Aircraft came roaring down, a barrage of thunder spears unleashed into the Titan horde. They detonated moments after the planes pulled up, shredding their targets into piles of steaming gore. Through the aftermath of the attack came the Eldian charge. Titan shifters leaping into the fray to rip apart Titans with their bare hands, with Reiner at the forefront of them all. His Armoured Colossal Titan form dwarfed over all but Historia's own Titan, and his steaming body burned the ground as he waded through the monsters.
Some tried to climb him, or tear into his legs, but the Titan success was limited. His body was too hot, fire spouting from the cracks in his armoured form burned away the fingertips of any Titan that tried to grab around his plates, while his mighty arms swept through the crowd and crushed dozens at a time.
But they never stopped.
They climbed over each other, using other Titans as shields from the heat as they scrambled up his legs. Though a Titan alone may have been much lighter than it should have been for its size, hundreds of them made a noticeable impact. A golden beam sliced down the front of Reiners Titan and cut through the arms of the horde that had been attempting to scale him. The creatures fell, crashing into a heap atop each other that was immediately stomped on by Reiner. His saviour soared by, landing down into a clearing to begin blasting away side by side with her comrades.
Petra was getting tired, but adrenaline was pushing her to the point that she didn't even feel it. Blast after blast she killed her foes, but it did not wear her down. This was not like Liberio, fighting with a desperation and recklessness that had her running her body to rags, now she was fighting with a true purpose again. Even as she killed Titans left and right, a single constant thought was running through her mind.
Gohan was alive.
She would have a million questions for after this was all over, but she dare not question her good fortune now. Whatever had happened to bring him back to her, she was overjoyed. But she also knew they were not out of the woods yet. The sky was beginning to blacken as storms picked up. The earth shook repeatedly, a horribly violent feeling she had never experienced, yet immediately knew the cause. Gohan and Cell's fight could threaten to rip the planet apart with their power.
She knew such a thing had happened before in Gohan's own history, his father's fight against the monster they had called Frieza. Gohan had described it in detail, how Frieza had sent the planet into a growing cataclysm as it fell apart, eventually blowing up to take both Goku and Frieza with it. Well, not exactly, but it was what they had believed at the time.
The picture that Gohan had painted had been a vivid one, and Petra did not want to experience her home being destroyed around her. She had faith though, complete and utter faith in Gohan that he would find a way.
But until he did, they had to fight and survive.
She fought hard, her heart beating with pride and love, until she saw the figure that made it beat with fear. Through the crowd of Titans, a horde of snarling and raging faces, she saw one familiar that sent a shiver down her spine. Short straight hair over a flat expression, the Titan she saw was the same she had seen back at Liberio.
"Levi…"
The words left her mouth in a hushed gasp, yet he was gone just as quickly as she saw him. A Titan stepped in front, obscuring him from view, and as she blasted it apart, he was gone. Her eyes peeled around, her senses reaching out, but it was all too much. There were so many large Ki's all around her, an ever swirling and chaotic crowd. Her eyes swept left and right in search of him, finding nothing until he broke from the crowd and charged her.
His Titan form was quick, faster than it had any right to be. His teeth crashed down in a mighty snap, missing her face by only a hairs breadth as she had flung herself back. In slow motion she saw into his monstrous eyes. It was him, he was in there, except he wasn't. Like a puppet on a string, he seemed so real and yet so lifeless, even as she felt his breath wash over her body.
His hand reached out for her, snatching through and crushing an afterimage of her as she leapt up into the air. She was above him and formed a ball of Ki into her hand. Silently, Petra made a mental apology and farewell towards him before she threw it.
It exploded against the ground, passing harmlessly through the afterimage he too had left.
Wide and alarmed eyes looked down at the ground in horror, only having a moment of realisation before he struck again. Levi had darted to the side and leapt up into the air, hand slapping her down out of the sky and towards the ground until she crashed into a crater.
'He can use his Ki!'
