"Okay, is everything ready in place?"
What was once a large and empty field had been filled with dividers, personnel, tables and chairs, with pre-packaged supplies ready and waiting. As Gohan waited for the vast team of technicians on radio to make final confirmation, he looked over their work with anticipation. Preparing to supply and integrate a potential extra one billion people was a massive undertaking that they had of course been preparing for. Something more understated, yet just as important, was what to do when the people physically arrived. They needed space for them all to be organised, given context of what had happened, and led through to their new homes.
By a vast number, the new arrivals would outnumber their soldiers and workers, meaning their organisation and control had to be top notch. Rehearsals had been drilled into everyone for quite some time, and they'd recruited every reasonably able person they could manage for the task to come. Paradis Island was also going to be the simplest to manage. One of the smallest returning populations, with an already large amount of empty space, the greatest concentration of people with Ki aside from those on loan to other nations, and a returning population that had at least somewhat lived with a trust in the crown. When the people arrived, Historia would give them a small speech, and the processing would begin. As he imagined, would the tears.
"All stations around the world are reporting that they're ready." Came the final word of the radio operator.
Historia looked to Gohan with a final nod of certainty, and he stepped forward towards the dragonballs. Given what they were about to do, Dende and Piccolo's presence would have been considered too much for them to handle, and so instead it would be Gohan to make the wish.
He cleared his throat and began.
"Come forth Shenron, I summon you!"
The dragonballs glowed a golden light, and a tower of lightning crackled from the orbs. Spiralling and twisting into the sky, the mighty form of Shenron was birthed into the new world, its sky darkening and the world standing in awe as he appeared.
"I AM THE ETERNAL DRAGON. SPEAK YOUR WISHES SO THAT I MAY GRANT THEM."
"Holy shit…" Muttered one of the soldiers, and Gohan suppressed a snort. Yes, Gohan's power may have been incredible, but it had come from ostensibly a fairly normal looking man. The mystical green dragon that wrapped around the sky and stared down at them was something else.
"It's good to see you again Shenron." Gohan muttered as he smiled up at the creature. He knew Shenron likely had no emotional attachment to any of the beings that summoned him, but he also knew that Gohan and the Z fighters had likely been a more recurring presence than usual. He looked off to the side and saw his father standing with pride, and remembered what he had said about wishing every chance he could for his sons return. Perhaps it wouldn't be fondness that Shenron was feeling, but irritation. It was said after all, that familiarity breeds contempt.
"Oh mighty dragon, I have two wishes for you to grant me! For my first wish, I ask that you undo the damage caused to this planet by the monster Cell and the war between Marley and the Mid-East Alliance!"
"YOUR WISH IS GRANTED."
Shenrons red eyes glowed, and there was a sudden pulse of energy as the world shifted. Craters were filled, cracks in the planet mantle repaired. Instantly, from the smallest to the largest building was instantly repaired. Flora was replaced, and what had once been turned into barren wastelands were transformed into lush fields of grass and trees. All over the world, the first visual sign of peace was made.
"SPEAK YOUR SECOND WISH!"
"Ok…" Gohan pulled out a thick wad of papers and began to read aloud. "For my next wish, I want you to bring back to life all those who have died within the last 100 years! With the following stipulations and details. Number one, do not bring back anyone who is considered completely evil and beyond redemption. Number two, the people brought back need to be organised at the following locations; all Eldian people and those who lived and died on Paradis Island are to be brought to the island, organised by alphabetical last name through the grids we have marked out by the white flags. The exceptions therein are for families of immediate descendants from-"
"UHHH… EXCUSE ME." Shenron interrupted, looking somewhat confused and irritated at the length of Gohan's wish. "HOW MANY CONDITIONS DO YOU HAVE ON THIS WISH?"
Gohan quickly thumbed to the last page and checked the count. "I have 56 pages of conditions."
A sweat drop appeared on the dragon, and though everyone else suddenly looked a little sheepish, Gohan stood by his word. Categorising and organizing the wishes of the entire planet as they returned had taken a lot of hard work, and he'd put in a lot of effort to be as thorough as possible with the wish.
"JUST GIVE ME THE PAGES."
