I. "Bertholdt."
Reiner's growling voice grates against his ears, jarring Bertholdt back into the spur of the moment from his thoughts, and his eyes widen as he truly begins to see. Bertholdt's eyes had taken the sight of a long, emerald plume of smoke carving a long swathe across the distant, twilight horizon, the same as Reiner. It's only now, though, when two more pillars of green vapor climb across the horizon with faraway thunderclaps that Bertholdt understands.
"Is that... a signal flare?!" Bertholdt can hear himself saying, the words pouring out his mouth in a waterfall of anxiety as he turns to face Reiner, "The Survey Corp? Already?! They shouldn't be able to put together a scouting formation without moving a lot of horses over the wall!"
"I didn't think they'd be able to act so quickly... damn it. Commander Erwin might be with them. " Reiner hisses, already reaching for his ODM's hand grips, "We're up against a tough bunch."
The blonde turns away, launching a hook into the bark of the parallel tree with the whine of a steel cable before leaping and swinging over to the other branch where their captives sit in confusion. Bertholdt doesn't waste a second to follow him. He reaches for his own hand grips, ignoring the way that they are still slick with the blood and sweat of their original owner, and steps over to the edge of the giant tree branch without a hint of fear. Bertholdt can feel the forest floor lurking on the other side of the ledge, meters upon meters beneath the canopy made up of hundreds of tree branches, but the fear of heights left him long before he learned how to navigate ODM gear, and it only takes him a moment to jettison over to the other branch and land next to Ymir with a mere hiss of steam.
For a moment, their eyes meet, Ymir's deep amber meeting with Bertholdt's own forest green, and the deep sinkhole at the bottom of his stomach that gnaws at him when he looks at her would have made him look away even if Eren hadn't started throwing a fit and drawn his attention away anyway. Eren knocks Reiner to the floor of the branch suddenly with a roar, and begins to pound away at him with the handless stubs for arms Eren currently owns. If Reiner were any other man, Bertholdt would be worried enough to contemplate stepping into the fight, but it only takes Reiner a few seconds to give Eren a sharp boot to the chest and knock the kid flat on his ass. Reiner scrambles over, and wraps one of his trunk-thick arms around Eren's neck while the other restrains one of his flailing arms, before beginning to squeeze down on Eren's windpipe. His raging screams lose a level or two of volume, although they are no less intense in tone, and Bertholdt turns his head away to try and stare Ymir in the face.
Bertholdt only gets halfway, stopping at just the point where he can catch a glimpse of the muddy glint of Ymir's eyes in the dying sunlight. He remains faced away from her, his attention split between Eren's ear-splitting shrieking and the weight of Ymir's heavy gaze. She must sense that there's been a change in plans, because the way that Bertholdt can see Ymir tilt her head in the way that allows him to know that she's going to ask a question is familiar predictable.
"Hey, why are we leaving already?" Ymir asks, and Bertholdt looks again, forces himself to look again, and he drags his gaze towards her like a locomotive does its freight cars on rusty rails.
"Ymir... just before you turned back into a human..." Bertholdt starts haltingly, "...Do you remember who you ate?"
When he says those words, Ymir gives him a sideways glance, her eyes widening ever so slightly as she understands what he's asking. For a long moment whose silence is only penetrated by the harsh rasps of Eren's breathing as Reiner chokes him into submission, Ymir stares off into the sunset, averting her eyes from Bertholdt and turning them into herself.
"...No, I don't remember, but..." Ymir finally answers, and Bertholdt isn't actually sure why he expected anything else, "...that was right around five years ago, which would mean..."
Ymir trails off, and her eyes suddenly regain their flint as they flit up towards Berthold's face, cutting deep grooves into his stony expression before her gaze settles upon him totally.
"Was it a friend of yours?"
She asks it so casually, tilting her head curiously and speaking with that same cool disinterest she's always had, and for a moment Bertholdt has half a mind to think Ymir is mocking him, like she does with everyone else. But then, a second later, the feeling fades, and Bertholdt is left with the sensation he always has when someone stares at him for too long, like they've somehow seen behind the mask and into the smog of paranoia and dread that collects inside of his skull, even though the masks he and Reiner wore have already been blown to pieces in the light of a glorious thunderclap.
