It never got too cold where we lived.

I remember the first time I saw snow.

I reached down and pulled out a pile, the cold frost in my hands made them red and burn but it was pleasant. My mother was covered from head to toe in pelts from the times Father went out hunting. He always made sure she was warm because of her fragile body and taught me to hunt when I was much young so I could fend for myself.

No matter how fragile she was, she looked like a beautiful sun goddess that I have read in my story books, my father the night that complimented her day. No matter how fragile she was, she looked like a beautiful sun goddess that I have read in my story books, my father the night that complimented her day. Her eyes are a mesmerizing l blue that reflected the light like water while she had upturned eyes which made her long lashes bat against the fat of her eyebrow. Her pink uneven lips were a little crooked into a lopsided smile, half of her face twitching slightly before it responded to mirror the other side. What framed her flawless face was her hair that was as thick as a horse's mane, the dark color that could rival the night.
I spun around and tossed the snow into the air with a cry of joy, the snow falling once again but this time on my face. My parents watched me from the side, my mother rubbing her slightly swollen belly and father making sure she was comfortable as she watched me.

I never understood where people like me came from, or how a family is family.

Everybody is family, no matter who they came from or what they did before.

Father always taught me to welcome people and ideas.

Mother taught me to be kind and understanding.

~

"Stabilize him, we need him alive!"

"Yes, sir!"

Drifting in and out of the darkness, there was a stabbing feeling every now and then that felt like needles piercing my thin skin. My wings felt torn but not detached, broken maybe. My chest was burning in pain, burning like hellfire. I deserved this. It was my fault.

"I'm sorry..." I whispered to myself, a tear slithering out from my eye. My thoughts swirled around my head, whispering and sometimes screaming my flaws and all the pain I deserved. Making sure to empty my face of all emotion, I opened my eyes slowly while my mind was screaming at me more and more. My lips moved slightly and I pleaded with the emptiness that enveloped my entire being.

"Hey, none of that now.." A woman's voice cooed at me and placed her warm hand on my cheek, it was slightly sweaty. Her hand was not only cold but calloused with thick skin, most of it around her finger pads, and palms. It was refreshing. "It is too soon to come here." A whimper came out from my lips. I could feel the sunlight on my skin once again, cleansing my body the best that it could. "Don't close yourself off, let yourself to feel. It is good. It is okay to cry." This woman kept cooing into my ear until I fell asleep once again. My heart burned from the sadness.

~

My eyes opened and I was in another room. My head throbbed with pain and I moaned lightly, grabbing it in hopes that it would stop for a while. "Fuck me, shit.." Cursing, I peeked at the room around me. It was furnished with not only the bed I was in but cabinets that held odd liquids and jars. Above me was a window, the sun cascading its rays into the room and brightening it.

A woman came in, her frameless glasses were twisted to the side a little while she read some papers that were in her hand. "Ahh, kiddo... You've had it tough." Hanji kept her head down and sniffed softly. I didn't say anything while I kept on watching her slumped shoulders. She had a different pair of glasses, ones that were round and framed her face nicely.

"Hey, Hanji..." I blinked quickly and raised my hand to give her a small wave. She turned around quickly and her face cracked into an open smile, rushing towards me as if it wasn't entirely real. She took my hand in hers and squeezed it. It wasn't the monstrous strength she had before.

She yelled for a person named Moblit. He came in and wrote down things that the woman said. "You are supposed to be out for another day, still healing." She pushed her glasses up and then my blanket down, exposing my upper torso. I tried to cover my bottom half the best that I could. "Amazing! You have been comatose for nearly two weeks. This is Moblit, my assistant."

Hanji started unraveling the bandages on my body, I don't remember where I got these from. My wounds, where they should have been, were closed and only the stitching was left with pink lines underneath them and some with dark red scabbing. A doctor came in on time and took care of pulling the stitches out, and yes, that did hurt but I didn't allow myself to show it.

