The Rumbling pt.2: Electric Boogaloo
Jules of Nature
Keni
Misplaced Lens Cap

⁂
"I'm Dorothy Gale from Kansas"
Sweet Seals For You, Always
Sade Olutola
he wasn't even looking at me and he found me
RMH
Three Goblin Art
Show & Tell

Andulka
Lint Roller? I Barely Know Her
TVSTRANGERTHINGS
todays bird
let's talk about Bridgerton tea, my ask is open

❣ Chile in a Photography ❣
Aqua Utopia|海の底で記憶を紡ぐ
will byers stan first human second
Alisa U Zemlji Chuda
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@usurpyr-a
The Rumbling pt.2: Electric Boogaloo
how does it feel to be loved by you ?
IT FEELS LIKE BURNING: everything about you is captivating. you're very intense, and passionate, and some people can't handle that. BUT NO-ONE LOVES AS POWERFULLY AS YOU DO, and some people will love that about you. you're easily excited, and tend to feel things very deeply. your emotions are unpredictable. ( but you are so so beautiful. more so than you know. )
random soft friendship things
Eren and Historia escaping to the pastures for a few hours and lying down in the tall grass, basking in the sun / saying nothing, because no words are needed / their hands inches apart but not touching. Sometimes one of the orphanage kids will find them and fall on top of them, giggling, but they just lie there and take it - Eren gives them a piggyback ride when they go back, though.
Eren and Connie napping together, one of their heads always leaning against the other’s shoulder, probably both drooling. Always after a long mission, the two of them always default to falling asleep on the way back home / Connie staying halfway awake on the chance Eren has a nightmare and needs to be woken up / and Eren draping his coat around Connie when he starts shivering in his sleep asking for his mom - because it was an old trick Mikasa used to use on him to simulate a bit of human warmth.
Eren and Sasha ( mostly Sasha ) dragging Eren along to escapades in the marketplace, flitting between the stalls and snacking on various bits of food - talking about random, usually unimportant things / Sasha slipping back-and-forth between her country drawl and “polite” manner of speaking. Eren, exasperatedly, reaching into his pockets to buy Sasha a nice slab of meat because he could see her pining after it from a mile away, and giving it to her on the walk back home along the trails / suffering her overbearing hug as she babbles about taking him back to have dinner with her family.
Eren and Jean ... just being together, quietly. Jean, picking up an old habit of drawing that he used to do before he joined the military / and Eren, being one of the few people that knows about it, having a casual interest in Jean’s progress. Maybe, sometimes asking him to draw faces or scenes from his memories - before they got the chance to cross the sea and actually visit locations in the outside world. Jean, quietly fascinated by the things Eren describes / and mildly horrified at how Eren seems to spontaneously switch into becoming another person entirely while he’s speaking: straighter posture, a different accent, the way he keeps rubbing at the bridge of his nose as though he were adjusting an imaginary pair of glasses ... And saying some stupid shit to try and snap Eren out of it, which usually results in a playful / annoyed shove.
Eren and Armin going on long, mundane strolls along the beach, wading into the tide / not really thinking or saying anything too important or profound. Sometimes Armin will speak up and talk about obscure things, like facts he’s recently learned, or how his studies on marine animal life is going. Eren’s shoulders subtly relaxing from their tight hunch / tuning into Armin’s voice and nodding along with interest that he doesn’t need to fake. A few times, they’ve actually gone swimming - and trudged back to camp soaking wet but smiling, smelling like sea salt and with sand clinging to their heels.
Eren and Mikasa trying their best to escape from their duties ( read: Yelena and Kiyomi, respectfully ) and finding niche little hiding places to go to when they’re feeling overwhelmed / usually under the shade of a tree. Meeting each other with a casual wave or a slow nod, settling in comfortably next to one another. Eren, bored, expertly climbing the tree / hanging from some of the low branches to poke at Mikasa, challenging her to race him to the top ( knowing that he’d win, but only because she’d let him ). Mikasa, struggling to contain a smile, refusing him at every turn simply because it’s expected of her ... instead, bringing up a happy memory about their childhood / sometimes an occasional anecdote about life with her parents / picking at the grass under her fingers with sentimental nervousness, forever awkward about sharing those kinds of secrets - but, above all else, trusting Eren explicitly to keep them safe for her.
Eren and Levi taking a break from training to have tea ... er, rather: Levi ordering Eren to take a break from training so that they can have tea together, as is a weekly tradition. Levi, trying to fill the silence with shit jokes and Eren laughing out of awkwardness / pity. Eren, tentatively, saying a few jokes of his own, and Levi snorting into his cup. Eventually, the both of them lapsing into a quiet moment again, until Levi abruptly stands and orders Eren to clean up ... ( but really, they do so together, because contrary to popular belief, Levi is not a totally heartless monster, and the thought of leaving Eren alone doesn’t sit entirely right with him. )
Eren and Hange being swept up in the chaos of experiments / with Eren emerging from his Titan form exhausted and in pain / Hange ordering everyone out of the immediate area so they can tend to Eren personally. Hange babbling excitedly about nonsense to ground Eren to the present moment, taking special care to make sure Eren continually keeps sipping some water or shoving a granola bar under his nose so he can eat something / handling him gently instead of hauling him around like they used to do, because there’s still so much that’s unknown about Titan Shifting and they don’t want Eren to fall into the habit of thinking his body is completely expendable - they’ve seen how fellow soldiers have pushed themselves into ruin for the sake of an objective, and Eren is still so young ...
Eren and Falco hanging out on their bench together - Eren, in his own reserved way, asking about Falco’s wellbeing and life in the internment zone. Falco, being especially sensitive to Eren’s loneliness, filling the air with stories about his friends, his brother, what the Warriors are up to ... sometimes even bringing Eren treats from beyond the hospital that they share in private because he’s not TECHNICALLY supposed to have them. Eren randomly sharing tidbits about his own life and friends - in a more somber tone, of course / with Falco secretly enraptured, always encouraging Eren to send more letters home, so that his friends know that he misses them. ❤
surprise valentines hug from the bird boy !!!!
“ -- !!”
THE IMPACT of a such small body in collision with his ribs startles a rough grunt out of Eren, ill-prepared as he was to find a pair of gangly arms suddenly locked in a tight vise around his waist. What little breath he’d held suspended between his threadbare lungs expels past his lips in a short rush noiseless air as he braces himself on the edge of his seat / only barely stopping his momentum from sliding off the bench entirely and landing his ass in the dirt, next to the crutch laid prone beside him. Even so, his arms instinctively move to hold Falco in place / the boy’s head pressed close to his aching sternum, his crown sitting somewhere beneath Eren’s dull-thudding heart. ( AND THERE: HE HAS THE IMPRESSION OF A BIRD BEATING ITS WINGS ‘GAINST THE GILDED BARS OF ITS CAGE. ) Unsubtle though Falco is at the best of times - ( with his heart, much like his pride / doom, pinned to his sleeve ) - this brazen display of informality comes uncharacteristically / for all he knows of the soft-spoken cadet who’d knelt beside him that day, with his whispered words and detatched notions of peace and safety / all at long last.
