Wall Maria, Shiganshina District, Year 845.
In a world where gigantic titans had stolen the freedom of humans, forcing them like rats into small secluded murals, it all began with a gigantic explosion of yellow lightning that shook the horizon and caught the attention of everyone in the vicinity.
In this small village city covered in gigantic murals that seemed to reach the clouds, they saw true horror.
Three young kids looked at the scene among the crowds. A blonde boy, a short-haired boy with green eyes wearing a jacket, stood and a girl who had a red scarf, and they all looked beyond the gigantic murals as a silhouette crept up. A head with no skin, just muscles and an exposed jaw.
The face alone was terrifying enough, but considering the size of the murals, and the size of this individual. They were so stupefied that they couldn't even feel terror initially, only confusion.
The murals were supposed to protect them from the titans; no titan should be able to cross those walls, or so they believed.
"IT'S A TITAN!"
"WHAT IS GOING ON!?"
Screams of confusion and insanity, and then next... a titanic explosion shook the land and forced those standing onto their knees. The doors of the wall Maria shattered, and panic took over the lands as rocks started to rain from the skies.
"RUN, RUN!".
The kids were relieved that the stones were not falling in their direction, but that relief was short-lived when the screams of despair started to reach their ears. As they stared at this figure in panic, something more caught their attention.
"H-Huh?!"
Something appeared ever so slowly next to the big head that was creeping up the walls. It was so ridiculous that it put their understanding of reality into question, and even the colossal titan seemed confused for a second.
It was a gigantic... fist?
A massive impact followed when that fist crashed against the head of that titan like a comet striking Earth, the head disappeared, and next they heard and felt a massive tremor, like that titan had been mercilessly trashed to the ground, unfolding a catastrophe that resembled an earthquake.
All of the people in the Shiganshina district, or at least those who were not running for their lives from the falling rocks, witnessed humanity's first victory, even while unaware of it.
Eren Yeager, the boy with green eyes, fell off his initial shock and realised that the rocks were falling in the direction of their home. Mikasa Ackerman, the girl, also recovered, and they both ran in that direction, leaving the blonde boy behind, Armin Arlert.
"We have to go look for Mom in the house! She has to be okay–"
"Wait, Eren! Mother is not in the house today! She's working at Mrs Vannir!"
"H-Huh? R-Right, Mrs Vannir, I forgot..."
When Mikasa pulled his wrist to run in a different direction from their home, Eren Yeager felt a headache, like a glitching memory that didn't make sense. They ran together as he was still bewildered. Titans began to come inside the wall, but at the same time, powerful impacts were heard from beyond the entrance, as if two colossals were fighting.
Some of those titans coming into the walls were coming in with missing limbs that were quickly regenerated, and some looked like they were running in fear.
After Eren's insistence, they went to their house, and when they reached their house, Eren and Mikasa's hearts stopped for a moment as the rumbling noise of the titans coming into the small city roared through. They saw their house shattered.
"EREN! MIKASA!!"
The boy turned his head slowly and saw her. The woman looked like she had run a marathon, and there was blood dripping down from her head. She was dressed in sweaty rags and overall, looked terrible... but she was alive and energetic.
"Mom / Mother!"
Once again, reality glitched for him as he stood rooted in place. The woman ran and hugged them hard. She was their mother, Carla.
"Thanks god you are both okay, we have to run, quickly, the titans are coming over the walls!"
As they ran, Eren noticed the phantom figure of a silhouette standing in a corner, watching. They looked at each other's eyes, but at the cross of the next corner, it disappeared.
The stomping noises went harder as the titans approached the area, but they were slow and could be outrunned so long as they weren't triggered.
"W-Where are we going!?" Mikasa couldn't help but ask, freeing herself just so their mother didn't have to strain herself, she could run on her own.
"Lady Vannir is still in the office. I have to go and–"
"Mom, we have to go! The titans are coming, we can't waste time!" Eren took his mother's hand, Mikasa took the other, and they began running towards the centre of the city, to the boats.
They ran and ran until the path split in two. One took them to the boats, another somewhere else. Carla stopped, breathing hard. She thought about a certain boy, smiling all day and caressing her hair; he was like her own son... and for that boy, Lady Vannir was important.
"I-I can't… You both go to the boats!" She made up her mind, thinking there was still time to salvage the situation while inwardly scolding that woman.
"Mom! You can't! I-I'll go!" Eren insisted, but Carla took Eren's hand and put it into Mikasa's hand, leaving the girl out of words.
"Mikasa, stay with Eren!" She said like it was an order, and the girl nodded.
"I'll be there shortly, be obedient, you two! I trust you! Keep heading down there to the city centre and get into the boats, you're both kids... they have to allow you in!" She smiled and ran her own way, leaving both kids to fend for themselves. She knew that although they were kids, they were mature enough to fend for themselves, like always.
