Reasons

by SilverShadow1711

The world could be a cruel, wicked place, filled with nightmares and terrors unending. Erwin Smith made the choice to throw himself into those nightmares, but even the most steadfast man is not an island. At the very least, there was someone he could fall back on, even if it took him some time to realize it. (Erwin backstory-centric, the slowest of slow burns. Cross-posted on AO3)

66. Filibuster

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Ch.66- "Filibuster"

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There was a time when Erwin would see the other branch commanders maybe once a year, at most, unless he was leading supply wagons into Wall Maria territory during the one gala he had begrudgingly agreed to attend. The past eight months felt as though they had taken eight years off his life, and he blamed that in no small part due to being forced to repeatedly endure the other heads of the military.

"Do you have any idea how large Wall Maria's territory is? Do you? We barely have enough soldiers to perform maintenance checks on our equipment- it would take us months to do a thorough sweep of Wall Maria!"

"And you would have us blindly send our soldiers into territory that's potentially teeming with Titans?! Who knows how long the Marleyans were out there- they could've hidden Titans around every district!" Erwin gaped at Commander Hayward, insulted that this man led the Garrison of the district he'd once called "home".

"I'm sorry- do the Garrison attend a different Training Corps that I'm not familiar with? Why are we wasting thousands of Sinas outfitting your soldiers with ODM gear if they can't use it for its intended purpose?"

"Dispatching Titans is the Survey Corps' job--"

"No, surveying the land is the Survey Corps' job- the land beyond the Walls, specifically, which we can't do until the Garrison fixes the gates in Shiganshina!"

"And we won't be able to fix the gates if we end up springing a trap. That Beast Titan was a royal from outside the Walls, wasn't he? Those bastards are good at laying traps!" Erwin blinked, taken aback by that strange yet confident conclusion.

"What are you talking about?"

"When we were investigating the Reiss manor, we found several hidden entrances that led to rooms even the servants didn't seem to know about," Nile filled him in, his voice and expression equally grim. "They all had locks we'd never seen before and we couldn't risk blasting them open because we figured more Titan serum might be in one of them. We brought in an engineer from the capital a few weeks ago and he just managed to open one of them…" He trailed off, and though Erwin waited several moments, it soon became clear that Nile had no intention of continuing- or perhaps he couldn't bring himself to. Erwin turned to the other men.

"So what did you find?" Commander Williams, of Utopia's MP Brigade, picked up where his fellow commander left off.

"Nothing, because no one went inside. The first officer who set foot in the room triggered a hidden mechanism that cut both his feet off at the ankles. The remaining officers vacated the premises and have refused to go back inside, even under threat of dismissal and imprisonment."

"And is the injured officer alright?"

"He's alive."

"Unfortunately," Zachary's voice was low and dour, "this has taught us what the existence of the Anti-Personnel Squad should have already made clear; the royal family will go to any lengths to protect their secrets. They had knowledge and technology we could only dream of, and Zeke Yeager has access to even more than they did."

"So you see now why we can't begin transporting supplies until we know for certain that the same thing that happened to you won't happen to us." The smug derision in Hayward's voice rubbed against Erwin's skin like nettles.

"Zeke Yeager is no longer here; without him around to turn any Children of Ymir into Titans, it wouldn't matter if he left a thousand of them buried around Wall Maria like potatoes."

"How do you know he's not here!? He and the Marleyans might have set up camp just outside Wall Maria!"

"Then you'd best head down to Shiganshina and start working on those gates so we can go check." The tension within the antechamber was nearing its crescendo so quickly, Erwin could almost feel the sparks in the air, similar to the sparks he'd felt before the light and heat of a Titan transformation. Premier Zachary slapped his palm against the table as though he were trying to startle dogs before they could begin fighting.

"That's enough out of all of you! Last I checked, you were all adults, so why are the lot of you acting like children now?"

"I'm being perfectly civil--"

"--didn't screw up a mission for the first time in five years and suddenly thinks he can talk to us--"

"That's enough!" The premier roared, his voice filling the room and suppressing all the other sound. In the silence that followed, a single, wizened hand raised. "What is it, Dot?" Using the table in front of him for balance, Pixis pushed himself to his feet, inhaling deeply.

