Disclaimer: I absolutely did not make this bonkers thing up, not consciously. It's a dream I recently had, and upon waking I instantly knew it was the single craziest crossover ever. And, freakishly, it works. May you enjoy it as much as I did.

At the front of our small formation, Captain Levi draws his sword. "We're overtaking them! And the idiots are aiming for the forest!"

Armin drives his horse to still greater speed. "With all the losses we've suffered recently, the bandits might think we're all new recruits! And those trees are too small for easy maneuvering!"

"It'll still be easy for us," Mikasa hisses. "We won't let them get away."

The team of thieves murdered two Scouts and wounded three others when raiding a supply convoy. I grit my teeth, disgusted, imagining how sad their final moments would have been. We all joined the Scout Regiment to kill Titans, defend humanity, and fight for freedom. We know we won't live long lives, but to die at the hands of lowly criminals? I draw my swords, eager to take to the air. I won't actually kill these scumbags if they don't resist, but I'll certainly be ready if they do.

Jean edges his horse closer to me. "Keep it together, Connie."

"Whattaya mean? I'm fine!"

Jean frowns. "You look like you're ready to bite someone's head off."

"Of course I am! Scouts are dead! And not even from fighting Titans! These bandits are human trash, and I hope they put up a fight!"

"Connie!" Sasha snaps, also drawing closer. "I hate what they did too, but we shouldn't want to–"

"We're in range!" Levi shouts, ending the conversation. "Switch to ODM!"

The Captain's airborne before he even finishes speaking, with Mikasa right behind. Itching for a chance to dispense some justice, I'm out of the saddle half a heartbeat later. Armin, Jean, and Sasha are right behind me. Eren isn't here, and I know the Commander made the right call. Bringing down a few human murderers isn't worth the risk of Eren taking a random bullet to the head. Instead, Erwin and Hange are helping Eren train with his new hardening powers. With plans being laid to retake Shinganshina, we need our only Titan stronger than ever.

The crack of a pistol startles me, but the Captain already moved. Jetting to the side before the thief could fire, Levi calmly and expertly spears the gunman with a launched grapple hook. Fighting Kenny's troops gave the Captain plenty of experience with this tactic, and he's withdrawn his hook in under a second.

Another shot fires, this time at Mikasa. She saw the woman aiming, and shot aside in time. Turning her evasion into a diving attack run, Mikasa smoothly strikes off the shooter's head.

At this rate, the Ackermans will finish this all on their own!

I pour on the speed, gaining by virtue of flying in a straight line while Levi and Mikasa were fighting. Armin shouts for me to be careful, but I ignore him. Two of the three remaining murderers ride in the stolen supply wagon, which can't possibly get away. I aim for the exception, a man with two pistols who drives his horse to greater speed. I gain on him, my eyes fixed on his guns, ready to jet to the side if he takes aim…

So I don't see the Titans until they strike.

Four of them, all under five meters, converge on the horseman. Screaming, the horse tries to turn aside, but it crashes into one of the Titans. The animal goes down, a leg visibly broken, and its rider is grabbed by two Titans. Shocked at the sight of Titans inside wall Rose, I break away rather than try to intervene. The bandit's shrieks are horrific, instantly erasing my vengeful drive. Yes, these bandits deserve death for murdering two Scouts, but no one deserves to be eaten by three-meter Titans. Ever since the battle of Trost, I've known that if I'm killed by a Titan, I hope it's a fifteen-meter variety. A single, devastating chomp is the least hideous way to go if Titans devour you. But the two fighting over that man are too small to kill their victim quickly.

The sight is too much. Mere seconds ago, I wanted to kill this man. But now…

I jet in, aiming for the nape of the closer Titan. My swords bite deep, and the monster falls, wrenching the dying man from the teeth of the other. Jean dashes by, landing a killing blow, and I come around in a tight maneuver, low to the ground. Sasha and Mikasa dispatch the last of the Titans, but one of the bandits in the wagon is already missing the top of his head. Apparently, one of the little Titans managed to give that man an unusually merciful death.

I land, heart aching at the inhuman shrieking of the man that had briefly been in the jaws of two Titans. As I jog over, bile rises in my throat and empathy overflows. There's no way he'll live, and this level of suffering–

Levi already came to the right conclusion, and he doesn't hesitate. The Captain shoots past the thief, sword bisecting the man's head in a mercy kill. I doubt I could have made it so quick and clean, and I'm grateful that I didn't have to try.

With obvious reluctance, Sasha ends the suffering of the maimed horse. Soon, all of us have surrounded the wagon, with Mikasa holding a sword to the final bandit's throat. The murderer suddenly feels unimportant compared to the encounter with Titans. The last time there were Titans inside wall Rose, it meant the destruction of my entire village. My mother is still trapped in the body of a malformed Titan, and I swore I'd do whatever I could to stop such a thing from happening to anyone else.

