~ Aftermath ~

When Matias went to sleep he'd been hoping to wake up to this whole day being a nightmare brought upon by his stress. He had wanted to wake up with Annie without the marks that condemned her as a Titan and continue things as they had been in what he had considered peace. When he woke up he got anything but, the sounds of chaos and death breaking him out of his sleep. He hadn't known how long it had been, but he had been quick in getting up and getting in his uniform before stumbling outside. His eardrums vibrated and his skull rung with the roars and cries of Titans. People in his neighbourhood confused and frightened by the chaos in a deeper portion of the capital had looked to him for answers. He hadn't known what to say to them except for the promise to make sure that they didn't get hurt in the conflict as he raced to where it was happening.

As he'd made his way over the damage done by the two Titans became more and more grotesque, children without their parents roaming the streets around him with dead eyes and tear stricken cheeks. Some hadn't been so lucky and were among the corpses that he found in the rubble. Flashbacks of his sister and his own past became more and more clear as he forced his way through these sights. The only thing pulling him forward being the smile that his subordinate had worn in their time together. It propelled him forward and got him to the epicentre of the massacre before he was stopped by the horrifying sight of a head soaring towards his neighbourhood; he had never turned around so fast.

He almost tripped over his own feet in his mad dash, adrenaline pushing his body to its very limit. By the time that he arrived in front of the carnage that the Female Titan's head had caused he was both exhausted and shocked. The impact that the head had caused had not only destroyed a home and killed those inside, but it had created this thick smoke that made visibility near impossible. Still by a stroke of pure dumb luck he noticed something crawling towards his door and sprinted over to it fearing that it was someone in trouble.

It was someone in trouble. It was his subordinate. Annie Leonhart.

His training and experience in the Survey Corps had stopped him from losing his nerve at the sight of his subordinate, but it was still hard to look at. To avoid looking at it any further then he needed to, the military officer was quick to scope up Annie and then make his way through his own front door. He raced his way to a single cellar that had come with his house, one that in his eyes should really belong to a serial killer; it was finally going to come in handy. He ran over to it and got to his knees, the door almost invisible with how it was coloured the same as the floor. He opened it up and then looked at Annie with a single command.

"Don't make a sound and don't move until I come back." His hands dropped her inside the pitch blackness the moment he finished speaking and then closed the door with an aggregated sigh. It was only a matter of time until the Survey Corps found their way here and questioned him about his relationship with Annie and her whereabouts. He couldn't let them know that she was here nor ever find her in the first place, at least until he got to know just who she really is.

Seeing him with her single eye, she stared up at him as he picked her up. Taken inside and simply dropped into the cellar, she hissed and moaned in pain before rolling onto her side and crawling into a corner; using the lid of a barrel as a makeshift shield, it was useless anyway but she was terrified; it was obvious in her wide eye.

The Survey Corps arrived quickly, inspecting the head, they noted she was not in there, nor had she been in the body so they began their search. Quickly finding the dismembered limb of her foot, having fallen off from the thin muscle holding it as Matias had picked her up.

They began to knock on doors, kicking them in and searching, the blood trail heading to his door had been disguised by the sheer amount of blood from civilians killed by her head landing nearby.

They searched but found nothing, rushing into Matias's house, they saw him covered in blood and questioned him, of course believing what he said because he WAS Military Police after all; and the blood on her was not Titan blood, it was human for now. Annie's blood only burnt away in her Titan form.

Dogs were brought to search for her and went crazy at the scent of his house, more men were stationed but it was revealed that this was her home for a while. Stationing guards outside while a few searched her room, she kept nothing in particular that she did not carry with her so they found nothing in it.

"This is worse than I thought." Was the first thing that came to mind when Matias stepped outside to inspect the damage done by Annie's Titan remains. The building she'd crushed had somehow fallen on top of another and destroyed it as well, the staggering amount of dead on the street and the blood making most grown men sick on the street. He did his best to help despite the very clear futility in the action and eventually got people to gather dead or living in rubble.

As each were pulled out he was covered in more and more of the blood that their gushing limbs or torn torso's released. Memories that he'd suppressed came back in quick succession with each body, but he kept strong and made sure that those living and dead could at least be seen by the families and friends. At this time the Survey Corps searched his home and eventually commander Erwin alongside Levi confronted him. He had expected as much and quickly told the two everything about their history together and his own observations. Both went silent and exchanged a look before joining the search, the military officer able to feel the eyes on the back of his head as he went back to looking for both the living and dead.

When three hours had passed and he was approached by Nile and Erwin it didn't surprise him in the least that they suspected him to be hiding her. He denied the claims on his own understanding that Annie was smart enough to know that coming to his home would be the worst choice considering their history. That was his first lie. His second was showing the Survey Corps every single abandoned area in the neighbourhood and beyond that would suffice as a hiding spot.

When asked about the dismembered limb of her foot at the front of his door he was quick to play dumb and mention the severity of the smoke that'd covered the neighbourhood. If she had come to his home he hadn't been able to see it with how hard it was to see and how he had been more preoccupied with making sure people in his neighbourhood were safe. It was hard to argue with him after that and the questions steadily stopped, but as he expected people were put on guard in his neighbourhood to keep an eye on him. He continued to play it cool and rather then go back into his home continued to help in the clean up operation until it began to get late and people with heavy hearts retired for the night.

He was just as exhausted as everyone else by the time he got into his home, but he knew that his night had just began as he went to the cellar entrance. It was an absolute miracle that the dogs hadn't found this cellar door due to the blood in the air and the stronger scent in the places she had lived in. He opened the door and then hopped inside with a grunt, hand running against the wall until it found the switch to give the place a little light.

In the cellar, Annie had yanked her eye from its dangling piece of muscle and was recovering VERY slowly. She was exhausted and needed energy, food and rest to fully heal; it would take a few days for her to be back to full health but for now, she was busy trying to heal her leg; putting all attention into it.

The wounds had stopped bleeding and were slowly sizzling with smoke as the flesh healed through the power of the Titan Shifter.

"You're... going to... hand me over... arnt you?" She whispered quietly, eye wide with fear and shaking, actually shaking. The once strong persona gone for now.

He snorted in an ill-fitting reaction brought on by the outlandishness of her question and the pure exhaustion that was this entire day and those before it.

"You're shitting me, Annie. I just lied to basically the entirety of the Survey Corps, hid you in this cellar, and basically became an enemy of humanity. I'm not going to hand you over." He walked over to where Annie was and in a sudden violent motion kicked the shield out of her weakened hands. It clattered to the ground as he crouched down to get eye-level with the Titan-shifter.

"Now that said, I will change my mind if you don't promise me right here and now to stop with the bullshit. That means no more lies and no more avoiding the subject." His voice is more powerful then it has ever been and in the dimness of this cellar his eyes carry a mad glow to them.

"You're going to tell me everything and you're going to listen to me. Do I make myself clear?"