amerdism: That and the fact that Ymir's been near Tanya since day one. As for Tanya, this is just so she has allies- allies= resources in her mind right now, and this is going to come up.
alexc123: I'm glad :)
Jupiter's Bull: Yeah, we're all really lucky in that regard- thank you.
Kaioo: I have not heard of nor played that game.
pipn123: I'm sorry that the writing has not been your preference. Thank you for your honesty.
Weebsweb: I will do my best.
Mayuraheika: Tanya is an aggressive person in canon, but this is usually when she is in a position of power over another person or peoples. Here in training, the ranks are far more equal and they're all subject to military hierarchy.
Edited 4/23/18
Tanya stared at the new bruises that coated her body, the purple-black skin nearly taking up half of the pigment. She had seen how merciless Annie was when handing Jaeger and Braun their asses, but she still hadn't been prepared for just how brutal the training under the blonde would be. She gingerly scooped some salve and rubbed the light green stuff over the bruises.
Every time she thought she had something down or had Annie right where she wanted her, the blonde would smash apart her expectations and send her sprawling onto the ground. At this point, she didn't bother keeping track of how many times she had been flipped, tripped or thrown down, nor how many injuries she had concocted.
Even still, the way that the blonde fought had been beautiful in it's brutal efficiency- Braus had once compared it to how a wolf would snap it's jaws around the jugulars of an unsuspecting sheep and Tanya found it an apt description. Efficient in style and in mannerisms, Tanya found that she honestly enjoyed the sessions with Annie and the blonde's attitude- no-nonsense, never beating around the bush and actually had some semblance of maturity.
I wish I could say the same for the company I keep, in both lives.
"Mmm..."
Tanya glanced over where Braus winced as she rubbed the light green salve into a particularly nasty bruise on her side, trying to hold back tears. During one of the lessons, she had dropped her wooden dagger and landed on the blade upright. While it hadn't broken bone or skin, the girl was in almost constant agony and it didn't help that the belts of her harness went over it and chaffed against the skin whenever she moved a certain way.
At least Shadis is holding off on the next stage of gear training until winter is over, she consolidated. I don't know what we'd do if we tried using the wires or gas tanks in the cold.
Tanya strangled the rising concern right where it started. I am DONE letting my emotions rule over me like some teenage girl-
The harsh bark of laughter escaped her before she could stop it and her chest ached from the action. "You okay there, Tanya?" Brause asked, concerned. "You like kind of-"
"Perfectly fine," she rasped out, teeth gritting together.
"Okay...?"
Tanya turned away before a particularly harsh gust of cold wind made the walls shudder and goosebumps crawled up her flesh. With no more gear training, they had two free periods that most cadets spent huddled in their cabins. Tanya had been briefly worried that the training they were doing with Annie would halt before she remembered the gym. Now in those free periods, she, Braus, Springer and Jaeger would meet Annie in the gym and continue their lessons while using the equipment there.
Officer Bierne had begin to come in as well and supervise them, making sure that things wouldn't get out of control. This was a relief as Ackerman was almost always there outside of free time and a rather fierce rivalry had sprung between her and Annie. With Officer Bierne there, things wouldn't get as vicious as the two girls wanted to be, even if their spars ended bruises aplenty on both sides. Not to mention whenever Ackerman was there, Jaeger would either push himself harder and be more focused, or get angry and be sloppier. More than once Tanya had nearly lost an eye when Jaeger accidentally sent his dagger right at her face.
Speaking of which, Tanya had taken to using the wooden daggers in practice as often as she could. When she was certain no one would see her, Tanya would take the dagger out of it's sheath and go through the motions she had learned. The wooden dagger was lighter and blockier than the the blade and she had taken to making her own practice dagger to better emulate the real deal. Springer had been a surprising help knowing how to whittle with different kinds of wood, and the fact he didn't question why she needed it made things much easier.
That and he was a moron.
