Creation began on 06-10-17
Creation ended on 07-19-17
Neon Genesis Evangelion
Hope from the Sky: Love and War
Misato couldn't believe she was standing in front of a heavily-secured Titan of fifteen meters. The creepiest thing of it wasn't that it was a giant, nude man with no external genitalia, making it look like a type of doll without the clothing, but the fact that it looked a lot like the Suzuhara boy. She thought it was a good thing the Titan was secured within the deepest bowels of NERV HQ.
"Hard to believe," she heard Hyuga say.
"Insane," added Shigeru.
"It looks just like us," went Maya, bothered by the way it looked at them, like it could still hurt them, "but it's not like us, is it?"
"That's what we're going to find out, eventually," said Ritsuko.
"Rrrraaugh!" The Titan roared at them for the eighth time, unable to move due to the so-called anti-Angel defense system restraining the Titan with heavy metal cables. "Rrrrraurgh!"
"Every time it does that," Misato uttered, "it gives me the creeps to no end."
"Maybe Shinji was right," went Hyuga. "Maybe it was a mistake to try and obtain any of them. I know we have two of them, but this one's fierce enough. It's like looking at a man that hates everyone to the very bone."
Misato didn't fault him for this. How could she? Even she was starting to think that it was a mistake to have these Titans here…even if it was the sake of powering the Evas. She just felt that this was no way to obtain power, even if it seemed the most beneficial.
-x-
Gendo was impressed by the sight of the vials of Titan Serum displayed on his desk. To think that the key to creating Titans was so simple as an injection with a serum that these strangers gave them when they asked for it? Now, all he needed were test subjects to use it on and discover how to create it for future use. His son had thought he could keep the power of the Titans away from NERV, only to fail miserably and be beaten by a greater authority.
Foolish boy, he thought, holding up one of the vials, with a language written on it that was eerily similar to that of the Japanese language, reading it to find that the vial's contents were capable of turning people into Titans of the strongest degree. You thought you could keep me away from this power we now possess? You disappoint me immensely. And soon, you will pay for running away.
-x-
On the far side of the carrier, hidden behind the island section, Shinji and Kaede had ample privacy to resume their conversation. It was mainly Shinji that was trying to comprehend what he had been asked earlier by the girl…and his heart was still trying to find a steady rhythm after being asked the question the girl had uttered.
"Kaede," he spoke, hoping he understood where she was coming from with her question, "surely, I'm not the type of guy you'd want to…be with."
"Why would I need to have a type? The truth is, I've stayed away from men ever since Wall Maria fell, after what that man did to me, fearing that if I ended up having children of my own someday, they'd be monsters, just like the Titans. You took away that fear. And before I even got to know you, hearing that it was you that made it possible for us all to take back Wall Maria, I just wanted to see the young man that gave hope back to the people, willing to put up being surrounded by many men if it meant getting a glimpse of you. Do I really need a type of man to like?" She asked him. "Not every girl wants someone to be tough…or smarter than others…or something of the sort. Not even successful in a good career or because of who their parents are or were. I don't even care if you think you have nothing without the Eva. So…do I have a shot at you…or don't I?"
It sounded like Kaede really didn't have a preference in men if she meant all of that. She just wanted to know if she had a chance with Shinji romantically.
A long time ago, after being abandoned by his father, Shinji lacked any dreams or ambitions, never aspiring to any career or profession. And yet, he was drafted into a life of violence at NERV by his father…and then found himself caught up in a life-or-death struggle between people and giant man-eaters of unknown origin until a deeper revelation revealed that it was a war between two nations that dominated the world he was stranded in. Even then, he chose to side with the Eldians he had met when he arrived here because they had been isolated behind giant walls to protect themselves when they thought they were the last of the human race, nothing more than a clever deception because of the centuries of being unable to venture past the Walls in fear of the Titans…instead of siding with the Marleyans and their propaganda that involved using the Eldians in their possession as slaves to obtain the Founding Titan's power. He still had a desire for a life after this was all over, free of the Eva, somewhere out there where he could do whatever he wanted with his life because he felt he had no way to return home…even when one such way involved abandoning the Eldians, the people that needed his help…and…those he felt connected to here.
"Do you…really not care about what kind of life I may have without the Eva?" He asked her, wanting to know just important he was without the Eva interfering with his identity.
"The Eva is really just a tool," she told him. "It's not the Eva that gives anyone hope. It's the young man that chose to use it to give hope to the people that holds the real hope for everyone. Even if there was someone else that could use it to continue that drive, I'd still want to be the one that gave me back the possibilities of my future, and that's you. You can be…whatever you want to be…and I'll still want to be with you."
Shinji looked down at his left hand, closing it into a loose fist…and then back up at Kaede.
"Then…all I can ask you is…do I have a shot with you?" He asked her.
