Chapter Text

Act 1

~O~

“It was a country . . . that he and his people had known how to use and abuse, but not how to preserve.”

― Wendell Berry, Remembering

~O~

Everything about this place is foreign to her.

It isn’t just that this steel train was moving a hundred miles per hour and she couldn't feel anything. Annie had never seen so much food. Had never seen delicacies beyond the shape of her usual porridge and protein servings—the rarity just as scarce as eating more than once a day.

Would anybody object if she takes a single bite? Annie dismisses the thought. It's better not to look desperate. There may be cameras on her, either hidden or in plain sight like the holovision mounted on the wall.

But then again, she hasn’t eaten in two days. And with the Marleyan government spending on its military without moderation or restraint, she expects the food shortages will only get worse. It's precisely the reason she boarded this train, carrying her towards security and peace of mind.

After too many years on the precipice of abject poverty, her destination now holds a possibility for a better future—one where hunger is a distant memory, bread is always warm, and the showers aren't freezing. This is what she's been training for her whole life. Her one shot.

And she won't let anyone get in her way.

“You’re not going to eat?”

Annie had forgotten someone was sitting next to her. He's impossibly tall for his age, yet he tries to make himself small by retreating further in his seat. 

“You know me, right? From the same Zone?” He fiddles with the seams of his armband, as though admiring its change from the usual grey to the more optimistic yellow color.

Annie doesn’t welcome the small talk but engages anyway. “We wouldn’t be on the same train if you weren’t.”

“Oh, I-I meant we’re neighbors.”

She gives him a once-over and was able to put a name to it. Bertolt Hoover.

It isn't that difficult to remember people from the zones; there's an unspoken pact if somebody belonged to the same one as you.

But Bertolt always gravitated towards other boys his age, dressed in uniforms too loose for them, carrying tools to help down the mines. 

Even though it was a bond created out of necessity rather than some grander philosophy on community life, nonetheless, it formed the very glue that kept them together. To keep fellow Eldians in line. 

Perhaps she could have been friends with Bertolt, but between her sparring lessons with her father and Bertolt's seeming inability to approach within a five-foot radius, there was never an opportunity for them to build a rapport.

He seems to be starting one now.

"D-do you remember me now?" he asks.

Annie nods once. “Just didn’t expect you to volunteer for this.”

He looks at the floor. “My parents wanted me to.”

That she could at least empathize with. The burgeoning pressure of fathers, mostly.

Annie had first glimpsed it when she turned nine and her father built a heavy bag on their front yard. At first, she had been pleasantly surprised; he had never gotten her a gift before, but the sentiment quickly turned sour when he spent the better half of the day coloring her knuckles with bruises, along with administering exercises that left her sore in all places that were supposed to help her walk normally. 

That would become the first day of what is now routine in her life. "To suffer less is to gain less," he had told her at the end of it. "And I wish for you to gain much."

That early in her age, she understood what she was born for. To change her and her father's status forever. To turn their lives around with one chance, one Titan.

Like her, Annie assumes Bertolt’s worth to his parents lies in his strength and abilities, and to fall short of it would make him expendable just as easily as he was deemed valuable.

“Hey, d-did anyone say something weird to you?" Bertolt brings up, face tight. "On the way here?”

Annie deflects his question to him instead. “Something weird?” 

“I-I don’t know,” he says in a voice that did. “Before I got on the train, my parents were acting… different. My mother cried like it was the last time I was going to see her.”

Annie pauses, her initial reaction was something akin to puzzled, but the longer she thinks about it, the more her look of confusion morphed into a rictus of realization. 

It was her father, groveling at her feet earlier that morning.

She had just made her bid as the Warrior candidate of the Eighth Zone and was given a few moments to say goodbye to him before she left for the train.

Where he was usually firm and demanding, her father was suddenly brought to tears. Saying he was wrong. Pleading to be absolved. Claiming he never wanted this. Claiming he found out too late.

Whatever it was, he wouldn't tell her when Annie asked him. All he asked from her was her promise to return home.

She remembers balking at his display of regret.

Why?

Even in the unlikely scenario that she doesn’t become a Warrior, she would still return. The same will happen if she succeeds. 

Annie didn’t have anywhere else to go, had nowhere else to be. She and her father were bound not by blood but by the sweat of her brow and the spit in his talk. But even in its own twisted way, he’s all she has.

Probably what was most remarkable about his request was the desperation in his eyes—affection she did not think possible he could have for her.

So when he asked her to promise to return home, she finds herself vowing to do so no matter what. After all these years, he has finally extended a lifeline for her to grab onto. And she will hold on to it, even if its threads are gossamer thin.

She may not have voiced her promise, but she always spoke volumes through silence. Her father should know her well enough for that. 

That brings her back here in this moment. To this train, where she must always look ahead.

“You’re overthinking,” she tells him to dismiss his worries.

“Y-you’re right. We had only two minutes to say goodbye, so I-I guess that explains it.” Bertolt also decides to shrug off. “If we don’t get picked as a Warrior, we just go home, right?”

Right, Annie thinks. But something about it seems to pick at her nerves, tingling in her arms, thumping in her chest.

The train keeps moving forward. Annie looks beyond the window shutters and finds the scenery changing, from cornfields to industrial plants. But when she tries to slide the glass for some fresh air, they were all locked tight.

"I-I can't imagine how proud our families would be if we both came back with the Power of the Titans,” Bertolt says, not without stuttering. “We should—we should work together. Help each other.”

“Thanks. But I don’t do teams,” she flatlines, aware that he probably meant it for his own self-preservation but shuts it down anyway. She doesn’t need to factor in his fate while she’s already uncertain of her own.

Bertolt must have gotten the hint. He doesn’t probe anymore and sits next to her in silence, but she could practically hear him grinding his teeth in anxiety, and if she stayed there any longer, she’s pretty sure she’d start hearing enamel break down.

Annie leaves her chair to inspect the doors of the compartment, wanting to see the rest of the train.

The first door doesn't budge.

Swallowing her rising sense of dread, she attempts to twist and pull each handle, hoping one might come loose. But as each one fails to open, a swarm of panic begins to settle in her stomach.

Why is everything locked?

Bertolt tries to rationalize and assume it’s for their safety, but she's not having any of it.

Annie begins pounding on the door, and when the shadow of a Marleyan soldier passes outside the frosted glass, she yells, determined to get his attention despite being an Eldian. 

No answer.

What's going on?

The sound of static commands attention in the room. To her left, the holovision mounted on the wall switches on, first commencing with a static drone, before projecting three-dimensional images—a program, Annie thinks.

Bertolt and Annie approach the holovision set with the hesitation of newborn deer.

“Is it a replay of the broadcast earlier?” He wonders as she observes. “We must be in it.”

An anthem of trumpets and percussion ensues. The symbol of the Marleyan flag flashes, kept in motion by the wind, before a man’s silhouette appears at the forefront.

The man thoughtfully introduces himself as Willy Tybur, even though everyone knows who he is. 

Except Willy Tybur is hardly in the public scene; for him to make an appearance is the direct equivalent of tectonic plates shifting.

“Good morning, Warrior candidates. You may be curious as to where your destination lies after volunteering. I assure you, the locks are there for a reason. And if you would spare a moment of your time to watch today’s broadcast—of which you were the stars but did not have the broader context of commentary—you will come to understand.”

Annie tries to stay grounded as the sharply dressed man, with his blond hair slick back and paint-by-numbers smile, begins to narrate and his surroundings morph into obscure shapes of lights and shadow.

He sure has a panache for drama.

“Let’s look back in time. Roughly one hundred years ago, the Eldian Empire ruled the world with the Power of the Titans. Countless cultures and people have been wiped out, had their histories stolen away.”

Annie almost tunes out. She’s heard this hundreds of times. In every story, they always begin with the Subjects of Ymir and the people they’ve killed.

“One Marleyan named Helos sought to end their reign. Thanks to his clever manipulation, the Eldian Empire was tricked into killing each other one by one. By joining hands with the Tybur Family, Marley could subjugate the Eldian Empire.

But despite our efforts, the Eldian King escaped. Brought with him as many Eldians as he could and retreated to the islands: the Ninth Zone.

As for the remaining Eldians here, instead of slaughtering them—as we had every right to—we spared them. Let them live among us. Divided them into the Eight Zones we know today.

Annie almost laughs at the idea of Marley extending an olive branch where the alternative was genocide.

"Now, the nation of Marley is stronger than ever with Six Titans under its jurisdiction—the Cart Titan, the Jaw Titan, the Female Titan, the Armored Titan, The Beast Titan, and the Colossal Titan. The Eldians, since then, have shown their gratefulness for Marley’s generosity by using the Power of the Titans to serve a national purpose—a greater good.

And every thirteenth year, we pass the Power of the Titans to deserving Eldians—Warriors who will take their place in our society as Honorary Marleyans. And defend our country at all costs.

Today, we welcome our sixteen candidates. And from this day forward, we will witness six of them become the mighty Warriors of Marley!”

The camera pans out to show Willy in a studio with a Marleyan live audience. Next to him, a hologram showcasing the replay of the broadcast when they announced the candidates.

Presiding over the commentary, he begins by listing down the candidates from the First Zone: Udo Schumacher and Zofia Soroka. The hologram projects the scene of the two climbing on stage; a motley crowd of people in the internment zone witnesses them as they salute with discipline.

“Nothing reflects the pulse of a nation more than its strong youth!” Willy declares, riling the audience into a token of applause.

When the camera properly focuses on their faces, Annie thinks they're much too young.

As usual, to foster a sense of competition, each candidate would be asked to answer the question, “Why did you volunteer?”

Udo timidly answers: to be treated fairly. Zofia calmly says: to test my limits.

The following round-up of candidates consisted of family members, perhaps all eager to take as many chances as they could to secure a Titan in their family name.

Colt and Falco Grice from the Second Zone are called to the podium. 

“They have a lot of nerve volunteering,” Willy prefaces. “But make no mistake, my friends. No one is beyond redemption.”

Annie has heard about the Grice family before; in an astonishing revelation that broke out chaos in the zones, the parents of the Grice brothers had been exposed as Eldian Restorationists. Annie surmises as much that their reason for joining wasn’t to attain glory or honor but to prove their loyalty, prove that they were not cut from the same cloth.

When asked the prompt, Colt predictably replies: to redeem our name. Falco adds: to be of service. Annie finds them to be honest and admirable, but if they don’t have any more skin in the game, she doubts they would last long.

Reiner and Gabi Braun from the Third Zone are opposites in their demeanor. Where Reiner keeps a reserved and collected composure, Gabi exudes a boisterous and loud energy that her older relative had to restrain with a tug on her collar. 

Reiner walks up to the podium to succinctly deliver his purpose: to do my duty as a soldier.

At Gabi’s turn, she doesn’t hesitate to make her livid intentions known: to make the island devils pay. Though her words were abrasive, it resonates with the crowd.

Willy grins. “I can tell she’s going to give us one hell of a show.”

Annie thinks that letting twelve-year-olds like Udo, Zofia, Gabi, and Falco is rash and desperate for families. These children were expected to undertake a task with gravity unsuited for their age. But ultimately, she decides she has nothing to envy when even her own childhood was a mess.

Marcel and Porco Galliard emerged as the Fourth Zone candidates. They gave the sort of impression that they stood a better chance of winning. Marcel oozed a sense of leadership, a voice that draws people to listen. He answers the prompt with dignity: to do what I must. His brother Porco, with a presence similar to Marcel, albeit overcompensating in bravado, answers: to prove my worth.

Next, Willy introduces Pieck Finger and Zeke Jaeger from the Fifth Zone. With their immediate presence and charm, Annie thinks they would be slated as darlings. Who could blame them? The audience will always look for something to suspend in amber.

The crowd cheers a bit more loudly for them when they take to the podium. Pieck smiles with radiance as she says her answer: to help my father. This earns her nods of approval and probably an uptick in their vested interest. The loving daughter figure. Surely, she would be a favorite in the polls.

Zeke, with his golden hair and golden skin, waves once more before saying: to ensure our precious sacrifices will bear fruit. Amused by his poetic charm, the people sigh and cheer. Willy calls him the Boy Wonder, and Annie thinks the name will stick.

The ones that followed could not be a more stark contrast. Yelena Lenkov and Eren Kruger from the Sixth Zone did not have smiles, only cold, unforgiving glares. Yelena answers: to be remembered. Eren Kruger’s gaze on the camera does not waver: to fight. For the world I was born into.

“He sounds cool,” Bertolt comments. 

“Sounds like a suicidal blockhead,” Annie sums up. They must have trained for this just as long as she had. The stares they exchanged hinted at an ambitious goal. What exactly it is, Annie isn’t sure why, but she’s certain that to compete against them would be nothing short of a feat.

The candidates of the Seventh Zone, the one that came before her, Annie finds herself more intrigued than threatened. 

Mikasa Ackerman did not possess the wide-eyed innocence of some candidates nor their calculating gaze, but she had the composure of a victor. When she speaks, it’s neither demanding nor demure but firm: to protect my family.

When the next candidate takes her place, Annie does not expect herself to linger a bit longer observing him. Armin Arlert, with blond hair that fell to his chin in length, with a timid gait but a determined stare, says more than expected. “To prove that those who cannot abandon everything cannot hope to change anything.”

Even when the time came for their zone and Bertolt took to the podium, Annie is still pondering what the boy meant. Those who cannot abandon everything, cannot hope to change anything.

Annie can only believe that he’s driven by something bigger than the outcome. What it is, she couldn’t divine from where she stood. Couldn’t glean his vision from the sibyls of his eyes—but the shine was mesmerizing. Inviting.

“To do what’s expected of me,” Bertolt on the holovision says, and the receiver of the microphone sends feedback that snaps Annie out of her musing.

She looks at Bertolt on screen, then the one beside her, and couldn’t see that they were the same person. His eyes on broadcast burned with resolve. But his gaze as he exchanged looks with her—it was empty and glass-like as if he’s rehearsed his character over and over.

Annie turns her focus to herself in the broadcast and watches as she steps up to the mic. She also notices how visible the bruises on her knees and cuts around her face were.

When she opens her mouth to speak, the crowd almost holds in anticipation of what wisdom and wonder she may impart after all the previous candidates have. 

Despite Annie’s combat reflexes in training, she’s rendered speechless stepping in front of a crowd for the first time. She could easily recall the memory of how her heart lodged into her throat, so she couldn’t rack her brain for something meaningful.

To have more hot showers was all that Annie ended up saying. She winces at her amplified voice, but that is immediately dispelled when the host bursts out laughing on the broadcast. The camera stills her frame.

“I suppose a sense of humor is a side effect of starvation,”  Willy jokes, and the Marleyan crowd returns a resounding laugh.

“At least they’ll remember you,” Bertolt tells her as if to comfort her.

After all Eight Zones had been broadcast, the camera pans back to Willy Tybur.

“And there you have it, ladies and gents, our Warrior candidates. Indeed, there is nothing stronger than the heart of a volunteer. That is why we always pluck the best from those willing to step forward and endure the sacrifice.”

Instead of a celebratory finish, there was something different about the change of lighting, the quietness and stillness of his face that greets them back. Annie wonders why he’s still talking; what more could he announce?

“However, this year, the sacrifice must be even greater.”

Willy Tybur is motionless, bathed under a single spotlight. Bright as judgment. Bright as light on a guillotine's blade.

Annie feels the pit of her stomach expand further until she feels its emptiness up to her neck.

He continues his speech.

“The Warriors have always been a symbol of Eldia's debt to Marley. We honor this tradition of passing the Power of the Titans each generation.

But along the way, the Eldians have forgotten the atrocities they’ve committed. Have become arrogant, and ungrateful. A decade ago, our officials exposed the existence of Eldian Restorationists. Their radical ideologies serve no other purpose than to rile our peaceful nation into chaos.

With help, we have expelled these vermin and banished them to the Ninth Zone. Now, to keep fresh the memory of these crimes, to remind the Eldians where they belong, we bring forth a new selection process for our strongest Eldian soldiers.”

The blood and violence in the play, the Eldians turning against each other; Annie sees her immediate future in pulsing flashes of the past. She feels her throat close, hears the rest of the announcement in muffled noise as though her ears are stuffed with cotton wool.

“To inherit our prized Titan weapons, our Warrior candidates will be sent to an arena to demonstrate their fealty to the Marleyan nation. To survive against all odds. And to distinguish themselves from the traitors in our midst, they will fight to the death.”

The broadcast cuts to an ironically outgoing tune where an ending sequence plays, but Annie doesn’t let herself see it, doesn’t let Bertolt hear the rest of it when she slams the hologram projector with her fists. 

And it all happens without warning. Annie jumps at the sight of Marleyan soldiers entering the compartment and closing in to seize her limbs. Annie jabs and kicks, deflecting as many hands on her as she could but their numbers overwhelm her. When she opens her mouth to scream and protest, none of it is heard when they gag her mouth and tie her wrists.

She thinks of her father, thinks of the promise she made, and realizes that she might not be able to keep it after all.

Chapter Text

Act 1

~O~

"Do actions agree with words? There's your measure of reliability. Never confine yourself to the words."

– Frank Herbert, Chapterhouse: Dune  

~O~

Waking up, the first thing that comes to mind is getting ready for training.

An early riser her whole life, this has been routine, moving by muscle memory and hard-wired by habit. She would take a cold shower that she hates, get dressed, eat the precise amount of calories her father strictly provided, and move to the front yard to work on whatever bastardized hybrid of fighting styles she’s accumulated.

But this time feels different. Like she slept so long her muscles had atrophied—not to mention the head-splitting pain. Her stomach feels like it has been gutted and twisted.

She first stirs her limbs, relieved they're still attached. But standing up was another matter. A crippling sense of disorientation pummels her when her feet find their footing, then a nervous clearing of the throat grabs her attention. She looks to her left.

Bertolt is sitting down on a fold-out bed across her own. They make eye contact for a split second before he breaks it and looks at his feet, shoulders slumped down.

He’s avoiding her gaze. From what? It's not like she's going to attack him—

Then an unwelcome rush of images comes in a flash flood. Saying goodbye to her father. Boarding the train with Bertolt. The broadcast of Willy Tybur on a podium, and her maniacally fighting off soldiers until they somehow managed to sedate her.

To inherit our prized Titan weapons, our Warrior candidates will be sent to an arena to demonstrate their fealty to the Marleyan nation. And to distinguish themselves from the traitors in our midst, they will fight to the death.

Annie presses the heels of her hands so hard into her eyes that she almost sees stars.

Get a hold of yourself. Where are you?

In habitual scan of new territory, she scans the four walls of translucent glass around her, and the space around them was more or less five strides. Light is emanating from the floor and along with the linings of the glass, bathing her skin in a harsh neon glow.

Beyond the glass, she mostly sees darkness, but when her vision adjusts from the glaring light within her compartment, other translucent containers amidst the darkness come into view. Placed in a circular formation, the spectacle of the cages was not unlike the grandeur of a large aquarium. All carrying two people each. 

The other candidates. 

She limps to the nearest corner. Peering to the side reveals all the candidates from the first zone to the seventh, either pacing listlessly in their containers, hunched down on the floor, or resting in their fold-out beds.

How long have they been here? Not that it matters. What time is it? It's hard to tell. Everything else aside from the containers is shrouded in darkness. There are no guards present—at least she didn’t have the visibility to know for sure if there was no one observing behind the large-scale mirrors around the room. 

“She’s finally awake. Hey! You sane now or what?” 

Someone quips, and Annie wonders how she’s able to hear anything outside her enclosure despite being surrounded by glass walls—probably connected by a pipeline.

Bleary-eyed, she can only make out a tiny shape of a person waving to her about twenty feet away. 

Short. Shrill. Angry. It is definitely Gabi Braun.

Another voice chimes in. “Thanks to the stunt you pulled, the Marleyan soldiers thought we were planning to do the same thing and locked us all up in here,” the taller blond says next to her: Reiner, as Annie is recollecting.

Annie doesn’t speak, mostly because she doesn’t feel like she owed them any explanation, partly because her throat feels like the width of a straw. What on earth did they drug her with?

Then she starts to hear conversation piling on through the ventilation, their pent-up animosity wafting in the air and landing on top of her.

“As if we needed another reason for the Marleyans to think we’re anything like the island devils,” Gabi adds to stoke the fire.

Porco Galliard joins her. “Great idea for a first impression. Maim five soldiers on broadcast." He turns to his brother next to him. "Wasn’t that just reckless, Marcel?”

Marcel agrees with the barest trace of reluctance. “It did make the rest of us look... threatening.”

More candidates took turns in airing their grievances. Udo and Zofia described how they were chained to each other the moment they arrived. Pieck detailed how they shoved a bag over her head and refused to let her say goodbye to her father. Colt seemed to be the most despondent of all, holding Falco in his arms and saying despite his family hitting rock bottom not long ago, they’ve somehow managed to get even lower.

Annie doesn’t move, doesn’t react, only lets her bearing become a degree colder. Bertolt is as motionless as she is, as though he was afraid that any intervention would have him caught in the cloud of their fury. 

Backed into a corner with no respite from the backlash, Annie has never felt so small. She decides to tune out the mob of vitriol at her back, allowing them enough latitude to ruminate on a list of things she should have done, tick-boxes that should have been examined before reacting as she did. 

"That’s all really easy to say, isn’t it?” Someone interrupts.

The new voice had neatly insinuated himself in the pause of their chatter. Annie cranes her neck and looks beside her cell to see him, Armin Arlert from the Seventh Zone, standing up with purpose. He wipes imaginary dust off his pants in a pedantic move before speaking again.

“Everyone can make a choice after knowing. It’s so easy to say we should have done it this way after. But none of you could have known what they were going to do to us.”

He pulled the attention in the room in the same way a vortex sucked air, cutting off noise, commanding silence. With darkness in the foreground and Armin shrouded in light, he almost comes across as a compelling voice of reason. 

“It doesn’t matter how the Marleyans see us in any way, shape, or form,” he continues. “The reality here is that out of the sixteen people in this room, ten will die. And I think—all she did was show that she’s not going to be one of them.”

When his last sentence trails off, Armin’s gaze lands on Annie. Bright blue eyes study her own, regarding her intently, as though he was searching for any signs that she disapproved of his intervention.

Annie, unsure what to make of the unsolicited defense, turns her attention to the Brauns. Gabi had simmered for a bit, glancing at the other candidates and then back at Armin, conflicted if she should nurture her offense. Reiner had the slightest sign of resignation on his shoulders, but it vanishes immediately when he speaks again.

“Armin Arlert. Made quite the impression at the broadcast. I wonder if you can speak that confidently when your bodyguard isn't around?"

He gestures to the black-haired girl beside Armin. There's an almost gestalt-shift the moment when Annie finds Mikasa Ackerman's gaze—a warning glare that had every indication it was ready to kill if given the chance, but it’s all missed by Reiner—who was about as observant as a brick.

“Armin, don’t get involved,” Mikasa adjudicates in a whisper, but it is audible enough for Annie keenly observing their interactions. There's a certain manner in which Mikasa grabs Armin's wrists, how he doesn’t protest and lets himself be dragged away, sparing only one glance over his shoulder at Reiner left stunned in their wake.

How are they related, she wonders. Are they family? She’s manically protective of him, that’s for sure. 

But they could have easily been lovers; they move in lockstep, as though their thoughts synced. They always stood close, as though they carried a decade of trust in their history. They exchange inexplicable glances, as though they knew each other's secrets.

Annie shakes herself out of such thoughts, dwelling far too much on the tedious minutiae of their interaction. She reels back to reality, where Reiner is back to hurling insults. 

“I was just saying there was no need to go batshit crazy," Reiner says with a roll. “We need to stay calm. Show them we're proper soldiers and maybe they'll start treating us like one."

Someone audibly scoffs, and it was so glaringly taunting that Reiner whips his head around to find Eren Kruger with a faint hint of a smirk curled on his lips. 

Annie notices it was the first time Eren Kruger had made a sound. Even though all he offered was a scant flash of white teeth, he had a way about him that made something on Annie’s hair rise. It is always the quieter people, and it reminds her of how still water runs deeper.

“Was something funny, Kruger?”

Eren doesn’t answer. But Yelena Lenkov, standing at an intimidating height, speaks for him. “Mr. Braun, I am reticent to admit, but you were not exactly the embodiment of composure. When Willy made the announcement, they televised you hunched over, on the verge of tears.”

Though Reiner displays none of his underlying shock when Yelena uproots him, he is more visibly unsettled when the rest of the candidates’ eyes are trained on him all of a sudden. 

“Everyone, please,” Yelena continues in an amiable voice. “We are not in a position to fight amongst ourselves now. Eventually, we will get to resolve all of this tension in the arena. At the moment, perhaps it is more sensible to focus less on our differences and more on what lies ahead," she suggests. “All of us are in a powder keg. But which one of you will set us off?”

“She’s right,” Zeke Jaeger, finally making his presence known, says calmly as he cleans his glasses. When he fixes them on the bridge of his nose, there is a sheen of eagerness in his eyes, something mercenary passing between them in the form of an otherwise pleasant expression. “Why not just give them exactly what they want? A performance?”

Annie feels the atmosphere of the room shift, from silent grievances to unspoken agreements. Naturally predisposed to skepticism, Annie finds Yelena’s ability to broker a détente almost as suspicious as it was impressive. She and Zeke seem to have quickly accepted their fate long enough to be rational, while most others are still recovering from the blatant shock of it all. 

Meanwhile, Eren Kruger seems jaded and detached. Mikasa Ackerman renders everyone nervous. And Armin… he’s always in an expression Annie can’t read—face tight with a complicated mix of emotions she can’t quite distinguish.

Before anything more ensues, they are interrupted by blast doors sliding open. A Marleyan in the standard uniform enters, followed closely by a group of noticeably less distinguished soldiers. Settling himself in the midst of the circle, where all the candidates had nothing to do but face him, he paces around the room, eyeing each one of them as he passes by. 

He introduces himself as Theo Magath, previously a military general, now the chief overseer of the Warrior candidates unit. 

He briefs their situation as casually as though they were normal soldiers conscripted into war, except these were not the circumstances. They were plucked from the margins and mercilessly shoved into a hole, pitted against each other with no say in the matter, and Annie believes that this is exactly how Marley intends to remind the Eldians that they are the ones in power. Look how we can just take your children and throw them to the wolves. There is nothing you can do about it. 

When Theo Magath finds himself in Annie’s vicinity, he pauses, staring in her general direction. “Before any of you react impulsively, let me set your expectations.”

“The candidates are to remain in the underground facility for the next three weeks, training in isolation from the outside world before they are reintroduced to society as seasoned Warrior candidates. They will be given a taste of the Marleyan lifestyle—in accommodation, in meals, in state-of-the-art training equipment.”

But what follows almost shreds Annie to pieces; Magath, who seems to value the establishment of strict truth rather than a comforting embellishment, points out that it will be impossible for them to make contact with their families until the end of the Games.

Up until this point, Annie has been out of her mind thinking of her father, not knowing if there’s an opportunity to see him at least one last time before total chaos and uncertainty take over. That perhaps by knowing he is out there for sure, she’d gain the resolve to keep fighting.

But the only way out of this gordian knot is to stay within. And to stay alive.

Magath is still talking, and there is one rule he’s emphasizing above all else. 

“You are prohibited from fighting any of your fellow candidates during your training. Should any of you be caught roughing it up with each other, that’s three days in the confinement cell,” he barks in a definitive tone with no wiggle room. “If you wish to claw each other’s eyes out, save it for the Games. Or carve a watermelon if you really need to get your anger out.”

When Magath finishes his brief, he flicks his arm and the soldiers around him disperse to approach the enclosures. Within a few seconds, the glass walls around Annie dissolve in glitching motions. She reaches out in anticipation of another invisible barrier, but her fingertips grasp nothing but air as she closes them into a fist. 

She’s never seen Marleyan technology up this close; they would never waste such advancements on Eldian-segregated areas; the Marleyans had a habit of reminding them they are not owed the luxury.

The rest of the candidates step out of their enclosures, but Annie delays leaving hers. Now that no barriers or walls separated them, she thinks about how she made the other candidates so viscerally angry, she wouldn’t be surprised if one of them would be so daring as to grab her in a chokehold. 

Fortunately, everyone’s eyes are only focused on the Marleyan chief. Except for him. 

Armin locks eyes with Annie the moment she steps down.

She thinks of her first impression of Armin since seeing him from the broadcast—mostly his words: Those who cannot abandon everything, cannot hope to change anything. Were they indicative of a noble principle or a sinister scheme? 

Could he really be so capable of blindsiding her just as easily as he had been prepared to defend her moments ago? The more Annie thinks about it, the more she finds it necessary to subject all of his intentions to scrutiny. 

One thing was certain: Armin Arlert is already fighting hard to stay in the game. Which could also mean he is trying just as hard as anyone else to deceive her. 

Chapter Text

Act 1

~O~

“There are no quadrants or formulas that can be used to measure the truthfulness of words and actions. It is always a gamble, an educated guess at best.”

― Wiss Auguste, The Illusions of Hope

~O~

How should one cope when given a near-death sentence?

During the first day, Magath suggested that in order to foster a sense of calm, the candidates must build a familiar routine to provide stability in uncertain times.

Uncertain times.

Seems pretty trivial for something that could determine life and death.

But to question the newfound purpose of the Warrior Games—as Willy Tybur had apparently named it—would be unwise. Even the slightest form of defiance was not tolerated. Falco Grice had been the first to glimpse what it would be like to deviate from compliance.

Earlier in the week, he had ridiculed the notion of fighting to the death as a Warrior candidate, only to live on borrowed time with just thirteen years in victory. 

It was his worst misstep, to say nothing of the consequences that followed. Falco was thrown in the isolation room for three days without food, water, or even a glimpse of sunlight. He came out looking different; his eyes were sunken and hollow, and the pallor of his skin looked as if all circulation had been drained from him. 

“How long do you think you can last there?” Bertolt had once asked in passing. 

In truth, it made Annie so viscerally terrified. She could not imagine being locked in such a tiny space for so long, with no respite from her internal apprehensions, fear, and crippling anxiety replaying in her mind like a personal torture reel—it would drive her to the brink of insanity.

But of course, she does not relegate this to Bertolt. That was off-limits repartee.

Though it's astonishing that Falco had barely weathered the repercussions, no one was willing to gamble their own odds of surviving that space. Thus, no one had complained since.

So even if the impending and imminent threat is always eclipsing at every waking moment, there was no time to wallow in a dung heap of self-pity. There was only urgency; at the end of their training, a critical portion called the Assessment would determine their chances of survival.

As the hours bled into a cycle, one week had already vanished under the tide of their horrendous schedule, and Annie has made good use of this time.

Instead of mulling over the unfairness of it all, she spends it on sharpening her edges, distilling the rage and the hurt into something that resulted in clockwork-like functioning.

Besides, she could get used to the accommodations: more food than she could eat, a warm bed, and the liberty to take as many hot showers as she wanted. 

Something disrupts her routine that day.

After showering and donning her training attire, Annie slips a round, metal ring into the sleeve of her jacket. As she always does. It's become her good luck charm, ever since the guards divested all contraband but overlooked this one.

It echoes one thing: her home. Her father. 

Annie pushes the thoughts away, steps into the elevator, and presses below ground level. The ride takes less than thirty seconds before opening into a nexus of highly specialized workout rooms. There is at least one candidate practicing in every grid, all honing skills of their choice, but mostly avoiding ones that made them look weak.

Marcel and Porco Galliard love to frequent stations like the Gauntlets, a daunting obstacle course with multiple ascending platforms that must be traversed in the fastest time possible. 

Pieck Finger, Udo Schumacher, and Zofia Soroka are often found in stations that challenged their wit, such as an edible plants test which Udo had easily breezed through, a paired-image matching challenge Zofia completed in record time, and pathfinding in different terrains which Pieck demonstrated exemplary proficiency.

Colt Grice and Zeke Jaeger often took turns sending spears into a dummy’s heart as far as fifteen yards away. Annie had once seen Zeke take down two targets at once.

Gabi Braun and Falco Grice are some of the more nimble candidates. With their rather buoyant feet, they’d often race while leaping across ropes that stretched across the ceiling of the facility.

Reiner Braun, no surprise, is white-knuckling it out in the weight-lifting station. He’d sometimes throw a medicine ball around purely for his own mirth and also to disrupt the other participants. 

Meanwhile, Annie sees Eren often engaged in wrestling with an assistant; he’d have no qualms stripping down naked and slicking his body with oil so that he could easily slide a hand in and lift the opponents, roll them over, and slam them on their backs.

His Zone mate, Yelena, liked to lurk in the knife-wielding station, and when she throws, she makes it a point to let everyone know she doesn’t miss. 

Still, none of them compares to Mikasa Ackerman.

Her specialties parallel and contrast Annie’s in a way; they both use their bodies as lethal weapons, but where Annie heavily relied on her knowledge of complex techniques, Mikasa’s fighting style was instinctive, as though she ritually taps on a hidden vein of power.

For the past week, she had grown into a fixture of interest for many candidates—especially Magath. He’d laud her with praises, commenting on her versatility regardless of weapon choice, but she is particularly the most impressive when using swords to maim the dummies in front of her. 

Armin, on the other hand, was an enigma of sorts. Like Bertolt, he spent most of his time in stations that did not require much physical agility, meager ones like starting a fire, tying knots, and making salves out of pine resin. 

But unlike Bertolt, Armin spends every waking opportunity mastering these basic skill sets, almost as if he were the most desperate out of everybody.

She’d catch him in the training facility during the early hours of the morning, even though she had just spotted him there at a much later hour the night before, as though determined to stave off the natural rhythms of his body, if only for fear of missing out on necessary preparations. 

From the very first day, she had already deduced that Armin Arlert is fighting harder than anyone to stay alive, and she had been right about it. All the more reason for her to keep her head low while keeping an eye on him.

Today, she’s decided to try one of the most difficult and ambitious training rooms with motion sensors on the floors and all the walls. The Mimic Room was programmed to analyze the unique fighting styles of the occupant during the session, and consequently deploy a clone of equal or more robust capabilities that could mirror their skills. It was the perfect test for Annie, given her aptitude for martial arts. 

When the hatch opens to let her in, some of the candidates pause their own sessions, slowly moving in a fascinated cloud towards the showroom to observe her from whatever view the tempered glass panels afforded them. They seem eager to know what she had to offer. After all, she has been training for a week. 

Annie’s not unused to an audience when it involves her hand-to-hand combat skills. There’s Magath sticking out from the throng of people with his height, but she also sees Reiner watching from the corner, and when their sights overlap, he slides a finger across his neck and breaks into a wry smile.

She'd love to wipe the grin off his face with a sandblaster.

The motion sensors around the room lock in on her position, and something starts scanning her vitals. Then, it begins materializing an opponent according to her weight and size and deploys it in the corner opposite of Annie. 

When Annie folds her sleeves and positions her arms close to her head in a defensive stance, the projection begins moving in rapid strides toward her. The moment it comes within striking distance, Annie expertly maneuvers around it and kicks their vital points with pinpoint precision—all particles of the computer-generated opponent dispersing in pixel-like shards.

After Annie had easily downed the first target, the computer reroutes and deploys a bigger, heavier opponent. Though it manages to land a punch right across Annie’s face, she reels back but leans into the momentum just to make a tight turning circle and deliver a jarring trifecta of knee strikes, uppercuts, and a winning roundhouse slam on the head. 

When the dummy she just flatlined simply disintegrates, Annie is able to take a quick glance at the candidates and catches Reiner looking grudgingly impressed. But her attention is much more drawn by another tuff of blond hair in her line of sight; Armin has come to observe her, with Mikasa standing next to him, taking in the situation with a brief sweep of darkened eyes.

It takes a while for the computer to recalibrate, and Annie anticipates another easy win.

The target materializes in a slow build from the ground up, then when fully formed, it sprints towards her. Annie tries to counter its advances but it maneuvers just like her with preemptive dodges from her kicks, until it finally delivers a devastating blow.

This is not the first time someone has failed this room. In fact, no one’s ever gone past the third round. In one fell swoop, Annie had ricocheted off the wall and crashed into the ground.

“Simulation completed. Please exit for the next Warrior candidate.”

Annie doesn’t get up. Even when the bot has disappeared and the systems have whirred back to the standard lighting, she doesn’t move. Her bangs are sticky and drenched against her forehead, and she finds herself slightly heaving from the intense workout.

She looks to her side and sees Reiner unglue himself from the glass walls with an air of underwhelm. From afar, she sees Mikasa guiding Armin away from the showroom, joining the other candidates as they retreat back to the other areas of the training facility, but Armin glances back over his shoulder as if he had something more to say.  

When the steel doors hiss open, she steps down from the showroom with the banality of her defeat clouding her mind.

“I—I think you did great, Annie.” 

Annie doesn’t look up but recognizes Bertolt’s voice and the way his looming shadow always preceded his presence. She didn’t realize he had been watching her simulation this whole time. 

There’s a lull because Annie doesn’t acknowledge his compliment, so Bertolt punctuates the conversation with a nervous clearing of his throat, before stating whatever he has been thumbing his fist on.

“Have you, uh, given my proposal some thought?” he asks. “I know Magath says it’s not yet time to officially make allies—at least not until after the Assessment. But I really think we could use someone like Reiner on our team.”

Annie allows a hint of irritation to show on the creases of her forehead. “And you think you and I are on the same team?” 

“W-Well, we’re from the same Zone, Annie.” Bertolt’s head tilts uncertainly. “Who else would be on your side, if not me?”

For a moment, Annie settles on that thought. She is aware that she isn’t exactly the best company, and has built a bubble of isolation that has kept people at arm’s length. But she’s not about to feed herself scraps of pity and leftovers of people.

“My answer hasn’t changed,” Annie says in a low voice, brushing past his elbow. “Why would I have your back when yours was turned on me the first day in?”

She doesn’t bother looking his way, doesn’t let Bertolt catch up to explain his reasons, and passes by him without so much as a by-your-leave. 

Doing it on her own wasn’t just a preference—it was a sound strategy. Where others built a tentpole of allies and connections, Annie steered clear of them, convinced the slightest turbulence could knock them over if a better opportunity presented itself. Besides, they wouldn’t get along even if she tried to be amicable.

Reiner and Porco had a habit of speaking in whispers as she passed by, as though they were enjoying a private joke at her expense. Sometimes, they’d tack on a snide comment if Marcel—their nicety chaperone—was elsewhere. Bertolt would join them but he wouldn’t look as amused, only relieved they were picking on anyone else except him. 

The more reasonable ones like Colt, Pieck, and Zeke, seemed to regard her as much too volatile to work with. And kids like Udo, Zofia, Gabi, and Falco only seemed unnerved when she so much as breathed the same air as they did.

Meanwhile, the reserved ones, like Yelena, Eren, and Mikasa, were not above suspecting her. She could tell they judged her with ill will just as easily as she deemed them in a similar light. 

At this point, Annie simply chooses to remain unprovoked. She would let them underestimate her, so they’ll never know for sure what she could do. And because no matter how much hostility they harbored, there is absolutely nothing knife-sharp about hatred; it was more of a blunt weapon—all the messier for not making a clean cut.

Then, there’s Armin. Well, he’s the real puzzle, she thinks. He has always regarded her with kind eyes. But Armin’s duality—soft-spoken in person, but devoted in training with ferocious, single-minded intent—was something that Annie could not have anticipated.

She remembers something her father had once told her. There were only two types of people: those who fool, and those who let themselves be fooled. There are so many fronts that can be put up and facades that can be fabricated at a whim. And it is why she’s determined not to fall for more of his ploys.

She could never let herself be foolish enough to be vulnerable, and vulnerable enough to be taken advantage of. 

Annie pushes her thoughts of Armin aside and makes her way back to the elevator when she hears someone address her.

“Annie?”

She’s never heard her name in this soft kind of inflection before.

When she looks back, Armin is closing the distance between them, holding something in his palm as he approaches her. “I think you dropped this.”

He opens his palm and the glint of what he reveals sends her into a stupor.

“Please give it back,” Annie says, her agitation breaking through the carefully cultivated nonchalance she had espoused earlier. 

Armin seems to lean into her distress. “How did you keep this ring?” he asks, closing it around his fist. “They took all our belongings when we came here.”

For a moment, she thinks that he is about to throw her under the bus, but he only smiles good-naturedly. 

“I'm kidding. The Marleyan guards don't seem that concerned. Things slip past them all the time.” He shifts his gaze downwards, something dark brewing just under the surface for less than a heartbeat.

He then looks up, bright and cheerful, and peers curiously at the ring once more, holding it between his thumb and index finger. “I was also wondering why there’s a blade here. Isn’t it kind of a walking hazard?” 

Armin flicks the ring in her direction and she catches the ring with a fisted grip.

“I don’t wear it,” she amended, tucking it inside the pockets of her sweatpants. “It’s for good luck.”

“Was it a gift?” he asks thoughtfully.

Annie hesitates, before saying in a low voice. “It’s my father’s.” 

Her answer somehow makes Armin’s eyes blink in wonder. “Oh, I guess you’re more sentimental than you let on, Annie.” 

She must have looked startled because Armin elaborates further as though he sensed her confusion. “I just meant you seem nicer than most people would give you credit for. You clearly care for your father, that’s why you couldn’t stand having the ring taken away.”

“Why?” Annie narrows her eyes. “Is that all everyone talks about? That I’m some kind of heartless monster?” 

Armin’s blue eyes are rife with introspectivity at her question. It takes him a moment to answer, as though he was trying his best to remain careful with his succeeding choice of words. 

“I think those rumors tell more about the people who see you that way, more than it is a summation of you,” he observes gently. “Maybe being a heartless monster is what they want you to be or what they fear that you are. Maybe it’s what they want to become—or what they loathe in themselves. Either way, only you know what you are. Or what you're not. Right?"

Annie blinks, processing this information and finding that most of his sentiments resonated with hers. It sounded sincere—almost kind and warm—but it could just have easily been lies, leavened with personal opinions and conjecture.

Except she couldn’t help but feel an almost seismic moment of reckoning, as though what Armin pointed out dwarfed her own understanding of herself. 

“I don’t know,” she says, despite having more complex thoughts on the matter. “I don’t really care what they think. I just want to get through this in one piece.”

Armin slowly bobs his head, a weak simulation of a nod. He then steps close enough to communicate in a whisper. “Well, if you want a heads-up, I think I finally figured out what makes the Mimic Room tick.”

She feels herself raise a brow. “You haven’t even tried it yourself.”

“I know.” He grins, eyes brimming with mischief. “But I’ve been watching everyone try. Including you.” 

When he emphasizes that he had been closely watching her, Annie feels the heat of something like a spotlight.

”Here’s my gamble: it’s basically a mirror of you right?” he asks, only continuing when Annie nods to show she’s intently listening. “Well, how do you defeat an enemy that does nothing but look at you?” Armin draws a bracing breath. “You hold up their reflection, and you let them shatter themselves.”

Annie, with her brows knit together, radiates skepticism.

“Then again, it’s just a hunch,” Armin says modestly. "But when the alternative is less than ideal, I think there’s some merit in taking risks."

The insight is so simple and profound that it makes Annie wonder how he's able to come up with ideas like that; ideas that no one realizes make perfect sense until it has been articulated. 

Armin lets his speculations hang in the silence between them, but any more discussion about this theory is flouted when Mikasa arrives.

“Armin,” Mikasa says softly, but she keeps her eyes zeroed in on Annie. “You should get back.”

Armin thins his lips and makes a small goodbye gesture to Annie with his hand. 

When his parting strides have taken him beyond hearing distance, Mikasa finally speaks to Annie. “Whatever he's up to,” she starts. “Don't get yourself involved.”

There is something hostile in the way she delivers it, and Annie registers it as a direct warning. It doesn’t come as a surprise; Magath had frequently pitted them against each other, claiming that if there was anyone in the room who could challenge Mikasa's abilities, it was most definitely Annie. 

Ultimately, she finds Mikasa’s accusation unwarranted, mostly because she hadn’t concerted any efforts to befriend Armin, in fact, he’s exactly who she’s most wary of. But Annie wonders if her apprehension towards him translated into any misconstrued actions that led Mikasa to think the opposite. 

In her fleeting conversation with Armin, Annie had already passively divulged more information about herself than any dry tidbit she’s given Bertolt, her own Zone mate. Armin's inquiries opened musings that she had tried to push away for the past week, so she takes the ring out of her pocket once again, wondering, indeed, why she keeps something so useless and trivial. 

But the ring bears a snapshot of the time when her father had given it to her, and the thought of him grounds her to reality, grounds her to her purpose. And Annie is going to make that happen, no matter what it takes. 

The next day, something unexpected happens. 

Annie enters the training facility, only to find candidates from every zone congested around where the Mimic Room is stationed. The candidates are gathered in cult-like formation, fingers clasped over their mouths, jaws dropped, and disbelieving eyes. 

She finally makes her way through them, and discovers Armin in the center of the showroom, breathing heavily, but standing tall. 

There is a consistent burst of electrical sparks in front of him, on a disheveled fixture that looked permanently destroyed. When he exchanges a knowing glance at Annie, she realizes he had tested his theory, and came out with everyone’s respect.

Armin Arlert’s gamble had led him to beat an exercise no one could figure out. 

She begins to think that there’s some truth to what he said; that when the alternative is less than ideal, there’s some merit in taking risks. 

Perhaps Annie’s gamble—at least for now—is to keep Armin Arlert close. 

Chapter Text

Act 1

~O~

“How can I be substantial if I do not cast a shadow? I must have a dark side also.

 If I am to be whole.”

― C.G. Jung, Modern Man in Search of a Soul

~O~

No one wants to be seen as the next weak target.

But Annie knows that it is a natural instinct to sniff out the most vulnerable people and assert one’s strength over them.  

It started the day after Armin had beaten the Mimic Room and it had been put out of commission. She thinks that perhaps the Marleyans might have been mortified to know that someone—much less a lowly Eldian—could outsmart one of their most advanced equipment. 

After his exhibition, Armin Arlert had become almost as formidable as Mikasa, perhaps not in the caliber of strength, but in that his clever antics might as well be lethal in an arena.  

She should commend his guts. From being viewed as the weakling, Armin had somehow elbowed his way to the top, and once you have that vantage point when it comes to picking allies, you have the pick of the litter.

This had set in motion the blossoming strategies of many candidates; when the boy they arbitrarily believed to be a weakling ended up having an ace up his sleeve, it accelerated fears, heightened tensions, and intensified the looming shadow of the Games. In a matter of days, alliances had been forming in the premises of dinner tables and training rooms, and Annie was simply a third party to it all.

As the second week begins to tide over, she feels the burgeoning pressure to form decent connections of some kind before the Assessment.

Magath, who liked to frequent these showrooms with the intention of monitoring their progress, had once approached Annie with his unerring ability to identify weaknesses and solutions.

“A word to the wise, Leonhart. Number not your allies. Weigh them," he had told her, with none of his usually straightforward remarks and pointed observations. Annie doesn’t try to refute him, but she thinks she can do just fine on her own.

So the next day, when Bertolt, relentless as he is, approaches Annie again with the intention of patching things up, she still does not welcome it. 

“I owe you nothing,” Annie tells him plaintively. She’s about to leave him again when Bertolt mentions something that anchors her foot in the ground, paralyzed.

“I heard you talking to Armin the other day. Something—something about contraband.” 

She doesn’t move. A slew of panic tears through her, but she tries to remain stoic. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“I-if we were on the same page,” he continues, bottom lip white around the edges where he was biting it. “I can just pretend I didn’t hear anything at all.” 

Annie looks at the vacant stare of Bertolt’s eyes and sees nothing more than a cornered animal, resorting to a desperate move. If Bertolt were to say anything about her ring, would Magath make such a big deal out of it and throw her to the isolation room? 

With such poor use of his time, it would be beneath him. Instead, she regards the opportunities of forming a temporary alliance with Bertolt, calculates the risks, and weighs her options. Perhaps this alternative has a twofold benefit; that she has eyes at the back of her head, and ears all around her, knowing Bertolt’s efforts to network.

Annie sighs with resignation.

The temporary arrangement proves tolerable for a while. Whatever awkwardness there was between the two of them, seems to be easing in close proximity as Bertolt teaches her how to set up a trap that would leave an unassuming candidate dangling high from a tree. 

“It’s not as elaborate as Pieck Finger’s,” he says, analyzing the loose ends of his contraption. “But as much as I'd like to coerce her as an ally, her zonemate seems really dead set on Eren Kruger.”

“I’ve never seen Zeke talk to Eren, much less anyone." Annie's eyes sweeping over the facility where she sees Eren sitting alone in the far corner, slumped over so his dark, unkempt hair veiled most of his features.

“Yeah, that’s because you don’t stay long enough during dinners, and you don’t hang around anywhere else except the training facility and our quarters,” Bertolt replies. Annie raises an eyebrow, somewhat stunned.

Surprisingly, Bertolt proves to be more of a useful interlocutor than she had thought, but it’s that very trait of his that leaves Annie wondering if that’s a skill he would use against her again—just like he did with her ring. The incident reminds her of Armin the past week, and how he didn’t think twice to give her the ring back the second he found it.

“Reiner told me he saw Eren, Yelena, and Zeke talking one night,” Bertolt is still discussing, despite Annie tuning out. “He couldn’t hear anything, but it looked like they were in agreement.” 

“You seem pretty close with Reiner already,” Annie remarks, finding that whatever sentiment Bertolt harbored had already been voiced by Reiner before. These past few days, he had been insinuating himself within the arrogant blond’s circle, joining their dinners, laughing at other candidates.