"I'd like to remind the junta that the most imperative thing at the moment is not resettling Wall Maria and her districts, but getting the Scouts to this "oh-shen" so that we might set up a base of operations and give our people some advanced warning the next time Marley decides to show up. The longer we wait to get out there, the more time we give them to lick their wounds and prepare another attack, but the threat of more Titans remaining in the area is substantial enough that porters and laborers would rightfully be opposed to taking that risk. To that end, I propose that the southern Garrison set up a defensive line along the main road, just as we did during the aftermath of Ragako. With sufficient palisades and canons in place, a single squad can oversee a half kilometer stretch of road, and the soldiers under my command have more experience dealing with Titans than any branch apart from the Survey Corps itself. With the southern regiment dealing with defenses, the northern regiment can focus its efforts fully on construction." Zachary leaned back in his chair, the slight smile on his lips mostly hidden by his beard.

"That's the only sensible thing that's been said in this room thus far today. Do I hear any objections?" Orvud's Commander Hirsch stood, a scowl darkening his entire face.

"You can't expect the North to shoulder the full brunt of reconstruction! Our Garrison is the least manned of all four, and in Orvud, we've still yet to completely repair all the damage Lord Reiss did to our section of the Wall. Some of this is going to have to be split between the eastern and western branches." Commander Rathborne frowned at him.

"The Calaneth Garrison is preparing to set up our own defensive line along the Calgary trail to the Titan forest. There isn't enough lumber in Wall Rose for the guillotines, let alone for what's going to be needed for the reconstruction, so the Royal Council has tasked us with aiding the expansion of harvesting areas."

"Fine," Hirsch begrudgingly relented. "The east will be procuring materials- the west still needs to do its part." Hayward heaved a heavy, deeply annoyed sigh, but nodded.

"We can go over the logistics next week…" The whispers and muttering that rose up weren't the simmering of another argument brewing but the impatience of a classroom counting the seconds until they were dismissed for the day. Unfortunately for all those who wished to return to whatever matters were always placed on hold for these meetings, Zachary was not yet done speaking.

"While that takes care of all the official matters on the docket, there's one other thing I'd like to discuss while you're all gathered here. The matter will have to be brought up again before the queen and the Council, but the more forethought we can approach it with, the better it will be for us in the long term. Erwin, you have the floor." The muttering had become confused, but it ceased as Erwin stood.

"With every passing day, the peoples' concerns about Marley grow more pronounced. Grisha Yeager's journals contain a wealth of information, but given that he came to Paradis nearly twenty years ago, that information is most likely outdated. And while we know that Marley is 'across the sea' from us, somewhere to the southwest, reaching its shores would be incredibly time consuming, difficult and impractical. That being said, we do have one other unexplored avenue for potentially gaining information available to us, in the form of Annie Leonhart. Several months ago, our lead Titan researcher, Section Commander Hange Zoë, theorized a way we could break the hardening encasing Leonhart and gain access to her."

"You mean free her?" Nile's voice was dripping with contempt. "That monster is contained- you want to let her loose after what she did in Stohess!?"

"We're also looking into ways to restrain Shifters and reduce the threat of them transforming. We already know the First Interior Squad had access to a sedative that could render Shifters unconscious for hours."

"So what are you going to do; keep her knocked out for the next decade? Might as well just keep her the way she is now."

"No. What we were actually considering is the possibility of feeding her to someone and transferring the Mimic- or as we call it, the Female- Titan to one of our soldiers. It's an incredibly fast and powerful Titan, on par with Eren's Attack Titan." Those words, and the idea they planted in the minds of the people- of another weapon in their arsenal, another way to fight back against Marley- seemed to dye the air itself with excitement. Pixis, however, for better or worse, was not a man to let himself get swept up in a blind optimism. And when Erwin was the one bringing forward these grandiose revelations, he especially took note of all the details that had yet to be brought up.

"Forgive me if I'm mistaken, but doesn't a person have to be turned into a Mindless Titan before they can receive the power of a Shifter?" It was as though all the sound had been sucked from the room, with how quickly it fell silent.