"Yeah," she answered him. "You have a shot with me."
"Then…you have a shot with me."
She hugged him closely. It felt really good.
Shinji raised his arms and held her shoulders. He actually had a girlfriend now. There was no other feeling like this in his life. It felt…really good to his heart.
"I should let you know," he told her. "I have absolutely no experience with this sort of relationship."
"It's okay," she responded. "I don't have any, either."
-x-
"You actually think he has a girlfriend over there, Asuka?" Kaji asked as the redhead got set to go back to the world of the Titans.
"He does, and that's wrong!" Asuka told him.
"Jealous?"
"Hardly! Why would any girl want anything to do with him? He's spineless, he can't do anything right, he tried to keep NERV from obtaining the Titans. He's even turned his back on us. If anything, this only proves how it was a mistake right from the start to put him in the Eva! And who told him that it was alright for him to find a girlfriend over there in a world he doesn't even belong in? If I can't have a boyfriend, he can't have a girlfriend!"
To Kaji, that sounded a lot like jealousy…and he wasn't even sure that Shinji had found a romantic interest in this other world. He had seen the small footage of the girl emerging from the large Titan's body, but Shinji's voice uttering what they had assumed was the girl's name left much to be ascertained in its entirety.
"The only good thing about going back is that we don't need to gather any more Titans for the time being," Asuka stated, "meaning this is simply just a minor pickup."
But there was nothing in the girl's orders from Commander Ikari to indicate that this was just a simple pickup. Not when it was able to be viewed, perceived, as nothing more than an unjustifiable abduction.
-x-
"What is this?" Reiner asked the Survey Corps member that served him and Annie their meal, holding up a plastic utensil in his left hand.
"It's called a spork," the guy answered. "This city's got dozens of these things. Simple relics of the past we're taking back to the present."
"And you thank your so-called hope from the sky for them?" Annie asked him, being watched carefully by Mikasa as she ate her meal.
"The future's ours because of him," the guy explained. "The civilians, they admire the guy. Half my friends wonder if he has other abilities he has yet to demonstrate that can end this nightmare for good, and the other half want to know what his plans are for when he gets older. Don't either of you have any plans for when you get older…or do your orders from this Marleyan government are all that matter to you, not your future?"
Annie didn't answer…and just picked up her cup of sweet tea; it was rumored by Sasha that the young woman that could turn into the Female Titan had a taste for sweets.
-x-
Necessary Deception
Kaede only knew about this because Shinji told her, deciding not to keep secrets from her, and that because she, too, was now a harbinger of hope for the people because of her power…and it was quite disturbing to some of the Survey Corps members that had been present, particularly Eren, Mikasa and Armin, how the girl was taking the idea very well.
"If my Dark Titan spinal fluid restores a mindless Titan back to human form," she stated, unsure about the idea actually bearing results desired, "then it could remove the power of a Titan Shifter. I don't know for sure."
"Still, it's only because Shinji suggested it," said Armin to them, "and we don't know for certain if we can take their powers away."
"The Eva was somehow able to take away Bertolt's power when we thought Shinji had killed him," added Eren, which made Shinji shudder at the thought of actually murdering someone with a conscious. "But we didn't have any means to understand what happened, exactly."
That's when Kaede asked, "The day the Colossal… I mean, Mr. Hoover was defeated, was that around the same time Shinji and his Eva fell from the sky?"
"That's right," Mikasa answered. "Why?"
"This is probably something else I can pin on Grandfather, but it might explain why that day I went and became the Dark Titan again after so long, it was much bigger than I had expected it to be."
"Bigger?" Shinji asked; he had never seen her Titan's original stature before that day in the city.
"It was over five years ago," Armin explained. "When Wall Maria fell and Shiganshina was invaded. The Titan that…"
Shinji had only the barest of information regarding that day. What he did understand was that it was the day the Dark Titan was encountered…and the same day that Eren almost watched his mother get killed by a Titan.
"It's okay, Armin," said Eren to him. "It doesn't hurt as much, anymore."
"The Titan that nearly killed Eren's mother was attacked and killed by the Dark Titan," Armin resumed. "It was almost eighteen meters in height. Far bigger than the regular Titans."
"I was that big in the beginning?" Kaede asked. "When I changed for the second time, my intention was still to help Shinji, but I didn't expect my Titan form to be massive. When Mr. Hoover was defeated, I might've obtained his power as a consequence."
This suspicion was really hard to comprehend because it seemed impossible, even though the knowledge they had discovered over the short amount of time was also just as impossible. Even if a Titan Shifter wasn't devoured and could live to a ripe age and die of natural causes, the power of the Titan would, as they had discovered, just relocate itself into an Eldian child, regardless of time, space and background, and then they'd have the power awaken in their possession and be drafted into the conflict by Marley. But if such a thing was possible, then it meant that Kaede was now similar to Eren in the fact that they had two different Titans in their possession…though the second Titan she possessed was one of the nine Titans the Marleyans no longer possessed.
