Eren was...shocked to say the least. In less than a day he'd gone from not even knowing that he could turn into a titan, or at least part of one, to knowing that there was a whole group of people who could. In fact, that was their defining feature if the name was to be believed.
"Wait, so...I can turn into a titan?" Eren asked.
Annie seemed confused for a second before saying, "Yes? What else would we be able to do?"
"Well, um, I didn't even really realize it was anything more than healing and regeneration until this morning when I kinda uh, messed up? And well I made this weird titan torso thing, or at least I think I made it but I'm not really sure-"
Annie put a hand up to stop him and asked, "What do you mean by messed up?"
"Oh well, ever since I realized I can heal I've been testing it." Eren explained, placing a hand on the back of his neck sheepishly. "That's what I've been doing in the woods these past few weeks, and earlier when I was testing something startled me, so I messed up."
"Ok, while I am glad to know why you've been disappearing, that still doesn't explain exactly what messing up, or any of your testing, for that matter, entails."
"Um well for a while I thought it was only healing, so I was just using a knife and a pocket watch to test how long it took to heal from minor and major injuries. So earlier today I tried to see what would happen with some major blood loss and my hand uh, slipped."
Annie pinched her fingers along the bridge of her nose. Fuck this was so much worse than she thought it'd be. "Slipped?"
"I mean, I was pretty startled so…" Eren trailed off. He still hadn't figured out exactly what had made the noise next to him, but he also hadn't had anyone ask him what the fuck he was doing, craving open his own throat, so he assumed it was an animal.
"Eren what the fuck did you do."
"Ah well, there's this big artery that goes through your neck and I thought that it would be the perfect thing to test."
Annie, still in a crouched position, moved both of her hands over her face as she moaned, "You cut your fucking carotid artery!?"
"Um, well not exactly? As I said earlier I kinda slipped and took out a good chunk of my throat as well."
She lifted her head from her hands as she just stared at him for a while in complete disbelief.
This boy, this fucking boy. God, she had heard all of Reiner's and Bertholdt's stories about the stupid shit he'd done so far, but had taken their jokes about Eren being straight up unable to think with a grain of salt.
It seems that she should have taken them much more literally.
"So you took out your throat and then shifted, is that what happened this morning?" Annie asked.
To be honest, Eren was pretty confused as to why Annie was trying to make such a big deal out of this. I mean it ended without any real damage and even a new discovery for him, which was a big win in his book. "I think I passed out first to be honest."
"So you didn't have a goal in mind or anything before you passed out? There was nothing you wanted to do?"
Eren grimaced. "Well I wanted to live pretty bad, but what does that have to do with anything?"
Annie sighed. "Not that much, but you definitely didn't shift while passed out."
"Huh?"
"In order to shift we have to be awake, in a life-threatening state, and have a goal, or a reason I guess, for using the power."
While the second half of her statement technically wasn't a lie, Annie wanted to keep Eren partially in the dark about the extent of what he could do.
A rage fueled titan Eren that thought he could only shift in life or death situations was dangerous enough, one that knew he could shift whenever he wanted would be catastrophic.
Although she knew that it was simply to protect herself and shouldn't lead to any major issues in the future, it didn't stop her from feeling slightly guilty as Eren stared up at her like she'd uncovered the secrets of the universe.
"So if there's a big issue I can just...become a huge ass titan and kill everything?" Eren asked throwing his hands up for emphasis.
Although having to be in a life threatening situation was certainly a handicap, he figured that worst comes to worst he could just create that himself with a knife or two. Besides, the Survey Corps are always in life-threatening situations, so it shouldn't be that big of a problem.
"Basically."
"Holy shit. Holy shit!" Eren exclaimed as he jumped to his feet. "Annie there are two of us, maybe more! Do you know what this means?"
Annie opened her mouth to respond, but was quickly cut off as he finished the sentence for her. "We can save humanity. We can go outside of the walls and just-just obliterate all the titans out there! We can go out and be free! We can go see the ocean…"
Annie smiled, as she thought. Maybe this would be much easier than she had planned after all.
"Yeah. If you want we could head out now, I could probably find it after running for a bit."
She'd expected unending enthusiasm from him at this proposal, so she was more than a little shocked when she glanced up to his face, only to see him conflicted.
"Well I mean, yeah but I promised Armin that we'd see the ocean together."
Shit, that was a problem. While Annie had no doubts that Eren would take basically any information she gave him as gospel, she wasn't so sure about Armin.
That boy was smart, too smart. She'd already been extra careful to limit any of her interaction with him, or around him, and with the extra factor of Eren being the loudmouth he was, she didn't know if she could keep her true intentions a secret or not.
