Bodies litter the battleground, with raw stumps for limbs and gleaming bone exposed to the air.

A dying soldier sprawls on the rooftop where Emil is crouched, croaking out the beginnings of a last word . . . it is fruitless, he does not finish . . . there is a hole that passes from the cavern of his mouth into the back of his head. Emil can see the eaves of the house through the gape of his lolling mouth.

But the work of the Titans is not done, not even after slaughtering a hundred soldiers and ingesting God knows how many more, not even after burying Shiganshina in rubble.

The Cart stares balefully off to the side, unaware of Emil's presence, carrying a bearded blonde man between its teeth . . . he . . . the Beast Titan . . . Emil will kill him.

He does not want to fight. He is here for information, for the secret that lies in Eren Jaeger's basement, now submerged somewhere beneath the piles of limbless corpses and the Beast's shrapnel. But the sight of the Beast engulfs him in flame -

His vision goes red . . . retribution, revenge . . . how dare they delay him for so long? Once he has that knowledge, he can go home. Once he learns the secrets of the world, he can return to Father - make him proud.

He will kill the Beast for impeding his progress. If the Cart resists, he will kill it too. His boiling blood yearns to punish them for inconveniencing him, for hindering his return home.

A pair of shaky green eyes settle on their target: the pale, exposed neck of the demon controlling the Beast. He imagines it cleanly slashed off, droplets of blood spattering over that golden mane . . . the bleeding stump of the neck, the cross-section of lifeless muscle and tendon . . . blood surging, adrenaline rushing . . .

He drops from the rooftop, eyes fixated - a whoosh of air, a battle cry, blades drawn back . . . a resolute strike, a spurt of thick crimson . . . blindly, he wonders, has he hit his mark?

Then, a deafening snap and the Cart Titan's jaws close shut around him.

A ringing, all-encompassing silence follows.

Encased in darkness . . . unheard shouts of help . . . the warm sensation of more blood as Emil plunges a piece of his shattered blade into the Cart's tongue. No avail. The silence continues, giving no sign that the monster felt a thing at all.

He drops the blade and falls on all fours.

Time passes . . . Emil is not sure how much. The humidity of the Cart's mouth begins to gather oppressively on his skin. It could have been hours, or days. Which way is up? The Cart is running, he can hear the dull racing footsteps, can feel the rhythmic thuds sending waves of nausea through his stomach. He reaches out, finding something rough and moist. The tongue. Yes, that way is down. Or is it the roof of its mouth? The heavy air leadens Emil's eyelids, and the declining oxygen . . . he thinks of the basement in Shiganshina . . . Emil can feel his breath getting shallower . . . thinks of Father . . . and then he can feel nothing.

When Emil opens his eyes, it is dark outside. But it is still far, far brighter than the abyss of the Cart's maw. His eyes unfocus and focus, attempting to re-adjust to the light.

What . . . is that?

A vast stretch of gently rippling water, wider than any pond or lake he had ever seen in his life. Blots of moonlight, like splatters of blood, fall onto the surface and bob gently with the waves. Limitless, boundless, infinite. Mysteriously deep, the holder of all secrets, the fortress of all knowledge.

The ocean.

The ocean, exactly as Father had described it. Exactly as the old history books had so vividly illustrated it.

But his wonder is short-lived as he lifts his gaze to the horizon. Slowly, past the lustre of moonlit sand and past the undulating sapphire: there he notices a strip of land, previously imperceptible from its distance. It grows clearer and clearer the longer Emil stares.

He squints further, clarity flitting in and out of his sight. His disbelief evolves into a cold, gripping terror as he makes out a geyser of steam and the curvature of a large stone structure. The unmistakable Wall Maria.

.  .  .

The wind whispers on a cold spring evening in the northeastern port of Marley.

