"How dare you?!" He jokingly yelled as Levi walks past them and opens the teapot from its box. Filling it with water from the sink, he puts the black tea leaves in and puts it on the stove, "But what about Levi?!"

"He's a full grown adult. I have faith he wouldn't burn the cottage down." Levi smirks as he acts as though he wasn't listening.

"Anyone here dislike any particular vegetable?" Crystal asks loudly and the scouts all exchanged looks before shaking their heads, "Okay. Dinner will be ready in an hour, so if you want to shower best get to it now. With only one shower you'll have to take turns." Crystal gets up with a yawn leaving her mouth before going over to her preserving bin and pulls out a stalk of corn, some peas and a leak. Putting them on her counter she notices how clean it was, and giggles to herself.

Levi must've had the scouts clean the cottage while she was gone. Smiling as she chops the vegetables with incredible speed, she lets all the stress in her muscles melt off of her like an extra layer of skin. She was home, she was safe, no more needing to follow orders and no more battles.

Chopping up the meat as well, she tossed all the ingredients into a pot before filling it halfway with water, then grabbing all sorts of spices from her cabinet that she had made during her time in the cottage, she starts eyeballing how much she should put in of each when the teapot started to scream.

Turning the heat down on that part of the stove, she pulled one of the fancy teacups from the box and rinsed it out. Pouring the black tea into the light grey cup, she lifts it and puts it on the table in front of Levi.

"I could've gotten it..." Levi mutters but Crystal saw the smile on his lips, he was happy. She looked up and saw that Hanji was looking through the cabinets.

"Something wrong?"

"Do you have Coffee? I don't necessarily feel like drinking tea or alcohol." Crystal realized she didn't really have a wide variety of drinks, but remembered she had some whole coffee beans.

"Oh yes. I will have to grind the coffee beans though." Crystal opens up one of the slim cabinets and pulls out the jar of coffee beans, "I'll have a pot boiling soon." Crystal says to Hanji who smiles and continues to snoop through each of the rooms.

Crystal didn't mind, she couldn't recall if there was ever anything she didn't want people to find. Grinding the coffee into a powder she makes a makeshift filter with some paper and puts it in the pot before pouring water on top.

"Uh..." Hanji walks back into the dining room with something in her hand and Levi looks at her curiously, "Crystal, what's up with all those scout badges...?"

Crystal tensed up before turning to Hanji who held a badge in her hand.

"Oh. During my night walks I continuously found scouts who had died during expeditions in Wall Maria and tried my best to recover their name along with their badges." Crystal said simply, "I kind of forgot I did that."

"This is... Moblits..." Hanji holds the badge close to her heart, "Would you be upset if I kept it...?"

"Of course not. I don't necessarily have any sentiments for those badges, I just figured one day when the titans were gone that I could deliver them to their families."

"Wait. You said you collected them off the bodies of those who died in Wall Maria..." Levi spoke up, a nervous tone to his voice, "Did you find any that belonged to Eld, Gunter, Ould, or Petra...?"

"Petra Ral?" Crystal asks and Levi looks back at her as she stirs her pot of food so it won't burn, "I believe I found her body wrapped up ready for transport. I had to take the badge off her shoulder," Crystal came and stood beside him, "She had short red hair?"

"Yeah... That was her." Levi mumbles, "Could you bring that one to me? I would like to deliver it to her family one of these days."

"Sure. Let me see if I can find those other names." Crystal walks over to the closet Hanji had come out of and turns on the lantern, Hanji follows her in as she grabs a journal.

"You kept these... Thinking how people would want them..." Hanji mutters, "How can someone be so selfless?" Crystal seemingly ignored her comment while she searched the journal.

"I do indeed have Eld, Ould, Gunter's and Petra's badges." Crystal walked in a little, the long closet had shelves covered in badges. Picking up four, she checked the back of them to verify, "Yeah. There we go."

"Can I ask you to look for... Someone else?"

"Hm?" Crystal looks at her and Hanji tenses up.

"Did you perhaps... Find Erwin Smith's body in a house in Shiganshina?"

"I have that one." Crystal reaches up to a singular shelf, it was all by itself on that portion of the wall and picks up the badge, "I also properly buried him outside of Shiganshina. Its a marked grave, so someone will find it eventually." Crystal said simply and Hanji took the badge, shaking before tears stream down her cheeks.

"Thank you... For doing that." Hanji sobs against the old badge and Crystal smiles at her sympathetically before walking out to where Levi was, now stirring the pot of food.

"Levi. I found all four names you asked." Crystal held out the badges, "I wrote on the backs of them which was whose." Levi turns and sees the badges in her hand, his eyes widening.

"... You seriously recovered their badges?"

"She even recovered Erwin's." Hanji says as she walks out, finally having composed herself.

"Tsk..." Levi took the four badges gently before sitting down in his spot, grazing his thumb over them.

"The shower was nice." Eren says as he walks out, and notices the solemn look on Levi's face as Crystal keeps stirring the stew, "What are those badges?"

"They're... The badges from the original Levi Squad." Levi says, putting them each down on the table, "I'll be bringing these to their families in a week."

"Whoa. How did you get those?" Eren asks, "We had to dump Petra's body-"

"Crystal recovered them." Hanji says as the two of them take seats, and Crystal looks back noticing that there was one less chair to seat everyone. Sighing to herself she put a bit more spice into the stew and lifted some up to her mouth, drowning out the conversation behind her to taste it.

"Sasha!" Crystal calls out and Sasha bursts out of her shared room with Connie and Jean.

"Yes- ooh that smells so good!" Sasha runs up to her and Crystal offers her a taste, Sasha took a bite, "WHAT THATS SO DELICIOUS! EXCUSE ME-!"

"Pft. So it's edible?" Crystal asks coyly and Sasha shakes her head vigorously, "Get everyone else for me and have Armin set the table." Sasha ran off and got everyone else into the kitchen to sit at the dining table, Armin setting plates down next to everyone.

"Wait. There's no seat for you." Armin says while he sets a plate next to Crystal on the counter. Crystal smiles sweetly at the boy.

"I'll sit on the counter." She patted the sturdy counter before she puts on some oven mitts before lifting the pot with one hand. Walking around the table she poured two scoops onto each plate, before getting back to hers and scrapping out enough for almost two scoops. Pouring a cup of black tea for herself she hoists herself up onto the counter and blows on her food before looking at the scouts who dug into the meal excitedly. Hanji sipped her coffee, while the others had either coffee or black tea.