Here it is! The complete version of chapter 1! I know it took forever, and I'm sorry about that, but it's probably gonna be the norm. So be prepared for a long wait for chapter 2.
Anyway, for those of you who weren't here when I first posted this, this is an AU in which Maria, Rose, and Sina do actually exist as goddesses and Eren is the god of war in human form. This is meant to be pretty self-indulgent with some BAMF!/OP!Eren, and I'm gonna be ignoring a lot of the more recent canon. This story will follow closer to the simpler idea that was presented in the beginning, in that all of humanity was overrun by the titans and retreated behind their walls.
Now with that all being said, I hope you enjoy!
Hot. It's so hot. Eren can't breathe. His flesh is melting off, the scalding acid finally reaching his skin.
Jäger, wake up.
The world is red, crimson with the blood of those trapped with him. There's nothing left. He can't fight this. He was foolish to even try.
Jäger you must wake up! There's little time!
His head sinks below the surface and there is nothing more. There is no light. There is no sound. There is nothing. He can't breathe and he can't fight, there is nothing left.
He will die here.
JÄGER!
Eren's eyes snap open. Instead of the belly of a titan, he sees the glowing silhouette of a woman. "Lady Maria?"
He can't see her face, but there is a smile in her voice. "Yes Jäger, it's me," Now there is sadness. "It pains me to do this, but there is nothing else, my power grows weaker by the moment. The time for you to return has come. My wall has fallen and now Rose will soon share my fate. The humans are dying faster than they are born and soon Sina will have the last of them."
"What would you have me do? I am dying!" He shouts.
"Remember Jäger, you must remember. You are the Hunter, you are the fighter and you lay waste to your enemies." Her voice fades, her final words echoing in his ears. "Remember Jäger and fight."
Suddenly, Eren's head breaks through the surface and he can see. Terrified faces disappearing inside cavernous mouths. Severed limbs bobbing in red acid. Half the torso of a young woman, still struggling to scream, splashing down in front of him. A simmering, roaring kind of rage bubbles up in his chest, setting fire to his insides.
How dare they. How dare they! The humans are his! His to kill! His to teach! His to destroy! How. Dare. They!
Screaming, Eren feels his body rapidly expand, new bones clicking and snapping into place. He bursts through the titan's stomach, crushing it underfoot. He roars, loud and long as he adjusts to his new body, his fury shaking the very foundations of the earth. Something inside him, dark and ravenous, finally settles in place.
A deep inhale and he scents the world around him, the smell of death and destruction and the putrid odor of titan flesh taints the air. One lumbers towards him, eyes a glazed grey and its mouth wide in an empty grin. Eren steps forward, a wet crunch as he steps on the half-destroyed carcass of the titan that ate him.
He raises his fist and plows it through the smaller titan's head, sending it flying. It lands with a crash, feebly twitching as the upper part of its skull regenerates. Eren marches toward it steadily, rage making his eyes glow an eerie green. Before it can stand, he brings his foot down on its nape. A sharp twist and a wet crack and the titan goes limp.
Its corpse steams as it decays. Eren lifts his head and breathes in, reveling in his kill. He's inhaling for another roar when he catches it, a familiar scent on a stray breeze.
Mikasa!
Eren turns his head sharply in the direction it's strongest, and he sees her. Mikasa, his best friend and sister in all but blood, alone and grounded against a fifteen meter titan. The simmering rage in his chest sparks into an inferno.
No. No.
They can't have her. Eren refuses to let her die. He's sprinting, the distance between him and the monster threatening his family closing rapidly. Before it even has the time to see him, he rears back and slugs it. His clenched fist colliding with its face forcefully enough to send its head flying off its body. It tumbles backward.
He smashes his foot down on its nape and steam billows. He roars at it, bringing his foot down a second and a third time, raging at the titan that had the gall to try and take anything else from him. When the corpse at his feet is nothing but a steaming, bloody mess he looks up.
Movement on the rooftops catches Eren's eye. Mikasa is there, talking to two other people. He can't tell who one is, but he'd recognize the other's mop of blonde hair anywhere. Armin. Good, together they'll be fine.
