Creation began on 03-27-24
Creation ended on 04-05-24
Attack on Titan
The Dark Titan: Interrogation and Salvage
Bertolt didn't expect this to be his current predicament. With his limbs cut off and bound to prevent regeneration, he was unable to change into the Colossal Titan until after he was healed. But as long as he was disabled, this wasn't going to happen, and here he was, in the presence of these leaders of the Survey Corps.
"Bertolt Hoover," went Levi to the disabled youth known for his nervous sweating that seemed to mirror the Colossal Titan's steam emissions. "You can either answer our questions truthfully…or you can experience more pain than you already have. We already know enough about you to take guesses on how to deal with you for the time being."
Since he was gagged, he couldn't speak, leaving nodding his head his only way to communicate.
"How about we do this the easy way," said Erwin Smith to him. "You start with why you attacked Wall Maria five years ago…and why you attacked Wall Rose less than a month ago. You've put us under a lot of stress with our previous state of zero and minus. You and Reiner Braun and Annie Leonhart. We want to know why."
Bertolt shuddered at the mentioning of those names.
"Based on the way you're shuddering," Hange Zoe utters, "all three of you knew what you were doing five years ago, meaning the attacks on Walls Maria and Rose were deliberate. You knowingly caused the deaths of thousands of people with your initial attack…and caused several more over the years when you let the Titans in. All of those deaths can be held against the three of you. But not everyone wants to consider you three as criminals or murderers. We want to know why you did it. Why did you attack people you didn't even know?"
"Why?" Bertolt recalls Kaede asking him again. "Why did you attack the people?"
Hange then got up in his face, her eyes staring intently at him.
"Oh, the many things I can do to pass the time with you," she tells him.
"Mmmm!" He shudders again, sweating profusely…and losing control of his other bodily functions. "Mmm…"
Sniff-sniff. Hange smells the air in the room and backs away from him.
"I don't know if he's more afraid of us or of Ms. Sogen," she tells the men. "Probably Ms. Sogen if he lost to her, even as a giant without any skin. Maybe we should have her talk to him?"
"Hmmmm!" Bertolt reacts to the suggestion as the goggles-wearing woman moved to leave. "Mmmmm! Mmm-mmm!"
The very idea of being in the same room with the gray-haired girl terrified him.
"I'll go get her," Levi states and gets up from where he was sitting.
"Mmm-mmm! Mmm-mmm!" Bertolt goes.
"Will you talk, then?" Erwin asks him.
"Hmm-hmm!" Bertolt nods his head; he didn't want to see the girl again, even if it was to interrogate him over what he knew.
Hange then removes the gag so he could speak with them.
"You are afraid of her, aren't you?" She asks him.
"I'll talk," he insists. "I'll talk. Just not with her. Not with the Sogen girl. She's not normal. She's not normal."
"If I could become an intelligent Titan and do what you do," Levi tells him, "I wouldn't be normal, either. But out of the four of you, if it was a popularity contest, you and your comrades would be at the bottom and Ms. Sogen would be at the top because of her lack of violent behavior and defending of the people from other Titans."
Bertolt couldn't fault him for saying such; from just the gossip he, Reiner and Annie had heard from the handful of people that were actually in Trost when the second attack occurred, and from their own witness of what occurred, Kaede Sogen and the Dark Titan were hardly feared and looked at in awe, with at least several people that didn't know the girl personally poking at the fact that she had gray hair, something that made her stand out in any crowd. If anything, the girl was a strange beauty that actually rivaled the beauty of Krista Lenz. If not outright surpassing her beauty.
"Let's start at the very beginning," Erwin states. "Who are you?"
"Bertolt Hoover," he responds. "I'm a Warrior for the nation of Marley, current holder of the Colossal Titan."
