• Third Person's POV •

Eren...Mina...Thomas...Jade...Mylius...Nac...

Armin was lost in thought, completely thunderstruck. He kept repeating those names over and over in his head, and his heart would pound painfully whenever Jade's or Eren's names were listed. It was an unending whirlpool, and it was messing with his head. The spinning wouldn't stop. It was infinite.

The image of Jade being dropped into the Titan's mouth with a smile on her face was a dementing thought. The image of Eren with a missing leg and blood staining his face, then being swallowed down the Titan's gullet was even more so.

But, why had Jade been smiling, he wondered. It wasn't the kind of smile where you would be at peace, or when you were somewhat psychotic either. It was just...a smile. A smile of relief, perhaps? Had she still been her selfless self at the time, and seeing him be thrown out of the Titan's mouth had comforted her in a way?

And Eren. Why had he thought Armin would be worth saving? Worth tossing away his life for? All Armin had was an imagination. Whereas Mikasa had strategy and skill, Jade had tenacity and adaptivity, and Eren had idealism and unleashed fury...all Armin had was a clever mind. How pathetic.

All of the children from Shiganshina were quite unlucky when you thought about it. All of them had their hometown broken into and were the first people to be raided by the Titans. But there was more, individually speaking.

Mikasa, who lost both her parents in a single robbery of her home. She lost her innocence that day, as well as she'd recently lost Eren, though she didn't know he was dead yet.

Armin, who was constantly bullied and treated unfairly, as well as he naturally lacked the normal physical build of his peers.

Eren, who was always an outcast and had no particular skills. He always had to work to get his piece, while his sister would outshine him in her perfection.

And Jade, who was the unluckiest of them all. She lost her brother to the Survey Corps. Her mother abandoned her a month before the Wall even fell. Her father and best friend were slaughtered before her very eyes, and she lost her leg in the shattering of Wall Maria. She was forced to struggle in the training corps, without the automatic mobility of her right leg.

And yet she smiled at the end.

"—min! Armin! WAKE UP!"

Blinking in surprise, the unrelenting spin of morbid thoughts paused as he met Connie's hazel eyes. "...!"

"Connie..." he whispered, still somewhat dazed. What had I been thinking about?

"Are you hurt?" the 8th Ranker fussed, checking him for injuries as he ignored Armin's initial response. "Hey! Where's your squad!?"

Armin blinked again, this time much more slowly as he fought to clear the mess of his mind. "Squad...?" he breathed.

"Come on, get a hold of yourself!" scolded Connie. "Why are you alone!?" He pulled back his hand in disgust, looking at it with a scowl. "And you've got slime all over you...! What the hell happened?!"

The blonde's eyes widened. "...Ah..." Then the flashes came.

Mina losing her head first, then gradually being swallowed piece by piece.

Thomas sobbing as the Abnormal gulped him down his throat.

Nac being torn apart before being eaten slightly and the rest was tossed to the side.

Mylius having his limbs ripped from their sockets and screaming all the while.

Jade smiling weakly as she was dropped into the mouth of a long-haired Titan.

Eren stretching out his hand, blood tarnishing his cheeks before the bearded Titan clamped its jaws shut over his arm.

Digging his fingernails into his scalp, Armin let out a despairing wail of horror. Connie jumped in shock at the awful noise and stepped forward to comfort and silence him. "Armin...!" he yelled. But the Last Ranker was on his knees with tears falling down his face at an alarming rate, unable to hear anything aside from the screams.

"You..." his voice sounded dry and cracked completely, which made the sound all the worse. "...useless bastard! Die!" He began hitting himself viciously on the head.

"Hey...Calm down! Armin!" Connie restrained his friend, pinning his arms down to either side. "Where is everyone!?"

"Oh, leave it, Connie!" the 11th Ranker, Ymir, grumbled in annoyance. "They've been wiped out except for this guy!"

"Shut up! Armin didn't say anything about that!" The short cadet threw his arm out to the side in anger at Ymir's statement, as if tossing away her harsh hypothesis from sight.

"Look around! It's obvious, idiot!" snapped Ymir. "And we don't have any more time to pamper him!"

