A silence pans throughout the entire ruins. The Survey Corps stare at the unconscious forms of Reiner and Bertholdt. Taking his sword back from Annie, Drayce carefully removes the makeshift sling from Reiner's arm, revealing steam drifting from the injured arm. Drayce steps away from the two and sheaths his sword. Hange adjusts her goggles, expression hardening.
"Tie the two up. We have the Armored and Colossal titan in our custody now! We can end this," Hange orders.
"No way," Eren croaks, staring at the steam rising from Reiner's arm. "We trusted you."
"They were our friends," Jean said, shocked by the revelation.
William and George grabs the rope from the cart and binds their hands and feet and eventually their bodies together, back to back. They hoist the two traitors onto the cart and lay Ymir next to them.
"Send a report back to the Wall, there was no breach," Hange instructs Keji. "Inform them we have the Armored and Colossal Titan as well. When we get back, we're locking them underground."
The man nods and gets on his horse and gallops away. "All soldiers, load back up, we're heading to Wall Rose now," Levi shouts.
Drayce climbs back into the cart, the one Reiner and Bertholdt are on. Levi climbs in and sits down next to him. Annie takes her seat across from them. Soon, the wagon starts moving, taking them closer to the wall.
"How long have you known?" Levi asked Drayce, not looking at him.
"Since, you let Annie see me in the infirmary. I kept silent because I felt it would cause too much distress to the rest of them if we had said it out right," Drayce replied.
Levi nodded in response but stayed silent. In fact, the entire ride was silent. No one was in the mood to talk after finding out two of their best friends were traitors. A somber feeling was hanging in the air. Mikasa held Eren tighter as the boy stared off into space, his anger and rising. They were the ones responsible for his mother's death. They were the ones responsible for starting this damn mess. As the hour passed, the sun began to rise, the colors of dawn spreading across the sky. The carts slowed to a stop. They had reached Wall Rose.
"Steady, keep it steady."
It was the next morning. Krista and Hange stared at the lift carrying the broken and injured body of Ymir. They were kind enough to give her a blanket. Steam was still rising, indicating that she still needed time to heal.
"Her arm and leg are gone. Her innards are scrambled from the entire ordeal. If she was a regular human, she would've died," Hange informed the blonde girl. "We've yet to find out where her loyalties lie."
"She risked her own life to save us! Doesn't that within itself speak volumes about her loyalties?" Krista protested.
Hange's face pulled into a grim smile. "She may have done it for you. Until we further question her, we can't be sure. I hear your name is Historia Reiss."
Krista nodded, her eyes downcast at the mention of her name.
"Is it Reiss as in the royal family Reiss?" Hange asked.
"Yes, it is," Historia answered, her voice becoming sad.
"Well then! It's nice to meet you Historia," Hange said cheerfully in an attempt to cheer up the girl. "We still need to give Ymir some proper medical care. We'll send her to a hospital when we get back."
Hange walks off, leaving Historia at Ymir's side. The scientist stops next to Levi, staring at the two bound shifters.
"We're going to have an escort team take them underground in Rose. They'll be held there for questioning until, hopefully, their execution," Levi explains.
Hange nods. "But until then, we need to wait until all the supplies are up here so we can move out. It should take approximately an hour or so."
"You two, watch them to make sure they don't try anything," Levi orders, pointing to two soldiers, before walking off to oversee how the progress was going.
'Ugh, what happened? Where are we?' Bertholdt thinks, slowly waking up.
"You two...make sure...don't try anything."
Was that the corporal's voice? He tried moving his leg but he couldn't. Of course, they were bound. They were found out, but how?
"Psst, Bertholdt. You up?" Reiner whispered discreetly. "We've been compromised."
"I know, but how? The last thing I remember is the Corps saving us and…" Bertholdt trails off.
"Annie's turned. She sold us out. It was going to happen eventually. She was never fully invested in this," Reiner whispered back, eyes still closed, feigning sleep.
It was a punch in the gut, although both boys knew it was going to happen. The mission was compromised, and furthermore, the Beast Titan was here. What were they going to do?
"We need to leave now," Reiner whispered. "Try skinning yourself against the wall. I'll grab Eren and maybe Annie. You grab Ymir. If we fight, the odds will be against us but we have to try."
Bertholdt nodded and the two began to scrape their knuckles rapidly against the wall. The two guards looked back, realising they were awake and aware of what they were trying to do. They both reached for their swords but it was two late. The sound of crackling electricity filled the air. Every single member of the Survey Corps turned, aware of what was going on.
