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Breathe in.
Bertholdt stared up into darkness.
Breath out.
He was searching in the darkness for the peak of the tent.
Breath in.
He’d been doing this for what must have been the past several hours.
Breathe out.
At first, he’d been convinced that once his eyes adjusted, he would be able to see it and then he could finally close his eyes and sleep.
Breathe in.
Now that seemed silly, but falling asleep seemed like as futile of an endeavor.
“You’re still up too?”
Breathe out.
“Huh?”
Reiner rolled over in the sleeping bag next to him. “I said, you’re still up too?”
“How’d you know?”
“You haven’t rolled onto me or kicked me in the face yet.”
Bertholdt was grateful for the darkness of the night as he felt heat rise to his face. “I—I really don’t know what to do about that. It’s not something I have conscious control ov—hey, you’re awake too.”
“Yeah, I am.”
There was a silence. Which one of them was going to break it?
Breath in.
“You can feel it too right?” It was Reiner.
“That it’s going to happen tomorrow?” Bertholdt replied.
“Yeah.”
“Yeah.”
He had thought it might just be anxiety, apprehension, anticipation, which were all to be expected but if Reiner felt it too… yes, something had changed in the energy. Could it be that the Founding Titan was getting closer?
Silence. Then he could hear Reiner shifting again. It sounded like he was getting up. The curtain to the tent pulled open and moonlight streamed in. He could finally see the peak of the tent. It was as unexciting as ever.
“You coming?”
Bertholdt nodded. “Yeah, just give me a second.”
It was a warm night with a breeze. Back in their training corps days, it would have been the perfect night for sneaking out of their bunks and… Bertholdt brushed the thought out of his head. Times had changed irrevocably and there was no use dwelling on those innocent—if you could called anything he had ever done innocent—days. Besides, a bit of wind atop Wall Maria was a little more threatening than pleasant, especially when you had a high center of gravity like Bertholdt did. He instinctively nestled behind Reiner. Marley’s shield was good at shielding other things too.
Reiner sat them down at the edge of the wall overlooking Shinganshina. Bertholdt had deliberately avoided this spot where it had all begun.
“This is what you saw back then, huh?”
Bertholdt stared furiously down at his own feet dangling off the wall. He felt small up here. Human. “Uh yeah, I guess. We’re right over the gate where… it all started.”
Reiner leaned over, tried to meet Bertholdt’s eye, but Bertholdt continued to stare straight down. He didn’t need to see through the eyes of the Colossal Titan any more than necessary. It was better to feel human when he could.
Reiner spoke again, “I used to think it must be easy being the Colossal Titan.” Bertholdt stiffened. “You could just blow everything away. You’re untouchable. I mean, I have Armor, but we’ve seen how that’s not unbreakable, but you, you’re basically all powerful.” Inhuman. “But now I think it must be hard being so much larger than life, to be on top of the world like this, seeing everything for afar. Every little action you make has so many consequences. It’s a lot of weight to carry on your shoulders.”
“It’s not so bad.” It was a knee-jerk reaction to brush off the statement—literally, he started nervously kicking his feet off the wall. He drew his feet into his chest to still them. “Besides, being the Armored and fighting on the spot is difficult too… I-it’s easiest when I have a plan to follow and I don’t have to make decisions on the spot.” Better in fact not to make any decisions at all.
“Yeah, I know that,” Reiner said. “I guess what I’m trying to say though is that I see now why making decisions is hard for you. You just see the consequences in a way that most of us don’t.”
But he didn’t. He had been refusing to look at the consequences of that first day. A creeping sense of guilt edged up his spine, beckoning him to survey the destruction. With each vertebrae, the need grew stronger until he felt his head involuntarily lift and he looked over his knees. It took only one glimpse and it all came rushing back. It was the same picture as that very day. Even though night obscured the details of the city and they might have been off by a couple of degrees from the exact position, his mind filled in the gaps and created the illusion of simultaneity. The scene before him existed at two point in time, the one covered in his shadow but lively, bustling, and unaware, the other, shrouded in night, reduced to ash, abandoned. He hadn’t had time to see the aftermath back then. It was just a blur of moving pieces and the absolute concentration on his task at hand. He was out before he had time to see what he had done. Only now with the dust settled did all the pieces land in their place. He hadn’t realized that kicking in the gate would destroy houses like it did, but now he could see the house-sized boulders and craters. He had done that. Of course, in the end, they were condemning these people to a violent death anyways—that had always been the mission—but… the thought of remains still trapped under pieces of the wall… he, Bertholdt Hoover, 12 years old, had been the first to draw blood on this land.
“Why are we are here?” Bertholdt murmured.
“To retrieve the coordinate,” Reiner responded automatically.
“No, why did you bring me here? Why are you asking me to relive the destruction I caused five years ago?” His voice was rising.
Reiner spoke slowly and deliberately, “If that’s how you feel… Bertholdt, I’m concerned. I see the way you’ve walked faster every time we pass over the gate and how you never look over this side of the wall, but what will you do tomorrow when you have to be the Colossal Titan again? That can’t be the first time that face what happened here.”
“I’m just moving forward,” Bertholdt snapped. “Isn’t that all we can do?”
“Towards what?”
“Nothing! The end. Finishing something we started and dedicated our whole lives to not knowing the least of it!”
“Is that enough?”
“What?”
“Is simply ending it enough reason to justify killing the ones you used to consider your comrades?”
Bertholdt flinched back. “What?”
“When the time comes, are you ready to kill them without hesitation?” Reiner asked. Bertholdt hesitated. “I’ll take that as a no.”
