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Reiner is home.
He is in the Liberio Internment Zone, Marley, between a nice warm sheet and a thin worn out mattress. Both of his feet are suspended over the end of the bed; it has been such a long time since the last time he had slept there. His room is as old as he is, but that doesn’t mean that it is not clean and comfortable, just as he remembered it. The sun rays enter the room through a window that reveals the landscape he has associated with said name —home— while, inside, his war uniform is neatly positioned on the desk’s chair as a friendly reminder of what he really is. Everything seems to be where it belongs.
He gets out of bed, stretches himself and gets dressed, the same three steps he has been following since he was sent to Liberio with the rest of the Eldian soldiers. When he looks in the mirror, Reiner decides that the beard he has been carefully growing suits him; it makes him look older, wiser, stronger. He ignores the purple circles under his eyes, of course. Suddenly, his stomach growls in need.
His steps, which make the wooden floor cry, follow the smell of freshly made breakfast: bread, something sweet, something salty and motherly love. Reiner enters the room silently, watching his mother arranging the table in a happy pace. On the table there are two plates, a basket with fruit, another one with Brötchen, and the ceramic jar with muesli, milk and honey. It seems that Gabi, his uncle and his aunt aren’t joining them today.
“Good morning, son,” greets Karina Braun once she notices her son resting against the doorframe. Then, she places a steamy cup on the table and says, “Start before your coffee gets cold.”
Reiner heads for his usual place and sits down, cup in hand, “Aren’t you joining me?”
“In a minute.”
Karina is moving from side to side, placing more food in front of him such as boiled eggs and cheese. The table is full within a couple of seconds. If someone had told him nine years ago that he would be having a breakfast worthy of a king every morning, he would have laughed. Hard. They were Eldians, after all. However, this kind of domestic situations were an everyday thing, as if hunger hadn’t made them suffer in the past. It could be said that being in such high rank has its perks.
He sighs comfortably and directs his cups towards his lips, inhaling the fondly remembered smell of coffee colored memories. Except it is not warm or soft or familiar as he has expected. It does not smell like constant anxiety, shyness or timid affection. There are no quiet twilights of truth and care, no loud dawns of lies and pretending reflected on the smooth surface. Instead, he finds a black, unsweetened smell he doesn’t really enjoy. Hesitant, Reiner tries taking a sip. Why is it bitter and unpleasant when it should be a bit salty but delicious and hot, oh, so hot? The only thing he truly recognizes is the color, black as the darkest night.
“This smells wrong,” he comments to himself as if he is talking about the weather, “It tastes wrong.”
“Really? I haven’t done anything different from the usual,” she doesn’t seem preoccupied by her son’s words. She just simply sits on her chair and starts eating. Reiner mimics her.
Breakfast goes by silently but in a rather peaceful way. The only sounds that interrupt the quietness are the ones made by the cutlery and cups. Moreover, the town’s waking-up sounds can be heard from not very far away. Reiner is lost in his thoughts when he realizes that his mother is staring at him. He mumbles a question.
“Oh? Nothing!” she exclaims with a smile adorning her aging face, “I was just thinking about how proud of you I am.”
That startles Reiner in a way that he almost drops his cup of coffee. He finds himself blushing quickly after his shock, but he doesn’t make much of a deal, coughing the embarrassment away. He responds, scratching his beard, “Well, being a soldier has bonuses for you and for me, I guess.”
Karina is suddenly laughing sweetly, eyes closed due to the smile from ear to ear. “And it is much better when you are a warrior!”
Oh.
Oh, that’s right. He is not a soldier (not anymore, not ever); he is a well-respected warrior. He is a well-respected warrior with one of the greatest powers a human like him could have. And he had to use it in war against the enemy, who wasn’t fantastic beasts whose secrets he doesn’t know. He knows. Everything. He does not need blades or gas in order to attack the enemy, doesn’t he? He has gunpowder and knowledge and power. And he is not the enemy. He is not a monster. Everything he has done it was for the greater good: for Marley. He broke the wall because it was what he had to do. Right? He hates walls.