"Yes," Erwin reminded the other commanders. "They must receive an injection of Titan serum to be turned into one of the things we've spent the last seventy years killing, and eat the person who holds the Titan that will be transferred." In case any of these men, in their fervor and pride and hatred of Marley, forgot the actual process of creating these revolutionary weapons.

Fear was definitely a strong emotion, but it quickly diluted until there was very little left when flushed with things like frustration and annoyance. Working off the impromptu vocabulary lessons Thomasin sometimes ended up giving him, Erwin would say that fear was "negative-soluble"- something that dissolved in other negative emotions. The other commanders were afraid of him, yes, afraid of what he was, but they were more so irritated by him seemingly snatching away their hope as soon as he dangled it before them.

"We don't have any more Titan serum," Commander Jones reminded him bitterly. "Unless Levi somehow got his hands on more and you didn't disclose that to us."

"Don't be ridiculous."

"But Hammich is right- it doesn't matter if we know how to make a Titan Shifter when we're missing the first step. The Reiss family has to have a store of it- they've been doing this for over a century, after all- but who knows how long it'll take before we can find it."

"We can't wait for the Reiss family to come through for us, gentlemen; have we not yet learned the error of that way of thinking? Counting on the royal family to drop a solution into our laps is what led to Wall Maria being breached in the first place. We know what the serum is mostly composed of. We know how to extract it, even if we don't yet have the tools to do so, but we know what those tools are. Section Commander Hange is working with my wife- who spent seven years working for and learning chemistry under Dr. Anthony Reed from Einrich College- on a way to stabilize a Titan's spinal fluid so that we can create our own form of the Titan serum that functions the same as what the Reiss family and Marleyan government use." As the other men all gawked at him, Erwin used the temporary lull to send a mental plea to Thomasin, 'Please don't be mad that I'm using you for credibility…' It was Pixis who spoke up again first, his eyes wide and disbelieving just as they had been when Erwin first informed him that the King he served was a fraud.

"You truly believe that we can make this on our own…?"

"Why wouldn't we be able to? The Eldian Empire was turning the Children of Ymir into Titans two thousand years ago; surely we have better technology and more complete knowledge than they did. Seventy years ago, we didn't think Titans could be killed. Nine months ago, we didn't know where they came from or what they were. Historically, there have only been two things stopping us from doing the things we once thought impossible- the looming threat of the Reiss family's Progenitor Titan… and our peoples' own resistance to change. Thankfully, the former is no longer a problem- and God willing, it never will be again- and as for the latter… well, public perception is a weather vane and right now, it's pointing in a favorable direction." The murmur came back, quiet whispers in hopeful tones. Looking around the room, gauging the general attitude, Zachary nodded.

"It seems that we're all in agreement that being able to use the Female Titan against Marley is more advantageous than letting Annie Leonhart rot under the Chancellery. If no one is opposed, I'll draft a missive to the Council asking for an increase in the Survey Corps' Titan research funding--"

"General, I'm not asking for funding." Several people gasped as dozens of eyes fixed on Erwin, wide in disbelief. The only way the Survey Corps wouldn't be asking for funding would be if they had all awoken in a hereto unrealized Hell where taxes were low and hot snow fell up. Even Zachary looked disquieted by that statement.

"Then… why did you--?"

"It isn't funding we need in order to see this through. Titan research is generally done on Titans, but this one aspect isn't something we can't use them for." It was slowly starting to dawn on them- it had to, but they still wanted to prolong the inevitable realization for as long as possible.

"What… what do you mean, Erwin?" He inhaled deeply.

"You can't turn a Titan into a Titan." Don't say it, they silently pleaded, please don't say it. "Humans turn into Titans, specifically the Children of Ymir, those of us outside the fortress known as the Interior. If we're going to create this serum and use it for the Mimic or any other Shifter- even for the Attack and Colossal, because Eren and I are operating under a strict deadline- then we're going to have to make sure that any serum we make will actually work."

Horror created a unique type of silence: it was the absence of breathing, that instinctive desire to hold one's breath so the scary thing wouldn't find them, even when that scary thing was just an idea, a theory. The Truth. To break it felt like sacrilege, but Pixis had forever been an irreverent man.

"You're saying we're going to have to test this… on people. Turn them into Titans?"

"If we wish to maintain the small advantage we have."