"Excluding the steam generation used in ways different from the other Titans," said Hange, "all that makes the Colossal Titan stand out from the other Titans…is its size. Its size, however, makes it a slow target, difficult for it to either attack or defend itself."
"Lesser Titans can move quicker than the bigger ones," said Shinji, but then had to reiterate and correct himself. "Lesser Titans that are able to move quicker, that is."
"But…how do you know for sure that you got the power of the Colossal and it's not just a side-effect of having spent the last few years without a triggered transformation?" Armin questioned her.
"I don't," she answered him. "Just a feeling. Nothing more than a feeling."
"Still," went Shinji, "if Marley doesn't have the Armored or Female Titans at their disposal, they'll be reduced to only four of the nine Titans that they do have."
Even though it was only a theoretical possibility, they really had nothing to lose by trying this attempt. But if it failed, then they had nothing to really gain, either. It was in the hands of fate to use Kaede's Titan power to deal a crippling blow to the enemy by removing two more threats to the Eldian people that lived within the Walls from the Marleyans that would exploit them.
-x-
As Reiner drank his cup of sweet tea, Mikasa hoped that he and Annie couldn't taste the Dark Titan spinal fluid that had been mixed in with the tea to mask its potential taste.
Annie put her cup down and resumed eating her sandwich.
"Shift change, you two," said one of two older female corps members as they showed up in the makeshift cell. "New orders from Captain Erwin."
The man left, but Mikasa stayed behind a moment longer to watch the two Titan Shifters.
"Don't take your eyes off them," she told the women as she left. "Especially her."
-x-
"…It doesn't seem like they noticed," went Shinji to Levi and Erwin as they watched the two Titan Shifters through the surveillance camera system in a different room as they consumed the spiked beverages he hoped would strip them of their powers.
"For the time being, we'll keep watch over them," said Erwin to the Eva pilot, "but for now, you and Ms. Sogen should head to the Walls."
In his plugsuit, the boy nodded and left the room to get to his Eva to respond to a message of smoke signals from the Walls.
The plan of attack was simply to reduce the Titans that were once the foundation of the wall that was destroyed by Asuka and Unit-02, returning them to humanity. And Kaede was getting into the idea of being a harbinger of hope for the people, not a monster as she had believed herself to be.
-x-
All Gendo had to do was tempt SEELE with the footage of one of the two Titans NERV currently had to get them to sign off on the new operation to acquire the girl they discovered could turn into a Titan that was of similar height to an Evangelion. The research into the Titan Serums was underway, with the searching for volunteers to risk their own lives as guinea pigs to further their Eva research within the realm of plausibility. Now if they had a person able to turn into one at will (and with an emotional attachment to the Third Child), they'd be another step closer to being all the more stronger against the Angels.
"Tread with caution, Ikari," SEELE 01 had told him. "For all you know, what was viewed in the footage may have only been a one-time thing. And if it isn't, you don't know how these people will react to your intention to take this girl from them. They may take offense."
Still, if NERV was to regain Unit-01, this was a risk they had to take. And Gendo was willing to have as many of these people from the other world slaughtered if it meant regaining Unit-01 and its Titan-fueled power.
-x-
"…I don't believe this," said Shinji as he, Kaede and a handful of the Survey Corps' veteran members made it to Wall Maria and saw it missing a massive portion of its structure. "Asuka, you're going to be the death of people here if I find out they were because of you."
With everyone riding atop the Eva, they held on as it ran across the expanse of land to reach Wall Rose.
"I can't believe an Eva was able to decimate that much of the wall," said a female member beside Kaede as she held onto Unit-01's neck. "And the worst part is that they did so on purpose."
"Titans!" They heard Shinji's voice coming from the Eva, and they saw several Titans, similar to the Colossal in appearance, but more muscly and a few meters smaller. "There's gotta be at least over fifty of them."
Fifty Titans? Kaede thought, terrified to see that this Asuka girl that Shinji mentioned had intentionally unleashed so many Titans from the wall because Shinji chose not to return to their world with the Eva he controlled or a number of Titans for their own purposes. And based on the layout of the Walls, they must be made of tens of thousands of Titans. Tens of thousands of Eldian lives cut off from the world. But…if she was able to destroy that much of Wall Maria…then she was likely able to get a few of the Titans for the people she serves, too.
"Shinji, what if the red behemoth was able to take a few of the Titans that made up the wall?" A male member of the group asked him.
"That's what I'm afraid of her doing," he responded as they were within attacking range of the Titans that were just standing in front of Wall Rose. "What the… They're not doing anything."
