MIKASA, ARMIN
DAY 2
TIME: 2350 hours
The watchtower was, strategically, a flawed place to be. That's what Armin was thinking when he struggled to climb the ladder behind Mikasa, whose strength was hindered by her leg that was still seeping blood through her pants.
A red drop fell on Armin's knuckles as Mikasa took another haphazard step up the ladder, and he flicked his hand out of shock. At the slow pace they were going, it was a good thing none of Kenny's squad had noticed what they were doing yet. On the ladder, they were sitting ducks.
As Mikasa progressed, Armin's gaze faltered to the distance, where yells were originating from around the titan currently terrorizing their opposition. It was clear Eren wasn't in control, even from a distance, but Armin still thanked his lucky stars that Eren could turn into a titan at all. Otherwise, they'd be practically defenseless with nothing but their blades against the guns.
Suddenly, the weight of Hange's rifle strapped to Armin's shoulder became apparent. The situation was still poor- Kenny's squad had shown time and again that they weren't the type to be talked down in a conflict. Fighting was the only option, and in the case of an injured soldier and a less-than-physically capable soldier, the odds weren't exactly on their side.
Mikasa finally hauled herself up to the top of the watchtower, giving Armin the chance to race up behind her. He couldn't ignore how each ladder prong was slick with blood, and the imprints that his palms made once he hoisted himself up onto the floor of the tower.
Armin slid the rifle off his back in relief, immediately taking the chance to bask in the loss of the weight. They were now over ten metres off the ground, and by overlooking the small fence that rounded the structure's edge, a solid view of the area around them was provided. The cabin was plenty far, and the next closest building was the stables. It wasn't promised that they could fight off an attack with just one rifle, but no one would be approaching them unnoticed.
The next order of business was to pull up the ladder. The flimsy ropes attached by the wooden steps rattled together as Armin pulled them up, and let them clatter on the floor of the tower. If only they had on their ODM gear, they wouldn't have had to deal with such a hassle.
Armin thought longingly of his gear that he had left stored underneath his bed. What he wouldn't give-
"Armin." Mikasa's voice startled him out of his thoughts. "Why are you staring off into space?"
Armin gave his head a shake. Walls. Even Mikasa was more attentive than he was right now, and she had a head injury.
Armin jumped and shuffled next to Mikasa. "I'm just thinking," he replied. "We can't spend too long not paying attention, but we should do something about your injuries."
Mikasa gingerly shook her head. "I'll be fine. You need to keep watch and make sure no one comes looking for us here."
It felt like his head was going to combust. "I can't," Armin said with finality. "You… you have a piece of wood stuck in your leg. We have to do something about that first."
"No," Mikasa said. "Armin, all you do is think. Which is good, because it's what you're best at. But I'm not getting any worse right now. I won't bleed out, or anything. You're avoiding taking charge by trying to help me, because it's what you're most comfortable with, but you're the only one of us who can fight right now. You need to keep watch."
The truth hit Armin's ears harder than any of his childhood bullies ever could. It only made sense that he had to protect them both. But he was no Mikasa, no one was like Mikasa.
"This is bad," Armin delved, "You shouldn't have tried to cover me. You wouldn't have gotten hit. I'm sorry-"
"Don't apologise if you have nothing to be sorry for," Mikasa reprimanded, lightly pressing a sleeve to the cut on her head. "Just hone in your confidence. I've seen you in training. You'll be fine."
Trying to ignore the tidal wave of anxiety crashing in his stomach, Armin nodded several more times than what was needed, and prepared the rifle. It felt heavier than before, but the smooth wood of the handle fit nicely in his hand. Armin ran his fingers over it, trying to focus on how slick it felt under his fingertips as he approached the side of the watchtower, and-
-came face-to-face with a bearded man climbing up, with death in his eyes.
Armin screamed, and slammed the butt of the rifle into the man's glabella, sending him careening haphazardly toward the ground. ODM wires were attached to the watchtower's floor, so all he did was fall five metres, then float in midair, regaining his balance.
"A man," Armin said as he rushed back over to Mikasa, who perked up slightly, despite her oncoming exhaustion. Armin took her arm and pulled her across the floor, to the side of the watchtower, and he looked over the side to assess the situation once again. The man was now back on the ground, but watching Armin with a hungry eye.
Armin whipped his head back over the edge of the watchtower. Next to him, the ladder remained in a heap. There was no way Mikasa would be able to climb down the ladder- that required balance and a clear head, which she was currently lacking both of. Still, jumping wasn't an option from this high. The only ODM gear around belonged to the man, and if Armin were to acquire it, that meant entering combat. Which seemed unavoidable, at this point.