"Why is Armin the only one who made it!?" the 8th was struggling to understand the gravity of what was happening. So many things were happening so quickly.

"They probably thought he was already a corpse," replied Ymir, almost heartlessly as she continued to look over the buildings for signs of nearby Titans. "I'm sorry he encountered multiple Titans...but rescuing this loser isn't worth the sacrifices of Eren and the rest."

Armin continued to fight against the urge to let the tears fall down his face. Ymir was right, in his opinion. Eren was so much better than Armin was, and yet he traded his life for the blonde. Armin wasn't worth Eren's life, but Eren had seemed to think otherwise.

"Hey, you stupid bitch..." Connie's swords flashed as he held them up threateningly to Ymir's turned back. "How about I make it so you never say a damn word aga—"

"Both of you, stop it!" Krista intervened, tears in her eyes threatening to fall as she forced herself between the two arguing cadets. "Everyone is frazzled! I mean, suddenly a bunch of our friends are dead...Of course we're upset!"

"That's my Krista!" Ymir suddenly giggled as she drew the 10th Ranker in close with one arm and kissed the side of her head. "After this mission is over, marry me!"

Connie shook his head disappointedly. "True...she's clowning around even more than usual..." he sighed. He then knelt to the ground in front of Armin and held out his hand for the blonde to take. "Anyway, we can't just leave him here."

Armin froze when he saw Connie's upturned palm reaching gently for him. It reminded him so much of...

"Can you stand, Armin?" asked Connie.

Tears welled in his eyes, and he stood up abruptly before turning. "I'm sorry I caused problems!" he yelled, his blue eyes firmly squeezed tight. "I'll meet up with the rearguard!"

"Armin!" cried the 8th Ranker, but Armin had already started working his ODM gear, and flew off. Connie knew that the blonde had heard him, but had pointedly ignored him and left.

"Let's go, Connie. Orders are to move forward..." said a fellow squadmate, and Connie sighed.

It's hard to believe that Eren and Jade are dead...I thought they would go on a rampage, but were they really taken down so easily...?

Using her ODM gear, the black-haired 1st Ranker seemed to effortlessly soar through the sky. She was like an angel if it weren't for the shadows cast upon her face and the lightless look in her eyes. But she only had her mind set on one goal; protection. And not for herself.

When her eyes landed on a fairly crowded rooftop, her arms stiffened ever so slightly. Mikasa had never even been aware of this little habit until Jade pointed out when she asked about the 1st Ranker's past when they were children. Before the walls collapsed on them.

Shaking her head to clear her mind of the unnecessarily depressing and murky thoughts, she contemplated to herself as to what the recently-graduated trainees were doing lying around like sunbathing cats.

'They must have heard the bell that signaled temporary evac...' the cadet wondered to herself, perplexed by their actions. 'Why aren't they scaling the wall...!?'

"Shit!" someone suddenly cursed aloud, making Mikasa's head snap in that direction.

'Huh...? That's...!'

"What do we do!?" the scrawny cadet yelled. On further inspection, Mikasa realized with a small start that it was Connie and Jean arguing loudly.

"There isn't anything to do," Jean grumbled, sitting down with a slumped posture. "The order to evacuate finally came...but we're out of gas and unable to climb the wall...I guess we're all dead, thanks to those cowards!" His left hand tightened into a fist, while the other rested over his eye. "I can understand their feelings...that they lost the will to fight...But they shouldn't have abandoned their mission and holed up in HQ! The Titans are gathering, so we can't over there to replenish our gas!"

"Okay then!" hissed the 8th Ranker, tired of the lack of response. "The only thing we can do is risk it all to kill the swarming Titans over there! The result's gonna be the same if we just sit around here! The Titans will be all over us here, too!" He pounded his fist against the gas canister that lay atop his scabbard. "And if we keep trying to pointlessly escape, it'll just waste the little gas we do have left! Once our mobility is totally gone, then it really is all over!"

