Petra, Year 843

"We now begin the enlistment ceremony for the 100th Trainee Corps! I am Tyrel Novak, and I had the misfortune to be assigned to train you bastards. And I'm not here to welcome you at all! Right now, you're mere cattle, fit for nothing but Titan food! In three years, we'll take you useless pieces of crap and train you. Give you the means to fight the Titans. In three years, when you stand before a Titan, will you still be food? Or will you be a noble wall, shielding the king? Or perhaps, one of humanity's glorious soldiers that slay Titans? You will decide!"

Petra Ral stood her ground as the bearlike man approached her. Tyrel Novak had earned his fame in the Garrison, where he had served as one of the top subordinates under Commander Pixis. The instructor was known for his no-nonsense attitude and his willingness to do anything necessary to drive home his point.

"You, there!" Novak called to the small, red-haired girl near the front of the formation.

"Yes, sir!" Petra's salute was perfect, but she felt dangerously close to wetting herself out of fear. She stared up into Novak's face as he towered over her like a slightly smaller Titan.

"Who are you?" The routine question was barked out by Novak.

"Petra Ral from Karanes District, sir!"

Novak crossed his arms in front of his chest and scowled.

"Why are you here, Petra Ral?"

"I want to join the Survey Corps and aid in humanity's fight, sir!"

Petra's answer was met with a short, innocent giggle from a trainee a few rows back. Appalled that someone would disrespect him in such a way, Novak immediately forgot about Petra Ral and sought out the source of the outburst.

"You, there! You think you're so funny, huh?"

Petra watched as the tall girl who had been unable to control herself snapped into a hasty salute for all the world to see.

"I'm sorry, sir. I just found it amusing that someone could be so disgustingly noble."

"You're amused, are you? Okay then, let's hear your story. Who are you?"

The girl smiled and stared straight into Novak's fearsome eyes.

"Leanne Fawkes, from the Shinganshina District."

Special Ops Squad, Year 850

Several days had passed since Eren unexpectedly attacked him, but Nap's body still felt sore all over. He would have traded all of the Titan traits that he did possess in exchange for their regenerative abilities if he had been given the option. At the present time, he was accompanying the rest of the Levi Squad, including Eren, as they went to meet up with their new member, who for all intents and purposes was Petra's replacement.

Nap had gone to visit Petra as soon as he had been able to walk. Her left leg had been injured when she had pushed Hange out of the way of Eren's Titan punch, and it was highly doubtful that she would be able to recover in time for the expedition, which was quickly approaching. He had taken Levi's advice and buried his regret, but he had still felt the need to apologize to her at the very least. Nap couldn't help but feel a bit responsible for causing the injury.

The entirety of the Special Ops Squad saluted as Levi rode up to them on horseback, followed closely by a woman who could only have been the newcomer herself. Her auburn hair was several shades darker than Petra's, and her eyes were the same piercing green as Eren's. As Nap looked her over, she appeared more and more to be the lovechild of the two of them. She was missing the ring finger on her left hand, and the injury appeared to be an old one.

The Captain and the newcomer dismounted and walked leisurely toward the rest of their team. This woman was significantly taller than Levi, though that wasn't much of an accomplishment considering the incredibly small figure that he possessed. Levi cast a frowning glance at each of the assembled soldiers before introducing her.

"Levi Squad, this is our newest member, Leanne Fawkes."

The woman called Leanne gave a methodical salute. Nap recognized the look in her eyes as the same one that he had seen in Katya's eyes the first time that he had met her. It was a look that he had seen briefly in the eyes of Anka and Gustav, as well as every member of the Garrison's elite squad and every member of the Levi Squad. In all likelihood, this was a look that he and his comrades would wear themselves one day. Leanne Fawkes wore the look of a battle-tested soldier with nothing left to lose, save for her own life.

"Welcome aboard, Leanne," Gunther said warmly. The veterans were obviously familiar with her, though to Nap and Eren she was still a stranger.

"It's good to see you're still alive and kicking," remarked Auruo. Nap had been hoping against hope that the young man who had tried so hard to imitate Levi would trash his pitiful routine with Petra out of the picture, and thankfully he had gotten his wish. Auruo had even quit wearing his utterly pointless cravat.

