A/N: Thank you Corina O for your review. Hope you continue to find Fatal Error cool and interesting. ^^ And a thank you to everyone else who return to read even after such long waits for new chapters.

Although this chapter took forever to be posted, I can happily say I have the next few chapters plotted out. Thanks to AutumnMobile12, I was given more ideas and advice (plus fanart...?), so the story is on its way. AutumnMobile12 is sort of a co-writer by this point I suppose. I still write everything, but I get plenty of input and help from her.

Disclaimer: I do not own Tokyo Ghoul or Shingeki no Kyojin.

-/-\-|-/-\-

Chapter 4 – Vigilante

"Aren't you going to finish that?"

Armin's head snapped upright in response to the inquiry, and he blinked dubiously, scattering troubled thoughts and assessing his friend's words.

"Um, yeah, I will," the blonde murmured, halfheartedly prodding the mostly untouched slice of cake before him. "Unless you want it."

Eren raised a skeptical eyebrow at his friend and shook his head. "No, I got it for you, remember? Come on, it's your birthday. You can finally walk on your own two feet again and tossed out those damn crutches. Celebrate a little."

"He's right, Armin," Mikasa added. "Enjoy today."

The three friends were seated at a table in the small café Anteiku, a cozy place Eren had been visiting for the past few months. Ever since Armin's run in with the ghoul, both Eren and Mikasa had been doing everything they could to ease their friend's troubles. The trip to the coffee shop was in celebration of both Armin's birthday and freedom from his handicap.

"I am enjoying myself," Armin insisted, looking to either friend with a nervous smile. "I'm not having a bad time or anything, it's just that my mind is a little cluttered, that's all."

Eren and Mikasa shared a quick look, before Mikasa murmured, "Is something bothering you?"

Armin scraped some cake onto his fork and took a bite, chewing slowly while pondering his next words. Yes, I've been bothered ever since I was attacked by that ghoul, but of course that's nothing strange. It's not every day someone is attacked by a man-eating creature and walks away.

The blonde pulled his eyebrows together in consideration. Okay, so perhaps he didn't walk away, but that was just it. That was the problem. If someone had carried him just close enough to the hospital, why not go the entire distance and bring him to the Emergency Room? Were they concerned about how much stress was being put on his body while being carried? If that was the case, why carry him at all? Was it to get away from the ghoul who'd attacked him?

"Armin, are you still on Earth?" Eren piped up, waving a quick hand in front of his friend's face. "Seriously, what's going on with you?"

Armin stabbed another bite of cake, shaking his head. "It's nothing. At least, it shouldn't be. I'm probably being too suspicious."

"About what?" Mikasa gently coaxed, taking a drink from her cup of coffee. "You can tell us."

With a deep inhale, Armin pushed away the dessert and folded his hands together, eyeing both his friends. In a faint voice, he said, "I may be overreacting, but I want you two to be honest with me, okay?"

Eren pushed the neglected cake to the right and leaned forward, glancing at Mikasa. "We'll do that."

After setting down her warm beverage, Mikasa nodded in agreement.

Bowing his head in thanks, Armin began to speak. "In the hospital, Dr. Akiyama said they received an anonymous call giving my location and the extent of my injuries. There was a trail of blood leading to where I'd been attacked, and the ghoul responsible had been killed."

"Yeah, that's right," Eren responded with a puzzled look. "CCG investigators later arrived and took care of everything. When they came to talk to you in the hospital, they said it had probably been a territorial dispute and that's what had done the ghoul in."

Armin shook his head, nervously lacing his fingers together. "I don't think it was an issue of territory," he murmured quietly. "That ghoul had been killed from a puncture wound to her chest. Dr. Akiyama said it was likely she'd just been knocked out, that's all I'd seen, and that another ghoul had finished her off, but..."

"What, Armin?" Mikasa coaxed gently. "But what?"

"Just before I passed out, I saw... a hand go right through her. Her killer wrenched his arm into her back and tore through her." Armin closed his eyes with a grimace. "And then that same killer carried me to the hospital and called for help."

From across the table, Eren made a noise between that of a scoff and an exclamation of surprise. "Come on, Armin," he protested. "Both Dr. Akiyama and the investigators said another ghoul killed her, so you can't be suggesting that it was a ghoul who saved you. That doesn't make any sense."

"I know it sounds completely nuts," Armin exclaimed in bewilderment, "But that's what I saw! I may have been on the verge of unconsciousness, but I know that's what I witnessed. After that, I was picked up and carried to the hospital, and I know it's unlikely a ghoul would do that, so that's why I'm having problems with all of it, okay?"

Behind the counter, one of the waiters dropped a cup he'd been handling, bringing Armin's rant to a halt as an explosion of glass tore through the café. Both Eren and Mikasa shot hesitant looks over their shoulders at the other civilians within the room. A few were looking in their direction with puzzled stares, but no one else seemed bothered by the sudden outburst. The teen who'd accidentally broken the coffee mug was nodding sheepishly beneath the evil eye of his co-worker as he sunk to the floor to sweep up the mess.

