Eren's eyes opened to the sky.
The sky was vast and filled with the air and the stars and the sun and the moon and the earth and the planets and…
"Whoa there… calm down. Don't take it all at once. Breath."
As soon as the world breath was uttered, Eren felt the wind encompass him, keeping him safe. All the things the sky held were kept at bay, and he no longer saw the vastness. The wind sat him down on… something. Eren took a deep breath.
"There you go. That's better. It's been a long time, Ymir. How have you been?"
A man about a meter taller than Eren hung over him. His skin was the color of the sky, with the setting sun in the distance, his lower half was bright orange. His head on the other hand showed the coming night. His torso was a mixture of both shades. All he wore were a pair of shorts (also the color of the sky).
Eren glanced at the man's eyes. They were filled with colorful nebulas and exploding stars, too many to count. Eh? What's a nebula?
"Oh… you're not Ymir. I'm sorry. The resemblance is uncanny. You must be her son?" The man's voice echoed throughout the cosmos. Despite its echo, Eren could hear every word clearly. "But how did you get here?" He knelt next to him, opening his mouth.
"Ahh. I see. You consumed some of my blood." He clicked his tongue at the thought. "You married an evil man Ymir."
Eren, finally getting his senses back, slapped the man's hands away. "Who are you? Where am I?"
Eren tried to get up to face this man, but the world spinned.
"Take it easy." He helped Eren sit back down, "Consuming my blood strains the mortal mind. The only reason why you are not dead is because of your mother."
Eren held his temple. He felt a headache come on. "My mother? My mother is dead."
"Not your birth mother." He chided. "The one that gave you your abilities." Eren didn't understand.
The man sat cross legged next to him. "I met your mother a long time ago." He placed his hand on Eren's forehead. "She used to keep me company." The pain from his head left him. "I haven't seen her in centuries." He smiled sadly.
Releasing Erens forehead, the man looked to the sky. "My, you are misbehaving today."
The man stood up and returned to his canvas. He waved his hand, and an exploding star in the distance vanished. He changed the color of a nebula to his left, and jumped to touch the sun of another solar system.
Eren, still sitting down, took in what he could of the sky.
It was beautiful. A gradient backdrop of the setting sun illuminated the many solar bodies in the sky. Eren didn't know why, but he knew the terms used to identify the items above him. But he didn't know their names. How do I know all this? He wondered to himself. His thought seemed to echo into the cosmos.
"An unfortunate side effect of when one enters my domain." He kept poking and prodding his canvas, "If you had learned the names of everything in the sky, your head would have burst." He laughed quietly at the thought, "Good thing I caught you in time."
He waved over a black hole. It also disappeared. "There." He put his hands on his hips. "That should keep things stable for now." He then turned to Eren. "Now what to do with you?" He crouched in front of Eren.
Eren didn't know what to say, so he stared at the man. The sun had set a little bit more, adding more dark hues to his body. The man looked a little malnourished, his body and face not having the fat they should have. Ignoring the deep space in his eyes, Eren noticed a familiarity.
"You have Jason's nose."
"I think you mean he has my nose." He chuckled at his joke.
The man narrowed his eyes in seriousness, "But I don't think you consumed his blood for fun. Would you mind telling me what happened?"
Eren, remembering what happened, started to tear up.
"Somthing… something possessed Berthold, and Jason made a deal with it."
"An exchange I presume?"
Eren stared at the transparent ground. He saw Wall Rose and the forest of Giant Trees. But they were viewed in such a lens that the wall seemed smaller than the forest. It was a weird perspective to view the world through.
Eren nodded slowly at the man's question.
The sky man put his fingers to his chin. "I felt some of my blood roaming this world. I didn't realize it was the boy who died. This is troubling."
Eren felt like he was hearing one side of a conversation. But unlike in the forest, he wasn't upset. Whoever this man was, he made Eren feel calm. But he was still sad. He decided to ask some questions of his own.
"Is Jason dead?"
"No." Eren quickly switched his attention to the man.
"He's not?"
"No."
The man helped Eren get up and said, "Follow me."
They both approached the edge of the sky. "Ever since my wife exiled me from my world," he began, "I have tried everything to return. The more time I spent away from my world, the less I could feel it. I gave up on returning a long time ago."
He gestured to Eren.
"But your mother taught me how to connect to my blood." He smiled at the memory. "She used a tree. I prefer planets."
Using the tip of his finger, he tapped an orange looking planet. It expanded, encompassing most of the space. The planet was filled with swirling gas, and was colored in different shades of orange. A dark orange spot was visible closer to the bottom of the planet.
"Luckily, Jupiter had many children." He gestured to the planet. "After finding him, connecting to the others was not so hard. This allowed me to keep an eye on my kin. While I never saw their day to day lives, I could feel their presence. I no longer felt lonely in my exile."
