I do not own Shingeki no Kyojin
A/N: As much as I love writing this story, I want to see how many of you guys actually like it. Please leave reviews~, they really give me the drive to try harder.
I update frequently, every day I'm writing a chapter~. The story has officially picked up.
Had you guys watched episode 15 of SnK yet? I have...I will say...Hanji, you poor thing *cries* Anyway, back to the story. I ought to write more A/N for you guys.
Ah, and for all you non-equestrians out there, a cremello is a type of coat color on a horse in which their coat takes on a cream color. Often times I refer to specific horses by their coats to give an indication of who is riding what.
UPDATE 7/26: I have made a few changes, I removed the previous Chapter 10 (containing Hanji's past and a brief glimpse of Rivaille's history), while it is relevant to the plot, I want to push it later on in the story. Sorry for all you LeviHan fans but something pushed me into rewriting it. Please bear with me.
Hooves thundered against the masonry.
"Shit," Sasha cursed. They were coming in to a dead end. There were no other turns in the narrow alley (large enough for two horses to fit through), just one direction, she thought it was the right way. Her horse, upon reaching the wall, reared and whined, turning and facing the other way without her command. Frantically, Sasha observed her surroundings. There were no windows or doors to break through, there was no other way to go but back. Back into the maw of the military that she had sworn her very allegiance to.
They're going to come. They're going to come down the alley in a few seconds...they're going to kill me. I'm going to end up like...end up...just like-
"No," she snarled.
She unlatched one holster to bring out a hand-grip. With a fierce thrust, she brought the slot down to a blade and hooked it in place.
With the sword complete, Sasha unsheathed it and let it rest on her side. It glinted up at her as though it were the only friend she had. She had to fight, she wasn't going down without one, she wasn't going to die without striking one hit upon someone. She wasn't going to die like the prey she hunted in the familiar woods of home.
Her horse, exhausted and dehydrated, nickered unpleasantly when she clamped her legs at each side of its barrel. It started slow, unwilling to take the strains of running, but she kicked with ferocity that forced it to press on. Her sword rose high and over her shoulder. Hooves beating ahead of her told her that her enemies were drawing near; she was convinced that the horses she heard earlier were not Ymir.
"I'm not going to die, I'm not going to die, I'm not going to die," she chanted as a mantra as her steed picked up speed.
The sight of a black and a cremello came to her in a blink of an eye. She was about to strike out, aiming for the cremello's rider, but recognized it to be Christa. Her sword swung low as she swerved away, barely missing Christa's thigh. It caused the blond to scream out and lean over to the side to avoid her as best she could.
"Sasha!?" Ymir shouted in disbelief, Sasha rounded her horse to follow theirs.
"It's a dead-end, don't go-"
But she was back to where she was. Their horses were immediately halted and turned.
"Did they follow?" Sasha panted, her adrenaline kicked in at some point, piqued at seeing Christa, and was still flowing even at that moment.
Christa breathed out,"Yeah, it's Annie."
Upon saying her name, another set of hooves neared them. Sasha kicked at her horse once more, beckoning it to gallop. Ymir and Christa lacked any type of weapon, they were relying on her to fight in their stead. It scared her that they rested their lives on her, it scared her that she would have to kill someone she once knew. Annie was a skilled fighter but Sasha hoped that she had the element of surprise on her side.
She ran faster when a gray horse came to light.
Her sword was held high and she steered her horse for a collision. Unexpectedly, Annie's face (as expression always seemed bored) contorted in shock as she tried to lead her horse to the right, this time, Sasha was quicker and had a much more definite target. She brought her sword down to strike at the blond. A cry came out from her as they blurred passed one another while stirrups grazed and sparked against each other.
The gray continued on.
Pulling her sword up, she saw half of its edge lined with blood. A severe hit. She turned her horse around and she chased after her, wanting to see if she had finished her off. Her horse, pushed beyond its limits, dropped into a lazy canter.
When she reached the end of the alley for the third time, she found Annie had stopped; she was still standing, alive but unmoving. She approached and saw that there was blood plastered to the gray horse's rump, it was fresh, it was Annie's.
"You have no where to go," Sasha growled, putting on a brave front. "You're outnumbered. I don't care if you were a classmate or not, we're not going quietly with you."
Her eyes shifted to Ymir and Christa. Their mouths were agape in horror, at least Christa's was, Ymir had an expression close to being shocked and, oddly enough, enraged. Annie, whose back was to her, didn't respond. Sasha let out a "tch" and walked her horse to her side, she then brought her blade to Annie's throat, threatening to lop her head off.
It was silent between the four of them. Suddenly, a hissing noise resounded from Annie. At first thought, Sasha believed Annie was making the noise by mouth but she realized it sounded more like water hitting a hot iron. Steam rose from her body, much like it did to a Titan. Sasha held her blade to her throat as she walked her horse around Annie's to see what Ymir and Christa were awestruck about.
"Put your weapon down," Annie finally ordered, Sasha didn't comply,"if you know what's best for you."
Sasha could clearly see where her she had sliced Annie. She had gotten her on the right of her and drove her blade downwards across her right arm, nearly severing it at the joint and leaving it on attached to the forearm through her skin and flesh. It was sickening to see her arm dangle, it was worse when Annie simply took her other hand, grasped her nearly severed arm, and pulled it apart, tossing her limb wall with a pained look on her face.
Sasha's body trembled and she backed her horse away; she threw her head to the side and vomited.
More steam rose from Annie's dismembered arm. She was regenerating.
