**written by: thesketchytepe**

12:03 AM

The sudden slamming of the front door yanked Annie out of her deep sleep like a fishing hook jerks an unsuspecting salmon out of water.

Her eyelids peeled open to the darkness of the bedroom. She unfolded herself and stretched her arms to the side, her shoulder blades clicking back into place. A silent yawn escaped her as she pushed her tangled locks out of her face. Her body shifted to the bedroom door which was left slightly ajar and waited for more sounds—the opening and shutting of the coat closet, the dropping of keys into the dish on the side table, maybe the switch of the hallway lights as Armin moved around the tiny living room and adjacent kitchen. But none of those happened. Just echoing silence.

Annie turned to her phone resting on the nightstand and checked the time. 9:04 PM. It wasn't that late, but Annie was already tucked into bed and had been asleep for almost an hour now. She'd been up since three that morning—she got up to study for an exam she had later in the day and went for a run around five (she ended up running three and half miles and, when she went to the academy at seven, had to run an additional three more). She was tired and sore to say the least and was ready to crash into bed once school let out, but remembered they were running low on some food and other necessities, so she automatically went grocery shopping afterwards.

Armin had sent her a text around the time she finally got home. 'Just finished dinner and heading over to Eren's now. Might be home late. See you in the morning?'

She knew he had plans with Eren and Mikasa; they scheduled this a week prior because it was the only day Armin wasn't working at the library this week and Eren's social service rep allowed him to go out (a short thirty-something year old man named Levi began watching over Eren shortly after Zeke's arrest for the hospital murders; Eren had been getting all sorts of crap from the town for being related to the guy and authorities thought it'd be for the best if he had someone to keep track of him for everyone's sake).

Annie responded with a subtle 'K.'

'Okay. Goodnight. I love you :)'

'Love u too'

She then stuffed a sandwich down her throat and hopped into bed. But Armin texted her not even an hour ago; she was expecting him to come back around ten or eleven, or he might even change his mind and stay the night at Eren's.

He didn't stay for too long at all, she thought to herself as she put the phone back down and pulled the covers towards her chin. I wonder if something happened.

She waited for him to come in, but she didn't hear anything that suggested otherwise. Was he just standing there in the living room? Did he even come home? Was the door slamming just her sleepy mind playing tricks on her?

Her eyes grew heavy once more and she was about to fall into the wonderful land of sleep again when the bedroom door finally creaked open. She didn't move or acknowledge that she was awake in any way; she only peeked one eye at Armin's small figure in the darkness, slowly moving around with a strangely terrified look on his face.

She blinked and squinted through her bangs. He was on his phone; the light radiating from it was dim, but it was enough for her to see how unbelievably wide his eyes were. His thick eyebrows were furrowed in concentration, his lips were pursed into a thin white line, his cheeks were bright red, either from the cold outside or from running home. She focused on his big blue eyes, at all the fear that they carried. Her vision was able to catch what he was looking at through the reflection in his eyes—he kept on switching from some darkened picture to a conversation he was having with someone. Or rather who he was waiting to have because his fingers weren't flying across the keypad.

Confusion and interest found its way into her brain as she let out a groggy, "What are you doing?"

"Shit!" Armin jumped out of his skin and nearly dropped his phone. His wide gaze landed on Annie and his tense shoulders melted somewhat as she rubbed at her eyes.

"Geez, Annie," he sighed. "I thought you were asleep." He subconsciously shuffled over to her and sat on the bed. He lightly pecked at her forehead and began rubbing her bare leg that poked out from beneath the sheets.

"I thought you were at Eren's. You're back earlier than I expected."

"Uh, yeah, I…" He trailed off, glancing to the side and back at her again. "I forgot I have an eight AM class and figured I should, you know, get some sleep before then."

That made sense for Armin, the most studious and responsible person Annie knew—she didn't think even Marco, a close second, would think that getting a full eight hours of sleep was important. But that didn't explain the petrified expression on his face.

"Are you alright?" she asked.

"Yeah, I'm fine, just tired." He smiled sweetly at her. "But I'm sure nowhere near as tired as you. I heard you got up around three this morning. Voluntarily. How do you do that?"

He then inquired about her day. He asked how her exam went and thanked her for picking up food on the way home. They talked like that for a while and she almost forgot about the fear that was probably bubbling in his chest right now.