The city of Liberio is still, save for the somnolent hiss of breaking waves and the demure tweet of nesting sparrows. Liberio is a refuge for all; from hunting eagles to sewer rats, from warriors to civilians, from devils to innocents. A city of reprieve, of safety; the buildings gleam pearly white and the cobblestones trace wonderful patterns in the soil, interweaving with infant rose-buds and blades of delicate grass.

A leaf flits sullenly down to Earth, drifting to a pitiful halt at Emil's feet. He sits back on a wooden bench facing the beach, his bones exhausted and his weary mind fixated on work.

Working 9-to-5 has been his daily routine for the past four years; he's had to suffer frequent verbal abuse from his manager, had to endure the suffocating musk of alcohol, and he's had to put up with inebriated men and women with their hands all over him. Evidently, the notion of a legal age is lost on the people of this country - his boss had allowed him to work at her bar since he was fifteen, after all. But he allows them to touch him, as long as it means he gets a tip. He's learned that here, the threat of Titans does not exist - to survive, what you need is not strength or skill or a sharp metal blade, but money.

Now, the cautious breeze on Emil's face is a foreign sensation; he'd taken time off to combat a raging migraine, and hadn't left the apartment in an entire week. His mental state, which had recovered after a sharp decline four years ago, seemed to be rapidly deteriorating again. He'd basked in the shadows for so many days that they had begun to infiltrate his sunken eyes, his gaudy roommate his only method of communication with the outside world.

God, he couldn't stand him. He'd brought home one tasteless trinket after another, scattering them sloppily about the apartment, all while turning a blind eye to Emil's scowl of disgust. He had caught Emil up with the latest town gossip (Our neighbour's gotten knocked up by an Eldian) and updates on the Marley-Mideastern War (I hear that kid Gabi blew up an armoured train all by herself!). Emil had nodded appropriately and murmured words of assent, all the while wishing his roommate were anywhere but here. But when his roommate failed for the umpteenth time to take the hint, Emil rolled over in his bed to face him.

'Axel.'

'Yeah?'

'Please shut up.'

Axel had snorted, meeting Emil's disgruntled stare. 'If you actually went outside, you wouldn't have to hear my voice all the time.'

Emil's frown had deepened at the idea and his expression had, impossibly, twisted further. Infuriatingly, Axel continued ploughing on about trivialities as if there had been no interruption, all with a self-satisfied smirk on his face. He really was trying hard to test Emil's limits; his voice, metal against metal, showed no sign of slowing, as if daring Emil to get up and leave.

That's why Emil, having stormed outside out of spite, is now seated on a bench facing the ocean, tasting the salt air for the first time in seven days. He hates to admit that Axel was right - the silence, compared to his grating voice, is truly refreshing. It allows a brief peace of mind, a momentary stillness away from any sounds that imply constant presence, any conversation that requires vague response.

Now, rustling leaves and the lapping waves nearby are all that Emil can hear. This quietness is rare in a constantly bustling town, and it is through stolen moments like these, transient but precious, that Emil's thoughts whirl with something other than vacant emptiness.

Again, Emil tells himself that this is how he intends to live out his life: quietly, inconspicuously, unremarkably. Nothing in his life shall ever again slip away. He will live to a ripe old age in Liberio; when he walks outside in the morning he shall hear the ceaseless bustle of the city, and in the evening he will invariably come home to his roommate's grey apartment and the stench of cigarette smoke.

His life here in Marley is comfortable, and Emil has not had the luxury of comfort for eighteen long years. Liberio has given him a new chance at life: a chance to live exempt from spilling blood, a chance to live unanchored to the crimes of his youth - a chance at something normal. Emil knows that his arrival at this place is by pure fortune, that the gentle current that carried his limp body to shore was the sole opportunity for atonement that would ever be given to him. He will never again be so lucky. So over and over again he tells himself, Don't let go.