"Why aren't you turning into a Titan?" Ymir inquired, though she was glaring.
Annie eyes flickered around the scene, then focused on Ymir. "This place is too narrow. But the moment you get into the open, I'll turn."
"Y-yeah," Christa shakily said, she had paled at the sight of Annie's self-inflicted dismemberment,"but you'll...you'll end up wanted too."
"Guess I can't have a reason to be a Titan then," she smugly replied,"well, I'll have to let you go, you'll make me compromise everything-"
"No, you're coming with us. Sasha, have my horse, yours is ready to drop dead," Ymir commented as she dismounted. Sasha was still vomiting while Ymir took off her cloak and wrapped it around Annie's joint so that they could cover most of the steam from being seen.
Ymir strode to be several feet away behind the horse. With surprising strength, she sprinted and then leaped up to mount it from behind, settling herself onto the back of the saddle. Christa, deeming it safe to approach, neared them both but kept her distance from Annie. She timidly asked,"Why take her with us?"
"She'll be good leverage against the military, give them proof that we aren't the ones to be sought after," Ymir reasoned, she suddenly brought out the gun and pinned it to Annie's back,"also, I wanna get back at her for walking-in on us...multiple times."
Christa's sickly face went a little red and she walked away, taking Ymir's horse with her. She offered the reins to Sasha while Annie retorted sourly,"Excuse me but everyone uses the barracks."
"Just shut up. Sasha, c'mon, she'll grow back a new arm-" In response, the brunette spewed more of her insides. "-ugh, you're taking it all out like a Titan-" More came and she was wheezing. "-seriously-"
"Ymir!" Christa snapped. "You're not helping!"
After a while, Sasha finally wiped her mouth, sheathed her blade, and got on to Ymir's horse, still green from what she had seen; she left her horse in Christa's hands, the blond obliged to lead it. As they walked, with Annie in front, white smoke and hissing flesh grew more abundant and louder by the minute, telling them she would regain her missing limb soon.
When they reached the main street, the blond did not shift into a Titan, much to the relief of the three Scouts.
-...-
Hanji spent the next three hours explaining to him...the insane result of her experimentation on regeneration. She raved and raved, even as they ate their meal, even as they went back upstairs, even as Rivaille began to clean her room.
"...so yesterday, I was trying to make more of it. By adding more of-" Her words drowned out as he glared at her boots; they were unpolished. "-and then Petra was supposed to write down what happened so I can remember the compounds..."
During her rant, he was thinking to himself of why she hadn't explained this to Erwin in the first place. It rattled his mind that hiding notes of a complex procedure could warrant a death sentence for her. Should this had been a another time, a time without Eren, Hanji would have gotten recognition (good ones with a promotion) without execution. By this point, it was useless to try and prove her innocence.
He had a feeling he would be charged for a vague suspicion, Erwin's cryptic warning was enough to convince him.
They would have to run away and start a new life, should they get out the Karanese.
For Rivaille this would be the second time; the first was when he was eighteen and pressed into the military after being stripped away of his wealth and power through insubordination.
For Hanji, this would be...well, this would probably be her third time. He didn't know much as far as she went with her past, he had only known that she was deceived by a man and that she had no other family other than Gabrielle. Then there was that time when they were forced to run in the streets for a few weeks, hiding from his once "loyal" criminally active friends; it ended with his own arrest and then a two offers: clear his records of all crimes if he could serve in the military or pay the price by execution.
He chose the military. So did she.
Hanji was free to move on in life but he guessed she feared the streets afterwards, she followed him, simply out of having no one else to look for.
He barely listened to Hanji as she continue on, but he found her smiling the entire time. She was happy that her experiment was a success, even going as far to disregard that it had ended with her being slated to die by a paranoid government; she must be overlooking it through the fact that she was still alive. She blabbered away, sharing her extensive research to him despite he had tuned her out after the first ten minutes of it.
His fingers rubbed a cloth against her boots vigorously, wanting to see them shine. He dabbed the shoe polish he had left on the bedside and then cut her off by saying,"You never told me about the guy who deceived you."
Hanji's eyes flickered over to him, she stared as though he had spoke in a foreign language. He couldn't tell if she was failing to process the words or she didn't actually hear him.
He repeated,"The man who deceived you, you never told me about him."
After fourteen years, she had never uttered details other than saying the phrase: 'the man who deceived me'. She did her best to hide away her personal stories though she shown it several times through reacting to certain stimuli, such as the mention of chains, the underground mall, or even her name 'Zoe'; he was surprised she could hold herself together in her native district or when Tobias addressed her as such.
When he first met her, she was withdrawn and flinched at every movement he made, almost like a green horse that never learned the ways of the city. He would admit, when he was younger, that he had grown smitten with her shyness and slowly began to admire her accumulating strength through time together at the quaint bookstore; it was after her sudden obsession with Titans that his interests in her dropped.
He relied on her as she relied on him, that was enough for both of them. But...he felt that he wouldn't go on without her, not after all they had been through. At times, he'd wonder if she had the capacity to hold deep feelings for him, but those were fleeting.
Now, with her need on him being pressed over his mind, he felt that now he would have address it.
A long moment passed. She had grown quiet as she sat in her chair. Her hands were still fiddling with her glasses. "...you never asked."
Rivaille figured that even after all these years, she still wasn't willing to open up to him. Sighing, he apologized,"You don't have to say anything, Hanji-" He had ceased calling her 'Four-eyes' as she stopped wearing her glasses. "-if you're not ready."
"...no, I'm not ready."