She was still cultivating the facade that she regarded them as friends with varying success- Braus, Springer and Lenz bought it, Jaeger was suspicious, Ymir seemed to see through it and kept to Lenz like a tick and Annie didn't seem to care. As for Armin, the two of them had come to a sort of truce at this point- she didn't ignore him at all turns and even found that she enjoyed his company when they were in the same area. He was incredibly smart and perceptive and Tanya had a feeling he'd do great things once training was over.
Through her sessions with Jaeger, Braus and Springer, as well as her newfound good relations with Armin, they all began to sit together during mealtimes and free periods. Lenz and Ymir would sometimes join them and Tanya quickly realized that Jaeger saw something off about Lenz as well but never remarked on it. They would also overlaps with Annie, Braun and Hoover's company as well, if only because the three were so often together.
She respected Braun, if only because his mentality was similar to her own at least in working hard to become soldiers albeit for different reasons, and the fact that he was incredibly reliable. She wasn't sure what to make of Hoover, he reminded her a great deal of a tree- she was aware he was there but he never tried to stand out or draw attention to himself. Even Braus and Springer were more tolerable, if only through exposure and the fact that they wouldn't leave her alone despite her protests.
As Tanya's fingers gently touched the skin just above her left eyebrow where one of the bruises had finally healed, she remembered how Officer Bierne had taken her aside the other day to talk.
"There's only so much you can do just taking out your issues on the equipment. I was worried that you'd isolate yourself and just bottle everything in, but now you have friends- or at the very least, comrades you can speak with. This isn't meant to be pressure, just something to bear in mind."
Well, Tanya was in no danger of taking that advice anytime soon- with the talk with Arlert and training in the meantime, she saw no need to speak of what had happened and simply focused on her work. Even if she did talk, she doubted there would be someone who could emphasize with her.
That's not entirely irrational, she thought. I doubt there's anybody else who was reincarnated by a psychopathic man-child of a deitic-like being.
Despite her shivering from the cold, Tanya pulled her shirt on before grabbing her patchy winter coat and gloves. As Braus finished getting ready, the two girls braced themselves and opened the door. Immediately, the cold burst through and Tanya winced at the brightness of the snow and the light reflected off and blinked rapidly, bright and black spots dancing before her vision before forcing herself outside.
They raced back to the barracks and Tanya ignored the protests as they threw the door open to get inside, slamming a little harder than necessary. "Sorry, sorry!" Braus gasped, rubbing her hands together to get some warmth back in them.
Tanya went to her bed and curled up in the sheets, letting the cloth drape over the mattress as she pulled out the book and rosary. An unexpected benefit with the cold was that with the blanket around, her reading was hidden from the other cadets- she had given off several impressions and she'd be damned if people began thinking she was religious.
I'm reading the book given to me by a man of the church possessed by the personifications of the walls, she thought sardonically, rubbing the beads between her fingers, that'll make sense.
The months of winter that passed her some of the slowest that Tanya had experienced. Even with the training and lessons, everyone had slipped into lethargy in the cold. She fought to keep her body in peak condition, inside and outside of training. This became harder when an especially powerful blizzard brought nearly eight inches of snow and made the gym's roof cave in.
Finding fellow trainees frozen dead in their bunks had not helped morale. They had lost twenty cadets to the cold and exposure, some frozen in their beds. Tanya felt nothing as they removed one of her bunkmates out of their bed, blue with cold and death- she was far more concerned with the fact that her source of training and the only relief to the inevitable cabin-fever was out of commission.
Having little choice, Tanya took to training in the barracks despite the others protests. She never skipped a day, even when her body creaked in protest and her bruises began to show. Push-ups, sit-ups, planks, stretches of all kinds, anything to keep her body limber and strong. She never skipped a day, even when her bruised body kept creaking and cracking from the strain. The sweat and energy she worked up kept her warm even as the walls shuddered from the cold gusts outside.
But day by day, warmth eventually started to return, the snow and ice melted and Tanya had volunteered to help get the gym's roof fixed with a few other cadets. Spring had yet to fully settle in but winter was already over.
"Listen up, you fucks!" Shadis roared. "This next part of training with the gear is going to determine whether or not you can actually get off the ground! Don't even think this is gonna be easy- a third of you shit-mongers can die or get maimed in this stage!"
