Creation began on 10-21-22
Creation ended on 12-20-23
Attack on Titan
A Decline in the Warrior Unit: Welcome to Marley
The boat ride to Marley was brief and the service was mediocre at best. Not that Roman Reiss was really expecting top quality food or drinks on a boat traveling to a continent he had never been to in his entire life; he had known everything that would happen with the Founding Titan, but due to the vow of Karl Fritz keeping the previous holders in check, he hadn't been able to protest against any of it or try to deviate from any of it until that day the stranger came to him and showed him the means to free himself from the vow and forge a new path for all Eldians. When he made his choices to forge the new path, all previous paths came undone, and once they came undone, there was no going back to the way things once were. He wasn't disappointed in the least; the previous timeline terrified him, and he was relieved to no longer be able to see it.
"We are nearly there now, sir," a woman tells him as he looks out at the dockyard they were heading towards.
"Thank you, ma'am," he praises.
-x-
"This is bad, this is bad, this is bad," went Calvi as he paced in his office. "There's no way to handle this discreetly."
"Sir, there is a way to handle this discreetly," said a member of the Tybur family to him as he sat in front of Calvi's desk. "Just accept the way things are now and life will get better."
"And sooner or later, Paradis will revert back to its previous state and unleash the Rumbling upon the world!" Calvi yells. "I can't risk that!"
"If this Roman Reiss wanted to unleash the Rumbling upon the world, he would've done so much earlier or when he learned of attempts being made by Marley to send members of the failed Warrior Unit to Paradis in order to take the Founding Titan away from the people. But he hasn't done anything to indicate that he's seeking the destruction of the world. He's taken away the power of the Titans, he's reduced Eldian Subjects of Ymir to regular people; no matter how many blood tests we perform, we're not finding anything to suggest that they're monsters. And the Walls on Paradis are gone, along with the Titans. With all due respect, sir…some people are starting to believe that you're becoming paranoid towards the prospect of peace and coexistence with Paradis."
"Just because they haven't done anything to attack the world yet, it doesn't mean that they seek peace. If anything, they're just waiting for the perfect moment to strike when we least expect them to, and then they kill us."
-x-
"Welcome to Marley's city of Liberio, Roman Reiss," a Marleyan man greeted Roman kindly as he set foot off the boat.
"Thank you, sir," Roman responds, seeing a nearby car. "How far is to our destination?"
"It's in the city, but the car will be quicker."
"If it's fine with you, sir, I'd prefer if we walk to where we need to get to. I want to see this city that is more advanced than what's currently on Paradis."
The Marleyan man sighs and responds that the detour would cost them adequate time, but Roman states that time is simply an illusion meant to give a sense of stability in people's lives. Time was the illusion meant to provide order to the chaos; by having schedules and dates of importance, people could ensure a sense of stability each and every day. But now people had nothing but time on their hands if they stopped to realize it, which included the ridiculousness that was wasting time.
"This detour will waste time," he tells Roman.
"If one doesn't have time to waste, then how can one ever take the time to do anything?" Roman questions as they walk down the street. "Wow. I never thought I would ever see such beauty here. It's so…mundane."
"It's just a neighborhood."
"Yes, it is…but look at it. Have you ever seen such a place with different eyes?"
Just the fact that he was here in Liberio was a simple pleasure that Roman found to be quite enjoyable, and he hoped that the rest of the Eldians could eventually enjoy such a pleasure without being confined to a limited space. This was why he was here, to give them their right to leave their unwanted confinement…and their right to choose where they wanted to be.
"Not all seek to control or destroy, Roman Reiss," he remembers the stranger telling him once, "just as there are those that don't seek to be free from something. Some will long for freedom. Others will long for peace and coexistence. But there are those that will do something else…because they want something else that not everyone will understand until it's too late to go back. But now you have all the time you'll need to understand everything."
-x-
"…Wait a minute," went Calvi, confused by what he was told a moment ago, "what do you mean, he's walking here?"
"Roman Reiss is currently walking through the streets of Liberio with his escort on his way here," said the soldier assigned to greet the man from Paradis. "There hasn't been any indication that he's up to anything. If anything, he's like a tourist right now. He's just taking in the sights."
"Or he's planning to attack the city under the guise of a tourist."
"That appears to be unlikely, sir. He went through the security like everyone else did upon getting off the boat. With the exception of possible Titan powers, he had nothing but the clothes he was wearing and pocket money. The more I think about it, the more I'm convinced that this guy isn't out to instigate a war with anyone. Whether it's today, tomorrow or a few years from now, it's unlikely that he's going to unleash any Titans on anyone. A woman on the street was afraid of him the moment she saw him, but all he said to her was how her day was going. What kind of monster does something as mundane as asking another person about how their day is going? You wouldn't get that from a serial killer or a monster, but from this guy… Who does that? Who would do that and commit something like the Rumbling later on, knowing that it will kill a lot of people? That doesn't seem like this guy at all."
In truth, Calvi was becoming paranoid; he'd an acting member of the military ever since he enlisted, and because of his experience with the power of the Titans Marley possessed and the dangers of what could be unleashed upon the world if the royal family unleashed the Rumbling upon the people, he couldn't let even the tiniest possibility that someone within the royal family would be against global genocide in favor of peace and coexistence. His paranoia towards the very thought of a peaceful outcome between Marley and Paradis was driving him to consider that anything and anyone was either a trick or being fooled into a false sense of security…and then the carnage would arise. Even if none of what he thought was true, to him, the only way to make sure that nobody with the Founding Titan could turn back the hands of time…would be to kill them before they could act.