"Good to see you too, Auruo. I like what you've done with your hair," Leanne said in a voice that was as powerful as it was noticeably feminine. Her hair and her surname were clearly not the only things about her that could be perceived as foxy.

"I've informed Leanne about your little episode the other day," Levi explained to Eren. "Since you only attempted to attack Napoleon and none of the others, Hange came to the conclusion that you were honing in on him because you thought he was a Titan. It should go without saying that something like this can't be allowed to happen in the future. We need better results from you, Eren. Otherwise, we may have to go one step further and just kill you outright. Personally, I was in favor of doing that regardless. If it happens again, I might not have a choice."

"I understand, sir." The boy from Shinganshina looked as if he had been told off by one of his nonexistent parents. "If it's alright with you, I'd like to go visit Petra and apologize. I haven't had a chance to see her since I recovered."

"Sure, it makes no difference to me," Levi replied lazily. "There's no way I'm letting you go anywhere alone, though. Leanne, keep him company."

"Shouldn't I be catching up on what the rest of our squad has been working on?" asked the redheaded woman.

"I wasn't planning on doing any more work today, unless you're interested in cleaning out Petra's old room." While it was rather uncharacteristic of Levi, this attitude was still understandable. "Besides, I think she would enjoy seeing you."

Miranda, Year 850

"Listen carefully, rookies! I am your Squad Leader, Dita Ness, and this is my horse, Shallot."

By all accounts, the man standing in front of the graduates of the 104th Trainee Corps looked extremely average. He wore a white bandana atop his head and sported a beard around his jaw. Ness rubbed the muzzle of a brown horse as Miranda looked on with a bored expression.

"These horses love to pull hair, so be careful if you want to avoid going bald."

The Invisible Soldier was as unconcerned about this trivial fact as she could have possibly been about anything. Her hair would grow back, after all, as would any other part of her body that was damaged. Shallot was the least threatening creature in the world to her.

On cue, the beast chomped down on the Squad Leader's bandana and attempted to pry it from the man's head, revealing his bald spot as it did. On another day, she may have found the situation rather amusing, but she was not in a position to be having any amount of fun.

She had needed every bit of courage that she could have possibly mustered to simply return to that place. Yet she had done it, and she had done what she had set out to do. She had made sure that no one would ever be put through the same horrors that she had been forced to endure in the cavern that lay beneath that chapel.

For the first time since she had returned from that place, Miranda put on her typical smile as she glanced to either side of her at the other members of the 104th who had chosen to join the Scouts. Unlike her, most of them had only made up their minds recently.

Armin, Mikasa, Bertolt, Reiner, Sasha, Connie, Christa, Ymir, and even Jean. The most surprising member of their new group, however, was the girl positioned directly to her left, wearing an eyepatch that just barely covered up the damage that had been done to her face, standing shorter than any of the other soldiers except for Christa.

Miranda didn't know Abigail particularly well, but she hadn't pegged the girl as someone who was likely to risk her life outside of the walls. Then again, she had felt the same way about most of the others who stood with her. What they had gone through in Trost had shaped their lives more than any of them had realized at the time.

Katya, Year 850

"Attention, rookies!" she called out. If Katya was at all nervous about her first day on the job, she did not show it. "I am Katya Drake, your new Squad Leader. Starting today, I will be showing you the ropes, so to speak. I'd also like to be one of the first to welcome you to the Garrison."

As he had alluded to, Commander Pixis had placed her in charge of a platoon of four new recruits. She stared them down one by one. They were all graduates of the same trainee class as Nap, but they had chosen a different life. A safer life, or so they thought.

These former trainees had all been through hell once in their young lives, but as Katya knew, the battle that had occurred in Trost was only the first of many horrors that the four new recruits in front of her would face. That being said, they had all managed to survive, and she was impressed with that fact as it was.

Victor Paulus, who had ended the life of a quadrupedal Titan just as it devoured one of his own squadmates. Hilde Schultz, who had survived a run-in with two aberrants at the same time. Jericho Grimm, who had been knocked off the wall by the Colossal Titan as it destroyed the gate. And Ava Miller, whose injured arm still had not healed completely.

