Authors notes: Uh, hi. So to clarify things, these one shots have no direct correlation with anything or themselves. I could explain myself with why I wrote each one in a long note before every shot, but you're here to just read something at least decent, aren't you? I hope I can be of service! So, forgive me for posting a whole bunch of shots at once on a Saturday night, but most of these have been written and finished for a while now, I just didn't have time to publish until now. Also, I know my format really lacks usually as well as my grammar. The stories obviously make sense to me, but if your confused don't be afraid to ask. Actually, feel free to critique me. --Marks indicate a scene break. Kudos!
Warnings: lengthy one. Swearing, vomit
Setting: This can take place at anytime during the plot of the manga, but probably it would make more sense if it was a early on. Oh also, in this one, Sasha and Connie are not a thing(at least to themselves) :3
"To be Worried"
"We did it! Let's go eat a huge dinner to celebrate!" Sasha rambled on happily to nobody in particular, her brown eyes watching the smoke fade away from the beautiful open sky that hid above it. She threw her hands up in the air, grinning, then falling back and resting her back on the wall. The world was now upside down because of this, but she found fun in it, even though she was literally hanging off the edge of the huge walls that surrounded everyone's homelands. Around the Survey Corps: Who were now finally getting to rest on top of the great walls in safety(for now haha), burned the bodies of the titans along a silence that never thought to be heard by the warriors.
"I'm with you, Blouse, I want to be feed before we go on another suicide mission." Jean voiced.
Sasha laughed bitterly, getting up. "Hell yeah!"
Levi's disapproving eye caught on to the group of relieved, hugging or what not soldiers, and he spoke in his monotone: "I don't know what you brats are getting on about. This is our first clean victory, that doesn't mean we won or anything. We-"
"Of course not Levi!" Hanji yelled suddenly pulling an arm around his shoulder, eyes sparkling. "But we captured a big ugly one! It could be a revolution! When can we go back to do some tests? I-"
"Stop yelling in my ear, shitty glasses." Was the last thing said in that conversation Sasha paid mind to, for now she was walking away, approaching the boxes of food rations and things. She pulled of a lid of one, digging in to see if anything would taste like first place.
"I can't belive that went so well?" Commented the smart blonde boy out loud to his best friends on Sasha's side.
"That's probably because it was another one of your ideas." Eren replied.
"I... er-"
Sasha exploded upwards dramatically from the wooden crate, "There's not even any meat in here!" She rummaged more, continuing, "Or like, any fruit, vegetables, who the crap likes saltine crackers for dinner?!"
"Potato girl, if you're really that hungry, then why the hell be so picky?" Someone said.
Armin rested a hand on her shoulder. "Sasha, if you want a decent fueling meal, it's gonna have to wait. We just have emergency rations up here."
She pouted, looking past Armin at everyone else, who was taking this as a greatful time of needed rest. Some even laughed amongst themselves, unbelieving.
"Anyway, is it really true there are no casualties?" Eren asked.
"I think so." Was the response.
Even so, with the victory and everything, Sasha suddenly felt odd. She was now pretty sure it wasn't hunger that was her issue. Maybe the war had gotten to her really badly this time? She was blankly staring at the crowd, and didn't notice that her friends had started a conversation. She became uncomfortably aware of the smell of the deceased, and the dried, cracked, blood up her arms and the rat's nest that had become her hair, even in a ponytail. The world seemed to be static noise and movement, and she began to feel uneasy.
An outside voice: "Sasha, what the hell are you looking for?"
The blood in her veins turned to ice, and her heart stopped for a long millisecond, as she felt color drain from her face. She didn't even know who was talking to her.
But they did anyway: "Hey, uh, are you ok?"
Her fingers trembled, as she finally took in a breath of air. She was loud when her voice rose out of her dry throat, "Where. the fuck... is Connie?!"
