Miche Zacharius had no idea what he was looking at.
He sure as hell knew Hange Zoe didn’t either, and she was loving every second of it.
“Look, Moblit!” she said excitedly, presenting the jagged blade broken in half in her hand. She had used it for her hardest swing yet at the strange entity. “Our swords can’t make a single dent on this delicious creature!”
“Hange!” came the obligatory begging from Hange’s caretaker. “We’re supposed to be reinforcing the supply base ahead, not using up all of our weapons on this thing! And you need to be more considerate where the broken blades ricochet!”
“Ricochet? Good idea! The base at Trost should have some surplus muskets we could test on this baby.”
“No!”
Miche sat on his horse as he watched the pair going about their usual back-and-forth. They were in the middle of a forest. Lying over a few fallen trees knocked out of their stumps was… Hange’s new baby.
It almost looked like an animal lying on its side. Four legs, a humped back, and a head, but no clear mouth, eyeballs, or nostrils. No skin or fur or organs. The stench over the thing wasn’t of the dead. Lifeless, yes, but stale, impersonal, more the absence of life than the loss of it. Moreover, from the way the outer shell looked, how ODM swords broke from striking it, and the more Miche breathed through his nose, this “creature” made itself out to be composed of a fine metal.
“Constructed,” Miche muttered.
Hange in her frenzy for information zeroed in on him. “What’s your take on this, Miche?”
“Someone constructed and built this thing,” he said, taking in more of the object’s form. “Metal plates and components, bolted together? The legs look intentionally designed, not something an animal evolved over time.” He sniffed again. “Smells like… a factory furnace. Not like a dying carcass going cold or a warm campfire snuffed out, but something more stale. Not rotten. Tasteless.”
Hange’s grin shone teeth at Miche. “Exactly what I was thinking!” She reached over with her half-sword to tap at a cylindrical tube attached to the “head” of the creature. “My first guess was these were nostrils emitting remnant heat, but they’re more likely some sort of cannon models recently fired. It would explain those explosions we heard earlier. Something had to have made the noise and caused those steam plumes to come from this area, and judging from the way the ground’s been disturbed–”
“– this thing wasn’t stomping Titan napes to kill them,” Miche finished. The imprints of Titan corpses overlapped with broken tree trumps across the grass and dirt, and Miche could see the footprints left by the metal construct, but the depressions on the ground weren’t deep enough to indicate a physical brawl except for immediately around where the construct lay. The plethora of dead Titans were killed while they were upright, their silhouettes on the floor after falling being too soft to have been stamped down. Given the weight the construct must carry, Miche had a hard time visualizing it kicking its legs at Titan like a rowdy horse booting a human.
The surviving Titans had obviously managed to knock the construct off its feet, giving a few good dents on its body. Miche scanned the area again and confirmed there was a trail of overlapping human and Titan footsteps going south.
“My money’s on there being a crew riding this baby and firing its cannons,” Hange went on, pressing her face against the front of the construct’s head. Moving closer, Miche thought it looked like glass. “I’m still looking for a door latch or anything like that the crew would’ve used to get out of this. Levi Squad already went ahead to Brodgar. The rest of my squad’s searching the forest, but there’s a good chance the construct’s crew went in that direction.”
The town of Brodgar was one of the many settlements left to rot when Wall Maria fell. It was a fairly developed area with tall, sturdy buildings and natural resources nearby: a freely flowing river and wild game left alone by the Titans over the past five years. Although the resupply outpost had been established early after the failed reclamation of Wall Maria, the Scout Regiment had gone through cycles of losing and retaking the base ever since. For every purge of Titans Miche and others made in the area, there was always another horde to push back the Scouts in a subsequent expedition, forcing them to start all over again.
The metal construct was a new element to the cycle, one that will surely capture Erwin’s attention as much as it did for Hange.
Moblit took a break from cringing at Hange’s behavior at the construct to give another cautionary scan of their surroundings. “Where’s the rest of Squad Miche?”