Eren - coward that he is - can only swallow down the complicated knot of emotion building in his throat and lay a heavy hand to Falco’s nape, mussing the sweat-damp tufts of hair curling there. It’s good that he’s so energetic, but ...
“ ... Hullo to you too, Falco,” he offers, eventually / amid the effort of trying to keep his expression neutral. He tilts his head down, regarding his friend with a soft sheen to his lone eye. “I take it ... training went well today ?”
💭 (usurpyr) for the demon hunting au :')
𝙵𝙸𝚅𝙴 (𝙾𝚁 𝙼𝙾𝚁𝙴) 𝙷𝙴𝙰𝙳𝙲𝙰𝙽𝙾𝙽𝚂 𝙰𝙱𝙾𝚄𝚃 𝙾𝚄𝚁 𝙼𝚄𝚂𝙴𝚂 » 𝙰𝙲𝙲𝙴𝙿𝚃𝙸𝙽𝙶 !
( caution warning for mentions of fascism and other unsavory developments in interwar Europe )
𝚆𝙷𝙴𝙽 𝚁𝙴𝙸𝙽𝙴𝚁 𝙰𝙽𝙳 𝙱𝙴𝚁𝚃𝙷𝙾𝙻𝙳𝚃 𝙵𝙸𝚁𝚂𝚃 𝙰𝚁𝚁𝙸𝚅𝙴 to investigate the rumors concerning Herr Yeager, I think Reiner himself is incredibly skeptical about the legitimacy of the stories. A novices, he and Bertholdt tended to the wounded and infirm who were sent to the monastery to recover during the Great War. He has seen, countless times, how destructive behavior can be the work of human trauma rather than demonic possession. Since Eren is a combat veteran who served his time in the trenches, Reiner is very wary of attributing his behavior to anything other than lingering mental strain incurred by the horrors of war.
𝚃𝙷𝙴𝙸𝚁 𝙲𝙾𝚁𝙿𝙾𝚁𝙴𝙰𝙻 𝙵𝙾𝚁𝙼𝚂 𝙰𝚁𝙴 𝙱𝙾𝚃𝙷 𝙸𝙽𝙷𝙰𝙱𝙸𝚃𝙴𝙳 𝙱𝚈 𝙳𝙴𝙼𝙾𝙽𝚂, so — hey! That’s something to bond over! Reiner doesn’t realize that he has one, of course — by the time he and Bertholdt actually meet Eren, Reiner is showing signs of some wear and tear that he dismisses as a passing illness and the strain of travel, but depending on how in tune Eren is with the literal devil he’s rooming with in his body, I’m sure he’s able to tell that something is amiss with Reiner to what extent is entirely up to you, but that would make for an interesting conversation between Eren and Bertholdt if he were to point out, “Hey, an incredibly parasitic demon is eating away at your friend both physically and mentally, and at this rate he’s either going to be dead or deranged by the end of the year. You should do something about that.”
𝚁𝙴𝙸𝙽𝙴𝚁'𝚂 𝙼𝙾𝚁𝙰𝙻 𝙲𝙾𝙼𝙿𝙰𝚂𝚂 𝚆𝙸𝚃𝙷 𝙴𝚁𝙴𝙽 𝙸𝚂 𝚁𝙰𝚃𝙷𝙴𝚁 𝚂𝙺𝙴𝚆𝙴𝙳 (and is skewed in general — if anyone can find a loophole in the Bible or in Catholic dogma, it’s him). As a man of the cloth in a more modernized Church dragging itself into the twentieth century following a global catastrophe, he should be against all forms of killing, no matter how justified by earthly morality. AND YET — the fact that Eren is killing fascists in interwar Germany? That’s a pretty noble cause Reiner can get behind. That’s a “sin” he’d gladly offer absolution for.
𝚆𝙸𝚃𝙷 𝚃𝙸𝙼𝙴, 𝚁𝙴𝙸𝙽𝙴𝚁 𝙲𝙾𝙼𝙴𝚂 𝚃𝙾 𝙱𝙴 𝙰 𝙱𝙸𝚃 𝙵𝙾𝙽𝙳 𝙾𝙵 𝙴𝚁𝙴𝙽. There’s definitely more to this man than what initially meets the eye — more than traumatized war veteran falling victim to tricks of a wounded mind, but also more than whatever entity is inhabiting his body. Reiner has never really encountered a case where the demon isn’t leeching off its host’s entire state of being — (from what we’ve discussed) Eren’s seems to be more symbiotic in nature, so while there’s a lot of trepidation there with exactly how to address this, Reiner isn’t itching to grab a gun and pull the trigger, not yet at least. (Plus if Eren in some way helps them, that gives him pause because, hey, bad people don’t help others.)
𝙳𝙴𝙼𝙾𝙽 𝙷𝚄𝙽𝚃𝙸𝙽𝙶 𝚆𝙸𝚃𝙷 𝙰 𝙼𝙰𝙽 𝙿𝙾𝚂𝚂𝙴𝚂𝚂𝙴𝙳 𝙱𝚈 𝙰 𝙳𝙴𝙼𝙾𝙽 — who would have thought? Eren becomes something of their best kept secret; are you supposed to form a tentative partnership with a man possessed by an otherworldly entity? No, the Church frowns upon that. Will that stop Reiner? Also no. There is something very funny to me about the idea of Eren just...appearing unannounced wherever they happen to be. Even if it’s for a completely innocous reason, like he wanted to see the bone church in Czechoslovakia and his two favorite long-suffering priests just happened to be in the area looking for demons.
𝙴𝚁𝙴𝙽 𝙺𝙽𝙾𝚆𝚂 𝚃𝙷𝙸𝙽𝙶𝚂 𝙰𝙱𝙾𝚄𝚃 𝚁𝙴𝙸𝙽𝙴𝚁 𝚃𝙷𝙰𝚃 𝙷𝙴 𝚁𝙴𝙰𝙻𝙻𝚈 𝚂𝙷𝙾𝚄𝙻𝙳𝙽'𝚃. Through some facet of being possessed by some otherworldy entity, I feel like Eren is probably able to glean some things from Reiner that he shouldn’t know, especially after having just met him. How much and to what expect is still to be determined, but Reiner’s soul bleeds trauma and regret, and you probably don’t even have to be possessed by a demon to pick up on that.
& without asking, nor saying a word, she is gonna takes his chocolate / gabi
“TSK - !!”