He turns away and towards another titan, its oddly curled hair bouncing with every thundering step. It reaches out, greedy fingers intent on catching the humans behind him. Eren catches the titan's hands in each of his. They scuffle, the titan trying to break Eren's hold as he pushes it back, but his superior strength wins out and he forces it across the street and into a building. It lands with a crash and stills for a moment, disoriented and weak. He throws one punch, then another, each landing in the titan's throat and destroying its nape.
The distinct hydraulic sound of ODM gear being fired draws his attention. Eren turns and sees Mikasa and the other guy carrying Armin hurtling off. A cursory glance around and he spots another titan corpse up the street, but no other titans nearby. He tracks them, watching as they speed through the air.
They land on a long stretch of roof and run to the end of it before taking off again, still heading in the same direction. Eren looks ahead of them, trying to figure out where they're going. He sees it. A towering building with titans crawling all over it.
Headquarters.
If they go there now they'll be killed! There's no way the three of them can take out so many titans on their own. Eren has to get there before they do. He starts to run, his own footsteps in thunderous cacophony with the lumbering titans he passes. It's not long before he pulls level with Mikasa's group. He forces his legs to pump faster and he easily outpaces them, widening the gap between them by the second.
He turns a corner at the same breakneck speed and levers himself over a row of buildings, his oversized hand leaving behind a crater in the roof. Between one heartbeat and the next, he's in the courtyard around headquarters. Two fifteen meter titans cling to the side Eren races towards. The titan with ragged blonde hair rears back, smashing its face into the wall and tearing a gaping hole in it. It leans back and the other one pushes past it to get a look inside. The two titans stare into the hole, their faces split by their meaningless smiles.
He's on them before they can reach inside. He jumps, fist colliding with the side of the blonde titan's head, sending both of them flying off the building. Eren roars. His wrist steams as bones snap and pop back in place. He glances to his left at the sound of breaking glass, just barely catching a flash of red scarf. Something tight in Eren's chest loosens. Armin and Mikasa made it inside, and they'll be safe as long as he takes care of the titans.
One of the fifteen meters he knocked down stands, one of its eyes and part of its cheek missing, but its mouth still open in a wide grin. He steps forward, and when it comes in range he punches it again, sending it back to the ground.
Eren roars again, the sound resonating deep in his chest and drawing the attention of every titan in the yard surrounding the garrison headquarters. He falls into an easy stance as they lumber toward him. Dodging around a ten meter running at him, Eren stomps on the nape of the nearest downed fifteen meter. He pivots away from the persistent ten meter titan. Punching it, he destroys its head and sends it skidding across the stones. He turns and stomps on the other downed fifteen meter's nape, the crunch of bone under his foot satisfying that dark thing inside him.
Thudding footsteps behind Eren make him look over his shoulder. Another fifteen-meter titan with wild grey hair and a bald crown raises its arm to strike. He turns just as it brings its arm down, catching it and using it to throw the titan over his shoulder. It lands on a pair of four meters, crushing them. A couple of smaller titans clamber over its body and a fourth fifteen meter starts to run at him.
He darts forward, socking the fifteen meter in the jaw. It stumbles back and Eren keeps moving. He brings his fist down on a seven meter's head and kicks a four meter, propelling it into the row of houses bordering headquarters. It goes through a wall, bringing the roof crashing down and pinning it under the rubble.
The titan with the bald crown tries to sit up, but Eren is too close. Kneeling, he grabs it by the throat and yanks. Its head comes away from its body with a sick squelch. Standing, he brings his foot down on what's left of its nape for good measure.
The last fifteen meter makes a clumsy grab at him. Eren easily ducks away from it, turning to face the approaching tian. He raises his arms in front of himself, tense and ready, but before he can strike he's barreled into by a ten meter he hadn't noticed. It sends him stumbling back into the row of already damaged buildings.
The titan bites down on his side and he lets out a surprised groan. He shoves it away, struggling to right himself quickly, but a tearing sensation and an unexpected agony stop him. Glancing down, some of the ribs on his right side are fully visible, and Eren has a sickening view of the inside of his chest cavity.