Captain Levi approaches the bandit. "Your team murdered two Scouts, and as you just saw, humanity needs heroes like us more than ever. This is the second time pure Titans have appeared inside Wall Rose. Part of me wants to execute you right now–"

The man flinches away from Mikasa's sword and Levi's glare, clenching his eyes shut.

"-freeing us to investigate this problem. Tell me… why should I let you live?"

The bandit opens his eyes, but avoids Levi's gaze as he gropes for the words that might save his life. Half a minute ago, I would have relished this killer's fear. But after seeing what the Titans did to that other man…

A blur of motion, faster than anything I've ever seen from even the Captain, blasts through our midst with a roar of displaced air. Mikasa stumbles backward, and even Levi looks bewildered, and the bandit is no longer in the wagon. His screams recede from us rapidly, doppler shifted to a low tone, and my mind rejects this surreal development. First, Titans inside the wall. Now, something has abducted that bandit, moving too fast to see.

But the Captain recovers quickly. "Jean! Return to base at top speed, and sound the warning of Titans in the wall! Everyone else, with me!" Levi takes to the air, pursuing the phantom, and I'm right behind him. As terrifying as Titans are, I'm even more worried about something that can move so much faster than humanity's mightiest defender.

Armin starts to fall behind, as everyone's focused on moving at top speed. The screams ahead are receding, and they're also growing weaker. Sasha and I can't keep up with Mikasa, who in turn can't match Levi. I'm as light as the Captain, but I can't duplicate his technique for getting maximum possible value out of every swing.

Then, the screams gain an echoing quality, and soon they fade entirely. Up ahead, Levi lands, followed by Mikasa. Sasha and I soon join them.

At the edge of the small forest, we've reached Wall Rose.

And there's a large hole in the ground, right up against the wall. The Wall itself isn't breached, but this hole is large enough for the smallest Titans.

"Stay alert," Levi says, drawing his swords again. "If we encounter Titans in there, we likely won't have room to maneuver. Be ready to retreat."

We descend at a jog. For the first fifty meters or so, the tunnel grows darker, as you'd expect. But soon, the rock begins to glow. Not quite as bright as in the caverns where we fought Kenny's unit, but more than enough to clearly see our surroundings. And it's not all blue. Some of the rock emits green, purple, or even a dull red light. This is too surreal…

We reach a fork in the road, with the tunnel splitting three ways. Distant echoes of boisterous laughter reach us from the left tunnel. It seems happy, carefree.

A short distance down the right tunnel, a human hand lies limp and dripping.

Levi waves Armin forward. "Thoughts?"

"That hand was left there deliberately," Armin asserts. "It's placement is too much of a coincidence otherwise. Whatever the enemy is, whatever their goals, they want us to see this."

Mikasa steps forward and kneels down, examining the hand. It looks like it was ripped off, rather than bitten or cut. "This feels like an obvious trick, to draw us down one tunnel."

"Too obvious," Levi agrees. "They know we'll realize this was intentional."

"Do we split up?" I ask.

Sasha punches me in the arm. Stressed as I am by this whole bizarre scenario, I fail to take it stoically. But Sasha ignores my less-than-manly squeal. "Don't you dare suggest that, Connie! With an enemy too fast to see, if we split up–"

"We're taking the right hand tunnel," Levi says decisively. "If the enemy hopes we won't follow him, we'd still have two tunnels to choose from. But if he wants us to follow him, he went to the right."

"I'd still like to investigate the laughter coming from the left," Armin says quietly. We've traveled far enough to be under the territory of Wall Maria. The voices sound human, so it's possible refugees have survived underground all these years."

"Ok, go check it out," Levi says. "But exercise maximum caution. If you encounter Titans or other hostiles, retreat all the way back to the entrance and report to Commander Erwin."

With that, Armin dashes down the left passage, and we race down the right, leaving the severed hand. Without the extreme physical conditioning required for all Scouts, the run would be taxing. There's a slight uphill slope, and soon we've covered what must be several kilometers. Sasha starts grumbling about all of our supplies being back with the horses, but the Ackermans are silent.

Then we come upon a corpse.

It's the bandit, missing a hand and dropped right in the middle of the passage. Levi pauses to examine the body while the rest of us stand watch. Soon, he rises. "No obvious sign of a killing blow. My guess is he suffered internal injuries when he was snatched at such high speeds. It just took him a while to succumb. Be careful. The enemy, whatever it is, can move way faster than me. Listen for rapid air movement. There shouldn't be any breeze down here, so we might get a warning if something approaches at high speed."

We continue on, a little slower so we can better hear over the sound of our footfalls. I consider suggesting that we head back. With the bandit dead, there's less urgency in trying to catch whatever snatched him. But Sasha would call me an idiot, or a coward, or both, so I keep quiet. I wish Jean and Armin were still with the party. Hopefully, the four of us can handle the super zippy whatever-the-crap if we find it.

The glowing rocks provide plenty of visibility, but soon there's an even brighter light up ahead. It looks like daylight, and there's a breeze.

"Everyone be ready," Levi warns. "We're well inside Titan territory by now, and we don't have horses. If we get jumped, it'll probably be in an open area, where maneuvering depends on anchoring to the Titans."