The thought terrified her, but she had no time to contemplate it deeper. Perhaps it was something that Cell had done specifically to him, or it was simply that he had been transformed when he already knew how to use his Ki. Whatever the case, Petra realised quickly just how dangerous the situation had become for her.
A swarm of Titans charged towards her, only to be smashed aside as Levi's Titan came rampaging through them at tremendous speed. He was so incredibly fast! Even darting to her feet and leaping away with as much of a burst of speed as she could manage, it was barely enough to keep herself out of his grasp.
Any Ki blast she hurled he dodged, jerking and twisting in ways that seemed so unnatural and impossible for a Titan. Because it wasn't a Titan, it was him. He still moved like Levi, pulling off the insane manoeuvres she had seen him doing countless times in his ODM gear. His moves and jerks towards her were impossible to track, firing off a flurry of Ki blasts to try and hit anything at all.
But he couldn't be stopped or slowed in the slightest, and as he rushed towards her she leapt up into the sky again, using her flight to keep him out of reach. She soared away, turning and preparing herself to blast again only to see… nothing. He had disappeared into the crowd of Titans once again.
Her eyes searched, senses searching too, but there seemed to be nothing for her to find until a flash of light drew her eye. She almost dismissed it at first, assuming it to be one of her allies as there were hundreds of beams being fired at any moment that could have been the source. That should have been the source. But trained instincts and experience made her pay true attention, and she spotted Levi once more.
He had cleared himself a slight opening, and gazed up at her with mouth wide open, a ball of Ki forming quickly in his mouth. Eyes wide, she tried to move as he fired, only to find herself too slow. Like wading through water, she moved through the sky in slow motion as it raced towards her, feeling the heat of the beam touch her skin before she was suddenly slammed out of the way.
The beam shot past with a roar, and Petra hit the ground hard with Mikasa on top of her. Titans around them swarmed, and the two separated quickly to blow them away and buy space.
"Mikasa! I-…" Petra couldn't say it. She wanted to say thank you, it was reflex and the lingering threads of their friendship that demanded she do it. But the words died in her throat. The pain was still there, still too raw for her to feel. Gohan may have been back, but the moment she had seen him die would live with her forever, and no matter what the reason may have been, Mikasa would forever be blamed for it in her mind.
"I saw Levi." Mikasa changed the subject quickly, saving them both the pain of Petra's hesitation. "He's not like the other Titans. Can you sense him?"
"No, he must be controlling his Ki to blend in with the others." He didn't need to hide his Ki, not with so many of the creatures around. So long as he didn't stand out like the spikes of her Eldian comrades, then he was effectively invisible. "But he seems to be focusing on me."
"Ymir said that there's still a part of them inside." Mikasa let out an invisible pulse that shredded a Titan, incinerating it neck from the flesh down to the bone and killing it quickly. "Ilse proved that too, there were Titans that worshipped Ymir and thought she was her. He knows who you are, so he's focusing on you."
Something spiked in her heart, but Petra didn't know what it was at first. It felt almost like… shame. She felt bad, guilty, Levi was focusing on her because to him, his team must have been all he had left in his mind. He was racing towards her with the last vestiges of his mind, but the Titan instincts and Cells control had him wild with murderous intent. He was seeking her out of some human instinct, but because of what he was now she would have to kill him for it.
"So, what's the plan?" Mikasa asked as Petra shot a beam that sliced through a Titans knee, dropping it to the ground before it was swiftly executed with a blast to the nape.
"Keep him in the crowd." It was a plan she was forming on the spot, but she had reasonable confidence in herself for it. "The crowd will limit him, and we can still fly out if we need to. Just don't stay in the sky or he'll blast us. The other Titans won't slow us down, but Levi will push through them to get to us. He's too fast for any of the others, so just the two of us will fight."
It was risky to do it this way, but what other choice did they have? If they brought in others to help, not only would they be outmatched, but it would weaken their continued fight against the rest of the horde. A rumble rose from the horde behind them, the sound of a beast charging through the rest of the Titans. Mikasa and Petra picked it up instantly, knowing that only one source could be to blame for it.