This was something that Kaede and the veterans took notice of, as well. The Titans just stood in front of the wall. There wasn't a single one that made any attempt to attack it or any of the people that were on it as they fired smoke flares to get the Eva and the corps members' attention.
"Why don't they do anything?" One of the men, Hannes, questioned. "There's people right there in front of them."
"Maybe they can't," Kaede suggested. "Maybe they're still too weak from being deprived of sunlight for so long. They were recently released by the red Eva a few hours ago, so it's possible they only got a little sunlight just to move. When the sun returns, they'll replenish their energy and then attack."
"Then we need to stop them before that happens. Are you ready, Ms. Sogen?" Another male member asked the girl.
Kaede looked over the Eva and at the ground, shuddering at the height they were at; as much as she thought about it, she wasn't ready to try jumping off anything and turning into the Dark Titan in that fashion, even if she was willing to put her power to good use for her people and their ancestors.
"Can I please do this on the ground?" She asked them, and Shinji brought up Unit-01's left hand for her. "Thank you."
She hopped on and was set down to the ground as Unit-01 took a few steps back; Titan transformations tended to invite potential harm to anyone that was within a certain radius of the people that could trigger them.
"You hungry for your humanity, you big uglies?" She questioned them. "Come eat some of this!"
She took out a small knife and cut into her right wrist, her goal that of letting the Titans bit her arms and legs to ingest her spinal fluid and be restored to human form.
BOOM! Her transformation was triggered, unleashing a lot of heat and steam as she generated the mass of her Titan form.
When it was completed, Shinji and the veterans saw a great change in the Dark Titan that was unexpected and beyond what was imagined. While still being one-hundred meters in height and still dark in its coloration, the Dark Titan now sported a more feminine physique, similar to the Female Titan, and its torso area seemed thickened, as if covered in armor plating, reaching up to its neck.
"My God," gasped several of the veterans.
She has their powers now, thought Shinji in realization. The power of the Female and Armored Titans.
The Dark Titan slowly examined itself before giving off an intimidating roar towards the other Titans.
Suddenly, the Titans turned away from the wall and at it…and gave into their impulse to attack and feed off it to sustain themselves. They ran as fast as their forms would allow them, and tackled the Dark Titan to the ground, biting into its arms and legs, unable to break the skin on its torso due to the strange, dense flesh that covered it.
Within Unit-01, Shinji watched with such a fearful expression that he worried that Kaede would get hurt because of the large number of Titans that were trying to eat her. Even if she now had armor up to her nape to provide her with a degree of protection against being eaten, it didn't erase his concern for her safety; as the boyfriend, he had to be concerned for her safety.
"Grrrraurgh!" Some of the Titans shrieked as they moved away from the Dark Titan's legs, grabbing at their throats as they began to give off steam and evaporate.
"It's working!" Hannes shouted, seeing other Titans that bit into the Dark Titan move away from it as they gave off steam.
As they fell, more Titans climbed over the rest, always trying to chew their way through to the dark one's accessible flesh. None of them were ever the wiser as to what they would get for trying to eat it. They simply attacked, ate as much as they before succumbing to the spinal fluid they unknowingly ingested, and backed away as they choked and evaporated, letting the others have their turn on its regenerating flesh.
Within the confines of the armored nape, Kaede could only watch and wait for these Titans' numbers to dwindle down as they were given back their lives and future. She saw four of them tear off her left arm at the shoulder joint…but felt no pain or experienced blood loss; only the Dark Titan body was getting punished by these mindless cannibals, not the young woman that possessed the power to set them free. None of them could get through the plating of bone that covered her form.
"Grraurgh!" The ones feasting on the severed limb choked on the spinal fluid in it as they pulled away and fell to the ground, evaporating. "Graugh!"
Just let them feast until they're all gone, she thought as the severed arm began to regenerate as more mindless Titans tried to eat away at her form. If it gets bad, I signal to Shinji, and he comes to my aid with the others, harming instead of killing.
So far, maybe more that forty of the Titans had feasted upon the Dark Titan, leaving the rest gathering for their final feast. None of them exhibited any increase in intelligence from watching the fallen members evaporate, only able to follow their most simple impulse to feed.
-x-
The larger Titan NERV HQ possessed was isolated to a chamber in Terminal Dogma, deprived of sunlight, completely immobile. Several armed guards stood in front of the humanoid, but it did nothing to indicate that it knew they were there. So far, the order was to keep it away from sunlight and run similar tests to it as they were with the fifteen-meter Titan, seeing that one of their remarkable qualities was their ability to regenerate. But the regeneration seemed hindered by the lack of sunlight, since it took eight hours for the large one to regrow its left arm when it was blown off by a small charge, making Dr. Akagi suspect that sunlight played a vital role in their physical activity.