He told her he'd be right back and headed for the bathroom, taking his phone with him. She situated herself into a comfortable position and waited. He walked back out about fifteen minutes later, went to his dresser, and proceeded to get dressed for bed, throwing on an oversized T-shirt and a pair of sweatpants with Trost University's logo going down the side.

Before he got into bed, he stared at his phone for another five minutes. She saw his eyebrow twitch in frustration when he apparently didn't get what he wanted. A low yet anxious sigh escaped his lips. He placed it on his own nightstand and then snuggled up next to Annie.

They were facing each other, legs brushing up against one another. Annie had her eyes closed for a moment, feeling Armin's warm breath against her nose, but she eventually opened them back up to find him staring intently into space. He had the covers pulled to his chin and he never blinked, his gaze stuck somewhere in the folds of the covers.

"What's wrong?" she asked.

He shook his head slightly, not looking at her. "Nothing. I'm fine."

"You look like you're going to be sick. What's wrong?"

His stare dragged back up to meet her eyes. He did what he did earlier: distract her, guide her mind in another direction. Manipulate her into thinking that nothing was wrong like he said, even though it was clearly not.

He smiled as gently and charmingly as he could and whispered, "Everything's okay. Just go back to sleep, sweetheart." He then placed a kiss on the tip of her nose and left the ghost of a smile as he shut his eyes.

She stared at him a moment longer. She knew it was working, for her mind reminded her of how beautiful his soul was, of how incredibly lucky she was. She knew that he wanted her to be happy and to not worry or panic about anything. She knew that, if he could, he would rip his heart out of his chest, pumping and bleeding, and offer it to her even if it so much as made her smile back. She didn't know of any other love greater than his; what a lovely sun he was, giving her life and another reason to be thankful for the light he shined on the darkest of places.

But then his smile wavered and she steered back into that dark place he was trying to avoid altogether.

She sat up and flipped on the lamp sitting on her nightstand. She turned to Armin, who was blinking at the sudden light filling up the room. He looked up at her, but before he got the chance to run his mouth again, she pinched his cheek, her thumb grazing his teeth, and dragged him into a sitting position.

"Ow, ow, ow, stop!" He grabbed at her wrist and tried pulling her hand out of his mouth, but, naturally, those noodle arms of his carried no such strength.

She glared at him. "Stop fucking lying to me and tell me what's wrong." She dragged each syllable out, making each word count, making them deadlier.

He blinked at her and visibly shrunk into himself.

"Something obviously happened at Eren's house," she went on in the same annoyed tone, "and it scared you so much that you left within an hour and can't get that horrified look off your face, no matter how hard you try. Now tell me what's wrong, or do I seriously have to do the pitiful thing and look through your phone to find out what's so damn interesting?"

She let go of him and he flinched away, rubbing at his cheek. Her glare never faltered.

"I thought we knew better than to keep secrets from each other, Armin."

His shoulders slumped at her comment, weighed down by guilt. His eyes searched at their legs underneath the covers wildly as if an answer would magically appear to assist him in winning this argument.

"I…need to think it over before saying anything," he mumbled in a small voice. The fear was evident in his tone; he was a timid mouse, scurrying around in his labyrinth of a brain, desperately searching for a way to flee the worst scenario.

She crossed her arms and leaned against the headboard. "Then think it out loud and make it real."

He looked at her, but the longer he stared, the more scared he got. His eyes slowly widened and his chest rose as he held back his breath, perhaps even a scream. He was visibly crumbling before her and he barely had enough strength to whisper out, "I think Eren helped Zeke kill those people."

It was now her turn to blink at him. Well, she certainly wasn't expecting so big a claim as that. She dragged her tongue against the back of her teeth and prompted, "Why would you think that?"

"Because I found something under Eren's bed that only an accomplice of murder would keep."

Her eyebrows scrunched at the odd way he constructed that sentence. Something that only an accomplice of murder would keep? Was he talking about souvenirs of victims that serial killers kept? She reached for that file in her brain; she had taken a few classes on the psychology of criminals and their behavior and the information was still fresh in her mind. She didn't think she'd have to pull it out for Eren, though.

"What did you find?"