“Handling another Titan mob by the abandoned mining site west of here,” Miche answered. Erwin had wanted this expedition to make an informative log of assets and resources in lost Maria territory to incentivize backing from influential merchants to sponsor the next ambitious expedition. The more bases they controlled, especially if the Scouts received the funding to install cannons at their outposts like at Brodgar, could mean a new steady flow of raw materials and food to funnel into the Walls. “They’ll regroup with the regiment soon. The Scout formation’s staying on the move to divert a big wave of Titans before they cut off the fastests routes back to Trost. The explosions might have attracted the Titans, too. The horses can only keep running for so long, so Erwin wants to know the situation at Brodgar if we can afford making a stand there.”
“You’ll have to ask Levi and the gang,” Hange said, sliding her blade along the border of the construct’s glass and its metal skin. “No one’s reported seeing any flares from that direction, so we can assume if there are Titans in Brodgar, they’re handling it.”
Or Levi was taking his sweet time finding the construct’s crew and getting answers out of them. Miche kept himself informed of the ongoing politics in military, noble, and criminal circles as needed, so for someone in the Walls to create and use this metal construct and get it into Titan territory without the Scouts’ knowledge, Miche knew they had to have powerful connections.
That was assuming the construct came from within the Walls. If not…
Miche took one last glance at the construct before hurrying his horse to gallop down the trail for Brodgar.
He exited the forest and arrived at the outskirts of the town shortly. The highest buildings were as tall as those in a wealthy Wall district, but the settlement overall was a good deal smaller than Trost, covering less ground. His gas reserves topped at capacity, Miche didn’t hesitate to launch himself off his horse and maneuver through the air, ready to take out any Titans he came across.
He did encounter a few, quickly dispatching them before they were alerted to his presence. The look and smell of one Titan stuffing a finger in its ear was that of an Abnormal. Following a hunch, Miche landed on a tower at the front of the Titan. It definitely saw Miche and ignored him, walking deeper into the city.
Given their name, not all Abnormals were drawn away from single human targets to focus on groups, but it was the case for Miche’s quarry. From his elevated position, Miche squinted his eyes and made out the shapes of soldiers soaring with ODM gear. Levi Squad was hard at work, putting up a valiant defense against a stream of Titans marching from all over the town.
Miche sniffed, and frowned. He was too far away to identify the individual squad members, but he did count five of them in total.
So who was emitting the human scent he caught directly above him?
It had to be one of the construct’s crewers.
Before Miche could swing up toward the stranger, he flinched when a streak of light descended from the apex of the tower to the sauntering Abnormal. It wasn’t a discharge of a musket or a cannon, but it had the similar effect of a cannon with a blast of damage striking the Titan’s nape. Multiple streaks follow the first, giving the illusion of a single red line penetrating the neck until the Titan dropped dead.
“You going to sit on your purge-hole till you bloat like a sitting mynock?” shouted a crude, feminine voice. “Or may you kindly lend a hand to pick off the murglaks moving to munch on your mates?”
Miche was keen enough to know the crewer was using odd terms as pejorative insults, but the more pressing matter was the devastating weapon the stranger had used. He spun his hooks and wires around the tower as he ascended, giving the stranger a fast-moving target if she decided to aim down. At the top of the tower was a small room with windows on all four walls. Miche flew in an arc to enter the opposite where the crewer had unleashed the light streaks.
In contrast to the show of light, the crewer was dressed in stark black armor. Armor, her head and entire body completely covered. The texture wasn’t like the metal material as the legged construct, but it had the same impersonal scent to it, only it overlapped with the human underneath the armor. The crewer leaned over the window with what must be a sharpshooter rifle that had fired the red light.
“Unless you’ve got a rifle or a launcher on you,” said the crewer, taking another shot at a target below, “you’re doing no good hiding up here with me.”
She was acting as if Miche wasn’t a threat. Dealing with an unknown warrior, Miche was tempted to correct her judgment before she could get the chance to aim her rifle at him if she became inclined to. He stayed his hand when another voice echoed in the room. A voice that should have been impossible for Miche to hear if it really was the Special Operations Squad he had seen in the far distance.