"If people that can turn into these things at will, will they possess the same ability to regenerate?" Ritsuko wondered, getting the MAGI ready to record an X-ray of the Titans. "Such an ability would be useful if it could be applied to all humans."
-x-
Thirty minutes. That's how long it took to take out all the Titans from the destroyed section of Wall Maria with the Dark Titan spinal fluid. And the current population of Eldian people from within the Walls were increased by eighty-seven more men and women. It was a sight that reminded the Survey Corps and Shinji how invaluable this new form of hope was that freed people from the endless nightmare of being a Titan without free will.
Kaede, once her Titan body had served its purpose, emerged from the evaporating carcass, unscathed and feeling relieved that the Titans were gone for the time being.
"…Ugh…what happened?" One of the men questioned as they stood up where they fell as Titans.
"You've been set free from a curse that's been long overdue to happen," she told him.
"Wha…what is that giant, purple giant?" A woman asked.
"A friend."
The only thing they all had to deal with now was that the people restored to normal were as bare as the day they drew their first breath, something that Shinji, even in the plug, was bothered by and turned away to spare himself the embarrassment of being around them.
It would be a while before he could have Unit-01 consume the remains of the Dark Titan to put more power in the Eva's internal battery.
-x-
"…If the Marleyans find out that you turned on them, they'll kill you, Bertolt," Reiner said to the former Colossal Titan from within his makeshift cell.
"I still have nightmares of attacking the people of Shiganshina from five years ago, you two," Bertolt responded. "That and Trost are enough on my conscience."
"They are the enemy," went Annie in her makeshift cell. "They brought their deaths upon themselves."
"No, we did when we attacked them. They never knew anything about the world outside the Walls. As crazy as it seems, I'm grateful that I lost the Colossal Titan to them. I'm grateful that Marley lost the Colossal. Ever since that day I attacked Wall Rose for the second time, the same time that purple giant appeared, all the way up to the present, I've begun to actually doubt the Marleyans and whatever promise they made to my parents years ago. And while it's true that neither side is right in what was done long ago, neither side is wrong for what was done, either. Both are wrong for the wars, the fighting over things, the ethnic cleansing and Titan exploitation. Yet that young man who has become the Eldians' hope from the sky… Even though I've not seen him, he has a simple reason for siding with the Eldians; the ones from the Walls, he views as innocent of their ancestors' crimes because they did nothing to deserve anything we did to them…just as our parents and their parents did nothing wrong to deserve what was done to them. The whole thing about how the sins of the parents shouldn't be carried by the children or something of the sort. He sees each of us, he sees people suffering from something someone else did long ago…and how we'll still paying for it all. He hasn't seen a Marleyan yet, but he knows what to expect from them; absolutely no mercy or desire to try and speak of peace between the two nations."
"Yet he's not an Eldian or a Marleyan, so why side with the losing nation that thinks they can turn this all around?" Annie asked.
"Because he saw them in danger first," Bertolt explained. "If it were the other way around, he'd probably make the same choice to aid the Marleyans if they lived behind the Walls. Before he even knew about the war, he thought the same thing as the Eldians; that they were all that was left of mankind in the whole world. Now that he knows better, he still chooses to side with them. And I want to see the war stop as soon as possible because of him. I want to see my family while I'm still alive."
Those last words made Reiner think about what he had that passed for his family. Ever since he could remember, it was just he and his mother in the internment camps…and his discovery of why his father was never around for either of them. It was the same reason why his mother sent him to join the Marleyans' warrior program for the attack on Paradis. If he became a warrior for Marley and was successful in the capture of the Founding Titan, not only would they would be accepted as citizens of Marley, but his mother could be with his father…and he'd be free of his personal stigma.
"We all want what we were drafted into this war for," he expressed.
-x-
"…You did good out there, Kaede," said Hannes to the girl that was the Dark Titan as they and the others took rest in Trost for the night with the eighty-seven people they saved.
"Thank you," she accepted.
Meanwhile, Shinji wandered around the streets of the city that was empty of its previous citizens, trying to wrap his head around the fact that he had used the Eva to relocate so many people away from the Walls. He was reminded of his brief time in Tokyo-2 before he ever encountered an Angel…and then that very brief glimpse of the blunette that piloted the one-eyed Eva. For a brief moment, he had been confused by why he saw her, but after a while, he decided to put it out of his mind, that some questions were better left unanswered. And it wasn't like he missed her or anything, but he was now in a committed relationship with Kaede…and he wanted to be with her.
"Careful, kid," he heard Hannes say to him, swinging in from around a building. "You can get lost around here."
"I try to stay close to the wall," he told him. "Sometimes, I still find it hard to believe that I cleared out an entire district."
"Eight districts, seventeen small villages and an underground city, kid. You set us free from a large cage. It's only the citizens of Wall Sina that didn't want to leave, but we can't force them."