The male doctor tugged the string and it slid out slowly. One by one they all came out and he put the medical strings on a metal sheet that was on a table next to him. "Amazing~" Hanji mused as my wings twitched, taking off the makeshift splints that kept my wings in place.

The doctor, with the help of Hanji, stepped back with the bandages. I flexed my wings, stretching them, flapping them in the air to test them out a bit. Hanji squealed, clapping her hands and then grabbing the book that Moblit was writing in. "Amazing. Healed in two weeks from extreme lacerations, scabbing in some parts but scars are fresh-"

"Hanji, I thought you weren't a doctor." The doctor bends my limbs lightly, looking at some of the scabs and putting patches on them to help for protection. She groaned lightly, rolling her eyes dramatically before looking up from her book. Moblit smiled a little, covering his mouth so that Hanji wouldn't see.

"I'm not! I am a scientist, two very different things!"

~

There was a knock on the door and I uttered a greeting for the person stepping it. I didn't look up from the reading and writing materials that laid on my lap. There were simple children's books and writing practices for me, and what irritated me the most was that fact that I couldn't fully understand them without a dictionary, but even then, I couldn't understand the fucking dictionary.

"I see that you are awake." My head snapped upwards and smiled lightly at the person in front of me. After a few seconds of an awkward silence, he moved to my side quickly and ruffled my messy hair. "You gave all of us a good scare." I could feel my heart skip a beat from his touch.

My face flushed with heat and I looked away, giving a short and embarrassing breath. "Heh..." I flickered my gaze from the bed to him, seeing his kind blue eyes with such hope, it almost broke my heart. I moved my hand slowly and cupped his cheek lightly, rubbing my thumb softly against his cheek. Erwin didn't move, he just let me touch his smooth skin, peering into those bottomless eyes.

"Oi, don't fall in love with me," Erwin softly spoke to me, his lips turning upward a bit in a smirk. I laughed lightly and pulled my hand away, teasing him back.

"Who would?"

We both laughed with each other.

~

He was a higher up, second in command, somebody, who took the lives of his soldiers onto his shoulders. I looked at the tea cup in my hands and I felt the warmth of it swell a bit. It has been another week and the doctors were mainly working on my current weight problem."While you were under, I went on a mission in the outer walls. We lost so many..." My head bobbed lightly, thinking about the human casualties that were either devoured or injured due to the titans.

I looked him in the eyes and could see the passion that burned in his bright blue eyes. It was intoxicating and gave me hope, something I haven't felt in a long time. I couldn't help but feel an overwhelming of emotions surge through me. "It's okay Erwin, it's... It's..." I couldn't find any words to help him. Everything that I thought of wouldn't help in this situation, I didn't know what to say to comfort him.

His eyes were soft and glimmered with a fragile look to them, like porcelain or a type of delicate glass. My hands moved quickly, grabbing his shoulders and pulling him into a hug, stroking along the way his blond hair swirled to the side. "I'm sorry Erwin. You couldn't save them..." We just sat there hugging each other. To think that every time they ventured outside these walls, an average of ten to twenty comrades dies.

A father.

A mother.

A sister.

A brother.

Would be gone.

~

The days blurred together and it was two main people who would come to visit me. Hanji would examine my wings and Erwin would have tea with me while doing some of his paperwork. I wasn't naked any longer but was wearing Erwin's shirt that had holes in the back for my wings to pop out in and a pair of Hanji's shorts. The shirt was a baggy button up on me and the shorts allowed me to move unobstructedly. They couldn't find me any underwear, there was only so much they could do for me.

"They seemed to be doing well.." The four-eyed woman mused as she extended and flexed my left wing, going onto my right to do the equivalent. "Just like a titan, they look heavy but they are actually lightweight... Interesting..." Giggling, Hanji gave me a crazed look. "I wonder how your nerves and blood vessels look like at their base. Oh, how I would love to see that~!"