“Is that you who scaled the tower, Miche?”
It was Levi. Miche narrowed his eyes at the source of the voice: a smaller piece of metal on the shelf next to the crewer. The stranger picked up the device and spoke at it. “I presume you’re looking through sarge’s binoculars, Captain. Do you know this soldier?”
Recognizing Levi’s rank, but clearly running with a different outfit than the Scouts. What the hell was going on?
“His name’s Miche,” Levi’s voice said, clearly exasperated. “Hey, sniper, give him the comlink, and keep shooting near the marketplace. Your engineers are almost ready.”
“Good to know,” said the crewer before she flippantly tossed the device back over her shoulder. Still wary, Miche caught the metal contraption and kept his eyes on the stranger as she continued firing.
Mimicking what the stranger had done, Miche held the device close to his mouth. “Levi?”
“Yeah,” came Levi’s voice again. “Don’t ask how these comlinks work. Save questions like that for Hange and Erwin to give to these Imperials.”
So, not an outfit from the Walls. The mechanical construct, the unusually equipped soldier, and this “comlink” were all things created by a self-proclaimed Empire. “How do I know it’s really Levi speaking to me through this thing?”
Miche heard a familiar click of the tongue, expressing annoyance. That was good enough for him.
“How many of these Imperials are there?” Miche asked.
“About a dozen in Brodgar with us.” Which implied more Imperials were active outside of the settlement. “The Imperials don’t have ODM gear, but you’ve seen some of the firepower they’re packing already. They’ve got more light guns like the sniper, and my squad is supporting them.”
“You haven’t fired any flares yet,” Miche noted, suppressing his own bewilderment at being able to communicate with Levi like this. There was still work to be done. “So you must think we can still take Brodgar with these Imperials.”
“What, getting antsy? Did Erwin lose the nerve to commit to a push for the outpost? It was his idea in the first place.” Levi snorted. “He’ll love this. Did you see the metal walker in the forest?”
“Yes. Can the engineers you mentioned get it running again?”
“Not today they're not. They’re tinkering with something else. It’s standing behind another building from where you can’t see, but the Imperials have a different walker they can use to help clear out the entire town once their engineers get it fixed.”
A second construct? It had to be smaller, no larger than a ten-meter class Titan.
Tempting fate, Miche jumped into the room and stood next to the black-armored stranger, as close as he could without disrupting her focus in shooting down Titans with her weapon. She didn’t turn her head away from the view out the window, though Miche could feel her gaze glance at him before returning to Titan slaying.
Contrary to the rumors the Scouts liked to chat about behind Miche’s back, he wasn’t actually able to determine a person’s gender with his sense of smell alone. If not for her voice, Miche wouldn’t have been able to identify the stranger as a woman. If not for his nose, Miche doubted he would have been able to identify her as a human. She could have been a miniature autonomous variant of the metal construct for all he knew.
Miche wasn’t Hange. Comlinks and the light gun were already pushing how much he was willing to set aside his disbelief at seeing astonishing technology on top of the original construct.
But Miche was a soldier. He had his orders to fulfill, allies to support, and enemies to kill, the filthy stench of Titans inevitably drifting toward him and spurring his fighting instincts. The soldier beside Miche seemed to follow a similar attitude, purely prioritizing the Titans and encouraging him to do the same.
“Keep the comm,” she said. She moved fast with her hands, readjusting the rifle to somehow begin firing a long purple beam more easily seen with the naked eye than the rush of red streaks. They were no less deadly, easily executing Titans. Miche saw a few Titans change direction from Levi Squad to the tower. “I’m down to my last power pack. Go make yourself useful, thunderbucker. You survive, you’re in for a good show.”
“Head to the supply base,” said Levi’s voice. “I’ll meet you there.”
Miche trusted Levi’s judgment as much as the shorty trusted Miche’s instincts, so the older soldier jumped out and swung his hooks in a good spin to slice through the fingers of a Titan grasping at him during his descent. Shooting a hook at the Titan’s face, Miche arced around to slice through the back of its neck. Leaping to the next Titan, a purple beam of energy shot past him to burn through the nape of another further ahead.