Fuck, she did know. Armin would figure out the holes in story and information the second Eren gave it to him, and wouldn't stop until he figured out exactly what was going on. Neither her, Reiner, nor Bertholdt would even be able to make it out of the camp before being discovered, which would ruin everything.
"Why not just go see it now, then come back later to show it to him," She offered, "that way we can figure out the quickest path and minimize the danger of titans."
"Because I promised I'd see it with him, not see it then drag him along."
Annie frowned. Damn Eren and his stubbornness.
"Why don't we just tell him and Mikasa, then have them come with us?" Eren asked.
"No. Absolutely not."
"But why, I don't-"
"Eren, why have you been hiding your abilities from them?"
"Well that's because I don't want them to think I'm lying, or some kind of monster-"
She cut him off with a wave of the hand as she said, "Exactly. I know that you've known them for a while, but you're not even sure that they would take the news that you're a titan shifter well, so there's no guarantees for me. I'm not willing to put myself into more risk than I need to, plus the more people that know about a secret, the harder it is to keep."
"But they wouldn't say anything." Eren stated, frowning. Though he knew if he told his friends the reason that he'd been acting suspicious lately they'd be mad, they'd certainly understand the importance of keeping his abilities a secret. They wouldn't be petty enough to put him in danger over a little bit of lying, right?
"I don't doubt that they wouldn't go directly to our superiors and report us, but all it would take is a slip of the tongue, and then what?"
"Well, they'd see what powerful weapons we could be and-"
"They'd kill us." Annie stated with finality. "They'd kill us and never look back because we're a danger, Eren. Think of it like this. For every titan you could kill after you shift, you could kill thousands more civilians."
And so Eren did.
He thought about the only other titans he knew may be intelligent, the armored and the colossal. He thought about how with one swift motion they'd killed hundreds of thousands of people. Innocent people who never did anything but try to live within the walls.
Looking down at his hands he realized that power resided within him as well. The only difference between him and those bastards would be how he handled that power.
Except his superiors wouldn't know that. All they'd see is a potential threat, regardless of how beneficial he or Annie could be in battle.
Fuck, how could he have been so stupid.
Annie watched as the realization dawned on his face before tucking a strand of hair behind her ear and saying, "Do you understand why we can't tell anyone? Do you understand why I haven't told anyone except for you?"
"Yeah I...I'm sorry."
"Don't be. It's not like any of this is your fault."
They both sat in an uncomfortable silence for a minute, simply listening to the wind whip leaves around the area before Eren asked, "So if there are others, do you know any of them?"
"No." She lied. "I thought I was alone."
Finally deciding to stand up, as the cold ground became too uncomfortable to sit on he asked, "Then how did you know what we are? Who else knows?"
"As far as I know, only the people who lived in my village, and they all got crushed during the fall."
"Fuck, that makes it even more important to find who the armored and colossal titan are then! Annie you gotta help me with this."
She jolted back a bit, "What makes you think that those two are titan shifters?"
Looking down at her Eren made a confused face. "Well, they knew what parts of the wall to attack, and when right? Wouldn't that mean they had to be intelligent? I mean, I'm just kinda assuming, but wouldn't it just make sense that they'd be shifters?"
Ok, that was bad. It seems like when Eren was really focused on something he could make relatively smart conclusions.
"Maybe, maybe not." Annie replied, rocking onto the front of her feet, and pushing herself up to full height. "There could be a lot of stuff beyond these walls that I just don't know about."
Eren faltered for a second, "But I thought-"
"Plus it wouldn't make any sense for them to totally destroy Maria, then suddenly decide to live here among us, would it?"
Eren looked to the ground conflicted. No, it wouldn't make sense to kill so many people, then suddenly be all buddy buddy with those who survived, especially since there hadn't been an attack since the fall.
But it was the last bits of humanity inside these walls! No human could survive outside in that titan infested wasteland for any extended period of time.
But they wouldn't exactly be human would they? If he went with the assumption that they were titan shifters, which was more than probable-Especially considering the fact that many of the people stationed on the wall that day claimed that no one had attacked the colossal, yet it just disappeared into thin air-that would mean they could simply kill of any titans that attempted to eat them.
Would any titans attempt to eat them for that matter? Would any titans attempt to eat him or Annie? Technically they were human, or at least partially, but would that little titan bit repel them? From what he'd heard titans were on a strict low-carb human diet.
Eren opened his mouth to ask Annie, only to shut it once more as he took in her annoyed face.
"It's getting kinda cold and dark out here, so if you want to stay and freeze that'd be fine by me, but I'm leaving."
"No, wait don't leave me here!"
Although it had felt like much longer to Eren, the two were able to make it back in time for dinner, entering the mess hall a few minutes before they stopped serving food.
After grabbing their respective plates Eren gave a quick goodbye before making a beeline for the table Armin and Mikasa had been sitting at, noting that Jean was already there with some displeasure.
