To celebrate the imminent release of season 4 I give you all this chapter!
I was a little bit torn on this one tbh because part of me (and I bet some of you guys as well) wants to just get the plot moving again but I felt like I had to show some reactions to the crystal cave etc. I've also been a bit overworked recently a bunch of irl stuff and other writing (I'm currently writing a one-shot about a post-rumbling ending, as well as beta writing for a friend's fic which I'm sure you guys will love as much as me!)
Anyway, let the season 4 hype begin!
Empty.
That's how Armin felt. Empty, as if someone had scooped out everything inside him, leaving only a hollow fleshy puppet with its strings cut.
It reminded him of how he'd felt at Trost, both Trosts, when he first thought Eren had died saving him and then when he knew it was all about to happen again. In a way, it was even worse than the second Trost, because he knew precisely how bad it was going to be and that it couldn't get any worse.
This, however, was that feeling of uselessness and failure taken to a whole new level.
Eren wasn't here.
Eren. Wasn't. Here.
He should be here; Kenny and Rod too. All three of them. One for rescue, two for the chopping block before they could carry out their scheme to take the founder from Eren. This should have been their perfect counter-attack, a lightning-fast raid carried out days before the interior squad expected anyone to arrive.
Instead, all they found was this. An empty, abandoned cave, with not an MP insight. And worst still, Armin knew that every second Rod held Eren in captivity without Historia at his side was another moment closer to when the desperate man might give up waiting and carry out the transfer himself.
Bile rose in his throat, burning its way up his airway and it took everything Armin had left to stop it from spewing out.
They could lose Eren. Permanently. And it was all his fault.
Why hadn't he just killed Rod when they had him captive?! He should have listened to Mikasa when they had the chance. They could have defended Historia from the MPs and Government even if she hadn't come back to the past like them. Sure, it might have been difficult, but compared to this?
Anything was preferable to this.
"Armin…" Mikasa sounded like she was a hundred miles away, her voice quieter and softer than a whisper. Stiffly, and still feeling sick to his stomach, Armin turned his head to face her. Had they been in any other situation he might have been taken aback by how the ethereal blue glow of the Titan crystals they were surrounded with haloed her face and shone across her alabaster skin like the summer's sun. Right now, however, it was impossible to think about anything except the pain and uncertainty clear in her eyes. "What- what do we do?"
'I don't know.' He thinks, but Armin simply cannot bring himself to say it. Hearing the words leave his mouth would make it too real to bear and bring his paper-thin facade crashing down around him.
So he says nothing, offering no words of encouragement or comfort to the woman who's relying on him as she always has to have a plan for any situation or the answers to their questions. In his painful silence, Armin had failed Mikasa as well.
In the end, all he could think to do was offer his pale, trembling hand to her to take, hoping she might at least take some hollow comfort from it.
'Forgive me, Eren. I'm so sorry.'
This was not the most optimal of results Erwin silently admitted to himself as he strode towards the jagged crystalline altar. Truthfully, he had been somewhat optimistic about this operation; they had the element of surprise, they had Historia feeding them accurate information about what to expect down here and they had Levi leading the charge with the exceptionally promising Mikasa Ackerman by his side.
This should have been the closest thing to a perfect op as it's possible to get on such short notice.
It was just a shame that no one was here.
Erwin could see the look of 'I told you so' plastered on Levi's face as he approached the Captain. Clearly Levi believed Historia had at least partially lied to them, or that this strike north had been a complete waste of time, but Erwin wasn't so sure.
In the few minutes he had been down in this cavern, two things had made themself abundantly clear to Scout Commander. The first was that this cavern was not man-made, for the sheer amount of manpower and materials needed to create something this size was almost incalculable. There was no way a construction project of this magnitude could remain hidden.
The second thing that stuck out to him was that this cave clearly wasn't natural either.
Erwin considered himself a learned man, but in all his years he had never heard of a naturally luminous blue stone before, and judging for Hanji frantic demands that they take a sample she hadn't heard of it either. That and all of the vast columns holding up the roof were perfectly cylindrical and evenly spaced out throughout the entire chamber, as if by design. It was all far too orderly to be natural.
Those observations left Erwin in the difficult position of trying to determine what this place was, and how it could exist when it clearly wasn't built by man or shaped by nature.
