Prologue - The Freedom Dog

-ˋˏ ༻❁༺ ˎˊ- Rae's POV -ˋˏ ༻❁༺ ˎˊ-

Watching clouds unfold across a vast canvas of blue had not been as magical as he always dreamed it would be. Cast from caves to the flames, truly, this venture outside the Underground has been anything but freedom. Has this all been worth it?

Drastic turns had been taken far too many times during the course of military service. Something given and something gained, something lost and something won. Never is a price to tilt in favor of one side. Such are the laws of an unruly, fantastical world of eat or be eaten, yet never has this felt like victory. Most will express in full confidence that life isn't fair, but he argues the opposite. Much too fair, this life is. One step closer, one step back. One titan down, ten men devoured. What is the difference?

It is all the same underground. To die like a dog, never known nor worthy to humankind, was his greatest fear long ago. He witnessed one too many mutts drown on their own faults, even his own mother.

Now, beneath a widespread sky clear of clouds, a fall breeze tousling all that can move, violet eyes gaze to the roof of the world in silence, as though no land exists. It is simply the endless freedom of blue air and a calm soldier to witness it. Like flying. Like floating, it is weightlessness that brings this sickening comfort. Dying in the quiet may not be as awful as he once believed.

Silence and peace would have been preferred, but this cannibalistic feast ravenously progresses.

Marissa's iron trickles in clumped rivers down a titan's chin. A small beast gnaws on the edges of Naan's final limb. Another's throat bulges as it swallows down the top half of Eliza's body, though discards the bottom half like a wrapper, for it is lifeless anyhow. There is no pleasure to be had unless the person is alive and wailing in agony, is there? Titans are picky.

Long-dried tears. Abrasions torn across Rae's knees and arms have long since stopped biting pain into his limbs. In fact, the only aches now are old scars littering every stretch of skin his body has to bare, a bittersweet reminder of all he has fought against. Onyx hair plasters to his forehead, but he doesn't care to check whether it's sweat or something more sinister. Legs are ebbing with numbness the longer the soldier rests back on his heels, kneeled in the dirt, blades laid to sleep in the grass.

These swords are retired now.

These hands are deserving of no more command.

Instructed, volunteered to distract this unexpected titan horde while the rest of the Survey Corps could escape. A decoy, this squad had been. The most elite of humanity, yet they fill beast stomachs now, all for nothing. One by one by one. One step forward, two steps back.

Maybe there is a subtle bias to this world, after all.

Crimson still drips from its delighted, splattered face with the blood of comrades, those who he could do nothing for, as this titan has finished its feast and come lurking overhead for more.

Its looming, sneering grin is blocking Rae's view of the sky.

So, amethyst eyes slip shut and he enters a dreamscape of relieved sunsets, exhausted sunrises, tranquil rains, and each blissful blue day of the past. If he could drown in the sky, he'd let his breath go.

Somehow, it's not so chilling to feel goliath digits pinch the back of his jacket. This isn't so unthinkable, to be lifted from the ground like an insignificant object. After all, this is how every last one of his comrades have gone. They have all become just pieces to be stuck between titan teeth.

As this squad's Captain, the blame is his. Humanity's strongest sounds like a joke now, surrounded by a field of crimson rain and a sky of blistering blue.

Is it so villainous to join them in that descent? A good Captain always goes down with his ship. A private funeral. No one will believe that Captain Rae Ackerman gave up. They will call him a hero, just as they will name each member of this decimated squad, and they will say that he went down fighting, but never came home.

That moment of weightless falling as the monster's grip is released so gently from stained clothes, it is a lot less like flying than he had envisioned. This is a lot less freeing than he believed it might be. As he hits a slimy texture, his gut twists with empty nausea. Bumps prick every inch of pale, ghostly skin and a stiff spine is electrified with chills. No, this is not how he imagined things would end, nor how he ever wanted it to be.

Now is not the time for regret. Already encased on this tongue of a deathbed, this decision has been made. A final peace to enthrall a weary mind.

'Wait.'

A dry gasp jumps down a parched throat. Eyes flown open, the Captain watches as teeth slam shut like boulders crashing at the bottom of a cliff and molars are crushing into gums like knives. What a grim prison.

Weary? That is a temporary state of being.

'Wait...'

SKSH!

Embedded within that muscle of tongue is a worn-down blade, grip on the handle wrought with desperation so vivid that knuckles are a heated white. Teeth grind within an overworked jaw so harsh that it echoes in a throbbing skull. It blisters all rational thought.

This is a fatal catastrophe of survival's call.

'Not yet...'

These blades are not made for stabbing. They are too smooth, too sharp to stay in place. Begun to slide out, his only grasp on survival will last not a heartbeat more, but just as that sludge of titan saliva has this aching body slipping further into the depths of its stomach, another jab of blades slam through the wall of its throat.

'I'm still alive.'

To die like a dog, never known nor worthy to humankind. Perhaps what he had truly feared was a death having never tasted true freedom.

"WAIT! STOP! I CHANGE MY MIND!"

Like anyone is listening to a hoarse, panicked plea, least of all this monstrous, thrill-seeking creature.

Pulse pounds blood through temples so loud that his own raw voice sounds muffled. A heavy chest threatens to collapse with lack of air. Adrenaline. Knives are slipping again, but this time, that is exactly what he needs. Weight drags those weapons along the interior of the throat, angled down, tearing through titan flesh, as slow as it is with these dulled blades.

