864 - January
There are three of them. A stumbling, twisting mass of steaming flesh and too-thin limbs that ambles, no lurches over the hills and through the valleys and across the fields. They don't remember passing the Wall - which Wall, they are uncertain - but they don't remember not passing it either. They haven't eaten in days. Before that, it was a handful of berries, green and sour and painful on teeth and stomachs. Mostly, they've followed the river. Drank until their stomachs bloated. Stared longingly at the fish swimming deep. Too deep. Moved on.
They have to keep moving. Running. If they stop for too long, they are a beacon of human scent for the surrounding titans. They run to protect themselves. They run to avoid capture.
It is uncertain if they have killed the ones that have been dogging their heels since their escape. Deformed faces have blurred together in memory. All titans look the same when death by one if just the same as by another.
They sleep in trees. One of the three in titan form, eyes wide and exhausted as the setting sun saps their energy. Precaution has saved their lives. Abnormals, abarrents, those conditioned to hunt, creep, stalk with the limited power from a full moon. In the dark, it's impossible to tell when the hunter is an animal or monster. In the dark it doesn't matter.
They run, titan form with clinging hands, galloping across the landscape. Gallop may be a strong word. Stagger. An agonizing tumble of fear and movement.
It's a shock, then, when they look up one day and see a tall, dark head, rows of teeth, and familiar, burning, glowing green eyes. Two pale spot swing up, perching of heaving shoulders. A dark spot launches from a shadow beneath the chin. It lands in the grass, swords out.
Perhaps it isn't good - it says a great deal about their current state - that naked blades and obvious threats are such a relief to see.
Ymir slides off of Reiner's crystallized shoulder. Bare feet hit the grass hard, knees only doing so much to compensate for the rough landing. She can feel the bones in her legs crumple under the strain. It's not the worst pain she's endured in the last long while. Ten years. Longer. She heals the fastest of them even though fast is still painfully slow compared to the rate she used to heal at. Unless she gets some good food and rest, her legs will take a week to heal
Still, the other two expect her to take the challenge. Face off against Mikasa if it comes to that.
Up close, a distance of several meters, Ymir notes the differences. Difference in uniform. Difference in stance. Difference in age. it's been more than ten year, she supposes. Mikasa is older, scarred, standing world weary ans strong on the grass as she never had in training. Always the strongest. Always the bravest. The best of the best of the best. Now, she settles into a stance that compensates for the blades and the pill of the harness still attached to the titan looming behind her.
Eren.
Mikasa isn't dressed as a scout. Sure, the wings peak up over her shoulders, blue and white bright against black cloth, and the cut is similar, but everything else... Blue and white bands loop tight around wrists - not restricting, but nowhere near loose enough to tangle in the rest of the gear. Everything else is black. Black shirt, black pants, black boots. Even the leather of the harness is more soot than brown. Only a flash of faded red around her neck betrays a holdover from childhood. The scarf.
It's almost a relief to note that, with everything that had to have happened, Mikasa still cares enough about family to keep that bit of cloth.
"State your name and purpose, shifters!" one of the blondes yells. Male. Slightly higher pitch than average, but that might be caused by volume and distance. Mikasa is muscle, then. The first line of defense should Ymir and the boys choose to attack. Interesting that they would send the human. Then again, Mikasa has always protected Eren.
"Mikasa." Ymir nods greeting. Wary. Mikasa remains blank-faced and at the ready. Encouraging. Turning enough to look up at the blondes without straining, Ymir shouts back, "I am Ymir. With me are Reiner Braun and Bertolt Hoover, formerly of the 104th training squad." She pauses, eyes darting back to Mikasa, the tense shoulders, the quivering, thirsty blades. "We come peacefully. Neutrally."
It's the truth. They have no wish to fight.