He wondered what else could have possibly made this place as his piercing gaze swept around what was clearly the sacrificial chamber. A wide-open space, surrounded on three sides with two large staircases wrapping around the walls to the base of elevated outcropping which jutted out like a knife. There were two long dangling chains nailed to the walls adjacent to the tip, their hefty iron rings glittering in the brilliant blue glow which dominated this cave.
Levi was waiting for him, standing on the ground just before the jagged tip with his arms folded over his chest. But rather than engaging his Captain in what would surely be another heated debate, Erwin just walked past Levi and used his gear to quickly ascend up to the altar. Landing with a gracefulness that came from a lifetime of 3DM usage, Erwin touched down just behind two thick iron restraints set closest to the peak and two heavy iron rings set slightly further back, all of which had all been hammered into the crystal.
Erwin took a breath, slow and steady, and closed his eyes.
In his head, Erwin could see it all coming together. Eren, drugged or unconscious, would be dragged up the stairs and carried out to the furthest end of this platform before being forced to his knees. Firstly his feet would be secured within the restraints, the heavy iron rings pinning his legs down and stopping him from moving. Next chains could then be wrapped around his body and slotted into the iron pegs, further weighing him down and restricting his ability to move. Finally, his arms would be cuffed and pulled back and out with those two long chains already nailed into the wall, robbing the boy of their use. All the cult would need to do then is bind Eren's hands with bandages to prevent him from using his nails to break the skin of his palms, and to gag him. With all that Eren would be left totally immobilised and helpless.
Erwin opened his eyes and let out the breath. That was how Eren would be restrained, he was sure of it.
Objectively, it was brilliant; simple and effective. Nigh impossible to break out of alone. This was a far better method of holding a shifter than just throwing them in an underground cell with some manacles wrapped around their wrists, as had been the standard for the military since the court session. Relying solely on a shifter's fear of being crushed should they transform was a recipe for disaster.
But as effective as this setup was, there was something about it that was bothering Erwin. Something that just wasn't quite right and set alarm bells ringing in his head.
Kneeling down, Erwin took a closer look at the foot restraints, noting the small number of cracks lining the base, before reaching out to touch one of the bolts.
'Rust.' Erwin's inner voice supplied as he looked down at the reddish-brown dust coating the pad of his finger. 'These bolts are rusting.'
It could be nothing, just a side effect of the cult using poor quality iron or rushed, shoddy craftsmanship. But if the cult was intending on restraining a shifter, someone who could turn into a 15m class Titan with only a paper cut, would they really skimp on the materials if there was even the slightest chance Eren could break out? It's not like they're struggling financially, seeing how opulent and ornate their churches were, and good quality iron isn't that hard to acquire.
There was also the timescale to consider as well. It had been little more than a month since Humanity discovered Eren's power, following his debut in Trost. The cult would have only had a few weeks to install these restraints in preparation for their kidnapping of him, and that simply wasn't enough time to cause such erosion. Especially with the metal being sheltered from the elements in this cave.
Now, if this setup had been installed severalmonths or even years ago then Erwin wouldn't be surprised at the sight of such wear and tear, but that wasn't possible. Humanity wasn't aware that shifters existed, let alone developed an effective method of restraining them. None of this made sense...
Unless, of course, the cult already knew about shifters.
'No, I'm jumping to conclusions.' Erwin swiftly rose to his feet, looking remarkably calm for a man on the verge of having his worldly perceptions rocked to their core. 'I'm shaping evidence to fit a theory, not the theory to match the evidence.'
Erwin didn't know what kind of shady things the cult got up to away from prying eyes. It was entirely possible that at some point they had carried out ritualistic human sacrifices. History was full of examples of religious cults dabbling in that sort of thing. They could have recently modified this place with shifters in mind.
He ignored how much of a stretch that explanation felt.
"So," the tight drawl of Levi's voice drifted up from the cave floor, shaking Erwin from his thoughts. "Is this the point where I go and force little Miss cult-baby to give us some proper answers?"
Filing away any more questions he might have about the cult and shifters in the back of his mind, Erwin flew back down to Levi and shook his head.
"No. Historia didn't lie to us. This is definitely the place Eren would've been taken to."
