[Egao, Egao Everywhere]

Rumors had been spreading out of knowing, grinning lips but no one quite believed them until this morning when it boomed and became the talk of the town. Even the most gossiping wives held their skepticism at first and laughed at the news like a glorious joke. No one could blame them. Only the children believed what they heard, and sparkled with hope and awe of what they saw. At that moment, a fire within the young was sparked, brightening their dreary, sheltered lives inside Wall Sina.

That morning, humanity's heroes marched toward the titans. For the first time since their foundation, the Military Police was leaving the inner wall.



"I can't believe they're telling us to move out when we'd just gotten here," a soldier grumbled, detaching the blades of his swords and equipping a new set from his inventory. His dark, black eyes closely studied the edge of his new blades. "We haven't had lunch! Even the academy fed us three times a day."

Another soldier, a young woman with a long, red, ponytail hair, sighed in agreement. She wasn't busy with anything but she kept herself occupied with her fidgeting hands. "How are we supposed to fight titans like this?"

The other soldier tested his swords, moving them experimentally to feel any change in the weight. "Yeah, what's up with that? The horses get to eat before us and they're not fighting."

A third soldier accompanied them inside the tent. He and the other two were only a year or two apart from each other, being no older than twenty. From the uncomfortable look on his face, it looked like he shared their sentiments. The third soldier stood up from a wooden crate and winced, reaching his rear with his hand.

"Speaking of horses, my ass had not fully recuperated. Riding was the most uncomfortable sixty minutes of my life."

"Aren't you glad being eaten by a titan only takes a few seconds?" a fourth voice asked, interrupting their chuckling. The soldiers turned to the opening of the tent. "You'd be dead before you know it."

"Nah, Captain," third soldier said, scratching his chin. "Once a titan has you, you'll know you're as good as dead."

"Who knows?" the man referred as the captain said. "We've never fought a real titan before. The legionaires might have a good story or two about it."

The captain was six-and-a-half feet tall and had a square jaw that matched the shape of his broad shoulders. Compared to the others, his uniform was much huger to fit his bigger physique. His head had been shaved clean but spikes of dark hair were already growing back from its place. He appeared very friendly but the white fang earring hanging on his right ear gave him a sort of wild, adventurous flair.

The captain glanced at a sheet of paper on his hand before turning to the soldiers. "Friendly reminder that this isn't just like any other training you've had. You three are lucky to be fresh graduates. A lot of the senior soldiers have gotten out of shape and forgotten how to use their maneuver gear. But that doesn't improve your chances of survival at all. Our opponent's from the Scouting Legion - a 12-meter titan. We'll be up against someone seriously experienced.

"Of course, we're not expected to kill him although our swords were all replaced with blunter blades as a precaution. Everyone had them replaced already? Good. The main objective of this special titan-combat training is to give the Military Police experience what it's like to fight against titans. As you might have noticed this morning, the people seemed to think we were heading outside the walls to kill real titans. Don't bother trying to live up to the people's expectation. Let it die and they'll realize it eventually. Just make sure not to get injured or killed. This could be the end of your career if you ed up losing a limb. We've brought body bags too in case of casualties and let me tell you - we're expecting at least two."

A loud horn howled from outside. The captain folded the sheet of paper on his hand and inserted it in his chest pocket.

"The geezers are ready. All right, everyone, let's move out. Still got some walking to do."

The three soldiers exited the tent and went ahead to join the other soldiers in the north woods, a dense, isolated forest at the foot of the mountains where the training would be conducted. The captain stayed behind, watching the three graduates go and overhearing them talk about his "trying-hard speech." It made the captain grin.

"How do you think we're going to fare, Adil?"

A fourth soldier stood at the very back of the tent, having stayed out of the conversation the entire time. He was older than his comrades, and he did not hold himself in the same lackadaisical disposition. Since they arrived and set up camp, he had not uttered a single word and remained as stalwart as a obelisk, arms crossed before his chest.

Adil shook his head, exiting the tent with the captain.

"That's not something I can answer. As you mentioned, none of us had ever gone up against a real titan. Their attitude makes me uneasy but it's no basis on how good of a soldier they are."

"So we hope for the best?"

"No," Adil said, keeping his gaze straight and uninterested to the idle chatters and spontaneous laughs and merriment going on the sides. His attention was briefly caught by the smell of alcohol, surely smuggled under the noses of the officers, by the officers yet he showed no surprise. No one did.

"Do your best and mind your own life."

the military police redox-kun with stefan

SPOILER: Click to show

Long intro is long. Go ahead and assume that they've arrived wherever Stefan is or something. The titan shifters are just meant to act like moving dummies. They're to throw some swings and move around and that's it...hopefully. Feel free to drop me a message you need something! And yes I changed his name to Adil.[/div

[redox-kun]

a white tunic hangs from his shoulders, and stefan thinks that he almost misses the weight of his 3d maneuver gear around his hips. nobody really expected him to learn how to use those properly, he knows. not when becoming their titan weapon was the reason for his continued existence. the only skills that they really cared about was whether he could handle a horse or not, plus a bit of diligence in hand to hand combat.

stefan gave all that the middle finger when he ended up graduating in the top ten of his class, stealing a military police slot from some other poor bastard. wasting, more like, since he never had the choice to join the military police to begin with. he reveled in the displeasure of the man who ended up ranked 11th in his class. the hatred in his eyes, as if this monstrosity deserved anything.

