The Pale One

by Traitor of All Traitors

In the past, due to the power of the Titans, most of the world was maimed by Eldia. In the present, it is now Marley that follows this path of death and destruction, using the power of the Titans to bring ruin to those deemed enemies. But there are few that believe in coexistence, in hope for a better tomorrow, and there is one among them that walks a razor's edge to such a goal.

3. To Paradis

Creation began on 07-04-22

Creation ended on 07-26-22

Attack on Titan

The Pale One: To Paradis

It took him a year, but Pēruwan had left Marley with a major issue before he set out to reach Paradis Island. While unable to take out the current holders of the Beast and Jaw Titans, he had tracked down and dealt with the previous holders of the Armored, Female, Cart and Colossal Titans, hindering their military and imperialistic control over their part of the world. Because the War Hammer Titan was kept by a family of Eldian nobles that didn't participate in the conquest of other nations, he chose to leave them be; Marley never used that particular Titan for warfare, so it was safe to assume, for now, at least, that they wouldn't. Once their enemies became aware of their significant losses, Marley would lose some support and have to deal with the repercussions from those that they warred against. But while this would cause further problems with the Restorative in the effort to gather more information and support from those that wanted to see a world free from the ravages of hatred and bloodshed, Pēruwan could only hope that they would be able to survive for as long as they could until some of them made the crossing to Paradis should there could come a time where their aid would be needed.

Safely hidden within a small crate on the ship escorting several Eldians to Paradis, Pēruwan slept until the Marleyans reached the island. Once there, he would act in the interest of the prisoners; no matter what their crimes were, if they were even worthy to be considered crimes, nothing anyone did, including speaking out of turn or even looking at someone wrong, warranted being turned into a Titan against their will and made to roam across an island in search of someone that possessed the power of one of the Nine Titans in the hopes of devouring them and regaining their stolen humanity. Beside him was a bag that carried what he needed while there until he could scavenge for whatever he could amass in resources.

"…Mommy, I don't wanna end up like those other people that were taken to the island," he heard a girl's voice utter in the darkness. "I don't want to become a monster, walking around…without a soul."

"It's a fate worse than death," he heard a man's voice. "I'd rather face death than to become a Titan. This is just being cruel."

"What'd you do, anyway?" Another woman's voice questioned.

"I was five minutes out past curfew. I was trying to get home, but the PSA wouldn't let me enter my building."

"I was suspected of being part of a cell belonging to the Eldian Restorationist Movement. I am involved in no such thing, but my word isn't worth much of anything."

Pēruwan heard similar reasons for these men and women being taken to Paradis…and none of them were worth being turned into Titans for. False accusations, harassment, stalking, simply existing. None of these warranted being sentenced to an eternity of wandering around an island in search of hope, either empty or genuine.

-x-

"Any last words, you devils?" The Marleyan man asked these seventeen Eldian men and women that were kneeling on the edge of the wall where their sentence was to commence on Paradis Island.

"Please," a young mother begged, "don't turn my daughter into a monster."

"You're all monsters, one way or another," another soldier expressed, holding up a syringe. "Let's get this over with."

The seventeen men and women were about to be injected and turned into Titans…until…

Slice!

"Aah!" The Marleyan soldiers yelled as they fell backwards, syringes shattering onto the ground and mixing with the blood spilling from their napes.

"What the Hell?!" The leader gasped, seeing his two remaining soldiers get stabbed to death by a young man that was…in serious need of sunlight. "Identify yourself!"

Pēruwan, wielding a pair of short blades tied with rope at the base of their hilts, looked up at the man and raised the blade in his right hand.

"I am…the whispers in the darkness," he uttered, rising back to his full height. "I am the tears of blood shed by the victims you create. I walk between life and death. Be…my next victim."

The Marleyan raised a gun to him, but Pēruwan was already in front of him, like some sort of ghost. He never got a chance to fire his weapon; his neck had been slit cleanly that he didn't notice the fatal wound that made breathing impossible for him. The gun fell to the ground as he tried to keep his blood from bleeding out from his neck.

"Death is inevitable, for it comes for us all," Pēruwan told him as he collapsed to his right side, "but when we choose to cross many lines in the pursuit of something we choose to do, whether it's for the pursuit of personal pleasure or the pursuit of power over others, something just as worse as death comes for them. For when people like you die, there is something missing from your death."