He was still somewhat upset with Armin, but at least recognized the fact that it had been a shit move for him to leave while he was getting chewed out by Mikasa.
(For a second he also recognized the fact that it was even more of a shit move to keep things from them, and that they just wanted the best for him and were only trying to help, but he quashed that down the second it popped up.)
"Hey guys, sorry I left I just had to-"
"Had to what? Go make out with Annie or something? Everyone saw how you two walked in late together." Jean interrupted.
Eren flushed. What was it with people interrupting him today? "Um, no. For your information we were just discussing throwing techniques."
Jean snorted. "Is that what you two call it?"
"I think you're projecting horseface, cause' I feel like every time you and Marco are late it's because y'all were 'discussing 3DMG maneuvers'" Eren fired back, making air quotes with his hands.
"Ok, but that's different."
"Is it though?"
"Yes, because-"
"I know that you guys didn't get a chance to do your weird dick measuring contest today, but can we please discuss the reasons for that, mainly the fact that Eren, you disappeared for like forever without telling anyone!"
Eren shrunk in his seat for a little bit before replying, "But I did tell you where I'd be, y'all just didn't believe me."
"Frankly because your story was crock full of shit." Mikasa replied coolly. "We're not stupid Eren."
"I don't think you guys are, I just think you're looking for something that's not there."
Both Mikasa and Armin glared at him, as Jean decided that he suddenly wanted nothing to with the conversation and made the move to leave.
Only to be stopped by Armin swiftly tugging on his sleeve.
"Oh, no, Jean I'd like you to stay and hear the bullshit Eren has been trying to feed us."
Ohhh boy, this was gonna be bad, wasn't it?
Jean sat back down as Eren began to defend himself.
"I told both of you exactly where I'd be, and what'd I'd be doing! I get it, I came back a little late, but Armin you've done that while reading, and Mikasa, you've done it while training as well! I believed you then, so why can't you believe me now?"
"Because you've been doing it consistently!" Armin cried. "All of a sudden you started disappearing for a while, then coming back super late, and we're worried ok!?"
"Ok, fine. But it's not like I'm coming back hurt or anything, so I don't understand-"
"Except that you are. Armin says he almost always sees new bloodstains on your clothes after you come back." Mikasa interrupted.
Shit, really? And he had been so careful to make sure there were none…
"Well, what's it to you if I hunt a rabbit or two while I'm out there, it's not that big of a deal."
"How? Why? What're you doing with the meat? What're you doing with the fur? If you're eating them, how are you cooking them? If not, why haven't I seen rabbit carcasses lying around? Why haven't-"
"Alright! I get it, you guys don't wanna fuckin' believe me, you don't have to rub it in my face!"
"Rub it in your face? What the hell do you mean by that?" Mikasa asked, starting to get angry. "You've been dancing around our questions and lying to us for-for weeks! We're just trying to help!"
"Obviously not, because if you were you'd take the hint and leave me alone." Eren hissed as he leaned forward and placed his elbows on the table.
Who the fuck did they think they were to question him like this? He'd given them possible excuses, and while yeah, they were lies, he'd thought they'd at least trust him a little bit!
Guess he was fucking wrong.
(Except he knew it wasn't their fault, it was never their fault and he was being an awful fucking friend for pushing this back on them because they're only worried and they're doing their best, they're trying to help-)
He clenched his fists hard enough that he could feel his nails bite through the soft flesh of his palm, and grit his teeth as Mikasa continued to retaliate.
Fuck, why couldn't they just leave this alone?
As the group continued to argue, they grew louder and louder, until a large chunk of the mess hall had taken notice.
It was normal to hear some loud squabbles-usually courtesy of Eren and Jean-however to hear the normally tight group screaming and at each others throats was...more than a bit unsettling for a majority of the mess hall.
Jean, for his part, was attempting to curl in on himself, making himself as small as possible, yet not daring to leave the table in fear that he'd be roped into the argument as he left.
Walls, that was the last thing that he wanted to happen.
Scanning the mess hall, he noticed that a good chunk of the previous cadets had already left, the remaining few either on the edge of their seat, waiting to see how it'll turn out, or simply waiting for a good time to leave.
Well, except for Annie and Ymir, who just looked totally unfazed.
Yet while Ymir didn't seem to be bothered by the screaming, Krista very obviously was, and kept squirming within her seat. She seemed to be bargaining with Ymir about...well something. Even if those two had been sitting directly across from him, he probably still wouldn't have heard them with how loud the trio next to him was being.
Sweet Sina, he knew that Eren could be loud, but Mikasa and Armin were a surprise.
"-right Jean?" Mikasa asked, rather loudly.
He snapped back to attention, realizing that he'd totally tuned them out for the last couple of minutes.