Not long ago, Katya had been in their position. Since then, she had lost several friends and several more acquaintances, and at one point she had very nearly lost the will to live. But she had been reborn with a completely new purpose in life, and she was determined to fulfill her promise, even if it meant wiping out every last Titan by herself. She would not put the faith that Commander Pixis and his grandson had shown in her to waste.

Langston, Year 850

"Listen up, kids, because I'm only gonna say this once." The drunken officer clumsily scratched his bright orange hair with his left hand as he paced leisurely back and forth in front of the new members of the Military Police. "My name is Captain Caleb Lynch, and I'm the one who gets to boss you rooks around, got it?"

He didn't wait for an answer.

"Since you've all been assigned to the Stohess District, you're gonna be taking over a lot of the work around here. Any questions?"

Once again, he didn't wait.

"Good, that's all I have to say. Class dismissed."

The lethargic Caleb Lynch yawned loudly before disappearing into a room where several other men from the Military Police were already playing cards. Langston's body relaxed. He had been standing in line with the other new recruits, the ones who had graduated in the top ten of their trainee classes. While most of the eligible trainees from the other branches had accepted their opportunities with open arms, he and Annie were the only members of the southern division of the 104th to choose a life in the interior.

"That bastard," growled one of the rookies to his left. "I can't believe how lazy he is. Does he expect us to do all of his work for him?"

"Chill out, Marlowe," advised the girl who stood between Annie and the boy with the bowl cut. "You're so ridiculously uptight that it hurts sometimes."

Most of the newcomers had dispersed by that point. Annie stood quietly next to Langston and two recruits from other branches of the 104th, Marlowe Freudenberg and Hitch Dreyse. Rather than stick with his pseudonym, Langston had gone back to using his real surname, Stendahl. There was no point in hiding when he had already been found.

"You two said you were from the south, right?" Langston hadn't realized that Marlowe's attention had turned to him.

"Y-yeah, that's right." He still needed time to gain some confidence around strangers like these.

"I'd let you go down south on me, if you know what I mean." The girl called Hitch leered at him with eyes that were more frightening than the Titans that he had fled from. It was true that he had grown into his body and become a fairly handsome young man, but Langston's skills in the romance department were practically nonexistent. With someone as eager as Hitch, however, it may not have even mattered.

"Seriously, Hitch, could you be more repulsive?" Marlowe's voice was layered with disdain. He rolled his eyes and returned his gaze to the recruits from the south. "Why aren't there more of you here? Was the rest of your class wiped out in Trost?"

"No, not all of them." Langston nearly gagged as he pictured Marco's disfigured body slumped against the side of a building. He hadn't been incredibly close with the freckled boy, but Marco had always acted kindly toward him in their limited interactions. "Most of the top graduates from the south chose the Survey Corps instead."

"That's dumb," Hitch said bluntly. "Why would they do that when they've got the Military Police waiting for them with open arms?"

"Big talk, coming from someone who had to resort to distasteful methods to even make it this far." Marlowe and Hitch were apparently unable to find even a sliver of common ground. "Even if their faith is misguided, they joined the Scouts because they thought that they could change things. Isn't that it, Langston?"

"Yeah, some of them are like that," he replied honestly. "Others, I'm not so sure about. But I get the feeling you didn't choose this branch for the same reason as everyone else, right, Marlowe?"

"You're correct in your assumption." The boy from the north gave an Eren-like scowl. "I chose the Military Police because I wanted to make things different around here. Once I rise to the top, the corruption that exists within this branch will be history."

"You sound like a certain idiot that we know." The other three were taken by surprise when Annie finally spoke up.

"What's that?" Marlowe was somewhat taken aback. "You open your mouth for the first time just to say something like that?"

"I was actually thinking the same thing." Langston caught himself smiling for an unknown reason. "I think we were both picturing the same person. Right, Annie?"

Eren and Petra, Year 850

Palms sweaty, Eren steeled himself as he walked through the already-open door and into Petra's room. Leanne had insisted on hanging back, out of sight, for reasons that she promised to explain to him at a later time.