"Well unless Yeager and Petra have suddenly turned invisible, we're still shit out of luck here. We're back to square one, Erwin. If we're not too late already." He muttered under his breath.
"We're not," Erwin asserted, despite having no idea if that was true or not. He simply couldn't accept the possibility that Eren was already dead. He had invested too much into him to believe otherwise.
But while Erwin was confident Eren was still alive, that didn't mean he was going to rest on his laurels. They needed to devise a new plan to rescue their missing comrades, and they needed it now.
Bringing a hand to his face, Erwin made a show of rubbing his chin as he considered their options. Returning to HQ would be tantamount to giving up on Eren and Petra, relinquishing what little advantages they still had left over the MPs and the cult. That was a complete non-starter and Erwin suspected Levi would desert the corps if he did and go after his squad members alone.
He considered the possibility of setting up camp here, taking control of this highly defensible position and merely waiting for their enemy to bring Eren to them. Again though, that would be handing over the initiative to their foes, and if the cult has even a single pragmatic bone in their body, they would eventually abandon this elaborate ceremony of theirs and just deal with Eren the old fashion way.
No, they needed something else. Something that kept them on the offensive and Reiss on the back foot.
"We need to head to Orvud." Erwin abruptly announced, hand dropping back to his side.
Levi looked up at him and cocked an eye. "Orvud? Why?" He asked with a frown.
"If our enemy truly has as much influence and power as we suspect, they would have the resources to post informants and people loyal to their cause in all the districts to be their eyes and ears. Call it a hunch, but I was certain we were being watched in Yarckel, so the cult likely knows we are on the move and will have reacted accordingly. If we can draw out some of these individuals, we can capture them and interrogate them for information."
Levi pondered the plan for a moment, his brow creasing in thought. "You... You want to use the girl as bait," Levi supplied with a frown, having caught on to what he was proposing. "Erwin, if we lose her, we lose everything. She got lucky escaping the MPs before, and Kenny isn't a man to make the same mistake twice. If this goes bad, there will be no second chances."
Erwin nodded approvingly. Levi wasn't wrong, Historia was the only card they had left to play, and losing her would be catastrophic. Which was why he had absolutely no intention of putting the girl in harm's way.
"Trust me, Levi. Historia will be fine." Erwin replied with a ghost of a smile as he started walking away from the altar. "Now let's go retrieve Hanji and move out."
Then, almost as an afterthought, Erwin looked at Levi over his shoulder. "We also need to blow up the church."
"Wait, what?!"
Hanji was practically shaking with excitement as she wandered around this cavern, mouth agape and gawking.
This place was positively massive. Mindbogglingly so. In fact, Hanji reckoned it was so large that Eren could stand up in Titan form and still have a dozen metres of headspace.
But undoubtedly the best thing about this place was that it was utterly impossible.
The layout and formation of the pillars, the sheer expansiveness of the cave and even the material it was made of made no sense, and that excited Hanji beyond all rational thought.
She needed to take samples and measurements! There was so much data she needed to gather for analysis! Oh, the things she would do for her lab equipment right now!
"I hope you're writing all this down, Moblit. This is our newest project once we get back to HQ." Hanji thoughtless blurted out as she came to a stop in front of one of the towering pillars, deciding that this was the one she was going to get her sample from.
'Oh right…' Hanji thought sullenly, the grin slipping from her face as she remembered her assistant was currently back at headquarters, leading the survey corp in their absence. '...I hope he's doing okay. I should give him some time off once everything gets back to normal. He's more than earned it.'
Hanji considered asking Armin for help instead, seeing as the rest of her official squad was busy 'guarding' Historia right now, and thus unavailable to assist in her note-taking. She reckoned he would have his own exciting theories about this place, and any scientist worth his or her salt knows that having someone to bounce ideas off of was a crucial part of the scientific process.
For a brief moment, Hanji's excitement returned, bubbling just under the surface as she pictured training Armin up to be her secondary assistant. However, that moment was short-lived as the section commander considered the state the boy would likely be in right now.
They had come all this way to the far north of Rose, braving one of the most monumental storms in living memory and potentially abandoning the entire southern territories to Braun and Hoover should they return, all in the hopes of finding Eren, only to discover their missing shifter wasn't here.
