Author's Note: Hey guys, it's Grimsley.
Before I do my usual rambley author's note thing, I'm gonna do that thanking thing I do every time. So, thank you to everyone who has read, favorited, followed, and reviewed this story, even if you do think I'm an evil tease for how I left off the last chapter. It wasn't intentional, I swear! Okay, maybe it was, but it couldn't be helped, that just felt like a natural stopping point for the chapter. The fact that I got some odd, slightly sadistic pleasure from it is totally unimportant and probably didn't even really need to be mentioned. Oh well, now you guys know.
So, I'm not certain if I've ever mentioned this before, but I also have to thank le girlfriend, who reads every chapter, sometimes multiple times, before I post. She edits stuff for me, lets me know if something feels off or needs to be expanded upon, and much more. While she doesn't have a username I can share at the moment, I like to refer to her as Giraffe, because chick is frickin' just over 5'9" … at somewhere between 5'5" and 5'6", I don't consider myself a short person. In fact, with the various nationalities that I happen to be, I'm actually pretty damn tall for the average, yet that doesn't seem to cease her constant barrage of short jokes. The other day she compared me to our super tiny Chihuahua, and she's constantly holding stuff just out of my reach, but I digress. Anyways, thank you, Le Giraffe, for helping me with my chapters and all those times when you're not being a gigantic ass and teasing me about my inability to compete with your vertical prowess.
Okay, lastly, I forgot to mention this in my last author's note, but it seems there's some interest in me writing a Mikannie fic. While I do have a rather large list of YumiKuri stories I want to work on, I'll do my best to brainstorm a good story for Mikasa and Annie, as I do have a lot of fun writing them. There's just something about their rivals relationship that's irresistible to me. And the whole Tsundere thing? Yes. All the yes. I don't know why I love it so much, but I just do. Too much info? Perhaps.
Until next time,
-Grimsley
Chapter 11: Trinity
Krista leaned in, and the scent of Ymir, fresh from recently taking a shower, nearly overwhelmed her senses. It wasn't floral, but more of an herbal, natural scent. Krista recognized it from the many times she'd run into Ymir before class would start, her hair still damp and messy, having been too lazy to mess with it when she could, instead, used those precious few minutes to sleep.
She wrapped her arms around Ymir's neck, unable to fight the desire of wanting to be closer to her. Before she knew what she was saying, the question had left her lips and all thoughts of allowing herself the time to think it over vanished. She was glad it did.
The moment their lips touched an electric shock pulsed through her body, and her heart beat so hard she was certain Ymir could feel it.
The kiss was gentle and slow. She didn't want this to be some quick peck, over before she really had any time to take it in. She wanted to remember just how it felt to hold Ymir so close. She wanted to remember the way Ymir's stuttering breath fluttered across her lips right before they touched. She wanted to remember the sweet taste.
She was delicate with her movements, not wanting to scare the often anxious Ymir, so it was a genuine shock and she almost melted when she felt Ymir hesitantly rest her hand against her hip, her fingers trembling.
There was no urge to take things further yet, no desire to rush things. She wanted to take her time. Ymir was far too important and just being able to kiss her was more than Krista ever thought herself lucky enough to do.
That being said, the kiss was still over far too soon for Krista's liking.
Ymir looked up at her, a dazed look in her eyes. Her cheeks were a brighter shade of pink than she had ever seen them turn before, and Krista couldn't help but smile, knowing she'd caused Ymir to react so strongly.
Ymir's body was tense and rigid against Krista's, showing no signs of easing anytime soon. In fact, Krista mused that she kinda looked like a deer in the headlights… completely oblivious, brain completely blank, and running purely on survival mode.
"Are you okay?" Krista asked, her voice shaking slightly from the laugh she was attempting to stifle. Ymir nodded, her eyes falling down to her lap, unable to look Krista in the eye, and a sudden splash of insecurity threatened to drench Krista's bright and bubbly mood. "Uh, did you not like it or-"
Ymir's face whipped back up, her eyes wide and mouth slightly gaping. "Of course I liked it… I just, I just," she stammered. "You k-kissed me. You, Krista, the Goddess who I'm not supposed to call Goddess, because you hate being called Goddess, and holy fuck I just said Goddess three times. No, wait, four times. Shit. Er, but yeah, you kissed me and now my words won't work and my brain is fuzzy, and it was so scrambled when it happened, when you ki-ki-kissed me, and now I'm trying really hard to remember it, but I was so nervous I can hardly remember a damn thing. But… but it was my first kiss, and my first kiss with you, and why the fuck is my brain being such a bitch and not letting me remember my first damn kiss?"