Twin bolts of lighting struck down simultaneously frying the ropes that restrained them. Reiner leaped forward, grabbing Eren with one hand and making a swipe at Annie with the other. Drayce had his sword, leapt forward and lashed out at one of Reiner's fingers causing him to quickly retract his hand. Bertholdt's titan grew, his rib cage growing clamping down on either side of the wall. Crates and various items flew everywhere from his titan's steam. Bertholdt grabbed Ymir before her stretcher could tumble of the wall and threw her in his mouth along with another, screaming soldier.
Reiner jumped off the wall, sliding down it to slow his decent. An anger and anguished cry came from his hand as it exploded, Eren's titan forming before his very eyes. With a mighty roar, Eren drew back his arm for a punch. Both of them tumbled to the ground. From the wall, Levi stood back up shakily. How could things go bad so quickly?
"Leonhart! Get them," Levi roared at the shifter.
"Wait," Drayce yelled. Annie stopped and turned around. A small object was thrown at her and she caught it. It was her silver ring.
With a trusting nod from Drayce, she lept of the wall and plummeted towards the ground. With a flick from her ring's blade, another bolt of lighting struck and flesh began to form, wrapping around Annie. She hardened her legs just before impact, preventing her legs from turning into slush.
Back at the top, the rest of the 104th stared at the scene in shock.
"Wait, Annie was the Female Titan this entire damn time?!" Connie yelled.
"Long story mate," William said. "But right now, we have a bigger target, that thing."
He pointed towards Bertholdt's humongous form. Hange was next to him, gritting her teeth before shouting, "All soldiers, target the Colossal Titan. Bring him down," she ordered. The soldiers blasted off towards Bertholdt, shouting as they did so.
'It's just like the reports said! He may be big but he's slow!' Jean thought, reeling in towards his former friend's nape.
Suddenly, a blast of steam was released from Bertholdt's titan. It was burning, way too hot to stand. Grunting, Jean fell back away along with the other soldiers. A man collapsed next to him.
"We need water here!" Jean yelled. "Hurry!"
"He's emitting steam," Hange noted grimly.
Armin's eyes never left Bertholdt's titan form. "Something's different. He's not disappearing all at once. He's keeping a steady stream as a defense mechanism."
"So is there nothing we could do?" Hange asked, eyes narrowed. In response, Armin fired a hook but the steam pushed the hook back and it fell down uselessly. "Then we wait."
'Reiner, Bertholdt, you traitors. We trusted you, we all did. Why?! What cause is great enough for you to kill hundreds? What?!' Eren screamed inwardly as his titan roars and throws a punch at him.
Reiner doges and tackles him to the ground. A hard blow strikes Reiner in the back, causing his armor to crack. Roaring in pain, Reiner rolls off Eren and gets back up to see Annie's hardened fists held up in a defensive position. She holds out a hand to Eren and he accepts it.
'This is bad. The odds are against me right now. I have to take out Eren first since he's the weaker of the two,' Reiner thinks.
"Eren, we need you to move back towards the wall! Don't let the damned traitor draw you away," Jean shouted.
Reiner roars and rams straight into Eren, knocking him against the wall, pinning him there. Jean waved his arms in the air as he tried not to lose balance.
"Well, that works too," Jean grumbled.
Annie make a dash at Reiner, hardening her shoulder before ramming into Reiner, knocking him of Eren. Reiner tumbles to the ground, bringing Annie as he does. From a distance, Hange's eyes widen. The back of his knees! She looks at his arms as well. How could she not see it before? She swings down and lands onto Eren's shoulder.
"Eren! I may have found Reiner's weak spot! The area behind his joints! He can't harden them or it'll restrict his movements!" Hange shouts. "If you can somehow use that to your advantage, we could win!"
Eren turns his head to the scientist and nods. Hange stares back at him and blushes before swinging away. Eren barrels towards Annie and Reiner, the two exchanging blows. He skids in front of them and grabs on of Reiner's arms and began bending it the wrong way. Reiner's titan let out a roar of pain as his forearm was ripped off.
Taking this hint, Annie delivers a swift kick to the back of Reiner's knees, downing the warrior. Eren pins him to the floor, attempting to rip Reiner's head straight off his shoulders. Reiner raises his remaining hand in a futile attempt to shield his nape as Annie repeatedly strikes at it with a crystalized fist.
"Yeah, you've got him," Rachel yelled.
'I need to get to Bertholdt, or I'm dead,' Reiner thinks as he pushes his feet, plowing through the dirt, trying to get underneath Bertholdt.