"Um, well-I, um-"
"Oi, why the fuck are you asking horseface?"
"Because I just wanna make sure that I'm not the only one hearing this bullshit." Armin yelled, and oh boy Armin swearing was really fucking bad.
The trio all turned to face him, obviously expecting some kind of answer, to which Jean had none to give.
Even if he had known what the question was beforehand, he wouldn't have wanted to answer anyway!
Give a response in Eren's favor and he'd lose the minuscule chance he had with Mikasa, and Armin would probably make his life hell through some sort of scheme. Answer in their favor and Eren would beat his ass ten ways from Sunday-and holy shit, could Eren hit hard even when he wasn't pissed, he didn't ever want to be on the receiving end of his full wrath-so there was no winning!
Jean rubbed the back of his neck awkwardly as he began to stumble over a response, "I think that um-well, I mean...I don't think I'm really qualified to give an answer?" Great, stay neutral and he might just be able to make it out of this alive!
"See I told you, he's biased so asking him won't help at all! He's not gonna defend me no matter how right I am."
"Eren don't you dare use words I taught you against me."
"Oh, I'm sorry I didn't realize you were the word police."
"That was uncalled for." Mikasa seethed, and walls, why did Jean decide that sitting here would be a good idea today?
Luckily for him, he began to hear two pairs of footsteps grow closer and closer to the table, and as he glanced back was pleased to see that they were from Ymir and Krista, both attempting to leave.
"Krista!" Jean exclaimed, jumping out of his seat just as the two began to pass him. Krista stumbled back a bit as Jean continued. "You were listening in on the conversation right? And you're impartial!"
"Oi, what the hell do you think-" Ymir started, but was quickly cut off by Krista raising her hand in front of her face.
"It's fine, I mean, I'd be helping right?"
Eren just snorted while Jean enthusiastically nodded.
"Um, well to be honest I don't really think any of you are handling this well, but Mikasa and Armin kinda have a point." Krista said.
"What!"
"Eren, I told you that any normal person would agree with us." replied Armin smugly.
While he had no doubts that Armin was probably right, Jean still had no fucking clue what the question was.
"Krista how could you agree with them!" Eren pleaded. "You disappear all the time without telling anybody where you're going!"
"Hey, she tells me!"
"No shit Ymir, it doesn't count if you disappear too!"
Armin cradled his head in his hands as he picked up his elbows, only to slam them back down on the table a few times. Sweet fucking Sina was this awful.
"So what? It's none of your business what Krista does in her free time."
"And it's none of yours what I do in mine!"
Ymir leaned forward and pointed to Mikasa and Armin as she began to yell, "I don't give a shit what you do, but those two do, so you better fucking fix it!"
"Guys!" Krista shouted, as she placed herself between the two angry brunettes. She pushed Ymir back using her left hand, as she placed her right on Eren's nape. "Screaming at each other isn't going to fix anything, we need to-"
All six at the table were stopped in their tracks as a solid 'thunk' rang out throughout the room, their eyes all being drawn to the center of the group to see-
Ah. Eren had passed out.
Walls Eren couldn't remember the last time he'd been so angry, well actually he could because it had been less than three hours ago, but that was besides the point.
Fuck Armin and Mikasa for continuing to argue, fuck Armin in particular for forcing Jean to stay, fuck Jean and Krista for not taking his side, and fuck Ymir in general.
Nobody had ever had a problem with anything he'd done before, but suddenly he disappears for a little bit and gets the tiniest bit of blood on his pants and now it's everyone's fucking business.
Truth be told, he'd stopped listening to any of what Armin or Mikasa said a while back because as much as he pretended that it didn't, their accusations hurt. Their lack of trust hurt. The fact that Eren knew he was lying to them and they were just concerned fucking hurt, and he couldn't handle it.
So he defaulted to the thing he knew best, anger.
"And it's none of yours what I do with mine!" He yelled. Walls he felt like an asshole.
It wasn't Ymir's fault, it wasn't anyone's fault other than his own, but to admit that would mean that he'd have to tell Mikasa and Armin what he'd been doing, and he knew that they'd probably still accept him, walls there was almost no way they wouldn't but what if?
'What if?' Whispered a small voice at the back of his mind. What if they didn't accept him, what if they saw him as a monster, something less than human. What if they became scared themselves and sent him to the chopping block?
They'd been there the day the wall fell too. They'd seen the utter havoc titans could wreak just by existing, with thousands pulled apart in their grip, sliced by their teeth, and crushed beneath their lumbering stride as they moved toward their next meal.
To add to that, he couldn't even reassure them that he wouldn't be like those titans, because he didn't know. From what Annie said, it sounded as if he would still have full control once he shifted into a full titan, but it was still possible that it was only bare minimum control, or it took a lot of time and training to get that full control.