It is a well-earned respite, he thinks, from the overlong years of watching blades slice through flesh with a hiss of steam and a spurt of thick blood. Eighteen years it had taken him to find stillness in these treacherous currents; and here he is, treading water gently in his enclosed haven of serenity. But even the very act of treading water drains oneself. Stay barely surviving for too long, keep your head above water for one too many years, and one begins to question; one begins to even wish for something to happen - for a current that will break again and carry them, by a sliver of hope, towards land.

Emil makes the painful mistake of letting his gaze follow the steady ripple of the ocean. The waves lead his focus towards the horizon, where the sea fades into dusky blue sky; the tiniest sliver of land can be seen from Liberio on clear days, and today is, unfortunately, one of those rare days.

Emil stares, his heart stilled, at the land where he once anchored himself. He'd always veered carefully around the subject of his past whenever Axel inquired about it, evading the mention of Paradis at any cost, so much so that he himself had begun to forget his homeland; but now, he has nowhere to run. Only the white-crested waves stand between himself and that wicked history.

His heart constricts, a familiar ache in his chest. He exhales a weary sigh.

What used to be a vast empty space in his mind, blissfully silent after years of hazy bloodshed and acute despair, always seems to stir up during moments of tranquillity. There again is the frustrated feeling of knowing something is close by, yet powerless to reach for it. He remembers fuzzy things that don't take shape, entities that float aimlessly. Faces, their features blurred together, surface to the forefront of his mind; who, what, where are these people now? The tang of pine trees in the air that he barely recalls, the sensation of fresh snow that evades his flitting memory. Emil knows them from another time, from the other side of the sea.

Yet on the other side - it is devils that live there, Emil has been told.

Emil does not associate himself with those devils - not consciously, at least. Any hint of recognition or remembrance of his Eldian origins would send him straight into the internment zone, and down the throats of the Marleyan guards' hungry dogs. He can envision his demise at their hands; his own innards dragging elegant trails in the soil, twining with the grass, mating with the flowers. What a sight to behold! Those scattered remains of viscera, the only piece of fading evidence that Emil Fischer ever existed.

So if Paradis' inhabitants are devils, if they are all damned down to the smallest child and the weakest mother from the moment they are born, then so be it. If all Eldians are sinners, then Emil has come to repent. Not once has he doubted the guilt of his people; his own memories are tainted with enough blood and gore to remind him of his own deadly transgressions. But the truth is set in stone. The Eldian race remains the usurpers of power who deserve to suffer the consequences of their actions. So the Marleyans lock them up in ghettos, feed them their scraps, and subject them to the occasional lethal beating that strews their entrails across the cobblestones of Liberio.

The ghettoised Eldians wear their distinguishing armbands, each one striving to become an honorary Marleyan, striving to abolish their identity. For that chance, many would sell their souls. They attempt to atone for the monstrosities they have fostered - but in vain.

How can it come to any fruition? They have not seen the destruction that has been caused, and they have no way of experiencing it in the sanctuary of Marley; how can they understand? The fruits of their violent labour grow on an island far, far across the sea, where these Eldians will never go. But Emil has seen it all: the Eldians that turn into Titans and cannibalise their families, the remains of flesh or the occasional bloody tooth crushed from a human face, the geyser of blood when a Titan's nape is slashed by its own people. Predator and prey. The oppressor and the oppressed. Only Satan himself could create such a vicious, dastardly cycle of killing and being killed.

Of course Emil is far from innocent - but it is his guilt that allows him to repent, to cleanse his sins away. He cannot rewrite the history of the world, but he can rewrite his own; so he renounces them, renounces his identity, renounces the Eldian race and all its crimes. As far as Emil, Axel and every human on this continent are concerned, Emil has never been Eldian, and he has no affiliation with Paradis Island. So long as he remembers his time in hell, a devil will remain a devil.