Keeping his hand on the ten meter's face, Eren tries to push himself up, sliding his foot back under him. Teeth clamp down on the back of his heel, making Eren hiss. Shit. The four meter. He glances down trying to get a look at it, but he can't see it from this angle.
The ten meter pushes against his hand, pressing Eren further into the crumbling building behind him and keeping him off balance. Between the ten meter scrabbling at him and the four meter chewing through his Achilles' tendon, he can't get the leverage he needs to push himself back to his feet.
Then the fifteen meter Eren had been fighting appears, tearing into his left arm. It jerks its head back, ripping a bloody chunk out of him. He can hear the grotesque sound of it gulping down the flesh in its mouth. Hungry, it goes back for more. Eren growls, trying again to stand, but the ten meter slips from his grasp and latches onto his right bicep, sinking its teeth in.
More titans have wandered into the courtyard surrounding headquarters. A seven meter starts tearing at his side and two four meters go for his free leg. He's pinned. Eren tries to struggle forward but they push him back, tearing into him ravenously. He can't move. He can do nothing but try to endure the odd ripping sensation and the searing pain that comes with it.
Eren drifts for a while, lost in the odd rhythm of pull-tear-pain and the sounds of chewing. He's not sure how much time passes, it seems stretched thin and pulled tight around him, dragging on and on. It's not until he hears another set of footsteps that he comes back to himself.
He looks up and sees another titan. It's a fifteen meter, which in and of itself isn't all that unusual, but he recognizes this one. The lanky blond titan that leapt over buildings and clung to a clock tower with one of his friends – with Thomas – in its mouth. Looking at it makes him see red.
That anger – rage – gives him the strength to move. Eren forces himself to stand, pushing through the titans clinging to him and moving even though both his arms have been eaten down to the bone. One arm breaks and falls off, too weak to hold under the weight of the titan and the pressure of him pulling away. He staggers a few more steps before the other arm falls off. Without the added weight of a titan on either side, he moves faster.
A thundering step, then another, and he's on it. He rears back and bites down on the titan's neck, breaking the skin and cracking the bones underneath, titan blood filling his mouth with a disgusting taste.
The fifteen meter that had one of his arms starts to stand. Locking his jaw, Eren raises himself to his full height, his exposed ribs cracking and breaking under the pressure. Tossing his head, he swings the body between his teeth with everything he has. The blond titan's body rips away from its head and crashes into the fifteen-meter, toppling it back into the buildings. It doesn't get back up.
Eren drops the severed head in his mouth and roars. His friend is avenged and his anger slowly evaporates, the strength it gave him leaving as suddenly as it came.
He falls to his knees, barely keeping himself upright. Chest heaving, steam billows as his missing limbs regenerate, ribs popping and cracking back into place while his side stitches itself closed. Exhaustion settles heavily on his shoulders. Eren isn't sure how long he's been like this, the sun had drifted across the sky without him noticing, too busy slaughtering titans. It would be so easy just to let himself fall here, to stop fighting and let the fatigue win. He's done enough, hasn't he? Mikasa and Armin are safe, most of the titans in the area are dead, and Rose's inner gate is still standing. It should be enough.
But how long could Rose hold out?
No, there's one more thing, one more thing he needs to do before he can let himself rest. He has to seal the outer gate. Seal the gate and Trost, everyone behind Wall Rose and Sina beyond that would be safe.
There's a boulder nearby. Eren had seen it on one of their rare trips into town and marveled at its size. He'd overheard a pair of garrison soldiers complaining about how much space it took up in the city, sitting there unable to be moved, too heavy for any horse to pull, and too big for any crane to lift. He'll just have to hope that he can.
He takes a deep breath and stands through sheer force of will, knees shaky and side tender. Most of the titans around him are nothing but steaming corpses, and the ones that are still alive are too small to worry about, so he starts walking.
As he walks, his footsteps jar aches and pains in his body. His side and his legs feel raw, stinging where the flesh had been torn off, and his arms are vaguely numb. His foot is stiff. Stubbornly, Eren pushes through the discomfort, ignoring it and forcing himself to focus on his goal. The boulder's not far off now.