A VINDICTIVE rage seizes hold of his spine as, barring any pretense whatsoever, the revered delicacy is snatched from betwixt lithe fingers by a girl’s thieving hand. Eren can do little more than gawk, stupefied, for the split-second it takes Gabi to steal away with his chocolate - before a torrent of blood rushes to his face, pounding violently in his ears with all the brutal staccato of a war drum / teeth and fists clenched. Falco gave me that, he thinks, veins thudding desperately in want of revenge, crying out for justice; I can’t just let her get away - !!
“Oi oi, give that back right now, you little ff- !! Frick’n brat !!”
usurpyr asked:
“Oi, Mikasa …” After more than an hour’s worth of aimless wandering along the beach, Eren finally finds her standing at the end of a pier, her gaze cast outwards at the jagged cliffs lining Paradis’ shoreline. For all the time he’d spent preparing himself for this moment, he still feels … strangely reluctant, and it’s up to his feet to unconsciously carry him forwards before his nerves seize hold in full / the clunky echo of his shoes padding over the docks ringing too-loud in the midafternoon stillness. From the depths of his coat pocket, he unfurls a length of fine red silk - procured from a divinely patient old woman at some market stall or another - and in the same motion gently takes Mikasa’s wrist, pushing back the sleeve of her jacket just enough to reveal the bandages beneath. “I, ah … I thought, since the secret’s out and all that …” He folds the ribbon in her palm awkwardly, expression taut / brows furrowed. “Hell, I ‘dunno … ‘Figured this would be better than using those plain-old bandages.” Eren scratches at his jaw, looking away towards the sea where ocean waves tumble playfully over each other in the distance. “I promise won’t get mad if you don’t want to use this, I mean- I know s’ a stupid idea, but I couldn’t think of anything else to … Well. An-Anyways, um. Happy birthday …” ( @erleidn ♥ )
𝙎𝙃𝙀 𝙒𝘼𝙏𝘾𝙃𝙀𝙎 𝘼𝙎 one of Kiyomi’s ships finally departs from the harbor and sails into the horizon, slowly growing smaller with distance / their slender, shrunken forms soon turning into a shapeless nothing / a mere pin against the vastness of the sea. Some part of her is quietly relieved that the day has come to an end – despite her soft, birdlike murmurings and sharp intellect, Miss Kiyomi had almost exhausted every topic that had come to mind in the span of three hours / their shared history, her other dominant bloodline, the tea she was served, the weather, even Paradis’ architecture – at some point, Mikasa could feel the beginning of yet another headache pressing against each side of her temples. She buries her mouth into the soft muffler wrapped around her shoulders and exhales deeply, suddenly aware of the weariness seeping deep into the bone-marrow, though before her feet can take her away, she recognizes the sound of his footsteps upon the empty docks. She catches sight of something red resting upon his palm – a ribbon of some sort, and without exchanging a single word to each other, he reaches forward and then gently takes her wrist / a little hesitant at first, though his eyes watch her expression closely before pushing back the sleeve of her uniform jacket, just enough to uncover the bandages underneath / that tender place of her arm that no one ever sees or touches. The realisation of his intentions dawns on her, then – hot, solid blood burns slowly up the nape of her neck, and she can feel the warmth radiating from her own skin. However, the mere thought of Eren spending what little money he has on a gift for her birthday sits strangely in the pit of her stomach – not to mention, fabrics as fine and delicate as these are usually worn only by wealthier societal groups.
❛ … you really didn’t have to, Eren … it looks- ❜
Expensive, Mikasa wants to add but her voice falters and she falls silent once more as she catches the red ribbon between her fingertips, feeling the silkiness against the flat of her palm. His face is averted in profile as he glances towards the wide-open sea, avoiding her gaze, overcome by boyish shyness – she slowly unravels the bandages from around her wrist, eventually revealing the inked flesh underneath / not moving, not speaking, barely even breathing. The rest of the bundled roll disappears into her pocket, and a shiver runs down the length of her spine as the wind blows softly / remembering the needle, a mother’s tender touch, the blood staining her skin. It has been years, yet the body never forgets. The red ribbon lays flat on top of the clan-mark, and she extends her arm so he can wrap it around her wrist, making sure the knot is tight enough and the fabric does not slip from her hand as she walks. His fingers work quickly, always mindful of that spot, and for a brief moment Mikasa is taken back to a time where he had placed a scarf around her shivering frame / an endless repetition of giving something up, like a blanket or a coat to keep her warm. Once he is done and the ribbon sits comfortably on her wrist, he takes a step back, allowing the distance between them to grow, and her dark eyes linger upon her arm – a slash of red against white. The corners of her lips curl upwards into a small smile, and she reaches for his hand to pull him in gently.
❛ … thank you. It’s … very pretty. ❜
softer prompts
“ i’m not going anywhere. ” “ you make me feel safe. ” “ i think i might be in love with you. ” “ i just like seeing you happy. ” “ just let me take care of you. ” “ you’re my family. ” “ i can stay, if you want. ” “ you make me feel alive. ” “ you’re captivating. ” “ i want you to know i’ll always be here for you. whatever you need. ” “ you don’t have to tell me anything, we can just sit here. ” “ i trust you. more than anyone else. ” “ you have a beautiful soul. ” “ i feel like i could watch you all day. everything you do has a touch of magic to it. ” “ i hope i see you in my dreams. ” “ do you trust me? ” “ you don’t ever have to pretend. not with me. not ever. ” “ i love you, every part of you. even the parts you don’t like. ” “ you make everything a little easier. ” “ will you just…hold me? please. ” “ just tell me everything’s gonna be okay. ” “ you’re enough. you’re more than enough. ” “ you have my heart in your hands. be gentle with it. ” “ i wanna be the one you go to. the first one you tell when there’s something good. the shoulder to cry on when it’s bad. and every mundane thing in between. i want to share it all with you. ” “ i have faith in you. ” “ i’ve never met anyone quite like you. ” “ knowing you is like…coming home. like i’ve finally found something that’s been missing all this time. ” “ every hard thing in my life feels worth it. it all led me to you. ” “ i feel like i could endure anything as long as i have you to come home to. ” “ i can tell something’s bothering you. ” “ what can i do to help? ” “ come on. let’s get out of here. ” “ i’m taking you somewhere special. ” “ where are you taking me? ” “ i don’t need grand gestures or declarations of love. i just need you. all of you. ” “ you make me feel like i’m worthy. ” “ you deserve good things. ” “ i want to be your home. ” “ loving you is like something holy. ” “ i made you something. ” “ come back to bed. ” “ stay the night with me. ” “ are you sure you’re okay? ” “ you wanna talk about it? ” “ did you wanna tell me something? ” “ you’ll always have me. ” “ i’m proud of you. ” “ i need you. ” “ thank you. for always being there for me. ” “ don’t ever let anyone make you doubt your worth. ” “ i’m not leaving you. not ever. ” “ you have kind eyes. ” “ sleep, my love. i’ll keep the nightmares away. ” “ there’s so much light in you. ” “ i want you here. ”
ACTIONS:
❀ for a forehead kiss ✦ for our muses to hold hands ❉ for one muse to nap against the other ✱ for one muse to surprise the other ✸ for our muses to cuddle ❄ for our muses to enjoy the first snow of winter ♛ for my muse to teach yours something new ☂ for our muses to stargaze ♡ for one muse to wake the other with breakfast in bed ♤ for a kiss on the palm ☁ for our muses to get caught in the rain without an umbrella ☀ for one muse to surprise the other with a home-cooked meal ☾ for one muse to hug the other without explanation ♞ for one muse to give the other a massage ✞ for one muse to give the other flowers ✔ for one muse to caress the other’s face ✚ for our muses to shower/bathe together $for one muse to catch the other staring lovingly
for our muses to cuddle after one of them has a nightmare. :'^)
THE HORIZON is at war tonight: great bodies of both heaven and Earth sparking at the seam where they meet, colliding violently / cataclysmically. Flashes of lightning rupture through the thick smoke-grey sky above, popping and rumbling alongside staccato bursts of thunder carried ashore by angry ocean waves. This is by no means the very first sea-storm Eren has witnessed since venturing outside of the Walls those two-odd years ago, but it is certainly proving itself to be the most entertaining one he’s been present for thus far. The rain is still many leagues out - hours away at this point - so he’s sat himself at the coastline, edged as far into the frothing waters as he’d dared, having not quite relented to the thought of being swept away / just yet. Calm seems a laughable juxtaposition to the wild elements raging so passionately in the distance, but it is still somehow able to claim him, here, and only here / unique to time, location, circumstance. As though the thought of a looming tsunami is enough to drown out all else on its own, leaving him vacant, exposed: a pearlescent shell still ringing with static cling. Yes, he thinks, staring long into the overturned palm of a flood knuckling the sheer cliff-face he frames himself beside. There are still a great many terrible things in this world ( BUT NONE SO TERRIBLE AS I ).