Breathing becomes a difficult task and clearing his thoughts is impossible. He is sweating. Karina does not really notice when she stands up and says, “Well, my warrior. I have to go to the market,” she grabs her bag and purse and directs herself towards the exit door, “You are leaving tonight, aren’t you?”
He nods, unable to speak.
“Okay, I’ll make something special for you,” her cheerful speech it’s not affecting him, “Don’t forget the keys when you leave the house!”
And Karina leaves and closes the door, leaving Reiner alone in his own personal hell.
He feels it, that shiver crawling up his back, that knot in his stomach, that pain in his chest, that dryness in his throat. He starts hyperventilating. He needs to calm down, he knows, but he cannot. He grabs his cup of coffee, which is not hot anymore, and tries to drink. Maybe that will ease him off a little. But he drops the cup. It stains his hand. And it shatters.
He is trembling.
Nothing makes sense anymore. He is not aware of his own existence, he doesn’t know who he is anymore. Is he a soldier, is he a warrior? Who is the enemy? Is he the enemy? Why are his hands stained with all of this dark blood?
He can’t breathe, he can’t focus on anything, he can’t calm down. Why can’t he calm down? He has to breathe.
He falls to the ground and ends up on his knees. Then, he crawls towards the wooden wall, just below the dining room window. He sits up, back against the wall and knees flexed. He hugs them.
He has to breathe. Slowly.
He needs someone.
‘Reiner, I’m here. Look at me. Breathe with me.’
There is a voice, a tender and worried voice, who calls him. He knows that the owner of that voice isn’t there with him, but, in some way, they are. It sounds almost like it is happening right now, although it comes from a memory he had eclipsed but he had not forgotten. He follows the memory, who guides him through the darkness. He inhales and exhales…
‘It’s okay. Reiner, I’m here.’
…Inhales and exhales.
He counts to ten. The memory does, too. He remembers green gentle eyes that have seen too much pain and anger while not many years ago they were innocent and pure. Those eyes stare at him preoccupied, hoping for him to get better. And hoping for a better tomorrow.
‘Reiner, what are you right now?’
He… He is Reiner Braun, a warrior. He fights for Marley’s future, even if there is Eldian blood running through his veins. He was chosen to be the Armored Titan when he was a child and he already is an adult, which means he doesn’t have much time to live. But that’s okay because he is proud of his time as a Marley warrior. He has built a better home for his mother, and he hadn’t needed his father for that. It is true that he sometimes believes that he is a soldier, although that is because he had to become one in order to get what he needed. What Marley needed. Furthermore, it is also true that he has killed thousands, although he does not regret it because they were children of the Devil and they deserved it. Or at least that is what Marley says.
He knows now.
He remembers a smile.
In the memory, there is coffee, too, and it smells right, and when it gets closer to him he almost can taste it and its flavor is right. But the coffee isn’t liquid, it is part of a soft short mane that brushes his face and neck when they pull each other into a hug. Reiner tries to hug the memory with all his might, although there is nothing in front of him but thin air. A void opens itself in his chest.
‘Are you feeling better now?’
He wants to say that he is fine since if He isn’t worried about him anymore, Reiner will be okay. However, Reiner is far from feeling that. This episode alone has left him devastated and he doesn’t even have the strength to stand up and continue as if nothing has happened. He also cannot say that he is fine because his heart hurts like hell, a throbbing pain has appeared in his head, and there are tears streaming down his cheeks. The memory keeps torturing him with more vivid images.
‘Hang in there just a little longer. We are closer to home than ever,’ he said quietly. It was nighttime, but the lantern’s light lit up the tent enough for them to see each other. His hands are resting on Reiner’s shoulders, making the skin there burn. It was a common reaction back then, but Reiner never had the courage to say something about it — his feelings, whatever they would be, were not as important as their mission, and he could not risk it with his own ego. Maybe he would say something about them when they are home. For now, he had to keep them quiet.