Krista smirked, watching the anxious girl's crazy antics, and feeling the incontrollable urge to tease her.
"You don't remember our first kiss?" Krista asked, her voice laced with mock-pain.
"Not intentionally," Ymir replied, shaking her head, obviously panicked and trying to explain why it wasn't her fault. "I-I couldn't help it. It's… you… and Gran told me I should just say it, say how I, er, how I… ugh, never mind." Ymir hung her head, obviously frustrated by her inability to sort out whatever she needed to say.
"Hmm, we'll just have to remedy that the next time." Krista's coquettish charms made Ymir's breath hitch.
"Uh, ne-next time?" Ymir asked, obviously surprised as she tripped over her words. Krista smirked, leaning in so close she was certain Ymir thought she was about to kiss her again.
"Yeah, next time."
Ymir leaned back against the door of her house, staring down at her green Converse, while Krista continued to smile up at her, a smug smirk on her face was still there, refusing to go away. Ymir hadn't yet had a chance to process exactly what had happened, but she knew the moment Krista left, that kiss was all she'd be thinking of.
"So, I'll see you at school then?" Krista asked.
"Uh? Oh, uh, yeah. See you at school." To say Ymir was tongue-tied, a total space head, and brain dead would have been the understatement of a century.
Krista began making her way down the walkway, but froze. Ymir, slightly worried, was about to ask if everything was alright when Krista turned around, ran back to her, leaned up on her tip-toes, and pressed a quick kiss to Ymir's cheek.
Ymir pressed her hand to her cheek, her skin growing hotter by the second, and watched as Krista made her way down the driveway, walked along the street, and disappeared from her sight. Trying to keep her calm for at least another brief moment, Ymir slipped back into her house, and closed the door behind her.
She couldn't control the uncharacteristic squeal that seemingly escaped from deep within her. She broke out into a full sprint and dashed into the kitchen where she found Gran making dinner. She pounced on her grandmother, hugging her fiercely, while giggling. Gran most likely horribly confused by the situation, pressed the palm of her hand against her granddaughter's forehead, unable to hide her concern.
"Are you sick or something?" Gran asked. "Or maybe you've been replaced with an alien intruder who, despite wanting to dominate the human species, is still a bit more pleasant than the original Ymir."
"Despite you being a crotchety, sassy bag of dust, I still frickin' love the crap outta you," Ymir replied, pulling her Gran in even closer. "She's amazing, Gran. Absolutely fucking amazing. I mean, holy crêpes. It's like my brain's exploding because of how frickin' awesome she is."
Ymir was now bouncing up and down on her heels, unable to keep still. There was a big, stupid grin on her face, so big it was making her cheeks hurt a little. Gran grabbed Ymir's shoulders, slowly pushed her away, and held her at arm's length.
"Who are you and what have you done with the real Ymir?" Gran asked, warily. "You know, the forgetful, lazy, usually a massive ball of teenage angst and rage, with a penchant for video games and being a general pain in my ass…"
"Nothing you say could ruin this feeling, you evil, old hag. Nothing!" Ymir pulled out of her grandmother's arms dashed out of the kitchen and bolted for the stairs. "Nothing!"
She tore the door to her bedroom open, cleared her room in two big leaps, and flung herself onto her bed. Grabbing her pillow, she burrowed her face into it, and let out a crap load of girlish shrieking, the likes of which would put all those damn teen movies she was forced into watching to shame. She kicked her heels against the blanket beneath her and giggled until she couldn't breathe anymore. Once she finally let everything out and gained back control of her own actions, she flung the cushion to the ground and let out a contented sigh.
"Er…Ymir?"
Ymir's body turned to stone. Like, could not move, legit frozen, like that statue of the naked David dude that she had to draw in art class or those poor petrified Hogwarts students after accidently spotting the reflection of a basilisk's stare, stone. Biting back the dread and the painfully hard thumping in her chest, she steeled her nerves and slowly turned her head towards the door.
Krista Lenz, in all her super fine, undeniably irresistible, Goddess-like glory, was standing in Ymir's doorway, eyes wide and mouth agape, with a light blush creeping across her cheeks, tinting the tips of her ears pink.
