Creation began on 02-23-24
Creation ended on 08-28-24
Attack on Titan
The Silent Corps: Sunrise
It was much colder than usual, with fewer people out and about, but Grisha walked along the side of the wall for over an hour, making sure he was too far from Shiganshina District to be noticed by anyone, whether he was human or Titan. After another half-hour, he walked away from the wall so that he had a running start to climb it. However, during the time he had the Attack Titan, he made little use of it, so whether or not he could climb the wall was anyone's guess; a fifteen-meter Titan whose sole purpose was to fight climbing a wall that reached fifty meters above ground was a question that didn't have an answer just yet from the an that barely used it. But he was confident that he could climb the wall and reach Dina before the Silent Corps found her and decided to kill her because they didn't know of her potential value as an ally.
The power of the Titans is not equal to the people that possess the Nine Titans, he could hear that stranger's voice in his head. The Attack Titan's sole purpose is to fight for a freedom that doesn't even exist for Eldia. It only knows how to go in one direction, never deviating from the path it walks eternally. But if you deviate from the path, if you force the Attack Titan to change its direction, make it stand for something other than a belief that is impossible to represent, then you become more than a belief. You become more than a mere Titan with intelligence comparable to humans that engage others in conflict. Change the direction of the path, Grisha. Deviate from the direction the Titan goes in. Forge a new path…and create a new future that is better than the previous one could only hope to be.
Once Grisha was far from the wall, he took a scalpel and slit his left wrist, drawing blood. He felt the surge of energy crackling as arcs of bright yellow light danced around him.
Boom! The explosion was unheard by anyone for miles…and nobody noticed what looked like a large, naked man climbing up the side of Wall Maria with a ragged grace.
Is any of it even possible to achieve, this new future? He wonders.
It's only possible if you forge it for yourself instead of letting the future be decided by someone that can't grasp the power of hope for a better future. Hope is a power that can not be bought or sold, taken and kept away. It can only be given…and has to be earned by those that seek it. If you seek hope, if you prove you deserve it, it will be given to you…but only if you choose to want it. You have to want it to receive it. The voice of Brother Correction tells him as he goes over the wall and descends to the ground below. I wish you the best of luck.
Upon touching the ground, the Titan Grisha possesses starts to run towards the open terrain away from the wall. He wanted to believe that it was possible, that he could save Dina from her fate, and by so doing save everyone else from an inescapable despair. He was told a light would guide him to Dina, but he wasn't sure if he would be worthy of such an aid…but he wanted to be.
Dina…please, wait for him, he thinks.
A second later, he sees a light in his eyes, pointing like an arrow of sorts, which directed him towards some trees. He follows it, into the woods. It feels as though he is running for hours, when in truth, it hadn't even been one hour, and he stops in the presence of the light shining down upon a Titan he hadn't seen in many years since arriving to Paradis. This Titan, massive in its own right, muscular and slender in a way, with blond hair and a smile that borders on creepy due to the way its teeth are showing.
Dina, Grisha can't help but feel joyful to the hope that she would live…but only once he made the ultimate sacrifice to give her back her life. I will save you, Dina.
He drops to his knees and submits.
The Titan looks at him, drown to both the sense of familiarity it exhibits and the power it has calling out to it. It was just kneeling there, waiting for something to happen.
Don't, it hears a voice say to it, and it sees a young man with a terrible expression of hatred on his face. Stay away from him.
Redemption is obtained through the will to persevere in the darkness, it hears another voice, a kinder voice, seeing a man with dark skin on the left of the angry man. Embrace redemption through perseverance. Take back your life and escape the wrath of the darkness, Dina.
No! Stay away from him! He's not yours to claim!
The Titan, Dina, looks to the other Titan…and walks toward it.
Don't! Stay away from him! Stay away! The angry man yells.
This is the way it has to be now. Change the future by forging a new one full of possibilities, some of which are beyond the scope of the imagination one such as yourself possesses. But it's not the end for you, just the future you're from. Whoever you are in the here and now, he will live to see a different future.
The Titan grabs the other Titan by its neck and shoulder…and sinks its teeth into the neck.
No! The angry man yells as he starts to disappear like a leaf in the win.
The dark-skinned man turns and watches as the Titan with the smile rips out a chunk of flesh from the other Titan's neck and sinks its teeth deeper into its exposed muscle and nerves.
Grisha feels he can see a white light that people are said to see when they die. He wonders if there is a place in Heaven for him, despite his sins that he has tried to atone for.