The closer Miche got to Levi and the others, the more dense and grouped together the Titans were. Miche would have thought it tactically unwise for Levi Squad to dedicate themselves in one general area instead of staying mobile, but he could hear more gunshots, or the energized equivalents of them for the light guns, going off. Imperials like the sniper must be helping keep the pressure off the Scouts.
Soaring up too low at a Titan jogging for him, Miche used the momentum of his last burst of gas to slide along the road. He dove between the legs and nicked an ankle, tripping the Titan and letting Miche have an easier time going for the nape. He knew a second Titan was coming for him from behind, so Miche shot his hooks to the sides of the buildings to his left and right before launching directly upward.
He frowned, practically tasting the saliva the Titan was carelessly drooling and letting droplets wildly scatter as it ran. Miche pulled the triggers on his gear for an extra gas boost, doubly making sure he was out of reach from the Titan. Miche was momentarily spended in the air long enough to see the Titan come to a stop at the legs of its dead brethren. Its inhumanly long tongue hung over its lower lip. The Abnormal snapped its fingers and pointed at Miche.
Miche was already planning his next attack, seeing himself shoot down with enough speed to avoid another grab and directly cut the nape, when the work of slaying the Titan was done for him. A blast of red, larger than anything the sniper had shown with her rifle, utterly destroyed the Titan’s neck. Two evaporating Titan corpses stacked on top of each other.
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Landing with a roll along a roof, Miche looked down the street to see what could only be the second metal construct. It was two-legged this time, sporting a different shape in general while keeping the same smell and material as the first construct. In place of a torso and arms was what resembled an oversized head. Its height came short of a ten-meter class Titan. Slim cannon barrels like the first larger construct’s protruded around the cheeks and mouth of the box-shaped head.
There was jerky movement in the head as the construct lifted and lowered its legs in its march. It honestly looked like the weight of the head and the odd gait would make the entire construct tip over and fall, but its stride never broke, the head turning to fire over buildings lower than the walker to hit distant Titans.
Imagining the giant constructs fighting Titans was one thing. Seeing it in action was another.
Levi wasn’t wrong. Erwin was definitely going to love this. Miche can already see Hange fainting from overexcitement.
“Looks like a freakish chicken without the feathers or wings, doesn’t it?”
Miche was joined by Levi on the rooftop. The usual scowl on his face was a welcome sight.
The blood on his cloak that wasn’t evaporating into steam was worrying, though.
“It’s from one of the Imperials,” Levi explained, wiping away a bloodstain off his shoulder with a handkerchief. “They didn’t attack us. The Imperial was almost a Titan’s lunch until my squad found them.”
“And you helped them out of the kindness of your heart,” Miche remarked, witnessing more of the devastation brought by the construct. When a Titan stepped around a corner behind the two-legged walker, Miche and Levi sprang forward, taking out the nape before it could do anything to impede the war machine.
From their new position, Miche saw the dilapidated stalls of the Brodgar marketplace. At the center of the plaza was a church, selected as the location for the supply outpost. While the immediate area wasn’t the most ideal for ODM maneuvering, the debris of broken wood and stone across the plaza were often able to slow down besieging Titans in past battles. Plans to install cannons along the windows and roof of the church was on Erwin’s list of objectives, and Miche watched a version of that plan in action. More red blasts were being shot out of the building. Since the windows were level with or higher than the approaching Titans, the blasts first targeted the Titans’ eyes or legs. Doing so caused the Titans to fall over or writhe in pain, giving the shooters better angles to hit the napes.
“You can’t say they aren’t doing a good job repaying my ‘kindness’ with their crazy weapons,” Levi said with a dry edge. “With their walker working, Erwin’s going to get his Brodgar HQ sooner than he thought.”
Miche still had doubts. They were relatively safe now as Titans were slaughtered by the construct, so Miche decided to get some answers from Levi. “Assuming they don’t turn those weapons against us.”