That must have been a body blow to Armin and Mikasa, seeing how close the three of them were in that odd little family of theirs, and Hanji doubted her future protegee would be in the right state of mind to help her right now.
"Alright then," Hanji mumbled with a sigh, drawing out one of her blades. "Looks like it's just me today."
Admittedly a sword wasn't the best tool to use to excavate stone but Hanji had to work with what she's got. That, and a whole lot of elbow grease.
"Alright, Mr Pillar. We can do this the easy way where you give me what I want, or we can do it the hard way. Your choice."
Silence.
"Fine then! Hard it is!" Hanji gleefully cried before slamming the blade into the pillar with all her might. The delicate extraction process had begun.
Almost ten minutes and three shattered blades later, Hanji had managed to break off a modest chunk of the luminous crystal and picked it up with tired, burning arms. She cradled the precious sample against her chest like a baby, making strange cooing noises as she looked it over and was filled with such jubilation that it was like a physical presence tugging on her heart.
It was still glowing.
The stone, even once broken off the pillar, was still glowing.
Hanji's grin was almost maniacal at this point as she considered all the possibilities this impossible stone had just opened. She'd need to do a thorough test to make sure, but if this stone stayed like this, then Hanji had just discovered a limitless source of light for humanity and one that came without the inherent risks of an open flame.
'Well, I may have just put every candle maker out of business and saved the corp a pretty penny at the same time. I ought to give this stone a name, a proper scientific name…'
It wasn't often Hanji made a discovery that wasn't Titan related, so this really was a special occasion. Within a few years, there could be one of these stones in every room of every house within the Walls. This was her chance to get her name firmly written in the history books.
'I shall call this Hanjicus crus lapis. Hanji's shiny stone. Perfect!'
"What are you doing, four-eyes?"
"AHHH!" The sacred stone was sent flying as Hanji spun round in a fright, one hand reaching for her clipped and broken sword before coming face to face with Erwin and Levi, both of whom were giving her strange looks. Oh, had she been muttering again? She really ought to stop doing that.
"Glow stone!" She loudly exclaimed, heart still racing as she gestured wildly at the fallen crystal.
Levi just continued to stare at her in annoyance, while Erwin's gaze followed her outstretched hand towards the stone.
"You cut a piece off? How long did that take?" He asked, raising an eye as the countless metal shards which littered the ground around her.
"A while," Hanji admitted with a shrug, running a hand across her sweat coated forehead. "Took a ton of effort as well. This stuff is harder than stone!"
"Interesting." There was a funny look in Erwin's eye as he resettled his gaze upon her. "So what exactly is this 'stuff'?" He nodded towards the pillar.
Hanji smiled. "No idea! It's utterly fascinating though since I have no idea how it's glowing like this." She happily informed her commanding officer as she walked over to pick up her fallen bab- sample, to pick up her fallen sample. "There are only a few things in nature that can glow by themselves; fireflies, glowworms, a few species of fungus, stuff like that. Most other 'glowing' found in nature is just a reflection. Never in all my years of research have I heard of a crystal which can emit its own source of light. It doesn't make sense! And that's what makes it so wonderful!" She hoisted the crystal up and held it out in her arms, letting the two men get a good look at it. "What I am holding shouldn't exist!"
However, despite her bold approximation, Levi remained unimpressed and made no effort to hide it. "So you broke your blades for some weird shitty crystal. You do know we can't resupply at the moment, right? Those blades needed to last."
"It's not weird!" Hanji snapped back, aghast at Levi's dismissal of her discovery. "Well, yes, actually it is weird, really weird, but it's not shitty! And I have plenty of blades left over, thank you very much. What I don't have in excess is a crystal which could revolutionise our way of life."
Levi's mouth started to open in a retort when Erwin stepped in. "You say its not just reflecting light, so could the glow be some kind of reaction? A certain chemical or gas in the air?"
Hanji turned her focus back to Erwin, considering his question for a moment before bringing the crystal to her head, first shaking it, then sniffing it, and finally to Levi's untold disgust licking it.
Satisfied with the initial lack of tactile evidence for chemical reactivity, and with the earthy taste still somewhat bitter in her mouth, Hanji looked back at Erwin and shook her head. "I'd need to do some more tests to make sure, but this feels pretty inert. We'd probably know if it was a chemical reaction anyway, as it would be letting off heat."
