"We did it Annie," Armin whispered as he reached out to her, a ghost of a smile tracing his lips.

He didn't have much time. In the next twenty or so minutes, he would hear footsteps trekking victoriously through the hallway to take her away.

"Far away," they told him.

"Where she can't harm anyone," he recited to himself from memory.

"Hey Annie," his voice was quiet as he leaned in to rest his forehead inches from hers.

"I wonder…if we lived a different lifetime things would be different." Armin sighed, his eyes fluttered shut, "We could have even been friends."

There was a scraping of boots and a buzz of chatter from across the room when Armin pulled away. Quietly, he snuck around the large mass in the center of the room and timed his exit to when the group walked in. His footsteps went unheard through the heated discussions and clanging of equipment. When he had reached the surface, the afternoon sun enveloped his body in warmth. He caught his reflection in one of the windows that cascaded across the building that kept her and stared. The man that looked back at him was older. Seeing her reminded him of the fact. There were bags under his eyes from the lack of sleep and his skin boasted a light tan from their last expedition.

He pushed the frame of his glasses higher on the bridge of his nose when a soldier called out to him, "Commander Arlert!"

The man approached him and saluted. That was his cue to straighten up and refocus on the relief efforts underway. All other thoughts of a one sixteen-year-old girl trapped in an eternal sleep were locked away in the deepest chasms of his mind.

NOTE: Thank you so much for the wonderful reviews! I haven't written anything in a long time and this is my first attempt at getting back into writing. I'm so glad it's being so positively received (:

— Peach