Prologue (Part I): The Fall

Wall Rose, 845, Burke Estate

The sounds of sparring rang out throughout the courtyard, as two young looking figures dueled each other with swords.

"Watch my arm, not the sword!" A girl called out to her partner, her long brown hair was matted with sweat as she moved in for a lunge on her sparring partner - a much younger boy who looked to be no older than the age of 10.

The boy grunted in acknowledgement, only to rapidly deflect the saber that the girl aimed at him and move in for a counterstrike of his own, causing her to gasp in surprise.

The girl leaned to the side, dodging the well-placed strike, only for the younger boy to suddenly sweep his leg around into her ankle, causing her to stumble and fall. Before she even had a chance to get back up, the younger boy was already pointing the mock saber down at her throat.

"Alto, you cheat." The girl scoffed,

"A real opponent won't fight fairly." Alto replied nonchalantly,

"I should be the one saying that…" The older girl grumbled,

"You should 'also' not be flat on your a-" Alto began only to receive a rude thump on the head from behind, causing him to yelp in pain as he crouched down and covered his head.

"Language, young man." Alto's mother denounced, "Honestly, who even teaches you these things…?"

"Kenny does…" Alto admitted, and she shook her head.

"A downright bad influence." She shook her head, "Gertrude, are you two done or what?"

"I think we are done for today mama." Gertrude replied, dusting herself off.

"Good, because food is ready." The woman stated, "If you two aren't careful, all the food will be eaten without you all."

The two children nodded and grinned, preparing to rush into the house only to be pulled back.

"But." Their mother said calmly, "Only after the two of you shower."


Alto pouted in the bathtub as a servant proceeded to roughly scrub his slate colored hair.

"...I wonder when father will return from his expedition." Alto wondered aloud,

"Well, in actuality, I heard that the Scouting Legion returned to Wall Maria. So I'm sure Lord Astell is not too far off." The servant replied, causing the boys eyes to considerably brighten.

"Really?" Alto said excitedly, "Do you really mean that Lillian?" The boy almost jumped out of the tub in excitement, only to be forced back down.

"I said he'll be here soon, not that he's here yet." Lillian chided the boy, "Now settle down so I can wash your hair properly."

Alto nodded, his expression one of calm excitement as he hummed to himself, blissfully unaware of the events that were going to occur over the next few hours.

"I just wish I knew this was the day that my life would change forever."


Wall Rose, Undisclosed Location

"Are you sure this is it?" One of two men on horseback stated.

"Yes, I'm sure." The second of the men stated, "This is it."

"That's not what I mean." The first man shook his head, "She is a good friend to your children, is she not?"

At that, the second man could only turn away. "Yes. She is." He admitted,

"I will never forgive myself for this, and when my time comes, I will undoubtedly beg her and her family for their forgiveness." He continued,

"But I can't sit still and let things stand either." The man's face steeled over, "This is as far as I go, I can't look them in the eye as I do this."

The first man nodded, "We will never see each other again in our lives." He stated,

"I know that." The second man smiled sadly at his friend, "Good luck, my friend."

The man raised his hand in goodbye before kicking the sides of his horse, riding down the hillside towards a solitary building in the distance, the second man raised his hand towards the sky.

'And I am sorry.' He added in his thoughts, before turning his horse and riding away.


Burke Estate

Having completed giving Alto his bath, Lillian was now preparing to leave the siblings' clothes out to dry on the clothesline.

'Lord Astell…I thought he'd be back by now…' She thought to herself, only to be roused from her thoughts by the clacking of a horse's hooves.

"Lord Astell?" Lillian approached her master, bowing before the Scout as he got off the horse, only to spot the distraught look on his face.

"Lord Astell, is something wrong?" Lillian asked,

"Get Victoria, Wall Maria…has been breached."


"Is this true?!" Astell's wife stated in a frightened whisper, they had moved outside the house to speak, in order to avoid alerting the children.

"It is, Victoria." Astell stated, "I only heard about it recently, the Scouting Legion will be ordered to rally to help evacuate Wall Maria. I only have enough time to warn you all before I need to rally at Utgard." Astell stated,

"We will need to move the children to the Interior. Before supplies become too scarce…" Victoria said thoughtfully with Astell nodding in agreement, when suddenly horror crossed her face.

"What about Dr. Jaeger and his family? My niece…!" She quickly asked, and Astell could only shake his head sadly.

"I don't know. We can hope they escaped. I'll try finding them once I head out with the Scouting Legion." Astell said to his wife, before turning to Lillian, who was silently watching the conversation.

"Gather the family and servants and take them to our place in Wall Sina." Astell told the maid, who bowed.

Astell gave his wife a kiss on the cheek, before remounting his horse.

"Don't worry, once the situation has calmed down. I'll meet up with you all there!"


Alto excitedly pranced to the foyer where he saw the servants anxiously packing all of their belongings.

"...hm?" The curious child wondered, "Hey. Aren't those my clothes?"

