dreamsofwings | open post;

( for a moment, Armin's breath catches in his throat.

even at his most bitter and angry, life without Eren felt like eternity, those lonesome, twilight moments before the morning seeming to contract and stretch the way the Paths do. the lines of adulthood in Armin's face are still somewhat youthful: the set of his eyes, weary and dull, aging Armin above all else. finally, he laughs in an exhale, straightening off the ground to face Eren as he last remembers him.

no, that's not right. the last Armin remembers — )

You can be really cruel... ( Armin smiles, subdued but fond. ) Eren.

[ Eren keeps staring for a long moment, eyes slightly unfocused. It's still memory upon memory happening all at once like always. He's had so much solitude here over the past endless amount of time. There's no Zeke, no Ymir, just sand. Or waves. Or the soft grass when he can hold onto it.

It always comes back to sand and endless night, the shining tree pillar of the Paths shimmering somewhere in a distance that now seems unreachable. He's not sure why it's still there, but he's not a god — he doesn't really know how or why this place works. He never wanted to die, to accept whatever this fate really is, but there was no other way.

Armin pulls himself up and Eren refocuses, still looking down but not as far. ]

It's too soon.

[ He means it as clarification, but it almost sounds like an accusation. However long he's been here will never be enough to completely diminish his anger, at himself, at the world and its disappointments, at the end of time, whatever.

His features soften again, though. ]

I missed you.

( evidently, not soon enough.

peace negotiations, ushered under Historia's reign, had at least taken some years ago. Armin only hopes his death, likely at the hands of someone fringe, strengthens the treaty. he doesn't think about it, not at the moment, his brow furrowing as the light softens in his eyes; the quality, wet. )

Mm.

( a beat. Armin wraps his arms about Eren, tight, a tremble in his body. his cheeks are round; his hair, short. he thinks of Eren's severed head, nested in Mikasa's arms, raw again and nineteen. his voice is louder than he intends, wavering and wet. )

Did you think I would be happy without you! I want to be here — so don't tell me it's too soon!

[ Eren, of course, never really thought or cared about diplomacy. He doesn't have a head for that kind of thing. He didn't ever consider that the Jaegerists would actually make life hell for the people he was trying to save, but part of that was a knowledge gap. He knew some people would die, sure, but he didn't know that the whole military would get turned into titans. He only knew about some of them; Yelena had misled him.

Ultimately, the knowledge probably wouldn't have changed anything. But by the time he knew the whole picture, it was too late and didn't matter.

All of it is too late now anyway, right? Here they are.

Together, in hell, forever. That's what Armin promised. Eren kind of wishes he hadn't made good on that. Armin didn't deserve to stay here in this wasteland out of time forever, regardless of what kind of responsibility Armin wanted to take for the Rumbling. On the other hand, after all this time, Eren was much happier than he let on to not be alone.

He's a little startled when Armin hugs him. When was the last time he touched anyone? Tomorrow. Last year. A hundred years ago. Lifetimes.

Chronologically, if that ever mattered, the last person who touched him alive was…well, he doesn't remember. He doesn't remember what happened after, either, Mikasa taking that last piece of him back to the island. The last person he really remembers touching…is standing here in front of him again.

After a moment he returns the embrace, leaning his face down against Armin's hair. Everything is different and nothing is. ]

I'm sorry. But I wanted you to live a long time, I told you that.

[ He had, right? Sometime, before he'd completely tipped off the deep end, back when he still had the barest hope there could be another way. ]

( except the grip of his fingers in Eren's clothes, clinging for life if they weren't already dead, Armin goes slack in Eren's arms. to most, Eren Jeager is a rhetorical device: humanity's hope, then Eldia's, a hero, a devil. here, Eren Jeager is real; his body, warm and solid against Armin's. )

Mm... ( Armin's expression remains contorted, anguished. after a moment — what does that mean in the Paths? — Armin manages a whisper: ) Mikasa will... Jean and Connie, too.