But something nags at Emil, and he recognises it instantly: a burning curiosity that licks at his insides like a flame. Curiosity is not a sin! He embraces his desire for knowledge, tells himself it is normal. Surely he had no intent to kill as a child; surely, as all children do, he himself frolicked in the grass and made angels in the snow. Surely the worst crime a child could have committed was the sin of being born.

So, how did it begin?

The flame grows and envelops Emil, consumed by the sinless longing to know, to remember. And so for the hundredth time since his arrival at Marley, he reaches for his pocket and retrieves a matted leather notebook. His fingers rifle through the pages until they find the one page he knows by heart. The book falls open easily, as if it has been waiting. He runs his fingers over the date, hastily scribbled with ink in the top-left corner of the blotted page.

February 8, 843.

. . .

The sounds of Utopia District are a euphonious melody. A lone bird tweets on the snow-covered sycamore tree, whilst a feeble fire crackles on burly logs nearby. Despite the chill and the extravagant layers that Emil is bulkily wrapped in, there is a sweet scent upon the air that signposts the arrival of the spring; the faintest hint of daisies in the wind, the softest rustle of leaves somewhere obscure in the woods. Emil's unruly brown hair is speckled with snowflakes despite his woolly hood, pulled snugly over his head. Mila's scarf unravels more and more as she flounces about, her light weight leaving the shallowest footprints in the snow.

'Mila! Emil! You'll get lost if you stray too far away!'

Mila wails with annoyance, hauling her feet and dragging her footprints together. Her thick coat gives her a clumsy waddle and ultimately gets the best of her as she trips and falls, face-forward, onto the powdery snow. Emil lets out a high-pitched cackle at his sister's misfortune. He runs towards her, albeit with great difficulty in the fresh powder, and heaves her towards their little cottage by her legs, his shouts of mirth interspersed with Mila's cries of protest.

'Don't be mean to your sister,' chides Mother, but the love that shines in her eyes is unmistakable. She wraps the grey scarf back around Mila's neck and brushes the snow from her face. 'There, now, Mila. You can get revenge on your brother soon, but dinner first.'

Emil traipses into the house, dragging snow along the wooden floorboards. His face positively lights up at the hot, familiar smell drifting from the kitchen. 'Soup!'

But his enthusiasm dampens at the sight of the dining table; there are four bowls, as usual - one for Emil, one for Mila, one for Mother and one for Father. Every night, Mother prepares Father's portion of the meal. Every night, Father does not come home to eat it. Father has not come home for three years.

Emil recalls many things about Father; he had pored over history books and spare parchment every night, and when Emil couldn't sleep in the hours of dead silence, he would strain his ears and listen to Father's pen scratching on rough paper. The next day, he would ask Father about his work. The same affectionate pat on the head, the same practised answer: 'I'm learning about the Titans!'

'But I wanna know about the Titans,' Emil would pout. 'Why won't you tell me anything?'

There would be a hearty laugh, then Father would lower himself to look Emil in the eyes. 'Because, my boy, knowing too much is dangerous. Especially for a little boy like you.' Here he would flick Emil's nose gently. 'Maybe when you're older.'

The last Emil had seen of him was on his fifth birthday - Father had been rushing, rifling through his room with a strange panicked fervour, and Emil had decided not to disturb him. The next morning Father was gone.

His room, Emil noticed afterwards, had been unnaturally tidy. All books had been straightened on the shelves, all pieces of blank parchment neatly stacked on top of each other, as if they had been placed back, one by one, after being taken out; strangely so, because Father had not been a meticulous person. And perhaps even stranger still - there had been a great gaping space where Father's history books used to sit proudly, towering over all who entered.

No matter what Mother had told him about his father's departure, Emil knew deep down she was wrong. There was no reason for Father to take only his history books; where would he go, without his money or his backpack or the jade necklace he had always worn? Why on earth would gentle Father ever willingly abandon his family? Father hadn't left, he had been taken.

Curiosity is not a sin, is it? But it seemed, nonetheless, that Father had paid the price for daring to wonder. Who knew the pursuit of history had such consequences in Wall Rose?