Levi held up his own comlink device, tapping it and pointing at his ear. As amazing as the foreign communication device was, Miche understood Levi’s meaning: the Imperials could be eavesdropping on their conversation. Even if Levi didn’t actually know if that was true, it was a possibility they had to consider. “Right now, their priority is killing Titans and surviving,” Levi said, “same as us.”
There was a practical question Miche thought safe to ask that wouldn’t draw undue suspicion. “Are there more Imperials in the city or beyond it? More metal constructs – walkers, you called them?”
“They say there’s a legion of troopers making their way to Brodgar. The ones already here were a recon party, with another batch of them already sent ahead to make contact with Trost. We had to take that early detour for the mass of Titans when we first left the Wall today, so the Imperials must have blasted their way through them while we were far enough to not hear their cannons and blasters go off.”
So they were dealing with an army, from an Empire braving Titan territory far outside the protection of the Walls. Miche never would have imagined the Scouts to, least of all in his lifetime, make first contact with individuals of another society and military power.
Their talk was cut short when more voices spoke from Levi’s comlink.
“This is Gunther. The north side is clear. No more Titans moving into the city.” All of Levi Squad must have been given their own comlinks.
The second voice was marred by rugged breathing but still spoke concisely. “Eld reporting. Titans are still crawling up the southern fields, but they’re slow-going. No obvious Abnormal behavior. We can funnel them into easy firing lines for the base or the walker.”
“Acknowledged,” Levi replied. “Both of you hold position. Keep us updated. Fall back if more show up than you can handle.”
He pocketed the comlink and fired a purple flare into the sky. Promptly, Hange or someone in her squad fired another purple flare. Closer to the horizon of grassland peppered with smaller trees, Miche saw the green flares of Erwin redirecting the Scout Regiment to Brodgar.
There were still Titans inside the city, converging on the marketplace. The sniper had stopped firing, so Miche assumed she had exhausted her munitions. Wordlessly, Miche and Levi went to work, hitting the Titans while red rain continued flying out of the church.
The odors of this battle were… a new combination. Titan blood and steam, overgrown flora, and dusty stone all competed with the palpable heat of the light guns and the burns they left behind. It was hardly anything to inhibit Miche’s combat ability, but the smokey air was different from discharges of typical cannons. The rate of fire easily outpaced cannons, too. The sound of the guns was also… It reminded Miche of the clangs Hange had once made by banging a wrench on an experimental metal cable during the development process for her special Titan-capture artillery weapons. Miche also had to occasionally remind himself the distant stomping of the metal walker wasn’t from a hostile Titan. It was from an ally – from a machine manned by, according to Levi, more armored soldiers sitting inside the head.
Eventually, Levi and Miche were standing side-by-side on the corpse of a larger-than-average Titan when the comlinks on them echoed an advisory from the crass sniper. “One-five-six checking in,” she said. A number designation? Not a name? “More caped calvary are moving in from the northern patch of forest. Only a few prune-faced freaks or the like are following.”
“They must have lost the bulk of the Titans in the forest,” Levi guessed, speaking on his comlink as he replaced his dulled blades. “Probably left a few scouts behind to distract them. That will buy us time to set up kill zones.”
A different voice, male, spoke on the comm. “Captain Levi, can you confirm there is a Commander Dot Pyxis charged with defenses at the Wall?”
From the way Levi froze, Miche knew he was surprised. He must not have disclosed Pyxis’ name, which probably meant the Imperials were using their comlinks to speak with their detachment at Trost.
“Yeah, we know who Pyxis is,” Levi said. He and Miche used their gear to get atop a roof, out of reach from the shorter Titans still being gunned down in the market. “That mean you’re sending your people back here to reinforce Brodgar?”
“Afraid not. Stand by.”
After a pause, Miche wasn’t surprised to hear Commander Pyxis’ voice on the comlink. “Captain Levi, can you hear me? Are you there?”
