Rated M for: Detailed descriptions of gore and violence

Also, beware that I do not follow the canon to a hundred percent or you would have no reason to read my story instead of the original works again.

Enjoy.

Chapter 11: Revelation

"Is everything alright?"

I tore away from the mane of my mare and glanced to the right. Mikasa's dark, expressionless eyes met mine and I slowly nodded. Eren's intense gaze also landed on me, his eyes clearly showing concern, and Armin swallowed hard, his blonde brows furrowing.

"You're going to tear up your wounds in no time if you keep on clutching like that," Mikasa quietly noted before setting her focus straight. The flickering flame of her torch danced wickedly across her exotic features and black, silken hair, and distracted my disoriented mind for a moment too long.

"Oh," I finally replied as she looked at me again, her left eyebrow arching the slightest. "Yeah."

Something similar to worry flashed across her stoic countenance but disappeared as soon as it surfaced. I blinked to check twice, then dismissed it as a trick of the light. I lowered my gaze and immediately discovered what concerned the girl—my knuckles were so pale that they almost glowed in the seemingly infinite dark. A drop of sweat trickled down my forehead and followed the contour of my eyebrow as I tried to concentrate on which muscles I needed to use to release my hold of the reins. Growing irritated at my constant failure, I heaved a sigh.

"Are you afraid?"

Her question both confused and surprised me. The former because I hadn't even realized how fast my heart was beating and the latter because Mikasa had asked me out loud. I had, during our short acquaintance, perceived that she was rather disinclined to communicate with anybody except Eren and Armin—not counting spontaneous, rather odd confessions, curt replies and discreet gestures—and witnessing her speak to me felt… oddly reassuring. Was it the lack of female company amongst the recruits that attracted her to me? Or was it merely a polite courtesy?

Or was it perhaps because she, too, had known Sebastian in some way?

I shrugged it away. Brooding over my brother would do me no good other than to eventually pop my brain without any titans' involvement. With a faint smile, I finally understood what Levi meant whenever he said that I gave him a headache.

Levi.

"Sera?"

"Sorry," I instantly responded and wiped my mouth with the back of my hand; a smile was hardly appropriate in our current situation. And just the thought of Levi's gorgeous face made me want to rip out my traitorous heart and mangle it.

"Did you hear me?" Mikasa wondered.

I nodded and met her gaze. Mikasa had switched hold of the torch and now held it tightly in her right hand, thus removing the barrier between us that had been of her other arm. "I did," I acknowledged and pursed my lips as I tried to come up with an adequate answer. "I guess I am," I then said.

"You don't look scared," she casually commented and resettled her gaze forward.

I furrowed my brows at her statement and tried to regain visual contact with the girl, but Mikasa's eyes were glued onto something into the distance. Eventually, I gave up and returned to suspiciously regarding the environment while I clung onto my horse the best I could. We were, after all, on titan territory now—it was only a matter of time before we would encounter at least one of them.

The thought excited me more than I was willing to admit even to myself.

I shook my head clear from any kinds of diversions and decided to focus on my task. I recollected that Sebastian had explained his ability to be somewhat of a pure, automatic impulse rather than something he had to actively switch on and off. He had told me that it was a nagging feeling deep inside his mind and heart, as a steady pressure or an inexplicable notion, and that the uncomfortable sensation intensified in proximity of titans. This was all my brother informed me the first time the subject was brought to ears, a late evening when he had returned from his first expedition, but as he continued to soar in ranks with dozens of solo kills and assists, I understood that there was more to the story than he had told me. As someone who had scored rank two amongst the top ten during his years in the Training Corps, I was well aware that he was extremely good at what he was doing but I also knew that nobody—well, probably Levi—could possibly be that good after only six months of service. And as I had confronted my brother with the facts, he had yielded with a laughter and stated the rest.

It's like I know before they strike, he had said with a proud grin. It's like I know exactly where they're aiming their silly bodies at and can predict their movement beforehand. I don't just see or hear it; I can feel it from my very core.