The burnette spent the next couple moments speed walking around the crowds, but she checked everywhere twice and ending up now running to look over onto the outside of the wall, Her fingers clutched at the stone that was the only thing stopping her from falling. Sweat rolled down past her ears, as she looked amidst the fallen beasts frantically. She didn't know to be glad she came up empty or not. Involuntarily, her brain started to replay the scenes of the battle that took place where the vaporizing, human eating, monsters laid still. Her memories reached out for any image of Connie during that time frame, to their last conversation on the horses before the battle. She didn't recall what they had been talking about, but it was probably something stupid. She did find the moment though, where Connie had left her, flying away at demand of Captain Levi because was fast enough to catch up to the titans. Faster. Completely out of view and no longer assigned to the back lines with her, but the front.
"Captain!" Sasha called to the squad leader, sprinting up to him. Embarrassing enough, she had to catch her breath a second.
"I- I-"
"Spit it out."
"Where did...where did Connie end up sir?"
She was responded with silence. Her insides did a flip. "I uh, said- where's-"
"Turns out it was another dirty mission after all...People are looking, after all you made a fuss. No one saw anybody out there."
"But- but, you told him where to go!" She said, unaccepting his words.
He showed a bit of guilt in his otherwise blank face. "M.I.A."
Twisting insides return. "That's crap!" She argued.
A broad intimidating figure emerged. "We can't send out a huge search party now. These soldiers are exhausted, hurt, and who knows when we might have to act again. We are here to regroup and make another move as soon as possible. If a Corp fails to regroup, that's on them or more likely, the titans."
Sasha blinked slowly, mouth agape.
"Erwin, the kid can go look if she wants." Levi sneered.
"It's not like it's Eren or Historia, it would be a mistake. Why lose two when it could just be one?"
Levi scowled. "He went all the way to the forest, so he may just be napping in a tree."
Erwin grunted and he was then called over by Pixis, and he left without another word. Levi looked back into Sasha's face. It was crestfallen and pale, and coated in a slight sweat. "You better hurry." He mused.
Sasha was knocked out of her mind then, and stumbled a little on her feet. She nodded harshly, and silently approached the wall side once more. She looked out at the vast open field of green, and squinted to try and see the inside of the woods on the other side. Without much thought, pulled her legs over on top, subconsciously readying the gears of her 3-D maneuvering gear.
"Are you serious? There's no telling how many there are in the woods!"
Sasha blew her bangs out of her face, stopping her movements. "That's great, horse face."
"For the record, he was actually kicking titan ass. So maybe he ran out of gas, but he's small so maybe he could've also just gotten crushed by his own gear and dense shiny head."
Sasha snorted. "Blah blah."
As Sasha tried to speed up her horse, she strongly had to ignore the fact that she was in this by herself. The field that seemed so freedom bound, now made her feel like bugs were crawling on the inside of her skin. As the woodland came closer, and the sounds of human race disappeared from earshot, her chest pounded with ugly emotions. She had tunnel vision on the entrance of the first tree, and tried to focus on what she would have to do in order to get up on it. There were no loud heavy footsteps or mumbling, but her brain kept playing tricks on her every now and then. Finally, she began to be able to stop her hands from shaking as she now could see into the tall trees. She calmed her horse to a halt at where they finally crunched down on the leaves. She tied her horse around the body of a thinner tree, and she petted the horse's head as she hooked her gear up high on the opposite tree and then pulled herself up.
She grabbed on the last wide branch with all her strength, and eventually she rolled over on top of it. Panting, she rested her back against her high post, and for a moment she was completely lost while she watched birds play and sing. A twig snapped beneath her, and she jumped, and then she remembered why she was her, serious was definitely not her thing but maybe it ought to be. Such a thought depressed her and before she knew it, her vision became blurry with unshed tears, as it appeared she was all alone. Her heart ached for her missing friend, somebody else who was not to fond of being serious either. Why had she taken that for granted? He was the only one who truly joked around with her, or could carry some normal conversations or things outside of the end of the world. She felt guilty for not noticing earlier, too busy with the thought of stupid food. She did not even want to eat anytime soon or maybe never. He could be serious at the appropriate times, and she could tell there's no way he could of felt victorious killing titans after seeing his own mother was one. Was his and his mother's relationship good then? The more she was alone over time, the more she realized how little she knew about her good friend. He knew some about her he had meet her freaking father even, and that realization caused a warmth to appear on her cheeks as she scanned the area for the tenth time.