"NO!" Commander Jones practically leapt out of his seat, his palms slapping loudly on the banister before him. "Absolutely not! If we start turning normal people into Titans, then we'll be no better than Marley!"

"That's despicable, Erwin. To even suggest--!"

"I didn't suggest anything," Erwin told the room at large calmly, holding his hand up in a show of surrender which, with only the one hand raised, had the unintended but not undesired effect of looking as though he were calling for quiet as well. "I simply stated a fact; if you want Paradis to have the Mimic Titan's power without waiting god knows how long before you can thoroughly search the Reiss estate for more serum- assuming there even is any to be found- it's going to have to be tested before it can be used on its intended target. But if you do not want that, if you cannot stomach the idea of turning people into Titans, then we will not be testing any serum we create. We will attempt to stabilize it, document our findings, and then dispose of it. It makes no difference to me. I have fifteen years to live at most; what happens to the Colossal Titan once I'm dead isn't going to be my problem. Eren has ten years to live, and once he dies, he takes the Attack Titan and the Progenitor with him. I pray Queen Historia was mistaken when she said all of the serum had been destroyed by her father's cave-in, because Ymir have mercy on you if she's not. I wash my hands of the matter."

He sat back down, pulling his watch from his pocket as the silence seemed to swell bigger and bigger until- pop!- that thin film membrane burst and all those negative-soluble emotions filled the room.

"You can't seriously be considering--"

"We have to prepare for the worst--"

The meeting had begun at 10:30. It was already noon. The Special Operations Squad was working with the Trost Garrison to fortify parts of the Executioner that were beginning to show signs of stress. Maybe the Mimic Titan could mimic whichever Titan was responsible for the Reiss caverns and create permanent structures. It probably wasn't the Armored- if Reiner Braun had been able to create defensive structures like pillars independent of his own body, that probably would have saved his life.

"--inhumane! No better than--"

"It's different for us! We aren't-!!"

Before he returned to Trost, he had to visit a specialty grocer while he was in Wall Sina. Thomasin had handed him a folded letter the other day, with the instruction to pass it along to Hange, not waiting for him to agree before rolling over and going back to sleep. He'd opened it (it wasn't sealed or anything) and after one glance of the lines upon lines of nonsense letters that didn't- couldn't- spell words (where were all the vowels?), he did as he was told upon arriving on base. Hange snatched the letter from him, shooing him away, barely noticing the quickly evaporating spot of blood that had been left on the corner of the paper where it cut him. Thankfully, Shifters didn't feel pain the way normal humans did… as long as they didn't want to, and there were few pains Erwin was less partial to than that of paper cuts.

"--volunteer--"

"Who would volunteer for--?!"

"--offer payment--"

Returning to his own office, he forgot about the letter for most of the day until an impatient rapping at the door alerted him to Hange's presence. The section commander presented him with a request for several types of chemicals in varying amounts, with a note at the bottom that they were to be delivered to the consultant. He almost smiled. Even if she was working with the Survey Corps, Thomasin was not a Scout. She could not ask him to buy things with the Corps' funding, and it would be a cold day in Hell before she paid for government work with her own money. Requests from a section commander, on the other hand, were very official and logged (and funded) accordingly. Hange had helpfully transcribed the nonsense runes he'd seen into words he could actually pronounce, but one thing on that list stood out like a sore thumb. Most of the things could be bought easily in Wall Sina- he was pretty sure some of them were already in jars and bottles in his kitchen cabinet- but salt… That was going to be tricky. Salt was one of the rarest things within the Walls, and its scarcity was reflected in its price. But they had funding, so… as long as it was being used exclusively for Titan research and not ending up in any Scout's mouth, it would be fine. A bang so loud it not only startled Erwin from his thoughts but silenced every voice in the room at once. Zachary had stood, lifting his chair and slamming it back to the floor.

"No more! You forget that the decision doesn't lie solely in our hands, but in the hands of the Council and the Queen. The matter will be brought before them and we will reach a decision then, but in the meantime if you're going to argue about morality, do it somewhere else. This meeting is adjourned." Given that the Premier was already standing, Erwin could only claim to be the second one on his feet. He had no intention of dallying like last time, especially given the death glare Nile was directing towards him, but before he could reach the door, before he even got close, a wizened hand grabbed his shoulder.

