Fear, I thought, kicking rocks while I dwelled in front of the enlistment center (a shack really), was the driving force behind our survival, and effectively our evolution. I paused to reel in the absolute detached, clinical way I carried out my musings. It was odd to think that one choice could have honeysuckle seeping from my thighs, instead of blood. I was no longer a child, even though in the beginning I had never been one, but now a woman. An officer, dressed in the drab of the military, peeked her head outside, most likely to reprimand me for loitering. There was no need. I made my decision. The route to survival laid in the food and beds in basic and perhaps, if I was truly forged from steel instead of delicate and decorative china, I would find a place in the Military Police.

There were plenty of stories swapped in the shadows of the Underground, creating a vivid picture of the Military. To the criminals who found a currency in broken bones and bloody bruises, they were the bane of their miserable existence. To the orphans they were the monsters your mother said weren't hidden under your bed. A sinister image of men with boots coated in the blood of innocents and jagged shards of bones torn from the carcasses of their victims for teeth had haunted me in my earlier years of life in the dark corners of the walls. I quickly realized what a sham that was, they may have been corrupt and had roadkill for hearts, but in the end they were pathetic human beings who never played poker with the devil or had a brush with death.

Somehow, that was where I would find myself, breathing the same oxygen as dog-shit I felt entitled to wipe off my shoes. There was a certain jaded irony to it all. I couldn't rouse any anger at the injustice, I spent all my hatred on the world when I watched... I shut those thoughts out with a sharp warning bite on my lip, taming the beasts running around in my head. The officer glared at me still, probably thinking she could scare away a brat like me with disdain. What an idiot. She obviously had zero clue what it meant to be an orphan on streets like these. The only thing I was scared of anymore was letting myself fail and sacrifice myself to be titan chow. Woman with pinched faces and haughtiness woven into the every twitch of their muscle were the least of my problems. Being at the bottom of this screwed up food chain was something I was determined to change. I'd be on top soon enough.

The officer didn't appear anymore pleased to see me enter the enlistment center, but stood aside anyways to let me saunter in, confidence seeping from every pore. If I didn't signal the utmost certainty in who I was, I could quite possibly be executed for enlisting with false credentials. It wasn't that hard to find some lowlife willing to forge documents about a "Wisteria Smith" from Stohess district. I even set-up a whole elaborate backstory paired with the fake identity so that no one would question what a girl from the interior would be doing behind Wall Rose. Of course, I didn't expect many to ask seeing as the fourteen year olds lining up to die were about as dull as a door knob. They rarely questioned things and let the world dictate their fate, which would get a vast majority of them killed. Free will was the key to survival.

There was a long line of sweaty puberty riddled kids with hormones for brains crammed into the compact building that I waited patiently behind. Twenty minutes into awaiting my turn, the petite girl in front of me began tapping her foot while gnawing her lip. She was a bomb waiting to go off, standing there with her grey eyes that burned like vats of molten iron and her curly frizz of hair framing her dark skin. I leaned against the wall, hoping to block out the incessant noise of her frayed boots slamming against the worn wood. Every creak that followed the each tap served to drive crazy and crazier until finally I decided to give her a piece of my mind.

One eye cracked open, like a predator staring down her prey, I growled, "Stop the fidgeting before I rip off your toes to feed to the homeless."

The group of chattering females behind me retreated away from me, which was nice since I could breathe again without them pressed against me. The girl, however, appeared non-plussed, "Quit the tough act. Bet you've never seen the garbage that inhabits the Underground. You have nothing on those rats."

I laughed. It was the first time I had done it in ages, but I didn't feel as freeing as it had once been. It was like being caught in a housefire and choking on the smoke from the flames. The sound was infused with none of the life or glee it was supposed, it was a wintery callous noise instead of the spring garden it usually was. A chill settled over our corner and the edged away from me, taking the hint. I wasn't a rat, I was a wolf.

"You shouldn't be scared of rodents, when beasts stand outside your door," I whispered in her ear, delighting as she flinched away.

"The fuck that's supposed to mean?" she blinked, pursing her lips in frustration. I had all but forgotten the meager education most of the population received. To be fair, I had a whole lifetime on these kids. Still. It was disappointing and irritating they never quite caught onto to my jargon.

"It means my name is Wisteria and you should keep both eyes open," a sigh departed my lips accompanied by a subtle roll of my eyes. The girl seemed relatively unbothered by my near glacial attitude.

"Will do," the girl replied, sticking out her hand, "Eloise. Nice to make your acquaintance."