Jean scoffed quietly to himself, unaware of Mikasa's coming presence. "You're using your head for once, Connie..." the 6th sighed. "But do you really think we can take them on with this many troops? Most of the advance guard has been wiped out...Who of us in training corps can take command of a desperate operation like that? Well...I guess that doesn't matter since even with a leader, we wouldn't be able to do anything against the Titans..."

Mikasa drowned their voices out of their head as she landed by Annie, Reiner, and Bertolt, who were quietly conversing amongst each other. "Mikasa!?" one soldier said. "I thought you were with the rearguard!" cried another. But the cadet pointedly ignored them as she ran up to the long-haired blonde girl.

"Annie!" Mikasa shouted. The blue-eyed girl turned, looking as bored as always. "I think I have a grasp of the situation...and I apologize for bringing my personal feelings into this..." Nervous, the cadet's arms tightened further. "But have you seen Eren's squad?"

"No, but some squads made it over the wall..." replied the 4th Ranker, brushing her long bangs out of her right eye. There was a small glimmer of brief fear in her eyes, but she clearly didn't show it all that much. She was worried for Jade, but no one else knew this. Not even Annie herself.

"Now that you mention it," spoke up Reiner, and Mikasa turned to face the bulky 2nd Ranker. "Armin over there was from the same squad."

Joy filled her insides at the sound of Armin being okay, and she sharply turned on her heel to run for her childhood friend. "Armin!" she raised her voice ever so slightly. She fell to her knees in front of him, trying to see past the thick curtain of bangs over his forehead hiding his eyes. "Armin..." she said with a much more calm voice than before. "Are you hurt? Are you alright?"

Shaky, the blonde managed a small nod.

Mikasa stood up, a small and satisfied smile on her face, then looked around as the expression instantly faded away. "Where's Eren?" But then her ears picked up the sounds of choked and stifled sobs. Her head swiftly turned to face Armin once more and was taken aback to see tears streaking down his cheeks.

With fists balanced unevenly on his fully-bent knees, he hunched back over. He was obviously trying not to break down into a fit of endless crying. "In training corps...Squad 34..." He sniffled loudly and continued to force out words that seemed like poison to him as he spoke. "Thomas Wagner...Nac Tius...Mylius Zeramuski...Mina Carolina...Jade Covert...Eren Jaeger..."

Annie's jaw dropped, as did Jean's. Connie guiltily looked away, as he had been concealing the information from his fellow cadets.

Annie looked down and realized with a start that her hands had instantly become fists at Jade's name. She relaxed, but the shock was tormenting her on the inside. She knew what Armin was going to say next, and forced herself to take even breaths.

"Those six carried out their mission...and died bravely in battle..." Armin continued, trying not to look at Mikasa for fear of her rage.

"Oh, no..." Sasha whispered heartbrokenly.

Jean was fighting to understand Armin's words. Jade and Eren were dead. He didn't know the others in their squad all that well, but the loss of the 5th and 12th Rankers was still strong enough to mentally wind him.

The suicidal blockhead whom he argued with constantly was dead. Eaten by the very things he swore to kill himself.

And the cripple who always had a smile on her face, despite her awful situation. She would argue with short-fused Connie, befriend unsociable Annie, and joke with everyone else. There were only three times when he'd seen her angry, and one of those times was right before she left as a member of Squad 34.

"So almost everyone in Squad 34 was wiped out..." a faceless cadet murmured in the crowd.

"And the same thing will happen to us if we clash with the Titans..." another whisper-yelled, afraid of the top ten rankers around them. The top ten were in their own special group, with a few outsiders like Ymir and Jade. Any slight or insult could cause one of their tops to blow over with fury. But it seemed they were too shocked to respond.

"I'm sorry, Mikasa..." sobbed Armin, unable to conceal the trembles that now wracked his whole body. "Eren...gave his life to save me." He hiccuped before continuing. "I couldn't...do anything. I'm sorry..."

But his breath was caught in his throat when he felt a warm hand enclose over his own. He looked up with red eyes to see Mikasa with a blank yet shielded expression. Her eyes—though the change was subtle—had lost their light, and it scared and relaxed Armin at the same time. "Armin..." she whispered, her lips moving slowly. "Calm down. This is no time to be getting sentimental." Tightening her fingers ever so slightly, she pulled gently on his fingers and stood at the same time he did. "Now, stand up!" Her voice didn't waver in the slightest.