The girl shook her head side to side, regretting not dragging somebody along because now here she was with her crazy head. Actually, she found herself getting angry. She recalled what Erwin had said about her going out here. How once again, nobody came with her. Shit, no he's not some titan shifter, but how could they blow Connie off like this? Through all this mess, he played it through and through, and made her laugh while he was at it. He was important as much as anybody else. Even more so, to her.
"CONNIE!" She shouted, scaring away the birds and annoying insects.
She perked her ears up for any kind of response, crawling up the edge of her branch. The more she was forced to think about it, the more the thought of him really gone seemed like an unimaginable nightmare.
Nobody would stop her so she called out once more. This time, there was a rattling in the branches of the tree diagonal to her. Shaking slightly, she got up and switched over to that tree, leaping. Her fingers feather touched the branch, and on account of many splinters, she slipped.
She gasped. "Shit!"
And of course her gear would be stuck in the cable. She reached out now, desperately for any branch at all as she fell. It took her lunch on a plunge in her stomach, and she had to scream because she was afraid. Finally afraid for once, and it would be this pathetic death that was now attracting lingering titans to top it off. But on the good end, she had never been so high up in all her life.
The ground was approaching her, and she tugged helplessly on her cables to no avail. A titan rested lazily on the tree, as if waiting for her to finally be able to consume.
"Unh- What the crap?!" As soon as she heard the unidentified scratchy voice, all of sudden she was no longer falling, and was pulled onto seating on another branch with a strong grip on her wrist.
Bewildered and panicked, she blindly faced the person and began to babble: "What the, what, who,-"
"Why are you back here?" They asked, the voice sounding more and more familiar.
She opened her eyes, sighing, and raised them into the confused glance of two golden apples.
Her nails dug into the bark subconsciously. "C-Connie?"
"What's-"
"Connie!" She said angrily, out of nowhere sending half assed fists onto his short body. "Why didn't you answer me you dork? Were you seriously napping? You think this is funny?"
He blocked her dangerous throws, but mostly just let her hit him, surprised.
"...Agh! What the hell are you beating me up for?" He grabbed her wrists, and easily made them slow down despite the hard clenching of her fists.
"Because!" She yelled in between hot breaths, struggling against his surprisingly stronger hands.
"Well, that's just great!" He remarked sarcastically.
Sasha cooled off then, using her last anger to rip her wrists out his grasp with a grunt.
She yelled in his face: "What the heck are you doing?"
"Huh. what the hell are you doing?"
The brunette blew harshly out her nose, establishing eye contact once again. When she realized how close she was to him, and that he was still blocking himself protectively, she wanted to laugh so badly at herself.
"I was looking for you, stupid!"
"...Well, good job I guess?"
"Yeah so why did I have to do that?" She threatened.
"You really didn't have to?"
Her anger bubbled down completely, remembering her peers, taking in that what he said implied something that made her feel awful again, "Yeah I did.", Her voice was soft this time.
"That sucks."
"...No-"
"I don't want to get yelled at by the big douche's right now. And i'm not letting them give you shit too, so say, I uh, got knocked out."
Sasha finally paid enough attention to take in her friend's greyish skin tone, and the leaning he took against his branch just to sit up. She felt uneasy herself. But nonetheless, she saw no injuries. "...You did?"
He lightly slammed his head onto the wood, his dark eyelashes seeming to heavy for him, "Yeah, sure."
Sasha bit her lip before closing the distance between them, looking around his body for injuries that she didn't notice. She still didn't spot any. He was just dirty like her and being unusually tired.
The panic from earlier that day returned to Sasha. "What happened, Connie?"
He chuckled. "Yeah, a pretty shitty time to have a freakin episode."
"An episode?"
"Yeah. My dumbass fault. Shouldn't we like, go?"
Sasha wished she could read his mind. "Why didn't you come back the first time?"
"Rise and shine, I just woke up."
"Okay, but you don't look so good."
"Ha, Thanks captain potato."
"No! Agh! Really, are you like, sick?"
Connie widened his eyes, travelling them across the ground. "The fighting gets to me because why not." He shrugged.
She could sympathize with that. "...Me too. But, you..."