Ymir looks at Bertholdt for a moment longer, looks at Bertholdt for an answer, expecting something, and if he squints hard enough, Bertholdt can swear that he's looking into Marcel's wide, amber eyes instead of her lime-green ones. Someone is screaming, and Bertholdt can't quite tell if it's still Eren solely making the noise, or if Marcel is there too, his shrieking transforming into the sound of muscle being torn by hard bone in an orchestra's sharp crescendo.
"... Sorry." Ymir intones, just as the popping noise of sinewy flesh being rent by her teeth graces Bertholdt's ears, "I can't even recall it."
There's a thudding sound that emanates from Bertholdt's left side, and he realizes where he really is just in time to turn his head and catch Reiner slam Eren face down into the bark of the tree branch they're all sitting on. Eren gnaws away at the stumps where his hands once were to little result, with nothing but small geysers of blood bursting out of the torn flesh in jets of steam, and the sight of Eren writhing pathetically in Reiner's iron grasp only makes Bertholdt sigh…
…And Ymir hum. Bertholdt can feel her presence lurking at his side, can feel her eyes scathe the back of his neck as they watch Eren scream and wail. Ymir's waiting for him to say something, anything, Bertholdt knows, but what? What can he even say to that? There is nothing to say, nothing that would matter now… and maybe it never did in the first place. But Bertholdt knows Ymir as well as he knows the rest ofthe One-Hundred and Fourth; she won't leave it alone, especially not now, not after the secret of their allegiances has been so brutally exposed under the harsh light of mid-day. Ymir will rip and pick and tear at the subject like a crow does with carrion, like she always seems to think she can, and Bertholdt needs to give her an answer that'll satisfy Ymir enough to keep her from reconsidering her own allegiances, her own choices.
"...There's nothing you can do if you don't remember," Bertholdt says, his words cocooned in the drab safety of meaningless platitudes, "It was the same way with us…"
It's not. For the others, maybe, but not for him. Never for him. The bone-deep tang of viscera lingers on the back of Bertholdt's tongue at every waking moment, poisoning every lie he's told for the last five years, and every time he does speak the smoldering coals roiling beneath Bertholdt's skin swallow and gasp in air greedily, growing and flickering like a previously-smothered candle.
"... I see." Ymir intones, and Bertholdt knows that she doesn't, not at all, and a small, dimly lit corner of his mind seethes at the fact that she thinks she understands, "Eren doesn't seem to remember either... I guess that's just how it works."
And then, she looks at him, edged steel and bloody bone hidden with the shroud an indifferent expression, and a chill runs down Bertholdt's spine as he suddenly becomes twelve years old again, shuddering in his boots as Ymir asks coolly:
"Do you still hate me for it?"
There's a hundred and one ways that Bertholdt could answer that question, but not a single one has any meaning to it. What's the point in brooding over a tangled knot such as that when nothing can be done about it? Marcel is dead, and Ymir is alive, and he and Reiner are sitting here with Ymir and Eren instead of Annie and Marcel, all the years of lies and destruction spent for this one moment. They've made their choices and have to go home. They're going home; there's no other choices to be made now. Not when they've finally salvaged some semblance of success from this horrid place, not when they're finally so close to a way out.
...But even so, even now, there's still that not so small, perfectly hidden piece of himself that simmers and foams impotently. It's not like Reiner's volcanic flashes of white-hot rage, or Annie's frigid and steely loathing, but it's still anger, that much he can easily recognize. At what, Bertholdt's not exactly sure, and it's irrational, especially when he knows there's nothing to be done about all of this. But even so, it's still there, and the old ashes packed into his heart still glow with caustic warmth. It's her fault, isn't it? Nobody ever gets sent to this wasteland without a good reason, and if Ymir wasn't just a bad person, then she wouldn't be here and Marcel would still be alive and there could have, would have been some other way than this.
"I wonder," Bertholdt finally replies simply, before adding, "I... don't really know. I'm sure you didn't want to eat anyone either. Just how long were were you wandering around outside the walls?"
It's a curiosity that's tugged at him, and it's only fair that Bertholdt asks a question of his own before they set off. If Ymir is here... then she knows. She knows about the truth of this war, and who their masters really are, and how so futile the situation ultimately is for Krista and her lackeys. But the last batch of condemned was shipped out from home decades ago, before any of them were even born, and Ymir looks to be the same age as him and Reiner.