"We haven't had much time to speak outside of these meetings, Erwin. I'd like to remedy that." He looked down at Pixis, his gregarious tone at odds with his stern expression.

"We're going to have to walk and talk- I don't have time to sit down for a drink."

"That's fine. A walk might do well to clear my head."

~o0o~

It wasn't the first time Erwin had discussed something as he walked with Pixis, but usually, their little chats took place sixty meters above the ground, atop Wall Rose where the constant wind served to muffle their voices from one another rather than any non-existent passersby. It was very nearly uncomfortable, walking the streets of Ehrmich with a man whose uniform didn't bear the Wings of Freedom. It was usually Mike, or in recent years, Levi, who walked beside him. A subordinate, someone who was more often than not there to provide emotional support while he nailed a fake smile in place and debased himself by begging for tips. Speaking to Pixis in such a mundane setting, removing him from the realm of "solider", just felt wrong, but the older man wanted to speak, so speak Erwin did.

"As I said during the meeting, I'm not suggesting anything one way or another. The Survey Corps will do whatever the Queen and Royal Council decide."

"This would be the first time in your life that you haven't had an opinion on something related to Titans, Erwin, and frankly, I don't buy it. You have a very distinct way of speaking when you want something. For years, I didn't pick up on it, but I've been hearing it more and more over this last year. It's not so much your tone- you always put on that orator voice, and it's hard to blame you considering how effective it is. It's the way you threaten people." Erwin stopped short, turning to face the other man entirely, his expression dark.

"I have never threatened anyone." Well, if you didn't count Nicholas Lobov… and Hange… and occasionally Levi…

"Oh, not you, of course not." Pixis brushed off his indignation with a flippant tone. "You would never threaten to actively hurt someone." Well, aside from Hange… "You just threaten people with what might happen if you don't get your way. If the Military Police don't turn Eren over to the Survey Corps, why, he might turn into a Titan and kill them! Because, let's be frank- Nile is a good man, but he doesn't run a tight ship, and he's probably the most competent Military Police Commander we've had in decades. MPs can't fight Titans; you made that exceptionally clear in Stohess. If the Survey Corps isn't allowed to continue… whatever it is they're doing, more Titan Shifters might sneak in and destroy even more Walls! If the Assembly tries to stop the Survey Corps from retaking Wall Maria, the food shortages could cause the common people to riot and the streets would flow red with blood…" The older man lowered his voice so that Erwin had to bend slightly to hear it, his golden eyes so dark they looked more like copper. "And if we don't let you turn innocent people into monsters, we lose the only weapons against the outside world that we have." Pixis pulled back, his breathing deep but even. "Do I have the wrong of it?" Erwin shook his head.

"No. Not in the slightest. Truth be told, a part of me is glad you've kept track."

"Oh? Is that so?"

"Of course." Turning on his heel, he began walking again, looking up at the signs to figure out where he could find a spice merchant rather than keep his attention on Pixis. He could hear the man's boots scuffing on the stone beside him. "It means that, for all your complaints, you actually understand that I'm right. You understand how much we have to lose. It's not the things that I'm saying that you disagree with, just the fact that I'm saying them. If you thought I was wrong, you would speak out against me… but you don't. Just like you didn't speak out against the Assembly when they ordered the deaths of all those refugees." He heard the quick, quiet intake of breath.

"You were quick to use those deaths to motivate your own soldiers to die- don't look shamefaced; we've all done it- but you didn't open your mouth to the men who actually cosigned all those innocent people to their deaths. Because you understand, almost in spite of yourself, that desperate times call for desperate measures. That's what all that ribbon candy sticking to your chest is for, just like mine; rewards for making the unpleasant decisions that no one else wants to…" He stopped again, and this time, it was his cerulean eyes that were dark, a summer sky just before a storm. "So tell me, Dot- why do you despise me for doing the same thing as you? Why do you have to act so goddamn sanctimonious all the time?"

For a long while, Pixis just stood there, staring at him, gold locked in a stalemate with blue. But then, the older man's eyes lowered, and as they lingered on this new focal point, so too did his head tilt slightly until he was staring at what was directly in front of him. Slowly, he reached up, his fingers brushing against the little strips of iron wrapped in silk ribbons pinned to his own jacket.

