Chapter 4

Five years later…

"Unit, assemble!"

Four soldiers were at her side in an instant, sheathing their swords and saluting sharply as the wall shook underneath them. Shouting and yelling could be heard below and all around them as guards scrambled to follow orders and carry out the tasks before them, all on edge. The wall shook again.

Captain Petra Ral steadied herself from the latest blow and made eye contact with her team. Oro and Jewel had just come from the ground surveying the damage, with Mason and David coming from a brief encounter with the wall security guards. Jewel gave her report first, chattering a mile a minute. She'd become more flexible and easy going as the years had gone by, but no less loud. "The outer gates in Trost were breached an hour ago, with at least twenty Titans swarming into the immediate blocks. One hundred dead, reinforcements from the Middle Guard are advancing from Hermiha now. The Rear Guard is on standby."

Petra nodded, the thin white scar across her jaw-line shining in the late afternoon sun. She could see the thick cloud of smoke rising from the outer wall in Trost, hear the chaos as the last of the evacuees entered the main gates below her and the gates slammed shut. She frowned severely. "They'll be deployed soon. We have to move quickly. Where are the Titans as of now?"

"Just making it to the center of the district. The Garrison's doing a good job slowing them down, but they're losing people fast."

Oro pointed towards the city below, slowly smoldering as giant figures crashed into building as building. He didn't talk much, even now, but being a man of few words was the quality Petra liked about him. "Front Guard means rookies…"

"Which means you'll have beginners trying to play hero and save their friends," Jewel finished for him. "Captain, over a hundred are dead. What's the plan?"

Petra scanned the horizon line again, thinking fast. "You two, swing down ahead of the rest of us. Scout out the area, bring down whatever Titans got past the Garrison and are headed this way. We'll meet you halfway to the outer gates."

The two soldiers nodded and leapt off the top of the wall, spiriting away on their gear. Petra turned to a nervous-looking Mason and an overtly excited David. "What do you have for me?"

David practically jumped to answer her. He was an active young man in his early twenties, like the rest of the squad (minus Petra, being older), who was easily excitable and eager for action. Mason was usually the calmer of the two, the rational one who thought things through before acting, which was why Petra had paired them together. They were a good contrast. "We talked with the guard who came from the outer wall. He was the one who was sent to bring the news of the breach here, saw everything. The gate was re-blocked fairly quickly, so no more Titans are entering the district now. About ten have been killed within the hour; apparently they're pretty large this time. That leaves ten more, and if Oro, Jewel and the rest of the deployed units bring down five of the smaller ones-"

"-we have the task of taking down the others and rescuing the surviving soldiers, yeah, I think the Captain already did the math David," Mason snapped at him. He looked at Petra. "I guess you want us to try and extract the survivors, right?"

Petra nodded. "Yes. Don't go near the eight block radius surrounding the outer gates, you hear me? The largest ones will move the slowest, and I've got a feeling it'll take the entire squad to bring them down this time."

"Yes Captain."

The Garrison heichou teetered on the edge of the wall, glancing over her shoulder at the two soldiers and smiling deviously. "You ready to kick some Titan ass?"

David laughed and leapt off the side of the wall, not bothering to answer. Mason saluted, grinning, and nodded. "Ready as ever, Captain!"

Petra nodded. "Let's go then."

They dove off the wall and into the fray.

Three years of training, strategizing, worrying, and sarcasm kept Petra's squad alive. But it always had, right from the start. As Petra scaled a Titan's back and plunged her blades into its nape she was reminded of their first mission, the extraction of a Garrison soldier who'd accidentally gotten locked out of the outer wall. It had been discovered after the Survey Corps were already gone ("Bastards hadn't even bothered to notice anything outside of themselves,"Jewel had said) and the Titans that had been lured away previously were coming back. Petra had wrongfully assumed that putting Oro and Mason onto the task of slaying the smaller Titan approaching first was a good idea, and after rescuing a reckless Mason from the jaws of the Titan, scolding sass-master Jewel for ignoring her order not to abandon the trapped soldier inside the gates and killing the monster herself Petra had finally found team pairings that would work and figured out exactly how she would go about preparing her squad for the next assault.