The man ceased his futility at clinging to life, laying there on the wall as too much blood spilled out of his neck, his eyes glazed over, looking into the unknown.

"You die without your honor," Pēruwan told his corpse, and then turned to face the seventeen Eldians that were saved from their cruel fate today. "You die without your humanity."

"Are you…gonna kill us?" A little boy asked him.

"No," he told him. "But I don't believe you can return to Marley right now."

"We can't go back," a man expressed. "They'd kill us."

Pēruwan looked at the dead soldiers and felt inspired by a new opportunity that presented itself to him.

"You people have anonymity right now," he let them know. "Marley thinks you've been condemned to eternity as Titans on this island, but only we know the truth. I'm here to locate a relic from the past that can promise a future without further hatred towards races like Eldians, but to get closer, I need to go across that terrain if there is no other way to get around the Titans already present on the island. But even if there isn't, I still want to ask you for your help."

"To feed us to the Titans?" A mother questioned, holding her son in her arms.

"No. I see a Titan that comes your way, I'd kill it. As some people believe, knowledge is a form of power that most take for granted. The power to develop and plan in advance based on knowledge of people acquired by other people, to know what someone's habits are and be able to track them based on their habits, and face one and beat them with their own methods. Knowledge is power that enables one to progress towards their goal…or goals. What I would have you do is difficult but simple: Meet with the people within the walled civilization and learn whatever it is that you can about them."

"But…aren't they monsters like the Titans?" An elderly woman asked him. "They live like gods cut off from the rest of the world?"

"That's wrong with your beliefs. You think that, just because people cut off from the rest of the world by someone that used a power that came at a terrible price are cruel and beyond any sense of reason, that doesn't mean that it's true. The people of Paradis Island are no different from any of you…even when stunted by being cut off from the rest of the world in both culture and technology that has progressed elsewhere for the last century. They have the same problems and difficulties as you, suffer as you do, experience joy and pain as you do. They are divided by their agendas, professions, desires and backgrounds, and to know these is to live among them, to blend in, to let yourselves see past the hate and allow for something different to be felt towards them. If you let hatred be all that you feel towards people you've never even had one conversation with after meeting them…then how are you any different from the people that hate you…simply for existing?"

"But…you kill," the girl stated. "Don't you kill out of hate?"

"There's a difference between killing out of hatred…and killing out of necessity…or in defense of others. To kill because of hate is to let your very existence be defined by something as deteriorating as hatred. Hatred is a poison that is beyond contagious. Hatred is a form of evil in the world of the living and the realm of the damned that is both vicious and ruthless. It has no allegiance to any one race, creed, nation, gender or whatever designations you try to put on it. It has no shape, but one can see it if they allow themselves to do so, to feel it. When it becomes a feeling that is acted up, the end result can only further unnecessary bloodshed."

Pēruwan then looked at the terrain ahead of the wall and at the corpses. And then, he began to strip them of their clothes and equipment. Anything they had that could be used had to be taken into consideration, whether it was a gun or a notepad. And as for the removing of their clothes, anything that didn't have blood on it wasn't going to need to be discarded for other people that could use them.

"It's going to get cold tonight," he told them after separating the clothes that were clean from the ones that had blood on them, leaving the corpses in just their underwear. "I shall be taking the boat and traveling along the coastline of the island; if Titans are created here and made to wander around, it's likely that they mostly wander close to the southern part of the island. The eastern and western sides are likely not to have many Titans wandering around."

"Can you operate a ship like this?" One of the men asked him.

"No…but I learn quick. If you can help me, I will do all that I can to make sure you live to have a future without the fear of being killed by any that let hatred rule over them. Cooperate with me…and you will survive on this island. That is the deal."

-x-

Marley was in a bind. Their access to the Titan powers they had used for the last century had been reduced to just two of the seven they knew of, with no sign of how to resolve.

"Who is this Pēruwan and how the Hell did they manage to kill four of our seven Titans?" A Marleyan man by the name of Calvi demanded to the other men during a meeting of the military officials. "Or operation to attack Paradis hinged on our access to the Titans!"

"There's no way that this is the work of just one person," a Marleyan man in charge of the naval reserves expressed. "It has to be a group, even a rogue faction."