“Yeah, Levi here.” The weariness was coming out more blatantly in his tone. Miche assumed the unease of working with foreign soldiers and their unfamiliar tools was starting to get to him. “I take it the Empire made it to Trost and introduced themselves.”
The old man chuckled. “Indeed, and thank the Walls for them.”
Miche and Levi exchanged anxious glances. “Why do you say that?”
“Levi, I implore you to contact Erwin and advocate for a swift return of the Scouts and an escort of the Imperials you’ve met back to Wall Rose. The Colossal Titan destroyed the exit gate, Titans have swarmed the city, and Lord Vader has agreed to supply his troopers for a cooperative reclamation of Trost.”
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Garrison Commander Dot Pyxis needed a drink.
The news of one of the Walls’ very own cadets having the newfound ability to transform into a Titan was a tempting incentive to partake in his favorite hobby.
But given this was his first time ever dealing with a lord and his hardened soldiers from beyond the Walls, he thought it bad decorum to pull out his flask and wear his vice on his sleeve so soon.
Overlooking Trost, Pyxis stood atop Wall Rose with his aide Anka Rheinberger and elite soldier Ian Dietrich accompanying him. Captain Kitz Woermann was still uneven on his feet, but Rico Brzenska should be enough to keep their men on the ground in steady spirits.
More than anything, they ensured civility was maintained with the soldiers of the Empire. Half of the Garrison was more than a little tense at the arrival of the troopers, unsure whether to believe their claims to help fight the Titans or to treat the armored gunners with more hostility. The other half, joined by assorted cadets and civilians, were singing the Empire’s praises for rescuing them from the Titan-infested city.
The Garrison Commander had to admit that the Imperials wielded impressive, incredulous technology. Pyxis watched the Empire’s Juggernaut vehicle circle around the streets to shoot Titans or trample them over its massive wheels. The live demonstrations of the jetpacks, the comlinks, and the hand-held blaster rifles were also nothing to scoff at.
A part of Pyxis had wanted to scoff at the reports of the Cadet Eren Yeager changing shape into a Titan, but he hadn’t lasted this long as a military officer and a favored friend of various nobles without knowing when he was being lied to or being told farcical stories by unreliable witnesses. Yeager’s fellow Cadets, the Garrison soldiers observing Trost HQ with telescopes, and the Imperials who gave their recounting of events could not be dismissed.
Also standing at the edge of the Wall was the Imperial leader, Darth Vader. Behind him were two Imperial officers not in Stormtrooper armor. Lieutenant Janek Sunber wore a black uniform with a cap on his head. Captain Bex donned different black armor pieces, including a peculiar oversized helmet covering everything except his face.
The metal carriage that was the Juggernaut parked its ten wheels at a spot directly below Pyxis and the others. Jetpack-wearing Stormtroopers exited the vehicle and flew up the Wall. The Juggernaut sped away before Titans, still trickling into Trost, caught up to it. The Stormtroopers carried more non-armored Imperial officers and Trost civilians. Some civilians were petrified at the Titan invasion to say anything. Others were repeatedly giving their thanks to their saviors. Pyxis motioned at other Garrison soldiers positioned nearby to escort the civilians to the ground.
“Is Commander Frickett alive?” Darth Vader in his ominous voice asked. One of the rescued officers was gently laid on the floor by a Stormtrooper sporting an orange-colored shoulder pad. The officer was unconscious, his right hand replaced by a stump wrapped in bandages.
“Yes, Lord Vader,” answered the trooper. “A Titan bit off his hand, and he went into shock.”
Vader waved a dismissive hand. “Send him to the medical area. You shall serve in his place as field commander for the detachment, Chainly.”
After another affirmative, Frickett was carried away and Chainly stood at attention. It was a fine reminder how the Imperials were as vulnerable to the Titans as any other man, whilst also being wholly committed to fulfilling their duty to Lord Vader no matter what hurdles they faced.
“Your troopers have done an incredible job safeguarding my people,” Pyxis said to Lord Vader with genuine respect. “You have my gratitude.”
The gesture hardly phased Vader. “Our labor is not yet over, Commander Pyxis. The city itself must still be secured.”