Sasha trembled with the slight chill and excitement despite this warning and she exchanged eager grins with Connie- they were finally going to learn how to fly and not even the the last chills of winter in the air could dampen her spirit! She shot Christa a little wave and grin and the blonde's lips twitched despite her trying to pay attention. Ymir smirked back from where she was trying to wrap an arm around Christa while Annie looked bored. Tanya and Eren didn't look back, their eyes locked on Shadis.
They were shown to the forest training area where several nets had been put up along the bottom of the area. Sasha fumbled for a moment with the tank before securing it onto the back of her waist- they had worn the tanks during climbing to get used to the weight but now that it had actual gas inside it, Sasha didn't know if she was imagining the weight or not. She checked over her gear a few times to make sure that it wasn't broken or out of place before joining the others.
Each cadet would take their place up at the trees and fire their hooks before activating the gas, trying to control the direction and speed before landing on the other side of the net. She watched as Mikasa took to the air with a grace that shouldn't have been possible before landing on the other side. Eren scowled with annoyance and some jealousy while Tanya just stared in disbelief at her performance.
"Seriously?" Connie said in incredulous awe. "How the hell are we gonna top that?"
Sasha doubted anyone could, at least with their first try. The cadets afterwards either got stuck mid-flight and dangled from their wires or overshot and landed on the net. One unfortunate cadet's grappling hook came undone and in his panic, fired the gas up and propelled him past the net and right into the ground with a sickening thud- and of course Sasha was set to go right after they got the body taken care of.
Her hands shook with fear, the fall of that poor boy etched in her mind. She fired the grappling hooks and the first try fell too short and landed on the net. She pulled them back and fired again but they struck the leafier part of the branch and came back with the greens stuck in the hook. No one badgered her for this, not after watching what could happen if they got it wrong. Finally, her grappling hooks sunk into the bark of the tree and a firm tug kept them stuck. She took a few breaths to calm her nerves, and activated the gas as she stepped off the platform.
Sasha's stomach plummeted as she fell before the wires snapped taut, halting her descent before her heart went up to her throat when the gas propelled her up. As she came towards the platform, she tried to retract the grappling hooks only for the wire to pull taut. The force of being pulled made the blood rush to her head momentarily and her stomach plummeted as she swung back. She tried to increase the flow of gas to propel her up again but the force wasn't enough and she ended up swinging back and forth like a pendulum.
"It was only your first try," Christa tried to comfort her once they got her down. "You can only get better."
"Yeah, it's not like we're all expected to be like Mikasa on our first go," Connie pointed out.
The other cadets had similar experiences with their first tries with a few standouts- Jean activated the gas tank right away rather than waiting to be in the air and he landed almost right on his feet, and Ymir pulled her grappling hooks out of the branch early and let the gas itself propel her up onto the platform. Eren had gotten stuck and immediately cut in line of the next cadet to try again before Shadis yelled at him to wait his turn. Annie was one of the few who were able to make to the platform without anything happening.
Tanya's scowl was dark as she looked up at them from where she had fallen onto the net, her grappling hook having come loose when she put took much weight into swinging. When Christa tried to comfort her, she ignored the blonde completely. "Don't waste your good graces on her," Ymir muttered with an eye-roll at the white-haired girl.
With this next step in their gear training and the longer days, nearly half of their lessons were now devoted to the new regiment with the gear. Now Sasha found herself quickly exhausted and strung just from the new training and often dozed off during mealtime or lessons before Tanya would always shake her awake.
"You can't afford to be slacking off now that we're at this stage," she said sternly.
She had always found her friend helpful but right now Sasha could only feel annoyed at the white-haired girl pushing them so hard. Even Annie was beginning to grow tired with Tanya pushing her to teach them every single say without rest.
The nausea was getting easier to handle and while the blood rushing to her ears still disoriented her, Tanya could power through it. The white-haired girl was fast approaching where her grappling hooks had embedded themselves into the tree and she quickly retracted them, her entire body tingling at the feeling of free-falling before she fired them off into the next tree, her body jerking with the movements as she was pulled forwards.