Then, just because of the fact that he had been informed that this Rod Reiss had an illegitimate child somewhere that was being searched for, Shinji felt the need to ask, "Suppose we find Mr. Reiss' surviving kid… What will be done to them?"
"The mysterious Reiss kid? Still leading towards the being questioned and later pardoning. Still can't find them and the bastard isn't talking. Why?"
"Just wishful thinking."
"Ever since I found out what you were capable of, a lot of that has been going on. Wishful thinking. Just praying, hoping that the Titans are all gone."
"As long as the Walls still stand and there are people that exploit the ancient power discovered long ago, the Titans will still be around. But so long as we can fight them and have the methods we now have to keep them in check, we can still have a future beyond the Walls."
"Shinji!" They heard Kaede as she ran over to where they were, carrying two small packages with her.
"Hey, Kaede," he greeted her.
"You cannot let me eat these rations by myself, even if they aren't as awful as I heard they used to be."
"I rarely ate them, but they aren't bad."
"Honestly, Shinji, you cook better food."
"Oh, really?" Hannes questioned. "You cook?"
"Well, when you used to live with a woman that was your commanding officer who couldn't cook even to save her own life, you have to adapt to survive," Shinji expressed. "Though, in all honesty, I learned to cook from an early age."
"Your parents must be proud of your skill."
Kaede turned her head away to spare Shinji's feelings regarding his father.
"I really wouldn't know for sure," Shinji told Hannes. "My mother died when I was little and my father is completely indifferent about me. I don't think he truly cares about me. He just wants back the Eva and whatever Titans he can get from here."
"But…there's a possibility that these people you used to be in league with before you ended up here have already obtained some Titans."
"And that's what makes me afraid for the innocent people back on my world. Just because Titans can't spread like a plague doesn't mean they're not dangerous if they got loose. If we didn't have the means to restore them back to human form, the only good Titan is one that is down and out for the count. Even if NERV knew how to kill them, I doubt they'd care much for such a way to stop them."
"Then…the innocent people there would be condemned only because of what that agency you turned rogue on have chosen," said Kaede, "not because of the Titans they took."
She then handed him his field ration; she had to be honest, before she became involved in this all, her tastes were more directed towards the simple cuisine that regular citizens were accustomed to, not these crummy scraps that the Survey Corps had to make do with. While she was getting used to them, she prayed for the day where they wouldn't need to rely on these, anymore.
"Hmm?" She went, seeing someone across the street from them.
"Kaede?" Shinji asked, and the person she saw was no longer there. "What's wrong?"
"I thought I… I thought I saw one of the girls you mentioned working with over there across the street," she explained, pointing to where she saw the girl. "She had blue hair."
"Ayanami?" He spoke; if this were true, then he wasn't the only one that saw a strange person before they ever met in person.
But he was hoping that nothing happened to result in Ayanami coming to this world like Asuka had. Dealing with the redhead was enough. To have to deal with both girls was just adding more to his plate than he could manage…and it was hard to cross the line he hoped not to cross with Asuka.
"Hey," went Kaede, taking a bite out of her rations, "after this, we should probably deal with that other guy from before. The one they're calling the Beast Titan."
The Beast Titan to the people, but to the select few, including Shinji himself, the man was revealed to be none other than a piece of a past Eren knew not of his father: Zeke Yeager, the firstborn son of Grisha Yeager…and Eren's half-brother.
"Yeah," agreed Hannes to her suggestion. "He's the only one left that we know of with Titan powers that's out to get us."
And now we have a secret weapon to negate him, thought Shinji, taking a bite out of his rations.
-x-
"…Do you think that Shinji has a girlfriend over there, Katsuragi?" Kaji asked Misato as they saw the plane that would be transporting Asuka back to Nevada getting prepared for takeoff.
"All we saw was a girl emerging from the nape of one of those giants and hearing Shinji say what we're just assuming is the girl's name," Misato responded. "If he does, however, it would help to explain any further reason to why he chose not to return here or why he didn't want us to have any of those giants, which I'm seeing as nothing more than an outright mistake on NERV's part. The smaller one tried to eat one of the scientists last night."
"Still, it would be interesting gossip if he did have one. You'd think he go for Rei or Asuka."
"You wish he would go for Asuka, but after everything that happened over there when we were trying to get him to come back willingly…or as willingly comes when Commander Ikari tries to use force to regain Unit-01, it's unlikely that Shinji will simply surrender himself or the Eva and leave these people that probably look up to him as some sort of hero or something."
Ring! Her cell phone rang, and she answered it.
"Katsuragi," she spoke. "What did you say?!"
-x-
Gendo was not impressed at all. There was no change in the Titans NERV had or contamination in the Titan Serums they had. It was something much worse than what they had anticipated.