Armin could only watch with an unhinged jaw as she turned around, the warmth of her hand gone so suddenly. "Marco..." the 1st Ranker said, walking to the edge of the building whilst passing the man she was talking to. "If we eliminate the Titans that are swarming around HQ, we'll all be able to fill up on gas and scale the wall. Am I wrong?"

"N-no, you're right," confirmed Marco. "B-but even with you there...against that many of them—"

"I can do it," Mikasa abruptly cut him off, before raising her sword and turning to the shell-shocked cadets. "I'm strong," she announced with a loud, respect-commanding tone. "Stronger than all of you...Extremely strong! And that's why...I'll be able to drive the enemy out of there...Even on my own."

Then, a small fleeting sneer met her lips, before vanishing right away. She pointed her sword at the graduate trainees mockingly. "But I guess all of you are useless...cowardly...pathetic...It's really too bad." Mikasa smiled to herself for another brief second, feeling proud of herself. "Stay here...and suck your thumbs...while you watch me."

"Mikasa...? What are you saying!?" yelled a girl, her face instantly white as a sheet. "You mean to engage all of those Titans yourself? It's impossible..."

Mikasa glared at them out of the corner of her eye, though her expression remained apathetic. "If I can't do it...I'll just die," the 1st Ranker said calmly. "But...if I win, I live..."

"And if I don't fight...I can't win."

With that final message, she gripped her swords tightly in her fingers before forcing her legs to carry her forward as she jumped and landed neatly on another roof before continuing her path. She kept running, and the others were left in her dust.

"You've got to work on your phrasing..." Jean grumbled, earning curious glances from his peers. "I bet you meant for that to get us fired up..." He sighed loudly, before whispering one last thing. "Eren...Jade...this is your fault."

The 6th Ranker then shoved his sword into the air and looked over his shoulder at the other stunned cadets. "Hey!" he thundered, grabbing everyone's attention. "Were we taught to one of our own fight alone!? All of you really will make cowards of yourselves!" He then took off running.

"Well, who'd have thought..." breathed Reiner, smiling to himself before taking off. Bertolt and Marco sighed in worry before following.

Annie looked at her hands, tight around her hilts. An unknown fury washed over her, and she pressed her lips into a straight line. "This is for you, Jade." Her feet began flying to carry her forward.

Everyone dashed forward in response, their voices resonating as one. As well as singing for the fallen Squad 34.

"Hurry! Follow Mikasa!" Sasha yelled whilst shooting forward with her ODM gear.

"Anyway, let's make this a short, decisive battle!" added Jean, pushing past the redhead. "And get to headquarters before our gas runs out!"

"But Mikasa is amazing..." the 8th Ranker murmured in awe, only Armin close enough to hear him. "How can she move that fast...?"

Armin kept his eyes pinned on the 1st Ranker's lightning-fast form. 'Actually...she's burning up too much gas!'

As if to confirm his suspicions, Mikasa flew forward and perfectly sliced open the weak point of a nearby Titan, before blasting far out of range once again. The gas from her gear created open clouds of mist around her as she maneuvered across corners and over rooftops.

'She'll run out soon! No matter how skillful we are, without mobility, we're helpless...' The blonde watched her expression, and pity twisted his heart painfully. Her lips were tight together and her eyes were completely hollow of emotion.

'I knew it...' he thought to himself, his fingers pressing rhythmically on the switches lining the hilts of his swords. 'She isn't cool-headed like she always is. She's trying to banish her grief by taking action...but at this rate...Before long, she'll—'

Almost as if on cue, the girl dropped from the air when a loud sputtering sounded from her gear. Her eyes didn't even widen in surprise, as she collapsed and fell from sight. Her lips moved, but no one heard her words.

"Mikasa...!" screamed Armin.

The girl didn't respond, and she disappeared. She was gone, and her mind was lost. I'm just wandering without you at my side. I miss you...Where are you? I need you...but you're not here to guide me. You've just left me to wander alone...That's so cruel of you, Eren.