Eren quietly saluted director Shadis.
"Today you shall all be doing hand to hand combat, your aim is to get the knife away from your partner, you pairs are on the board, get moving maggots!" Eren gently snarled before walking forwards to find his pair.
"Eren...Eren...Eren...Eren and Reiner, Reiner who is that again?" The brunette thought back to everyone who he had met, maybe Reiner was the other tall kid or maybe he was the blonde stocky one with the broad build who he had seen arguing earlier at breakfast..probably that one. He was pulled out of his thoughts when a hand clasped his shoulder, the tall boy spun around and looked down to lock eyes with a blonde kid.
"Eren Jaeger right? I'm Reiner, your partner!" Eren grunted in response to Reiner and followed him to clear space, so Reiner was the angry stocky human.
Reiner crouched into a fighting stance
"Now, just gotta protect yourself from this knife and I Eren" Reiner smirked and lunged forward, arm pointing outwards but he was lousy and his weight wasn't balanced properly from the start. Eren grabbed the blonde's arm and lapel of his jacket, bending forward slightly before using his leg to throw the man over his shoulder. Reiner fell to the floor and gasped in pain, staring up at the brunette.
"Ow shit, Eren what the hell man." He stood up and handed over the knife, a sour look on his face. He slapped Eren's hand away, favoring to stand up by himself. The blonde looked around and grinned.
"Hey sorry, I should learn how to hold back."
"It's alright, let's see how you do as the rogue."
"This training doesn't make sense, we're not exactly picking fights with someone our own size. A guy'd have to be stupid to use this, I mean, a knife?" Eren thought back to the time when he would fight alongside his humans, spear at his side, taking anyone down who got too close.
"What if there's not an option? The fight doesn't give us a say, if it wants to get ugly it gets ugly, it's our job to be prepared. The enemy comes in many forms, artillery is not always going to be the answer, soldiers, the ones worth themselves anyway, are ready for anything."
"You speak wise words for someone so young, you sound like you've fought before, it makes me wonder Reiner...who are you, or should I say what?"
"...what?" Reiner stood still, staring at Eren
"You said it yourself, the enemy comes in many forms," Eren smirked at the blonde boy who looked at him worriedly, he was onto something, he could feel it in his bones. The blonde snorted but the worrie dlook on his face gave it all away, he wasn't human.
"Don't believe me, Jaeger? Look." The blonde gestures to Annie.
"What about her, the only thing she is ready for is a chance to slack off."
"You think so? Maybe someone ought to give her a talking to, give her a little hard nox lesson in preparedness."
"Huh?" Een watched as Annie came to a stop in front of Reiner
"Common doubt not beating you down enough? Keep it up and you'll be as flat as the ground you're walking on. I suggest you think back as to why you enrolled in the first place." Eren twitched at Reiner's words, gods he hated self-centred assholes. He looked at Annie with calm eyes, she was pissed.
"Okay now go get her." The blonde boy shoved Eren in Annie's direction
"What the hell? I never agreed to this Reiner" He spat his words like venom.
Annie fell into a fighting pose, holding her arms up to protect her face but she was loose uncaring a big mistake.
"Right, I do hope you know I won't hold back." Eren lunged forward, he could see her weight shift, a kick so he dodged, she was slightly off-balance now but he couldn't let his guard down, she was strong, calculating and she knew what she was doing by the looks of things. She twisted round to dig her elbow in his face, he grabbed her elbow, slid his arms around her, placed the knife to her neck while shoving his weight over her to get her to the ground, he then wrapped his legs around her.
"You're dead." The brunette stood up and handed the knife hilt towards her. Annie took the blade.
"Where did you learn to fight? Who taught you?"
"I suppose you could say nature." Annie lunged towards him, now a lot more careful then she had been. He dodged the blade but didn't miss the kick the side of his knees, he felt his kneecaps crunch underneath the force. He fell backwards onto his back and hands before pushing his feet forward into her face, hearing the crunch of her nose. She moved her hands to her face, now was his chance, he lunged at her, wrapping his arm around her neck, locking her in place, the knife in his hands as he whispered in her ear.
"Better let it heal quickly or we will be in trouble." Eren moved away from her, his kneecaps almost healed completely. She looked at him with wide eyes, steam gently rising from her fingers.
Eren didn't know what Annie was but she wasn't human, he had never seen a human emit steam from a wound. He was currently sitting on a bench in the dining hall, eating bland food, Jean talking to his left, it was annoying.
"Gods, would you shut up? I would call you horse face but that would be an insult to all horses around." Why horse face you may ask? Well, Jean had a long face, a god awful hairstyle and once neighed in his sleep, Eren will hold it against him till the end of time. Jean snarled and was about to open his mouth but Sasha cut in.
"Eren can you tell us a story of the forest and mountains and seas and those things again please?" Everyone sighed but secretly they all found it interesting, all of Eren's stories he knew so much about the world for someone behind these walls.
"Okay, there is a small island called the emerald isle, known for its luscious green grass, open skies, vast flatlands and beautiful scenery, the people there were cheery and kind. There were no snakes on this island for one of their saints had chased them all away, St. Patrick. There is a small landlocked nation with high mountains, snow fell every winter, layering the world in beautiful white, wolves ran wild, panting and thundering through the forests. There is another nation, in the south, there are beautiful fields full of plants called sunflowers and lavender, in the north there are mountains, it was colder but no less stunning, birds swooped and dived above in a tantalising fashion. There was another nation, filled full of rich history where the sun bore down upon everyone, people laughed and singed, praying to ancient gods, grapes growing all around it was stunning." he smiled sadly.
"Oh oh tell us about the stars, oh pleaseeeee!"
"In the night sky you are able to see thousands of stars hanging above us, these stars are millions of millions of years away from us, the ones we see are already dead the sun is a star but it is the closest one we live to. There is something called the universe and in the spectrum of things we are only minuscule ants, it is lonely and dark in our corner of the universe and we are the only humans left...there could be thousands of planets like our own out there, harbouring life, maybe they don't have to fight against titans as we do...who knows?"
"Tell us about the gods, the one with the horns."
Eren laughed, a grin on his face, his friends all leaning forwards, hanging off of his every word, even if they didn't know about half of the things he was going on about.
"How about we save that tale for later, right now we should eat." Eren hummed and ate away at his food, Sasha's disappointed sigh made its way to his ears, he let out a hearty chuckle.
Eren sat on his bed, book in hand. It had been many years since he had read something in the Ogham script, the language was created based off of the idea that anyone with knowledge of the Roman alphabet would not be able to understand the Ogham. The book was yellow in pages, the ink was obviously handwritten, the weird thing was, some of the pages were written in Ogham, some in Elder Futhark and some in Ancient Greek, he couldn't read Greek, he would need to find someone who could but with the state of this colony of humans most likely no one could which means he would need to find a Greek god or a Demi-god but he hadn't sensed any yet, the closest scent was that short, black-haired man's scent but he couldn't be sure, it would be too dangerous too, the stakes were too high, he had seen how the humans treated the captured titans, even if he was a God and he could escape Mikasa could still get hurt and he had promised Carla he would take care of Mikasa.