“Oh, uh, the Brauns are close with the Galliard brothers,” He explains as though he already had his excuse shelved and scripted. “If—by some miracle—we also get them as allies, then our chances also dramatically improve. If we don’t, at least we’ll last a bit longer if we don’t get on their bad side. That’s why I’m trying to convince him you’d make a great asset.”

She huffs. “What does Reiner have to say about that?”

Bertolt swallows. “He, uh, says you have the personality of a watercress sandwich. But you fight good, and you’d make a good ally.”

Annie only makes an unintelligible sound that intonates her objection to the idea. 

Bertolt stops tying a knot and peers at her. “Who do you want then?” 

There’s a name that comes to mind, but now that his reputation has been reinvented, Annie thinks there’s much more noise around his radar, and that perhaps her skill as a martial arts fighter is already a spot filled in by Mikasa. Surely, Armin has eyes on far more versatile choices to up the ante in his team. 

He wouldn’t possibly consider her as an ally, and even if he did, Mikasa would probably not let him.

“Anyone that’s not Reiner," she replies.

“At this point,” Bertolt says with a sigh. “Our slim pickings boil down to helpless children like Udo and Zofia or a bunch of stray Eldian Restorationists like Colt and Falco.”

There’s something about the way Bertolt chronicles the lost causes that don’t sit well with Annie, but she stays silent, the words sinking back into her tongue.

“I don’t know what you’re thinking, Annie. Most of the time that is,” he says, with a little frustration sieving through his usually calm exterior. “But I’m really trying to do my part here. Building connections takes a lot of time, and right now, we’re running low on that commodity.”

For a moment, Annie almost doesn’t consider his proposal, but with the situation at hand, she ultimately decides to align herself to a common goal, and that could probably at least take her a bit higher on her climb to the top. Unless she has to grease the other poles beside her.

After the trap-setting session, Bertolt has already made his way back to Reiner; he’s definitely made it clear where he’s hitched his wagon to, so now Annie’s going to find a way to pull her own weight. 

Looking at the bevy of candidates scattered across the facility, Annie spools out a mental list, their possible motives, her purpose, and if a venn diagram formed between them. But she finds there are too many variables to sift through and not enough social wherewithal to confront each one about it.

Then, the thought of Magath’s advice earlier passes through her head in quiet recollection.

Number not your allies. Weigh them.

And when Annie sees Falco in a deserted station, channeling all his focus into creating fish hooks, the clarity of his counsel hits.

She thinks about what Bertolt says, thinks about what Willy Tybur had plaintively pointed out about the Grice brothers that reduced them into a mistake their parents made. Despite his young age and weak stature, Falco is much more headstrong and defiant than his brother Colt, remembering that he had the audacity to point out the foolishness of the Games and the stomach to last the isolation room.

It’s the very thing that had put a target in Annie’s back at the very beginning, and while that sense of defiance always lingered in her throat, Falco had the resolve to speak it. And it’s there that Annie finally decides she wants the little boy from the Second Zone on her side.

She strides towards Falco and he’s so focused on his craft that he doesn’t seem to notice her in his periphery. His fingers are busy, careful, and nimble, and as Annie continues to watch, he could make a fish hook out of anything—even out of a bent nail and a hair strand. When she takes a peek at the other items he’s crafted, he’s already built a repository of slingshots and even more advanced ones like a bow and arrow.

“Can you teach me that?”

“Oh!” Falco yelps, with a twitch in his concentration not unlike a small-scale grimace. 

He peers curiously up at Annie, terrified. Despite her already short height, Annie drops down to her knees, attempting to make herself look as least threatening as possible. 

“You seem like you know a lot about threads and ties.”

“Yes,” Falco says sheepishly. “My dad was a fisherman and my mom worked at a textile factory.”

Annie decides that if she wanted his trust, she should also make an offering. “I can teach you some of my fighting techniques if you can show me how to build a proper bow?”

At her request, the little boy widens his eyes in childlike caricature and begins to pull Annie towards his crafting trove where he had already gathered many materials for her perusal. His enthusiasm is bouncing off the walls as though he had been given free rein of a confectionary for breakfast. 

Falco begins by demonstrating how to choose the right wood to make a bow stave from a common sapling or branch, then proceeds to guide Annie on all kinds of fibers that they could possibly use to make a bowstring. He giddily walks her through the basics of what makes the most versatile material, from plant fibers, sinew, gut strings, or rawhide, but the material he lauded the most was silk. 

“People mistake silk to be weak and delicate, but did you know that a silk handkerchief can protect the wearer from a gunshot?” Falco points out as a matter of factly. 

‘No, I didn’t,” Annie replies with a bit of levity in her voice to sound amused. 

“You can even make it as thin as you like, but it will still hold its strength,” he chirps, and Annie finds something about his strong affinity for the craft disarmingly endearing.

By the end of the session, Annie’s metaphorical hands have been filled to the brim with a wealth of knowledge about the splicing methods to make a firm cordage, the tillering process to shape the bow, and the finishing touches to sand off the wood.

Though Annie tries to imitate Falco’s technique, her slipshod bow falls even below his standards. She tests it out by attempting to shoot down a moving dummy, but without a snappy release from the string, the arrow flies weakly and lands on its thigh. 

Falco demonstrates how to do it, and with one arrow, he makes a clear shot right through the dummy’s heart. He flashes a toothy smile at Annie, who lets a faint smile tug on the corners of her lips.

It is Annie’s turn to demonstrate to him a few disarming techniques with the dummy she failed to shoot down. She gives him a few pointers on where to strike an enemy using various sharp points of his body. 

"I like to attack the spine, collapse the throat, shock or rupture the liver with strikes—" She pauses when Falco's face had blanched white. "Or we can try something simpler. A strike to the chest won't work against a larger opponent, but a strike to the solar plexus can work for someone like you. Then go for the knee of the leg with the most weight on it."

Annie executes a couple of moves for him to follow: a diagonal-downward strike on the solar plexus using her right elbow and a smooth pivot to raise the leg and kick the dummy using her foot blade.

At first, Falco tries his best to mimic Annie’s movements, but his timing is consistently off. "How do I know when to hit someone?"

"Two conditions: when you have no choice, and, when you can get away with it."

After a few more attempts and far more simplified moves, Falco is beginning to give up, so he looks up at Annie inquisitively from his hunched-down position on the ground. “It's useless. I won’t last against any of you in a hand-to-hand fight. I’m not strong enough.”

This snapshot of Falco, in his despondent state despite his efforts, reels Annie back to a moment in time—back to her training sessions with her father. She had done her best and executed the techniques he had taught her with grit and perfection, yet he had never imparted a word of encouragement. Instead of seeing Falco, she sees a projection of her younger self in front of her, tired, breathless, choking on her tears, lest she receives a beating for showing an ounce of vulnerability.

Annie thinks about what she would have wanted to hear, what would have been comforting to know. 

And so she kneels down next to the young boy and tells him—with a melody in her voice that signaled her version of a smile. “You aren’t weak, Falco. You’re made of silk.”

Falco leaves the station that day with an easy grin and a look of brand-new resolve, and as he waves goodbye to her like a newfound friend, Annie leaves with one thought in her mind. Perhaps invisible threads make the strongest ties.

The day was nearly ending, at least, that’s what the clock on the wall had indicated. The workout rooms are incrementally emptied as one candidate leaves after the next. Annie decides to leave early and rest, so she heads back to the elevator and absentmindedly presses the button back to her quarters.

She’s almost forgotten what sunlight feels like on her skin, and actually yearns for the searing afternoon blaze, the rush of vigor after an exhilarating workout in the sun.

When the elevator opens, Annie steps out and heads back to her room with the intention of taking a long, blisteringly hot shower.

Except it dawns on her that the layout of the hallway is different. And the door she had mistaken for her room had a completely different exterior than the one assigned to her and Bertolt. 

Annie makes a small sound of frustration realizing she must have pressed the wrong floor, and wishes that the Marleyans could have provided locks for their own rooms if it weren’t for the popular sentiment that Eldians didn’t deserve privacy.

She’s about to retreat from the opened door when a couple of elevated voices catch her attention. Something gives Annie the tingling feeling that perhaps she is overhearing something denied to the public eye, and that it’s possibly useful information that could be sussed out, could be leveraged just as Bertolt has been trying to this whole time. 

Annie crouches low and stays near the walls as she approaches the sound. Thankfully, the lights are dim, with only the faint flow of overhead lighting in the living room, where she sees three silhouettes in front.

After a discerning squint, she recognizes Eren Kruger, his distinctive long hair had been tied up. Then, she’s surprised to see that the figure standing adjacent to him is Armin Arlert—face tight, shoulders tense. Behind him, Mikasa is holding Armin back with a hand on his elbow.

“Armin, keep your voice low,” she says, regarding him with faint alarm, both eyebrows raising to her hairline. 

“No,” Armin says adamantly, and Annie realizes she has never heard him refute Mikasa so explicitly. “I need to know. Right here. Right now. Your actions after meeting Yelena… are they all you?”

“She got us this far, didn’t she?” Eren responds, devoid of expression but Annie could already glean from the minute-degree shifts in his ramrod posture that he is also as tense and agitated. “Why should I doubt her?” 

“Because,” Mikasa interjects. “She’s manipulating you.” 

“But unlike you, she isn’t a slave to her bloodline. ” Eren says, with the undercurrent of a snarl. 

Mikasa shifts her gaze downwards, visibly upset. Armin is becoming more animated with his gestures.

“Enough of your bullshit acting, Eren, I can’t stand it,” he rasps. “This has Yelena written all over it.”

Annie doesn’t understand why they were talking the way they were, why they sounded so high off their gourds; it was like witnessing two completely different sets of people; she doesn’t know what to make of this unfamiliar Armin, who—usually composed—suddenly speaks with unbridled frustration. Then there’s Mikasa—known for being unrelentingly firm and resolute—now seen flinching at crude remarks and belittling attacks.

Most of all, she has never seen them interact with Eren, never seen them attempt to establish a meaningful alliance. And for a moment, Annie considers that maybe that’s what they were here for—but the way they spoke, the way they chastised each other, leads Annie to another conclusion: that they’ve known each other for longer than they’re letting on. That they’re talking about something much deeper than the Games. Something that had already taken root long before.

“Thanks to Yelena’s intel, we already know how the Gamemakers have planned the Assessment. Thanks to her, we got to plan ahead of time,” Eren says, jaw set stubbornly. “If she wants to team up with Zeke, I'll do just that.”

Annie feels her entire body go rigid, the sensation raising every hair on her body. The notion of someone rigging the Games—

“If you want to team up with Zeke—fine by me.” Armin’s mouth is twisted with distaste. “Just quit putting up this front.”

“Armin, you don't have the moral high ground here,” Eren replies. "You think befriending people makes it any less fucked up that you're going to have to kill them? You've always been so naive."

Armin’s fists are still at his sides but they harbor a thrum of tenuously controlled anger. "You think you're the only person in the world who hasn't been brainwashed?"

Eren's gaze doesn't waver. "Only in this room."

There are many questions swarming Annie’s head, but the most pressing one: what could be Eren’s skin in the game? They were all brought here against their will, forced to participate in a sick and twisted game. Unless—

“Eren,” Mikasa intervenes with a shaky breath, and Annie could hear her resolve breaking down into smaller and smaller pieces. “Please stop.” 

“And you, Mikasa. You’ve never been anything more than a slave who obeys orders,” He hisses. “It’s why I can’t stand the sight of you. No free will of your own. Just like livestock—”

Before Eren could continue, Armin had already leapt over the table, extended an arm and slammed a fist against Eren’s cheek. His other hand grabs hold of the taller candidate’s collar, but before Armin could land a second punch, Eren pulls away from his hold and dives into his flank, pushing against him until he slams Armin against the wall.

“Armin,” Eren breathes, forearm pressing hard into his neck. “You and I have never fought before. And you know why? Because it wouldn’t have been close to fair.”

Annie, still reeling from each revelation, does not have time to react when Eren heaves and shoves Armin in her direction, the blond falling to his back and with his head flung upwards. His eyes land on Annie’s form, hunched just a few inches away from him. 

A distinct wash of shock races over his face.

“A-Annie?” He rolls to his side. “How long have you been—”

Annie sets her sights on Eren and Mikasa, who are both looking at her with widened, panicked eyes. 

Before they could articulate their surprise, the commotion had already drawn too much attention, and Magath is already barging into the room with a company of soldiers trailing behind him. 

Magath’s eyes dart from her, then to Armin’s battered figure and Eren’s bleeding nose, and demands accountability, demands a name that will be thrown to the isolation room for having violated the rules. 

Mikasa steps forward. And what she does not anticipate is the name that comes out of Mikasa’s mouth, a detail that shoots fear like a rush of fire through her nervous system.

“It was Annie. She came here and attacked both of them.”  

Chapter Text

Stunning art made by Cib for this chapter. Please check it out, it's amazing.

Act 1

~O~

“There are many who don't wish to sleep for fear of nightmares. Sadly, there are many who don't wish to wake for the same fear.”

― Richelle Goodrich, Dandelions: The Disappearance of Annabelle Fancher

~O~

There’s something that alters the chemistry of Annie’s mind when she’s met with her worst nightmare come true.

It was Annie. She came here and attacked both of them. Mikasa had said, and Annie remembers feeling as if an earthquake had split the ground underneath to swallow her whole. But if it was Mikasa’s plaintive lie that shook her to the core, the very thing that sent her falling into the abyss is Armin’s silence.

It reminds her of the canaries in the coal mine back at home—caged birds she had so often seen being carried deep beneath tunnels by the miners. Their small bodies and rapid breathing meant they consumed toxic fumes faster—should one be seen dropping dead, it was the signal to leave immediately. 

Only this time, it is Annie who was sent away to suffocate first, dragged into a level lower than the training facility, something that even looked reminiscent of an age-old prison, with brick walls illuminated by the ruddy glow of iron sconces, except it does nothing to light the prison she was thrown into. 

Six days in the isolation room. Magath said. For having attacked two people. That she never laid a finger on.

The room is barely enough to pace around in; the ceiling is low, so low even for Annie that she has to hunch her neck if she tries to straighten her back to use the wall for ballast. She could at least stretch her legs, let her entire length sprawl against the floor, but the cement is cold, and the silence is deafening without the noisy bargaining of the other candidates around her. Most of all, Annie never realized that the sound of her heartbeat could be so oppressive. 

After the shuffling feet of Marleyan soldiers have faded, it’s there that Annie finds herself in a void so dark, it is as though she is suspended in a vacuum, in a pocket of space and time where there is nothing to do but orbit nothingness. Marred in a state of semi-lucidity and hallucination, time in this room somehow feels both infinite and instantaneous, and without clear sight of her hands, her feet, she can only feel that she’s a vessel, and whether or not it contained a soul, Annie doesn’t know—couldn’t know.

With only herself and her thoughts as her company, she succumbs to exhaustion and bathes in her drowsiness until she feels the sleepiness tide over. In it, she finds that the thoughts she had left unopened and entrenched in the subconscious were much, much worse.

In the assemblage of four walls and tight spaces, Annie is unraveling memories, something she had kept buried so deep it could have been a forgotten dream, a nightmare long past. But the abstract clouds are finding their shape within her mind, and the memories are resurfacing; it comes in the form of a deep forest, a cold afternoon, a punching bag in front of her hands, and a puff of her breath in front of her face, but while the rest of the images are fuzzy, the clearest one is her father, face tight, jaw clenched—clear disapproval of her progress.

“Anything that you cannot sacrifice pins you.” He spits near her foot. “Makes you predictable, makes you weak.”

Annie doesn't speak, only wipes the sweat on her brow. 

“An animal with a foot caught in a trap does not have time to despair,” he says. “It is too busy trying to survive. And it will sacrifice a part of its body to become free.”

She does not plumb the depths of its meaning until he takes her deeper into the forest, bringing with them a wooden crate roughly the size of a casket. He tells her it was for storing game, but she never realizes that the weight in his eyes had suggested it was for something far more substantial. But she trusts him and follows his lead until the forest turns ominous and unwelcoming. As golden rays of sunset are tailed by the high moon.

They stop in a thicket where the trees grew the tallest, where their immense height drowned noises and cloaked secrets. Her father instructs her to dig a hole under the ground.

Annie does not object. And when she finishes shoveling to a depth that satisfied him, her father takes her by the shoulders.

“Annie,” he says, the urgency in his voice startling her. “Do you remember what I said? In order to survive, we all must sacrifice something.”

She feels his grip tighten, and she tries to shimmy out of his grasp, but he holds on tighter. “If this is the sacrifice, then… then I will bear the guilt.”

He tells her, and it all happens without warning; her father’s hands push her into the crate, and before she can run out, the lid slams in front of her face.

No matter how hard she tried to, Annie couldn’t shut out the memories of how her knuckles bruised on the wood, wailing as she feels the sensation of being lowered underground, realizing that she was just sentenced to be locked in an hourglass, doomed to watch the sand pile up from the wrong end.

As the hours slipped away, as her endless screaming consumed what remaining air there was left, Annie is on the precipice of slipping from the world, away from this awful limbo, but before she could succumb to the inviting notion of permanent slumber, she thinks of the story her father told her of how she came into his life; a baby left in the sidewalks by her mother, an unwanted by-product of a reckless affair, a sacrifice so her Marleyan status could be left undisturbed. 

She thinks of how the people in her life who were supposed to raise her and protect her could abandon her so easily. 

And perhaps she deserved it.

Her father once told her in quasi-religious fervor that guilt is carried on and passed over generations until atonement has been paid. And perhaps that is Annie—the literal embodiment of what people do with their guilt—abandoned on the sidewalks, buried underground, forced to be one with something as indiscriminate as earth and soil. 

But the hollowness of her breath against the tight space, the crest and fall of her chest meant that she's alive now, respiring and taking up space.

These confinements belonged to dead people, and Annie is far from them. Annie isn't a coward. Not like her mother, who had left her simply because she was too afraid to deal with the consequences. Not like her father, who became a tormentor because he knew fear and how to dominate through it. 

It's there that her resentment started building up to her neck until she was immensely flooded with intense, visceral anger, the kind that could burst through the smallest crevice, tide over the landscape, and drown any hapless soul to cross it just as mercilessly as water. 

That night, Annie corrals every ounce of strength in her arm to break the casket, punching exactly one spot, bloodying her knuckles, but her rage drowns out the sting. That night, she digs through dirt with spite in her teeth and vendetta through her bones, emerges from the soil, and is met with a thunderous sky and torrential rain on her face, as if the water had meant to baptize her in her ascent. But the loudest is the roar of her own heartbeat.

She arrives back home to haunt her father’s presence as an unburied corpse.

When Annie slams the door open, she makes sure it is with a force so hard it bounces back against the wall and leaves it idling swinging from the hinges in her wake.

And there she finds her father, sitting by the dinner table, with an expression she can’t read, and oh did she try desperately to glean something from his eyes—whether it's joy that she’s alive, disappointment that she didn’t come back sooner—anything that could let her know he had an ounce of a soul within him. Something that could feel. 

For the first time, Annie walks up to her father, takes his hands, and demands why, no, how on earth he could do this to his only daughter, how he's so desperate for her to become a Warrior that he would sacrifice being a father.

But instead of speaking, he answers her with a slap that knocks her off her balance, a red, stinging handprint left on the side of her cheek.

And Annie doesn't know what comes over her; the full spectrum of feelings she once locked away starts simmering in all waves. All the pain, outrage, hate, vengeance, and confusion started to gather in all the points of her body that she had trained to kill with. For many years, any form of catharsis, even a single tear, was cause for more severe abuse. But now she had been buried underground far too long.

Annie sweeps her father’s legs and doesn’t give him the respite to get up on his feet. No, she attacks him with a tenacity she had never felt before, with the missing rage in all her training sessions. Just as she concentrated on one bloody knuckle to weaken one spot in the casket, she directs all her damaging kicks to one point of her father’s body: to make it so that he could never walk again to the place he buried her.

When she stops kicking him, he shrivels up like a newborn, holding his leg to his chest. Except it didn’t look like he's drowning in pain; his smile stretches all the way to his ear.

“Now you can kill your enemies even when you’re unarmed,” he rasps, a shuddering laugh breaking in between. “You’ve become exactly what I trained you to be.”

Except in that insidious half-truth, her father never taught her to become cold-hearted; it's what she became in the gaps of his parenting, in the punishments he thought she deserved, in the loving conversations they never had.

Still, it always came back to this: why did she want to come back to him? Annie thought back to the morning she left, and wondered why that one instance of him showing that he finally cared trumped all the other times he had mistreated her. Was it hope that he would change as a father? Or desperation that she could be a daughter to him? Like grass on top of asphalt, like the slightest lining of the most tarnished silver, Annie held onto that thought.

It was possible. And possible was enough.  

Something wakes Annie from her nightmare. She hears the hinges of the gate creaking, the sound reverberating not unlike a piercing scream.

What time was it? She’s not sure if it has been an eternity or a few hours. Her only form of dead reckoning the passage of time was the riling hunger in her stomach and the growing parchedness of her throat.

Annie lets her head stay flat on the cold cement, raking in the sound of blood in her ears and footsteps of something approaching, which she had initially mistaken for the faint pulse of her heartbeat.

“Annie?”

She freezes, recognizing the owner of the voice by the soft inflection, the tender intonation. But despite the warmth of it, her blood boils hot; any favorable temperament she had towards him was dampened by the likelihood of another betrayal, another deception. Annie considers that perhaps Armin is there to suss out what she must have heard, so she keeps her mouth sealed. Whatever secrets are spilling out, it will not be hers. 

“I… I’m not here to make an excuse for what I did—or didn’t do .”  

His voice is nervous and cracking. 

“But I just—I had to see you. Annie. If you hate me, you have every right to. But, you shouldn't be starving.”

The next thing Annie hears is the sound of a metal flap being lifted, and it sends a beam of brightness that lands across Annie’s eyes. She sees Armin’s hands slide across the floor a tray laden with a small flask of water and assorted nutritional supplements that were small enough to sneak around with.

Despite the temptation, however, she doesn’t give in so easily; after all, even her father prepared her guts during times of hunger. 

But Armin stays anchored there, for quite some time, as though waiting for the sound of her chewing. And at first, he talks about trivial things, like how he managed to get inside in the first place. He chronicles that it wasn’t that hard to slip past the Marleyans during their rotational shifts. 

“Falco helped me by distracting them. After he learned where you went, he came up with the plan after his brother Colt did the same thing for him when he was in the isolation room.”

So that’s how Falco survived. Annie thinks about that boy with inexplicable fondness. Despite her vow to steer clear of any attachment, she knows in her heart she would hate to see him die in the arena.

Why is he telling her this? Does he assume that the mention of Falco would let her guard down? 

“You’re both a lot alike, you know. To be honest, when I saw you on broadcast for the first time, you seemed easy to figure out. Indifferent. Defiant."

Annie feels her face contort in confusion and wonders if the visit is meant to extort something out of her. Absent the willingness to reply and figure it out herself, she would have to let him speak.

“And when I finally saw you in person, you were quiet. Distant. I wasn’t sure we’d get along. But when I spoke to you about your ring, when I saw the way you trained with Falco, I had to figure you out again. You were also kind, loyal, and genuine.”

As Armin naturally spells out a cache of positive adjectives—things Annie had never heard referred to herself before—she feels her stomach flip, like waves crashing against the caverns of her ribcage. 

“And I don’t blame you if you only see me as one thing now.”

There is silence for what seemed like an infinite stretch of time. And before she knows it, Armin has left, only hearing him erase the evidence of his break-in with a lock of the door. 

When Annie thinks it was the last time she’d see him, he proves her wrong each time he comes back with a tray of provisions. And soon after refusing, Annie ultimately decides that providing adequate sustenance to herself would be the wiser move. 

But she still remains wary and vigilant; perhaps he intends to use these gracious gestures as a smokescreen for his grander schemes, as a gradual unspooling of her defenses if he seemingly lets down his. One would marvel at his persistence in coming down here, at the risk of his own neck, but Annie isn’t convinced that he would waste time he could have spent training for providing food for someone who wouldn’t speak back.

But just as he willingly gave her ring back with no conditions, Armin doesn’t ask for anything in return, doesn’t pry for the sake of prying. Instead, Armin comes to tell stories.

Initially, Annie only listens in on the likely moment he spills something that would explain his interactions with Mikasa and Eren. But that topic never comes up, and soon enough, Annie forgets about it too.

How it begins: in his next visit, Armin informs her that, without her presence, some of the candidates have been flaunting much more in bluster and bravado.

“Reiner dropped the weight on his toes while deadlifting.” His tone is rife with flippancy, despite the plight of the candidate. “I just thought you’d like to know, given your friendship with him.”

Annie exhales sharply through her nose before she realizes what she’s done.

The reaction probably startled Armin because it took him a while to address. “Did… did you just laugh?” he asks with disbelief. Still, Annie gives him no answer.

Yet, she eventually discovers that she had come to depend on the comforting cadence of his voice, and she subconsciously learned to exercise the awareness of his presence like a muscle. Perhaps she will simply appreciate his company for the structure it provided, and for the rhythm it gave her for reflecting on the passage of time. 

For each lull in time where Armin isn’t there, where his voice doesn’t overlap the haunting ones in her head, Annie finds herself slipping into a nightmare—back into that wooden crate. And she would remember the tiniest, horrific details that had been shoved so deep in the ravines of her mind. 

She would remember the insects that crawled against her neck, the ones that slipped into her mouth when she was gasping for air. 

She would experience dreams where she finds herself drowning. But come the ripples of Armin’s footsteps, Annie realizes that she is simply floating in water. Where Annie couldn’t distinguish reality from a dream, it is Armin’s voice that anchors her back to the material world. And it is in his generous abundance of narratives that he starves her nightmares, so much so that they’re too far away to hurt her.

Annie does not acknowledge the pattern; only that she looked forward to hearing him again. Even if the flow of his stories is not linear or structured. His anecdotes branched out in the sinuous way a tree grows leaves, with his many extended narratives as rich and vivid in substance despite their triviality. And he always pondered as though he was experiencing a new revelation in each recollection.

“I miss seeing the sunset. I thought about it after you spoke to me about your ring,” he tells her once. “There’s this big tree where I used to live. And during the sunset, it would light up the tree like it's on fire. Every day, I’d race with my friends there. And every day since, I always look back on it. Like it was the only moment in time that mattered. Like sometimes, when you stand on the edge of a bridge and watch the river flow slowly past you, it feels like you suddenly know everything there is to be known.

I thought the same thing a few days later, reading a book on a rainy day. And when I gave a squirrel some nuts and it ate them. Maybe the reason I was born was so that I could run to that tree. That very day.”

And it’s these images that keep Annie from spiraling, keep her wondering how Armin could still view the cruel world she knew in awe and wonder, how, despite the hundredfold tragedies it gives, he puts much more weight in the smallest miracle he discovers. He speaks about a connection with the world with the lightness of a leaf, in stark contrast to Annie ,who constantly carries with her the weight of a coffin.

But even with Armin’s stories, it doesn’t stop the inevitability of Annie’s slowly fraying mind; the remaining vestiges of her sanity are being stretched far too thin that even the slightest trigger could be a catalyst for a meltdown.

Armin makes a passing comment that it is the third day of Annie’s confinement, but something about enduring this hellhole for another seventy-two more hours makes Annie teeter on the edge of emotional collapse. Whatever slim hold she had of her body is rapidly eroding; her hands clawing to pull her hair, nails digging into her skin—all in a maniacal drive to inflict pain. And when her restlessness has moved on from her body, Annie starts scrabbling at her own surroundings, scratching the metal surfaces, and punching the wall in futile anguish. But there is no dirt to dig through, no crevice to escape in. 

She wouldn’t last here, not another day. Annie hears a thousand voices screaming before realizing it’s all her own.

“Annie!” 

Armin must have heard her slamming her body against the wall, banging her head to the point of near unconsciousness. “Please stop! Please! You’ll hurt yourself!”

But no gesture could comfort Annie overcome with emotions she was ill-prepared to handle.

She could barely hear his voice over the cacophony of her own, but Armin is persistent. “I’ll make this right, Annie. I swear. Just hold on a little bit longer.”

And soon, Armin’s hurried footsteps fade from earshot, and like the eye of a storm that passes over briefly, even the worst of Annie’s most pervasive episode soon flatlines into quiet, bracing breaths. In the aftermath of her raging tempest, what ultimately remains is the little debris of grief—the wooden splinters of the crate she was never really able to leave. 

Annie is lying down, tired and fading, bitterly wishing she could leave her body in a way that didn’t hurt. 

Then, she stirs at the sound of Marleyan soldiers afoot, their clanking boots pressing hard against the stone stairwell. Annie briefly dreams of being found dead, that the moment they pull the steel doors open, she would vaporize just like a Titan’s corpse, her particles disbanding and dispersing—but free.

Except when the steel doors have paved way for the soft glow of torchlight, Annie feels the heat of it on her skin. Her blood runs towards the warmth, thawing her cold hands. Her eyes had been so accustomed to the darkness that the torch seemed to have the glaring capacity of a supernova, but nothing could tamp down her utter delight in seeing that stream of brightness. The victory feels familiar, like rain on her skin. Annie feels her pulse again. 

But the one thing she couldn’t figure out was why they would let her out so soon.

None of the soldiers bothered giving her the explanation, and perhaps that didn’t matter now. She is free.

Only Annie feels herself gravitating somewhere as soon as she’s escorted out of the underground barracks. There’s only one person lingering in her mind; both the cause for her stay there and the reason she came out alive. She’s not sure what to say to him beyond any present reckoning—but she needs to see him. 

She presses the elevator to the Seventh Floor, and when she steps out into the ghostly hallway, she rushes to his quarters, where she last remembers it. 

Annie is silent as she enters the room, the door creaking slightly on its hinges. It’s there that she finds Mikasa Ackerman sitting near the dinner table with sullen eyes. Armin is nowhere to be found.

When the brunette's gaze lands on her, Annie finds that she can’t read her expression at all, whether it is fear that she’s alive, anger that she is, or something else altogether.

Annie’s voice is low, speaking for the first time. “Where’s Armin?” 

Mikasa doesn’t move; something about it makes her heart drop. 

“He’s right where you left.”

Chapter Text

Act 1

~O~

 “What is a secret? It is much more than knowledge shared with only a few, or perhaps only one another. It is power. It is a bond. It is a sign of deep trust, or the darkest threat possible.”

 — Robin Hobb, Fool's Quest

~O~

“He’s right where you left.” Though Mikasa retained a placid expression, her eyes are cutting. “So if you’ve come to demand an apology, there’s no one in this room you’re getting it from.”

Wrinkles of irritation loom over Annie’s features, clueless at what she must have done to earn such umbrage from Mikasa.

“I’m not—” Annie clears her throat, newly exercising vocal chords that have only been stretched for screaming. “I’m not here to demand an apology. I don’t expect one anyway.”

Mikasa regards her for a moment, attempting to gauge the direction of where this conversation would be leading.

“What I want to know is what you’re hiding.”

The muscles in Mikasa’s jaw noticeably tighten. “And if I refuse. What then?”

Annie didn’t exactly have a plan; there was no way she was planning to escalate this into a direct conflict. She’s not about to spend another three days in the isolation room, so she does what she does best: play her cards right.

“You underestimate me as an ally, just as easily as you overestimate the threat you think I am. If I really had it out for you, I would’ve gone straight to Magath and ratted you all out—Armin, Eren, Yelena. So it’s either we make this more difficult for each other, or—” Annie pauses, internally impressed that three days in mental stasis did not impair her ability to reason. “Or we can both benefit.”

Annie tries to read the subtle expressions of Mikasa, speculating from the most minutiae of cues whether or not she’d consider it. 

“No one would have believed you. And there’s no point telling you about Yelena’s intel,” Mikasa replies, palms flat on the table as if to imply she had nothing up her sleeve. “The information would be useless to you. ”

Annie’s head tilts to the tiniest degree, prompting clarification from Mikasa’s end. The brunette only shakes her head. “It’s too late for you to do anything. We knew from the start what was going to happen, and that’s how we prepared for three weeks—exactly the amount of time they spent watching our every move.”

Annie raises an eyebrow. “...they?” 

“The Gamemakers,” she clarifies. “Watching us through the glass walls in the training center.”

The idea of a hidden entity unearthing her hidden strengths makes the hair on her skin rise. But what would observing their every move lead to?

“You don’t need this intel, Annie. That much I can say,” Mikasa continues, moving deliberately slowly around the rectangular table, stopping short of each corner to tap on the wood with her nails. “It only matters if you have a family to protect. And you’ve made it clear from the beginning. You’re in this alone.”

Annie is dumbfounded, caught in the position of comprehending both too much and too little. And while she couldn’t pinpoint Mikasa’s reasons at their source, there is one thing she managed to derive from the statement, something that slipped in the interim of her accusations.

A family to protect.

Annie’s eyes settle on Mikasa’s with revelation. “You’re not here to win, are you?” 

Mikasa stops leaning against the table and turns her back, as though she didn’t want Annie to read anything that brewed underneath. 

“That day during the broadcast, when you said you volunteered to protect your family. It all makes sense now,” Annie says, an exhale punctuating her disbelief. “Most people volunteer for this because they want to escape something. Maybe they want to live better lives. I guess there are even a few who want to devote themselves to the nation. But you? You didn’t join for some family you had in the zone. You joined to follow someone here.”

Something about the way Annie broached the subject makes Mikasa move with an element of apprehension, judging by the anomalies of her rigid stance—not because she was familiar to her but because she was trained to notice anomalies. 

“I think that’s the difference between you and me, Annie,” Mikasa says, quiet but confrontational. “I’m not just here to save my own skin.”

The word wasn’t spoken, but Annie heard it all the same. It does not, however, trouble her to admit that she’s selfish—it’s a trait she had long come to terms with and a principle that had always aligned with her goals. 

Annie draws a thin breath into her lungs, shoulders shifting as her chest swelled. “I wish we had all decent reasons for coming here. But maybe I’m delusional for thinking nobody lacks a good reason to survive.”

“I don’t care what you’re here for,” Mikasa says, by way of settling the matter. "But remember this: don't make me your enemy.”

She may very well have the posture and bearing fit for a disciplined soldier, but Mikasa’s eyes—cold as sleet—belied a hidden readiness to disregard any trace of humanity if it stood in the way.

“Is that a threat?” Annie says, calm despite the telltale clench of her hands. “That you’ll kill me. The moment you get the chance?”

Mikasa’s eyes, though inscrutably dark, reflect thinly veiled aggression.

“No. That’s a promise.”

There was no other incentive to reply; Mikasa was intentionally callous towards her, intentionally provocative. Annie realizes she would make no inroads if she continued to pursue the discussion.

With no choice, she steps out of the Seventh Zone quarters with one question.

Is Armin Arlert… her singular reason for being here?

Of course.

Annie should have surmised this as much, recalling Mikasa's attuned behavior around Armin since day one: her cloying need to know his whereabouts, if he had eaten, or rested enough between training. She had even gone out of her way to lie for him, to form alliances with the likes of Eren Kruger. 

She had chartered out Mikasa’s motivations—except for Armin who remained unaccounted for. The question still burns in her mind, repeating ad infinitum: what reason could Armin have to take her punishment? 

Kindness? Annie had long held firm to a dogmatic belief that kindness cannot be construed as fundamentally inherent—there is always a motive. 

Guilt? Their fleeting interactions could not have been enough to warrant such a thing, not when they’re involved in a game of survival—there’s no room for remorse. 

Maybe, and probably the most likely, recklessness; Armin taking her place in the isolation room could not have been a discussion he had in agreement with Mikasa. Though it didn’t make sense at the moment, Annie was sure she’d unpack the motive—under the haze of smoke, there is always a fire.

Unable to unearth the roots, Annie leaves the Seventh Zone floor with the banality of Armin’s current predicament putting weight into her footsteps.

The lift chimes to signal her arrival at the Eighth Zone floor; it briefly enters her mind the glaring contrast between Mikasa’s protection for her zonemate and Annie's blatant lack of regard for her own. Mikasa acted as if her own welfare drifted in just the periphery of her mind as if she were fighting for something greater. Annie had tunnel vision, and she didn't care who would be beside her as long as they didn't get in her way.

Annie steps into the quarters she shared with Bertolt, and the space feels different somehow after that harrowing experience. It makes her somewhat reticent to close the door behind her. There is little light to be had, save for the faint overhead lighting in the living room where Annie finds a figure sprawled on the couch.

Bertolt is sleeping, long limbs awkwardly tucked to fit within the length of the furniture. Though she tries to make her way back to her room discreetly, her uncoordinated movements—brought by atrophied reflexes—led her to bump into a table, the plates and porcelain glasses clattering and jolting the tall boy awake.

When his eyes land on Annie standing still in the darkness, his first reaction is to squint, muzzily confused. He lifts his legs off the couch, standing with urgency as though realizing she isn’t a figment of his imagination.

“Annie, I thought the worst had happened," he says, approaching her but keeping at arm’s length, as though a forcefield was constantly in between them. 

“Don't waste your breath,” Annie replies, more hollow.

He bites his lips, then lets it slip free from between his teeth. “I-I wanted to visit. I was going to,” His voice sounded rueful, but the lines at the corners of his eyes were not tight with regret. “but Reiner said he couldn’t risk both of us.”

“Of course,” Annie says, the emphasis blotting an accusatory undertone. “I don’t need to hear more.” 

“I tried to warn you, Annie. I tried to tell you my suspicions about them.”

“You think telling me how untrustworthy people are makes me trust you any more?” 

No amount of throat swallowing could have obscured Bertolt’s increasing discomfort, but he commits himself to the act. “Annie, when will you realize I've always been on your side?”

Something about that thought almost enrages her, dulling her senses, and filling her with something uncontrollable. The world had proved, time and time again, that the more people she had let in, the more betrayal and anguish she reaped. 

She only needed it from one person.  

Maybe it was the flashing memory of her father, maybe it was the quiet rage that Mikasa instilled with her scathing words, maybe it was Bertolt’s asymmetrical understanding of what she had gone through, but something compels Annie to pick up a broken shard of glass and point it at him.

“I don’t need anyone else to look after me.” 

She’s gripping the shard with such force; the serrated edges are pressing against her palm, puncturing her skin with small rivulets of blood.

Bertolt is looking at her with alarm, and Annie doesn’t even realize how much of a distance he had already put between them.

“Annie, put that down,” he says, both palms open.

“You’re not on my side,” Annie hisses. “—I don’t need you on my side.”

As Annie moves around the room, Bertolt mirrors every step—slow, calculative, encircling her like she’s being hunted.

Maybe he saw how sloppy her movements were, how easy it would be to sweep her knees that weren’t in the stance for perfect balance. In a split second, Bertolt plunges forward, grabbing her forearms and driving her to a corner until her back smacks flush against the wall. 

“Annie, s-stop it. They’ll hear.” His hands are gripping both her wrists, digging his thumb into her palm to loosen her bloodied grasp on the glass fragment.

Somewhat predictably, her command of her limbs are not at its optimal, given how much time she had spent in the isolation room. And Bertolt towered her with his height, his shadow looming over hers.

His head bends down.

“Look at me.” His plea was vehement, his breathing a gust of hot air on her skin. “I’m not going to hurt you.” 

But the implication that he could and had the capacity for it only riles her. With the upper half of her body rendered powerless, Annie knees him on the ribs, making Bertolt fold and loosen his grip on her forearms while she shoves him against the floor.

Flung on his back, Bertolt winces, and when he rolls to his side, his shadow on the wall exaggerates and distorts his shape. The dim light of the room makes the shard of glasses surrounding him glint not just on the floor, but on something else jutting out on the point between his shoulder blades.

Annie’s face darkens with horror, realizing what she’d just done.

Suddenly, all traces of her killing rage vanishes in an instant; Annie looks at his side; a shard sticks out, having left a long, slim gash likely from when Bertolt skidded against the floor.

“I didn’t mean to—” Annie is frozen; her eyes are desperate, overcome with the immediate dread of backlash, of a punishment she had only left not too long ago.

The taller boy is lying on his side, grunting in pain, except his eyes aren’t furious; they remained temperate as he looked up at her, arm crossing over his chest to put pressure on his shoulder.

“It’s okay,” he says through gritted teeth. “I won’t tell them, Annie. I won’t tell them. But—” he tries to stand up. “Can you… can you help me?”

Having overcome the hesitation that kept her feet planted on the floor, Annie makes her way to Bertolt with a sense of urgency. 

When his hand reaches out, she allows him to wrap it around her for support as he tries to place his feet under him. Annie’s hands are supporting his chest as she walks him to the couch with brisk agitation and takes it upon herself to find a first-aid kit the moment he is somewhat vertical on the couch. 

There’s an adrenaline shake in Annie’s hands as she props open the kit on the floor and takes out a tube of antiseptic. She comes back to the couch with Bertolt, and notices the beads of sweat plastering the wisps of his hair against the back of his head.

“This might hurt.”

Annie yanks the shard on the area between his shoulder blade without warning, and it makes Bertolt jerk with a strained grunt. Thankfully, the pieces were large enough that they hadn’t been difficult to extract, so she only has to disinfect the area and patch it up. 

“I can’t treat this with your shirt in the way," she informs him, assuming he’d take the appropriate action despite the lack of an imperative in her statement. 

Bertolt swallows, but diligently pulls up the end of his shirt; Annie holds on to the bottom hem until it rides up to the back of his neck, and she notices the way he shudders—not from the cold but by the brush of her fingers.

With a brief sweep of his musculature, thrown into sharp detail by shadows, she begins treating his wound, his tense shoulders easing fractionally. 

“Doesn’t this prove anything—” Bertolt heaves with a sharp groan, muscles twitching underneath her palm as Annie finishes patching up the last layer of adhesive. “—that I’m not here to fight you?” 

He turns to look at her, a complexity of emotion deepening the shadows around his dark eyes and olive complexion. 

Annie’s eyes are stricken; it’s the fact she couldn’t leave, couldn’t walk away to consider it for another stretch of a week. 

Her relationship with Bertolt in its entirety was a wreck and a reckoning in between, always teetering on a tightrope and second-guessing his every step forward just so Annie could take a step back.

“You could be telling the truth,” Annie finally replies. “But you could be lying about your reasons.” 

Bertolt shakes his head with a wince. “But why do the reasons have to matter when we both want the same thing?” He points out. “To get out alive. To return home with honor. ”

The mention of home seemed to evoke mutual understanding that led Bertolt to lay a hand on her shoulder and Annie to accept the gesture, but only so briefly so that the contact would not set a precedent or imply she was comfortable with it.

Instead of addressing his point, her mouth only thins. “I should be grateful that you’re keeping this between us.”

It’s the first time Annie did not lace venom with her words, and by consequence, curiosity blooms in Bertolt’s eyes, as though searching for a trace of tenderness beyond her unflinching gaze. 

“I know you can trust me, Annie. We’re a team now. I’ll—I’ll protect you.”

That night, when Bertolt retreats to his bed, Annie returns to her quarters and lingers awake on her own, reflecting on the mercurial unfolding of events that’s left her feeling everything is spiraling out of control.  

Perhaps constantly imagining Bertolt as the enemy had been more of a disadvantage than she had thought, that in the internal battle of her mind—deciding whether or not he’s out to get her—she had exhausted herself doubly fighting, both the imaginary Bertolt and the real one in front of her. 

When she winds back to her encounter with Mikasa, there was only ever one thing she made clear, that she will never be on the same side as Annie, and pursuing anything of the sort would be futile. Now that the Games were nearer, it was more important than ever to establish lines that shouldn’t be crossed, and alliances that would never work out to any party’s benefit.

The next day arrived, with Annie only having scant hours of sleep under her belt. With only a few days left until the Assessment, Annie decides she needs the most practice, given she must be behind most of the candidates. 

She briefly considers the thought of visiting Armin, that maybe a simple gesture of bringing him provisions would be harmless, but she immediately prunes the idea away. 

Armin has Mikasa, that much was proven, and she lets that undisputed fact puncture any inclination to speak to him.

When Annie arrives at the training facility, the atmosphere has seemingly shifted. Word of her untimely comeuppance must have seeped into the rumor mill of the candidates. 

No matter where she passes by, she could feel the weight of their gazes on her the way a magnifying glass burned an ant. Whether or not it was true that Annie had incited violence with the Sixth and Seventh candidates, no one had bothered to ask the questions that they’d already made assumptions about in their heads.

The consequences of these rumors became much more magnified when she attempted to approach Falco Grice; the moment she came near him, his brother, Colt, took it upon himself to steer his younger brother away from her, and Falco could only spare her a worried glance over his shoulder. 

The proverbial line in the sand. Annie thinks no matter how good of a rapport she and Falco may have formed, she could not blame him for siding with his family. The Games have only bolstered the ties of those related by blood. Such kinship would be a great advantage in the arena; Marcel and Porco’s bond of brotherhood, as well as the magnetic tandem that is Reiner and Gabi, would surely be touted as likely—if not guaranteed—winners.

That is, unless, the Gamemakers had other ways to even the odds. 

Annie winds back to Mikasa’s words. 

It only matters if you have a family to protect.

The worst thing comes to mind. The Gamemakers couldn’t be so vile as to pit family against each other—could they?

Annie shakes her head, realizing that these matters are of little consequence to her, just as Mikasa had pointed out. She can only hope for Falco’s sake, that he and his brother should never find themselves in a situation where surviving meant choosing one over the other.

The following days harden with cold, like last year's loaves of bread. 

On the third day, just shy of the Assessment the next, Annie is exhausting the last leg of workout sessions to help her muscle memory kick back into place—when Armin shows up in the facility, finally released. 

At the very sight of him, Annie thinks the next best move is to avoid him, to shirk away every time he comes near. What would she even say? Distance, to her, is much easier than confrontation.

After finishing her sets, she immediately heads to the lift back to her quarters, slowly piecing together that the training facility—which had once been a welcome distraction—is gradually becoming the bane of her focus.

“Annie?”

She pauses and takes a few strides back, stopping short when her sight falls on Armin’s figure between the wall posts, hidden in what one could consider a blind spot. From the Gamemaker’s view, Annie assumes.

“Armin,” she says, only to indicate recognition.

“I wanted to talk to you. But you kept avoiding me,” he says, pitch low and soft. “Did… did I do something wrong?”

“You and I have nothing to talk about." She casts her gaze sideways, letting her disheveled hair veil her features.

His eyes are traveling down from the bruises on her knuckles to the cut on her palms from last night, newly formed tissue indicated by thin streaks of red. His eyebrows raise to his hairline. “Annie, your hands. Who did this—”  

“What does it matter to you?” she snaps, while reflexively pulling the sleeve over her wrists. “Why do you pretend to care?” 

“No,” he huffs in disbelief. “No, I—” 

“Then what were all the visitations for? Just to keep me company? So I’d thank you and be grateful? So I’d keep my mouth shut?” she outlines, her picking becoming staccato. “Then you took my place too. Like a martyr.” 

She exhales sharply through her nose to convey her exasperation. “Was all of that… to show how much of a good person you are?”

She knows the words would sting, but that’s what she intends. She won’t let Armin play her like a fool.

Balking at her words, Armin steps back, the eagerness in his disposition disappearing—a nearly visible drain from his eyebrows and the line of his shoulders. 

Annie expected the lull that follows, somehow knowing that Armin’s delays to respond right away stemmed from a habit of organizing his thoughts. Of so much introspectivity that it scares Annie just how discerning he is. 

She doesn't expect the reply that follows.

“I… don’t really like that term. A good person, that is.”

He continues when Annie could only imbue his reply with silence. 

“It’s always just a show, isn’t it? A performance for when people are looking. But… I doubt you’d still call me a good person if you knew—if you knew the things I did to get here.” 

Whether he was talking about “here” at the present moment or something else writ-large, the statement had been so sufficiently cryptic. Like a sleight-of-hand where its true meaning can be slipped into a seemingly innocent exchange.

“You’re not giving me any reason to trust you, Armin,” Annie finally admits. 

“That’s the thing, though,” he says, with a flat huff of breath that almost sounded like a nervous chuckle. “I’d rather you don’t trust me, Annie. I’d rather you don’t give me that kind of faith.”

It's here that Annie fails to follow him; trust is the commodity everyone had been exchanging, earning, or exploiting in this game. And here Armin was. Preaching against it.

“When the time comes, once we’re out there in the arena, who knows—I’ll turn into something I’m not,” he says, rubbing his nose against the base of his thumb where it ran into his wrist. “And I-I don’t think I’ll be able to stand anyone looking at me like—like I’m some kind of traitor.”

It isn’t hard for Annie to detect the tenor to his voice, a trembling that reflected only a fraction of his inner struggle. Ever since he had started visiting her in the isolation room, Annie didn’t fail to notice how Armin’s character had begun splitting in front of her. From a timid weakling to a tactical genius. From his seemingly agreeable nature to his hidden rage that incited a fight with Eren. 

Annie thinks a part of him somehow battled with his own philosophies, something that wrestled with his purpose for being here. 

Those who cannot abandon everything, cannot change anything. 

Was it a point he was trying to prove to the world, or to himself? Annie’s not sure what could be interfering with her mental filter, that she could read strangers like Mikasa so well but drew blanks when it came to him.

There are a dozen questions on Annie’s mind, but she decides to ask the most pressing one. The one Mikasa had denied her. Armin could at least give her this peace of mind. 

“I'm sure you know what happens tomorrow,” she begins. “Tell me. Is there any chance that I’d have to fight the boy from the Second Zone?”

“Falco?” Armin’s upper lip stiffens, as though second-guessing if he should withhold it or not. He shakes his head with an edge of sadness. “No. He won’t be your problem. That much I can tell you.”