"Wiener-Schnitzel. Tell me you have a way to get back at least."
She smirked. "I never tasted that... Oh yeah! I have a horse down there. Let's put hussle in our muscles or whatever they say." ,she said beginning to climb down the base of the tree.
When she reached the middle, she looked up to see that her friend was still sitting in the same spot, looking down on her. Flustered, she called, "Dude, let's go! You made me hungry, and if there's no food left for us I will hit you again!"
"First of all, did you forget titans exist? Second of all, you might want to turn around."
Painstakingly, she looked over her shoulder and held still. Titans were lingering around mindlessly in the distance, and the one that had been watching her fall was walking towards the others that were wandering around to nowhere in particular as it seemed. So, if they kept quiet and made a run for it, they had a clean escape.
"I think we're okay for now!" She proclaimed.
For a brief moment, everything seemed to be muted. She looked up at Connie, who had turned away from her, supporting his lower body with his arms as the top half lurched slightly while it hung into the air. At first, Sasha was confused and annoyed, but then she remembered and caught on as soon as he lost the beginnings of his precious lunch. Basically on autopilot, she scrambled back up to him, and placed a hand on his shoulder. Her hand moved down hesitantly to the feeling of his spine through the cloth of the shirt underneath the Survey Corps jacket. For the next couple of slow-mow heaves, she had begun rubbing circles on his back, wincing at the pain he would occasionally groan or grunt from.
When he finally stopped for longer than a minute, he sighed shakily and straightened up but didn't face her. "...I told you to turn around, Sasha."
She ignored his comment, pausing the circles she had been making, and put her palm back on his shoulder tightly. Her concerned tone was barely veiled, "What's going on?"
He ignored her too, and instead rubbed his temples and then his eyes, breathing shallowly.
"Connie."
The boy shook his head.
Sasha could feel her heart pounding in her ears. "Connie." She repeated, this time using her grip to turn him to look at her.
Wiping his mouth, he half answered: "It's dumb." He sounded so defeated.
Maybe her hold was way too strong or way too personal, because he instantly glanced at her fist anxiously. She dropped it to her side, and changed her sitting position. His gaze now traveled down like earlier. Sasha was patient for him to catch his breath or something and they sat silently for a few moments. She was hoping he would lean back against the tree base, but he hardly moved at all.
She voiced softly, at complete odds with herself: "We are going to have to do something so…"
He rolled his hands into fists clenched so hard his knuckles turned white, mind spacing out elsewhere. "Yeah...let's go now. Sorry."
Sasha tripped over her response: "Uh, what, no? uh?"
"Huh?"
It would be easy to imagine exclamation points and questions marks over the girl's head as she ending up spurting out something she didn't really care about at the moment: "Where's your horse?"
"Oh yeah."
"Ok i'm going crazy! What the heck? I know i'm not clever, but all this makes no sense!"
"You're plenty smart. My horse is having a shitty day."
"What?! Why are you so vague at the worst times?! Did you hit your head?!"
She reached out a hand to said thing that might of been the very root of this mess if he did hit it or something, everything would then make sense. Before she could even check, Connie swatted her arm away, "I wish I did."
Sasha bit her lip, a little hurt that he was so touchy to her, but more so now wondering if having a shaved head felt fuzzy or rough to the touch. She decided to use a different approach. The brunette narrowed her eyes at the smaller boy, frowning. Connie quirked an eyebrow, making Sasha gaze turn colder.
After a tense second or two, he exasperated. "Ok! The freaking horse is on a lower branch! Geez!"
Sasha's harsh expression dropped into confusion again, her mind trying to connect any dots to very slow avail. She decided to just look, she squinted through the leaves towards the ground onto every branch, and through a thick canopy, she saw a swift movement of a tail flick up followed by a snort.
"What the fuck."
"It's scared of heights. Won't run away or get eaten."
"...how?"
"I don't know much about horses. Ask Jean or something."
"Haha... agh, no I mean, I didn't know horses could climb or jump that high?"
"What? They're almost as dumb as me. You just have to throw them."
"What?!"
"What now?"
"You picked up a horse?"
"You make it sound like a bad thing."
"Is that your problem? Did you break your legs or something?!"