"It's good to see you, Eren."

Petra waved at him as he approached her bed slowly. Her legs were hidden under a blanket, which was probably for the best. Seeing firsthand what he had done to her body would have made this feel all the more real to him.

Eren took a seat in the chair by her side, his body shaking slightly. Seeing Petra in this state amplified all of the guilt and grief that he had done everything in his power to suppress ever since the attack on Trost. He had seen his friends slaughtered mercilessly by the Titans. Even Marco, one of the best and brightest, had met his end during the battle. And though he didn't remember it, he had tried to attack Mikasa in his Titan form.

What disturbed Eren the most was the way he had swung his fist at Nap during their last experiment. He hadn't felt like a mindless Titan at the time. He had seen the other members of the Levi Squad, and he hadn't been compelled to hurt them like he had done to Mikasa. But the second his eyes fell upon Nap, that had all changed. Eren still couldn't understand why, but at that moment he had wanted nothing more than to erase his friend from existence altogether.

Because of that, Petra had been injured. Because of his screw-up, she was lying in a bed before him, unable to participate in an expedition that would likely be a key factor in the advancement of humanity's retaliation against the Titans. Because of Eren, it would be several weeks before she could even walk on her own two feet.

"You shouldn't be so tense."

Eren took his gaze off his lap and stared wide-eyed at Petra. Despite everything that she had been through because of him, she managed to look back at him with a smile on her face. His eyes fell once more as his heart began to beat faster.

"How can I not be tense? It's my fault that this happened to you."

"You think I didn't know what I was signing up for?" Petra gave him her adorable little laugh once again. "I'm not sure how you can blame yourself for this, Eren."

"It's impossible for me to stop blaming myself." His hands gripped his knees so hard that his knuckles turned white. "I should have been able to control myself. There's no excuse for what I did to you back there."

"You're being too hard on yourself." Eren looked up once more into Petra's warm, genuine smile. She took one of his hands in her own and squeezed it softly. "There's no point in beating yourself up over something that already happened. What you can do is learn from it and become stronger because of it. I'm going to be fine. Just promise me you'll be fine too, okay?"

For the first time since he had woken up following the incident, Eren felt at ease. He grinned and nodded as Petra retracted her hand. Standing up, Eren put on a bold salute.

"Thank you, Petra." The two of them beamed at each other. His visit had done as much to help her as it had to help him. "I'll continue to believe in myself. And I'll make sure to give the Titans one for you, as soon as the expedition begins."

"That's just what I wanted to hear." She did her best to manage an awkward salute from her position. "Good luck, Eren."

With his conscience cleared almost entirely, Eren waved goodbye and exited the room. Waiting patiently for him, out of sight but well within earshot, was Leanne Fawkes.

"You're done already?" she asked, unfolding her arms after they had taken a few steps.

"There wasn't really much to talk about," Eren replied. "But I feel a lot better now, and I'm sure Petra does too."

"Yeah, that sounds about right." Leanne's dimples revealed themselves as she showed him a reluctant smile. "You know, if I had been the one to go in there, Petra and I probably wouldn't have ever stopped talking."

"Why do you say that?"

"She's my best friend." The redheaded woman gently rubbed the stump of her finger with her opposite hand. "She has been ever since our trainee days."

"You two are best friends?" Eren stopped in his tracks, causing Leanne to do the same. "Why didn't you go in there with me, then? Don't you want to talk to her?"

"It's not that simple, Eren." Leanne tilted her head slightly. "I'm not sure what Petra would think if she knew that I had taken her place. I don't know if she'd ever forgive me."

"That sounds like a cop-out to me," he said brazenly. "What's the actual reason?"

Leanne sighed and resumed walking. Eren followed her, still expecting an answer.

"I used to be a lot like you, kid," she said after a while, puzzling Eren.

"What do you mean by that?"

"Captain Levi told me that Shinganshina was your home." She turned her head enough to keep her eyes on both him and the hallway in front of her. "It was mine, too."

