CHAPTER ONE

Armin felt the thud as the bullies slammed him into the wall. His ears rang and he looked in contempt at those poised to hurt him. His weakness had brought another beating, more examples of him not being able to defend himself. A fist hovered, poised to hit him once again. He only gritted his teeth and readied himself for more pain.

"Stop!"

A familiar voice, Eren, drew their attention away from him. He shifted to the side as he ran, revealing Mikasa running just behind. At once the bullies took notice.

"Oh crap! It's Mikasa! Run!" one shouted, leading the other two on as he dashed with all his might.

Armin rubbed his aching neck. "Thanks, guys," he said. "I appreciate it."

"No problem, Armin, you can't let bullies treat you like that," Mikasa added.

Armin shook his disheveled blond hair out of his face. "No, I'm just not strong like you guys," he argued.

"Don't say that, Armin, you're just fine," Mikasa said.

As they walked on, Eren looked at the troops in the distance and shook his head. "I can't believe they just want to get drunk all day and not worry about anything," he chided. "Don't they realize we're living like cattle?"

"I have to believe we're one day going to see the outside world," Armin said. "Right, Eren?"

Eren cheered up. "Yeah! We can't live in fear of those titans forever."

Armin suddenly grabbed the side of his head. "Errgh!" he groaned. A thunderous pulse passed silently through his brain, the agony as intense as it was brief. For a pained instant, it felt as though his whole brain would come apart. Then, back to normal he went.

"Armin!" Mikasa shouted. "What's wrong?"

Armin looked up at her. "It's weird," he said. "They've happened off and on for three years now, but it's been almost a year since the last one. I thought they were gone."

"What happens?" Eren asked.

"Well," Armin explained, "it's like a bee sting, times a hundred, and in my head. My ears ring, and I feel like my skull's going to pop! This never happened to you?"

"No," Eren replied. "Weird."

"Then it just goes away?" Mikasa asked. "I don't get it."

Armin was about to say something, when the afternoon sky lit up. A single lightning bolt, just beyond the wall, flashed like a second sun. A moment later, a thunderous boom resounded with a billowing cloud of smoke.

"What was that," Eren asked. "An explosion?"

Everyone's horror became real, as a giant hand grabbed the crest of the wall, proceeded by another hand, and an enormous, skinless face. A titan appeared, taller than the wall which enclosed them and protected them. All three children looked on in absolute horror. Any pretense of questioning motives disappeared a few seconds later, when the mysterious titan kicked at the gate, causing a significant chunk of the wall to explode, and huge boulders and debris flying, shattering buildings and crushing innocent people.

A single horrifying thought snapped Eren out of his daze. His mother would be eaten.

"Mom!" he shouted, tearing away from the group. Mikasa jolted out of her stupor as well, taking off after him.

It took a second for Armin to amble off to a running start, but he began chasing them down. "Eren!" he shouted. The two of them already dashed far ahead of him. He turned a familiar corner and saw them turn way ahead. He cursed his weakness and barreled on. As he jumped down a short step, he stumbled forward to continue his sprint. He turned a corner, and skidded to a halt. His worst nightmare, come to life, stood right in front of him.

He stood face to face with a titan.

The giant hand scooped down towards him, and he tried to dash out of the way, only to get caught in its steel grip. Held upside down by his leg, he screamed at the top of his lungs. "Eren! Mikasa! Help!"

The titan swung him up and placed him on his chest in between its upper and lower teeth. Armin turned over, looking upward. He would meet his end at the huge teeth above him. "No! Eren! Help! NO!" Death closed in as the huge upper jaw clamped down. He shut his eyes and felt an intense pain as pressure like he'd never felt before slammed into his lower torso. He screamed.

Then, inexplicably, the pressure stopped. The pain, against all logic, simply ended. He felt the pressure of the jaw, but opened his eyes and saw the teeth trying to bite him in half at the waist, but nothing happening. He began hopelessly banging away at the upper jaw of the titan. His fist did absolutely nothing to it.