Looking down at her feet, her sigh of relief comes out much louder than she meant to. “Good. That's good.”

“What about you, Annie?”

When Annie looks up, there’s a line of concentration furrowing between Armin’s eyes.

Armin swallows before taking a step toward her. “Have you already… joined hands with someone?”

Annie doesn’t reply; with Armin barely one pace apart, it’s only now that she can see finer details, like the freckles on his neck, the tip of his ears peeking through the curtain of his hair, and the gentle slope of his nose. His thoughts, though, are larger mysteries left unmapped, uncharted, unreachable, if only by mere proximity.

She is spared from formulating a reply when a taller shadow looms beside her—the newfound presence almost an answer in and of itself, and Annie glimpses the way Armin’s shoulders stiffened at his arrival.

“Annie, I was looking for you,” Bertolt says as he puts himself between them, and Annie finds herself drawing tenuous comparisons: Bertolt’s metallic dark eyes against Armin’s lucid, deep blue gaze. Both with a double edge to their personalities, resembling two sides of the same blade—either just as likely to cut and maim.

“We should head back,” Bertolt tells Annie, glancing sidelong at Armin and then turning away again almost immediately. “Big day tomorrow.”

Annie finds Bertolt’s interruption timely, realizing it’s the excuse she needed to leave without another word. In a moment that lasted only a few seconds but seemed moored in eternity, she takes one last look at Armin—something softer than a glare but firmer than a gaze, but a tight-lipped farewell that signaled the end of whatever it was forming between them. 

Annie turns on her heel to walk away. 

When she steps into the lift, the elevator doors begin to eclipse her view of the training facility, of Armin’s scant, moving figure from afar taking his place right next to Mikasa.

Before the doors came to a full close, a hand jabs in between to pry them open; it belongs to Bertolt, sporting an uneasy smile as he takes his place beside her. 

“What did he want?” he asks the moment the elevator takes off. Annie looks down in quiet recollection.

“He asked about the wound on my palm,” she is silent for a moment. “But I didn’t show him my hand.”

He doesn’t probe further, so they silently retreat back to their shared quarters; Bertolt lingering at the entrance while Annie makes a beeline straight to her room, but she stops just shy of entering to look back at her zonemate.

“Bertolt,” she calls out.

His head whips up immediately, then bobs it awkwardly as though reeling back from the unchecked reaction. “Yes?”

“Could you… really see yourself taking someone else’s life in the arena? After having talked to them, and… everything.”

Bertolt ponders on it for a bit, digging his hands into the loose folds of the sweater at his waist. “There’s no telling what’ll happen in the Games. But when the time comes, if it's what I have to do, then I won’t let anything stand in my way.”

His words drift in her head like a sinking anchor that hasn’t found rock bottom, and Annie takes it with her until she’s lying down on her bed, staring at the ring she retrieved from the hidden folds of her pants. 

She thumbs the hidden blade until it protrudes, and without much afterthought, she pricks herself and examines the thick, fat droplet of blood that oozed from the puncture.

In the split second it took for her to injure herself, thousands of others back home in the zones are also dying of starvation, thirst, and disease. But why should that bother her?

Many people will get hurt, some will get lucky, and there isn’t a rhyme or reason for it. Everything is precisely as her father had instilled in her: all things are the same if ground to the finest powder and filtered through the finest sieve; there is no grain of goodness, no molecule of mercy, no design, no purpose—nothing but cold, pitiless indifference.

Morals and ethics are better left to the armchair generals. Simple soldiers like Annie just want to get home.

Chapter Text

Act 1

~O~

"Indifference... is the strongest force in the universe. It makes everything it touches meaningless. Love and hate don't stand a chance against it. It lets neglect and decay, and monstrous injustice go unchecked. 

It doesn't act, it allows. And that's what gives it so much power.”

Joan D. Vinge, The Snow Queen

~O~

There is no sunlight to announce the dawn, only the slow, approaching footsteps on the front porch. The reckoning Annie almost dreads to confront.

Her father is at the door when it softly creaks open. Where he used to slam doors with careless bluster, he now moves carefully with a limp she had only given him days ago, but would stay with him for the rest of his life.

"You’ve come a long way, Annie," he says, approaching her. Annie doesn’t step back, doesn’t recoil when his hand reaches out to brush the crown of her head lightly.

The tenderness is unfamiliar, but not unwelcome.

“Do you know why I went to such lengths for your training? That no matter how skilled you were, it was never enough," he starts. Annie feels herself flexing her arms and curling her toes in anticipation of a spontaneous fight that never comes. “Until you finally got your revenge on me.”

It’s the memory that makes Annie flinch, recalling in surprise how much devastation her arms and legs held for a child estimated to stand at five feet tall.

“This is what I’ve learned, and what I want to pass on to you. You can teach technique. But you cannot teach heart. You cannot teach the will to survive. Always remember this, Annie. You’ve mastered hand-to-hand combat so you can be two things everywhere and all the time: raw and ready. When you are raw, you are always ready, and when you are ready, you realize you don’t need to be anything else but raw. This way, you can always fight back, even when they’ve taken everything away from you. Even when you’re backed into a corner.

But this also means being prepared to make the world your enemy. So tell me, Annie. Are you ready to do that?” he says. Annie hears a faint knocking on the door that grabs her attention, but her father pulls her face back in his direction. “Are you ready to be indifferent to all? To abandon everything?”

Are you ready?

Annie snaps out of her daze in the shower, the water streaming on the crown of her hair and trickling in front of her face, painting her vision with only the spectacle of water droplets.

She dials the water pressure back, and when the steam in the air clears, she blinks hard at her immediate surroundings to ground her back to where she is; the signature points of polished industrial walls instead of tattered cement, of chromatic and brass fixtures instead of wood, were all indications that she’s no longer home, and captive inside Marleyan walls.

The knock comes once again. “Annie, are you ready?” 

It’s Bertolt’s voice: “The Marleyan soldiers are waiting outside to escort us.”

“Give me a few minutes.”

It takes no less than that for Annie to don their ceremonial dress uniform; a white single-breasted tunic with pale-colored trousers and dark combat boots. Her hand rests on the armband she had just slipped on, lets her fingers run along the interior seams.

They had not worn their bands for an uncommonly long time; had this act been committed inside the internment zones, it would have been a quick death sentence. Annie had almost forgotten how crippling its presence was, not just in the basic amenities they toiled in labor to get, but in the very dignity that was denied them. The bands will always be a persisting symptom that they cannot escape, even by virtue of loyalty as a Warrior. Even if the yellow transitioned to red, the band would still be there, coiled around their bodies like a noose, the only consolation being that their suffering is shorter, thirteen years to be exact.

“I’m ready.”

Annie steps out of the bathroom where Bertolt is waiting for her. 

“Y-you really do take your time in the shower,” Bertolt says, eyes slightly averted, rubbing the back of his neck. He’s dressed up just as formally in the same garb, hair neatly swept back. Then when his gaze lands on her head, his jaw slackens slightly. “Your hair. It’s down.”

Annie grabs a lock of her hair, thumbing it as if it were dirt. “And?”

“W-well, it’s a big event later—for us to be seen and remembered,” Bertolt’s eyes drift slowly from her head to the floor. “Plus, cameras will be everywhere. Maybe you should tie your hair up? Like you always do? It looks nice that way.”

Though Annie didn’t think much of it and could not care less, their recent interactions had her feeling somewhat obliged to comply with his request. Besides, there isn’t much harm in looking presentable—it might even be a determining factor for receiving sponsorships that could very well be their lifeline in the arena.

Perhaps Bertolt is simply looking out for her as well. Annie makes the sweeping gesture of gathering her hair in a few swipes, neatly locking them in a bun. 

Bertolt appears satisfied. “Much better.”

A lull in conversation occurs, and Annie feels as if she has to return an equally observant remark about Bertolt. She notices his back is positioned a lot straighter than before, set parallel against the straight lines of his uniform. 

“Your injury seems healed.”

“Ah,” Bertolt says in a daze, stretching his arms to demonstrate how fluidly he could move again. “I could hardly believe it myself. Their medicine is incredibly advanced. I wish I could take some home.”

Annie briefly thinks about her father’s limp. With the technology she’s seen, it wasn’t too far off that they could heal his legs, or perhaps give him a prosthetic—all of this, however, hinged solely on whether or not she would raise their status as an Honorary Marleyan.

They must keep moving forward.

The moment Annie and Bertolt step out of their rooms, they are escorted each by a Marleyan soldier to the elevator, where pressing the button for the floor back to the world upstairs requires a fingerprint and retina scan.

In a few seconds, they arrive at the ground floor, a dome-like waiting area where Annie witnesses the converging cloud of the candidates all heading towards the center. Chariots being pulled by teams of four horses are arriving at the scene, lining up according to the number-emblazoned banners flung across their sleek, gleaming backs.

Which means Armin and Mikasa will be right in front of them. Annie tries not to turn her head to the side when the blond and brunette figures intensified on her periphery. Instead, she channels her focus on the scene in front of her—the sight of placing Eldians atop such fine, brilliant horses seemed almost too gracious of the Marleyans. That or it reeked of pretense, in the same way a body is embalmed.

“They mean to… parade us?” Annie says, the concept of being lauded by Marleyans as alien as it was disturbing.

“It’s better than having us in chains and walking like slaves to the guillotine, right?” Bertolt offers. “Besides, you heard what Magath said. It’s a chance to show our good side. Who knows, we might even get an Azumabito sponsorship.”

The corner around Annie’s eyes suffuses in confusion. Annie cants her head at how the idea seemingly excited Bertolt. How he seemed so eager to indulge in a kind of feat that only gave them exoneration in the same way a pig is fattened up for slaughter. Something didn’t feel right.

“Bertolt, do you know exactly how they’re going to assess us?”

He thinks about it for a moment. “I’m not sure. Reiner says they could rank us, top to bottom. Leave it for the candidates to cut off the weakest links so that the six strongest would remain.”

The idea seems logical but almost too superficial, given what she knew of Willy Tybur’s antics for thrilling and immersive entertainment. 

Bertolt continues. “You’ll see, Annie. Our connection with the Brauns will pay off. And there they are,” his attention is immediately grabbed by the figures of a bulkier man and an even noisier little girl making their way to the Third Zone chariot. 

For a moment, Annie almost doesn’t recognize Reiner for the gentleness he displayed when it came to Gabi, gingerly lifting her by the waist as she climbs on the carriage. 

When Bertolt leaves her side to make a beeline for Reiner, Annie tries to feign preoccupation by standing next to one of the Eighth Zone horses.

Annie has never seen them up this close before, let alone a well-bred one. The industrial revolution had reduced the need for horses, their numbers declining and limited to being a last resort war transport.

The enormous mare dwarfs Annie’s sinewy figure, but her hands find the courage to brush its curving neck that stretched perfectly into a broad back and hard flank. As she lets the low-pitched whinnies fill the surrounding noise, Annie finds herself deeply struck by its beauty; with its immaculate dark coat and firm legs tapering to slender ankles, it looks much too delicate for war.

A distant noise erupts, something like a stray firework that had gone off before the ceremony, but it’s enough to startle the horse next to her. Annie tries to chide the animal, trying to wrap her arm around its neck, but the nervous tossing of its head quickly escalates to adamant rearing, nearly treading on her heels and disturbing the formation of the other horses next to it.

Already, Annie notices the conniving stares of some of the Marleyan soldiers, keeping a close eye on whether the horse could be pacified. If not kept in control, there was only ever one solution they resorted to that rested on their hip.

The horse is already rearing its legs in the air, pawing the ground, but another pair of footsteps hit her ear before she even realizes who it is.

Armin appears next to her but his eyes are focused on what's in front of him.

She feels the need to tell him that the animal could lethally kick in dangerous proximity, but it’s Armin who instructs her on what to do.

“Annie, step away. Slowly.” 

She follows with hesitation, doubtful if he could do anything—no one in the zones would have ever even seen a horse if they’d never stepped outside the gates.

Then he simply stretches out his hand to reveal sugar cubes stacked high.

“Hey, it’s alright,” he says in a soothing voice, eyes locked on the sanguine black of the horse’s eyes. The mare, after appearing skittish for a moment, quiets down, interest piqued after sensing the sweet treats on his hand. 

Its ears flick curiously back and forth, and when Armin seems to have deemed it safe to interact, he slowly approaches the horse and allows it to feed on his palm.

Annie looks at him inquisitively, keenly observing the way he interacts with the horse, without much afterthought.

“You… seem really good with horses.”

“Oh,” Armin looks up briefly, before returning his gaze to the horse chewing on the stack of cubes in his hand. “I had one. A long time ago.”

When the horse finishes eating, Armin wipes his hands on his trousers, but the gestures extend far too long. He and Annie stare at each other, unknowing of what to make of this distance between them, but Armin doesn’t step any closer. Not this time.

“She should be calm for now,” he adds as if simply to eliminate the gnawing discomfort of silence. “If she gets spooked again, there’s a handful of cubes you can get from their saddle.”

Armin has already turned on his heel before Annie has had a chance to thank him, but that wasn’t at the forefront of her mind.

She has little time to elaborate on the thought; shortly after having arrived, they are immediately rounded off to the chariots like sheep, and Annie climbs up on the chassis and grabs hold of the supportive rods, where the reins for the horses rest. The mare at the far end seems to have calmed down.

The Marleyan escorts give the signal to begin moving. Annie tugs on the reins, and the clink of both the wheels and horse hooves resounds against the architecture of the surrounding walls.

After the chariots before them start moving in succession, Bertolt catches up shortly and climbs on. The horses begin marching at a steady pace, but visibly champing at the bit, eager to break into a canter.

“This is terrifying. It's a good thing we're at the back—I could fall and get trampled to death by these beasts," Bertolt says with a strained smile, constantly looking for balance with the turbulence that the suspension systems failed to absorb. “But at least we’re the lucky few from the Zones who get to see them up close."

Annie nods faintly, confusion mounting, thoughts stirring. “Yes. The lucky few.”

There is excitement brewing in the air as the horses trot in an uphill climb away from the training facility; everyone is mesmerized by the thought of seeing the outside world once again. But it’s not Annie's focus.

The Seventh Zone’s chariot is decked in a chromatic silver that bore Armin and Mikasa’s reflection, and Annie finds herself fixated on the blond's figure.

As if catching her eyes in the reflection, he looks back, lips twitching in what might have very well been an amicable smile of sorts.

Annie shifts her focus away and pretends to be interested in the study of far wall. Something about the incident earlier did not quite add up.

The horses blow their noses hard as Annie pulls their reins, stopping just short of the other chariots that had halted when they arrived at the doorway to the outside world. Already, Annie hears the bustle and screams from behind the massive concrete gates.

Rhythmic drumming ensues, and Annie finds it matches the rapid beating of her heart.

When the doors slide open, that’s when the trumpet blares and an anthem of music erupts, prompting the cacophony of raucous laughter and hoots, and Annie sees the sheer massiveness and density of the crowd-lined streets. The evening sky is ablaze with fireworks and colorful strips of confetti begin to rain down, almost obscuring her view of the First Zone candidates speeding off in their chariot.

The Second Zone candidates follow after an appropriate distance, and it doesn’t take long before Bertolt and Annie eclipse the entrance—Mikasa and Armin are ahead by a few meters. Along the streets, several iterations of the Marleyan flag are hung high: a gilded shell of seven enclaves, representing the seven Titans in possession; six under the Marleyan government’s control, one under the Tybur family.

Before Annie realizes it, the horses have rolled into a quicker gait, her heart thumping along with the cadence of the horse’s hooves as they trot uniformly toward the Marleyan Headquarters. 

“W-we should hold hands.” Bertolt offers with a slight yell against the noise, keeping his eyes on the crowd. “It’ll be good for the cameras. Shows solidarity between us. And also I really might fall off this thing.”

Annie briefly weighs the virtue of such a display against the probable yet only fleeting discomfort she would feel. By her reluctant account, she nods her head, leaving one hand to hold the reins while reaching out with an open palm on the other. Bertolt’s fingertips envelop the back of her hand in a tight grip, his thumb digging into her palm as he raises her arm with a flourish.

The sight of Bertolt’s and Annie’s interlocked hands immediately pulls the attention of the audience. Annie catches sight of multiple versions of themselves on large holovision screens. The audience starts cheering for the Eighth Zone pair, and the chants continue throughout the loop as the chariots circle the Marleyan Headquarters.

In succession, all eight chariots halt as they arrive at the entrance and the music ends with triumph. The only sound left is the uproar of the audience, cheering still as each candidate descends from their chariots and heads towards the stage.

The announcement is not so much a pompous event, but a means to rile tension among the bevy of candidates. Annie surmised much of that when all the Warrior candidates were gathered on stage, with a general impression of caged animals looking to sate their bloodlust.

Willy Tybur appears from a balcony, his figure minuscule from where the candidates stood but his presence is made even larger by the projection of himself on the hologram stretching the length of the pillars of the Marleyan council’s headquarters. Dressed sharply in an elegant black tie, he volleys back cheers and applause from the crowd with the usual swagger and flair in his gestures. 

Something about this made Annie's heart throttle out of her ribcage; the celebration, the grandeur, the needlessly ostentatious way to deliver the results of the Assessment.

An extravagant event must be accompanied by an equally spectacular reveal.

“Tonight,”  he begins—even the flick of his wrist appears like a scripted component of a highly orchestrated play. “Is a revelation. Many of you were surprised by the turn of events in our last broadcast, but let me remind you that the toll of casualties involved in the Great Eldian War had been no less than harrowing.

This is a burden that the Tybur Family holds far too intimately, as it is our distinct role to safeguard the memories of the War Hammer Titan.

It stands as our duty to bear tidings of this grim reminder. That though we live in peace here in our beloved nation, the power of King Fritz still remains. Tens of millions of Titans are locked away on that island, waiting to be unleashed at his behest.

To this day, the only reason we haven’t been trampled is merely a fluke. And it is because of that knowledge, we have devised a means to prevent such an attack from ever happening. To eliminate this threat, our motherland, Marley, will send six covert operatives wielding the Power of the Titans to the Ninth Zone, retrieve both the Attack and Founding Titan, and end the island devils once and for all.

The Warrior Games is a brilliant endeavor by our esteemed military to choose our best soldiers who can perform under the most extreme conditions. Like steel made malleable by fire, our Warriors will be made from the ashes of those who could not best them.

Now the burning question remains: how do we choose who will inherit the Power of the Titans?

It would be so easy to simply put them all in one arena. Have them eliminate each other until the last six remain. But where would the honor be in that? Where would the skill, the strategy, and the entertainment shine?

The mechanics of the Games have been a secret kept from all but our elite Gamemakers. In the past three weeks, our candidates have been fully equipped with the technology and resources necessary to prepare for an undertaking of this magnitude. This is where our Gamemakers have been closely observing their every move—and for good reason.”

The small-scale surprise on Annie’s face is simply residual from the other candidates who had no idea of what was to come, their frantic, darting glances radiate absolute agitation, but she looks over to where Yelena, Eren, Mikasa, and Armin are, intently observing if they will feign any kind of reaction.

They each hold their own facsimile of a battle-hardened expression. But Annie didn’t need the confirmation from them; the fear and certainty Annie feels is bone-deep, like any animal backed into a corner.

“Each of the Nine Titans possesses a distinct trait that gives them their edge. And while the Titans themselves are extraordinary in that regard, it is ultimately the wielder who can command it, who can master its power, that truly makes them the most formidable threat.

It is for that reason that we have decided to pit skill against skill. Power against Power. With careful consideration of each candidate's strengths and abilities, our Gamemakers have astutely classified them according to the Titan they would be best suited to inherit.

And to inherit that Titan, they must be the last one standing.

This is how we ensure the fight will be fair. The odds evened.”

Having one’s death sentence outlined, in a fashion so casual and publicized, made it all the more difficult for Annie to internalize what he meant. What—what did that mean?

She thinks back to the singular clue in Mikasa’s words. It only matters if you have family you’re trying to protect.

Then the meaning clarifies when Annie sees the dawn of horror on the faces of the other candidates—particularly those from the same family: the Galliards, the Brauns, the Grices—all harboring a distinct wave of dread.

The Marleyan audience also hum their own noises of astonishment, but one of enthusiasm and anticipation, instead of sharing the horror that only the candidates intimately knew.

Percussion beats thrummed in thunderous volume, silencing any traces of residual surprise.

“The Cart Titan,” Willy begins after the noise subsides. “The embodiment of endurance. Possessing a higher level of stamina than the other Titans, it is exceptionally well-suited for strategic combat. Although we may equip this Titan with weapons to expand its tactical use, it can not be without a practical wielder to successfully execute the plan. The names we will call forth, therefore, have expertly demonstrated the sound judgment and intelligence necessary to wield this weapon to its full use and potential.”

Annie watches as the spotlight beams on three figures, illuminating the crown of their head in a blinding halo, the shadow under their foreheads obscuring the shock on their faces.

Pieck Finger.

Zofia Soroka.

And Udo Schumacher.

The surrounding candidates shuffle away from them, allowing the beacon of light to shine solely on the chosen figures. Some form of resolve eventually washes over their faces, and they’re able to walk, heading towards the stage and aligning themselves in the silhouette of the Cart Titan.

“Only one of you will remain as the Cart Titan,” Willy says with finality.

Annie sees the lineup was clearly a careful and deliberate decision—Mikasa had been right that the Gamemakers were watching their every move, observing their strengths and weighing them against the similarities of others.

Pieck was an obvious choice for her discerning eye, and for the elaborate traps that had earned her a reputation in the training facility. Zofia, on the other hand, exhibited bouts of genius when she’d solved puzzles within minutes—her ability to recognize patterns must also be indicative of her prowess in analyzing the situation. Udo wasn’t quite the stand-out candidate in terms of systems thinking, but his expertise in medicine made him uniquely qualified.

From what little Annie knew of Pieck, she wondered if she had the capacity to kill two children. Looking at the elder candidate, eyes straight towards the blinding glare of the spotlight, Annie tries to read her.

Does she feel relief that she’s set against what may likely be two easy opponents? Or, if Pieck is truly as intelligent as she’s given credit for, she would be wise to assume that even if they were children, Udo and Zofia cannot be so easily underestimated.

The brightness dims and the silhouette of the Cart Titan fades, only to give way for the outline of the next Titan.

“The Beast Titan,” Willy introduces. “The creature of carnage. In spite of their many differences in shape and ability, there is one thing they have in common, regardless of the animal taken form: their exceptional instincts. The names we will call forth are a reflection of the split-second reflexes that mirror the Beast Titan’s ferocious will.”

Willy holds his tongue as everyone else holds their breath.

Zeke Jaeger.

Yelena Lenkov.

Colt Grice.

Annie’s shoulders stay tense, fearing both Grices would be called. But Falco’s name never came.

She sighs with relief.

At once, all three members pluck themselves away from their zone clusters. Zeke and Yelena were more than prepared, bearing none of the lingering disbelief that had made it difficult for the Cart Titan candidates to walk in the first place. Annie catches sight of Colt looking at his brother, a mix of all kinds of emotions, but ultimately the desire to appear strong for him prevailed in the lines of his face.

The candidates walk towards the shadow of the previous Beast Titan, a human-like body but with a head in the shape of a ram. As soon as their bodies line up, they regard each other carefully as if feeling out a snake in the tall grass.

If the Beast Titan is truly characterized by the instincts that drive them, then Annie finds herself deducing why the choices had been made as they were.

Colt is the clearest of all, driven by the filial instinct to protect his brother. All of his peak performances at the training facility were all instances he had been paired with Falco, the meek boy barely able to keep up deflecting attacks from incoming simulated foes, but his brother’s intervention guaranteed his safety.

Yelena is probably the opposite; self-preservation ultimately fuels her survival instincts. Annie recalls that day during the broadcast that Yelena wanted to be remembered. Since then, she had been carefully securing her place among the most skilled candidates, using her superior knife-throwing abilities to hit the bull’s eye and command attention.

Meanwhile, Annie could not posit what it was that had led the Gamemakers to choose Zeke Jaeger. Just as she used Yelena’s broadcast answer as a portal to her psyche, she thinks of Zeke’s; that he longed to ensure their precious sacrifices would bear fruit. 

At the heart of his words lay an unwavering belief, an ideology. Fueled by purpose. 

In the end, Annie only has a scant history to rely on; there may be something amiss in her sparse appraisal of Zeke. It's clear that she knows little of her adversaries, a deficiency she is determined to fill. 

Now that the names are narrowing, her eyes land on the rest of the candidates, speculating the possibilities. Her attention is drawn to Marcel and Porco, eyes wide, senses on high alert.

Willy’s smile was sinister, baring teeth. “The Jaw Titan. The apex of agility. Its compact size makes it the swiftest of all, and with its powerful claws and jaws that can crush anything with devastating efficiency, this Titan is truly a force to be reckoned with. The names we will call forth have proven to be adept at both speed and grit: necessities for harnessing this Titan.”

Marcel Galliard.

Porco Galliard.

The gasps underlying applause could not be missed. The brothers had almost been too dazed to move, frozen as if someone had nailed the blades of their feet to the floor with a crux.

Willy Tybur calls their name once more.

It’s Marcel who moves first. His distress, if not as palpable as his brother’s, is still visible. Annie sees his hand cupped against his brother’s back, nudging him forward.

There’s a stiffness to Porco’s body, adamantly planted on the floor as if he could not be moved if a Titan threatened to flatten him. But Willy’s command is absolute, and such things transpired whether they were desired or not.

Marcel and Porco eventually make their way up the stage. They glance at each other, realizing the dual strength they had been leveraging now became the double edge of a knife. 

Behind them, the silhouette of the Jaw Titan takes an ominous shape.

Willy straightens his posture, his expression stiffening after Porco’s seeming reluctance to cooperate.

“The Armored Titan,” he continues without missing a beat, with little regard for the chaos that was to come. “The ward of warfare. Built to withstand heavy damage with its all-encompassing layer of plated armor, this Titan is not just a formidable defender; it ensures there is no wall that won’t crumble with its bludgeoning impact. The names we will call forth have demonstrated a spirit as unrelenting as its hide.”

This time, Annie knew precisely the candidates that reflected this Titan best.

Reiner Braun.

Gabi Braun.

Eren Kruger.

Even from afar, Annie could not miss Reiner’s twitching jaw, eyes struck with a rictus of horror.

Gabi looks only to Reiner, something in her expression shed away the adult soldier she was quickly forced to become and was left with only the lost eyes of a child, unable to think for herself. 

Reiner could not even reciprocate her eye contact, as though afraid he could not offer comfort for her in the way he himself needed.

Meanwhile, Eren's expression is only that of a soldier who has been through more wars than one should.

When they take to the stage in the silhouette of the Armored Titan, the weight of the consequences already bore on their shoulders before the battle even began. But despite it all, it is the very concept of pitting families against each other that sums up the monstrosity of the Games.

When Annie’s attention is pulled back to Willy, it dawns on her that there are only two Titans and five candidates left. And her name still wasn’t called.

Annie’s eyes land on Mikasa standing a few feet away, her words ringing in her ear. 

Do not make me your enemy.

“The Female Titan,” Willy begins with a bit more vibrance to his voice. “The vanguard of versatility. An all-purpose unit, capable in every area with exceptionally high mobility and endurance—this Titan can only be wielded by the most adaptable of individuals. The names we will call forth possess extraordinary power and talent, unlike anything we’ve seen before.”

Mikasa’s saturated dark eyes pierce through her. Annie returns it just as brazenly.

Annie Leonhart.

Mikasa Ackerman.

And no one else. 

Up till this point, Annie had predicted that her rivalry with Mikasa would somehow manifest itself much later in the arena. She did not anticipate the immediacy of its incipience nor the staggering revelation by which it had been presented. 

But Annie is raw. Annie is ready to make it between her and Mikasa.

Both women move where the light designates them to be. Both fluid, cold, expressions almost utterly blank. 

Not even the resounding cheer and excitement of the crowd bothered them. 

Annie almost tunes out the succeeding spiel of Willy Tybur making the final reveal.

“The Colossal Titan. The deliverer of damnation. With its immense height and power, the destruction it can unleash cannot be understated. But the strength needed to wield this Titan lies not in the ability to destroy, but in the calculated art of control. The names we will call forth have demonstrated mastery in leveraging the resources at their disposal, in refining even the tiniest details with which to further a grander, more colossal outcome.”

Annie knew two names of which to expect, names that had spent the past few weeks in the training facility not engaging in destructive methods but in craft and invention. Both names a clear illustration of these inane attributes that seemed trivial in isolation but became the ethos by which The Colossal Titan had been renowned.

Bertolt Hoover

Armin Arlert

But there is one name Annie forgets.

And Falco Grice.

A shadow falls across the stage for what feels like an eternity before the light illuminates the last remaining candidates. 

But Annie looks away and refuses to let her attention linger. Between the only ally she had just aligned with, the enemy who had saved her on multiple accounts, and the innocent one she least wanted to see killed, Annie is certain of only one thing. 

She could not be indifferent this time.

Chapter Text

Act 1

~O~

“...for the monsters, for those who fear the monsters, for those who fear to know they are the monsters, for those who know to fear they are the monsters...” 

Phillip Andrew Bennett Low, Monsters in a Mirror: Strange Tales from the Chapel Perilous

~O~

The situation at hand is eerily familiar to Annie.

The candidates are all positioned in a ring, a manner in what one might deem to be a post-processing of the Assessment. However, just like the announcement from day one, it isn’t quite so much a processing as it is a forced acceptance of the inevitable.

This time, there are no walls of translucent glass to stop them from coming at each other’s throats. 

The first to speak up, is Porco. 

“They can’t do this to us,” he says, forehead scrunched in thin, firm lines. “Does anybody else not see how insane this is?”

“A few weeks earlier, you seemed hardly unbothered by the concept of the Games,” Yelena observes. “You had been, at one point, even willing to participate. Eagerly, if I may add. Now that the scales have tipped to your inconvenience, you would voice your grievances?”

“I wouldn’t call killing my own brother an ‘inconvenience,’” Porco issues with a snarl, surging forward but halted only by the firm press of Marcel’s hand on his shoulder. 

“Calm down,” his brother warns, glancing at the walls around them. “We don’t know for sure if this is being recorded.” Marcel gives him one hardened look, and Porco releases his fury with a hoarse whisper of fine!

“This can’t be the only way, can it?” Falco says not long after, as though empathizing with Porco. Annie doesn’t think he’s asking for the sake of his own situation—he never seems to look out for himself as much as his brother does.  “There’s no way we can talk nicely to them and convince them?”

“I’m afraid there’s not much else we can do to convince them, little one,” Yelena says, approaching him with a finality that seemed less comforting and more provoking. At this, Colt stops leaning against the wall, putting himself in between Yelena and his younger brother.

“Is that your way of saying you have no problem killing me?” Colt says, pulling Falco away from Yelena.

“The opposite cannot be more true—” Yelena places a palm on her chest, with such grace and aplomb that it triggers Annie’s analytical red flags. “It is simply in my best interest to move this discussion forward to a subject more fruitful. Dwelling on consequences beyond our control is illogical.”

Annie spots Marcel visibly stiffening at her curt reply. “Yeah, because logic’s exactly what we need right now,” he says. “What we need is a bit of empathy.”

“What we need—” Pieck intervenes, squatting beside Udo and Zofia who seem permanently moored on the floor. “—is a plan. Find out what the Marleyans want out of this interview.”

A space of silence followed, an opportunity to internalize, but the insanity of the situation was as hard to grasp as the consequences were difficult to stomach. For them to whittle down such a gruesome picture to a mere entertainment program made it all the more diabolical.

It’s Zeke who breaks the silence. “There’s only one thing they want to see from us.”

When no one objects to Zeke taking over the discussion, he clears his throat. “Bias confirmation,” he says simply. “There’s nothing they love more than to see us for the devils they think we are. To see that we genuinely want to kill each other.”

Colt almost laughs. “Oh, the feeling is genuine, alright.”

“Okay, let’s back it up a notch,” Pieck says, attempting on a new vein of conversation. “Zeke, what can we do?”

“Yes, Boy Wonder. What can we do?” Colt adds, tone dripping with mockery. 

Zeke grins, the glaring obviousness lost on the rest of the candidates. “What we can do, is resist the urge to give them what they want. Show them we’re not the devils they think us to be. That we won’t simply jump to kill each other. That we are still rational, reasonable human beings.”

Something about the way Zeke had control of the frame unnerves Annie. He knew exactly what to say to corral the candidates into a common goal. But the strategy reveals a deep misunderstanding; they are gravely underestimating the prejudice of the Marleyans and grossly overestimating the impact of their own resistance. 

There will always be people consumed with calling someone else a devil, always looking for them in others because they have proven—time and time again—that they exist in themselves.

The ceasefire is momentarily interrupted by Reiner grabbing something on his arm, and holding on to the very symbol of the Marleyan’s puppetry. “That’s it. I’m taking this armband off.”

“No!” Gabi screams in frantic protest, clutching the band tightly so it stays on his arm. “Put it back before they see you!”

Reiner jerks his elbow away, hazel eyes turning cold. “Why would you still want to wear this?” He grabs her by her arms as if to shake her free of nonsense. “After everything they’re making us do? Why?!”

Gabi closes her eyes, the act squeezing tears that run down her cheeks.

“Because we’re good Eldians!” She screams in religious devotion, and Reiner lets his grip on her loosen as she falls to her knees. 

“What are we if we don’t have this?” She tearfully asks of Reiner, then of the candidates staring at her, before scowling at her hands and the yellow band that came with it. “Take it away, and we’ll look just the same as the devils on that island.”

Reiner can only stand still, ossified into silence, pale with shock.

The thought is astounding to Annie, that Gabi would let a piece of fabric be the arbiter of their worth, a measure of their value. But beneath the misbelief was anguish, and beneath the anguish was a desperate attempt to cling to a comforting axiom. 

She could not blame Gabi for remaining resolute in that belief, after all the chaos that upended her life.

In the absence of dialogue, a shaky, shuddering breath punctuates the air, quickly escalating into fits of laughter.

It’s Eren Kruger, the response a notch above what he usually affords with the pleasure of his rigid company.

“You got anything to share, Kruger?” Reiner instigates once again, just as he did the first day. But the enmity between them is much more prevalent, now that they are both set to claim the Armored Titan. 

“Impressive,” Eren says finally, not looking up. “It’s all impressive—the lies you can tell yourself. Even more impressive: the lies you tend to believe when you’re desperate enough.” He glances at Gabi before returning his attention to Reiner and the rest of the candidates before him.

“You’re all the same animals. Born in a cage, yearning for the cage,” he says with a dismissive wave. “Devils. Island devils. You’ll all end up the same in the end. Crushed to bits. Buried in dirt.”

When he stands up, he holds the bearing of someone of an entirely different disposition. Where he used to carry himself as though he was simply a mere spectator, he is now moving with the express intent of affecting change. Annie catches sight of Mikasa, eyes drawn toward him as if transfixed.

“Th-that’s a cruel thing to say,” Bertolt points out. “We’re not monsters. We don’t behave like those devils.”

“Does a monster cease to be a monster if it stops acting like one?” Armin says, broaching the conversation with the same candor as he demonstrated the first day she saw him in person. “Does it become something else?” 

Bertolt stiffens. “That kind of thinking won’t do anything to help us. We Eldians have to prove ourselves to Marley. It’s always been that way.” He turns to Annie, expression expectant of something like self-sacrifice on her part. “You think the same, don’t you?”

The way Bertolt summoned Annie is expected—the way he summons a third party to support him… is expected. 

Annie has never made her voice known, and perhaps Bertolt assumed that it was synonymous with being agreeable, just like how he is with Reiner.

But Annie is far from it. Every bit of her rage and frustration was channeled into silence, as inconsequential and passive as running water, but just as deadly if allowed to flood. 

"You wanna know what I think?” She says, expression sharpening like shards of glass, with zero intention of assuaging anyone’s guilt, for it was theirs to confront, and theirs alone to resolve. “Marley? Eldia? They can all go to hell.”

There are no soldiers within the vicinity, but the widening of each candidate's eyes was indicative that they feared otherwise. 

Still, Annie continues. “They're all liars. Every single one of them. They only ever think about themselves… but… I’m the same.” 

She fixes Armin with a look, nothing tender like their first encounter, nothing like when he picked up her ring and explained she wasn’t the devil everyone made her out to be. “Maybe I am a heartless monster. But the truth is, I don’t care what I am. I don’t care what they want to see me become. As long as I get back alive.”

It isn't how Annie intended for the night to unfold, but she refuses to appear on the stage. The door slams behind her as she exits, and she doesn’t look back. 

In fact, she’ll gladly become the monster, if it meant that she won’t become the victim of one instead. In truth, it had always been set in stone and engraved in her bones; all those dark days, training sessions, and sleepless nights were all prerequisites to her becoming. 

Annie keeps moving forward in the sinuous hallways, but each room and hallway branched back to a central corridor that was curved enough to indicate the entire hall itself was circular. Like a snaking loop. A repeating pattern.

Even now, the Marleyans are treating them like rats. With the illusion of choice, hundreds of trap doors, yet all routes lead exactly where they want them to go.

“Annie, wait!” Bertolt is catching up, his footsteps a thudding noise as his strides catch up to hers in a few paces. “Come back, please. The-the interviews are almost starting.”

“I’m not going up there. They’ve all probably made up their minds about me anyway since that day I went ballistic on broadcast.”

“Wait,” Bertolt makes the bold move to circle around her until he’s blocking her way. “What if I told you I could help change that?”

“What do you mean?”

“You heard what Zeke said. They’re always looking for some dramatic reveal,” Bertolt says, something simmering in his mind. “I’ll think of something so all that resentment goes somewhere else.”

On someone else, Annie almost hears.

“How will you do that?” She asks.

“I’ll think of something. You know I’ll do anything for you,” he says.

“I’m not asking you to do that.”

“But... we’re allies, right?” he asks, every step forward causing her to take one back. “Do you trust me?”

It’s the fact he dared to lean in closer that startles Annie, standing still in front of her.

Annie is frozen, caught between the tempting urge to push him away but second-guessing the rift it would make between her and her only other ally. 

“Annie,” he says with his usual whispers, but the tone is laced with something else. Just as he leans towards her, his breath a light feathering on the tip of her nose, a noise catches their attention.

With Bertolt obscuring her view, Annie cranes her neck sideways to see Armin, standing in the hallway, the light behind him obscuring his expression. She doesn’t know how long he’s been standing there.

"I'm sorry to interrupt," Armin’s tone is neither apologetic nor regretful, and when his head shifts, the light behind him reveals the way his brows are knitted and heavy over the round shape of his eyes. “The Marleyans are looking for you.”

Bertolt turns around, his height another tool at his disposal. “Are you sure it wasn’t just you snooping around? We were discussing something private.”

“As far as I’m concerned,” Armin squares his shoulders. “Eldians don’t get any privacy.”

“Is that what you like to do?” Bertolt says, with a small-scale growl. “Creep around and show up when you’re least expected?”

Armin holds his gaze. “Only as much as you force yourself where you’re least wanted.”

At this, Bertolt’s reply comes only as an unintelligible sound, his face appearing to puzzle through a mental recollection that corroborated Armin’s observation.

He grudgingly steps away from Annie; the expression on his face is calm despite receiving a substantial blow.

More candidates are starting to pour into the hallways, heading in the direction of the interview stage. Mikasa appears at the far end, calls Armin, and he takes this cue to turn his back on them.

When Armin has walked a good distance ahead, Bertolt shows a visible struggle to keep quiet.

“I think I know just what I have to do,” he manages at last. Annie, not seeing fit to reply, watches as Bertolt rubs his neck, and it would have been a typical gesture, if not for the corrosive anger that now seems imbued into his every word and deed.

Upon lining up, they are eventually sectioned off backstage according to their Titan roster.

If the announcement was but a means to rile tension amongst the candidates, the interviews seem to be the extra pressure on the wound—the twist in the knife. 

The fashion in which the interview was organized forced the competing candidates into one stage, with Willy facilitating the conversations as no one was more fit to do so; the stage is clearly his element, while serving a dual purpose for furthering an agenda.

In a stage set up like a theater, Willy appears from the balcony, waving at the audience and at the cameras, where Annie watches the holovision broadcast with the rest of the candidates backstage. He goes on to emphasize what an important night it was, not just for the candidates. It will be the precedent for future Games, the nascent framework that will be passed on to the children of the Eldians.

In the next frame, he has already descended the balcony and joined Magath onstage, sitting casually on a couch. 

“Exciting! What an exciting event! I’m here tonight with our Head Gamemaker. The genius behind it all. Who better to prepare the soldiers of war than our esteemed general?”

The camera pans to Magath, and Annie doesn’t find herself surprised by the reveal. There had to have been a reason he watched them closely: to learn their dynamics with each other, to understand their strengths and weaknesses. Clearly, to understand which rivalry will drive the best ratings.

“You’ve truly outdone yourself, Magath,” Willy affirms with an enthusiastic shake of his hand. “The stakes are just incredible.”

Magath nods. “The worth of a game is not inherent in the game itself, but rather in the value of that which is put at hazard.” 

“Precisely,” Willy agrees. “So tell me, as the Head Gamemaker, what are you hoping to achieve here?”

“The Games have been designed to subject the candidates to necessary exposures—ones that will prepare the winners for the ultimate mission: retrieving the Attack and Founding Titans.”

“Marvelous! Absolutely marvelous! There’s also a very fascinating little detail that I’d like to discuss with you in secret,” Willy turns to the audience and politely requests them all to avert their attention, which only garnered laughter in response. 

He leans forward to Magath as if to quietly impart the question, despite not making any real effort to lower his voice. “I have been told that you have designed the arena so as to be an exact replica of Paradis Island. Is that true?”

Magath sighs as if on cue. “That was supposed to be classified information, Willy.”

“Oh, please! You know I love spilling secrets!” Willy teases, and Annie is left with the dismal feeling that he will do precisely that with all the candidates. “That’s not even the best part. There, I’ll let you tell the best part.” He makes the motion of zipping his mouth, waiting for Magath to open his.

The general straightens his back. “ Thanks to our superior technology, we have managed to simulate not just the geographic landscape of Paradis down to the very atom, but also their land-dwelling threats: the Pure Titans.”

Magath sweeps a visual on stage, the hologram of barbarous Titans in all varieties and sizes eliciting gasps from the audience. Willy sits forward in amazement. “My, oh my, are they real?”

“As real as their appetite for human flesh,” the general confirms. “They are easily controlled and can be detonated at will. That is made possible by the chips we have installed at the nape of their necks. The very same ones installed in every candidate.”

Annie’s hands instinctively reach to her nape. They must have installed it at the very beginning when they sedated her and brought her to the underground facility.

“Genius. Deliciously genius,” Willy remarks with a thumb to his chin. “So, how can our candidates win?”

“The competition will be a race,” Magath informs him with the projector slide animating a visual rendering of his every sentence. “The arena is divided into three sections, denoted by the Three Walls of Paradis. In the innermost wall, lie the six current holders with the Power of the Titans. There, the candidate should find a serum that can transform them into a Pure Titan, allowing them to consume the current shifter and inherit their power.”

“And suppose all candidates from one Titan roster perish?”

“Then no one will inherit them. They have been classed for a reason, and that cannot be changed.”

“Oh, how unfortunate for those related.” Willy, a picture of solemnity for a moment, breaks into another wide grin almost just as quickly. “This will surely be an event that no one will forget!”

In the next frame, Magath has left the stage, leaving Willy alone once more.

“It’s been three weeks since we last saw these candidates! We all look forward to seeing how they've grown in the time they've been here. Tonight will be their final opportunity to express their thoughts, and our final opportunity to say goodbye to all but six.”

As if being one in solemnity, the stage dims, before the silhouette of the Cart Titan is illuminated. 

The roster for the Cart Titan emerges on stage, the three taking their assigned seats that faced each other and ultimately, Willy, who commenced the interviews.

Though not said explicitly, Willy did not express much hope for Udo and Zofia’s survival. He made a fuss over their young, short lives, though Zofia made sure to point out that with her intellect, she cannot be counted out so easily. 

When it comes to Pieck, It's hard to overstate how charming she is. She talks about her father, in a manner Annie would never talk about hers: in fondness, in a way that didn’t make her chest hurt.

The interviews are only a few minutes long, but that’s enough time for Willy to set up what he wants.

“You want to return to your father, don’t you, Pieck? ” Willy asks. 

Pieck delays her answer discerningly but agrees.

“So you can look at me in the eyes, and tell me you are willing to go to any lengths to reunite with him—including killing?”

Annie would have probably answered yes in a heartbeat, though Willy could not be more obvious, planting words in her mouth, hoping it would sow the prejudice of every Marleyan. But the underlying intent does not go unnoticed by Pieck.

Though caught in the trap of the blinding spotlight, she finds her footing. “The blood doesn’t have to be on my hands,” she replies.

Willy gently places a palm on her, looking at Udo and Zofia. “For their sake, I hope so.”

The Beast Titan roster rolls next on the program, and once seated, Colt spares no time getting straight to the point.

“I’ll get out of here with my brother and secure a Titan to redeem our family name. That’s all that matters, ” he says.

Willy also seems equally intent on cutting to the chase. “Then would you kill Yelena and Zeke to get to your goal?” 

“It’s a big arena,” Colt says by way of explanation. “Perhaps their arrogance could get them killed by Titans and not by me.” 

“And if Yelena or Zeke here killed Falco, would you hunt them down?”  Willy says, the shift as sudden as the subject turned cold.

Colt is visibly disturbed by the idea, though he tries his best to rein in the anger at the very thought. But the invisible threads of paranoia are forming in the depths of his eyes. Willy then proceeds with Yelena and Zeke, who were more than happy to make banter and play up an accommodating angle.

The timer rings, and Willy thanks them for their participation.

With the Jaw Titan roster, Marcel is avoidant on the topic, tiptoeing around the glaring insanity of what he and his brothers have been stacked up against.

“I’m certain you were both shocked by tonight’s Assessment,” Willy tells them.

“Whatever happens, will happen,” Marcel says. “ Whoever gets the Jaw Titan would have earned it.”

“And you feel the same, Porco?” Willy asks.

Porco wordlessly nods, ignoring the attempts at banter by gnawing on his bottom lip as though he sought to hide it from the close-up shot of his face.

Willy’s face twists in a way that implied he wasn’t satisfied.

“That’s all? I’m sure brothers have their fair share of conflict!”

Porco chuckles nervously as Marcel gives him a consenting look. “He can be a little annoying, I'll admit. But what brother isn’t?”

 “Oh,” Willy remarks, completely leaning into a crumb of information. “He’s always been the golden child, isn’t he? Tell me. How does it feel to live in the shadow of a greater sibling?”

Porco doesn’t reply either, and Annie can only surmise that his exceeding silence was a tactical move. However, the topic of conversation was quickly escalating to something from which neither of them could hope to benefit.

“Don’t you ever feel resentment towards him because of that?” Willy presses on, salt on wound. 

From Annie’s perspective, there is no point in responding. Damage had already been done, and Willy had done his job. 

He moves on to the next roster.

Annie watches the Armored Titan candidates march on stage; her attention is drawn to Reiner, waving and smiling as though he had properly jettisoned the baggage he was harboring earlier.

He looked completely different; nothing like the Reiner that was backstage only moments ago, breathing hard, palms being comforted by Gabi’s soothing movements. 

“Tonight must be very emotional for you, Reiner,”  Willy prefaces, but Reiner’s disposition is far from it.

“Not at all, Willy,” he insists. 

“That’s the spirit!”  Willy commends. “Perfect! Just perfect for the Armored Titan, isn’t he, folks?”

The crowd hoots and Reiner placates them with a humble wave.

“And what about you, Gabi? I remember you made quite the impression on your desire to make the island devils pay. I wish we had more youth with your passion!”

“Y-yes. They must be punished for the two-thousand-year war they’ve started… ” Gabi trails off, seemingly distracted by something deeper running in the ravines of her mind. Although clearly in want to please the audience, something about her speech lacked the ferocity and confidence she once carried. “That’s… that’s all I want.”

Willy takes note of Gabi’s disposition, avoiding asking any questions that would only be supplied with a croak and a lull. 

“Tell me, Eren. Do you think you'll get what you want at the end of this?”

“At the end of this, I don’t think I will. I just have to wait long enough.”

“To ‘wait’? Not fight and survive?” he says in disbelief, confused when it ran directly counter to his answer that first day of broadcast: to fight for the world he was born into. Annie remembered it so vividly. 

The suicidal blockhead, she had called him, but perhaps she was wrong to some degree—that maybe he wasn’t simply ready to throw away his life.

“See, you can’t really survive the games,” Eren points out. 

“Why ever not?” asks Willy.

“The only way to survive is to die for a cause,” Eren says, expression vacant. “Cause is the pulse of any struggle; it brings people together, and whether victory is gained or defeat is suffered, cause endures. Where strategy, systems, and leaders may fail, it will not.”

Eren is looking at the camera this time. “In the souls of those who have given their lives, in the hearts of those who will remain, it will always live. And you can never take it away from them. Fight for a cause and your win is… inevitable.”

When he ends, Eren does so with a more pleasant expression except there is an edge to his smile, almost crocodilian-like. 

While Willy never asks him what exactly his cause was—a sensible move for him to ignore it—he thanks him for his inspired speech and wishes him luck on his endeavor. 

“May that cause help you stay alive,” Willy says, by way of closure. He turns his attention back to Reiner. “What about you? You told us in the beginning that the reason you volunteered is that you wanted to do your duty as a soldier. Can you tell us more about that?”

