Summary: Armin's dreams are filled with nothing but nightmares and the bite of fire.
Warning: Potential disturbing imagery
The air is musty, possesses a humid clinginess he can't shrug off himself. Sirens blare so loudly, Armin's brain bounces in his skull. He wants to eject from this puppet-master nest, but he can't—his objective hasn't been completed yet.
There's a plupping noise from the boats sinking in the water nearby. A c-c-crunch and the occasional squelch are noises made in succession as his Titan advances. Gunfire and wails and condemnation wafts around every corner, adds to the whirring of the zeppelin which follows at his Colossal's posterior.
There is no surface of this port which isn't burned or burst open, no inch which doesn't have the boat-sized oval of his Titan feet shoved into it. Muscle tendrils affixed to Armin's eyes let him see everything he has done, what he's chosen to do—his gut flip-flops like a fish deprived of air.
He has to get out of here.
A long psstttt of steam and unfurling of muscle creates an exit for Armin—he takes it, scrambles out onto the red-lined nape of his Titan. The difficulty is great—he's trying not to look—but the trap doors of guilt are falling on his shoulders, building in strength to pressure him to cave. The growing weight forces his eyes to peel open.
Rubble scalded by his transformation stretches out for miles. This landscape once teeming with civilians and soldiers is now an awful mix of dirt and mayhem and the bitter, copper smell of blood. Maybe he's hypersensitive to his surroundings too—there's a hoarse cough somewhere out there, a labored breathing violated with fear and leaving life. Armin glances down below.
A boy is beneath the rubble and he stares right at Armin. Armin's eyes stay widened for so long, dryness settles in. This boy can't be any older than he was when Wall Maria came down...
A flashflood of fire swoops along Armin's body and he shouts in alarm. The ground quakes before the rubble shifts, churns against each other like ocean waves. Blown apart wood and brick rebuild, stack into houses where vines grow and rise in height until the town and walls he grew up within are rebirthed. And from this height, from his spot on his Titan's shoulder with the steam billowing around him, Armin sees it.
Bertholdt is huddled in the Colossal's nape, eyes glossy but expression determined. Armin sees himself at fifteen, flying in mid-air.
Steam is burning his flesh away and he's choking, dying. Just like that boy down below is crying and fading, so many others have before him too. And maybe with what he's done now…he hasn't paid enough…it's still not enough.
Armin's chest inflates and deflates rapidly. He tries to put his arm up to grapple to the zeppelin but he can't budge. His temples throb with spike-sinking pain; he doesn't know if he's having a migraine or if this is one more suffering he must endure. All he knows is tornadoes of fire revolve around each of his limbs, scraping and eroding each layer of skin again. Armin shrivels into himself, shouts in agony and grief. His fingers meld together, his feet have become an indistinguishable block of flesh; everything singes and flakes and melts off him.
Armin stumbles over his own gimped feet. He staggers, loses his footing—gravity pushes him back.
He falls.
He falls just like his fifteen-year-old self does across the way…fades away like the little boy does on the ground he falls toward. Armin opens his mouth to scream.
"Armin!"
Gasping, Armin jolts awake. There's a cold-sweat damping the young man's clothes, a breeze over his eyes. His eyelids have been yanked open by forefingers and thumbs.
Annie has turned his face and stares him dead in the eye, the fence of her fingers stationed on his cheeks.
"Nightmare," she whispers softly.
Life is a nightmare and he's so groggy and consumed with the shakes, he doesn't know where he is. All Armin can decipher in this moment is his skin is dripping off in fire-hot droplets. Everything burns, like fire-ants are marching on every centimeter of his skin, biting and burning and burrowing in to munch at his marrow. His breathing picks up, the sweat dampening his chest and neck gets worse. He frantically runs his hands over his arms and hair. Those ants of fire won't get off him. The hands on his face jolt him minorly, as if to rattle him out of it.
"Armin, it was a nightmare. You're okay. Okay? It was just a dream."
Armin groans, miserable. Annie tells him to breathe and the tired man listens, follows her lead to fill his chest completely before exhaling. Finally, the retired soldier squints, tries to assess the room.
This place does look like home except it's missing memories—pictures he does not have the heart to put up yet. The tear-dripping face of Bert's Colossal settles before his eyes, how much it hurts, how much one wants to collapse into oneself and break. That boy's face might as well be seared into his brain—Armin can see every wrinkle and tear he shed. Warm streams pour down Armin's cheeks. He attempts to pull away except Annie's steel grip has captured the sides of his face—she may as well be squishing him.