Mikasa nods. "At least then we'll have good visibility if the unidentified killer tries to rush us."

Gulping, Sasha stays close to me as we follow the two Ackermans into the daylight.

What we see can't be real.

An absolutely enormous castle stands perhaps half a kilometer away.

At first, my brain assumes it's nearby, because the scale just doesn't make sense otherwise. But when Mikasa dashes a good distance to the left, she's able to confirm. "That structure… It's as big as it looks... This doesn't make any sense."

"It's over fifty meters tall…" Sasha whispers.

"This can't be right…" Levi never sounds unsure, and this greatly adds to my worries. "That castle would take years for humans to build, and it's far too massive to have gone unnoticed. Even if we badly underestimated how far we traveled underground, expeditions beyond Wall Maria would surely have found this a long time ago…"

"And look at the scale of the windows and doors," Mikasa says. "It's clearly not meant for humans."

She's right. The windows and doors suggest this building had only two stories… and yet it's taller than the Walls.

Then, I think to turn around. "Uh… guys…"

The others turn too, and Sasha gasps.

Wall Rose is nowhere in sight.

In every direction, as far as we can see, there's open countryside, or distant forests. But no Walls.

The impossible, out-of-scale castle is by far the biggest thing in sight.

"This… how…?" Levi's confusion has me near to panicking. Forget how unreal that castle's dimensions are, there is simply no way we traveled far enough to have lost sight of the Walls.

While the castle is the most impressive sight, there are other nearby features that warp my sense of scale. The grass at our feet feels totally wrong, with the blades broad as my hand and growing up past my waist. Cobblestone walls, tiny compared to the castle but still five meters tall, obstruct our view of the ground surrounding the ginormous building. Mikasa is the first to move, using her maneuver gear to scale this wall with ease. The rest of us follow. From the top, it's even more certain that Walls Rose and Maria are nowhere to be seen. I look down upon a vast plot of tilled land, easily large enough for a field of crops for feeding a full town. But it more resembles a private garden.

Sasha descends first, and I follow.

The radishes are bigger than my head.

Almost dizzy, I turn to the others. "Where… where are we?"

"I wish we had Armin here," Mikasa says.

"Or Hange," Levi adds. "This is way beyond our ability to explain."

With a mighty heave, I yank one of the giant radishes out of the ground. "I wonder if these huge crops might be useful if we—"

"Hi there!"

Sasha yelps, and Levi spins, drawing his swords, with Mikasa reacting almost as fast. I'm the last to see the source of the words. The cheery voice sounded human, but the speaker most certainly is not.

Approaching without fear of the swords, the freakish fellow has a spring in his step.

He also has a tail.

And he's green.

And he appears to be made of… fabric?

"Oh, I get it," Sasha says. "I feel much better now. I'm just dreaming."

I punch her in the arm, exactly where she punched me earlier, though not as hard.

"Owch! Why?"

I raise an eyebrow, waiting for her to make the connection. She blushes. "Oh. Nevermind…"

The walking green alien doll thing waves as it draws near. "I'm Wembly Fraggle! Who are–"

"Are you the one who murdered that man?" Levi demands, drawing back a sword in preparation to strike.

"Huh?" The creature's big googly eyes look genuinely confused, but not at all scared. "I don't know what that word means."

"Man?" I guess.

"'Murdered,'" Wembly answers. "Did you make that word up? It sounds silly."

Levi and Mikasa exchange glances. This bizarre critter doesn't look like he could possibly run as fast as the thing we followed here. And his childlike innocence feels genuine.

Sasha speaks first. "Nice to meet you, Wembly. I'm Sasha."

"And I'm Connie." I reach out a hand awkwardly. Wembly shakes it enthusiastically. The hand is soft and simple, with only four chubby fingers, which are flexible despite having no obvious joints. And they are absolutely made of fabric. No skin, scales, or fur could ever feel like this, and I detect no warmth. How is this guy alive?

Clearly unsure, Mikasa gives a little bow.

"This is strange," Wembly says, standing on tiptoes, taking a step back, and holding out his arms as if to measure us. "You look like the Silly Creatures from Outer Space… but you're way too small. Silly Creatures are supposed to be really big, almost half as tall as Gorgs."

My heart pounds at that. Is he talking about Titans? To this bizarre cloth alien thing, do Titans just look "silly"?

Levi doesn't bother to introduce himself, but gets right to the point. "You've seen things like us, but bigger? Describe them."

"Well, I've only ever seen the one," Wembly says. "He calls himself 'Doc.' He's really tall, but not as tall as a Gorg. He wears glasses, and he's an inventor. My best friend's uncle sends postcards to Doc's workshop."

My head's spinning. A Titan that wears glasses? And is an inventor? Is this another intelligent Titan like Eren, Annie,or Reiner?

Sasha asks a question Levi didn't consider. "Does Doc wear clothes? And does he try to eat you?"