He paused before turning to his phone. "I saw a box poking out from beneath his bed and, when Eren and Mikasa left the room, I pulled it out."

His fingers trembled as he pulled up an image, probably the same one he was ogling earlier. He gingerly placed the device in her hand and watched her as she peered at his phone.

She saw a small cardboard box with a bunch of random crap in it. There was a checkered scarf, a glasses case, some jewelry, a wallet, keys, and a worn-out notebook. She didn't find anything unusual about it until she swiped to the right. Armin's pale and bony fingers were holding up a golden ring and an opened locket sat in his palm. The name Maria was engraved on the inside of the ring and a picture of some unknown woman and man was tucked into the locket.

She swiped again. The scarf had the initials D.F. embroidered into the corner of it. Swipe. The driver's license still sat in the leather wallet and brought up a picture of a woman with long blond hair—her name was Rose. Swipe. Attached to the ring of keys was a school picture of someone's kid—it was wrapped in a plastic frame and the words "Happy Father's Day!" was scrawled beneath the child's smiling face. Swipe. "Oncology" was written in black sharpie on the purple notebook with the name Sina scribbled near the top right corner. Inside was all sorts of medical notes and quick little sketches of body parts.

When she swiped again, she frowned and blinked at the photo. The thin, round glasses that sat in their case had a crack in one of the lenses. Beneath them was a handkerchief with a golden G.J. sewed into it, just like the scarf.

Before she could ask about it, Armin whispered out, "Those were Grisha Jaeger's glasses, Eren's dad."

Her gaze landed on him once more. He was now looking at his phone in her hands as if it were a ticking bomb. He hugged his knees to his chest and she saw the tension in his arms tighten. He mumbled under his breath, almost as if he were in some trance.

"I couldn't find any names on the locket or set of keys, but the names on everything else matched up with the ones that were murdered at Trost Hospital: Dina Fritz, Rose Brown, Sina O'Neil, Maria Moser. Even Eren's own father. How could he get his hands on the personal items of those other nurses and doctors? Why would he even keep them there, underneath his bed in a dirty old box? All the victims, excluding Mr. Jaeger, were found with all sorts of toxic chemicals in their bloodstreams like mercury, lead, dioxin. Zeke had easy access to all sorts of drugs because he worked at the same hospital with those victims. He even admitted to separating the poisons and inserting them into the victims. He buried them in the woods surrounding Eren's family cabin. Mr. Jaeger was the only one found with a bushed-in skull, his face beyond recognition if he didn't have his wallet on him when he was buried."

Tears glistened in Armin's eyes. "Eren wouldn't have those things unless he helped Zeke with the murders. Why would he keep them? If Zeke acted alone and had those belongings with him and Eren found them, he would've turned them in, right? Why would he want that reminder of death so close to him at night? I knew Eren and his father never really saw eye-to-eye, but I didn't think he would murder him."

He drew a deep breath, trying to calm himself down. "I left as soon as I could. Eren looked confused, but I told him I wasn't feeling well and would call him in the morning. I'm pretty sure he bought it; I don't think he suspected anything. I texted Mikasa on my way home, telling her to stay away from Eren and to leave the house as soon as she could. But she hasn't answered me yet, and she's usually quick when responding. It makes me think…that she knows. She knows and she's not doing anything about it."

"Why would she keep quiet about it?" Annie spoke up.

He looked back up at her and sighed, moving his jaw around. "Because she's been madly in love with him ever since she first laid eyes on him."

That much was obvious; one would have to be blind to not see that. She was always at his side and did everything for him, whether he appreciated it or not. Whenever strangers asked them if they were a couple, Mikasa's entire face would bloom a tomato red color while Eren dumbly replied, "No, she's my sister." It was hard to tell if Eren was just that oblivious or if he didn't feel the same way and tried avoiding it at all costs, but Annie knew Mikasa would do just about anything and everything for him, apparently even murder.

Oh, the crazy things people do for love.

Annie dropped Armin's phone to her lap. "Should we call the police?"

Armin bit on his lip. "I don't know. I'm not sure if that's strong enough evidence and even so, my fingerprints are now all over that box."

"So would Eren's."

He put his face in his hands and leaned forward, his forehead landing on her thigh. "I don't want him to be the killer, Annie."