Wishing to really drive home her point about how strange this stuff was, Hanji tossed the stone to the dour-faced Levi who reluctantly caught it not wanting it to smash into his shirt. "See? If there was some kind of chemical reaction taking place, Levi would likely be screaming in agony as his skin burns from the heat it would be emitting, yet he's totally fine." She pointed out, ignoring the sharp look Levi gave her.
Without a word, Erwin plucked the crystal from Levi's grasp, staring at it intently as it rested in his palm. It was only from working alongside him for years did Hanji notice the tiny facial quick that indicated he was thinking rather intensely about something.
"You're thinking of something." Hanji stated, eager to hear what. Erwin was perhaps the only other person in the corp except Moblit who she could talk science with and not have it fly over their head.
"...I am," Erwin confessed, sounding oddly unsettled as he returned the crystal to her. "But I fear it is madness."
"I like madness." Hanji exclaimed, having to stop herself from bouncing on the spot.
"What a surprise..." Levi grumbled to himself, wiping his hand clean with a cloth he had picked up in Yarckel.
Ignoring the moody Captain, Erwin shook his head. "We can discuss it another time. For now, Eren and Petra remain our top priority, and we can't afford to spend any more time. Pack everything up, we're moving out."
"What?!" Hanji visible deflated, her disappointment immeasurable. "But there's so much we can learn here. Just a day or two and I could figure it out, I'm sure of it!"
"Our comrades may not have a day or two, Hanji. Whatever we could learn from this place is not worth losing Eren and Petra over."
Hanji was torn. On the one hand, she had a veritable treasure trove of scientific discovery right at her fingertips, just waiting to be pried open and have all its little secrets revealed to the world. She lived for moments like this.
But on the other hand, there was Eren and Petra; One was a close personal friend who she had served alongside with for many years, and the other was the corp's most crucial asset, and perhaps Humanity's best chance for long term survival. Both of which were relying on them to come rescue them.
Actually, now that she thought about, Hanji wasn't that torn. Petra being a friend was reason enough to leave, but if they lost Eren, then Humanity's extinction might soon follow, and she can't research if she's dead.
'If only I could take it with me.' She silently lamented, looking around the cavern wistfully. 'Wait… hold on a minute. I can!'
In a flash, the shiny crystal was once again cradled against her chest in a protective embrace. "Alright, but I'm taking this with me!" Hanji announced, swearing that the only way this prize was being left behind was if Erwin and Levi pried it from her cold, dead hands.
"Of course," Erwin conceded diplomatically. "As long as you keep focused on the mission. We already have a new plan laid out to draw out some of Reiss's men, but first I need to know how many barrels of gunpowder we still have left?"
Hanji blinked in surprise, wondering where Erwin was going with this as she cautiously held up three fingers. "Two medium and a smaller one. Why?"
Erwin languidly gestured around them. "We need to bury this place in case Reiss manages to sneak past us while we are looking for him. If we blow up the entrance and bring the church down on top of it, it could buy us several hours to catch up to them, which could be the difference between recovering Eren alive or not."
"And here I thought you were just some militant atheist." Levi deadpanned as Hanji inwardly debated which was better; maintaining easy access to this cave for future studying purposes or blowing something up.
It didn't take long to pick the latter.
After all, once Eren was back in their hands, he could just dig this place back up for them in his Titan form. And that was a win-win in Hanji's book.
Marco tried not to stare. Really, he did.
He tried looking away, checking on Historia (who was not so subtly surrounded by section commander Hanji's squad) and Ymir (who was loitering nearby with a face like thunder having been forced to leave Historia's side). He tried staring at nothing and counting back first from a hundred, then from a thousand. He even tried picturing himself dismantling and reassembling a set of 3DM gear as Shadis had relentlessly drilled into them to back at bootcamp.
But no matter what he tried, Marco just couldn't stop himself from glancing over at them.
They were all doing; Sasha, Connie, Jean and himself. One moment they would be looking away or down at their feet in their little huddle and the next one of them would allow their eyes to dart over towards the crystal staircase before snapping away, ashamed of their indiscretion.