“What’s there to tell, Willy? It’s what I was born for,” Reiner replies.

“Is it… to prove something?” He adjudicates with an edge to his voice, the kind that indicated he was withholding information, only to reveal it at the perfect moment. “To your Marleyan father, perhaps?”

Silence tides over, the revelation as surprising for Annie to hear as it was horrifying for the audience to digest: the trepidation of having an unsuspecting Eldian infiltrate their homes.

“That’s the real reason why you volunteered, isn’t it? I’m telling you, Reiner. Win the games, and you will win his favor. But you can’t get what you want with these two in the way, can you?” He gestures to Gabi and Eren.

Once again, Willy has returned the tense atmosphere back in his thrall, and Annie tries to steel her nerves in anticipation of whatever Willy has prepared for her. But it couldn’t possibly be anything that matters—not when she’s worked up massive efforts to remain invisible, alone, and unbothered for the better part of her life.

Before she has time to elaborate on the thought, the feedback rings with Willy calling on the Female Titan roster. She sees Mikasa on the opposite end unglue herself from the wall, disengaging any form of eye contact.

When she climbs on stage, the light is blinding at first contact and Annie’s heart lodges in her throat. She barely registers Mikasa appearing on the opposite end and in a dream-like state, she feels herself floating towards her on stage, converging in the middle where Willy makes the gesture for them to sit.

After a moment, Annie notices Willy staring at her as if waiting for a response. 

Did he say something?

“What?” She croaks out, and it already earns a few chuckles from the crowd.

“Quite the distracted one, isn’t she?” He says in a jovial tone. “I mentioned that I explicitly remember you saying you volunteered for the hot showers. Do tell us your experience!”

She swallows, throat as dry as ash. “I had no idea water could come from so many directions.”

Chimes of laughter follow, a bigger one this time, though she had no intention of speaking in jest.

“Indeed, well. I’m quite certain it’s why we smell a lot better than you lot in the Zones,” Willy teases. “But in all seriousness, it had caught me by surprise. Your reason could have been anything. For money, fame, or glory. Could have set your sights a little higher,” he says encouragingly.

“I…” Annie is trying to string coherent sentences together. "I guess I didn't think that far ahead. But…“ Annie pauses, eyes squinting thoughtfully. “I thought I’d at least get a good shower.”

Willy is fully committed to his bit of laughing bent over, holding his stomach. “Hilarious! I love this girl!”

The audience joins him, and not long after, he turns to Mikasa.

“Mikasa Ackerman,” he mouths, enunciating her name as though imagining the letters spooled out in front of him. “You know, my sources tell me you’re one of the best fighters on the roster.” He turns to the audience. “In fact, they would even go as far as speculating you’ll get one of the biggest sponsorships in the arena. The famed Azumabitos, perhaps? What do you think of that?”

“I don’t need anyone’s help,” she says, without second thoughts, merely indignant at the suggestion it would matter at all.

“We expect nothing less from you,” Willy agrees good-naturedly. “But let me ask you something. What do you think of going up against Annie Leonhart?”

Mikasa purses her lips. “I don’t… see her as a threat.”

At that moment, she locks eyes with Mikasa, the carefully worded statement stinging.

The timer rings and Annie is mildly surprised they have somehow managed to walk away scat-free—but such generosity transpiring was not characteristic of Willy. Rather than relief, Annie leaves with worry far greater than she came in with. 

The Colossal Titan roster allows her reprieve from ruminating on this.

When Willy turns the spotlight on Falco, he’s much more accommodating—every word of encouragement is also interlaced with pity, as though he’s already dismissing Falco as a real opponent for the very notion that he was still a child. Still, he asks him the question, “Do you think you have a chance of winning?”

“I can be hard to spot,” Falco replies in a brittle tone. “You won’t see me coming, so don’t forget about me just ‘cause I’m a kid.”

“I wouldn’t in a million years,” Willy grabs his small hand and squeezes it encouragingly.

When it's Armin's turn, Annie isn’t surprised to witness his aptitude for public speaking. He grips the audience with funny anecdotes, as well as a verbose litany of how much caffeine he liked to indulge in during his stay. He mentions the impressive technology and how elaborate the operation is in taking the Attack and Founding Titans, without sparing a single word of praise. Truly, if putting up an act was his specialty, he did not disappoint.

“To be frank with you, I really do wish to be part of the mission to infiltrate Paradis,” Armin adds. ”I think it’s beneficial that we try to study them. Understand their ways.”

“What’s there to understand?” Bertolt intervenes, earning an eager sound from Willy. “There’s nothing complicated about them. They’re devils—through and through.” The crowd roars in approval. “ Unless…” He hardens his gaze.  “…you want to label yourself as a sympathizer.”

Falco squirms, the line of his body as curved as his mouth. Annie could see through Bertolt’s ploy: that he intended to malign Armin as an Eldian Restorationist just as easily as he dismissed Falco and his brother. 

Armin adjusts the collar of his uniform in a pedantic move. 

“Well, Bertolt. I believe understanding the devils is a great defense against becoming one,” he replies, and Annie tries to look for the cracks in his deliberately congenial demeanor but finds none, as though it was the one truth he believed in above all else. “When you blame the devil, you fail to recognize the devil within. The devil in all of us.” 

Instead of responding, Bertolt chews the inside of one cheek, smiling as pleasantly as he could manage, but looks away shortly after, as if he did not trust his expression to hold under the spotlight. 

“I think we already managed to bring some heat on stage tonight, folks. If I may just lean into this… ” Willy says suggestively. “…I’ll be honest, and I’m sure this is just speculation. But all three of you seem to have… a common connection.”

Falco, Bertolt, and Armin all appear puzzled at Willy.

“This concerns you, Bertolt, most of all. I don’t think your ally has been completely honest with you, picking her allies and disregarding your wishes. Whether or not that reflects upon her values as a person or your own remains a mystery to me—to all of us.”

Willy turns his head, facing a crowd with disbelieving eyes.

“Oh, you don’t believe me? I think I have some samples ready.”

The holovision footage that Willy sweeps across the stage paints Annie with shock—she should have known there was no way she was walking out of this interview without debilitating consequences.

It’s her in the training facility, splices of footage of when she was teaching Falco hand-to-hand combat, and when he taught her how to make a bow and arrow.

“Isn’t this right after you told her not to make allies with them?” Willy asks Bertolt, whose jaw is slightly hanging.

After getting no response, Willy continues his antics. “And that’s not all, folks. Watch this.”

The next frame, this time, is unfamiliar, but mostly because it was outside of Annie’s purview.

The footage showed a view outside the isolation room. Annie is nowhere to be seen, hidden inside, but Armin is later seen appearing, offering her food, the montage splicing his every visit. 

“She never told you about this either, didn’t she?”

“No,” Bertolt swallows. “She didn’t.”

“Well, I’m very sorry you had to find out this way,” Willy says, without a hint of remorse in his voice. 

A more alarming notion comes forward, that this whole time, the Marleyans knew everything, and that they were being watched everywhere and all the time. Except, they cherry-picked the ones that could fuel the entertainment, the drama. 

The interview ends with the signature outgoing sequence, and Willy closes it with a triumphant declaration of: “And there you have it, ladies and gents. Our Warrior candidates!”

The echo and reverberation of the mic cloud Annie’s hearing; everything feels as if she’s submerged underwater. As she looks up, all the other candidates are staring at her, the way one would watch a firing squad.

Trying to avoid their scrutiny, Annie turns away, only to cross paths with Bertolt, appearing right in front of her, having just descended the stairs backstage.

He stands tall in front of her, a blank stare with wounded eyes.

“All this time, I’ve been trying to help you,” he says. “I trusted you.”

“What do you want me to say?” Annie says, of the opinion that what she never disclosed was not equal to a lie. Discretion isn’t the substance of deceit.

Bertolt’s hand is fidgety, uncurling and rolling into a fist, knuckles whitening. "You're so scared of being misunderstood that you'd rather wrap yourself up in secrets and obscurity than let anyone get close."

A huff of air leaves Annie's nose. "Well, you just have me all figured out, don't you?" She says with an icy bitterness in her voice. "Congratulations. You're the first person who's ever come up with that theory."

Bertolt focuses his reproachful gaze on the floor rather than centering it on Annie. “I don’t think I need your help anymore, Annie. You’ve made that much clear. But you’ll see, I’ll be the last one standing. And not even Armin will get in my way.”

Annie is left speechless at his reply, the gravity of his paranoia pulling him further, miles away from the Bertolt she knew for the past few days—a clear demonstration of what the Assessment had meant to do: their confidence in each other torn asunder until there is no retreat except in the fight or flight responses of their instincts. 

“What about Falco?” She calls after him.

“What about him?” 

“He's just a kid,” Annie says simply, narrowing her eyes, every fiber of her being wanting him to think very carefully about his answer.

Something disturbing passes between Bertolt’s eyes, his sinister intent cracking through his otherwise calm exterior. 

His voice drops low, akin to uttering a promise. “Then I'll take care of him first.”

Bertolt keeps moving forward, but Annie stays anchored where she is—so still that the throng of candidates moving past her almost feel like fleeting apparitions from a dream.

Annie has dreamt of leaving, more than once. The only thing more unthinkable than leaving was staying, and the only thing more impossible than staying was leaving.

After the interviews, they were led to another tower. Unlike the training facility, the skyscraper served an entirely different purpose. A means for enjoyment and recreation, whatever that might be is up to the whim of the candidates. 

Suppose it’s a pitiful gift from the Marleyans. But Annie finds little joy to glean from the festivities they’ve arranged. While some decided to stay and rack some sponsorships, Annie finds herself gravitating towards the rooftop.  

The elevator door opens, and Annie immediately finds a sense of comfort and reprieve. The view of the evening sky is a quarry Annie finds herself privileged to observe.

There is something exhilarating about being so far above the ground, where the skyline offers a perspective that is hard to come by in the small shack she calls home. At that moment, nothing else exists. The moonlight is hers and hers alone.

Annie combs the rest of the rooftop, focusing on the scene and ignoring the statues of the Marleyan Helos in varying poses. Walking made her appreciate the cold hair against her skin, but suddenly, every hair on her body is rising—a sensation often leading to the conclusion that she isn’t alone.

Before Annie could walk any further, she hears two voices, both escalating.

She continues moving to one side of the rooftop, finding the source of the voices growing louder. When she spots the silhouette of two figures, she hides behind one of the statues and lets the shadows obscure her. 

Upon closer view, she recognizes Reiner’s profile, standing on the edge. What led him there, Annie could not figure out, but the question of how, is hardly relevant. 

The other stand-out figure is Armin, holding out his hand. “Reiner, get down! Let’s talk this out!”

Reiner’s jaw is set stubbornly. “You don’t understand.”

“We can do something about it, I promise you!”

“This is all my fault,” Reiner says, his eyes only a chasm of loss so vast. “I wanted to be a hero. I wanted our family to be venerated, so I dragged her with me to this hellhole. How could I be so fucking stupid?”

“And what? You’ll leave Gabi alone to fight Eren? If you feel so bad about it, why don’t you actually help her in the arena? That’s better than standing on the gutter!”

“How could you possibly be sure about that?” Reiner replies, unwavering. “There’s only one way this ends.”

And it is clear. The best solution to Reiner’s inner turmoil was in front of him; the view down—which served only as a spectacle for Annie—seems to be an instrument in Reiner’s plans. 

Eyes squeezed shut, he spreads his arms in preparation.

Instead of further convincing him, Armin runs, a full-body jerk of surprise, and pulls Reiner with a twist of his body, but his footing staggers right on the edge of the wall. The next thing Annie sees is Armin’s body tipping backward, with Reiner reaching for him but the latter is out of reach.

In the blink of an eye, Armin’s silhouette disappears, and she finds her knees caving as Reiner gazes at his hand, empty from an action too late.

In a state of utter confusion, Reiner gathers himself up, disposition miles different from where he was moments ago, and half-runs, half-stumbles on his way out, without even sparing to glance down there to check if Armin survived the fall. 

With Reiner’s escape from the scene, Annie surges forward, running to the edge of the rooftop, but before she could reach it, a blast of a sonic wave knocks her backward. 

Flat on her back, she sees the scenic view—from the cityscape underneath to the sky above—ripple in hexagonal shapes, briefly exposing the metal panels and circuitry before glitching back into a deceptively real panorama.

One moment, there is silence, then the next, Annie sees a figure ricochet back up, and the following sound she hears is a body skidding against the ground next to her—it was Armin, alive and breathing. 

Annie’s eyes widen as if witnessing a ghost come back to life. 

Armin appears just as surprised seeing her, but his attention is much more directed to retrieving the air that got punched out of his lungs.

Annie sits up on her knees. “What... was that?” 

“I think—I think… ” Armin says between frantic gasps for air. “…there’s a forcefield. It— cough! —caught me before my back hit the cement.” Unable to stand up properly, he uses one of the statues near him for ballast. “The Marleyans must have built it as a precaution. If someone tried to kill themselves.”

"No, not that,” Annie says, shaking her head. “Why… did you let yourself take the fall?”

Armin’s eyebrows shoot up to his hairline, surprised at her choice of questioning. "I…I don't know.”

He is silent for a solid thirty seconds before hesitantly elaborating. “Maybe… maybe it's because I thought he had more of a reason to live than I did.”

For days, Annie suspected his ploy to take her place in the isolation room was nothing but a mere act. But the pieces she’s stacked up to label Armin are not adding up.

Like Reiner, it looked as if he wore a mask for so long it became part of his skin, except it’s just as prone to cracking, thanks to every move by the Marleyans that had been a careful, sustained, and continuously renewed effort to break their spirit. 

“Where is he, anyway?” Armin asks.

“He… left the moment he saw you fall.” 

“Right,” Armin exhales with a forceful burst. “No, I understand. He was pretty rattled about tonight. I always thought he was self-absorbed and obnoxious, but… he can be well-meaning. And nice.”

“Letting someone fall to their death… ” Annie starts. “…is in your list of ‘Things Nice People Do’?”

Rather than being affronted by her conclusion, Armin brightens. “No—I mean… ” he trails off, missing the opportunity for a quick-witted repartee, even though he demonstrated a natural talent for it earlier. “You know, it’s your deadpan delivery that really nails your sense of humor.”

“I wasn’t trying to be… humorous,” Annie says with a straight face. 

“There,” Armin jabs a finger in her direction. “You’re a natural.”

Annie does not comprehend Armin’s fixation on her alleged humorous side, downplaying his near-death experience only moments ago. 

She tries to steer it back to the most pressing issue, ignoring his idiosyncrasies. “Did you know about the forcefield?”

Armin shakes his head. “Not that it was down there. But I had a hunch,” he says, wiping his cheek that must have been bruised.

Annie tilts her head towards him, curious. “How’d you figure?”

“Look around you,” his eyes dart around the parts of the rooftop with sources of artificial light. “Every now and then, they flicker… ”

“…like something’s taking up too much energy,” she finishes. 

Armin nods.

“Exactly. I guess no matter how advanced their technology is, there's always going to be a flaw in the system.” Still, something seems to be occupying his mind. “But that’s only one part of the mystery solved. I couldn’t figure out the other thing.”

“That is?” Annie presses.

Armin wrinkles his forehead. “That the Marleyans would go so far as to protect us.”

Immediately, Annie shakes her head. “No, it’s definitely not that.” The notion is so ridiculous that the alternative explanation was so abundantly clear to her, and she almost wonders why it isn’t Armin’s first assumption.

With his intelligence, he couldn’t be that naive. 

“Then why?”

“‘It just shows they own us. They won’t even let someone die on their own terms,” Annie explains, noticing her voice has dropped an octave.

Armin’s face darkens with understanding, and although several of the Helos statues are inanimate in theory, Annie couldn’t help but feel their ashen eyes slanting towards them, following their every move.

She had gone to the rooftop for a haven of solace. Why people would needlessly die without due cause baffles her. But in the grander scheme of things, where being in the Games increasingly meant losing much more than you bargained for—a fall from that height could indeed have been a relishing escape.

But while she has her own hopes of returning home, she’s not taking that leap. Annie’s every stride would be slow, measured, and calculated until the finish line. 

Finally, when it seems as though Armin’s eyes were coming back into focus, he sits up, dusting away dirt on his pants.

“Everyone’s either resting for tomorrow or enjoying their last days,” he says. “So what are you doing here?”

Annie points out that she could say the same for him.

“I couldn’t sleep,” comes Armin’s reply. “I was going to come up here and distract myself … until I found Reiner. I guess tomorrow, he’ll probably be disappointed to know I survived.”

She almost anticipates the look on Reiner's face; the shock of Armin surviving a fall probably will intimidate him even further. He walked back to his quarters so quickly for someone who was so willing to die earlier.

“I think you’ll upset Bertolt more than anyone,” she asserts, addressing the immediate tension that came with it.

“Yep,” Armin says, the chuckle in his voice shrugging off the threat. “He’s a little hard to swallow anyway. Especially when it comes to you.”

Annie makes a sound that resembled a scoff but had no interest in pursuing the topic further. If there was one thing made clear tonight, it was that Bertolt’s interests no longer aligned with hers. Where Annie yearns for the sun that sets home, Bertolt now seems transfixed on the end of the horizon.

“Well, Mikasa’s not that well-meaning to me when it comes to you either,” Annie says. “You should probably go. For all we know, this is being recorded too.”

“Hey, I almost just died,“ Armin points out, as though casually commenting on a shift of the weather. “And that isn’t how I want to end my night. I’m sick of being the punching bag of something we can’t control. Aren’t you?”

Annie’s response this time is less restrained. “Yes.”

At that, his head whips up, cheeks flushed, eyes reflecting the glint of city lights surrounding them. “Then come with me, Annie.”

She hadn’t thought that far ahead. “What?”

“I had some unfinished business before you and Reiner came up here,” he says, footsteps already leading elsewhere. “If you’re looking for a distraction, you can join me.”

Perhaps it’s because Annie is still recuperating from the sequence of today’s events, from the asinine Assessment, the ill-conceived interviews—the weight of it all made any other activity a bargain, a welcomed distraction from her perspective.

"So, are you coming?” Armin prods, walking backward to keep facing her. “I promise we won’t get into any trouble.”

Annie doesn’t answer yes, but walks towards him until her pace matches his—Armin only beams at her agreement.

He starts leading her toward the other side of the rooftop, where she discovers a table that he seems to have set up long before. 

On it, a rectangular board sits open, inlaid with ivory, with beautiful, wooden pieces ebonized so that they always remained glossy and pristine.

Annie thinks it’s exactly what they needed. Something that lets them move their own pieces. Somewhere sacrifice for a greater gain can be possible. A game they could play by their own rules and not by arbitrary ones.

Armin and Annie look at each other. The only question that remained: 

Who will make the first move?

Chapter Text

Act 1

~O~

“Stone walls do not a prison make,

Nor iron bars a cage.”

—Richard Lovelace, To Althea, from Prison

~O~

“Pick,” Armin says simply, holding out both of his enclosed palms.

Annie chooses the one on the right, and Armin reveals a black pawn. 

“Alright, my move.”

Many would consider playing black a disadvantage, but Annie sees the opportunity to adopt a defensive strategy, where she favors slow and methodical moves over aggressive ones.

They both take their seats across from each other, and when Armin puts forth his move, Annie leans forward, bowing her head and entering into her own headspace, like fish to water.

“You seem really serious about a little game,” Armin says.

Little game? Annie hardly thinks so, and would be so bold as to call it an insult to refer to it as such. 

Chess is a game of contradictions and paradox. It is ancient and yet eternally new. Mechanical and yet utterly imaginative. It is confined to a fixed area, and yet infinite in cosmic possibilities. It is a contemplation without meaning, a mathematics that amounts to nothing. It is scarcely fought for prize as it is won for honor.

“Self-taught?” Armin asks.

 Annie frowns. She had always known chess to be a quiet game. 

“Are you going to interrogate me like Willy?" 

“Would you prefer that I earn it?” Armin offers without skipping a beat. “Then how about for every piece I get, I can ask you something? The same goes for you.”

The wager piques her interest just as it raises her suspicions. Annie knows Armin wasn’t just a curious person for the sake of being one. 

But the initial trepidation slowly dissipates into one of guarded curiosity. It wouldn’t be an unwise move to know more about a possible adversary. Anything could be an opening. 

“Fine.”

They move silently at first; the first line of pawns moving across the board is slow and methodical. Then, Armin brings forth his knight, galloping over the pawns and capturing one of Annie’s.

“Who taught you?”

Annie hesitates. The question could very well be about chess, but at the same time cryptic enough to mean everything else.

“My father,” Annie replies, the answer as concise as the question was. As she utters it, she's overcome by the rush of memories. Days of heavy rain and no training. A dining room lit by a single candle overlooking a plain wooden chessboard. And she and her father would play until the wax had reached the bottom of the chamberstick and the light came from dawn. 

Just as often as her father trained her in physical combat, he sharpened her mental acuity in games of strategy, as he was of the opinion that without a sharp mind, one ends up not unlike the flat edge of a hammer—fitter to bruise than to polish.

It took more matches than Annie cared to count to beat her father, thanks to a marginal miscalculation on his part. That’s when she learned it was much easier to make a move once the opponent had a mistake.

Annie captures a pawn and finds herself formulating a question for him. “How long have you known Mikasa?” she starts. 

The question allows Armin some time to ponder his next move. “I’ve known her since we were kids,” he says with a distinct fondness in his voice. “I trust her with anything. My life even.”

Annie presses her lips together and glances up to capture Armin’s eyes. “Must be nice teaming up with your girlfriend.”

“We’re not—” Armin blanches and scooches back in his seat a little, then his expression shifts. Then he starts laughing, the sound of it deep and rich, as if it had been buried too long and had to surface. "No, god, no. Mikasa’s always been one of my best friends.”

Something like reassurance sweeps her thoughts—perhaps it was the clarity he offered about the nature of their relationship. “Could have fooled me,” Annie says, recalling Mikasa’s overbearing behavior whenever she so much as breathed near Armin. 

“Both of us lost family growing up,” Armin says with an edge to his voice. “That's what happens to orphans I guess. We just…stayed close ever since.” 

Back on the chessboard, Armin’s subsequent moves were careful, as though he was also refraining from making an error the longest.

Annie takes this opportunity to get a headstart in taking possession of another pawn.

“What about Eren Kruger?" Before he could deny anything, she presses further. "I can tell you both know each other by the way you pretend you don't."

Armin shifts uncomfortably, and Annie’s not sure if it was because his pieces were rapidly declining. “The truth is, I don’t know him. Not in the way I thought I did.” 

“Still, you’re allies,” Annie asserts.

Instead of advancing his play, Armin castles his king, effectively nestling it deeper amongst his other pieces—a shrewd move in Annie's opinion, perhaps indicative that he was starting to feel cornered. “We are on the same side, if that's how you see it. But… that’s only because we’re teaming up with people who aren’t direct threats to us. It’s not much deeper than that.”

That might be true to some extent. Eren is the most logical choice to put in their arsenal, given he's in direct competition with Reiner.

She wonders, however, that if Armin was truly concerned with his own survival, then it didn't make sense why he had pulled Reiner from the clutches of death a while ago. It would have been one less enemy for Eren.

Armin is still talking. “It's too early to start worrying about each other, though. With the Pure Titans in the arena, I don’t know how we’ll even get past the first Wall.”

“I’m sure you’ll have a plan,” Annie says. The remark produces a compound reaction of both shock and concern from Armin, as if she had just suggested something he did not have the correct response for. “I mean. Just like how you beat the Mimic Room,” she adds.

Annie notes the way Armin somewhat deflates after the clarification, like he was relieved it was something else entirely. How could he discount bringing down Marley’s most sophisticated training equipment?

“So, how did you do it?” Annie asks, with a tone that places more importance on the topic. "The Mimic Room. Did you hack it?"

Armin’s eyes crinkle at the corners, and he points to the chessboard. “Care to trade something first?”

Right, Annie thinks, slightly flushed that their rule escaped her attention long enough to imply that she had gotten lost in the conversation and that she ended up looking more curious than intended. She risks a glance at him, and though Armin was not directly smiling, there was a visible sign of contentment around his blue eyes and in the shape of his mouth, protruding as if to stop from widely grinning.

Annie turns her attention back to the board to assess any opportunity for an extraction. She decides to capture his knight, trading it with another of hers. It may create a vulnerable opening, but it’s nothing she can’t refortify with a few tactical adjustments.

After finishing her move, Armin leans forward, lowering his voice. “Did I hack it? No, I was actually counting on it to work exactly the way they programmed it to," he says, annoyingly vague for that matter. Although she understands that he needs to be cautious, knowing that their conversations are most likely being tapped into. 

“That’s the thing about machines, I guess," he elaborates. "What we usually think is their strength is actually the chink in the armor.”  

She watches as Armin’s white rook transports across to corner her queen. Neither a check nor a checkmate, but it does significantly advance his pieces. 

“Machines lack fear," he continues. "It looks like an advantage but it’s their biggest flaw. See, that’s our edge as humans. Machines can’t improvise well under pressure because you can’t program a fear of death.” 

It's fascinating to watch him talk. Annie can see him visibly trying to organize his mind’s internalized chaos and overlapping theories. “The Pure Titans are like machines too, and in the arena, they won’t be any different. They’re not as desperate as we are to survive. And to surpass monsters like them, we can even be willing to abandon our own humanity.”

“So you do seriously believe that,” Annie says.

“Which one?”

“‘To change anything, you have to… abandon everything,’” Annie says, wincing inwardly as she recalls his statement at the broadcast. 

“Well…” Armin starts. “I think it takes a lot of strength to leave everything you know behind for something you believe in.”

Annie’s face scrunches up on one side, and of course, he seems to pick up on this. 

“You don’t agree,” he says, eyes alight with curiosity. 

“It just sounds like something my father would say,” Annie says, and the fleeting comparison reveals a striking similarity in words made more apparent than before. 

Anything that you cannot sacrifice pins you. Makes you predictable. Makes you weak.

The cityscape lights behind them illuminate Annie's little huff of air, devoid of a reply. It reveals more than her careful neutrality ever would.

“You don’t like talking about him, do you?” Armin says. “Not a question. Just an observation. You’re free to comment on it or not. It’s just—every time you mention him, you get all tensed up.”

Annie hates that his observation had come before her awareness of it; she rolls her shoulders as she would after a workout, a vain effort to cover her distress.

Armin holds up both his hands. “You don’t have to explain. I just kind of figured he’s your real reason for coming here—not for the showers,” he says, unable to restrain a chuckle. “I guess you’re just not as open about how much you love your father the way Pieck is.”

"Love?” Annie almost scoffs, with ice in her voice. “I don't need that kind of relationship with my father."

Armin stalls from saying more, allowing Annie some respite to think about it. To really consider why she still wanted to return to him. It’s not that Pieck’s devotion to her father didn’t resonate with her. It’s that she could not find her feelings for him cemented on a word as trivial as love.

“It’s just—I’ve always found love useless. It cradles you until you can’t support yourself without it. It cripples you when it’s absent. Pain? Now that’s something you can use." Sculpt it. Sharpen it. Wear it cold with bitterness or hot with rage. "It’s what got me this far." 

She thinks briefly of that night when she broke him. How empty his eyes were. "Pain made me strong, and stronger people win.”

When she looks up at Armin, his thick eyebrows have drawn in further, not in place of a frown but rather a display of reflection.

“I guess I never really thought about it that way,” Armin says, as though in disagreement but not discounting the merit of her belief. “Maybe because when I think of the strength I'm looking for, it’s not the kind where you win or lose. I’m not after a wall that prevents outside forces from coming in. What I want is the kind of strength to absorb it. Turn it into something else. Something that helps me understand.”

Annie settles a little more deeply in her chair. The sentiment, admirable. The method, impossible.

“There's no point.” Annie gestures to the yellow material on her arm, the distinction between them and the Marleyans as straightforward as the black and white pieces.

“Maybe there's a chance," he points out. "We've been on their screens a lot more now. The whole world is watching."

"For a spectacle. Not because they think we're worth anything," Annie counters, absentmindedly picking up a spare piece and stabbing the table with it. "We're animals they can poke with sticks as long as they're standing outside the cage. So what do you do?" She drops the pawn, letting it roll on its side. "My father says you get used to it. That way they can't hurt you anymore."

"Is that what he did to you?"

There's an undercurrent of anger in Armin's question, a question that throws Annie off her train of thought.

At this, Armin inclines his head, silent, at the same time his lips are pursed as though fighting the press of more questions in his throat. "The first day of broadcast. You had bruises and cuts all over you."

Annie goes still, remembering the moment she witnessed the footage of herself on the train's hologram and how noticeably scuffed she was. She didn’t know Armin concerned himself with its origins.

Armin's rook scrapes across the board, knocking the dark equivalent of her own piece, forcing a dangerous opening.

"Your father had something to do with it, didn’t he?”

Annie doesn’t reply. She’s assailed by a maelstrom of emotion—a whirlpool of flashbacks, a wave of fear, dread, anxiety. Armin must have noticed this because he starts dialling back.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to pry,” Armin says, the volume of his voice tapering off.

“It's my move,” she says after collecting herself in seconds, though the buzzing is still residual in her fingers as she moves her pieces inconsequentially. Images still swim in her mind: an abandoned baby on the sidewalk, the underground soil. Annie almost tastes dirt in her teeth. 

With the finality of Annie's voice, Armin recedes, nodding thoughtfully as something like regret colors his expression, before making his countermove.

Shocked, Annie stares at his new position with an intensity that could vaporize the chessboard if she willed it. After a series of cautious and logical maneuvers, Armin had poised a sacrifice so ridiculously tactless, she had no idea if he was bluffing—or far more disturbingly: if he was luring her into a trap by guiding her into a false sense of complacency. 

It’s at this point that the game continues in silence.

It is Annie’s move. But for the first time, what was usually achieved by trusting her instincts is met with overthinking; she’s second-guessing, even triple-checking her calculations. 

It takes her a while to respond, realizing she had allowed her pieces to be pinned, stymying any potential for an attack in the future. And the moment Annie hesitantly decides on a move, Armin immediately slashes forward his countermove, either knowing exactly where she meant to go or simply having contingencies in place for every turn he thought she would make. 

His split-second response is throwing her for a loop.

Annie tries her best to feign apathy, but locked in such a complex position, there is a sense of dread that Armin might be seeing something she couldn’t. Coaxing her into a corner she didn’t have visibility of—not until it’s too late.

Annie makes another terse move, and yet again, Armin responds with virility; his confidence like a machine, his moves a calculator, his veins running electricity, and the light behind his eyes a switch that can turn back on and off. 

What ended up on board was a dead-equal position that seemed difficult to convert into victory. 

Thinking the game would still carry on, Annie still produces a response, but it’s Armin’s following decision that leaves her in doubt. 

He calls for a draw.

At first, Annie hesitates with a lingering sense of suspicion, but with the way the game hangs suspended, evenly matched, she decides that a draw is no less honorable than a win, and such is the nature when playing one step behind as the black piece. 

Armin stands and draws himself to his full height. Annie screws her eyes shut with an exasperated sigh—a pronounced disdain for the outcome but at least it hadn’t been a complete loss on her end.

There’s a delay before Annie eventually mirrors his movements and extends her arm over the table, and when her hands fold against Armin’s, she does not anticipate the strength of his grip nor the calluses on his palms. She clearly expected them to be much softer than hers—but the coarseness had clearly been developed over the years by something—whatever it was, it was yet another gap in her knowledge of Armin Arlert’s history.

“That was a good game,” Armin says as he shakes her hand, and there seems to be a particular savvy in the way he said it, knowing full well there are far worse games to play.

She’s about to loosen her grip before Armin holds on tighter, the nudge of his pull surprising Annie as her eyes flick up towards him in faint surprise.

“And Annie?” he carries on, hand still laced with hers, his touch gentle. “I just wanted you to know. I really wish we had met under different circumstances.” The barest hint of despair leaks into both his voice and eyes. "Tonight was nice. I wouldn't have minded doing this more often, you know?"

If not for the exhaustion of playing the game, perhaps Annie would have had the equilibrium to consider the implications of Armin’s parting remark. But she was also lost in thought, caught between the sensation of his firm touch and the intense weight of his blue gaze. 

Annie nods, “I won't go easy next time.”

Armin’s lips twitch in a fleeting smile as he retrieves his hand, but he doesn’t step away. Annie couldn’t help but notice the heat that was radiating off him like a furnace. It wasn’t hot with desperation like Bertolt whenever he came close—Armin’s warmth was soft, like the sunset’s.

“I'm sure you won't,” Armin admits. “Well, good night, Annie.”

Annie watches him leave first with a strange feeling of emptiness.

"Good night," she says, to no one in particular.

As she retreats to her room with only a few hours of darkness left, she still feels a frisson of electricity on her skin, alight with fire left by Armin’s lingering touches. Restless in bed, Annie rolls onto her back, arm flung over her forehead.

In a postmortem of a completed game, she reflects. Plays the pieces over and over in her mind. Runs a thousand simulations of how she could have played it better. Each piece she memorized in her head, embedded in her memory,

Annie could not explain it, but she has this sinking feeling that Armin has other pieces conquered beyond their short-lived game, and perhaps when it really came down to it, he wouldn’t call for a draw—he’ll be executing his checkmate.

As if the sunlight were a signal, Annie’s eyes flicker open, surprised she had drifted off to sleep. But her body immediately slides into wakefulness, into the present—maybe it was the uncertainty of not knowing whether or not this will be her last sunrise. And she should absorb every bit of its radiance as available.

Still, she does not find herself in a state of panic and despair. To do so would only be another nail in the coffin. She intends to be disproportionately calm towards what would have rendered many dysfunctional—that would be an advantage.

She's changing into the standard shift each candidate is required to wear. Even here, Annie takes her time to observe the material of the jacket, anticipating it as a clue of what to expect in the Ninth Zone’s environment. Thanks to a training session with Falco, she identifies that the material of the jacket is thermal. If the Titans don't get to her first, perhaps extreme temperatures will.

In the light of dawn, a glint of silver catches her attention. She thinks for a moment before taking the ring from the bedside table and slipping it into the pocket.

The room is empty when she steps out, and for a moment she's thankful she doesn't have to deal with Bertolt. Ever since the interview, he had been avoiding her with a determination that bordered on childish petulance. 

Annie is escorted by Marleyan guards out of the building and into a long-winding, connecting bridge that leads to a cargo bay, where she finds herself in the midst of bustling activity, of crewmen sorting through their pre-flight checklists and boarding arena-bound candidates in their hovercrafts. 

She had heard the arena was built far from the city’s vicinity—it had been in construction for almost a decade, only having been completed in the last quarter of the previous year. So this is what’s been eating most of their resources and supplies, Annie thinks. They have enough money for the world’s biggest theatrical stage but none to spare for housing.

Annie leaps on board the hovercraft, throws herself onto the fold-out benches, and lets the guards strap her onto the harness. One of them grabs her neck without warning, swiping off the locks of hair at her nape. Annie could not prevent herself from tensing slightly as she feels a sharp stab of pain when the device scans her vitals. 

“Tracker signal verified,” the Marleyan confirms, and it's yet again another reminder that no matter where she runs in the arena, someone up there will make sure she never escapes. 

Just like the train that took her here the first day, the hovercraft moved just as swiftly and silently, leaving no noise for distraction. The windows were also sealed, preventing the candidates from obtaining an aerial view of the arena. Annie thinks the twitching of her hands was more from the engines.

After an interval that feels far too brief, the guard nearest to her depresses a tab on their collar. “Helos Sixteen to Base. Arrival in two-point-five minutes at our current trajectory."

Unintentionally, she hears a faint voice patch through the comm. "The candidate will be escorted by the chief to the rendezvous point. Cease contact at the receiving pad."

At the receiving area, the guards stay behind. Annie descends from the ground level until another train comes to extract her, and the longer and further the ride takes, the more Annie fears how deeply embedded she is into the arena. The windows turn black, indicating they've arrived.

Magath appears when the doors slide open. 

"Leonhart," he greets, hands clasped at his back. "The last one I will be saying my farewells to."

He accompanies her as they stride towards the launch room, and as they walk, he sifts through an itemized list of what to anticipate.

"Expect flat, open ground stretching for miles. Pure Titans will be roaming the area. Do not step off the metal plate until after the gong sounds or the chip in your nape will detonate. Once it’s clear, the first thing you'll need to look for is cover—look for tall trees to set some distance between you and the Titans. If you can make it past that, you'll stand a chance."

“Is this the same advice you give to everyone else?” Annie asks in monotone, but Magath does not acknowledge, which seems to be an answer in itself.

Annie's voice turns gruff. "Must be fun to watch the action from up there."

Magath nods once. "We are all given roles, Leonhart. I know the piece I play in this game. Do you?"

She stiffens, knowing very well which category she belonged to, and the limited mobility associated with it.

"As Head Gamemaker, I must remain impartial." Then Magath's eyes draw level. "But as the chief overseer of the Warrior unit, I will say this: I never wished for anything more than for my soldiers to return home."

The door to the launch room slides open, and Annie steps in, witnessing a cylinder tube on a metal plate that Annie surmises will beam her from underground to the arena.

"Leonhart, there is one more thing," he says. "The ring." 

Annie stills. She could play dumb—pretend she knows nothing or how it got there. But Magath doesn't take action to extract it from her. He turns his back on the door with the heaviness of something unspoken. "Consider this as a countermove from Willy Tybur."

When the hatch opens, Annie feels the blood drain from her head.

“Father?”

At first, she thought it was a ghost, or a hologram created to unhinge her, but when he rushes to embrace her with an iron grip, it dawns on her that he’s real.  

“Do you know why they’ve brought me here?” He says after pulling away to look at her. Her arms are still stiff, frozen in place.

Annie doesn’t know. She’s afraid to know. It’s a far too generous move, letting her see her father. But how could she trust the motives of the very people who knew how to break her?

“Never mind, Annie. I need you to listen to me now. Soon, you shall be landing in the battleground. Make sure you have the right weapons to fight the enemy. Make sure you know them and what they are capable of. Deception is the key. Pretend they have power over you. Break their spirit before breaking them. You are a soldier—”

“Stop,” Annie protests, the barrage of scattered advice disorienting her. "This isn't what I wanted to hear.” 

"You need to listen, Annie. Forewarned is forearmed. What if you've forgotten all that I've taught you?"

In place of a verbal response, Annie pulls out the ring from her pocket, and when she reveals it to her father, there's almost a tinge of tenderness in his grief-stricken expression. 

The face that was usually so stern and abrasive had softened to a degree Annie never thought possible. “You kept it?"

"I did. I did not forget." Annie says, fist closing around it. "As you said, it's a reminder of pain. That pain makes us stronger."

“How right you are,” he affirms, in a way he never did before. “But, I am hearing rumors, Annie. They are starting to think you are not the loyal soldier befitting a Warrior of Marley. That ring is not going to help.”

"They allowed it."

"No," her father says with a violent shake of his head. "They're letting you keep the ring. But I urge you, Annie. Do not use it. As contraband, it represents defiance. Rebellion—the one thing they cannot stand. The more they see you breaking the rules, the harder they will make it for you. The more loopholes they will create to stop you from winning."

“Father—”

"Annie!" Her father says, and for once, Annie senses urgency in both his voice and eyes, as she had never seen before. “Remember what I made you promise me.”

Annie nods. 

"You focus on just that. Nothing else."

Their attention is pulled away by a radio announcement prompting the candidates to step into the plate.

Annie, still shaken by the sudden arrival of her father, unwillingly pries herself away from his arms and slips the ring inside her jacket with a newfound adrenaline shake to her fingers.

"I'll be waiting here," he says, in a voice that sounded like home.

She’s never felt more distant from her father until the moment she steps onto the metal plate, and watches as a translucent cylinder materializes to envelop her. Facing her father, she holds out her palm against the glass, and he returns the gesture.

“I’ll be home soon,” Annie says, even though her father cannot hear her. She waits in anticipation for the metal plate to shoot her up several floors of concrete. But it doesn’t. And it still doesn’t.

The silence is deafening, in a similar way Annie would feel dread in her bones in the coal mine back at home. When all the canaries have stopped singing.

Then, she’s alarmed by the abrupt turn of her father’s head; his eyes suddenly fixed on the door as if he’s hearing the approach of something Annie couldn’t hear.

That's when the door bursts open and four Marleyan soldiers enter the chamber—the pointed end of their metal batons unfurled, and when they smash her father’s head against her enclosure, Annie screams.

Her father coughs against the cement, leaving blood splattered on the floor as they pull him away and drag him to the side.

Stop, stop, stop! Comes her begging, but the soldiers are unbothered—two of them pin her father’s arms while the others take turns beating him with their batons.

Annie is punching and scraping against the carbonate with ferocity, but the material does not bend to her will, does not cave or crack—only allows her to watch as they drag his limp body outside the chamber, as though she was always destined to remain trapped in closed spaces.

Her view of the horrific scene is shrinking, and that’s when Annie feels the metal plates starting to rise. She’s struggling to breathe, heaving hard, her blood drumming in her ears and mind on the brink of collapse. All that’s surrounding her are the black walls of concrete, so Annie tilts her face up and sees the tiny circle of light above, and it looks nothing like redemption—it is a harrowing halo.

The images of her father’s beaten body play ad infinitum, and a thousand questions are bombarding her sanity.

Where are they taking him? Are they still torturing him? Will she see him again?

But why would they do this? So she could turn into the monster they wanted to see? 

No, Annie could fall apart right here. The thought of losing him so devastating she could drift away, pieces of herself just like flotsam, reaching for the remains of a shipwreck. He was her sole reason for winning, and they took him away before the Games even began.

The light above is growing larger as it approaches fast. All at once, her grief morphs into something else as another intensity seeps through. It was the familiar sensation that fueled her when she was once buried underground, rose from the dirt, and found herself reborn. Her lips and cheeks tingle from a sensation like a bolt of electricity, scalding as a father’s slap. 

Annie has been around long enough to know that dark places aren’t locked rooms but tunnels. And the drive she needed to cross it was revenge—the same force that she once unloaded on her father and the same one that she will unleash on Willy Tybur and everyone involved in the Games.

Annie will inherit the Female Titan. And she will trample everyone outside the internment zones as retribution.

She needs to pick her pieces back up.

Focus, Annie. Where are you?

Though it's her own frantic command, it sounds like her father’s voice. Grounding her. Just as he always did before every training.

Where are you? 

The voice is demanding now. Her vision incrementally adjusts to her surroundings. Blue sky. Flat, open ground. Harsh sunlight—unimpeded by clouds or trees—beating down on her head.

Annie draws a deep breath to center herself, and slowly the objects are coming back into focus. 

She’s able to see the other candidates now, scattered throughout the field in equidistant spaces—the nearest to her was a clear threat: Mikasa—but she was at least thirty paces away. She isn’t looking at Annie, though—she’s focused on something else entirely. All the candidates are looking at something else without leaving their metal plates. When Annie draws her line of sight straight ahead, her eyes zero in on a stretch of wall in the far distance.

Where are you?

You are in Paradis, the Ninth Zone.

When the ringing in her ear stops, that’s when she hears the countdown.

“Ten.”

“Nine.”

“Eight.”

Who are you?

You are Annie Leonhart. A Warrior of Marley.

“Seven.”

“Six.”

“Five.”

And what are you?

“Four.”

“Three.”

“Two. “

“One.” 

Raw and ready.

.

.

.

.

.

End of Act 1: Escaping

Next Act: Hiding

Chapter Text

Act 2

~O~

“The trap had teeth.”

George R.R. Martin, A Storm of Swords

~O~

Three.

Two.

One.

OUTSIDE WALL MARIA

The canon's boom heralds death but it ignites every fiber of Annie’s being.

Like a predator in pursuit of game, she cuts straight through the air as if it parted for her. 

The dry-baked earth is unforgiving on her soles, leaving a cloud of dust with every fall of her boots. In the force of her run, she is both wind and wraith—mind blank, reveling in her speed. 

A quick look to her left and she runs faster, seeing Mikasa coming for what seems to be in her direction.

Annie braces herself for a fight, but Mikasa bypasses her entirely and veers off. 

When the fog of dirt thins, it reveals the scuffle of other candidates clashing over scattered supplies. Annie hesitates, the glint of steel weapons is tempting her, but—

The Wall. Get to the Wall.

She glides past bodies coming to blows, hands grappling for bags and weaponry. Distantly, two figures flee the fray.

Falco, in wild leaps, chases his brother Colt across the glade—his frantic strides sweeping and kicking up dirt like prey, sprinting towards the patches of forestry. 

Seeing their reaction, Annie recalibrates: either choose the exposed path towards the Wall or the cover of thickets.

Decision made in the split second, she pivots, wind biting at her cheeks. Driven by primal instinct, she accelerates towards the forest.

It’s not too long when she finds herself running under the canopy of the trees, slowing as she feels her knees buckling under gravity. A glance behind shows a clear path, which was almost worse than it being occupied; maybe something she couldn’t see was gaining on her from behind.

She surveys her surroundings—pines so thick they seem to be edging each other to compete for light. This is safe. But what will be safer is high above ground.

She spots a nearby tree offering a ladder of branches with jagged edges perfect for many hand- and footholds.

Annie doesn’t waste time; she clambers onto the tree, feet securing their place in each stride to the top. Her grip falters but tightens at the sound of distant screams.

After at least a five-meter distance from below, Annie stops climbing and rests her back against the bark. She levers herself carefully upright and lets her legs dangle over the edge to rest.

Then a slight shift alerts her—something like dirt moving in the air currents or rhythmic sounds.

From her perch, Annie spots three figures advancing with caution, their steps muffled by the thick roots underfoot.

They eventually slow to a stop, panting and heaving. Annie lowers herself by a branch, trying to both distinguish their identities and parse fledgling bits of an argument breaking out.

Below her vantage, she only sees the crown of their heads. She’s trying to peek while remaining hidden.

Decibel by decibel, the voices climb, sounding more rough and agitated.

“—what do you mean you’re going alone?”

“It means don’t follow me.”

“This isn’t a joke. What if they catch you—“

“Stay out of this—“

The argument continues until one voice silences the other two.

“And you’re gonna run to who? Zeke?”

That voice.

Annie would have rolled sideways if her hand’s quick reflexes didn’t grab onto the trunk mid-fall. Her movements cause a slight rustle. She worries her whereabouts have been exposed but it’s clear Armin is occupied with another matter entirely. 

“You really expect us to just go along with your plans?” Armin says, the shadows of the woods pooling in his eyes. “We took a gamble coming here. We risked everything for you. We trusted you—”

 “I thought that’s what we do. Trust our comrade’s choice.”

“Yeah, well, can you at least sound like you’d regret it if we died?”

Annie tries not to make a sound as Armin and Eren made a noiseless exchange of hardened glances. 

“Ever since you met Yelena, you’ve been nothing more than a jerk. To me, to Mikasa. To everyone back home.”

“I don’t care what you think,” Eren snarls. “As long as you’re afraid of me.”

Unease slithers over Annie’s skin. How deeply entwined are their histories? They were from different zones, segregated for a reason. 

“Eren,” Mikasa interjects.

But he only snaps at her intervention. “And if you’re not here to protect him, what happens?” he asks, then looks down at Armin. “Gonna freeze again like the pathetic coward you are?”

Armin looks down on his feet. “If you really hated me that much,” he finally says. “Maybe back then, you should’ve left me for dead.”

In a flash of motion, Eren’s fingers dig into Armin’s collar and lift him up. “Maybe I should have.”

Armin hits the ground, whacked on his upper spine, rolling into a fetal position. Eren welts him again on the side of his chest, bloodied fist meeting cheek after cheek.

Mikasa bolts between them.

“Eren, you’ll kill him!”

“Fucking right I will—“

Then, the sound of intermittent thumping breaks their scuffle apart.

That’s when Annie feels it. The stones shaking.

Annie stays on top of the branch, the sound of distant rumbling a dark and savage throbbing that she could feel vibrating in her guts, the mere depth of the tone like a finger jabbing into the notch of her collarbone.  

Something of the stuff of nightmares cuts through the branches—the figure an inception of Marleyan disgust, the shadow an exaggeration of Eldian features. 

While they looked mostly human, there is an obvious foulness about them, something too stretched and askew and terrifying to behold.

Annie had long braced herself for this encounter, but the shock of seeing a caricature of their race rattles her to her core. 

She almost doesn’t notice Mikasa stepping forward with a focused stillness. 

Eren only stands back, seeing them distracted, then slowly, the distance between them unfurls as he turns his back on them and makes a break for the woods.

Armin is still on the ground, unable to get up. “Mikasa—”

“I’ll take care of it,” Mikasa says like it was a chore.

Holding ever so slightly for a moment’s breath, she heads towards the Titan’s direction—a death sentence.

Then she unsheathes something that Annie hadn’t noticed hung at her belt—a sword with a length and breadth unfamiliar to her, tapering to a gleaming edge with a lethal sharpness perhaps to a human. Surely not a Titan. 

She beckons for Armin to stay back, and he reluctantly obeys.

Mikasa is standing still, the sword looking more and more like an extension of her arm as she swings it around as if to be one with its weight. As Annie watches from above, she thinks she may spectate her only enemy’s potential demise. Mikasa may be renowned in combat, but alone against a Titan? The likelihood was still far-fetched.

Engrossed by the small human standing like easy prey, the Titan runs forward frenetically, plowing up dirt in the air, but it’s Mikasa that leaves her transfixed.

In avoiding the Titan’s jaw-snapping radius, she is all speed and preternatural assurance, like an artisan executing a well-rehearsed choreography but with equal bursts of spontaneity. 