"Seriously?" Eren once again came to a halt, as did a slightly peeved Leanne. "But that means-"

"Yeah, it means that I lost my home just like you did." She rubbed her stump once more, as she did nearly every time she thought about the past. "Sometimes it's difficult for me to even remember what my world was like before that day. There are so many things that I wish I had done differently, but that's life. You don't get a second chance, no matter how much you think you need or deserve one. So despite how close Petra and I are, there's only one person I can really count on in a pinch, and that's myself. You should learn that, kid."

Leanne and Petra, Year 844

"Long story short, that's how I manage to make such deep cuts on the dummies," Leanne bragged between bites of bread. "It won't be very useful to me in the interior, but it sure helps make me look good in Novak's eyes."

Petra was the only other trainee sitting near her at the table. It would have been difficult for an outsider to understand why she took the time to associate with a person like Leanne, but neither one of them would let anything like that get to them.

"You're right about one thing." Petra took a small sip of her drink. "It's going to be a lot of fun once we've graduated and moved on from here."

None of the trainees had ever figured out the true contents of the drinks that were served to them, but she continued to consume hers because it tasted somewhat decent.

"Stop joking around, Petra." Leanne playfully slapped her on the back, causing Petra's beverage to splash all over her face. "You've gone on about this Scout thing long enough. Tell me why you're really here."

"I told you, I'm really serious about joining the Survey Corps," the shorter girl said amid a flurry of coughs. She sloppily wiped her face with the sleeve of her gray shirt.

"Come on, you don't need to lie to me." Leanne sounded somewhat offended by the notion that her closest friend would even try something like that. "The Scouts are a joke. They've never been able to accomplish anything."

"Why don't you say that again?" called a stocky, light-haired boy at an adjacent table. He rose from his seat between two other trainees and flashed a contemptuous look at her.

"Calm down, Auruo," she said with a pitying smile as she too stood up and walked leisurely toward his table. "Everyone here knows that you only want to join the Survey Corps because you're hopelessly in love with Petra."

"You're a moron if you think you'll be any safer in the interior." The young Auruo and his beady eyes stared straight at Leanne as the attention of all the other trainees gravitated to their area. "Then again, maybe you've gone soft in the head already."

"What's your point?" Leanne asked in an irritated voice. "I couldn't care less what regiment you decide to join. Just don't come butting in where you don't belong, you suicidal bastard."

Several of the other trainees snickered as they heard this nickname for the first time. Auruo knew that he couldn't wait too long to respond to her insult.

"Do you really think it makes sense that you're honing your fighting skills just to get placed further away from the Titans? If those of us who are capable decide not to fight back, that just leaves everyone else at their mercy forever!"

"That doesn't concern me at all, but thanks for wasting my time." Leanne rolled her eyes. "The Titans haven't broken through the walls in a hundred years. You're a fool if you truly believe that fighting back will do any good for anyone. But I'd expect nothing less from you."

"You're just a coward!" Auruo furiously approached Leanne and grabbed her by the collar of her shirt. "You think this world exists just for your sake?"

At this point, Petra sprung from the seat next to the one that had previously been occupied by Leanne.

"Stop that, both of you!" She firmly placed her hands on Leanne's shoulders and walked her a few steps backwards, away from the still-fuming Auruo.

"Sorry, Petra," Leanne said sheepishly. "You know I never wanted to start any trouble."

Petra smiled at her while Auruo returned to his seat, never taking his glaring eyes off of her.

Eren and Leanne, Year 850

"This might sound crazy, but I had a confrontation just like that with someone in my trainee group," Eren remarked upon the conclusion of her story.

"That doesn't sound crazy at all," Leanne replied. "Though I'm sure you were on the opposite end of the argument, knowing you."

"Yeah, but it all seems kind of petty now that I think about it." By this time, their stroll had almost taken them to the exterior of the castle, though they had both realized that they had no intended destination due to the dispersal of their squad for the day.

"You can probably predict what happened next." She leaned against the wall only a few meters from the entranceway. "Less than a year later, the Titans broke through Wall Maria. My entire family was still living in Shinganshina, and none of them made it out alive. The world that I once knew changed completely once I heard the news." Leanne sighed audibly and closed her eyes.

