SKY ⇻ [ bertholdt hoover ] ▼

[ 1 ]

A small crevice lay hidden between the peaks and valleys of the gently rolling hills, flowing back towards the horizon like a wave of liquid green, slowly inclining steeper and steeper until they were no soft slopes but rather sharp, jagged ridges of land. Not quite mountains, not quite yet. They were still certainly enough to give the most experienced hiker occasional bouts of trouble.

Perhaps the cliff-abundant, hardly-habitable, unpopulated location had been chosen with a purpose. After all, if one wanted to keep to themselves, there was no better way to ensure such a possibility than with a boundary of bountiful barriers. It undoubtedly took a lengthy period of time to map the area, much less set it up for human use.

Someone had still done it.

Prematurely-constructed wooden shacks lined the miniscule portion of the range that wasn't filled to the brim with peril, following a winding, well-trodden dirt path that wove here and there without any particular direction. It was somewhat of a gradient: at first, the structures were measly in size and quality, packed with horses and haystacks; as one progressed, however, it faded to multiple hardier, sturdier buildings, both quite large in size, and then onto a just a handful of domiciles with considerable space. Quite frankly, it was a small town in and of itself.

Its inhabitants, primarily around their teenage years, were clustered together in a sandy, open expansion of the main pathway. They were buzzing with conversation, greeting new faces and smiling at the old; if not, they were quiet, maintaining their relatively reserved natures, and staying near the outskirts of the gathering. Almost everyone seemed to fall within one of those two distinct categories.

You, on the other hand, weren't quite sure where you belonged. On the outside you were just as blank a canvas as the most introverted loners, but on the inside you could feel your mind clambering precariously over its bank of emotions and rivers of memories. Somehow you had wound up still within the large group. More so on the fringe of it all, you were provided with a good prospect of everyone else. There was hardly a person there that you hadn't already seen before. You owed some of that to the night spent at the training grounds - after all, you had come to know a few people in your cabin, albeit very informally and very hurriedly. Most people hadn't wanted to talk at all, but there were always a few.

Krista, for instance. A petite blonde girl whose blue eyes seemingly struck down into the depths of your soul, she had been kind enough to start your first conversation, exchanging casual greetings and commonalities. You two were quite similar in most ways. Having gotten along well, you would've appreciated the idea of spending more time with her, but an unfamiliar tall brunette had swept her away somewhere between lulls in the consultation.

Of course, her disappearance hadn't gone unnoticed. Soon enough you were acquainted with the culprit. Freckled and rather unrestrained, Ymir had taken an interest in you (and, more specifically, Krista). She was different enough to distract you from the terrors that had begun to form within your mind about the next day. For that, you were grateful.

Now the two of them stood in close proximity to one another, but you were off in another area of the grounds. Left to your own devices, your mind had begun to wander, but it hadn't gotten very far. Those fears had caught up with you. The great, unanswered 'whens' and 'whys' and 'whats' were swelling up within your brain, causing a profuse headache as your brain practically scraped against the sides of your skull, sending a sickening stream of suffering through your veins, mixing with your excited yet distressed adrenaline until the two were indifferentiable from one another. It took everything you had to keep standing on your own feet and not collapse into a heap of anxiety.

A sudden flood of silent sternness washed over the group. You felt it, too, and fell in step with those in front of you, assuming the respectful position you'd learned just a few days ago on your journey here. Legs slightly apart. Left hand bent back against your shoulder blades. Straight posture. And, of course, your right hand curled into a ball, resting shakily above your heart.