Knowing too much is dangerous.

Mother's spoon clangs against her bowl once, twice, startling Emil back to the present. 'Eat up, Emil. You haven't had a bite of food since you went outside.'

Emil cowers under her chastising frown and complies. The hot soup scorches his tongue, but after the shock of the initial burn, it warms him from his throat to his hands, to the tips of his fingers and down to the soles of his feet. Mila blows exaggeratedly on her spoonful of soup, gingerly testing it with her lips every two seconds. Mother's gaze is on her bowl again, and Emil can't help noticing how little her expression reveals. He wonders if she is thinking about Father as well.

The dinner is strangely quiet - their meals are usually punctuated by short snippets of conversation between Mother and Mila. But Mother isn't talking, and Mila is still busy trying to cool her soup down. So Emil attempts to alleviate the weird chill in the room.

'Mila, what should we do later?' he wonders out loud. 'I could finish reading you that book we started, if you want, the one about the lamb and the wolf.'

Mila pouts at him. 'Your reading is so boring, Emil. I'd rather watch the faucet drip. You know I actually fell asleep yesterday while you were talking.'

Emil frowns, stung. 'It was a good story. If you actually paid attention you'd learn to appreciate it, instead of zoning out all the time.'

'I can't. I literally can't. Your voice is like one of those flies I can't swat away at night. I don't want to read. It's just not my thing.'

'Okay, fine! You decide what you want us to do.'

Mila looks at the door, a longing expression on her shining face. 'I want to go outside. I bet the village looks so pretty at night, with all those lanterns and fires and lights. We could go to that sycamore tree and you could write in that little book and I could play in the snow.'

Emil starts to reply, to tell her it's far too dark to be outside, but the sight of Mother stills his every movement. She's straightened up from her hunched position, Mila's words a catalyst. 'No,' she snaps.

Mother's brows are furrowed angrily at Mila. Mila slides lower in her seat, clamping her hands over her mouth theatrically with the air of having let something slip.

'You're not going anywhere this late. Not unless you want to end up like that poor neighbour's daughter who got eaten by a wolf. Or that little boy who went outside one night and never returned. All they found of him was a glove. Don't you know what sorts of evil things are out there?'

Emil shrinks into his seat, spooked. Mother's words have clearly had their intended effect on him.

Mila, however, leans forward again, resting her chin on her palms and pouting dramatically. 'Mama, I'm sorry. I promise I won't think about it again.' She holds out her little finger to Mother, who is evidently surprised by this childish display in response. 'Pinky promise?'

Slowly, Emil watches Mother's glowering expression soften and the hard edge in her eyes fade away as she looks at her daughter's tiny hand. She reaches out with her own little finger, and twines it with Mila's.

'Thank you, angel. Now both of you finish up and head off to bed.'

The rest of the meal goes in near silence, and when everyone's bowl is empty - except Father's - Emil offers to change the tablecloth. Mila runs upstairs and flops on her bed with a loud sigh, and Mother heads into the kitchen to do the dishes.

As Emil carefully rolls up the dirty cloth, he basks in the quietness and the distant sound of water running from the kitchen. He loves Mila, of course he does! But there are times - more often than Emil would like to admit - that he wishes Father's gentle baritone would speak to him instead of that shrill laughter.

Poor Father, having his life's work taken from him. How agonising it must have been for him, to work from dusk till dawn just to have it all slip away in one night! That day, Emil had made a vow to Father. He would learn to read and write all those intimidating words that had been in those massive history books. He would write day and night like Father had done. And when he was old enough to do so, he would complete Father's work and uncover the history of the Titans. Imagine how proud Father would be then!