Though regretful, they didn't hesitate as they dropped into fighting poses and prepared for him to come.
When Levi did emerge, he did so with another Titan in his hands, holding it aloft as a meat shield against the blasts the pair unleashed at him. The Titan he held was blown apart, but enough of the torso remained as he hurled it violently towards the two of them. Sharp and jagged ribs poked out from the creatures wrecked body, ripping up the earth as Petra and Mikasa leapt sideways to avoid the attack.
Mikasa landed and sent out another Ki blast, only to see it pass harmlessly through an after image before she was struck from the side. He had delivered a mighty sweeping kick, his foot bigger than her entire body as she was launched from her feet and into Petra. The redheaded woman caught her, recovering enough in time to focus back on Levi as he rushed in to bite her in half. His jaw opened out and bit down, Petra's hands and feet flew out, blocking his mouth from snapping down onto her. Foul and wet breath washed over her face, and she could feel the vibrations through his entire body as he tried relentlessly to bite down.
"Mikasa, HELP!"
Mikasa leapt over the two of them, a Ki ball forming as she prepared to aim directly for his nape and kill him while he was distracted. One of his Titan hands plunged itself into the dirt, blinding lights shining from the cracks in the earth before the ground exploded out from beneath them. Both Petra and Levi were sent hurtling up into the sky, Levi's hand destroyed but already regenerating. Mikasa followed the two of them, tracking with Ki blast ready to fire. She released, firing off three blasts that she homed in on Levi. He twisted in the air and shielded his nape. He sacrificed chunks of flesh and bone in its place, but survived enough to bring up the remains of his arms to his forehead.
The solar flare blinded Mikasa to the point that she didn't even notice when one of the Titans from below leapt up, biting down onto her leg and dragging her down into the crowd with a scream, where the monsters swarmed over her, piling high with biting teeth and seeking to rip her apart with their hands.
"MIKASA!" Panic swept through Petra as she saw her comrade be subsumed by the horde. Before she could intervene, Levi demanded her attention again, firing off another beam from his mouth that she managed to avoid with the barest margins. It hit the horde, incinerating several of Levi's new brethren, but still only a drop in the ocean as they continued to fight.
She landed in the horde and began to dart, slipping between legs and gaps in the crowd before they crushed one another trying to get her. Shadows loomed over her, and every moment in the thick of the crowd was darkness, with a single wrong movement liable to have her ensnared and ripped apart.
Once again, Levi tore his way through them all, beelining towards her with hands raised. They had regenerated, missing chunks from his body still reforming but doing so quickly. Her hand reared back to form a blast, but he was too quick, grabbing her in his hand and ready to crush her in an instant. And yet… he didn't.
For the briefest moments of hesitation, she saw him, the real Levi. Fighting underneath the transformation and giving her the smallest window that saved her life.
A body ripped itself through his arm, shattering through the elbow joint with sheer physical momentum. Mike landed with a Ki blast in his hand, hurling it towards Levi's face though it was blocked by his other fleshy hand. Another duo of blasts struck Levi in the back, having just barely missed his nape as he jerked.
Covered in steaming gore, Mikasa flew straight for Levi. Mike struck with Ki blasts into his form, crippling his limbs as Mikasa smashed straight into Levi's spine. His Titan form twisted, lashing out at his attackers as the trio blasted him and picked apart all his vulnerabilities. Levi tried everything his Titan body allowed him. Ki blasts were fired out at random, hitting the Titan crowd but none of the Eldians attacking him. Bursts of speed, solar flares, after images, he fought desperately yet it was fruitless. Too outnumbered, too weak after he had given up the initiative, Levi finally dropped face first into the ground in a groaning mess.
Petra leapt onto his back, Ki blast in hand and held aloft ready to strike at his nape. She held it ready, knowing what she needed to do, but hesitating. Levi was a Titan. He was in pain, he was dangerous, she needed to kill him. But… She closed her eyes, muttering a quiet apology.
"Goodbye sir."
