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Mikasa was back home. Surprisingly, she got to watch the events of that day from the third person perspective rather than her normal point of view. She watches as her younger self is slowly preparing to head outside having just heard a fairly loud explosion from outside, no urgency in her movements.

Why wasn't she more worried? Anything that loud had to be dangerous. Didn't she care?

At the minimum shouldn't she have gone to check on Eren?

Speaking of, she sees a young Eren head downstairs, confusion on his face. He looks out the window as he reaches the landing and another extremely loud noise rings out, the gate having just been kicked in. Surprise and urgency immediately adorn his features.

"Run Mikasa!"

Mikasa. Go faster. You have to be faster. If you don't go faster he's going to die. Please...

And yet, Mikasa could only watch as she got up unbearably slowly, confusion etched into her face as her younger self looked over to see Eren running towards her and the door. It felt like she was watching herself move in slow motion, so slowly that Eren had to shove her out the house. Mikasa watched as part of the gate the Colossal Titan kicked in destroyed their house, crushing Eren as well. All as a result of her slowness. Her lack of attention. She could see the horror on her younger self's face, watching Eren's prone body wedged underneath what was once their home as tears started to stream down young Mikasa's face.

A single question popped into her head. "Is... is it going to hurt?" Eren asked so innocently, his voice filled with so much fear.

She felt that same horror well up inside her, stronger now than when it had happened, guilt welling up in her chest as tears stream down her face. She wanted to scream.

It was all her fault. She wasn't fast enough. She was just too slow.

"Mikasa! Mikasa!" She could hear Armin, rousing her from her nightmare, gently moving her as well to ease her out of her sleep. "It's been a while since you got this bad overnight. Anything you want to talk about?" Armin inquires to her.

Mikasa, not wanting to burden Armin with her issues more than she already has, shakes her nod in the negative. He nods grimly.

"Try to get some more sleep if you can. We don't need to be up for a couple hours still. Hopefully it's more restful for you now. On the bright side, we can watch the scouts head out again today. It's been a while since they were in this area, it's kinda exciting. It's always nice seeing people fight for us." He says before lying back down to try to get a bit more sleep himself. Mikasa's thoughts were storming through her head with memories of that day. She doubted she would be falling asleep again tonight.

I'll never be too slow again.

"Hey Mikasa," Armin said, turning to face her, "would you want to start running and doing other exercises with me? I need to up my game if I intend on living a long life and accomplish my own ambitions. I'm planning on doing it either way, but I figured you'd want to join me."

Mikasa merely nodded in her assent before lying her head back down to see if she could fall back asleep for a bit.

"While I understand their circumstances, still... It's strange, seeing all these people crowding around to watch us go. It's not like we are doing anything we haven't done before." Levi muttered to himself and to Commander Erwin.

"It's as the symbol on our jackets indicates. We give them hope for freedom. Most of these people are homeless refugees from Wall Maria. It's all they can do to survive at this point. Even if we are never successful, the hope we provide them is meaningful in and of itself. Either way, it's good to let them have what they can get, and there is no need to linger on their behavior anyways." Erwin responded to him. It was a brief conversation, but he understood Levi's observation. People were getting more desperate as time went on. If things could be considered hard before, now with less than half their original land, the situation for some people could probably be considered impossible. It was no wonder people were so desperate for something to glom onto. However, with the threat of another titan attack hanging at any moment, humanity would need some sort of a breakthrough in order to survive.

Still, I have this weird feeling in my gut about this trip. I'm not sure what it is but something is going to happen. I can feel it. Whatever it is though, we'll manage because we have to.

Levi and Erwin looked through the civilians as they passed through on their way to the gates.

Everyone was gathered with visible excitement. The opportunity to see the Survey Corps as they leave to once again resume the reclamation of their territory was one not many wanted to miss. It was another trip at attempts to establish an outpost in titan territory, paving the way for further advancement. Ever since Erwin Smith had become the new commander of the corps, a new wave of support towards them had resurged as a result of their newfound success. Between Erwin's cunning and his ingenuity, the Scouts had been returning with fewer and fewer casualties while extending their influence into titan territory further and further. Never before had success of this magnitude been seen against the titans.

In the grand scheme of victory over the titans it may not have been a large step, but it was certainly valuable. This group was setting a precedent of non-defeats against the titans. When fighting an unstoppable, ever-mysterious foe like the titans, it's hard to conclusively say any of their campaigns were victories, but at the minimum humanity no longer was facing harsh defeat at the hands of the monsters.