"Of course Doc wears clothes! And he doesn't try to eat us, though his friend Sprocket kinda does."

It's clear the others are just as baffled as me. Pulling it together first, Levi switches subjects. "Do you know of anything, or anyone, that can move so fast you can barely see them?"

Wembly looks instantly worried. "Oh… that must be Wander McMooch. He's not nice. He likes to take people away."

Levi gestures toward the enormous castle. "Is that where he lives? Or is that your home?"

Wembly chuckles. "Neither. That's the Gorgs' castle."

"And who, or what, is a–"

The castle's huge double doors bang open, shaking the ground beneath my feet. A genuinely enormous figure charges out, howling, "Fraggles! Get out of my garden!"

The sight is so bizarre I don't immediately react. The towering figure briefly reminds me of the Beast Titan, though easily twice as tall and maybe ten times as massive. But, just like Wembly, his "fur" doesn't look real. It's more like shaggy brown fabric. And his exaggerated facial features include jumbo-sized versions of Wembly's googly eyes…

With everything else that's happened in the last half hour, I feel a total disconnect from reality coming on. The gigantic silly nose, the hand-spun shirt that could have provided enough cloth for a thousand blankets, the preposterously large boots…

Then the tremendous shaggy Titan doll thing… hefts a club.

The monstrous slab of wood is easily twenty meters long.

Ok… this just got very real.

"Ma! Pa! Get out here and help me thump these Fraggles! They look really strange!" Despite his tremendous size, his voice isn't nearly as deep or booming as expected. But the earth shakes as he charges toward us.

"Scatter!" Levi roars, launching a grapple hook into the garden wall and taking to the air. The enormous club comes crashing down, and the rest of us dash aside just in time. The earth erupts into flying dirt and grass. Wembly goes flying too, squawking in alarm, and the huge monster–a "Gorg" I suppose–sweeps his club back into the air. The next swing comes parallel to the ground, and only with a costly blast of gas from my jets do I descend out of the way in time.

"He's too quick with that weapon!" Sasha shrieks. "He's smaller than the Colossal, but way faster!"

"I'll distract him!" Levi shouts. "Mikasa! Go for the nape!"

Sasha deftly catches Wembly out of the air before he can hit the ground, while I cautiously assist the Captain. The Gorg tries to stomp me when I get too low, but at least he seems a bit clumsy. His next swing, though packing devastating power, misses Levi by a wide margin.

Mikasa's grapple stabs into the Gorg's lower back, not having the range to reach his neck in one shot. Launching herself upward, she detaches and fires a second time, embedding her anchor in the back of the giant's head. It doesn't react in any way to either shot, instead taking a swing at Sasha. She leaps clear, but the club smashes a section of garden wall, sending broken rock flying. A glancing hit wrenches a cry of pain from Sasha, and she loses her grip on Wembly. The Fraggle squeals all the way down, but when he bounces off the ground, he seems unharmed.

Reaching her target, Mikasa slashes out with both blades. They cut deep, raking along the giant's nape, sending brown fabric and bits of white fluff everywhere. I'm simultaneously surprised and not surprised at the lack of blood. Once again, I wonder how in the world we ended up in this mess.

Her attack run finished, Mikasa loops around her target to avoid getting crushed by its fall.

Except… it doesn't fall.

The monster doesn't seem to have even noticed the double slice to the back of its neck.

Mikasa's so stunned she barely avoids the Gorg's attempt to swat her out of the air with a back-handed swing.

"How do we kill these things?" Sasha demands.

"Kill?" Wembly screeches. "Why would you ever want to kill someone?"

"Are you kidding?" I shout, slashing the Gorg's leg but getting no reaction. "He's trying to kill us!"

"Well, maybe, but that doesn't mean we should be mean too!"

The Ackermans circle and dive, landing numerous quick slashes, and I risk getting involved. Here and there, bits of white fluff stick out from the gashes, but there's never any blood. And the giant still doesn't seem to notice. At least the monster isn't regenerating.

The giant spins in place, swinging his club with terrifying speed, and I have to get clear. Only Levi stays on the offensive, which briefly becomes easier. The monster made itself dizzy.

Then two more giants arrive.

Wearing crowns bigger than supply wagons, the newcomers take one look at the situation and scramble into action. The dark purple Gorg shouts, "An attack! The Fraggles come armed for war!"

The pink Gorg in a dress screams, "Oh my poor boy! Junior, they're ripping you up!"

The female snatches up a broom, which is even longer than Junior's club, while the other dashes back inside. "I'll fetch my blunderbuss! Hold the line!"

"Not good!" Levi shouts. "Just one was bad enough!"

Mikasa lands a deep cut to Junior's wrist, where a human would have tendons powering the fingers, but to no effect. "Orders?"

"Focus on the first giant! Avoid the others till this one's dead!"

"Dead!" Wembly squeals. "No! Gorgs are meanies but you shouldn't want to–"

The massive broom catches Wembly full on, sending him spinning through the air and out of sight.

