A/N: Just wanted to give a moment of silence for our girl Sasha.
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Alright. Hope everybody is doing alright. Hope you enjoy the chapter. ~Scipias
CHAPTER 6 – THE 104th TRAINING CORPS: DISTRESS PT.2
"If we had worked as a team, then we could have done something!" Eren angrily posed.
"YEAGER, YOU ARE A FUCKING IDIOT!"
Jean Kirschtein felt a mix bag of emotions at that moment; pain, annoyance, definitely anger, but one he didn't expect was surprise, and not only that but surprise that cleaned the slate of his own anger. The gray-haired teen could safely say he knew his friend Lukas Schmidt pretty well, even better than the boy himself sometimes, but there had been only a handful of times he'd seen his black-haired friend this angry. Not to say Lukas was never angry, hell the two made it a habit to piss each other off almost on a daily basis, but this, this was different.
"Wha…" the teen from Shiganshina barely sounded off, just as surprised as him.
In a moment the Lukas was in the shorter boy's face, "They had three other guns pointed in our faces, what if your little stunt set one of them off?"
Eren glared back up at the boy, "But they didn't" his voice still hostile.
"No." Lukas started, "but the fact that you were willing to gamble that is disgusting." The teen spoke with bile in his voice then pointing to Jean himself, "Hell if Jean had been an inch to the right, he'd be dead right now, but don't try and weigh that on your conscious" he said almost sarcastically.
He's not wrong.
The gray-haired teen reached up touching his grazed cheek. What his friend had said rung true, but Lukas's attitude concerned him. Jean knew that in reality, not a whole lot of thing ever really did anger his friend. Sure, the two of them fought constantly, but there was always an air of competitiveness between them; both never missed an opportunity to get one over on one another, and both never backed down from a fight. That being said, Lukas never really felt angry, in fact his face in those situations always looked like it was going to bust out a shit-eating grin. The boys face right now though, looked like he was close to killing the teen from Shiganshina.
"This exercise is over" Everyone turned to see Marco add to the conversation.
"It is?" Eren questioned, "Are we abandoning Krista?"
The two arguing parties had since backed off one another, anger still easily visible in both Eren's and Lukas's eyes.
"That's not it." Marco retorted surprised. "But with just us, we can't do anything. That's why, we should ask the Instructor…"
"What if we don't make it." Eren steamed. "I won't accept it as it! I'm going to save Krista for sure, even if I have to go alone."
"You're…" Jean turned to see Lukas, a grim expression on his face, "…always 'you're'. Yeah…you're going to get Krista and yourself shot!"
"And what…" Eren retorted glaring at the boy, "it's better than waiting!"
Lukas pinched the bridge of his nose, "No you thick-headed fuck, I'm coming with you."
"Me too." Jean added, "I'm not going down in this undignified manner."
The gray-haired boy expected a quip from his friend but was only greeted by a stone-faced nod from the teen.
What is going on with you, Lukas?
"You guys...?" the boy from Shiganshina looked surprised.
"No one gets left behind." Lukas muttered.
The group resolved to reach high ground to get eyes on the group of bandits, and even though it was a mad dash up the hill they were able to make it to an outcrop overlooking the forest where Jean spotted smoke in the distance.
"What do we do?" he questioned looking through the spyglass, "At this rate, we'll be too late."
"They have rifles on them." Marco added. "Were gonna get shot."
Jean nodded handing the spyglass to Lukas, who still had the same grim expression, his eyes staring very intently at the camp below. "6" the boy muttered not even raising the device to his eye.
The gray-haired teen looked at his friend confused, "How can you tell?"
His friend still stone-faced gave a slight look of confusion himself, "What do you mean, I can see them?"
Jean shrugged it off as Armin added in, "I have an idea."
The five of them moved to go inform the rest of the group but Jean grabbed his friends' shoulder before he too slid down the embankment.
"What the fuck is going on with you?" Jean spoke.
Lukas squinted at the teen, "What do you mean?"
The taller of the two lowered his tone, "Don't give me that bullshit Lukas, you were about to ream into Yeager earlier."
The black-haired boy shrugged his shoulders, "Rightfully so…"
Jean rolled his eyes, "Yeah…but you never do it like that!" he exaggerated his last word.
Lukas gave him a blank stare for a moment, but after seeing that his friend wasn't going to relent, the boy sighed, "Fine. I've had this bad feeling all day today like something was going to happen, but I ignored it."
The gray-haired teen sighed; his friends' attitude having made sense now. Lukas had the tendency to want to fix things, especially things that he assumed to be of his wrongdoing. If the teen blamed himself for something, or thought he did something wrong, he'd go to unnecessary lengths or do sometimes equally bullheaded things to fix the situation. The black-haired kids' habit had gotten the duo into a fair share of sticky situations growing up, but it had also been that sense of wanting to right a wrong that led Lukas to running back to help Jean fight a bully the day they'd first met.