"How would I get up here without legs?"
Sasha was getting past frustrated now. "For fucks sake!"
Connie began to sweat nervously. "You're making me wanna go to church."
"Look! I know being serious or whatever isn't our thing, but you've been freaking me out all day so just try with me!"
His eye's widened and Sasha felt a heat erupt on her cheeks and pounded her hands onto the bark in a little fit.
"You're right. I'm going to be in so much trouble when we get back, but let's go now so you don't."
Sasha brushed her bangs out of her face. "No." She said determinedly. "Not until you tell me what happened."
"I-I told you."
"Nuh-uh!"
"Yes I did!"
"Well say it again, but this time, actually explain you dork!"
Connie groaned loudly, irritated and stressed. "I just freaked out, okay?!"
Sasha was by no means satisfied. "That doesn't make you sick as a dog!"
He visibly took offence, his mouth closing before he could even retort, but now holding a scowl, as he now only paid attention to fallings leaves and clouds rolling by. Sasha banged her head against the tree softly and also looked to the sky above her. In a hour, the sun would begin setting, which meant they had to book soon. But she wasn't getting anywhere at all. She thought finding him would be the hard part. She replayed their conversation a couple times, and when she actually stopped to think like this, she marked on the actual key things. She's never had a personal talk with Connie, and obviously he wasn't open to it. But it must of had something to do with that issue based off the evidence. She supposed if you "freaked out" enough, it could make you sick. But that would have to be a really ugly breakdown, she grimaced at the thought. So, now they both were being stubborn idiots, and it appeared Connie would only leave if she made a move or maybe not even then, if he was still hiding an illness or something. She never mastered social skills because of her childhood. So, too bad for both of them, her new goal was to learn something about her supposed best friend and make him back to himself.
She took a breath, her tone steady and gentle in return. "I came to help you, dude."
He glanced up at her enough for the shadows to cross his face and quietly replied, "and I told you that sucks. Who told you to? They should've gave you support! Bunch a' bull crap."
"Nobody told me to. I was given permission, but that's it."
Suspicion and confusion struck his features and he sat on her remark a second, unbelieving for the most part, to the dismay of Sasha's guilty pulled heart strings. Sasha was wishing her lucky stars he wouldn't ask something like "why?" as she tapped her foot uneasily.
"...Well since you went through so much trouble...I guess you deserve...yeah."
Her curiosity and interest showed with the raise of her eyebrows, "Hm?"
He acted like Mikasa or Annie, monotone and emotionless as he threw his issue in the air: "It's just, well, everybody's has shit to deal with, but I don't handle it so well obviously. I was just thinking while I was slicing a nape, that um, what if that was a human trapped inside there? And then I started wondering what Hanji planned to do with my, you know. So I dunno. I mean, if titans are people, have we been in the wrong the whole time?"
"That hasn't really been proven yet, Connie. But, our hearts as soldiers are still in the right place, trying to save people, even if we are unknowingly...I don't know either. What I do know is that they try to kill us, so, we gotta...rebel. Yeah?"
He shrugged. "I guess."
The tension of his body language told Sasha that wasn't his whole dilemma, but she was glad she got a little somewhere. She made an educated guess it must've been about his mom, and hell, her dad was completely fine, and she would still not easily talk about him.
"Maybe all we gotta do is slice her out of that thing?"
"In this complicated world? Huh."
"Well I mean she's alive at least. Right?" She cursed herself at her rudeness.
"She'd probably rather be dead, though. She...couldn't even use that body."
Sasha didn't want to say anything cliche or make him feel worse, so she said nothing at all. Connie took that as an opening to stand up, and Sasha blindly accepted this half success and rose as well. The boy then startled her, by punching the tree base with unshed tears on his eyelashes. Pieces of wood flew out, and the birds away. She sensed it finally coming, though.
"It's so stupid, Sasha! Here I am standing in one piece for years in all my cowardice, while my whole village got turned into the shit heads I should've protected them from! But, no, and now we have been probably killing them off this whole time! I should of stayed and not been a selfish piece of crap like always! I was planning to die long before my relatives, but they got things even worse than plain old death! It's unfair, weird, and not to mention confusing and it's my-my fault."