( Armin can hear the beach, waves on sand. )

[ Eren's spectre surely hangs over the world he left them, the ruined torn up ground and half-boiled ocean finally calming to something manageable. Whether that was what he wanted or not, it's inescapable. The people still alive cannot possibly forget his name and his horrors.

Eren himself, here and unchanging, is still more than just that monster. Here with Armin, he can still just be human. ]

Yeah, but…

[ He's not sure how to say everything inside him. He's always been shit with words. Hitting things to solve problems? Sure, great, fine. Talking to people? Hard pass. He got worse at it the more he withdrew, the more lies and half-truths he told, the colder he became. It's been so long since then. (It hasn't.) ]

I don't want anyone else I love to die young.

[ It's as close as he gets and he nearly chokes on the words anyway.

The sand turns wet and thick, not the dry desert but the strange texture of the beach, white sand and blue water that goes on forever. Not the ocean between them and Marley, but the ocean they longed for. Armin's ocean.

Eren straightens up, taking Armin's shoulders and moving him back so they can look at each other again. ]

I wish I could send you back.

[ He half-means that, always heedless of what other people want. He's always been so selfish, even in his desire to protect people, even in his insane roundabout plan to save a handful of people from a world that hated them. It's always about him, too. He's not good at selflessness.

His hands finally drop away, back to his sides. ]

I didn't think you'd really come.

[ The last part is soft. It isn't that he doesn't want Armin here. Of course he does. He's longed for that promised company, the penance Armin agreed to pay for the world that Eren destroyed. It's so much better than the nonlinear solitude of his own thoughts. Besides, he missed Armin specifically, Armin who had always been there to stand by him — or against him, when truly necessary. That last goodbye, the one he erased from Armin's memory until he was dead, had been the hardest one. ]

Eren...

( what does it mean, really, that Eren is here? isn't Ymir free? he always wondered...

what happened to the lobopodia?

Armin turns, eyes on the sea. ) I haven't exactly forgiven you. For a while, what happened after was worse. More people died: disease, hunger, paranoia... ( fighting each other for resources, on suspicion of Eldian blood. ) It was like the old government under the fake King Fritz. It seemed hopeless. Even today, there's a lot of refugees... ( for a moment, Armin falls quiet. ) That's why I had to come.

( smiling, Armin turns, eyes bloodshot. ) Because I showed you my grandpa's book. ( because he convinced the others to protect Eren, to make contact with Zeke. he hesitated when he shouldn't have. even if Eren could... he can't. not really. all the people and places they lost, all the pieces Armin has had picked up, it would be for nothing. ) We did the Rumbling together.

[ Eren might not have all the answers himself, in the end. If asked whether he chose to stay, he'd say the same shit he always does about freedom and inevitability, contradicting himself in the same two breaths.

Maybe it really is just hell, the price he paid for the death of the world.

He would pay it again. The terrible truth has always been that he will take this over the other option, the death of everything he actually cared about. Eren weighed his love and rage against the world and the world didn't stand a chance. ]

I don't expect you to forgive me.

[ He never has. He's aware that the things he's done are unforgivable. Those people didn't want to die. Most of them didn't deserve to die.

He frowns a little.

He had never set out to save the world, or really save the island. It was about a few people, their worth to him more than anything imaginable. He didn't mean to leave them something hopeless. What had he meant to do? Well, his ability to plan ahead has never actually been all that good. Knowing the ending didn't change that too much (and clearly there was plenty he didn't know). ]

We did not. It had nothing to do with you.

[ He doesn't want Armin to share any responsibility for the horrible things he's done. But he already knows; he's heard this before.

He reaches out with both hands, one on each of his friend's cheeks, and tilts Armin's face up. Finally, after a million years where he wouldn't look anyone in the face and mean it, he meets Armin's eyes here. Finally, he is just Eren. No titan marks on his face, no distant look, no lies. They are just them, even in this strange never-ending nightmare. ]

You didn't do anything to blame yourself for. Let that go.

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