They had been up there, silent as the grave, ever since Captain Levi had declared this cavern empty. Both of them had just sat down, unmoving, and no one had approached them since. No one had the guts it seemed.
And so Marco and the others continued to awkwardly stand around, nervously waiting for the officers to return and give them orders like the good little soldiers they were, occasionally stealing a glance at their mutual friends on the stairs.
A lump had formed in Marco's throat, making it difficult to breathe as his clammy hands tightened around his rifle, clinging to it like a lifeline.
For years they had been the two pillars that had held up the 104th; the number one and two. The brains and the brawn. The mind and the muscle. The two impossibly high benchmarks that Shadis constantly pushed the rest of them to match.
Others had been jealous of the two, but almost from the very first day he had met them, Marco had looked up to the pair, inspired by their strength and persistence. Even during the nightmare of Trost, they had stayed strong and calm, determined not to give up and admit defeat, even when the rest of them had.
So perhaps that's why Marco was so unnerved by what he was seeing.
For the first time ever, Armin and Mikasa looked human. Flawed and vulnerable. They looked beaten, despondent and dejected, as if some guiding light they had been following had just been extinguished leaving them adrift in the void. Right now, they weren't the two inviolable powerhouses of the 104th, but merely two distraught teenagers who's best friend was still missing, the one lead they had on him revealing nothing except a bewildering, yet desert, crystal cave.
It hurt to look at but trying to ignore it hurt even more.
"We should say something." Sasha quietly announced, making Marco jump from the suddenness of it. "They're really hurting."
At least he wasn't the only person thinking that.
"And say what?" Jean's voice was low and flat. "Sorry that our only lead to finding Eren was a bust? You heard the Captain, Sasha, this was our only chance."
"We could just be there for them instead of hiding over here!" Sasha glared at the taller boy who held her gaze with a look of grim resignation.
Marco's face creased into a frown as he looked between his two bickering friends. While unnecessarily harsh, Jean wasn't exactly wrong. Both the Captain and the Commander had told them, multiple times, that this was their only lead on where Historia's father might have taken Eren but they had come up empty-handed. And knowing that, what could they say to Armin and Mikasa? Sorry? That would be them admitted Eren is lost, and how in the name of the Walls would that help them right now?
Marco looked away from Sasha and Jean, glancing at Connie out of the corner of his eye and wondering if the shorter teen was going to throw his two coppers into the debate. But he remained sullen and silent, clearly as torn on the subject as Marco was.
Marco let out a shallow breath and closed his eyes. How was it that he had been willing to follow Armin and Mikasa straight into hell at Trost on their mad dash through the city towards the armoury, but he struggled with the thought of going up to them and asking if they were okay and if there was anything he could do to help?
How could he be more scared of helping his friends than facing Titans?
Was he really that pathetic?
"I'm-" His mouth started to move before his brain did, the first syllables of his decision passing through his lips before another louder voice cut across, interrupting what he was about to say.
"What are you lot mumbling about?" Ymir came barrelling into the conversation with all the tact and subtle of a cannon blast. She stood behind him, arms folded over her chest and lips pressed into a thin line as her sharp grey eyes swept over them, judging them in her own unique way.
"Um…" Sasha paused, withering under Ymir's expression as her own eyes darting between the three boys, looking for support. "Armin and Mikasa," She said after getting an almost imperceptible nod from Connie. "I was saying how we should go talk to them, see if they're alright since… you know…"
Ymir's head slowly turned towards the stairs and the two scouts in question. She frowned at what she saw.
With a click of her tongue Ymir turned back to the four of them and shrugged. "About their boyfriend, yeah. So why haven't you done it then?"
Sasha eyed Jean before clearing her throat. "...We don't know what to say."
That, apparently, was the wrong answer to give. Ymir's frown deepened and she kissed her teeth in annoyance. "What a bunch of-" She breathed out, slowly shaking her head before straightening her back and pushing her way through them. "Fine then, I'll do it."
"What?!" Sasha's face quickly went pale, as she pictured how the legendarily blunt Ymir would deal with a situation like this. "Ymir, don't!"
Also knowing how this would end Jean reached out to grab Ymir, hoping to stop her march before it was too late, but the freckled girl was already too far gone. His fingers curled uselessly in the air before his hand dropped back to his side in defeat. And with that the fuze had been lit.