"Or maybe a traitor," went a general in charge of the newly-minted blimp brigade.

At the murder locations of the remaining three holders of the Cart, Colossal and Female Titans, a letter had been left to be found and read by the military, indicating that the people responsible for their losses was acting in the interests of the people, but didn't indicate any association with any group or race, nation or location. Because Marley didn't have any other details to go on, other than the name of the person that killed these four Titan Shifters, and the name of an outdated cult, they were left with no other recourse.

"We need to find out what this…Restorative is," said Calvi to the others.

"Forgive me for saying this," went a soldier for the Marleyans, "but this…Restorative, it sounds like nothing more than a cult. A bunch of mystic storytellers and soothsayers."

"And yet, some people believe this Pēruwan is a part of this Restorative," another soldier stated. "They don't have anything to do with the Eldian Restorationist Movement; one group existed to restore an entire race of devils, and this group's interests were based on the so-called restoration and unification of all races. But there was something about the Restorative that stood out more than the people themselves."

"And what was that, soldier?" Another general questioned.

"The Restorative was led by a woman who would always have these four followers that stood out among the rest for being handpicked by her. Leaders, generals, outcasts, individuals that were believed to be imbued with powers by her, to carry out the will of the whole group."

"Wait a minute," a different general uttered, "I think I heard of something like that. They were called the Four Horsemen of the Restorative."

"Yes, yes, them. If this…Pēruwan is one of them, then he must have abilities that put him on par with one endowed with the power of the Titans."

"There is a translation to the name. Pēruwan literally means…'The Pale One'."

"The Pale One? 'I looked and beheld a pale horse. The rider's name that sat upon it was Death…and Hell followed with him'."

"Death, the fourth and supposed strongest of the Four Horsemen," Calvi expressed. "But is this Pēruwan truly Death…or just someone playing a role?"

-x-

It took over an hour to move the boat to the island's western side, but as the sun went down, Pēruwan informed the Eldians with him as he dropped the anchor that traveling at night was better than doing so in daylight.

"Titans are inactive at night," he explained, checking his blades. "You could walk right up to one in the silence of the night, whether they be sitting down or laying down, and they wouldn't be able to harm you."

"Why?" A little boy asked him.

"Because of the sunlight. In the daylight hours, Titans often draw strength from the sunlight to do as they do, whether it's walking around or eating people. But when the sun goes down, after enough time has passed, Titans lose their power to move. In the night, in the darkness, even under a waning moon, they're no different from people stumbling in the forest: Helpless."

With the belief that they had no other alternative, the seventeen Eldians from Paradis went with the pale boy as he walked away from the boat and into the dominions of Paradis Island. If their job was simply to acquire information from the people that lived there while blending in with them and informing Pēruwan of what they know, it didn't seem like a job at all. It was…just a way to survive until they could return to the place they knew as home…without the fear of being killed by someone that hated them just for existing.

"How far can we travel until the sun comes up?" A woman asked him.

"There's a forest a few miles inward," he answered her. "Paradis is known for having tall trees that reach over fifty meters. Titans can't climb trees, so we can avoid them up in the high branches until the sun goes down."

"How do you know so much about the Titans?" A boy asked him.

"Mother Gaia taught me everything I needed to know about what Titans are, along with everything else I needed to know."

"Each member of the Nine Titans has abilities unique only to its own existence. Some possess similar strengths, but no two Titans possess the same degree of power," his memory of her teaching him what was known about the Nine Titans replayed in his mind.

"But…each one is dangerous if misused, right?" He asked her.

"Yes, but when you know how to fight any of them, they are simple to overpower, even without a bag of tricks. The majority of the Nine Titans are most vulnerable on the back of the neck. Sever the nape, you sever their lives. The partial exception to that limitation is the War Hammer Titan, which can remove its current holder and put them inside a shell of crystal connected by a thread of flesh to the Titan husk. But no matter which method it chooses, the War Hammer is a Titan power that can only be used sparingly."

"Why?"

"It was never intended for extended use, as it drains the holder of strength much faster than any of the other Titans. There hasn't been a single War Hammer Titan that could go more than twenty minutes before exhaustion sets in. Each Titan is a formidable challenge, but the people within them are still as human as we are. Remember that above all when you face one."

