*Play Symphonicsuite (Aot) Part2-3rd: Before Lights Out*
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Captain fired the flare, and it rang in my ears.
"An acoustic shell?!" Eren asked, still covering his ears.
"Tell me, what is your job again? Is it simply to give in your emotions of the moment? No, it's not. This squad's mission is to do everything possible to keep this brat unharmed. Down to our last breath." Captain looked back at Eren.
"We're going to keep pushing ahead on horseback, got it?" Captain looked back forward. "Understood, sir!" Petra replied.
"Push ahead?! But for how long? Not to mention, it's almost on top of us now. More... More reinforcements! They'll get killed if we don't help!" Eren looked back, and I continued to face forward.
"Eren! Face forward!" Gunther yelled. "Mr. Gunther?" Eren looked at Gunther. "Don't fall out of step! Maintain top speed!" Eld added. "Mr. Eld?! Why?! Who can possibly stop it, if not the Levi Squad?" Eren desperately asked, and looked back again.
"Another one's dead! We could've saved him, too! One person is still fighting! There's still time to save them!" Eren continued to look back. "Eren. Shut up." I sighed and continued to look ahead. "But--"
"Eren! Focus ahead and keep moving!" Petra looked at Eren. "Are you telling me to ignore the fighting going on behind us?! To just run away and abandon my comrades?!" Eren looked at Petra. "Yes, I am! Do as the Captain says!" Petra shouted. "I don't understand why we're letting them die! And I don't understand why he won't explain! Why?!" Eren frantically asked.
"Because the Captain doesn't feel immense purpose to explain! But you don't understand that, because your wet in the ears! Now shut up and follow orders!" Oulo shouted at Eren.
I saw his facial expression soften, and he put his blades back into the boxes. He raised his hand and I furrowed my eyebrows. He stared at his hand for a while, thinking, and then he went to bite his hand.
"Eren." I looked at him, and he stopped.
"Eren, what are you doing!? You're only permitted to do that when your life is in danger! That was our agreement, remember?" Petra shouted at Eren, and he started to put more force into the bite.
"Eren!" I shouted at him.
"You're not in the wrong." I suddenly heard Captain.
"If you wanna do it, do it. I can tell. He's a real monster, not because of his Titan ability. No matter how hard he's restrained, no matter what cage he's put inside, no one can ever tame him." Captain began to speak, and I gripped tighter onto my blades.
"The difference between our experience is why we don't see eye-to-eye. But you don't need to rely on that. Choose. Will you trust yourself, or me, these guys, or the whole entire Scout Regiment? I don't have the answer to that. I never have. Whether I trusted myself or the choices of my dependable comrades, there was no telling how things would turn out. So, just do the best you can, and choose whichever you'll regret the least." Captain continued, and then Eren put his hand down.
He held his hand back up when he turned back to see what was happening.
"Eren! Trust us." Petra frantically looked at Eren.
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*Pause current music (1:39) and play Days Gone By*
"Time for your experiments!" I saw Hanji skip into my room, with Captain trailing behind her. "What will we be doing?" I asked, standing up. "We'll be seeing your pain tolerance, and if your wounds heal like how they did when you were fatally injured." Hanji simply explained, and started to walk back out of my room, and I followed her.
We walked outside of the castle into a grassy area with tables to eat at.
"Where is everyone?" I asked. "Since you're not a Titan shifter like Eren, it's safe to say you only need two people at the least." Hanji smiled.
"Okay, it's a weird thing to ask, but can you use this knife to cut through your arm?" Hanji asked and handed me a knife, but I went to my pocket to pull out my own. She put the knife back down and set it on the table, and I flipped the knife out.
I held the knife at the top of my forearm, and then carefully slid it inside of my skin, and slid it all the way up to the top of my arm.
"What do you feel?!" Hanji asked, as Molbit came up behind her. "Just a pinch." I simply responded.
Hanji looked amazed at how I was tolerating the pain so well as the blood dripped down my arm. I had to do all types of torture training methods as a child.
I wiped the knife's blood on my arm and folded it back up, placing it in my pocket as I realized the blood flow was slowing down.
"Woah! It's only been less than a minute!" She exclaimed. "Moblit, take notes." Hanji nudged him, and he nodded, and continued to write on the clipboard. "Clearly you have a very high pain tolerance, how?" Hanji asked me. "Training." I looked at her. "What type of training?" Hanji asked.