-x-
It wasn't something she wanted to get in trouble for doing, but all Dot Pyxis asked Kaede was if she could build a makeshift sealant to replace the outer gate of Trost District, the same as she did for Shiganshina District. And because it was the head of the Garrison's southern division, it was basically an ask from the branch of the military that had the most personnel because they were people persons, dedicated to protecting the civilians within the Walls. So, here she was, in her Dark Titan body, gathering trees and stones to build another sealant for a district in need of one. If anyone saw her, it would be up to the Garrison soldiers to explain that she was simply fulfilling an ask for protection.
"Hey!" She hears a female voice from the breach. "Kaede Sogen!"
She turns to see the breach and notices several young women standing in front of it. There were about seven of them. Eight if she included the little girl beside one of them. But…she recognized them, even after five years.
"Little girl," one of the women utters, "big woman. You had quite the growth spurt!"
Although she could talk in her Titan form, speech was still painful to a degree, so Kaede etched the woman's name in the ground: "KYLIE?"
The woman, standing six feet tall, waist-length salt-and-pepper hair and green eyes, wearing a casual burgundy dress with work boots, chuckled at the Dark Titan.
"It really has been too long, Kaede," she expresses.
Kaede looks at the seven ladies, eight when she included the little girl, and etched into the ground the names of the other six girls she recalled from five years ago when they all lived in Shiganshina before the Colossal and Armored Titans attacked.
"RACHEL?"
"MIMI?"
"JULIETTA?"
"DELILAH?"
"AMANDA?"
"SALINA?"
The ladies all looked at their names etched into the ground and stood in the spots where they were etched, representing who they were. Even after five years, Kaede remembered each of them. Even after all this time, even when she was a Titan, she recognized them, despite the absence from her life.
"It's…good to see you again," went Julietta to Kaede, picking up the little girl. "I would ask you how you been, but I heard that talking like this hurts a little?"
"Not as much," went the Dark Titan, "as it used to."
"Oh," the little girl gasps as she holds onto Julietta.
"My…apologies," she scoots back, but then Julietta steps forward.
"It's okay," she replies. "I want her to meet you. Charlotte, this is my friend from before you were born. Kaede Sogen, meet Charlotte, my daughter."
"Hello, Charlotte."
The little girl must've been three or four years of age, as Kaede only knew that Julietta had a baby shortly after they all left Shiganshina. But still, five years since that life-altering situation…and yet these seven ladies she knew from that time…were here before her…as though it were all…only the day before their lives went south and sour. The girl looks up at her, slightly intimidated by her size.
"Hair…long?" Charlotte says.
"Yes, my hair is long."
"Pretty."
"Thank you."
-x-
With the mere fear of being in the same room with Kaede serving as their leverage against any deception from Bertolt, Erwin, Levi and Hange made him tell the truth to each and every one of their questions that he had to answer…and beyond upset with his answers. It wasn't everyday that one that lived behind one of three concentric walls learned that they lived on an island miles away from a continent where people from a different nation lived…and that the world was never ruled by Titans as they were led to believe…or that the human race was an endangered species. These, along with the fact that the whole attack on them from five years ago was nothing more than an elaborate ploy by some higher-ups in an enemy military that was simply to take something called the Founding Titan, the first and most powerful of these Nine Titans that existed, away from the royal family in order to get rid of them all and take possession of their island's resources. If it hadn't been due to the fact that these people they had never seen before had the displeasing idea to use children as soldiers…or that this was pressed on by Reiner Braun shortly after a fourth member of their group was killed by a Titan on their way here, Erwin would've likely decapitated Bertolt.
Levi approaches Bertolt and grips him by his neck.
"You better not be leading us astray, boy," he tells him, angry.
"I swear, I'm telling you the truth," Bertolt pleads. "I'm telling you all I know."
"You said there are these…Nine Titans?" Hange questions. "This…Founding Titan? And then, there's the Colossal and Armored Titans. And then, there was that Female Titan we met that was Annie Leonhart. And then, there's Ms. Sogen…"
"No," Bertolt had to correct her. "Not her. No way she's one of the Nine Titans. No way."