She saw his shoulders shake and she went to rub his back, but he snapped back up like a rubber band. His wide eyes were damp with tears, rolling down his round cheeks. His lips quivered as he whimpered out, "It can't be him, it just can't. It can't be the same boy I met at five-years-old, who chased down a couple of kids giving me a hard time, running and screaming like that's the only thing he knew how to do. He's always stood by my dreams and supported me throughout my entire life. He attended my parents' funeral, he stayed up with me until four in the morning, talking about our futures and our pasts. He's always been there for me and I thought I knew everything about him, even more than Mikasa does. But I don't, not anymore."

His body slumped and the tears continued to fall, but he didn't make a sound. He was so shocked, the thought of Eren growing up to follow a path so dark and so twisted that Armin couldn't keep up with him never crossed his mind.

"Why would he do something like this?" he mumbled to himself.

Annie's mind peeled open that file and read off the cold, hard facts. Childhood trauma? Mental illness? Maybe he was manipulated by Zeke? Yet she knew she should be the good little girlfriend and lie. Tell him everything's alright, that this was some huge misunderstanding and Eren had some rational explanation for all of this.

But she loved him too much to do that.

She shut Armin's phone off and leaned pass him to set it back on his nightstand. "Call Levi tomorrow and tell him your suspicions," she said as she sat back down. "You don't have to say anything about the box, but only that you think the murders are getting to him and might be affecting his mental state. Levi will deem him as a potential threat to himself and those around him and might put him in the hospital for a seventy-two hour watch or something like that. He can reach Eren's therapist too, I think. Maybe they'll catch something before he becomes dangerous." She paused. "If he does."

He looked at her with his sad, sad eyes as if she were a puppy that got ran over by a car and left by the curb to die. "Do you think he killed them?" he whispered in a broken voice.

She hesitated. Her eyes peeked at his hands gripping the sheets and then glanced back up at him. "I'm not sure."

His expression didn't change right away. He stared at her some more, desperately, anxiously. His gaze eventually lowered, and he let go of the crinkled sheets to wipe at his eyes. He took a few deep breaths and then went silent for a while longer.

"Okay," he simply said before slipping into her arms and drifting back into the darkness.

The sudden ringing of the car alarms yanked Annie out of the memory like how a violent wind would drag the flightless baby bird out of its mother's nest.

Her head snapped toward the ceiling of the basement as if the blaring car was right there. Her chest rose in nervousness, yet she made sure to lock her jaw to keep from gasping aloud.

"What was that?" whispered Eren's voice.

"That's someone's car alarm," Armin clarified, his voice shrinking as the minutes ticked by.

"Why do they have that on? What does that mean?"

"I-I don't know."

Annie looked back down at Historia. They probably can't get away for whatever reason. Maybe that was the "distraction" they needed to make.

She went back to shrugging out of her coat and lightly draped it over Historia's stomach, the messiest part of her whole body. She noticed Armin getting squeamish at the great sight of blood on their friend, so she decided to cover her up—and to get a closer look at her body.

She didn't stray too long (she didn't want Eren to get suspicious of her) but was able to identify certain clues. On her left calf and left arm were deep puncture wounds in the shape of big shark teeth. It didn't tear up or down her skin like how an animal's would, but only sunk deeper into her flesh. It was as if something was holding her down, and this something wasn't a human or an animal—the wounds would've been messier, made her bleed more.

Before she had covered up her torso with her jacket, she discovered right away that she was stabbed several times around her chest and stomach with such force and strength that she was honestly surprised she didn't leave a bigger stain on the couch. Historia was a tiny girl, and it must've been extremely easy for the killer to do the job. Dirt and leaves were tangled in her golden locks and her fingernails were coated in black as if she were trying to crawl away or out of whatever was holding her down.

What Annie was sure of was that Historia suffered for too long and had fought for her life, but ultimately lost that battle.

She turned around and went back to her place by the wall opposite of Historia, alongside Armin. Mikasa and Eren sat on the loveseat beside Historia's corpse, stiff as nails. The car alarm continued to go off and, to be frank, Annie was a little grateful for the periodic break of silence that was quickly filling up the room.

Some time had passed before Eren spoke up again: "I can't believe this is happening. This is so much worse than the usual taunting I get in Trost. Like, for God's sake, Historia is dead! How fucking crazy do you have to be to do that?"

