.the enemy in question
.1 .i’m trying
Humanity. There really is no saving it. No matter how many wars you have, how many plagues and purges, you can never actually cleanse humanity of the evil it is. The one thing you can do though is trying to get rid of the bigger problems, to have the smallest sliver of peace at the cost of a few noble sacrifices.
"Y/n get your head out of the clouds." I feel a smack to the back of my head, Porco walks past me holding his bags, classtime must be over. "You ready to have your ass handed to you at training?" I quickly gather my book and shove them into my bag to catch up.
"Yeah right, you keep talking shit yet the only thing you have been able to win against me is our bow and arrow training." I brag, walking alongside my best friend. "Let's not be late again, Zeke is gonna chew us out." Porco laughs and nods as we head to the courtyard. Of course, everyone was already outside waiting on us. We all head to our respective spots in a line awaiting General Magath.
"If you two keep showing up late you're gonna get caught and it's going to look bad on all of us. Don't let it happen again, understand?" Zeke's demanding voice sent a chill down my spine, I nod.
Magath walks up and we all straighten up. "All right you damned devils, today we're doing cardio and stamina training, you've all been slaking and slowing down so we're going to fix that right away. Heard?"
"Heard!" we shout in unison.
We all run out to the flat plain where our races usually take place. Training consist of sprinting and a 4 mile run with gear and no breaks. I absolutely despise stamina days. Running isn't exactly my strong suit, neither is breath control. Still, at least I have good comrades and even friends by my side to help me when I fall. Like Porco and Marcel; our trio had been friends since birth, well for me at least considering I'm the youngest, we all grew up in the same division and we all shared the same dream of saving the world from our damned ancestors since we learned about it in school. Although I never understood why we were responsible for the earlier generations' sins I followed along with everyone else and grew to be one of the top Marley warriors.
During the 6m sprints, we were paired up and told to race. I was paired with Marcel, by his physique I could tell he was over with today's training and was about to collapse. Easy win. Everyone stands behind us observing, Magaths eyes stare intently as we wait for him to start the timer.
"I may be tired but there's no way in hell I'll let Porco get teasing rights for letting you win." Marcel whispers. I turn my head to him earning a wink.
"Keep talking bud, I can tell by your body language there's no chance that you're gonna be running faster than me." I scoff readjusting my legs.
"Set...Go!" Magath yell. I push off from the ground gaining speed slowly but steadily. We go at the same pace for a while but Marcel gains speed. I push my pace harder while trying to focus on my breath. The finish line is just a couple of meters away but, Marcel starts slowing down. You take the advantage and pass him and cross the line first. You both lay on the ground catching your breath as everyone else makes their way to you cheering for your victory. "Marcel, I expect more from you especially considering who you are up against," Magath says walking back to the building. "Training is over for today."
"Damn Marcel. y/n beat you. Are ya getting weak old man?" Porco joked poking his elder brother. "How does it feel to finally have a win in sprints y/n I'm sure you're proud of yourself." I stand up and shuffle over to Marcel.
Smack
"You asshole. Do you think I can't win by myself? Do you think I'm weak? Well, I'm not. If you ever make yourself weaker when competing against me I'll beat you till you can't think straight." I hissed. I hate feeling weak, yes. But being treated like I was weak felt even worse. Porco put his hand on my shoulder but I shoved him away. He does the same thing but in academics. They treat me like a child that just needs to be praised to be able to do something, and it makes it hard to tell sometimes if what I excelled on was really me or if it was for me.
Later that night I heard a knock at the door. It was late at night so it could only be two things: Marcel and Porco are here to check up on me, or an officer is here for some reason. I slowly open the door to find Zeke.
"Y/n I need to speak with you in private, Commander Magath has a message." he continues to walk in past me. My parents come in looking concerned, Zeke reassures them nothing is wrong and ask permission to talk alone in my room. When they agree he grabs my wrist harshly and pulls me back to my room locking the door.
"What the hell is going on? What's so important that Magath has to send you out here so late?" I ask worried that something happened during our training today.
"Nothing, he didn't send me out here. I just needed to talk to you," he confesses. Makes sense my parents would have never just let me and him "talk" knowing what happened with his parents. It's still a little weird though. Mine and Zeke's relationship is complicated, we could be seen as brother and sister for the most part if it wasn't for our looks, but other times we absolutely hate each other. Not going to lie Zeke scares the shit out of me but I'm pretty sure it's a mutual feeling. He told me once that my "passion and devotion" was inhumane and no one should care about one specific thing so much.
"Look, you need to be doing better. I overheard Magath talking and he heard your outburst on Marcel. He said when it comes time to start picking titan holder you're definitely not going to get one with the track you are on. I wanna look out for you, we have the same goal here. I know that you aren't putting your all into it though. What's holding you back?" he asks. He wasn't completely wrong, but this is the guy that snitched on his own parents. If I told him I sometimes doubt our mission there's no telling what he would do.
