The Devil is Watching You

•20•

"If I take my hand off, will cooperate?" He asks.

You hesitantly nod, agreeing to this simple requests. It's not like you want to hurt anyone, you just want to do whatever you can to save the kids.

As his hands loosen and drops away from you, you pause for a second before swiftly lifting your elbow back and using all your force to hopefully hit your captor.

You feel hands block the attack, so you whip your head around, eyes narrowed and focused as you use your other hand to throw off your bag from your shoulder.

"If you make noise someone will realize that you're trying to escape and all this hard work will be for nothing!" Armin's voice is desperate, but quiet as to not draw attention to us.

"I don't care!" You bend your knees slightly, ready to attack or defend at any moment. "My only concern is those kids, I don't care if I get punished for it. They're in danger and if they die because I decided to stay all cozy in a cottage, making friends with the people who kidnapped us, I'd never forgive myself."

"I can't help you if you don't trust me," his eyes seem to be begging you to listen to him.

"Armin, I will save those kids and you're not getting in my way," you bend down, reaching into your bag and quickly grabbing out the small kitchen knife you took from the cottage.

You stand back up, flipping the knife in your hand so your closed fist is around it, the blade sticking out the side, closest to your pinky.

"Don't make this hard, y/n! I don't want to hurt you," he warns, now lifting his hands up in front of his face.

"I won't have you getting in my way," you growl, desperate to hurry up and find Gabi and Falco before it's too late.

"They'll be okay. We have people looking for them now," Armin moves to his right and you step to your left, trying to keep the same distance from him.

"How do you know that?! There's someone who tried to kill me and you don't even know for sure who it is! You expect me to just trust that Gabi and Falco will be okay with some psycho on the loose trying to kill people from Marley?"

"There isn't anyone to find, y/n...." Armin drops his hands and stands up straight, a very obvious look of guilt on his face. "It was me, okay?"

"What?" Your hand holding the knife lowers to your side as you try to process his words.

"It was me who set the fire. It was a plan to get you to trust us more. You wouldn't open up so I suggested we put you in danger in order to get you to open up to us."

"You son of a bitch," the anger wells deep in your stomach, filling your eyes with a blinding rage.

"You have to under—"

In a second you're pushing off the balls of your feet, knife out and ready to slice as your body propels towards Armin. He reacts slowly because of the surprise, so you get a good slice to his left side.

"I believed you!" Your words come out as a scream. "I ignored everything Reiner told me because all you ever did was show me how good of a person you were and I fell for it like an idiot!"

"It wasn't a lie," Armin backs away, one of his hands clutching the side where I just sliced him and the other holding itself out, palm towards me.

"No? You pretended to almost kill me to get me to trust you! That sounds like a goddamn lie to me," you charge forward again, this time he was ready and he grabs on to your wrist that has the knife.

"You've gained everyone's trust though," Armin's words desperately trying to convince you. "I did this so you wouldn't have to be treated like the enemy."