Eren didn't know what to say. He didn't think feeling pity for the man was appropriate.
The stranger continued, "While I felt their lives, I also felt their death. Many of my kin have slaughtered each other over the eons." The man stared into the abyss. "My wife would have blamed it on human nature. But I know they got their thrust for blood from me." He said somberly.
The man then turned the gaseous planet around. The planet was surrounded by moons of many shapes and sizes. The man tapped on a smaller moon located near the dark orange spot.
"This right here, is the one you call Jason Grace."
The moon, despite receiving the same amount of sunlight, was darker compared to the others. "It's so dark." Eren noticed.
"Quite so. He used to be the brightest moon in my sky, being that Jupiter had not borne an heir in generations. But he died."
Eren looked away from the moon. And who's fault is that. He chastised himself.
The man gave him a peculiar look. "You misunderstand, son of Ymir. Jupiters son died before his arrival to your world."
"What?" Eren asked.
The man moved farther towards the edge of the abyss. He pointed to a moon surrounding a brown planet much smaller than the orange one. While it had five moons orbiting it, only two were distinct. One was dark enough to look black. The other, bright enough to be white. The man was pointing at the darker one.
"When any of my offspring die, their light disappears."
He then returned Eren to Jason's moon.
"But Jupiter's son has not perished. His light is dim. As if it does not know whether it is alive or not."
"So, he's alive!" Eren almost shouted.
The man gave it some thought. "Currently? Yes. But his life is draining. My wife is using his blood to resurrect herself."
"Your wife…?" Eren asked in disbelief. The thing that possessed Berthold?
"Yes. I do not know how she arrived here. But at this rate, Gaia will come back and kill all your people." He thought about it a bit more. "Well, she'll kill all people. She does not particularly care for your race."
Eren raised his hands. He wanted to shout at this stranger, but nothing was coming to him. What can we do against a force like that? Eren was scared.
"There is nothing we can do." The man kept looking at Jason's moon. "It seems that the consequences of my sins have caught up to me."
The sun set a bit more. The man was now equally orange and blue. The way he stared at the moon angered Eren.
"Why are you acting like it's over?" Eren clenched his fists. "Why does everyone keep giving up?" The man looked at him. Eren punched his chest. "I'LL DECIDE WHEN IT'S OVER! And it's not over!"
The man's face didn't change. "As soon as I leave here, I'll save Jason, defeat that woman, kill Reiner, and go back to the Wall Rose!" Eren began to walk away. "You can stay up here and keep pitying yourself for all I care."
Eren took a couple of steps before the man called to him, "Son of Ymir." He turned around.
The man, who used to be only a meter taller than Eren, was now towering above him by more than a hundred meters. His entire body was dark and filled with all the universes. His eyes were colored by exploding stars. His voice boomed and echoed when he spoke.
You underestimate our power. Eren tried to run away, but he tripped and fell. He looked back up. The man's hand, the size of three galaxies, was going to squash him, like a bug. He raised his hands and closed his eyes in vain.
Instead of being crushed by the weight of the universe, Eren felt a light flick on his forehead. Images flashed through his head. Mikasa was in chains, being eaten by small ugly creatures. Armin, impaled, was being used as a scarecrow in a field.
He opened his eyes and moved his hands away. The man had returned to his normal size. He was squating in front of Eren.
"My wife is a scorned being." He began, "Massacring your people will only be the start for her. If you become her adversary, and fail to defeat her, she will make you suffer a punishment greater than death." His voice was back to the quiet echo.
"Your anger blinds you to reality, son of Ymir."
Eren, shell shocked by what just happened, breathed heavily.
Jason said the same thing.
He thought back to those horrible images of Armin and Mikasa. Even if he escaped from the traitors and made it back to Wall Rose, this Gaia woman would kill them all. None of them had any idea how to fight her, much less defeat her.
Eren recalled the strange conversation Jason had with the woman. His eyes widened. The only one who knows how to defeat her is…
Eren then slammed his head on the ground.
How selfish can you be? Bringing Jason back just to die again! But how are we going to get out of this situation?
Eren raised his head. He looked at the man with narrowed eyes.
He bowed down and begged. "Please, help Jason get back home. If I have to face her, then I will. But Jason is different. He never asked for any of this. He's done nothing but help everyone around him. Please, if you can, send him home."
The sun set a little more to the west.
Eren didn't know if this was the best decision. But he had to save everyone. Even if it meant dying in the process.
Eren felt the man take his shoulder, raising him up. He wore a kind smile.
"I see now, why you were chosen." He cupped Erens hands in his. "Tell Ymir… tell her it was an honor to meet her."
The man's dark hands glowed a bright white. Eren felt the sky tremble. Then, whatever was holding him above the world broke under him. Eren yelled as he fell towards the earth.