Slither
You don't really comprehend how fucking loud you are until you try to keep quiet. I'm literally taking the most careful and precise steps ever, but that doesn't matter to the constantly snapping twigs beneath my feet.
My only saving grace is that Ymir is just as loud. She doesn't seem to be making any effort to mask her presence; she just saunters through the woods like she owns the place, shoving through bushes and just generally walking noisily. Leaves rustle and hiss under her feet. She heads directly west, and I as well on her trail.
I walk far enough behind her that I can only glimpse the back of her bobbing head, and I duck like a motherfucker whenever I see even a twitch of her neck. It would suck if she catches me; I can't think of a way to explain why I followed her without sounding like a desperate loser, and I don't think anyone would want to be alone in the woods with a pissed-off Ymir.
I haven't been in the woods by myself at all yet, and even if I'm not truly alone, I feel oppressed. Everything from bears to wolves to cougars to porcupines rove these hills, and I keep glancing left and right to make sure a shape isn't loping toward me. I never noticed how loud squirrels are; one tiny animal with enough leaves under its paws can make it seem like a stampede.
My legs are starting to darken from the damp, and my toes are starting to squelch and rub together. My shoulders ache from keeping myself hunched so low and ducking so often. God, how long is Ymir going to take? How long is she just going to barrel through the brush before she decides to get some nice hunting done? Is this a tactic or something? I wonder if I've been doing it wrong this whole time. Is the trick, instead of making an effort to be stealthy, to just walk along as bold as you please and chance upon an animal? Hunting seems lazy if it's like that.
I flail and nearly trip when I realize Ymir has stopped, and I duck hurriedly, watching her through the leaves, breath bated in anticipation. Ymir's looking around, squinting, and I think, Yes! It finally begins!
That is, until Ymir promptly spins on her heel, turns directly to her right, and resumes walking with the same forceful destruction as before. Ugh.
I wait until she's gone ahead a considerable amount before resuming the stalk. I was expecting more . . . you know . . . excitement. If I wanted to walk I would have . . . well, actually, I never want to walk. Fuck walking. I would have stayed at Reiner's and listened to those two losers talk to each other.
The thought of giving up while Eren fucking Jaeger flashes into my head gives me the determination to keep going. Even if I'm insanely hungry. Ymir has always insisted upon going alone during her hunts. I'm the first person to ever see her in action! Learn her secrets! I'm the fucking man! Suck my dick, Eren, you and your faulty wicker chairs.
I realize that I'm externally grinning like a psychopath as I internally fantasize about my imminent rise to glory. I hastily check to make sure Ymir is still within sight and oblivious of me, and I breathe a sigh of relief.
There aren't any paths here anymore. I mean, I figure someone as intrepid and skilled as Ymir doesn't need a measly path, but it's just making walking even more loud and obnoxious. And it kind of bothers me. I mean, we hunt a lot, so we beat down a lot of paths. Where the hell are we?
She was heading west. Then she spun right.
Northwest.
I nearly slam into a tree. Oh my fucking God. Of all the days to follow Ymir, it's the one when she finally decides to tramp up there and enact revenge against the fucking naga.
What other explanation is there? There aren't any trails because no one goes near here. Ymir's the only one nuts enough to traipse right through the northwestern woods like she owns them; hell, she's probably headed right toward the high cliffs.
"Fuck this. I'm going home," I mutter to myself, and turn around. Facing the empty woods makes me stop. I can hear Ymir's fading cacophony behind me, and my chest pangs with an emptiness I didn't expect.
How long have I been waiting for this? And I'm just going to let it go? Fuck that, Jean Kirschtein. There is literally no better opportunity than this. You get to watch Ymir hunt, sure, but you get to watch her slay the fucking naga. The naga. And you get to bear witness? Even if she dies (which, according to her, is either likely or unlikely depending on what mood she's in), someone's got to be around to tell people what happened, right?
What am I kidding. Now I'm excited. I don't care about telling her sob story; I want to see her kick ass.
And I'll be there to soak up all that majesty like a two-toned sponge.
Oh, and I can't hear Ymir anymore.
I spin around, heart pounding. I realize right in this moment that I am farther west than is custom and farther north than is sane. I am alone in naga territory. Oh Christ, how big is the naga? Ymir said it was bigger than a bear. Surely I can see that barreling towards me . . . not that that helps calm my nerves. Now I can't stop imagining a hulking cobra, all hissing and rustling scales creeping up behind me.
I start jogging as fast and as quietly as I can (which isn't very fast or quiet), muttering swears under my breath as I frantically search for a brown ponytail amongst all the bobbing greenery. Why are there so many fucking trees? Oh, I am so not getting lost in the fucking northwestern woods. I could swear she was just here a second ago. How long did my little crisis take?
The trees thin out to my left and I spare them a glance, slowing once I see a moving shape. I freeze before realizing it's human, and spare a sigh of relief. I creep closer, because it can only be Ymir.