Eventually he relents to returning, exhausting himself of worry / hopeful of an opportunity to sleep and not be moved ‘til morning, despite the incoming downpour. He shakes out the wet grains of sand clinging to his legs as he begins the long trek back to camp, stealing away into the dark corners / guided only by moonlight’s soft illumination / the barest flickers of lampfire dancing away from his peripheries. Not that anyone would be expecting his arrival at such a bizarre hour, but even so he marks it strange that he’d somehow managed to slip into the grounds entirely unnoticed, and then into the tent barracks - stranger still that nobody rouses even as he shuffles across the enclosure, barefoot, over a litter of bodies. Sasha and Connie are sound asleep and snoring away. He spies Jean a little further down, curled into his side, facing opposite Armin. Many more are scattered throughout, none awake enough to raise their gaze at his passing shadow. So, he moves as a ghost through rows of the sleeping dead / envious of their prone forms - yet strangely detatched from this scene, impassive and unsympathetic. The further he drifts into the tent’s closed maw, the more intangible he becomes; indeed, the callouses of his feet ache less, now / his malaise maturing into a form undeniable, both mental and physical.
Which brings him to pass by Mikasa, of all people. He stops only after a brief bout of vertigo, hesitation tugging at his ankles / urging him back from a ledge he hadn’t even been aware he was standing on. Eren stares passively down at her as she is, entangled in her thin bedsheets, and frowns at the nagging suspicion that something is wrong with her image / as though it had been reflected back at him at an imperfect angle, warping her slender limbs out of proportion. It’s only when he steps closer to her cot that he notices it: the twitching of her hands, the sweat-soaked sheen of her skin / her nervous expression hiding behind a fringe of messy hair sweeping across her cheeks. A soft ‘oh’ cleaves through his mind with perfect clarity / the eye of a storm centering directly on him, pupil dilated with a forgiving margin of interest. He knows how to survive the chaotic maelstroms of night-terrors; he braves their icy and stinging winds each time he braves sleep itself. This territory secedes easily to him, pulls away like a February breeze through fields of wildflowers still laden with snow / promising to return come springtime in kinder weather. In this moment he has the impression of an injured bird, wing twisted and askew / whistling mournfully at a sky that had so cruelly left it behind, no wind now strong enough to bear its broken body aloft. It could startle so easily, that wounded animal living behind her skin.
“Mikasa-?” he ventures, tenor a low rasp. “Hey ... wake up.”
Eventually he works up enough nerve to sit beside her, his weight dipping into the bow of stubborn bedsprings. Her initial lack of any response stirs a twinge of panic in him - something that had been buried deep beneath the debris of bygone years / only just now resurfacing like bits of driftwood rotting off the hull of a wrecked ship, washing ashore with their splinters smoothed away by the tide. Eren lays a warm palm against her shoulder, rocking it at a cautious pace, to-and-fro. Surprisingly, Mikasa doesn’t come to immediately - but when she does it’s with a gasp, a twittering whimper. His feather-light touch then becomes a reassuring pressure, face pensive / brows knit together in a way he wishes didn’t come so naturally, but hopes the darkness of night will conceal anyway. He’s reluctant to admit his place in this / suddenly hyperaware of the impossibility of this situation: that he’d somehow, clumsily, managed to intrude upon a moment of vulnerability he hadn’t even been aware was happening. As recognition dawns on her, too-bright with a clarity of relief she has no right looking at him with, he wonders -- is she still seeing someone else ?
Eren, for his part, can only stare down at her, carefully neutral. “... It’s just me,” he reassures, leveraging himself on a propped elbow. “You were having a bad dream, or something. Thought I’d better snap you out of it before you got too carried away.” Suddenly, a wash of sympathy overcomes him as he’s reminded, rather unceremoniously, of childhood nights spent huddled beneath a barricaded fortress of blankets, all but impenetrable: Mikasa’s shivering, his own vigilance on her behalf ... These memories roll over him in the same way the dull rumbling of thunder crests over a shoulder of hills in the distance. “... It’s the storm,” he states, “isn’t it ? I know those always used to freak you out when we were kids.” Hm. “Guess you never grew out of it ...”
With a sigh, Eren slowly lowers himself onto the bed. Mikasa accommodates him without any protest, their limbs entangling themselves together like knotted tree roots / perfectly interlaced. He faces her, swiping away a wayward strand of hair from her cheek with a careless wave of his hand, palm soothing her fevered skin, still damp. Something about her expression speaks insecurity into the small silence between them, and he can’t help his soft scoff: what does Mikasa have to fear, after all ? It’s only a little rain. Nevertheless, he falls into the same old habit of solidarity / ignoring boundaries, tucking her head under his chin, keeping awake because she can’t - a rule established as far back as their very first night spent under the same roof. His younger self had constructed a simple argument, one that still, apparently, withstood the test of time to this day: it wouldn’t be fair of him to sleep so soundly when Mikasa has no peace of her own. So, it’s his obligation to share what little comfort he is capable of offering, anymore. Nothing more than a single stubborn routine his parents never had the heart to break for them. That’s all there is to it.