Just how many have shared in falling into this stomach?

Freedom.

KSSSH!

The titan's steaming wounds scorch exposed skin. Lungs are engulfed in hellfire. He can barely see through foggy steam and the pitch black of this monster's interior. The stench of rot stings sore eyes until they're watering.

Freedom.

Arm jabbing through the opening, a gasp for oxygen in this slimy, acidic dungeon of gasses is the first thing to clear his mind. Another arm shoves into the open air. Tucking himself slowly through this pocket of wound, dragging a weary body through to see light once again, but how this burns his every touch is nearly unbearable, singes through layers of skin.

Yes, freedom.

There is nothing so reviving as a scrape with death.

A massive hand looms over this carved escape route, closing in from above. Never have Rae's eyes been so wide they ached. A final boot is yanked free from the opening, soles slam against the titan's chin to dash down rather than fall, and, just in time, he has avoided the titan's crushing grip.

The selfish desire for freedom is worth living for.

Hissing through the air are ODMG clasps. It seems he falls forever in wait for the hook to slam into the titan's flesh, but when it does, he doesn't care if he uses what little gas fumes he has left.

Now this feels like flying.

There is nowhere for battlecries to echo out here on the prairie. No trees to be foundations, no buildings to offer opportunity.

He doesn't need opportunities. Just one chance, one swipe of these deathly worn blades, and a call for his horse. The other titans can be outrun as long as they are still distracted with the corpses of lost friends.

As a twirl leaves him just within position to blast towards the titan's nape, swords rising in perfect form, he realizes a hard pill to swallow.

This is what ugly feels like. Ugly, it truly is, to rely on the corpses of friends to survive. Hideous, but this world has laws. It is out of his hands.

It took death for Rae to learn that freedom is worth every sacrifice.

No matter how ugly freedom can be.

Ever the unsettling feeling is the colossal slice of flesh from the nape of a neck. Spinning far too quickly, Ackerman knows he's using too much of the mere fumes left in his gas canisters, though adrenaline all but replaces blood in those veins. Thought is a rarity.

Fatal blow received, the titan is collapsing in a bed of steam, but it's not the only thing falling. Wires won't eject. Gas has dried up.

Mere feet from the ground, a kick backwards into a roll barely lets this tumble absorb the blow, rather than a spine. It is hell scraping dirt through all these burn wounds. This fall opens bloody patches and gashes, smudges grime and blood that isn't his into the skin of his face, and sends his head reeling with a dizzy episode.

Only a steadying breath takes him to shakily prop up onto damaged arms. Fingers press into either side of iron-tasting lips and a high-pitched whistle swims over the prairies in search of a particular horse. It doesn't matter that he tastes blood and dirt. This is the only way back home.

STOMP.

Stranded here.

STOMP.

His own two legs and no gas.

STOMP.

That's right. His own two legs. Damaged body, yet he knows how to use it. All that's left within Rae forces a knee to the dirt, and then a boot, and legs tremble under simple weight.

A hushed whistling through the air reaches his ears. Maybe someone has come to fetch him.

No. That's a colossal hand flying downwards.

A leap aside, he throws himself just in time for another titan's palm to crush through the very ground he had stood on, indenting the dirt and killing a stretch of grass in an instant. It would have been another soldier's life not a moment earlier. It's worth every scrape of stones through layers of baked flesh and bloodied gashes.

He will do it again, and again, and again. Struggle shakily to aching feet, take several stumbling steps into a jog, and throw himself to the side just in time to evade a titan's swipe or a crushing blow. He'll do it all the way back to the wall if he has to.

Because he is still alive.

Hooves? Is that the sound of a horse? Reddened eyes peel from the titan in pursuit to sweep over the land. Sure enough, here comes a saving grace, tearing across prairie land and belting out to a man in need of a miracle. Maybe he will survive after all.

A grip on the saddle allows him to tug limp weight halfway onto this steed, but it takes a slap of its side to send the horse careening away just before an unforgiving swipe can snatch them both from the ground. It takes all the strength left in these torn, bloodied, and burnt arms just to drag the rest of his weight properly into the saddle.

Black hair blown back and cool breeze kissing scorched skin, this feels a lot like floating. The sky embraces on all sides and fading goliath footsteps are cast long behind.

Why fight?

It's still a mystery to Rae. Why must people so stubbornly claw for life and victory, even if sacrifice far outweighs that victory? Something he will never understand, and yet he is guilty of the same blind desperation. Maybe no one knows why they're fighting.

'Don't let me die a caged dog.'

Even as this demand leaks into the universe, the Captain can't help looking back. Just over his shoulder, past the titans chasing far behind, there is a decimated squad that once were his best friends. His only family. Their shared blood paints a field of green life, left to dry and wash away with the rain. They will be erased like dust from a history book.

He nearly gave up. He let one take him, drop him between its jaws.

Rae Ackerman gave up.

He faces forth and looks onwards towards the wall. Never will he face giving up again. There is no freedom in a faithless goodbye.


A/N: Hello friends! Thanks so much for choosing our story out of the bunch, we really hope you enjoy it if you choose to follow along on this adventure with us and find it to be as fun and fulfilling as we do.

If you have any comments feel free to place a review, otherwise, enjoy! :)

~ Pax and Pug