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The first thing Eren became aware of was the wetness. Warm, rough, persistent; sliding across his cheek, his forehead, his nose, leaving a trail of sticky saliva in its wake.
"Mrrph... Mikasa stop... five more minutes...I'll do the dishes…" he mumbled, swatting vaguely at the source of the annoyance. His hand connected with something furry and solid, and the licking intensified.
Lick. Lick. Lick.
Eren's eyes snapped open.
A massive, smooth, eyeless face hovered inches from his own. Hot breath washed over him in rhythmic puffs, carrying the faint scent of... was that tree sap? The creature's mouth opened slightly, revealing rows of teeth that could have crushed his skull like an egg, and its tongue; apparently the source of his impromptu facial; lolled out for another lick.
"GAH! Stop! Stop it!" Eren scrambled backward, or tried to; his arms slipped on whatever he was lying on, and he only succeeded in flopping awkwardly like a fish out of water. "I'm awake! I'm awake!"
The Vulpimancer's head tilted, its smooth dome catching the dim light filtering through an impossible canopy. Then, from deep in its chest, a sound emerged; a low, rumbling chuff that seemed almost... amused.
Eren stared at it. The creature that had terrorized half of Wall Rose. The demon dog of a hundred nightmares. The beast that had killed cadets, burned forests, and very nearly eaten him alive.
It was laughing at him.
"You—" Eren pointed an accusing finger. "You think this is funny? I just—we were—the Titan—" Words failed him. They always did when his brain was trying to process seventeen different kinds of impossible at once.
The Vulpimancer chuffed again, and this time, its tail; a long, powerful appendage that Eren hadn't really appreciated before; gave a single, heavy thump against whatever they were standing on.
Wait. Standing on?
Eren looked down.
And immediately regretted every life choice that had led him to this moment.
They were on a branch. A very, very large branch, true; it was easily fifteen feet wide, a platform of ancient wood that could have held a house; but it was still a branch. And branches, by their very nature, were attached to trees. Trees that grew up. Which meant that the ground was down.
A very, very long way down.
Eren's breath caught in his throat. His hands, suddenly sweaty, gripped the rough bark beneath him as if it might suddenly decide to tilt him off into the abyss. Through gaps in the foliage, he could see, far, far below, the forest floor. It was a patchwork of shadows and faint light, dotted with shapes that moved with the slow, shambling gait of nightmares.
Titans. Dozens of them. Maybe hundreds for all he knows.
One; a 10-meter class with a distended belly and a face frozen in a rictus of idiot glee; was just standing there, staring up at nothing, its head slowly swiveling as if tracking invisible prey. Another, a lanky 13-meter with arms that hung to its knees, was attempting to wedge itself between two of the giant trees. It pushed, and pushed, and pushed, its featureless face showing no frustration or strain. Then its foot slipped on a mossy root, and it fell.
The sound was tremendous; a wet, crunching SMASH that echoed through the forest. Two smaller Titans, 4-meter classes that had been loitering near the base of the trees, were directly in the path of the falling giant. They didn't even have time to react. The 13-meter crushed them both, the three bodies collapsing into a tangle of steaming limbs that slowly began to dissolve into mist.
Eren winced. Beside him, the Vulpimancer made a sound that was almost a whimper, its head ducking slightly as if in sympathy.
"Yeah," Eren whispered, his voice hoarse. "That looked like it hurt."
He forced himself to look away from the carnage below, to focus on something—anything—else. His legs. Right. His legs.
He looked down at them. They were... there. Both of them. Whole. Unbroken. He flexed his toes; ten of them, all wiggling on command. He rotated his ankles. He bent his knees. Everything worked. Everything was fine.
But his trousers told a different story. From the knee down, the fabric was shredded, torn into ragged strips that hung loosely around his calves. And beneath them—
Eren pulled aside a flap of cloth, his heart hammering. His skin was pale, yes—he'd always been pale; but unmarked. No scars. No wounds. No evidence whatsoever that, just hours ago, those legs had been inside a Titan's mouth. That they'd been bitten off. That he'd felt the searing, white-hot agony of his own flesh tearing, his bones snapping, his blood—
He stopped breathing. The memory was too vivid, too real. He could still feel it, phantom pain dancing along nerves that shouldn't exist. His hands flew to his thighs, pressing hard, as if to confirm that they were still attached.
"I grew them back," he whispered. The words made no sense. They were impossible. And yet, here he was, legs intact, sitting on a branch a hundred feet above a Titan-infested forest, being guarded by a creature that had tried to kill him yesterday.