At least the first three tries didn't. Upon the fourth one, he slammed his fist into the soft tissue of the upper gum of the titan. Despite all sanity indicating otherwise, the impact shattered the skull of the titan, and what followed was a massive spray of gore and tissue, as well as blood, as the entire upper part of the titan's head blew apart. He didn't have time to marvel at the bizarre turn of events, as the titan fell forward, throwing him fourteen feet forward to plant face down.

He pushed himself up at once. His body had left a sizable impression in the stone. His entire body should have been a wrecked mass of broken bone. Instead, he brushed himself off, and save for a very wet and torn tunic, he had no visible bruises on him whatsoever.

Alarmed at his own lack of observation, he immediately spun around and saw steam rising from the hole in the titan's neck. He looked at his right fist a moment in confusion, then put it to the test, slamming it down into the upper back in a desperate attempt to prevent it from regenerating.

A loud bang rattled windows for dozens of feet around. To understate the carnage would be to say it worked. The entire upper half of the titan popped like a large zit. Blood and chunks of flesh were strewn all around. The titan's body began to disintegrate, revealing a crater six feet in diameter from the epicenter, where Armin had landed his fatal punch.

Armin looked at his hands again. Had God answered some prayer somewhere? Had he simply gone insane? Or, as he worried almost instantly, was he experiencing the last thoughts before dying? Questions raced through his mind.

Then he heard Eren scream.

"Eren! Oh my god, I'm on my way!" He shouted, and began running. The buildings blurred all together. In less time than he imagined, he stood in front of Eren and Mikasa, trying to unearth Carla Yeager from the wreckage of Eren's house.

"MOM!" Eren screamed, pulling upward in vain against the entire roof of the house. Even with Mikasa's help, nothing was happening.

Titan footsteps sounded closer. "Eren! Get out of here! Take Armin and Mikasa and go!" Eren's mother shouted.

Eren looked back. "Armin!" Before he could finish his thought, Armin stepped forward.

Please God, if this is your work, don't leave me now, Armin pleaded mentally. Gripping a firm section of the roof's lumber structure, he pulled upward with all his might, hoping he hadn't somehow imagined the events that just transpired with the other titan.

The heavy roof groaned as it lifted upwards. Armin found himself almost struck dumb at the lightweight feeling of the roof. This was an entire house roof, and it felt like he had lifted an empty crate.

Mikasa and Eren stood wide-eyed. "Armin, what…?"

"Get your mother out! Don't worry about me!" Armin shouted.

Eren snapped out of his stupor as his mother shouted in pain. Mikasa and he hoisted her carefully. Her legs had been crushed. Her pained voice chilled both kids to the bone. Eren would never forget that sound. As they slid her out of the wreckage, Armin set down the roof with a prominent boom.

Hannes showed up a moment later. "My god, are you kids ok?" He ran up and grabbed one side of Carla. "You're hurt! Let's get you out of here!" The three of them ran ahead with Armin slightly behind.

Huge footsteps clearly changed sound from walking to running. Armin looked back and saw the titan's creepy grin and realized it would catch up all too soon. They weren't moving fast enough. There would have to be a distraction.

"Armin! ARMIN!" Eren shouted. "Where are you going?"

Armin ran up and punched the titan's lower leg. From slightly below the kneecap the leg burst apart in a shower of flesh and bone chunks. Losing its balance and collapsing into a building and then onto the ground didn't change its creepy smile. Armin stood poised and punched it in the neck. The ground quaked as his punch left a sizeable crater and nothing above the titan's upper chest intact. It began to disintegrate.

"There still might be more!" Armin shouted. "Run!"

Hannes, Eren and Mikasa were shaken out of their stupor. Run now, they figured. Question later. Armin followed them close by, keeping lookout and hoping nothing else closed in as they neared the gates. A huge crowd gathered outside the gates. Boats began filling with people desperate to escape the titans and the overrun town. As the group crowded onto a boat to take off, another nightmare emerged.

The gate protecting Wall Maria exploded outward. A fierce-looking titan, covered from head to toe in armor-like plating, had breached the gate. The crowd's screams became louder as titans began pouring in. Eren shivered and clenched his fists as people continued to be eaten. Armin looked at his hands. Could he stay and fight? His newfound strength meant he might make a difference. On the other hand, there were so many of them. They were like the tide, like the stars.

