A/N: What more is there to say but we stan Prissner? ...I wonder what kind of couple costume they'd do for Halloween...

Chapter 27: Beautiful Menace

The adrenaline that had been rushing through her system as Priss made her risky escape was starting to wear thin; her sprinting slowed gradually and her breathing became heavy. She wasn't sure how long she'd been traveling through the tunnel, which was dimly lit with small glowing spheres affixed to the ceiling. Most of them were consistently emanating light, but she noticed a few of them flickering on and off here and there, which added a further element of eeriness to her journey. There was at least five feet of space between these unfamiliar sources of light, and since they were so small the illumination provided by them was just barely enough, but when traveling a straight path it wasn't a terrible hindrance.

"Ugh..." She grunted, finally coming to a full stop. She continued to speak through her panting, "At least... there's no rats or anything..."

"What are you doing here?" Came a voice from the shadows ahead of her.

Priss snapped her head up to see a figure obscured by the darkness, both of them frozen in place for a moment. While she was under a light, the unexpected person to cross her path was just some steps away from being illuminated themselves. With no reason to hesitate, the figure stepped forward into the light; Priscilla's face dropped from wide eyed worry to a deep frown.

"What are YOU doing here, Zeke?" She groaned, straightening herself out and then muttered under her breath, "Guess I was wrong about there being no rats here."

"Ahem, I believe I asked you first." Zeke responded.

"Oh yeah, that's the response a grown man should be giving here. But really I should know better by now, you jackass." She sneered.

Zeke exhaled sharply through his nose, "If you're down here then you know exactly what this tunnel is for, there's no way you could find it on your own and be ignorant of it's purpose."

"Paying my brother a visit then?" She asked, but it was a question that needed no answer. Priss knew already how the two of them had some sort of scheme together that involved her, and as she remembered that latter detail she was struck with concern.

They were underground, which meant no moonlight for Priss to use to access her supernaturally augmented strength from – if it was even in the sky at this point, she had no clue what time of day or night it was currently. If Zeke wanted, he could easily subdue her and drag her to the Tybur mansion and right back to her brother kicking and screaming. It was dawning on her just how much luck played into her making an escape; if she was brought back there she would surely be more heavily supervised. Three men – her brother, Willy and Zeke – all had some investment in her from what she could tell. If they kept her locked up with no ability for her to tap into her hidden strength, there was no chance that she could take all three of them on. Hell, she couldn't take on one man realistically, despite her height. She had the weight of her blessed feminine assets to throw around, but she knew that she'd ultimately be at a disadvantage.

Even if she had the moon on her side, there was an inherent downside to that: if she had access to it, then so would her brother if he were in the same space as her. His face flashed into her mind; just the thought of him made her stomach turn so the mental image of his smug grin made her feel even worse. Anteros may have been lithe instead of overtly muscular, but if she's learned anything about her race, he would be able to subdue her. Anteros has had far longer to hone his ability given he's been aware of it all his life while it was a relatively new thing to her. Then there was what her father had written about Anteros, how he was 'the strongest' of all the Hyperians at previously unprecedented levels. It would only make sense that siphoning strength from the moon was apart of how powerful he was and could outdo her on that. Priss has no refined form or focus with it – the word 'beastly' or 'berserk' would be an ideal way to describe what she was like when she chose to be combative.

Could a senseless berserker with no real sense of how to counter a 'professional' stand a chance against him?

Priss wasn't much of a fighter to begin with, she was the lowest graduate of the Cadets after all, and she had foolishly revealed her hand to Zeke about her lacking combat skills previously. Priss internally cursed her bad fighting skills, if she had more prowess there then she could hold her own against just Zeke. However, that wasn't the case, and if he had the same idea in his head that she did, which Priss was certain he did or soon would, Zeke had no reason to doubt he could take her down.

But the baby...

She questioned whether this man was cruel enough to rough her up significantly when she was with child. So early on as she was, Priss was sure that something bad might happen if a real fight broke out. She suddenly felt a pang of guilt hit her from when she attacked the soldier on the ship; she was in a more berserk state than she had been before and tunnel visioned on trying to destroy that man. She recalled that Zeke tackled her to the ground and grew fearful that something like that would have hurt the fetus.