no, he thinks. stefan doesn’t deserve anything, so the least he can do is make it hell for the rest of them.

a cool breeze comes in from the north, and the hairs on the back of his neck prickle. the first wind that was strong enough to pierce the greenery. wholly unnecessary for them to practice in a natural habitat. they would make poor decoys, with their mettle.

but of course the military police weren’t around to fight flesh eating titans. they were here to fight halflings like him. they were here to teach the wall cult’s children that humans were far more fearsome than the lumbering giants outside.

what an unbearable farce, if only he didn’t believe it.

he turns around at the first sounds of crunching leaves under the men’s footsteps. stefan doesn’t like -- doesn’t trust any of them, but there were some that were a little more scum than others. the captain had mentioned two bodies, but stefan knows that they actually expect around five. five is the maximum quota. he surveys the police calmly and tries to pick out his five with a little diversity. he’s a believer in equal opportunity.

stefan is in no hurry to transform when it takes less than two seconds to draw blood from his lower lip. anyone who was stupid enough to charge him deserved to be caught up in the blast.

he ignores their blades - he’s not interested in those - and surveys their expressions carefully. stefan doesn’t understand them. he doesn’t understand their complacence nearly enough. so he asks.

“...what are you willing to sacrifice?”

it’s only a mild curiosity, but there’s not many opportunities like this. he'll be the one to take what they won't give up. that's what titans do, after all.

he's here to give the military police real experience.

▼
Egao, Egao Everywhere

LAIKA OF GS!

[Egao, Egao Everywhere]

They arrived to the location with shuddering jackets and gently swaying hair. Above, clipped to the crisscrossing branches, leaves rustled like chiming bells as the squad caught sight of a single person standing - waiting - for them ahead. They saw him turn to their approaching noise, given away by the cracking brambles crushed under their boots. There was no greeting or acknowledgment. It anxiously waited while they wordlessly inspected the other but it never came.

Adil thought he had spotted a ghost though he hadn't really believed it. The titan shifter had stark white hair and having known very little of the procedure and science behind titan shifting, Adil wondered if such odd traits were normal. The rest of his features appeared normal, human, and his young age - younger than the fresh graduates in the squad - was of no surprise either, not to anyone. In this era, all soldiers were child soldiers, of a short life and a non-existent childhood. But it wasn't himself who was raised by a general to become a soldier and was taught to count lives and deaths alike like numbers that Adil would think of each time he sees the cruel reminder.

He'd think of those cold, distant eyes, the exact blue pair that was on the titan shifter's face. They were probably one of the worst he'd seen.

The squad reacted with mild surprise when the titan shifter spoke up. When it registered to them that they had been asked a question, an even thicker silence followed. None of the fresh graduates appeared uncomfortable. It only made them as confused as the shifter was with them. Adil's straight gaze, however, dropped a fraction and a small echo sounded in his head as a second wave of breeze blew.

"I don't need grades or ranking." There was her black, bobbed hair, her invincible words, and her blazing, stone eyes. "Once I graduate, I'm off to kill titans with the legion."

The Scouting Legion. The captain mentioned the shifter came from there. Adil took note of the coincidence but dared not to dwell on it.

The captain cautiously regarded the shifter with a frown. He knew what the answer to the question was but he did not like where it was going.

"What are you hoping to gain?"

The captain's opening mouth dropped down. He along with the other soldiers turned to their formerly, silent member. Turning his eyes away from shifter, Adil looked at their captain and continued.

"Can we ascertain that this is the titan shifter we're to go up against?"

Catching on Adil's drift, the captain nodded and gallantly stepped forward.

"I am Raal James Siegfried the Fourth, captain of the twenty-first squad of the Military Police for the Military Police's Anti-Titan Advancement and Live Combat Training," Captain Raal announced, confident but not arrogant. "Identify yourself, soldier!"

redox-kun with stefan

THE MILITARY POLICE

[redox-kun]

he supposes that it’s only fitting that he should be denied even the protection of the uniform. by now, even his skin is numbed from the autumn cold. what did it look like he stood to gain, the coat on their backs?

actually, that wasn’t an entirely bad idea. they were warmer than what he had on, and nobody would look twice at a man in a military police uniform. that was a sky that riff-raff like him could never touch. he doubts that he could pull off the look after he smeared the coat with their blood, though.

that’s right. only by fulfilling his purpose can he be allowed the privilege of raising his head again.

“stefan finley, scouting legion” stefan turns his attention to the captain and salutes him with no hesitation in his fist or on his lips. his words are strong, but there is no real fire in them. the salute is technically solid, but not much beyond that. “the commander had received a request from the military police last week for my presence”

he wishes that he could have only given a first name, but he doubts that people even remember the finley name anymore. the people have no use for dead heroes when the titans are an omnipresent threat. they might teach his parents’ 3d maneuver gear techniques in textbooks today, if they were lucky. that's right. nobody needed to know who he was and what he wanted. that's not how this world works. 

“if you will step back, captain, i will be glad to provide my services once you are at a safe distance away” stefan finds it rather distasteful to be court-martialed for the military police’s sake. thalia would never let him live it down.

▼
Egao, Egao Everywhere

LAIKA OF GS!