In the distance, the skirmish still raged on. This man seemed to be the only one who had taken interest in attacking the watchtower. That would change if Armin ended up having to fire his rifle- a lot more opponents would be attracted to their location. If either if them fired, it would alert everybody within thousand metre distance.
Armin was almost appalled at how stupid the man was. All he had to do to get backup was fire his gun. Unless he didn't think he needed backup- after all, Armin couldn't have looked like much of a threat.
Breathe, he told himself. Playing the underdog was an advantage. He was being underestimated.
"Mikasa," Armin began. "If you get on my back, will you be able to hold on?"
Mikasa nodded behind her sleeve, and once Armin had re-applied the rifle strap to his shoulder, he let Mikasa wrap her hands around his neck. The warmth of her scarf rubbed against his neck, and the sound of wires finding a home once again in the wood of the watchtower signalled that the man was going to be arriving soon.
"Hang on," Armin squeaked, just as the figure of the man appeared soaring over the railing. At the same time, Armin forced his legs to rise and wrapped his hands around the prongs of the ladder. For a brief moment, he made eye contact with his foe as they crossed paths- the man, landing on the floor of the watchtower, and Armin with Mikasa in tow, jumping off.
The two of them freefell through the air until the ladder fell far enough for the ropes to stiffen, and propel them both back up through the air. When their feet were less than a mere metre off the ground, Armin let go, sending him stomping against the grass with Mikasa bouncing on his back from the impact.
In a flash, Armin raced beneath the Watchtower until he and Mikasa were leaned against the main support pole. Here, he allowed Mikasa to relax into the ground, and once again, Armin revelled in the newfound weightlessness from the weight leaving his body. He couldn't run, not carrying Mikasa like that. Which meant he had to fight.
"Hide on the other side," Armin advised Mikasa, who asked no questions and obeyed as the gears in her friend's mind turned. Armin surveyed the watchtower's supports- Aside from the thick, main pole in the middle, he was surrounded by a jungle gym of wooden beams that looked very climbable, if he did say so himself.
He began on the outside, then with the speed of a squirrel, shuffled along the higher beams, until he was well off the ground, and covered by the shadows of the floor above him, which even with a few metres distance, still creaked as the man regained his balance and jumped back off the side in the direction Armin and Mikasa had left.
With his gas, the man was able to land effortlessly. He looked around the field, and back up at the watchtower, especially eyeing the ladder. Armin checked the pole- Mikasa was out of sight.
Growling, the man started towards the pole. He wasn't the sharpest tool in the shed, that had already been made clear- but it didn't take a genius to deduce that in a field with nothing but a watchtower, it was impossible to simply disappear. Armin had one chance to do this or they'd both be found out.
The man got closer to Mikasa with every step, but Armin waited until just the right moment, when the man was directly beneath the beam he was on, to jump. For a moment, he didn't think he was going to make it- from where he had jumped, the man didn't notice and had continued walking. Desperately, Armin reached out with both arms, and before he hit the ground, pulled himself towards the man by wrapping his hands around his neck from above, and letting his full weight fall on to him.
There was a satisfying snap as they both hit the ground.
For a moment, Armin lied still on top of the dormant body of the man. His ear was pressed against the top of his back, and as hard as Armin tried to concentrate through the blood pounding in his head, he couldn't hear a heartbeat.
Rising up, Armin noticed the strange angle the man's neck was at, and how his head was twisted to the side. The eyes that were once filled with a rich intent to kill were now void of anything emotion, unblinking.
Armin rolled off of the corpse.
"Armin," Mikasa said. Armin jumped at her voice, and looked up to see his friend right next to him on the ground. She must have noticed the silence and crawled over from her hiding place behind the pole. When? How long had he been sitting there for?
"Hey," she said again, giving Armin's shoulder a bit of a shake. "Don't you think we should go? If they spot us with the body, we're dead. We can't exactly run. We should leave now."
Armin looked at Mikasa through watery eyes- he was crying. He couldn't remember when he had started. Yet, Mikasa appeared to be completely calm, even with a small piece of wood embedded in her leg and a likely concussion. She was right, too- they couldn't move fast, so it would be wiser to leave sooner than later.
"Okay," Armin said, in a voice that wound up being a whisper. With shaking hands, he tightened the rifle around his shoulder once more, hung Mikasa's arm around his shoulder before standing up. "We shouldn't go to the house. It's too close and too much of a target. Instead… we could wait the fight out in the forest."