With one last glide, she landed on the ground, propelling the gas so she wouldn't land as heavily on her feet. She panted for breath, adrenaline pumping hard and hot through her veins while the officer wrote down a few notes. "All right, you can go."
Tanya nodded breathlessly and went to put away her gas tank and scabbards. She didn't think it was possible for time to pass as quickly as it did, but now they were coming close to the end of the second year. Her stomach churned inside and out, her head felt light and her body tingled with energy and adrenaline. She took deep breaths to try and calm down but the endorphins made her feel disturbingly giddy and a giggle escaped her before she could stop it. She covered up her face, trying to stifle them and hide her grin.
More than once, Tanya had narrowly avoided slamming right into trees or free falling if her grappling hooks got loose. She still didn't think she'd ever get used to fighting like this, but going in now for seven months had shocked her with how accustomed she had become. She no longer visualized the dozens of ways she could die horribly in this stage of training, the feeling of flying through the air was too exhilarating. The white-haired girl knew that this could be it's own problem if she got addicted to the adrenaline rush.
Finding out that the gear counted for more than half of the final scores quickly made her more somber. Her gaze became sharp with a grimace as she remembered over-hearing the officers speak about it and her stomach still plummeted a bit. She had been pushing the others to the limit in academics and hand-to-hand and if they found out that the former barely counted and the latter had no points, it would destabilize the routine she had set up for them.
The routine that was where she had the most control presently.
She made her way back to the field where the cadets were beginning to start the hand-to-hand lessons and she became more serious once she met with the others.
"Seriously Tanya, pull the stick out of your ass!" Springer said exasperatingly from where he slumped on the ground after she had flipped him over. "We'll be dead if we keep this pace up!"
Tanya didn't bat an eye to this as she said, "We have to be in the best shape we can be in if we all want to get into the top ten."
"She's right," Jaeger said and Tanya blinked at the brunet taking her side. "With her pushing us and Annie's lessons, we'll-"
"It doesn't matter."
Tanya turned to the blonde as she uttered this, a shade of the anger from the first day of their lessons flickering on her face. "What do you mean?"
"Just what I said- this is pointless." Annie jerked her head up and Tanya followed her gaze towards the cadets. "Why do you think the other cadets either unwind at this point or goof off? Hand-to-hand doesn't count for points in the final exam."
"What?!" Springer and Braus both exclaimed in upset disbelief.
Shit!
"Meanwhile, they put all their focus onto the maneuvering gear training since it's worth the most points," the blonde continued impassively. "The right to live in Sina- that's all I'm interested in, not revenge, not being a 'soldier'."
Tanya fought to keep the scowl off her face- why did Annie have to go and say it?! The others knowing could completely destabilize the routine she had set up, with moral dropping for Braus and Springer if they saw no reward in training. Not to mention that Tanya would have to contend with other less brutally efficient people in training and she had no desire to do so.
"Then why did you agree to give us lessons?" Jaeger asked, that annoying fire in his eyes again- the kind that meant he was going to give another bullshit shonen hero speech. "Why bother to put up with us if you think it's pointless?"
Annie's eyes narrowed and she closed the gap between them, the brunet barely able to block her blow and keep the wooden dagger from hitting his ribs. "Good question- here's another," she growled. "Why do you think that the ones best suited for killing the titans are the only ones given the chance to be the furthest away from them?"
The white-haired girl's blood froze and her mind raced at the implications. Before she had assumed that the ones with the highest scores or the most well-rounded were given the chance because the Interior would only accept the best to guard the more privileged. But with the revelation of the scores concerning the gear and the question Annie raised, it was clear something was up. Why would they need the gear to go up against humans, especially ones that don't have access to the same weapons?
Jaeger's grunt as Annie slammed him onto the ground brought her back to reality. "Maybe it's just human nature?" the blonde continued. "Maybe that they're just fine with the 'out of sight, out of mind' mentality like everyone else?"
"H-hey come on!" Braus protested and she and Springer quickly pulled them both apart, Jaeger pulling himself up.