Armin had looked up at Eren but went back down to staring at the floor. "People make bad decisions when they're angry or scared."

"But this isn't anger, Armin. This is…absolute fury. A hatred unlike any other. I mean, I just…can't believe it."

Silence (excluding the car alarm) swam between them with the same slow taunt that a great white shark would make, the same one who ate Historia. Eren couldn't keep his mouth shut for long, however: "I never thought this hatred would go this far. Why are people mad at me for something I didn't do? I hear it all the time in interviews, down the street, I even get random phone calls and texts from people everywhere. They want me gone, they want me dead, even though it was Zeke who did the actual killings. Even Levi won't let me out of my own goddamn house—I was lucky enough to convince him to let me come here." He sighed. "Well, 'lucky' isn't really the right word to use here."

"Eren, none of this was your fault," Mikasa reassured. She gently laid a hand across his. "You didn't know."

"I just…" He paused and tried again. "I just wish my mom was still alive. None of this would've happened if she didn't die."

His hand retracted from Mikasa's; he swiped at his eyes. "Zeke was close with my mom too, despite us being half-siblings, so he took it pretty hard. But my dad spiraled into this deep depression. He stayed at the hospital for long hours and stalled in coming back home. He always wore this exhausted expression whenever I saw him, and we eventually stopped talking to one another. He would never answer me back. He once told me he and Zeke got into a lot of arguments at the hospital over mom's death. Yeah, I could understand Zeke's feelings about it, but she was my mom. She was my dad's wife. Zeke…there's no excuse for what he did. Why can't the court just kill him already, so I can be done with all of this shit?"

Mikasa stared at Eren like he was the only thing in the room—Armin and Annie weren't cowering in the corner of the room and Historia's bloody body wasn't laying a few feet from her and the car alarm from outside didn't tell her to be worried for their friends, running around hopelessly out there in the woods. Armin never once looked up at Eren; his blond hair shielded his face from Annie's vision. She could tell he was trying his best to ignore it all, but that was nearly impossible, especially at a time like this.

Eren finally pulled his hands away from his face. It was still as dark as coal in the basement, but Annie had been down there long enough to see a little bit more clearly. His jaw was locked and his eyebrows were furrowed as if he were trying to hold back a scream or a cry. She could see his nostrils flare a little as he reached for his phone on the coffee table in front of him.

Light exploded in his face once he turned on the device. His thumbs moved around and Annie could see something shift around in his hazel eyes. Something reflected against them, something was moving.

Annie bit on her tongue.

"Is your phone working?" she asked him.

"No. Is yours?" He didn't even flick a glance in her direction. Instead, images continued to dance across his eyes and his thumbs continued to fly.

She replied in the same bored tone that he gave her: "No."

Mikasa peeked over his shoulder and frowned. She plucked the phone out of his hands and turned it off.

"If your phone doesn't work, then stop messing with it," she said as she set it back down on the coffee table. "No use to run in circles."

Eren huffed but didn't say anything.

A lightbulb flickered in Annie's mind. Her eyes glanced around them, but she made sure to not move her head around like some confused bird. She peeked at the corners, at the darkest parts of the room. She had to squint and wait for her eyes to adjust some more, but she eventually found them. Little black dots that resembled something like a smoke detector were attached to the ceiling and, as far as she was concerned, there might've been others hiding in less obvious places like somewhere on the TV or near the bottom of the couch.

There it was—more evidence to prove that Eren was the cause behind all of this.

She leaned her head against Armin's shoulder and, with his head already down, she was able to whisper into his ear without the prying eyes of Eren and Mikasa taking note of what they were doing. "Eren's phone is working. I think there's cameras in the room. He's probably watching the others right now."

She thought of Reiner and Berthold. Did they have any idea of what was really going on? Probably not, knowing them. Their minds were most likely stuck in the moment, and had forgotten to think of the future or to question Eren's legitimacy. If anyone were to pick something up out there, it'd either be Marco (another academic all-star) or Jean, who was surprisingly alert of his surroundings despite drowning in his own pity-party all the time. She hoped one of them would eventually figure out that there wasn't anybody else lurking in the woods; the monster was here in the cold, dark basement.

