::Recap::
"What are you people doing here?" They suddenly snapped their attention to see a young man with bark colored hair, and shining emerald eyes. He wore on a foreign outfit that the person next to him also wore. "It's dangerous here with the titans running around. Only soldiers are allowed this far out."
"Titans?" Erza slowly inquired.
But she was ignored as the brunet turned his attention to the man next to him.
"Connie," the young man with dark hair addressed his colleague. "Can you get these people back to Wall Maria safely on your own?"
His friend had a crew cut, and tired golden eyes. He sighed as he studied Team Natsu lazily. "Probably not, if I'm being honest. There're too many of them to keep an eye on at once. On top of that, it's unlikely that all of them know how to ride a horse."
Eren sighed and glanced back at the forest for a brief moment, his eyes calculating. "I guess we should take them back to Captain Levi and the rest of the squad then... it's closer than Wall Maria, anyways."
Connie chewed at his lip warily, his gaze never leaving the strangers in front of him. "What are you people doing out here anyways? You got a death wish or something?"
Natsu scoffed, earning a glare from the solider. "S'nothing like that. We were back at our guild hall and somehow we ended up here." Natsu explained as if it made all the sense in the world.
The other men both stared at him blankly before both of them asked in unison, "He's insane, isn't he?"
"Am not!" Natsu protested angrily.
"Nah, he pretty much is," Gray said, causing Natsu to glower.
"Either way," Eren tapped the gas tank attached to him. "We have to get going. More of the titans are probably going to be in this area soon. It isn't safe."
"Titans," Erza drawled thoughtfully. "Is that what you call them?"
"What do you mean 'is that what you call them'?" The brunet asked, almost annoyed as he eyebrow arched an eyebrow in the S-class mage's direction. "Of course that's what we call them."
Erza blushed slightly at her ignorance, "This is our first time encountering such a foul creature."
Both of the newcomers gave them incredulous looks. "Well, not many people other than those who survived from Shiganshina and the soldiers have seen the titans up close. But you act like you've never even heard of them."
"Aye, sir! We haven't," Happy said from atop of Natsu's head.
Their eyes widened impossibly and their mouths gaped open so far they thought their jaws would unlatch.
"I-it just... t-t-the cat j-just..." Connie sputtered.
"The hell..." Eren trailed off, speechless.
"I guess they've never seen an exceed before," Happy shrugged.
"Not important right now," Natsu interjected, his impatient personality returning. "Those things nearly ate Lucy and me! What are they?"
Connie was still watching Happy with curious eyes but then shook his head to clear it. "Are you serious? How have you guys not heard of titans? That's impossible! They've been around for centuries and are the reason the human race is on the brink of extinction."
Team Natsu stared at Connie, confusion dancing in their eyes.
"Alright, we've wasted enough time as is," Eren cut in. "It looks like we're going to have to go by foot so they can keep up. Unless any of you know how to ride a horse?"
"I..." Erza started, wanting to ask more questions but decided against it when she felt that it could wait. "Indeed, I can. I suppose one could ride with me if they needed to."
"I probably could figure it out," Gray shrugged, following Erza's drift of thought.
Eren nodded before he placed his fingers in his mouth and whistled, causing the dragon slayers to cringe at the sharp shrill.
Moments later, two horses galloped into view, skidding to a quick halt once they neared.
Eren and Connie both handled a horse, holding them close by the reigns that tied them.
"Alright," Connie said as he ushered the horse towards Erza and Gray. "You and this guy can both stir a horse; it seats two people. And one of you... I guess one of us could carry."
"I don't need to ride a horse or be carried for that matter," Natsu snorted, waving his hand dismissively before pointing to his cat. "I've got Happy."
Wendy nodded in agreement, "Charle can take me, too."
The two soldiers eyed the dragon slayers warily but decided not to question them.
"Okay," Eren said as he readied himself. "Connie, go to the head of the group and make sure no titans attack us. I'll make sure none ambush us from the back."
His companion nodded in agreement as Lucy filed onto the saddle of the horse Erza controlled.
"Alright. Let's head out!"
Connie used the reigns of his ODM gear to latch onto a tree and swung forward.
The soil from the ground kicked up, forming dust clouds as the horses rushed forward, Gray nearly losing his hold on his horse, clearly not used to riding on them, but still managed to keep from falling.
Charle easily flew Wendy high in the sky despite the young dragon slayer's protests. The exceed had insisted it was safer the higher they were in order to avoid the monsters they knew nothing about.
Natsu wasn't too far behind as he was held up by Happy. His sharp eyes not trusting his surroundings as he glanced around suspiciously, ready for anything that came their way.
