Author's Notes: This is a response to the Canon Divergence prompt for Annie Week 2023.
Marco's death was one of the most traumatic episodes in AOT for me — and I believe this was one of RBA's biggest regrets too. So as a birthday gift to Annie, this little ficlet reimagines what would have needed to happen for Marco to survive on the roofs of Trost.
This was pretty cathartic for me to write, and I hope you enjoy it too!
Marco let out a desperate cry, as Reiner pinned him down on one of the roofs at Trost.
"R-Reiner, what are you doing?" Marco screamed, tears streaming down his face. "Bertholdt, help me!"
Bertholdt grimaced as he tried to look away, putting his focus on the titan movements around them instead.
This was the sight that greeted Annie as she landed on the roof. Even without knowing the specifics, she felt that something had gone horribly wrong.
"Annie! Save me, please!"
"What's going on here?"
Although her question was directed towards Reiner and Bertholdt, Marco was the one who replied.
"Reiner's acting crazy!" Marco screamed as he struggled against Reiner's grasp.
Marco's cries felt like icy tentacles that wrapped around her chest, squeezing the breath out of her.
The worst of her suspicions were coming true.
If Reiner and Bertholdt were breaking their facade, it could only mean …
"He heard us talking," Reiner announced gravely. "We can't let him live, he's too smart for that."
Marco's eyes widened. He turned at Annie in shock. Marco's look told Annie everything — he already deduced that she was in on it too.
Behind him, Bertholdt sweated anxiously.
His olive-green eyes searched Annie's desperately, as if the solution existed in their cool blue depths. What should we do? This can't be right? Bertholdt's eyes seemed to convey.
Bertholdt looked powerless at that moment. Once again, he had seemingly elected Reiner to make the decisive calls, having already resigned to falling victim to its inevitable outcomes.
"Take off Marco's ODM gear, Annie. Hurry!" Reiner commanded gruffly. "That's an order!"
"N-no! No, please, don't!" Marco screamed, choking on his own tears. "Annie, please! We can talk this through!"
Washed-out memories of Marley, of Marcel, came back to Annie at that moment.
Reiner never spoke in that tone to the Paradisians.
"What, no! I'm not doing your dirty work. You fix your own mess," Annie managed to retort, taking a step back from the trio.
"Are you defying me, defying Marley?" Reiner growled back. Even with Reiner's superior strength, he was starting to tire against Marco's struggles.
"I knew you were starting to get attached to these island devils. Wasn't it you who risked your own life — your titan powers — to save little Connie?"
Annie was aware of Reiner's tactics. But among the three of them, he was the only one who was deeply indoctrinated with Marley's propaganda. Rather than persuading her, Reiner's words only worked to simmer her temper as she became reminded of Marley's ridiculously flawed rhetoric.
"That's rich, coming from you!" Annie spat back. "I saved Connie to keep up with that good soldier facade you forced us into in the first place."
Reiner froze. He wasn't counting on Annie to disobey, much less bite back.
"D-don't you want to get back to your father? I'll report you to Marley for insubordination!"
"Haven't you forgotten who got us into this mess in the first place, who killed Marcel?" Annie's words were laced with venom. How dare Reiner bring up her father as a negotiating tool.
"Losing one of the nine titans is a heavier military offense than so-called insubordination for not listening to you."
Despite the gravity of the situation, even Marco stopped struggling. Marley? Marcel? Nine titans? There was too much to process, too much to take in.
Slack-jawed, Bertholdt looked at Annie in a mixture of surprise and awe. Reiner's behavior had been bothering him for a while, but he did not know — nor dare — to oppose him whenever he brought up the Marley card.
Bertholdt, too, simply just wanted to go home.
"So, you don't get to call the shots, Reiner. Not when you have done nothing but compromise the mission." Annie stared at the blond man coldly.
It was silent for a moment, Reiner seemingly stupefied by the exchange. It was unclear if he was his soldier or warrior self then.
"Annie's right, Reiner. Let Marco go." Bertholdt said as he gripped Reiner's arms gently but firmly.
Eyes seemingly glazed out of confusion, Reiner loosened his grip on Marco's arms.
Finally free, the freckled man let out a huge sigh of relief.
He collapsed full-bodied against the roof for a second, before quickly getting up and offering his gratitude to Annie.
Annie held him away at arm's length.
"Don't be too happy, Marco. You're not off the hook."
Marco gulped.
"You will join the Military Police, as will I."
"You will not say a word of what you heard today to anyone, not to Jean, not to any of the commanders—if I catch wind of even as much as a hint of this to any breathing soul, unlike with dumb and dumber today," she glared at Reiner and Bertholdt, "when I get my hands on you, you won't even have the chance to scream for help."
Annie cracked her knuckles for effect. "Got that?"
Marco nodded wordlessly.
The silence grew palpably awkward between them on the roof.
"Tch. You can leave now, Marco. I'm not Shadis."
"T-thank you, Annie. I owe you my life," Marco murmured, still nervous as he leaped away on his ODM gear.
"As for you two," Annie glared at Reiner and Bertholdt, but moreso at the former. "Thanks for giving me another thing to keep tabs on," she said cynically, rolling her eyes.
"It's not like we don't have enough to worry about," she said dryly while Eren's titan ran amok around them in the city.
"Thanks for stepping in, Annie," Bertholdt mustered. "I feel like we might have just avoided something we would really regret," he whispered, wistfulness in his eyes.
"I-I'm sorry, Annie," Reiner murmured, still somewhat confused and not quite himself. "For Marcel, for everything."
In a move she found uncharacteristic of herself, Annie walked forward and leaned her head against Reiner's chest while gripping Bertholdt's jacket sleeve tightly.
"Look, we've got enough blood on our hands. All of us," she breathed, closing her eyes and pretending they were just refugees in Shinganshina again, even just for a moment.
"Our past doesn't give us the license to go around doing stupid things." She beat Reiner's chest halfheartedly. Even as her hand was balled into a fist, she felt the threaded texture of his shirt graze against her skin.
Marley treated them like simple pawns in a game of chess, but they were not inanimate nor dispensable weapons of war. They were people — physical beings, with blood coursing hot through their veins. The physicality of Reiner and Bertholdt's presence was living proof of exactly that.
Gripping his jacket sleeve even more tightly, Annie turned to look up at Bertholdt pleadingly. "I need both of you to make it out of this, please."
Both men's gazes softened at Annie's rare show of vulnerability. They hugged each other tightly, even as chaos continued to ensue around them in the city.
They needed to make it out of Paradis alive, if only for each others' sakes.