Carla ran towards her workplace, but when she was alone, she leaned against a wall amidst the shaking ground as the titans came up against the walls. They seemed to be approaching her, but thankfully, the kids were out of the way of the titans, so long as they kept running, they would arrive safely.
She checked her heels, her right foot. There was a massive cut on her that looked painful, and it was. A rock had fallen and shattered not too far from her, but a flying pebble had managed to strike her. Carla didn't give up; she tore a piece of her dress and wrapped it around, then ran, trying to ignore the pain.
She had just run away from her workplace to look for her kids; she didn't want to think that they'd still be there. But somehow, after working with that woman for so long, she knew how she thought... and she believed she'd still be there.
'P-Please be safe, Vannir, Arthur! Arthur...' She thought of two people that were important for her, whom were not in the district at the moment. In a way, Carla was relieved she didn't have to worry about her husband as he wasn't in the district.
After running for a while, Carla always saw people running in the opposite direction, towards the boats at the north, while she headed south. She soon reached her workplace, a merchant office tasked with the distribution of medical supplies across the murals.
"Hurry up and pack everything up neatly, we have to reach the gates!" A woman spoke in hectic orders that couldn't be refused regardless of circumstances.
Vannir Borg was a beautiful blonde woman in her fifties; she had deep blue eyes and a sharp gaze. Even if it wasn't her job, she packed up all the supplies.
"Lady Vannir, we have to go!" Carla screamed, everyone looked at her for one second, then, after seeing the blonde woman's glare, they continued doing their job.
"Carla! Hurry up and help me pack all these medical supplies, we will need them! Do you even know how many injured people are making their way into the inner walls!?"
Carla acknowledged her worries, but still ignored it, "We have to run, the titans are close and there is no time!"
As much as she wanted to help, she knew there were too many supplies; there were just too many things, and the steps were getting closer. They wouldn't be able to pack everything up and set up in the carriages before the titans spotted them.
Lady Vannir, a blonde lady with blue eyes roughly the same age as her, was looking at her desk for something when someone took her wrist and began running.
!!!
"What are you doing, Carla!?"
"We have to go, no time–ugh!"
She got slapped. Carla looked at the woman in shock... the person who she considered her saviour and friend was looking at her with a threatening glare.
"We have worked for two years in this branch. IT IS MY AND MY FAMILY'S MONEY THAT'S ON THE LINE, NOT YOURS–"
"Do you think this is about money!?"
"…"
For the first time, someone screamed at that woman in her face.
"If you die, wouldn't Arthur be sad!?" Carla insisted, but then, at the mention of her son, Lady Vannir's gaze contorted with a mixture of feelings as she looked at Carla.
"Just go if you want to go, that boy likes you more anyway–"
It was then her turn to get slapped. Lady Vannir held her cheek in shock, feeling as if one of her teeth had loosened with that strike. Comparing their strength, it was obvious whose strength was greater. Carla took the woman's wrist again; she wasn't going to take a no for an answer, even if it meant that they'd be enemies later on.
"You're coming with me…"
The blonde didn't say a word; she was still shocked that she, a high-class woman from Wall Sina, got slapped by a commoner of the Shiganshina District.
They ran away from the office, discarding the supplies. Seeing the owner leave, the workers also began to run, leaving everything behind.
However, as Carla ran from the hilly surface, she noticed there were titans on their way to the boats, and the path was no longer free. They had taken too long, and the path she had taken had two titans heading their way.
"Oh no", They all said in unison and fear.
"If we go cross streets, we can still get there!" Carla took the lead fearlessly while everyone else bit their nails, wondering what to do. They ran into the alleyways as the titans walked in. They came across several crossroads until Carla stammered with her hurting heel.
"Foolish girl", Vannir checked her heel as the rest ran ahead of them.
"Don't talk like you're that much older…" Carla smiled and allowed Vannir to better wrap her heel. They heard shouts from the place where the people ran, and they saw a titan walking towards them while eating a corpse like it were as fragile as popcorn.
They paled.
"Go back! GO BACK!"
With her heart beating madly, Carla pulled Vannir to run in the opposite direction from where they came. And after running for a while, coming across an intersection, they came face to face with a titan coming slowly, it was a short-haired smiling titan that looked straight at her and Vannir's soul.
Carla burst into a house, and everyone followed after her like she knew the answer to every problem in life. There was no way out.
They were all packed up inside a house in silence, but Carla knew there was no way out. The men and women all closed their mouths, trying not to scream, and only the noise of their dripping tears resonated together with the shaking of the ground.
"We can't all stay here, we're going to die!" Carla screamed with a whisper, but no one moved a muscle. No one dared to do anything.
