Chapter Text
Armin crept slowly towards the noises, resisting the urge to just run over there and pull Eren into his arms. He knew he was probably overreacting, but it wouldn’t hurt to check.
He hid his body behind a lone tree and peered over the side of it, his eyes just barely adjusting to the darkness. He squinted to try and make out shapes and colors, but he could hear muffled voices. I could go yell over to them, but that’s dumb as shit, what if it’s another person trying to get their hands on Eren? Armin sighed quietly and then heard horses' hoofs going in the opposite direction of their camp.
“Shit,” He muttered and waited a second before sprinting to where Eren had fallen asleep only hours before. His eyes finally adjusted to the dark and he scanned the area for any sign of Eren.
His breath picked up and he pulled at his blonde hair, a nervous habit he had picked up. He dropped to his knees and inhaled deeply, lungs rattling, and then breathed out. He repeated that action multiple times and then ran back to the campfire. He rummaged through his stuff and ripped out the back page of his notebook and took out a quill, dipping it into the ink and scribbling a quick message to Hange and Levi.
Eren disappeared, I’ll be back soon with him.
- Armin Arlert
He put it on top of the log by the campfire and extinguished the fire fully. Armin was lucky enough that he didn’t change out of his clothes earlier, but he decided against using ODM gear, instead opting for his horse.
He mounted it and went to the edge of the camp, looking back one more time to make sure he was truly alone, and then left. He wasn’t completely sure which direction they went, but he decided to try and go the way he thought he heard them leave in.
I don’t even know who they are, Armin thought, what could they want? They could be angry Military Police guys, but that wouldn’t make sense, these people went in the opposite direction of Stohess.
Armin groaned and shook his head slightly, “It doesn’t matter who kidnapped him, all that matters is getting him back. Walls, I can’t believe he’s gotten kidnapped twice. Who’s that stupid?” His mind supplied the answer to that question, Eren is.
Armin kept his eyes and ears open so he could sense if he was around other people, but after a couple minutes of wandering aimlessly in one direction he paused. He held his breath to hear anything out of the ordinary, and sure enough he could hear the soft sound of horse hooves far in the distance.
“Thank the Walls it’s quiet tonight,” Armin muttered. To be honest, he didn’t know what he was doing. Armin had never been one for spontaneously doing things, strategy was something he was better with, but he dove into this situation head first. Now he’s starting to get second thoughts, “Eren’s a bad influence on me.”
Now isn’t the time to fall apart, get your shit together Arlert, he thought. What would Mikasa do in this situation? Oh wait, she wouldn’t be in this situation,Armin mused sarcastically. He couldn’t believe how stupid he had been. What was wrong with him? Every bone in his body was screaming at him to just turn around and wake up Levi.
But if he was going to be honest…
I’m lost, aren’t I?
“Fuck!” He yelled.
_____
A voice rang out from behind the trio, not exactly close by, but too close for comfort.
“What was that?” Bertholdt asked hesitantly, as if he already knew the answer.
“Someone already noticed Eren’s gone,” Reiner said, rubbing his eyes and looking behind him. “Well, I don’t see anything and I really don’t feel like going back to check.”
“How much farther until we get to Wall Maria?” Bertholdt asked.
“Well, technically we haven’t even gotten past Wall Rose. We haven't reached the titan territory yet,” Annie explained without sparing a glance at them.
“Done sulking?” Reiner rolled his eyes, sarcasm dripping from his tone.
“Fuck you, Reiner.” Annie responded, “I’m the only reason we’re still fucking alive today.”
“Finally snapped? I haven’t seen you this angry since you beat the shit out of me when we were 11.”
“Want me to do it again?” She seethed.
“Shut up, fight when we get back home,” Bertholdt interrupted them. He knew how well they could rile each other up.
“She started it…”
“You are such a child!”
“Shut up, oh my fucking God. Shut up, shut up, shut up! We have someone following us you dumb shits.” Bertholdt was normally a pretty kind and calm person, but Annie and Reiner fighting was one of the few things he had no patience for. Even more so in their current situation.