"Yes, Mother Gaia."

"So…you know everything about the Titans?" An elderly man asked.

"Not everything…but just enough," he replied.

"Can you tell me the name of the Titan that Marley never took along with the Founder? Nobody knows what it was called at all."

"It's called the Attack Titan, also referred to as the Rogue Titan."

"Why?"

"Of all the Nine Titans, it's said to be the worst one because anyone that had it had a serious problem with respecting authority and falling in line with those that understood better than most of any given situation. Its sole purpose was to fight for freedom, no matter the age or place, to move forward. However, because it refused to obey even the simplest of commands from those of authority, it became known as the Rogue Titan because of its unwillingness to accept that it needed to be subservient to those that sought to resolve matters with as little conflict as possible. It only understood fighting for freedom, no matter how violent or cruel it chose to be. To be free was to fight, and to fight was to do anything to stay free."

"Sounds like a self-centered Titan," another man expressed.

"There's a reason behind every Titan that does what it does, but this Titan, while it does possess some good qualities, is not a team player in any sense. It's nobody true ally in any struggle; if you hinder it in any way to make it feel as though freedom is at risk, it will pick a fight with you. Neither friend nor foe is worth the difficulty of having such a Titan that is no different from a pouty child that refuses to demonstrate restraint or show that they can be trusted."

"Then…the Founding Titan couldn't control it?" The little girl asked. "Even if it wanted to?"

"The Founding Titan supposedly kept order among the Nine, but ceased to do so when the Great Titan War ended. According to the Restorative, the Founder is flawed in one of its powers."

"Flawed?" An elderly man asked. "But…it can control other Titans. How can it be flawed?"

"It can't deviate from the path it takes. Unlike the Attack Titan, which receives memories from people yet to possess it, inheriting bits of the future, those that inherit the Founder see more than what they want to. They see the past and the future, and it destroys whatever sense of drive they ever had to change things. To know what happens…and know that it doesn't matter what you do…it eats you up and leaves you feeling like you can't do anything to change anything."

"So, the Founder is a Titan power with a curse?"

"So far, it's a curse for the Fritz royal family; anyone that has royal blood in their veins is a potential victim to both the clairvoyant-like power of the Founding Titan and the ideology of Karl Fritz. The power of the Founder is not absolute, but it could be used to great effect if used to its fullest."

"And the people of the island know nothing of this?"

"It's a two-way street in this situation: The people beyond Paradis hate the people of Paradis for something that happened two-thousand years ago and think they're living like the world has been overrun by Titans…and the people of Paradis have been deceived by the ones in charge of the island into believing that they're all that remains of the human race. Whosoever holds the power of the Founder, if they can access it, can do amazing things. Cultivate wastelands, build grandiose bridges that can span oceans, even remove the power of the Titans and free all Eldians from the grim fate of being turned into Titans. But it's not the only power that exists in the world. There are other powers laying in the ground, either seeking to be found or need to be found, that need to be used. It's why I'm here. The Restorative has a relic that can break the cycle of hatred that runs through everyone like a contagious disease or rumor of the end to the world, creating new paths for all that are free of prejudice."

"Could this even get rid the Titans?" Two of the children asked him.

"It could. We just need to find it once within Wall Sina. It can't be destroyed by any means possessed by people, only hidden away. It was never meant to be used as a weapon to crush one's foes, only a tool to ensure a future of hope is given, over and over again, to return all hate and desires of death and destruction to zero."

"Return to zero?"

"It's a way of saying to go back to the beginning…figuratively speaking. Literally, it's a step backwards in action, to take back the choice you made…by never fulfilling it to begin with."

"Oh…"

It was about three hours before they reached some trees. The darkness was dense, so Pēruwan lit a torch and led the way through.

"Oh!" One of the women gasped. "Titan!"

And there was a Titan. A five-meter Titan, laying on the ground like an animal, eyes open and looking at them, but not moving an inch. Appearance-wise, it resembled a young man with salt and pepper hair, eyes as blue as he sky or ocean, but the face was that of a tortured soul.

"It's okay," Pēruwan told them, approaching the Titan. "He can't do anything until the sun comes up. Just walk past him."

They did as instructed, leaving the Titan alone.