Oh, there is a place for you in Heaven, Grisha, he hears the voice say to him, but it's not your time yet. You still have your whole life ahead of you before you truly go down your road of endings. Until that time comes…wake up and help the people that need you. Wake up.
"Aah!" Grisha gasps as he opens his eyes, finding himself on the ground in the woods, steam surrounding him where he lays. "Aah…what?"
He rises up, seeing that the steam is coming from his Titan body's evaporation…and sees another Titan nearby, also evaporating.
"Dina!" He yells as he rushes over, the Titan body degenerating down to its bones and muscles. "Dina! Are you awake?! I'm here for you!"
He goes to where he assumes the upper body of the Titan was before it started degenerating, unable to see anything because of the steam.
"Oh!" He goes as he trips over something.
"Ahh," he hears a groan and turns over to look up in front of him, seeing a naked woman with blond hair lying on the ground. "Mmmmm…nnnnngh…"
Grisha removed his coat, which was intact, and covered her body.
"Dina," he utters as he picks her up, just as the sun rises.
The future…renewed with hope…and the past…reforged, Grisha hears the man's voice again. The power to hope, to give a sense of peace to those in need of it…and to feel reinvigorated by it. Head back to the wall…and you will find a hole in it that is big enough for you to get through without attracting the Titans.
Rather than question anything right now, Grisha quickly carries Dina out of the woods.
-x-
Brother Correction smiles as walks in the sewers beneath Liberio, hearing from a distance the singing of humpback whales on the other side of the world. He praises Grisha Yeager for saving his first wife and rewriting the past and future by giving the Attack Titan to Dina. Stopping on the path beside the stream of sewage waste, he looks up ahead and sees Ymir Fritz.
"Your boon is coming, Ms. Fritz," he tells her. "The path to hope is for all. Paradis, Marley, everyone…everywhere."
Despite her silence being a constant source of mystery, Brother Correction understands her persistent presence to himself more than most. She was simply becoming impatient with waiting for what he promised her. For someone that lived more than two millennia ago, patience wears thin for some more than others…and could only get thinner as time passes. But patience was among the greater quirks of any individual, as it shows one's ability to enforce self-control over prolonged periods of time.
"Death and destruction create nothing for nobody," he reminds her of why he chose to do this at all. "They may be the opposite of life and creation, but when such power is ignored in favor of their opposite forces, you lose sight of the benefits that they bring. Even if you think they can afford one opportunities, they are nothing more than a cruel reset to the world, taking what already exists and leaving only debris and broken dreams. So, tell me…what do you want out of this? What do you really want?"
Of course, he knows what she wants, but he wants to hear it from herself on what it is that she wants, what she really wants.
Moving her mouth, Ymir Fritz spoke, with her voice, for the first time in a long time, "My daughters and I…to live once again…in a world without cruelty."
Brother Correction nods in understanding.
"I'm a man of my word," he says, "and you will have that desire granted in due time, which nears closer with each passing day. The darkness of now lifts ever more from the days of our mortality. And as the seasons slowly shift, so, too, will the banes of negative feelings wane. The Attack Titan that promises true hope to the people of the world…has been unleashed upon the present…and pact between past and future…shall be reforged."
-x-
Dina awoke to find herself laying in a small hut, illuminated by a small fire.
"He…hell…hello?" She utters out. "Is there someone here?"
"Yes," she hears a female voice reply to her. "I am here."
She turns to her left and sees a woman with long, salt and pepper hair, dressed in commoner clothing, a blouse and long skirt, holding a pitcher of water.
"Where…am I?" She asks the woman.
"Gijāra, a village just two miles from Shiganshina District within Wall Maria."
"Wall Maria? Paradis Island?"
"Huh?"
The woman was confused by what Dina had spoken. What was Paradis Island?
"I'm back," they both hear a male voice utter, and Dina's eyes widen in disbelief; the voice sounds so much like that of her husband. "Dina?"
She looks over to the entrance of the hut…and sees an older Grisha, carrying a sackcloth in his right hand.
"Grisha," she utters, confused but hopeful. "Are you…really here?"
Grisha approaches her and sits in a chair beside the bed.
"I am here," he answers her.
To be continued…
A/N: I think the strongest part of this chapter for me was not the return of Dina Fritz-Yeager, but the revelation of what Ymir Fritz desires more than anything from what Brother Correction is doing. Her desire to have her daughters and herself live again in a different world would be understandable, and a man that wants to create such a world with as little bloodshed as possible is also understandable, which is why he does things the way he does, trying to keep certain actions from going too far into violence. But there's going to be hope for everyone soon enough, because we don't know yet what powers an Attack Titan with royal blood possesses that would be more than a regular one has.