And there was no room for error when you're about ten times your original height.
Eren was so caught up in his thoughts that he didn't even notice Krista's hand reaching out toward him, until it came into contact with his neck.
At first all he felt was fear. Pure unadulterated terror as every single muscle in his body rapidly tensed, because someone was touching his nape and that was a bad spot, bad spot, he had to move, to move! But then it stopped.
And suddenly he was somewhere else.
A large cavern, full of gorgeous blue crystals-they almost looked like the shiny stones that the women in the inner city wore around their necks, that ones that costed more than most people ever make in their lifetime-and a group of people in all white standing directly in front of him.
The one in the middle, a woman with shoulder length black hair was yelling something, something, but Eren couldn't hear. It felt as if his head was submerged underwater, his body no longer his, as if he were just a spectator watching from the outside.
Briefly, Eren realized, he should probably be concerned.
Armin had talked about something like this before, where after really bad events to cope with the trauma some people's minds just kinda...kick them out. "It's like watching a show depicting your own life." he had explained, and while Eren had thought it impossible at the time, it definitely seemed possible now.
Except he'd never seen these people before, never seen this place, and he certainly hadn't been sitting in a weird crystalline cave a minute ago.
Then he was moving, which was odd because Eren hadn't wanted to, and hadn't attempted to, but it allowed him to see his hands and forearms, which were covered with a black jacket, shirt frills just barely poking out.
Huh. That was new.
The black jacket was recognizable, but still odd. It should have been sitting back in the barracks, folded along with his other civilian clothing, as he hadn't worn it since the day he obtained his trainee jacket, but the frills were something totally different.
Walls, he'd never be caught dead wearing some kind of fancy ass shirt like that under his jacket, but before he could mull over it the woman brought her hand up to her mouth and…
Bit right through the fleshy part of her thumb, and holy shit, why the fuck would she do that? Eren felt like flinching just from watching the display, but then the scene changed and suddenly a titan, massive and looking like a woman-he thought the commander said all titans lacked any distinguishing gender features?- was running straight at him, her hand in a fist, but it was….different somehow.
For one, he was eye-level with the beast, and it looked like he was looking through some sort of goggles, but he was sure there was nothing on his face.
Her fist came closer as Eren attempted to bring his arms up to brace for impact, but he couldn't, his arms felt too heavy and they weren't responding, and fuck it wouldn't do any good anyway would it? Trying to block a titan fist with his arms was desperate at best, and he was going to die here, thrown into those shiny walls because of a random fucking titan.
But then the fist made contact. Eren could feel himself stumble back, almost losing his footing, but nothing like the full slam into the walls he had been expecting.
In fact, it didn't even feel like it'd hit his whole body, just the ride side of his face, and holy shit was he a titan?!
Another flash and he was on top of her, pinning her shoulders to the ground as she struggled against him. She looked bruised and exhausted, as if she was fighting a losing battle, yet still trying in vain to free herself.
Eren could see the fear in her eyes, the anger and frustration, and for the first time, he felt bad for a titan.
This one didn't look lifeless like the rest, hell she was entirely proportionate as well, simply looking like a fifteen meter tall human, but he couldn't free her. He still had no control over his arms or legs, and even if he did, he probably still would have killed her.
Eren felt a pang of sadness rip through him as he saw his right hand, large and veiny like a titan's, lift off of one of her shoulders, probably to crush the nape. For all he knew she could have been trying to kill those people he'd seen earlier, but something told him that wasn't right. Something told him she'd been protecting.
He wanted to close his eyes as the hand lifted up higher, preparing to strike, but that's not what happened.
The hand was placed beneath her shoulder and used to flip her onto her side, and Eren felt her struggles increase.
Suddenly he was moving, his vision growing closer and closer to her neck, her nape, and he couldn't be planning on biting it could he?
Eren watched in horror as he descended, wanting to scream. No he didn't want this! He wasn't going to eat her like some fucking mindless titan, he was different, he could just kill her by crushing and it'd be done! He didn't need to do this.
But he couldn't control himself.
He felt his jaw drop open and place itself over the bone that jutted out from her neck and bite.
His teeth slid through flesh and bone as it were simply a bit of meat that had been rationed out to the cadets as a warm metallic liquid began to fill his mouth, and he pulled.
Hands still firmly placed on her shoulders, he ripped his head back, pulling the chunk of flesh between his teeth with it, but that wasn't all.
Out of his peripheral he could see her head coming along with him, eyes dead and lifeless and he finally bit clean through the bone.
The meat slid cleanly down his throat, aided by the blood he could feel spilling over his mouth, as her head dropped to the ground, and Eren wanted to puke.
Fuck, this wasn't him, what the fuck was happening, why couldn't he control himself, where the fuck was he!