One of Mikasa's tethers twitches and the girl, woman, flies backwards with nary a twich of her fingers. There are several tense minutes in which the three on the titan converse. Mikasa, hard to see, prowls agetated on Eren's shoulder. One blonde stands between her and the other, hands out, placating. When the disagreement doesn't immediately resolve, the figure pushes the other off its perch, launching hooks into the ground. The pair, one sulking, the other annoyed, lands not far from where the shifters huddle.
It takes Ymir a moment to realize - Armin and Annie.
Reiner recognizes them sooner, faster, steam rushing from his body as he hurries into human form, Bert dumped unceremoniously on the ground. Titan Eren shuffles in place. Tense. Ready. Obviously uncomfortable with the movement of a shifter so close to his friend. Mikasa stays balanced with ease. Ymir wonders how often Eren is in titan form if his friends are so comfortable riding him around. Even she, after a month or more of travelling with the boys, dislikes being human while riding on Reiner's shoulders.
Annie and Armin dess similarly to Mikasa. The only difference is with Annie - bright around her wrists are strips of red fabric. The color nestles snugly between the blue and white bands both Mikasa and Armin wear. Ymir wonders what it stand for. What the change of attire means.
"You came back," Armin says. He stands as Mikasa did. Easy confidence with fingertips pressed to the handle of a short blade. Comparing the two, Annie still hold the stance of a child, a teenager, death matured but without the hard experience of years. "Why."
"It wasn't..." Bert tries, but the words stick in his mouth. "We couldn't..."
"We were misled and made our escape as soon as we were able." Ymir has no time for his twisted tongue. I came back to find Historia. To protect her, if she'll let me. Repay the world for my crimes."
Armin hums. "Bertolt." Somewhere in the intervening years, Armin lost question marks. It's a surprising development.
"Reiner and I just want to settle in a patch of unused territory. We won't bother anyone. Never again."
Armin stares at him, at Reiner laying panting in a steaming pile of bone. He raises one arm. Beside him, Annie flinches, just a quick flash of wide eyes and a tight mouth. Her hands tighten on her swords. Ymir idly wonders who she plans to fight - them or Armin. They never find out. Armin's hand makes a complicated motion. Eren takes two huge steps forward and kneels.
Mikasa appears, sudden and silent, next to the blondes. "You can't be serious."
Armin smiles. Ymir decides right then that she never wants to see that particular smile of his face ever again. It isn't sweet like she remembers. Nothing like Historia's. A long time ago, the two could have been twins. Can they still pass? If not twins, the siblings? Counsins? Is Armin still a reasonable facsimile of what Ymir can expect Historia to be?
More than ten years. It's along time. People change. Sweet, adorable Armin, dependable, terrified, agonizingly intelligent Armin - Armin changed. Mikasa too. Eren, sitting calm and obedient in titan form, legs folded, glowing eyes intent on possible threats. They've all changed. Historia's been with them. How much has she changed?
"Mikasa. Go with Annie. Take Reiner and Bertolt. Annie - " Armin pauses, face serious as he looks at the teenager. "Make them an offer."
Annie nods. She skirts around Ymir, heaving Reiner up by the back of his tattered shirt. Mikasa motions with a sword for Bert to follow the pair. He does so meekly. Of the three of them, his form is the most impractical for travel and fighting. For anything, really. Against a fresh Mikasa, he'd be dead in minutes.
Eren touches the tip of one finger to the top of Armin's head. His other hand taps a pattern on the ground. Evidently, they have worked out a method of communication. Armin responds by smacking Eren's nose.
"You've missed a lot, these last fourteen years," he tells her. The not-nice smile is replaced by something gentle. Soft. It looks odd on his face. Doesn't quite fit between the scars and bruises. "Historia's queen now. Has been for four years. She spends what time she's not babysitting the nobles teaching the military police exactly how they suck." Eren makes a deep rumbling noise, leaning up to observe their surroundings. Armin leans against one bent knee. The heat doesn't appear to bother him.
Ymir isn't sure what to say, so she doesn't, just smiles. She knew Historia would be brilliant at whatever she put her mind to. Queen. She's queen now. Ruler of all the sheep within the Walls. People. Humans. Same difference.