"Hanji, it's probably something that is best leaving it where it's at." Captain looked at Hanji, while folding his arms.
"I see. Well, give it a day or two and it's healed up!" Hanji said, as Moblit gave her a wet rag and she handed it to me while I wiped all of the blood off of my arm.
"Will limbs heal back?" Hanji smirked. "Hanji, no--" Captain pinched the bridge of his nose.
.｡☆*⋆⍋*∞*｡*∞*⍋⋆*☆｡.
"Were you taking a long crap?" Captain asked Hanji as we walked into the room in which she had summoned us to, and Eren was by my side. "Nope. A pleasant one. I got stuck explaining things to the top brass. But anyway, take a look at this." Hanji said, and pulled a tea spoon out of a cloth. "A tea spoon?" Eren asked. "Yep." Hanji said, and held it up.
"That right Titan hand you created was holding this. Between the index finger and thumb, like so. It's hard to imagine it was through sheer and dumb luck. And, somehow, it hasn't been warped through the heat or pressure. Any thoughts on this?" Hanji asked.
*Play Sunset*
"As I recall... I went to pick it up. I transformed right after that." Eren said.
"I see. That might explain why you couldn't turn into a Titan earlier. Killing Titans... blocking a cannonball... lifting a boulder... in each instance, you had a clear goal prior to transforming. It's possible that self-inflicted harm isn't the only trigger. You might need to have some sort of goal as well." Hanji explained.
"It's true that the latest transformation is similar to when I stopped that cannon shot. But... transforming into a Titan to pick up a spoon... this is crazy." Eren held his hand up. "In other words, you didn't break the rules on purpose?" Gunther asked. "Right." Eren looked at him, but Gunther, Eld, Oulo, and Petra nodded at each other.
They all rose their hands to bite them, and we were all confused.
"Huh? Huh!?" Hanji looked around the room. "Wait! What are you doing?" Eren asked as they looked down at their hands that had bite marks on them, and then they each grabbed a knife and slit a tiny cut onto them.
"This really hurts..."
"Eren, I'm impressed you can bite so deeply like this. You too, Lilly, how could you cut yourself like that..." Eld looked up at Eren and I. "We made an error in judgement. This is our small way of paying for that. So it's no big deal." Gunther smiled.
"Our job is to keep you in check. And that isn't in the wrong, so don't get cocky, kid!" Oulo scoffed. "I'm sorry, Eren. We were so scared... You must be disappointed in our stupidity. But... even so, we'll be relying on you, so you need to rely on us. So... please... trust us." Petra looked at Eren.
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*Continue music at 1:39*
"Trust us." Petra looked at Eren, and I looked down at the bite mark on her hand. "Eren! Hurry, decide already!" Captain looked back at Eren. "...I'll go with you!" Eren reluctantly spoke up, and everyone looked at him, shocked.
The Female Titan then started to lean forward and speed up even more, and I looked back forward.
"The target is speeding up!" Gunther shouted. "Keep moving! We're going to outrun it." Captain commanded.
After a few moments of running that felt like an eternity, I heard a boom behind us and I looked back to see hooks fly into the female Titan. She instinctively covered her nape as hundreds of grapple hooks shot into her. We kept moving forward as the smoke from the cannons that shot the grapple hooks let out smoke.
"Hitch your horses a little further ahead, and then switch to ODM. I have to leave for now. Eld's in charge of the squad. Hide Eren a suitable distance away from that Titan. Lilly, you're with me. Watch after our horses!" Captain commanded, and I made eye-contact with Petra, and gave a small wave and shot my grapple hooks onto the tree.
*Play Professional Work*
I followed Captain to where Commander Erwin was standing, and I stood next to Captain on his left.
"It looks like she's stopped." Captain observed the Titan. "We can't drop our guard down. I'm just impressed you managed to lead her to this spot." Commander Erwin reminded Captain. "The credit goes to the rear squad members who gave their lives for her. They bought us time. It would have been impossible otherwise." Captain looked at Commander Erwin. "Is that so?" Commander asked. "Yes. Thanks to them... we get to see what's inside this one's nape. Let's just hope they're not wetting their selves inside of there." Captain scoffed. "This entire expedition's purpose was to capture the Titan?" I asked. "Yes." Commander Erwin simply replied.
*Outro - Brave Shine*
a/n: how is everyone liking the story so far? also how are you doing yourself? i hope you guys are taking care of yourself. stay safe! ^^