"Good shot, Ma!" Junior shouts. "But the flying Fraggles are worse!"

"I can see that! They're cutting you to ribbons!"

All four of us maneuver continuously, trying to keep Junior between us and "Ma," but things are looking grim.

"Maybe it's not worth fighting these things!" I yell, barely avoiding getting my line caught on Junior's club.

"Good point!" Sasha calls, slicing a long strip of fabric from Junior's leg. "If we can't see the Walls, maybe the only way back to civilization is through that tunnel, and these giants can't fit!"

"Whaddaya mean, 'civilization'!" Ma shouts, dashing around Junior and narrowly missing Sasha with her enormous broom. "We are civilization!"

"The Lords of civilization!" That shout came from the castle, and my eyes nearly pop out of my head when I see the purple Gorg.

He carries what looks way too much like a musket… except twenty meters long.

"We're the King and Queen of the Universe!" the gigantic psycho declares.

"Over the wall!" Levi orders.

"Get down, Junior!" Pa shouts, booting his son on the rear end, knocking him sprawling.

Then he raises that enormous gun.

We're all jetting for the cover of the damaged garden wall, but there's no way Mikasa will make it in time. She was in the middle of an attack on the side of Junior's head when Levi ordered the retreat, and the distance is just too great. I want to go back for her, but I doubt I'd even have time to reach her. And even then, what could I do?

With the power of a hundred cannons, the Gorg weapon fires. My eardrums nearly burst, and a pressure wave beats upon me. I barely got to the far side of the wall in time, and I hear rocks smashing as shot tears into it. From the sound, the weapon didn't fire just one projectile, but many.

Long before I would have considered it wise, Levi launches himself back up and over the wall. Sasha and I follow. The force of the weapon firing apparently caused Pa to topple backwards, and he struggles to reload his weapon where he lies. Several tears on Junior's back suggests that some of the bullets hit him despite him lying face-first when the weapon fired.

I can't see Mikasa amid the swirling dust and bits of shredded grass filling the air. From a couple trenches dug into the earth, it looks like the individual bullets fired from that monstrous gun are bigger than my fist. And hundreds could have easily fit in a weapon that huge.

Then I see her. Tangled in one of her grapple lines, Mikasa lies in the dirt near the base of the wall, bloody and groaning. Sasha reaches her first. "Her rig was hit! She won't be able to maneuver!"

Wind roars as Ma swings her broom, each bristle thick as my arm. Levi evades in midair, demonstrating mastery of equipment that I know I'll never achieve. He moves to engage, buying time for Mikasa, and I join him.

Grumbling, Pa gives up on reloading his gun. The earth shakes as both he and Junior get back to their feet.

Three scouts. Three Gorgs.

Considering we have yet to make them bleed, these are not good odds.

But Levi keeps it together. "Even if they can't die, we can cut them! If they're just full of fluff, enough damage to the outside and they'll come apart!"

"The purple one's slower than the others!" Sasha shouts, taking to the sky again.

"He's our first target! Aim for the midsection, and don't hold back!"

All becomes a chaotic whirl of cables, gas jets, enormous flailing limbs, and frustrated howls from the Gorgs. In the mayhem, Junior takes a broom hit to the face and crashes to the ground. Pa clumsily swings his huge gun at me, misses, and sends Ma tumbling. Again and again, I hack at Pa's enormous belly, circling him continuously. Though tough, the fabric these things are made of isn't as durable as Titan flesh, and I've only broken two blades. With perfect edge alignment and exquisite skill, Levi's only broken one blade despite attacking far more times than me.

At last, all our efforts combined bear fruit. Fabric starts to tear on a grand scale, as the slashes from our blades start to stretch and join up. Pa makes one more sweeping swing with his gun, and the spin is finally too much. The tearing sounds grow overwhelming, and with a confused shout, Pa rips completely in half.

His upper body tumbles free and crashes to earth, and a fast fountain of fluffy white stuffing falls out. Freakishly, Pa's legs remain standing, and even try to walk about blindly.

"Dear! I need a bit of patching up!" Pa's upper body has largely deflated, with a huge tangle of stuffing slowly settling nearby, but he doesn't seem especially worried.

"Oh! What have those nasty flying Fraggles done to you!" Ma struggles back to her feet and readies her broom. "Hold on, Dear! I've got to get these pests away from you first!"

I'm growing weary. Battles with Titans rarely last long: In mere seconds, either the Titan or the human is dead. But with hits to the nape doing nothing to these things, we've been forced to fight far too long. I fear my gas is running low, and with two giants left to fight…

Ma comes straight toward me.

I wheel and dive, using Junior and the garden wall as anchors in rapid succession, but Ma doesn't let up. That stupid broom barely misses me, and the wind of its passing sends me into a tailspin. Sasha and Captain Levi move to intervene, hoping to drive off my pursuer, but it backfires. Sasha's gas runs out in the middle of a maneuver, her anchor line flops wildly in the wind…

And it tangles with the Captain's line.