Eren, however, lingered back for a few moments as he watched the others take off. Instead, he made his way over to the ditch that held the decaying corpse of a titan.
He frowned to himself as he studied it intently.
'This hole wasn't here before... so how'd it get here? And none of our members killed this titan... so how is it dead?'
Eren glanced over his shoulder, watching as the group made off.
'There's no way they could've killed it on their own...'
He shook his head to clear it when he heard a familiar pounding of the earth and headed in the direction of Connie and the strangers.
'Just who are these people?'
"So let me get this straight," Levi said as he gave Eren a blank stare. "Instead of escorting these people to Wall Maria, you brought them even further into titan territory where it is even more possible for them to get eaten. And now you are also telling me that they claim to know nothing about the very titans that have been roaming our world for several hundred years."
Eren scratched the back of his head awkwardly, "Well, it would have been worse if we went to Wall Maria; the distance was too much for us to take them there on our own. And I'm only telling you what they told us. They seemed pretty genuine... but it still seems too incredible to actually believe."
The shorter of the two had a hard look on his face before he walked off without another word about the matter, Eren following close behind.
"So what do we do about them?" Eren inquired. "We can't just leave them here."
"I never said we were going to," Levi retorted. "But because you made the idiot mistake of bringing them here instead of going back to Wall Maria in the first place, it looks like our mission will be coming to its premature end."
Eren gave a distasteful click of his tongue but didn't argue with the squad leader as he gathered everyone up.
"We're heading back early," Levi informed. "Make sure you're all ready within the next few minutes. We're escorting commoners back to Wall Maria."
Natsu fumed as he stomped his foot forward, "Just who do you think you're calling a commoner?"
Levi simply gave him a cold look, but chose to save his energy as he turned around and made his way to the exit of the forest. "We leave in five minutes."
"Oi!" Natsu protested. "I'm talking to you!"
Erza stopped him from charging as she slid an arm in front of him like a barrier. "Enough. Stop behaving like an ignoramus."
He gave a low grumble, "He started it."
"Natsu," Lucy warned, but still gently patted his shoulder. "They are trying to help us. The least we can do is show a bit of gratitude."
"Yeah, yeah, I hear ya," he mumbled as he tucked his muffler away from his face. "Still don't know where they're taking us, though. D'you know where Wall Maria is?"
Lucy pursed her lips and gave a small hum, "Honestly, I can't even remember hearing about a Wall Maria when I was learning geography with Spetto-san back at the Heartfilia Estate when I was younger."
"Nor have I," Erza agreed as she eyed the soldiers. "I have reason to believe we are no longer even remotely close to Fiore. Or even our earth for that matter."
The rest of Team Natsu gave her shocked looks.
"You don't mean like Edolas?" Charle asked from Wendy's arms.
Erza gave a troubled look, "No, it's not quite like that... Edolas was more like a different world. I'm not entirely sure if we're in a different planet... or a different dimension entirely. The people here seem human enough. But they claim that these titans have been roaming the world for centuries. How is that we haven't heard about this? The only explanation is that we are no longer on earth. It has happened before, it's possible for such an event to occur again."
Gray blinked, "Then how do we get back to our dimension?"
Erza shook her head, distraught, "Your guess is as good as mine."
"Enough chitchat," One of the men from the squad with brown hair styled in an undercut ordered. He had announced himself as Olou when they had arrived. "We're leaving now."
"We'll discuss this more at another time," Erza said as she readied her horse. "For now, we will simply focus at the task at hand of getting to safety."
Team Natsu nodded in agreement as they got ready to leave as well. And then, just like before, they headed out, this time in the direction of Wall Maria.
Team Natsu was in the middle, protected at all sides as the soldiers surrounded them like a barrier.
A woman with dark burgundy hair tied up in a high ponytail and glasses swung near by Natsu and Wendy as she studied the exceeds with wide eyes.
"I'm Hange," she introduced herself quickly, not giving enough time for either dragon slayer to acknowledge her as she continued. "I've never seen such a species of cat before in my life! Where did you get this from?"
Natsu gave her an annoyed glance, "Happy ain't just a cat, he's my-"
"Is it a robot? How does it produce wings such as these?" Hange asked, her voice rising with excitement.
Happy made a sound of protest as she tried to touch his wings, but Natsu swiped at her. "Quit it, lady! You're pissing me off."
"Do you think it would be okay for me to get a saliva sample from your cat so I could study its DNA? Or maybe if you have more, could I dissec-"
Wendy gave a small trill, an unusually fierce expression on her face, "No, you can't dissect either of them!"
Hange gave a pout but continued to squabble until finally Levi told her to stop.