“I… am…” Bertholdt tried.
“Or are you just going to pretend the decision was out of your hands?”
It was a stab in the back. He new he had blood on his hands, so much blood on his hands, too much to ever even pretend to be human. All he did was face away from what he had done. It was all he could do. He just wanted it to end. He could make it end. His eyes drew back down to his feet, the edge of the wall, the 50 meter drop below. It didn’t have to be anyone else. It could just end here. Even if the fall didn’t immediately kill him, there would be no healing without a will to keep going…
A strong hand gripped his shoulder.
“Bertl.”
He looked up at Reiner and for a moment he thought he was still seeing double, two Reiners one younger and one older in front of him. He blinked. No, it was just tears blurring his vision.
“Bertl, I didn’t mean to hurt you. I just need to know you can do it tomorrow. We’re depending on you.”
“This isn’t exactly your best pep talk,” Bertholdt mumbled. “I just want it … to end.”
Reiner tightened his grip on Bertholdt’s shoulder and then pulled him in. Bertholdt lost his balance but found himself face pressed up against Reiner’s chest, wrapped up in his arms. He could hear his heartbeat. He could hear his breath.
“What about after this ends?”
“What?” he breathily squeezed out. It was hard to speak, knotted up in Reiner’s powerful hold, not to mention, he felt… short of breath, his heart beating a little too fast.
“Do you ever want anything, Bertl, for yourself?”
He felt dizzy. “Uh, can you loosen up, Reiner?”
“If I do are you going to jump off this wall?”
Bertholdt shook his head as best he could, and the arms released. He let out a breath and adjusted himself… but didn’t lean too far away from Reiner.
“What do you want, Bertl?” Reiner repeated his earlier question.
Bertholdt thought hard but all he could come up with was “To finish our mission.”
“But what about after that? Do you ever think about life once you’ve completed your life’s purpose? What do you want?”
All he could come up with were answers he’d rehearsed so many times he wondered if they had any meaning left. He wanted to become an Honorary Marleyan. He wanted to protect his father who he hadn’t seen in six years now. He wanted to be a hero. But all of that was past tense.
“What do you want?” Bertholdt returned.
Reiner answered easily. “I want to see my family again and make sure that they’re safe. I want to see how baby Gabi looks now. I want my mother not to be ashamed for having me. What do you want, Bertl?”
“I… I wanted my dad to get medical care, but being a Warrior was enough. He’s being cared for. I’m not like you, I don’t have a big family. I don’t… have anything to look forward to. This was it.”
“You could… have a family. We wouldn’t be able to be there for long, but kids of Warriors would get to live as Honorary Marleyans.”
Bertholdt scoffed and then quickly apologized, “Sorry I didn’t mean to laugh at that. I just… don't think I could bring a kid into this cruel world. Besides it would never be a real relationship. Nobody could ever understand what we’ve been through.” As he said those last words, he knew what Reiner would say next.
“Annie?”
“No!” he cut in too quickly. “Really, no. I mean, I want to make sure she’s okay. I care about her…”
“Oh yeah, you care about here,” Reiner chuckled.
“I just care about her like I care about you, okay? Besides, her ideal future would probably exclude both of us. I mean it! I feel the same way about her as I feel about you!” He sped through the words, voice a little too loud, heart racing, cheeks hot.
“Well then, if Annie turns you down, you can marry me.”
And then his heart stopped altogether. In truth, he didn’t feel the same way about Reiner and Annie. In truth… yes, he did want something. And the revelation released something in him so that when his heart started up again, he couldn’t catch his breath. The answer of what he wanted was too obvious, always right in front of him.
“Ah-hah-ha,” Bertholdt laughed uncontrollably and he couldn’t make it stop. “Ha-ha-aha.”
But the other man wasn’t laughing with him. “Glad I could make you laugh at least, Bertholdt. I hope you do find something you want. It must be hard to fight without anything to look forward to.” Reiner gave him a curt pat on the shoulder, and started to get up.
The entire world seemed to tilt. Bertholdt caught his balance—and his breath—and got up, “Wait, Reiner.”
“Hm?” Reiner didn’t even turn around to face him.
“Thank you.”
“What for?”
“I did think of something I want. You were right. Before now, I was afraid to want anything. The end always felt far away, and I wanted to absolve myself of personally making any decisions. But I thought of something I would sacrifice it all for. Something worth making a decision on.”
“What?” Reiner turned around.
‘He’s standing right in front of me, literally glowing… oh wait no that’s the morning light.’ But of course that wasn’t said aloud. “I’ll tell you when it’s all over.”
They held each other’s gaze for a while. ‘Forgive me for laughing,’ thought Bertholdt. ‘Forgive me for not realizing earlier. I didn’t dare to want anything at all. And forgive me for not being able to tell you now, but it’ll make our reunion all the sweeter.’ There was a passing thought that he was mistaken about all of this, of the reciprocity of this feeling, but looking at Reiner now, he dared to believe. ‘When we reunite after it’s all over, I want to hold you and tell you how I really felt tonight. I want to feel your heart beat against mine. I want you.’
“Well, I’ll add that to my list of wants for when this is over then,” Reiner said. “I want to know what drives Bertholdt Hoover.”
Bertholdt smiled. He turned to face the remains of Shinganshina. The pink glow of morning did nothing to dull the picture of destruction. Five years ago, the decision wasn’t his to make, but it set him down a path there was no turning back from now. But today, he would be decisive. He would act on his onw. He would do what it took to see Reiner at the end of this.
“I’ll go start the coffee.”
No use delaying the inevitable.