"Lukas, it's not your fault." Jean replied, "We all got duped by those bandits."
His friend grumbled, "But, if I'd…"
The taller boy cut him off, "You couldn't have known Schmitty."
Lukas looked down in annoyance, a look of regret could be seen in the boy's eyes. Jean didn't have to read the teen's mind to know he was reliving a certain event from three years earlier. The two would have sat there in silence but a call came from down the slope coming from Armin, bidding them to hurry. The duo nodded at one another before both sliding down to meet the group.
The blonde boy started, "They're probably going to sell the stolen goods. If that's the case, they'll probably find a wide exit around this area." He pointed to a fork in the road on a map.
Handing the map off, Armin continued, "We'll ambush before they get there."
"It'll be hard since we have no horses." Connie added, looking at the map.
"It's possible, if there's a wide exit." Sasha mused looking at the map over the boy. "If we leave the forest."
Armin nodded in agreeance, "After leaving the forest, the road divides into two routes. One of the roads goes to a wider exit, and once they enter there, we don't stand a chance."
Jean butted in, "And if it goes well?" he questioned.
Eren added, "Which carriage will Krista and the 3D gear be in? How can we tell?"
"If we hear a rattling sound, we'll be able to tell." Marco answered.
Lukas, arms folded questioned as well, "The rattling being the cart with the ODM I suppose?"
"Exactly!" Marco responded.
"Considering how much equipment they have, it's a good bet they'll have Krista in the other carriage." Armin mused, "In that case we should only have three of us drop in, two in the ODM cart, and one in Krista's as too not accidently fall onto her."
The bookish teen looked to the group, "I suggest Eren, Jean, and Lukas. They have the best hand to hand scores out of the lot of us."
The mentioned trio nodded in agreement, and Lukas replied with resolve in his voice, "I'll take Krista's cart."
Damn it Lukas.
"You sure?" Eren questioned.
"Yeah" the boy nodded, "Those training sessions with Annie at least taught me to take a beating." Lukas half joked, face still serious. "Just make sure you two don't leave me hanging."
Jean could tell that his friend was still holding on to a sense of guilt for the situation but knew he didn't have the time to argue with Lukas about it. As everybody made their way to the fork in the road, he was almost surprised as Sasha strolled up beside him.
"What is it, Potato-Girl?"
Uncharacteristically brushing off the comment the brunette replied, "Is he ok?"
Jean didn't have to discern the girls meaning. It had always wondered the gray-haired teen how selectively oblivious his friend could be, but he knew Lukas would figure it out at some point.
"Stubborn is what he is…" he scoffed.
Connie is horrible at making bets.
…
What the fuck is wrong with me!?
Lukas's body was still as he balanced on a tree branch with the road below him, the teen's mind was the complete opposite, however. He didn't understand what was going on with his body, didn't understand how he was able to sense the thieves before everyone else, and didn't understand how that was even possible. What was even worse was he was wracked with guilt over it. If the teen had understood the signals his body was putting off this all wouldn't be happening; his teammates wouldn't have been put into danger, his best friend wouldn't have almost been shot dead in front of him, and Krista wouldn't be being held hostage by some fucks with god know what intentions.
This is all my fault.
The black-haired boy's spine shivered at the thought as he clenched his fist even harder. The continued demeaning of his psyche only stopped by the two rings of a nearby can.
ODM's in the second cart, means I'm going to the first.
He looked over at the tree next to him to see Eren and Jean perched on a similar branch. The duo nodded at him as the rumbling of the thieves' convoy made its pass below, and in a synchronized motion all three of them jumped from their elevated positions. Lukas felt as his body weight easily ripped through the canvas covering the top of the first cart. The teen felt himself bump into a body before landing successfully but was thankful to see it was one of the thieves and not Krista who at a quick glance was tied standing up to a bar at the rear of the carriage.
Two thieves in the carriage, one driving it up front.
"Wha…where'd you come from?" one of the men spoke in shock.
The boy didn't grace the thief an answer as he laid a fist into the man's face, downing him for a moment. Turning his attention to the other man who he'd knocked into on his decent, Lukas tackled him forward towards the drivers seat next to the third thief. Suddenly feeling the man behind him try and use a rifle to put the boy into a choke hold, Lukas instead used the thief's momentum to flip him over, situating all of the hostile combatant in front of him and Krista behind him.
"You ok?" he muttered to the blonde who nodded in agree, and before turning back saw a glimpse of Jean fighting the driver of the second carriage.
"Watch out!" the girl screamed.
Lukas turned back to narrowly avoid getting a rifle butt to the face but instead using a trick out of Annie's playbook used the thief's momentum to sweep the man behind him past Krista and completely out of the cart. Looking in shock he saw as the horse of the second carriage narrowly missed the man and ran off the road Eren and Jean still inside. Before he could even think if his compatriots were ok, he felt the surefire feeling of a wooden butt of a rifle hit him square in the back of the head.