He looked at the Vulpimancer. It looked back, its smooth face unreadable but somehow attentive. Its ears; if those flaps on the sides of its head were ears; twitched toward him, listening.
"You know what happened, don't you?" Eren asked. "You saw it. The Titan... it bit me. It ate me. And then..." He trailed off, the memory fragmenting into green light and roaring and a feeling of power so immense it had threatened to consume him.
The Vulpimancer chuffed softly. Then, with deliberate slowness, it lowered its head and nudged Eren's shoulder; not hard, just a gentle push, like a dog seeking attention.
Eren stared at it. "Are you... thanking me?"
The tail thumped again. Whump. Whump. Whump.
"I—you—" Eren ran a hand through his hair, which was somehow still attached to his head despite everything. "You're welcome? I guess? I mean, I didn't really plan any of this. I just... did what felt right. And now I'm here. And you're here. And we're both not dead. So... you're welcome."
The Vulpimancer made a sound that was almost a purr, a deep, rumbling vibration that Eren could feel through the branch. It settled onto its belly, curling around him in a protective arc, its warmth seeping through his torn clothes.
For a moment; just a moment; Eren allowed himself to feel safe.
…Till reality came crashing back.
"The Omnitrix." He grabbed his left wrist, shoving the shredded sleeve aside. The watch was there, but it wasn't glowing. It wasn't even red, the way it sometimes flashed when it was low on power or timing out. It was just... grey. Dead. A dull, matte grey that reminded him of ashes and old bones.
"No, no, no..." He pressed the dial, twisted it, smacked it against his palm. Nothing. "Come on, you stupid piece of—WORK!"
The Omnitrix remained stubbornly, infuriatingly inert.
Eren slumped back against the Vulpimancer's warm flank, his brief moment of calm evaporating into the cold air. The watch was dead. His legs worked, sure, but he was a hundred feet up a tree in Titan territory with no way to fight, no way to escape, and no idea how to get home.
He looked at the Titans below. They were still there, still shambling, still mindless, still hungry. The 13-meter that had fallen was already regenerating, steam rising from its crushed torso as it slowly, painfully pulled itself upright. The two smaller Titans it had landed on were regenerating as well.
"That's gonna be us if we go down there," Eren muttered. "Splat. Then mist."
The Vulpimancer rumbled something that might have been agreement.
"So what do we do? Just... stay here? Forever?" Eren gestured vaguely at the branch, at the tree, at the impossible height. "I can't climb down—I'd break my neck. I can't climb up—there's nothing above us but more branches and sky. And I can't—"
His stomach interrupted.
The growl was loud, insistent, and utterly undignified. It echoed off the tree trunk, startling a flock of small birds from a nearby branch. Even the Vulpimancer's head snapped up, its sonic flaps swiveling toward the source of the noise.
Eren pressed a hand to his abdomen, face flushing. "What? I haven't eaten in... I don't even know how long. It's been at least a day. Maybe two." He counted back; the escape from the 103rd, the flight through Trost, the battle with the mutated Vulpimancer, the Titan attack, the... whatever happened after. "Yeah. A while."
The Vulpimancer studied him for a long moment. Then, with a grace that seemed impossible for something its size, it rose to its feet and padded to the edge of the branch. It looked down, then back at Eren, then down again.
"Oh no," Eren said. "No. Absolutely not. You are not leaving me here alone."
The Vulpimancer chuffed, then; impossibly, unbelievably; wagged its tail.
"I'm serious! You can't just—I don't know how to—there are TITANS down there!"
Another wag. The creature seemed almost playful now, its earlier trauma and rage replaced by something Eren didn't quite understand. It was like watching a wolf decide to play fetch with a rabbit…disorienting and vaguely threatening.
Then, without warning, the Vulpimancer leaped.
Eren screamed; a high, undignified sound that would have embarrassed him if he'd had any dignity left. He scrambled to the edge of the branch, looking down, expecting to see a splattered mess of orange fur on the forest floor.
Instead, he saw the Vulpimancer landing on another branch, twenty feet below and thirty feet to the left. It landed with the easy grace of a cat, its powerful legs absorbing the impact, and immediately looked back up at him.
Then it barked. A sharp, commanding sound that echoed through the trees.
Eren stared. "You want me to... follow you?"
Bark.
"Down there?"
Another bark. The Vulpimancer pawed at its branch, as if demonstrating its stability.