Her hand plunged down into his nape, and a flash of light illuminated through his skin. The explosion was muffled, as quiet and dignified a death as she could have been.
"He's gone." Mike muttered the words, sending out a pulse of energy that nocked back the Titans streaming towards them.
Petra nodded. She wanted to say something more, but their foes were unrelenting in their attacks, already clambering back to get them. Instead, Petra spared a glance to Mikasa and eyed her over. She looked a mess, covered in gore and mucus, but she was alive. Petra knew she should apologise to her, thank her, but all that would have to wait until after it was over.
As the Titans raced towards them again, they were thrown to the ground as the Earth shook violently. Large cracks opened up in the ground, glowing magma soon bursting out in geysers of death. Large swathes of Titans were slaughtered by it, the Eldian forces swiftly retreating out save for Historia's Titan, too large and cumbersome to move in time.
Instead, her guards cut her out quickly, flying her out as the Titan form slumped and fell into the lava.
"What the hell is going on!?" Jean cried out as he flew past the trio. He looked exhausted, drenched in sweat and with his uniform showing numerous signs of damage where Titans had gotten too close to him for comfort. His faithful assistant was by his side, looking just as worn out.
"It's Gohan and Cell!" Petra called back, instantly knowing the answer. "Gohan's doing whatever it takes to win."
The earth continued to shake as Petra explained, and it was clear to all that whatever it took to win might just doom them all anyway.
Gohan's fist burst through Cell's chest. Such a blow would have been devastating, deadly to anyone else, but for Cell after having taken so much damage already it was nothing. Cell struck back with a swipe, his sharp nails cutting through Gohan's face and obliterating one of his eyes.
Though he leapt back with a cry of agony, Gohan didn't let up in his attack. Utilising a burst of speed to blitz around Cell and delivering a spinning roundhouse kick to the back of Cells head. The chasm that Cell created in his impact would be visible from space, but did nothing to the monster, who charged back and began trading blows with Gohan.
A punch shattered Gohan's ribs, who gagged before swallowing as much air as possible and speeding around Cell once more. He grabbed the creatures' wings, ripping them off with a roar of anger, a roar drowned out by Cell's cry of pain. Kicking the creature away, Gohan panted as he recovered, pausing to rest as he watched Cell regain control.
Cell turned back to face Gohan, snarling at him but hesitating to attack. He may not have wanted to show it, but Cell was exhausted. Though he could regenerate, his body was continuing to show more and more damage. Watching him try and hide it, Gohan couldn't help but laugh.
"You… What are you laughing about!?"
Cell sneered with his teeth bared so hard they seemed closer to cracking. Gohan's laugh rose even higher before he forced himself to control it.
"You." Gohan admitted, still chuckling at Cell. "I'm laughing at you. All your power, all of your abilities, but you're not anything special at all are you?" He opened his eye, revealing it to be healing as electricity sparking around the flesh. His vision was blurring, his mind whirling as the broken orb was fixed and specks of information were sent to his brain again. "My father, my friends, so many people who could match you for strength. All that gave you a chance was the abilities you stole from other people. Now I'm so much more, now I too am able to do everything you can do, you know why? Because of my friends. The people you look down on every time, the one's you think are so insignificant, so unworthy of attention that you could never even consider the fact that they sowed your defeat. It's my friends that gave me my strength, and it will be them that led to your defeat."
Cell growled again, flexing his muscles. He seemed to consider attacking, seeking to end Gohan and his insults, but a twitch of his ripped wings had him reconsidering. "What is the point of your drivel. Do you really think I would concede to you, to dignify your lies as if they were truth?"
Gohan let out a small chuckle, his eye fully healed he could look at Cell fully once again. He considered him and decided to make him an offer. "You know what Cell, if you left this world, left it all behind, I won't pursue you."
The offer took him by surprise, Cell too stunned to fully register what was being said to him. "You… you would what!?"
"I won't pursue you." He reiterated. "I will let you go, and I won't follow you."
"What- why? Why would you do that, that's not like you at all. Explain yourself Son Gohan, explain yourself now!"