I inhaled deeply, filling my nose with the smell of cool air, warm horse and the thick fabric of my cape. The last one warmed my heart, reminding me yet again that I was a member of the Survey Corps, but other than that, I felt nothing. I saw the members of our large party, many of them also brandishing a torch, and the blurry silhouettes of sparse forests spread across the fields. I heard the movements of our mounts, my ragged breathing and the occasional clinks from my traveling companions' gear. My hands were cold and rapidly numbing from pain and chilly gales whipped my hair and clothes, cutting and clawing into my skin like thousands of sharp beaks and talons, but I, myself, felt nothing even close to resembling what my brother had told me. Still, I valorously kept my attention on alert.

Maybe, I thought halfheartedly and subconsciously gritted my teeth together, maybe I've gotten used to having this "strange" feeling. And the reason why it hasn't increased yet could be because there are no titans around here. That makes sense… right?

Two hours of exhaustive, hurting and mostly silent riding through the uncannily peaceful landscape steadily passed. A thick atmosphere of trepidation rolled off our party, almost making the air enveloping us difficult to breathe, and my heart was pounding hard against my ribcage. But unlike the rest, I was actually hoping to glimpse a titan. Unfortunately, as dawn broke through and reflected its warm shine across the land, those hopes were quenched.

I stared up into the astonishing sky, glad for the change of scenery. The darkness quickly faded and the slowly ascending sun sent a flurry of invigorating colors over the firmament, flaring life into the wispy remains of the alleviating clouds with tender shades of peach and a blushing lady's rosy cheeks. Countless of tiny, brilliant dots speckled the dark blue heavens like a trail of breadcrumbs, rejoicing in the transient, delicate moment of twilight.

The vivid spectacle brightened my mood immensely. It portrayed the perfect transition of night and day, the divine order and the endless circle of finales and preludes, and for an unknown amount of time I kept looking up, engrossed by the ethereal beauty in it all, until a somewhat familiar rumble promptly roused me from my daze. I could feel the ground quiver even where I sat on the horse and I frantically looked about with mixed emotions, direly enthusiastic to pinpoint the location of the sound. Immediately, I caught a flash of light, similar to the one in Stohess albeit a lot more confined, and slender, billowing pillars of smoke from a place merely two miles ahead of us. Although I hadn't been too focused during our ride, I remembered that I had noticed the ruins of an old castle at the exact same spot.

My face drained with color as I distinguished something on the outside of the only remaining stone tower. Judging by its muscular flesh, taut skin, protruding spine and altogether humanoid body, I understood that it was a titan and although it was clearly larger than a human, I found it much smaller in comparison to almost all of the other titans surrounding the tower. The nimble figure had grotesquely long arms to its tiny legs and ball-shaped torso, and moved with a hunched-over posture, its inwardly curving shoulders reaching high to its chin. Its skull was covered with shoulder-length, tangled strands of dark hair and its terrifying, pointy teeth glistened in the morning light like shimmering fish scale. The titan's round eyes were globes of complete blackness, devoid of any pupils or white, and glimmered with intent as they purposefully scanned their surroundings.

At first I thought that it was trying to reach the top of the tower, perhaps in an effort to get away from the many titans chasing it, but it was maneuvering itself too gently for something that would be fleeing in panic. It darted between different juts with carefully calculated and controlled movements and occasionally clawed at the titans just underneath it.

With a sharp intake of breath, I realized what it was.

"Towards the castle!" I heard Hange shout, far ahead of me and the three recruits I was riding next to. "Full speed!"

Strange, I thought in unease as I urged my mount into gallop. Mikasa was called to the vanguard and she forced her horse into an even faster pace, her head lowering and her left hand—she had discarded her torch since long—digging into her side as she shoot past me. Eren also increased his speed to catch up to the girl even though no orders had been given and a frightening glow illuminated his otherwise so very kind, green eyes. He sent me a hasty look but was gone before I had a chance to interpret what it had meant, and I was left with Armin. The golden-haired boy was rigid in his saddle and nervously gripped his reins as we steered towards Hange and her squad. The two of us nodded at each other before I redirected my attention to the macabre scene.

