Creation began on 10-09-18
Creation ended on 10-10-18
Neon Genesis Evangelion
Hope from the Sky: Commitment born of Devotion
A/N: After watching the most recent episode of Attack on Titan, I felt the need to write this chapter that deals with choices and reactions from two characters that are past and present.
Unlike with previous Titan Shifters that could only recall the memories of either the previous inheritor of one of the Nine Titans or required a bloodline relation, the Dark Titan had this abyss, this well of time, that enabled it to recall the memories of virtually everyone that ever had in their possession any of the Titans…and could converse with these amalgamated consciousnesses. This is what led to the conversation the Titan was having right now with the last mature inheritor of the Attack Titan and usurper of the Founding Titan…and it was turning into quite a debate over the human aspects of right and wrong.
"…You're not one of the Nine Titans," the echo of Grisha Yeager uttered to the Dark Titan as it stood in the perception of the cosmos, occupied by small buildings and bits of debris on the surface they were on, like a patch of land in a sea of stars. "What are you?"
"I am the Dark Titan," it answered him. "I am the Titan belonging to Kaede Sogen."
"And who was your inheritor before her?"
"There is no 'before'…just as there will be no 'after'. There is only Kaede Sogen."
"And what of the Nine Titans of Ymir Fritz? What happens to them if they're with her?"
"If everything follows the path that I'm on, the Nine Titans will all be a thing of the past, just as we will be."
"That's not right. My son, Eren, he has to free the people from the oppressed rule of the First King, to liberate Eldia from Marley, to…"
"You're wrong," the Dark Titan cut him off. "Your son, Eren Yeager, doesn't have to do any of that, anymore…and he can't, anymore, even if he wanted to. Kaede usurped him of the two Titans you forced upon him, taking them into herself, into myself, all in an attempt to obtain the Founder and to protect the people from the scornful wrath of her lover's father, who was willing to condemn them to death as long as it meant getting back at his son for refusing to submit to him. There are only two members of the Nines Titans left to gather, and when they're gathered, what is possible will be within Eldia's reach…and Kaede will be able to reach it for all of them."
"How can you be so sure of this?" Grisha asked. "If you're not one of the Nine Titans, then if something happens to her, you won't be passed onto a new inheritor, and the Titans that are a part of you will be lost forever, meaning it's necessary for there to be people to have these Titans to fight for Eldia."
"Because I am not like the Nine Titans of Ymir Fritz…for I am devoted only to Kaede Sogen; I can't replace her with another person and just hope for the best. Your Nine Titans, they're no different from parasites; they just move on from one person to another after the previous one can no longer serve a purpose. What separates me from them…is that I can't survive without the person that makes me whole. They can survive because they're not dependent upon you for their own survival. When you die, they just move onto the next convenient person that is within their reach…and the next one…and the next one…and the next one after."
"How can you be sure you won't survive when the girl dies?"
"Because I will not want to survive and move onto a new person like the Nine Titans do."
"What?"
"You accepted the power and damnation of the Attack Titan because the previous inheritor was already at his end…and took the Founder from the Reiss family because they couldn't do anything with it to help others, even if they wanted to, but you couldn't use it without a member of their family that wouldn't be influenced by the First King's will. Even as you were at your end with the power of the Titans, you condemned your son to the same fate because you couldn't do what you were started on yourself. But now, nobody has to worry about their fate at the hands of the Titans…because Kaede will be the last one to possess all of them and do something nobody else will be able to do."
"But won't she die in thirteen years, anyway?"
"No. That's another thing that sets me apart from the Nine Titans; I don't have a limit to how long Kaede has me. I guess you could view me as Kaede's…daughter in a sense if it adds clarity to our link. We're bound, Kaede and I. The time she has to live is dependent upon other factors, not by the power of the Titans. As far as I am concerned, and I am, she can live to be over eighty and I'll still be with her."
"You're that committed to her?"