In the distance, just at the edge of her hearing, Annie says, "uprising. Reaching the Wall, surviving - clear your names - fight -"
Armin means over her voice, raised just a little. "You've always done what's best for Historia, Ymir. Giving her your place in the top ten. Following her into the Survey Corp. Betraying to us that you are a shifter. Going with Reiner and Bertolt. She's the most powerful person within the Walls now. And you're right. She does need protecting.
"Currently, Levi's with her. They both hate it, but they also recognize the need to keep her safe. There are assassination attempts every other week. Uprisings, rebel attacks, every couple of months. We need Levi out here. We need his mind. We need him for Eren - Mikasa and I have him settled most of the time, but you remember training. Levi's the only person able to pull him out of a blind rage.
"So here's the deal." Armin pulls a tattered fold of parchment out of a cleverly disguised pocket. A bit of charcoal follows. He scrawls a tangle of shapes - not letters, not in any language Ymir knows at any rate - on one corner and tears it free. A bit of discolored parchment appears from yet another pocket. He folds the scribble within the discolored scrap and presses the packet flat against Eren's knee. "You take this to Levi at the palace. Tell him that we'll be in the City of Orphans for the rest of winter. Tell him about Reiner and Bertolt. Tell him we're basing them over at Shahalis with Annie for the time being."
Neither name makes any sense. Ymir is quick to memorize them, though. She tucks the note-packet in her belt, carefully making certain it is secure. She has a nasty thought that Levi will dice her if she tries to get anywhere near Historia without this little scrap of verification.
Eren rumbles, looking off into the distance. Armin glances that way too. "Time to head back. We'll give you a lift over the Wall. Mikasa! Annie!"
The four trot over, Annie looking blankly pleased. The boys appear a little shocked, glassy-eyed and pale. Mikasa keeps looking the way Eren is pointed. Tense. Annoyed. Determined. Eren allows then all to clamber into their preferred positions. Bert and Reiner stay cupped in his hands. Ymir perches in the crook of an elbow. The other three plant their hooks in the meat of his shoulders, balancing easily as he breaks into a swift, jarring run towards home. The Wall. Hope, salvation, and another cage.
Bertolt doesn't exactly wake up. He isn't born away, but it doesn't descend upon him suddenly either. He doesn't remember a gradual return of memory. One day when he's still too small to walk, he think, oh. I'm Bertolt Hoover. And this isn't where I died.
He the oldest of a gaggle of children born that year. There's Thomas and Hannah and Franz and Nac and Mylius and Mina. Bert knows all these names. He watches them carefully. Searches for something familiar in round, tear-stained faces. There's nothing. He thinks that maybe it's coincidence. It's just his imagination.
That changes as he grows. As they all grow.
When he's small, the world he lives in isn't that different from the one he left. We'll there's a noticeable lack of Walls-formed horizons, but other than that and the language, nothing much has changed. Horses pulling carts. Candles for light if it's needed. Everything is always doing something, be it farming or mending clothes or tending the animals. He quickly accustoms himself to the way of life.
Watches. Waits. Hopes.
He plays with the other children. Teaches them various chores and games to make the tasts go by faster. Has them running and jumping and chasing him around the dirt streets. Keeps them active. Trains them. Play fights with sticks out of sight of watchful adults. He tells them their past disguised as stories, desperate to trigger something, but the day always leaves him disappointed.
There's nothing. Not a single spart of recognition at all. Just bright, innocent eyes and begging words. "Bertie! Another story! Bertie, play with us! Bert, I need help!" They gather around him like ducklings.
By the time he's eight, Bert is convinced that this is his punishment. These faces he's known riddled with pain, hate, and exhaustion. Now he has no choice but to see them bright-eyed and pure. He was the cause of their horrible past. A past they don't, can't, will never remember. He took their childhoods away from them last time.
Never mind that he was a child too.
