➳AGAINST ALL ODDS | E. JAEGER
[ CANONVERSE + MEASLY ATTEMPT AT ANGST + SLIGHTLY FLUFFY ENDING + HOBO EREN! + ELDIAN SCOUT!READER + S4 SPOILERS + INDICATIONS OF MANGA SPOILERS??? ]
A/N; THIS OCCURS BEFORE EREN BEGAN TO INTERACT W/ FALCO + BEFORE EREN SENT THE LETTER TO THE SURVEY CORPS BACK IN PARADIS
WC: 3.3K
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This quaint little bench.
There's a sense of familiarity to the spot that never fails to make a sudden tingle, uncomfortable or otherwise, surge through Eren. Maybe it's the lonesome aura that he feeds off of day by day, practically “bench-ridden”.
Or it's possibly the sickening feeling of staying perched in the seat that reminds him that he could be somewhere else right now.
Somewhere far away from all the war and ostracization, preferably to a place that was closer to home; the island that he spent the majority of his miserable life in, so he'd say. Somewhere that was closer to you.
When he makes himself comfortable on this measly bench, it lasts for hours, if not longer. It's rather saddening, since hardly a single soul pays him mind throughout his wallowing and peering at the ground through vast strands of dark hair. Though, it also has its perks.
Relief, is what it gives him in the slightest; because nobody can watch him grimace to himself, distraught over what he’s becoming. Or, what he’s technically already become. He wouldn't dare say monster, it simply wasn't his place to. It was up to the people that he was bound to hurt in the future as to whether they’d deem him as such.
As trivial as it is, he can't help but think of what he’ll be seen as. Throughout all the plotting, it crosses his mind every minute of every day. Eren thought he was sure to grow past that, gradually grow devoid of emotions. Though, whether he expresses those churning worries or not, they'll still rest weighty, burdening and heavy, so heavy on his sulking shoulders. His name will practically be known as the incessant ringing of fear when heard aloud.
Eren Jaeger.
Eren then frowns deep, nimble fingers clenching at the handgrip of his wooden crutch, due to being in a dilemma that he silently screams over every night— Turning into somebody he’s not. Or better yet, somebody he didn’t know he was.
Before he lets out another sullen huff, the bench creaks. His brows instantly furrow, for it hadn’t made such a sound just for nothing. No, this bench was whining under the abrupt weight being placed among it. Somebody was sitting next to him.
Eren aligns his face to an expression ridden of expression, quicker than the agile way an unknown someone made their way beside him uninvited.
“You must be enjoying yourself here,” he can’t even attempt to cease the shaken, gruntled sound that leaves his lips over hearing a voice. Your voice. Eren knows you all too well.
He also should’ve known that you'd follow after him like you always do, and he knows that it's you who’s fervently, unshakingly searched for him up until now. Until finding him at his lowest, nestled upon this damned bench with a crutch in hand and his left leg half gone.
“Aren't you, Mister Kruger..?” His dull eyes flit up, and you’re already staring right back. Grinning and easing yourself into the wooden seat like this was some vacation.
All this time of staying in such a godforsaken continent must've brought him to the breaking point; hallucinating about the girlfriend that he abandoned all for the sake of moving forward on a baseless account, grasping for an unattainable sense of liberty.
It was either that Jaeger was in the middle of said bittersweet daydream, or you’d taken extreme measures— sneaking past Levi, making your way across the ocean, and enlisting yourself as an Eldian in Marley— all just to see your beloved.
That’s why you and him were such a perfect match— the pair of you were both fucking insane.
“Who would ever like it here..?” Eren sighs his brief retort aloud, accompanied by his pursed lips as he begrudgingly runs a hand along his face.
You always knew how to make Eren so damn angry, with his firm jaw clenched, thick brows downturned and all. Following him was practically a suicide mission; you could easily get caught in the mix of his plans, and you knew that. Of course, you vacuously followed after him anyway.
“Maybe I can make it a little more bearable for you, then.” You sound nothing but genuine, so much that he feels a brooding sensation of alarm. He could only pray that you weren’t planning to endure all the prejudice that came with the territory of being an Eldian in the internment zone. You always had to go out of your way just for the sake of Eren, sticking your neck out and risking it all.
He hated it.
“Go home.” Eren grunts.
“Only if you’re comin’ with.” You then tug at the white armband plastered along your left arm, “So we won’t have to wear these anymore.”
He groans distressfully at the sight. Never in his life did he ever want to see you clad in such a thing, that damned band of bondage.
“Take that off.” You smile to yourself, a brief and subtle one that eases his agitating worries in the slightest, “I’d get in trouble if I did, ‘Ren.” Your eyes flit down to his own arm, bearing the same band on his clothed bicep. Your eyes then drag along his form, which was noticeably burlier, despite being overlaid with such baggy attire.
His left leg, you mentally hum, that’s... new.
You pull your lingering gaze away, but he’s all too quick for you.
“Chopped it off.” Jaeger briskly explains, “What of those bandages over your eye? They just for show or what?” He voices a deep sigh over your questioning, but dubiously responds nonetheless. “I had to gouge it out.”