"Something's wrong." Zeke stated, not as a question but an accusation as he scanned her face while she went through her series of thoughts.

"I'm in a new world... I'm confused and frightened..." She spoke, words that weren't a lie in the grand scheme of things, "Reiner is gone and I don't know when I'll see him again. Of course there's something wrong with me."

"You think you'll be able to find him just by running blindly into the Internment Zone?" Zeke asked, a hint of mockery in his voice, "You said it yourself. You're in a new, confusing and frightening world. How do you expect to just find your way around and get exactly what you want?"

His words cut Priss deep, and as always it was evident in her eyes what she was feeling.

"A bit childish of you to believe that, don't you think?" He added.

"Shut up!" She shouted. Her posture stiffened and her hands balled up into fists, though she still had no intention of fighting with him, but despite her strong stance her voice began to waver, "Why can't you just leave me alone?"

"Even if you found your way around by yourself to where Reiner is being held," Zeke went on, reaching over to scratch his ear while he completely ignored her question, "They won't let you see him, you're not authorized."

With that, the girl collapsed to her knees and then fell forward, catching herself with the palms of her hands against the cold ground so that she was on all fours. She kept her head down and her silken, lustrous hair draped over her face and shoulders.

"Won't you please just let me try?" She said in a small, uncharacteristically weak voice, "Try, probably fail, and let you have the satisfaction of telling me 'I told you so' ?"

Zeke raised an eyebrow, "Hm?"

"You love to put me down so I bet you'd really get off if you had that chance to mock me for trying my hardest and not getting what I'm after..." She continued, still with her head down, "And you'd be able to find me quickly enough too, right? So just get out of my way and let me make an effort, even if it's a useless one. Let me have my moment of hope rather than none at all. Then you can take me back to my brother and savor every second of my failure."

From above her she heard Zeke sigh, a disgusted one instead of a sympathetic one, and his words to follow emphasized that further, "For God's sake, get up off the ground, Ziegler. You look pathetic."

He took steps closer to her as he looked down upon her with disdain; her emotional pleading that did nothing for him.

"Well, I guess I have nothing else to try..." She spoke with a tone of quiet shame, "But to do the only thing I'm good at."

"Eh?" Zeke's face went from disdainful to puzzled, not entirely sure if he was getting the right implication. For the sake of playing it safe, he chose to ignore what he thought she was getting at and remained firm with what had to be done, "I said get up. Then turn yourself around and come back to the Tybur mansion with me."

"If I do you a little favor," The white haired girl's tone lowered more, but the shame was melting away from her words. She tilted her head up enough to look at him through her bangs, "You do me one? Let me go in exchange for me putting this skilled mouth of mine to work."

Priss fully raised her head up to look at the now fully perplexed Warchief, meeting his gaze with a darkly seductive look as she slowly ran her tongue along her upper lip first, and then dragged it across the lower one as well, making them glisten even in the minimally lit hall. His eyes widened in disbelief that the initial implication he got from her was actually right, and while this behavior was undoubtedly strange, Zeke's brain was willing to toss out logic with the lusty nymph on her hands and knees in front of him.

What an absolute idiot

While Zeke was still processing what he thought was going to be a home run, Priscilla suddenly lunged forward and bashed the top of her head into his kneecap, causing him to buckle down. But she didn't stop there; the wild and deceptive woman then chomped down on his nearest bit of leg that she could get at and sank her teeth in as much as she could from outside the fabric.

"What in God's name is wrong with you?!" Zeke shouted, awkwardly and frantically shaking his leg in an attempt to get her to let go, but she held on. She even went as far as to snarl like a beast while she did it.

In the unexpected chaos, he felt a devastating blow blindside him – quite literally – below the belt. While he was focused on what her face was up to, he didn't notice her swiftly raise up a fist and punch with all the force she could muster right into his groin.

"Urgh!" He grunted, fully falling to his knees at that point, "You... rotten little...!"

With renewed vigor, Priss hopped back to her feet and continued her sprint through the tunnel to get as far away from him as she could before he recovered from the shock and pain of having his dick and balls take a direct critical hit. Zeke sat there, hearing her footfalls grow more and more distant, and contemplated whether he should get up and pursue her or just make his way to meet up with his cohorts like his initial plan was. He growled as he looked over his shoulder, he couldn't see anything since her burst of energy after that triumph got her operating at maximum speed again for the time being, leading her to quickly disappear into the darkness.