An Angel was spotted in Nevada…but it went through the portal to the other world instead of trying to come to Tokyo-3.
Why? He wondered. Why would an Angel choose not to come here in favor of some other world where there aren't any Angels or Adam? It couldn't possibly be because of Unit-01.
Whatever the reason, Gendo needed to know what had prompted the Angel to deviate from what the Dead Sea Scrolls had ascertained.
-x-
Shinji awoke from a short rest and realized that he was alone in the small room he took with Kaede in the Trost District of Wall Rose. It was the only one that had two beds; despite their pairing, they weren't going to get entangled to that degree just yet.
"Kaede?" He called out to her, but got no answer from her. "Kaede?"
He got up and looked around the small house for her. Stepping into the kitchen area, he saw her at the table, looking like she had experienced something terrible.
"Kaede?" He asked again, and she looked up at him.
"Oh, Shinji," she responded. "I didn't hear you come in."
"What's wrong, Kaede?"
"Just a nightmare…of things I had forgotten…and wish not to remember."
He sat beside her at the table and asked, "What did you dream about?"
"That man again. My step-grandfather. I heard him saying more of what he told me that night he turned me into a Titan Shifter. He kept spouting things like 'Yeager', 'hunter', 'Titan' and 'god-like'. The last thing I saw before I woke up was him shooting himself with a needle in his right arm." She explained the details of her nightmare. "I must've been half-dazed."
Shinji then noticed how Kaede held her arms close to her chest; it was the way she caressed her exposed skin, reminding him that her step-grandfather had injected her arms and legs with some variation of a Titan Serum, implying that her nightmare wasn't really a figment of her imagination.
"Kaede," he spoke, "did it feel like a nightmare? I mean, did it feel like it was actually happening to you? I'm noticing the way you're caressing your arms; people hold certain areas on their bodies where they were…harmed. They call it phantom pain."
Kaede thought about it, and sighed. In her nightmare, it felt like her step-grandfather was injecting her all over again. Sometimes, she woke up in the dead of night with pain in her arms and legs, exactly where the needles punctured her. And then, there was that expression the man made as she saw him injecting himself with a needle, some…sickening, depraved expression.
"Yes, Shinji," she answered him. "Yes, it did feel like it was really happening to me. Why?"
"It's possible that it wasn't a dream…but the rest of your memory of what happened to you that day. Sometimes, when people want to forget about something that they can't face or bring up because of some emotional aspect to it, they just…repress it, carpartmentalize in some area of their subconscious to bury it as best they can."
"Then I guess I didn't do that enough. As much as I try to see this power as an aid to the people's salvation and freedom from the Walls and now their freedom from isolation on an island from these Marleyans…I can't stop feeling so angry at what he did to me…and…"
She sighed and placed her hands on the table.
"What is it, Kaede?" He asked, wanting to know the extent of her feelings toward this man. "I want to know, whatever it is."
"Ever since the day Wall Maria fell, I've wanted to believe that he died…but…I can't bring myself to believe in such a want. What if he isn't dead?"
Shinji couldn't find a right answer for her. Even though he'd never even seen so much as a picture of the man that hurt his girlfriend, these mentions of the kind of man he was made him suspect that if given the chance to save himself at the expense of his family, the guy would choose the path of self-preservation instead of accepting his fate. And if, by some act of some sort of deity or dark act of fate, he was very much alive instead of dead, Shinji could only see him as a monster, not as a person, and he had harmed the lives of three people that were supposed to matter.
"If he's not dead, how could he possibly survive out there in Titan territory with only one leg?" He reminded her that he was physically handicapped and people with physical handicaps couldn't get very far in dangerous places.
"Suppose he found a way? What if…there was some personal reason for why he turned me into Titan Shifter. What if…it wasn't to help anyone…but to help himself?" Kaede suggested.
It wouldn't be within the realm of deniability for Shinji to suspect that. Because of the aftermath of Second Impact (even before then), there were dozens of people that suffered and did many things, most of which were either sick and depraved to try their best to save only themselves. Having very little and wanting more when terrible things happen to take away from one's life brings out unforeseen changes in their character, doing whatever it took to survive.
"Shinji… People have done such things in your world, too, haven't they?" She asked him.
"Yeah," he answered her. "It wouldn't be too farfetched, Kaede. He dabbled in something beyond him, let his curiosity drive his actions, maybe thinking he found something that could be used to his benefit, but didn't know what could happen to him if he tried it on himself, so he looks to someone else that could be used to see if it was worth trying."
"You mean…oh, what's that saying that isn't 'bait'?"
"Guinea pig, Kaede. You really think he used you as a guinea pig to see if his method to turning people into Titan Shifters was able to help himself?"
"I can't think of any other reason for why he would go to such extremes."