The titans were… unnerving, to say the least. Much more terrifying than I thought that they would be. Their eyes were large and glossy and their facial features were dreadfully similar to a human's. Their large, naked bodies reminded me of a toddler's with their soft, unmarred flesh and round, generously-sized stomachs, and they moved with a childlike contradiction of grace and bluntness. The titans were determined to satiate their infamously insatiable hunger and kept on reaching for the deftly dodging titan-shifter—the answer came obviously—until a clumsy hand soared from the crowd and finally caught it by its arm. The titan-shifter adamantly grasped onto the tower before abruptly glancing up and letting go of its hold, falling on top of two titans' heads. I shuddered as it howled in fury and began savagely biting and mauling its opponents with its feral teeth and nails, and although that initially kept its foes at bay, it quickly lost its edge when the titans managed to seize its struggling limbs. A gaunt, bald titan was first to lock itself around one of the titan-shifter's wildly kicking legs and was rewarded with a dark river of blood. The steamy, viscous fluid splattered all over the stones and a pair of shorter titans immediately begun lapping up the crimson gold. The titan-shifter shrieked in unrestrained pain, making the hairs on my neck stand erect, but didn't do anything else. It had given up.

"Sera!"

I met Hange's stern gaze. I hadn't even noticed that Armin and I had caught up to her and her troop; we were almost at the crumbled castle walls now. Mikasa and Eren were nowhere to be seen.

"Do you feel anything?" she heatedly asked, almost shouting over the howling wind.

I swallowed after failing my first attempt to speak. "Not yet!" I truthfully called back.

Hange's dark eyebrows pulled together. She was just about to reply when a loud grumble erupted and cut her off. My head whipped back towards the dilapidated fortress and I was just able to witness the tower quickly tipping towards the horde of titans, collapsing already halfway through the air, before a blast of dirt hindered my vision. I instinctively shaded my eyes with my right forearm, coughing out some of the dust that slipped into my nose and mouth, and fleetingly noted that I could finally move my hands.

"Rearguard, disperse and survey the surroundings!" barked Hange in a sharp, authoritarian tone. She wasn't fazed at all by our ride through the dirt-filled gust, much thanks to her spectacles. "Do not let any more titans come closer! Everybody else, dispatch from your mounts and initiate combat at free will!"

"Hange!" I yelled, then coughed again. We suddenly burst out of all the fume and after a moment of fervently blinking, I saw that we were riding along the ramshackle walls. "What am I supposed to do?"

"Just follow me for now!" she replied and signaled for her hesitant squad to advance forward. "You guys go on too! Don't let any titans get through to us!"

A man with short, light brown hair opened his mouth to protest but then refrained and gave Hange a nod. Together with the small troop that had been riding with Hange during the strenuous journey, he deftly launched himself directly off the horse and flew over the wall with blades in hand. Armin was unusually pale where he readied himself to my right and parts of his bangs lay slicked to his forehead and temples. I was also sweaty but the boy almost seemed nauseous as he, too, vaulted over the wall, armed and with a resolute expression across his sweet face. The now unmanned horses obediently stopped as soon as their riders abandoned them, unfazed by all the commotion.

"Good luck!" cheered Hange before she became grave again.

We were riding alone now. I was filled with dread, knowing that a titan could appear anytime and anywhere, but I trusted that Hange would know what to do if that happened. She had shown superior leadership several times by now and I was no longer baffled by how such an eccentric personality had gotten the rank as a squad leader. Still, I couldn't deny the fact that I would have felt a lot more safer with Levi around, even though he most likely would have been glowering and insulting me since the departure from Hermina.

"Still nothing?" Hange asked, her voice lowering as we curved around a corner and found safety from the ruthless gale.