"I'm not here to make friends, idiot," I scoffed, swatting away her hand.

Eloise took these all in stride, sending me a sideways smile, "Stop with the dramatics, ice queen ain't a good look for you."

"Shut up," and to my horror my face began to redden a bit. Goddamn teenaged body. "I don't want to befriend a shitbrain like you. Hell, I don't want to befriend any of you because when it comes down to it you'll turn tail and run for the hills in combat."

"Suit yourself," she said with a raised eyebrow.

"Next!"

"That'll be my cue," Eloise backpedaled away with a lopsided grin. "See you later! Hope you get that stick out of your ass when we meet again."

I kicked the empty space where she had previously occupied. I just wanted to be left alone without a bunch of flies buzzing around to cause to me annoyance. The drawbridge to the fortress of my soul slammed shut. No more friends. It was just me. I was going to live even if I left every human being in this room to die in the wake.

Keith Shadis was not a frightening man. Had the circumstances of my lifetime been different, had I met him before the fall of Wall Maria, I may have found his vaguely buggy eyes unnerving. You live long enough, though, and you begin to see all the things people wished to keep buried. Shadis was simply a man who had been beaten and broken. Perhaps, he may have been a predator once, zooming through the sky, but a bird cannot fly without its wings.

I watched him stalk down the rows and rows of cadets, chewing them out until nothing but a carcass of shaking knees and teary eyes remained. He was brutal and ruthless with his words, I wondered if he could back them up with action. A boy a few people down from myself, lanky and appeared well-fed, boasted about joining the Military Police. It was hard to bar my laughter from leaving my chest, I could imagine the cocky sneer plastered on his face. The kid was about to find out what it meant to make the cut for the branch. Bone crashing against bone produced a loud crack that made my own skull ache in sympathy. Whimpers sounded from down the line, presumably the victim of Shadis' headbutt. Pathetic. He had a lot to prove if he wanted to so much as fantasize of achieving the top ten.

Another boy was interrogated by Shadis, and his response was near identical to his predecessor. This time some bullshit about serving the king was added in. At this point it was putting me in physical pain not to burst out crowing at their stupidity. I watched Shadis grill into this boy with keen interest, observing the utter terror coloring his irises. Then it was over and I swiveled my eyes forward to avoid my own personal chat with the vicious instructor as he made his way past several others without as many comments. When he reached me, he stood at a standstill for a minute assessing me as I woodenly stared ahead. Not an ounce of weakness that I still was plagued with was on display for Shadis to rip apart. He moved on, saying nothing.

My muscles relaxed and I shrugged my stiff shoulders. The whole thing was worthless to me, nothing more than a charade or a show. For the majority of the rest of the initiation, I endured the scorching summer heat and prayed that the girl behind me would shut her trap and stop sniveling. I almost sprinted to the barracks when Shadis dismissed us, pushing past some of the slower girls who grouped together to gossip about their apparent 'trauma.' If I wasn't in such a rush to get acquainted with a shower and bed I would have paused to have a 'word' with them. Not that anything I could say would actually leave a dent on their thick skulls.

A small gathering of girls was already swarming around the bunks like a colony of honeybees when I stormed in. The ones who came across my path quickly dodged to the side. There was a bunk in the back, closest to the showers and farthest from the dull chatter of my fellow female cadets. There were two girls already occupying the bunk across from the one I was determined to lay claim to. One was perched on the top bunk with her legs swung over the railing, playing with a pocketknife. She had an unpleasant scar that ran diagonally across her face, stopping just at the edge of her jawline. The other was tying her boots with great attention, pulling at the strings with a display of strength I found entirely unnecessary. Silky dark hair fell and guarded the expression that donned her face. A bright red scarf was sprawled out next to her. I couldn't help but wonder what purpose it served her in the unbearable heat.

Tossing my meager supplies onto the bottom bunk, I spread my aching limbs across the rock solid mattress. I closed my eyes for a moment, hoping to regain some of the energy I had perspired under the sun. They snapped open when I heard a foot creak against the wobbly ladder.

"Fancy seeing you here," Eloise said with a cheeky smile. Her bronze skin glistened with sweat and she discarded her uniform and rolled up the sleeves to her tunic. A sorry excuse for a knapsack was thrown over her shoulder.

I groaned and rolled over. Hopefully she got the message. I was not to be bothered.

A few seconds later I heard the wood planks above my head squeal as Eloise pulled herself onto the top bunk. Not a moment later curly hair was tickling my forehead. I startled upwards to see the damned fool hanging upside with nothing but her calves for support. She poked my cheek. "Let's get dinner, yeah?"