Armin hated the words as soon as they came out of his mouth. Currently, his friends were fighting, outnumbered, and he was speaking of waiting it.
Useless, he thought to himself. Utterly useless. You can't even do nothing correctly.
Mikasa must have seen the dejection on Armin's face, because she leaned in closer to his side as they began to walk in the direction of the treeline. "Thank you," she reassured.
"For what?" Armin questioned. "I couldn't even shoot the guy. Hange gave me a single job and I failed."
"Hange wanted you to watch out for me," Mikasa corrected. "I'd say you're doing good so far. So thank you."
Armin didn't smile, but the frown left his face as they entered the forest.
LEVI, SASHA, CONNIE, HANGE
DAY 2
TIME: 2350 hours
In the midst of confusion from Eren's titan, not one member of Kenny's squad noticed the entrance of Hange and Levi. Instead, anyone who wasn't on the ground debating how to climb Eren was already climbing Eren, using ODM gear to haphazardly swing from the titan's perpetually swinging limbs.
"Well," Hange huffed, blades drawn and their back pressed against Levi's. "My hypothesis was correct. Eren is definitely not in control of his titan!"
Levi scanned the scene of sprinting Military Police in front of him. "Are you happy now, you greasy shit? Are you satisfied?"
Hange whooped. "Titan hand coming our way!"
Instinctively, Levi held his blades away, and rolled out of the path of Eren's hand in the nick of time. Had he been wearing his cloak, it would have been shredded in half. In wake of the missed hit, Levi spotted Hange's figure a few metres away, and raced over. "Is there any chance we can snap the brat out of it?"
"Armin's report of Trost mentioned that Eren might respond to pain on his real body," Hange said, out of breath from the constant dodging. "But that was a different situation. Right now, he's sick. I've never gotten to experiment with that until now, you know."
Levi grit his teeth. "Slicing it is, then. Where the hell is Jean?"
"He had his cloak," Hange said, eyeing Eren's fist for the direction of his next strike. "I'm not seeing him, Levi!"
Shit. If a recruit died here, not even in battle, it would only become another regret for Levi to carry.
"We need to find him before recovering Eren," Levi said. "Once the titan's gone, we have to make a quick escape. There's no sticking around to find him without Eren's titan as a distraction."
"We can't leave Eren forever," Hange countered. "Soon enough, one of them might make it to his nape."
"Well, shit. I don't know. We need to choose."
Hange looked to Levi, a haunted look behind their glasses. "It's your squad."
Levi nearly threw his blades in the air. This was just what he needed: damning one of his recruits to hell. Tactically, he knew what the right answer was.
"Stay on the ground," Levi muttered. "Look for Jean. I'll be right back."
In a flash, Levi had attached his wires to Eren's ribcage and sailed away.
Levi had landed directly next to an MP, who seemed to be holding on for dear life. "Shit!" she said, turning to face Levi. "This thing's skin is so fucking hot-"
Her voice trailed off after meeting Levi's eyes, and widened as they filled with recognition. There was a second where she hesitated, and Levi pulled his blade out in half that time, slashing through the wire that kept her embedded in Eren's skin. He didn't watch as she fell ten metres to the ground below.
Levi kept his feet pressed against one of Eren's ribs as he felt him prepare his fist for another punch. The force of the movement sent Levi's hair blowing to the side as the hand plowed into the ground, knocking down the MP that Levi had just sent to the ground, along with another shadow of a figure.
Levi sent his wires higher up to Eren's shoulder- once he got there, he'd be able to slide around to his nape in an instant, before the kid could even notice. Hange would finish their scout for Jean, and they'd escape during the confusion of Eren's titan falling.
If only things went the way Levi planned.
They didn't, of course, and he knew this when a clang erupted at his side, and heavy reverberations rattled the left side of his body, like throwing a brick at a bell. For a moment, the feeling in his leg was nothing but an active buzzing, and next, he was falling.
The weight of the ODM gear shifted as Levi stuck his blades into the skin of Eren's titan to break his fall- the blades were new, and cut through Eren's skin like butter, but kept him from freefalling to the ground. It was the best he could ask for.
Levi peered down through his hair that flew wildly at his speed. The bolts on his waist that maneuvered his wires were hanging loose from their straps, and in the low light, Levi could still tell that part of it was missing. He didn't hear the bang through the commotion, but it had to be a bullet, and he was lucky to not be a bleeding mess right about now.