Eren looked at the distance. At the drop. At the Titans milling about below. At the branch that seemed impossibly far away and impossibly small.
"I can't do that," he whispered. "I'm not—I can't—"
The Vulpimancer barked again, more insistent this time. Then it did something that made Eren's heart stop. It leaped again, not down this time, but up. It caught the edge of a branch with its claws, hauled itself onto it, and in three bounding strides was back beside Eren, looking at him with what could only be described as exasperation.
It nudged him toward the edge.
"No," Eren said firmly.
Nudge.
"I said no."
The Vulpimancer sighed; actually sighed, a long-suffering exhalation of warm air; and then, before Eren could react, it bent down and grabbed the back of his shirt in its teeth.
"HEY—PUT ME DOWN—THIS ISN'T—"
They were airborne.
Eren's scream cut off as the wind rushed past him, as the branch fell away, as the ground rushed up and then stopped because the Vulpimancer had landed on another branch, fifty feet away and thirty feet down, with Eren dangling from its jaws like a particularly disgruntled kitten.
The creature set him down gently on the new branch, then looked at him expectantly.
Eren lay there for a moment, gasping, heart pounding, mind blank. Then he sat up, pointed a shaking finger at the Vulpimancer, and said, "If you ever do that again, I will—I will—"
He couldn't think of a threat that would matter to a creature that could carry him through the air like a toy.
"I will be very annoyed," he finished weakly.
The Vulpimancer chuffed. It might have been laughing again.
Below them, the Titans continued their endless, mindless wandering. One of them; a 7-meter with a comically big head; looked up at the sound, its beady eyes scanning the branches. For a terrifying moment, Eren thought it had seen them. But then its gaze slid past, unfocused, and it returned to its eternal patrol.
They were safe. For now.
Eren looked at the Vulpimancer, at the impossible creature that had been his enemy, his ally, his captor, and now; apparently…his transportation.
"We need a plan," he said. "A real plan. Not just... jumping around in trees hoping we don't die."
The Vulpimancer tilted its head.
"First: food. I'm starving. If I'm going to figure out how to get home, I need to not pass out from hunger."
The creature's ears perked up. Food it understood.
"Second: the Omnitrix." Eren held up his wrist, showing the dead grey face. "I need to figure out how to recharge it, then transform to burst out of here to get there." He gestured vaguely in the direction of the Walls, somewhere far behind them.
"Third: home. I need to get back to Mom, to Mikasa, to Armin. They're probably freaking out." He paused, a fresh wave of guilt washing over him. "They're definitely freaking out. I've been gone... I don't even know how long."
The Vulpimancer made a soft sound, almost sympathetic.
Eren looked at it; really looked at it. The orange fur, the dark patterns, the powerful body. This creature had been through hell. It had been captured, experimented on, turned into a weapon. It had killed people…Eren couldn't forget that, wouldn't forget that. But it had also saved him, multiple times. It had carried him away from danger, protected him from Titans, and now it was... what? Helping him? Sticking with him?
"Why are you still here?" Eren asked quietly. "You could have left. Gone anywhere. Found somewhere safe. Why stay with me?"
The Vulpimancer regarded him for a long moment. Then it did something Eren didn't expect. It lowered its head, pressed its smooth forehead gently against his forehead, and let out a low, rumbling sound that vibrated through both of them.
It wasn't a purr, exactly. It was more like... acknowledgment. Connection. A bond that neither of them had chosen but both of them now carried.
Eren's eyes for some reason stung. He blinked rapidly, blaming the wind.
"Yeah," he whispered, reaching up to touch the creature's head. "Me too."
They stayed like that for a moment; boy and beast, lost and found, bound together by circumstance and survival and something that felt almost like family.
Then Eren's stomach growled again, and the moment shattered.
"Okay," he said, pulling back, face reddening. "Food. Really. We need to find food. Now."
The Vulpimancer's tail wagged.
And somewhere, far below, a Titan moaned in endless, mindless hunger.
Eren looked down at the forest floor, at the monsters that waited there, at the impossible height and the impossible distance and the impossible task ahead of him.
Then he looked at the creature beside him; his unlikely ally, his strange companion, his only friend in a world gone mad.
"Alright," he said, squaring his shoulders. "Let's do this. Together."
The Vulpimancer chuffed, and together, they began to move through the branches, two small figures in a vast and dangerous world, searching for a way home.
Chapter 30-31 are already available on Patreon.com/Weeb Fanthom.