Dances and Ruin// Reiner Braun x OC

Chapter Six

Someone is crying nearby.

Reiner's hands creep up along his cheeks to make sure that they're dry before looking around the corner to see Annie and Bertolt standing side by side. Their cheeks are dry too. It must be someone else. Regardless of who it may be, he can also hear the faint sound of someone trying to console the poor soul. The sound seems to be coming from every angle. Cries of anguish and empty words of reassurance. The only thing that seems to stand apart from the rest is the sound of Jean's scoffing. Reiner's eyes train on the back of his comrade's head as he allows his thoughts to take him away.

He knew when he, Annie, and Bertolt planned today's attack that this would be ugly. He knew for a fact that many of the people he'd trained with for the last three years wouldn't make it beyond these 24 hours and that he would have to live with that guilt for the rest of his life. Even so, he thought it would be easy. He never once imagined that he'd feel so overrun with grief when faced with the consequences of his actions. Am I still doing the right thing? Was it ever right to begin with?

When faced with the things he witnessed over the past few hours, he isn't so sure anymore. He never got to see the full effect of what happened in Shiganshina five years ago, so it never felt so heavy, but today feels like a burden that won't ever be lifted. The instant that he and his squad came across Armin and Connie, alongside several of the others he felt as if he were being condemned by some higher power.

You did this, now feast upon the fruits of your labor.

Armin lost his entire squad, his best friend, somewhere along all of the fighting. Dozens of soldiers were left stranded after the withdrawal signal sounded because they'd run out of gas, and he was among them. I'm going to die here with countless others, all because we'd decided to initiate a plan to smoke out a king who couldn't care less. All of this to provoke the sole person that they needed to find. Reiner sighs. We should have known better. You can't provoke a coward if they're already determined to hide.

Then came along the brilliant idea to do something about it, and it almost costs each of them their lives. Making it to HQ seemed impossible as it was, but upon reaching it, they still had more hurdles to jump over. The hurdles are what almost killed Sasha and Connie, they'd both missed a titan's nape in a critical moment and found themselves defenseless. Annie was able to clear the way for them to have a second chance though by taking matters into her own hands and killing those two titans alongside Mikasa. Reiner never failed to be amazed at the power that the two of them carried with them wherever they went.

And lastly, the biggest surprise of them all was discovering that they had a titan on their side. A rampaging beast that stood out among all the rest, an anomaly, Eren Yeager. If anything, that definitely throws a wrench into everything and raises many questions. And, with all the mystery that surrounds this one titan, in particular, he still can't shake his own personal dilemma.

I only have myself to thank for this. There's no telling how many people lost their lives or their loved ones because of the decisions that I made. How many people that I care about are among those that have lost? Do I even get to ask that? Did I really care to begin with if I chose to do this to them? How many corpses did I mindlessly encounter and not give a second thought? Why did I feel so helpless when faced with the possibility of watching Connie and Sasha die before me? Why did it hurt to see Armin mourning Eren so much? This is all my fault, and it shouldn't matter but it hurts. Jean, Sasha, Mikasa, Marco, Connie, Armin... Peri. I couldn't live with myself if-- wait.

Reiner pushes himself from the wall he's been leaning on and he walks over to Jean who has his head cradled inside of his hands. Reiner's hand clasps over his comrade's shoulder, "Hey, have you heard anything about Peri?"