"Armin, are you sure?" Mikasa began quietly as Anteiku's atmosphere slowly regained its calm, mundane aura. "I wasn't there, so I can't claim to know what happened, but just remember that it was dark, you were losing blood, and you were probably in shock."

"Plus, a ghoul saving a human... that's never happened," Eren added softly. "When was the last time you heard of a ghoul aiding a human being?"

"You both think I'm being paranoid," Armin interrupted glumly.

"We're just looking out for you," Mikasa corrected, placing her hand over her friend's and giving it a quick squeeze. "We don't want you to go out searching for trouble, okay? Tell the truth, you were going to return to the crime scene to find something to prove your case."

Armin opened his mouth to protest but withered under the skeptical gazes of both his friends. With a sigh, the blonde let his attention slide to the uneventful world outside the window. "I was just going to pass by for a few seconds."

"Just forget about it, Armin," Eren replied shortly. "You're alive, out of the hospital, and celebrating your sixteenth birthday, so just forget about everything that happened last month. A human knocked out the ghoul and a few more finished her off because they wanted the territory, case closed."

Without looking at either of them, Armin ground his teeth together and followed a leaf's haphazard descent to the pavement behind the window. "Sure, I suppose."

-/-\-|-/-\-

"What were you thinking, moron?"

The receiver of the harsh reprimand flinched as he emptied a dust pan of glass into a nearby recycling bin. Stammering an uneasy reply, he turned to his co-worker as she strode into Anteiku's kitchen.

"You agreed to work here, so do us a favor and quit being so pathetic," the scowling girl muttered, waving a dismissive hand at the teen before her. "If you can't handle serving people, then—"

"It's not that," the dark-haired waiter interrupted nervously. "Didn't you hear them out there, Touka? Those three high school students were talking about ghouls, and the one swears he was saved by one."

"So what?" Touka retorted, crossing her arms with an icy glare. "The blonde was on the news awhile back. He was cornered by a ghoul but was saved and carried to the hospital. An anonymous civilian saved him, and Doves later found the ghoul was killed. Quit worrying about it, stupid Kaneki. Our only concern should be the fact there's a larger number of Doves in our Ward now."

"But he said he saw a hand go through the ghoul!" Kaneki exclaimed before his gaze dropped to the floor. "Is it possible a ghoul saved him? After all, Yoshimura decided to help me and let me stay here."

"It's none of your damn business," Touka snapped. "Yoshimura hasn't heard anything about vigilante ghouls aiding people. Besides, you're part ghoul, so Yoshimura felt sympathetic for you. Don't think any of us would do the same for a human."

Kaneki brought his eyes to Touka's before nodding shortly. He supposed it was true, but after everything in the last month with Rize and starting to work for Anteiku, his view on ghouls had changed. Yoshimura hadn't proved to be the bloodthirsty beast he'd initially assumed all ghouls were. Touka, too, even if she had beat the crap out of him more than once.

"Why are you even concerning yourself with it?" Touka muttered. "What difference does it make if a ghoul helped a human?"

Kaneki turned to place the broom back in its closet, pondering the question. What did it matter to him? Would he be relieved if what he'd heard proved to be correct? Would he be optimistic towards the idea of more ghouls helping humans, that they weren't all bad, just like those at Anteiku?

"I guess I was just thinking it might be kind of nice," Kaneki responded sheepishly. "A ghoul going out of their way to help people, I mean."

Before him, Touka raised a skeptical eyebrow and clicked her tongue in annoyance. "You idiot."

-/-\-|-/-\-

Gravel crunched beneath steady footfalls as a figure stepped from the empty sidewalk and into a narrow alley. They squinted at the dark rooftops, waiting for movement other than their own. The alley was still, an almost discouraging sight, but the figure shrugged it off.

They came to a halt beside a dumpster just as a frigid breeze wrapped around them, urging them to curl their lip in disgust as the stench of garbage filled their nostrils. Some left over police tape fluttered from where it had gotten caught by the dumpster leg, but aside from its quiet flapping, silence accompanied the unmoving scenery.

With a troubled exhale, the concerned student ran his fingers through his hair while making an attempt to sort his thoughts.

"What am I doing here?" he muttered. "It's been a month, so most of the evidence is gone by now. You should have checked it out at the beginning of last month as soon as most of the Doves had cleared out."

Snorting impatiently, the teen kicked through the loose gravel, sending a few rocks clattering against the side of the dumpster. "Of course, what business is it of yours? When you're not standing in abandoned crime scenes talking to yourself, you're spending time at home or with your friends enjoying your normal life. That's what you want, isn't it?"

"Even outside of school, you're as dull as ever, Yaeger."