"Desperate times call for desperate measures…" he whispered to the multicolored slab on Erwin's chest. It was larger than his own by a good five bars. "When Shiganshina fell, Commander Keller sent a messenger to Trost to ask for backup. I know he went to the Survey Corps first because he came to me cursing some 'bushy eyebrowed motherfucker' with every fiber of his being. He was so certain that I would order the soldiers under my command to head south with him. I don't think Walter expected any of them to actually survive an encounter with a Titan, much less take down any; I think he just wanted more warm bodies to serve as shields, to give him more time to get away. I didn't think that until after the fact, long after I denied his request. The reasons I gave made perfect sense- if Titans had caught them unawares and broken their gate, it made sense for us to remain on standby in Trost, to ensure we wouldn't lose another layer of protection. How would we even get there; our horses aren't as fast as the Survey Corps' and trying to take the ferry would just slow down the evacuation efforts. I needed to stay where I was, to monitor the influx of refugees, to make sure there wouldn't be any looting or killing… When I look back on it now, I realize that everything I said was a little threat, a warning of what could happen if things didn't go the way I wanted… The Assembly rewarded me for keeping a level head under pressure, for keeping the peace in Trost and keeping Wall Rose well-guarded… they rewarded me for leaving hundreds of soldiers and thousands of civilians to die while I guarded the gates to their front lawns." Pixis blinked. His eyes shone with moisture, but his cheeks remained dry.

"It's so easy to see in you the worst of myself. A man who sends people to their deaths without a moment's hesitation, who reduces human lives to numbers and always argues that the bigger number is more important… I've told myself that you were an arrogant, selfish man for letting people die around you while you so cravenly cling to life… but if you're an arrogant, selfish coward, what in God's name does that make me? A man who spent the worst disasters of the last five years staring down at the danger from on high while he sent his soldiers to their deaths… Over the years, I've convinced myself that I'm better than the likes of Zachary… better than you or Keith or Robert before him… that my hands are stained, but not nearly as much as all of you…" He blinked again, and a shining trail ran down his cheek, catching in all the crevasses worn into skin as a result of standing so close to the sun for so many years.

"And it's so easy to forget that's only because I haven't had the chance. I could have chosen to be a Scout, but I didn't. I could have led my regiment down to Shiganshina that day, but I didn't. I could have stood against the wicked men letting us circle the drain while they lived in blissful ignorance, but I didn't. Because you don't live to be as old as me if you're willing to die for humanity. I'm ashamed of myself, but it's easier to be ashamed of you."

Erwin watched as he reached up, swiping the wetness from his face with his thumb. Six months ago, he wouldn't have thought that level of introspection was possible from the Garrison commander. He inhaled, but waited a moment before he spoke, to ensure his thoughts were in order and his emotions in check.

"…do you know what you call a man who isn't a selfish coward, Commander? Dead. We are all selfish, every last one of us, for every moment we live is because something else died for us. A plant. An animal. A person. When Wall Maria fell, there were parents putting their children on the ferry, not just at the exclusion of themselves, but the exclusion of other people. They decided their children's lives were worth more than the lives of everyone else; would you call them selfish?"

"Of course not."

"You should. They are. But that's not a bad thing, at least… I don't think so any more. We should want to live, just as we want the people we love to live. To want to die, to view your life and the lives that life has touched as so worthless as to not need to exist, is not noble; it's an illness, a terminal illness." His jaw tightened. "…it's what King Fritz wanted us to die of." Pixis stared at him, a long stare that, hard as it was, did not carry any anger or loathing.

"For as much as you've stayed the same, so too have you changed. The man who led the Survey Corps down to Shiganshina all those months back is not the same man standing before me today." Something darkened behind those yellow eyes. "Are the horrors Marley has in store for us truly that terrible?" Erwin sighed and closed his eyes, the void behind his lids a maddening mural of choking green and agonizing red. He opened his eyes once more.