"Why do you say that?" Erwin asks him.
"Her Dark Titan may possess some similarities to other Titans, but if I had to wager, she's in a class of Titan by herself. Her Titan is eighteen meters, one meter taller than the Beast Titan, which is seventeen meters. She can be a Titan for almost an entire day, longer than anyone that isn't the Cart Titan, which possesses great endurance at the cost of durability; nobody except those with the Cart Titan can stay in Titan form for longer than a day. Maybe several minutes to several hours, but never more than a day. We risk being consumed by our Titans if we try to stay in them longer than we can. Plus, based only on the fact that we had limited knowledge on the Founder, we were led to believe that it was thirteen meters. No more or less, and that it could control other Titans, bending them to its will. Miss Sogen isn't any of the Nine Titans. She stands out too much to be any of them."
"If she's not a member of the Nine Titans, how was she able to acquire the power to become a Titan? Based on what you informed, a Subject of Ymir, a race of people that can turn or be turned into Titans, has to be injected with Titan spinal fluid and then eat someone with the Titan power to regain human form. Miss Sogen believes her step-grandfather had something to do with this. Did any of you see an old man with one leg at any point before you attacked Wall Maria?"
Bertolt thought back to that day…and nodded in the negative. He never saw an old man with just one leg.
"Are you sure?" Hange asks him, making sure that he knew that any deception would have him come face-to-face with the girl he was afraid of.
"If I had seen a guy without a leg, I'd know," he confesses. "I wouldn't lie about that."
"Does Marley look down upon people with physical disabilities?"
"Only if they can't serve in the military. If you can't serve Marley as a soldier, you're no better than a dog that needs to be put down. But they keep the maimed alive as a courtesy to their greatness and power."
"Sounds more like they do it because they know deep down that they can kill them wherever they want to."
"It's not far from a falsehood. If you can't serve in the military, you're no better than a dog that needs to be put down."
Even with this revelation, the fact that Bertolt had no knowledge of Grausam Zanki left the trio wondering how Kaede obtained her power as a Titan…and if what was done to her permanent or even something that could be repeated if they tried to harness her power for future purposes. Nine Titans with intelligence were one thing and a Titan that could be used to protect them against danger… Or better yet, multiple Titans with intelligence and knew right from wrong… They'd be close to untouchable by any foe that was looking to make a power grab on them.
"I can take a guess at what you three are thinking about," Bertolt tells them. "If you had more Titans like the girl on your side, nobody would ever think to pick a fight with Paradis. And while I would agree that you would be right to assume such, how would you go about doing that if you could pull it off?"
"You care to elaborate?" Levi asks him.
"Who would you trust with such power at their disposal? How many people would you have able to become Titans with intelligence? And…what would you do if they were to decide that they want to be in control of things? Personally, and only because I'm terrified of her, Ms. Sogen is perhaps your greatest blessing. Anyone else would be a curse."
"Except she's not the best fit for any life in the military," Hange states. "She is a force to be reckoned with, this is true, but she has other interests that she still wants to accomplish in her future. Her goals, however small, however insignificant to others around her, are still hers to want to see fulfilled, no matter what others believe. Didn't you once have personal goals that you wanted to accomplish, Hoover?"
-x-
The makeshift sealant was much larger than Pyxis suspected, but he had to admit that Kaede's work didn't disappoint. She had dug an additional trench around the breach that was over twice her Titan's length and made the trees and stones used to make the sealant durable enough to keep the Titans out. But she left an opening big enough for people to get through, with two other openings on opposite sides of the sealant, just in case of Titans causing a retreat and soldiers being unable to get to the primary opening. If there was ever a girl that deserved recognition for her makeshift work, it was this girl.
"We checked the durability of the sealant, sir," a man informed Pyxis with two other Garrison soldiers. Unless the Titans were to plow through this, they won't be able to get in."
"Ah!" They hear a woman gasp, seeing one of the girls that came to see Kaede feeling her Titan's skin. "It feels like sculpted marble made soft and warm!"
