"So..." Ymir started, curious eyes glancing between the two males shaking hands, one of her single arched brows raised. "What do we do now?" She questioned, folding her arms over her chest. Thick grey smoke rising from her right hand that was slowly regenerating.
As enthusiastic as always, Kain beamed brightly, yanking his hand out of Reiners before slapping it to the back of his head and ruffling his already shaggy hair, "Got no clue!" Menacing sharp points of his predatory canines glinting in the sunlight that filtered through the gargantuan forest.
Reiner was left dumbfounded by the halfbreed, unsure whether to feel intimidated by the menacing creature he was, or deciding if his psychotic personality and rapidly changing moods was far more terrifying than him being a demon.
Bertholdt had already decided before learning of Kain Croix's demonic heritage that he was an absolutely terrifying person, and would consistently think of him in that way.
As for Eren, he was more confused than anything, though still scared. Shifters was a pretty new concept to him still, so adding demons into the mix was a strenuous pain on the young boys mind. Especially since the crazy Croix was one of the people he looked up to and admired.
Unlike the rest, Ymir was oddly calm about the whole ordeal. Her relaxed aura not once faltering. Even so, Kain was still able to pick out the slight jumps in her heart beat, the quickened pumping of her blood. It would be impossible to tell that Ymir was on edge unless you were truly looking.
Something which was further proven when she huffed loudly, drawing out a long breath before rolling her eyes at the red eyed man and critiquing him. "You know, for a big bad demon halfbreed, you are no where near as intelligent as I thought you'd be." She accused harshly, though still maintaining her calm demeanour.
The comment earned wide eyed, horrific stares from the other 3 shifters, and a sparkled glint from the halfbreed. "Are you crazy?!" Eren shouted at her in alarm, not sure how Kain would react to Ymir insulting him to his face.
But they were all surprised when the man in question burst into energetic, obnoxious laughter. A single hand gripping his stomach as he keeled over in breathless chuckles. "HAHHAHA! I LIKE THIS ONE! SERIOUSLY, YOU'RE GREAT!" He managed to get out through his loud humour.
Reiner sighed lightly as he watched the interaction, his initial fear towards the situation calming. Now, he didn't feel so threatened by Kain, though was still wary of him. "No, she isn't. But he definitely is." He responded to Eren's previous question. Shaking his head and pressing his lips into a thin line as they waited for Kain to calm down.
"W-what... what are you doing?" Eren's small voice suddenly stuttered out, the trembling in his voice not going unnoticed.
The rest turned to him, brows raised in question and wondering what he meant by that. "Huh, what d'ya mean?" Reiner asked, voicing the words everyone else was thinking.
And when Eren's distorted gaze landed on Kain, it was clear what point he was trying to make, leaving the halfbreed to internally groan. "You're gonna make a deal with him, just like that? He's a demon! How desperate can you be to trust a demon?" The boy made his case clear, teal eyes searching for some reasoning in the all too calm auras of the other shifters.
Much to Kain's surprise, Reiner rebuttled against Eren, defending his decision to trust the halfbreed with an air of confidence. "If you want the truth, very desperate. We have faith in our abilities as shifters, but even then we know not to underestimate humanity. And Kain, even though he's a demon not a shifter, he knows what it's like to live in our shoes. Humanity might not know about the existence of demons and halfbreeds, but when they do, my guess is that they won't treat them so differently to how they treat us... Besides, I know its better to have a powerful ally rather than a powerful enemy." He finished strongly, holding an authoritive gaze over the young boy.
It left Kain moderately surprised, Reiner definitely seemed like the strong leader type who commanded respect, but he also knew there was something odd about Reiner from past observations.
"And you'd already be dead if I wanted it." Kain added smugly, shrugging his shoulders with a crooked grin. "Jeez, you've known we exist for all but 5 minutes and you've already decided to give us a bad rep. What a bummer." He sighed heavily, chest moving up and down dramatically.
Eren only stared in wide eyed disbelief, unable to wrap his head around everything that had happened in the last few hours. He was ashamed that he had been captured by the enemy, terrified of the new knowledge that demons existed and that he knew 2, and bamboozled that Reiner and Bertholdt despite wary, were more than willing trust one of those said demons. It was all too much.
And that led to the look of pure determination infecting his features, his still hand-less arm suddenly rising to his mouth as he chomped down harshly on the recovering flesh, attempting to shift to his Titan form.