"So, that's when you chose to join the Survey Corps instead of the Military Police?" Eren had responded with surprising indifference to Leanne's tale, but considering his own past, it was understandable that he would be rather jaded in that regard.

"Yeah, that's when I finally started to understand what goes on in Petra's head." Leanne curled her left hand into a fist and took her back off of the wall. "Come on, we should keep walking. We'll end up somewhere eventually."

When they emerged from one of the many exits of the former Survey Corps HQ, they were greeted by a single green-cloaked figure with a relatively empty expression. He had attempted to slick back his hair, as he had done at times when it had been longer, but Nap Pixis lamented the fact that even in this state it still looked a bit too Levi-esque for his satisfaction.

"How is Petra doing?" Nap asked as Eren approached him, while Leanne hung back.

"She's still in high spirits, somehow," Eren answered. "What are you doing out here?"

"Auruo told me that he saw the new recruits heading over here, so I came to meet them." Nap's tongue instinctively brushed against the inside of his cheek.

"No way!" Eren grinned widely at the thought of seeing his friends again. "We'll finally get to see who decided to join the Survey Corps, then."

"Don't get your hopes up," said the realistically-inclined Nap. "Other than the few locks that we know of like Mikasa and Miranda, I doubt many of our classmates decided to join. Especially considering what they all went through during the last battle."

"I guess we'll find out right now," Eren replied excitedly, pointing to a small parade of figures in the not-too-far-off distance. "Leanne, can we go talk to our friends?"

"What am I, your mother?" she asked absentmindedly.

Without a second thought, Nap and Eren sprinted off in the direction of their peers. The group had almost passed them by entirely when the two of them rounded a corner and saw a pair of familiar figures stationed at the back.

"Mikasa! Armin!" Eren called out to them.

The boy and girl at the rear of the group turned around in a hurry when they heard their names. Mikasa wore her trademark scarf as well as the scar that she received when Eren had attempted to strike her in his Titan form. Nap now knew exactly how that felt.

"It feels like it's been forever!" Eren said ecstatically, running up to the both of them while Nap lagged a few steps behind.

"Eren" was the first word to escape Mikasa's mouth as she firmly grasped his hand with both of hers. "What kind of horrible things did they do to you? Did they poke around or harm your body? They didn't torture you, did they?"

Nap examined the rest of the squad as Mikasa fawned over her adoptive brother. Most of the faces in the crowd were ones that he had not expected to see. In addition to Mikasa and himself, four other members of the top ten graduates were present among the new members of the Survey Corps, along with a surprisingly large group of trainees from outside of the top ten.

"Don't tell me all of you joined the Survey Corps?" Eren asked incredulously.

"Why else would we all be here?" answered Connie.

"I see at least a few of us did what I had expected." Nap knew of three other trainees from whom he had received very clear signals about their intentions. "Annie, Jean, and Langston are the only ones who joined the Military Police, I guess."

"Not exactly."

Neither he nor Eren had heard the footsteps of the sixth-ranked graduate in their class until Jean was right on their heels, so his statement caught Nap by surprise.

"No way…" was Eren's simple reaction.

"Did you tell him about Marco?" Jean's question was directed at Nap, who only nodded.

"That's good. I would have hated breaking that kind of news to someone like you, Eren."

"What's that supposed to mean?" Eren asked in an accusatory tone. "You were his best friend, right? You should want to honor his death."

"There was nothing honorable about his death." The sandy-haired boy from Trost clenched his fist tightly. "Hell, no one even knows how he died. No one saw him. No one noticed. Apparently not everyone gets to go out with a bang."

"Hey, recruits!" Dita Ness broke through the stench of sorrow that polluted the air. "Gather round! Your uniforms have arrived!"

The Squad Leader stood next to another soldier from the Survey Corps, Luke Siss, who held a stack of green cloaks just like the ones that Nap and Eren already wore. All conversation was abandoned as the new recruits lined up in front of Ness and one by one received the very symbol of their membership in their new regiment.

"This thing seems a little impractical to me," complained Miranda as she played with the edges of her cloak. "I mean, what if it gets caught in a branch or grabbed by a Titan?"