“Anyways,” Annie started, “If need be, I could transform into a titan and get us there faster.”
Reiner shook his head, “That's the worst case scenario, if luck is on our side we’ll be at the entrance to Wall Maria by sunrise.”
“We’ll have to be even more on our guard when that happens,” Bertholdt added. “Oh, speaking of which; Eren is still passed out, right?”
“Yeah, we’re good. I still have that drug that makes people lose consciousness, too, so we’re all set.” Eren’s head was resting on Reiner’s chest, moving slightly whenever the horses took a step.
A silence settled between the small group and left them to their thoughts.
_____
Armin almost fell off his horse when he awoke. Walls, I must’ve fallen asleep, he thought, disappointed in himself.
His horse was walking lazily, occasionally stopping to eat grass and Armin hopped off it and pulled the horse over to a tree on the edge of the large plain. Armin tilted his head up to the sky to see the beginnings of dawn and a yawn wracked his body while he stretched his arms.
“Damn,” Armin groaned, “How long was I asleep for? How well trained are those horses that they can continue traveling even when the person riding them is asleep? What the fuck.” He shook his head and sat on the ground next to his horse, playing with the grass absentmindedly. “I really should’ve brought a map or watch with me, shit.” He tended to swear a lot when he got nervous, you could say he picked it up from his grandfather who forgot that cursing was bad around kids, but truthfully it was from Eren who couldn’t shut up.
Eren! How could I forget about him? I really hope he’s ok, Armin thought. The only reason he was here in the middle of nowhere was because of him. Armin didn’t blame him though, he knows Eren doesn’t ask to be kidnapped. He knows Eren blames all this on himself.
He fell onto his back, gazing at the sky pretending he was a kid again with Eren and Mikasa beside him.
Mikasa.
Another person he forgot about. He didn’t let his mind wander for long, though, he first and foremost needed to find out where he was. Then Eren. Then his way back to Levi and the others.
Easy.
But that was becoming increasingly difficult as he rode his horse through the land, looking for any landmarks he’s seen in maps or even some hoof prints. He scratched his head and sighed heavily, he knew he would have to turn around soon without even accomplishing the thing he had set out for.
“Fine, I’ll go back to Levi!” He yelled angrily and jumped off his horse, kicking the ground for no good reason besides pent up frustration. His horse fled and Armin didn’t have it in him to chase after it.
Now he was truly alone.
_____
Levi woke up with a pit in his stomach and he knew immediately something was wrong. His instincts had yet to fail him.
“Hange, get up!” He yelled from outside their small and dirty tent.
Hange stumbled out and put on their glasses lopsidedly, “What? Can this wait? It’s,” they checked their pocket watch, “five in the morning. I literally went to bed like five hours ago-”
“I have a bad feeling about something,” Levi interrupted.
“Titans?”
Levi shook his head, “No, not that. Where are the brats?”
“You mean Armin and Eren, they’re over there.” Hange pointed at the area past the campfire.
“You are clearly misremembering because there's no one there.”
Hange scrunched up their nose, “Armin was sitting at that campfire last night. I saw him and I know you did too.”
“Yeah, but that’s not the point. Where are they now?”
Hange shrugged and stepped around Levi, walking to where the campfire would've been if it hadn’t been extinguished. A small piece of paper sat on top of a log and Hange grabbed it and tossed it to Levi.
Levi unfolded the note and read the one sentence he had been dreading.
“Fuck.”
“What? What does it say?” Hange snatched the note out of his hands and their eyes went wide. “Is this some sort of joke?”
“I doubt it, Arlert is smarter than that.”
“Then how, how Levi? How could anyone snuck in here in the middle of the night and not get anyone’s attention besides Armin’s?”
“You think it's the Military Police?” Levi suggested.
“Could be, but they aren’t dumb enough to kidnap Eren on the first night. They would have waited for him to screw up and prove to Zachary that he’s unstable and not fit for this.”
Levi raised a brow, “So you think it's an unknown third party? That just makes our life harder.”
“It’s the most logical answer.”