"Armin? Are you okay? What happened back there?" Mikasa asked.

Her question knocked him out of his train of thought. He looked at Carla Yeager and her badly broken legs and thought of the roof weighing little to him. He shook his head. "Mikasa, did I imagine what happened back there?"

Eren suddenly turned to Armin. "No, you didn't," he argued. "My mother's alive because of you."

Eren's mother spoke up. "How did you lift the roof off of me?"

Armin looked over to the people getting eaten as the boat drifted away, and felt guilty about not staying. He turned back to Mikasa. "I couldn't keep up with you guys, and a titan tried to eat me," he explained. "He couldn't bite through me, and his teeth didn't even leave any marks." He lifted his damaged tunic. His skin bore no marks. "I just smacked its head, you know. When I did, it was as if a miracle occurred. I was strong. Impossibly strong. I blasted its head clean off with one blow."

Eren looked at a very nervous Armin. "How…how did this happen?"

Armin shook his head, his mouth slightly agape. "I don't know," he said. "it's impossible. Just a few hours ago, I was the same weak Armin you've known your whole life. Now, I'm…different."

It was at this point Hannes chimed in. "Well, whether it was God or whatever it was, you saved our lives today, Armin," he said. "I have to thank you."

Eren wrapped an arm around Armin. "One day, Armin, we're going to take back this world," he said. "I'm going to exterminate all the titans!" A fierce determination entered his eyes. He didn't say it, but he felt emboldened by the impossible. Armin's new abilities defied all explanation, but it gave him a realization. Nothing he knew could be certain anymore.

Armin took a deep breath and let it out. "I'm with you, Eren," he replied. "Mikasa?"

She simply nodded.

Two years had passed in the wink of an eye. Eren Yeager and his mother, as well as Mikasa and Armin, all took up the desperate task of survival. Armin had used his powers to help with the food shortages. He could do in one hour what would take a dozen normal farmers a whole day of tilling fields by hand. As the time progressed, he found himself getting stronger. When the government decided to send almost a fifth of the population on a suicide mission to reclaim Wall Maria, Armin thought of joining, until Eren and Mikasa reminded him it wasn't time yet. His powers would be a secret kept until the time was right.

Each of the teenagers decided to join the military. The group sat down at a table for dinner. It was the last night before they would leave to train. Eren had to help his mother since she still didn't walk right, so they set out the plates and served up dinner.

"Hey, Armin!" Carla said. "Is your uniform going to fit?"

He looked up from his plate. "What do you mean?"

"Well, look at you."

Eren and Mikasa looked away from their food for a moment. Both of them noticed a dramatic change in Armin. He was actually a few centimeters taller than Eren, and had some noticeable musculature. "Now that you mention it, he has grown the most of either of us," Mikasa said.

"You've worked very hard, Armin," Eren chimed in. "I'm not surprised."

Armin shook his head, smiling, embarrassed. "It's really not the same, though," he argued. "Somehow, I'm, well, different. Normal people can't lift huge logs all by themselves."

Eren laughed a bit. "Normal people can't kill titans by punching them," he replied.

"Or fly," Armin said, breaking the news.

He went back to eating. The room went silent.

"You developed another ability?" Mikasa said.

Armin set down his fork. He took a deep breath and let it out. "Let me show you." He stood up and pushed his chair back. He levitated a meter off the ground and floated around the room, landing back in front of the table. "I fell out of a tree a few days ago, and stopped in mid-air. After a bit of trial and error, I can control it."

Eren patted him on the back. "Hey, that's great! You'll be killing titans in no time!"

"I should be doing it already," Armin lied.

Mikasa hugged him. "Armin, we talked about this," she countered. "Don't give the military any excuse to be paranoid. They're probably going to be scared enough already. Get in, then use your powers to stop the titans." Armin shot her a look. She didn't have to know.

"So," Carla chimed in, "what are your abilities up to now?"