He gets there with minimal fuss, all the titans he'd come across have been either too small to be a threat or dismissing him as one of them. The boulder sits in a small courtyard, having been left mostly alone by the people of Trost. It looks deceptively peaceful. Very few of the buildings surrounding it are damaged at all, and the vegetation around it sways gently in the light breeze. The top of the boulder is nearly level with Eren's shoulder, and it's about half as wide as he is tall. Moving it won't be an easy task. He places his hands on it, plants his feet, and shoves.
The boulder doesn't budge.
Eren huffs a surprised breath, still pushing against it. It feels more like he's trying to move Wall Rose herself than a freestanding rock. He stops after a long moment of nothing happening. Eren adjusts himself, crushing the grass under his feet as he digs his heels into the ground, levering his shoulder against the boulder. The rough face of it digs into his hide. He can feel the bones of his shoulder grind together as he struggles against it. Nothing.
Frustrated, Eren grits his teeth, pulling away from the boulder. He glares at it. This stupid hunk of rock is going to move. Rolling his shoulders, he takes a deep breath and lays the palms of his hands on the boulder again, level with his chest. He slides his right foot back and bends his left knee. Taking a deep breath, Eren shoves forward again.
The boulder still doesn't move.
Damn it! If he can't move the boulder, he won't be able to seal the breach in Wall Rose. The titans will keep walking in like it's nothing, and if the inner gate falls after that? All will be lost. Every human left behind those walls will perish, and it won't be long before Sina falls, either by titan hands or human.
Eren closes his eyes, forehead falling against the boulder, and thinks. There has to be a solution. What other option does he have?
He's trying, but he's grasping at straws and he knows it. Anything he comes up with is summarily dismissed, either too weak or too time-consuming. Goddess, he wishes Armin was with him. His quick-witted friend could have found another solution. But Armin isn't here and Eren is on his own. There's only one thing he can do.
He has to move that boulder.
Failure is not an option.
Eren sets his sights on the boulder one more time. Knees bent, he wraps his arms as far around it as he can and heaves with everything in him. The boulder comes up off the ground and he struggles to settle it on his shoulders. The crushing weight of it presses down on him, more than a ton of solid rock on his shoulders fighting the pull of gravity. His legs shake as he forces himself upright, hearing and feeling his rib cage creak and crack, the bones in his shoulders grind together. He pants under the strain of holding the boulder up, the air around him cloudy with the steam pouring off his body as it tries to repair itself. With the same steely determination that got him through his cadet training, into the top ten of his class, Eren takes the first step towards the gate.
Eren's focus narrows to the road ahead of him, one foot in front of the other and the next after that. He wobbles more than once, the weight on his back threatening to send him crashing to the ground, boulder and all. He doesn't hear the approaching footsteps of other titans. Doesn't hear the twang of metal wires and the slick sound of blades slicing through flesh. He can hardly see through the steam and the bulk of the boulder, but gradually the ground beneath his feet changes, from mud to cobblestone to thick wood planks. He reaches the trenches leading to the outer gate, a scant few yards from his goal.
Out of nowhere, a titan appears before him, its glazed eyes staring at him with a starved sort of joy as it ambles forward. Eren doesn't stop, he knows – knows with a fierce sort of certainty – that if he stops now he won't continue. So he keeps walking.
The titan draws closer and closer, but just before it's too late it stumbles and starts to fall, a faint look of surprise on its warped face. A tiny figure in green jumps off its corpse, quickly sailing out of his limited field of view. Eren keeps walking, stepping on the steaming, half-decayed corpse as he goes.
He's almost – almost – there, just a little farther and this entire thing will be over. Eren clears the remaining distance with a few large strides, coming face to face with the gaping maw of the breach. It's nothing but a large jagged hole in Wall Rose, surrounded by rubble and debris, and yet it dooms them all.
This is it.
With a deep breath, Eren grits his teeth and heaves the boulder up and off his shoulders, shoving forward into the breach. The boulder grinds against the sides of it, moving forward with a bone-shaking rumble. He pushes and shoves until the boulder won't move any further, until he can't move it further.
The breach has been sealed.