"Uhm," Krista muttered, unable to tear her eyes away from a mortified Ymir, "I forgot my phone."
"As you all know," Armin announced, beginning what Ymir figured was going to be one of his long, boring, supposed to be motivational, but was actually a genuine snooze-fest, speeches, "the preliminary rounds for the A.O.T. tournament are next week and-"
"Er, they are?" Ymir interrupted.
"Crap," Mikasa mumbled against her scarf.
"Well, shit," Sasha cursed. "You should have told us this earlier, Armin. I would have stayed home practicing instead of going to that all you can eat place over the weekend with-"
"No you wouldn't have," Eren pointed out.
"Okay, no I wouldn't have," Sasha agreed, "but I would have felt bad about it."
"Again, no you wouldn't have," Eren reiterated.
"Shut up and let me at least pretend so I don't get in trouble, okay?"
"I need to find new friends," Armin muttered, rubbing his temple.
"You say that a lot, but never actually get these new friends." Mikasa had pulled her scarf down so it wasn't covering half her face as it usually did. "I sense an empty threat."
"I sense a disturbance in the force." Sasha chirped in.
"I sense a disturbance in all of my friends' brains," Armin complained. "Friends who aren't gonna win the beta competition because you've all been slacking like crazy."
"Hey, it's not my fault I've been busy," Ymir huffed. "Anyways, I train all the time."
"It's true," Mikasa added. "And, I mean, the Goddess is showing interest in her. Videogame betas come and go, but Ymir being the possible object of Krista's affection? The likelihood of something like that happening is practically one in a million."
"Hey, I take offense to that," Ymir pouted.
"So then you don't think it's true?" Sasha asked.
"I never said that. Obviously it's true. It's just still kinda offensive how true it is, that's all."
"Pretty much winning the lottery would have been more likely," Eren explained.
"She'd have a better chance to get bit by a radioactive spider and turn into Spiderman," Mikasa added. "Er, sorry, Spiderwoman."
"Ya'll are some pretty craptastic friends," Ymir muttered. "Like, really, the worst."
"Oh, oh, I have one," Sasha added. "She'd have a better chance of sneaking into the girl's restroom at school, hissing at the sink, and discovering the chamber of secrets."
"She'd have a better shot at breeding a shiny Pokémon with perfect IV placements than she'd have of hooking up with Blondie," Mikasa decided.
"Oh, snap." Sasha giggled.
"Gigantic asses, the lot of you." Ymir was now pouting, her arms crossed in front of her chest.
"Could we focus on the matter at hand?" Armin asked. "You know, the bit about how we need to train more?"
"Hey, I play every day," Eren huffed.
"We all do." Armin pulled his laptop out of his backpack and set it up on the kitchen table. The group had all congregated in the Jaegers' house after he had called an emergency meeting. "But what we need is to practice together as a team. It doesn't matter how strong we are individually if we can't work well together as a team."
"Dude, I think you forget, Ymir can turn into a frickin' titan," Sasha reminded him. "This thing is gonna be a piece of cake. She'll like, just rip the crap outta them, devour their souls, and we'll call it a day."
Ymir, who seemed pleased with Sasha's plan, leaned back in her chair and grinned cockily. The smug grin irritated Armin who, as usual, kept getting interrupted while trying to get his point across.
"Maybe if she had more time to practice that'd be true, but she doesn't even know how to fully work everything yet. Not to mention she can't even trigger the transformation before reaching a kill count of twenty without dying." Armin glared at the loading screen, wishing it would move faster as it was wasting valuable training time. "The titan form is strong and fast, that's for sure, but you have to be precise, otherwise you're gonna end up killing us all as well. Anyways, haven't you noticed that when you turn titan, more enemy titans than usual seem to appear?"
"What're you talking about?" Ymir asked as she finished killing another of the massive creatures, bringing her to the needed kill count. She quickly changed into her titan form. "I mean, look at this and tell me I'm wrong." Her character jumped into the middle of a swarm of titans, her quick titan's long claws easily taking out all who came near her. It was then that Armin's character spawned, right in the middle of Ymir's path. "Oh shit!"
Ymir attempted to redirect her titan, but in the heat of the moment, she got her scout form's controls and her titan form's controls completely mixed up and ended up slashing at Armin's character. Despite her attempt to avoid him, she watched in horror as the videogame version of her friend slumped to the ground, his body split horizontally right down the middle.