"Let's see," Armin said. "I can fly, I'm strong, I'm durable, I can shoot heat out of my eyes, I can see through things, and I can hear very quiet things."

"You're practically a god," Mikasa said.

Armin sank his head into his arms. "I don't deserve any of this," he said. "Who am I? I can't be a hero that deserves any of this."

"Whatever reason you have these powers," Carla said, "you were clearly given them to save the human race." She smiled. "And hey, you saved my life, didn't you?"

"You're right," Armin responded. "I'm going to save the human race if I have to kill every titan on Earth with my bare hands." He clenched his fists. "And I swear, I'm going to rip that huge skinless titan and that armored one apart personally."

Eren tapped him on the shoulder. "That's the spirit," he said. "I'm sure once we join the military everything will be fine."

Armin let out a shallow breath. "How am I going to use my powers?"

Mikasa smiled. "I have an idea about that."

"Oh yeah? I want to hear it," Armin replied.

"Well, since the military uses three-dimensional maneuver gear, you can use it to disguise your flight," she explained. "Let them think you're very good at aiming, when really, you'll fly into the titan's vulnerable part."

Armin pointed at Eren's chest. An old key hung from his neck. "What about that?"

Eren shook his head. "I know you could probably just fly over there and get in, but I think we should get better situated first," he said. "I'm joining the military, and then we can talk."

Armin ate. It bothered him that he didn't feel hungry. As late as a year prior, he would get tired if he spent all night sneaking out and killing the local titan population. A few months ago, he stopped feeling tired altogether. He frequently slept just to dream, to feel human again. Then he would wake up, and find that more titans had crept into the area and he'd feel bad about it. Every so often, he'd notice camps and houses going up. A refugee would move into area. A family would notice that titans in certain areas would die at night. Emboldened by the safety, a makeshift village began to form. He felt bad; soon, they'd be enlisting in the army, and moving around. He wouldn't get as many chances to clear out the population, and the refugees would likely have to move again.

"Well, thanks for the dinner, mom," Eren said. "The moon's getting high in the sky. Time for bed."

Mikasa stretched, and headed for her room. "Good night, everybody," she said.

Armin took a deep breath, and headed for the door. "I'll be in bed soon," he said.

Eren motioned at him. "Armin, don't do anything stupid," he said.

Armin waved. "I just need some air," he lied. "I'm not going to do anything rash." The front door creaked shut behind him.

The gentle breeze blew as a full moon illuminated the ground. He lifted up into the sky. Although painless, the temperature dropped around him as he lifted hundreds, then thousands of feet above the dirt. He desperately wanted to use his eyes to see beyond the walls in the distance, to the world beyond. The temptation to fly to somewhere far away, even for just a few moments, to see, to experience it, tugged at his heart. Still, he resisted the urge. Whatever gifted him these powers, obviously intended him to solve the immediate problem first. Still, there was something he could do.

Many miles away, there sat the gaping entrance to Wall Maria. The armored creature had plowed straight through. Armin saw the huge chunks of stone blasted from the wall. In an instant, he knew his action. He propelled himself forward. Having learned how to fly mere days ago, his speed was about that of normal running. He flexed his power like a muscle; surely, he had more power behind him. Predictably, he sped up. Pushing himself, he zoomed forward like a burst, covering the distance of many miles in a moment. His heart caught in his throat as he saw the wall rapidly approaching, and he had to throw his power into full immediate reverse to come to a stop some five feet from the wall. Panting nervously, from almost hitting the wall, he descended to the ground and closed his eyes to relax. At his speed, he realized, he might have burst straight through. He approached the debris.

Scattered for hundreds of feet all around, were chunks of stone and shattered wood, some the size of a fist, some as large as a house. Sections of ruined buildings lay in pieces. As swiftly as his feet allowed, he began gathering debris and piling it inside the hole. After what seemed like several minutes, a gigantic pile began to fill the gaping entrance. Soon, chunks of rock solidly packed the hole from ground to ceiling, spilling out a bit from each side. The entrance choked shut with stone, he had one more task to do.