Zeke looked forward again and shook his head, "I should know by now that when she's got nothing else, that's the sort of tactic she uses... just like a wh-"

He stopped himself before he could utter that dreadful pejorative word he had used against her on the ship; what little moral compass he had kicked in, the memory of how she was legitimately hurt by all that was fresh in his mind and he felt guilt over his senseless cruelty when he remembered the fallout of it all and would rather put that thought behind him. Now, to even say it when she couldn't hear it, felt wrong. Still, Zeke hated the fact that she managed to outplay him, but considering the situation she was in he could understand why she opted for it. When her sincere pleas fell on deaf ears, when her begging to just be left alone to go find her one true love utterly failed, it wasn't surprising that she'd use an underhanded tactic to get out of a tricky situation she otherwise had no way of escaping.

If he weren't the victim of such trickery he might have found her mastery of how to target and exploit a man's carnal weakness to be impressive. It was, in it's own way, a unique and effective tactic for what the situation called for – but he was the one who fell victim to this, and thus he deemed it to be utter fucking bullshit.

With Priss having made such significant progress through the tunnel before she ran into her obstacle, she was much closer to her destination than her departing point.

I have to be close... She thought, keeping up her pace fueled by her intense desire to find Reiner somewhere on the other side. Her heart beat hard in her chest and pounded in her ears like the sound of one hundred titans stomping across the land. That's when she saw it: barely lit by the light sources was a ladder.

A hopeful smile spread across her face as she closed the distance and clumsily threw herself onto it, starting her ascent. It wasn't a long climb before she came to a flat ceiling where she swore she could see some light in a square pattern; Priss carefully took one hand off the ladder and started feeling around on this square with the lit up outline. After a moment of blind groping around, she felt it: a basic handle. She grabbed it, fiddled with it, and pushed the 'square' open and found herself popping up through a trap door that was situated on the floor of a room.

Peeking her head out, she looked around and made sure there was no imminent threat before she went on. There wasn't a great deal of light in the room, but it was enough to shine through the edges of the hidden door on the floor. Satisfied with her survey of her surroundings, she climbed out and closed the door behind her.

"Alright," She whispered to herself, "Warrior HQ can't be too hard to find... and I can ask around, someone has to know."

Her fixation on finding her way to Reiner was so strong that she was blinded to most of her surroundings, only using her energy to locate the door and get the hell out. It wasn't a particularly large room anyway, so getting out wasn't all that tough. Priss unlocked the door, flung it open and slammed it shut behind her and took in the surroundings she was immediately met with: deserted and narrow long paths going off to her left and right, leaving her with no indication of how to get to somewhere actually populated.

The buildings that damn near were suffocating her towered above her as she looked up; there was some sight of a barely crimson sky still, but nightfall would be upon her before she knew it. So, she chose a direction and just started marching off, keeping her hopes up that she was making meaningful progress. It wasn't easy to ignore the fatigue creeping up on her, but Priss did everything she could to push it down, which mainly consisted of thoughts of Reiner and reuniting with him.

Zeke had taken his sweet time crossing the passage to the Tybur mansion, both out of humiliation over what had happened to him, but he also was in no special rush considering he had to face the inevitable wrath of Anteros. Priscilla's disappearance couldn't have gone unnoticed for very long so by now there had to be questions and accusations flying around already. Zeke also had to consider the fact that the nuisance of a girl surely spilled the beans that he was the one that struck her, and now Zeke had to worry about how Anteros would react to that once they were face to face again.

The Warchief's thoughts about how his reunion with Anteros after all these years would go left him in a trance as he exited the passage and made his way through the Tybur mansion. Miss Tybur noticed his lumbering entrance and greeted him. He didn't process the words she said really, but just the fact that someone had spoken to him brought him out of his daze enough to respond.

"Sorry I'm late," He muttered, "I had business to deal with at HQ before I could report to Willy and..."

"Oh I'm sure neither of them will mind," Helen quickly assured Zeke. The woman kept up her pleasant as ever demeanor, but something about it seemed force. The way she smiled felt insincere, but Zeke didn't care at all to ask what could be bothering her, "I'll take you to them."