GET UP!
The black-haired teen came too what seemed to be a few moments later. Besides the blistering feeling in his head accompanied by a moist feeling coming from the back of his skull, Lukas saw that Krista had somewhat gotten free of her bonds and was doing her best to distract the thief, rifle still in hand. Still stumbling to regained consciousness, the boy saw as the man got the better of the blonde, ripping her from the restraints and tossing her to the side of Lukas on the floor of the carriage. The thief would have continued his rampage had it not been for the distinct noise of ODM approaching the rear of the vehicle.
The thief turned to the threat taking a few pot shots but to no avail. Lukas finally able to regain his footing took advantage of the distraction, flinging forward from the ground and tackling the man has hard as he could, knocking the both of them into the side of the carriage very roughly. Glancing towards the front of the carriage, he saw the blurred figures of Jean and Eren cut into the reins attaching the horse to the carriage. The driver in response, not having control of the vehicle, viciously pulled the brake. Lukas, looking back in terror at the blonde, knew that at this speed the crash was going to be rough so in a split-second decision dove onto the smaller girl hoping to at least shield her from the blow of the crash. The boy from Trost was not a second too soon as right after he made contact with Krista, he felt an object strike his head, the world going black once more.
…
"Taking responsibility is having the means to look after your people, and the will to see it though."
"You take care of those people you care about."
"You're the man of the house while I'm away."
"YOU DON'T BELONG HERE!"
Lukas shot up with a start, morning sun peeking in through the forest canopy.
"Look who decided to wake up." Jean said sarcastically crouched in a seated position to his right.
"I'm glad he did." Lukas looked to his left to see Krista standing to his left. "I would've never forgiven myself if he didn't." the blonde smirked.
The black-haired teen lifted his hand to meet the throbbing back of his head only to feel a wrapping of bandages around it, "What happened?"
The grey-haired teen chuckled, "The part where that thief whacked you upside the head with his rifle, or the part where flying debris cracked your hard-ass head open even more?"
Jean and Krista explained that Lukas had saved the later from the brunt of the crash when the carriage had started into a barrel roll off the road. Though it had knocked the teen unconscious Krista remarked how even in that state the boy had a death grip on her, enough so that when the thieves had recovered from the crash it took the two remaining men to pry her from his grasp. Although the men took Krista hostage once more standing off with the group as it arrived, a timely flare that Armin had fired earlier had alerted the second group of their position, Mikasa and Annie arriving just in time to subdue the bandits. Marco had gotten into contact with the Military Police who arrested the thieves, and also applied first aid to Lukas's wound, which supposedly required them to stitch up the back of his head.
"Makes sense." Lukas muttered a reply, turning to Krista, "I'm sorry I wasn't able to prevent you getting taken hostage."
An audible sigh could be heard from Jean, as Krista shook her head confused, "What are you apologizing for?" she spoke, "You saved my life, who knows what would've hit me if you hadn't shielded me from that debris."
The teen was about to reply until Jean butted in, "Lukas just take the damn compliment, your thick-headed stupidity saved Krista's life."
The blonde leaned over and kissed Lukas on the forehead, "I don't know, I thought it was pretty brave." She smiled before walking off.
The two boys looked at one another shocked for what seemed to be a long moment. "You lucky piece of shit." Jean remarked standing up.
Lukas grunted, rubbing the back of his head again, "I don't feel lucky."
The taller boy offered his hand to his friend to help him up, his features softened, "But really, are you ok Lukas?"
The shorter of the two took the hand and rose to his feet, "Yeah peachy." He smirked, "You're not getting soft on me, right horse-face?"
"Not on your life shorty."
The two walked over towards the various assembled groups of their comrades, when Lukas caught sight of Eren talking to Armin. Making his way over to the duo, the black-haired boy from Shiganshina looked up and greeted him, "Oi Lukas, how you feeling?"
Lukas shrugged, "Like shit, but better." He paused, sighing, "I wanted to apologize for earlier, my head wasn't in the right place and I shouldn't have blown up on you like that."
Eren looked surprised for amount then looked down and scratched his ear, "I…can't say my head was in the right place either. All that matters was that it turned out alright huh?"
The taller boy nodded his head, "Right." He smiled, holding out his hand "So are we good?"
Eren smirked in return clasping the outreached gesture, "We're good."
Not a second after the two boys made up did Lukas notice a presence behind him. He barely got the chance to turn around seeing a blur of familiar long brunette hair approaching him.
"Oh hey Sasha I…"
SLAP!
Before the boy could even register the pain coming from his cheek, the girl had walked away, almost fuming. Lukas reached to touch his cheek very confused.
What was that about?