Not even getting a moment to recover, he felt his head swivel, eyes locking onto the group of people from before, all frozen in fear. Why hadn't they run? Why were they still here!?
His body lunged to the people who now began to flee, but they were too late.
Two were crushed beneath his massive hand, as another, holding a child fell under his feet.
'Probably a mother,' Eren thought dizzily, 'A mother just trying to save her child.'
Two of the men were running, running as fast as they could to an exit, but Eren had size on his side.
No matter how fast they ran, they couldn't escape his hand, reaching, grabbing the younger male as he began to squeeze. Bones crunched under his fingers as the man became little more than paste in his hands, and Eren didn't want this.
He didn't want to be here, out of control and slaughtering people as if he really were a mindless titan, but worse, because this was targeted, because he wasn't eating these people, he was just killing to kill, slaughtering innocents who had done nothing wrong, and he didn't want to be here, he didn't want to be here!
Eren's eyes shot open, and for a second he couldn't move. Panic began to set in, as it was just like wherever he was before, trapped without any way to control himself, simply destroying all in his path, until he saw the familiar ceiling of the medical tent.
His breathing began to slow as he took in what was around him. His head was lying on something soft and cushioning while the rest of his body was enveloped within a comforting warmth.
Movement finally coming back to him, he turned his head to see Armin sitting next to him, a thick book in hand.
Hah, typical.
"Armin?" Eren asked tentatively. He had no idea why he was in the med tent, nor how long he'd been out for.
The vision, or dream, or whatever it was hadn't felt any longer than five minutes, but it obviously had been for his tablemates to have been able to drag him to the med tent.
Armin looked up and immediately dropped his book. "Oh my walls, Eren you're awake! Are you ok, do you feel faint, does your head hurt, is there anything that hurts?"
Eren flinched back a bit. Yeah, his head kinda hurt, but it wasn't all that bad, and saying something would just lead to Armin worrying more, so he elected to respond with a, "Nah, I'm all good. How long have I been out?"
"You've been out for almost a full day, and-MIKASA HE'S AWAKE-we've been really worried because you kinda just fainted out of nowhere, and we didn't know what caused it, and you had a bit of a fever when you came in here, but we couldn't find anything wrong and it wasn't going down no matter what we did for a while, so-"
Armin's rambling was cut off by Mikasa quickly rounding the corner that led into the resting room of the med tent as she asked, "Eren are you ok?"
"Yeah, like I just told Armin it's all-"
Within a second she was at his side, lifting him up by the collar of his shirt.
"Do not lie to me this time."
Eren tried to shirk back, an effort made entirely useless as she drew him closer to her face.
"What do you mean? I'm totally fine-"
"Your ears are red."
Fuck.
"Ok, I have a bit of a headache, but honestly I'm all good! It's not even that bad."
Mikasa scanned his face again, searching for any reason to not believe him, before finally dropping him back to where he'd been sitting before.
The three sat in a comfortable silence for a minute as Eren rubbed at his temples to give a small bit of relief to the pounding that had started after she had yelled directly in his face before Armin spoke up.
"Eren, I understand why you lied before, but please, for our sake and yours, stop lying over such small things, ok?"
"I know it's partially my fault too," Mikasa continued, "But I'll try to be better about my…'overprotectiveness' in the future, so please if you're going to do something possibly harmful just...tell us. I promise I won't be mad."
While Eren was grateful that they seemed to be over the argument, he still had no clue what they were talking about.
"Huh?"
"Annie told us what you had been doing in the woods all this time."
Eren felt his blood run cold. Annie had told them? Told them about his experiments? How he could become a monster? And they were ok with it?
They were ok with his testing?
"Ah...what exactly did she tell you?"
"She told us everything," Armin responded, "And while I'm disappointed in you for not thinking things through, it didn't really end up being anything harmful, so I guess it's ok."
Wait, so they were just ok with what he did? He'd thought they'd be a little bit more upset, especially Mikasa with how pissed she gets whenever he ends up with the slightest scratch.
"I mean, I'm not happy that you two decided to go off on your own to practice hand to hand, especially outside of training times, but I can see why, considering your scores in it lately." Mikasa shrugged.
That was...nowhere near what he had been expecting. Tension flowed out of Eren's body as he realized that Annie had covered for him, pretty nicely as well if Armin and Mikasa were no longer suspicious.
He relaxed back onto the pillow, yet couldn't find it in himself to be too happy about the situation. Yes, Armin and Mikasa were off his back, and probably would be for a while, if not indefinitely, but he'd still have to continue to lie to them.
He'd still have to stare them in the face as he betrayed their trust because he had no clue if they'd still accept him after they found out what he could do, what he was.