"Eren! Don't do it!" Bertholdt ordered quickly, rising from his crouched position on the branch and staring at the boy in panic.
Though Kain was optimistic to the idea, "No, no, let him. I'd love to see how well he does in this situation." He smirked, glancing down at the countless Titans that were littered on the ground beneath them. In his current state, there was no way Eren would be able to do anything to fight off the Titans, shifters or Kain. He was severely outnumbered and outmatched but too blinded by anger to see that.
"Easy there, hothead." Ymir warned Eren, grabbing his arm and pulling it away from his mouth, before explaining the situation to him. "Take a look at where we are. This is the giant forest
within Wall Maria. Wall Rose is leagues away. Which means... we're deep in the heart of Titan country. See? I think our buddy down there is an abnormal. It may look like he's just kickin' back, but those eyes haven't left us once." True to her words, there was a Titan laying on the ground, at least 20 metres tall with a hand behind its head, seemingly relaxed. But it's beady, hungry eyes were fixated on the humans. "Lot of smaller ones down there, too. That's plenty bad enough. Another big one over there. Fixated but keeping his distance. Strikes me as the shy type." Once again, like described there were multiple less than 20 metres scattered along the floor, fists pounding at the trunk of the tree for the delicious human flesh up above. And another larger Titan was peering around a tree, unable to tear its eyes away from an easy meal.
Then she turned her attention to Kain, Reiner and Bertholdt on the branch opposite them. "And then there are
these chumps. Dirty bastards. They had the foresight to suit up in full gear. 'Course Reiner took yours. Point is, changing into a Titan isn't gonna accomplish very much right now. 1, they can do the same thing if they want.
2, they can zip into the trees if not. 3, we're basically surrounded on all sides. And we're yet to find out what a halfbreed demon is truly capable of. You've seen him regrow a hand in barely a few seconds, I'm not entirely eager to see what else he can do. Power or no power, getting out of this would be tricky as hell, even at the best of times. Y'read me? There's nothing to gain by being a dumbass." She lectured him with a firm grip on his shoulder.
"Though feel free to be a dumbass for my entertainment. I might get bored if you don't." Kain interjected with a cheeky wink thrown Eren's way.
And it took a few seconds to sink in, but Eren knew the only thing to do was to accept that he was truly stuck in this situation with no way out. Nothing he could do would help, it would only make things worse and more dangerous.
Still, that didn't make it any easier when Reiner openly agreed with Ymir, like rubbing salt on a fresh wound. "She's right. Y'can't turn into Titans right now anyway. Don't count on that ability
coming to the rescue. The body can only take so much. It's a little preoccupied
with healing at the moment." Being an obvious expert on the matter, it was clear that Eren should've listened to Reiner, not that he would do so easily.
"Nice try. You expect
me to sit here and take the word of a liar?" Eren spat, glaring defiantly at his captors. His body may have been useless at this very moment, but his resolve was unwavering.
With a deep sigh, Ymir turned away from the boy, grabbing her right arm as smoke dissipated around it, along with her right leg, both of which had been chewn off during the kidnapping. "Yeah, well. We're sort of at a disadvantage here. It's not like we know the ins and outs of how this works. Unlike you guys, I'm basically clueless about the whole thing." She droned a little too calmly for Kains liking.
It was almost as if she were speaking rehearsed lines, something that had been practised so much that it was unnaturally perfect. It left the Croix wondering if she was really telling the truth, or if she knew more about shifters than she was letting on.
"Hey, Reiner." Ymir suddenly called out to him, her focus unbroken, "You said you'd start talking once Eren was up. Don't'cha think it's about time somebody explains what you plan on doing with us?" She raised a very important question.
Kain himself was almost dying of curiosity too. He'd joined this little escapade on a whim and a thirst to know more, but realised he didn't really know anything. Now they were getting to the parts he really wanted to hear.
~•~
I just wanted to let you know that the next few chapters will be Kain chapters, so we won't see Arden and Levi for a little while.
Again, sorry for the really slow updates. I will try and get the next ones out soon so we can quickly get too Arden and Levi. And my own mini season where the truth will be revealed.
Hope you're still enjoying the story.
I think I said this before, but I don't want this to solely be about Arden and Levi's relationship, I want some plot for the demon storyline and how things will turn out with that. Sorry if that isn't exactly what you want.
Thankyou for reading and being so patient with me! You guys are truly incredible. 🤍🖤