At the titan's knee, one of the blades snapped, and Levi took this as a chance to catapult his feet from Eren to get as far away as he could to ensure he wouldn't be stepped on. Instead of hitting the ground, his back made contact with what felt like two bodies, and after knocking them both down, he rolled overtop, turning once, twice, three times in the dirt until his movement was stopped by a slanted rock.
Levi looked over the edge of the rock precariously. It was situated right on the edge of a sizeable, treeless, steep cliff.
Those two bodies that he hit on his way down were still there. Jumping up, Levi saw the tangled mess of limbs just mere metres away, fighting for an object in both their hands.
A gun.
And a tassel of greasy brown hair.
It's dangerous to run into a gun fight, that much is obvious. But it's different when one of the people in the fight is someone you've worked with for years.
Levi runs, but the gun goes off before he can intervene, and one of the figures slumps to the ground, while the other rolls onto their back in exhaustion.
Not Hange, not Hange, not Hange-
Approaching the scene, the first face Levi sees is the one staring at the sky with empty eyes, and blood oozing from the back of their head. He squints. It's the woman he kicked off the titan from earlier. And she was so strangely familiar, but Levi couldn't grasp from where.
Hange is on their back, blowing a wisp of steam from the gun belonging to the woman.
"For fucks sake, Hange," Levi sighed, pulling his comrade to their feet. "Next time try not to give me a heart attack."
Hange smiled, but it was a look that soon faded from their face after spotting something to the side, and in an instant, they pulled Levi towards them as another gunshot went off.
"That one was for us," Hange panted. "We need to regroup!"
"Those two brats are still here somewhere," Levi grimaced. "We can't leave without them, you know."
"I know," Hange said while running in the opposite direction of Eren and their opponents. "But I saw her shoot. You can't do much with that gear, and we just blew our cover, so we need to take this chance to leave!"
Despite disagreeing, Levi ran straight alongside Hange, keeping a side eye for any threats that weren't too busied by Eren's titan to chase after them.
"Fine," he said. "We regroup, and we come back ready to fight humans, not titans. If they end up capturing Eren, we're going to have to go at them with all we've got."
"Sounds like a plan," Hange puffed. "I can give you my gear."
"You're keeping your gear."
"I'm giving you my gear, and then if Eren hasn't been captured by the time we get back, you're our best shot at removing him from the titan. We can plan as we go along, but for now, we use those guidelines. How about it?"
"Having no plan isn't a plan," Levi corrected. "But it'll have to do."
Connie and Sasha were at the stables, as planned- with the horses and packs ready to go. Levi didn't spare a thank-you as he instructed them all to mount the animals, and with nothing but a glance exchanged, the two recruits followed Levi and Hange on their own horse on the way to the watchtower. Each rode their own horse- there was room for Mikasa and Armin on the backs of two.
"We can change gear here while we get them back. The ladder was probably pulled up," Hange exclaimed as they dismounted their horse. "Armin! It's me, I'm coming up!"
With singing wires, Hange launched themselves into the watchtower, and Levi dismounted his own horse, removing his gear than was now a mess of straps and broken bolts.
"Captain," Sasha's voice sounded. "I smell blood."
Levi's face drained of the mentioned substance as he turned to his soldier, who was now searching in all directions. Only a moment later, Hange leaned over the railing above them. "Levi! There's nobody up here!"
"Hange said Mikasa was injured," Levi said, circling the watchtower and tossing his gear into a pile beneath it, to come back for later. It was here he stopped in his tracks- he smelt it, too.
Picking up a snapped blade from his pile of discarded gear, Levi silently made his way around the jungle of poles and beams that held up the watchtower, vaguely registering Hange landing back down on the grass behind him.
"Armin," Levi cautioned. "Mikasa. It's me-"
As Levi circled to the other side of the watchtower's base, he saw a figure prone on the dirt before him. Much too tall to be either Armin or Mikasa.
Levi kicked the body to be sure. It was dead.
"It's one of the enemy," he called, inspecting the body. Obviously, he'd died recently, and it appeared to be from a broken neck.
Levi looked upwards at the beams decorating the watchtower's base. It was pretty easy to deduce what had occurred here.
Hange had jogged over, but stopped abruptly when seeing the man in the grass.
"Free gear," was all Levi said.
EREN, JEAN
DAY 2
TIME: 2358 hours
This had to be the longest day of Jean's entire life.
Was it just this morning that they were training in the forest? He hadn't even gotten a wink of sleep in the time since supper ended, and this mess started. It was, apparently, too much to ask for to have a day of peace in the Survey Corps.