"Yeah, I'm sorry." Eren said through clenched teeth. "I just...I didn't want to worry you guys, y'know, and I didn't want to drag Annie down with me."
"We know, but honestly, your lying had us more worried than the actual story. Just tell us ok? The worst we can do is get mad at you."
'Or you could report me to the military police and get me executed.' Eren thought bitterly. As each moment passed he began to feel worse and worse about this predicament, but it wasn't like he could say anything now without throwing Annie under the bus.
Fuck, this sucked.
"I'm sorry."
"Hey it's in the past now right." Armin said with a soft smile. "You can't do anything to change it now, so don't beat yourself up over it, ok?"
"I'm not." Really, he wasn't, but beating himself up over the lie he was still telling was fair game.
"Now we've got to focus on more important things like," She whipped around to face Eren, "the fact that you haven't eaten in almost a full day."
"Oh yeah, but I'm not really all that hungry." Eren said with a wave of the hand.
"I thought we agreed to stop with the lying?"
"Yeah, but I'm telling the truth now." and he really was. Although he hadn't eaten much at dinner the day prior, before he'd passed out, the scene that had played while he'd been asleep still had him nauseous and without any desire to eat things for a while.
Mikasa glared at him slightly before spinning on her heel and responding, "Too bad, you're going to eat regardless."
The two boys watched her retreat around the corner, before turning to each other.
"Are you sure everything's ok, Eren?"
"Yes, I've said it like five times!" Eren said, throwing his head back in exhaustion. "I don't understand why you guys keep asking me that."
"I know, I know, but you've just been...off I guess. Like something's been bothering you ever since you woke up."
"What! No, no, everything's fine, I'm just a bit groggy from being out for so long."
Armin pursed his lips as he stood up from the chair he'd been sitting in. He placed a hand on Eren's forehead, which Eren instantly backed away from.
"Sina, your hand is cold!"
Armin simply frowned and stated, "You're still really warm…"
Yeah, no shit, but it wasn't like Eren could change his temperature at will, or could he? He'd have to ask Annie at some point, because it'd be extremely inconvenient if he'd have to flub every temperature test he'd be forced to take in the future.
"It's probably just the remnants of the fever you said I had earlier. Really, I'm totally fine."
Eren was not fine.
Remnants of his vision or dream-he was just gonna stick with calling it a dream, because to call it a vision implied that it could, or did, happen-kept flashing through his head. He knew it wasn't him, couldn't have been him, because he'd never seen that place in is life, nor had he ever transformed into a full on titan, with lost memories being out of the question due to the fact that Armin and Mikasa would have noticed if he had suddenly changed into a frilly shirt and grabbed his black jacket.
He'd still have to check to make sure that it hadn't been moved in storage though. Just to be absolutely certain.
That left either the weirdest and most vivid dream he'd ever had, or something that he had been made to see for some reason, whether it be a future possibility, something that had been happening at the time, or a past event, each equally implausible.
Honestly, it was making Eren sick just thinking about the possibility that it could be real, that someone would be cold-hearted and ruthless enough to slaughter and innocent family and their protection for whatever reason.
But it wasn't like there was a way for events that happened elsewhere to be shown to another person like they had been right there, looking in from the perspective of whoever, which left a dream as the logical conclusion, but it had felt so real.
He could still hear the soft crunch of bones as he squeezed his hand, the slight resistance of flesh before it gave way and burst, the feeling of his teeth sliding through-
"Hey, they didn't have anything lighter than the normal bean soup and potatoes, but I think it'll be ok." said Mikasa as she walked into the tent, balancing a small bowl and a potato on a tray.
"Yeah that's fine, but I already said I'm not hungry."
"Too bad. You need to eat."
"I don't want to."
She sighed and placed the tray roughly on the stand next to him. "Eren, you're either going to eat this voluntarily, or I'm going to force it down your throat."
He looked over to Armin, who simply shrugged helplessly.
"Fine, fine, I'll eat it, just relax."
Truth be told, he was dreading eating anything. His memory of the dream was too fresh, too vivid to be totally ignored, and he just knew that it'd come back up the second anything hit his teeth.
"Oh, I also grabbed and filled up your water sack too, so make sure to drink some of that."
"I know, I will."
Eren threw the blanket off of his legs and swung them to the same side as Armin, placing the tray on top of them. He stared down at the food, wishing that it would just disappear, but alas, the potato and soup simply stayed where they were, letting off small wisps of steam as if they were mocking him.
"You gonna eat, or are you just going to glare that poor potato out of existence?" Armin asked jokingly, but Eren was not amused.
"I'm gonna eat, but I already told you, I'm not hungry. Just give me a minute."