Armin didn't say anything at first. He didn't even move and Annie wondered if he was too wrapped up in his own thoughts to even hear her in the first place. But he finally turned his head in her direction, his lips brushing against her hair.

"We have to get that phone," he murmured back.

"I'll distract them. Call Levi when you get the chance."

He stayed body slowly grew stiff the more she talked. She didn't want to tell him this—it only proved his theory right all along. The Eren they knew was no more; a demon dressed in sheep's clothing had taken his place.

"It'll all be over soon." She buried her nose into Armin's hoodie. "We can go back home and try to forget."

Home. A place where they were safe, warm, and happy. They didn't have to pretend or look for an escape or do anything for that matter. They'd just recede back into their own little world and live their lives in the way they wanted to. She wanted to get off this ride, this long, bumpy ride to the gallows. She felt like she was waiting by the sidelines and watching them tie up the noose for the witch to slide her neck into.

She closed her eyes. I want to go home.

She then felt Armin's cool fingers slip beneath her chin. She didn't bother to open her eyes and she let his lips fall onto hers, gentle yet persistent. It was long and slow, the kind of kisses that she liked, the ones that meant something. She returned the comfort and wished it wouldn't end. But, like with everything else, it did.

He didn't pull away, but instead kept his small lips near hers, breathing her in and breathing her out. Her own lips titled up in the slightest. It quickly fell when his breath trembled and the shaky words dropped into her mouth like dynamite: "I love you."

She flinched and scowled. Her eyes flew open only to find a broken man behind Armin's ocean orbs. Hope was brimming in the corners and threatening to fall once again. The sight shattered her heart and the pieces caught on fire.

"Don't," she growled. She wasn't going to let him say goodbye, not like this. There was no need; everything was going to be fine.

She felt his fingers slip away as she backed up and got on her feet. Mikasa looked over at her, but her gaze was trained on Eren.

"Eren, we're gonna need some sort of weapon to protect ourselves with if the killer somehow gets in the house," she stated in a monotone. "Does your dad keep another gun down here?"

He opened his eyes. They practically glowed in the dark like a cat's. "No, he only owned two guns. One for me, one for him."

"What about a hunting knife? You said you would go hunting with him."

He shrugged. "I didn't see one in the box on the bookshelf."

"We're gonna need something," she muttered as she rounded Armin, walked past Eren and Mikasa, past the staircase, and into the blackness that made Grisha Jaeger's office.

"There's nothing there, Annie," Eren called out. "I've checked."

Her eyes dragged up the wooden bookcase and found a long, skinny box sitting on the top shelf. She of course couldn't reach it—the joys of being five foot one—but she had to. She had a serial killer and a lapdog to distract.

She grabbed the edge of the bookcase and shook it until the box fell onto the floor, but not before a bunch of thick, heavy books fell first. The clatter was loud and the room became a mess in mere seconds. She peeked in the box and found nothing but little specks of dirt and dust. It might've been the first truth Eren had told that night.

"Shit, Annie! What happened to being the quietest person on earth?" Eren came into the room and stumbled over a couple of books. He caught himself before he fell and shot an irritated glare her way.

"What the fuck are you doing?" he spat out in a whisper.

"I told you—I'm looking for a weapon."

"No, you're just being a pain in the ass."

As Eren shakingly lowered to the ground, grimacing at the pain shooting up his thigh, he started to pick up his dead father's books. Mikasa soon emerged by the doorway. She looked at the floor and frowned. She stepped over Eren and began collecting more of the books and sticking them back into the shelves. Annie picked up two and shuffled back to the doorway. She watched Eren and Mikasa's backs as they cleaned up the mess she made.

Eren muttered some more bullshit under his breath while Mikasa remained silent as she worked.

"I thought there would be at least something," Annie said as she lightly tapped her two books together, sending more noise into the room.

As soon as Eren replied, "And I told you I checked it already," she felt a presence zoom behind her and heard light footfalls running up the stairs.

She didn't look behind her. She didn't need to see the last image of the love of her life. Not a strand of blond hair, not his long eyelashes, not his bitten-down fingernails, not his perky nose, not his skinny collarbone. She was going to see him again in the morning next to her at home.

She blinked away the fear burning at the back of her eyes. She just had to.