Neither could Shinji, for that matter. If this were the case, then not only was it selfish, but cruel and endangering to Kaede.
Don't even try to defend the guy, Shinji, his mind's sense of morality argued with him. If he did what he did just to save himself, then there was no guarantee that his method would even pan out. There was no guarantee that you would even be here with Kaede, that she would even be here. And you have to own up to the possibility of a drawback, since there's no guarantee that she doesn't even have a thirteen-year life sentence like the previous Titan Shifters.
But Shinji shook his head to clear his mind of such a thought. There was no way he would ever accept such a possibility. Not when she had saw in him, not the Eva, such hope for a future where she could be free and with someone like him…or anyone, for that matter. He just couldn't bring himself to believe in any negatives beyond what had been done to Kaede…and wouldn't bring himself to believe in such based on some form of retroactive fright.
"Shinji?" Kaede asked.
"Sorry," he apologized to her. "Bad thoughts that don't need to be in my head."
"My fault."
"No, just random thinking."
"Shinji?"
"Hmm?"
"Again, thank you for all that you've done since you fell from the sky."
"I'm glad that I met you that night in Shiganshina when I helped the Survey Corps take back Wall Maria after being told of the situation you were all in."
"Please, Shinji…kiss me."
He leaned over to her…and kissed her.
-x-
There was a lot of land on the continent, miles away from the large island that played host to the abomination that was somehow stronger than anticipated. If it went up against it now, it was guaranteed to lose more than its own life. That's why it was best to play it safe, observing other factions of this enemy that weren't an obstacle to its objective, which wasn't here. But a power far greater than what it had originally sensed caught its attention.
It was unlike the power that was nothing more than a perversion of the power its enemies exploited. It felt like its enemies, but without the power of its creator, substituted with the power of the planet itself.
-x-
"…I don't think I've ever seen such sight from atop the Walls, Shinji," said Kaede to her boyfriend as they watched the sunrise.
"It's really beautiful to watch the sunrise from anywhere," Shinji confessed, "but I've never really enjoyed such with anyone…anywhere."
"It's a beautiful sight from up here…or atop a roof… The tranquility, the calming breeze, the spaces and things bathed in the light. It's truly beautiful."
As they walked along Trost's portion of Wall Rose, Kaede felt better about herself with Shinji.
"We should dispose of the remaining Titan Shifters that Marley has as soon as possible, Shinji," she told him. "They might have weapons we don't possess, but if they lose their hold on the Titans, then they lose at least one of the only resources that gave them an edge."
"The only people with the power of the Titans…would be the ones with the power of the Dark Titan and Rogue Titan, whom, according to later revelations, is also called the Attack Titan."
"Attack Titan? Somehow, even if that is the real name of Mr. Eren Yeager's Titan form, it just doesn't feel right."
"That's exactly what I told Eren. It turns out that, regardless of the identity of the Titan he turns into, most of the Survey Corps refer to it as Rogue instead of Attack."
"And each of these Titans that only nine people can turn into has its own distinct identity?"
"Yes. The Nine Titans that were brought into existence after the death of the woman that discovered the power of the Titans, the original Titan Shifter. Each one is just a different part of what she was. So far, Grisha Yeager's notes and diaries spoke of most of the nine, but not all of them, each with a purpose or ability unique to itself."
Even Shinji found himself impressed by the details mentioned for each Titan that, as of for the time being, he had seen, fought against or fought alongside four of them.
The Colossal Titan, the only known Titan that was far more massive than the rest of them, including the ones inside the Walls that they made.
The Armored Titan, a walking shield of hardened plates that could be removed in exchange for more mobility and speed.
The Female Titan, which might've only been passable to women, a very nimble fighter that could defend herself with temporary armor and might've had other abilities that were now in Kaede's possession to exploit.
And the Beast Titan, the most inhuman-looking of the Titans seen so far.
Yet the Dark Titan, Kaede Sogen, now had the power of three of the four foes that became their allies. And Shinji suspected that if she had obtained the power of the Beast Titan, its inhuman features would manifest on the Dark Titan. Possibly longer arms or hair around the lower body. But no matter what the change, the girl would become just as powerful as the Titans were on their own.
"When this is all over," he heard Kaede say, "do you think they'll permit me to walk away and hope that the power of the Titans will just fade away?"
She had turned away from him and looked out at the expanse of terrain between Rose and Maria, so Shinji turned to her and held her shoulders.
"When this is all over…we can go someplace far from here and find a peaceful, quiet life. The Titans will become just another memory." He told her.
"Then…let's go make the Beast Titan another bad memory."
To be continued…
A/N: What did you think of the Dark Titan's power trip? Not only does her spinal fluid serve as a means to return Titans to people, but it can allow her to take the power of other Titan Shifters and add them to her own. How do you suppose that's possible?