Something's not adding up here. A sinking feeling gnaws at the bottom of Bertholdt's stomach, and he gets the sense that Ymir's loyalties are even more fickle than they thought as a distant look overtakes Ymir's expression. She's remembering, maybe, in the same way that Bertholdt does sometimes, where the weight of simply existing suddenly drapes across his body like a lifeless caul, wet and sagging off of his bones. Flashes of images, alien and yet familiar, both at the same time, dancing in the heavy blankets of steam and smoke that pumped out of his heart and into his mind. Beholding deep crimson unto an even deeper scarlet with the taste of raw meat on his tongue, and the feeling of sand between his toes.
"About sixty years," Ymir finally murmurs, and Bertholdt's lips part, but no words of surprise come out, "It was like... having a nightmare that wouldn't end..."
And that, perhaps, Bertholdt can finally relate to.
"For now," Reiner yells over the whining of steel cables and the roar of wind in Bertholdt's ears, "Let's just head somewhere with no Titans!"
The deep boom of lumbering giants flailing forwards to follow after their group from behind shakes the trees from the beginnings of their massive trunks, and the canopy shudders above them, the families of leaves chafing against each other and causing a raspy sort of whisper to set an anxious backdrop to their exit. The Titan's thunder footsteps punctuates the silence, and Bertholdt can feel Ymir tighten her grip around his waist, and instinct is helpful in this moment, his muscles accounting and correcting for the unfamiliar weight on his back as Bertholdt swoops through the treetops. Reiner seems to have no such trouble, his stout stature more than capable of hoisting Eren's comatose body and using ODM equipment at the same time.
"Stay as far away from them as possible! My Titan moves slow so if we get surrounded, I won't be able to protect the both of us!"
Orders are orders, as Bertholdt always has known, and so he does not complain, but Ymir does. She's about halfway through sniping about how they should've just waited for night when he can feel her shift her body, turning to glare back into the distance, and the sound of signal flares exploding in the distance is like a judge's hammer administering their death warrant. A bead of cold sweat drips down Bertholdt's forehead, and he suddenly feels he's wearing a second skin, and is acutely heart beating away like a jackrabbit's as it's chased by a hunter. Bertholdt doesn't dare turn to try and look over his shoulder, because his mind is doing all the work for him, fabricating visions of the enemy, getting closer and closer and closer with each passing second.
"...Signal flares?!" Ymir exclaims, "So the Survey Corp came to rescue us!"
"Damn it... they're already close," Reiner grumbles, "This is all because Eren got violent..."
Ymir pays Reiner no heed, like she usually would, but she's quiet. That's not right. Ymir is all piss and vinegar, even in times like this, so why-?
"...It can't be... she couldn't..." Ymir murmurs, not so quiet that Bertholdt can't hear her perfectly, "No... She's there."
And then, bellowing in Bertholdt's ear: "REINER! IT'S KRISTA!"
Bertholdt stifles a wince, eyes widening and his teeth grinding together, and Reiner let's out a shocked yelp as he looks over his shoulder to stare at Ymir.
"Krista's come here with them! Now's our chance to grab her!" The look on Reiner's face is one of both fury and fear, and Bertholdt can feel Ymir lean forward on his back and dig her fingers into his ribs hard enough to bleed.
"How do you know that?! You can't see her from here!"
"I know she's with them! That idiot is too kind-hearted for her own good! She's going to come to rescue me!" Her words blow across Reiner like a hurricane gale across a mountain, and like the great mound of rock and stone, he does not bend, merely looking away with a steely expression in his eyes.
"Even if that's true, we can't go back now! We'll get another chance!"
"What?! Ymir hisses, breath hot on the inside of Bertholdt's ear, and he grimaces silently, the slow but sure ache of worn muscle beginning to flood his arms and back under the weight of her body.
"We're clearly not likely to succeed right now! How are you going to grab Krista while she's inside that group?! Wait for our chance!"
"...Wait for 'our chance' ?!" Ymir hollers incredulously, after a tense beat of silence booms between the two of them, "When's that going to be? After one of your Warriors eats me?! No! I can't trust you!"
"Trust me!" Reiner shoots back, "I'm not lying when I say we need Krista too!"
"Then do it now!" Ymir cries, "Prove it to me right now!"
Reiner doesn't respond, his gaze pointed dead ahead, and Bertholdt can feel Ymir's eyes burning holes into the back of his neck as she pleads;
"I... need it to be now! I want to see her now... At this rate... I'll never see her again!"
