Here we go, the next chapter, I hope we all had a happy holidays. Now then let's enjoy this new chapter, in this one we're going to see how they deal with the aftermath of their town going to pieces, enjoy.

Responses

Clayman: You can expect this to be kept up, by a good long shot.

Masede: You can expect a special bond, but expect it to be rocky. Annie though? You can expect an Aruani ship.

Lavendar fox: I'm glad my visual descriptions are getting better, and I hope the edits I made in the last chapter are better too.

Notoriety

"Rogue Titan", by DACYON, It crosses over with SnK, and the movie Pacific Rim: It's very awesome, it only has 1 chapter so far, but I enjoyed it very much.

"The Dahl Invasion" by Rayne l. Stryder, I dunno if any of you are interested in Borderlands, but this guy has a very well descriptive story.

Chapter 7: Sit Here Picking Stitches

Eren, Armin, and Mikasa reside beside a well-lit fire. The cold is unbearable, like the tragedy that's piercing their hearts, and souls. With their time settling, they can finally cope with the facts that their home is pulverized.

Mikasa is quietly whimpering, rocking herself and biting her knees, repeating "It's happened again. It's happened again. It's happened again." She watches Eren deal with his loss, but it's just as heart breaking for her to bear. All she wants to do is comfort him, after all that he did. Eren left his mother to die, by her dying wish.

Armin seems to be the quietest of the three. He's just sitting, slouching his back on a tall, full grown tree. His eyes though, they're completely dead, no soul, no relief of any kind. His newly acquired rapiers, are stabbed into the ground, while he cradles the letter given to him by his deceased flame, Mina Carolina.

"Who's Annie Leonhardt? I never heard of her." Armin thinks to himself.

Eren though… he seems to be taking it the most in these turn of events. He's pacing in the snow with his feet numbing through his shoes, and he's arguing with himself. He's jerking his head back and forth every time he changes sides to his self-quarrel "I had too. No, no you could've saved her!" He keeps shaking his hands, completely broken inside, "Shuddup we couldn't save her! Yes you could if you were just stronger. And we're not… not" He finally stops talking to himself, and then breaks down, moaning for his losses, "NO! NO! NOOO!" Eren then falls to his back, in fetal position, and cries his heart out. He's completely lost it, he's mourning for the loss of his mother, and it's not making him right in the head. "I killed her! My God I killed her! Oh my God I killed my mother! NO!" Eren yells without the care of his friends.

Armin is still silent, mourning over his turn of events, looking down at his letter to this "Annie Leonhardt". But Mikasa, she can't help but draw into his torment. She gets up from her own anguish, and picks Eren up. He is the only reason for her to live, and she won't have him tousled, "Eren, look at me!" Mikasa clamps her hands around Eren's face, so he can look straight at her "You didn't kill your mother. You followed her dying wish, and you didn't think twice." She fights back her tears before proceeding with her words, "Eren. You are so brave. Your mother thought so too, and I certainly did too; you saved my life, you taught me how to live, and you gave me this scarf. I. Will. Never. Leave you!" She relaxes her hands down to his shoulders, knowing that she has Eren's green eyed stare fully fixed onto her, "You're mother told us to live on," Her tears break through, they start penetrating down on her face, but it doesn't change her looks. Her sight is still fixed on Eren, with the same face he made when his mother died; determination, and promise, "And that's exactly what we're gonna to do. You, me, and Armin. We will live on! But we need you, we need you to be strong. We need you to fight, just like you taught me that night. Me, and Armin need you to be BRAVE! I need you to be brave!" It was unbearably hard to keep her face the way it is in that talk. She had to keep her own feelings compressed, just to focus. Her willpower dwindles into a weakness. The words she spoke felt like poison to her own thoughts, she hardly believed what she said.

Eren can't help but cry to that pep talk. He just let's his head fall onto Mikasa's shoulders. She lets the reaction proceed, and wraps her arms around him.

Armin hasn't budged at all, he's just staring at the letter in his bloody hands, with dead eyes. It's either an act of instinct or an act of curiosity, Armin opens the letter. Eren and Mikasa blink to the sight, he hasn't moved a muscle since they made camp. Armin really doesn't want to do this, but he needs to know what's going on.

"Annie, my old friend I don't know if you're going to get this soon, but I'm confident you'll get it eventually. I've heard rumors, around your relatives that you'll be going out to sea in a few years, I can't imagine how beautiful it'll be. Those people must see the beach so much, it's a boring sight. I wish you the best of luck but there's one more thing I must ask? There's this boy, Armin Arlert, people around me say he has a crush on me, and I must say he's a little cute, but I don't know, I'm thinking of joining you, and the people your with. What are they again? All I know is that they're monks who are known by as 'The Creed', or the 'Brotherhood'.