Frustrated by Mikasa’s elusive movements, the Titan stops and makes a beeline for something else lying limp on the ground.

“Armin! Look out!”

It’s too late; the Titan has bound Armin by his legs.

But instead of screaming, he made no struggle to fight the Titan.

Armin is stiff as a board—whether it was because of fear or acceptance, she could not tell.

What on earth is he doing?

Something else almost takes over Annie. Her legs align themselves in a jumping stance, but before she can leap, she hears the crack of steel on bone, a wet splintering rip, followed by a generous trail of steam obscuring what had transpired.

Mikasa’s movements had been so fast it was barely a flicker of motion, but the evidence of her intervention is all there the moment the steam clears: Armin is safe on the ground, with the Titan pawing its eye sockets, devoid of what should lie therein.

Mikasa quickly drops next to Armin instead of bearing witness to her unlikely escape from death—almost as if she had done this a million times. 

“Armin, are you okay?” she says, with no regard for her own wellness, nor for the Titan still moving and thrashing from blindness.

Armin is bent over with his hands on his knees, but he shakes his stiffness away. He nods as if the swelling, bruises, and dirt smeared on his face no longer counted as pain to him—not after what Eren did.

“We have to find Eren,” she says, helping him draw himself to his full height. 

“No, we can’t afford to think about him right now. He made his choice,” he says, a hint of irritation bleeding into his voice. “And we’ve got bigger things to worry about.”

“What do we do, then?”

 He looks at the space of wood not far from Annie, and her body goes rigid. 

“Let's take care of the other candidates first,” Armin says. “You said she passed by here?”

Mikasa nods and Annie pauses, remembering their brief altercation in the field.

It doesn’t take much to know who they were referring to. 

“We’ll stick to the original plan, then,” he says. “Remember what we talked about—”

“I know,” Mikasa cuts him off, more taciturn than usual all of a sudden. “I won’t let her get away. I promise.”

Their hostility could not be more clear, the traps not more obvious. All this time, Armin had just been waiting for Annie to walk right in Mikasa’s trap, much like the foxes her father would snare with steel-jawed claws.

“Mikasa. It’s moving again.”

Annie's attention shifts towards the Titan with newfound alertness.

Its eyes have regenerated. Annie didn’t even know they could do that. 

But Mikasa is unfazed by it. She picks up her sword once more, charging towards the Titan with carefully calculated maneuvers. The Titan reaches out with both hands, left going high and right going low.

Mikasa jumps and flies thin as paper in between, sweeping the tip of her sword to align with her body. 

Her movements are barely discernible from where Annie is; by the time she finds a view unimpeded by the frock of leaves, Mikasa is already climbing atop the Titan’s nape, and with a short-arm swing, she lacerates the flesh in front of her, ribboning the pipe.

The Titan stops moving—not unlike a machine that has been abruptly unplugged. Mikasa sheathes the unassuming sword back, and Annie wonders if—from the very beginning—that was precisely the weapon she had been gunning for.

Annie only watches glumly as the figures of Armin and Mikasa shrink from her view, pounding towards the deep valley of pines. Her last words repeating over and over.

I won’t let her get away.

To kill Mikasa or die trying; the other outcomes—to fail, to not even try—would have consequences she could not even bear to think about. Getting rid of the only other Female Titan candidate was the only way to find out if her father lived.

The thought of him momentarily sends her into a relapse, clutching the side of her head with her eyes sewn shut, but the images of his limp and bled-white body are still burned to the back of her eyelids.

Still, she’s nursing the ignoble hope that he’s still alive.

If he is, she will save him. If he’s dead, then she’s ready to make someone pay—for everything she’s lost in this game, for the monstrosity they forced her to become.

But that shouldn’t be a concern for now. Her top priority is making sure she’s one step ahead of Mikasa, or at least close enough behind to outrun her when she makes a mistake.

She shakes herself out of her reverie and climbs down the trees with an air of caution, skin raising gooseflesh as the cold seeps into her body. She doesn’t like the downward slope of the ground—she felt safer above the labyrinth, where she could see enemies approaching, but there’s no choice other than to keep moving forward.

The arena is much bigger than she imagined. 

Running into Mikasa may still be a distinct possibility, but the sheer largeness of the forest dampens that altogether. She has more immediate things to worry about. 

In the process, Annie tries to comb her surroundings for something useful.

There's nothing but trees and plants of arrowheads, old thistles, and nettle greens—edible, as far as she knows, even though it’s not exactly a feast. Pine trees, however, she’s not unfamiliar with. Weeks of starvation in the zones meant the occasional diet of pine bark. 

The inner bark, she remembered, could also make for particularly strong cordage. A nearby tree catches her eye, ripe for the task, but it would need to be peeled off into long strips using something precise and pointed.

She palms the inner pocket of her jacket, feeling the shape of contraband. A high pitch ringing titillates in her ear—fragmented sounds and fractured screams.

They're letting you keep the ring.

But she needed it.

I urge you, Annie. Do not use it.

It would be so much simpler.

The more they see you breaking the rules, the harder they will make it for you.

Annie grinds her teeth till her ears ring. If she is truly being watched, she couldn’t reveal all her cards just yet.

Stripping the bark of the tree was more tedious than she expected without a proper tool, but Annie had always known to make do with what she had. 

With the flat edge of a rock tapered to a point, she lifts fragments of the bark. It isn’t long before she exhumes the long, stringy fibers, revealing its veins like exposed nerves. She takes some to chew, wincing at the jarring change of palate after three weeks of gorging on Marleyan delicacies. 

Annie taps on some hidden reserves of patience and precision to separate it into thin strips, then buffs the fibers against a rock until they’ve become long and thin enough to twist together. When they have coiled to satisfaction, she bridles it in the space of her shoulder and underarm, ready to be deployed at a moment’s notice. 

She might have been vilified for it, but spending time with Falco and his expertise on textiles all stand in good stead now.  

Thirst crawls up her dry throat, but after surveying the land, there were no indications of a river nearby—not even animals to track and follow for their source of water. Still, she sets up a deadfall trap camouflaged by mounds of twigs and dandelion leaves for bait. While it was nothing compared to Pieck’s human traps, it should still catch an unassuming rodent.

Evening is fast approaching, and the rumbling fades just as soon as the light does. The wind carries the moist, rich smell of the woodland floor. The cry of summer cicadas so persisting that the sound seems stitched into her bones.

Adjusting to environmental triggers is a welcome opportunity after weeks spent underground. But now that there’s not much to see but the dark cloaks of the surrounding trees, it’s almost suffocating. 

Annie stops when she finds tracks. Not Titan, not human. The straight line suggested a hunting animal.

Surviving the forest meant much more than simply evading Titans. Central to making it through the night was finding a safe place to recuperate—and she won’t find it below ground. 

After amassing a blanket of evergreen fronds cut from downed trees, Annie clambers onto a branch with a fork that gives her adequate space to sprawl her legs and gingerly secures herself using the rope she just made.

Settling under the blanket, she feels the chill of the night quickly crawling up exposed skin—like candle fire engulfing the edges of paper. She tries to focus instead on staying alert. 

High enough above ground, she could somewhat observe how the artificial surroundings changed. From afar, a soundless shadow emerges from the edge and passes through the lay of the land. 

Something wasn’t right, and the difference was almost unnoticeable.

There was a pattern in the way the lights dimmed and how the mountains faded from view; the inconspicuous flickering of hexagonal shapes looked much like the incident at the rooftop when Armin fell and ricocheted back upwards.

His survival was proof of one thing: that the seeming perfection behind Marley’s technological prowess is not all that it seems.

For the next couple of hours, she lies clipped in on top of the tree. The night is alive with creatures emerging, of tree frogs croaking in orchestration, of squeaks of bats. She liked the susurrations that filled the background, allowing her to keep distracted and avoid the tempest of her own mind.

The moon shines just enough for her to notice movement below; amongst the dead, brown ferns, a fox skitters along the deep green moss and lichen,. It stops to yawn, the pickets of its teeth glimmering. When it burrows underground and Annie hears the chirping and trill of pups, Annie realizes it was a vixen coming to nurse her young.

Memories surface: a moon-cold forest, her father crouching low with a gun slung over his shoulder, staring into a dark patch of overgrowth.

“Do you see them, Annie? Look closer." She peers into the foxhole with him, lying low until she sees the world from the level of the grass. Then, she sees it, the kits pressed against their mother’s teat. " The pups are dark and wooly. They’re born blind and deaf. Then they grow and fight over food, and the strongest feeds more often than the weakest. It is the obligingly simple rule of free animals.”

Before them, the vixen is undisturbed, unknowing a hunter is teaching his child how to hunt.

“But out here,” he continues. “There’s no such thing as freedom. Freedom, you must remember, is only the distance between the prey and its hunter. Between dead and living. Everyone has the same goal—to always be the latter. But you have one task, Annie—to always be sharper. Survival is the residue of smart thinking and deliberate action.”

Gradually, the mother peers out of the burrow, its long, red ears twitching back and forth. Slender, diamond-shaped paws trawl out, gingerly stepping on dead, brown leaves—unaware of an indiscriminate steel mouth lying hidden in wait.

The vixen raises her head, more and more alert. Annie makes the motion to stand but her father presses her shoulder down.

“You must wait. They all make the same mistakes. And you must remember it is no fault of yours when they do. You can’t help everyone.”

The vixen continues treading the path.

Three more steps.

Two.

One.

She convulses awake with the shock of something ineffable. 

The first thing she notices is the low-lying mist rising from the ground, slowly receding and diminishing at the onset of warming air.

The signs of dawn are approaching faster than she anticipated. She makes her way down to briefly check her trap. Acid disappointment churns in her stomach when she finds it unsuccessful at luring critters. Maybe she should have paid more attention to the trap-setting classes. 

If there is an audience watching, this wouldn’t be a good look. Tired, dehydrated, and weaponless—no one would even think to sponsor her.

How would Falco be doing?

Maybe he would’ve had no trouble setting up an impressive twitch-up snare. Or he could have fashioned himself a bow and arrow.

Annie briefly entertains the possibility that he might be dead. However, the likelihood was more likely to be the opposite.

That bright kid should not be so easily underestimated by his competitors.

Armin briefly crosses her mind; the thought of his conversation with Mikasa and the revelation that they had a plan all along to corner her. A stabbing bitterness makes her bite down hard.

If Falco mustn’t be underestimated, Armin shouldn’t be trusted. She couldn’t believe she had let herself spend her last few moments above ground with him. Playing chess like it wasn’t just some stupid game, as if her life wasn’t riding on it. 

Her icy cautiousness tells her that Armin is planning to use whatever he’s learned from her in the past three weeks—use every kernel of information acquired as artillery. 

He’s probably proud of himself for playing his act to perfection to the point she almost believed it. Believed he wasn’t her enemy.

She imagines Armin’s face after their every interaction in the training facilities, probably smugly grinning right down to the scurf between his toes. 

Mikasa must be satisfied, too, now with her display of killing a Titan, Annie’s confident they will include it in the broadcast with many sponsors clamoring to give her gifts—ones that could help her ensure Annie’s death.

The ice that had lodged in her chest turned into flames.

They don’t know what she knows. She’ll keep it that way.

Find the Female Titan. Get the Female Titan.

Back on track, Annie makes her way to the edge of the grove, where the overgrown buttresses stopped its reach at an invisible line and revealed the open ground of Paradis island. Scanning her vicinity, she sees no Titans afoot. And the entrance towards the inside of the district is open.

After a sharp draw of breath, Annie makes a break into the Wall’s gaping maw.

When she’s finally inside the district, she bears witness to the deserted layout of a village, greeted by a ghostly silence in streets awash with early morning fog. But there’s a certain grace and splendor to it that Annie doesn’t expect.

Unlike the compounds in the Zones surrounded by razor wire and guardhouses, here in the Walls, the gentle rolling swell of fields and grass stretches all the way to decadent stone houses.

She wonders about the so-called devils who inhabited these walls, picturing faceless ghosts that left the doors half-opened, frightened villagers bumping into toppled-over barrels as they fled from their homes from Titan infiltration.

The winding, snaking paths were littered with ramshackle tenements overrun with untended foliage, but Annie finds a house with a relatively sturdy frame. Bare, falling apart, yet still standing. Funny, it looks almost exactly like her own house, if only it had a generous yard with sand-filled poppets lined up. Drawn to it, she decides to scout its threshold for supplies. 

The unlocked door swings on a smashed hinge as she toes it open, a faint square of light appearing on the dusty floor. 

For a mock-up of the Ninth Zone, the Marleyans sure had taken their time making every detail as realistic as possible, from the kitchenware left in the sink, the rustic wood of dining chairs and tables, all the way to the books collecting dust on the shelves. 

But as it was a simulation, something about it wouldn’t entirely be right—like if she pulled a book open, there would be no words, no inscriptions in them—just tomes of empty pages.

Rummaging for anything usable, Annie finds little in the way of weapons. She does find a bone-dry canister for water, some hardened loaves of bread in the kitchen cabinets—not unlike the ones back home—and a backpack where she could store them.

Annie peeks through one of the window curtains and finds the top curve of the sun had already lifted out of the foothills.

She scuttles through the shadows and thinks about the consequences of staying inside the house but weighs it against the likelihood it would trap her inside. She can’t let that possibility give Mikasa a headway.

Before stepping out, Annie hears fast approaching footsteps.

She hunches below the window.

“They’re coming—there’s a whole horde of them headed this way,” one says with panting breaths. Deep, pounding footsteps from afar grind in her ears, and blood rises into her face. “I think I saw an Abnormal one too.”

“Stay close and don’t make any noise. We don’t know what attracts them.”

She recognizes the voices, something that naturally came to her as a result of listening into many conversations in the training facility, but she keeps quiet, though she has no reason to hide. Marcel and Porco aren’t threats—only to each other. But she still couldn’t be too sure.

“There’s no way we can outrun them again.” Porco swallows. 

“You’d be right,” Marcel agrees. “If we didn’t have this.”

She hears the rustle of paper before hearing Porco suppress a sound of mirth. “Where did you get that?”

“In the clearing. While everyone was gunning for the weapons, I had my eyes set on the backpack, which coincidentally had the map.”

Now she’s second-guessing whether it had been a smart move to ignore getting supplies. But she knew a few extra pounds could slow her down fatally at the critical cusp between victory and death. Still, a map of Paradis would be invaluable. 

It wouldn’t be the most unwise decision to tail the two brothers.

“You take it,” Marcel says. “It’s better you have it on you in case we get separated.”

The pause lingers a bit too long, and much to be said. It’s all too easy to read what the older brother is trying to do. Porco seems to pick up on this.

“You’re not going to leave me, right?”

A silence beleaguered by uncertainty follows.

“Whatever happens—hey, Porco, look at me—no matter what happens, I want you to get out of this arena. Use the money from the Games and get Mom out of the Zones.”

“Stop talking like that,” she hears Porco reply, settling to anger instead of confrontation. “We’re barely past the first wall.”

Though Annie couldn’t see their expressions, the serrated edge to Porco’s voice is every bit as clear, running counter to Marcel’s level-headedness. The younger one always had an element of unpredictability that went with the restless and jointless way he stood, while his older brother kept a quality of meditative readiness—a capacity for both soaring assault and smart defense. 

Marcel had everything it took to be a Jaw Titan—if it weren’t for his tenderness for his brother that made him vulnerable in every respect. There’s a galling thought that crosses her mind: if the Gamemakers already had a preference for a certain candidate, they were surely not above eliminating the less desirable contender. 

Porco might have an inclination they’re gunning for him.

Marcel should know better. They will kill his brother.

“Just take the map—“

“No, you keep the goddamn map. I can take care of myself.”

“Look,” Marcel’s voice is thinning. “I promised Mom I’d bring you home—

“Shut up! You’re not a martyr. You’re not even a Warrior yet,” he barks, and Annie thinks it’s about time the consequences of Willy’s interview are finally catching up to him. “Stop acting like the hero.” 

With scoffing finality, Porco takes off with a head start. 

Marcel yells his name as he chases after him, the padding of their steps hitting the pavement at counterpoint. When the noises fade, Annie steps outside and follows them in their general direction, pattering sideways around buildings.

By this time, the sun has shed a blanket of light across the town, making plain the dust littering the air, the fog more prominent in a faraway horizon where the Titans must be moving towards them in herds.

Initial fright quickly gives way to stern mental discipline. In only the time it takes for her to breathe deeply in and slowly out again, she had plotted the rudiments of a strategy.

Not too far off lies an elevated structure—a church bell tower three stories high—which could serve as a practical vantage point from where she could determine a way out. 

With tunnel vision, she sets out with nerve-wracking slowness, avoiding the light and skulking along the shadows of the houses with her back pressed against the wall. 

Astonishingly, she arrives at the tower's door without trouble. She flies in and climbs the winding steps until she reaches the top, peering outside carefully should a fifteen-meter Titan spot her from that height.

The view provides the new angle she needed; Annie sees the gate leading to the land beyond the First Wall and spots a river nearby—right next to a stable of horses that could easily mean the difference between surviving the walls here and beyond. 

She is just about to map out her plan to head in that direction when a blood-curdling scream jolts her. It punctuates the air like an icy breeze, rendering her frozen as she determines its source, like a fox drawn to the sound of a rabbit in distress but not to help.

The scream rises again, fickle but palpable.

Two streets away are two figures, tiny as ants, running away from a presence preceded by the smoke of collapsing house structures. Annie hopes against all reason that whatever it is, it will deviate from its course and pass the opposite way.

But it’s heading towards her.

Without warning, something leaps into her view: a hand large enough to crush her like a housefly in its fists appears over the bell tower’s dome, fingers longer than she was tall.

Then a leaning head with the caricature of a human smile takes all the space in her field of vision. 

Her mouth goes dry, heart skipping into a trip-hammer beat. She could run back to the door, but if the Titan demolishes through its collapsible structure, there’s no getting out. And nothing is worse than being trapped underground.

There was no tree this time to watch from a distance. This figure is no simple holovision dancing in electrostatic mist at the far end of the training facility. The threat is real, just as every bone in her body felt the urge to run from it. 

But fear is a conductor; the desperation to survive electrifies every molecule in her body—a controlled burn. 

Titans lack fear. But that’s exactly what she’s counting on. Paralysis eases down from her shoulders and rolls off her back, and Annie steps away from the door.

That Titan better savor its vision; it won't have it for long.

She charges forward into the fray, staking her life and everything riding on it—all on her gift for destruction.

Large looming hands move to reach her legs, but quick thinking saves her as Annie rolls to her side, narrowly missing its fisted grasp.

Before it reaches out to her again, Annie makes a bold dive from the tower and onto the shoulder of the fifteen-meter Titan, flying with the reckless abandon of a cliff jumper and grappling with the dark strands of hair until she heaves her way to the crown of the head.

Quickly finding balance, she grabs a clip of hair as an anchor and reaches down until her feet are perched against the forehead.

The Titan’s eyes flit to the space between its forehead and the bridge of its nose, but before it could lift its arms to snatch her, she kicks herself off the forehead, clinging onto the lock hair and letting the momentum swing her back until her heels strike against the soft lining of its eyes.

Steam erupts, then Annie swings again until she blinds its other eye, the vapor rising hot against her skin and quickly dissipating as she slides down the limbs of the now-disoriented Titan.

Abseiling down from the chest all the way to its thighs, Annie vaults the rest of the distance and rolls to her feet as soon as she drops to the ground. Sweat springs up on her face as she dashes down the stairs across the street.

The billows of smog from collapsed buildings have filled the air, giving her some cover.

Even with the Titan blinded, she doesn’t know how much time she’s bought herself. 

As Annie rounds the curves of the street, the mist starts to thin. Behind her, the sun was still shining. The ghostly silhouettes of human-like figures are clustered at the front of the gate. 

Before her, amongst a nearby pile of rubble, another human-shaped shadow lays underneath.

She stops, recognizing the identity sprawled across the cement, half his body hidden by a toppled stonewall.

Marcel Galliard—regarded as one of the most promising Warrior candidates—lies with his chest impaled by a wooden branch. Rivulets of blood gushing from muscles torn through are pooling around him like rainwater. 

It’s too much blood, way too much for one body. It’s almost impossible to believe he’s already out of the picture when the Games have barely begun.

She finds her legs are just as frozen and unmoving as his. She looks around for signs of Porco, but he isn’t anywhere near.

They must have gotten separated when the abnormal Titan rampaged not many moments ago. Marcel was right about him needing help with navigation—

She pauses, reminded of their game-changing asset. 

It must be still in his pockets.

Annie looks back; the Titan is still lying motionless. 

Step by step, she approaches him, studying for any signs of life—be it a tensing of the muscle or a twitch in his closed eyes. But there’s nothing.

Even if the rise and fall of his chest are barely discernible, he may not be entirely dead. Different parts of the body shut down at different rates, shuddering and jittering, spasming until it ossifies into lifelessness.

But from the looks of it, he’s quickly approaching that corpse-pale color. 

Annie slouches low, coming to level with him. Then she starts fumbling around his slumped body, checking the seams and digging inside the pocket jets.

By this time, the Titan is fidgeting, hands flexing as steam keeps pouring from their eye sockets.

From the sleeve of his jacket, she retrieves a rolled-up paper, kept in place by a silver bangle that was inscribed by the initials: M.G. 

Not the only one who brought contraband in the Games.

Quickly she unrolls it, and like a lost ship navigating with dead-reckoning, she glimpses her waypoint—her way forward.

Fear has turned into a compass, pointing her in the right direction.

Then, the toll of heavy footfalls resumes. From afar, Annie sees the Abnormal Titan she had just blinded move with an astute awareness of its surroundings.

She didn’t expect it to regenerate its eyeballs that fast.

Act faster. Think faster.

Annie stands to make her leave, but an odd sound reaches her ears: a weak groan. When she looks back, a palm is raised slightly from the ground where she could have sworn it was lying limp moments ago.

Shit.

Because she had lingered a few seconds too long, she finds herself at an impasse.

Marcel is reaching for her; his index and middle finger only remain, where the other missing fingers are now bloody stumps.

She draws her eyes away from his hand and towards his now opened eyes, swollen with profound attention. They are furrowed and fixated on the sheet of paper rolled by the silver bangle.

He doesn’t say anything. He doesn’t ask for help. 

But every line of his body screams one thing.

That doesn’t belong to you.

He's looking at her like she’s a thief when she’s fighting just as hard as anyone to survive.

Beside her feet, the dust rises as the bricks rattle. With every beat, the Abnormal Titan draws closer. Annie tautens with every passing second, wound up, but unsure which direction to go.

Maybe she should help him. Put him out of his misery. Or maybe she shouldn’t interfere at all.

You have one task.

Always be sharper.

Annie’s grip on the map tightens.

Winning this game means no ambiguities clouding her judgment and coloring her decisions.

There is no more gray-scale wandering in the dark walls of the training facility.

Out here, there is only black and white. Dead or alive. And she will always be the latter.

She tucks the paper inside her jacket, unfazed by the Titan’s imminent shadow and Marcel’s unblinking glare.

She's already ahead of the game. And it should stay that way.

Like water to gravity, Annie follows the force of her principle, winding along the streets before any droplets of remorse catch up to her.

Still, the Titan rummaging through the rubble falls within earshot. But she doesn’t hear a scream.

Then, she makes the mistake of looking back, a scene among many that will soon come back to haunt her when she's not fighting for her life, and in those moments, wish she never succeeded.

The Titan picks Marcel up, gathering his hunched body in its palm. It tilts him towards its jaw, unhinging and stretching to an impossible-looking degree.

Its teeth jut out, glimmering bright against the sunlight. Then she hears it: the sound not unlike the steel-into-wood chock of a guillotine’s plunge. Then she sees it: blood taking to the air in fine mist. 

You can’t help everyone.

Annie sews her eyes shut, gathering herself in the anchor point of one breath, and that’s all it takes. She turns around with more conviction, and goes back on track.

Moments later, she arrives at the stables where most of the stalls have been seemingly emptied.

She tries not to panic at the notion that she may be too late. While she had a map at her disposal, there is no way she could traverse to the Second Wall without a horse—

A sharp snort and whicker draw her attention, then from the far end, a finely shaped head resembling a living shadow pokes out of its stall’s barrier.

If she didn’t know better, she would have called it luck.

Survival is the residue of deliberate action. 

Annie gets straight to unlocking the pad bolts, and with a firm grip, she leads the already-saddled mare outside, calm as though the rhythmic strides of distant Titans soothed more than scared it.

Before she could hoist herself on its back, she hears the distinct tramp of a set of boots coming her way. 

Someone’s coming.

When she draws her eyes to the right, the sight leaves her stomach-sick.

In the skitter of sun-flash, she sees the haunting ghost of Marcel dragging himself towards her. Joints in the wrong places. Hairline oozing blood. Eyes that weren’t eyes but black pits. The wheezing of his mouth sounds as though he was choking on putrefying lungs.

It couldn’t be—

Disbelief is all that keeps Annie from retching. 

How does he still have his limbs? Did she not watch his flesh take violet and gray hues as it lay crushed under brick houses, become more disfigured as Titan jaws shredded him?

He’s coming closer.

“Annie.” The figure breathes when he is all but a few paces from her. Then the voice gradually shifts to a comprehensible tenor, and the face morphs into someone else’s.

“Annie, it’s me! Galliard!”

Porco staggers to the point of buckling to the ground just a few meters away. Annie sullenly watches his flurry of movements in a daze.

“I’m not here to fight you,” he says with both palms open before her, but all she could think of was how much he looked like his brother.

Annie finds herself stuttering. “M- Marcel, he… “

At this, Porco’s eyes are suddenly alight, glinting like sunlight in deep water. 

“You saw my brother?” 

A wave of nausea layers atop a weak nod. Then followed by a cool tingling. Then numbness. 

She hadn’t expected to run into him—she even made the assumption at some point that Porco may not have made it and that had made leaving Marcel much easier.

Porco’s hands are on her shoulders. “Where? Where did you see him?”

It wasn’t her fault.

She couldn’t help him.

She had no choice.

“He’s gone… ahead.”

There’s a shift in his expression, full of hope, not unlike fooling himself. His eyes drift to the gates. “You mean, he already escaped?”

Gone. Killed. Left. Escaped. They are not so different.

“Yes,” is all that comes. 

Annie’s unsure what to make of her inability to think all of a sudden. She feigns distractedness by hoisting herself on the back of the horse.

He rubs his face, racking his brain for a solution.

“Let me ride with you, Annie. Please. Just until we’re past this wall.”

She shouldn’t. 

She really shouldn't. 

Porco is still talking and the Titans are still coming. “If you do this for me, I’ll help you get your Titan. I’ll do anything to return the favor.”

Now, an opportunity to dovetail their interests presented itself. 

Except, Porco had zero clue he was pulling the shortest end of the stick.

Maybe it had been a remnant of remorse. Maybe it wasn’t. The repercussions are not entirely clear to her, but all that rumination is moot now.

There’s no doubt having Porco in her arsenal will help her against Mikasa.

Annie gives him her silent agreement, and Porco quickly swings himself into the saddle.

They set off at a dead run towards the gate, passing by rows and rows of demolished houses. Once, Annie swears they briefly passed what might have been the last place she saw Marcel, but she shakes the notion away. Somehow, the map held by a silver bangle feels like the heaviest thing she has on her person.

They pass underneath the colossal archway of the inner gate, which was already pulled open by a medieval mechanism of chains attached to an internal winch. 

Candidates who had a head start must have figured out how it worked. If they were any smarter, they would have destroyed the mechanism and trapped their rivals inside. Focusing solely on surviving was their mistake.

Annie won’t make that mistake.

They pass through the gate, and the hoofbeats shift from clicking on stone to drumming onto the dense, earthy floor. 

“I wonder who got left back there,” Porco says, turning to look over his shoulder, watching as Wall Maria shrank with distance.

Against the horse blowing hard and the wind lashing through her cheeks, she tunes him out, urging the animal forward as it leaps into a flat run.

Then he says something that renders her limbs unsteady.

“Annie, whose blood is that?”

He’s observing her grip on the reins and the color staining her fingertips. 

The color of the fox. 

Something unspoken wells from her chest, but she replies with a firm resolve, “It’s mine.”

At her answer, Porco says nothing, setting his sight to fields ahead. To a paradise unknown, and a nightmare still waiting.

Chapter Text

Act 2

~O~

“But the truth is that no person ever understands another, from beginning to end of life, there is no truth that can be known, only the story we imagine to be true, the story they really believe to be true about themselves; and all of them lies.”

― Orson Scott Card, Children of the Mind

~O~

~O~

BEYOND WALL MARIA

When the terrain changed from a wide, flat landscape to a scenic view of the mountains, Annie was not moved by the beauty of the land. And as the gradient of the sky shifted with the sunset, it served only as a reminder that stillness was a thin chapter—to survive, they must always be on the move.

Annie had been diligently following the river beyond Wall Maria: a lazy, serpentine trail that rolled through the vast expanse of the field, hopefully leading to a yoke of civilization.

She’s always looking ahead—mostly because she can’t even so much as spare a glance at her travelling companion. As The First Wall shrank with distance, Annie hopes that the same could be said for Marcel Galliard’s haunting presence.

It’s not long before the moon brushes silver across the faraway mountaintops. Shortly after, rain starts pouring. Annie and Porco lead the horse through a well-situated patch of green. As they yield themselves to the canopy of trees and into the dark, they find a warm and level spot beneath the evergreens thick enough to divert the rain. 

“Maybe we should stop here,” Porco says, the remark meant to point out that they had been riding on horseback for hours. “Maybe camp here for the night.”

While the forest was an inviting oasis of a more temperate zone, she doesn’t think it’s a good idea.

“Not a chance,” Annie says, dismounting and leading the horse to a tree. “We’ll leave as soon as the rain stops. We can’t waste another day, Porco.”

“It’s Galliard,” he corrects. “Only my brother calls me by that stupid name.”

The request comes with a lot more weight than expected. Where distinguishing their faces already posed a challenge, now the family name was an omnipotent reminder of such. 

“All I'm saying is we should slow down,” Galliard continues. “Look, I get why you always want to keep moving. But you’re obviously tired, Annie. I am too.”

The remark pulls Annie’s attention to her labored breathing, the ever-present battle to keep her eyelids from closing. 

Anything you cannot sacrifice pins you. 

Makes you predictable.

Makes you weak.

I’m not weak.

I’m not weak. 

I’m not weak. 

There’s a tipping point with lies, a point when you have said something so many times it begins to feel true.

I’m not weak.

I’m not weak. 

I’m not weak. 

“I’m not like you.” Her voice comes out firmer. “I can still keep moving.”

When she braves the decision to finally look back at Galliard, all she sees is Marcel. 

How is it that two people can look so much alike? Their similarities ran from the distance between their eyes, the slope of their noses, and the seriousness with which their eyebrows scrunched together to convey disagreement.

It takes Galliard a few seconds to absorb her assertion. After that, it takes him another moment to convey his thinning and tenuous composure.

“You can, but I won’t. Stop making decisions we haven't agreed to yet,” Galliard is building up to a scowl. “I’m so sick of people telling me what to do.“ 

Annie makes a motion to move forward, then Galliard raises a hand as if to stop her. But before his hands could reach her shoulder, Annie catches his forearm, eyes unflinching.

“I got you out of the village. In exchange, you help me. That was the deal, right?” she reminds him flippantly, tightening her grip. “He who owes should follow.”

“Says who?”

“If you want to contest me, fine. We can settle that,” Annie allows, but always with a caveat.  “The Warrior’s Way.” 

They stand there for two breaths, maybe more if they had been less agitated. Maybe more if she isn’t channelling all her focus on preempting Galliard’s next movements. 

Would he take her challenge, or would he run away?

From a droning drizzle, the rain quickly escalates to a roaring downpour, the cold water dripping down Galliard's forehead and down to his eyes—hazel eyes that are darker; the shadows of the trees and the faint moonlight have drained them of color.

With an almost imperceptible tightening of his jaw, Galliard subdues under the weight of her command, under her blunt, practical fingernails where she held him firmly. 

That’s when she sees the stain. The ends of her fingernails turned black—dried blood that isn’t hers.

The sight clouds her judgement. Annie drops her grip on Galliard and he pulls his arm away, but before he could voice his protest, the sound of a stick breaking in half grabs both of their attention.

Annie cautiously moves towards the rear as Galliard follows behind. She bends down and paws her fingers through the ground. 

That’s when they see the tracks. 

“It’s Marcel’s, ” Galliard says, voice lowering to a hushed note. “It has to be.”

Knowing the impossible, Annie remains cautious as she studies the tracks. They swirled back and forth, shuffling dirt—almost a design of indecision. But what was it really? Could it be a false trace? A foot swipe or two of an animal? 

Or was it a false trap to lure them?

Annie steps back quickly.

When she yells a warning to Galliard, he’s attacked from behind and tackled to the ground.

Annie turns and dodges an ax. It whistles past her arm and sinks into a tree, slicing through the sleeve of her jacket.

She takes several steps back, putting as much distance as she could. The ax is now stuck in a tree and now she can size them up in fair game.

In brief flashes of lightning, she surveys their silhouette but singles out one important fact: they’re twice her height.

Before she could puzzle out their identity, they surge forward, full tilt. 

She sidesteps, letting their spring carry past the point of attack. As they flew by her, that small window allows her to dive underneath their extended arm, vault them over her shoulder, and slam their tailbone on the ground. 

They might have been double her size, but her speed makes up for muscle.

She has maybe about fifteen seconds before her downed opponent gets back up again. 

Her attention is now turned to Galliard struggling, back pressed against the muddy floor and hands raised, digging earnestly into the neck of his strangler.

Annie sprints with the intention to separate the attacker from Galliard, and with a single smooth rotation of her body, she uncorks a kick with enough force and momentum to send their ass diving to the ground. 

Limit your weak angles. Without breaking stride, she backs to her rear flank. 

Distance. It’s all about distance. Because the only rule she has in mind is to never let the grapplers grapple you. 

The attacker coughs hard from getting the wind knocked out of their pipes, but they quickly find their footing. By the time they’re up, Annie’s forearms are braced protectively by the sides of her head, drawing them on.

She dodges swing after swing as they close in, always falling back with enough room to intercept them. But it’s the next short-arm swing that she fails to anticipate; the well-timed punch collects cheekbone so hard it turns her head and—shit, they’re strong.

Something’s not right. The knuckles feel nothing like flesh; it was armored.

Blood spurts in the air and Annie falls to the floor, disoriented and dazed by the impact. She turns the face-plant into a shoulder roll and kips up to her feet, but a moving force grabs her by the neck until she’s backed against a tree. Brass knuckles loop around her throat, closing her airways, confident in their grip.

But it’s exactly what she counts on: misplaced confidence and the mistake most people make when fighting someone whose body is all they have to use as a weapon.

Annie bites her tongue. Then saliva fills her mouth and her spit flies straight into their eyes.

Their blink lasts a second—but it’s enough. In the time it takes for their eyes to close and open again, she lifts her boot and aligns it to their kneecap.

The idiot bends as their kneecap shifts, and while they’re deciding whether to scream first or pin her back into place, Annie twists out of their hold, sweeps off their feet with a low swivel and their face is flat on the ground.

Galliard darts into the scene just as Annie presses her weight on top. He shoves down the head while Annie pins both arms to their back.

“Hold them still, Annie!” He says as he takes out a dagger, the moonlight and raindrops revealing its form.

Galliard pulls the mop of hair towards him, and when their neck cranes up, that’s when the lightning flashes and the revelation of their attacker’s identity shocks even Annie.

The tip of the blade remains still on the underside of Reiner’s chin, with Galliard unable to drag it across his neck. 

The surprise disarms both of them so much that Annie forgets one thing: the companion lying on the ground moments earlier.

“Reiner, run!” His companion tackles Annie to the ground, but as they roll, it’s Annie who still ends up upright with her forearm pinned on their throat.

Just as she does, the lightning sheds light on his features, adding all the pieces together. “Bertolt,” she supplies her attacker’s identity to Galliard, but when she looks back, he had released Reiner from his hold.

“Annie, stop,” Galliard says before she could react. “They’re allies.”

Allies?

Bertolt rasps against her elbow. “It’s true.”

For a moment, they’re all frozen looking at her, bodies rigid with anticipation and glued for any signs of her next move.

Then, calmly but not without reserve, she slackens the tension on her arms, and Bertolt coughs the air back into his lungs with the vivacity of someone buried alive.

By this time, the rain had subsided, and the passing clouds allowed the moonlight to filter through the leafy awnings. 

“My brother finalized the pact just before the Games,” she hears Galliard try to explain as she gets off Bertolt.

Stunned at the newfound information, Annie’s not sure what to make of this pact. It’s instinct to consider every opportunity as a snake rearing its head in the tall grass. 

“Then why the hell did they attack us out of nowhere?” 

Bertolt collects himself and stands up to take his ax lodged in one of the trees. “We thought… “ he pauses to make room for breathing. “We thought you were somebody else.”

“We were ambushed earlier,” Reiner explains as he leans against a tree, clearly distressed by his knee where Annie had applied judicious force. “We fought them off… but Gabi was separated from us.”

Galliard’s lips hang open dry. “Ambushed? By who?”

“I don’t know,” Reiner replies, quiet and stern like still water. “I didn’t get a clear look on their faces.”

“Do you know where Gabi could’ve gone?” Galliard hesitantly asks.

“Gabi’s always been a good tracker. She’ll find her way,” Reiner regards him calmly. “He then looks at Galliard, then the empty space between him and Annie. “Where’s Marcel?”

Galliard makes a nervous swallow. “We got separated running from the town in Wall Maria—“

“The town?” Reiner’s disbelief blots through his scoff. “That place was crawling with Pure Titans.”

Annie’s full attention is on Galliard, noting the real signs of strain on his face.

“Do you think—” Reiner chews his lips as he edges to his question. “Do you think he was—”

“Marcel’s alive,” Galliard interjects before the other can get a word in. “It’s true. Annie said so herself.”

The attention volleys back to her.

“And she’s the only reason I escaped that place,” Galliard adds, a final affirmation to Annie that he had ceased challenging her. “We’ve been traveling since.”

“That’s… generous.” Bertolt’s voice thins, and there’s a dubious look in his face that suggested he didn’t believe it one bit. He faces Annie more directly. “Whatever happened to ‘I don’t do teams’?”

A callback to their first meeting in the train. Annie wonders how long he had kept that in the barrel, how long he’d been holding on to the grudge until the opportune moment. Had he always been like that, or had he simply shed skin, slithering up to people and waiting for an opening to strike?

Annie notices he didn’t stutter once.

“I guess people change,” she reveals, keeping her eyes straight at him.

Galliard breaks the tension by stepping up with a plan.  “Now that Annie’s part of the alliance, we should decide what to do next—”

“Hold on—” Bertolt slow-blinks with purpose. “Not everyone’s agreed to this.”

Annie doesn’t move her head but her eyes follow him as he snakes around the group. 

Now that he has more influence, he seems to enjoy determining who benefits.

Reiner peers at her with pointed interest, “What do you think, Bert? We’re all after different Titans. We could use someone like her on the team.”

“I don’t know,” Bertolt says. Something about the suspicion in his voice puts her teeth on edge. “What’s in it for you, Annie?”

She straightens her back. “I’m just looking for a group to travel with. People with no incentive to kill me.”

“What about the incentive to keep you?” Bertolt contends. “How can we know you won’t turn your back once you get what you want?”

There’s an all-pervading hush that becomes more apparent the longer Annie stays silent. 

She tries to ignore Bertolt implying her fickle sense of loyalty—evident as it may be. 

Instead, she focuses on what they’re really looking for. And how she—and only she—can provide that.

The first thing that comes to mind is the map. She could assert that she’s the only one capable of calling the shots.

But a map is a material, tangible thing that can be seized from her. And her father always taught her never to put her worth in something that can be taken away.

Annie looks down at her clenched hands, an ever-present reminder that they were empty but never lacking. 

In them, they contained the lessons for her survival—something her father made sure she remembered with the back of his hand.

This way, you can always fight back. 

Even when they’ve taken everything away from you. 

Even when you’re backed into a corner.

“You’re all vying for a Titan, but have you ever fought one? And lived?” she says. "I downed one unarmed the same way I downed both of you. And by comparison, yours wasn't much of a fight,” she looks at Reiner and Bertolt, then glances briefly at Galliard before turning back to them. “And I saved your ally from a Titan-infested village.”

She waits for some acknowledgment of her invective commentary, but they’re left speechless. “By the looks of it, you’ve had a harder time keeping your necks more than using your heads. So it’s either you take your chances with somebody else watching your back…” she pauses. “Or grow yourselves another pair of eyeballs.”

Without another word, Annie turns her back, as ready to leave as she was ready to step in. 

It’s precisely that mindset that has allowed her to reach this point in the game. 

“Wait.”

When she looks back, Bertolt has taken a half-step forward as if to run after her. He looks to Reiner then nods visibly and somewhat discreetly at the same time.

Annie’s tense shoulders slump down, and she hopes her relief didn’t show through the ragged exhale of her nose.

“Let’s just get out of this rain,” Reiner affirms, dragging himself forward. It’s a striking moment, when the rest slowly fall in line to follow him, allowing Annie in the last place.

She looks behind her, almost admiring the path before. If she looked far enough into the void of the forest, she might have seen the shadow of her father. Maybe even noticed a nod of approval. That she has come this far. 

The ability to disarm while unarmed. 

You’ve become exactly what I trained you to be.

Under the rain, the motley crew of now four move in weary pace, with two horses in tow striding alongside them.

They make their way beneath an overhang of rock whereupon Galliard suggests stopping to make camp. But the moment Annie notices how it sloped inward to an underground cave, she suggests moving on. 

Reiner, however, reasons otherwise.

“Galliard’s right. It’s not the safest place, but it’ll keep us dry,” he says, limping where Annie had stomped her boot on his knee.

In principle, it doesn’t make sense for a lack of movement to attract attention, but when Annie freezes, it does exactly that.

“What’s wrong?” Galliard asks.

Annie winces inwardly; something like panic is creeping up her chest and she wrangles it away with an uncharacteristic clearing of her throat. 

“You go ahead. I’ll tie the horse outside,” Annie says in place of an explanation.

“Be careful,” Bertolt says, and it’s almost a considerate remark if it hadn’t been followed by stern caution. “Or you’ll give away our position.” 

Annie doesn’t comment, making a sound only to nudge the horse on as she pulls it away from the cave.

After an appropriate distance from the cave, Annie stops and takes a few deep breaths, trying to lay a veil of calm on her racing heartbeat. Despite the stillness of her demeanor—her heartbeat betrays it. A gnawing, ever-present alertness to danger.

The horse blowing its nose catches her attention.

She notes the tired sunken eyes and the almost lethargic dragging of the legs. Even if she hasn't been around horses long enough to know the signs, she assumes that if she's tired and exhausted riding it, it must be as well. She grabs a saddle bag from the side and lets it collect rainwater until it’s overflowing and trickling at the seams.

The stain on her hands are more apparent than ever—the ones Galliard pointed out earlier. The ones she claimed to be hers.

Pressure starts wrapping itself around her head, tightening and coiling around her temples. The bag falls from her hands and Annie shuts her eyes, faint memories crawling to the surface.

The pounding of her heart feels so loud and reverberating it’s almost outside of her head, like a pickax chipping through her skull—heavy as a Titan’s footsteps.

Images of Marcel crushed under rocks. But his eyes are moving, and he starts speaking.

Does the blood on your hands keep you awake

Or does it help you sleep peacefully?

The emotion that arises makes her stomach lurch, and it hits her with such a ferocity that her legs give, making her reach out and hold on to a nearby tree.

The back of her neck tingles, feeling the gust of something that has taken shape behind her.

Won’t you tell my brother the truth?

She doesn’t look back, only taking a handful of mud and tries to buff away the stain. 

Tell him the truth.

Tell him the truth.

Tell him the truth.

 “Just leave me alone!”

Annie turns around, and right before her is Galliard, taking one step back.

“Annie, It’s just me,” he says with an air of hesitation.  “I just thought you wanted to go back. They started a fire now. It’s warmer there.” 

He’s right. Her skin pricks with cold despite stretching her muscles to the point of burning.

Annie grapples with self control and tries to shake off the dizziness as she stands. 

Still no word.

“Look, I’m sorry,” Galliard continues, assuming he was the reason for her silence. “I shouldn’t have questioned you earlier. I should have known what you were trying to do. In fact, Marcel would always do the exact same thing.”

Marcel.

Annie blinks hard.

I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. 

I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. 

I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. 

I’m sorry. I’m sorry. 

I’m sorry.

“I’m sorry,” she says, to the space right beside Galliard.

“You didn’t do anything. I was being stupid,” he waves her off, unable to recognize something heavier in her eyes. “But I wanted to thank you for not leaving me back there. Once we find my brother, I’ll do everything I can to help you get your Titan.”

Calmly, blankly, she raises her head. “What if Marcel’s really far from here?”

“It doesn’t matter how far he’s gone,” Galliard replies, firm.

Annie chooses her next words carefully. “But if he’s a thousand miles away—”

“Wouldn’t matter if it’s a million,” he asserts. “Wouldn’t matter if he’s beyond the walls of death. I will find my brother. I owe my mother at least that.” He flicks his fingertips, conveying uneasiness and a desire to cease conversing.

“I’ll go around and collect rainwater for us.”

Annie observes him with silence as he walks away, recognizing the familiar shape of his determination in Marcel.

When she comes back to the cave, they are all sitting on fallen logs as they crowd around a decent-sized blaze Bertolt is tending to. Reiner informs her they’d been able to prepare a meal thanks to the traps Bertolt had set. Reiner is in the middle of gutting and cleaning the rabbit, leaving the innards on a slab of rock. 

Meanwhile, Bertolt is fashioning a spit out of fallen branches to set the meat over the fire.

Around the fire, Reiner and Bertolt’s knees are angled towards each other to form a natural enclave, making conversation as the rabbit cooks, but Annie finds a small pocket of comfort away from the warmth of the blaze. 

“How’s your leg doing?” Bertolt asks Reiner. 

“Just popped it back in.” He stretches his leg, shooting Annie a vaguely irritated look. “Tiny here did a great job dislocating it.”

Pissy as he is, it seems to be his way of dispelling the tense air.

The smell of meat searing over fire made her mouth water, but she steels her nerves. The food was prepared by people who might decide to kill her at any time.

Besides, she wasn’t that desperate yet; Annie had been subsisting on raw vegetation. Every chance she stumbled upon edible tap roots, berries, and ferns, she ate. It was not a full meal, but it was enough to keep her from collapsing. 

When the rabbit finishes cooking, Galliard arrives just in time with a canister of water and everyone begins serving their own helpings.

But Annie does not stand to take hers.

“You’re not going to eat?” Galliard asks, offering a piece when she shakes her head. 

“No,” she looks away after staring at it for a handful of seconds.

Reiner’s mouth upturns with instant distaste. “You think we poisoned it or something?” 

Annie doesn’t respond, only limiting her expression to one blistering glance. Her swollen lip stings anew, holding back the bite of a retort. 

Reiner scoffs. “Suit yourself.”

With soot on their faces and grime in their hands, the three boys wolf down on what’s remaining of the rabbit, eager to lick the bones clean, all while Annie watches.

After they had quickly finished their meal, Reiner stands.

“We should get some sleep,” he suggests, in a way that wasn’t a suggestion. 

“Someone needs to take watch,” Galliard points out.

“I’m staying awake,” Annie says but not as an offering. Reiner seems to pick up on this and exchanges a glance.

“I can take the first watch, Reiner.” Bertolt offers as he stands to stoke the fire, the length of his shadow growing behind him.

Reiner and Galliard agree without hesitation then they begin to retire, finding their places in the cave; Bertolt takes the spot right across from Annie.

Resting his back against the stone wall, he sits comfortably with his elbows on his knees. His gaze is somewhere on her general direction—only his eyes move, taking her in, weighing and assessing her.

Annie sits near the mouth of the cave, eyes wandering from the moon-shaped light hovering in the artificial sky. It looked similar to the yellow beams of searchlights that roamed the internment zones at night, searching for anyone who broke curfew. 

A searchlight that’s also a sentence.

She feels the backpack as she leans against the wall so she removes it and sets it beside her. She briefly thinks about taking out the map but decides against checking it just yet. 

Maybe tomorrow, she’ll look at it again when she can find an excuse to be alone.

The night is passing much more slowly than it should—at least for someone who’s fighting to stay awake. 

As she grows more and more exhausted, her eyes start to sting. Annie grits her teeth as though she can hold back the wave of exhaustion by sheer force of will. 

She doesn’t believe in her weakness. She must never fall short of being what her family name meant. A name she has to earn.

But despite pulling off feats of physical endurance that seem inhuman, she’s not a well of indefatigable strength.

When she closes her eyes, it feels like free-falling through a chasm. And there she lays, cocooned in the only frontier she can escape to, in dreams of hope and longing that exists in what remains of her fraying mind.

The fog grows around her.

A gray sky and the gates of a grand mansion. 

Beyond the gate, the sound of a baby crying. A man approaches, picking up the baby from the basket and tucking them in his arms. 

Annie approaches the familiar shape of the person who raised her. She catches a glimpse of the child with yellow hair. Her pale blue eyes haven’t yet seen how much the world could burn bright red.

“Father,” she asks. “Why did you take me home that day?”

He wraps the baby further in his coat. “I knew you had the potential to be great, Annie. From the moment I held you in my arms, I knew you would surpass everyone.”

Annie doesn’t meet his eyes. “I must have disappointed you.”

“You make a fine Warrior,” he affirms, but the lingering emptiness tells her it’s not what she needed to hear.

