“Hello! Is anyone still out there?”
Rita was running between the remains of wooden structures that had burned to the ground. Fire had to be smoldering beneath the debris because it was fairly hot. The sweat was never-ending as it dripped off her. The area was filled with the tang of scorched timber and flesh.
It was nothing less than a scene from hell. Smoke billowed from charred fields in every direction. A few Titans were still there, ambling through them. The ground was peppered with holes from the bombardment. If she didn’t watch out, she could stumble and fall in.
“Hello! Anybody?”
Rita squinted through piled stacks of rubble. No sign of any survivors.
She raised her head and started to run again. Her foot caught on something as she turned past one of the collapsed structures. Seeing what it was, she only just swallowed her scream.
It had once been a soldier.
The lower body, drenched with Titan saliva, had been ejected onto the ground. The upper body was nowhere to be seen. The angle thankfully hid the cross section, but Rita could glimpse where the Titan’s teeth had most likely come down. The jawline was carved into the soldier’s flesh, leaving the trousers soaked to the thigh in blood.
“H-Hello?! Is anyone out there?” Rita called with a trembling voice.
She had been out since morning, searching with the remaining members of the Garrison Regiment and the Training Corps for any survivors they could pull out. There had been little in the way of results. All they found were corpses spat out by the Titans or corpses that had been spat out then burned to a crisp.
“Rita, above you!”
Her eyes shot up in response to the piercing female voice. A three-meter-class was crouching in towards her, its arms wide in a trap.
“One sec…”
Instinct pushed her to reach for the mechanism to fire an anchor, but she couldn’t see any solid structures nearby. She’d strayed farther from Quinta’s wall than she’d thought. If she aimed at any of the charred remains, the anchor could come right off.
The Titan began a slow, lumbering fall towards her. Its abnormally hot breath blew over Rita’s skin.
She rolled the moment before it had her, escaping off to one side. The giant frame crashed prone where she’d been only a moment earlier. Clouds of dust spewed into the air as the impact sent tremors through the ground and surrounding rubble.
The Titan’s head jerked upwards. It planted one arm on the ground to push up its torso and reached for Rita with the other.
“Yikes. Enough!”
She readied a blade in each hand.
Just then, a shadow appeared over the Titan’s frame. A female soldier landed on the Titan’s sizable back and swung the two blades in her hands. Rita heard swishes of air followed by the sound of flesh being sliced open. A great curtain of steam burst from the nape of the Titan’s neck. Moving quickly, the solider leapt into the air and dodged the vapor before coming to rest at Rita’s side.
It was Amanda, who had graduated the same year. Rita’s former classmate was tall, with straight black hair that she kept long. In terms of appearance it was fair to say she was Rita’s opposite.
“Got a death wish?”
Always cool-headed, Amanda never cut anyone any slack. In this respect, too, she was more or less Rita’s direct opposite. To tell the truth, Rita found her a little hard going.
“Sorry. I wasn’t thinking.”
“Damned inconvenient, if you went and died on us.”
“Right. I’ll be more careful, I swear.”
“So, you noticed yet?”
Amanda’s blades were locked in her hands, her eyes set on the colossal plumes of smoke funneling out from the Titan. The creatures possessed extraordinary powers of regeneration, but slice through the nape of their neck and they leaked steam from their entire body until they evaporated.
“There’s no one left above us.”
“Hmm?” Momentarily puzzled, Rita answered with a question. “What do you mean, no one?”
“Just that. They all got eaten, either defending the evacuees to the end or because they couldn’t get back over the wall.”
“Everyone?”
“Yeah. They’re all dead.”
“But that’s…” Rita recalled the look on her commander’s face as he’d given the order to shut the gate. It was true that they had yet to find any survivors outside the wall. But was it really possible that none of the officers had made it back?
“I don’t believe it.”
“Well, there’s those who went to the other side. With the evacuees. It’s what all those Military Police Brigade trash did, right?”
By “other side” she no doubt meant Fuerth. Rita turned to look down the main roadway. Scattered corpses of evacuees who hadn’t been able to break free lay there too, along with their horses and the troops who had tried to protect the column. She didn’t see a single living soldier. Instead she saw Titans, still wandering this way and that. What had become of Mathias? Of his father, Jörg?
“I just hope as many got away as possible,” Rita said.
“If I were you, I’d put my own concerns first.”
“My own concerns?” Rita cocked her head, unsure. “You mean so I don’t space out, like just now? Or do you mean food?”
“Well, that too.” Amanda snorted air through her nose. “But no. You’re gonna be busy.”
“I suppose. With fewer soldiers, we’ll all have to─”
“Still not getting it. From this point on, you’re in charge of the Regiment here.”
“In charge? The regiment?”
Did she mean the Garrison? Rita couldn’t process the information. Amanda let out an extravagant sigh.
“It’s pretty obvious. When an officer dies the next in line takes over command. As things are now, there’s no one above you.”
“Are you sure? No one?”
“That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you.”
“But we’re the same rank.”
“I’m not team leader.”
“True…”
It was true that, as team leader, Rita had been commanding a number of her former classmates. But that didn’t mean she was any better at combat. Amanda hadn’t made the position simply because her personality was seen as a problem.
“Wait. Does that mean…”
Rita made a survey of the shantytown, now just blackened fields. Young soldiers threaded paths around the trails of smoke still spiraling into the air. Granted it was only temporary, but was she really supposed to take charge of them all?
“I…can’t do that! It doesn’t matter what the rules say.”
“It kind of does.”
“You’d be much better at it than me.”
“Don’t be silly. Would I ever commit to something as tiresome as that?”
“But…”
“You should probably pray. That there’s at least one senior officer still out there.” She added, “Not that it’s likely, mind.”
“Oh, thanks.”
In front of them the overflow of steam began to settle. The Titan was almost gone.
For there not to be a single person who ranked above her… This was only Rita’s second year with the Garrison. For her to be the highest-ranking soldier!
The commanding officers must have made some kind of miscalculation. They must have believed at least one of them─someone with the proper status─had stayed behind.
“Uh, sorry, pardon me?”
Rita and Amanda swung around toward the voice. One of the trainees had approached without their noticing─a youth with closely cropped hair. Traces of childhood innocence still played on his features. Rita seemed to remember his name was Duccio. She’d sparred with him a few times for his sake.
“We’re done tending the wounded for now. Reporting in.”
“Right. Thanks.” Come to mention it, Rita did remember giving out the order.
“What do you want us to do now?”
“Have you checked that key personnel are safe?” Amanda said without pause.
“Don’t think so.”
“O-Okay, then that’s next,” Rita, flustered, gave the order. “Can you do that for me?”
“Would be happy to. Only, I don’t know what they look like.”
“Nor do I.”
“Even then, that should be your job.”
In response to Amanda’s declaration, Rita asked, “Mine?”
“You can’t have a trainee deal with the bigwigs all by himself.”
“Ah… Yeah, I guess you’re right.” Again the thought hit Rita that Amanda was better suited for command.
Amanda only floated a sly grin, whispering as she turned away, “Don’t forget your manners, madam acting commander.”
“…Meanie.”