Paradise Island - Marley Coastal FOB
"Sir, sensors within Paradise sector E-139 are detecting massive spikes in ground vibrations, temperatures, and energy!"
Commander Stephan Kollmann strode across the Marley Forward Operating Base, a deep sense of dread squirming in his gut. He knew what his officer was saying: they were all signs consistent with the manifestation of a Titan. Alone, it meant nothing more than earthquakes and weather changes - but all together, and so notable, so drastic in scope and increase...? There was a damn good reason Marley had placed monitoring equipment around that particular area. Just as there had been a damn good reason that the people of Paradise had set up AA turrets and other vehicles to guard that particular area for as long as they could. But, after it was over, and nothing had happened, Marley had allowed themselves to sigh in relief. It was over, it was never coming back. Those horrors, two thousand years of terror, capped off by an attempt to destroy the world itself - which had succeeded in wiping out eighty percent of it.
It couldn't possibly be happening again, could it?
In Stephan's lifetime?
Why? Why couldn't these damn monsters leave it alone? How many times did the world have to beat them back down again? How many times did the lesson have to be taught?!
Stephan set a hand on the officer's shoulder and gazed at the computer screen. "Divert one of our surveillance drones to the area, immediately - and give me live feed. And do the same for any and all patrol units in that sector! Send them all right to this location."
"Yes, sir. Right away."
If the Eldians wanted to rise up with that power again, make another go at destroying the world...at finishing what that madman Eren Yeager and his fascist "Yeagerists" had started...
Stephan was going to be here to stop them in their tracks!
He shut his eyes briefly, listening to the sounds of the ocean on Paradise's beach.
He only hoped he could contend with whatever monsters and horrors were about to rise again on this cursed, dead island.
Lydia looked out across the forest, the field, to the city's ruins. Over it all, from far, far above.
She was so high up it was terrifying.
Against her better instincts, she looked down - at herself.
She was in a body not her own. A massive body. She thought she would have towered over the tallest of skyscrapers, had they still been standing. She had to be hundreds of meters tall - four, five hundred? A swipe of an arm could have done away with an army, a stomp of a foot could have shook the world apart! And she had some physical features she definitely wasn't supposed to have gotten for another year or two, at least (according to her mom, anyway).
Lydia stood tall, massive legs moving underneath her.
The tree she had emerged from was destroyed, fallen - it had crushed dozens of other, smaller trees underneath itself. Dust surrounded it in a great plume, along with the steam from Lydia's titan form.
She couldn't see the ground clearly in her immediate area. How was she meant to find Mira in all this?
Carefully, Lydia crouched down, setting a hand on the forest floor to brace herself.
She swiped her free hand through the air, hoping to clear it.
She pushed her face down lower, scrutinizing every inch of the ground from up close for signs of Mira. She had to find her, she had to! Mira had to be around here, she had to have...
Twenty-two year old Elsa Eichler sat upright in the dusty old bed as the room was filled with a yellow light, and the whole building trembled.
"What the hell?"
She jumped to her feet and went to the window, grasping the frame to peer outside. Down the barren streets of New Shiganshina.
Had Marley decided to make an unexpected trip on through here, scour it for more survivors or items of interest again?
The woman brushed her white-blonde hair out of her eyes, flicked her ponytail behind her shoulder and peered out ever more intently into the world.
She knew it was idiotic to stay in the ruins of the city, but hell if she was going to pass up ready-made shelter and resources. All the things and places that had survived the bombings were hers for the taking, these days. All hers.
Because nobody else was stupid enough to set up shop in the city - everyone else had long-since gotten far away from New Shiganshina. From any major cities across Paradise. They had all retreated into the woods, into nature. Caves. Even underground (Elsa had heard of some emergency bunkers before). Though, she doubted anybody had had the time to get to them, with how swift and unexpected the bombings had been for the entire island's population of the time...
Even Elsa's own parents had lived out in the trees, raising her there.
She just hadn't stayed put.
Hadn't wanted to.
It might have been a mistake, if current events were any indication.