Understandably, the people who had been expelled from their homes were quite supportive of these efforts. To go from having their own homes to nothing in a single day has many longing for what once was. Whether anyone truly believes that it's possible to go home at this point is anyone's guess, but they at least could rally behind the hope that it is possible. Still, no one knows if it is actually possible to beat the titans, but if anyone could find a way to do it, it was this current group of scouts lead by Erwin. And not only did they have Commander Erwin, but they had Captain Levi, a man widely renowned as the strongest human alive; a man said to be as strong as an entire platoon by himself.

Yeah, if ever there was a group that would reclaim their lands, it was this group.

And so the civilians crowd the streets to send off the Survey Corps as they leave again. Unknown to anyone though, another party is to be leaving the walls as well, his hope that the survey corps will attract most of the nearby titan attention so his journey back home can go as smoothly as possible.

Fate. What a novel concept, one that Grisha Yeager had never paid any mind considering if it existed, it had been absolutely awful to him and almost everyone he knew up until this point. It was certainly not anything he put any stock into as a result of all the things that had transpired. But the fact that things had managed to play out so perfectly for him was a damn good argument in it's favor. It was either fate, or the best damned luck he'd ever had in his life up until that point.

Maybe it wasn't fate, but karma? He hadn't heard that concept in such a long time, the idea that what goes around comes around, but considering how his life had gone at this point, it was certainly possible.

Getting sold out by his own son after treating said son like an object, a means to an end, rather than his own flesh and blood certainly seemed like karma. Perhaps this opportunity was karma in the other direction? Although he's not sure what he had done to deserve it if that were the case, but he would take advantage of the situation, that's for sure.

In either instance, fate or karma, he certainly wasn't going to complain about how events had transpired for his current venture.

The opportunity the Survey Corps provided him was perfect. The fact that they were leaving from Trost, today itself was a miracle for him. With what little time he had, he was going to leave whether this opportunity had presented itself or not.

He was desperately running out of time at this point. He didn't know the exact dates, but he wagers he has less than a month at this point.

But thanks to the scouts, his journey should be significantly safer at least for the start of his trip. It was understood that titans would get attracted to larger groups of people, so while the Survey Corps are off doing their jobs, the large majority of titans in the area should migrate towards them. As long as he stayed an optimal distance away, nearby titans shouldn't be a problem. Meanwhile, if he did need to transform to defend himself they would hopefully not notice it and come investigating. It wasn't necessarily a perfect plan, but it was the best he would get in the time he had.

After all, he dared not transform anywhere near the scouts if it could be avoided. Even if they didn't kill him on the spot in titan form, the alternative would be that they capture him, and that was not a conversation he was ready or willing to have. Not in his current predicament with what little time he had left. He didn't know who he could trust with his goals, still.

He was able to learn in advance that the Survey Corps were leaving today due to overhearing a drunken conversation between soldiers a few days ago. Necessary information in order to ensure he was ready to go when they left, largely due to the fact that he needed a way to smuggle his horse outside the walls in advance so he could travel on it rather than on foot as his titan. He had enough knowledge of titan transformations to understand that he shouldn't transform unless absolutely necessary. He likely wouldn't be able to get away with transforming and running the whole way there, then running the whole way back, without help so that wasn't an option. In addition, the fatigue he would face after a transformation was an experience best avoided in a place where one wasn't sure of his own safety.

Thus, travelling by horse was his only choice. Which came back to his other fortune, the gate guards were blackout drunk so he had been able to smuggle his horse outside the walls and hide it that previous night just before the Survey Corps were leaving. With his horse already out there, all he had to do was sneak away in the chaos of the crowd, get to his horse, and start heading back towards Shiganshina.

Speaking of which, it was time to leave.

Silence. Absolute silence. A gentle breeze blows through the area but besides the breeze there is nothing. No people. No animals. Just one lone titan. Standing completely still, its face as unchanging as ever. No other titans are in the area. Whenever one happens to go past on its way towards in inward walls, there is no interaction in any way.

Just the single, smiling titan with an even emptier-than-normal look in its eyes stands absolutely motionless over the wreckage of the Yeager's house.

Okay. I'm pretty sure all the groundwork has been laid out. Next chapter things should start happening. Don't expect too much in terms of writing fighting with titans though. I'll cover it at the minimum in that it's happening and I'll do what I can, but I have doubts with how well I'll be able to describe it. We'll see what happens