Gohan shrugged and used his telekinesis to levitate the pages up to in front of Shenron's eyes. Thankfully, he hadn't written the pages double sided, otherwise this would have been even more difficult. A small pair of reading glasses popped into existence over Shenron's eyes as he read through the pages, humming as he did so. Time passed awkwardly for the onlookers as they waited for the dragon to finish studying their work. For some of them, it felt awfully similar to having handed over an assignment to a teacher to review and see if they had passed or not.
After what felt like several agonising minutes, Shenron's glasses disappeared and he seemed to refocus back onto them.
"IS THERE ANYTHING ELSE TO SPECIFY FOR YOUR WISH?"
"Nope, that's everything."
"VERY WELL. YOUR WISH IS GRANTED."
His red eyes glowed and lightning crackled as his body disappeared, reforming into light and returning to the dragonballs as they rose back up towards the sky. They moved to separate and fly off to scatter across the world, only to be swiftly caught as Gohan and Goku moved to grab each of the stones. Hunting down the orbs in a years' time would have been quite the pain, and Dende wouldn't have been very happy.
"Did it work?" The question was on everyone's minds, but it was Historia who asked it, the Queen of Paradis Island looking to Gohan in anticipation of his answer.
In response, the half-Saiyan looked out across the fields they had prepared and saw the first pop as figures began to appear. Bright light took humanoid shape a billion times over across the planet, and human beings popped back into life from across a hundred years of tragedy. Their wish has worked.
Eren stared at his hands in wonder, feeling the fresh air fill his lungs in a way he never thought he would again. The last thing he'd remembered was the afterlife, meeting a creature who told him he was strong enough to go to heaven and retain his physical form. It was a world of joy, and peace, but not of his father, one not strong enough to retain his form and had instead become a spirit. Alone in heaven, Eren had still found himself… at peace.
But now he was elsewhere, surrounded by people all looking around in confusion.
"Eren!" The shout was familiar, though hard to hear over the chattering of so many voices. He rose up into the sky, ignoring the shouts of alarm from the strangers around him, and saw the origin.
It was his mother, standing upright and smiling with tears streaming down her face.
"Mom…"
He blitzed towards her, almost crashing into her with far too much force before managing to control himself at the last minute.
"Mom! You're okay! And you're… you're standing! How?"
"Another miracle from Gohan." She said as she gently brushed his hair and held him tight against her chest. "I'm so happy to have you back. You were-…"
She couldn't finish the words, but he could, gulping painfully as he said them. "I died. Mom, I'm so sorry, I- AGHH!"
"Eren Jaeger! Don't you ever pull a stunt like that again, do you hear me!?" The pull and twist on his ear should have meant nothing with his new Ki powers, but it seemed the strength of a scolding mother was more powerful than any other force.
"OW! Mom! I had too, it was to save the world!"
The force relented, though the finger did not let go as she eyed him dangerously. "Yes, you did, and I understand that and am proud of you. But don't you ever scare me like that again or do such a thing without telling me. Do you understand young man?"
"I understand! I understand!" She let go of his ear and pulled him in again, hugging him as he soothed his injury. "By the way, where's Mikasa?"
"Don't worry, you'll see her soon. She wanted to see you too, but she had some people to find first."
"Excuse me! Have you seen our daughter?"
Mr and Mrs Ackerman tried to get the attention of anyone in the crowd of value, though everyone was either unfamiliar with the two parents or wholly distracted by other events. The two of them had their own infinite number of questions, but they were entirely too pre-occupied with their last memories. A group of men had come for them, something had happened and now they were standing in a field without their daughter.
Clutching each other for security, the parents pushed their way towards the edge of the crowd where one of the soldiers was waiting. It wasn't exactly the Garrison uniform they had seen before, but it was clearly identifiable as a military uniform of some sort.
"Miss! Please, can you help us? We're looking for our daughter, Mikasa-"
"-Ackerman." The woman finished, looking at the two of them strangely, as if she was holding back a wave of emotion upon seeing them.
"Y-yes." Mrs Ackerman began, stepping forward and gently touching her arm as they begged for help. "Please, do you know her? I'm afraid something terrible has happened."