Gohan chuckled, revealing his cocksure smile. "I make that offer because I know you won't accept it Cell." He delighted in the raging sneer that pulled on his face. "I know you won't listen to what I tell you, so when you're about to die, you'll remember this moment. You'll remember the moment you chose this fight Cell, the moment you chose to embrace the path that leads to your death!"
His aura flared. As soon as his ribs had healed, he roared with power and hurled himself towards Cell, hitting him with incredible power. Cell raised his arms to block, but even though he did, Gohan's power pulsed through and blew apart his arm. Cell gasped in shock, another fist crashing into his face and cracking his skull.
Blow after blow rained down into his body, shockwaves rippling out and shaking the world itself. Cell tried to fight back, but Gohan had been right in his predictions. Cell was exhausted. His regeneration had been taxing his body to a degree he just couldn't compensate for against an opponent such as Gohan. No permanent damage could be done to him, and Gohan was too powerful to beat before Cell had worn himself out.
A kick smashed through his face, and Cell felt his jaw rip off. He was beginning to panic, feeling the growing fear inside of him. Cell tried to move, weaving and dodging with bursts of speed only to find Gohan on him at every step of the way. Punches and kicks battered Cells body, each one with such power that Cell was sent hurtling through the sky.
They soared through the air, leaving the arctic wasteland and passing by different countries. Gohan could still see and feel the people as they passed, the reminders of Cell's Titan unleashed rampage driving Gohan further and further, to hit harder and harder.
With one last punch he turned, pulling his hands in together at his side.
"Ka… Me…" The blue light shone with determination, Gohan's eyes following Cell as he struggled to regain control. "Ha… Me…" He just needed his moment.
Cell paused, righting himself and facing Gohan. Too wounded to move, but eyes wide open to see the attack coming.
"HAAAAAAA!"
The shining blue beam hit Cell head on, blasting him through the air and incinerating his body piece by piece. Cell screamed in agony as he was sent flying, bouncing off the barrier of the world and being sent hurtling in shreds to the ground. The Kamehamaha, for all its strength, dissipated and cracked when it rebounded off the barrier, no longer enough to fully kill Cell.
But Cell's body was blown to tatters. Multiple atoms and clumps remained, quickly searching for each other to reform as Gohan flew towards him.
It only took a few atoms for higher mental function to be achieved, and quickly his mind was ablaze in panic. He needed something more. Gohan's words rang tauntingly in his head. His friends had given him his strength he had said. He almost dismissed it as drivel, foolish words from a naïve child, but there was something there. Something that clawed in his mind, an insidious thing.
If Gohan claimed his friends gave his strength, then why couldn't Cell do the same?
Artillery fire rained down on the Titan horde, each of them falling over themselves as they tried to get past the chasms now blocking their path. Eldians blasted with Ki the Titans that piled themselves into the small paths that gave the Titans access to them. Incoming fire was brutal, unrelenting, but the Titan's seemed to not notice it at all.
There was no hesitation as they died in droves, sprinting with all of their might. Until suddenly, they stopped.
Mikasa sat exhausted on the dirt, cradling the wounds she had received from the Titan horde, and saw the moment where every one of them suddenly stopped. Most Eldians didn't notice, too focused on attacking or blinded to the extent by the numerous explosions. But Mikasa saw it.
Each and every Titan suddenly twisted in their expression, one of horror and pain pulling their skin back almost to the point of tearing their flesh. Their hands came up, some shaking as they tried to fight back, but all of them gripped their napes. Fingernails dug in, blood flowing free before sickening rips rang out from the horde.
Every one of them tore their necks in half. But out of the cascade of gore, lights could be seen. Twinkling balls of energy dazzled into the air, rising and flying off into the distance.
All of the Ki from each of the Titans was pulled away, off into the distance where Mikasa's senses confirmed her fears. It was all heading for Cell. Then, but a moment later, the biggest lightning storm she had ever seen struck all at once. The familiar bolt of energy of a Titan transformation.