As if in response, Lillian came from behind. "Young Master, we will be heading to Wall Sina for a while. It's sudden, but your father will be joining us there."

"Wall Sina…? But why?" He cocked his head, "I don't know anyone in Wall Sina."

"Don't worry, Wall Sina is very beautiful. I promise, you'll like it there." Lillian said, only to be rudely interrupted by the loud complaints of yet another one of the Burke family siblings.

"Sina? Why head to Sina all of a sudden?!" Alto's second oldest sister, Annabeth, complained loudly.

"Stop whining young lady and head to the carriage!" Victoria commanded, her voice taking a serious tone in what the children of the Burke Family liked to call her "Military Police Voice". A reminder that the seemingly docile housewife of the Burke Family was still a respected Officer in the Military Police.

"Yes mother…" Annabeth quickly calmed down after that.


It wasn't long after that that they had managed to relatively clean out the Burke Estate, and Alto was now residing in a carriage with his brothers.

"What do you think this is about?" Kyren, the second youngest of the family, questioned.

"You don't know?" William raised an eyebrow, "All the servants were whispering about it. Although Mom tried her best to keep it on the downlow."

"Know about what?" Kyren and Alto leaned in curiously, and William grinned as he leaned towards his younger brothers, as if he was only telling them some fresh new gossip he'd heard in town.

"Wall Maria got breached." William confessed at last, leaving the boys in shocked silence.

"That's a bunch of hogwash." Kyren shook his head, "How would titans possibly get through? It's not like there's anyone else like Dad, unless Frieda went up and broke them herself, which she would never do."

Alto looked down at his feet when Kyren said that. According to his father, and grandfather before he passed away, the Burke and Reiss Family were much different from any other Noble Families within the walls. That's because they passed down a special power from generation to generation, the ability to shift into the same monsters that lurked beyond the walls.

The ability to shift into Titans.

The Reiss' possessed the "Founding Titan" and the Burkes' possessed the "Flare Titan". Alto had only seen his Father shift into the Flare on a few, rare occasions. Mostly when he got the chance to help train Frieda in using her own powers.

'Frieda…' Alto wondered to himself about his surrogate cousin. The Burke and Reiss Families, due to the shared nature of their abilities, as well as their roles in governing the walls, had long since been close, to the point where it was generally accepted that the families were one singular unit. Likewise, Frieda often acted as a third sister to him, always taking him out places and even reading to him.

'I hope she is alright.' Alto thought to himself, only for him to be rudely pulled out of his thoughts when the carriage suddenly came to a halt.

"Are we there yet?" Kyren wondered, poking his head out of the carriage.

"Nope." William stated, "We're still on the path, so why'd we stop?"

Alto looked out, and his face broke into a smile as he saw who was coming down from the path in front of him.

"It's Kenny!" Alto stated excitedly,

"Kenny?" Kyren raised an eyebrow, "Why the heck is Kenny out here?"

Alto didn't reply, excitedly hopping out of the carriage door despite the protests of William, he raced up to the approaching horse.

"Uncle Kenny!" The ten year old grinned at the man in the trench coat and dark fedora, almost startling his horse as Alto nearly tackled the man.

"Dang brat!" Kenny swore, "Get off!" The sight became quite ridiculous as Kenny tried to shake the young boy off, only succeeding after a couple of seconds of struggle.

Sighing, the man looked up at the train of carriages. "Your mom with ya?" He questioned, and Alto pointed to the frontmost carriage, where his mother and sisters were. As if on cue, Victoria Burke stepped out of the carriage to see what was going on as well.

"Your dad?" He continued, and Alto shook his head.

"He said he needed to go back to the Scouting Legion and deal with the breach."

The man grunted in acknowledgement.

"Kenny." Victoria said coldly, unlike her son, there was no sense of warmth in her words.

"If looks could kill, Lieutenant. If looks could kill." Kenny chuckled as Victoria glared at him.

"Alto." Victoria reached forward, pulling Alto back towards her and the carriages as she placed herself between him and Kenny.

"Go back to the carriages, and wait." She ordered, and Alto stepped back, albeit a little confused by the perceived change in the atmosphere.

"What do you want?" Victoria asked,

"Can't a man say hello to his favorite kids?" Kenny asked in sarcastic hurt.

"If you aren't aware, there is a breach going on in Wall Maria. We don't have time for this." She replied,

"Yeah." Kenny nodded, "You're goddamn right."

And then, without further warning, Kenny whipped out a double barreled pistol and proceeded to unload two rounds into Victoria's chest.


A/N: With that, we conclude the first prologue chapter of "Attack on Titan: The Flare Titan - Diamond Edition". If you're a new reader, welcome, if you're a returning reader, welcome back. Finally managed to work up the motivation to continue this story after 4 months. That being said, I hope you all continue to enjoy it as I figure out how to repair the absolute dumpster fire that was the Old Version.

As always, leave a review and check the wiki, Solmanthe1st out.

Official Wiki Link: the-official-flare-titan .fandom. com