"Almost, but everything's okay now." She said with a smile. "Hi mom, dad."
The two parents blinked, looking at the woman with a familiarity they didn't realise they'd felt. Mr Ackerman almost thought she'd been some distant cousin of his, a strange similarity to his own family he could see on her face. His wife thought she could have been a little sister, so alike they almost seemed as a rare pair of Asians. But as strange as those final words had been, there was an emotional force that compelled them to see it.
"Mikasa…"
The woman began to cry, and flung herself into the pair, wrapping them up into her arms in a hug. Gingerly, the two parents began to return the hug as realisation crept in even against their understanding of how, and tenderly they hugged their daughter.
Grisha looked around the crowd in alarm. Was this what happened to Titan shifters who died? Did they become one with the dead who had been taken by Titans? Or was this Ymir's realm, and the forms around him were other Titan shifters from throughout all of history?
As much as he tried to understand, he simply couldn't, and the noise of crowd began to overwhelm his ears. Shutting his eyes and clapping his hands over his ears, he tried to block it all out, silence everything so he could just think. Whatever flickers of peace he had been hoping to get were lost when he felt a tug on his shirt.
"Dad?" The questioning voice came from a little girl as he opened his eyes to see her. She looked at him in scrutiny, before changing her mind and turning to leave. "I'm sorry, I thought you were my dad."
His hand reached out and grabbed her arm before she could leave, as familiarity hit him. It was her, just as he remembered. The last time he'd seen her, the day where the two of them had snuck out of the internment zone and been caught. The day where some Marley guards had thrown his sister to their dogs to be eaten alive.
"Fey…" His words were but a whisper, and her confusion turned to fear as she tried to pull out of his grip. He pulled her into him, hugging her tightly even as she squirmed against him. "Stop! Stop! Please, it's me! It's Grisha! It's your brother…"
She paused, pulling back only enough to look him in the face. She was still wearing the same outfit, the same style of simple clothes that all Eldians wore in the internment zones, but he had changed so much. Grown so much, and wearing a completely different outfit, the same he'd been wearing the day he had transformed his son. Yet despite it all, there was recognition.
"Grisha? You're… you're so old."
He laughed, an honest to goodness laugh as he pulled her in tight against his arms.
"I'm sorry Fay. I have… I have so much to tell you. I don't know what's happened but, I'll tell you everything I know."
"I can help." Another female voice, this one from a woman. Grisha turned his head to see another figure he'd not seen in years work their way through the crowd towards him.
"Dina…?"
Hovering above the crowd of people, Levi looked around them all in confusion. He had seen the people's shock when he flew up above them all, and had been gifted with the view of the Eldian military surrounding countless people and attempting to maintain control. His senses were being overwhelmed. So many people, so many energies he could sense, and so many were familiar. So many that he thought he would never sense again… He turned as a familiar presence flew up to him.
"Petra, what happened?" He looked around at the crowds of people. "I remember fighting Cell. We were being killed one by one, he… did something to me. I remember fighting, and pain. I died, didn't I? How am I here?"
"You died." Petra confirmed, though looking uncomfortable about it as she remembered what he had been through. "Cell transformed you, turned you into a Titan and unleashed you on the world. Others too. But," she gestured around them, "Gohan's family arrived, brought the dragonballs with them. Now everyone's back. Not just those who died recently, but a hundred years of death."
A hundred years!? Levi's mind boggled at the thought, and he looked over the crowd. He could certainly believe that it was a hundred years of people, the crowd was enormous, spanning across an unfathomable stretch of land that had been prepared for them. Then something else twigged in his mind. A hundred years, everyone who had died. Him, his team, Hange, even… His eyes bulged, and he began searching around with a fervour he didn't realise was still possible for him.
He couldn't sense for it, he didn't know their energy signatures, and among the massive crowd of people he thought it would take him an eternity. But flying over the heads of people tended to make them take notice, and look towards him, and it didn't take him long before he found what he was looking for.
A girl and a boy standing side by side, looking at him in shock at what he was doing.
He flew down in an instant, landing in front of them and startling them with the seeming impossibility of what he had just done.