"You don't know her step-grandfather, Grausam Zanki. It's only because of him that I exist inside her. Unlike him, I care about the girl and all that she loves. All he cares about is himself and power, whether it's in the form of the Titans' ability to regenerate injuries so long as their napes are unharmed…or the power Kaede's lover possesses in the form of his anti-Titan behemoth that he uses to protect the people of Paradis."
"How can you possibly know of this?"
"Because that soulless man gave me to her," she answered, just as a small statue of her human self materialized in front of them, looking serene, but there was a saddened expression on her face. "I don't know for sure what you call our union. Unholy, attempted homicide, illegal human experimentation…or just plain rape, but when he used her to get what he wanted to reclaim his lost leg, he made me. If I'm what you could view as a god, then he is, undoubtedly, the Devil incarnate. The Akuma Titan, opposite to what the Dark Titan represents."
"Akuma Titan? The girl and her boyfriend call this Titan the Devil. I saw a glimpse of him, but I didn't see how he could be such a being."
"How is anyone anything that can't be explained? Grausam Zanki is just a human being…devoid of any humanity. He's good at faking it, but that's all he's good at, just faking what makes us human. He's a vain individual, unable or unwilling to demonstrate sympathy, friendship, family bonds or even the most basic of compassion. He's basically an old man that spits on all the things we take for granted."
"And you hate him?"
"Kaede, her parents, her lover and the people he hurt, they hate him…but, yes, I also hate him. To him, nobody means anything to him…except as results. He cares nothing about their hopes or dreams, what they desire out of their lives. He never once even considered the possibility that he'd kill Kaede in his journey to regain his leg. To him, she was just a lab rat, completely devoid of meaning."
"But…why give her the Nine Titans? If they could ever be taken from her…"
"When she gets all of them, there will be no more Nine Titans. There will only be the Dark Titan. The Dark Titan, which has the combined strengths of the Nine Titans…and more. Kaede will be the only one of her generation that will have surpassed Ymir Fritz, the only one that will have surpassed her, period."
"Why? I mean, why her? Why not someone more qualified?"
"Fate? Fortune? Chance?"
"You don't know?"
"How does anyone know? People aren't equipped with instructions. There's no foresight, no glimpse of the future, but there shouldn't have to be. I know Kaede will do alright, though."
"How can you be so sure of her success when anyone else could pull it off?" Grisha asked.
"Because anyone else would've just killed to get what others have," the Dark Titan answered, "but not Kaede. Even if she wasn't in control during her first transformation and attacked dozens of Titans when Wall Maria was breached, she lacks the will to kill people that have done her no wrong or don't deserve death. Instead, there was a blessing in her curse, in my existence. Somehow, after acquiring the Colossal Titan and increasing her height to one-hundred meters, her spinal fluid saturated her blood or was distributed throughout her body when she turns into me, and anyone in Titan form or in possession of the power of the Titans…is returned to their previous state as human beings. She became hope for the people, just like her lover, just like your son had been before he lost his Titan power."
Grisha, even though he was just an echo of who he used to be when he made his son eat him, even after being relocated from Eren to Kaede, knew from the Dark Titan through this union of itself and the Attack Titan that the girl, albeit indirectly, had killed his first wife, Dina Fritz-Yeager, to save his second wife, Carla Yeager, sparing Eren of loss of his mother through murder. But even if she hadn't killed Dina back then, she couldn't have saved her or restored her to her human form.
"I know she didn't mean to do it, that she didn't have anything personal against Dina," he told the Dark Titan, "but tell me…did you have anything against her?"
"I had nothing against your first wife," she answered him. "My concern at that time was merely Kaede's life being saved from the Titans that attacked. Neither of us knew what they were, who they were. My concern for her life was because of her parents, her mother and stepfather, the only people she knew were there waiting for her. Even to this very day, my primary concern will always be her life. If her legs are broken, I'll mend them. If her organs get ruptured, I'll make them functional again. If her parents, her friends, the love of her life value her life above all other possessions…then her life has the greatest value to me."