Sure enough, a large glade stretches out in front of me, brimming with lush tall grass and purple wildflowers. Ymir strolls casually through the thick turf, whistling a loud and energetic tune and twirling a stick in her hand. I hunker down behind a tree at the edge of the clearing, watching her. She heads for a knotted tree trunk lying flat upon the ground, its roots tangled in the air, speckled with long-uprooted dirt; upon reaching it she flops down upon it, yawning and stretching her arms.
How anyone can be so casual in naga territory is beyond me. Maybe Ymir isn't actually the best choice of a role model. Maybe she's a genuine psychopath. Does she get her kicks from being in danger? Is that it? I take a moment to glance over my shoulders anxiously, as if begging to see a horrible snake face leering snaggle-fanged out of the shadows.
I'm interrupted by a piercing noise, and I jump nearly out of my skin, a startled exclamation wheezing from between my teeth. I snap my head back around to see Ymir's hand falling from her mouth, and she starts rifling through her bag.
Did she . . . ? Did she seriously just . . . whistle? Loud and clear through the whole forest where, lest we forget, a fucking naga dwells? She's nuts. I should have gone home. Oh God. I'm going to get eaten. If the naga didn't know we were here it sure does now.
I almost debate with running out there to ask her to take me home, but hell no to that. Firstly, that would be admitting I ever followed her here, and I don't want to ignite her wrath. Secondly, if she's crazy enough to even go out here then she's definitely crazy enough to do something stupid like ditching me or something equally cruel.
I take another cursory glance over my shoulders, paranoia and anxiety making my heart pick up the pace. How about I never even let slip about this whole fucking incident to anyone. If I get home alive, I'll be happy as hell. Forget the hunting; Jean Kirschtein wants to live.
It's when I'm looking around again that I see it.
I do a double take, because there's a shirtless guy hunched over in the bushy shadows at the edge of the tree line far to the right of me, staring at Ymir. Her back is to him, and she seems oblivious.
I stare in mounting terror at him because holy Christ he's just staring at Ymir, crouched with his back bowed in the bushes, as if he's trying to keep hidden. At least I don't think he's noticed me. But my fear ebbs away slowly as I reason with myself. It's too far away to make out any distinguishing features, but that looks to me like a normal human. He's the right size and shape, anyhow, just lacking a shirt. The naga's supposed to be a gargantuan snake monster. So that can't be it.
That still doesn't really answer the question of why in the hell a man is hunched over and staring at Ymir as she sits there oblivious. I contemplate this as I hunch over and stare at Ymir, who sits there oblivious.
The man moves, and my eyes snap to him. Calling to Ymir never occurs to me, or perhaps it does, but no force exists that will propel my voice; only a frigid one that renders immobile my wide eyes. The guy slowly creeps out of the bushes, and the motion sends a shiver up my spine. It's way to smooth to be natural. It's like he's being propelled by something.
Then I'm uncomprehending, because he doesn't step into the clearing. He slithers.
It possesses the upper body of a normal man, but from the waist down is a huge, long, milky-bellied, black-scaled snake trunk. Scales merge with skin around the creature's waist, lowest at the hips and highest up along the stomach and spine, the latter of which sticks out of its skin in bony ridges. The full body squirms out of the forest and coils twistingly under where the head should be, a glistening mass that must be over thirty feet long.
The first thoughts that hit me are both, Oh my God, the naga, and, Oh God, it's small and that's somehow worse.
With terrifying swiftness the beast charges, the human part's back bent low to the ground, its hands pawing, digging into the ground as the twisting tail flattens and writhes to propel it forward. Ymir hasn't even noticed; the beast is far too quiet, and the only noise is the panicked roaring in my own head. Ymir! I try to shout, but nothing comes out except a weak cry; my throat feels like it's turned to stringy mush.
Ten feet from Ymir the snake slows and rears up, towering, the human hands bent into clawed fists, and like a spitting rattler the creature lunges at Ymir's back.
It happens so fast, but I see it all. Ymir doesn't even look, just tosses her stuff off the log and throws herself sideways, covering her head; the snake's heavy body hits the log with a loud thump as it misses. Ymir gathers herself, turns, and vaults directly into the arms of the beast, and her momentum shoves them both over the other edge of the log.
The naga's tail whips through the air and they doubtlessly grapple, thumps and muffled exclamations being the thing I can absorb, and then even those phase out as I panic; the fallen tree censors anything else I might see. I stand, my knees like rubber, my tongue like wet bread; this is so unbelievably out of my league that I can't even move to help her. There goes the other one, flashes through my head over and over, stupidly, for the naga has claimed first one sibling and now the last.
Oh. I'm right here. When the naga gets bored, I'm next.
I turn and promptly trip, hitting the forest floor hard; Way to go, Kirschtein, now run like the wind! I urge myself, and heave myself onto my hands and knees.
It's in that moment somehow that I can hear clearly.
Ymir and the naga must still be fighting, because I can hear scuffling noises quite clearly behind me, but the noises I hear aren't quite right for the situation.
Ymir is laughing.
