Coming for your heart

Chapter 62

He had been the one to help Armin get over the devastating pain that followed after his parent's death when even his beloved grandfather wasn't sure how to handle the wailing child that was forced to live with him.

"Mikasa..." He swallowed and shook his head, getting on his feet. Black dots danced in front of his vision for a second and his legs threatened to give out under him. But his focus lay on Mikasa and Mikasa alone. "Tell me he has been arrested."

The words were nothing but a mumble.

Mikasa avoided his gaze.

"They killed him.", she whispered, her long hair surrounding her face like a veil and she gasped as if those words alone had taken all her energy. Not even after Carla's death had he seen her this devastated and...hopeless.

Her words punched Armin straight into his soul and he sank down next to the bed on the could ground.

Shaking fingers gripped the fabric of his shorts while his eyes searched for something to train themselves on.

Something to steady his racing heart.

His eyes found those of the dark-haired girl just a few meters away from him.

Mikasa wasn't one to lose face easily.

Which was probably the only reason she wasn't kneeling on the ground as well. The endless depth in her eyes showed him the same amount of the crushing ache he was experiencing.

Armin didn't know anything about Mikasa's past and even though he suspected that those corpses hadn't been the first one the girl had ever seen, the gruesome death of yet another person close to her tore her heart apart...

And it painted Armin that he was there to watch it.

"Eren." Armin longed for answers from his best friend. For a shoulder to lean on. "Please tell me that's not true."

Eren didn't answer.

The prince didn't even look in their direction, his eyes trained on what had once been bright flames but were nothing but ashes by now.

Armin's head jerked around to face Mikasa.

The girl was watching him with a sorrowful gaze and a dark glimmer that softened her eyes in a way that shook Armin.

"Why...why would they do this?", he whispered and closed his eyes. "Hannes could have never done anything wrong..."

"They said he stole things.", Mikasa answered, almost uncertain of the truth behind what they had apparently been told by someone. "And that he...killed someone."

"Hannes would never-"

Armin's mortified shout was interrupted by the door that went open again, loud enough to disrupt the sullen atmosphere in the room.

Eren still didn't move away from the fireplace.

Mikasa shot around, her dark eyes trained on the two men standing inside the room, watching them as if they were interesting animals and yet Armin could detect some sort of...pity in the taller one's eyes.

"What the fuck was that just now?", Levi huffed, his arms crossed in front of his muscular chest hidden under his uniform. "One minute longer and the king would have fucking treated you like that murderer."

"He would have never killed anyone.", Mikasa snarled lowly as if daring the smaller man to say just a single bad word about the man they had all grown up with. The man they had grown to love like family.

Levi simply raised an eyebrow but didn't say anything else while sending a questioning gaze in the other man's direction.

Blond hair tucked behind his ears just as usual, Erwin took in their appearances with the same cunning pair of eyes Armin had come to appreciate more than the sight of a blue sky in the early morning.

"Did you know the suspect?"

Armin was glad that he hadn't decided to go for 'murderer' but the relief he was feeling over something simple like that couldn't dim the burning sadness he was desperately trying to hide from the other man, who had only then taken notice of him.

Erwin opened his mouth but rushed to his side instead of spilling useless words that wouldn't minder the pain the king's decision had once again caused them.

Warm hands gripped his elbows and helped him up from the ground.

Armin breathed in the by now familiar scent of the man. He wanted nothing but to simply lean his body against the older ones, resting his race against the broad chest and listening to the soothing heartbeats that would reassure him that not all was lost yet.

But just as he was about to lean into the touch, Erwin drew back and Armin almost fell over again, whimpering softly at the loss of contact.

Hurt reflected in his eyes as the Commander moved away from him, taking several steps back to get some distance between them.

Between the servant and the master.

The thought hurt Armin more than he would like to admit.

"Care to share what the fuck that shitshow was about?", Levi asked again.

His voice might have been the tiniest bit gentler than before but Armin, although softhearted and forgiving by nature, couldn't care less.

He knew what the General was asking them.

"He was innocent." Armin inhaled deeply and thought to feel Mikasa and Eren doing the same as he said those words out loud. "Hannes could have never hurt a fly. Not...not anymore."

He would have.
For Carla.
For Eren.
For us.
If he knew that we are still alive...

Mikasa looked over to him, probably reading his thoughts as easily as ever.

"Armin...", she called out to him softly and Armin balled his hands to fists, tears escaping his eyes without notice. "He knew it. He knew that...he is alive."

"That who is alive?" Erwin looked back and forth between Armin and Mikasa, not minding Eren who still didn't move or react to anything happening around him. "How were you related to the victim?"

...

It was that word.

That single word.

Victim.

It broke whatever they had been stuck in and just as the last word fell from Erwin's lips, Armin found his sibling's eyes in this room filled with past memories and bone-deep pain, shared by them alone.

He found those beautiful orbs that belonged to the man he called his brother and he found the sharp eyes of the girl he had grown to love like a sister.

Victim.

They all knew it.

And without voicing it out loud, a single nod was enough to share their thoughts.

Hannes wasn't the first victim.

Armin straightened his back, feeling the rage that his brother had carried within for months, for years.

The true meaning behind this single word hung in between those three people, who had completely forgotten that they weren't alone in the room.

Revenge.

"We don't know anything.", Eren spoke for the first time since he had gotten inside this chamber and glared over at the two men. "It is useless to question us."

The young man's fists were balled, his anger visible in every fiber of his being and burning through his aura just as much as through the contacts in his eyes.

Mikasa rose, inhaling deeply and nodded once, regaining her emotionless mask that concealed her unwavering loyalty to her brother.

Eren met Armin's gaze, then his sister's.

Softly and yet with a razor-sharp edge he said: "Hannes was innocent. And one day the king will pay for all those corpses."

(I'M BACK!
I still don't have the internet that I need to update from my laptop, so I wrote the chapter again on my phone.
So I'm sorry if there are mistakes, I'm quite tired and was looking back and forth between two displays 😅)