He closes his eyes. I’m still scared of storms too, he doesn’t say ( THERE ARE FAR SCARIER THINGS OUT THERE, HE DOESN’T CONFESS. ). Instead, he murmurs with one final breath as the first few pliks of water skitter over the tarp roof above them: “I’m here. Now, go back to sleep, alright ? It’s late ... Storm’s ‘gonna pass by the time you wake up again, just watch.” He shrugs, absentmindedly tucking Mikasa’s blanket closer to her sides - he’d not cold, she probably needs it more than he does. He still tastes static at the back of his throat. “There’s nothing for you to worry about. Just a little rain, s’all. Just some rain.”
comfort ask meme.
"-your name? Hey, stay with me. We're almost there. What's your name, kid?"
HIS CONSCIOUSNESS SLIPS somewhere between here and there, lingering in a distant no-place detached from any reality he knows – he can feel the thundering of his heart-muscle against his sternum, frantic and restless and irregular / the all-familiar repetition of sorry-sorry-sorry. He grits his teeth together when his head unexpectedly lolls backwards, and for brief a moment he loses the grip over his own body / regenerative flesh burns and hisses almost against his will, and his hand reaches for the blood-drenched cloth around his now defenseless forlorn limb in a desperate attempt to tie it around his leg-stump. Eren knew it wouldn’t require too much mental and emotional energy to amputate his own leg, though he severely underestimated the effect it would have on his body and mind – the blood flows freely now with no way of stopping, dripping down the sides of his face and neck, staining his trousers and uniform / he looks like a slaughterhouse where he’s both the butcher and the gangly-limbed calf / the knife and the bone. And though the pain is almost too unbearable to withstand and he feels like absolute collapse, there is a war raging inside his head, pushing him forward. And maybe the war began simply because he wanted his mother back. Or maybe his mother never birthed a son in the first place but rather a lifeless mass of every terrible thing in the world / if you want to save Mikasa, Armin, and everyone else, then–
A thread of blood trickles down his chin and his vision suddenly blurs, leaving him dazed and disoriented like a half-mad man rummaging the darkened streets of Wall Sina with no way of ever returning home. And whatever it is that follows next, Eren has no control over it, nor does he have the strength to fight it in this pathetic state / his limbs grow numb and heavy, hanging slack against his sides like something stiff and wooden, and suddenly he’s being carried away by another. It could be a soldier, or an animal, or something in between. He’s going to die, he knows – maybe not now, and maybe not here, but he’s going to die / there is no place in the world for the body he inhabits. Panic coils through his lungs and stomach, twisting him into knots, making him sick. He focuses on the voice speaking to him, trying to make sense of the syllables between his teeth, and then – yes, here, in this foreign enemy-land, he has no reflection / he has no face, no identity, no name, other than– ( UND DIE KINDER, DIE LAUFEN UND SCHREIEN: HIER IST DAS GROßE MONSTRUM. )
′ ... E- ... K ... Krüger. ′
ERLEIDN.
𝙏𝙃𝙄𝙎 𝙄𝙎 𝙉𝙊 bloodied confession – it is no revelation of secrets lingering underneath the envelope of her skin, threatening to spill over like an overflowing glass. It is a dark, oblivious thing, its heavy-weight resting over the breast-bone, tugging and pulling at the seams of her until she is nothing but loose ends and parts of this-and-that – her father’s blood and her mother’s bones. Fingers uncurl in an attempt to release some of the tension in her arms, while the tone of his voice leaves her rather confused of his intent / she cannot tell whether he is laying blame, or simply calling her out on her uncertainty, judging: why are you so hesitant / why are you not leaving / why-why-why-why. Perhaps if she had a more direct and less vague answer, she could ease some of his worries and concerns in his mind, but it appears that she merely aggravated him even more. He chews on her words, then spits them out as though he had bitten into the flesh of some rotten apple, disregarding her line of reasoning on the matter. Her lashes flutter as she looks up at him and tries, again.
❛ … I understand, I just need more time. ❜
His rage outgrows her – even at the age of nine, he stood ten feet tall, holding the end of a knife with both hands. Surely there has to be something that forces his expression to shift from curiosity to almost anger … perhaps Miss Kiyomi did talk to him last time she was here, right before her departure, even though she cannot imagine a reason why: the woman never bothered to hide her eagerness around Mikasa, never shied away from laying the flat of her palm upon her shoulder, repeating the same things over and over again like some sort of prayer / some talk about new beginnings, heritage, linage … wealth, to the point where Mikasa could feel the artery in her neck thudding all the way into her ear canal. She does not expect Eren to understand because she lacks the mechanisms to explain herself and make sense of her own flesh / the body divided in two, half of her weakening into the farthest distance. She only knows this: she acts and moves and fights out of want, but the words form strangely on her tongue.
❛ … I’m not holding back for your sake, Eren … and I don’t have to do what you say, ❜ She rests one hand passively on the desk, watching as he lowers his gaze this time, the length of his hair brushing his cheeks, his chin, his jaw. The silence lingers heavy between them yet at the same time, somehow inevitable. She releases a long, weary breath. ❛ … why … did you come here ? ❜
“... It’s-- nothing.”
HER WORDS are no stark relief against the black chasm of his thoughts - they come as no surprise to a subconscious that betrays it’s own expectations. Even still, he flinches / cowed like an abused animal at the crack of the dreaded shepherd’s whip ( COME, CATTLE / COME HITHER TO YOUR SLAUGHTER ); he clenches pinpricks in his fists ‘til his hands are rendered numb, compliant / the blood stripped from bone-whitened knuckles. A surge of anger flares within him, too little too late: his flesh no longer yields to such familiarities as emotion, the habit having since outgrown this charred, hollow husk of personhood he now wears / limbs now too heavy to be moved for the sake of argument alone. And no, he realizes, he didn’t come here to argue, no matter what his traitorous instincts imply. True, a younger self might have heeded the call, making a point of his stubborn pride / that childlike desire to defend himself at all costs, from threats either real or imagined. ( THEY STARTED IT, THEY HAD IT COMING / THE FAULT IS NEVER MY OWN. ) Youth has gutted him - all that remains now is ember and ash, the body reminiscent of a tree struck by lightning / self-consumed.
“I wasn’t thinking clearly,” he mutters, turning away from Mikasa’s silhouette haloed by the sun setting beyond her room’s only window. “I ... shouldn’t have even bothered you about it. That was stupid of me.”