Isabel and Furlan looked at him like he was some kind of creature, and he couldn't help but laugh at their reactions. He was older, he'd been flying, but they hadn't changed a day. Not since the last time he'd seen them, during the excursion that had left them both dead. The last thing he'd seen of Isabel was her severed head, decapitated from her body by a Titan he'd killed too late. Now here she was, looking at him with that same wide eyed look he'd seen a million times before, yet never since.
"Big brother?"
"What the hell?" Nile Dok moved between the crowd, looking to see who if any he recognised. Most he didn't, some he did, a few MP's that had worked for him over the years, but some he knew who had died. Murdered in what had been thought to be corruption related cases, but never with enough evidence to provide a lead. Some had called them dirty, but he'd known it was the opposite. They were people he knew had been killed because they were innocent.
"Commander Dok, can you explain this to me?"
Premier Zackley's gruff voice rumbled, and he snapped to attention, though sadly without an answer for the man.
"I don't know sir, I-… sir, you're dead." The premier looked at him with an almost dismissive confusion before vague memories began to return to him. "I watched you die sir, I-… I died."
"Is this the afterlife?"
"Not quite." Strolling through the crowd as a pair of soldiers parted them for him, Dot approached the pair of former colleagues. "Dhalis, Nile, please come with me, we have a lot to catch up on."
Armin broke through the crowd in search of a select group of people. From their planned order, he knew where they should be, and indeed it didn't take him long to find them. Sharing an emotional reunion were a group of three people. A grandfather he'd last seen during the 'attempted reclamation of Wall Maria' which had of course been nothing more than a purge, and the two parents he'd not seen since he was but a young child. Parents who had been killed for attempting to leave the walls behind, to find what was beyond the world they had known at the time.
Oh, he had so much to tell them.
They saw him as he came near, all three of them. Recognition flickered in their eyes at different rates, he looked so different now. Older, standing more certain, and in one of his finest business outfits as the proud company representative he was.
"Hi."
"Commander Erwin? You need to listen, the Female Titan has broken free and- and…" Hange had seen her commanding officer from afar, approaching with a satisfied smile and not at all taken aback by the large crowd she had found herself in. All she'd remembered was a fight, attempting to hold off the Female Titan as her team died in vain, and the others tried to flee.
She'd felt an urgency, an urgency to warn him, and yet even as she'd begun to speak, she'd known it was pointless. More memories came to her, those very final moments.
"Commander Erwin? Did I… die?" He nodded. The smile on his face wasn't what one would have expected from such terrible news, as instead he looked relieved. She looked down at her hands, pinching herself as she came to a realisation. "I'm alive? I'M ALIVE! WOOHOO!"
She screamed in joy. It was no secret that Hange loved life, and especially loved discovering its secrets. It felt like now she'd discovered perhaps the biggest secret of all. What happened after death. Admittedly, she couldn't remember at the moment, but she was sure it would come to her.
"I'm alive! Commander, were you waiting for me?"
She faked a swoon, though was a little disappointed when Erwin didn't play along and let her drop down to the grass.
"Waiting for you, but also another." His eyes moved from her towards the crowd, as he picked out the one he was looking for.
There was a man in a teacher's outfit who looked at Erwin with a growing familiarity, and furrowed brow.
"Erwin?"
"Hello dad." Erwin smiled at his father, a man who had been killed when Erwin had asked questions his father had pursued. The questions Erwin had asked, now had answers, and he couldn't wait to share them.
"Mom?" Connie found his mother by his side when he appeared on the grass. Her weak legs had her on the ground, rubbing and soothing them with her hands as she noticed her son.
"Connie? You're back, it's been so long I thought the scouts would never let you have a break." She seemed to notice their strange surroundings and the crowd of people were a far cry from the village of Ragako. "Where are we Connie?"
He wrapped her in a hug before he even knew what was happening, simply overjoyed to have her back. "Mom! I- You-… it's ok, you're back now." She clearly didn't understand, but she hugged him back regardless. A wave of guilt washed over him, and he wished that he'd hugged his mother more in life. He should have been better to her.