"You two are just like my father." Tanya blinked at this unexpected admission from the blonde, her expression frustrated as she looked at her and Jaeger. "Whether being carried away with ideals that had nothing to do with reality, or trying to please everyone while hiding under a facade. Even as a kid I knew it was bullshit, but dad still made me learn these moves and I was too young to defy him."
... is that what she thinks of me?
Jaeger looked conflicted at this, mind racing. Braus and Springer both looked sympathetic at this and the former tried to reach for the blonde to comfort her before the blonde wrenched her shoulder away from her touch. "What's your point?" Tanya asked and Annie set her a cold look.
"My point is that I refuse to play pretend at being a soldier in this pathetic world like you are."
Tanya stared as the blonde walked away from them, never looking back. She... was not sure how to feel about this. She had assumed that the blonde was similar to her, but now she wasn't as sure. Clearly, there was a misunderstanding here from her end of things. Not to mention there was an undercurrent of something in the blonde's words that gave her cause to worry- what it was she didn't know.
Much to her displeasure, her worries were founded as Springer and Braus began to goof off again despite her protests. "You heard Annie- we should be focusing on the gear training," Springer said before shooting her a look. "Besides, I thought you'd be more excited about this, being so concerned with your scores and all."
The insight from the bald boy briefly startled her before she became furious. She grabbed their arms, grip like a vice. "Tanya?!" Braus exclaimed in surprise, fear crossing her expression.
"I won't let you throw away this training." The words were low in her throat.
She was not going to lose the area where she had actual control, dammit!
"You're not the boss of us!" Springer snapped, trying to pry her hand off him.
"Tanya let go, you're hurting me!" Braus said, fear becoming stronger.
The next moment, her arm was caught in a lock as Jaeger pulled her backwards. Her leg shot out and tried to sweep his feet out from under him before she had to dodge his fist, brushing against her cheek. In this moment, his foot came out and smashed against her shins and she could feel herself falling. Snarling angrily, she grabbed at his torso and shoved her elbow into his stomach, cutting off his air.
His hands grabbed at her head, boxing in and making her ears ring before she lowered herself and grabbed at his leg. Jaeger's knee shot up and knocked her head back, her lower jaw and nose stinging and tasting copper. As he tried to grab her arm, Tanya slammed her head forward against his, knocking him back before pulling her elbow back to hit him in the ribs before a large hand grabbed at her face and pulled her backwards and up- through the fingers, she saw Shadis watching them with a flat look, Jaeger in a similar position.
"I don't give a damn what you're arguing about," he intoned, "all that matters is it ends now."
He dropped them both and Tanya forced herself to land upright despite her ringing head. Springer and Braus were already making their way over to Lenz and Ymir while Jaeger went off to who knows where, leaving her alone.
Tanya poked at her food, appetite diminished. Braus and Springer were sitting with Lenz- who kept sending worried looks in her direction- and Ymir, the latter looking deeply annoyed with the two interrupting her time with the blonde. This left her alone with Jaeger, Ackerman and Armin while the brunet ranted to his friends over what happened.
"It's not so surprising," Armin said once Jaeger was done. "Innovation for the gear at an all time low before Wall Maria since the only ones who would make use of it were those in the Survey Corps. To keep them from fully dying out, they had to raise the value of the gear by promising people a life in the Interior. But ever since Maria fell, everyone's been trying to get in..."
Tanya wished she could pay more attention to what they were saying but the day's previous events were sticking in her mind for whatever reason. It's just an argument, and no one was hurt too badly, she thought, trying to shovel the food into her mouth only for her hand to drop back. They'll come around soon enough, and if not...
If not, what? Why do you give a damn? Why bother being concerned about their opinion? Her grimace grew, memories of her younger days coming back despite her trying to strangle them.
Ikeda Susumu never had inherent talent in anything, save the ability to follow the rules. He had tried to become the best at something- anything- and in that pursuit, lost any potential friends and allies, whether by breaking the relationships off themselves or drifting away to find others to fill their needs.
As she had spiraled downwards at the uncertainty and instability of the future, Ikeda Susumu had been able rise to a comfortable and secure lifestyle through economics, through sales, through cold logic and abandoning anything that would emotionally hinder him. For the sake of fulfilling his needs and gaining the secure life he wanted, nothing could be held sacred.