Then, they saw the other girls feel the Dark Titan as she sat against the wall.
"Are these girls really friends of this Sogen girl?" One of the soldiers asks Pyxis.
"From what I can gather, they are friends of hers."
"And I'm guessing she hasn't seen them in years."
"It seems that way."
-x-
For now, the Survey Corps had the advantage of having knowledge that they wouldn't have had otherwise were it not for the assistance of Kaede Sogen, as Bertolt Hoover revealed all that he knew about Marley and the state of the human race. Now, it was just a matter of handling two other matters: Rebuilding the district of Shiganshina and tearing down the government that supported the old regime supporting the royal family that possessed the Founding Titan and made absolutely no use of it to liberate the people of Paradis from the Titans. For over a century, the royal family had the means to help the people from the oppression of the Titans, only to look the other way because of something they had no say against. But now, the tables were going to turn, and a new order was to be established that allowed for them to deal with their problems instead of letting them get worse before they could even begin to get better.
"Once they realize that we know the truth, they'll likely try to kill us," Hange reminds Erwin as they and Levi leave Bertolt in his cell.
"Maybe, but once they're exposed," Erwin replies, "they won't be able to silence the truth."
"Not unless they use the Founding Titan," went Levi, "which they likely won't."
-x-
It was like something out of a nightmare, only it was happening in front of them. First, the Dark Titan just fell over and became immobile, then it started emitting steam as its whole body seemed to begin melting from the outside in. It looked like a painful, agonizing process, but despite being witnesses to it, none of Kaede's friends or the Garrison soldiers heard any screams or howls of any kind from the Titan. Minutes felt like hours, hours felt like days, but the body of the Titan was wasting away at its own pace. The dark flesh and hair looked like sparkles as they evaporated, allowing people to see the muscles and bones beneath, noticing that they were just as dark, too, followed by the expelling of innards that they knew of to be within a Titan's body, such as a stomach-like pit and lungs, releasing more steam as they broke apart.
"Where is she?" Mimi asks, unable to see Kaede because of the hot steam; it had been twenty hours since her transformation into the Dark Titan, and it surprised the friends to learn that once Kaede turned into a Titan, she was that way for that long, as she didn't know how to change back at will…or if she could at all.
"Ooh! Ooh!" Charlotte gasps, pointing over to where the Dark Titan's lower torso had been wasting away. "Is that her over there?"
Amidst the decaying bones of the lower spine, a body could be seen laying on the ground. It was a girl, with gray hair and damp clothing, looking as though she were asleep. There was no trace of turmoil, no suffering, just a sense of peace, like the state of the current world was unable to affect her in any way. As the heat of the steam dissipated, the friends of Kaede approached the unconscious girl as she slowly stirred from unconsciousness. Opening her eyes, the gray-haired girl looks up to see her friends in front of her as she sits up.
"Well, this is a little awkward," she says to them.
"You sitting there on the ground," went Julietta, "or you looking like you took a swim in the lake with your clothes on?"
"All of the above."
A different girl, almost as old as Julietta, with reddish hair and a left green eye and right hazel eye, lowers down to Kaede and offers her right hand.
"Does it hurt when you turn back?" She asks Kaede.
"No, Delilah," she answers her, accepting her hand and standing up in front of them. "I…don't really feel anything when I turn back. Wow. Look at you all."
Unlike Kaede, who stood out due to her gray hair, these ladies in front of her each stood out to her in their own way.
Julietta with her maturity and premature motherhood.
Delilah with her red hair and mismatched eyes.
Kylie with her salt-and-pepper hair and attitude.
Mimi with her dreams of having emerald earrings one day so she could stop using green paint to highlight her ebony hair.
Rachel and Amanda, the twins that were as different as night and day with their ebony and blond hair, respectively, but had the same knack for speaking an answer at the same time when asked at the same time.
Salina with her cat-like green eyes and white streak in her brown hair.