"There are many horrors in this world, not just those wrought by Marley's hands… it took very nearly dying to truly open my eyes, and I don't want anyone else to have to have to pay that price. Marley does posses one truly unique horror, however. How were they able to turn an entire village into Mindless Titans?" Pixis blinked, taken aback.

"What do you mean?"

"Going by both Connie Springer's recollection and the last census taken, Ragako had a population of approximately a hundred people. We confirmed kills of seventy-two Titans, and we know that Mike and his squad also took out several dozen based on reports made by the cadets with them at the time. A hundred people, Pixis. Let's be lenient and say Ragako had a population of seventy-two; how do you administer Titan serum to seventy-two people at the same time without falling prey to them yourselves?" The older man frowned, the lines on his face growing more severe as he sank deep in thought and deeper still into dread.

"Perhaps they… poisoned the village's water supply with it?"

"Even assuming they managed to stabilize theirs to a degree that we can't even imagine, how do you guarantee that every single person drinks all at once? There was no blood anywhere near that village, not a single chunk of flesh or sliver of bone to be found. If there had been anyone who hadn't been turned, they would have been killed, either by the Mindless Titans or by the Marleyans controlling the Beast or Quadruped Titans."

"What are you suggesting, Erwin…?" He swallowed, turning his attention away from Pixis and to the windows of the store he had been heading towards, the windows blackened with smoke to keep the ingredients within from losing their efficacy.

"My wife told me something a very long time ago, back when she still worked at an apothecary. She told me a lot of things, but the only thing I really took away from it was that you can get drunk from alcohol vapors. You don't have to drink it if it's pure enough; you just have to breathe it in." Blue eyes shifted to meet gold. "But we shouldn't worry about that. It's probably nothing."

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A/N- Wow, another short chapter, but I didn't want this one to drag on (it has absolutely nothing to do with the crippling writer's block that had been plaguing me for months back when I actually wrote this… back in June). I just cannot, will not, believe that Rod brought every single Titan serum the Reiss family had available with him to that cave, because that doesn't make a lick of sense in-universe. He specifically wanted Historia to use the "most powerful" serum, so why bring multiple spares; in case she wanted to swap out her Titan's default skin? Some series keep their mysteries as mysteries by never having anyone ask any questions about anything- AoT does it by making every character so stupid and maliciously incompetent that they destroy any clues before the audience can even ask what's going on. Oh, there's a serum that turns people into Titans? "It's gone now, it's all been destroyed and it's impossible to make any more (even though people must have been making it 2000 years ago); don't you ever fucking think about it ever again, so help me god…!" Well, what about the serum the Volunteers bring them-- "Didn't I say don't think about it? That's it, I'm gettin' my belt…"

Something I always loathed about AoT canon was the fact that the Survey Corps didn't really seem to do anything in the year-long gap between the end of RtS and them getting to the ocean. Like, I understand that their forces are super tight at the time and Hange probably can't focus too much on Titan science when they also have administrative duties to deal with now (hmmm, if only there had been someone who could run the Survey Corps to leave them free to run experiments! I guess Armin could just pick up the slack- oh wait, no; that might interfere with his Annie watching duties, and the fact that he can never live up to Erwin's legacy means that he shouldn't even try to contribute. We can't have Armin doing anything useful over the next five years), but like… surely there are other people on Paradis who know literally anything about how science works that could help them? If random nobodies are out here making revolvers and hot air balloons in their basements, surely someone knows anything about anything. The government is cool with innovation and learning now; why would they not put out a notice saying "CALLING ALL CHEMISTS AND DOCTORS: we need you to run tests on Titan spinal fluid"?! They know that there's shit brewing in Marley, and they apparently just spend a year sitting with their thumbs up their asses. What was their plan going to be if Zeke hadn't been plotting to help them behind the scenes; just waiting for Marley to come back for round two with an actual military force this time? Paradis already has resources and technology that are completely unique in the world- these people have been killing Titans in melee combat while the rest of the world was cowering from them for decades. They have rail systems, they have motors capable of propelling people around like fucking jet packs, they have rifled canons that can shoot straight down and hand canons, they have… something propelling their massive ferries uphill; they could easily make a dent in the technology gap if they actually tried, but then there would be less drama for Armin to talk-no-jutsu his way out of so everyone has to be stupid and incompetent all the time forever, I guess.