Sign of the Times

Year 850 - Revelation // Battle of Trost, part 2

The sky was getting darker, and the rain threatened to start at any moment, but there was no time to stay in the same place. Viktor was holding his bleeding cheek and glancing at Armin at times, but the blonde boy was still with his eyes lost in the roof tiles. He knew he wouldn't be able to make him react right now, but the weather wasn't in their favour, they needed to move. They stayed there for what it felt like hours, but there were only minutes, so Viktor decided it was time to get away from there and try to find the others. He couldn't see a supply team nearby, the only way to hold on with the gas they had was to try to go to the HQ, which was still far from the titans.

Slowly, he kneeled in front of his friend, looking at him with kind but sad eyes, trying to see if there was any reaction from his part. Nothing.

"Hey...Armin?" He was still looking at an empty space, not acknowledging his friend was in front of him. His eyes were wide open, and that pretty blue they had looked darker. Viktor tilted his head and, carefully, he put his hand on the blonde's shoulder, squeezing it a bit. "Listen, we need to move. We can't stay here for too long..." He was interrupted when he heard steps behind him. It was Connie and his squad.

"Guys! What are you doing here? Are you hurt!?" Krista ran towards her friends with worried eyes, Connie followed her, but Ymir and the others stayed behind, not even looking at them. The blonde girl tried to check Viktor's injury, and he let her, wincing a bit to her touch.

"I think I have something for it, not much though..." Krista grabbed a handkerchief and slowly tried to clean the cut up a bit. The boy tried not to move too much, but the cut hurt a lot, and Krista assumed it was pretty deep. Then, she took a small band-aid, and carefully covered Viktor's cut. While the girl was checking him, he slowly turned his head to look at Connie, who was trying to make Armin come back to his senses. He was shaking him and asking questions, without getting a reaction from him, but one question made him open his eyes and start screaming like crazy. The blonde boy was grabbing his hair and repeating all the time how "useless" he was, because he remembered how he stood there without being able to help his friends. Worried, Viktor walked towards him and gently grabbed him by the shoulders, now forcing the boy to look at him. Armin stopped and, with tears in his eyes, he focused on his friend in front of him again.

"Hey, I'm here. Please stop saying that, you're not useless!" Armin couldn't calm down. The bad feelings were stronger than him, and Connie couldn't do anything more than watch his friend helplessly and without understanding what was happening. Ymir, who was just ignoring them, looked at Connie over the shoulder like he was the most oblivious idiot.

"That's enough. They were all probably wiped out," she shrugged her shoulders, "except him of course."

Connie scoffed. "And what about Viktor, huh? He's still here and they were on the same team!"

"He could easily survive. After all, he was one of the candidates for the top ten, but Armin?" She turned to see him, with a bored look. "The titans probably thought he was already dead, so they just ignored him. That's the most logical answer, what a shame the loser gets to survive instead of Eren and the others..." Viktor didn't say anything, but the way he was looking at the girl said everything. Ymir didn't know what happened, and she definitely didn't have room to talk about Armin like that.

Connie clenched his hands around his swords, angry, but before being able to say something, Krista got in between him and Ymir. The blonde girl begged them with the eyes to stop arguing, it wasn't the right moment and place, and she was right. The group was still in the middle of the chaos, a titan could attack at any moment, they had to move. Doubting Armin's condition, Viktor made a signal to the others.

"Guys, you can go, we'll be right behind you." Connie looked at him confused, but nodded his head anyway. One of the members of the team told him they were needed somewhere else, so the whole squad left the two guys alone. Viktor looked at his friend, he was still in trance, it was understandable after what he witnessed, but he didn't lie when he said they were going behind the others. During those minutes they spent resting, he hadn't seen any vanguard team around them, and that worried the tall guy. Sighing, he stood up and helped Armin, who moved like a marionette, completely disorientated; only moving because someone told him to. Viktor knew he wouldn't be able to leave if he was in such a state, Armin needed to come back to his senses.