He knelt in front of the remaining half of a building. A section of the back wall stood almost completely intact. It stood about twice as high as the entrance of the wall. His fingers dug into the rock, his back and arms tensed, and he strained downward with his legs. It occurred to him that one force opposes another, and his lift would press him downward. His feet being small, he would punch through the ground, so he opposed with some upward effort from flight. With a creak and a thud of gravel falling off the top, the wall lifted off its foundation. Plodding forward, using his vision to see through to his target, he stepped forward, and set the barrier firmly against the clogged entrance, sealing it. Finally, a burst of heat from his eyes melted the edges against the wall. He leaned against the rock and panted. It felt like more of a placebo than a real need for air, but damn it, he wanted to feel at least a bit human. A quiet laugh escaped his mouth as he saw the entrance completely barricaded. Backing up, the full effect of his work made him smile. He'd plugged the hole.

Quickly he turned his head, using his eyes. Among the ruins of the nearby towns, were dozens of titans, some dormant, some surprisingly moving. He travelled around for a few minutes, killing the ones that ventured close to him, before he grew tired and the local monster population dwindled. He decided to test his running abilities, bending into a runner's pose, and taking off. At first his footfalls came at a normal pace; a second into the run, the scenery blurred momentarily as he hit incredible speeds.

The clearing of his cabin appeared in front of him in seconds. His mind fired off calculations; he'd ran, on foot, miles in moments. The powers his body had demonstrated continued to confuse and astonish him. Was his earlier super speed in flight, connected to his super speed on foot? Surely, he figured, they'd have to be. But what were his limits? What did this mean? Did he have any limits? A horrifying thought came to him. What if he was a god? Worse, what if such a thought process, as one of a deity, became his normal thought process? Would humans cease to matter to him? Even if he never got stronger than he had become that evening, he already would have no opposition from anything seen thus far. He violently shook his head. No. Armin Arlert would remain Armin; he would die making sure of that, if he had to.

I will not fail you, he swore to everyone and no one in particular. He went inside and went to bed. There would be no invasions into Wall Maria anytime soon. He wondered if even the Armored Titan would be able to punch through the opening. Well, even if it was, he would be there to seal it again. Eren Yeager and Mikasa Ackerman would live to see the end of the titans. He would bring it about with his two hands. He went to bed. In his dreams, he saw a world far beyond Earth, a giant red sun in the sky and beasts of every fantastic variety.

The next day, the trio of Armin, Eren, and Mikasa reported to training camp. The uniform fit Armin tighter than he wanted, but didn't show it as he stood in formation. Their grizzled trainer, his bald head atop tan skin and a downward arrow of a goatee, regarded the trainees with a mixture of bemusement and disgust. He approached the line Armin was in.

"Unfortunately," he bellowed, "you sorry lot have to deal with me, Keith Shadis, as your trainer." He passed by a medium-sized boy with auburn hair down past his ears. The boy had a look of determination like few he'd ever seen. Several had the look of despair, of horror—those, he could understand—but this one, seemed bursting with an eagerness tempered by fire. "You, what's your name?"

"Armin Arlert, sir!" Armin chimed in, pounding his fist against his heart in the standard salute.

Keith scratched his chin. "You seem like you're in a damn hurry to get somewhere!" he shouted. "Is there a fire I'm not aware of?"

"Helped my friends escape from the Titans at Shiganshina," Armin replied. "Saw people I love get eaten. If it's all the same to you, sir, I'd like to get to actual training so I can graduate and start taking these bastards down."

The instructor almost barked a laugh. "Well, aren't you eager to get eaten!" He placed a hand on Armin's head and turned him around. "Face the rest of the men! Show these people what it looks like when someone is eager to die! Say, Arlert, have you ever killed a titan?"

Armin swallowed. "You may not believe me, sir," he replied, "but I have. Surprised it."

This time, Keith did laugh. "Well, Arlert, tell you what. If you can kill a few more, I'd appreciate it."