Emil reaches for the new cloth, shakes it loose in the air and lets it settle over the oak table. It doesn't settle perfectly, with slanted folds across the surface, but Emil is far too busy envisioning his glorious dreams. The honour that would be bestowed on him! Maybe once the truth was out, he could convince them to release Father. Emil pats the folds distractedly, immersed in dreams of heroism - but then he notices something. It is far too quiet. His ears strain in the absolute silence: Mother's dish-washing has stopped.

Curious, Emil leaves the tablecloth lying oblique and exits the dining room. The kitchen door is closed; Emil wonders if he should knock. But he decides that the sanctity of the silence would be better left unmarred. Tentatively, Emil pushes the door open.

The kitchen lights are off. Emil's eyes take a dizzying moment to adjust to the sudden blackness. He would have concluded that Mother wasn't there and left, if not for one perceptible sound - the low sound of heavy breathing.

The light from the dining room illuminates the kitchen just enough for Emil to notice a silhouette: he can just make out Mother, bent over the kitchen sink in the dark. Her back is heaving ever so slightly, in time with her audible breaths. Concerned, her son takes a hesitant step towards her.

'Mama?' he asks quietly, not wanting to disturb her trance-like state.

She stills. The laboured breathing stops.

Utter, deafening silence.

'Mama?' he tries again.

She speaks, almost inaudibly, but Emil can just hear her through the silence of the room and the gush of wind outside.

'Why did you bring Mila outside?'

Emil freezes. He knows that tone. It is terrifyingly cold with a hard edge - a bone-chilling hiss. The voice of a coiled serpent poised to strike, and he knows what is to come.

His body tenses. Blood rushes to his head and to his legs, ready to leap into action at a moment's notice. He tries to speak, but his voice comes out feeble. 'Mama, I'm sorry.'

Eerie silence, the calm before a storm.

'I'm sorry,' Emil repeats giddily, ready to run.

Slowly, she turns to look at him, and he almost doesn't recognise her. Her hazel eyes, the same ones Emil prides himself on inheriting, are glassy and dark, her pupils dilated unnaturally - and she is crying. Pearly tears run from her great wide eyes down her hollow cheeks. Her lips form a ghastly line, laced with anger and disgust.

'Why did you bring Mila out in the cold?' she repeats in that low, rustling voice that cannot be above a decibel.

Emil is granted only a fleeting second of preparation. Red lights flash DANGER and he moves a moment too late - Mother lunges at him, a glint of metal in her hand, and all Emil can do, caged within her skeletal grasp, is let loose a strangled cry. A flurry of motion ensues in the dark and Emil feels a sharp slicing pain across the side of his neck amidst the chaos. Panic seizes him like an iron fist; he involuntarily opens his mouth to scream again. 'Quiet!' hisses Mother, clamping her hand over Emil's face. She grips his collar, and with a heavy grunt, thrusts him onto the floor.

Emil hears the dull thud, muffled as if it were coming from outside. His blood roars and rushes in his ears, a cacophony with the quick irregular pounding of his heart. His skin is icy and numb, his throat papery, and no sound comes out when he tries to speak.

A trail of scarlet rolls down his neck like a cold creeping finger. Mother's crazed eyes are more sunken than ever before as she gazes down at him with pure contempt.

'You could've killed her. You could have cost me Mila. You spawn of the fucking devil. Don't you know how much I love the both of you?'

With a last heaving breath, Mother turns and leaves the kitchen. Her back is turned on him, but Emil can still see those haunting dark eyes, inhumanly wide, glazed with tears; the ghost of them stares out the back of her head, right at himself.

He welcomes his fear, embraces his terror, for they are far more welcome than the familiar encroaching sensation that he knows is soon to come. He closes his eyes and inhales, bracing himself.

And there it is; guilt crashes onto him with the weight of a thousand suns. Of course he knew how much she loved them; he should have done better, he could have killed his sister, for God's sake! With a single shuddering breath, Emil deflates on the cold kitchen floor, wondering why he makes the same mistake every time, and wondering why he has to make up for it in blood.

✶