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“Why?”
Armin turned and saw an Eren with his lips curled into his teeth and hands trembling at his side. He wasn’t looking at Armin rather his gaze was focused on the horizon.
“Why?” he repeated again.
Armin just stared at him, waiting for him to continue.
“Why are you looking at the ocean like that? Isn’t this what we wanted? What we dreamt of? The world from your grandfather’s book. Rivers of salt, flaming waters, deserts of ice, this is what we had always dreamt of, Armin.”
As soon as Armin realized what Eren meant, he felt the air getting knocked out of his lungs, it felt as if the ground beneath his feet was slipping away, and his legs started to wobble. His head felt like it was going to split open, and he held it with both hands tightly gripping at the blonde strands to the point it felt like he would tear them off his head.
This was all his fault.
“I….”, a wail left his mouth as he fell on his knees, gripping at his hair, “I, I di-did this. It-It’s all my fault. I killed billions.” He took his hands off his hair and held them in front of his face. “M-my hands are tai-tainted by their blood. I was the one who showed you that book. Everything is my fault. My fault, all of them my fault. I-I di-did this.”
Another wail tore of his throat as he sat there at the ocean crying for his crimes, the ocean that was his freedom, the ocean that has been turned to red because of the innocent dreams that Armin helped plant themselves viciously inside Eren all those years ago.
“No, it's not your fault Armin but there was no other choice. This world was already rotten. They would never let us be free. It was either them or us, and I choose us. I have no regrets. This is how we save Paradis. This is how we get our freedom” Eren said as he extended his arm towards Armin, who swatted it away as if it burned.
“Bullshit!!!” Armin screamed as he threw a punch aimed at Eren’s face who all too willingly took it. “Save Paradis? Ha don’t make me laugh Eren, and don’t you dare try to fool me, I know you better than anyone, better than I wished I did. Saving Paradis???” The maniacal laughter that tore out of his mouth sounded felt so unlike him to Armin, “this was never about saving Paradis. All of this, everything you did up until this point was all for your own selfishness. Paradis is just a name to threw in there to make yourselves feel better. If it really was for Paradis's sake, then why did you not stop after you took out all the world's military? Why did you go this far? ANSWER ME EREN!”
“You wouldn’t possibly believe that, I would be stupid enough to just activate the partial rumbling, and wait what? the next 50 years just so the rest of the world can gain back their military power and attack us again? And don’t tell me that we would have talked our way out of this. HAHAHAHA! Since when did you become so gullible, Armin? You, of all people, knows how ridiculous it is to believe that everyone will just forgive and forget everything and have happily ever after Bertholdt really has influenced- “another punch landed at his face.
“Why?” punch
“Why Eren? why?” punch
“Why are you like this?” punch
“Why did you, Eren?” Eren caught his hand before the next punch would find its target, and Armin didn’t struggle against his grip instead he gave up and retired into his dejected self. The tears ran down cheeks like an endless cataract, and he didn’t bother stopping them he was done holding in for so long.
“I always thought there was a world outside the walls that we hadn’t seen yet. Even when I found that that the rest of the world wanted us dead, still I hoped for it, and I wanted to find it with you right by my side. We were supposed to explore the world together weren’t we Eren?” he waved his hand around the scenery, now a wasteland carpeted with giant footsteps and rotting cadavers. “What is this Eren?”
“Armin, this world was never what we dreamt of, there was nothing outside the walls except for disappointment, hatred, and more pain. It’s not like it was in your book. You and I and Mikasa and the rest of them, we weren’t free, we were just caged animals. We will never be free; this world would never let us be free. We finally have a chance to be free, Armin. This is what we wanted.”
Armin scoffed, “of course you don’t care.” He gently took Eren’s face in hands, and tilted his face just enough for them to be touching forehead to forehead, and looked into those stormy grey eyes and said, ” Eren, my dream was to explore the world, the meet the people outside the walls, to learn new things, as Sasha used to say to eat all different varieties of foods, to explore the darkest depth of the ocean, to reach the tip of the highest mountain, to almost freezing to death in the deserts of ice, to map out the stars in the sky and watch the floating lights swimming above my head, all while having you right by my side, always with each and every step I took, forever. That was my biggest dream. That was my freedom, and you trampled over all of them to achieve yours. Our dreams are not the same Eren, they never were, and they never will be. You were always chasing freedom, but are you really free, Eren?”
Eren scoffed at his question though the streams pooling out his eyes said a different story, he didn’t answer his question, “Are you?”
No. I’m chained to you. “Yes”, Armin replied without hesitation.
“Liar”, Eren chuckled.
“You can stop now. You already destroyed more than half of the world. These people did nothing wrong to you, they don’t deserve this.”
“So did my mom, even she did nothing wrong yet, she had to die, like a sheep trapped in a pen house. Her only fault was believing that she was leading a peaceful life, and that got her killed. These people are the same they turned a blind eye towards reality. We parasidians were dying on that island, getting trampled and eaten away, caged inside walls for crimes we didn't commit, they took our freedom away from us and turned us into cattle, and these people let it happen because it was convenient for them. After all, we are the devils we don't deserve to be treated as humans, do we? How can you not hate them, Armin?”
“I don't care about them, and deep down I do hate them, but I don't want my freedom to be brought upon billions of lives. I don’t want that, I don’t want to take away someone’s freedom to gain mine, and that is exactly what you are doing Eren. Maybe there is no way we can achieve peace, maybe everything’s hopeless, and maybe are my naïve wishes, but I refuse to accept that until I have tried my very best. I refuse to accept that this is the only way.”
Eren just stared at him, his arms limp at his side before he left out a deep sigh and asked, “Do you know Armin what my dream is? It was you and me side by side fighting for our freedom." Armin was stunned to silence his hands feel off Eren's face, "but dreams don’t always come true, do they?" Eren continued, "In the end, we have to part ways, because you are who you are and I am me, and we’ll both fight for what we desire the most. You were right I didn’t do it for Paradis, I did it for myself. Even if it was for a fleeting moment, I wanted to experience that freedom I saw in your eyes all those years ago. I used to think that you were the freest person in this world, you were always seeing a dream none of us would even begin to imagine and I wanted that. I know you will hate me forever, even Mikasa too, but I won’t stop until I have my freedom.”
“I never thought I would ever feel pity for you until now. I pity you Eren Jaeger, you are nothing but, a slave to your own freedom and I wish you wouldn’t have talked to me for the first time that day, might have saved us both a lot of suffering, maybe these people would have still been alive too. Goodbye, Eren.”
Armin got up and started walking farther away from him, he borne his heart to him today and cried enough and now he has his answers and he was finally ready to meet Eren on the battlefield.