Kaede couldn't have asked for better friends to be around her back when they all lived in Shiganshina District.
"Your friend sad, Mommy?" Charlotte asks Julietta, pointing to Kaede, who looked like she was going to cry now.
"Kaede?" Julietta asks her.
"It's nothing," Kaede tells her. "I'm just…glad to see all of you again."
"Five years apart," went Amanda. "It really does feel like an eternity since we were last together. Days turn into weeks, into months, then years, and…"
"It just feels like we're waiting for something that brings us back together again," Kylie says.
"Yeah," the twins reply.
"How long are you all here?" Kaede had to ask; she hated herself for asking, but she knew they all had personal lives they needed to live just like she did.
"I'm free until next month," Julietta says on account of her enlistment in the Garrison.
"Some of our relatives behind Wall Sina question why we lived in Shiganshina," Salina states. "I've been understanding why my parents made a conscious decision to live there instead of Wall Sina. My aunts and grandfather are complete jerks, and my dad says that wealth and privilege can do that to people if they let it. I don't understand whoever thought of wanting a life of luxury, but if it means growing up to be like my relatives, I would much rather go back to life behind Wall Maria. At least then, I wouldn't have to see the fancies every time I walk down the street."
"Unless Shiganshina can be magically rebuilt in under a year, I doubt you'd recognize it, anymore," Kaede expresses with regret.
"How bad was it when you got there?" Delilah asks her.
"It wasn't all that bad. There was a lot of damages, but they all seemed minor and could've been repaired after a while. But then the Colossal Titan appeared again and… Whatever wasn't trampled on got burned away…and whatever wasn't burned away got trampled, leaving the district as something like a burn pit."
To hear that the place these young ladies one called home was a memory that someone they didn't know anything about had decimated in the foulest of ways…was not something they could process easily. Their homes, their places of interest, their favorite walkways, all gone. The familiar smells, sights and sounds, gone.
"But," uttered Mimi, "only the buildings were destroyed, not the whole district, wall and all, right? That means we can rebuild over time."
"The wall is still intact, yes."
"Then…we're out of our state of minus and will get out of our state of zero because of you, Kaede. When people have to rebuild, they have nothing but their wits and insight to achieve the difficult task of creating something. And sometimes, the only good thing about rebuilding something…is that you can always build it better than the first time around."
"True."
"Oh!" Charlotte gasps, holding onto her mother's legs.
"What is it, Charlotte?" Julietta questions.
"The bad guy," she says, pointing back towards the breach, "over there."
Kaede looks over…and sighs as it was Eren Yeager again, but he was keeping a distance.
"Does he not know when to let up?" Salina asks. "I've been hearing nothing but crazy things about him. He's like the problem child that won't change."
"More like, he doesn't forget anything he believes is a transgression towards himself…and he doesn't know how to forgive and move on," Kaede tells them.
"I hate myself for saying this, Kaede, but I'm starting to think we'd all been better off if we had just let you end him that day over five years ago," Kylie reveals, surprising Kaede. "One rumor I've been hearing about him is that after he was dismissed from the Cadet Corps, he started following you around, raising complaints about you being a menace to society and so on. Sooner or later, someone's going to have to set him straight, lock him away or put him down."
"Leave him be for now. He just wants to provoke me into causing a scene…and I will not do anything to make a scene. One way or another, people like him always get their comeuppance."
"What is that? 'Come…puppets'?" Charlotte asks Kaede.
"That means…people that do wrong to other people eventually…get the biggest scolding of their lives…and the worst of spankings."
"Grow…grownups get spanked, too?"
"Yes."
"Only the bad ones, right?"
"That's right."
They then saw Eren get dragged away by an older man, and Kaede recognized him as Shadis.
"Why does he not like you?" Charlotte wanted to know from Kaede.
"He once did something bad to me," she explains to the little girl, "so I did something bad to him later on. Unlike him, however, I refuse to hold a grudge against people for a long time."