"How bout you leave me the fuck alone?"

She snorted, "You'll sleep through it if I leave you here. I don't think you'll last very long tomorrow without food."

"Fine," I growled. "But you do anything to annoy me and I'll spoon out your eyeballs."

"Has anyone ever told you you're an absolute joy to be around."

"For fuck's sake."

The two of us were walking to the guest hall when we spotted to wagon transporting rejects and quitters to the fields. I had been mostly been tuning out Eloise's meaningless yapping, but she never was able to take the hint I wasn't interesting about learning about her six brothers or her cat. She was relentless. I didn't know if she was purposely ignoring my attempts to scare her off or if she was just plain dense.

"I wonder how many of these soft-hearted headasses will be joining them," I commented, interrupting Eloise's rambling.

She chuckled, to my surprise, "They're a bunch of pansies. If they can't handle a bully then how the hell are they supposed to face titans? Good riddance."

In that moment I decided I wouldn't mind it all that much if Eloise decided to stick around. I figured she'd get bored with me after awhile. "You're right about that much. I wouldn't want to serve with a bunch of fucking cowards who would drown in their own piss if they ever came face to face with one of those fuckers."

"And you've had the pleasure of meeting a titan before?" Eloise questioned, turning sharply and boring her eyes into mine. Maybe she was smarter than I gave her credit for.

I leaned down and pinched her cheeks, to her utter dismay, "Wouldn't you like to know."

"You're full of shit," she spat and slapped my shoulder. It actually kinda stung. Eloise could prove to be useful.

"And you're not?" I said, raising an eyebrow.

"Now, see this," she laughed, "this is why I like you."

I was more pleased with this statement than I'd liked to admit.

The mess hall was stuffed to the brim with ravenous cadets when arrived. We squeezed into a table right next to where a bunch of owl-eyed kids had converged around one sitting figure. A few gasps of amazement reached my ears as I shoveled the poor excuse for soup into my mouth. The girl next to me, from the one from earlier with the scar, pinched her nose and mutter something profane underneath her breath. Eloise slid in the open spot across from us, nearly getting elbowed in the eye by one particularly ardent spectator. She punched him in the gut for good measure, still. I complimented her on her left hook to which she glowed.

"What's with the fanatics behind us?" she asked Scarface.

"Some kid from Shiganshina is putting on a show," Scarface responded, tearing at her bread with the ferocity of a wild animals. "The dumbasses as lapping it up like dogs."

"YOU SAW THE COLOSSAL TITAN?!"

"Fuck, if this goes on for much longer I might just kill myself," she groaned, plunking her bread into her soup and planting her face into her hands. A certain sadness, however, crossed her face at the mention of the titan who kicked in Wall Maria. My gut told me that she had been there on that day. A sick feeling twisted my stomach at the memory.

"He wasn't actually that big," came the short answer to the bombardment of questions, like the kid was trying to sound impressive. I only picked up on idiocy.

His audience continued to eat it up like a bunch of starving orphans. I never understood why those in the interior were so fascinated by the titans but so vehemently discouraged any mentions of the outside world. It was only obvious that to unearth more about the monsters we would have to venture outside the safety of the walls. Not that I was eager to leave myself. I just found it ironic.

I caught on to the last bits of whatever the kid had gone off about, "I'm going to kill them all."

I couldn't stop myself. I roared with laughter.

The kid spun around with murder in his burning green eyes. "You got something to say?!"

Oh boy, this was bound to be fun.

(a/n)

eren pls stop yelling 2k17

forgive me for the low quality. exposition is always such a struggle fuck. i'm trying my best to reveal more about wisteria's character and I really hope she remains consistent? she's pretty much an asshole but like,,, i hope she's more three-dimensional than I feel she's coming off as. since I haven't really had her meet meet any of the canon characters yet this won't apply til later chapters but please inform me if someone is blatantly OOC. I will however ask for a bit of leniency seeing this will be my interpretation of the characters and odds are they might end up developing slightly differently than in the manga/anime.

i will also address what happened to may and wisteria's family in future chapters, I'm leaving it up in the air for a reason, mostly to kind of show you that wisteria doesn't even trust herself with those memories and "erases" them from her head. however, it'd be cool if you'd leave any theories you have in a review (it's a bit obvious but I appreciate it anyways.)

reminder to review !

more reviews = faster updates y'all. I posted this on here not only for you to enjoy it, but also to get feedback.