Zeke gave her an uninterested nod and the woman kept up her clearly forced pleasant facade as she began to escort him through the sprawling, elegant home. Helen didn't bother to make any sort of small talk with him, which he was more than grateful for as he was in no mood for such things. Between being outfoxed by the girl and now having to face whatever Anteros had in store for him left him on the irritable side.

"Here," Miss Tybur said, stopping in front of some double doors, "A room where Willy holds his private meetings. If he's not there, I'll go find him and let him know you're here. I believe Mr. Ziegler is already waiting within."

Zeke had forgotten that Anteros had his own 'cover' name for the outside world since he never called him by it, Anteros had insisted he didn't long ago, so to hear him referred to by it was jarring. Helen Tybur bowed her head politely before leaving Zeke standing outside those ornately carved and varnished wooden doors, uncertain of his fate that laid on the other side of them. To waste anymore time, however, was not in the best interest of anyone, so he took a step forward and opened the doors. Right away he saw Anteros standing near the large windows on the far side of the room, both hands in his pockets.

"About time, Yeager..." His old familiar friend spoke as soon as Zeke entered.

Since Zeke dragged his feet and took his sweet time, night had come, and the moon was fully visible and shone through the windows. Anteros half turned to his comrade with a smile on his face, but Zeke knew this man couldn't be truly 'happy' to see him in the way that friends who had been separated for about a decade would be. Opposed to his sister, Zeke couldn't tell what Anteros was thinking, but he sensed it wasn't anything warm or welcoming.

"I ran into some delays," Zeke said, closing the doors behind him and making his way closer to the white haired man, "I apologize."

"As you should," Anteros replied ominously, "Your apology is accepted, but I won't say it's okay that you kept me waiting."

"Yes, yes... I know," Said Zeke, looking down to avoid the unsettling emerald stare of Anteros, who turned to face Zeke fully.

"With that out of the way..." Anteros went on, "I have to say I am pleased that you managed to obtain my sister. The odds were stacked against you on such an immense task... I feel like I should praise you, but you're not worthy of even the slightest bit of that. Not after what you did to her."

Zeke's eyes widened and his head whipped back up to see Anteros staring him down, looking far more malicious now that the subject of Priscilla came up – and 'what he did' to her. Zeke had a pretty long list at this point of how he had done wrong to the poor girl, so he couldn't be sure what Anteros was referring to with his remark. Zeke had to be careful with how he proceeded with this, if he revealed anything more than what Anteros already knew, it wouldn't go well. Things already weren't going to be good for Zeke, but he didn't need to make them worse.

"I know I haven't conducted myself properly," Zeke began, keeping his 'admission' as vague as possible, "But-"

"I suggest you take off your glasses," Anteros interrupted, ignoring Zeke's words, "Put them off to the side somewhere safe. Wouldn't want those to break, would you?"

Anteros' eyes glinted with danger while the light of the moon from the window behind him made his hair gleam. Zeke knew what he was in for, and considering he more often played the role of 'underling' than 'friend' to this man, he was ready for it. The Warchief removed his glasses and set them aside on a nearby table, trying to keep his hands from shaking as he did so. Doing his best to maintain some dignity, Zeke straightened his posture and looked Anteros straight on. Those green eyes never left Zeke, and now they were revealing much more than dangerous intents, but a brief glow that he had witnessed before when Priscilla had tapped into her powers. However, he knew that Anteros would have a much better grasp on them, and before he knew it all Zeke felt was pain.

He was blinded by a fierce fist colliding with his face so quickly that he literally didn't see it coming. The blonde was knocked straight backwards onto the ground, blood pouring from his mouth and what remained of his nose. The single focused strike from a master of his supernatural power left the front part of Zeke's skull as nothing but mushy soft tissue hanging off shattered bones and teeth falling to the ground in pools of blood. One of his eyes dangled out of it's socket and eventually snapped from it's connecting tissue and fell to the ground as well.

"Who do you think you are?" Anteros growled as he slowly approached the helpless, partially mutilated Zeke on the ground, "Striking my dearest sister and leaving her beautiful face marked? By your beastly, disgusting hand?"