He could feel his flesh slowly pulled apart as the combined force of Annie's blows and Eren's pulling battered at his now brittle armor. His hand fell to his side, practically nonexistent from all the punches he was taking. He crawled slowly under his best friend and roared three times.
'Oh crap,' Annie thought, hearing the signal.
She tried to pull Eren away from Reiner but the burly boy had now tightened his grip on him, refusing to let go. Back up on the wall, Bertholdt's humongous form began to tilt, ribs cracking as they snapped, giving way to his weight.
"Hey, what are you doing?!" Jean shouted, staring at Bertholdt's precarious position.
With a final snap, the last of Bertholdt's bones broke. His titan form started falling from the wall, straight towards Annie, Eren, and Reiner. Annie hammered desperately at Reiner's arm, trying to free Eren before Bertholdt fell on top of them but it was useless. There simply wasn't enough time. She closed her eyes and concentrated every fiber of her energy to hardening her back, shoulders, arms, and nape. A thick sheen of crystal spread over her entire form as the world around them exploded.
Steam, rubble, bones and flesh flew everywhere. Among the debris, she could see Reiner bite Eren's nape, pulling the controller out of his flesh shell. She could see the people on the wall get blown off from the extreme winds. She couldn't move with all the armor on her. Cursing her own stupidity, she began to shed it and ran. The crater was at least twenty meters long. Reiner had already taken off, no doubt the moment he managed to grab Eren. They were long gone by now.
Struggling to pull herself from her titan form, she could see a figure streaking from the wall, falling towards the ground. She swore she could've heard the person screaming something about falling off the wall again. She sighed, knowing only one person that would say that when taking a fifty meter dive, head first towards the ground. She trudged towards the hole and looked down to see Drayce smashed flat.
"Umm, help please?" he groaned, looking up at his exasperated girlfriend before passing out.
"Dude, what is that now? Two times within two months?" William asked when Drayce came back into consciousness.
Drayce nodded painfully. "Really exhilarating, you should try it sometime."
"Nah, I'm not into skydiving," William snarked back.
"When was the first time you fell off the wall?" Annie asked.
"Trost invasion. His gear was stuck so he got blown off when Bertholdt transformed," Connie replied.
"Damn traitors," Drayce said angrily.
Annie gave a sideways look at all the injured soldiers. The aftermath of the fight had left many of the soldiers incapacitated. Among them was Mikasa and Hange. Oh crap, Mikasa. Annie's eyes widen. She would furious is she found out they lost Eren again and not only that, she would take it out on her. Unluckily for her, Mikasa's eyes shot wide open.
"Mikasa!" Armin said, supporting his friend.
"Where's Eren? Did we win?" she asked frantically.
"No, unfortunately. Reiner managed to grab Eren when Bertholdt fell on top of them," Armin said, head low. "Sorry Mikasa."
"Why didn't we send people to chase them?" Mikasa asked.
"The horses are still on the other side of the wall. It would take time to get them over it," Armin explained.
"We have Annie! Why didn't she go after them?!" she asked angrily.
The blonde walked over and sat down next to the two.
"For your information, I was blasted in the face with Bertholdt's damn titan and I couldn't transform again after getting out. Besides, I was instructed to take care of that idiot," Annie said, jerking her thumb at Drayce.
Mikasa stared at her brother who had bandages wrapped all over him. The bandages on his back were bloody.
"What happened to him?" she asked incredulously.
"Bertholdt's impact threw him off the wall," Annie replied.
Mikasa looked back at Annie and nodded at her, glad that the blond was at least taking care of her brother.
"I wonder if I'll ever remember," Mikasa said softly.
"Leonhart!" Levi barked. "You know the two traitors best. Where would they be headed now?"
"I would assume to towards the forest of giant trees, judging by his footprints and the shelter it provides," Annie replied, looking at the map. "But it really depends on when Reiner want to move. Most likely at sunset."
"We need to move out now. We won't have much time until they start moving. All soldiers, get up! The hunt is on," Levi shouted.
Suddenly, someone grabbed Levi's foot, causing him to almost kick Hange. He sighed in annoyance.
"What is it this time four eyes?" he asked annoyed.
All Hange could do was point. Levi's eyes followed her finger but he saw nothing.
"He's gone," he said. Hange nodded in response.
"What?" Annie asked whirling around.
"He's gone! He was just here a moment ago!" Levi fumed angrily, stomping over to where Drayce used to be at.
'Oh no,' Annie thought.