Admiration filled the young girl's big brown doe eyes as the procession passed. Men and women in green cloaks avoided eye contact with the civilians intently watching. She could feel the tension in the air, the usual adoring crowds were silent now. Even as a child she could grasp what had happened. The mournful looks on faces she'd learned to recognize as heroes truly worried her.

"Mommy, did a lot of people die this time?" She looks up to the woman she is a spitting image of.

Her mother held onto her hand just a bit tighter and replied gently, "Oh, Honey. They're soldiers, lots of them die every time. That's why you're gonna stay here with your Mommy forever, right?"

"Right!"

Ella Seaver smiled at her daughter's toothy grin. Her head turned when a mother, not unlike herself, started wailing the name of her child. She could never picture herself sobbing over the severed arm of her daughter, pathetic. Deciding to save her little girl the sight she tugs her away from the front of the crowd.

"Come along, Kassia. We have lots of shopping to do!"

Getting one last eyeful of the Scout Regiment before departing, the girl spots another young blonde sharing a morose look with a dark haired man. The other blonde was oddly familiar, almost as if Kassia was looking in a mirror years down the road. They were both on top of horses and didn't pay any mind to the masses.

An hour or two later the air had cleared and everything was back to normal. Ella held different fabrics to her chest, a pink sheer one and a deep blue satin.

"Which one do you think, Kass?"

Kassia looks up from her own prospective garments, "Um, I think..."

Before she could answer a loud clap sounded through the district, a green flash accompanying it. The pair whipped around to find the origin. Ella grabbed her daughter and held her closely, shielding her from whatever would come. In the next few seconds, a lot happened, but it felt like it drug on for hours. A hand composed of only muscle and bone gripped onto the rim of the 50 meter wall. Every person in Shiganshina was stunned into a silent horror. A Titan then peered over the barrier and stared down at the frozen people staring right back up at him. Kassia knew about Titans from school, but she never thought she'd ever she one in person. And this one was different. It was massive. As Kassia felt the Titan look deeply into her soul and shake her to her core, time sped up. Her mother grabbed her wrist and started to run in the opposite direction, closer to the inner wall. They went around a corner and past a couple of market stalls into a wider alley. But the duo was too slow, the Colossal Titan kicked in the gate. Kassia was struggling to keep up because her legs were much shorter than her mother's.

"Mommy, stop! I can't run that fast!"

Ella spins on her heel and kneeled in front of her daughter. With tears in her eyes she explains sternly, "Kassia, we have to run. We have to or we will get eaten. The Titans are inside now. We have to run."

Seeing that her little one nodded in understanding, she stood again. She got stepping and was starting to build pace. Kassia finally comprehended the urgency and moved quickly as well. People were screaming and running with them. Kassia took a split second to look up and saw a chunk of some building flying towards them. She couldn't even react before it crushed her mother and yanked Kassia to the ground too. The ten year old laid on the ground letting this event sink in. Her mother just died in front of her, still holding her hand. She ripped her hand out of the still warm grasp of her mother. Blood was spreading out along the pathway and no one stopped to help the girl knelt in the scraggly remains of her whole world.

"Mommy?"

She didn't know why she was asking for her like it was late at night and she wanted a glass of water. Her mother was right there and she was not coming to help her now.

Kassia started screaming.

Tears and blood began to mix as she wiped her face. The ground had been shaking ever since the gate was broken, but it was definitely closer. She allowed herself a few more moments of mourning before looking up. A smiling face was leaned over the building behind her. A glassy eyed Titan towered over the defenseless child, and in that defeated state, Kassia didn't care. She, a ten year old, was already welcoming death.

The teeth never came though. She was in the arms of a tall and sturdy man covered in a green cloak. A Scout. She was thrown over his shoulder with ease and he ran in the direction she was previously going. She watched the unbothered Titan shrink in the distance, she watched houses go by, she watched Titans swallow people she knew, she watched one rip through the side of her house which had already been torn to rubble. Kassia was silent until her savior set her down on the edge of a throng of scared people.

His hard eyes softened when he looked at her, "You need to stay here, get on this boat and you will live."

"What if I don't want to?" She replies meekly.

He tilts his head in confusion, and his expression turns stern, "Then you're a coward. If you're going to throw your life away, be damn sure it's for a good reason, Kid."

With that he sprints back into the city soon to be in ruins and Kassia heads to board the boat. His simple words resonated within her. He was right, she was a coward and any waste of life was a tragedy. She vowed, if only just for him, that she wouldn't squander her life. She wouldn't be a coward.