All that your reading from here on has been written two weeks from above. I've decided to go for 'The Creed', I'm gonna to find one of these Assassins, and ask them to train me, and maybe we'll meet again. Now about Armin, I'm sure I can find a reasonable way to break it to him. I don't want to break his heart though, I hope he'll take it well, or maybe I can ask him to join me?

Either way, I'll see you soon. Your friend, Mina Carolina."

Armin tightens his grip on the parchment. He can't help but cry to Mina's final words, "She really thought I was cute?"

An hour has passed as they sit in silence, Mikasa is trying to bring herself up. Her words may have brought Eren back up, but she still hasn't gotten herself up. Armin is trying to wake from his self-induced trance, and so far he's almost there, with the help of the letter he's whimpering over. Eren almost has himself in a trance until he's come to his realizations. He stands up from the cold seat of the snow, and turns his attention to his friend, "Armin!" Eren sounds a little growly, but its firm. He comes towards his friend, and his tree, "We need everyone to be strong." He pulls out his hand, and Armin refuses it as he pulls himself up. Just like he always does when it comes to bullies. His face is still dead, frozen, but he's not dropping out, "My father gave me a map to his safe house. He says to use it if we need sanctuary." He then turns to look at Mikasa, and back to Armin, "And we definitely need more than sanctuary. Its two miles west of here. We need to…" Eren hesitates with his eyes on the fire, "Mikasa, douse this fire, Armin I need you to get your act together, and keep watch towards the west." Eren tries to keep his attitude in check, with Mikasa's words of inspiration repeating through his head. She follows her orders with no expression, and Armin wipes away his tears, picks up his rapiers and heads west for his task.

They're ready to find their sanctuary, "Mikasa." Eren blurts out her name to get her attention. His eyes are darting for the snowy ground, with no eye contact, "I'm no leader, but I refuse to have my friends lose faith. I can only hope that we get to the safe house in one piece. And, maybe we can find a way to the capital city."

"Wait Eren!" Mikasa shouts, as if in protest. "The capital city won't help."

"Why?" Eren now has his attention set on her.

"That's… huh." Mikasa takes a sigh out of her breath, "Eren, I think it's time…" Mikasa slumps her posture, and turns her sights away from Eren.

"Time for?" Eren ponders on the subject.

"The Truth. Those people? Back in Verspruchen…" Mikasa fight's out her words, "They're known as the Templars. They run the Capital city. I know this because they were the ones who tried to kidnap me last year."

It's a little hard for Eren to swallow all of this information, and she's not even done. Eren walks to Mikasa and places a hand on her shoulder, from behind "They were the ones who tried to take you?"

"Yes" A plain and simple answer from Mikasa, "They were probably there for me. It was me who killed your town… I don't deserve to be here."

Eren's face is completely dropped; his eyes, and his jaw. It takes Eren a long moment to sink all of her emotions in him, she's completely given up, and she gave her a Hell of a pep talk an hour ago. Now it's his turn, "Bullshit Mikasa, don't ever say that!" Eren assures with full force. "Don't ever think about that." He turns her gaze to his, and puts his hands on her face this time. Roll reversal for the two.

"But it is my fault, I-I-I don't know what to do." Mikasa is stuttering.

"Well I do. These 'Templars'? If you think this is your fight, alone, it's not. They made this my fight too. They made this mine, and Armin's fight the moment they burned our town. Armin and I will help you fight these bastards, we'll drive them out together. All three of us!" Something important also occurred to Eren that he needs to say to her, "You told me I need to be brave, right? Well I need you to be brave too. Remember what I told you the night I saved you?"

Mikasa blinks to Eren's words, but she nods 'yes'.

"Well let me remind you anyway. We'll both die if you don't fight! I'll hold my end of the bargain, but I need you to do the same. Do not forget that again. Ever!"

Mikasa finds it weird; an hour ago she gave him a pep talk to bring him up, and now he's bringing her up with another pep talk.

"Let's go catch up with Armin. We're gonna make it. I promise you." Eren reassures.

All Mikasa could do to react, by giving Eren a nod, "Okay then. Let's get to your fathers safe house."

Caught up with Armin, all three of them are up and full of confidence, as they head west.

Now this chapter maybe a bit short, and maybe not as good as the last, but I think I did well.

As always now and forever, review, PM, and suggest. See ya next chapter!

Funfact: The title of this chapter is based off of lyrics from a song called "Stitches". Made by a band named "Young Guns". In my opinion, they ROCK!