“What for?”
“It's all part of something bigger.” His tone sounds evident of mental fatigue as he huffs, “Something that you don’t have to worry about.” You merely sigh to yourself before voicing out a call of his name, which you were never bound to get tired of saying. “Eren. I don’t know what you’re planning to do, but I don’t think I like it either.”
“You don’t have to like it.” His words come out gruntled, pained. “Nobody likes war.” With only a few brisk, ever-passing minutes of conversing with Eren after months on end, you quickly realize that his dispiriting, flat-toned way of speech would be the new normal.
“I thought you liked the idea of causing destruction, ‘Ren.” Your chuckle clashes hard with the melancholy aura of the conversation, contradictorily so.
“We aren’t fifteen anymore.” Both you and Eren knew well that it was a rather blatant statement, one that didn't leave much left to further interpretation, but it was deeper than you knew regardless.
“I know, Eren,” Your subtle laughter died as quickly as it came about, a painful chord of realization striking you. Your former boyfriend had drastically changed. You repeat your prior statement once more, begrudgingly allowing your dispiriting reality to seep in a bit more, just in the slightest, “I know.”
“Then don’t treat me like the rambunctious little bastard I used to be. That isn’t me anymore.”
The sudden quiet lingers, and ironically starts to grow all too loud, unbearably so. It isn’t long until you emit a delayed hum, tapping your foot upon the cobblestone floor before maneuvering around on the wooden bench in search of comfort strong enough to break down the unbridling awkwardness.
“... You’re still a bastard, Eren.”
“Am I?” He emits a begrudging huff, one that lets you know that he believes it, even though he doesn’t want to. His thoughts began to flit back to the snippets of the future that he’d received via the paths, all the monstrosities he had to go through with.
Eren leans towards you until his lips are leveled with your ear, his bristling stubble grazing along your skin sparingly. “I’m planning an attack on this shitty continent,” his pitch falters lower until it sounds borderline secretive, “So I guess I really am a bastard.”
He didn’t feel obligated to whip up some conniving bullshit lie with you. You were the only one he’d sworn his unwavering honesty to, not even Armin or Mikasa. You couldn’t understand his reasoning behind that, so the most you could do was treasure it. Maybe it was because he saw so much of himself in you. How much better of a person he could’ve been, if not tainted by the horrors that the world had to offer.
“An attack isn’t necessary.” You retort within a whisper, “There's always other options, are there not? You don’t have to—“
“Let me guess,” Eren breaks away from the chain of hushed speech, one which he’d ironically begun himself. “You want us to run away together, all cooped up in some homey cottage so we can live the sweet life until my years run out.” It was all too scarily accurate to be a plain old scenario, one that seemed thoroughly thought out, as if it had been planned for years on end.
Though, this questionable scenario just didn’t pertain to you. His abrupt choice of words remained disparate with your soul, neither did they click with not one of your countless desires.
“That’s the exact opposite of what I want. Thought you’d know me better,” Your statement comes out as a borderline scoff, “I want what you want, Eren. Freedom.” You’d craved for such all on your own for as long as you could remember, and it definitely wasn’t thanks to him or his distinct ambitions that he’d made clear over the years as a soldier.
The explanation was rather simple. You wished for such because you’d always been that way, just as him. Though, there was an intricacy to Eren himself, that of which you were never quite able to comprehend.
He's always yearned for more than what his humble life had to offer, even as a child overconsumed by boredom.
Though, maybe his crave for “more” was just too much to bear in every aspect. Too much for anyone to give to him, too much for him to retrieve and bear all by himself, and too much to merely attain.
What happens next, though? When you’re unable to acquire what you seek resolutely, what you set your heart on wholly, what you go to bed thinking about? Eren knew the answer to that, and he knew it well.
You take it by force.
“Whether I attain my freedom with or without you doesn’t matter to me.” You continue on, “ I just had to see you again, before you get yourself arrested.” He quirks a brow, but is quick to ease out his facial muscles that reeked of question.
“You told me that your Titan abilities allow you to see into the future, ‘Ren.” You've already caught onto him and his brief “expressions” that you could hardly classify as such. “You saw yourself in a cell, Eren. Did you not?”
“I've been in a cell many times before. Could’ve been a flashback.”
It grows devoid of words between you and him once more, and isn’t as though nobody has anything to say. You had more, much more you were eager to speak of, yearning to talk with him about. Though, just as he stated earlier, Eren wasn’t the same teenage boy you’d familiarized yourself with—Meaning he wasn’t open to having mindless chats for hours on end.
“Before you interrupted me earlier, I was about to say something.” He remains still, hand seeming to eternally rest on the handle of his trusty wooden crutch. “—That you don’t have to go it all alone.”
Eren hums, one that indicates his dim, but lighted spark of intrigue. That wasn’t something he’d been preparing himself to hear, especially from the likes of you. “Send a message back home. A note, letter, something. And as for this attack.. we’ll be there.”