MORE TIME, JUST A LITTLE MORE TIME - isn’t that what they all need ? He supposes Time itself is the root of his frustration. For all that he has changed in these past few months and she has not, he has come to envy her stasis / how gentle the ascending slope of her growth into maturity, while he had been shunted off the sheer drop into oblivion by his own future’s hand. He has become like the shot bird fallen from its nest / yet, so too is he the hunter, finger on the trigger / eyes on the prize. Is it his own private yearning for escape that has him seething in her presence ? All this time, has he just been casting his own dark reflection on her mirrored surface, glaring at himself through her warm eyes ? His jealousy is inescapable. MIKASA ACKERMAN: the strong one / the calm one / the gifted one / the one he has consistently failed, again and again, to protect, as his late mother had requested of him. Yet another lost promise in his miserable array of lifelong regrets.
Eren tips forward off the wall, leaning into his first tentative step. Coward that he is, he still can’t manage to meet her gaze. “So,” he grits out, at a loss for any explanation of his own, “just- forget about it, okay ? I'll ...- I’ll leave, now. If that’s what you want.”
I could taste funerals on my tongue, wings budding at my back.
Quail Egg, Lance Larsen (via decreation)
GEPANZRT.
The voices settles upon him with the weight of MILLENIA. It shakes the foundations of this timeless expanse, arches with each thunderous word, crests like the hungry maw of an oncoming wave. It swallows him whole; its unbearable heaviness surges through him, crushes down every desperate and aggrieved thought Reiner has been nursing since their tragic reunion in Liberio. The intonation of a TORTURED CHILD bent on bloody torment is heartrending. The very power of it threatens to shake his bones apart to dust, to melt their marrow like the wax of a candle. He should not have come here — this too is timeless. He should never have come here; to Paradis; into this world. Tragedy repeats ad infinitum.
—ELIMINATE ALL ENEMIES. —A WORLD UNITED AGAINST US. —MANKIND’S VICIOUS CYCLE OF HATRED.
Is this Eren’s voice? It may well be his own, for how recognizable this mindless vitriol sounds. Reiner had believed it once, too: a world bent on victimizing them, an island of cloistered devils waiting for the perfect moment to inflict their vengeance upon it. Utter ruination had been their only strategy: maim before you are maimed; kill before you are killed. An ignorant fabrication of a casus belli, but fear is a powerful elixir — Marley had forced him to choke it down for years, until terror seized his heart at the mere mention of this word, this ‘ RUMBLING.’ He sees it now for what it truly was: a wretched lie, a farce orchestrated by idle, sniveling men who sent children to wage their wars. And now it is thrown back at him, these words dripping like tar from the very lips he thought least likely to bear them.
They are far too alike, in this petulant foolishness. They are more alike than Reiner could have ever realized. He would not wish such a pitiful fate upon anyone.
‘ Is that really what you think, Eren? ’ His own voice sounds so woefully small in this place. He is reminded again that this is not his domain; this is not a plane he is meant to linger in. ‘ Who will protect them from each other? Do you really think that killing everyone else will keep them safe from themselves? ’ He remembers the camps, the crowded barracks filled with refugees, the constant gnawing of hunger and hardship. Lean times — desperate times. If ever there was a lesson to glean from those years, it is that everyone has the capacity for selfish cruelty. Mankind’s vicious cycle of hatred? The hardest lesson Reiner had been forced to learn was the utter humanity of these people — mankind, for all its beauty and unbearable tragedy, comprises Paradis as well. ‘ When you clear away the earth, and the people of Paradis can finally leave, what then? What will stop them fighting over the land outside of the island? What will stop them from repeating the same mistakes we did? ’
There will be nothing for them to lay claim to, of course. Do those people know this? Paradis will be the only thing left, the only thing salvageable. But perhaps that is the aim in itself — a return, rather than a rebirth. The same quiet island, now gifted with an OCEAN VIEW. An idyllic dream; a boy’s dream.
( Are you still in there after all, Eren? )
The world may not matter to him now, as it once had. Perhaps petty technicalities are beyond him, standing so high above the clouds. The boy is dead, yes — but Reiner must believe that the man, with his wounded, aching heart, still remains.
‘ What about Falco? You remember him, don’t you? ’ Grief creeps into his throat. It calcifies behind his tongue, threatens to crack the steadiness of his voice. He cannot swallow it down; he must push past it. ‘ He brought you chocolate once, visited you in the hospital — befriended you. Do you know what happened to him, because of Zeke, because of this plan? He became a TITAN. So many of the same people you wanted to save were transformed that day. Falco only survived because he ate one of our warriors. His brother died holding him. Is that what you wanted for him, Eren? ’
( It can’t be, it can’t be. If you are in there, please, say this isn’t want you wanted and STOP THIS! )
THOSE WORDS, mere ripples in the vast cosmic pool of Creation / but he feels them, even still, as far underwater as he could possibly hope to retreat away from the waves of consequence churning endlessly at the ocean’s surface, as they grapple with stubborn hands one over the other / desperately clinging to the horizon’s final few scant rays of sunlight / before the oppressive night swallows all. ENOUGH, ENOUGH: no single tear shed / no miniscule drop of water into the already immense weight bearing down upon him would ever be enough to make him yield - the world’s pitch-black seas roll harmlessly over his shoulders, as though moving through air, through a space unoccupied. HE IS UNBURDENING HIMSELF OF HUMANITY / OF THE CONTINUED TERROR EXISTENCE ENABLES, TRAGEDY AFTER TRAGEDY. Indeed, if humanity is the price he must pay for this liberation of apathy, then he will pay the cost / one over the other. AGAIN, AND AGAIN. AD INFINITUM.
That’s what Reiner consistently fails to understand. This story has already been told; no orator could possibly misinterpret it, untranslatable as it is / the words having already decided themselves before the thought is even conceived to speak them. If Reiner had been expecting a cold wash of terror - that which would have paralyzed a younger boy, a helpless boy - then he will bring forth wildfire in its place. His clenched teeth tighten like a vice on the barren wasteland sprawled out before him. The starry sky hung overhead begins spinning backwards in panic / supernovas sparking like embers to kindling, blazing wildly out of control before suffocating themselves in the imploding vacuum of their own making. YES, HE FEELS IT: one life extinguished, then the next, and the next, and the next-- What’s one more countryman turned ? Why now would such emphasis be placed on the abrupt extinction of a few dozen Eldians transformed into the gluttonous monsters that have always lurked beneath their skin / ready to perform their only function, absolute annihilation ? Because it wasn’t planned ? Because it happened to someone close, someone special, someone who didn’t deserve it- ?!