A shadow passed overhead, and Connie turned to see Sasha had arrived by their side. She was beaming down at him, looking a few years older but just as bright and happy as ever.
"Hey Connie, long time no see."
The first thing Annie saw was a pair of soldiers standing before her, arms crossed and tense. Her hand flew into her mouth, and in a panic she bit down hard, blood spurting into the air, the trigger for her Titan transformation.
Nothing happened.
The soldiers seemed neither surprised, nor worried about her attempt, and merely flicked their eyes over to another who was near her. Not just one other, but two. Bertholdt was on the ground next to Annie, looking dazed and confused and just as defensive as her. But Reiner… Reiner was older, and putting a calming hand on Bert's shoulder as he whispered softly to his friend.
He looked older, not just in the passage of time but the man seemed worn. She began to speak, only managing confused babbles before he turned to face her, giving her a sad smile before he jerked his head slightly to behind them. A young boy was with them, so much smaller than the rest of them Annie hadn't noticed him at first. But even as she saw him, her brain moved to dismiss him as she knew he simply couldn't be there. The last time she'd seen him, he'd been devoured by a Titan as they travelled to Wall Maria.
"Marcel?"
Marcel Galliard was but a young man, not even a teenager when he'd been killed as the four warriors travelled to Shiganshina to breach Wall Maria. They hadn't truly understood the horrors that had awaited them, nor the suffering it would take on them to enact such a thing. He had died young, naïve, and saving Reiner's life, a far cry from the future that the rest of the warriors would live.
"A-Annie? Is that you?"
He could barely recognise her, having grown so much since last he'd seen her, from a child to a teenager, approaching womanhood. She looked to Reiner for explanation, her eyes darting nervously to the two guards watching them and her pulse quickening.
"It's okay Annie." Reiner said, sighing wearily as he took a seat by all three of them. "There's a lot to catch you all up on. But it's ok, you're safe."
The grass was nice to touch, a soft feeling beneath her fingertips. Frieda simply laid there for a while, savouring the sensation as she tuned out the noise all around her. It was more than simple peace and quiet that she felt. For the first time, in a long time, she felt no other presence in her mind, no subconscious desires or force changing her mind for her. She was finally, alone again.
The voices around her would not leave her be though, and she felt the touch of her mother shaking her awake. Frieda looked at her and saw the others too. Her family, not just her brothers and sisters or mother and father, but so many more, people it seemed from generations back. She recognised her grandparents, having briefly known them as a child, and seen portraits enough to recognise the rest of her family tree.
Each of them was talking amongst themselves in confusion, or trying to pry answers from the guards around them. They weren't hostile, or rude, simply passive to their demands.
"Answer me! What is happening here!?" Demanded one of her ancestors, one she recognised as having held the powers of the founding Titan for some time.
"You've been resurrected." The simple explanation came without fanfare from a familiar face, and Frieda smiled as she stepped forwards with Ymir by her side, both looking as fancifully as possible. "A hundred years of people resurrected so that we may have true peace, once and for all."
"Y-you!" Frieda's mother held up an accusing finger, spitting venom as she saw Historia again. "You're the one who killed us! Murderer! And how dare you, what are you doing with that crown!?"
"You will address her as 'your highness'." One of the guards corrected rather smugly, enjoying the way she and so many others balked. "She is your queen after all."
"Thank you, Marco." Historia said, her own smile soft and the pride hidden well, but Frieda saw it clearly and took her own joy in its presence. "A lot has changed, so listen well as the speech will soon begin. But in short you have all been resurrected, the year is 852, and I am the Queen of Paradis Island. I'll speak to you all later."
She turned away from them, pausing only briefly to give her sister a genuine smile that Frieda returned. A few of their ancestors began to protest, a few more bit their hands to attempt a transformation, only for nothing to happen.
Frieda tuned it all out as she watched Historia take her place on the stage to address her people.
"Attention everyone! People of Paradis Island! I am Queen Historia Reiss, ruler of Paradis Island and the Eldian people! The Titan threat is over, peace has returned to the world, and with it so have you! Thanks to the angel of Trost, Gohan Son, you have all returned to the plane of the living! The bloodshed is over, and the damage undone, there is now and forever, world peace!"