‘Yes… We are going to go home. Together,’ Reiner mutters, half convincing himself and half reassuring the other, whose worried expression transforms into a soft one. There are bags under his eyes, Reiner touches them softly with his thumb, caressing the cheek with the rest of his hand. ‘Are you okay?’
‘I’m…’ he averted his eyes from Reiner’s and leaned on his palm. Reiner hadn’t been the only one with a personal torture chamber inside his mind. They manifested their pain differently: Reiner was louder while the other one was quiet, Reiner expressed physically and explicitly what he suffered while the other expressed anything but silence, Reiner’s inferno was the world outside while his partner’s was his inside world… The only thing their problems had in common was the cause and the solution: each other’s company.
He moved away from Reiner’s hand, which had been slightly dampened. ‘It doesn’t matter,’ he whispered.
‘But it does matter, Bertolt.’
Reiner comes back from a past where he believed that everything would be fine, that nothing bad could happen. His facial expression as well as his feelings resemble the ones he had when he saw his mother for the first time in forever and discovered the thousand wrinkles that now adorn her face: shock, nostalgia, longing, remorse and hundreds of different emotions he could not place. He also remembers that, when he walked towards her and hugged her tightly, he whispered something like ‘I’m glad I’m back home’, she answered ‘Home is where the heart belongs, after all’ and he almost broke into tears. He hadn’t known why all of the sudden he had needed to cry so much, but now that he is crying like he had wanted back then he knows.
He remembers everything clearly now. He recalls all the time he had spent in Paradis, all the people he had met there who weren’t demons at all, all the moments he spent with them, all the time he was with Annie and Bertolt without thinking about Marley or Eldia or any other nation. Suddenly, everything is Bertolt. Bertolt offering him a hand when they were kids, Bertolt always by his side, Bertolt supporting all of his decisions, Bertolt’s bizarre sleeping positions, Bertolt’s cheeks reddening when he was complimented, Bertolt protecting him and him protecting Bertolt, Bertolt helping him during his panics attacks and Reiner wiping his tears, Bertolt tearing the plan apart in order to save him and Reiner not being able to save him. Reiner loosing Bertolt.
“Oh, god. Bert,” he sobs, “I am so sorry.”
Annie is alive — Armin had said so —, but nothing proves that Bertolt is. That breaks him. He had lost his best friend and someone he loved dearly in order to get back. Get back where? It’s just like his mother had said: home isn’t a specific place in space, home can be a place but also a person. Home is where the heart belongs. However, Reiner’s heart does not belong anymore, it is floating in a deep dark water that drowns him from the inside.
He cries for all the things he hadn’t said, for all the things he had said, for all the things he hadn’t done, for all the things he had…
He cries for those three simple words that tickled his tongue that morning before Shiganshina’s battle, for that kiss that still burns his lips in need, for being such a coward, naïve and pathetic warrior…
He cries because he isn’t comfortable in his childhood’s house, in Marley’s troops, in his warrior uniform, in his own skin…
Then he stops crying. Because he remembers he doesn’t have much time to live and this little time he has left he has to be strong (or at least pretend he is) in order to protect Gabi. Also, tonight he will return to Paradis hand in hand with Zeke, Porco and Pieck in order to get the Coordinate (he mustn’t call him Eren, he needs to remind himself that they mean nothing to him) and Annie. Not Bertolt, because, even if Zeke insists that there is a possibility that he has been held just like Annie, Reiner knows. His heart does.
He inhales and exhales.
Reiner gets up, cleans his coffee stained hand, grabs his house’s keys (not his home) and exits the building at the pace of Auf Wiedersehen, Sweetheart playing on a nearby gramophone.
Reiner isn’t home. He will never be.