"...oh." She kinda wanted to fall to her death a second time after that's all she got out.
Connie shook his head side to side, and jumped down to the branch below. He dissolved the tense silence by adding, "Like you said, no use sitting here, lets just go already."
They proceeded to do the motions of climbing down. Sasha knew her ODM gear was broken, but either Connie's was too, or he didn't feel like bothering. He pushed the horse off the branch, and he was telling it to, "Ok, look, don't you break your legs. Be like a cat, land on your freaking feet. If you brake your neck, I'll throw up on you." The horse made noises from the back of it's throat, stubborn to move from its stone standing on the huge branch. "Don't make me hurt you on accident." He continued to mumble. "You're not up that high. Don't make it bad." Sasha was tending to her own horse awkwardly, untying it from the stump. She patted it's head. "This world has issues." She whispered to it.
Connie's voice interrupted her. "Are we still good?"
"Huh?"
"Uh, Titans?"
"Oh, um nope. They moved on."
He jumped down behind her, crunching lightly on the leaves, only to get back on another branch. He expressed unamusement to the horse now above and across him. In a moment, there was a slight thump and the horse groaned, annoyed, it's hoofs now clicking onto the safety of the ground. It snorted, and Connie told it to stop being dramatic. If Sasha was in a better mood, she would of laughed her ass off at the whole scene, what with this bald boy kicking a horse out of a tree with no accidents. They simintamiusly got on top of their horses, and before Sasha realized, they were back out in the middle of the field, and she saw the colors of the sky begin to change. Connie was slightly behind her, on watch for danger. That was the biggest way in which they had been lucky, no titan issues.
They did not make the horses run, they kept at a pace that was ingrained in them from missions they did back in training with the horses involved. The great wall stood in all it's glory ahead of them, and squinting she sighed as she saw only a few on the top now, probably looking down on them, angry. But other things were bothering her, so as usual, she didn't really care about getting punished or whatever.
"Hey, Connie."
He didn't answer and she worried he might of been mad at her, or regretful of his tiny burst. She looked back, over her shoulder, and now she was sure he hadn't even heard her. He was staring a hole into the horse's back, ashamed and yet in space. Sasha's chest ached, and she really needed to say something about something he said, or what if they never talked again? They always talked about nothing when they could, and here was an open opportunity, and, no. Who could blame him? "Ymir was right." She thought "I'm a fake socially. Damn."
She slowed her horse by pulling on it's rope slightly. "Connie."
His horse meet up with hers, and all she had to to get it to stall, was steady it with her hand. She grabbed the rider's shoulder gently. "Connie."
He raised his head, looking at her very tiredly. "What?"
"How the heck is it your fault? How were you suppose to know?"
His eyebrows burrowed. "What are you talking-..."
"It's not your fault at all." ,She continued sincerely.
He looked up above, and let out a sigh. "Just cause i'm not the one who did it, dosen't mean i'm innocent for not helping."
"I said how were you suppose to know?"
"Well for starters, titans attack anybody, so."
"There was no way you could of gone back. And, they weren't attacked by titans.''
"I'd call the guy who created 10 meter monsters a fellow dickless titan."
"Hmm, true. But don't blame yourself anyway. It's not fair to."
"Our job is to protect the people, Sasha and I-"
"You did, just somewhere else. And is that really our job? Because I am still confused on the actual goal we want to achieve."
"I know! What is killing a couple titans gonna help at all? It just gives them more reason to attack us. Like we could kill an entire specie like this. If they have human minds along with those powerhouse bodies, what sense would that make? They are higher up than us in like, every way. If they're getting smarter and bigger, then I get the people staying in the walls, slower time it would take them to kick the wall again, then dying out here without training or something. They're just hoping on a long time, and we are hoping for some miracle."
"Geez... I never thought about it that way. ….Why did you join this side then?"
"To hopefully give them some more time like they're looking for. If we keep the titans back, that will do that. But, someone is always gonna have to do that if nothing changes. That's just what I hate. It's a lame story, but I am the lame master." He finally smiled when he said that.
"That...that makes more sense then whatever the commanders preach all the time."