His tongue is like a bar of lead, drowning in saliva at the bottom of his mouth, and it takes what feels like all the strength Bertholdt has in his body to move it and make what they're all thinking come out of his mouth.
"...We can't," Bertholdt mumbles softly, and it doesn't feel like he's even speaking at all, like Bertholdt can't believe that this is where he finally decides to speak his piece for once in his life, "Sorry, Ymir... Right now, we don't even know... If we can safely escape ourselves."
But Reiner chugs along anyway in spite of Bertholdt's words, all bravado and grand declarations; "I promise you! If there's just one person we free from this conflict, it's going to be Krista! We'll free her, I swear!"
Silence. It's totally silent. It reigns across the forest, drowning them all in quiet even though the forest is abuzz with the rustling of the leaves, the thundering of the Titans and the hissing of steel and steam through the treetops. Reiner is silent, glare fixed towards the light in the distance, and Bertholdt is silent, mouth sealed shut with plaster and concrete, and Ymir...
"I'm the strongest one here in this terrain."
For a moment, Bertholdt almost doesn't register that she said anything at all, but then half his vision goes dark, and the sensation of grimy fingers across his eye socket sends shivers down Bertholdt's spine. He knows that he lets out a yelp of surprise, and knows that he has to save them from almost falling into the darkness of the forest floor, but none of it finds purchase in Bertholdt's mind. His mind is racing in a thousand different directions at once, swinging through the trees and curdling in fear of what is chasing them and shivering under Ymir's heavy gaze all at once.
"I'd be able to dominate this area, don't you think?" Ymir states huskily, glaring into Bertholdt's eyes with a dead expression plastered across her face, "My Titan... might not be as strong as yours, but I can move quickly through the trees. I could probably even steal Eren from you... and go back to the Survey Corp."
Reiner screeches to a halt, swinging to land on the branch of one of the towering trees, and Ymir allows Bertholdt to follow. He lands with a thump on the thick bark of the branch, his aching feet trembling inside of his boots, and from beneath Ymir's pressure forcing Bertholdt to lean forwards, he can see Reiner's sweaty and beet-red face tremble with barely contained outrage.
"If you don't take Krista with you right now, I'll make a nuisance of myself here." Ymir explains, and Reiner's lip quivers before he finally explodes.
"And what about Krista?! We won't we able to save her that way, all because of your selfishness!"
"Yeah... I'm fine with that."
Fine with that. Fine with that. Fine with wasting her opportunity. No, no, no. Not at all. He's not, no, he can't. Not when they're so close to home, not when they're so close to escaping. All the hard work he's put in, and for what? They can't go home if they die here.
They're going to die here. They're going to die here, alone in the forest. Ripped to shreds between a Titans teeth or flesh pared by steel blades or smashed to bits beneath a giant foot or beaten to death with the rifle butts or hung from the neck, gasping from air, or fed to the dogs bit by bit, and what is Ymir doing?
Ymir is babbling on, and Reiner is growling guttarly, and there is fire beneath Bertholdt's skin.
The flames lick at the inside of his flesh, pouring out from openings in the sooty blast furnace where his heart should be in rhythm with the drumbeat pounding of blood in Bertholdt's ears. The hollow of his ribs and skull are already stained with ash from the smoldering of his chest during the quiet moments, and with each of Ymir's words it feels as if his body will split apart and blaze like the summer sun.
Ymir wrenches a hand down across his face, her sweaty fingertips digging grooves into his skull as she threatens them, and through the gaps in her fingers wrapped around Bertholdt's eyes, he can them, the howling, tear-streaked faces of the dying soldiers and the gut-splitting smiles of the Titans. They scream and shriek and wail, and-
-Bertholdt is eye to eye with the one that ripped Marcel to pieces.
Ymir roars for him to try and stop her, and the crude, wrought-iron cube in Bertholdt's chest finally immolates.
His hands move on their own, and the sticky, familiar sensation of blood covers his hands.
Bertholdt doesn't remember doing it, only that he did.
One second, he's there, quaking under Ymir's grip, and the next, Bertholdt has wheeled around, fists coated with sanguine ferocity and clenched so tight that it feels like his fingers are about to snap off.
Blood, red and glimmering in the stray, golden rays of light that pierce the canopy, sprays out of Ymir's bent, broken nose in a crimson waterfall.
Ymir's expression glazes over, eyes rolling into the back of her head, and she topples backwards off of the tree branch and into the abyss.