( Falco! bemoans a weary voice, thick with grief / heaving with the effort of expelling saltwater from nonexistent lungs as though it is somehow still trapped in the throes of drowning. It cries out in horror, in anger, unable to be heard: No! No, I never wanted this! No, I never wanted you to suffer! No, I never wanted to do this! NO, NO, NO. NO, NO NO NO NONONO IWANTTOSTOP-IWANTITTOSTOP-IWANTTOBESTOPPED-ICANNOTBESTOPPED-- !! )
It doesn’t matter. It never mattered ( ? ). That innocuous spring-summer morning, a fresh wound still bleeding sluggish blood / memory betraying a touch of chill to the air, making sunlight all the more warm for it. Those early hours spent in brief, halting conversation / his petty reluctance null in the face of such innocent charity - did that matter, either ? Was any of it genuine ? Is any of it still salvageable ? ( NO! screams the louder voice, the stronger voice, the voice that commands armies / that continues marching forwards, even now, despite everything / not even stuttering in the slightest. THIS IS THE STORY YOU STARTED / SO FINISH IT !! )
In the distance, his image is superimposed over a glowing tree of light, silhouette shuddering with hate / hate / hate. You were planning for Falco to inherit the Armored Titan either way, he seethes, his own static tone betraying nothing of the underlying rage that drives these words into existence. You begged him to. You gave him no other choice if he wanted to save his friend. Gabi, your cousin ... The hypocrisy drips from his lips like toxic spittle, accusatory and sickening even unto himself. To spare her, you would willingly sacrifice another child to the same hell you yourself wanted to escape from so desperately. YOU’D SACRIFICE YOURSELF TO THAT HELL. Is that what you wanted ?
... If I hadn’t come that day and attacked Liberio, either Falco or Gabi would have gone on to inherit a Titan, and you wouldn’t have done anything to prevent it. If not one, then the other. HIS FATE WAS PREDETERMINED, AS WAS ALL OF OURS.
Don’t you see ? This cycle must be broken. This cycle will be broken. What becomes of Humanity in the future is irrelevant ... I CANNOT CHANGE THE PAST. I CANNOT CHANGE THE FUTURE. EVERYTHING I’VE GAMBLED ON ... HAS LED ME HERE, TO THIS MOMENT. AND I WILL SEE IT THROUGH TO THE VERY END.
FALKENKIND.
Falco watches Mr. Krüger with enthralled, almost scientific, fascination. His curiosity about the man, about what he may once have been, is mired with sorrow and pain for his sake, but it remains a steadfast fixture in his young mind. Falco has no love for war, no love for battle or explosions or the glory-hounding they sell these men for sport. Not that there is much of a sale’s pitch involved. They have no choice. Eldians must fight and bleed and die for their motherland of Marley, for the horrors they have inflicted upon the entire world. Falco bristles inwardly. And what good has it done, that Mr. Krüger lost his leg and his eye and what peace of mind he had? Nobody treats him any better for it now.
Perhaps for this reason, Falco is keenly interested in his reaction. He doesn’t want him to think he’s been forgotten. There is still some light to be had, even if his friend only has one eye to see it. On some level, Falco might suspect that this impulse of his is not entirely selfless. He needs the light, too. Perhaps he will be that kind of person when he is grown, who forces room for kindness, for quiet, when all else is in shambles and ruination. He will give because he is too ashamed to take. And it will offend the drudges and thralls, the chain gang of despair, as they stumble towards their end. He will not be well loved for it. He already isn’t.
But Mr. Krüger accepts the gift even so. He regards it with the distant confusion of a man trying to decipher foreign hieroglyphs. It is an obscene luxury for Eldians to indulge in, Falco knows that. Chocolate is an exotic good, something that is grown and produced in far-off lands with warmer climates where the forests are millennia old and so thick with lush green that they seem an oppressive force. A suffocating verdant landscape, dotted with brightly colored birds.
“It’s sweet,” He warns, in the same tone of voice someone might use to say ‘it’s hot’ or ‘it’s poisonous’. There is an edge of excitement to the cautioning. Falco is no better versed in these things. He has, in truth, never had more than a bite of such a candy himself. The small sample he was granted by the vendor, however, was enough to convince Falco that this is a treat worth sharing. He can still recall the thick flavor of it, rich and oddly bitter but with such a fruity sweet tang to it that it had near overwhelmed his immature senses. Culinary experience is nothing anybody puts a lot of stock in in the internment zone. You eat what they serve or you starve. —But not today, sir! Today there is chocolate.
“No, don’t worry about it. I wanted to. It’s not a gift if you give me money for it.” Falco explains with youthful patience, even as he watches the veteran with hawk’s eyes to gouge his reaction. It seems a contradiction to see him holding the colorful wrapping. The thin paper is decorated with friendly patterns and easy to read block letters that label it as a chocolate bar. It doesn’t exactly fit in with Mr. Krüger’s drab hospital garb, the tied off pant leg, the crutch or the ever-present bandage that hides his empty eye socket. All the more reason, Falco figures, for him to have this.
“Besides, aren’t we taught to honor the brave veterans who fought to keep our home safe? I think this counts.” He adds with a wry smirk.
“-- Hmph.”
HE CAN’T help his incredulous grunt / a cruel bark of laughter swallowed back down in bitter humor. ‘Brave veterans’ - ha. He is no unsung hero, no honorable martyr: even within the vague boundaries of personhood Falco believes him to be confined by - that role of an enigmatic amputee far from home / reluctant to return - such a statement holds no merit. Eren Yeager and ‘Krüger’ are interchangeable cowards, relying on a young boy’s naivety to pursue such selfish / self-destructive ends. But that was likely the point of such a joke, and hence why his own amusement comes as such a surprise; until this moment, he’d doubted his words on the injustice of war had had any significant impact on a mind so guttered with propagandist filth / though this once he relents to the disgrace of being proven wrong. It’s almost a relief, despite how horribly it dawns on him / the thought like a glinting ray of hope shimmering at the end of his long, dark, tunneled vision ( taunting, scraping its sharp edges along the narrow walls of his mind’s corridor ). STILL - HE KEEPS PUSHING FORWARDS.
Eren busies his hands by thumbing at the wrapping paper, though it unfolds easily enough without the need to resort to such crude methods as ripping and tearing. He’s met with a solid brick of deep-brown color, nearly black, segmented into smaller squares - presumably for the ease of portioning - embossed with the simplified image of an animal, or so he assumes. The shapes are mostly foreign to him, though he recognizes the outline of a bird in flight at the upper leftmost corner. The chocolate snaps between his fingertips, though it is far from a clean break: he’d only managed to split the square roughly in half, seam diagonal / the poor bird decapitated. He wasn’t sure what to expect, aside from ‘sweetness’ - foodstuff this solid hardly seemed edible, let alone enjoyable, but his trust was in Falco not to lead him astray. Bringing it up to his lips, the smell is faint and vaguely earthy / nostalgic, he realizes, in the way that some things inexplicably are / shared sensations through a bloodline he is but one lone branch of, at the end of its lineage.
--- Well. Too late to back out now.