Eren roared in his ear. Yep, too much to ask for.
"You stupid freak," Jean muttered. "You homicidal maniac."
Jean had kept a firm hold on Eren's hair for what felt like an eternity, and all he was grateful for was the fact that Eren hadn't tried to squash him like a bug for hitching a ride on his head. He couldn't see the ground below him, but there was no chance he was letting go and joining the fight- not while he had blades and all his enemies had guns.
He had blades. He had blades. He didn't want to use the blades. Using the blades and cutting out Eren meant his only form of protection was gone, and that he'd have to face a horde of angry MPs thirsting for his blood on the ground.
So, what was he supposed to do in the meantime? Wait for Eren to eat every single one of them? Would Hange or Levi come in time to stop that from happening?
Jean's head hurt. There were too many questions and not enough answers. He gripped Eren's hair as he felt the titan swing around again, but this time, there was a different sound that accompanied the cacophony of bullets and Eren's incessant seething. It was quiet, but it was there.
Light sounds of wires retracting, directly on Jean's right.
He barely had any time to react, but a man from the ground had climbed his way up to Eren's nape, with a blade manually attached to his belt. Jean made eye contact, and both enemies held it out of nothing but sheer surprise at the other being there, until Eren reacted to the second presence.
Jean reckoned the soldier must have hit a nerve, literally, because Eren let out a scream so piercing that Jean was left with ringing in his ears. The shoulderblades of Eren's titan lifted, and Jean had just enough sense to release one hand and use his gas tank to shoot up higher onto Eren's head, while both hands crashed down onto where Jean and the soldier had both been loitering on the nape. From higher on the head, Jean could see the palm of one of Eren's hands- it was bloody.
The titan tipped.
Right on the edge of a cliffside.
"Fuck! Eren, keep your balance!"
Jean's voice scratched his throat, and he knew it was no use. Eren had just diminished the former soldier to nothing but blood and guts by slamming a hand onto his own nape- no doubt was that going to reduce his equilibrium. And, as luck would have it, they were next to a cliff.
Jean felt the moment they began to fall.
Never before had it been his job to remove Eren from his titan- it was always Levi, and by the time that anyone else could have picked up some practise, Eren could do it just fine on his own. That didn't seem to be the case here, though, as Jean and the titan he gripped to were plummeting to the ground below.
Jean was no match for gravity- he didn't have much time. There was a chance he would cut too narrow, and end up murdering his friendly rival. Or, there was the chance he would cut too wide, and not extract Eren from the titan at all.
He didn't have time to think. He stuck one blade in, dragged it downwards, and let the other one follow the same motion from the other side, both tips pointing inward. With luck, he hadn't just taken off Eren's head.
The pattern was ragged, but he felt the blades meet slight friction as he pulled downwards all the way, and leaned into the steam, wrapping his arms around what he hoped were limbs. Lurching back, he pulled Eren free of the sinew, and pushed as far away from the titan corpse as he could, watching it crash into the rocky cliffside.
Falling backwards and with a hopefully alive Eren on his front, Jean snuck his arms from Eren's and, with slippery hands, maneuvered his wires into the rocks. As they fell even more, Jean kept his back flat, ensuring Eren wasn't sliding off- even if he was currently too close for comfort- allowed his feet to slam into the cliffside several metres below the wire entry point, finishing off his swing.
They were just over a metre off the ground.
With the biggest exhale of his life, Jean turned and let Eren tumble to the grass below, and relished in the loss of weight on his chest. After a moment of catching his breath, and hoping his heart rate would stop skyrocketing, Jean let the wires retract as he joined an unmoving Eren on the ground in a heap.
A sore heap, but an uninjured one nonetheless.
He craned his neck. The same could not be said for Eren.
Jean might have brought his blades together too soon, because his lower legs were gone.
Fuck. He had just dismembered his squadmate.
Jean took a closer look. There wasn't any blood. But shouldn't there have been steam?
Heat raged through his head. Yes, there certainly should have been steam. But for some reason, maybe because Eren was sick, maybe because he royally fucked up removing him from the titan, there was no steam.
A thousand thoughts crossed Jean's mind, what if they never grow back, what if he dies, it'll have been my fault, but he still moved forward and tucked his hands under Eren's arms and dragged him towards the trees. Two things were for sure. One, they had to move, because Jean was almost positive that not all of their enemies were dead, and here would be the first place they'd start searching.
Two, this day was far from over.