What the hell had that light been?
A spotlight? A bomb?
Target sighting for some new missile that would fully burn the ruins to hell?
Whatever it was, Elsa wasn't going to stick around to find out.
She had to leave.
She knew when not to push her luck, especially with Marley patrols.
Elsa grabbed her flashlight, her combat knife, her sidearm in its holster and a spare ammunition belt, and she vaulted out the window to drop down into the street.
She hit hard, bending her knees and taking it with gritted teeth.
She kept low as she moved down the street, thankful she had inherited her mother's short genes. She had to reach the city's edge, reach the trees. Get the hell back to the woods (she could practically hear her parents screaming at her for her stupidity).
Elsa's head was on a damn swivel as she approached the city's edge. She hadn't had any trouble, not even a sign of Marley's patrols - but that didn't mean they weren't here.
She crept out past the last line of half-standing buildings, into the open field.
She looked left, she looked right - and then she looked straight ahead, and she felt her heart stop beating.
Off in the distance, towering over the tallest of trees, was a fucking titan.
A creature from history and legend, tales passed on to Elsa by her parents.
Eldian's greatest sins...and their greatest chance for salvation.
Over a hundred years ago, a time had come when it looked like it could have been the latter, finally, for their people. And it had earned them some peace and quiet, but then...
The nation of Marley had had to come in and ruin all that.
Elsa couldn't keep her eyes off the titan, standing there so gloriously, so beautifully. Like a reborn goddess...
The Goddess of Eldia.
For it was female, massive and gorgeous and powerful.
Smoke and dust swirled around the titan, and its short dark hair was blowing in the wind so majestically.
With the sun shining down, it was...the image of perfection.
Had the goddess Ymir returned to protect her people...or was it her chosen one of over a century ago - Eren Yeager?
Whoever it was, however it was even possible...
Elsa had to reach the titan.
With tears in her eyes and a great big smile, she broke into a run, across the field, bound for that hill and those scattered trees.
Things for the remnants of the Eldian people were about to change - Elsa could feel it.
Lieutenant Laura Rader brought her patrol unit to a halt, outside the ruins of New Shiganshina. She hopped out of the truck and shook her head of dark, kinky hair, and she stared across the field toward the forest.
Her soldiers were exiting their vehicles as well. And all of them were staring at the same spot on the horizon as her.
"What the hell is that?!"
"Is that...a titan?"
"No way!"
"Everyone, stow it!" Laura barked at her unit, raising a hand. "Bartz, get the heavy weapons set up. I want snipers to spread out."
"That monster is going to squash us flat, eat us alive!" Tatjana Bartz protested.
"Then you'd better turn on your helmet cams and record as much as you can," Laura retorted. "At least then you'd be more useful to me before you die than you currently are."
Bartz swallowed. Hard. She nodded shakily, and finally tore her eyes off the giant in the distance to race around the jeep. "Y-yes, ma'am!" She reached under the seat in the back of the vehicle, and with the help of another, hauled out a huge black case.
"This is it, everyone!" Laura shouted to her unit, clenching her fists in resolution. "You all complain so much about how boring it's gotten? Well, here you go! We've got the chance here to be the ones to bring down this monster before it can carry out a repeat of two hundred years ago! So let's not screw up and fail all humanity, alright? Because if we don't do this, here and now, humanity will be brought to the brink of extinction again - and this time, I guarantee you the Eldians will actually finish the job! No twenty percent left to rebuild and repopulate! They won't risk it, not this time! So neither will we! Our ancestors let them live in peace for over a hundred years, taking their word for it - believing their promises and lies! Well, we won't! Look at that monster and tell me that mercy was the right move back then!"
Laura shouldered her assault rifle, flicking off the safety. "The Eldians were just laying in wait, taking advantage of us when we spared them, even after they nearly destroyed the entire world! All this time, they were trying to regain that devil power of theirs, trying to grow a military of their own! They run and hide and play the victim now, when they were always anything but! We're not falling for it again! Let's take that titan down, and let's save the world!"