“Did I ever make you happy, at least?” It may have been the bravest question she's ever asked. “Tell me the truth.”

Her father’s expression is frozen still on her for a moment, then he looks down to the infant resting in his arms.

“In my lifetime, Annie, I’ve learned that there are only two things a child can do to please their father.”

Dust lifts from the earth, spinning and swirling around them like a vortex. Their clothes billow against the upwelling air.

“The first is to become everything he ever dreamed of. The second is to live longer. As it stands, you have two unhappy alternatives before you. Where you achieve one but never fulfill the other. The choice is up to you.”

The ground opens its jaws, swallowing Annie until she’s six feet under. Her father is now above the hole where he had always been. In a place she could never reach.

“Please don’t leave me again!” Annie yells but the thunderous crack of the earth drowns her voice, the ear-splitting rip echoes as the fault line grows bigger underneath her feet. “Don't make me go back under!”

“To go under is the only way to rise,” he replies. Instead of a baby in his hands, a shovel took its place. “Look ahead. You’ll find your way back home. You always do.”

The sound of breaking sticks brings her back.

Despite having just woken from slumber, the force of tension is still in her eyes.

Ever since they locked her in the isolation room, the nightmares came and never left, always renewing the pain every time darkness settles. 

If she can’t keep it in check, she’ll be vulnerable for a moment—and a moment is far too long.

From the mouth of the cave, Annie sees the morning sun slowly inching over the horizon, the dawn air still crisp.

She jerks into a state of alertness.

How long was she out?

“You’re awake,” Bertolt appears from behind, carrying sticks and various materials for his traps. “Reiner’s looking for you.”

Her eyes traverse the upward slope of the land and find Reiner and Galliard at the crest, eyeing the horizon and something they must have drawn on the ground. She picks up the backpack by her side and heads toward the pair, Bertolt following closely behind.

When they arrive within hearing distance, she picks up on a rather animated discussion on their whereabouts.

“Annie,” Reiner calls, gesturing to the ground. “We were just figuring out our next move.”

He has them gathered in a circle, pawing the ground with a stick.

“So this is a rough estimate of where we are,” he points to three lines denoting the Walls, then places a mark between Wall Maria and Wall Rose. “First, let’s figure out our threats.”

“Narrow it down to our Titan roster,” Bertolt suggests. “The obvious ones: Eren, Mikasa… Armin—” his mouth twists with distaste. “—and Falco, if we’re being generous. Of course, that means his brother is an immediate threat too.”

“I still don’t understand how Armin’s alive,” Reiner says, a remark that instantly engages Bertolt.

“What do you mean?”

“I thought he died before the Games started.”

“How is that possible?” Bertolt inclines his head. 

“The night before the Games, I watched him fall from the roof before my eyes,” Reiner says. “I just didn’t think to check if he really died.”

Annie stays silent, knowing full well that revealing she stayed with Armin that night could put her further into question.

“It would have been painless that way. If he comes for us, he won't have that option,” Bertolt says stiffly, and Annie tries not to dwell on the fact it sounded like a promise.

“Do you think there are still Titans in Wall Maria?” Reiner asks, shooting his question towards Annie and Galliard’s general direction.

Galliard considers it for a moment. “Pure Titans seem to be attracted to a large group of people. I’d wager they moved on from the area if no one's there anymore.”

Reiner takes a deep breath, his expression carries the weight of what he will suggest next. “We should go back to Wall Maria,” Reiner proposes. “There’s a good chance that the Titans have moved on, but the area could be ripe with supplies.”

The suggestion sets Annie’s heart racing uncomfortably.

“Wait, go back?” Bertolt protests. “Can we afford to go back?”

Galliard stands behind Reiner. “We have horses. We can just go back to scout the area and make sure we didn’t miss anything.”

Bertolt’s hands have balled into a fist at his sides. True enough, Reiner and Galliard aren’t seeing what they were seeing. They didn’t care if it was a race, not if their family was left behind. 

Meanwhile, Bertolt and Annie had common ground—that the only way was forward. That time was too precious to give in to what-ifs. 

“If we go back,” Bertolt continues. “There’s a chance the other candidates will get their Titans before we do,” 

“Listen,” Reiner gives him a look that could be mildly patronizing. “What if Gabi’s back there? Or Marcel? Are you saying we can just leave them?” The words come in a rush, betraying his steady disposition and revealing emotional compromise.

Desperate people do desperate things, Annie is aware. Urgency spawns irrationality, so someone has to be a reasonable voice.

“No,” Annie finally says, marshalling her defiance. “I’m with Bertolt here. If we go back, we’ll lose the early mover’s advantage as we close in on the inner circle. There’s no guarantee we’ll find anything of use back there—but there are more opportunities beyond here. More chances to gain higher ground.”

Reiner, surprised at her intervention, hesitates for a split second—but it was long enough to remind Annie that her place is still in question.

He takes a step forward, goodwill evaporating presently. “When did you start thinking you could call the shots?” 

There’s a clench of uncertainty in her gut, but it does not surface in her otherwise stoic expression. “When I had every chance to kill you both, but I didn’t.” Her face settles into impassive lines as she presses him further. 

Confusion fractures his frown. Annie lets a disappointed huff leave her nose. “After all this time training as a Warrior, I thought you’d know better.”

“She’s right,” Bertolt’s voice surprises her. He graces her with a meaningful look. “She earned the command, the Warrior’s way.”

“I already told you I’ve taken down a Titan.” She steps forward, bracing for a fight. “I can show you how.”

There was a hardening of features both from Reiner and Galliard, a fleeting twitch of a strong desire to challenge her, but the result was already absolute. To defy it would mean defying the carefully crafted system of command the Marleyans had designed—and to do so is nothing short of an uprising.

That, Annie knew well. And if she establishes this firmly, she won’t have to wrestle with any more contentions.

She watches Reiner stew in his turmoil, observing the vein pulsing in his temple and the unmoving but tense set of his shoulders.

“Alright,” he concedes, and she feels the rightness of her decision come over her. “What do we do now, then?”

Annie beholds the motley crew of three people looking to her for instruction. Something definitive has happened; something has shifted the pieces in the game in her favor.

Her father had been right, his training methods justified. It was the person she had to become that paved the way for her progress. 

“We’ll gather food and supplies,” she says, voice clipped and precise. “If you see any threats, put as much distance as you can and come back to this base.” Her tone leaves no room for them to interpret it as a suggestion.

There is a collective nod, albeit varying in enthusiasm. 

“Reiner, Galliard,” she says at length. “You can scout the area for survivors,“ she pauses, somehow managing to convey a degree of apology in the instruction. “If there are any, they’ll keep moving forward instead of staying in one place.”

Taking in her command, Reiner returns only a fraction of a nod, and Galliard lets the silence speak for himself.

The group splits. 

With Bertolt, the trek in the forest is mostly silent; their pace is interrupted every now and then as Bertolt sets up a trap, a twitch-up snare that was a notch above what she had set up in the forest early on in the games. 

He sets more rigs at multiple points in the area, creating a funnel that eventually directs to a far more sophisticated trap for a larger animal. He is clearly set on seeing something in death throes.

“Why do you have to put up so many?” Annie asks after the upteenth one. “They’ll be signs we’re in the area.”

“If they trigger it, it’ll slow them down at least,” he says, thumbing the tenacity of the strings.

“We're taking too long,” she says after a few impatient beats. “It’s better if we keep moving.”

“How would you know which way’s right?” Bertolt turns, his tone is flat. Biting.  “We have no idea where the gates are in each wall. We don’t even know where the shifters are hidden.”

By the end of it, Bertolt has closed the distance between them, a thick heat of judgement in his bearing. He continues, “If you keep telling us we have to move, can I ask: do you have any idea where you’re heading?”

Annie grips the strap of her backpack that contains the map inside. “Let’s just find Reiner and Galliard and get the hell out of here,” she says in the act of turning away, but Bertolt had something in his arsenal.

“Does it have anything to do with the map you’ve been keeping from everyone?”

As soon as the sentence leaves his mouth, the air becomes deathly silent.

Annie schools her features carefully for her response, but when she meets his gaze, he’s staring as though daring her to deny what was so glaringly obvious to him.

“You went through my things,” she ignores the allegation. 

“Let’s stop lying to each other,” he says before looking at her intently. “Here, I’ll even return this to you.”

Bertolt takes something out of his pocket and tosses a metallic bracelet. Annie catches it with a fist grip.

Marcel’s bangle. 

She could run away now. Simply bolt from here and never come back. But she needed to know where to go.

“Where’s the map?” The voice comes out more demanding than she intended.

Something mercenary flickers between his eyes. “I tore it up.”

Swallowing a nauseating wave of panic, Annie steps forward. Now, he was turning this into a situation she couldn’t walk away from. Panic is then replaced by a creeping outrage. Because this is what always happens with Bertolt. Manipulation is how he starts and ends.

“I can make you pay for that.”

“I’m just trying to make you understand,” Bertolt continues, and whatever emotion Annie tries to read on him, she finds nothing. “I really tried to help you before. Getting you connections. Getting people to trust you even if they have every reason not to. But it’s obvious you’re never going to take anyone’s side. So here’s my proposal. Let’s just be useful to each other. Use your skills to protect me. And I’ll get you where you need to go.”

She stares at the bangle in her palm, truly discomfited at how Bertolt quickly gained ground on yet another personal shortcoming. 

Bertolt was almost unrecognizable now. Were his stuttering and timid posture all fabricated? 

She thinks back to the scores he received back in training—they must have been the catalyst to his newfound gambit. 

Compared to the other candidates, Bertolt did not measure up. If he showed potential in combat, Magath would tell him to embody Eren Kruger’s aggression or Mikasa Ackerman’s intuition. His biggest grievance, however, might have something to do with Armin Arlert and how quickly he beat the Mimic Room, where Bertolt had been trying to for days.

His overall performance had always been a shadow of someone else’s, but now, he seems to have embraced learning the different shapes and forms he can take—all the secrets he can hide when he’s not the center of attention. Where he could not rise into the height and light, the more vigorously his roots struggled earthward, downward, into the dark.

Where people kept their weapons, Bertolt kept their secrets.

“Do we have a deal?” Bertolt asks.

It takes almost forever, but Annie nods, and Bertolt’s lips flex into something very close to satisfaction.

Her father was right yet again. Kindness is conditional. Everything came with a price.

When they circle back, a fox is lying still in the trap, having triggered a wire that trapped it and let loose a slab of rock right on the head.

Even so, it is still breathing, but the kind that was near the end of its pain tolerance. As the fox continues to struggle, Bertolt seems to be taking his time admiring it.

“Just put it out of its misery,” Annie presses.

Instead of taking action, Bertolt doesn’t move. “If you think about it, a quick death is kind of a rare mercy. That’s something even you and I won’t get from anyone in this arena,” he explains as the blood gushes through the soil. 

Annie looks away, unable to watch the creature struggle. Bertolt turns to her. “That’s the truth and you know it, Annie. What difference does it make to animals?”

Annie’s fingers clench into a fist.

She steps forward and takes his ax, pushing towards the animal on its dying contractions of muscle. Flipping the weapon, she points the blunt wooden edge to its head, and the next thing Annie hears is the crack of a punctured skull.

She steps away as Bertolt picks up the body, draping it over his shoulder.

Despite the brief exchange, it’s not a small revelation; Bertolt showed the desire—no, something stronger. It was almost a hunger for something more methodical and cruel and slow.

Her mind wanders back to what Bertolt said earlier about Armin, how he won’t afford him the option of a painless and swift end.

No—Bertolt would make it slow, let him bleed until the ground is soaked with him. 

Whatever grievance she harbored against Armin, there's a part of her that hopes he doesn’t cross Bertolt’s path.

Should Armin cross hers, however, perhaps she will do the contrary and strike him down quickly. 

The least she could do is spare mercy. If she couldn't spare his life.

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ENCRYPTED MESSAGE FROM SECURE CHANNEL.

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MESSAGE DECRYPTED.

Chapter Text

Act 2

~O~

  “In their moral justification, the argument of the lesser evil has played a prominent role. . . its weakness has always been that those who choose the lesser evil forget quickly that they chose evil.”

― Hannah Arendt, Responsibility and Judgement

~O~

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~O~

OUTSIDE WALL ROSE

Arriving at the Second Wall had been a lot quicker with miraculously no casualties. 

It’s partly due to Galliard’s observation that Titans moved only during the day, Reiner’s proposal to move solely at night, and Bertolt’s navigation that leveraged shorter routes in lieu of the river’s bend. 

It took a bit of convincing to follow another trail that was faint at best and misdirected at worst. But Annie supported Bertolt’s advice and that had made it final.

And when the sight of Wall Rose loomed on the horizon quicker than anticipated, no one raised any more doubts. 

Reiner remarked on how it was that Bertolt had a sense of the way, and the latter claimed that he simply interpreted the geography around them, noting which side moss grew on trees, the direction in which the highest clouds moved, and the celestial bodies at night which proved to be a reliable anchor point.

It’s always as if he has an answer for everything, all without providing a clear intention or purpose. 

Bertolt once told her that he simply wants to win so he can live as an Honorary Marleyan, but his actions aren’t simply driven by ambition. Not like Reiner’s self interest. Not like Galliard’s desire to prove himself as a hero.

Bertolt is full of spite, and perhaps it unsettles her for the very same reason the emotion resonates with her. 

The hidden rage.

Annie shelves the thought. There’s no time to ponder on such things within her. 

They continue approaching their next destination on horseback, Galliard and Annie astride one horse and Reiner and Bertolt on the other. The moon bleaches prairie grass as pale as charcoal, but as vast as everything is, it’s all eclipsed by the Wall ahead, a cliff of countless grays and shadows.

The Wall is too big for comprehension but Annie’s reminded that it’s only a simulation and there aren't actually rows of Colossal Titans supporting the stress of the fortress.

Moreover, it means one thing: there is only one last wall left to conquer after Wall Rose. 

Then Annie hears something.

Quickly replaced by alertness, she yanks the reins and Galliard almost falls behind her.

Reiner also halts before them.

“What the—?” 

Annie hushes them with a finger and drops down from her horse. Galliard follows suit.

The Wall is much too far away to see any activity at the foot of it. But the distant chimes of bells reach their ears, a ghostly chorus suspended between notes of welcome and warning.

"What's going on?" Reiner drops down as well.

Just as abruptly as it began, the chimes fall silent far too quickly, making them question if they really heard them at all.

Annie’s curiosity draws level as she takes a step closer, scanning the horizon.

“It could be a trap,” Bertolt cautions, staring at the Wall like he could read their future in it.  “Could be worse.”

Galliard agrees. “Could be us.”

“It might be safer to circle around.” Reiner proposes, then turns to Bertolt. “You said there should be another gate, right?”

“Yes,” Bertolt confirms. “Four gates in each Wall.”

Annie runs her gaze on both ends, counting the number of pillars along its length and how wide each one was. She comes up with an estimate that could easily be converted into distance and time, but the answer is disappointing all the same: circumnavigating the wall would take far too long.

Time is already tailing away, nipping at her heels.

While everyone else takes a stand, Annie is already mounting her horse. 

“Annie,” Reiner calls after her. “We need to think this through—”

“There’s no need to. It’s the fastest route to the Third Wall,” she cuts in. “If we move now before sunrise, we can reach Wall Sina in less than two days.”

Reiner stares in disbelief, like he didn’t expect she would come up with a plan before he finished his sentence.

When he doesn’t answer, Annie squeezes her heels into the horse’s sides to move it. “Faster if we leave your sorry asses behind.”

Galliard climbs up her horse as if to indicate his agreement. Annie tugs the reins to send the horse leaping and striding across the packed earth, and soon enough, she hears hoofbeats galloping behind.

When they arrive at the gate, there is one problem they didn’t anticipate.

The portcullis was lowered, blocking passage.

“Anyone into climbing?” Galliard says as they crane their neck up to scale the Wall.

Annie ignores them. She eyes the river a few meters away, the same one they originally followed in Wall Maria. Somehow, she remembers the cages they had put her and the rest of the candidates in on the first day, where a pipeline connected their cells together so they could communicate.

Something must be connecting the Walls too.

She makes her way towards the river and then takes off her jacket and backpack, chucking them to the dry side of the banks before dropping into the shallow, fast-moving waters, the current eddying around her and lapping at the folds of her clothes. Reiner, Bertolt and Galliard stand in confusion by the water’s edge, glancing at each other and then back at her.

Filling her lungs with air, she dives beneath the surface, the turbulent flow blurring her vision. At first, the odds of finding an abandoned channel seem ridiculous, but not a moment later, a canal tucked away in an alcove proves her wrong. It had been half hidden due to underwater silt and the noticeably darker waters beyond.

Swimming towards it, Annie spots the wooden barricade half-buried under mud instead of the hole where it belonged.

Someone else had gotten here first.

The opening is about as wide as her upper body, barely wide enough for someone like her with slim shoulders to get through, let alone broad-necked brawns like Reiner or Galliard nor taller individuals like Bertolt.

There’s a name that comes to mind. 

Could it be possible? How could they have made it this far?

But if she wants to find out, she has to do it alone, for his safety.

Annie rises to the surface, walking towards her allies as she wrings her hair of water. She informs them of the new passageway. But there’s one caveat.

“None of you can fit in there. But I can go ahead and open the gate from inside.”

There’s a noticeable stiffening from her companions, a furrowing of eyebrows and fidgeting of hands. Did they think she would not return for them?

It was a reminder once again that they would always view her loyalty as a teetering fulcrum, shifting with the slightest whiff of doubt.

“We’ll wait out here,” Reiner tells her when no one else could come up with an alternative, then adds. “With the horses.”

Right, because even if she wanted to run off on her own, she’d need one.

Annie dives back into the river, into the narrow sluice, and emerges out on the other end of Wall Rose.

She swims to the banks, and the moment she rises and lays eyes on the village, only one thing was clear: it’s been ravaged. Rubble and scrap fill the streets. Pigeons cooed from roof ridges where tiles hung precarious or had entirely black-gapped wells. 

But no signs of Titans. Either they’ve been driven out of the gates, or someone had the means to eliminate them all.

Carefully, she makes her way in a straight line, her feet squelching with every step, clothes clinging in all the places that made her shiver. Charred wood smolders underfoot, and broken glass crunches beneath her boots as she moves through the debris, nodding thoughtfully at the unavoidable noise she’s making. 

Even if the area seems deserted, it oddly feels as though activity had taken place just moments before, strange and unsettling as the silence after interrupting a conversation.

If only the river hadn’t turned lazy wide and far too quiet to cover the sounds of her passing. 

As she passes by one of the houses, something catches her attention. Amongst the rubble in some nearby collapsed houses, where piles of gray granite had formed small hills, here and there were long, discolored streaks.

Dried or not, the smell of blood is as recognizable as the fear that had started forming in her gut. 

A hand was hanging limp beneath a pile of broken bricks and splintered wood planks.

She swallows, not knowing what she would find.

As if suddenly thinking better of it, she shakes her head, then takes three steps back. Her body moves sluggishly as if it was being pulled away by something that wanted to keep her from investigating the pile of rubble. 

But she chooses to step forward. 

Carefully, she starts moving chunks away until a face emerges into view.

Then two faces.

In the light of the moon, she finally makes out their shapes. Lying there on the ground were two motionless children, a boy and a girl.

Udo and Zofia.

Annie feels like her heart has stopped. As frozen as every nerve ending in her body. She jerks away and runs as if hell itself was in pursuit of her.

It’s when Annie rounds the next curve towards the gates that she stops, the shock jolting her legs to a standstill.

Another child is hanging upside down, like deer after hunters have cut its throat and left to bleed dry. 

Falco.

Hanging from a prickly hemp of rope.

Taking in his still form, Annie thinks he might be dead but notices the fluctuation of his breathing. Relief makes her own chest swell.

He’s alive.

“Falco?” Her voice cuts through the silence. “Can you hear me?” 

He’s unconscious; head wound, probably, which explains his predicament. She surveys the rope and sees it rigged up through an iron post a few meters shy of the gate then held down by a counterweight.

A trigger. 

So it was a trap, only someone else had been caught first. 

It had been cleverly set up so that anyone who tried to move towards the gate would find themselves snared and lifted from the ground.

Falco likely went through the same way she did: swam through the floodgate and tried to open the gate for someone.

Colt.

Annie looks around, searching for anything: a noise, trail on the ground. But nothing stirs except for flapping wings overhead from birds.

Now it’s a race against time to get him down; since finding Falco, she’s been counting down until the ones who had set the trap will find them.

Then, something moves behind one of the houses.

Shit.

It’s a good distraction, because then, Annie stiffens at the press of something cold and sharp against her neck. 

She’s been in one too many drills with her father to fail to recognize the sensation of a weapon digging into her body. 

And steel was always deadlier with silence.

She steadily brings her hands up, showing no intention of retaliating.

“Don’t move."

Even if the stranger is standing behind, she knows it’s Pieck Finger from the tenor of her voice.

Annie tries to calculate her odds. The only ones safe from Pieck’s knife are several paces outside the gate.

There could be a chance they’ll notice she’s been gone too long, realize she’s in trouble, and find another way through the gate. But it's far more likely they'll think she abandoned them, and they'll end up finding another way in.

Either way, she’s left to her own devices. 

Screw it.

In barely a blink, her left hand slams down and seizes the blade.

It breaks skin in the process. Yet, Annie doesn’t flinch. Or at least—she’s trying not to show any trace of pain.

Annie slowly turns around, burrowing the blade even deeper in her palms to overpower Pieck trying to wrest the knife away. Her skin feels fiery in contact with its cold metal body. 

Red streaks of rivulets travel down her forearm while she maintains resolute and calm. Determined not to lose no matter what.

Clearly, the gesture lands because Pieck—too stunned to react—releases her grip, allowing Annie to yank the knife away, grab the handle and hold the tip against her neck.

“You’re not gonna kill me.” Pieck’s voice is confident. 

“You’re right. That depends,” Annie answers, then nods her head in Falco’s direction. “Is that your doing?”

Pieck’s body tenses as though she was ready to bolt. 

“Why?” Annie demands, the tilt of her head taking on a more pronounced angle. “He’s not a Cart Titan candidate. And you’re the last one remaining. You’ve practically won.”

Pieck visibly blanches at her, as though trying to comprehend the implications of what had just been said aloud. Annie glares at Pieck, daring her to deny it. 

She could not have been the more obvious culprit.

Then another voice interjects. “This is a pleasant surprise, Leonhart. It seems I was correct in assuming the bell would attract courageous individuals like yourself.”

When the person steps into her line of sight, it takes a fraction of a second longer than usual for Annie to recognize him. Zeke’s voice fills the leftover space between them, like it had taken shape out of thin air.

He pushes his spectacles further up the bridge of his nose. It shines with the same glimmer as the spear at his back. 

If he makes any move to grab it, Pieck will be a good shield. 

“What do you want with Falco?” Annie presses.

Zeke’s eyes flicks towards the little boy, the action tinged with surprise as though remembering he was just there. “Oh him? No, we were not planning to kill him. Not at all.”

She had heard too many half-truths in the past to take any words at face value anymore; instead she looked beyond each word until its full implications were made clear.

Her gaze shifts to a point beyond his shoulder, then back to Pieck and her trap.

“You’re planning to use him as bait. To lure the other Beast Titan candidate,” Annie makes plain.

“Perhaps you could put it this way. We’re holding him simply so he can be reunited with his brother,” Zeke says instead. “No harm will come to Falco. Not on my watch.” 

Annie’s hands knot into fists. Whatever the reason was, Falco could not be safe if this is how they handled him. Trapping him like an animal.

“If you could just put the knife down.”

Recalibrating her moves, Annie thinks of her potential play, whether she could force her way out of this.

She looks at Zeke, her gaze a careful appraisal; the way he stood without flinching suggests he would rarely surrender to threat. 

“There’s no need for bloodshed, Leonhart,” Zeke says as though he read her mind. “I have to admit: I admire your guts.” He’s looking at her bleeding palm where she wrested the knife from Pieck with sheer will. “But I never had the pleasure of fighting you.”

The air seems to be charged with electricity before he even makes the offer. “How about we settle this with a duel?”

“What’s the catch?” she asks first, making clear that she was not going to commit without caution.

“If you win, Falco is all yours,” he says, far too generously. But naturally, it follows with a proviso. 

“If you lose, you will stay and help us for one night.”

She pauses for a moment before asking this aloud, voice laced with skepticism. “That’s it?”

“Yes. I thought I should make my priority clear,” Zeke affirms. “Or you could walk away. Find yourselves another passage. Because I will not let you get through.”

So she stands between two choices.

If she walks away, who knows what nefarious plans Zeke and Pieck had for Falco? On the other hand, if she takes the gamble, she runs the risk of losing to Zeke and delaying her mission.

Annie looks at Falco. Despite being unconscious, the lines of his face harbor some residual terror that only seems to be amplified the longer she stares at him.

She looks on with a growing sense of dread. Trained all her life to run towards danger but away from people, her feet are planted at the crossroads.

The more she thinks about walking away, the more prominent Marcel’s shadow looms over her own. The more she thinks about leaving, the more she remembers having been left behind. Under the forest floor. 

She knows one thing: leaving this time means Falco would not come back; the gravity of the moment is as heavy as the soil that buried her. Guilt colors everything in vignette black, dragging her subconscious down with staggering force.

“Do you accept?” Zeke prods.

Annie squeezes her eyes shut. In the heat of the moment, she steps forward.

If a dangerous gamble is the price, then this is where her bet begins.

Straightening her posture to a more relaxed stance, she tosses Pieck’s knife on the ground. “I accept.”

His mouth twitches at the corners, his eyes sparkling with satisfaction. “Excellent.”

Then Annie asks, “But how do I know you’ll keep your word?”

“Oh, please, Leonhart. Faith is for the foolish. This is simply a contract. We don’t need to have faith.” Zeke replies, then cocks his head infinitesimally. “I thought you’d know better than that.”

Words of an opportunist.

“What do we do about the other three outside?” Pieck asks him.

Zeke’s mouth opens and shuts again in quick succession, clearly considering. “Let them in,” he decides. “It would be quite nice to have an audience.”

“And the boy? We can’t just leave him there,” Pieck points out, and if Annie didn’t know any better, she would have thought it was a considerate proposal.

“Not to worry. He won’t escape in such a condition,” Zeke says, missing her point entirely.

Pieck sighs, walking away and disappearing under the archway in the Wall. She must have found the wheel operating the portcullis because Annie hears the low rumble and metallic echo of the gate slowly rising up from the floor, revealing an opening.

They hear the sounds of hooves clicking against the cobblestones. Reiner and Galliard ease the horses under the spiked bottom of the gate. Bertolt follows close behind, looking over his shoulder should Titans have been alerted by the noise. 

Annie makes her way towards them, Pieck tailing right behind.

In the darkness, the trio is not alarmed by Annie approaching them.

“Took you long enough,” Reiner says with a scowl. 

Bertolt nods. “Yeah, you had us thinking you left us.”

Then Galliard shuffles backward, an air of uneasiness in his steps. “Hold on. Why am I seeing double?”

By this time, Pieck is breaking away from Annie’s silhouette, that’s when the three snap life into their spine and draw weapons.

“Good to see you, Pok,” Pieck regards Galliard calmly even as he raises a dagger towards her.

“Pieck?” He’s almost breathless when he says it, an almost noticeable twitch in the way he holds his weapon.

The two of them stare at each other, revealing more familiarity between them than either cared to admit out loud.

It’s Reiner who breaks the silence. “What’s happening?” he asks, eyeing their newfound companion with caution while Bertolt fixes his gaze on Annie, a deep accusation barely contained within its edges. 

“Well, this is your problem to explain, Annie,” Pieck says, breathing heavily from manning the portcullis. “Better hurry up before Zeke starts getting impatient.”

She leaves, allowing them to discuss it privately in a corner.

Now that three sets of eyes are wide with attention, Annie runs the argument over in her head. All she knows is how vital it was to convey that they had no other option but to accept the deal.

After a quick recount of how she came across Pieck and Zeke, she talked about their offer to allow safe passage if a duel was won—purposely excluding Falco for the sole reason Bertolt was there. They’re agreeable until she reveals the duel would be between her and Zeke. 

It’s immediately met by a tirade of doubt and uncertainty.

“Are you fucking crazy?” Reiner shoots her a full look of derision. 

“It’s too late,” Annie says. “I’ve made my decision.”

“I sparred with Zeke once in the training facility and I lost before the minute was even over.”

She squints with confusion. “Magath wouldn’t have allowed that.”

“Yeah, tell that to the guards,” Reiner says, then Bertolt shoots him a cautious look. “What? You seriously think they’d air the fact that Marleyan guards forced us to brawl for their amusement in exchange for favors?” 

He stretches out every syllable with contempt, glancing above, then distilling all his frustration into a breathy sigh. “They can edit me out in the broadcast for all I care. I don’t give a shit about sponsorships.”

She reels her head back in disbelief. “Why don’t I know any of this?”

“You were in the goddamn isolation room when it all happened. It was non-stop for three days and Zeke won every fight but one.”

There’s only one person with the reputation to beat Zeke.

“Mikasa.” Annie preempts the obvious answer.

“No. Armin Arlert,” Galliard corrects and it strikes Annie that a small sound of surprise leaves her throat. Bertolt paces away from the group, appearing to be agitated.

“Armin?” she clarifies, fighting for expressionlessness. He’s the last person she thinks would show up to a brawl, let alone win one. 

“Guy had a death wish. Kept getting beat up but he kept coming back anyway,” Reiner says. “I don’t know how the fuck he won but he probably had a strategy. And we better come up with one fast.”

She devotes half her attention to Reiner’s succeeding theories and half to the bigger mystery: Armin Arlert uncharacteristically brawling with another candidate—all to get a favor from the guards?

There’s one insane possibility that comes to mind. 

A favor.

The same one that negotiated her early release from the isolation room?

Annie shakes her head. There’s no way. She berates herself for even giving his actions any ounce of credence. 

“And maybe that’s one way you can fend him off, Annie," Reiner is still talking, motioning with his arms for attention. "You just have to keep your guard up around Zeke. You never know when he’s going to attack.”

“That won’t be enough,” Galliard steps forward then with a more aggressive approach. "You have to attack him first," he says, throwing a jab in the air for emphasis. "Move fast, throw punches from unexpected angles before he can even defend himself—it's all about confusing him.”

Would Armin have done that? No matter how they put it, Armin's way of thinking seems much too calculated to resort to such methods.

In the noise of their advice, she turns her attention to Zeke; he may be impressive with a spear in the training facility but pare it all down to guts and nuts, he’s just an older and possibly slower opponent. 

She can take him down in two minutes. Maybe less.

“Enough,” Annie plucks some inner restraint to lower her voice. “I don’t need your advice. I can take him on just fine.”

Ignoring him, she tears off a piece of her cloth from her shirt and wraps it around her palm, cringing as it makes contact with torn skin and putting pressure until there is no more blood seeping under its weight. 

“This isn’t an easy win, Annie. Look at you, you’re bleeding for fuck’s sake. Tell her, Bertolt.”

It’s a measure of Bertolt’s preoccupation that he hasn’t even noticed Reiner, let alone participated in their discussion. Instead, his eyes are fixed entirely on something else, maintaining a clear, unbroken line of sight on Falco hanging at the post.

“They have Falco,” he says without moving. That once inexplicable look of his takes on a dangerous calculation. “He’s alive.”

Annie grits her teeth. 

“This isn’t the time. We’ll worry about that kid later.”

Bertolt has a slight frown of concentration on his forehead that made him appear contemplative, combing the offer from deep within its dark corners. 

“Who are you really doing this for, Annie?” he asks, a deep gravel of voice.

She feels a clench in her gut before it dawns on her. It’s become more than just about winning. It’s about implicitly revealing whose side she would take.

A feeling of unease began to creep over her like a fog; at first it was just tingling in the back of her mind.

By this time, Zeke is standing barefoot, cracking the knuckles of each hand while gazing off into space, breathing deeply and slowly with a kind of indifference for what was coming. 

“Any day now, Leonhart,” he says, meditative. Relaxed. Meanwhile, the first tickle of adrenaline edges its way into her nerves.

“I’m ready,” Annie says, though the shiftiness in her footing betrays the possibility that she might not be.

Pieck had already drawn a ritualistic circle on the ground using her knife.

“First out of the circle or first to draw blood?” he asks.

Kicking him out of the ring would be easy. The fight would be quick with no wasted time.

As she considers her options, Zeke decides to add, “I would have preferred fighting to the death, but I couldn’t possibly steal Mikasa Ackerman’s chance.”

Annie grates her teeth, building the urge to dig her heels in his shins. “First to draw blood,” she confirms.

She steps into the fight circle, and it almost feels like stepping onto a stage—all eyes are on her, and she’s briefly reminded that thousands more are looking, watching behind the safe walls of their home.

The air hangs heavy with anticipation as they circle around. 

“I do hope you live up to your name, Leonhart.”

”Do you always talk before you fight?”

“When I am at ease.”

The remark is meant to rile her, so she tunes him out and analyzes the scene before her.

He’s not moving, not attempting to make headway and maybe that’s a good thing. No momentum means weaker strikes.

Deciding to immobilize Zeke below the waist, Annie shifts weight forward and breaks into a sprint, chambering a sidekick to his knee.

Backing up a few steps, she’s appalled to find him more amused than anything. His arms even hang loosely at his sides, almost beckoning to be attacked again. 

“Your strength is impressive. But your technique? It seems to be missing something.”

On her left, Bertolt’s expression had shifted from eager anticipation to concern. A sense of urgency rises within. 

Annie ducks to his side again and puts her entire weight and all the energy that could be crammed into an exceedingly well-trained kick.

But the only thing it bruises is her confidence, when she steps back and sees Zeke completely unaffected. 

In fact, his feet are firmly planted on the ground the same way his reptilian grin wouldn’t leave his face.

What the hell is going on?

“There's something intense about you, Leonhart. Your very soul burns with it,” he says calmly after the dust clears from her footwork. “Tell me, what is the source of all that fire? Why all this anger?”

Ignoring him, she returns again to throw her hip into a roundhouse but this time, Zeke has a response. 

He spins in a tight circle, dodging the kick and coming up from behind faster than she could react with a counter. Then she feels it: his fists smashing into her knees with bone-jarring force, shitcanning her entire follow-through.

Loose footing makes her buckle; Annie catches herself with her arms on the floor, utterly shocked at how much she miscalculated this.

From afar, Reiner and Galliard are pacing in erratic directions, doubt radiating in heatwaves. Bertolt stays rigid.

“I ask again, why all this anger?” Zeke says. Annie’s nails dig under dirt.

Enough with the preamble. She’ll end this quickly.

“Stop asking me that.”

In the face of her shadow, she waits for the clouds to veil the moon again before she kips up and takes a swing, engaging in a vicious back-and-forth of jabs and blocks, neither party making headway against the other for long stretches at a time.

“You are not as fast today, I noticed. You are usually better than this.”

Zeke ducks under the whirring of her arms and locks her into a chokehold but Annie leans into him, using her lower center of gravity to drive him backwards, forcing him to skid toward the lip of the circle. 

But he bends his knees, drops for the back-throw and before Annie could wrench herself sideways, he hurls her with enough power to tumble over the ground like stone skipping over water.

She lifts her head off the ground, vision blurring and sharpening again. Looking at the edge of the ring from outside.

“This would have been quicker if you chose the former,” Zeke says as Annie recovers from the fall, feeling a heady mixture of disbelief and denial.

Sweat starts to trail down her face and neck; soreness blooms on spots where she had been too busy blocking to notice them either. 

Annie’s heartbeat reaches to her eyelids, and she’s fairly certain, no, absolutely sure that he can tell.

When she rises to her feet, Zeke's noir silhouette appears larger, silver around the edges like the thin clouds above. Without warning, he rains a slew of strikes at a faster and more brutal pace than before and Annie takes even more strikes than she’s able to dodge.

“Keep moving, Annie!” Galliard’s voice rises over the hiss of Zeke’s swings.

With a quick side step, she manages to slip away from yet another hard right hand, spinning backward this time before landing on the balls of both feet just barely out of reach of him.

Now with a quick respite, she could see Reiner and Galliard gesticulating wildly behind Zeke with contradictory maneuvers, and if it was all meant to piss her off even more to keep throwing rights, then it was working.

“You look terribly spent,” Zeke points out. “I must say I really expected more from tonight.”

“Shitty day for both of us, then.” Annie wipes perspiration beading down through her chin.

She returns to gain ground with a furious flurry of short, wicked pokes that keeps Zeke on retreat for a dozen steps but he settles in an easy cadence, his defense keeping him buoyant and lightweight.

Like a dance. He’s taunting her.

“Your anger holds you back. It finds hallucinations in the shape of your fury,” Zeke outlines as he weaves gracefully through the air, deliberate and quick—no added motions or hesitation, no wasted energy on wild swings or footwork that didn’t add speed or power. “Whoever taught you was lacking.”

Annie coaxes him into an opening, and when Zeke pushes in, she grabs his arm and twists it behind him. “You know nothing about my father.”

“Ah, I see it now,” he says with more clarity, eyes suddenly alight despite the tension in his arm. “Little Annie’s weaknesses were beyond his ability to teach.”

He retaliates with an elbow jab that Annie narrowly misses but it forces her to let him go. 

“Shut up.” The intent is warning, but Zeke seems bent on teasing out the edges of her wrath. A fire is coming up in her throat, spiked and insatiable.

“It did not matter how hard you tried,” he continues. “It was not enough then. It is not enough now.”

“I said shut up.”

“And it will never be enough.”

That’s when Annie’s temper goes nuclear. The intensity pounds through every artery as muscles tensed, the floodgates of her anger opening and spilling in chaotic torrent, consuming rationality, unmooring her restraint.

Annie plunges back into the fight with full adrenaline but half the thinking. 

She lunges, twisting and rotating her body to deliver the fatal blow, but as her leg cuts harmlessly high, Zeke dips low, raises his fist, and Annie pays for the premature strike by taking a square punch in the face hard enough to make her head ring and vision blur.

She leans into it just enough to escape a hairline fracture but her legs give and she collapses, struck down like stone in water. 

Lying still, she begins to think her limbs had been paralyzed but soon finds Zeke’s weight pinning her like an insect on a mounting board.

“Do you yield?” he asks. 

She swallows, fighting to suppress the flash of shame that follows it. The bitterness stays in her mouth, metallic and tangy until she realizes it’s an open wound in her gums, dripping down her mouth.

Zeke releases his hold on her and she rolls to her back, facing the sky.

She had prided herself on her combat techniques, honed in a manner few could match. But now, Annie feels flayed, irreparably damaged, past any attempt at redemption. Falco is staying exactly where he is, and she has neither the right nor power to take him to safety.

“You trained hard, Little Annie. But that has to do with the problem,” he says, standing upright above her. “Training is a blueprint, nothing more. They are simply plans. They are stories that fool yourself into believing it will prepare you. But we both know the truth: at the root of it all, you are still weak. Still afraid. Unable to stand on your own two feet.”

The rebuke cuts her far deeper than any weapon had. All of her strength dried up in one damning sentence. Her eyes begin to sting, but she refuses to weep, and it takes considerable effort to summon up the shell of who she was.

Back when she was in control. Back when she was indifferent.

Then his tone shifts. “I know because I recognize it in you as I did once in myself.” The sentiment somehow manages to impart a degree of sympathy, as though he’s revealing a sliver of his own self. “And there’s power in admission. I recommend you give it a try.” 

Give it a try?

With Zeke’s back turned on her, she slips the ring on her index finger and grabs him by the neck.

Galliard jumps forward but Annie snarls, eyes blazing. “Step back.” Bertolt pulls him to the side with Reiner.

When she faces front, Zeke is already gesturing to Pieck—who had come far too close to Annie—to put down her knife. 

“Do not harm her, Pieck,” he instructs with measure, and she stays frozen in position, obedient. He turns his attention right back to Annie, livid with rage.

“Go ahead, Little Annie,” Zeke regards her with a rehearsed smile, mouth twisted up in one side. “If you do not abide by the rules, you know very well what they will do to you.”

Anyone looking at them may think she just has him in a headlock. But Annie makes sure Zeke is aware of the pressure from the ring’s blade, pointed to his jugular.

“I am saying this to save your neck. Not mine,” Zeke tries once more. “Is this how you want them to kill you off? How disappointing.”

Disappointing.

Disappointing.

Disappointing.

The echo no longer comes from Zeke but within, as though her father was just standing a foot away.

Slowly, the taut edges of her body begin to loosen, as though his very presence was the invisible grip that held her firmly in place, slowly draining the rage in her veins until pain is all that is left.

Annie stops straining against Zeke, and releases her hold.

Zeke palms his throat instinctively, collecting himself, smoothing the messy wayward strands of his hair with his palm. He looks around to assess everyone’s level of acceptance.

The mood quickly shifts and it seems all of them felt the change in every inhalation. Zeke has secured his place and in doing so, undoes Annie’s.

He allows the silence to stretch, and in the absence of voices, the wind loudly stirs debris in circles along with smells of ash and smoke. 

Zeke approaches Reiner, Galliard and Bertolt, tense but with a distinct lessening of intensity.

“As we agreed, you will stay with us for the night,” he reminds them. “That should be plenty of time before we encounter Colt, and perhaps a few of his other companies.”

Annie was still making strides towards making sense of what was happening. 

Zeke’s commands are distant and muffled. She tries to retrace when it had all gone wrong, but she’s too disoriented. A deep exhaustion had replaced all anger and fear—only confusion is left.

Her eyes sweep across the faces of Reiner, Bertolt and Galliard, searching for some sign that was a momentary setback for them, but their expressions suggest that they’re coming to terms with the loss.

“There’s an entire village to loot and we don’t have all night,” Zeke all but snaps, untying his horse from a post and leading it forward into the village. “If I were you, I’d pick up my jaws and get moving.”

Bertolt’s lips are nervously pressed, but he makes a stand anyway. “I’ll stay and help them.”

“No,” Zeke dismisses swiftly. “I need eyes behind my back. Reiner and Galliard will defend my sides.” His voice suggests no room for negotiation, and even his gaze turns colder. “Bertolt, you would do well to distance yourself from Falco Grice. It is extremely important that he remains alive for me.”

Bertolt manages to break away from the intensity of Zeke’s gaze, blinking at the ground before moving towards the horses. Reiner and Galliard eventually follow suit, each climbing their own horses.

Before trotting into the village, Zeke pulls the reins to look back, his face incredulous, almost amused as he looks from Falco to Annie. 

He gestures grandly with his hands. “Little Annie, why don't you make yourself useful? Help Pieck cut Falco down." There is no warmth in those words; they are meant only to taunt her. 

Annie returns his gaze coolly but says nothing. Zeke kicks the horse and they speed off.

Pieck sighs, hands on her hips and a look on her face that suggests the tone didn't sit well with her.

“You heard him,” Pieck says when Zeke is beyond earshot. Before she approaches the counterweight holding Falco up, Annie forestalls her with a gesture. A warning.

“I’ll do it.”

Pieck allows her to move forward as though agreeing she needed the distraction. At least this way, she’s more focused on mechanically unspooling sections of rope, thereby lowering Falco slowly.

“I always thought you’d team up with this kid,” Pieck comments to punctuate the emptiness as Annie uses her remaining strength to get Falco down. “Or that other guy you talk so much to.”

Annie says nothing. 

“Not in the mood? Yeah, I get it,” Pieck lets up a frown. “You bet everything on this and it backfired.”

Annie’s grip on the ropes tightened for a moment before becoming suddenly slack again, calculating what this means for herself and the consequences of losing in such a way.

When Falco is lowered, Annie reaches out, pulling his shoulders down with her own weight until the rope gives way and he falls in her arms. She feels the swell of exhaustion burn in her chest as if it had been siphoned from all parts of her body. 

But when she sees Falco at close up, the sight throws Annie headlong into a spiral. His skin is dry and chalky, lips cracked and chapped, revealing hurt and neglect. 

Behind her exhaustion came something else: a numbness. From admitting defeat, suffering humiliation, and letting down another person she couldn't help.

This is what happens when she tries.

Pieck appears behind her with plenty of rope around her arms. “We need to bind him.”

Annie rouses out of her stupor to set Falco down and takes the rope, coiling it around Falco’s wrists first. She pulls on both sides just enough so that the rope doesn’t cut into his skin too much, but tight enough to hold him securely.

“Is it really true what you said?” Pieck brings up, sudden and without context.

“About what?”

When Pieck turns, her eyes are devoid of the light it had earlier. “About Udo and Zofia.”

It surprises Annie that she feels compelled to ask. “What’s it to you?”

“I just… want to see them for myself.”

Pieck gives her more rope, and she begins winding it several times around both of Falco's legs at the ankles before tying them together in a complex knot. 

She looks away for a moment, her severe profile unchanging. “Are the bodies… underground?”

“No,” Annie says, the memory sending a chill down her spine. “Not all of them were.”

Pieck shifts uneasily, then sits up with haste. “If Titans find their bodies, they’ll be eaten. We have to go back and bury them.”

Annie blinks slowly, a deliberate gesture.

“Help me find them, Annie. I can give you something in exchange,” she says, maintaining determined eye contact, prepared to stake something on it.

"What could I possibly want from you?”

“Zeke’s not the only one with secrets,” Pieck says in a hush tone, glancing from the empty road behind them then to Annie’s face with urgency. “I have his intel on key locations.”

No. She could be lying. Anyone could be desperate enough to say anything. She has to test the validity of the claim first.

Annie pretends to be half interested. “So, you know how to get to Norwall? I’m not interested unless you know where it is." 

“Norwall?” Pieck frowns, studying her doubtfully. “There’s… there’s nothing by that name.”

Still Annie says nothing. 

Pieck’s face undergoes a series of baffled expressions until it settles on fond exasperation.

"Oh, I see what you’re doing," Pieck tuts under her breath.

“What am I doing?” Annie’s voice is rhetorical but her eyes remain keen.

“You were checking to see if I was telling the truth,” Pieck explains with pointed awareness. ”I just said I had key information on valuable locations, but since you had no way of confirming this, you asked a question with a nonsense word in it. Very clever of you."

A plume of air lifts from Annie’s nose. She’s sharper than she looks kind. 

“So,” Annie exhales slowly. “You have a map?”

“Never said I had a map,” Pieck corrects. “I just know where the Titan shifters are.”

Annie freezes, breath caught somewhere between inhalation and exhalation. She collects herself and hopes she was able to hide her surprise.

Pieck might have just given her the single advantage she’s been looking for. The discovery affords her a small sense of victory and banishes fatigue.

But while that one mystery is solved, the more important one remains unclear.

“Answer this first,” Annie begins. “Why bother burying Udo and Zofia? They’re dead. They wouldn’t know what you did for them.”

Pieck balks at the question with faintly offended air, biting the inside of her lip as though struggling with some inner dialogue.

Her eyes travel from the length of the rope, down to how it’s coiled around Falco on the ground. Her voice lowers. “They won’t know. But I will.”

Pieck looks at her feet, lips pursed and eyes hollow, fingers twisting of their own accord. “I sometimes forget who I was before all this happened. They make you suffer so much you become numb. Indifferent.”

“Some of us learn better that way,” Annie counters, hands clasped.

“I don’t believe that one bit,” Pieck says, eyes blazing. “If suffering really teaches, wouldn't everything at home be better? Wouldn’t everyone learn and make peace and break down walls? But here we are, abandoning children like they’re nothing.”

The line makes Annie’s mouth quivers before forming a straight, deceptively stoic line. 

Pieck continues. “I didn’t know Udo and Zofia well enough to make their death any more personal. But I do know that they were just children. They should be back home. They should be racing each other or looking at… stupid ladybugs and pansies.”

Then more quietly, she whispers. “They should be mourned.”

The intention finally dawns on Annie, what Pieck was trying to do. But she narrows her eyes, doubtful. “There’s no chance they’d broadcast that.”

“I don’t care,” Pieck replies. “Maybe I just have faith that they’ll see it too.”

Annie scoffs. “Faith is for the foolish.”

“Yeah,” Pieck agrees. Her face settles into something devoid of expression.

Then it comes back with a harder edge. “But sometimes, it’s all we’ve got,” she says as a parting shot, rising to her feet and walking away.

Annie looks at Falco lying beneath her, then to Pieck marching on her own, then the empty space in the sky for a longer stretch of time, feeling struck and pissed off and skeptical all at once, because she’s never let other people become the determining variables in her mission.  

“Pieck,” she says, blinking once. “We’ll leave tonight.”

Because the more she thinks about it, the more she sees that avoiding them would be impossible. Just like how Armin kept getting himself involved in every waking moment, despite all her attempts to shut him out.

Then the sleeping body below her stirs. 

And when Annie looks down, Falco is wide awake. 

Chapter Text

Act 2

~O~

“Man is born free; and everywhere he is in chains.”

— Jean-Jacques Rousseau, The Social Contract

~O~

INSIDE TROST DISTRICT, WALL ROSE

Annie could have weathered more blows from Zeke. She would prefer the agony to the way Falco looked at her.

She doesn’t expect the moment to render her still, figuring out if he’s been awake long enough to hear about Udo and Zofia’s death, or just enough to be aware that Annie is to blame for the ropes on his wrists and ankles. 

“Annie?” he asks, as though in disbelief if it really was her. “Are you really one of them?”

She doesn’t answer and lets her gaze fall to her soles. That is all it takes for Falco to realize what she had done; what he had been too afraid to ask out loud.