Just thinking of that time in her previous life was sending far too many emotions through Tanya now, the worst being inferiority- inferiority to geniuses who could affect the world, inferiority to the dreamers who got what they wanted through hard work, all while she had to adopt what others would call a twisted mentality to rise up. Her hand clenched tighter around the spoon, hard enough to send a crack through the wood.
"What is it, Eren?"
Tanya blinked at the strange look on the boy's face as he turned to face Jaeger. "Don't you think it's crazy that the only reason people are trying to improve titan-killing skills is by offering a life as far from them as possible?"
That was something that the white-haired girl should have been concentrating on, what she should have been concentrating on in the first place. Of course they want the 'most gifted' to protect the ones on top. The only reason that people bother with the gear now is because of the titans and the promise of a life of comfort. But that still doesn't explain why hand-to-hand doesn't score points if all they deal with is other humans.
"You've got a point, but that's just how reality is," Jean shrugged, "that plan exists for people like me," and the white-haired girl knew that a fight was only seconds from breaking out.
Sure enough, both boys leaped out of their seats and Tanya really didn't have anything better to do than watch, even as her rations grew colder. Ackerman was already standing up between them, murmuring, "That's enough," and Jaeger seemed to calm down somewhat.
"DAMMIT YOU ASSHOLE!"
Tanya startled at the sudden yell from Jean as he grabbed Jaeger's shirt. Where did that come from? she wondered, shaking her head in disbelief before she caught Annie, Braun and Hoover looking their way.
She expected the two to start brawling only for Jaeger to grab Jean's wrist, kick his feet out from under him and send the on his back with a thud. The entire messhall went silent and Tanya noticed Braus and Springer looking their way as well.
"Jackass-!" Jean rasped in pain as he pulled himself up. "What in the hell was that?!"
"That was a move I learned in training while you were lying around," and Tanya wasn't sure if she was imagining the cold look in the brunet's eyes, so different from his normal fire. "Your reality's living an easy life, only doing enough to satisfy yourself- how can you call yourself a soldier?"
... that should not have hit her so hard.
All humans did what they did to satisfy themselves or to protect themselves. Yet this boy's hotblooded and naive words had, just for a millisecond, made hot shame well in her stomach at her actions and words and the inferiority returned full force. She smothered the shame on the spot, disbelief and anger making her grip tighten, sending another crack up the spoon but the inferiority only became worse.
Who the hell do you think you are, she thought in hatred to the brunet, saying that shit when you don't know a Goddamn thing about the world?!
"Tanya!"
She froze at Armin speaking her name, her body going cold as he looked at her before she felt something hot on her hands. Looking down saw her spoon in pieces and the splinters sticking into her flesh, drawing blood. The blond was already moving towards her to pry the spoon away despite her protests. She saw Shadis looking through the door but looking in her direction where Armin was with her seemed to pacify him and he closed the door, the cadets all letting out sighs of relief.
"I'm fine," she said, trying to yank the wood out but her fingers kept slipping from the size of the splinters and the blood.
"Here."
Lenz was standing above her, holding bandages- because of course she kept them on her- and took a seat beside her, helping the white-haired girl remove the splinters while wiping the blood away. Jaeger and Jean were glaring daggers at each other but they were saving their fight for later. She refused eye contact with Arlert, eyes locked on her bleeding fingers before she heard a chair being slid by her- looking up found Springer and Braus.
"Are you okay?" the girl asked and Tanya felt her face grow hotter when she realized she couldn't face her.
Be the bigger person and end this. "I'm sorry about earlier," she ground out.
"No, you're not," Springer deadpanned before shrugging, "but we accept your apology."
"You know you can talk with us, right?" Braus said, that stupid god-like smile back on her face.
... this is why you don't make friends anymore, she thought exasperatingly. Once this is over, you can forget about them and move on with your life, as far from them and the titans as possible.
The training is nearly done!
Also, I got Tanya's past from the light novel/ manga and the lines detailing inferiority were lifted from the translation of the light novel's prologue.