Anyone else would surely have been killed. In training, awareness of your grapple line is drilled into us again and again. Elite ODM troops might make it look easy, but our maneuvers are always one misstep away from disaster. For two cables to get tangled is generally considered a death sentence.

But no one can compare to the Captain.

As he and Sasha corkscrew wildly through the air, and Sasha screams in abject terror, Levi does everything in his power to keep them both alive. His free cable stabs into Junior's arm, taking advantage of the latest swing of the club to twist both Scouts in an arc counter to their wild tumble. A quick detach is followed by another launch, this time anchoring to Junior's knee. Sasha's rig is too tangled for her to do anything except try to hold still, minimizing the factors Levi has to account for. Four rapid bursts of pressurized gas, timed with flawless precision, level out their flight barely in time. Levi is caught up and tangled in Sasha's equipment, but their new trajectory saves them both. They crash into Pa's deflating head, rolling and tumbling across his floppy face before falling out of my line of sight.

Levi turned a deadly disaster into something they probably both survived…

But now I'm the only Scout left in a position to fight.

The wild spectacle of that collision managed to catch Ma's attention. Otherwise, I likely would have been killed by her vicious pursuit. "Junior! Finish up here! I've got to sew up the King!"

Tossing her broom aside, Ma quickly gathers up the mass of stuffing and grabs Pa's upper half, which hangs limp and loose like laundry. Incredibly, he can still talk, thanking his Queen for her "magnanimity." His legs, still upright, waddle awkwardly into the castle. The Queen follows them inside, arms filled with the other half of her tattered husband, and the doors slam shut.

While everything about the sight has me deeply confused and disturbed, at least there's only one Gorg left. Sasha and Mikasa are injured, and even Levi's out of action with his gear hopelessly tangled. My gas is nearly out… but that doesn't change my duty.

Either I disable the last giant, or we're all dead.

With no other Scouts to maneuver around, I can move with greater efficiency, focusing on momentum and cable swings rather than using much gas. At great risk, I dash right by Junior's hands while he's recovering from a huge swing, and I manage to open wide gashes in several of his fingers. Stuffing puffs out, his grip slips, and the huge club flies from his hands to smash into an enormous shed.

My next grapple launch has less power than it should, proving my gas is nearly out. I can't imagine how I could possibly do enough damage to disable this thing with the time I have left. I anchor to Junior's arm, make maximum use of the momentum as he swings at me, and I sail past his face.

I slash my swords across his eyes…

…and both blades break.

Running on fumes, I manage to land safely on the low garden wall and turn, hoping it was enough.

The Gorg rubs at his eyes, but when he pulls his hands away, I can't even see a scratch.

So the rest of them might be all fabric and fluff, but the eyes are too hard to cut.

Twice as tall as most Titans, intelligent, armed, and immortal, we'd have needed incendiary explosives to actually defeat these things.

I try to launch a grapple hook, and I'm not really surprised when there's not enough pressure.

That's that. I've failed everyone. This monster can still fight, and none of us have working gear.

The huge hand reaches out to grab me, and I decide not to run. If we're all about to die, I'm gonna go down fighting. I manage to hack off one of Junior's fingers, and he changes tactics. Leaning back, the giant raises a massive foot, aiming to stomp me flat.

With a fierce cry, Wembly Fraggle leaps onto Junior's other boot and starts biting at his ankle. Confused, Junior lowers his raised foot and just stares. Wembly has no teeth, and even our swords took forever to accomplish anything. "Fraggle… are you biting me?"

"You're trying to thump my new friends!"

Junior bends down and snatches Wembly with the remaining fingers on his right hand. The Fraggle kicks and struggles, but he has no chance. I lean back and swing with all my might, launching a blade, but it vanishes inside Junior's body without him even noticing.

Bringing Wembly close to his face, Junior says, "Your new friends are ugly, they can fly, and they cut up my Pa."

"You started it!" Wembly tries to chew on Junior's hand.

"You bite me, I bite you!"

Junior tosses Wembly in his mouth, and starts to chew.

I almost look away, as I would do if a comrade met his end in a Titan's mouth. But the comical appearance of the Gorg and the Fraggle make it impossible not to watch.

And Wembly… doesn't scream.

In all the chaos, confusion, and absurdity of the last five minutes, I never consciously pondered a simple fact:

Though enormous, horribly strong, and able to swing weapons the size of a building…

…Gorgs don't actually have teeth.

Junior's jaws work, and he noms away for a while, but it has no effect. The soft and floppy Fraggle isn't harmed in any way.

"Are you done yet?" Wembly asks.

Junior pulls the Fraggle out of his mouth. "Huh. I thought that would do more."

"Did you forget the time you thumped Red? She walked home afterward."

With a long, slow, deep sigh… Junior shrugs, casually tosses Wembly aside, and stoops to pick up his severed fingers. Grumbling about everything "ruining his fun" he trudges back inside the castle. His parents can be heard bickering about how best to sew Pa back together, then the doors slam shut.

