Well here's chapter 2! I hope you're enjoy this as much as I am enjoying writing it. Please leave me a review or a PM with your thoughts on this chapter, that'd be awesome.
Anyway go on, read and enjoy!
For a horrifyingly long time nobody reacted to the bloody and heartbreaking story Reiner had told. In all her years of being around Reiner, not once had she ever seen him with tears falling down his cheeks. Part of her begged her to go over and comfort her friend, but whenever she tried to move her legs felt like they had turned to stone.
Annie was forced to watch as Reiner's shoulders trembled with grief. Her friend was right in front of her, but there was nothing she could do or say that would ease the pain he was feeling. Part of the reason why she was left so immobile was not the prospect of never seeing Marcel again, but the shock of seeing the strong and stoic Reiner reduced to his most basic, innocent, and child-like instincts. After all, he was only ten years old.
The only sound in the entire house was the sound of Reiner Braun sobbing over the loss of one of his best friends. That was, until Annie's father spoke the painful but necessary truth.
''The mission...must go on.'' While to the children it seemed as if there was no sorrow or sadness in his tone, the truth was the exact opposite. In his eyes, all this meant was that another child had been taken by what he believed to be a suicide mission. And it was only going to tear his family apart even more.
''You don't even care do you?'' Reiner spat as he wiped the tears from his reddening eyes.
''This mission is more important than any individual. You know that and Marcel knew that.''
Each and every word that he spoke ignited a fire underneath Reiner's skin. He got to his feet and picked up one of the chairs around the dining table. Using all of his supernatural strength, he launched it towards Annie's father.
He lazily dodged the projectile and watched it explode into splinters against the wall before turning on Reiner. ''What would Marcel do if it were you?'' He shouted. ''Because I can guarantee that while he would grieve, he wouldn't cry like some weak child.'' He paused to take a breath.
''Listen, all of you.'' Bertolt, Reiner and Annie gathered around him. ''You are no longer children; you are proud warriors. You must succeed so that you can come home to us, to your families.'' Annie's father hadn't even realised that he had turned his head to face Annie as he spoke these last words. ''Marcel didn't die in vain; he saw your strength and sacrificed himself so that you wouldn't waste it.'' He rested a hand on Reiner's shoulder before pulling him into a hug.
''But… But his dad and sisters?'' Reiner said between messy coughs.
''Leave that to me son, I'll tell them don't worry.'' He said. He was about to offer some words of encouragement to both Bertolt and his daughter when a loud knock at the door shattered their moment. Annie's father instantly stood and made his way to the door. Here we go Ilya. He thought before throwing the door open.
The rest of Annie's memories that day were a terrifying storm of heat, steam, pain, muffled screams and Titans, so many Titans.
*Two years later*
Peaking over the unbroken ridge of Wall Rose, the punishing morning sun shone through Annie's bedroom window, reluctantly pulling her from a particularly peaceful sleep.
She took a moment to relish in the dream she was having until morning decided to interrupt. It was of her father. While the years of training Annie had endured were long and brutal, they were still some of her happiest. In the two years since she had seen her father, the world had changed - and not for the better. Wall Maria had fallen. The Colossal Titan had seemingly appeared out of nowhere in a flash of lighting, and with one foot it had shattered a century of peace. Minutes later the Armoured Titan crawled through the hole made by its companion, followed by a seemingly endless flow of Titans. Using the sheer force of its body it had crashed through Wall Maria's last line of defence.
Annie had helped kill thousands of people and thanks to her training she didn't feel a thing; it disgusted her. She snuck over to the window and looked out over the city of Trost. In the distance, she saw two fully grown men fighting over what Annie guessed to be a simple yet precious loaf of bread. Annie sighed as she felt her own stomach calling for sustenance. Casting away her night clothes, the not-so-little Annie put on the hoodie and tracksuit that she had finally grown into in recent months.
Hours later, Annie was standing in line with Bertolt and Reiner as they awaited their much needed morning rations; being children came with certain perks, even in a crisis. They could cut most of the line to receive a large portion of bread and water each. As the line shuffled ever closer to the distributors Annie heard something loud and annoying.
She simply ignored it, but as time progressed the noise escalated into shouting and screaming. After taking her bread Annie turned her head to find the source of the yelling. To her surprise the sound was coming from a young boy who looked barely as old as her. He was quite far away so Annie couldn't clearly make out his features, though she could tell that he had chocolate brown hair and striking green eyes. He was shouting to an equally young boy with golden blond hair. Even from her distance, she could feel his anger in the air and see the rage in his eyes. Although she would never admit it, Annie felt her heart beat a little quicker and a little harder in her chest. Nothing in the world made Annie feel that way.