"Are they ever aware of people at night?" A man asked Pēruwan. "Can they feel anything?"

"No," he explained. "They can sense the presence of others around themselves, but they can't tell any of them apart from others. It's like…being lost in a maze; you know there are others there, but you can't find them. They feel our presence, but can't get any closer to us. That is the fate of any Eldian turned into a Titan, to be lost in a maze, unable to find other people, unable to find the exit."

Some of them looked back to where the Titan lay, feeling sympathy towards it; none of them wanted to live like that with a fate as bad as the one that befell others before them.

-x-

Somehow, the truth that Marley had tried to keep hidden had reached their enemies. Someone had informed the higher-ups from other nations that Marley was stripped of at least four of their seven Titan powers, which included the Colossal and Armored Titans. This alone inspired their enemies across the oceans to gather their forces and set aside their own differences in favor of working together and then divide up the spoils of wars once their greatest enemy was no more.

"…This will delay us from the operation to overtake Paradis," Calvi realized; with only the Jaw and Beast Titans, Marley's forces were already spread too thin to risk sending them to Paradis right now.

"Most of our strategies relied upon the Titans to install fear against our enemies," another general said. "Mostly the Colossal Titan. We're not really sending any messages with only two Titans. Even if we regroup, we're still facing blowback."

Put quite simply, they needed to take control of this situation with their enemies before they could return their attention to the little island. If they tried to go after Paradis first, they would lose their hold on their own land, but if they fought with their foes overseas, they would at least be able to hold off their enemies for some time. Nobody ever said that this war was going to be easy. When war was a choice made by those that desired something more than what they already possessed, they would do whatever they chose to in order to take what they wanted from other parts of the world, including mass murder and manipulating young people to kill for them.

"Were we able to find anything related to this Restorative?" A third general questioned.

"Rumors from our allies in other countries are claiming that their enemies are starting to show more resilience and determination in their ransacking of stockpiled weapons and rations. There's even talk about individual men that were able to take out an entire squadron of heavily armed soldiers. That they were…they were almost unstoppable." A soldier informed.

"Individual men?" Calvi asked.

"Three men. The information is still sketchy, but one of them had a sword made of fire."

-x-

"…I gotta hand it to you, Pēruwan," said one of the men to the pale-skinned young man that saved him from being turned into a Titan, finishing a sixth apple, "I never thought I'd appreciate fruit when provided by the wilderness."

Taking shelter in the trees, carrying the children and elderly up to safety by being in several feet higher than fifteen meters, the standard height of most of the Titans, everyone was enjoying the apples and oranges they found in some of the trees. It was nearing dawn, and once the sun came up, there would be Titan activity until dusk. Their safety for the time being hinged on staying out of the Titans' reach.

"Pēruwan?" One of the female elders spoke. "What does your name mean?"

"The Pale One," he answered her.

"Why are you called that?"

"It was given to me to replace the name I lost because of Marley's violence."

"You…you don't remember your name?"

"No. I can't recall anything about my life before I ended up wandering in the desert with an arrow in my back, dragging a small blade. I don't let my lost past weigh me down. In the end, whatever is lost will eventually be found and returned…even if it's not in the way the one that lost it expects."

"So…how long have you been…doing this?"

"Ever since the Restorative found me as a child. I was a foundling, lost and alone. They gave me a new name, a new life, and a purpose to end the hatred in the world. I can't see the future, but I have hope that it can be better than the present. Nobody hating anyone simply for being different, nobody engaging in war over differences or for resources, people sharing what they have, learning about other cultures, building bridges between divisions and so on. I hope I live long enough to see that become a reality, not just a possibility."

"Is there anyone in that future with you?"

"Maybe. We made a promise to meet one day on this island. That was four years ago."

To be continued…

A/N: There will be more information about Marley's knowledge of the Titans and Pēruwan's past in the Restorative in the next chapter, but what do you think about Pēruwan gathering followers to aid him while he's on Paradis? It's pretty much a symbiotic relationship between himself and the Eldians he rescued from being turned into Titans; they gather information for him to use in finding the Unity and learning about the people on the island, and in return, he protects them and makes sure that they have a future once the discrimination and violence is ended. There are symbiotic relationships of this sort nearly all the time in one way or another.