the hilt | eren jaeger

t w e n t y o n e - E.J.

"They would've had no reason to keep her here."

I didn't want to shoulder away the defeat in my tone, but it was unequivocal. There was truly no reason for her to be here. Anyone with a resolute plan would not have kept her in nor near this place. She was gone.

She was a fading memory, at this point.

I did my best to keep her alive in everyone's soul, but I grew tired. I grew so tired.

Maybe she's dead now.

My thoughts were not so kind. They were callous and unabiding. They never faltered for a moment. They plagued me in doubt, bathed me in worry, etched me in history.

Why does one lie to themselves?

It was clearly the end of the line for her.

She would have certainly died if we hadn't let her go with them. We didn't have the medical facilities to treat her. We could only pray that the enemy was so merciful as to save her.

I saw her.

I saw her tattered and limp body in the arms of Bertholdt. I saw that she was nothing short of a dead woman. I saw that she was not going to recover.

I saw all this, and yet held hope.

Why did I lie to myself....

But still, Mikasa looked to the ground in defeat, knowing this to be the truth. She knew that there was no reason for her to be alive, as unspoken as it may be.

Maybe she should be dead.

Maybe she was never meant to be born into this world.

Mikasa and I reached a silent agreement. She was not dead verbally, but we both knew the truth. We could lie to ourselves for hours on end, but nothing would change.

"She probably went back to... Wherever they came from."

I spoke a definitive lie. We had no idea. I acted like I knew in order to fill the void a little more, to feel a little less alone with what had happened to us.

I missed her.

And so, the barely lit trail leading us back to our hometown had never felt more lonely. The uneven dirt underneath our footing that was being traversed by an entire regiment was only bringing us closer to more death.

Was she the first?

The first casualty in this long, long arbitrary war?

It was likely.

But the trail was silent. No one was speaking. A solemn omen.

We were all kids when it started. A cycle we will never be able to escape. She's not the first to die for it. I wish I could have saved her, I wish I could've done more.

But we stepped forward. Each as crisp and clear as the night it all began. An echo was not differentiable from the original.

I had always envisioned her by my side as we travelled back here, reclaiming it for humanity. She'd make some sort of petty joke about something stupid, and we laugh into the night. Even if it wasn't actually funny, she'd help ease the tension.

It was startling to be around her.

She knew what was needed to be done in order to make situations better. She could escalate and deescalate at will. 'Could've called it good social skills, but I knew better than that.

She was avoiding the pain, as she always did. She did not like to repeat history. She was not the type to allow things to happen in front of her.

Even though she'd tell me she wouldn't join the Survey Corps, deep down I always felt like she was actually going to. She hated everyone else too much to not.