Given the condition Zeke's face was in, he had no way of responding. Anteros came to a stop and knelt beside Zeke, now smiling down at his handiwork. The pale white hand that was stained with blood found Zeke's right one, the one that he used to strike Priss with, and he lifted it into the air. Anteros looked at it for a moment, viewing it from different angles as he contemplated what he'd do next. Zeke watched in terrible anticipation with the one eye he had left in his skull. After that brief time of making him wait, Anteros looked down at Zeke's brutalized face and kept smiling at him as he made his next, equally swift move: Anteros' hand gripped the wrist of Zeke's while his free one flew up and tore Zeke's hand clean off his arm.

Zeke let out pained, incoherent gargling noises from his sorry excuse of a mouth since it was all he could physically do while Anteros tossed the dismembered hand over his shoulder, chuckling as he did so. The Warchief also writhed in pain, which amused Anteros further.

"Oh, Yeager, Don't be so dramatic. You can just regenerate," The man said dismissively, "In fact I'd prefer if you'd hurry up and do it, so I can crush your skull and tear off the hand that you committed your crimes with again."

Even though it was true that Zeke could regenerate with his shifter ability, he still very much felt the pain of what was happening to him at the hands of his 'friend' – which was exactly what Anteros wanted. Since Zeke hurt Priss, in more ways than Anteros seemed to know about, he wanted to make Zeke endure repeated punishment until he was satisfied with the pain inflicted upon him – or until he got bored.

"Regenerate, Yeager!" Anteros shouted his command, "And then tell me, are there any other sins you want to confess to me?! What wrongs have you committed against her?!"

"Anteros!"

While the white haired man was conducting his interrogation and torture of Zeke, Willy Tybur had unexpectedly entered the room. He was shocked to see the bloody and disgusting mess that had been made of the room that was as lavish as all the others in his home. Anteros looked up to him, still with that casual smile stuck on his face, and gave him a wave.

"Hey there, Willy..." He said in a soft voice, which was a stark contrast to what had just been happening, "I was just setting a few things straight with Yeager, here."

"Setting a few things straight?!" Willy exclaimed.

"See, when I confronted your sister about Addie escaping, she gave me information about who hurt my dearest..." Anteros explained, the steam of Zeke's regenerating body swirling around him, "I took that info from her and chose not to punish her too harshly, since I knew she's the only one who could have gotten Addie out of here unseen. I still gave her a bit of punishing, but nothing too severe since she was helpful to me... and just like Yeager here, she can just regenerate."

"Just because the shifters can heal themselves doesn't mean you have free reign to do things like this!" Willy shouted.

"Oh I have free reign to do whatever I want to any Eldian, or anyone really..." Anteros said, finally rising to his feet, "Don't forget who I am, Tybur, and how lucky you are to have me. A few bumps and bruises on a shifter is a small price to pay for their wrongdoings. Helen aided in Adrestia's escape, honestly she got off easy since she told me about Yeager and the Marleyan soldiers being who harmed her."

Willy shook his head, "Bumps and bruises..." he repeated the words in disbelief before he found his senses enough to continue, "And then what of these Marleyan soldiers you speak of? You plan to punish them too?"

"I'm sure Yeager can help me identify them," Anteros said, nodding down to the bloodied and still immobile Zeke, "And they will be dealt with accordingly for trying to put a bullet in my sweet Addie."

Willy rubbed his face and sighed; he was quite aware of how... passionate of a person Anteros was, but seeing it in practice was always jarring, especially when it came in the form of violence. Zeke, however, was not surprised or shaken by any showing of brutality from the man he swore loyalty to. No cruelty from Anteros would shock Zeke after he stood by and witnessed the man he had allied himself with genocide his own race with no mercy ten years ago. What was reported as a 'ritual mass suicide' to the media was actually an event orchestrated by the son of the Hyperian leader, and Zeke was at his side when he did it.

They did not 'mysteriously vanish.'

They did not 'tragically die off' by any natural means.

Anteros used the raw power he had over all of them to end the existence of almost his entire race, ensuring that only he and Priscilla would remain so he could proceed with the future extermination of the Eldian race without anyone else getting in his way. Zeke didn't want to think about that day again, especially the part he personally played in it. That was the true moment of no return for Zeke Yeager – the day that he traded what humanity he had left for the promise of 'something greater than he could ever imagine' – and the promise of that is all he had left to live for, thus leaving him with no choice but to live at the mercy of Anteros.