"Nothing Zeke, I just don't really know what I'm doing. I can't tell my strengths from my weaknesses because of Marcell and Poc. They try to help me by making themselves look worse than me. I love them for it, but I really just need to be able to perform on my own." Once the words leave my mouth I realized what I said, basically blaming my poor scores on them. And by the look that Zeke gave me, he was going to make sure it would change. Hopefully, he goes to them instead of the commander. It actually is great if he didn't say anything at all so I could talk to them.
"I see, I will go over and talk to them after I leave then."
"No!" I say a little louder than intended.
"No?'
"Uh-yeah no don't I'll go talk to them. They'll probably listen better to me anyway. I promise this will be fixed by the morning." I beg, he gives me an unsatisfied stare adjusting his glasses.
"I suppose, but I better see you putting your all into training tomorrow. Got it?"
"Yes sir" I joke saluting him. I walk out the door with him after telling my parents I was passing the (fake) message on to the guys and that I would stay over at their house so Zeke could get back home. It was pretty risky going out at this time of night especially since it was past curfew.
I bang on the door of the Galliards hoping their parents were asleep yet. The door swings open with a loud groan coming from the person who opened it. It was Marcel wearing only shorts, my cheeks heating up at the sight of his shirtless upper body. I push him out of the way letting myself in.
"Hey! Do you know what time it is? Sleep o' clock. Leave." he says grabbing my shoulders and pushing me back out the door.
"No, I need to talk to the both of you, like right now." I stop him from closing the door in my face.
"Is it really that important that it can't wait till morning?" he leans his against the door frame making my face once again heat up. 'Dammit, Marcel why are you so effortlessly pretty?'
"Yes, I told Zeke I would have this problem fixed by morning."
"When did you have time to talk to Zeke?"
"He was just at my house."
"Excuse me? At this hour?... Come in, don't want you getting caught outside." The mention of Zeke's name made him gag. The two weren't friends, and with Zeke being much older yet not shy at all when it comes to physical touch or choice of words, Marcell had a protectiveness towards you when it came to him. He stealthy leads you to his room answering your question of if his parents were asleep or not.
"Okay what was so important that you needed to sneak out past curfew to talk to me?" he ask again laying out some blankets for you to sleep on.
"I need Poc too. It's about earlier..." your voice gets lower, you replay the scene in your head and realized that your reaction was a little dramatic.
"Oh yea, your gonna beat me till I think straight was it?" Marcel teased watching curl into a ball on his bed with a groan. He makes his way over and lets all his body weight fall onto you.
"Marcel get off you big oaf!" you whine, giggling as he reaches for your sides and starts poking. You try to conceal your laughter not to wake anyone up, but you can't and Porco swings open the door.
"What the hell is going on in here?" he asks rubbing the sleep out of his eyes. His eyes set on me and he rushes to close the door and get near. "What are you doing here it's past curfew!" he whispers yells.
"I needed to talk to you both. Marcel is just messing around." You catch your breath sitting up on the bed. You all get situated into a spot finally getting serious. "Look I love you both, BUT you need to stop helping me out during school and training. You don't think I notice but I do. It's holding me back and making me look like the weak link. I can't even tell what I'm good at because you'll purposely do badly on a test." The boys look at each other with their heads down. Your eyes go back in forth between the two, it was like they were talking telepathically, mouths not moving but having a whole conversation in front of you.
"Look Y/n we didn't mean any harm. We were just trying to get you in the light so the commander could see you." Porcos words were harsh but he means well. Marcel elbows his younger brother for how he ignorantly said his plead.
"What this idiot is trying to say is that we can tell you try but maybe...you arent...trying your best? We are trying to push you to be better than us by messing with your mind so instead of wondering if you were better or not you would just be your best and it would pass us," he explained, his eyes widening in fear when he seeing your hurt face.
"You don't think I try hard enough? I've been pushing myself ever since we started this damn thing! I've been the smallest, the weakest, the dumbest from day one. Why in the world would mess with my mind help at all? You leave me confused and I try and try but it's never good enough." Marcel comes near to comfort you but you push him away. Your best friends think so little of you. "Don't please, just promise me you will stop. I wanna beat both your asses fair and square, alright?" you force out a laugh to lift the mood. Both the boys nod quickly and pile on top to hug you.
"I don't like it when you get mad, your all bitchy." Porco says earning a smack from you. He goes back to his room leaving you and Marcel alone again. You both stay up for a while talk for a bit before going to bed. He insists you take the bed while he lays on the floor as always.
"Good night y/n. I'm waking you up extra early for keeping me up this late." you both giggle. You laying on the edge of the bed face to face with him on his knees. Your faces get closer and closer. You can feel his breath on your face. You two had feelings for each other, yea, you both knew it. But neither of you acted on it, you knew it would be difficult when you got drafted and you would rather wait till you got older anyway, your mother is always rambling about how young relationships never last. Marcel goes forward and places a soft kiss on your forehead. You smile at him before he lays down. As your drift off to sleep you hear him whisper one last thing.
"We'll get there one day after we both save humanity."
---
words: 2.3k
hope yall enjoy a try at a new fic, I've been planning this forever so hopefully I'll stay motivated to keep writing. ALSO IK IT LOOKS LIKE A MARCEL FIC BUT IT NOT LOL. just helps with the feeling and the dramatic :)