By nine, Bert has to remind himself that this is punishment. He is not supposed to enjoy this. It's just not allowed. He can't, shouldn't find it adorable when Franz trips over himself trying to impress Hannah. He's not supposed to look at Mina's desperate need to visit the outside world with anything that resembles fond amusement. He's not to have fun when Nac and Thomas convince him to leave his chores and go play with the new foals. He's not supposed to look at the world outside of their cultural walls and marvel at how far humanity has come in little more than a thousand years.
In the coming years, he sees technology advance in leaps and bounds. Various tourists that visit his little town always have some new gadget. Random trips into a neighborning city to sell canned goods are another source of welcome information.
He's the first of them to turn eighteen, just barely in time to join with the group leaving for their year away. It's exciting and a little frightening. He doesn't ask - for how would he explain the question - if his age-mates are more or less frightened than he is. After all, he was thirty-five when he died, crushed under the foot of a titan. That's almost twice what these kids have experienced in their lifetimes.
A week out, Bert is on a train to New York City. A week out, he's laughing with one of the older girls, excited about their plans. A week out, the world ends.
859 - June
Armin receives the notice almost as soon as he steps through the gates of the second house. One of their allies - bought and paid for, unfortunately - owns a series of manors in the upper districts. It's safe enough now that the king is ot of power to hide where the opposition is.
The notice comes in the form of a little girl in a faded yellow dress, black hair a riot of curls tied up in an equally yellow ribbon. Probably one of the kids from the City. Not quite old enough for military training, but too young to sit around playing all day. It's a useful age for the Scouts. No one pays attention to the orphaned kids. A spot of spending money for delivering a message keeps the kids out of trouble and information flowing.
Armin takes the note and tosses her a coin. She flashes a grin at him and runs off to join a pack of loitering children. Off to spend the treasure, sure in the knowledge that there is more to come.
The notice has him turning from the second house, remounting his horse, and galloping out of the city. Dated a week ago, it has only a few words and the seal of one of his scientists.
The Leonhart crystal is disintegrating.
He reaches the place where Annie's crystal resides two days after leaving the second house. He's swarmed by scientists almost immediately, hands pulling him from his overworked horse and dragging him inside. They babble at him, holding up crystal shards and telling him of evaporation sheering off large sheets of mostly clear rock. Preliminary studies indicate that it is of a similar material to that which makes up the wall. Obvious differences include opacity and density - the crystal is hard enough to scratch the Wall.
Armin nods in the appropriate places, gently herding the group towards Annie's chamber. Cell. Storage space.
It's a week of continuous watching before something more substantial happens. Eren and Mikasa send a letter informing him of their movements - coded, of course. They've moving to the City of Orphans again. Some idiot set fire to something and half the settlement burned down. Only one of the kids was lost. Jean is using the opportunity to teach some of the new recruits about building multistory houses. It's surprisingly good practice for using the 3DMG. Levi has control of last year's recruits. Mikasa claims that he is training them. Eren amends that by saying he's throwing the recruits at raiders invading the more isolated communities. Eren is fairly certain that this does not count as training.
Historia, ensconced in the third house babysitting lordlings desperate for the war to end but unwilling to openly support a new ruler, demands regular updates on the situation. She's gotten a lot better at leading. Armin sent the latest report - crystal size, rate of decay, Annie's lack of movement - yesterday with one of the more flustered scientists. He's been gradually weeding out those he cannot trust to stay relatively calm should the crystal do something unexpected. Like explode.
There are only two others present when Annie blinks shards from her eyes, ribs creaking as lungs expand for the first time in nine years. Armin watches her closely. Watches the confusion of waking up fade into remembrance. Watches recognition flicker across her features. Four brick walls. A single door. No winders. The only light is the flutter of candles attached to the walls. Her eyes mark Armin first, framed by the doors and highlighted in fire, then the two scientists hovering at a table.