"Walls help us." Sasha whimpered. All the four of them could do now was watch with a growing sense of dread at the approaching carriage-wreck of a conversation.
"Oi!" Ymir called out as she stomped over to Armin and Mikasa, nostrils flaring like an angry bull. "What the hell are you two doing?"
From their spot on the stairs, Armin looked up from his lap and locked his watery blue eyes on the approaching Ymir, his boyish face and expression resigned and tired. "Not now, Ymir." He said quietly. "We're not in the mood."
"Well that's too bad because I don't give a shit." Ymir fired back as she reached the base of the stairs and started to climb. "I asked you a question, and I want answers."
Something flashed across Armin's face for a second before it was hidden under a flat, emotionless mask. "About want?" He gritted out with clear reluctance.
Ymir came to a stop a few steps below the two scouts and rested her hands on her hips. "I wanna know why you are both sitting here, pouting like two moody children up past their bedtime."
Mikasa shot Ymir a baleful look, the lower half of her face emerging from her scarf as her eyes narrowed dangerously. "You know why." She answered harshly, hands flexing in her lap. "Eren isn't here." Mikasa added on somewhat redundantly.
Well, redundantly for Marco anyhow. Apparently that was not the case for Ymir.
"And? That's it?" The taller girl asks, sounding genuinely surprised. "Are you serious?"
"And?" Mikasa echoed the word as if she didn't understand its meaning. "Is that all you have to say?"
"Yeah, I'm just disappointed, that's all. Of all the idiots I have to deal with, I thought you two at least had some balls, but I guess I was wrong. You're just a pair of weak cowards, aren't you?"
Jean's mouth dropped open in shock while Sasha recoiled sharply, letting out a low hiss. Next to her Connie just brought his hand up to his face and slowly dragged it down, making a noise between a groan and a long-suffering sigh in the back of his throat.
"What?" The word that left Mikasa's mouth was barely louder than a whisper, yet it easily carried across the cavern, sending a chill coursing down Marco's spine. Mikasa was pissed, and if Ymir had any sense at all she should shut up right now.
But of course she didn't, because she's Ymir and Ymir apparently has no sense of self-preservation.
"You heard me, scarfy," Ymir answered with a dismissive wave of her hand. "It's pathetic. You two, who swaggered through Trost like it was nothing more than a morning stroll, who called everyone else out for giving up, are doing the exact same thing. So not only are you cowards, you're hypocrites as well. Giving up after a single setback, sitting here mourning like you're at a damn funeral! Does Yeager mean so little to you that you've already written him off? Or was just some annoying third wheel you kept around for the sake of it?" The string of insults grew in volume and intensity until it reached its inevitable crescendo. "I'm starting to think you never gave a shit about him in the first place!"
Marco blinked, and Mikasa moved. In an instant the hurting, despondent scout was gone, and the Reaper of Trost now stood in her place, towering over Ymir like a titan and glaring down with a look of such unbridled fury that it nearly sent Marco stumbling back in terror. Her lips were pulled back into a snarl, baring her teeth like a predator preparing to tear out the throat of its prey. Her eyes blazed like fire, and one of her hands was clenched into a fist at her side, white-knuckled and trembling with anger.
There was only one thing holding her back. Somehow, in that split second it had taken Mikasa to shoot up, Armin had caught her, his hand wrapping around her own and holding her back. Marco had no idea how he had even reacted that quickly, and even less of an idea as to how he was actually holding Mikasa back.
Armin was strong in many ways, there was no doubting that, but Marco knew he wasn't strong enough to hold back an angry Mikasa. He doubted anyone was that strong. Yet, there he was, sitting perfectly still, a painfully blank look on his face, as he kept Mikasa in place with a single hand.
Possibly unaware of the imminent danger she was in or uncaring, Ymir then did something else breathtakingly idiotic and pointed a finger straight at Mikasa's face. "There! That's it! That's the expression you two should be wearing, not this grieving, self-pitying bullshit. Get mad! Get angry! This fucker took your friend, just like he tried to take my Historia and nearly got some of us killed with his bullshit. So the bastard isn't here like we thought, so what? There are only so many places you can hide a kid who can turn into a big fuck off Titan, so wherever this son of a bitch is hiding him, we're still going to find them, and when we do, we're going to teach that fucker a goddamn lesson! But I refuse to do it with you two moping around as if he's already won! He hasn't! And he's not going to, so stop acting like Yeager's already dead, because we all know he's far too stubborn to die, got it?!" Ymir finished her rant by jabbing her finger into Mikasa's chest like a knife, using enough force to send anyone else reeling back.