Armin, now extremely irritated, looked up from his computer, his thin lips turned into a scowl as he glared at Ymir, and told her, "You're wrong."
Ymir, tired and completely drained from a long day of titan slaying and working on her teamwork skills which admittedly needed some polishing, slumped into the house and began to trudge upstairs to her bedroom.
"I'm home," she called, half-heartedly behind her. Gran answered back, but Ymir didn't catch it and was too brain-fried to be bothered to go back and check.
Despite working at it for hours, Ymir just couldn't get the controls for her titan form down. She was fairly certain Armin was just about ready to kick her off the team after she accidently eviscerated his character for the seventh time. She'd even managed to kill Eren, Mikasa, and Sasha's characters several times as well. If she didn't get her shit together, not only would she miss out on the A.O.T. beta, her friends would probably kill her.
Ymir dragged her feet down the hall and made her way into her room, thankful that the Jaegers' home was so close to hers, because had it been any further she probably would've passed out on the side of the road somewhere. As it was, she'd barely made it this far.
That being said, in her half-conscious state, it took Ymir a bit longer than she would have liked to admit to realize that there was someone sleeping in her bed. Someone incredibly attractive, blonde, and who seemed to have passed out while taking notes of some sort, because her face was now resting against the open pages of her notebook, pen still in hand. She probably should have listened to what her grandmother had attempted to tell her, because seeing Krista sprawled out on her bed was most definitely something right out of Ymir's fantasies, and she had to pinch herself to make sure she was awake.
Setting her bag down on the floor, Ymir grabbed her blanket and gently draped it over the sleeping girl. Realizing the only way she could get some much needed sleep would be to lay down next to Krista, Ymir decided to go with the safer option and attempt to get in a little more practice. She definitely did not want to invoke the wrath of Armin again.
"Ymir?' Krista called out, her voice heavy with sleep.
Ymir sat in the middle of the room, glaring furiously at her laptop, as if her high level of suck-age was the computer's fault. She was definitely getting better, but progress was slow and nowhere near good enough yet.
Krista's voice pulled her out of her thoughts. She glanced up at the girl and felt her stomach drop. Tired, blue eyes peered at her, as if they were trying to make sense of what they were seeing. Her hair was messy, most likely from her sleeping position, and Ymir had to stop herself from whipping out her phone and filming her as she rubbed the back of her hand across her eyes, attempting to wipe away the sleep.
"Well, hello there, sleeping beauty," Ymir greeted. "It appears your hair's defying gravity."
Krista groaned, running her hands over her hair in an ill-attempt to smooth it out. Ymir couldn't help but think that only Krista could look so perfect having just woken up. The ink on her cheek, most likely transferred from the notes she passed out on, just added to the adorableness.
"What're you doing?" Krista asked, groggily.
"Attempting to not suck at this damn game." Ymir motioned to her laptop, her character having just fazed back into scout form. "I'm trying to figure out the parameters for my titan form. I think the gang's kinda pissed at me, so I'm trying to get my shit together, you know?"
"Er, why are they angry?" Krista asked, her head tilted to the side. Ymir, once again, had to resist the urge to openly fawn.
"Er, so we may have discovered just how dangerous the titan form can be to one's allies."
"Uh-oh"
"Yeah, I killed them all. Multiple times. It was kinda funny at first, but then it just got sad."
"Oh, I'm sure they were all thrilled."
"Eren said a few colorful words, but it was fine. I'm totally used to it. You should hear Gran when she's driving. Let's just put it this way, my first word was 'fuck' for a reason."
"Why am I not surprised?" Krista asked, peeking back down at her notebook. She patted the spot on the bed next to her. "When you're done with that, wanna quiz me on this crap for my History test?"
"Yeah, of course!" Ymir replied, almost too excitedly. Attempting to rectify the situation, she shrugged her shoulders and cleared her throat. "Uh, I mean sure. Just give me five minutes to finish off this transformation and get to town so I can save."
"No need to hurry, I can wait-"
"No!" Ymir interrupted. "Er, I mean, I was pretty much done anyways, and I wouldn't want to keep you waiting. I mean that would be terribly rude, you know? I'm totally fine with finishing this off now. Anyways, my eyes are starting to feel a little fuzzy, so it'd probably be for the best if I called it a day soon."