"Hanji, they are probably hollow like a bird so he could fly. You should dissect birds first before moving to him." Erwin sipped his tea and looked at the papers that were laid on my legs. He was using me as a desk. "You are not allowed to touch him like that without my go-ahead."

Hanji bickered with Erwin for a while over the ethics and humanity of dissecting me, even a little. They are so funny, almost like they are coupled. Erwin bit back his tongue from speaking much more and went back to his papers. He stood up from his seat and gathered the papers at my bedside. "Erwin, I want to join the Survey Corps."

He stopped what he was doing, freezing for a moment and then moving once again. "No." Denying me, I furrowed my eyebrows and clenched my bedsheets in my hand, crinkling them. "Not in the state that you are in now. Nonetheless, no."

"I am going to join when I am healthy enough! I just need to gain a couple more pounds!"

"No!"

"Erwin! This isn't something that you can decide for me! I am going to join and that is final!"

Erwin slammed his fist on the arm of the medical bed. I could see the muscles in his arms move, being put to use. The bed rattled, shaking me lightly but it didn't scare me. "Can't you understand? This isn't child's play, we are putting our lives on the line!" I glared back at him, straightening up my back and huffing.

"And you don't think I know that already, Er? I can't sit here and do nothing while the people I care about most are at the risk of dying!" I looked around the room for Hanji. She endured the conversation by the kettle that was in the corner of the room, her back turned to us. I could tell she was listening by how tense her shoulders were. "Hanji, speak some sense into him!"

"E-Erwin.." She started, turning around somber look on her face. "You know you can't stop him. Shadis will recruit him as long as he is Commander..."

I got out of bed and stumbled a bit like a newly born fawn, clinging to Erwin to support. It has been weeks since I moved my legs to this extent. "I am not allowing anything hold me back. Train me. You know me best." I looked up at him and adjusted my footwork, moving away from him and going slowly towards the door. "If you don't then I will just go through it like the civilians."

~

After a few months, I was deemed healthy enough by doctors to start moving on my own and to train myself at a moderate pace. Erwin and I haven't talked and regretted forcing Hanji into the dispute, forcing her to take a side. It plagued my thoughts for disturbing the both of them, but this didn't stop me from working out.

I was currently running and it was near dawn. The chilly air sting away at my skin while I sweated, the heat fighting against the chill. My lungs burned from breathing too fast, my legs felt like lead, my stomach was in agony like it was going to force me to throw up. I couldn't stop now, though. I know that I could push myself a bit more, just a bit more before I couldn't move any longer. I adjusted the goggles that Hanji lent me. I couldn't see very well from living in darkness for such a long time and needed tinted sunglasses to help me with the process of getting used to the sunlight. I was as blind as her without them. The sun seeped through the top of the horizon and there was a bed of grass and flowers. I have been running this trail for a week or so, and I have never come across this gorgeous scene.

"What do you think you are doing here?" My blood flowed with the adrenaline flowing throughout my entire body for a moment, twisting my body and swinging my leg to hit his side. Erwin quickly caught my leg, grabbing it and twisting, making me fall on the dirt. Erwin held onto my leg and shifted my weight to make a stumbling land. I cried out lightly and landed on my side, trying to get my leg out of his grasp. I moved it feverishly, shaking it heavily and giving him a cold glare.

His eyes were an icy blue, different from the warm ones that he would look at me with. "What do you want?" I spat at him while the pain surged from my twisted leg, shivering its way up my backbone. He didn't speak for a while before tossing my leg to the side. "Damn it, what do you want?"

"I'll allow it." He spoke slowly to me. A perplexed look contorted onto my face and I shifted myself so I was looking at him properly. "I'll allow you to join the Survey Corps..." I ignored him for a while and picked at the grass beneath me, glaring at it while the flowers around me swayed with the breeze.

Erwin shifted his weight in front of me, moving down to kneel. "Train me," I commanded bravely. His mouth formed a tight line, his eyes flickering a bit in their blue chroma.

"For humanity and myself, I will make you one of the best."