The flavor isn’t immediate; unsure whether or not to chew, he lets it sit upon his tongue for a moment / the occupancy one he dares not disturb until his next breath, pressing the morsel to the backs of his teeth. Oh - and there it is: subtle, then abruptly bitter / but still warm, rich, and not unbearably so, either. He realizes, belatedly, that the chocolate actually melts in the heat of his mouth, and something about that notion sparks a surge of overexcited hysteria. There’s no way, he scoffs inwardly, blinking stupidly into the midmorning courtyard of the hospital grounds. His nerves are buzzing with a youth that betrays him, casting him back into times of wonderment when he’d never been afraid of new experiences.. It’s absurd, the sentiment of this prolonged minute / this spindly trap of yearning spun for a memory that didn’t exist before, that has been created only now, in the present / no past or future in sight. Again, a burst of laughter tightens in his chest, yet no sound seems capable of escaping him. He can only swallow, throat thick with savoring.
But he is quickly jolted back into body, the skin of his nape prickling with the sudden impression of eyes on him. Just how long had he been dazed while Falco sat there, impatient for a reaction ? The only thing he can think to say is thank-you, though that doesn’t seem entirely appropriate. “You’re right,” Eren admits instead, whisper-soft. “It’s sweet ...” Unlike those obnoxious, high-aristocracy delicacies from the stately galas he’d attended back home, which only ever managed to make him sick. This aftertaste of cocoa and butter is much more tolerable in comparison. “I, ah-- I like it,” he finishes awkwardly, fearful of seeming ingenuine. “It’s very good ...”
gently cups his face with one hand, leans in and gives him a kiss – on the mouth, ( and then 👋 )
RARELY EVER is he subject to the hazards of temptation; for all of his want, for all of his need, there are few opportunities spared for indulgence / so scarce they are, a foreign delicacy unto this caustic flesh / that which eats and eats away at life leaving nothing but bone and marrow to remain. HE IS NO LONGER THE SPRING-SUMMER BOY OF HIS CHILDHOOD: all innocence has become forfeit to the horror of his creation, in-becoming the creature-thing he is / was always destined to become. He no longer observes ever-petulant Earth through the rosy tints of youth - over time the shades have darkened to vermilion hues / a curtain of blood hung in front of his face, tacky to his lashes, begetting stagnation. He is clotted, a vessel about to rupture at the seams, body but minutes away from self-inflicted ignition at any given moment ( and what fine kindling his wooden limbs would make, how easily the fire could strip away his paper-thin skin / heart a lit matchstick pumping gasoline through a faulty circuit ). No, he can no longer afford the easygoing smiles his younger self had paid for in reckless ignorance; he feels as though he would splinter, now / his visage would crackle and shed / all teeth and no charm.
But. There are still moments - however strange and tenuous - where he dares tread the thin divide of tenderness become cruelty / heel dragging heavily beneath him, smearing cinder from the dead hearth into an abandoned home. Usually they are no more than fleeting, one-off occasions: a nostalgic sight, the taste of dark chocolate / wind sweeping through the streets, carrying the salt of their distant ocean / a single missed call labelled Mom and his insistence on never answering for all the knowledge her safety comforts him ( that being: her safety from him, her safety from the evil she unwillingly bore / as consequence of his existence alone ). Softness is something so easily forgotten amongst his endless indifference - in being reminded of it, he reels, surprisingly fond. But it, too, passes. Eventually.
Though, he finds that in her company, it comes ... more frequently. It is less of a shock to his senses and more a gradual incline, a well-deserved reward / a spark-jump of pulse skittering up the length of his spine, easing warmth into his aching joints. She does not burn - she is the slow melt of a waxy candle, flickering at the edges / a glow that does not blaze wildly out of control but illuminates a darkened pathway. Mikasa, no doubt, only holds stock in her ability to harm; wary of any curious fingers that linger too close, so easily snuffed out like every other life she wicks in an effort to keep herself from suffocating. ( But beside him, she is a reassurance. Where he consumes all in his wake, scorching and searing and seething / she tempers him with patient reassurances, stokes calm and quiet and I’m not afraid of your heat. Most of the time he doesn’t know what to do with that. So, most of the time he is quenched for thirst, beaten back by tides of cold water rushing over his fevered mind / as close to clarity as he can ever get having survived trial by fire for as long as he has. Some part of him has even admitted his reluctance to let her drip - so resolute, he will not be the one to destroy her / this single petal of orange-yellow in a field of blackened char / smog-soot utopia. If he must be consumed whole a thousand times over, then he will burn / and burn / and burn. )
Such is the case now, or so it seems. A winter scene, trapped in the light of a single fluorescent sign suspended over their heads, advertising a garish neon red / and yet, his eyes find hers soon enough, startled by the sensation of one gloved palm conforming itself to the curve of his cheek / the casual way in which his head turns at the most feather-light touch, almost without his input. He swivels easily, the axis of his worldview spun entirely around her, the awareness of her body beside his / grounding in a way everything else simply is not. A questioning hum rolls into the back of his throat, further suspending the seconds lingering between them, stretching them into minutes / hours / centuries, pulling them taut with expectation. Mikasa’s expression betrays nothing of her intention, but curiously her fingertips remain tucked neatly under his jaw, thumb just barely hovering over the cold-flushed skin beneath, lower lashes catching on fibers of suede. It’s warm, he notices, in the distant way that is not fully conscious, despite how instinctively he leans into it. Eren’s brow furrows, tensely-lined / wary of whatever motive made her so directly reach out for him, though he’s moreover concerned that something is wrong - that he’d done something wrong. Had he not been paying enough attention ... ?
“... Ah, Mikasa-- ?”
But - oh. He hardly registers what happens next, still lingering in the past-tense / the afterimage of her dark eyes, stark against pale skin, clinging to the backs of his eyelids. So close, he could almost count the flecks of snowfall nested in her hair / could even breathe them away with a well-timed sigh ghosted over her temples - yet all air seizes in his lungs / his final sharp inhale arriving too late to properly brace himself before her lips catch his own. It spans the length of one slow, stupid blink, this innocuous kiss; for all intents, it’s picturesquely lazy / unhurried, undemanding, casually chaste / implying more intimacy than he’d believed, before, they were capable of. He feels the traitorous little spark-flame of his heart flare against his sternum for a moment ( hopeful / dismayed ), eventually simmering into a low, pleasant buzz as Mikasa moves away, nonchalant / as though she’d not just done something significant, something -- new. And this is significant, he thinks, lips still abuzz with the remnants of her warmth pressed there. So much so that he demands an explanation, justification / struck numb as he is, for no discernable cause. After all, for her to just ... And, isn’t that the kind of thing -- partners do ? Are the two of them ... ? Is it ... official, now ? The reality currently dawning on him is a terrible truth, one he’d been caught unawares against. So, he makes to grab her wrist, delirious and drunk with want / want / wanting, childishly afraid of her warmth being stripped from him. Oh, he’s so tempted, now: I WANT, I WANT / I DON’T WANT THIS MEMORY TO LEAVE.
“Hey, wait. You- that-- ... What was that for ?”
Leonard Cohen, from Selected Poems