A sincere thank you to everyone who got interested in the rock!AU and asked some really awesome, detailed questions — I'm finally delivering the answers!! I hope I didn't describe everything too chaotically.

Tattoo and piercing meanings

He got all his tattoos and piercings done by Ymir: she tried out a lot of stuff on him as a rough draft, purely out of friendship (which is why his bridge piercing isn't perfectly straight).

At first, it was driven by protest and a desire to express himself somewhere, but later he just started to genuinely love the aesthetic. He grandiosely considers his body a "diary" or something like that.

Reiner has two whole tattoos referencing the slaying of a certain "Serpent": St. George piercing it with a spear, and Heracles killing it with his bare hands. Both are about eradicating evil, lies, and the punishment of betrayal.

On his right ankle, there's another edgy piece — a wolf in sheep's clothing — because his character isn't one-dimensional, and he knows it perfectly well.

My absolute favorite is the ArmouR across his entire neck; it's pretty obvious what and who it's about

On his back — a portrait of the Armored Titan in a Japanese style (Reiner has a weakness for things that are conventionally "cool" and "unusual").

On his left ankle — one of his first INSANELY COOL (or so he thought back then) tattoos — a dagger with the inscription "Endure and Survive": he takes pride in being a tough bastard who can take it.

On his sides — a wolf devouring the Marleyan star, and a cute little My Melody with a spiked bat — the latter was requested by Gabi, who's a huge Sanrio fan and talked her cousin into it. Neither of these two has any deep meaning.

He got the syringe on his thigh on a dare, and right next to it sits a VERY BRUTAL set of brass knuckles. He also got the word "Sweet" tattooed above his pubic bone while high, because he and Bert thought it would be very fitting.

The rest of his tattoos are purely for the "vibey" look: he loved the Y2K style, which he successfully exploited, adding plenty of dead-inside swag.

Piercings: a bridge, helix piercings on both ears (two on each) and stretched lobes, snake bites, a septum, and nipple piercings.

He'd pierce a lot more of himself — he genuinely enjoys the process — but he also values aesthetics and actually knows how to stop in time.

Parents and childhood

His relationship with his parents is terrible. In this universe, he has a "full" family, though who knows if that's actually better.

His father is a classic domestic tyrant, prone to violence and alcohol, blaming his wife and (not exactly wanted) child for his failed life.

They have a mutually tense relationship, and the older Reiner got, the worse things became, until father and son eventually reached complete estrangement.

He took a dislike to his son from the very beginning and raised him using almost military methods: hard labor, sports, severe punishments. He was "making a man out of him," in a word.

A specific feature of this AU, which you don't have to read if you're not interested in genitalia:

He's so concerned about his son's masculinity and treats him with prejudice and cruelty because, specifically in this AU, there are guys with female reproductive organs, and as it happens, Reiner was born exactly like that. And that in itself is reason enough to doubt him, make humiliating jokes, give him nicknames, and constantly demand he prove something.

Reiner still has a deep-seated feeling of fatherlessness, because his biological father was more of a warden than a relative; it was actually the elder Hoover who, at least partially, managed to fill that father figure role, teaching him a lot and explaining the things a dad usually explains to a kid.

His mother is a deeply religious woman. A backbone only appears in her when it comes to behavior, "honor," "what will people say," and anything in that vein. On those matters, she kept her son on a tight leash and was strict, sometimes excessively demanding.

Otherwise, she's amorphous. She avoids thorny topics that make her uncomfortable, is completely submissive to her husband and his decisions, even if she disagrees. Her absolute limit is to literally have a cry and then agree anyway, and instead of protecting her son, she'd just pity him afterwards.

On one hand, Reiner understands her perfectly, since he lived with the same father and also couldn't say a single word against him. But he can't come to terms with the fact that she never once tried to truly protect him, even just by taking his side. He's angry at her, yet he himself acts as her protector, trying to shield her from everything he does in secret, while giving her extra reasons to be happy, to be proud of him, and to praise him.

Bertolt

Bert and Reiner met in early childhood, even before school. Karina was acquainted with the elder Hoover, and Bertolt seemed like the perfect friend for her son: a boy who comes home on time, polite and kind, and won't teach him anything bad. (Right?)