In a hurry to get to Krista, Ymir began the kill count again. While practicing with the others, they'd realized that only the titans she slayed herself counted towards the kill count, so even if her group killed dozens of them, she still wouldn't be able to go all badass titan mode until she got her own twenty kills in. She also could only stay in her titan form until she lost a certain amount of health, at which point she'd faze back into a regular scout. Generally, that wouldn't have been a problem, but, as Armin had noticed, whenever she turned titan, it was as if all the other titans forgot about their other opponents and zeroed in on her, instead. This was great for her teammates, but she didn't like being the equivalent of a scratching post.
She glanced over her shoulder at Krista, quickly peeking to see what the girl was doing. What was supposed to be a hasty glance turned into a long stare. She really, really wanted to finish this game up so she could join her.
Krista was laying on her stomach, her feet kicked up in the air, reading from a massive textbook. There wasn't exactly anything unusually sensual about it, yet Ymir found herself lost in thought. How was it that someone so amazing, so kind, so beautiful was in her room, on her bed, patiently waiting for her? It felt right having her there, as if it was something she could easily get used to.
Remembering her game, Ymir turned back to her laptop just in time to see her character disappearing into the mouth of a four-meter titan.
After finishing her shift and getting back to town, Ymir pushed her computer away, refusing to look at anything even remotely resembling a titan for the rest of the day. She set her laptop on her desk, and stretched out her back. Prolonged hours of sitting hunched over her laptop left her feeling like she'd just finished a wrestling match with a wookie.
"All done?" Krista asked, looking up from her book.
"Uh, yeah," Ymir replied, eyeing the spot on the bed Krista was currently motioning for her to sit in. She'd been so gung-ho before, but now that the moment was upon her, she could feel herself tensing up. She did as Krista wished, and nervously sat right next to her. It was insane that, after knowing each other as long as they had, simply sitting next to Krista still made her so anxious. "Er, do you have a study sheet or something you'd like me to go over with you?"
"Hmm, I think I'm done studying, actually," Krista mused, and the way she said it made Ymir think that maybe, just maybe, studying had been a ploy right from the beginning. "Uh, you know, I don't think my brain can handle anymore right now."
"Oh, uhm, okay," Ymir muttered, nodding in agreement. "Happens to me all the time. Well, not all the time. I actually don't have to study too much. I retain information like crazy."
"I actually kinda had something I wanted to talk to you about," Krista confessed, grabbing Ymir's hand to steal her attention, causing Ymir's entire body to stiffen. Ymir stared at their connected hands, wishing she could will her heart to stop thumping so damn hard.
"Is this about that bed thing and the weird noises I made while hugging my pillow?" Ymir asked, feeling a telling blush coming. "I just, uh, well, I was very excited about my new pillow, you know?"
"No, this has nothing to do with that-"
"Did Gran say something weird to you while you guys were alone together?" Ymir blurted out. It was only a few days ago that Ymir had told her Gran about her feelings for Krista, and she wouldn't put it past the woman to have told her all about their embarrassing discussion.
"No, your Gran was lovely, as usua-"
"Then was it one of my friends?" Ymir interrupted. "It was Sasha, wasn't it? I'm gonna kill that damn Potato Girl."
"What? Sasha didn't do anything. Well, not that I know-"
"Then it must've been Mikasa. Oh, unless it was Eren. It must've been Eren… but, then, Armin was really pissed off earlier."
"Ymir-"
"Was It something I did? Did I offend you or something? I'd never do that intentionally, I swear!"
"Damn it, Ymir," Krista huffed, attempting to get a few words in before being interrupted. "I think you're amazing, and I was wondering if, maybe, just maybe, you'd be interested in-"
This time it wasn't Ymir who interrupted Krista, but the buzzing of a phone. Oddly enough, there was no pervy song this time, which Ymir found peculiar as every time she was called recently, Chrissy Amphlett would start singing about touching herself.
"Uh, hold that thought," Ymir muttered, not noticing the embarrassed and disheartened look on Krista's face. She stared at the phone, not recognizing the number. She hit the 'accept call' button and raised the cell to her ear.
"Hello?" Ymir asked, figuring it must be a wrong number or some outside caller wanting her to answer a survey.
"Ymir?" The voice on the other line made Ymir's heart drop. Her brain swirled, and it was as if she was reliving that cold, December day all over again. She felt like she was going to be sick. Desperately, she looked up at Krista, knowing the girl had no idea what was going on, yet somehow wishing she could, in some magical Goddess way, make it all go away. The voice on the other line continued. "Hey, it's mom."