Relative silence falls, and the dust and fluff begins to settle. I stand there, weary, sore, bewildered, and hardly daring to believe we all survived.

At the base of the wall, Mikasa staggers closer. "The shrapnel missed my core," she calls. "I might need surgery, but I can walk. For now."

Levi and Sasha approach on foot, with their damaged gear abandoned. Pale and weak, Sasha looks relieved just to be alive. The Captain merely looks irritated at having been knocked out of the fight before we… won? Did we actually win? Did that count?

Do I care? Nah… Everyone being alive is plenty.

I carefully scramble down the collapsed section of the garden wall, getting down to ground level. Wembly skips over to us, showing no sign of injury despite being nommed by a giant. "That was kinda fun… but I'm sorry the Gorgs broke your toys. You reminded me of that one time when I was able to fly, even if it was only for–"

In a blur of motion and a roar of rushing air, Wembly is skidding across the ground, and the rest of us are knocked sprawling. Levi flips back to his feet, but a barely visible figure circles him many times in under a second. The Captain is now hopelessly ensnared by an anchor cable from his discarded gear, which has wrapped around him too many times to count. Mikasa moves to help him, but a figure knocks Levi to the ground and then skids to a stop at Mikasa's side.

The impossibly fast newcomer holds a stollen sword to her neck.

All again goes silent, with none of us daring to move.

"Wander McMooch!" Wembly shouts, struggling to his feet a considerable distance away.

The creature is a head taller than Mikasa, and obviously very strong. The sword he holds came from Sasha's ruined gear, meaning he must have snapped the steel cable. His broad, wrinkled face reminds me of some horrid corruption of a frog. Unlike Wembly and the Gorgs, he's made not of fabric but of a greenish rubbery material. The disturbing thing wears tattered, rotting clothes and a floppy hat that would look ludicrous under normal circumstances. His grotesque, deep-set eyes betray not the slightest fear of the elite and deadly Mikasa.

"What a shame… you all survived your playtime with the Gorgs." The gravelly voice has a slimy slickness to it. I'd instantly distrust any merchant who sounded even a tenth as sleazy.

"Why would you care whether we live or die?" Levi demands, bold and combative despite his current inability to move. "We may not know much about our world… but there's no way you're a part of it."

"True, true. Not even the Coordinate can touch the realm I'm from. But I have seen enough of your world to love the way things are there."

Despite the sword at her throat, Mikasa's voice is calm and collected. "You mean you've been inside our Walls?"

"Yes, yes… and beyond them. Fraggle Rock connects countless worlds, some wondrous, some delightfully horrific. And of all the places I've seen, few things have been as pleasing to my heart as the predicament your people are in. Trapped, caged, beset by hideous monsters you don't understand, and with no memory of your history… It's simply delicious."

Despite my fear for Mikasa, I can't help but speak up. "Wait… What do you mean no memory?"

In a flash, Wander McMooch has repositioned, so he now has Mikasa grappled from behind, her arms pinned, and with the sword still held to her throat. Sasha can't hold back an involuntary gasp, but Mikasa remains stoic. The hideous rubbery freak leans close to her ear and whispers, "You and your Captain are the two mightiest soldiers inside your walls. Without you, the chances of your people ever learning the truth of your world will fade almost to nothing. I intended for the Gorgs to do my dirty work for me. But I suppose draining the hope from an entire civilization is worth a little more blood on my hands…"

"Please don't hurt her!" I shout. "I'm skilled too! You don't have to kill her to weaken humanity! I'll trade places with–"

"You live up to your reputation for idiocy," the vile thing says with a chuckle. "None of you have working ODM gear. I don't have to choose just one of you. I can kill all of you…"

"Just a sec, McMooch," Wembly says, approaching carefully with his hands raised. "I have an offer you can't refuse."

A sly smile crosses the creature's disgusting lips. "You have nothing I want, icky little Fraggle. Not even Convincing John could talk me out of this. You're just stalling."

Now it's the Fraggle's turn to smile. "Well, I only needed to distract you for a couple seconds…"

The launched grapple hook impales the monstrous creature's swordarm, then retracts at full speed. Mikasa spins, breaking her captor's grip, leaving McMooch to fly backward and upward, howling in panic.

From the top of the garden wall, Armin sails in to meet his enemy in midair. The target's tremendous speed means nothing in this situation, and Armin's swords flash.

Mikasa catches Armin, preventing what might have been a very painful landing.

Wander McMooch bounces off the wall in multiple pieces.

"Thanks," Armin says, and Mikasa sets him back on his feet.

"You're thanking me?" A rare chuckle escapes her at that.

"Very good timing, kid," Levi says, rolling to unwrap the cord that binds him.

Armin takes in the sight of the scattered debris from the battle with the Gorgs, including the gargantuan club, broom, and gun. "It looks like I missed a lot too…"

I rush over to McMooch's right arm, which is still trying to flail about with the stollen sword. I manage to kick the blade away without issue.