"But I'm-!"

"Listen, you're not military or government personnel girly, so just get lost."

Priss stood in front of two guards who were stationed outside the Warrior HQ. She had been desperately pleading with them to let her in so she could see Reiner, but they wouldn't relent. Priss frantically babbled about how she's the wife of the Armored Titan and grasping at any other connection she could use to get in, but the guards weren't hearing it.

"Please!" She wailed.

"I said go home little girl!"

...Home?

One of the men pushed her back and she stumbled a bit but kept her footing. Where the hell was home now? The only answer she knew was that home was wherever Reiner is, so she effectively had no home no matter which way she looked at it. No way would she go back to her brother, that was for damn sure. She clumsily turned around and started to walk away, slouched and sulking as she did. She was upset, but in a way where she was beyond tears, so she just let her feet carry her around without much thought. Eventually, she found a darkened alley and stopped. There was something horribly familiar about staring down this alleyway and seeing it as a place to stay for the night. There was no guarantee of safety, but she had no money for lodging and no other place to go, so she shuffled down and slide to the ground against the cold wall.

Memories of her troubled youth came back to her, it was almost as if she was right back where she started in a way, and this time there was no beautiful blonde hero to come to her rescue.

"Oi there..."

Priss looked up and saw a group of men reeking of alcohol peering at her from the alley's entrance. She had gotten so wrapped up in her thoughts that she didn't hear anyone approach.

"Go away," She said flatly; she wasn't in the mood for anymore bullshit.

"Ohhh that's no way to greet us!" One of the men said, lumbering towards the girl and squatting down next to her while he breathed his putrid breath in her face, "What's a pretty young thing like you doing out here in the dead of night?"

"I suggest you back off," She continued, still in the same flat affect without looking at him, "Or you will regret it."

"You hear that, boys?" He hollered to his group behind him, "The little girly here is trying to talk tough!"

Her expression remained blank as he and his men laughed uproariously at her, but with the moon shining down brilliantly on her she had no fear in her heart, "You must not know who I am." She added, slowly turning her head to look at the boozed up man with cold eyes.

"Eh? The hell you talking about, girly?"

"...You ever see a Titan before?" She asked, her mouth curling into a smirk while her eyes still remained dead and unblinking. In his drunken stupor, the man didn't know what she was getting at, but even if he was sober he would have been confused anyway by such an odd and seemingly random question.

"...The hell are you goin' on about?" The man finally asked, "What do Titans have to do with anything right now?"

The area Reiner was being held in was permanently patrolled by at least two guards outside of the bars he sat behind. It wasn't as dank or dreary as a cell in a real prison, since he was just being held in HQ, but it was close and miserable enough for him. He sat on the edge of the stiff bed he was provided with, his head in his hands.

"What is it?" Zeke asked, discreetly accepting something from Reiner between the bars.

"It's for my mom," Reiner quietly explained, "To explain to her who Priss is and to let her stay with her."

"Huh. Right."

"Please, Warchief Zeke... I'm begging you, take Priss to my mom and give that to her. I wrote her address in there. No matter what happens to me, I need to know she's somewhere safe."

It was a risky move scribbling that note and passing it off to Zeke while he was being held in there, and he wasn't even all that confident that Zeke would follow through with it, but it was all he could do now. Not knowing about anything that was going on outside of his imprisonment was killing him and every moment that went by without any news about anything hurt him even more. Reiner had no idea when he'd be seen for trial and judgment over his failure to secure the Founding Titan during his operation, and as much as he tried to stay strong, he was legitimately frightened. He didn't know what the 'best case scenario' for him would be, but he knew that if the judges ruled against him, he would be fed to the next potential candidate for the Armored Titan.

"Damn it..." He cursed under his breath at himself.

Reiner shifted around so he could lay down, although he didn't expect to sleep with all that was on his mind – and every time he closed his eyes, the only thing he could see was Priss and how she looked when he last saw her: crying, fearful and shouting while she reached out to him as she was being held back and choked by a Marleyan. He wanted to think of the good times they had together, but all the fucked up shit that was happening clouded his mind too much to see anything that even slightly resembled goodness or hope.