It was already part of his plan to implement the soldiers back home, so this only proved to show that you and him were always on the same page, but only to an extent. It was as though you were in such sync with Eren, line for line, but reading off of two completely separate books, or peering at the world through the same looking glass that simply had two different lens.
Despite your similarities, there’s some qualities to you that he finds rather unrelatable, and he can’t help but question you. Your faith in him, in your comrades, is all but too strong. It practically leaves you vulnerable to the slip ups of the ones you confide in so dearly, and it’ll only result in your mental crumble if they were to. Though, you always defied reality at the end of the day, and did what you felt to be most benefitable.
“What makes you so sure that they’ll be so willing and ready to kill?” Eren questions, despite knowing well of what the outcome will be of said attack. He’d already seen it all play out before, nor was any of it a sight for the lighthearted.
“We’ll be there.” You briskly repeat, “And even if the survey corps don’t show up, just know that I’ll be there.”
Albeit your stern words— which Eren found to be empty claims of you attempting to persuade him that you weren’t still that same teenager that continued to remain utterly hooked on him— You were incredibly loyal to him nonetheless, unwaveringly devoted. It was dangerous.
Eren inhales deep, moments before jabbing a pointer finger at your chest, right where your heart lies beneath.
Your eyes flit between his unmoving digit and the stuck gaze of his remaining eye. He doesn’t look away, doesn’t blink, but continues to allow his thick brows crease into his forehead with a furrowed motion.
“Don’t let this stop beating just because you want to be a follower for an undeserving bastard.” You may not know that he’s wholly pouring his heart into the words he says, and contemplated on making you swear an oath to preserving a life as inestimable valuable to him as yours, that one fact having been the only thing he couldn’t confirm by catching glimpses of the future.
Though, all you do is snicker, grinning in such an untimely manner. He’d known ever since you almost got devoured whole by a Titan and whisked away via ODM with a quirked expression of laughter on your face— You never did know the right time to smile.
“I don’t think you’re undeserving, ‘Ren.”
“I don’t fucking care what you think, [Y/N]. That isn’t what I’m asking of you.” Eren had always appeared rather calm and unnerving throughout his time in Marley, but just your sudden appearance was enough to make his voice sound urgent and strained rather than emotionless.
He proceeded to leave his eye fixated on you, and you could only wish to see the other underneath the array of bandages. Eren stared, and stared some more, his glare obviously more hostile than inviting. Though, there was something about him having his attention on you for such a lengthy duration that left you satisfied regardless, whether he’d been shooting you a lethal glare or a heartwarming smile.
There was more depth to his dull gaze than that of what met the eye. Something almost sinister in that dark turquoise eye of his. The trivial things were all part of a bigger scheme in the mind of Eren "Kruger".
Though, you were all the more significant of a role than any expendable pawn, whether he planned to use you as one to score himself a checkmate at some point in time, or otherwise. Albeit his lack of sincerity, not a single trace of such swirled somewhere far and deep beyond his dreary iris, Eren found it in himself to end up caring for you as he always did. It was this shitty ultimatum, choosing between his lifelong goal and you, that had been weighing him down.
“Don’t you dare end up—“ Jaeger’s statement starts off rigid and persuasive, just to result with a trailed-off speech, his words slurring into lackluster silence.
He clearly doesn’t want you to die— You know exactly what he means, voicing it out just isn’t necessary. Your morality was the last thing you could ever promise the man, and he knows it, yet still demands of you to keep true to such. Even he himself hadn’t had much days left to count.
“Just... Don’t.”
You grasp onto his hand, all sneaky and abrupt as though the action was forbidden. He feels calloused, rugged against your own slender digits, and overall nothing near soft to the touch as it used to be. You interlace his lithe fingers with yours albeit it all, the tense feel of his large palm that you seem to love for whatever reasons.
Eren refuses to allow you take notice, but the most minuscule slips of breath are catching within his throat, all the while you lead his palm to your beating heart. It was a soothing, recurring melody; The song of life, which had almost succeeded in lulling him into a state of momentary peace. His fingers curl lightly, in an attempt to fit well with your own smooth grip, and his hold is something you've gravely missed. Radiating off pure warmth and buzzing passion.
Eren remains frozen in everywhere but in the right hand where he encases yours, and eventually ends up squeezing onto you too tight. Though, you don’t mind it. He always held you that way given any circumstance, and you’ve always loved it.
You stroke the pads of your fingers along his knuckles, ones that have been grazed and bruised in the past, and possibly in the near future.
“I won’t.”
Your response is plain and brief, just the way he had been anticipating to hear it. Eren then sighs, and it isn’t as begrudging and distress-laced this time around. This slight sense of soundness that he was sure he’d never be lucky enough to find or experience ever again, was the very thing you found some way to miraculously gift him with, even if just for a couple seconds at most.
You squeeze his own hand in return, and he allows his eye to slip closed, eliciting a lowly hum. There was some unrecognizable feeling that he couldn’t decipher; It didn’t make his stomach churn for a change, but rather it twisted delightfully. Though, your effect on him wasn’t anything surprising.
“I won’t, Eren.”
Afterall, the pair of you had always been this way.
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