“But… you’re not going to kill me,” he says instead of asking, almost giving her the benefit of the doubt. Then a sheen of uncertainty passes through his eyes. “Are you?”

It’s difficult to maintain eye contact when Annie knows what awaits him.

Finally, Pieck steps forward.

“We’re not going to kill you. Zeke needs you as bait. For your brother,” she replies honestly despite the discomfort in her throat.

Where the thought of his own death seemed inconsequential to him, the moment Pieck spoke of Colt is when Falco’s composure fractures. Tears begin to spill over his cheek, which was still pressed against the ground. 

“I screwed up again. This is all my fault,” he cries, eyes scarcely visible under the cast shadows of his forehead. “I shouldn’t have gone alone. I shouldn’t be here. I shouldn’t have—”

He shifts his weight towards Annie's feet and inches closer so he could reach out with his bound hands, wrists already red from struggling against them. 

"Please," he says once more, the words strained and desperate. "Just let me go. I’ll never get in your way again, I swear."

Annie steps back involuntarily as he crawls into her personal space and a silent scream lodges deep within her. 

It’s as if Marcel had returned from the dead to haunt her again, reaching out his arm toward hers in an almost pleading gesture, every breath heaved in ragged gasps.

Get out of my head, Annie thinks. 

Shut up. Shut up. Shut up. Shut up. Shut up.

Shut up. Shut up. Shut up. Shut up. 

Shut up. Shut up. Shut up. 

Shut up. Shut up. 

Shut up. 

Falco repeats himself more urgently now, drawing himself high up where his knees could: "Please!"

“Shut up!”

With the tightness of stress pulsing through her veins, Annie stumbles forward before realizing what she’s doing. Her hand acts before she could stop it and strikes Falco with an ear-ringing slap.

Then all at once, when she finally sees the angry red welt on his cheek, the wrongness of it congeals in her chest, like an explosion that had nowhere else to go but inwardly back upon itself. 

Falco recoils in surprise and touches his cheek, burning with the imprint of her outburst.

He’s staring at her with the same wide-eyed expression, but there’s an edge that wasn’t there before. The light in his eyes that used to regard her as a friend was now pared down to something else.

When Annie steps forward and he slides back, that’s when she knows.

The entire state of his body is wired taut like a bowstring held all the way back. She lowers her hands, looking at it in disbelief, feeling like a stranger in her own flesh.

All sense of security vanishes into thin air. Annie’s rubbery legs feel the tickling burn of adrenaline, coursing through them with the urge to run away.

“Where are you going?!” Pieck’s voice becomes smaller with distance.

“I can’t—I can’t do this—”

Annie sets off to a frantic run, body in full tilt but with no direction in mind. Then something abruptly pulls her back by her forearm then forces her to the ground. 

Her limbs seem to go limp as Pieck pins her down with a knee on her chest that almost slams air out of her lungs.

“They’ll kill you for breaking the rules,” Pieck presses against Annie, half struggling, half thrashing with no focus. “Think about that before you do anything reckless.”

A wave of nausea rises as though it were a tide, her chest tight and her heart pounding, mind roiling without a clear picture of what she’s trying to get away from. 

“You need to calm down, Annie. Think about what you came here for.” 

Despair poisons Annie’s resolve, struggling against Pieck with no clear strategy of getting away. 

After so many attempts to remain above and detached, all of them had gone to waste, like every gear, device, and switch in the Games is actively being recalibrated to drive her as mad as possible until her breaking point.

Even the journey was nothing but circles—every stretch of the wall like a snake eating its own tail, with no end in sight. 

“Think of home,” finally suggests Pieck, and it’s then and there when Annie stops moving abruptly and lays still. 

She’s slowly losing sense of the ground beneath her back, losing sight of the cloudy sky as far as the eye could see.

The world around her is visible but not properly understood, as if through murky water or some form of haze that kept them from being fully real; everything had grown distant yet oddly hyperreal at once—lines fuzzier than before yet sharper somehow.

She squeezes her eyes shut.

Focus turning inward, a scene starts forming in her head. The visage conjured isn’t the thorned gift of memory, but a glimpse of the future.

She sees herself coming home down from the train, brandishing a red band around her arm, looking for her father.

She will smile as soon as he comes into view amongst throngs of people. He will return that smile, proud she had become the soldier he always wanted her to be,

And she will embrace him, be safe in his arms, for he will no longer be the man who strikes her when he’s upset, not the father who will lock her away when he’s disappointed. 

It won’t happen again.

Now that she has made something of herself, he will be better from now on. Kinder and softer.

And they can finally live the rest of life in peace.

Home. 

Slowly she begins to relax, the tension ebbing away from her body as she breathes deeply, softening around the edges like a fading dream.

“I'm letting go. So don't run off,” comes Pieck’s voice, and all at once she’s aware of the vice grip crushing down on her limbs. 

The pressure from Pieck's body gradually lessens as she remains quiet, until finally she feels none of the weight at all. When she opens her eyes, blinking her way back to consciousness, she sees Pieck stepping away from her but still standing close by ready in case another outburst occurs. 

After a few moments of silent contemplation, she lets out a deep sigh before helping Annie back up off the ground.

The reality strikes her again upon seeing Falco from afar, from the moderate span of nothingness between them, and she sees how small he is. Expendable. Like a pawn.

“I know you didn’t mean what you did to him. I know that look,” Pieck intervenes, her palms turning over, supplicating sympathy, if not comprehension. “It wasn’t you. It’s not you.”

“I can’t stay here,” Annie says, and even to her own ears, it sounds pathetic. Pieck’s expression only darkens, the pressure only intensifying when there seems to be no clear path forward. But then, Pieck lifts her head.

“Then I’ll join you.”

The statement stuns Annie; Pieck had seemed so loyal to Zeke, always posturing about doing what was told. Now, she’s offering her commitment to her? 

The gesture fills Annie with equal parts surprise and skepticism.

"I know,” she murmurs, as if reading her mind. “It’s taken me this long. But I don’t want to be part of Zeke's games.” She glances at Falco with fists curling as her gaze takes on a deep concentration. “I’m so damn sick of being his puppet.” Pieck finishes, voice calm, with a hint of steel in it. “If leaving with you means I can escape him, then count me in.”

Annie finds herself agreeing. Her father never raised her to be servile; she was made to make her own paths and blaze new trails.

She might be able to navigate this new one with Pieck—not bound by conditions but something else; it might not be entirely trust, but it was one out of respect for each other.

“Then we’ll both leave tonight,” Annie affirms, and a sense of awe seems to take hold in Pieck’s expression.

Though Annie had been content in traveling alone, a part of her felt oddly grateful to have another companion—one who didn’t belittle her like Zeke, patronized her like Reiner, or used her as leverage like Bertolt. 

“What about Falco?” Pieck asks eagerly, an expectant light in her eyes.

But Annie's mouth twitches in response, reluctant to answer. She had hoped she wouldn’t ask.

She could tell her all the superficial reasons; it would increase the chances of them being followed or paint a target on their backs multiple times over.

But really, it was all for the same reason she no longer wanted to be in this same room as Galliard. The worst company, Annie is beginning to realize, isn’t someone you hate or despise; it’s someone you had wronged. 

With Galliard and Falco, every glance felt like a condemnation of her own choices and every conversation seemed to lead back to damning memories. Memories that echo for days afterwards in painful nightmares, invading even her waking moments as she tries desperately—almost futilely—to shake off its dark clouds. 

The only escape from guilt is forgiveness, which does not come easily or quickly enough. The only way Annie knows how to deal with it, is to bury it.

“No,” she says.

The glint in Pieck’s eyes vanishes.

“You have to understand this,” Annie explains with a thickness to her voice she doesn’t realize is a dry imitation of her father’s. “He was never going to make it. Better accept it now than deal with it later."

Judging by her stillness, she could tell Pieck didn't like the sentiment, but it was a truth everyone must swallow. 

“Is that what you really believe?” Pieck questions.

Annie turns away. When a piece on a chessboard is quagmired, she can only sacrifice or leave it behind. Such is the way of victors.

The wind dies down, leaving only the distant cackle of a hawk spiraling high above them to break up the silence. Wall Rose looms ominously on one side while the large gate of the district stands opposite.

“What's our next move, then?” Pieck asks, her expression had somehow changed from an initial look of determination to one of resignation.

“We need to leave at dawn,” Annie asserts, going through the steps of their escape plan in her head, thinking about further complications that might arise. “We have to figure out how we’ll get past without anyone noticing.”

“Zeke will most likely assign rotation later to keep an eye out for Colt.” Pieck offers neutrally. “I’ll suggest that we take watch together then leave. We can probably get away with two horses—” 

“Three,” Annie corrects with a flat shake of her head, not even with a hint of regard or consideration to what that would mean to everyone else left behind. “Two for us to ride, one to carry anything else we need. That’s how we make sure we outrun everyone. Even the Titans.”

Pieck's frown deepens as though cycling through the potential pitfalls before them. “It’s… possible.”

Annie’s well aware of the risks: the possibility of running into a horde, or perhaps being cornered from all sides. They could end up swerving in the wrong direction and losing their way completely.

Her stomach ties itself in knots at the thought, but she can't stay worrying about it forever; they have to take risks if they're ever going to make it out alive. She sets her jaw.

“Possible is enough,” Annie replies.

Pieck is silent for a moment, muscles tensing in her jaw, turning her gaze downward at the ground beneath them before finally letting out a deep exhale as if all the air had left her body.

“We should be getting back. Zeke will start wondering where we are.”

Annie follows Pieck as she returns to where they had left Falco, her heavy booted feet dragging across the ground. Falco remains motionless, legs restrained with rope; he seems even smaller than before, a bundle of anxiety trembling at the edge of awareness. Annie moves closer, her apprehension like an invisible hand around her throat. 

She feels his eyes boring into her, but it seems better not to meet them. Instead, she looks away at a distance, not wanting to look at him nor bear the guilt for his reaction. The less people she’s involved with, the easier this will get.

“I’ll carry Falco,” Pieck says to her, before bending down to drop to her knees, and Annie pretends to look away but is paying close attention in her periphery.

Falco flinches the moment Pieck had come near, but she grants him a reassuring nod. “It’s okay. I’m not going to hurt you.”

Annie finds herself appreciating the gesture, that if they couldn’t grant him freedom, they could at least make him feel less afraid.

Pieck slings Falco over like a sack of grain, his head hanging low against her back. 

He remains quiet the entire time, almost like a child afraid to speak out of turn for fear of getting punished. It’s there that Annie finds herself foolish for getting that Falco, indeed, was just a child.

As they walk, the full moon glows eerily between wispy clouds and throws long shadows, making gnarled shapes out of trees. If she’s completely honest with how she’s feeling, she would acknowledge the slight imbalance in her footsteps.

Annie feels both the chill of the night and a far deeper cold within, centered and revolving on the singular fact that she had wronged the one person who had no ulterior motives for befriending her.

Pieck eventually spots their horses beside a building, grazing on the grass, coats rippling like oil over water as they shift against each other.

“We’re here.”

Annie’s not sure why Zeke would pick this out of all places.

Weeds and overgrown grasses surround the steps leading up to the porch. The ivy on its stone walls has grown wild and the exterior is even covered in a thin layer of mossy lichen that had grown to take advantage of the shelter.

But it isn’t these things that strike Annie as remarkable. Unlike the houses that were ravaged and left to rubble, this place was completely untouched, as if it were insulated from its surroundings by some kind of invisible barrier.

When Annie notices the towering rear structure partially obscured by fog, it’s there that she realizes this was no ordinary building. 

The church tower in Wall Rose is larger compared to the one in Trost, a good indicator that the population increased further in the Wall.

Annie pushes the carved oak door and Pieck follows behind, Falco still over her shoulder. They enter with caution, passing by the thin shafts of moonlight spilling through narrow windows. 

The roof is high, vaulted, with geometric patterns intertwined like vines. A skylight dome hovers above, so even though the hour is dark, she could see how the noonday sun would fill the room with light.

At the far end of the hallway, a few steps lead up to an elevated platform, to three banners covered in gold-trimmed tapestries. In it, they enshrined three divine figures, their noble heads adorned with ornate crowns. 

Three Walls.

Three Crowns.

These people worship Walls.  

Annie scoffs at the thought of people believing in fantasy disguised in pious trappings.

Everywhere it is all the same: Helos to the Marleyans, Ymir to the Restorationists, and the Three Walls to the Paradisians.

Everyone needs to be a slave to something.

Not her.

“You made it.” The sentence fractures through the chilly air. As Annie looks around, searching for the hint that people are in the room with her and Pieck, Zeke steps out of the night-black corridor like an apparition.

When he sees Falco, his expression settles into satisfaction. 

“Make sure the boy is tied up first,” Zeke instructs, pointing to the elevated platform and Pieck understands the instructions.

Falco, who has taken it upon himself to make no sound or ask no questions, lets Pieck lay him atop the altar itself, his entire body lying flat against the table. She fastens his wrists along the poles of the table tightly.

Annie watches as Falco squares his shoulders and juts out his chin, determined to put on a brave face. His hands clench into fists at the bindings around him. Zeke comes forward and makes a few adjustments, pulling Falco’s arms so that they are outstretched on either side of him. 

Falco only frowns back, defiance emanating from behind those eyes. Only after Zeke leaves his periphery does a hint of panic seep into his expression, prompting Annie’s stomach to churn.

“Come. We were just about to eat.” He coaxes them with a violent flick of his hand to follow in his direction. Not far away from the altar sits Reiner, Bertolt and Galliard in a circle. 

This time, there is no firepit to warm them or roast a tasty meal. The air was still, faintly redolent with walls covered in thick layers of dust.

“Sit,” Zeke motions. 

Annie settles cross-legged in the circle beside Galliard, and Pieck joins her, sitting opposite Zeke.

Reiner rummages through his bag, sighing dubiously. “There’s not much from what we scavenged in this area."

He plucks a few cans from the bag, handing out just enough for two people to share; he splits his can with Bertolt then passes one to Pieck and Zeke, finally handing one to Galliard sitting next to her.

Annie gives him a look; by now he should know that it’s not in her nature to accept anything from anyone. But she sees his fingers linger over the lid, tracing its edge as he looks at it, then back at her.

Instead, he hands over the unopened can and perhaps he meant to show her that he could be trusted, but moments pass and his gesture is still hanging in the air, waiting to be accepted.

Days ago, Annie would have refused the help of anyone who wasn’t Falco, but now it seems like her choices are starting to become limited. The methods she previously employed—from being completely independent or trying to assume control of every single circumstance—have brought her to her lowest.

“You forget what you are training to be.” 

Annie looks in Zeke’s direction where she notices him side-eyeing her interaction with Galliard.

“If you can’t trust the person next to you in battle, then you’ve already lost,” he says with a disappointed timbre in his voice. “Trust is the foundation on which we must build our bond. That is precisely what the Games are for,” he looks at Pieck beside him, gracing her with a pensive glance, unaware that she was intending to leave him. 

But of course, Annie keeps that thought to herself and lets Zeke continue his unwarranted speech. “A sense of camaraderie must be our guiding principle when it comes to making decisions. Something as small as refusing food can lead to mistrust between peers.”

The room falls silent, pausing mid-slurping and -chewing.

“... I trust her,” Galliard says amidst the astonished hush. His voice warms even more as he continues. “If it wasn’t for Annie, I wouldn’t have survived.”

Somehow, he manages to change the atmosphere in entirely one breath.

Bewildered by his decision and unsettled by his conviction, Annie thinks of all the wrong she had done to him, all the lies and omissions, piling on worse than Zeke’s brutal punches.

The gravity of his trust was so bizarre to her. That someone would believe in her capacity to do right.

And here she is. Lying to him. 

And here he is. Giving her all his confidence, hands still holding out his gesture of goodwill.

Everyone’s attention is still on her—Pieck specifically shoots her a look to simply play along, letting any hint of defiance fly under their radar so they could pull the escape tonight. 

The pressure this gives makes Annie reach out and accept the can, if only to pretend for a short while that this is an effort to form a strategic, united front. 

Prying the can open with a snap, she feels Bertolt’s eyes linger on her, and she can’t help but feel as though he’s closely reading the relationship between Galliard’s statement and the nervous twitch of her fingers, but doesn’t speak up.

“What is it, Hoover?” Zeke has departed from paying attention to Annie. “You have something to say?” 

“Nothing,” he dismisses with a nervous clearing of his throat.

“You have not said a single thing since you’ve stepped foot in this building.”

“Why does it matter to you?” he replies instead, relying on his suspicions.

“Curious, is all. I do like to know the people around me.” Zeke casually lifts his left foot to his right knee. “I know Pieck and her family well, living in the same Zone. I spoke often to Reiner and Galliard in the facility. And Little Annie here has already revealed more to me than I expected.”

Annie swallows, pressing down her discomfort. There is something behind his eyes that makes her suspicious—he had done this before, probing for weaknesses so he could use them later on, just like what he had done to her when they dueled.

“What do you want to know?” Bertolt asks, a contained emotion in his voice. 

“Anything. About yourself. The reason why you’re here. The reason why you want to win,” Zeke prods, like it was a confession Bertolt was obliged to admit.

Bertolt’s gaze darts around the room nervously as if seeking an escape route from this line of questioning.

The words seem to stick in his mouth like glue.

“Nothing?” Zeke presses with what appears to be fraying patience. “Why volunteer if you have no reason?”

“I didn’t volunteer.” The muscles in Bertolt’s jaw bunch and then loosen. “I was sold here.”

The statement couldn’t have inspired anything out of Annie—struggle doesn’t change how a person looks to her. 

However, when she peers at everyone else, each face staring at Bertolt stands out with its own warped expression of disbelief and horror. Could that have been such a bad thing? At least someone thought he had any worth.

But just like them, Annie is expectantly waiting to hear the rest of the story that now made Bertolt a living, breathing person with his own past and history that framed all other actions in his life.

Bertolt takes a deep breath before elaborating further, glaring at Falco’s direction, “The Restorationist started all this. They blew up the mines where my father worked and the accident left him paralyzed. My mother couldn’t afford to keep us fed while paying tithes to the Marleyans.”

His mouth turns down ever so slightly as he treads memories that led him here in the first place—to the one small branch of life's tree with wilting leaves.

“So what can a mother of ten children give if you demand one-tenth of her worth?” Bertolt asks them, letting the revelation sink in. Within his calm voice is quietness and a silent rage that seems to be brewing. Something Annie can sense from a mile away, waves after waves of heat.

Reiner pats his back but Bertolt seems to recoil at the gesture, brows drawing together and a glint of disgust flashing briefly in his eyes before it was hastily suppressed by an apathetic mask.

“This isn't a sob story, so don't look at me like that.” He leans forward with a stiff back, shoulders squared like fortress walls. In a way, it sounds rehearsed, as though he’s told himself that so many times he somehow convinced himself. 

“I’ve made my peace with it. I’m not angry at my parents. I don’t blame them,” Bertolt says, solemn and oddly sincere. “It’s the island devils who deserve to be killed.”

“And you believe killing those people will solve your problems?” Zeke comments rather casually, one can in hand, pouring beans on the other.

“We wouldn’t be killing people. We’ll be killing vermin,” he replies, a snarl permeating his voice. “And once we get rid of them, the world will be free. We’ll be free.”

Zeke pauses and makes a little sound of dismissal in his throat, popping a handful of beans in his mouth. “Only fools would believe such a thing.”

Bertolt, appearing to be uncomfortable at the heat of attention on him, returns a glower. “What?”

The older man raises his finger, chewing the last bits in his mouth before speaking. “What makes you think they will see you any differently?” he looks, eyes leaving Bertolt and passing to Pieck, Reiner, Galliard and finally Annie. 

“Well, it’s clear that we’re not… ” Bertolt’s mouth was in a bitter line that usually indicated he was going to say something unpleasant. “We’re nothing like them.”

“Them?” Zeke’s voice feels like a thousand-raised eyebrows. “We share the same blood. The same history. The same sins. Aside from the armband on our person, what else makes us different?”

When Bertolt doesn’t answer, his frown deepens into a scowl, like a schoolboy upset with being lectured.

“We were once gods, you see?” Zeke says, speaking with a slow, deliberate cadence. “We ruled the earth for so long at the cost of so many millions of lives. Today, that world will not make the same mistake again. They will never grant freedom to limited humans with unlimited power.”

He’s speaking to an unknown object in the faraway corridor, addressing no one in particular. 

“We’re close to gods. Close to ordinary people. But always lesser than both,” Zeke says. His tone has gone blank and bleached free of emotion. “It’s why we deserve our endless punishment under the Marleyans. It is only righteous.”

“I still think…” Reiner chimes in, looking at Bertolt. “I still think it’s terrible what happened to you.”

Annie raises an eyebrow, surprised that Reiner hasn’t moved on from that note.

“No, Zeke’s right,” Bertolt dismisses his attempt to overstate the case. “It’s good that it happened. It changed the way I saw things. That the world really is just that… cruel.”

The last word, just a word—that’s all it should be, really. But it melts down his lips like acid. Descends upon his features like poison and seeps its way through Annie’s psyche. It’s something she notices every time Bertolt opens his mouth, like seeing a warped reflection of her own thoughts she’s reluctant to acknowledge. Like holding up a mirror of herself and not liking what looked back.

“Sometimes,” Zeke says. “I wonder if the world would have been less cruel… had our kind not been born at all.” For a moment, another one of those fleeting and bitter almost-smiles passes over his features, and a chilling shiver trickles down Annie’s spine. 

Despite not revealing in words, his sentiment evinces a history that clearly left broken pieces scattered inside of him—remnants of which the Boy Wonder was now trying to assemble again into a different shape: but the shape remains unwieldy in her mind.

To ensure our precious sacrifices would bear fruit , Zeke once said on his first day of broadcast. But all Annie’s seeing is this unsettling combination of logic and apathy. The kind that wouldn't concern himself if his actions would mend or destroy those around him, so long as the higher purpose was achieved.

“I suggest we get some rest,” Pieck says dispiritedly, probably in an attempt to put the pieces of their plan in place.

Zeke stands fully upright. “Why don’t you handle the rotations, Pieck?”

“Annie and I can take the first watch,” Pieck tells him, glancing towards her and she pretends to be unfazed by the suggestion.

Zeke nods his head in approval before Pieck continues on with allocating the watch periods for everyone else, blissfully unaware that Pieck is setting the ultimate trap for him.

It would seem that in Zeke’s attempt to find flaws in the people around him, he had failed to detect the cracks in his own ranks.

One by one, Annie watches them retreat to their own space; Reiner and Bertolt lay down near an old wooden door at one end of the hallway, ready to be obstacles should anyone dare to barge in. On the opposite end, Zeke makes himself comfortable on one of the steps leading up to the altar where Falco is—darkly intent on guarding him.

Meanwhile, Annie stays with Pieck outside the church, exactly five paces away from each other, waiting for the quiet but distinguishable drone of voices telling her that some of their companions are still awake.

While there are more brazen alternatives to waiting, Annie finds more benefit in following the trail with least resistance.

A chorus of crickets surrounds them as night tides over. Pieck shifts her weight from foot to foot in an effort to stay awake while Annie stands still, reserved and composed. Alert.

When the church becomes noticeably silent, Annie hears the hoot of an owl and realizes it is Pieck with her hands clasped over her mouth who had made the sound. 

Let’s go, she manages to communicate with only a firm set of her lips.

Before following her footsteps, Annie takes one last look at the church. A twinge of regret stabs her as she thinks back to how everything had come to this point. 

She allowed Galliard to drag her into his troubles. Allowed Reiner to question her. Allowed Bertolt to manipulate her. Allowed herself to believe she could help Falco but all that did was allow Zeke to see through her and humiliate what was hiding.

She’s done allowing.

Goodbye, Falco.

Pieck and Annie creep up to the church yard, crossing the grass towards the horses—their freedom in the shape of four legs.

Unlatching the harnesses from where they were connected to a tree, Annie mounts on the mare of her choosing—the same shadow-looking steed she had grown comfortable riding.

After Pieck settles in her saddle, Annie gathers the reins in her hands, pulling back hard on their ends which rouses an angry snort from deep within the horse's chest but it stirs and begins to turn.

Sorry, she thinks, not meaning to cause it any pain.

Pieck follows closely behind, making sure to tow along an additional mount with white speckled legs that carried their bags.

They let one horse gallop free, knowing that leaving it behind would be like leaving a loose end that could catch up to them.

But as with all matters that do not contribute to her own victory, she must remain indifferent.

The horses trot eagerly forward towards the decrepit houses, treading over rock-pebbled crumbling ground. Annie is ahead of Pieck as they move through the streets, taking stock of the desolate roads and the few scraggly plants clinging to life amid debris-strewn homes.

“Wait,” Annie spots the familiar pile of rubble, her horse stopping with a sharp rear of its neck as she dismounts.

She hears the sound of Pieck’s boots reaching the ground to follow her, and despite the emptiness around them, they approach the moon-drenched rubble with light and discerning footsteps. 

The angle is different from when she first saw them, but Annie slowly makes herself turn to look at the scene, half-flinching, before finding the faces amongst the shapes.

It gusts through her like a cold wind, seeing Udo and Zofia lying there under the rocks, crushed by a boulder larger than the width of both their bodies. Even more tragic are the signs of struggle; broken nails that tried to scratch against it, trying to push its weight upwards but to no avail.

The hollow mental echo of a child crying in the darkness creeps up on her, frictive on her skin. 

She had somehow become nine years old again.

It’s the worst fate she could imagine. She would be happy to be killed in any other way—in any other element, whether vaporized in the air, burned to ashes, or sent down to the bottom of the sea. Anywhere, just not the earth.

All of a sudden she finds the air to have thickened around her—thick as soil she could barely force into her lungs. Thick as the air in the coffin that has her lost in a vast, whistling darkness.

Unable to stare any longer, Annie steps back, drawing in air like breath to a drowning man.

“We’re wasting time,” she says, hoping at the same time the twitch of her fingers would not betray how much she feared this moment.

“So you want us to just leave them like this?” Pieck asks disbelievingly.

“Yes.”

“I don't understand, Annie, why?”

“Because there’s no point—”

“What do you mean there’s no point—”

“Because people die all the time!” Annie doesn’t realize she had just yelled, up high in the back of her throat, in the full force of the truth she believes. 

Pieck only stares, speechless, so Annie lowers her voice but remains clear. “See, I don’t know if this is your first brush with death but trust me, this won’t be the last. And the bodies will just pile up faster than we have the time to bury them.”

Her throat tightens. “The world’s built for survivors. If you don’t make it, well tough luck. Life goes on, the world keeps moving.” Her chest heaves as she takes a ragged breath before continuing. “Maybe we just have to accept that their death doesn't mean anything at all, because our lives don’t have any in the first place.”

When she looks at Pieck, she’s facing the horizon. She clenches her fists at her sides, and for a moment it seemed like Pieck might lash out at her in fury. But then, she deflates; her entire body sinks and slumps as if some inner fire had been extinguished within. Her gaze fixes on the ground beneath them as if lost in thought or despair—perhaps both—before slowly lifting again.

“There are flowers over there.” She points to an overgrowth not far from the river banks. “I’ll gather some.” 

Did she not hear anything that was just said?

Pieck leaves her briefly, but it isn’t long before she comes back with an unruly assortment of colors. Her one hand clutches all the stems together.

Annie balks at the sight. 

"Dandelions," she says. "Zofia likes to put them in her hair. The other ones are violets, Udo said they use them to treat cough.” 

Pieck pushes the flowers to Annie’s chest, asking her to hold them.

As Annie watches Pieck take a broken board near the rubble and repurpose it as a makeshift shovel of sorts, Pieck mutters something.

“I wonder if these flowers know they’re only good for blooming," Pieck says thinly. "After that, they're quite useless. But even still, they flourish. In the cracks of the sidewalks outside my house. In the meadows outside the zones. In the mountains where they climb hillsides and break through rocks,” she continues, more to herself than to anyone.

The hard earth resists any attempt at larger digging but eventually yields enough space for two small forms to be buried beneath clods of soil. Pieck wipes her forehead from sweat and wipes soot from her fingers.

Her footsteps drag as she moves to the rubble where Udo and Zofia are, sizing herself up next to the heavy-looking boulder that buried the children. The size of it would takes the entire length and breadth of Pieck’s arms to embrace. Plugging her feet to the uneven ground, she starts heaving.

It’s in the way Pieck strains against the weight that Annie begins to see her eyes in a different light, twinkling with determination. It’s only when the rock doesn’t budge that Annie realizes they had been filled with tears.

Annie sets the flowers down and stands beside Pieck. She placing her hands on the rock and looks at Pieck earnestly.

Pieck stares at her with misty eyes, and a few seconds pass before she musters the determination to push the rock with Annie.

With their bodies in full tilt and combined force, they heave until the rock begins to move past the grass it crushed.

Annie pauses when Pieck does when they see the bodies in full. They stand in silence for a brief moment, over a stillness that seemed to stretch far past the Wall itself. The night sky was beginning to soften at the edges, revealing a bluish glow that is much too close to a Titan’s wake-up call.

They step forward reaching for the children. Strong hands take hold of limp limbs and lay them gently in the earth. Annie and Pieck begin to throw handfuls of dirt over the small chests, covering them up again until all that could be seen was an uneven patch of land.

“Maybe the world really is that… cruel.” Pieck says wonderingly when they have finished. “But maybe some good was also there. It just didn’t make a difference."

Pieck’s voice cracks through a haze of pain, but it comes back with more conviction. “But it matters that it was there."

She picks up the flowers Annie had set down. Her fingers are steady even as the soft petals sigh and sway, ebbing with the fickle rise and fall of the wind. 

One petal gives in and joins the breeze, flying until it passes by a tree in the distance.

Scraps of words begin floating up towards her consciousness, the memory foreign, the voice not hers.

There’s this big tree where I used to live. 

And during the sunset, it would light up the tree like it’s on fire. 

Every day, I’d race with my friends there. 

And every day since, I look back on it. 

Like it was the only moment in time that mattered.

Maybe the reason I was born was so that I could run to that tree.

Armin?

How can a name like Armin, a name as thin as the mist in the air, register like a seismic wave in her nerves?

When I saw you on broadcast for the first time, you seemed easy to figure out. Indifferent. Defiant. 

And when I finally saw you in person, you were quiet. Distant. I wasn’t sure we’ll get along. 

But when I spoke to you about your ring. 

When I saw the way you trained with Falco.

 I had to figure you out again. 

You were also kind, loyal, and genuine.

Falco.

Remembering how she had left him, Annie’s heart sinks at the darkly sobering thought.

She remembers the first time she saw him: twitchy but unafraid, carefully crafting a small fish hook out of twine and driftwood. Even with his incredible skill of tying those same components together in a bow-and-arrow configuration, he looked down on himself for what he was not able to harm with his delicate hands.

Even then, she never saw him as weak. It had always been his gentle nature and strong defiance that stood out to her. 

Maybe the world really is that cruel. 

But maybe some good was also there.

The words had taken on an even deeper meaning for her than they'd had before, just as names started to sound different the more one speaks of them. 

But she holds still like that for what feels like several moments, an urgency spiking up in her throat.

In that moment, her balled fists burn hot with conviction. Sure-footed in her stance, the idea begins to sink in more than it ever had, that she might be crazy. But that’s what everyone else had suspected all along.

“We need to leave. Now.”

Pieck calls after her when she departs quickly. “You’re going the opposite way.”

She turns once to face Pieck.

“We’re not leaving without Falco.”

Annie spins back, but not before catching sight of the newfound light in Pieck’s eyes. She flashes a grin, before running after her as Annie mounts her horse with an all-too-real desperation.

The ground blurs beneath her as her horse kicks up a flurry of dust and determination, Pieck tailing far behind but she doesn’t wait. 

Wind whipping against her cheeks, Annie passes by the same gnarly shapes of houses and trees that seem to be reaching out to her with their shadows, urging her to turn back before it’s too late but no, this was no afterthought to be abandoned halfway through.

She’s going to get Falco Grice, come hell or high water.

She rounds a turn in the road and there it stands—a white church steeple rising into sight. Annie pulls on the reins and gets off her horse quickly, tying it against a low-hanging tree branch. Pieck arrives momentarily, panting and probably reassessing the sudden shift in their plans. 

“Annie what the hell?”

“Shh!”

Annie scuttles along behind some bushes for cover, emerging at last near church grounds as Pieck crouches with her. 

The faint sound of voices growing in volume is unmistakable, and as she steps closer it becomes clear—the murmurs have grown into an argument, echoing through the air with a heightened urgency.

She motions Pieck to keep her head low, and then Annie slowly and steadily raises her head to peer into one of the windows.

Immediately, she hears something like the snap of a whip, sharp and raw.

“Where are they?”

Shit.

Cautiousness returning in full force, Annie retreats her head further into the shadows, discarding the stutter of her heartbeat and the solidified air in her lungs.

Exhaling slowly, she peers in again.

Zeke’s back is facing her, and when he steps away, that’s when she sees Falco crumpled in the corner, lip split and right eye swollen shut.

He’s trying to stand up but he sways unsteadily, unable to find purchase on anything to support him upright for more than a few seconds before slumping back down into an exhausted heap.

Regret and hurt burn inside her while rage creeps through her knuckles but Pieck grabs her forearm, reminding her there isn’t anything she could do. She can only watch the scene unfold, unable to stop it any more than she could control the seething heat in her bloodstream.

“This is your last chance to answer me truthfully,” Zeke orders, every syllable even sounds like a physical pressure. “You conspired with Leonhart, did you not? She manipulated Pieck to do her bidding?”

Despite his disposition, Falco raises his head, lips clamped together and brow furrowed; only a stubborn silence.

Zeke’s feet shift impatiently as he looks around for something to break this wall of inaction. 

This is when Annie sees the other figures in the room—once her allies, now foes, divided by cause and circumstance. There's something ironic in the fact that they used to regard her as a ghost in the training facility, yet here they also are, angered at her disappearance, unaware that she is so close amongst them in plain sight.

Reiner speaks up, arms around himself in a tense knot. “We don’t need Falco to tell us this. Clearly, Annie and Pieck took the horses except one. You all should be grateful I heard it roaming outside the church and chased it down.”

Shit, maybe they should’ve taken all the horses.

“Let’s just get the fuck out of here and go.”

“It’s only one horse,” Bertolt's voice cuts loud against the hush, pacing into Annie’s view. “How do you expect all of us to get out of here with one horse?”

“We can all still make it,” Reiner asserts. “There’s a four-wheeled cart outside. One horse is enough to carry all of us. It’s just—I’m not sure if it’s enough to escape the Titans.”

Annie watches as Bertolt's stern expression melts away and a single word escapes his lips. "Falco,” he says under his breath. He turns towards them with an intensity that makes her breath catch in her throat. “Falco here can still be of use.”

“What do you propose?” Zeke asks, as though feeling it appropriate it should come from the person slated to kill Falco.

“We can throw him out of the gate,” he says simply yet decisively like it had been something he had thought about for a long time. “It’ll distract the Titans while we make our escape.”

The hair rises on Annie’s skin and her mouth goes dry. In her mind, she sees Falco running outside the gates, pursued by thunderous footsteps behind him, surrounding him and engulfing his body—and the image is far too horrific for her to bear. 

“The same death as his parents,” Zeke points out, face twisted with a look akin to the ravenous bloodlust of the guard dogs outside the internment zones. Bertolt nods. “An excellent idea, Hoover. Once we are done with the boy, we will figure out what to do with the traitors.”

There is a rustle of movement as they begin to gather their supplies but it’s quickly interrupted by someone who hasn’t spoken yet.

“What if we’re wrong?” 

Startled at the sound of Galliard's voice, she peers into the window further to get a better look.

“Wrong about what?” Bertolt questions. A deep frown stretches across his forehead, etching clear lines into the creases spent doubting every decision Annie’s ever made.

“What if…” Galliard treads carefully. “What if Annie and Pieck are just in trouble?” 

Annie feels a heavy ball of shame in her throat. How could he still give her the benefit of the doubt?

“You honestly believe that?” Bertolt intervenes.

“Maybe they ran into other candidates. Maybe they had to escape.” Galliard’s words roll together, as though desperate to get them out as quickly as possible. “Maybe something else—I don’t know! But there’s no way Annie would have left like that—"

“She did,” Bertolt says, in a gravel-laden mutter.

“But how could you be so sure? We don’t know what happened—”

“Because—”

“There must be some other explanation—”

“Because she’s been lying to everyone!” 

The force of his outburst lands scattered at everyone but the target of his fury is precise. Annie‘s gaze turns into solid ice, growing in enormous spades of pressure.

This was the consequence: the simmering embers of rage within Bertolt only erupted now, setting her ablaze.

Bertolt dials back, face shifting into the kind of expression designed to provoke and agitate. “Do you want to know the real reason your brother isn’t here?”

Annie feels the bottom drop out of her stomach, heart diving to the depths of her chest until all she could feel was falling, falling, falling with the earth’s jaws wide open. 

No.  No.  No. 

No. No. 

No.

Galliard’s face grows cold. Still. Like a cornered animal. As Bertolt takes the beginning of a breath, he also makes a purposeful step that brings him looming over Galliard.

He wouldn’t. He wouldn’t.

“Why don’t you ask Annie why she has your brother’s bangle?”

No words form in her mind and no sound escapes from her mouth. With each blink, visions of different versions of Marcel come into view.

Shut up. 

“You’re lying.”

She looks up and Galliard’s face has already drained of color. She could hear the sharp intake of his breath, flinching, his whole body shaking. His hands clench together so tight the knuckles whitened and he’s gripping them so hard that it almost hurts to watch. 

“I didn’t want to believe it myself.” Bertolt looks away, the story as fabricated as his reaction. “But her leaving like this proves everything. That she’s a traitor.”

Shut up. Shut up. 

“No… Marcel’s still out there—” His retort dies away under everyone’s pitiful stare.

“Your brother’s dead,” Bertolt clarifies without grace, exasperated. “He’s dead. Annie wouldn’t tell you and I think you know why.”

Shut up. Shut up. Shut up.

Galliard’s mouth hangs open, lips curled downward. He trades a dubious look with the others before him but finds no relief in their equally stunned reactions.

“That—that’s not true.”

It’s not what you think. It’s not. It’s not. It’s not.

She watches as revelation after revelation rushes through his mind until it settles like dawn on his face and Annie recognizes that look—the kind of look that was raw and primal. The kind that was out for blood.

The air is heated and thick with trepidation but Zeke cuts through it with his voice.

“Enough of this,” he orders with the full weight of his authority whilst maintaining a level of composure. “First, we must secure our escape from the Wall. Then, we shall have Falco serve his more fruitful purpose.”

He glances around the room for any opposition, and when none comes, he turns on his heel in the direction of the wooden door, gesturing with his hands for Reiner and Bertolt to grab Falco.

The moment feels illusory as Annie watches them drag Falco away, boots scraping against the ground as his feet try to find traction to pull away from their grip.

Galliard lags a few paces behind, his profile dark and menacing. 

Once they’ve stepped out of the church, Annie circles around to avoid them, making sure to keep herself hidden by pressing up against the walls of the building. As she stands there quietly in the shadows, time seems to pass at a snail's pace until finally, their voices shrink with distance.

In her side view, Pieck is looking at her with concern, head tilted slightly to one side. “Are you okay?” It sounds almost as if she was afraid of asking.

“We need a plan,” Annie replies vacantly, the tone coming out more brittle than she intended. But there is no room left in her for processing what happened.

She’s not sure if her attempts to stifle her emotions are successful, because Pieck’s face settles into a forced expression of calmness that did nothing but mirror what she was feeling inside.

As the interval lengthens between them and Annie holds her carefully composed expression in place, Pieck slowly shakes her head before stepping forward.

Then Annie feels the sudden, unexpected weight of Pieck's arms around her shoulders. 

She stands stiffly at first, unsure how to react, but strangely the sensation becomes oddly soothing despite its strangeness, its otherness. To be touched in a way that was not intended to cause her any pain.

The tightness quickly gives way to a warmth that spreads through her body, making its way down the back of her neck, to the tips of her fingers, and settling somewhere in the pit of her stomach. 

She doesn’t return the gesture but she’s taken by it, like a leaf caught in the wind.

Then Pieck withdraws just as quickly, hands still on her shoulders before continuing to talk but it sounds muffled to Annie’s ears.

“It’s in the Stohess district.” 

Seconds pass before Annie acknowledges it. “What did you just say?” Her voice is almost lost beneath her own breathing.

“I’m telling you where the Female Titan is. Like we agreed,” Pieck says neutrally, ignoring what had just transpired. “You’ll want to avoid Ehrmich. That’s where the Jaw Titan is. And the Cart.”

She could not find the explanation for Pieck divulging the information freely, where she used to keep them tight-lipped. 

“The Colossal is in Orvud district, along with the Beast Titan. It’s the longest trip.” Pieck is still talking and the words are still floating in Annie’s head, aware of the message but the message itself is not quite sinking in. 

“Why are you telling me this?”

“Because if anything goes wrong, I want you to find your way.” Specks of light glitter inside Pieck’s shadowed eyes. Her voice grows as warm as the embrace she had just given her. “I realized something important tonight, Annie. I thought I forgot it but you helped me find it again.”

There isn’t time left to ruminate on her words but the brightness in Pieck’s eyes somehow has her understanding in some way. That she could still find the light leading her home. Not running away from anything but standing still on a front porch, for a breeze that smelled of wide-open spaces and limitless skies.

“Help me get Falco back.”

Pieck nods, with all the confidence evident on her face. Pulling herself together, Annie comes up with a plan.

“I’ll find a way to separate Falco from them. You stay with the horses and stay out of sight, but keep close to where I am,” Annie directs. “On my signal, you’ll come get us.”

Pieck hesitantly nods. “What signal?”

“I don’t know yet,” she admits. “You’ll know it when you see it.”

She thinks the ambiguity of her plan would somehow scare Pieck off but it doesn’t. And perhaps Pieck is also painfully aware of the truth that had just come to her, that in the arena, everything is already volatile and unpredictable; to stay ahead, one must be even more volatile and far more unpredictable.

Annie makes the motion to walk away from Pieck but she says one more thing.

“And Annie?”

She turns her head back. Pieck offers her a smile. A real one.

“I really hope you make it home.”

Then she disappears into the shadows to play her part.

Annie looks ahead, determining the direction of her previous companions. Luckily, they hadn’t gotten far as they took their time drawing the remaining horse to an abandoned carriage just on the edge of the road.

The sound of wheels clanking and creaking against the cobblestones become louder, accompanied by a steady thud of hooves. Staying close behind trees and crouching behind hedges for cover, she sketches out a plan for extraction but as long as Falco is surrounded, she has little chance of getting to him.

They finally arrive at the gate.

Bertolt moves quickly, roughly shoving a reluctant Falco down from the carriage. He drags him to his feet and pushes him forward with a powerful hand at his lower back. 

All the small movements ring aloud in the quietness of the village as they trudge onward towards the great iron gate standing between them; certain death at the hands of Titans roaming beyond its threshold. 

Her gaze shifts between them, back and forth like a pendulum, anxiously looking for any sign that she’d be able to step in before it was too late but they are standing in the middle of a clearing and not enough cover for her to retreat and escape. They would also be able to spot Pieck charging in with the horses from afar.

She needs to think this through.

“It’s time,” Zeke says. “Open the gates.”

But eerily, Reiner, Bertolt and Galliard have stopped moving. He does not receive a response.

“What on earth is the matter?”

“Zeke,” Reiner says to grab his attention, eyes transfixed on something from afar. “Someone’s there.”

In the deep shadows cast by the Wall, Annie sees a figure shrouded amongst it, blocking their path despite it being only one person.

Her heart starts swelling in her chest, overwhelmed with a sudden sensation of danger although she can't quite place its source. But the needling feeling intensifies, building and reaching a fever pitch inside her.

Something’s wrong. 

Run.

“Colt?” The hope in Falco’s shout echoes clearly. 

Bertolt makes a move that sweeps up Falco in a chokehold. “Don’t step any closer,” he warns the figure.

“Let him go.” Zeke’s unexpected intrusion turns heads towards him, including Annie’s.

“What?” Bertolt asks in disbelief.

“I said,” Zeke wears a thin, cold smile. “Let him go.”

Listen to me.

Run.

Now.

Bertolt unceremoniously lets go of the grip he has on the younger boy’s collar, and Falco surges forward with a strength galvanized by the mere presence of his brother. 

He closes the distance between them, the older brother not moving.

“Colt!” Falco calls out as he pushes forward, body swaying for momentum where his hands couldn’t.

He gets closer and closer, and then what Annie expects to be a moment of reunion becomes something else entirely.

Colt strikes him.

The kick to this chest sends Falco staggering backward from the force, leaving the boy in a crumpled heap on the ground.

The older brother’s face is twisted in rage, all the muscles in his body spasming in a mix of emotions Annie’s finding harder to parse. It’s Colt but at the same time, it isn’t. His normally bright face has become discolored and vacant-looking. 

Reiner and Galliard sprint towards the scene, intervening to drag Colt away from Falco's reach. 

“You should be dead!” Colt’s eyes are still fixed on his brother. “Why aren’t you dead?!”

The words hang in the air, heavy and poisonous.

“What?” Falco recoils as if he had been struck by an arrow. 

“You never had what it takes to be one of us,” Colt continues his fast and ragged tirade, each word slicing through the air and making Falco retreat further as Reiner and Galliard hold him back. “You’re nothing to me!”

He twists and turns himself until one foot makes contact with Reiner’s knee, causing a sharp yelp of pain from the man behind him. Before Galliard could react, Colt jabs backwards with his elbow, leaving both his captors doubled over in agony as he leaps away.

Annie holds herself back from getting involved. Waiting for the right opening.

Not yet.

Reiner and Galliard still far behind him, Colt stands unmoving, impassive, as though nothing could erase him from where he stood. He turns his attention to Zeke and Bertolt, both standing still, refraining to make impulsive decisions. “All of you are unworthy. You're all going to die."

Eyes now trained on the sky, he speaks more wistfully. “Are they all watching?” he asks, a dark and vicious cheer—his one free arm holding a knife is a matter of concern.

Not yet.

Not yet.

“We are the chosen people. We shall restore our place,” he pauses, face determined yet mournful. “In the world we were born into.”

Colt tears off his shirt to reveal what he had been hiding underneath, and it’s only when Reiner bellows to leave, when the rest run away in scattered directions, that Annie sees it for a brief moment: straps packed full of several bright cylinders that criss-cross over his body.

There is a beat of silence, almost like time slowed at that moment to allow Annie one final thing to notice: the cult-shaped symbol on his upper chest. 

And before the image fully imprints in her brain, Colt bursts into light—an explosion in a blinding sunfire bore—followed by a blast that rattles the ground and sends parts of the Wall collapsing. 

The air buzzes with stone-shard shrapnel and Annie’s tumbling into a shoulder roll from the shockwave. 

Followed by the rumble of heavy footfalls.

Her vision is disorienting, dizzy, but locked in on Falco’s blurry silhouette from afar.

That’s the signal.

And she runs.

Chapter Text

Act 2

~O~

"Our words, like our hearts, are weapons still hot from the forging, beating themselves into new shapes each time we swing them."

— Brandon Sanderson, Tress of the Emerald Sea

~O~

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SOMEWHERE, BEYOND WALL ROSE

Annie leans further in the saddle, scanning the horizon for a sign.

“Falco!”

She yells Falco's name over and over again, sending pleas into the towering trees, their limbs spreading outwards like hands reaching out to her for purchase.

She couldn’t blame him for running away when he had the chance.

He’s scared.

Let him go.

The horse slows its gait as the thicket grows thicker with late summer foliage, sprightly beneath her as it dodges roots and jumps streams while Annie ducks low to avoid branches.

She calls his name once more but the response is the same as before.

She starts to feel the strain in her arms and legs, growing more tired with each desperate pull she makes on the reins. The mare eases to a trot and then to a stroll, head hanging low. Her own thoughts become heavy as gravity, weighted down with far more than fatigue.

If she had just avoided getting herself involved, if she had just avoided intervening, none of this would have happened.

She was made for one thing only. And in that singular expectation, had failed astonishingly and pathetically.

Now, she’s alone.

Then a flicker of motion catches her attention.

Straining her eyes, she sees it again: a figure on horseback wedged into an alcove formed by two giant trees.

It must be him.

As quickly as the shadow had been spotted, it darts out of view like a deer glimpsed in the distance.

Annie rises in the stirrups and then sets off in pursuit; the figure had already crested the nearest hillock but she spurs her mount to go faster still, leaning forward against its mane in hopes that it would answer with greater speed. 

All she does is blink and in that instant, a low-hanging branch appears faster than she had time to swivel. She’s yanked off the saddle, head colliding hard with the ground that rushes up to meet her.

Flat on her back, her vision goes in and out of focus, hazy and blurred. 

The leaves, the branches, the sky, and everything else contract to a single point of light.

Then nothing.

Annie rubs her eyes, not knowing if she has gone blind. But everywhere is darkness.

Except, for one thing, far away. It looks like a half-opened door, light streaming out from its interior. 

Closing the distance, she could hear the rhythmic clang of metal on metal, the whirring sound of bellows blowing fiery hot air. Pushing the door open, she finds herself inside her father’s smithy, enveloped by heat from all corners of the room.

The light of the forge creates a blaze across his face as he pulls out glowing yellow ingots with his tongs. Now that he has a limp, he spends the rest of his days forging weapons.

Despite taking the profession only recently, he had always known how to make weapons out of everything.

Today, he is making a new one. A weapon of stealth, he said. 

“Silver or steel?” he asks.

“Steel,” she blurts, as if she had known all along what she was here for. 