She clenched her teeth, looked at Vannir and then thought about the boy... the things he used to say, the way he behaved; about everything they had done for her and her family. She thought about what her husband would do, and she thought about her children.
"You're more important than I am", She said to Vannir, who gasped at the implications, Carla took the woman's shoulders and began explaining but as she did, her hands shook more and more in fear for what she was going to do, knowing that there would be no tomorrow.
"Y-You have to run to the opposite direction, Vannir... two blocks down turn left t-then... then keep straight and–"
"Carla, stop it! If we stay here silently–"
"WE CAN'T ALL BE COWARDS! IF WE ARE ALL COWARDS, WHO IS GOING TO SAVE THIS WORLD!?"
She had made enough noise for the titans to hear, but it mattered not, because they were already close and coming, they was no other way. Carla ran outside, followed by the only two brave men in a crowd of at least twenty people packed up in a small living room, they closed their eyes and cried, Vannir shook and held her mouth in grief, knowing that there would be no tomorrow for Carla.
Carla, for her part, cried... as she ran down the stairs and outside to the streets where death awaited. She recalled his words and their conversations, that boy's words that resonated in her mind, his voice and message convinced her that just like Lady Vannir, Arthur Borg was also necessary.
'Look around you? Do this place look equal to you, Carla? All of humanity struggles to survive while confined to these little walls. We all have one objective in common, to survive, and yet there is still a difference in status. There is a King at the centre of these walls. Do you really think a King is necessary? What is he even doing for humanity...? Is his life valuable?'.
For his young age, he spoke to her things that she had never thought, or at least... a perspective she never imagined.
'Some lives have more value than others, Carla... that is a sad and undeniable truth. But it is us who detemine who has more value for us; sometimes even more than ourselves. Don't let some corrupt crook system determine whose life is worth sacrificing yours for. I think... when you can make that decision yourself, that is true freedom'.
Carla ran and her tears receded, replaced with a fearless smile. She knew she would die, but at least... so far... she knew that the people she cared about, the people she considered valuable for her, would be safe.
'Arthur, am I being free? I have chosen that your mother is worth sacrificing for... because you are valuable to me, I-I have chosen...!'
Carla burst out of the door and came face to face with the titans on either side of the street. She screamed and ran randomly while the other two men followed also doing the same, hoping to get the titans' attention.
She kept running and crying and crying as the rumbling noises ensued around her, the stepping of titans. But then, out of confusion, she stopped even with her eyes closed.
Because she was still alive.
Carla looked around and saw… the titans ignoring her and heading towards that house.
"N-No… NO!"
The ground shook as a titan stepped not too far away from her, nearly crushing her but still ignoring her, heading towards that house as if there was an even bigger price in there. One of the titans punched the house and burst it open as screams rang from the inside.
"STOP!!! I AM HERE, COME FOR ME!!" Carla panicked, even if she was safe, she knew Vannir as done for. She even wanted to go and kick one of those titan's legs, until she heard something.
"Mom!"
!!!
Her world stopped, her scheme of values restarted... she turned her head slowly to the end of the street and saw a kid waving at her.
"E-Eren… why are you here!?" All of Carla's mother instincts activated when she saw her son and even as Vannir's screams resonated together with the rest. she kept running towards her son, only turning around to see two titans fighting to see who was going to devour that woman. They pulled her body from both sides.
And then, it was a cascade of blood.
*CRUNCH!!*
Carla's heart stopped, 'I'm sorry… I'm so sorry… Arthur!'
The despairing yells and screams of her friend resonated behind as she ran towards her son desperately, taking advantage of the fact that the titans were ignoring her. But she was fated to never reach.
On her way, a single titan didn't ignore her. It stretched the elongated arms and caught her in front of her son. That titan had short yellow-ish hair and a broad smile.
"Run Eren, Run!"
Just at that moment, as she punched the titan's arms, hoping to get free, a man landed using his ODM system. He stared at what was happening and gasped with shivering legs.
"Hannes, take my son away! GO, GO NOW!"
The man, Hannes, thought about fighting that titan to rescue Carla, but he only thought about that for a mere second before giving up.
"I love you, Eren..."
The boy could only helplessly watch his mother get eaten alive, as if he were fated to do so. As if there was nothing he could do to stop this from happening.
Less than an hour later, Shiganshina's gate fell as a colossal armoured titan burst through, bringing chaos to the inner walls. It was the greatest loss for humanity, in more than one sense.
In the evening, when the titans could be seen sleeping against the houses, a boy walked the streets, staggering as if he was looking for someone. He had neck-length black hair and blue eyes. His clothes were all ragged as if experienced a tough battle.
His wandering steps looked lost, as if he were looking for someone, but he would never find them.
'Mom, Carla…! In the end, it all ended the same way?'
Screams and howls of pain reverberated in the night, a cracking soul.