"Where is he now?" He asks the soldier.
"Roman Reiss and the escort should be arriving in another hour," the soldier explains, "after their detour in the internment zone."
Calvi's eyes widened at the thought of the internment zone…and all the Titans emerging from it with a large Titan at the center, guiding them to destroy everything.
-x-
The internment zone didn't look all that different from the rest of the city, but the only thing wrong was the large wall that segregated the Eldians from the rest of the people. Most of the rest of the world was opening up to the Eldians now that the power of the Titans had been removed from them, but Marley was trying to hold on to the falsehood that they were still a threat because of the Founder, which was far from the truth.
"Are you him?" He hears a woman ask him, and he turns to face her, seeing she was currently expecting a baby in due time. "Are you Roman Reiss?"
He nods and responds, "I am, ma'am. Who are you?"
"Rachel Yeager," she introduced herself.
Yeager, Roman thought as a memory of what was no longer valid in this world returned to his conscious mind, seeing a young man that could only be described as angry at the world. Yeager.
And then the memory faded again, like a dream meant to be forgotten about. It was no longer a memory of what could or would happen. It was a forgotten moment, never to be recalled…because it no longer adhered to any part of any trace of history regarding anything. This also meant that this woman, this mother-to-be, her future was up to her to forge, not someone else's.
"Are you truly here to free us from this internment zone?" Rachel Yeager asks Roman.
"If that is what the people here want," he responds to her; he wouldn't force the people here to leave if they didn't want to, wanting them to decide for themselves what they wanted most. "I will not force people to do anything they don't want to."
"All I desire…is a better life for my children. I don't want to see them become soldiers fighting in another war."
Roman smiles at her and says, "Nobody should have to fight in any war."
-x-
The Tybur representative could see the madness in Calvi's eyes and the despair on his face. He knew the guy was starting to lose it, wanting only to fear for the worst when the situation didn't even call for it. And so he called his father for advice on how to remedy this situation with the military leader's instability.
"…Your concerns are noted, my son," his father informs him over the phone.
"But I'm worried that this guy is going to do something reckless and call it justifiable," the son responds. "We may not have the War Hammer Titan, anymore, but we still have the knowledge of what happened in the past. We gave the world back to the people because Karl Fritz hated what his people had become. But he didn't have the will to kill us outright. What if somewhere down the line, someone overcame the ideology he installed in the Founder and decided to simply remove the ability to become Titans completely from the people? We'd no longer be a threat to anyone because we'd be like everyone else, no matter what they believe."
"Maybe, but Calvi is from that belief that war resolves every problem that exists, especially when it doesn't resolve anything."
"Except if he does something reckless and it ends up killing people, it's likely to result in another war. His fear of there being an attack when people least expect it is making him paranoid, and I don't want people getting hurt because of misguided decisions or mistaken assumptions. The worst kind of war is one instigated by someone that won't even admit why they wanted one to begin with. This has to end."
-x-
Even if he gave his word that he would end their segregation and make sure they were released to go wherever they chose, Roman knew it wouldn't have meant anything without the proof to back it up. And he needed to prove to the Eldians that wanted to be free that he meant what he intended to do for them. So, rather than promise them freedom, he told them that he would be back, one way or another, to give them the proof he aimed to get.
"Please, help us leave this place!" A young father yelled at him before he left the internment zone, holding his wife's hand.
"No more being confined!" A teenage girl declared.
"Happy days ahead!" A pair of fraternal twins expressed.
Roman had to end this segregation and enable the people to be able to leave their confinement, to go wherever they chose, to live better lives. His ancestors stole the hopes and dreams of many away when they abused the power of the Titans for personal gain or to install fear across the hearts of many that were powerless to protect themselves against the misuse of such extraordinary power, and now he, for the first time in his life after inheriting the power to make or break the cycle of hatred and fear, had to break the cycle and begin anew. And now here he was, standing before the military base of Liberio with his Marleyan escort.
"Sir?" He asks his escort.
"Yes?"
"Do you believe in change? I mean, in positive change. Do you believe in such?"
"I want to believe."
"Me, too."
"But…you've changed things. Eldians can't turn or be turned into Titans. The fear of the Rumbling has become a thing of the past because the Walls are gone. And you're trying to establish new relationships with other parts of the world that are sympathetic to Eldians and are beginning to open up to. How can that not be positive?"
"Not everyone is open to change if they think that it's only temporary instead of permanent and benevolent. Change isn't necessarily a good thing if there are people that can't accept it. That don't want to accept it."
"If change means an end to war without any more losses, I am open to it. Shall we?"
He led Roman towards the front door…and all Roman could do was hope that the Marleyans inside would hear him out and accept that he only wanted to end the hate and build better relationships with the world.
To be continued…
A/N: It must've taken me a day or two to get back to this chapter. I hope it impresses those of you that like deviations from the canon. If Calvi does seem too paranoid or not paranoid enough, I hope the next chapter will fix the issue with the outcome of his character development; he's younger and more hardened to change than some people. Merry Christmas!