Humanity's Hope || Levi Ackerman

104TH TRAINEE SQUAD

The aroma of fresh oranges filled her nostrils as Marta strolled past market stalls, her hunger suddenly becoming priority as her malnourished stomach groaned at its lack of food. She approached the street vendor and asked for a bag of oranges to which they complied before she handed them the last of her money. At the time, she was sure she would get away with it but then she felt the collar of her purple dress being lifted.

"You little brat, that wasn't enough for the oranges!" Marta found herself face to face with the vendor, a large man with a bushy moustache.

"Hey, hey, hey, what's going on?" A kid her age with a kind face caught the attention of the man she was sure would kill her on the spot and suddenly his eyes had turned soft.

"This little street rat didn't pay enough, something a kid like you wouldn't do, little Marco." Marta struggled in his grip but it was like a vice, Marco stared at her pitifully.

"I'll pay for her, it's no problem." He suggested, holding out a few more coins than the actual price but the man had no problem snatching them from Marco's small hand.

"Be grateful Marco is such a good boy," was the last thing she heard from the man as she was pushed to the ground only to be helped up by said boy.

That day was the start of a beautiful friendship between Marco and Marta, and eventually Jean who she met soon after. She came to rely on the two boys for life's necessities, they brought her food everyday so she wouldn't have to keep stealing to survive. As time went on, she found the word 'family' meant more to her now than she ever thought it would, because she considered Marco and Jean her brothers.

Marta found herself smiling peacefully at the memory, she was now sitting with a bowl of soup and piece of bread in front out her.

"What you thinking about, fairy?" Jean smirked down at her.

"Don't call me that, he probably wouldn't have called me that had it not been for you being your cocky self in front of Shadis!" She retorted before Marco tried to calm the two down before they tried to fight each other. He had always been the one to diffuse a bad situation and calmly sort it out, Marta had hope for him that one day it would do him some good as opposed to stopping childish fights like theirs.

She chomped into her bread, still angry but not wanting to upset her favourite freckle face and tuned into the conversation happening at the table surrounded by at least a dozen recruits.

"Yeah, okay? I saw the big guy." She heard a male voice pierce through the quiet chatter.

"Wow, seriously? How tall was he?" Someone asked.

"He stuck his head over the outer wall."

"Wait! I heard he stepped over the wall completely!"

"So did I!"

"That was a rumour in my village, too!"

"Nah, he was big but not that big." The same voice said nonchalantly and Marta finally stood up to see the shaggy brown haired boy who she would later come to know as Eren, speaking.

"So what did it look like?" A girl with black pigtails asked.

"It had a mouth like a corpse. And no skin, just muscles." Marta let herself visualise the giant creature and she suddenly realised there might be something finally scarier in the world than her mother. That fact became clear as she saw the look in Eren's emerald green eyes that matched her own so well after he had been asked "what were they like?"

She knew that look all too well, her mother's eyes had held the same one shortly after her father had stopped visiting the two after she had turned 5 years old. It was a look of loss and despair, 'Elsa Moller had loved Marta's father so much, and she couldn't find anyone else to blame for his leaving except for Marta. And so she suffered over something that hadn't been her fault all along.