Mikasa, of course, didn't move an inch, her body still and unmoving as a statue.
Marco held his breath, a knot formed in his throat as cold sweat trickled down the back of his neck. This was it, he thought, the moment when Mikasa snaps and Ymir gets her face brutally rearranged in a flurry of blows that would require the combined effort of their entire group to prevent it ending in a homicide. Well he can't say he didn't see it coming, but perhaps some small, possibly naive part of him believed that Ymir might be a bit more gentle in her approach than usual.
But, strangely, after a few impossibly tense seconds the anticipated blows had still not arrived, only the uneasy silence that permeated the world. Then slowly, gradually, like the melting of ice or eroding of stone, Mikasa's face shifted. She still looked livid, her body tense and high strung, ready for a fight but something changed in her eyes. No longer were those grey orbs filled with fury and hatred, nor were they clouded with defeat and sadness. Instead, there was a faint spark of life, as if some new hope had been kindled in her heart.
And she wasn't the only one. To her right, Armin was looking at Ymir as if truly seeing her for the first time, his bright blue eyes wide and glistening as he allowed Mikasa's arm to slip from his hand and rose to his feet beside her. He said nothing but from the hopeful look on his face it appeared that Ymir's harsh, unyielding approach had clicked something back into place for the two, forcefully dragging them out of the spiral of despair they had been plunged into.
"I-I see." Mikasa's rough gravelly voice eventually echoed out. She still stood nearly a whole head higher than Ymir, but with those two small words and Armin's hand on her shoulder, the imposing height difference between the two girls seemed to melt away.
"Good," Ymir said as she rolled her neck. "Otherwise I was going to beat it into you. Now sort your shit out and get your arses off the stairs. Potato girl wanted to coddle you two for a bit, and her 'umm'ing and 'arr'ing was driving me mad."
Sasha let out a squeak as Mikasa's gaze fell on her, the anger on her face softening into a weak smile. Even back in their training days they had all seen that Mikasa had a soft spot for Sasha, second only to Eren and Armin.
Nodding at Sasha, Mikasa turned back to face Ymir. She wasn't glaring anymore, but it wasn't exactly a kind look either.
"...Once we find Reiss I'll be the one teaching him a lesson. You can have what's left." Mikasa announced matter of factly as if discussing who was going to make Historia's father suffer first was the most normal thing on Earth.
Ymir scoffed but stood aside, opening the way for Armin and Mikasa to head towards the rest of the 104th. "As if I'd let you have all the fun, scarfy. Fortunately, I'm willing to share. Now get moving before Sasha gives me another headache."
With that, Ymir also turned and started walking back down the stairs, grumbling under her breath as she wandered back to where Historia and Hanji's squad was standing, looking wholly indifferent to what had just occurred. "Seriously the shit I have to put up with around here. I'm like a damn babysitter. I should be getting paid more..."
"What- What just happened?" Jean whispered once he had picked his jaw up off the floor. "No way that just worked. No fucking way."
Numbly Marco found his head bobbing up and down at his best friend's statement as he watched Sasha run up to Mikasa and encase the girl in a semi-awkward hug as well as reaching out to Armin to drag him in. With a shake of his head and a relieved sigh at the insanity that was his life, Marco started to move towards the embracing trio, sparing Ymir's retreating form a quick glance.
If he thought she had been lucky to survive Reiner's transformation unharmed, Marco was now sure Ymir had some kind of deity looking out for her.
After all, no one was that lucky.
Right?
Next chapters will all be plot stuff and I promise it will be more exciting!
Also, big news about your's truly (who's asking? I hear you saying lol) but ya boi is buying his first place! Lots of stress but lots of excitement as well!
Maybe I'll post the next chapter from my new house!
Chapter 135 was pretty intense as well wasn't it. Cant wait to see what happens next (I'm betting Armin visits paths to talk to either eren, ymir or zeke)