Grisha had never expected to hear of this from anyone of this sort. It seemed impossible for anyone that was a Titan…to express concerns about anyone they were bonded to. As far as he or anyone else that possessed the power, the Titans were always tools of Eldia, meant to restore the people to their rightful place among the most powerful and influential. But the Dark Titan, it blew away his beliefs like they were ashes in the wind.
"It confuses you, doesn't it?" It asked him.
"A Titan concerned about its possessor's life? Yes. Being protective of anyone… It's a human emotion. But you…it shouldn't be possible."
"You're wrong about how it's only a human emotion. Yes, it's an emotion that those alive exhibit, but it's not limited to humans. It's also just a word. All that really matters from it being an emotion…and a word…is the connection they both imply to whoever or whatever they're implied to. Kaede's my commitment…born of the devotion of those that would do anything, give anything…just to continue being with her, to hold onto their connection to her."
Suddenly, all around the statue of Kaede, several statues of the people she knew, the people she loved as friends and family emerged from the ground. The former Attack Titan saw the statues of the girl's mother and stepfather, the boy addressed as Shinji Ikari, his son, Eren, Mikasa, Armin, the young queen addressed as Historia Reiss and a handful of other people the girl valued.
"So many," Grisha uttered, "and not for any desire like what I had."
"Revenge against the people that wronged you isn't always the best drive…even if it's a justifiable one. Anger clouds judgment, clouded judgment leads to reckless behavior, and reckless behavior…eventually leads to unforeseen consequences, sometimes of the self-inflicted variety if not of the inflicted by others variety."
"And yet…in just five years, the people of Paradis have been able to get more accomplished than even I had expected. But Eren, he…he…"
"Go on."
"I thought he'd be the one to do what I couldn't because I believed I was at my limit back then. I thought he'd be able to control the Titans and stop Marley for good and atone for our sins."
"What sins? People that commit the unforgivable onto others are the ones solely responsible for whatever fate awaits them in the future. This whole 'sins of the parents being visited upon the children' is nothing but a falsehood attempt to shift empty blame onto people that did nothing wrong to deserve whatever fates they were dealt with as they live and breathe. The First King, Karl Fritz, he became consumed with self-loathing by what his ancestors did in the past to get where they were in the present and chose to reverse it all in an attempt to atone, but it ended up making things worse to the point where even if he himself tried to resolve the matter, nothing would've changed…and he wouldn't have. And nobody within the Walls that were under his reign could've done anything to change their fate, not when he chose to renounce any means of conflict, even to protect the people they love. Even to this day, the Founding Titan is a force to be reckoned with when used to the full extent of its power. Anyone that had ideas of leaving the Walls to return to the world outside them were silenced, and if their memories couldn't be taken or they couldn't be bought into the silence of the world beyond them, they were removed from existence. No evidence of their past, no witnesses, no explanation. But now the Founding Titan has been usurped under a will far stronger than even its previous holders could've ever been."
"And you put a lot of faith in her, a girl of common descent, of low birth. Not even a chance of being a noble in the eyes of the people, and yet she's an adviser to a young queen alongside her boyfriend…simply because the queen needed people she could trust…and because she wanted to be someone she could trust."
"Royals and nobles aren't as adaptable as you may think they are, Grisha. Sometimes, it takes people born amongst the rubble, who are less than gold or silver, that live plain, ordinary lives…to make the greatest of differences in the world. Is your family any different from other commoners? Is Eren any different? Your sister? Your parents? What of your eldest son, Zeke? Did you really believe that he would liberate Eldia and return it to its former glory, that he'd be the hope that people needed?"
Grisha thought about Zeke, about how he stressed during his childhood that he needed to free the Eldians from Marley, to take the Founding Titan from the First King and end the nightmare that was the oppression. But when he turned on them for his attempts to use him to get what they wanted, Grisha didn't realize until then how it was his greatest sin to use his own son to do what he couldn't…and he didn't stop even after he forced Eren to carry on his torch.
"I just thought I was doing the right thing for our people," he confessed.
"They all did," Dark Titan expressed, "but they were trying more to make sense of a senseless time and a senseless situation where the truth is hidden behind many lies."