Armin simply rolled his eyes and picked his book back up, while Mikasa took his blanket and began to fold it. Eren hesitantly gripped the potato, before breaking it in two. It was pleasantly warm in his hands, as if it'd been cooked recently and set to cool for a minute or two, and under any normal circumstance, Eren would have no qualms about digging in.
Yet as he held it, the potato seemed to grow heavier, as it was something other than plant matter, as if it were-
Nope, not going there. The only thing in his hand was a half of a potato, nothing but a root grown beneath the ground, boiled to become soft, and served to all the cadets because they were cheap. Just a potato.
Eren continued to repeat this to himself as he brought the piece to his mouth and bit down, the flesh of the plant yielding under his canines as he pulled it apart, the weight settling uncomfortably over his tongue.
He could feel the nausea rise up again as he continued to chew, mashing the food until it was nothing but a paste, then finally relenting to swallow, the thick sludge beginning to slide down his throat, just like, like-
Eren scrambled to the very edge of the bed, soup sloshing, and promptly threw up-directly onto Armins shoes.
And oh, those had been new, new boots that Armin had saved up for with his own money after his previous pair had been ruined in the rain, and Armin had been so excited to get them, and now they were ruined because of him and his stupid fucking inability to be a good friend, becuase even after they told him that he could trust them, he still lied ot their faces, he could see exactly how much it hurt them, and he still lied, but he couldn't tell the truth, he couldn't-
Eren hadn't even realized that he'd started crying until he felt Armin wrap his arms around his neck while Mikasa rubbed his back.
"I'm sorry, I'm so sorry, I didn't mean to-I didn't want-" He sobbed as he pulled Armin closer.
"Hey, hey, hey it's, okay." Armin whispered reassuringly. "You said you're not hungry, and we should have listened to you. It's not your fault."
Eren shook his head. That's not what he was apologizing for, and it was his fault. He had the option to tell them, fuck he still did, but he couldn't. He wouldn't be able to handle it if they rejected him now, if they treated him like the monster he was, the way he knew he deserved to be treated.
But he couldn't say any of that. He just couldn't.
So Eren opted to pull Armin closer and dig his hands into the back of the blond's shirt as Mikasa ran her hands in comforting circles over his back and through his hair.
And there they sat for who knows how long, until Armin felt the grip on his shirt loosen and Mikasa felt the muscles underneath her hands relax.
He tentatively pulled back, placing Eren's head back onto the pillow and his hands in front of him. Surprisingly, throughout the ordeal the soup had stayed firmly put, and aside from a few splashes on the mattress and Eren's shirt, had avoided making any sort of mess.
The same could not be said for Armin's shoes however.
"How bad is it?" Mikasa asked in a whisper.
"A direct shot." Armin responded dryly. "If his aim was anywhere near as good as this with the 3DMG gear, he'd be having a much easier time during training."
She chuckled softly as she pulled out a spare blanket from the drawer beside her, throwing it over Eren in one smooth motion. While now peaceful, both could see the red rings and tear tracks underneath his eyes, indicative of the prior incident.
"I didn't think he'd get so upset over something as small as messing up your shoes."
Armin sighed as he moved to find one of the many buckets he knew were kept within the tent. "I don't really think it was that to be honest."
"What do you mean?"
"Well his reaction seemed kinda...extreme, don't you think? I think something else is really bothering him."
"Like what-oh and here's a bucket."
Armin grabbed the bucket and pulled open his own water sack, using it to fill the bucket around half way. "Thank you, but I don't really know. If it had been before today, I would have said whatever secret he had been keeping but now…"
He dumped the bucket on top of the toes of his shoes and the area surrounding them, diluting the bile so it could be mopped up with a towel.
Mikasa walked up from behind him, carrying three large towels, as well as a bottle of some type of cleaning agent, of what exactly Armin wasn't entirely sure.
"Maybe he's just sick. Annie had said he was running a fever when she took his temperature."
"Maybe." Armin responded, but that didn't feel right, and both of them knew it. There was something else going on, something that Eren either couldn't or wouldn't say, yet the question of exactly what eluded both of them.
As much as neither wanted to admit it, they were back to the drawing board, and two steps back from where they'd started now that they knew what he'd been doing in his free time.
"Well, it's not going to do us any good to just sit here and watch him. He'll probably sleep through the night after that, so I'm going to head back." Said Armin, as he neatly folded the used towels so that any filth was contained on the inside.
"I might stay a bit longer to be honest."
"Suit yourself, but I'd prefer to sleep in an actual bed."
Armin gathered his things, being sure to fold the top part of his boots over the soiled ends, as well as to grab a pair of slippers from the front of the tent, before he began to walk outwards, towards the barracks.
Just before he exited, he heard his name being called and turned back to see Mikasa waving at him.
"Have a good sleep!" She called.
"Yeah, you too."
And with that, he turned back to enter the barracks and finally get some rest.