I smoothed my tangled hair. Our pace had slowed considerably now and I took the opportunity to catch my breath as I shook my head in reply.

"Hmm… odd."

I soaked my lips, tasting tiny bits of grit and sand in my mouth. "How so?" I wondered in bemusement.

Screams and shouts could be heard as the soldiers coordinated their attacks. Hange tensely listened to someone's voice but then relaxed. She coiled around her handgrips, simply controlling the horse using her legs, and locked her attention onto the castle wall as she spoke.

"Nothing really," she replied with a light tone. "I was just so certain that you shared your brother's gift."

I stiffened at this and looked down at my hands. "Right."

"Your brother had his bad days," Hange suddenly said as she stood in her stirrups and tried to peek over the wall. After a couple of seconds, she slumped back down with a disappointed sigh. "He had these… mysteriously reoccurring headaches that could knock him out for a good couple of hours. Not even Shorty with that nasty mouth of his was able to bring him back to life. It wasn't really as if Sebastian were unconscious or so, but our words didn't seem to reach him. When I heard that you also had some kind of headache, the day you tried your Maneuvering Gear and… well, failed, I thought I was onto something."

I tried to see her face but she was still looking at the wall. "Hange," I began, frowning. "What are you trying to say?"

"You saw the note I had written, didn't you? That night in the infirmary?"

My eyes widened. In all honesty, I had actually forgotten all about it.

Hange turned to face me, a stern look set on her features. "I dismissed my first notion when I realized you weren't healing in an instant." Her eyes darkened. "I thought you were dead when Levi carried you through the courtyard and even reckoned he was going delirious because he was in some kind of denial…"

I felt my cheeks reddening but quickly urged my petty emotions away. She's surely exaggerating, I assured myself.

"...and after that, I concluded that you weren't a titan-shifter. I'm almost a hundred percent certain." She said the last triumphantly but her mood instantly dropped as she went on. "But really, Sera. You shouldn't have survived a fall from that height and you definitely shouldn't have been walking around the day after. Or even six months from now on. I… I don't know what to make of it. Both you and Sebastian… you're more than what you seem, aren't you?"

I was staring incredulously at her now, completely speechless and shocked by the copious amount of information she had managed to gain after only a couple of days of acquaintanceship. Hange was much cleverer than I had thought she was and that made me dumbfounded; I usually never misjudged someone's character.

Should I tell her the truth? I asked myself as I looked into her inquiring brown eyes. They were wary but more in a curious way than one of distrust. She of all people should understand… but then, I gave Sebastian my word that I wouldn't speak of it to anyone.

I was ambivalent, continuously switching between different answers, but when I finally opened my mouth, it wasn't to reply.

"Hange!" I screamed in sheer, hysterical fright. "Look out!"

A blonde titan had suddenly stepped out of a tear in the stone wall with incredibly quick and agile movements, and was swinging its wiry left arm towards the perplexed Hange. She was just able to look in the direction I was gaping at before the titan's hand smacked into her side and sent her flying to the ground, unmoving. The titan then stepped to block the path, opening and closing its wide mouth as something low and guttural came out. The horses reared away from the giant with panicked neighs and my mare threw me out of the saddle before darting away into the same direction we had come from. Hange's mount wasn't as lucky; its hind legs weren't able to stabilize the immense weight of its body and the horse stumbled during its disorganized retreat. Several crisp snaps, like the sound of someone cracking a bundle of shriveling twigs over their knee, resonated from the animal's falling shape and it gave out a shriek of horror. I would have hurled if I could, but I had been knocked out of breath as I slammed into the gravel and was now desperately trying to draw some much needed air into my shrinking lungs. A pool of scarlet spread from the horse's broken body and white foam trickled out from its flaring nostrils and slackened jaw.