“Does logic really apply to anything anymore, Hange? A 15 year old can transform into a 60 meter tall monster. Logic has basically been throw out the window since that.”
“Trust me,” Hange said. “When have I ever led us wrong?” A grin started to form on their face.
Levi rolled his eyes, “Many times actually. Do you want me to start naming them?”
“As if! I’m the reason the Scouts have been so successful!” Hange laughs and pats his head, flaunting their height difference.
Levi hits their hand away and walks over to where his squad was sleeping peacefully. They clearly didn't hear anything either, Levi thought bitterly. “Get up, cocksuckers.”
Petra scrambled up and blearily looked at Hange and Levi, “What’s happening?”
“Well it's more like what happened, and what happened was that we lost Eren and Armin.” Hange explained, their tone too calm for what was happening.
“How is that possible? We were all here.” Eld interrupted.
“Doesn’t really matter now. It’s happened, it’s in the past, too late for us to change it, so just get ready. We leave in 10 minute.” Levi commanded. He went back into his tent to grab his small bag of belongings and then readied his horse, happy to see everyone else doing the same. They were lucky none of them bothered to change out of their clothes from the previous day, all they had to do was secure their ODM gear on their hips.
When Hange had finished loading the few things they had gotten out of the wagon back onto it, they set out, looking for hoof prints or just signs of human travel.
“Spread out! Use the smoke signals if you find anything!” Levi urged his horse to go faster while the rest of them panned out and Hange followed him. Like a dog, Levi’s mind supplied for him pointlessly.
_____
Eren didn’t know where he was or what was happening. His mind was muddled and he felt like he had slept for eternity. He groaned and felt grass pressing against his cheek and pushed himself up with… his bound hands? Eren’s eyes flew open and was met with the blank stares of three people, each of them sitting on the grass a few feet away from him.
“Oh, so you're awake now,” Reiner said, “ready to not be a bitch?”
Annie chuckled softly, “When is he not a bitch?”
Eren growled and lunged forward, more appropriately he tried to, his hands and legs were tied with thick rope that made his skin red and his body felt like it had lead in it.
“That’s the drugs in your system,” Reiner answered the question displayed on Eren’s face, “you put up a good enough fight for it to come to this.”
“Wh- Where am I?” Eren stuttered out, his eyelids drooped and he had to will them back open.
“I’m afraid we can’t tell you that,” Bertholdt said, but he had an apologetic tone unlike the other two.
“Fine then, where are you taking me?” Eren asked and was happy to see that his mind was already becoming less of a mess.
“Can… Can we tell him that?” Bertholdt whispered to Reiner and Annie, “I mean we gotta tell him sometime, might as well be now, right?”
“Marley,” was Reiner’s only answer.
“Marley?” Eren repeated, the name felt foreign on his tongue, but oddly familiar. “Where is that?”
None of them decided to answer that question. He tossed the name around in his head, trying to remember where he could’ve heard that mentioned.
Eren let out a short groan when nothing came to mind and was met with a small rock being thrown at his head. “Shut up.”
“Not until you tell me where you’re taking me. Have we passed through Wall Maria yet? No, there’s no way. We wouldn’t be able to just be lounging in the middle of nowhere if
this was titan territory.”
Annie’s eyes widened briefly before returning to their normal glare, “You’re smarter than you let on.”
Eren smirked, “Or maybe I’ve always been like this and you all just underestimated me.” He struggled against his bonds, the rope cutting into his already sore skin. He bit his lip before an idea popped into his head.
I have a knife, Eren’s mind raced, in my boot. Thank the Walls, I might not be screwed.
He moved his hands to where his feet were and peered over his lashes to make sure none of them were looking at him. When his hand was situated over his boot he tried to quietly unzip a bit of it, just enough to stick his fingers in there and grab it.
“Looking for this?” a voice said. He snapped his head up to look at Reiner holding a his knife in between his thumb and index finger.
Eren glared at him.
Reiner just laughed, “We aren’t stupid, you know. We all know that each soldier is supposed to stow a knife in their boot.”
Eren grit his teeth, “I’m going to kill you.”
“I’d like to see you try.”