It's the sick combination of heady relief and bone-deep exhaustion that sends him back to his knees, his vision blurry and chest heaving. He can't see much beyond the steam clouding the air around him as his body desperately tries to heal, but he can faintly hear the continued sounds of battle, screaming and shouting accompanied by the characteristic thud of overly large bodies.
Several small figures in green land near him, their cloaks emblazoned with a pair of mismatched wings. The Survey Corps had arrived sometime during the fight. He can hear them chattering, but he's not focused on what they're saying, struggling to calm his breathing as he is. It's not until one of them, a taller man with a big mouth, raises his voice that Eren takes notice.
There are six of them and it seems like they're in the middle of an argument. One that, from the bits and pieces he can catch, seems to be about him. They're split evenly on how they should deal with him, whether to kill him or to capture him. Which, Eren has to admit, sounds fair. After all, he does look like a titan even if he's not, so he can understand their fear. But he has no interest in finding out if he can regenerate a titan killing blow.
When he moves they all tense, readying themselves to fight or to flee, but the entire squad stills when he calmly lays a hand on the nape of his neck. A shocked outcry ("Did you see that!? It's protecting its weak spot!" "Oh God, it's intelligent!" "We have to kill that thing now! What if it turns on us next!") pours out of each of them, the squad unable to truly believe what they have just seen. In their disbelief, they don't realize how loud they are and they forget to pay attention to their surroundings.
Eren sees it before they do. An abnormal with its upper torso flopped back like it has no spine, arms flailing behind it, sprinting toward easy prey. It's still too far away for the group of soldiers to have noticed it, but it's moving fast.
If they don't move now most of them will die and Eren can't let that happen.
He forces himself up, limbs painfully sluggish as if he were moving through thick mud. The squad scatters in a panic, startled by his movement. Eren doesn't pay them any attention, focused on the abnormal rapidly gaining ground on them. He sprints towards it, closing the distance between them twice as fast, and rams into the abnormal. As exhausted as he is it nearly knocks him over, but he stands firm and sends the titan to the ground.
It lands on its face, its back contorted in such a way that its belly faces the sky. It struggles to get up, arms and legs flailing wildly, but it can't move with its body stuck in such an unnatural position. He grabs its ankle and drags it forward, straightening it out. The titan starts to rise but he plants a foot in its belly. He forces the titan to bend forward with his grip on its throat, exposing its nape and leaving it vulnerable. Eren bites down and pulls, ripping open its nape and tearing out part of its malformed spine. The titan goes limp and its body starts to decay as he spits out the oversized bones in his mouth.
His merciless slaughter of another titan seems to have snapped the soldiers out of their daze, and they all fly off, no one so much as mentioning an attempt to kill him. The squad goes after another titan, bringing it down with a coordinated assault before speeding off to help their comrades.
All of Eren's exertion finally catches up to him. An overwhelming wave of dizziness hits him and he falls flat on his face, the world spinning sickeningly around him. He doesn't try to move, his arms and legs like lead. Sharp pain slices through the nape of his neck. For a nauseating moment, he's looking through two pairs of eyes, before he falls back, landing on something rough and uncomfortably hot.
Disoriented and exhausted, it takes longer than it should for Eren to realize that he's back to his normal size. There's something wet on his face and he's lying on the remains of his titan form. He needs to move. Out here, like this, he's vulnerable, any titan that comes along could use him as an easy snack. He sits up, his arms like jelly and barely able to hold him up, and looks around. There's a house that's mostly intact maybe twenty feet away. With no small amount of effort, he drags himself to his feet, carefully making his way down his own corpse, his exhausted clumsiness and the slick of decay making the climb dangerous.
He stumbles to the ground, barely able to stop his legs from folding like a house of cards beneath him. Goddess, he's so tired. He weaves drunkenly as walks toward the abandoned house, the world spinning around him. He makes it through the empty door frame and to the far wall without falling. Leaning against it, he uses the wall for support as his knees finally give out and he slides to the floor. Eren barely has a moment to spare a thought for the safety of the house before his eyes slip closed and between one breath and the next, Eren passes out.
What do you think? Leave me a comment and let me know!
And to those of you who left their comments on the last chapter, don't worry! I still have your comments saved, and I'm super grateful for all your support!
Edited 1/30/21