Did you guys know that 24 hours without sleep is the equivalent of .1 alcohol levels. Or something. Either way, I got zero sleep last night, so I am staying up until bedtime so that maybe I can wake up in time for my class tomorrow. Fuck I'm tired. Anyways, I woke my muse from its daylight hibernation and we wrote this because I'm exhausted. Tada or whatever. I don't really care about anything right now. Except maybe caffeine. This chapter is probably filled with glaring grammatical errors. You still aren't getting a chapter tomorrow, but you get two today. It'll have to tide you over.

Withdrawal

Armin struggles on the inhale as his entire body seizes in an approximation of a shiver. It feels like the flu. He wishes it was the flu. Then he could puke all over Kenny fucking Ackerman and get that bastard sick too. That would be amazing. Kenny Ackerman miserable and sick, curled up under a blanket with chicken soup and a fever so high he's hallucinating. A fever high enough that his organs catch fire and he burns up from the inside, because that's what is happening to Armin – he's certain that something inside of him is burning, on fire, and he's going to die from this not-flu is Kenny fucking Ackerman doesn't hurry up an kill him.

What exactly were those idiots thinking? He's freaking forty-nine, wait, no, that's wrong, he's eight. He has to remember that. He's eight now, and that's a problem because he is small and defenseless again, doesn't even have Mikasa and Eren relying on him, no, that's wrong too, they didn't rely on him until he was older, not a weakling brat that can't stand fend off bullies without his younger siblings. Not that Kenny fucking Ackerman is a normal bully. Those stupid kids would have wet themselves had they knowingly been within the same town as the stupid serial killer. Stupid military police. They always ruin everything. Can't they just learn to stay out of the way like good... like good dogs? Historia calls them her personal guard dogs, or, wait, Ymir calls them poor excuses for guard dogs. Yeah. That's right.

Ymir makes a much better guard dog than any of the military police. She can turn into a titan and bite peoples' heads off. Levi can do that too, but he doesn't have to turn into a titan. He just opens his mouth and words tumble out like scary acrobatic swords or chop idiots into tiny, itty bitty, pieces.

Armin wishes Levi was here now. "I'm not your captain anymore," he growls at them, swimming into focus. The remainder of the 104th stares at him with wide, uncomprehending eyes. The man sighs aggressively. "The scouting legion was officially disbanded. All of you shit-stains are technically renegade soldiers and traitors to the crown." Despite the anger in his words, his eyes are bland, disinterested.

The kids look to each other to make certain that, yes, that is what everyone else just heard. Eren is practically seething with rage, seemingly only holding his tenuous control because of Mikasa's steady hand on his shoulder. Armin isn't sure what to think. They've been disbanded. They lost. Sasha is snarling as if possessed by a wolf, but her head is down. Historia and Mikasa are blank.

Jean looks up, face scrunched in determination. "Historia is the Queen. We can't be traitors to the crown if we - " His words fade and Armin is staring at the dark, dank walls of the dark, dank room he's been occupying for the last several days. His friends aren't here. Why had he thought they were? He hasn't seen any of them in at least eight years.

"Where is Eren Jeager?" a voice croons. And there's Eren in the corner, bleeding out and dying, dying, dead, but he's wrong, too young, far too young even though the hole in his chest is the same size, not so much a hole as tiny Eren ripped in half like so many other corpses. The room is filled with them, rotting.

"No, no, no, no," Armin whimpers and attempts to cover his eyes but his hands are taped behind his back. He's fairly certain that he's on fire. His head is on fire. His head! He can see the flames out of the corner of his eye, but they don't go near the festering bodies littered around him, piled high. He closes his eyes but he can still see it, seem them, feel the flames eating away at his flesh like the rot does the corpses.

Soon they'll drown the the slime and Not Eren in the corner is laughing at him mocking. "Stupid baby Armin. Pathetic. Useless. You let me get killed. It's your fault. All your fault. Because you're a useless wimp. Not even worth the cloak on your shoulders. How many of us did you kill, baby Armin? How much of our blood is on your hands? Mine. Mikasa's. Levi's. Jean's. Connie's. Everything Sasha did, that's certainly your fault. You killed Connie."

"NO! Shut up!" He curls up as much as he can with his hands behind his back, and sobs into his knees. "You're wrong, you're wrong, you're not real." Armin keeps up the litany, not noticing that he slips into common somewhere in the middle. He's desperate to drown out the jeering laughter, harsh and grating.

Outside the door, two people stand guard. A man and a woman, neither of them particularly nice or kind individuals. They listen to the desperate shouting and heart-wrenching sobs with barely a twitch. This is not the worst they've heard by, having stood watch over this very room as Boss dug information out of some tight lipped idiot with a knife. Boss is in there now. He's supposedly interrogating the kid, but to the two outside it seems less of an interrogation and more watching the kid hallucinate.

They've been standing guard for a week.

"What were they giving that kid?" the man asks suddenly. His expression hasn't changed and his stance is still the straight-backed rigidity Boss demands out of everyone, but something around his eyes is a little off when the woman glances over.

She shrugs. "I dunno. But whatever it was, he's coming down hard."

"Yeah," the man agrees. They do not shudder when the kid releases a piercing shriek. It is uncertain if the sound is one or pain or fear. "I had a cousin. Were were close as kids. He got wrapped up in some back shit, started taking the hard drugs. We were able to get him into rehab once. It, he sounded a lot like that." Another scream they do not respond to. They can hear Boss inside, murmuring in the same strange language that the kid is. It's almost as if Boss is prompting the boy's hallucinations. He'll say something, there will be a moment's pause, and then the kids takes off into another stream of terrorized babble.

They both face forward again, resolutely ignoring all sounds from within the room. They are not good people.