Eren spun around to see the owner of the scathing tone a few yards behind him, a bemused sneer plastered below her freckled cheeks. The teen softly cursed himself for not being attentive, but his cluttered mind hadn't registered the extra pair of footsteps, and the dumpster had masked any sent.

"Ymir," he muttered with a curt nod. "What are you doing here?"

"I've been trying to get a chance to talk to you," the other teen responded before adding a long sigh. "Work has been so demanding lately, I haven't had the time to attend school. Whenever I was free, you were never around and I couldn't talk to you about this at school. I left work early today and spotted you and your buddies leaving that coffee shop, so I followed you here."

"What do you want?" Eren inquired, green eyes narrowing in suspicion.

Ymir extended her hands, motioning to the alley around them with slender fingers. "I heard a story on the news awhile back regarding a certain blonde you and I both know. It was quite the chilling tale, gruesome even, until you reached the end."

Eren fixated a glare on his classmate. "What do you mean by that?"

"I mean, most of our workers do an efficient job when it comes to nabbing research specimen," Ymir responded before her face twisted into a disapproving scowl. "So you can probably imagine what a state I was in when one of our own returned, not with a body, but with an infuriatingly short recollection involving a defenseless student and a rabid ghoul."

"Armin was saved by someone from Reform?" Eren murmured dubiously. "How is he still alive then? You're not exactly the most charitable band of thieves."

Ymir's lip twitched and Eren saw her fist clench momentarily before she growled, "Watch it, Yaeger. That's your family you're talking about, not to mention your only form of self-defense. I don't think you're expressing the proper amount of gratitude."

The boy raised his shoulders, looking momentarily bewildered before inquiring, "What's the problem, then? It sounds as though Armin's savior willingly let him go, and it's not like Armin remembers very much. Who was it who saved him, anyway?"

"Armin doesn't remember very much?" Ymir scoffed, ignoring Eren's last question. "Not remembering very much doesn't help us, Yaeger. You either have memory of something, even the smallest detail, or nothing at all. Armin's smart. He'll start putting pieces together, make an attempt to track down who saved him, and discover everything."

"You think he's going to stumble across the corporation?" Eren murmured thoughtfully. "Ymir, even if that happens, turn him away. Make up stories and throw him off the trail, but don't let him offer himself up as a test subject."

"I don't give a damn if he wants to be a guinea pig!" Ymir spat, eyes flashing dangerously. "I'm worried he's going to lead Doves to Reform and then you know who will have my head! Hell, he'll probably have both our heads, your dad's, too."

Eren blinked in alarm, opening his mouth to protest before thinking better than to argue. He could understand Ymir's concerns, especially when he'd just been convincing Armin to let the entire ghoul business go. He didn't want his friend to start digging through the matters of the man-eating creatures simply because no good would come of it, but now that he knew it was someone from Reform who saved him...

"I know you don't want to hear this, but Armin needs to be taken out of the picture," Ymir spoke in an eerily calm voice. "I won't risk Krista or anyone else in the corporation just because some brat couldn't keep his nose out of our affairs. I'll do the job myself, and I assure you it will be qui—"

A blur of movement stopped the teen mid-sentence, and she whipped her arm to the side, quickly blocking the punch Eren had been aiming towards her left temple. Feeling sharp knuckles against her arm, she fell back a few feet, raising her hands in surrender.

"Calm down," Ymir muttered. "I swear, you'd think I was suggesting you finish the shrimp off."

"You're not going to touch him," Eren seethed, curling his fingers and returning to a firm stance. "I will talk to him. I'll tell him to let everything go, and you will not lay so much as breath on him."

Ymir snorted in frustration. "You think you can get through to him, simple as that? Like I said, Armin's smart enough to figure out everything, so I highly doubt he'll give up every hunch and theory just because you'll ask nicely."

"I'll convince him." Eren repeated, stressing each word through gritted teeth. "I'll make sure he doesn't mention ghouls, let alone do extensive research and discover Reform. In time, he'll be back to his regular, straight-A life and ghouls will only be tragic stories on TV."

His classmate's face twisted from a grimace to unamused doubt, but she didn't look ready to push the issue further. Instead, she crossed her arms and gave him a stern glare, earning one in return. "Fine," she snapped. "But if I discover he's been looking into us, if he should so much as whisper about ghouls in his sleep, I'm going to tear his throat out."

Eren felt his insides twist into a bitter knot as he watched Ymir turn on one heel and stride back in the direction she'd arrived. As she turned onto the street and disappeared, he groaned in exasperation and rubbed his temples to ease the growing headache.

"Always nice to talk," he murmured.

-/-\-|-/-\-

A/N: So… Armin makes some theories, Kaneki worries, Eren investigates, and Ymir threatens. Just a casual day for the protagonists.

Thanks for reading. The next chapter is when the games begin.