“Of course,” Pyxis agreed. “The Scouts and your legion will be here in due time. The extra manpower and the arsenal your troopers carry should be enough to draw a line around the exit gate and defend our engineers while they build a temporary barrier.” Ferrying the materials from within Wall Rose territory to Trost would be its own time-consuming endeavor, but it was their only viable strategy to stop the flow of Titans into the distinct. “Until then, we should strengthen our defenses at the inner gate here and keep an eye out for the Armored Titan. We must be ready for the possibility it can suddenly manifest from nothing as the Colossal did.”
A chill shook Pyxis’ elderly bones when Vader spoke with disapproval. It wasn’t personal, Pyxis knew. Merely a subtle assertion that Vader desired to get his way, not too unlike the haughtier nobles or senior members of the Military Police whom Pyxis has had the pleasure of speaking with. Only there was real power behind Vader’s demeanor compared to them.
“Our priority will be to seal the outer gate immediately,” Vader all but demanded.
“I suppose you have good reason to underestimate the threat posed by the Armored Titan if the inner gate is left with too few defenders.”
“While your cannons may be imprecise, my Legion has the firepower and the mobility to obliterate material as enduring as your Walls. The Armored and Colossal can be dealt with if they do appear.”
Not the most discreet of threats to the sanctity of humanity’s venerated barrier against the Titans, but now was neither the time nor the place to antagonize potentially essential allies over discourteous manners. “If your Legion is skilled at destruction, do they also have comparable skills as innovative engineers to seal the Wall?”
“In a fashion.” Vader motioned to his officers. “Captain Bex?”
Professional and objective, the Captain was definitely a career soldier with plenty of service under his belt compared to dutiful if greener Lieutenant Sunber. “Power packs are running low on all fronts,” Bex reported. “We still have explosives – mines, missiles, TDs – enough to blow the section above the gate opening to improvise a barricade of rubble. We can place the Juggernauts to reinforce it. Troopers can observe from the top of the Wall if Titans start digging away the debris.”
Ian reacted with haste before Pyxis could stop him. “You want to destroy more of the Wall?”
Pyxis placed a stern hand on Ian’s shoulder to silence him. “Unorthodox, but theoretically doable,” the Commander said, Ian adequately chastised as he stepped back. “Still, it sounds impractical as a long-term solution. I can believe you have the armaments to do damage against the Colossal, the Armored, and the Wall itself. I cannot foresee my people rebuilding the destroyed gate and Wall section from the ground up instead of building on top of the existing structure.” Thankfully, the Wallist types of Pyxis’ circle of elites weren’t present at the moment. The Imperials should be wise to see Ian’s practical concerns instead of religious fervor.
“The Empire has the means to help rebuild your home,” Vader said.
“We already have much to thank you for, Lord Vader,” Pyxis said with a small smirk. He wished he could see Vader’s face behind his helmet, even if it was only a completely stoic face. It would still have given Pyxis some insight on the man. “It would be a shame to overexert your forces and place them in unnecessary danger until both of our armies have reunited.”
At least Vader’s tone still conveyed his lack of endearment to Pyxis’ flattery. “If you wish to make use of my legion to retake your home, it must be done as expediently as possible such that we may continue with our primary objectives without unnecessary delays.”
Protective of his legion. Could this mean an internal distinction from lords and their authority within Vader’s Empire? “And what do your primary objectives entail?”
Darth Vader stared into Pyxis’ soul. Pyxis weathered the storm, quite well in his opinion. “The uplifting of your world, guided by the Empire,” he said with finality.
Pyxis envisioned an Imperial conquest of Rose and Sina, and secretly shuddered at the thought of blasters ripping apart soldiers and Juggernaut cannons burning down the Walls. He considered his countrymen putting up a valiant resistance, and then pictured a more… cordial colonization, at best.