"If you're worried about either of those things happening, maybe you chose the wrong branch of the military," Ness retorted. Making sure that the whole lot of them had donned their new uniforms, he called them into formation.

Nap stared up and down the line at the wings that were emblazoned on the backs of each of his friends. If he closed his eyes, he could see two additional black-haired figures standing in line with the others.

"This is our life now," he said to Eren as Ness barked out instructions to the rest of the new recruits. "We've put all of our faith in you. There's no going back."

Survey Corps, Year 850

The bell tower that rose high over the city of Karanes let out a chime for all the world to hear as the Survey Corps prepared to go beyond the walls once more. Nap had taken his place directly behind Eren as he and Captain Levi sandwiched the Titan shifter from the front and back. Leanne, Eld, Gunther and Auruo formed a rectangle around the boy from Shinganshina, creating what was truly the safest place for him within the long-range scouting formation that the Commander had worked so hard to create.

Nap tried desperately to clear his head as the front gate of Karanes gradually rose into the air. He would need to be at the top of his game during the expedition. The other members of the Levi Squad were counting on him, as were the rest of the Scouts, and all of humanity in a way. Everything was on his shoulders, and that was exactly what he lived for.

He had spoken privately with Mikasa after he and Eren met with the other members of their class, and he had apologized sincerely for the way he acted the last time the two of them had met. Nap had not gone into great detail about the discovery that Hange had made on the previous day, but Mikasa had willingly accepted his apology and that had been that.

Over a month had gone by since Nap discovered his true nature. He still had no idea what originally caused him to shift between human and Titan form, but with the assistance of Hange, Eren and the rest of the Special Ops Squad, he had grown used to his abilities and the mental burden that came with them. Following the incident that resulted in Petra's injury, Eren had experienced no issues controlling his Titan body around Nap. Though this fact in itself was suspicious, Nap could think of no logical explanation, so he let it go.

As his horse pawed impatiently at the ground, the memory of Nap's first visit to Karanes came to his mind. That thought led directly into images of Mina that blew through his brain like leaves in the wind. He hadn't truly realized until that point how much his life had changed in just over a month.

Mina was gone forever. Langston had chosen to join the Military Police. Even Annie, his oldest friend and the only person in the world with whom he was completely honest, had taken a different path.

All that Nap had left were the comrades that surrounded him and the memories of the ones that he would never see again. But more important than any of them, he had himself. He would not fail in his quest. It was his destiny to be a great savior, after all. He hadn't forgotten that for one second.

"Move out!" yelled Commander Erwin as his horse raised its legs into the air. With that, the 57th expedition beyond the walls began.

Leanne and Petra, Year 845

Why couldn't she cry?

The Titans had broken through the gate of her home town. They had taken everything from her and left her with just her own pitiful life. She hadn't even been there to see it happen, or to try and save the people that she loved.

She had lost the world, but she still couldn't bring herself to shed a tear.

"Leanne, I'm sorry…"

Petra approached her tentatively from behind. Leanne had taken a seat on a fallen tree near the edge of the forest that surrounded their new training ground. They had been forced to move within Wall Rose following the attacks by the Colossal and Armored Titans, and the scenery was just one more thing that was unfamiliar to Leanne.

Her best friend of two years sat down next to her. Neither one of them said another word for an amount of time that seemed both infinite and nonexistent at the same time. Leanne began to wonder if time even mattered at that point.

The deaths of her loved ones hadn't brought about the sadness that Leanne had expected. Yes, she mourned the losses of their lives, but the sorrow was quickly replaced by an all-consuming rage that had been building up inside her ever since.

"I'll kill them all."

Petra looked up at her. Leanne was staring straight ahead, barely paying any attention to her closest companion.

"What do you-"

"I'll kill every last one of them."

Leanne rose swiftly to her feet and thrust her hand out toward the nearest tree trunk. She grasped the soft bark in her hand and felt it crumble beneath her fingers.

"I swear, Petra, on the graves of every single person that those filthy monsters have ever taken away from us... I'll kill every last Titan in this world."