"Ow," Armin complains, meek and tired, "Annie, that hurts."
"I don't care. You're not going anywhere."
"I don't want to be here…" her stubborn partner squirms, succeeds in worming out of her grip and shifts onto his opposite side to turn his back to her. She ropes her forearms around his back just as he starts to rise, anchors them around his pecs—his leg is the next to be trapped. They fall back, entangled with Armin grunting from struggling. His head ducks; he keeps attempting to get out but she knows he knows it's futile.
"I was just going to go to the guest room, Annie…" he croaks, "I don't want to keep bugging you."
"Then I've been bugging you for months now too. How many times has this happened to me and you were here?"
The space in Armin's head is too foggy to properly recall. All he can do is whisper, sounding deplorable and feeble as he always is, "I don't want you to see me like this…"
Annie rubs her cheek against his clammy nape, "Stop acting like it's illegal for you to cry, Armin. I'm the last person who could ever judge you for that," she holds him so close, his torso bends forward a fraction, "I know it's not easy…but just talk to me. I'm also trying to do better at that."
Confliction clips his wincing, "…I'm sorry, Annie. I want to tell you but I don't want to talk about it right now. My head hurts too much and I just feel…"
Feel what, is what Annie wants to bite out—trapped, alone, scared? She wants to hop over his huddled form and force Armin to look at her, make him tell her which one it is and if it's all three, he will be okay so long as she's here.
Annie sighs instead. She shouldn't use force or be too rough—her only success will be in scaring him off. The small woman pulls back one hand and runs her fingers through the side of his hair, pets down the shaved surface of his undercut—the gesture prompts a deep, relieved hum from Armin, "Turn around, Armin. Please?"
The whistle of the wind outside their window fills the mute pause. A half-hearted mumble is the first response she gets before the release of a long, chest-deflating sigh. He twists onto his side, his chin still kept to his chest so she can't see. Annie doesn't bother to bring his face up. She pulls him in, rests against her chest a head which is just as disturbed with vivid imagination and bone-shaking terror. A miserable noise is coughed into the space between her chest. His nose pokes her as Armin tucks his face deeper into her. Strong forearms wrap around her.
Annie nurses the top of Armin's head with quick, cotton-soft kisses. She moves to his temples, his forehead, and each peck leaves him feeling like he's being shot with mind-fuzzing painkillers. Her fingers run along the back of his head, rotate in circles in the way she knows soothes him. One of his eyelids droops; the other follows soon after. But before the black sleep-wave engulfs him, memories flying as fast as shuffled cards zip through Armin's brain.
Annie's troubled face at the top of the staircase haunts him again; Annie pressing him for answers before their assault on the Yeagerists comes back; Annie…crying while on her hands and knees over their deviation from Liberio to Odiha shatters his heart.
His arms tighten on her so hard, Annie exhales from shock. She can't see his face though she doesn't need to—the entire region below her collarbone is damp and Armin's shoulders are trembling. It's frightening for Annie—he's hanging on as if he'd fall off a cliff if he's forced away. Like almost everything with Armin, it takes time for him to calm down. She's having one of those nights where she can't sleep anyway—it's not like she had anything else planned but avoid waking Armin and stare into the wood of the ceiling, trying not to envision titan teeth and whizzing bullets moving above her. The wetness dripping onto her nightshirt slows then eventually stops. Her thumb rubs back and forth behind his ear until his chest pressed against her rises and falls, calm and steady—he's finally asleep again.
Not soon after Armin falls asleep, a sliver of light shines across the room from the door to the wall. A small blond head pokes in.
Falco is there, visibly concerned—he must have heard Armin's shouting from his bedroom down the hall.
Annie waves a hand in motion to stop opening the door further. Falco halts. She puts her finger over her mouth then taps at her temple—just another nightmare, she mutely speaks.
Falco's mouth parts and he nods, understanding. He's planted to his spot still and he turns to the point to the kitchen.
Water? he mouths silently.
The gesture inspires Annie to smile—Falco is too sweet a child to be under her faulty care.
She sounds out "No, thanks," with a smile. Her eyes dart from the door to him—a signal to leave.
Falco nods. As he turns and shuts the door, Annie catches him flash a thumbs up toward the staircase; Gabi must have come down, having heard Armin from her upstairs bedroom.
Annie sighs, returns to consoling her woeful partner. She rests her cheek on his head, ensures he's glued tightly against her. Having Armin so close sends this warm heat through her veins, frightens off those shadow creatures which slither closer when she's alone and scared. Annie forgets all sense of time, sinks deeper into warmth, until eventually, sleep overtakes her too.