Coming for your heart

Chapter 9

Maybe there were stones tied to his feet. Every step he made reminded him of the weight on his body, on his heart. It prevented him from sprinting up to his house.

"Eren...don't." Mikasa sounded so weak. Weaker than he had ever heard her before.

"She was your mother, too.", he mumbled. "She can't just...leave us. She wouldn't."

Another step. Another weight. A pang in his heart.

He came closer to the house with every second. With every moment he spent remembering what he begged to never forget.

Memories of their first days in that house.

Of the first meal they had eaten there.

The first day Mikasa had slept in her new home, next to him.

He reached the doorstep.

He saw it.

He saw the beam on the ground.

He saw the dust, the ash, the ruins.

And he saw the black-haired woman who had been crushed by the beam's weight.

With a blank face he kneeled in front of her. Just...knelt there. As if sitting in front of his mother's corpse would do her any good. As if he could arrive just a few minutes earlier.

He might have had a chance to save her.

He might have...

"Eren, come back.", his sister called out to him. Eren didn't listen. Just as he hadn't listened to his mother. She shouldn't be lying there. In the dirt.

So he stood up and tucked his hands under the beam, not answering. He lifted it with all his strength, but he didn't even feel it's weight or the splinters digging into his hands, into his flesh.

He felt absolutely nothing.

He shoved it aside, not caring if he had destroyed anything else. There was nothing to save anymore. His new life had crumbled, just like his old one had.

His mother's eyes were open.

Her mouth tugged open like she wanted to let out one last scream.

And, oh, how Eren would give anything to just hear his mother's voice again.

He carefully put his hands under her neck and the back of her knees.

"Eren!" He recognized Armin's voice, but he didn't turn around. He was busy trying to keep his balance. But his mother wasn't heavy. In fact she was terribly thin. Why hadn't he noticed it when he had the time to change something about it?

There were steps behind him. He heard them. He didn't know them.

He didn't care.

Sharp gasps, a muffled cry.

He didn't care.

Eren rested his mom's head on his shoulder, smiling down on her as gently as he could manage.

"Jetzt bist du in Sicherheit, Mama. [Now you're safe, mom.]", he whispered into her ear, nuzzling his tearstained face into her scalp.

Only then did he turn around. Horrified looks awaited him from the soldiers who had gathered in front of his house.

He recognized one of them. General, they had called him.

They all saw the dead woman in his arms who had been his beloved mother.

He carried her down the stairs, watching his step – watching over her like he should have done before. He hated the tears running down his face. Hated them for the reason that had caused them.

The people moved out of his way.

Mikasa pressed a hand on her mouth, muffling any crying and Armin laid an arm around her. Even though his breathing was just as shallow as everyone else's and his eyes just as wide there was something different about them.

And suddenly Eren understood why he hadn't run back to save his grandfather.

There hadn't been any grandfather left to save.

He came to a halt in front of the General. General Ackerman.

"The authorities give you what you need. So why are you out here?"

He looked him dead in the eye, anger and pain hidden by the void he felt inside, reflected by his eyes and the way he didn't even react when people around him gasped in shock.

The man met his gaze just as stoic as the first time they had seen each other.

The guilt in his expression was the only thing dimming the pain – the only way to satisfy his need for revenge. For a start.

"Where are your precious authorities now, General?", he hissed, pulling his mother even closer to his chest. "You were the one to say they would give us what we need. But what we needed was protection. We asked for nothing more. Just the assurance that we would be safe here."

The man said nothing. But Eren noted how he clenched his fists. How his jaw gritted. How his whole body tensed up at his words.

He walked past the man.

"We asked for nothing else. Just for a way to keep living. And you couldn't even give us that much."