Author's Note: I do not own Shingeki no Kyojin or any of its respective characters and am in no ways affiliated with its creator, Isayama Hajime-sensei, bless him. This story is written for entertainment purposes only and I am in no way profiting from them in any financial terms whatsoever.

Prologue: Shelter

The rain was cold and the night was dark. The girl didn't mind, she was used to it; she liked the rain, anyway, but her things were getting wet.

Lightning flashed for a brief second but that was all she needed. She could stop for the night, there was no rush, and she started trudging towards her goal.

The place was darker than outside but at least it was dry. There were things in there and they stamped and snorted when they sensed the intruder. Animals, she thought, and the sound they were making was vaguely familiar, as if she heard them before in a dream. Nothing approached her and she relaxed.

Dripping, the girl shed her cloak and circular straw hat and inspected the damage the water has done to her bags by touch. Titan's skin is waterproof and save for the hilt and scabbard of the sword that hung on her back, none of her other more precious possessions were damp.

She unstrapped the two short belts over her shoulders that held the longer one above her breasts that held her sword which she unbuckled and pulled over her head. Then she proceeded to unsheathe and polish her favorite weapon. No kills today making it one whole week since her last hunt; she was bored and irritated but there was nothing she could do. She had a fresh change of clothes in the dark, squeezed and wrung her wet ones, then laid them on the floor. The pouches full of knives, needles and herbs that were banded on her thighs would remain in their usual places tonight: there would be no telling what thing or person would come and discover her presence without her consent. For now she will rest and maybe even sleep.

There were ten creatures in the dark place and there was a bale of soft stuff that smelled like hay on the corner near the door. Ah, she thought, a stable full of horses. It had been so long that she had almost forgotten.

She curled up on the bed of straw with her backpack as a pillow (her sword laid horizontally beneath her neck so that no one may touch it without her knowing). The horses started to sigh back to their sleep, the poor, stupid things, and it was high time she closed her eyes as well…

from the Diary of Historia Reiss, September 30:

Moved to this new castle today. Turned it upside down with the others to clean it. I don't know why Levi-Heichou is so obsessed with cleaning. Maybe it has something to do with growing up in the Underground City.

It's been a week since Eren suggested I started writing this diary, when the others were away to deal with the merchants. He said it might help me feel better if I wrote down my thoughts, which he thought was the better method for me, since he usually deals with his feelings by having a shouting match with Jean. I don't know. I've been Krista Lenz for so long that I no longer know what it's like to be me. Who was I before Ymir? Before Training? Before my mother's death? I honestly don't remember. Not anymore.

I wonder why I decided to start today. It must be a sign that something big's about to happen. I hope so. That way, I could do something radical as Historia Reiss. Maybe then I would be able to find who I am.

Anyway, I've been getting weird dreams lately. I always forget in the morning but there always seems to be a young woman in them…

Once upon a time, there was a girl with no name. She lost it a long, long time ago, when she was just a baby. At least, that's what she told people when they asked her but she knew deep in her heart that she never had one, never will.

She lived in a cage with other people, but they had families and friends and they were too busy being scared and worried to pay any attention to her. Everyday, masked men would take them out of their cell by turns and on the first time she was taken out, a doctor, the first she ever met, inserted a needle into her skin and made fire bubble in her blood. The needle hurt, but the pain went away eventually.

The next time she went to see the doctor, he cut off her right hand and told her she was sick. She was sick for a long, long time, but the sickness didn't go away.

The sickness was that her hand didn't grow back.

The girl jerked awake once the rain stopped falling. She felt uncomfortable but couldn't remember why. The smell of the air said dawn was beginning and she pushed herself up from her soft place to put her goggles back on. She felt tougher, stronger, better as she placed the aged slides of glass in front of her eyes and let go of its black rubber strap with a tiny snap over the back of her head before freeing her trapped locks from the rubber band's hold by flipping them up with her fingers. Perfect.

She surveyed the area. The horses looked a lot smaller than she remembered but it had been a decade since she's been in the presence of one of the many monsters that plagued her world. Not anymore.

She leapt over the pen of the one nearest to her, hesitated, then touched it. It jerked awake in an instant and folded its ears back in tension but the girl had always been good with animals and soon the mare had its eyes half-shut. She stopped when it had fallen asleep from her petting and she skipped over its gate to fix her things.

She picked up her used clothes, now only slightly damp, and she wore the belts that held her sword, then swung her backpack over her shoulders. There were still puddle marks on the cold stone floor where she lay out her clothes the night before but she would be long gone before the venue's owner even opened up their eyes.

The air was thick with fog when she stepped out of the stable and closed the door behind her without so much as a creak. She retraced last night's steps back into the forest to head north: she would get ready for another day in a secluded place and not in enemy territory. Since this was the forest, there should be a stream nearby for breakfast and if a Titan came, there would be no rush.