"I am certain," Mikasa said, evenly. "That Armin would be just as pleased with an easier-to-get flower."
Eren snorted in frustration, dusted himself off with his hands, and pawed at the ground with his hooves to get ready for another go at climbing the cliff face.
"Armin needs this flower for his potion study with Hanji," Eren said. "How else is he gonna get it and pass?"
Eren grabbed at the scruffy, sparse roots on the cliff face to try and haul himself up. His hooves scrabbled for purchase on the cliff face. Eren huffed, puffed, flattened his ears to his head in determination. He squinted upward, trying to pick out the outcropping where the flower grew. In the process, the root he was holding snapped, and he crashed back to the ground with a shriek of frustration.
Mikasa started forward to grab onto the roots herself, only for Eren to headbutt her out of the way. He promised he would do this for Armin. He pushed any thoughts of asking the mountain goats for help out of his head. Goats were fucking weirdos anyway. If they didn't just bleat at him and try to lick him with those creepy long tongues, they'd probably just eat the flower once they got to it anyway. Eren gave another snort, a determined snort, a snort that said that he would do this, he would—
A bluebird, sun glinting off its wings, fluttered down from the skies with a flower (that flower) in its beak, delivering it to where Armin stood at the edge of the trees. Armin took it gratefully, and allowed the bird to eat its fill of seeds and berries gathered from the deep forest. As he did so, Armin tilted his head at Eren and Mikasa.
"What are you two doing? It's dangerous to climb those cliffs. The birds will gather any herbs you need if you pay them."
Eren scratched at the base of his horns, underneath his hair, feeling Mikasa's judgmental gaze on him. Okay, so maybe Armin had just mentioned that he'd needed to get the flower, and Eren had taken it upon himself to get said flower without telling him. Eren watched jealously as the bird fluffed its feathers and nestled in Armin's cupped palm, resting after gorging itself. Armin squinted at the sun in the sky.
"It's just about time for lunch. Want to go down to the meadow by the stream? The fruit trees are ripe."
As they trotted down to the stream, Armin snuck his hand up to scratch behind Eren's ear. Eren looked over at him just in time to catch his smile, and that little twitch of his nose.
He was definitely glad he didn't ask the fucking goats.