Something warm and slippery soaked my bandages and although I had too much adrenaline in my system to feel any pain, I knew that I had injured my palms again. The scent of old rubble, sweat and iron filled my nose and I stiffly craned my neck backwards as I raised my gaze, hearing nothing but my wheezy inhales and the grinding noise from my hands as I clenched around the jagged pebbles I had landed on.

Why am I not dead?

The titan was shorter than the castle wall but it still towered high over me where I sat on the ground. It looked vaguely male with its pronounced, crooked nose, broad face and sturdy, square-shaped jaw, and its tanned, sinewy body emitted some kind of extraordinary heat. Its round, honey-colored eyes were glittering with intelligence as they focused onto me, sending a shudder of fright through my body. At first my thoughts veered into the idea of another titan-shifter but I couldn't discern any human purpose in its gaze. My mind quickly organized the facts—it was hiding in the wall crack; it took out the strongest opponent first; it scared the horses—and I paled as I realized what it was.

An aberrant.

I was frozen in place. They're the most dangerous of them all, I heard my brother's voice say, recalling a morning stroll a year ago. They're close to impossible to predict and have more than just a few tricks up their non-existent sleeves. I've only managed to kill eleven of those weirdos and all those times were a team effort with at least two or three casualties. It isn't just pure skill that you need; it's mostly luck.

The aberrant tilted its head to the right and crouched down in front of me, its eyes remaining locked with mine. I wanted to crawl away from it but my instincts told me to stay where I was and I obeyed, knowing that I couldn't trust the logical, currently infested with fear, part of my brain. The blonde titan parted its plump lips, showing two perfect rows of pearly teeth and a gigantic, fleshy tongue. Strings of drool connected its incisors and a wave of hot, humid breath whirled over me. I couldn't sense any particular smell from the titan but I still raised a hand to cover the lower part of my face, overcome with a feeling of queasiness as I tried to stifle a pathetic yelp. The edges of my vision were starting to get hazy and I shook uncontrollably even though I told myself to be as still as possible.

The titan's eyebrows twitched. Then, it hastily shut its mouth and plopped down on the ground in front of me at an arm's—my arm—length. Its large eyes were still pinned to me but other than that, it didn't move. It just stared at me, blinking once.

I'm ready, I thought as I accepted my fate. Death does not intimidate me.

A surprisingly soft sound came from deep inside its windpipe and it cocked its head to the other side as it carefully approached me with an enormous hand. I shut my eyes, too scared to look anymore, and braced myself for whatever would come. I only hoped that it was going to pass fast, that I would be able to suffer a swift, merciful death before I was eaten.

But as nothing happened, I frowned and opened my eyes.

The aberrant was still observing me with its honey-colored globes and although I could feel the heat of its palm as it surrounded me, its grasp remained completely open and created a crescent barrier behind my back. It simply watched me for a moment before its mouth and throat struggled to utter a single word.

"F-frie…" it gurgled. "F-frie…"

My jaw dropped and I was no longer afraid. Is it trying to say what I think it's trying to say? I quietly wondered.

I would never know. I hadn't even realized that there had been compassion in its large eyes until they suddenly grew dull as a spray of blood came out of its neck. Its slayer, an auburn-haired figure, flipped through the air and landed to the blonde titan's right. Her stained blades gleamed menacingly and she rapidly flicked them in a large cross in front of her, removing most of the red liquid.

The aberrant's head drooped and its body immediately began deteriorating, sending steam from its infantile limbs. I scrambled away from its cupped hand and staggered towards Hange while trying to not scream in relief. Her spectacles were miraculously enough still in one piece and she looked completely unharmed except for some dirt on her left cheek and clothes, indicating her earlier fall.

"Sera!" she exclaimed as she saw me, her eyes widening. "I thought you were dead! Again!"

I ignored the last as I bent over and rested my hands on my knees. My head was spinning and I knew that I was merely seconds away from slipping into paralysis. I had to tell her while my memory was still fresh.

"The titan…" I panted, as if I had ran a mile instead of a few puny yards. "It… it didn't touch me."