They didn't really let anyone into their friendship and kept a lot of secrets, so infatuation and a relationship with naive vows quickly blossomed, though it was kept completely secret: both sets of parents were firmly convinced the boys were chasing girls and wouldn't have reacted positively. Especially Reiner's parents, who are terribly conservative (dad).

Of course, at some point, the secret was revealed — first to one side, later to the other — but they were already adults by then, and no one could influence their decisions anymore.

As the story goes, for the sake of his own reputation and in his general emotional turmoil between Reiner and Annie, lives with whom were radically different, Bertolt "chose" Annie: he married her in a practically sham marriage, while simultaneously continuing his relationship with Reiner.

This pseudo-relationship drags on for over a year, and the longer it goes on, the more Reiner — who already suffers from a massive abandonment complex — starts to lose it. Bertolt was the only person who accepted him as he was, and even he didn't fully choose him.

He starts drinking more, numbing everything that hurts with substances, sinking deeper and deeper until he hits rock bottom — which finally becomes a sufficient wake-up call for Bertolt.

This short marriage, which was already going to hell anyway, will end; on their next tour, Bertolt better propose to Braun already, or he's getting run over by a steamroller 🙂

They'll keep living in tiny apartment Reiner rents not far from the city center.

Neither of them is really a whiz at cooking; they're used to living on deliveries and ready-made food. But if the need arose, Reiner is actually pretty good at making simple home-cooked meals; he likes meditatively chopping salads and hanging out in the kitchen when he's at his best.

However, he absolutely cannot make coffee, or anything that might "boil over."

School days and when things went south

Reiner was in the same class as Bertolt, Connie, and Jean — with the latter two, he was always getting into some kind of trouble, especially with Kirstein: regular arguments and fights were a staple of their relationship back then, but with age, they began to understand each other much better and became really tight.

Later, against the backdrop of Bertolt and Annie's relationship, Reiner often hung out with Kirstein and it was to him that he poured his heart out, complaining and getting drunk to the point of oblivion. Between them, it could be just hangouts ending in an alcoholic coma, or it could lead to nothing-more-than-that kisses, or even more. Neither of them took it seriously, but Jean is frankly hurt and bitter on Braun's behalf. He's a nasty, hot-headed guy, but he tries to support Reiner, to stop him when he's overdoing it with drugs or booze. Takes care of him, in a sense.

In high school, Reiner got tired of trying to earn his father's approval and stopped waiting for any softening. He dropped out of sports, his grades tanked, and under constant stress, he eventually rolled right into substances: at first, lighter and "harmless" ones, just to relax and forget, but by the main storyline, he's sinking deeper and deeper toward the bottom.

Over time, he disappeared from home more and more often, until he finally moved out, first to his friends' place, then into his first rented apartment.

He started using substances (and still does) precisely with Jean and Connie, in their tiny, roach-infested apartment they rent together; Springer deals on the side. Bertolt hates those guys categorically, and his relationship with Jean is strained to the absolute limit.

The Band

Later (once sports freed up his time), he and Bertolt got seriously into music. They devoted all their free time to it and eventually enrolled in a music class. That's where they met Annie and Marcel, with whom they'd later form their own band — "Four of Nine"(no deep meaning – it's simply a tribute to the warriors from a manga).

Forming their own band was just a teenage dream of Reiner and Bertolt's, who wanted to break free from the circumstances suffocating them, to make a statement, and to realize themselves in what they loved most.

Lineup:

Reiner — lead guitar (he adores its sound and is generally obsessed with guitars), backing vocals, rarely — lead vocals

Bertolt — vocals, bass guitar

Marcel — drums, sometimes mumbles or howls something into the mic

Annie — keyboards, guitar (she can generally replace almost any of them and learns their parts "just in case")

They play something close to KoЯn or Dope Stars Inc; they have both lyrical tracks and very rough ones.

Reiner's relationship with Annie didn't work out from the start. His whole type and behavior irritate her, and he's irritated by her feigned coldness and that same subservience to her own father that he himself once had. Reiner thinks her father is the one "forcing" Annie to learn multiple instruments, which leaves her with almost no free time.

Besides, right before graduating high school, that very classic love triangle among the three of them arises, as mentioned above.

Marcel, just like in canon, is an outgoing, slightly older guy, a friend and comrade to everyone, a sort of older brother. The only one in the band who tolerates Braun's antics to the very end; he generally has nerves of steel, and everything rests on him during especially stressful moments.

The rot consumes