Grumble. They heard Kaede's stomach growl, reminding them that it was a new day…and the girl hadn't eaten since the previous before she started on creating the sealant.
"Come on," Delilah tells them. "We should go eat. I hear that Trost has this place where the pasta is delicious."
"I think I know where you mean," Kaede replies. "The pasta there is very good."
-x-
Bertolt had an itch on his face, but without his arms, he couldn't scratch it, leaving him to move his head against the wall behind him in an attempt to alleviate his minor issue. Unlike his missing limbs, his facial injuries would recover in due time. This was a minor concern, as he was still fortunate to be alive…until his captors decided they had no further use for him. He prayed that they wouldn't kill him before his time was up; not a fan of death in any way, his thirteen-year curse was enough to make him accept that he was going to die, whether he liked it or not. But all he really hoped for…was that he could see his father before he faced the music. If he could have that one request fulfilled, he could go out without any other regrets.
"Why?" Kaede's voice repeated in his mind, reminding him of his fear of her Dark Titan.
-x-
Sleep felt different this time for Kaede. It wasn't the feeling of dread for or animosity towards someone that made it feel unusual this time. It was the sense that she was not where she should be. Around her, she saw nothing but charred remains of buildings and a large wall enclosing all. Was she back in Shiganshina?
Curious, she moved down a street…or what she believed to be a street…and saw…a Titan that she hadn't seen before. It was fifteen meters in height, lean but muscular, had a pale skin coloring, as if it didn't get enough sunlight in its life, and had a face that was…familiar to her. It was shifting through the debris of where a house once stood, moving away a large piece of stone, causing her to remember something else that had occurred that day in Shiganshina. Just moments after saving Mrs. Yeager from a Titan with a creepy smile, Kaede had proceeded to destroy the Yeager household that had already been damaged by the debris created by the Colossal Titan kicking a hole into the wall's outer gate, but she had been driven by her desire to hurt Eren Yeager by letting him know that his actions have consequences.
Why did I…feel like I had to make sure he knew this? She wonders as she sees the Titan reach into the ground for something. What…what else did I forget?
"I just wanted to get away from here," she hears a man's voice that she dreaded because of the pain she felt due to his ambitious goal. "I just wanted a life beyond these wretched walls!"
Turning around, Kaede saw…the Dark Titan, standing over the ruins of another Titan she couldn't make heads or tails out of, seeing an elderly man still attached to the body through muscles and nerves, his face partially smeared in blood. She had seen him before! It was Grausam Zanki, her step-grandfather that just disappeared, presumed to be dead.
"Why can't you understand that?" She hears him ask. "These walls, this life, it can't last forever. In the end, if one finds a way to achieve freedom, they must take it by any means or be forever imprisoned by those that possess the power to decide everyone's fate."
Then, she sees the Dark Titan looking down at him, lowering so that its chest, to her horror, opens up to reveal…a little girl with gray hair, her facial cheeks covered in these strands of muscle and sinew, making her look like a distorted version of herself, with an expression of hatred on her face.
"You're an awful person, Mr. Grausam," she hears herself say to him. "Awful people don't get what they want like this, hurting other people that don't deserve it. You're just like that boy, messing with other people because you want them to do as you want, not caring for what they may want. You both need to disappear. You…need to go far away…and never come back to hurt someone else the way you hurt me."
"Kaede…what are you saying?"
Kaede then sees her younger self raise her Titan's right arm up…and bring it over Grausam's body. No, she couldn't… She couldn't mean that! Yes, there was anger and disgust towards what he did to her, but…this was a line that was being crossed.
"Kaede, wait!" Grausam pleads to the girl.
"You turned me into a monster," the girl expresses, tears falling from her eyes. "There's a place for people like you, that turn good people into monsters. Good-bye, Mr. Grausam."
"Aaahh!"
Squelch! Kaede saw in horror as her younger self brought her hand down on Grausam and reduced him to pulp, and then her body disappearing back inside the Dark Titan's chest.