"And what was the truth?"
"That Ymir Fritz discovered a source of power deep in the Earth that only a rare few could ever find…and used it to benefit her people, but at a terrible price of a shortened life. Yet, she didn't fear her end because she would still exist in other forms to benefit the Eldian nation, both as memory…and as the Nine Titans that carried pieces of her soul. It's only those that lost sight of her dream that did the wrongs that got people to hate Eldians for their gifts, their blessings. And Karl Fritz just didn't see his people in a positive light, which is why he did what he did."
"And now it's people like Kaede, like her boyfriend, and this Historia…that are trying to change things with as little bloodshed as possible."
"That's right. Even when it's difficult, they persevere because in the end, the people they have in their lives motivate them to continue and live for a future they can be proud of."
"Still…can Kaede do what you believe she can do? Can she handle it? Is she up to the challenge that's in front of her?"
"She can. There is a strength in her that she doesn't know she has…but will master in due time. Only one Titan of Ymir's soul remains to be claimed. Once the War Hammer has been taken back, it all falls to Kaede to do what only she can do. Embrace the possibilities, acknowledge her inner strength, and tear down the walls that keep us from moving further into the bridges."
Then Grisha saw the statue of Shinji standing beside Kaede's statue on her left, holding her hand…and her statue possessed a small smile.
"I hope Eren will be able to live freely because of her," he expressed.
"Believe in the young woman that holds me in her soul…and she'll give everyone the future desired for generations to come," the Dark Titan revealed.
-x-
In the quiet of the night, Kaede, asleep in her bed as she enjoyed her freedom after she was released from her prison cell earlier today, slowly turned as her left hand raised and fell onto Shinji, who was asleep beside her. It was only an hour ago that the girl had asked him to spend the night with her, just so she could wake up to the next day and see his face, not to take advantage of him, as they were still in a conflict between nations that they would end together with others on the same team.
"Say, Shinji," she had said to Shinji after they had changed into their pajamas for the night, "when we're through with Marley… Through with the fighting, I mean… What do you want to do afterwards?"
"Me?" Shinji responded. "I don't know what I want to do afterwards. I just know I want to be with you when this is all over. What do you want to do?"
"Me? I wouldn't mind just being able to walk away from future fights…and being with you."
"Same here, Kaede. Same here."
As she slept, the girl dreamt of some of the strangest forms that were made by people, either with Titan powers or without them. She saw towers, castles and cities, all made from the flesh of Titans hardened to many times that of diamond or metal, unbreakable. Whether or not these were memories belonging to the previous Titan Shifters from hundreds of years ago or her imagination taking from the pictures and images she had seen from old books found around the coastal city, but she was in awe of these sights, these constructs. She was especially impressed by the construct known as a bridge, connecting one place to another, and while the one she saw was on Paradis, she couldn't see where it led, only that it was bathed in sunlight.
Shinji was beside her, holding her left hand, looking out to wherever it was this bridge led.
"It's beautiful," she heard him say.
"Yes, it is," she agreed with him.
Behind them, surrounded by countless people overlooking the vast ocean, stood the initial form of the Dark Titan, the fifteen-meter Attack/Rogue Titan with Eren and Mikasa on its right shoulder and the five-meter Jaw Titan with Historia and Ymir on its head. They were just there, realizing that they had achieved what had been taken from them generations ago: They had regained the future and their freedom.
"Long live Eldia, a nation reborn from the darkness," Kaede expressed.
To be continued…
A/N: I'm sure there was more to this chapter, but I couldn't recall all of my ideas for it. But there's always the next chapter.
Omake (Venom-influenced)
Kaede, standing in front of the window of the office building she and her Dark Titan had broken into to leave a message to her former boss that would exonerate Shinji and get him out of prison, hesitated before looking down at the streets below.
Jump down to the ground, the Dark Titan instructed her in her head.
"You're joking, right?" She asked.
I don't joke.
Ding! The elevator dinged as the door opened…and Kaede stepped inside.
Sissy, the Dark Titan called her.
"Whatever," she responded.