Now that she had collected her food Annie left the food barn to look for somewhere secluded where she could attempt to enjoy her pitiful excuse for a meal in peace. It didn't take her long to find a hill covered in a thick cloak of lush green grass. Atop the very center of the hill stood a lone oak tree. Its thick canopy provided the perfect amount of shade for Annie to eat in peace and comfort.
Annie sat down under the cooling shade and gazed out at the city of Trost that was her new home.
From her position Annie could see most of the city and despite the years she spent building up a fortress of steel around her heart, she still felt a small lump arise in her throat. She saw families begging on the streets in hope of finding scraps for their children. She watched as two soldiers were forced to break up a fight between two friends over some alleged stolen bread. She watched as the boy with emerald green eyes was beaten to the ground by the people charged with protecting him. Annie watched as friend turned on friend over something as trivial as breakfast. She watched as families were torn apart; as fathers and brothers went to work in the frontiers in the hope of feeding their loved ones.
No matter what her father had told her, no matter how hard she trained, no matter how hard she tried to ignore it, Annie and her friends had caused this chaos and grief.
As a result of the worsening food shortages the royal government ordered that all refugees must work in farm camps to bring in some much needed food. It wasn't enough. Many people died that winter, trying to plow the lands proved too much for some of them. Annie would always remember seeing an old man working next to her and Bertolt collapse in the snow and simply not get back up.
Despite the sacrifice of many lives it was simply not enough to alleviate the ever encroaching famine. Fearing that the lack of food would impact on their luxurious lives the people of Wall Sina pleaded to the royal government, demanding that something be done about the overwhelming number of refugees. As a result the King announced a massive operation to retake Wall Maria from the Titans, a few weeks later the gate to Trost was opened as 250,000 men and women left armed with pitchforks and swords. Only 137 returned. People were rightly outraged at the decision made by their rulers but they couldn't deny that it eased the food shortages somewhat.
Somewhere among the veritable hive of mourning families and friends, three young children stood. A girl with a scarlet scarf, the boy with golden hair and the boy with the stunningly green eyes agreed that they would no longer let the Titans rule their lives. Little did they know that on the other side of the city, Bertolt, Annie and Reiner were making the same decision - albeit for very different reasons.
*Two more years later*
It wasn't strange for Annie to have dreams now. Since she had left her father and village behind, she found that she was having more and more dreams. For as long as she could remember her sleep was mostly empty, but recently she found herself dreaming of the boy with angry yet vibrant eyes from the food barn. It had been two years since she last saw him but nonetheless she still remembered him in perfect detail. Annie dreamed of him standing up from yet another brutal beating. Annie dreamed of him as he threw what little food he had to the floor. Annie dreamed of his burning determination and it made her heart flutter.
Out of the three of them Bertolt was the lightest sleeper. His sleep had been plagued by nightmares for four years now, meaning that he was never far from waking in the night covered in sweat. After waking from a particularly painful nightmare Bertolt threw the covers from his bed. He and the others had been moved to an inn in the city shortly after the recapture operation. They were given their own shared room under the condition they kept it clean and well maintained and helped out in the bar below. As he sat up, Bertolt found his eyes wandering to where they usually would in the mornings. Underneath their single window was one of the three beds that occupied the room. But it wasn't the morning sunlight that caught his eye, it was the one who was sleeping silently under the thin covers.
Bertolt felt his heart fly into his chest as his still adjusting eyes focused on Annie Leonhart. Annie was sleeping with her back to the wall and her head was just poking out of the blanket. Her flawless golden hair was splayed out across her face, coming to an end at the bottom of her snow white cheeks. Bertolt felt a strange but familiar urge to stroke her hair back and tuck it behind her ear as she usually did. However he already knew what her reaction would be to such a gesture. Annie had never been the most 'huggy' of people and he doubted that would have changed over the course of a single night.
The giant boy climbed out of his bed and was about to open the door to go downstairs and prepare some breakfast when he heard Annie stir from her slumber. He watched as her eyes slowly opened revealing the icy blue colour he so adored. Bertolt gazed into her eyes. I wish she would let me hold her, hug her… maybe even. He stopped mid thought before it became an image that would undoubtedly make him blush.
''Good morning Annie.'' Bertolt whispered as he tip-toed his way over to her bedside. He knew it was a grave mistake to wake Reiner before his body clock.
''Yeah.'' She said in a surprisingly gentle and soft tone. A tone that almost made Bertolt faint. Oh how he wanted to run up to her and confess his feelings until he was blue in the face, but when the timid giant was finally ready to give his heart to her it would be too late. Far too late.''Today's the day right?'' Annie yawned.