There’s a pleasant expression on her father’s face, indicating she must have made a good choice. It’s impossible for Annie not to feel the anticipation build within her. That she was being made at this moment too. A precious creation in her father’s making.

Annie starts depositing steel rods into the crucible, heating the forge and, at her father’s direction, to keep stoking the fire until it was the hottest she had ever felt. Not just to soften the metal but to completely melt it.

It scares her, the way he’s looking. Like he expects her to do it wrong. His face is drawn and tight, wrinkled in an ever-present scowl of warning and she’s constantly treading the razor's edge. His dark eyes are fixed upon her every move, measuring each action against some invisible standard that constantly shifts depending on his moods.

Even though there was no outward sign of displeasure yet, Annie could feel it coming like waves radiating off him. He expects no less than perfection.

The fire has now become too hot to look at or even approach.

“That should do it.”

Her father fetches the mold. In the middle is the design, a circle roughly the same size as her finger. 

Preparing for a steady pour, she grips the tongs that would hold the steel-filled crucible. The heat through her gloves, combined with the distance, makes handling such a hazardous substance all the more difficult. But when her father grimaces, she’s overcome by the sense of urgency to steer the vessel containing a miniature sun.

Slowly, the glowing liquid spills into the ready-made channel, filling the shape completely. 

It’s a little while before the metal cools and her father instructs her to pry the mold open, and she’s met with the brilliant reflection of the ring. Using small files and abrasive paper, she smoothes out the irregularities, painstakingly sanding away at any remaining flaws.

She stops to let her father inspect her efforts, leaning in close with a skeptical look, as though expecting it to have defects. 

“Pass it through the forge again.”

Plunging the steel back for one final round of heating, she drops it in a basin of oil to temper.

Only then does he look pleased.

“And now, for the final piece.”

He takes a small blade from the perch on the shelf, then inserts the base at a pivot point, meticulously aligning it so that it can fold smoothly in and out of the recess.

When he hands it to her, the alloy gleams brightly in her calloused palms, almost deceptively innocent-looking. 

“Try it on.”

She does. And as it sits on her finger, the longer she stares. Like looking into a mirror of herself. Underneath that steel surface lay an unassuming scythe within. 

“Let this remind you, Annie,” he says, hand gripping her shoulder. “All weapons are made to pass through fire.”

She continues gazing at her warped reflection. His voice drops lower. 

“You were made to pass through fire.”

The sound of a door opening interrupts them both. 

Her father whips his head around. “You. What are you doing here?”

“Annie?”

That voice. She knows that voice. 

When she looks back, a boy with long blond hair is standing in the doorway, blinding bright light behind him but his entire front is shadowed. 

What is he doing in her father’s smithy? Her father grabs the hammer in her hands. “Get out, boy. You should not be here.”

“It's okay. You're safe.”

Her father raises his arms, the steel rod catching light. “Leave!”

Annie coughs awake.

The world spins dizzily before returning to clarity as the brightness of the day breaks through the canopies of the trees above. 

Where are you?

She slowly raises herself on shuddering arms to look around. Clumps of grass are lending comfort underneath her body. 

Annie tries to remember, laying there for a moment collecting herself. Everything seems strangely still, like time had stopped when she closed her eyes but was now slowly starting to catch up again. Her mouth feels dry and her hair is stuck to the sides of her face, but she manages to sit up and take a few deep breaths. 

There’s a fog that prevents her from thinking clearly, from remembering how she had gotten here; somehow, it’s getting harder to distinguish reality from dream.

What she remembers first is Colt standing in front of the Wall, spewing absurdities before the explosives on his body ignited him like mere tinder sticks, the flash shattering his skull like a nutshell and incinerating his guts. 

She remembers finding Falco crawling right up to the dark, ashen spot where Colt had been standing. 

“Falco! We have to go!”

“No! I’m not leaving!”

“They’re coming!”

“No!”

She could still recall hauling him up on the horse when he refused to get up, yowling and yelping against her like a panicked rabbit until they were interrupted by the all-too-familiar rumble of footsteps.

Her fingers curl with the memory of the ground vibrating, the smoke of the collapsed Wall and the dust billowing skyward, only to be cut through by grotesque giants moving with unimaginable speed towards them. 

Knowing there was no way out but through the hole swarmed by Titans, she led Pieck and Falco into their approaching footfalls. She didn’t look back until they had reached safety, but by the time she did, Pieck was no longer behind them; all that remained of the Wall were collapsed ruins, with wisps of smoke climbing into an otherwise placid sky.

The details that followed only come in fragments; Falco pushing ahead in the fields, trying to run away from her. And as she pursued him through more forests where he tried to evade her, she kept chasing him until—

Annie palms her forehead where she feels warmth radiating down where it had connected with something. Where she expected an open wound, she feels a wet cloth wrapped around her head.

Who did this?

She scans her surroundings before slowly getting up and continuing on with more trepid caution, aware of every bird call and motionless leaf. When she sees nothing on the horizon, her search goes vertical.

A gentle breeze rustles through the leaves and Annie pauses to listen. With a start, she hears a distant crack of bending branches and she quickly looks up, scanning the tree line.

If it weren’t for her keen eyes, he would have gone unnoticed amidst the dappled shadows and sun-drenched leaves that stretched into the sky above him.

Falco is perched in one of the highest limbs of the pine tree next to her, motionless against a backdrop of leaves.

In the most non-threatening voice she could muster, she calls out. “I know you’re up there.”

Despite making direct eye contact, he stays put and watches her from afar. 

“It’s okay. I’m not going to hurt you,” she says, recalling Pieck's words to put him at ease, but he doesn’t respond as though unsure of the authenticity behind it.

“I'm not here to force you into anything.” Annie grips the rough, knotted bark. “I’m just… looking for company.” 

There’s a rustle of branches, and when she glances to where he had perched himself ever so dangerously before, he is nowhere in sight. 

“I don’t know.” His voice now came from a different direction, as if he just leapt from another tree. “What if you’re pretending again? Like how you pretended to be my friend.”

She’s about to open her mouth to say something but finds the words failing her; no amount of apologizing seemed likely to make up for what had been done. But she owed it at least a try—anything else felt cowardly.

“Falco,” Annie says, more like a balm to soothe her nerves rather than to call his attention. “I know it doesn’t make sense for you to trust me. But I wasn’t pretending back then. I’m not pretending now.”

“Prove it.”

She hadn't expected him to ask for proof of her sincerity. She hadn’t thought about proving herself to anyone. What blooms on her mind is the first day they had interacted, the gentle patience with which he had shown her how to wind thread in patterns, watching him exclaim “just like this!” and producing something strong out of silk.

Annie takes something out from the inside of her jacket. 

“I want to give you something,” she calls out. “So you don’t fall off the tree.”

“What’s that?”

“It’s a rope. I made it just like how you taught me.”

Another rustle of branches and she finally sees Falco, holding on to a much lower branch as if to better peer at it. 

“It looks bad,” he says with a frown. “I can see the fraying from here. Also, the end loops are poorly defined. It’s too long and it’s too loose.” He moves his hands in big circles to illustrate what he means, unaware now of his own anger that had been there moments earlier.

He continues listing the weaknesses of the weave, picking out a knot that seemed particularly ill-made even among its several counterparts of ineptitude.

“But…" He says, fiddling with the nerve cluster in the pad between his forefinger and thumb. "It’s not a total loss.”

Falco, taking a few steps back and gathering momentum, jumps off the branch and lands on the soft patch of grass beside her.

“If you cut it in the middle and then tie it back again, it’ll bring the ends of the rope closer to each other. Makes it stronger. Nice and taut, good enough for a bowstring.”

He approaches a tree where there’s a recess down its bark and retrieves a bow, probably something he made himself. It looked like it had his signature way of making things; precise, polished, with its limbs fashionably curved and tapered to a point—sturdy despite being made of sapling. 

“This might work. But it won’t be easy," he says, pointing at his bow and the rope she made. “It’ll take some time. And it won’t be the same.”

"I can live with that,” Annie answers with a smile that was as friendly as she could manage.

Falco sits down on the ground, already making adjustments to the rope. As Annie watches him attach them to the ends of the bow with reinforced looping, she thinks about how he had always been resourceful, and she couldn’t understand why people didn’t find him a valuable ally.

“Falco,” she interrupts in the middle of his crafting. To even apologize feels presumptuous, insincere, and contemptible. But to not even try felt more cowardly.

“Yes?”

“I’m sorry. I don’t even know how many apologies are enough.” She angles her face down, unable to look at him. The shame feels heavier in her head than the throat that once held it in.

She steels herself for the coldness sure to come.

“One is enough,” Falco says, in a voice so small it could have escaped out of his tear ducts. “If it’s genuine.”

Somehow, the tension within her chest drains away. The thin wires of muscle in her arms become somewhat less stiff. 

It’s almost impossible to believe that he had the capacity to forgive her despite the trail of hurt she had caused him.

But it’s that very trait that terrifies Annie. 

He didn’t seem to understand how vulnerable that kind of thinking is; how his simple trust puts him at risk for harm and manipulation. The thought of anyone taking advantage of such a vulnerability fills her with dread—and determination—to protect Falco where his lack of guard or suspicions could prove fatal.

She had been running with the goal of getting the Female Titan. A goal that now seemed so far out of reach. But she could at least accomplish a simpler goal. A purpose closer to where she is. 

“I think it’s ready,” he says, testing the draw strength of the cord with a slight grin on his face. But they would eventually need to test it on a real thing.

“Can you hunt?” Annie asks. 

The moment she asked this, whatever enthusiasm brimming in his eyes suddenly drops, a stone into a lake.

His eyes dart away from her uncertainty. His shoulders slump slightly, and she notices a line of worry on his forehead. Clearly, the thought of hurting anything with it—even for necessity—unnerves him. 

The sun has already started westering toward twilight, leaving the shadowy areas cool—the perfect time to hunt. It surprises Annie that Falco is silent as they venture up the hill for an optimal vantage point, nervousness betraying his eyes. His knuckles are tense, bow held at readiness and an arrow nocked to its string. 

“Have you ever hunted before?” Annie is the one to break the dead air. 

“Fish,” Falco replies. 

It’s not the same. It’s nothing like staring into a large creature’s liquid black eyes, right before the moment they stop moving and quickly become obsidian, holding no life other than the warped reflection of the one gazing into it.

Annie leads the way along a narrow path, moving with the confidence of a practiced hunter. She fixes her eyes on the ground, looking for signs of life in the undergrowth—the flicker or shine that would mark an animal’s presence. 

“Quick,” she whispers, swerving sharply into an area where broken twigs suggested recent activity and they both glimpsed movement in the underbrush off to one side before it quickly vanished out of sight again. 

Falco proves to be an excellent spotting partner when he silently points at something by the river. The outline was barely visible against dry leaves.

She pauses to read the signs of her prey, a white-tailed deer no doubt eager for relief from the summer heat. She could see where it had drifted through the grasses, leaving faint impressions on the crushed leaflets as she draws nearer to its trail. 

"Aim from here," Annie instructs.

Falco, who had been sticking to her side closer than her own shadow, steps forward. He leans hidden amongst towering trunks, watching the deer graze beneath an ancient tree just yards away from them.

Annie braces herself as Falco pulls the bow back to its full extent and adjusts himself for optimum aim. 

But he doesn’t release. And he still doesn’t. 

Whether unable or unwilling to let go, she’s not sure. But she patiently waits. 

Something in his expression shifts, and Annie turns to what seems to be captivating him. When she looks at their prey, it is staring right into their direction.

The deer stands motionless in the glade before them, twitching its ears back and forth, nostrils flared, observing them warily with barely concealed disregard. Its eyes, though unmoving, are deeply alive. Watchful and curious. Without terror.

Annie looked at Falco as he stood there with the bow in his hands, frozen in a moment of disarray, straddling the border between childlike innocence and the hunter he is quickly forced to become.

Then, Falco exhales, and with it, releasing all the tension from his arm to the flight of the arrow.

The projectile of the arrow flies beautifully in the air.

Before it misses.

The pointed end hits the bark of the tree just inches away; the deer blinks once before bounding for cover, a sudden explosion of movement as the legs shoot out beneath its sleek body with blinding speed, skipping on rocks running by the river and zigzagging through the trees until it disappears from sight. 

Falco is about to run after it but Annie holds him back by the shoulder.

“Let it run,” she tells him.

With the way he’s looking at her now, it seems he’s expecting a scolding or a disappointed lecture.

“I’m sorry,” he grips his bow as though angry at it for missing, but she could see right through him. The reason had nothing to do with the bow and everything to do with the bone of his being. 

There had been no mistake or miscalculation. Just mercy. He was willing to starve himself rather than have blood on his hands. 

All at once, she begins to comprehend how much he reminded her of all that was hunted and all that was preyed upon in this world—a world that is endlessly hungry and in which terror is fervently abundant.

To take part in a violent world is to assert dominance over fear. To commit violence is a form of rebirth, and Falco’s persisting innocence is all that is holding him back. 

He needs to learn the way of survivors, not of victims—that was what Annie was forced to learn at his age.

She bends down and shifts to a more reassuring gesture, hand cupping the side of his shoulder.

“I once saw a deer charge at a wolf and kick it.”

Surprise colors Falco’s face, probably not expecting a story. She pauses for a few beats, recalling the memory, before continuing. “And as soon as the deer did it, the wolf left right away. Not because it was afraid. Or because it got hurt badly. The wolf was just looking for an easy meal. It didn’t expect its food to fight back.”

Her voice has taken on a deeper tone, lending more importance to her words. 

“I’m saying you have to be like that deer, Falco,” she says. “Do you understand?”

Her hand grazes over his discolored eye. “That’s how you survive today. And tomorrow. And this year. And twelve years more.”

Twelve more years—that’s as far as they’re going to get but they’ll make what they could of it. “Can you do that?” she asks, voice softer compared to the demand she had just made.

“I don’t know—”

“Promise me,” she says with more urgency, gripping him with the same force as she would with her father’s furnace tongs.

Falco’s taken aback, and she’s not sure if it’s residual fear of her or the desperate way she’s clinging onto him, but nevertheless, he solemnly nods his promise. And when he does, Annie decides to make her own.

“Then I’ll take you as far as Orvud District. That’s where your Titan is.”

“But… how do you know…” 

Annie shakes the question away. “The important thing is that we get you to your Titan.” 

To hell with Bertolt. In spite of Armin.

Falco sets his eyebrows in doubt. “But the shifter could be anywhere in the district. How are we supposed to find them?”

Right, Annie thinks. Despite narrowing it down to one district, finding them within wouldn’t be simple. What on earth could the Gamemakers be using as a prison for the shifters?

Before she could think further on the possibilities, a loud rumble interrupts her train of thought, coming from Falco’s stomach.

He scratches his head with a sheepish smile out of embarrassment.

Annie shakes her head with a hint of a smile. Maybe it’s far too much heavy thinking on an empty stomach. “We should eat something first.”

“Agreed.” Falco lets up a grin as he falls in line when Annie resumes walking the trail.

After spending the rest of the afternoon searching for game to hunt, they come up empty-handed. 

Unfortunately for them, any animals that might have been around must have fled before they arrived at this place. Annie had resorted to collecting what was only available in plain sight; plenty of roots, stalks and nuts. Falco began using his bow and arrow to knock off clusters of fruits from high branches. Soon, they were able to gather enough to sate them until darkness fell again. 

“It's probably for the best.” There’s a pleasant quality to Falco’s voice as they eat. “We would’ve needed a big fire to cook all that meat.”

Annie nods, trying her best not to picture seared venison on a plate as she eats sprigs of wild mint she collected into the folds of her shirt. “Too bad. You collected all that moss for nothing.” 

“I’ll find some use for it.” He grins, pocketing what would have been good tinder material.

“Thank you, by the way,” she says without preamble.

“For what?”

“This,” Annie points at the bandage wrapped around her head. Falco looks even more confused than when she clarified.

“That was already there when I saw you,” he asserts.

She stares at Falco incredulously, searching for answers he doesn't have.

“Ladies and Gentlemen.”

A voice from above breaks the thin barrier between arena and reality, and both Annie and Falco momentarily lift their eyes away from their feast to look up at the clouds.

“We would like to announce that Porco Galliard has claimed the Jaw Titan. This marks the first successful acquisition in the Games, and we advise the remaining candidates to be vigilant at all times. There is no telling what a shifter could do in their early transformations.

Good luck. And remember, there is no end to the Games until all Titans have been claimed.”

Just as abruptly as the announcement was, the light around them rapidly fades, a thick blanket of dark swarms over the landscape, as if a curtain had been hastily thrown over the dome. 

“Looks like someone’s getting impatient,” Annie says, chewing the last of her sprigs. 

She tries not to be unnerved by the fact Galliard has just acquired the kind of power that could turn deadly for her if he so chooses. There are more immediate concerns. 

Even though Pieck had revealed which district the Female Titan was, it only serves as a useful starting point. The district in question is vast and enormous, and one wrong assumption could mean the difference between victory for her or Mikasa.

How on earth did Galliard find his shifter so quickly?

A stroke of luck? It couldn’t be. Willy Tybur would not have left finding the shifters up to chance. He’s far too calculated and intrepid for that.

Intuition? Annie knew Galliard couldn’t find his way even with a map.

Maybe, and probably with the best certainty: Bertolt knows and told him, certainly not out of the goodness of his heart. It’s impressive really, how quickly he turned Galliard into a tool, to be summoned at will like the hidden blade in her ring. 

Falco gulps as he looks suspiciously above them. “We shouldn’t stay here long.”

Nodding, Annie tells Falco to finish their gathered greens and set about looking for shelter, which is, of course, in the safety of the treetops where it would be easy to see danger coming from a mile away.

With no time to survey the terrain and barely any visibility before them, they settle for a sturdy-looking spruce with narrow needles that seem to reach into the clouds.

She lets Falco climb first with quick and confident swings. When he is already halfway up, she begins her own ascent, pausing when thin branches would waver beneath her weight. Midway, Annie stops, taking in the empty space below and feeling as though the force of gravity has been dialed up.

“This is high enough,” she calls out to him.

“No, we should go higher!” Falco says, eyes laser-focused on the tree tops up ahead.

She calls to stop him, but his toes continue to take purchase in the crevices of the bark until he has already passed out of sight. Even when she tries calling him to come down, she would only hear his distant voice encouraging her to climb higher. 

Sighing, she digs her fingers into the rough bark beneath them and begins scaling up. 

Boughs tickle her chin and branches scrape her legs as she propels herself higher. Finally, through some gaps between leaves, Annie is starting to see Falco’s silhouette perched on the uppermost branch, looking out beyond the edge. 

Emerging away from the shadows and into the moonlight, Annie is almost rendered struck by the view. If she hadn’t known it was only a simulated environment, it would have been a beauty to behold. 

Above her is a night sky that contains seemingly innumerable stars within finite grids. The single moon provides enough bright light to illuminate the landscape below, so smooth from afar that it looks as if it had been flattened out with an enormous rolling pin. Even the air smells different.

Nestled in the tree, Falco lies next to her with a satisfied grin on his face. “I like it up here. The world always looks different somehow.” 

At once, the branches sway with the breeze, and when Falco loses his balance and clings to her waist like a child, Annie’s arms lift in a moment of surprise. 

Her arms stay in the air, not knowing what to do. But the longer Falco holds on to her, paying more attention to the frightening ground below rather than her reaction, her arms slowly descend like wings coming into landing. Her fingertips alight onto his shoulders, careful not to put her entire weight on it, worried she would frighten him.

But when he shows no regard for it, when his hug grows tighter in panic, she lets her arm wrap around him in a secure embrace, fighting back a smile. Further beneath her own amusement is astonishment—not merely because he’s holding on with such intensity, but because she had difficulty believing Falco would find comfort in her.

“You should get some sleep,” she says in the crown of his hair. 

Falco leans back to look up. “What about you?”

“I have to keep watch.” She looks down at the pitch-black void where her legs are tenuously dangling. “Besides, I don’t like to sleep that long.”

“Is that why you always look tired?” Falco asks playfully, and Annie grins sincerely this time. His expression then turns to one of concern. “Why can’t you sleep long? Bad dreams?”

All the time, Annie thinks. “Sometimes.”

“What do you do about it? ”

Annie shifts slightly. How could she explain being buried alive over and over? The soils and sands and mounds of the earth that only keep piling around her as she lay, unable to scream? 

Falco waits patiently for an answer, so she takes a breath.

“Wait for it to pass, I guess.”

She doesn’t say more but Falco doesn’t press further, as though sensing her discomfort.

“I get awful nightmares too,” he says quietly. Annie leans in.

“You don’t have to talk about it.”

“It’s not that. It’s just… everyone around me ends up leaving.”

Annie feels a lump in her throat. She wants to say something, anything to comfort him, but she's never been good with words.

“But I learned this trick. And it helps me get through the night,” Falco met her gaze, his eyes warming despite the soft discoloration swelling around them. "I keep a list in my head of all the kind people I’ve met,” he says softly as if in a pensive trance. 

He runs through each name carefully like a prayer: a man called Doctor Jaeger who took care of him when he was orphaned. Mr. Kruger, a wounded Marleyan soldier in the internment zones who eventually became his friend.

The next name he mentions surprises her. 

“Annie Leonhart,” he says, giving her an affectionate shove. “Taught me how to fight… or mostly how to stop falling on my butt.”

Annie chuckles at the trivial comment and doesn’t think much of it. But as Falco continues with his list, she finds herself more and more fixated on it. 

Kind? Why would he ever see her as kind?

Even the word is out of place in her mind. Was there more that Falco saw beneath her neutrality and indifference?

When he stops counting names, Annie’s focus returns. “The list just keeps growing but I keep counting every single one. It gets a little exhausting. But it works. Somehow, the world isn't so scary… you know?”

As he finishes, Annie realizes she has been completely speechless. Like she had been talking to someone older than her, rather than a child six years younger. Or do all children talk like this? She wouldn’t know; she had never been to school with other kids. 

Her father had kept her home for most of her upbringing, believing that mingling with other students would detract from her discipline. She had never questioned that decision, but now she’s starting to think that if she had met people as likable as Falco, maybe she wouldn’t have kept to herself all these years. 

Despite not understanding yet, she wants to learn all the same. Like it was a window into a world she was just starting to piece together.

“You came up with that by yourself?”

“No, uh, my brother did.” Falco’s voice tapers off to a lower volume, as though recalling the last few callous moments between him and his brother and suddenly questioning himself. 

When the clouds give way for more light, Annie could see his face has changed yet again and his eyes have become far away, the edges of his mouth twitching. 

She wishes she had something profound to say, something to help him cope, but nothing seems right or adequate enough. Fact is, nothing can shield him from reality and the gut-wrenching certainty that lives will be taken without delay, without cause, and without warning.

“I’m okay,” Falco says in the absence of a reply, lips turned up in a weak smile. Some grins were reflexes and others were acts of courage. His was of the latter. 

“Your brother was just protecting you,” she offers. “Maybe if we weren’t born Eldian, things would have been different.”

For a while, Falco ponders on it, before finally speaking. “No, I wouldn’t have wanted that.”

He stares hard at the inky blackness beneath them, but she can’t say for sure what he’s seeing. 

“When I think of Colt, and all the people who took care of me, it all kind of feels like a miracle. That I had a family. That the world was kind enough to give me at least that,” he says softly, picking up pieces of his history like petals from a flower. “If I had to be born again, I’d still choose this life.”

Annie looks up. “You think we get to live again after we die?”

“I think so.”

Falco follows her line of vision, looking at the canvas above streaked with lavender and pale blues. 

“Or maybe we stick around and never leave,” he also considers. “Like the fog from your mouth when it’s chilly.”

As if in response to his words, a hawk soars overhead and then circles lazily in flight before banking away across the tips of the forests. Annie briefly wonders what it would be like to fly, soaring without regard to the ground below them, relishing the wind beneath her wings—

Then something strange sails into view. 

From afar, white wisps of cloud condensation are coiling upward like—

“Smoke,” Annie says.

“Yeah, just like smoke.” Falco agrees.

“No,” she corrects with sudden caution in her voice. “Over there.”

Falco turns to Annie. “Is it them?” 

“Only one way to find out,” she says, glaring at the ghostly shape, wishing she could see what was unfolding in the distance from the safety of their tree.

Climbing their way down, she warns Falco to keep a wide berth and to remain vigilant for any sign of life, worried that this could be a trap.

With their feet planted in dangerous territory, Annie leads and starts moving with purpose under the gray shadows of the trees.

The cold air carries more information to her nose as she trails the wisp of smoke into a deep copse, walking single file along a narrow trail in the woods.

Every so often she sees the smoke catch the light as it curls away from them in an ever-widening arc through the trees. As they progress down the hills, hints of activity are apparent: crushed twigs here, an orange scrap there, and soon enough Falco spots something persistently bright, beyond the edge of the forest.

As they trek forward, Annie finds the landscape before her has turned into a vast field, with tall stalks of golden wheat swaying in waves, rippling like an undulating sea. The air is light with smoke and dust from the dry ground beneath her feet. 

Motioning for Falco to follow her with a head tilt, she strides forward carefully, amongst the waist-high stalks that seem to stretch ahead for what seems like miles in every direction. She leads him laterally across the plain, the persisting brightness and smoke becoming larger and more visible.

Then, she sees it: a patch of clearing. In the midst of it, a bonfire is blazing, sending smoke billowing into the air like black wings but it’s the smell that stands out. At first, she thinks it’s burned wood, but the odor becomes far more unsettling: an overpowering stench of burning flesh and hair, intermingled with the nauseating, metallic scent of blood. 

At this point, she slows her advance, one foot after the other, toe first then heel. Holding up her arm, she motions for Falco to remain quiet.

Concealed behind the crops, she surveys the encampment before her.

In the orange-hued flames, a figure is moving about, and it takes a while before she can recognize him.

As he walks, Eren Kruger manages to get into a position right in her direct line of sight.

Her breathing becomes more and more shallow with every passing second as she watches him, and the longer she stares, the more she seems to learn about him.

Eren’s features are much clearer and more alive, the underside of his chin engulfed in the light of the flames and it makes his eyes all the more darker. But it’s not like the soft and curious gaze of a gentle deer. Not like the vicious yellow of wolves. 

Rather, his eyes resemble those of great horned owls—the true, undisputed hunters of the wild. With silent wings, they swipe songbirds from the boughs. With violent beaks, they leave a trail of headless rabbits, endlessly hungry as they glide atop the food chain. 

She had always feared them as a child, believing that these birds, if they chose to, could devour her whole.

And even as she grew older, all the more convinced she became that these birds, if they could, would devour the world.

What was he burning? The wind shifts, blowing a sickening smell her way, and Annie fears for the worst.

Eren throws more sticks to stoke the fire and the heat intensifies. A sudden flare of brightness illuminates the surroundings, and when she looks more carefully at the fire licking the edges, that’s when she notices four, long tapered legs.

A dead horse, singed by flames that ate away at its mangy hide. Its eyes are vacant as it stares out into nothingness.

Why was he burning a dead horse?

Rustling from the far side grabs her attention—two more figures arrive, two that she hasn't encountered in the Games yet.

Yelena is dragging someone behind her.

“Oh no.” Falco’s whisper is lost in the rush of breath, face suddenly white when he sees her.

Annie squints, seeing the shape of a little girl shuffling forward with slumped shoulders, her stiff silhouette suggesting her hands and limbs are tightly bound. Then she’s forced to the ground with a hard shove.

“Is that—?”

Falco nods grimly, his eyes never leaving Gabi. He starts to move forward but Annie puts a hand on his shoulder, gently restraining him with an almost silent shake of her head, motioning for him to wait.

Yelena steps in the middle, eyeing the blaze before them with slight disgust, then returning her gaze to their group. 

“We must leave,” she advises. “The smoke will attract attention.” Her eyes dart around nervously as if expecting something unseen to materialize from out of the tall grass.

When she doesn’t get a reply, she becomes frustrated. 

“Must we compromise our position for this… animal?” Her voice is teetering between frustration and calm.

It takes a moment before Eren responds, straightening himself. “I am honoring its life.”

The response earns him a sideways look from Yelena. Squatted on the ground, Gabi scoffs. 

Eren walks nearer to the fire, his shadow growing larger behind him. “You find this absurd?” 

“It’s just a horse,” she shrugs slightly with her head and one shoulder. “You’re treating its funeral better than what most people in the zones would get.”

“Maybe it deserves a better funeral than most people.”

Gabi blinks, deepening her frown. “Are people's lives worth less than animals to you?”

“I’m saying,” Eren supplies impatiently, “this animal has served more bravely and honorably than most humans.”

Annie clenches her jaw, confused. Animals don’t know honor or bravery. They are only capable of understanding two things at a time: predator and prey, struggle and survival, flight or fight. 

In a way, she isn’t so different from them. Barely human. Only action, and at other times, reaction.

But why was he so intent on paying his respects to the creature?

Inexplicably, Annie is reminded of an interaction, moments before the Assessment, into that strange interim where something had felt off-kilter.

“You’re… really good with horses.”

“Dogs, cats, hawks—these animals are all natural partners of humans,” Eren is still talking, eyes steady on Gabi. “We work with their natural instincts. To hunt. That’s why our eyes are on the front. But horses are prey animals. Eyes on the side. We're natural enemies. And it goes against all reason and all instincts for a horse to let you ride it.”

“I had one. A long time ago.”

“Every time a horse lets you up onto its back, it pledges its life to you,” Eren’s fist finds its way to his heart. “It devotes it without hesitation. I can’t say the same for a lot of people.”

Gabi is defiant but silent, limiting her aggression to one questioning eyebrow.

At this, Eren’s composure lapses for a second, and a contemptuous look flashes across his face.  “Careful.“ He graces her with withering interest. "Now that we’re down one horse, we may have to get rid of unnecessary cargo.”

The smell of burning hair and flesh has now thickened in her nose, poisoning her lungs with every inhale. 

“No more of this," Yelena says, walking in between them as though steel welded into her spine. “I shall make haste to Orvud and ensure everything goes as planned. I will, however, say this: your friend is no longer to be trusted."

“Armin will do what needs to be done.” Eren’s voice is loud enough for Annie to hear him, neither doubtful nor shrill. “If he won’t, then do what you have to."

“You would say the same for the other?” Yelena’s stare is almost a challenge.

Eren’s eyes become less focused, the question almost snapping him out of non-expression. “Mikasa won’t be a problem.” 

The words sound hollow even to Annie.

Yelena's eyes narrow as if she saw straight through him. “And what will you do if she decides to be one?” The silence that follows from Eren is thick as the lump he swallows in his throat, so she persists further. “Why? Do you care for her?” 

Eren refuses to meet her gaze. “What difference would that make?”

“Everything.”

When the word leaves her mouth, Annie watches Eren struggle to remain impassive; the only movement is a slight compression of the lips.

Yelena lets the silence hang for a moment before turning on her heel. “If I do not hear from you, I will remain in Reiss Chapel.” She pauses. “Do you remember where that is?”

Eren slowly nods, his gaze so very far away, as if unpacking a long distant memory. “I remember.”

As he turns to look at Yelena walking away, his head snaps to a certain direction, as though something made him cautious—almost as if he could feel her presence from yards away. 

Careful not to make any sudden moves, Annie feels the staccato of her heartbeat, every sense heightened as she stays completely still.

Her breath catches when his eyes land in her general direction. Time freezes momentarily between them before he walks away and Annie quickly retreats back into the shadows.

Chapel? Why would they be going to the chapel?

Now that she thinks about it, the houses of worship had been a common thread throughout the Walls. 

The church tower in Wall Maria had been the first place she had gone to. The place where she saw Marcel. And if only by intuition she suspects that Zeke knows far more than he lets on, she is certain—with every fiber of her being—it is precisely why he chose to investigate the chapel in Wall Rose.

All of this is a constant reminder of the power we abused when we were gods. 

She thinks about it more. What are the Games, if not a ceremony of the Eldian’s fall from grace, a confrontation of their sordid history, and a demonstration of the extreme dissymmetry between the slave and the all-powerful yet invisible sovereign?

It strikes Annie like a lightning bolt. 

That’s where they’re keeping the shifters.

Annie gets up to leave, heading back into the safety of the forest for a new game plan. Falco tails behind her but the moment they’re safe out of hearing distance, he reaches for her hand.

“Wait, where are you going?”

“What do you mean?”

“We can’t just leave Gabi!” he protests.

Annie looks past the fire at the other figures that had surrounded Gabi and somehow begins to realize that she had never been quite as tough as she wanted to be if she tried to be. It had always been easier to look the other way.

She looks down at her hands.

“No,” Annie says with a firmer shake of her head this time. “It’s too dangerous.”

“Then I’ll go.”

This makes her squint at Falco, confused. Why would he want to risk his life to save someone who could very well be considered a rival? The more she thinks about it, the more reckless and senseless it sounds, and the more she suspects it’s for one reason only.

“I can’t let you do that,” she says with finality. His feelings for her will pass. Putting his life at risk isn't an option.

“Why not?”

“You’re not ready for this. You’re not—”

“I’m not what?”

Annie takes a moment to make sure her expression remains composed, unperturbed. Like steel. Another second passes before she could condense the dread in her chest into a ball of barbed wire. “You’re not strong enough.”

She watches as despair floods his face, the resolve gleaming there just moments ago fading away in an instant. He sways slightly as he takes a step back.

Annie looks away. She doesn’t want this either; to be the one to refuse his plea for help. But in the all too real risk of putting someone else at peril for just trying, she’s ready to walk past if it could prevent more blood on her hands.

Falco steps forward again, with resolve in his voice.

“You said before I was made of silk. Or are you gonna underestimate me like everyone else too?”

She casts her gaze down the tender-hearted boy before her, and somehow something shifts. To look at Falco was to see a different kind of strength she didn’t think mattered. A strength that persisted in ways mere muscle or will alone could not surpass.

The world has always been more abundant in weapons, like silver and steel. But it’s all the more reason why she needed to protect the precious things. The soft and sincere. The ones that existed not to strike but to soothe. Like sunshine and songbirds.

She doesn’t ever regret fighting Zeke to save him. Even though Falco wasn't a deadly weapon, what he had given her was a small grain of peace, a dandelion in the sidewalk, an innocence she had long forgotten. Punctuated by the gravity of the situation, two realizations fall into place.

Any consequence now was purely arbitrary. What mattered more than anything was the hope in his eyes that she intended to keep alight.

She leans into Falco, buzzing with adrenaline, coming back in full circle.

“If this is going to work—” she makes sure the tenor of her voice demands total compliance. “—we’re going to need a big distraction.”

A surge of relief blooms into Falco’s face. “How big?”

“Enough smoke to make me invisible.”

She looks down at the moss he had collected earlier, and Falco grins wider as his thoughts seem to sync with her idea.

He takes the dry moss from the pouch hanging at his belt, examining the size, expression confirming it’s the right amount for the job. 

Setting the arrow in place, Falco begins wrapping the moss around the pointed end, tying it around neat layers as if spiraling thread, not too much so as to not impede flight.

Then, raising his weapon in one smooth motion, he draws back until the string is snug against his ear.

This time, his prey is not deer. 

Pulling back on the line, he lets the arrow fly, zipping past the other Warrior candidates and straight through the brazier of the burning horse.

The arrowhead emerges out of the heat engulfed in red-hot embers, igniting everything it passes. Adrenaline floods the enemy camp as they watch the flames reach higher into the sky, delivered by unseen hands.

“More,” demands Annie. “Separate them.”

Obediently, Falco loads an arrow to set flame to another part of their encampment, cutting the space that separated Yelena and Eren from Gabi.

In a matter of moments, it was all consuming, rising higher and higher until she couldn't see anything but red-gold heat engulfing everything in its path. 

From afar, she sees Gabi dart away from her captors in their momentary distraction. 

This is her chance.

“Stay here!” she yells to Falco as she runs towards the blaze. Before she’s even halfway across the field, the heat of the fire is already scorching her face. Using the inside of her shirt as an air pocket for breathing, she wades deeper in the current of wheat stalks, searching frantically for Gabi. 

In the growing blanket of smoke, she’ll die soon if she doesn’t find her. Now.

The oppressive warmth seeps down into her bones, exposed skin blistering like hot coals beneath a furnace. And as the heat becomes unbearable, the telltale signs of fear and hesitation take over. A tightness in her chest, a sense of dread, and growing darkness around her field of vision are all too familiar signs that she’s losing control. 

That everything is consuming her whole.

Chest tight, even breathing becomes impossible. And as the seconds pass by like hours, the world feels as if it’s about to crumble inwards.

She feels her legs buckling, suffocating in the heat. Her breath starts coming in shallow gasps.

Just as her knees hit the ground, a small object slips out and lands in the soil before her. With enormous effort, she squints against the smoke to see that it was her ring, half buried in the earth, glimmering against the flames—in the element where it was forged, in the soil where she was born.

You were made to pass through fire.

Annie hoists herself up to her feet—now a raw force of energy made of teeth, bone, blood and boiling rage.

She trudges forward against the odds, her eyes stinging with tears and sweat and—against all odds, she finds the silhouette of a child in panic, walking in circles, turning this way and that without clear intention in the reddened atmosphere.

Just as Gabi collapses, Annie reaches her in time, lifting her head from the ground. She yanks off her jacket, draping it over Gabi's head to shield her nose from the smoke. 

Before she can lift Gabi, a force of hand drags her by her shirtfront and yanks her away but her palms slap the ground in a breakfall.

Eren starts to turn towards Gabi just as Annie picks herself up. With a wild yell she dives and wraps her arm around his foot. Eren twists and falls as her leverage on his ankle forces him down the ground.

She adjusts her hold faster than he is able to respond. In moments, she has him pinned between her legs and Eren’s cheek takes on Annie’s fist: an arc of force striking down like her father’s hammer.

Someone's bone grates and she can’t tell if it's hers or his but she’s beyond pain at this point. Her battered nervous system has dulled the world down to the singular shade of red. 

The sound of Gabi coughing has her stopping. And somehow, some of the world is slipping back into focus.

In her distraction, Eren somehow uncoils a punch a fraction of a second faster and it decks her so brutally that her eyes go glassy for a second. She rolls off him, clutching the side of her ear, unable to think past the haze of smoke around her.

Eren staggers upright. One of his legs doesn’t seem to be able to bear much weight.

Annie braces herself to strike him again but the hardness in his expression melts back. Instead, a smile spreads across his face.

It’s over sooner than she could properly understand: small tendrils of steam curl up from the wound she had inflicted on his face, blending into the air just as quickly as it had appeared—the wound is gone in a flash. 

A sick weight gathers in her chest, not sure if what she'd seen had been real or an illusion.

“Annie!”

At first, she thinks the voice is imagined, but it rises again in the distance until she discerns it must be Falco’s voice.

Eyes back on Eren, she decides against pursuing him further.

No use playing his games. He’s too injured to chase them anyway and the fire is encroaching at an alarming rate—now is a matter of survival.

Wasting no time, Annie drops to her knees, scoops up Gabi with both arms and rises to her feet, running across the sections of the field that haven’t been burned yet.

She doesn’t look back. Everywhere around there is dry ash coating her skin and lodging in her nose.

Impending destruction closing in, she keeps her ears trained on the sound of Falco shouting where to flee, and her eyes land on a thin line of emptiness where it seems like there might be a way out. 

As her vision blurs, Falco spouts in the distance, jumping for her attention.

Fueled by his presence, she forces her legs forward with one last burst of energy, her head feeling deliriously light but she’s vicariously aware of the child in her arms. Her steps start to fumble but not until she’s out of the fire’s threshold and she collides into Falco’s open embrace and his delightful cry.

Gingerly, he takes care to help her set the unconscious Gabi down on the cold cement.

Knowing danger is still behind, Annie’s head spins to face the out-of-control inferno, but something unexpected happens.

As if programmed to do so, the wall of flames had stopped its relentless march just short of where they stood—an invisible barrier now holds it at bay. 

Annie pauses for a moment’s astonished wonder that she is in fact, still alive.

Then she looks at Falco, her expression skirmishing between anger that he didn’t stay put like she told him, but ultimately fond relief that he risked his safety to guide her out.

It hasn’t even been a full day, and he had saved her life twice. And Gabi’s. 

Falco puts a gentle hand underneath Gabi’s head to cushion it, and when he flashes a satisfied grin at Annie with an uneven row of teeth, she sees a hint of a hero beneath.

For a brief moment, there is a sense of peace that comes over them, safe and sound inside the cold walls of whatever this place is and—wait, what is this place?

Annie turns around, and what greets her ahead is the open gate of Wall Sina, its grandiose structure stretching up to the sky. The gate itself is wide open as they stand in the middle of it, arms outstretched and inviting all those longing for freedom from within, or shelter from without.

It’s the only path forward that isn’t consumed by flames, and it’s precisely the lack of any other option that makes the hair on her skin rise.

“What’s wrong?” Falco asks as though seeing her body go tense. 

She doesn’t answer, doesn’t move.

What district was this again?

Gabi is stirring. Black soot is all over her face she’s almost unrecognizable. “Reiner,” she murmurs.

And all of a sudden, Annie’s senses are on high alert, vision sharpening once again. And perhaps this is to be expected when one makes enemies on both sides.

“Hide. Now,” she instructs, taking Gabi by the legs as Falco grabs the underside of her arm. They drag her until she’s flush by the walls of the gate, hidden by the shadows. Annie rises to her feet to step out into the light and Falco tries to follow her, but that’s when she snaps at him.

“No. Stay here.” 

“But—”

“Stay. Here.” It’s her final warning and there’s no room for argument.

Falco swallows, nodding earnestly as he steps back into the shadows.

Annie strides past the entrance of the district, her eyes darting left and right.

The place is deathly still but she’s aware of a kind of humming silence, a presence she couldn’t sense but knew was lurking—like an icy touch on her nape. 

Keeping her pace deliberately even, she moves in a straight line that puts herself in plain sight of every doorway and window along her route, hoping to lure out any potential threat and draw them away from Falco and Gabi. Dragging her feet along the worn cobbles, she scans each side of the street, searching for a tell.

Then, she stops—just as a predator becomes aware of being stalked by a bigger threat.

“I know you’re there.”

Galliard steps out from the shadows of the houses, his coat flapping and billowing in the night air. 

He’s different somehow. He didn’t move in the restless and jointless way she was used to seeing. There’s an unnatural stillness in his frame, yet something is brewing underneath him. A smoldering fire waiting for oxygen.

All at once, she’s aware of what this confrontation is, and the fact there is only one outcome to it.

She steps back warily from him, though he makes no movement towards her. Her eyes subtly dart around in case Bertolt was nearby. 

“I’m on my own now,” he points out as if reading her mind. “It was getting harder to tell." 

"Tell what?"

"The people who have your back…” he drags his eyes from the ground to meet hers. “From the people who have it long enough just to stab you.”

Annie is unable to look away or muster any kind of response beyond blinking slowly at him.

“It’s not what you think—”

“Then whose blood was it?” 

She doesn’t answer. The dread begins to seep into her pores.

“That day we met,” Galliard steps closer, face more feral. “Whose blood was it?”

The words hang in her mouth like a noose waiting for someone to pull it tight.

“It wasn’t mine.”

His eyes are wide and his mouth hangs slightly open as he takes in the revelation, and then the hard-set line of his jaw tightens further. She swallows hard, knowing that if he chooses to transform right this moment, it’ll all be over—she couldn’t go head to head with a beast and expect any kind of outcome other than her defeat. 

“The thing is nobody at home thought I’d make it,” he says all of a sudden. “They all thought I’d do something reckless or stupid and get killed because of it. When we both volunteered, our mom said we’d finally have a Warrior in the family but I knew she wasn’t talking about me.”

Galliard’s expression had changed in a heartbeat. He now had a look in his eyes—an aggression and vacancy all at once. It made no sense for two expressions to exist at the same time but somehow that’s what she sees.

“So when I found out my brother was already dead, I didn’t think I’d be so upset—”

It was the same look as Colt’s. 

“—that I didn’t get to kill him myself.”

Annie goes still, gazing at the ground, unable to comprehend it. Instead, it soaks slowly into her. Water seeping through sand. 

Then she looks up at him and stares, wide-eyed. “I don’t understand—”

“I’ve always wanted to do it.” Galliard’s expression hardens like iron. “And you took that away from me. So now, I have to kill you.”

"Then get your revenge on me.” Annie steps back, her hand subconsciously moving towards her chest as if to protect herself. "But if you want to be half the Warrior your brother was, you'll do it with your bare hands."

“You don’t get to talk about what a Warrior is,” he snarls. “You don’t know what it is. You don’t know the meaning of it—”

The words are lost through the rasp of sucking air through his teeth. She’s heard that sound before. Like a knife pressed against a grindstone.

“Half the warrior,” he echoes back at her with a scoff. “You know, Marcel always talked about being the bigger person. Don’t fight fire with fire. Don’t answer violence with more violence. I used to believe him. Looking back on it, it’s all so stupid.” 

He cracks his knuckles one by one, each click resounding with spite. Bullets being loaded into a pistol. 

Annie silently hopes that wherever Falco is, he’s found himself somewhere far away and safe. She tries to glance for a way out when Galliard reaches into his pocket, pulling out his dagger.

She never imagined she would end up hoping he meant to use the knife on her, instead of the soft lining against his palm.

“Stop—”

“Think about it,” Galliard ignores her. “Nobody remembers if you were the bigger person. They only care about the ones who make it.”

He drags the blade with deliberate pressure, the curved tip just grazing it, and she knows with sickening certainty that it’s only a matter of seconds until she is finished.

“Don’t answer violence with more violence. What bullshit,” he scoffs. Menacing. The air around them starts to crackle. “If there’s already a knife I’d rather be the one behind it.”

The blade bites into his flesh and wells blood.

In a blink, lightning flashes and a serpentine blaze of yellow radiates from Galliard’s body like a waterfall of fire, rising upwards.

Annie’s pushed away by the burst of explosion. Her back whacked on the ground, she pushes her elbows towards her ears, shielding the sides of her face. When the smoke clears, whatever materializes in Galliard’s place looms far above her, its face impassive, impenetrable, and inhumanly solid: a living stone.

As its massive clawed hands strike down at her, she rolls over and leaps to her feet, ducking beneath its legs with a fear-driven agility. She cuts around a sharp corner towards the alleys. The narrowness affords her some protection and reduces his capacity to swing his tree-trunk-thick arms at her.

Galliard’s Titan jumps in the adjacent direction as Annie sprints down cobblestone streets, desperate to outpace the flurry of sparks around her with each missed attempt from gigantic claws. 

Ahead of her lies an open courtyard, spilling out from the middle of the village.

When Galliard’s Titan jumps to cut off her escape, the courtyard cracks like a frozen lake, the fracture spreading out from the center of his landing. One part opens up beneath Annie's feet but her hands strike in half-convulsion and she somehow manages to grab hold of rocky terrain just in time, hanging precariously over a bottomless dark void.

The shadow of his claws looms over her. Her fingernails split under her weight. Its hand raises, preparing to swipe her.

Time stretches in that instant. 

She wonders if she will see a flash of light when her skull cracks open after falling down—like the flash she always saw in her nightmares. But this time she isn’t going to wake up. Maybe she’ll never even know what it would look like. 

It's unclear why she wants to know all of a sudden. Death had always been a vague periphery. In the everpresent mayhem to pull her life from the grave, nothing else mattered. But somehow, right now, the idea of an afterlife is important.

Just as important as anything a person could think of before they die.

“I’m sorry.”

Galliard’s hand pauses at the highest point of its arc and she could have sworn she sees the flash of human eyes in the dark void of its Titan eye sockets.

But the rock she’s holding onto crumbles even more and she joins the descent of several smaller chunks of dirt falling, plummeting deeper underground.

The shock comes first before the agony.

At first, she lies still on the ground, disoriented. As her awareness sharpens, so does the pain. When she tries to move, one of her arms sends tremors through every fiber of pain receptors like fire up her spine. Annie screams but no sound comes from her mouth. 

Her entire right arm is hanging limp and filled with numb tingling while her left instinctively clutches it. She could sense the bone protruding at an awkward angle beneath her skin. Her calves wobble when she attempts to stand, giving out just as quickly. She collapses onto her stomach and then rolls onto her left side, curling tightly into a ball to conserve any remaining warmth.

Waves of exhaustion come in tides as repetitive as time. Annie decides to focus on the pain that has been keeping her awake. 

Just as she begins to feel numb, she moves her right arm and shoulder and the pain brings a pinprick of life back to her. Her upper body conforms, curling as an electric current surges through and around her arms like little shocks that make everything real again—yet she feels herself succumbing to numbness once more, like slipping underneath cold water. 

She tightens her grip on wakefulness once again with a slight shake that sends her screaming into nothingness. But as the night grows colder, the tactic also begins to fail her. The side of her arm is now pulpy and inflamed. Piece by piece, function by function, her mind begins to shut down, slipping in and out of consciousness. 

It takes nearly all of her lifetime’s discipline to stay completely still where breathing out only worsens the pain. 

Must open.

Eyes.

Open.

Not. Weak.

Get.

Up.

She attempts to force her head upright and just as she does, something strange presses against her head. Solid yet softly yielding. A bit stiff, but warm—as if it were flesh beneath her cheekbone and temple where she had been laying on an odd angle. 

“Annie?” a voice says above a whisper. “It's okay. You're safe.”

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-O-

ENCRYPTED MESSAGE FROM SECURE CHANNEL.

…

MESSAGE DECRYPTED.

Chapter Text

Act 2

~O~

“But I warn you, little warrior. The price of power is pain.”

― R.F. Kuang, The Poppy War 

~O~