Near the middle of the group, another young woman with short orange hair, swept down as she traveled from the lower branches. She had brown eyes and the same uniform as everyone else from the squad.
"I'm Petra," she said after a moment of hesitation as she kept her attention on the one's riding the horses. "Can I ask what you were all doing in the middle of this forest?"
Lucy smiled in her direction, "The name's Lucy. These are Erza and Gray. The other two up there are Natsu and Wendy, and their more than strange cats Happy and Charle." She introduced as she indicated to each person in her team. "And as for what we were doing in the middle of the forest... I couldn't really say. We just kind of... ended up there somehow."
Petra gave them curious looks, but tried to keep from staring for too long, "So you just appeared there?"
Her tone was suspicious, but none of them could really blame her.
"Pretty much," Gray confirmed bluntly with a shrug.
"Where are you guys from?" Petra asked, her voice not too prying, but they could tell she expected an answer. There was no doubt that the captain had asked her to interrogate them.
They were silent for a moment, not knowing what to answer with. Should they tell her that they were from a place that possibly didn't exist here? Or should they lie and say Wall Maria? They already had seemed insane enough when they announced not knowing what titans were, so they'd definitely be thrown into the looney bin if they answered with a place that didn't even exist in this world in the first place.
"Wall Maria," Erza finally answered.
"Sorry, I meant what district?" Petra elaborated.
"My apologies, but we'd prefer to keep this information private," Erza said.
"No, no. I understand," Petra gave a genuine smile. "But we need to know so we can get you there."
Gray sighed and he and Erza shared a look, "We're actually not from around here."
Petra waited patiently for him to continue.
"You guys know we've never heard of titans, or seen any for that matter, before today. We also haven't heard of Wall Maria. And to top things off, this place has a different feeling..." Gray trailed off as he glanced around. "We don't think we're from this world at all. Our home town is called Magnolia."
There was a moment of silence as the tangerine haired girl studied them with wide eyes.
"I see," Petra said as she blinked in a daze. She then smiled to them and nodded.
She then caught up to her captain at the head of the group and they exchanged words that were too quite for them to hear over the galloping of their horses.
"So what now?" Lucy asked. "Do you think they believe is?"
"Maybe," Erza said slowly. She opened her mouth to say more but was cut off as one of the soldiers from the front with blond hair in a ponytail shouted.
"13 meter titan coming in fast at 12 o' clock!" Eld warned as he readied his blades.
"Damn, already?" Gunther growled under his breath.
"It's an abnormal!" Connie added.
And then it sprang into the air, its shadow hovering over them as it descended down quickly.
"Ka-ryū no: Hoko!" Natsu roared, flames erupting into the air as Natsu aimed upwards towards the titan. But it did barely anything to buy them time as the titan came barreling down, just narrowly missing Gray's horse as it landed on the ground with a huge quake that shuddered everything around them.
Levi was quick to react despite the phenomenon he had just witnessed, slicing at the nape of the titan and killing it mercilessly.
He gave a 'tch' as the blood splashed onto him, quickly dissipating. "Filth."
Eren approached Natsu with wide emerald eyes, "What the hell was that? How did you...?"
"Dragon slayer magic," Natsu answered easily.
"Magic?" Olou growled and Natsu nodded as he allowed his fist lit up with flames.
"Captain Levi..." Eld trailed, waiting for their leader to make his decision.
Levi sauntered over, his eyes disinterested, "We'll let Captain Erwin deal with this once we get back."
Hange stumbled forward eagerly, her eyes shining crazily, "L-Levi- I have to- I have to do some tests! Please, Levi! I've never seen something like this- this is even more strange than-"
"Shut up, Hange," he simply said as he walked forward, back to the head of the group.
"B-but I-!"
"We're continuing forward," without waiting, he sprung forward, leaving the rest of the group to follow.
Hey! Welcome back to another chapter!
I rewrote this particular chapter a few different ways because it just wasn't turning out the way I wanted it to...
Anyways! I'm past that block in the road, and am pretty satisfied with this chapter, so I hope you all enjoy!
I'm hoping I got the personalities right for Levi's squad- or I guess all the characters from AoT/SnK. I'm pretty happy with how I portray the Fairy Tail characters, though... let me know what you think and how I can improve!
For whatever reason, I always thought Hange's name was written as Hanji. But when I looked it up, it turned out it was Hange, so...
Oh! And you might be wondering: 'what is Connie doing with Captain Levi's squad?' Well, I dunno, honestly... the first time I wrote this chapter, Armin and Mikasa were with Eren... and then it somehow changed to Connie. I guess I just like Connie's character, so...
Thank you to all those who reviewed/followed/favorited! I appreciate it!
Anyways, peace out! 👆