“I will negotiate with your royalty the finer details at the earliest convenience,” Vader went on. “For now, I require a portion of land in Trost for my men to establish an… embassy of sorts. We must rearm and take stock of our available resources until we reconnect with the wider Empire. The sealing of the gate to stop the Titan infestation must come first, naturally. In return, I promise you Imperial support in reclaiming Wall Maria to protect and oversee at your military’s leisure.”
Had Pyxis been a weaker man, or the man he had been thirty years ago, his eyes would have bulged and his jaw would have dropped at Vader’s unbelievable proposal.
But as the season Garrison Commander, having braved the the ruined reputation of the Garrison Regiment following the fall of Wall Maria, bearing guilt of the failed resettlement project for not aiding the Scouts and the civilians well enough, and working tooth and nail over the course of five years to whip the entirety of the Garrison into shape to prevent the fall of humanity from another overwhelming Titan attack, the Pyxis of today was more inclined to see the merit in cooperation with the Empire, not the dangers they posed to Wall society and their livelihoods.
The Empire was the push humanity – evidently not completely sequestered in the Walls as sole survivors of their species – needed to dominate the Titans and reclaim the entire world from those monsters.
Still, Pyxis had to make some effort to make this a collaboration, not succumbing to subjugation. Vader may or may not be lying about the extent of ammunition and weapons his legion possessed, but this was still a negotiation Pyxis can work with.
“Sirs! If I can–”
Pyxis turned to Cadet Armin Arlert breaking from the group at the opposite edge of the Wall. Lieutenant Sunber intercepted him and held the boy back by the shoulder. Cadet Arlert performed a salute.
Another elite soldier, Mitabi Jarnach, was keeping watch over three cadets – Arlert, the top student of Shadis’ southern division Mikasa Ackerman, and the Titan transformer himself, Eren Yeager.
During Pyxis’ arrival to Trost and after being told of the Titan shifting tale, he had seen the Yeager boy going in and out of consciousness before Yeager composed himself somewhat to weakly gaze at Darth Vader. The Ackerman’s loyalty to her adopted brother shone shamelessly as she remained close to him and conspicuously glared at the Imperial lord. Arlert, among the first to make contact with the Empire and organize coordinated evacuation efforts with them, was a childhood friend of Yeager and Ackerman. He had provided what little but reliable information he knew to Pyxis personally before they all came atop the Wall to discuss their next steps.
“– I have a suggestion!” Arlert said, overcoming his initial hesitation at interrupting a conversation between a commanding officer and Lord Vader. “On how to seal the Wall as quickly as possible.”
Pyxis had agreed to let Arlert and his friends be present for this meeting, so he wasn’t offended at the cadet’s intrusion. It was welcome, in fact. “Please, speak your mind.”
Arlert gulped. He was going to need more practice with public speaking if he was going to use his sharp mind more in the future. How one explained a plan was almost as important as the plan itself in order to convince others of the viability and success of the strategy conjured by the planner. “The giant boulder in Trost,” Arlert said. “Eren in his Titan form can use his massive strength to carry it to the outer gate and seal the breach. Soldiers and troopers can support him, distracting Titans in his way.”
Working with a Titan.
Forget the potential threat of an invasion by a foreign army. Working with a Titan was an outlandish enough idea alone for Pyxis to want to down an entire bottle in one shot.
But, outlandish as it was, Pyxis imagined in his head Arlert’s idea play out and found it very appealing. If Vader was insistent on taking back Trost now, Yeager could be an asset to use without guaranteeing more harm to the Wall.
Of course, that was assuming Yeager knew how to transform and control his Titan. There were still many unknowns to the cadet’s powers, including if the Empire’s claims of ignorance to Yeager’s abilities held any water to them or the helmeted Vader was a very good liar.
It was still an option heavily worth considering, Pyxis decided.
He committed when Vader gave his opinion.
“Cadet Arlert gives a fine suggestion. Eren Yeager may prove himself to be more capable than he appears.”
Vader wanted to see the Titan transformer again for himself.
As ideas filled his head on how to proceed with the inevitable operation to retake Trost, Pyxis made a mental note to ensure the Ackerman was assigned close to Eren Yeager at all times.