''You're right, we best get Reiner up and head to the recruitment office before it's too late.'' Bertolt pointed to his best friend who was passionately hugging his pillow.
''Have fun with that.'' Annie whispered and before Bertolt could reply Annie leaped out of bed and silently rushed across the room, she stood in the open doorway for a second before slamming it shut as hard as she could.
Reiner instantly jumped out of bed and landed on the floor. ''What-What's happening!? Did they find us?'' Reiner's eyes were frantically searching the room to find the source of the noise. Finally they settled on Bertolt who was still standing over Annie's bed and instantly a fog of anger descended on his face. ''YOU ARE DEAD BERTOLT HOOVER!'' Reiner yelled in a booming voice that shook the floorboards. Bertolt simply sighed before explaining the situation to the seething mass of teenage muscle in front of him.
*Six hours later*
The baking sun beat down on the recruits as they stood to attention. Annie was standing with her hands behind her back focusing entirely on displaying an expression of utter boredom. Her concentration doubled whenever the looming instructor Keith Shardis walked by her, she needed to make a good impression if she was to make it into the military police and continue her investigation.
Shardis was a tall man with tanned skin and golden eyes, there wasn't a single strand of hair on his face which Annie guessed was due to stress. It was common knowledge that Keith Shardis was the former commander of the Survey Corps, he devised and lead a mission that if successful would have given humanity its first settlement outside of the Walls. But by looking at his current position Annie could speculate how well it went.
Annie was dressed in the standard training corp uniform: a white T-shirt under her brown jacket. She had managed to get her hooded jacket under her uniform for a sense of comfort as she faced off against Keith Shardis. Across the back of her jacket was the universally recognised symbol of the training corps, two swords crossed over a shield. Annie also donned a brown skirt over a pair of light grey trousers.
As Shardis walked by her he leaned over her, he was far taller than Annie and his shadow spread over her entire body. That alone would have been enough to give most recruits second thoughts about enlisting but combined with the infamous glare that went with his inspection no one would have blamed Annie for cracking. But Annie's expression didn't even falter. After a few seconds he broke his stare and gave her an approving nod before moving on to the next unlucky teen.
Once he was out of earshot Annie let out a small sigh, she had done a good job of impressing Shardis which would surely earn her some points to help her gain entry into the Military Police. Even though he was gone Annie kept her form, she knew that Shardis wasn't the only one watching. Standing to her full height, maintaining her expression of icy solitude and not making eye contact with anyone else.
A few minutes later Annie hear a strange noise, it sounded as if someone had taken a bite out of something. Before she could stop herself Annie had already turned along with most of the regiment to find the source of such a disturbance. Shardis dropped a short boy with a buzz cut and slowly walked towards the culprit.
Standing in front of him was a girl with long brown hair and what appeared to be a boiled potato in her hand. The roar of Shardis' voice brought her to salute and give her name.
As Annie turned back to facing the horizon she noticed something or someone in the corner of her vision. Someone that gave her that strange feeling in her chest. A feeling she hated for its confusing nature as much as she liked for the elation it caused. She saw the green eyed boy standing only a few feet away. In the past she had only seen him from a distance thus making any detailed observation impossible. Annie didn't notice as her snow white cheeks turning a coral pink until a girl with ash grey hair standing next to her elbowed her in the side. She leaned closer to make sure Shardis didn't hear her.
''He is pretty cute.''
The abruptness of the statement made Annie's pink cheeks momentarily burn a fiery red. She tore her gaze away from the boy hoping that Bertolt and Reiner hadn't seen her blush. Her sudden and stuttered movements caused the girl to giggle.
''It's okay I won't tell anyone, I promise. I'm Mina by the way, Mina Carolina.'' Annie didn't even glance in her direction. ''Oh the silent type then?'' Mina's voice was so friendly and hopelessly optimistic it made Annie feel ill.
Mina had a point though. No matter how hard she tried Annie couldn't shift the boy from her thoughts, she struggled to pull her eyes away from him. If anything it was more frustrating than anything else. Whenever she did find herself looking at she would hear her father's words echo in her head. Don't let them close to you little Ann. They will hurt you! However Annie was a curious girl-as a child she would constantly ask her father questions about every subject that entered her still growing mind. It would often get her into trouble but Annie would only be satisfied once she had the answer.
And now here she was, she was stuck far from home and far from her answers. Annie needed to investigate these feelings if she was to find a way of dealing with them. She needed to investigate the boy with the jade green eyes. There was just one problem. Annie wasn't the most sociable of people and she knew this but luckily for her Reiner would give her the perfect opportunity to examine the boy who made Annie Leonhart blush.