Armin notes the lack of change. It was hard to tell, those few visits he made over the years. The crystal always obscured the fine details of aging. He suspected, of course. Never said anything to the scientists. Mentioned it once, briefly, to Historia in a conversation about Ymir. Discussed it at length with his siblings when it became obvious that Eren is a few years younger in appearance than he should be. Neither Eren or Mikasa are scientifically minded, but both acknowledged the probability of time spent in titan form halting, or at least slowing considerably, the process of aging.
Now here's Annie. Blatant proof that the cure to old age might be a titan transformation. She still small and fifteen. Strong, but lacking matured muscles and frame. Certainly not delicate, but young. Dreadfully, terribly young in a way Armin never thought to consider back then. Whe they were all fifteen, they thought they were adults, grown up, world wary and mature. Armin certainly thought of himself that way. He knows for fact that Eren believed himself indestructible at fifteen. Now. Now he's nine years older than Annie. Nine years older. He's been helping the community living in caves under the palace. Tutoring children in the City of Orphans. Building and rebuilding homes.
He's killed on and off the battlefield. Fought humans and titans aline. Send men and women and children to their deaths on suicide runs. Prioritized food in his own stomach over sharing a finite supply with a starving civilian. He's looked Levi in the eye and told him to sit the fuck down, I'm speaking. He's committed treason. Plotted and planned and conspired and disobeyed.
All the the name of the common good. He lives by that phrase, loathes that phrase. Hates its necessity almost as much as he hates carrying out the deeds. At how easy it is.
"I'm going to give you a choice," he says when Annie's eyes focus on him once more. The tattered uniform. The fraying harness. The patches in his boots. The scientists jump at the sound of his voice. They grab what papers and tools they can carry and scurry out of the room. These two, the most composed, know what Armin means when he offers a choice. He offered one to them years ago.
Annie watches them go with a painfully familiar stony expression.
Armin waits until they are gone before speaking again. "I am going to give you a choice," he repeats. "Join the Survey Corp or die." Really, he should just kill her. Maybe let jean in for an interrogation first, but a sword should remove her head from her shoulders for her crimes.
Treason.
Crimes against humanity.
Not that he has any room to speak about treason. Annie, at least, is only out for herself. Armin and the rest of the Scouts are attempting to overthrow a corrupt government with no room to care for collateral damage.
"I don't like those choices." Her voice is rusty. Hoarse. Armin thinks it makes her sound unbearably weak. Young.
Jean is their interrogator. He's the best Armin has ever seen, including that one time he got captured by the military police and interrogated for days. Jean is fast. He's clean. His methods are even, usually, painless. They don't leave physical marks, at least. He always gets accurate information. Armin isn't Jean, but he doesn't need to be. Back before Sasha died, the pair spent a few months gathering up any information they could find on the rogue shifters. The information was spotty at best, but it is enough for this at least.
"Annie Leonhart," Armin says, drawing her name out the was Historia does when one of her underlings gets into trouble. His voices lacks a certain dignity. He's spend too long coercing new recruits or barking orders to have fully gained the absentminded arrogance of a noble. This tone from him would never work on someone accustomed to the ways of the upper class. Luckily for him, Annie only had a few months with the military police. She doesn't know the difference.
"Annie Leonhart," he repeats. "Do you know how long you've been inside that crystal? Nine years." He smiles a little, ducking his head like he used to when he was a child. "Nine years ago I was willing to trap you under ground, manipulate your respect for me . Nine years ago, I ousted you as a traitor to the cause, as a titan shifter. A secretive, lying rat. Annie, I've grown up. I'm leading a war - I'm winning a war against the false crown and a corrupt government. I've been labeled an outlaw. The Survey Corp has been officially disbanded. Do you really think I will hesitate to slaughter you where you stand? I can."
She must be tired. Her eyes widen just slightly, just enough to show shock at his words.
"But I won't. You see, Annie Leonhart, I know something you don't. Something that you care about even after all this time." He grins, a half-feral flash of teeth that he's copied from Eren. It's an effective motivator. "I know where your father is."
Okay, this is longer than I thought it would be. Um... don't expect many chapters like this. I thought this was about 2k shorter.