It hadn't been easy, but it had been built off mutual respect and trust that had evolved to friendships and deep bonds. Petra had been with them through thick and thin, and vice versa. She'd seen them mature, and they'd helped her open up. She was firm, hard working, intelligent, the strongest leader the Garrison had to offer- and no one knew about her. The squad got a little publicity, perhaps, but only within the range of a few Garrison regiments who were stationed in Trost. Perhaps that was the way Pixis had intended it to be, and Petra was fine with it. She liked her discrete life, even if her team didn't always like the fact that they got zero credit for their own work, and she wouldn't have changed a thing.

The last titan fell three hours later, and with only a sprained ankle in David's part (no surprise) and a minor concussion for Oro (which he suffered silently, as usual) Petra let them retire early and decided to debrief the Commander in Chief alone. She usually took Mason with her to flesh out the details she hadn't had time to notice (too busy making sure no one on her team got kicked into a tree, Pixis joked once. Petra didn't find it funny), but she figured fifteen soldiers rescued from certain death and 10 solo/assist kills from her team didn't need much backing up. However, she entered his office to find the Commander passed out on his couch and Anka sitting at his desk, shifting through papers. She looked up and grinned.

"Petra! Come on in. I just got wall security's report in and was about to call you." She glanced over at the drunken old man lying in the corner in disappointment. "He had a relapse again, after I'd gone to interview one of the regiment sergeants. I came back to find a bottle of Scotch stolen from the office down the hall and him snoring away. He won't be up for a while." She smirked slyly for a moment. "I might just leave him here overnight for once."

Petra chuckled as she sat down in the chair across from her. "You're so mean." She handed the report over to her friend, noting the bound-up wrist poking out from under her coat sleeve. "How'd you end up with that? I thought Pixis' personal guard didn't deal in Titan attacks."

Anka shrugged. "Special case. Gustav accidentally slipped and fell over Wall Rose, barely caught his bearing and swung himself to safety with his gear. I had to go down and help him back up, got caught up with that Titan that got past the Rear Guard." She shook her head, sighing. "I haven't actually fought a Titan in forever, but man was it fun. Nowadays I just keep the Commander over here" she nodded towards Pixis "out of the way of muggers and his drinking habits." She opened the file, scanned it through to make sure everything was in order, and set it on the desk before resuming the conversation. "You know, when I agreed to be Pixis' personal body guard and main strategist I never imagined I'd be his caretaker too."

Petra frowned thoughtfully. "That means he trusts you, on the field and off. One day he'll retire, and when he does you'll be higher up than you could possibly imagine."

Her friend chuckled and shook her head again. "I'm not looking for glory here, Petra. I'm here because I like making a difference, same reason you joined back up. That's the kind of people we are." Her face brightened up suddenly, and she reached into the folds of her jacket and pulled out a letter. "Oh, before I forget, your father sent this for you. It ended up in my mailbox on accident." Petra took it and tucked it away. "Thanks."

"How's he doing?"

"He says he's better, but I don't believe him. His handwriting's too off, shaky, run together. I'll have to pay a visit to his doctor, see about potential treatments."

Pixis snorted in his sleep. Anka ignored him. "You know," she said "smoking's a lot like drinking, except they affect different parts. The Commander's liver's gonna give if he tries drowning his sorrows as much as he used to, and a smoker's lungs can get damaged pretty badly after years of abuse. He could go for a lung transplant, but those are expensive and don't have a high chance of success. Even if you could afford to have one replaced getting the second one would be nearly impossible. He'd have to live with the other decaying one the rest of his life, still running the risk of cancer or serious infection."

Petra nodded. "I read up on it. If it gets worse even a minor cold could kill him. I'm worried about him." Anka frowned sympathetically, tapping the pen in her hand against the desk while she thought. "You've got vacation days coming up soon. Take some time off, go visit him. It'd be good for you, help you two to weigh your options."

The Garrison captain's eyes widened. "Are you serious? They'd let me do that, even right after a wall breach? I'd think that would be the last thing you'd need."

But Anka waved her off with a smile and a friendly twinkle in her eye. "Pixis wouldn't mind, and since he's incapacitated right now I'm acting Commander anyways. Take a week, go up to your father. Does he still worry about your safety in the field?"

Petra got up to leave as she nodded towards her friend. "Not as much as he used to, or said he did. I think he likes the Garrison better than the Survey Corps- he likes the fact that he sees me more often, he told me once."

Anka cracked a smile. "Then you will most certainly be welcomed home. I'll sign the form for your release and you can be on your way in the morning."

"Thanks." Petra stifled a yawn and headed towards the door. "G'night Rheinberger."

"Good night Ral."

End Chapter 4