I'm ready to dismiss this as crazy, psychotic, come-and-get-me-naga-bastard laughter, but it has a note of genuine giddiness that makes me look over my shoulder. Ymir has disentangled herself from the naga and is chasing it, her arms outstretched, her weapons strewn all over the ground and forgotten. She's howling something it takes me a while to decipher.
"Let's gooo, little man! I'll beat the snot out of you, punk!"
I squirm back to the tree I'd been hiding behind before, genuinely in disbelief. The naga is fleeing her, its human head turned over its shoulder to behold her as its snake body slithers and hops with heavy leaps and bounds, always twisting just out of her reach. The naga faces me for a second, just one, and that's all I need to see that the creature is smiling.
They're playing.
What.
Ymir skids to a thudding stop, huffing out great exaggerated breaths. She waves her fist in a joking manner. "Maybe in a minute. Give me a minute. Wheeeew. I'm getting too old for this. What were you trying to do, kill me?"
"No I wasn't," pipes up a new voice, a male voice. The naga's human mouth is moving, its tongue is flicking, but a young man's voice is coming out of its mouth and the naga is speaking to Ymir and they're playing tag and what the fuck is happening.
"I was just messing around," the naga goes on, slithering up to her and lowering its human torso to her side, so that it's at a realistic height for if it had legs. "I'm sorry if I startled you."
"I almost didn't hear you, little buddy," Ymir sighs, throwing an arm around the naga's shoulders and reaching up a hand to tousle its black hair. "Like a force of nature. I almost got scared."
"Almost?"
"Almost! Do I get scared? Ymir doesn't get scared!"
They continue to babble as I lie there on my stomach like a moron, gaping at them. I mean, sure, I guess it could make sense that the naga can speak. It has a human mouth, after all. But Ymir's . . . being chummy with it. The creature that gave her her scars, ate her brother. The creature that used to keep me awake at night and instill terror in the whole village.
I have got to get out of here.
Two things happen right now.
First, I try to get up. My hand goes down right on a twig, because of course it does, that's just my luck.
Second, a gust of wind tousles the back of my head as it changes course, blowing from behind me into the glade. The naga goes silent and stiff as a board, its head tilted at a weird angle, its mouth open.
Then it snaps its head around to stare right at me.
Me, crouched in the dirt like the worm I am, as the beast looks directly into my eyes.
Busted.
An unearthly shriek splits the silence, and I cry out in fear, scrambling to my feet as the naga launches itself away from Ymir and barrels right at me.
If that was play before, this is not. The naga's face no longer looks human; its eyes have become wide and glassy, its nose humped and slit, its mouth fanged and gaping beyond the boundaries of the human skull's capability to gape. Its tongue flits out, thin and tubular and whirring at the end as it tastes the air like a snake. Its fingers have turned to black claws, and scales erupt like boils all over its body as it gallops and writhes and skids toward me.
Hearing blots out; vision goes sharp. The rubber has congealed, the bread blackened. I turn and run like a motherfucker.
That earsplitting screech erupts behind me again as my feet pound into the dirt, sprinting through the forest as fast as I can go. My eyes are wide with horror, my mouth agape and rigid and panting, and my entire being screams, Go! Go! Go! The noises I hear are worse than pursuing footsteps; instead I get irregular thumps and crashes as the naga tears after me, coiling and uncoiling its body to literally throw itself after me, smashing through bushes and into trees in indiscriminate haste.
The forest has no end and no variation; there are only trees and dirt and nowhere to hide. I'm way too far away from the village to even contemplate screaming for help. My body bows forward, my ankles wrenching and tingling, sure that jaws snap just behind them.
The naga shrieks a third time, and it's right behind me; I can feel the wind from its winding body buffeting me, bark and leaves thrown at my skin in the disarray of its pursuit. Is my back too flat to have a chunk bitten out of it on the fly, or will the naga just go for my legs instead? Or my arms? Don't stumble, don't trip, please God don't let me trip over my own feet, I pray as my feet thud clumsily on the forest floor. I'm making noise; maybe I'm sobbing, maybe moaning, who the fuck knows because my life has never been about to end and I can't hear a goddamn thing-
A hand wraps itself around my upper arm and I gasp out a half-scream, too winded and scared to do more; I'm wrenched from my path, thrown off my feet, and slammed back into a tree.
My vision lists to my feet, blurry and bright. My back arches in a halfhearted attempt to get free. "No, don't oh God, please just-"
"Shut the fuck up!" Ymir screams in my face, her fingers digging into my arm.
I breathe hard, blinking hard, trying to think hard, looking around wildly. The naga is nowhere to be seen.
Ymir's eyes are narrowed, her lips curled back, lifted in a snarl, and for a second I wonder if she's a naga too. "Why the fuck are you here?" she bellows. When my answer is a little too slow for her taste, she lifts me back up and slams me against the tree again. "Earth-to-asshole! Answer the fucking question!"
"Ah- uh- I, uh- I f-followed y-you," I manage to stutter out. "I just- wanted to see- wha- what the fuck was that thing? What the fuck was that?"
She glares at me in hearty anger, breathing just as hard as I am.
"That," she growls, "is my brother."