Free and back on his feet, Levi strides over to the enemy's severed head, which is actually less ugly without the ludicrous hat. McMooch's expression shows only annoyance. Unlike the Gorgs, he isn't stuffed with white fluff, but a thick brown sludge that's oozing out very slowly. The Captain's sword tip hovers a millimeter from the gruesome creature's left eye. "I'm guessing it might still be possible for you to get pieced back together, perhaps with the help of the Gorgs. But if we all start cutting, we could leave you in so many shreds you'd wish you could die."

I kneel and lean in close. "Even if you don't feel pain, I can't imagine you enjoying life as a thousand bits of trash."

"Buried in a thousand different places," Mikasa hisses.

Sasha deliberately kneels on a chunk of the enemy's torso. "Or even better... Dumped in a thousand different toilets."

Wimbly looks genuinely horrified, and is clearly second-guessing his choice to side with us.

McMooch lets out a sigh. "I suppose… you have me at a bit of a disadvantage."

I give his head a kick, but not enough to send it flying. "Ya think?"

The severed head glares at me. "So… what is the alternative to your lovely 'thousand toilets' scenario?"

Armin steps in. "In those tunnels, I saw hundreds of happy, colorful, singing creatures, who seemed to know neither sorrow nor fear… And you say their world is a nexus between many."

"True, true. It's a horrible irony that a place infested with hundreds of vile Fraggles is so important on a Cosmic level."

Armin sounds suddenly hopeful, with a building enthusiasm that only he could feel when in a world that makes no sense. "Tell us all you know about those other worlds."

Mikasa steps closer. "There might be resources or technology we could use to overthrow the Titans."

"Or potential allies," I add. "Wembly mentioned 'Silly Creatures' that looked like us but are way bigger. What if they aren't Titans? What if they're humans that are willing to help us… and they're the size of Titans."

"Your universe is built to an unusually small scale compared to most others," McMooch observes. "Normal-sized humans could never survive your aerial maneuvers. But you'd never have had a chance to discover that… if the tunnels to your world hadn't formed."

Levi kneels down, keeping his sword close to the scumbag's face. "Tunnels?"

"Yes… at least three. That's how those Titans got inside Wall Rose. They entered Fraggle Rock through a different tunnel… and I may have deliberately led them to you."

My head is spinning at all the possibilities. When I woke up this morning, the whole world was simple. There was the land inside the Walls, where Humanity lives, and the Titan-infested wilderness beyond. But now, it sounds like there are many worlds. And while some contain impossible giant living doll things, there may be others with people who can help us…

But Levi has something closer and more immediate in mind. "Oh, I'm sure Armin, Hange, and Erwin will love to hear what you have to say about other worlds… But for my part, you're going to start with something else, after we get back to HQ. You mentioned the 'Coordinate' before, and you spent a lot of time in our world, but beyond the walls…" The Captain sheaths his sword, picks up McMooch's severed head, and looks him dead in the eyes. "Before you blow everyone's minds by talking about other realms, I want you to tell all you know… about ours."

Author's Note:

I hope you had fun with this zany crossover story. I absolutely never would have considered combining these two IP's, let alone with the twist of having the Scouts be as small as Fraggles… but the dream managed to be so… coherent. Perhaps my subconscious conflated Ymir's realm and the Coordinate with Fraggle Rock's mysterious status as a nexus between worlds. Or maybe my sleeping brain got confused, thought Gorgs and Titans were the same, and went from there. Either way, I had a load of fun, and upon waking, I knew I had to write it.

The first dream I ever wrote, "Bullets, Blades, and Extradimensional Fire," combined Aliens, The Underland Chronicles, and Kingdom Hearts in a way that weirdly fit. To me, "Titanic Muppets" feels similar. The ideas involved never should have worked, but somehow they just do. This is the 60th work I've posted, and with a name like WillDreamer it felt fitting that this milestone involve the most absurd dream I've ever had. Not even "New Hire" felt quite as random as a fusion of Fraggle Rock with AoT. And I was Connie of all people. Sure, I like the guy, but he's certainly not the first character that comes to mind when I think of the show. But having Wander McMooch as the evil mastermind that brought the two worlds together does feel appropriate. That creepy scumbag scared the crap out of me as a kid, and even gave my sister night terrors. Not too surprised my subconscious brought him in as the final boss of this dream.

It's been a fun year. I've averaged about one story per week ever since the total mental and emotional overhaul I experienced when writing "The Children of Rohan." While that story in particular will always be the most dear to me, I'm quite proud of the entire collection. And I hope to keep going strong. I have detailed notes on several dreams I haven't actually written yet, along with plans for multiple stories of far greater length. I'm nearing completion of a major expansion to my "Metalborn" story, and the next big project after that will be a collaborative work that I hope will be genuinely comical.

Thanks again for reading. If this is the first of my works you've read, consider taking a look at the rest of the collection. About half of them are dreams I've had over the years, and two ("Omega Fleet" and "Watchers") are longer sci-fi works that a ton of planning went into. As always, feel free to review this story or any of my others you find. Friendly/constructive feedback is much appreciated.