I…I killed him? She wonders as she feels like she needs to puke. I killed Grausam because he turned me into a Titan? Did I really feel that much hatred that day?
Kaede wasn't sure of what she could believe to be the truth and what was nothing more than her imagination playing tricks on her based on her memories and her emotional struggles with discovering her Titan power. She couldn't even say for certain if what she was feeling was real, either. Did she kill Grausam? Did she cross that line?
"Kaede," she hears a female voice calling out to her. "Kaede…Kaede…"
She looks down at her feet and sees a darkness reaching up her legs. It reaches further up her waist and feels like a liquid trying to eat into her flesh.
"Kaede…wake up," the voice tells her.
Snap! Kaede opens her eyes and finds herself in her room, seeing her mother's hands on her shoulders, shaking her.
"Huh?" She reacts, confused.
"You were talking in your sleep again," Christine tells her.
"What? What was I saying?"
"You kept saying something about someone turning you into a monster and how they needed to answer for it, that they deserved what they were getting."
"I was…dreaming…of something I thought was a memory I had forgotten…about someone I really detest as a person."
"Was it…Grausam?"
Kaede sighs and nods her head.
"You must think I'm a terrible person, thinking that I might've done something like that," she says to her mother. "I don't know if it was just a dream or a memory I was trying to recall."
"You wouldn't be the first one to think you might've done something you can't recall in detail," Christine responds to her. "It was over five years ago, Kaede, and the Colossal Titan had just attacked our town. You were barely nine, and just went through one of the most traumatic experiences of your young life. Many things were happening during that day that were too much for you to comprehend. And you're still trying to recall things you've forgotten about that day. There were things that were happening that day even I can't remember completely. Three of the only things I do remember doing that day we were forced to leave was retrieving your father's ashes…trying to find you…and seeing a Titan that looked like it was bathed in a dull sheen of light from head-to-toe. I can't remember if I was crying out for you to find us."
"I can't remember much of anything in between that day and the days following it."
"Then…for all we know…a Titan could've killed Grausam…or he had a heart attack…or got trampled by people that were escaping. We simply don't know what happened to him, so our minds try to come up with possibilities to make sense of."
Kaede looks outside her bedroom window and sighs again. Maybe her mother was right; because there was no way to recall everything that happened that day, and because she was so traumatized by what had been going on to the point where her recollection was like a jigsaw puzzle she was trying to piece back together, there was no way to say definitively what really happened to Grausam. And if she couldn't say for sure, there was no way to know what became of him.
Would it be wrong of me to pray that he's dead? She wonders.
-x-
Rip! A drawer was ripped out of its socket in what remained of a desk inside what remained of a study.
At first, the drawer looked empty, but it was ripped out with such force that it broke into pieces, revealing that a false bottom was placed to give the illusion that it was empty. Under the false bottom were three books, perfectly preserved and containing information that was being sought after by the person that came all this way to try and salvage them.
"Even after all these years," they said as they picked the three books up. "The destruction caused by the Dark Titan really was the lesser of two evils. But its mere existence is a shot in the darkness that not even I can see through. Still, this knowledge is worth the patience I've spent putting up with those memories. It will aid in getting us out of our state of zero and minus. Grisha Yeager, there has been a great shift in what is to come because it can no longer be seen by us. The future is unclear. Nothing is for certain, anymore."
Stashing the three books into a bag, the seeker fled the ruins of Shiganshina District, their personal mission now accomplished.
To be continued…
A/N: I liked the part where Kaede was able to enjoy a moment of solace with her childhood friends from Shiganshina. The hard part was just coming up with their names. And as for Bertolt being terrified of Kaede, I felt it made sense for him to show a reluctance to be anywhere near her after seeing her Dark Titan up close and personal defeating his Colossal Titan. The end of the chapter was something I had to get down soon, as it indicates something else that is a deviation from what is known into something unknown. Until the next chapter.