Armin said nothing as Keith moved on and hazed a few more trainees. With his enhanced hearing, he could tell both Eren and Mikasa had tensed up from his outburst. Nonetheless, he looked forward to getting done with training. He looked around, and saw that many of the soldiers in training were looking at him. One trainee in particular, Jean Kirstein, was shooting him ugly looks. He figured it was due to his eagerness to kill titans, as he recalled Jean specifically wanting to join the Military Police to escape into the inner walls.

The next thing was dinner, after some basic physical exercise to give the commander a basic understanding of what each person was capable of. After changing clothes, each person went to the mess hall for dinner. Armin sat with Eren and Mikasa, and ate, although he didn't have to. Jean approached the trio.

"I heard what you said out there," he said to Armin. "I don't know what sort of thing you're on to, but I don't think for a second you killed a titan."

Armin finished a bite. "I did," he simply retorted, "and I plan on doing it again."

"I think it's damn cowardly of you to want to join the military police and live it up in the inner walls," Eren chimed in.

"Oh yeah?" Jean retorted. "You think you can kill titans? Wake up! The only way is to escape from them."

"What? Why, you…!"

Armin put a hand up, stifling Eren from further argument. He stood up and faced Jean. "Unlike Eren, I'm not going to question your motives," he said. "But I want you to be sure. I've seen with my own eyes that they aren't invincible. I understand you. Really, I do. But, isn't part of the reason why humanity is so beaten down, is because nobody seems to think they can be beaten?"

Jean took a breath. "Well, I'm not going to apologize for being the one who tells it like it is," he argued.

Eren looked at Armin. At times like these, he couldn't help but be amazed. In his mind, somehow, he pictured himself as the heroic type. When he saw his mother, trapped under rubble, a creepy smiling titan closing in, he saw the scene play out in his head. Hannes running away with Mikasa, Armin, and him, and his mother getting eaten. Instead, Armin demonstrated some impossible strength and hoisted the roof off. Ever since that day, he'd seen his once-meek friend grow into a more confident, eager person. The previous Armin would never have confronted someone as loud and ill-tempered as Jean. The previous version of his friend was the kind to follow and be quiet. Now, Eren found himself following Armin. His internal image of Armin and Mikasa standing behind him as he killed the titans, morphed into Armin in the lead with Eren beside. He decided to chime in.

"Jean," Eren said, "I'm going to fight the titans to the end. If you want to join the military police so you can live in peace, I won't stop you. Just stop pretending it's the only option."

The dinner bell chimed, preventing Jean from getting the last word in. Armin and his friends took their plates to the wash basin. As the trainees went to bed, Armin suppressed his hearing. Hearing everything for miles around bothered him sometimes. He could hear things he didn't feel like hearing. He wanted to walk around the woods at night, look around to see the sights and be with nature. With all the people around, however, the odds of him being noticed were too great. It wouldn't exactly do to reveal secrets. People would get suspicious after awhile if they saw him go long periods of time without sleep. He closed his eyes and soon, he was out.

Almost an instant later, a brilliant red light startled him awake. Two grown men, garbed in robes the likes of which had never been seen before, stood looking down at him. Both men wore on their chests, a red stylized 'S' in a diamond-shaped shield, with a yellow background. Who were these men? He looked around. Why was the furniture, the walls, the sky, so foreign? Nothing looked familiar. The sun peeked in through the skylight; a blazing red inferno. Where was he? Why was the sun a different color?

"Is your son going to the same planet as mine?" the dark-haired man with a beard asked of his fellow man. He had a look of pain on his face, mixed with angered certainty.

"Yes," the blonde-haired man replied. "Your son should be launched first, so to make sure that the coordinates are correct."

The dark-haired man did not agree. "Look, I know you're worried," he argued, "but it's for the best that your son goes first. Kar-El is readier than my Kal-El is. You know he's hardier and probably more likely to survive the experience."

"Armin!"

Eren's voice startled him awake. He looked at his friend, who looked a bit nervous. "Oh, Eren," he said, shaking the sleepiness out of his eyes and shifting to a sitting position. "Sorry. I just had the strangest dream."

Eren's eyebrows raised. "Really?" he asked. "What?"

"Well," Armin began, "I was sitting in some kind of seat—I…think I was a baby, or something—and these two men were talking about sending their sons on a journey. I…" he slapped his head. "I didn't recognize anything. Everything looked different, the clothes, the stuff around me." He looked at Eren. "The sun, was red in the sky."

Eren leaned his head back, squinting slightly in confusion. "Red? Weird."

"Yeah, I don't understand it either." He shook his head again. "Well, let's go see what practice has to offer!"

Eren placed a hand on his friend's shoulder. "Remember, be careful."

Armin nodded. "I know."

Practice that morning consisted of the three-dimensional maneuver gear he'd heard about from Mikasa. As he clasped the wires onto his belt, he found himself lifted a short distance off the ground. Righting himself in the air, without assistance from his powers, took a few minutes. His body wanted to whirl completely over and bury his face in the dirt. He had to bend his body in new directions every few seconds or so, adjusting the load of his weight on the cables. After all, he had to make it look like he used the gas canisters to propel himself and the cables to maneuver in the air. After a few minutes, he had the entire act down. He disengaged from the cables and watched the others, and focused on Mikasa. She looked almost bored, as well down as she had it.

Then he looked at Eren. He gasped.

Eren planted face first in the dirt. A look of horror on his face told the tale as the fellow students gathered around to snicker and openly mock him. More than a few comments about his bravado the evening earlier spread around. The drill instructor let Eren out of his harness. Armin felt he had to do something to protect his friend.

"I…I don't…" Eren stammered. "How…?"

"Wait a moment!" Armin approached behind his friend. "Eren, stand up a minute. I wonder." He felt around the belt for a few seconds before seeing through the material. He would grasp for any excuse at this moment. After inspecting the innards of the belt a moment, he saw that there was a defective part. "Wait! I found a problem!"

Keith let out a nasal snort. "Don't try to make up something!"

Armin shook his head. He unbuckled the belt and handed it to the instructor. "No, sir!" he said. "Take a look at the clasp!"

Keith held the belt up to the sunlight and examined it. A metal piece stuck out. His eyes went wide. "Wow, I take it back," he exclaimed. "This is a first. I've never seen this component break before. Suppose it'll have to be added to the maintenance list." He looked at Armin. "Why don't you give him yours for a moment?"

Armin saluted, then unbuckled his belt and held it out. Eren clasped it around his waist and was up in the harness in under a minute. Armin held his breath.

Eren wavered back and forth a moment, his hands shook. "Please," he thought to himself.

He righted in midair and held firm. He held tight and soon found himself comfortable in a stable position. Armin let out a sigh of relief.

"Arlert!" Keith cried out. "What made you think to check the equipment?"

Armin took a breath. "Well, sir, I have faith in my comrades that they wouldn't be so quick to fail. Eren's always been the one who can prove me wrong. If I can do it, surely he can."

Eren looked at his friend, bewildered. Why was Armin being humble? He wiped an eye and almost lost balance before being let down to the ground.

"Well, Yeager, looks like your friend just gave you a full sales pitch!" Keith bellowed. "Don't waste it!"

"I won't, sir!" Eren cried.

Armin headed towards where Mikasa was, walking towards the fields for their second bit of training. "Armin, wait!" Eren said.

"What?" Armin stopped and turned. He wondered about the curious expression on Eren's face.

"You just told him I was better than you!" he argued.

"Well…yeah, I did," Armin agreed.

Eren gestured with his hands. "I mean, well, you're the one who saved my mom and me, and Mikasa. I was pretty useless."

"Don't worry about it," Armin said, turning to leave.

"No, wait!" He put a hand on Armin's shoulder. "I'm not ok with that!"

"Eren!" Armin said. His cry silenced his friend. On his face was a look of worry and concern. "Listen to me. Normal folk get credit for doing good. I'm not normal folk."

Eren's hands hung at his side, his mouth dropped a bit. "Armin," he simply uttered.

Armin shook his head. "I'll do whatever I can," he said. "But I don't deserve the credit you do, I can't be hurt the way you can." He stared into Eren's eyes, and his friend would take that look to the grave.

"It doesn't count if the Titans can't hurt me."