Freedom Fighters League of the Exiled

Funeral for Three

Pixis came in and signaled to Erwin for him to close the portal. There was a moment of silence before Nanaba ran over to Eren and me and pulled us both into a hug. She let go and walked up to Pixis and he just kinda rubbed at the back of his neck. "Sorry, I know I said I would come back without a scratch on me, but I guess I broke my promise," he said motioning to his arm. "It's a little more than a scratch, but we are all okay."

Nanaba just rolled her eyes and pulled him into a careful hug. "Thank you for making it back safely." Her eyes were glossy as she tried to hold in all her tears. All the stress, all the grief she had been holding in was threatening to spill out.

She turned back around her eyes, landing on Hassam. She stuck her hand out to shake his. "Nice to officially meet you," she said with a smile and something clicked to Hassam.

"You must be the one who contacted me," he said shaking her hand back.

"Yup that's me. Thank you for helping," she said I could tell she really wanted to talk more to him. Thank him for not killing us, for being a genuine person who just wants to help. I'm just glad she trusted her instincts with him.

I looked over at Erwin hearing his thoughts. Oh no he knows this wasn't a normal mission. He's starting to piece it together. I took a moment hearing other thoughts in the room and I froze. Shit.

I turned around to see Jean and Marco standing there with their arms crossed like a bunch of angry parents catching their kids sneaking back into the house.

"Hey guys," I said awkwardly.

"Hey, guys?" Jean said back with a tone that asked if I was sure that that was what I wanted to say. "You have to be fucking kidding me."

"I thought you guys were going to be spending the night together," Marco said. His tone was less angry and more hurt. He was disappointed, but mostly he just was upset that we didn't trust them enough to tell them the truth.

"Well, technically," Eren said before I cut him off with a smack to the back of the head.

"We're sorry, we weren't allowed to tell anyone."

"Why the hell not?" Jean asked.

"Because they weren't sure if they would be coming back," mom said from the doorway before dropping the stack of letters Eren and I had written on the table.

I felt my blood run cold. I looked over at Eren and he looked just as scared. I tried to stop myself from laughing when hearing Pixis's thoughts. He was wondering if he lost enough blood to pretend to black out just so he could miss the explosive lecture that was about to happen.

"You weren't supposed to see those," I felt myself say quietly.

"Well, it's kinda hard to miss them. I went in there to check up on you and all I see is an empty room with two stacks of notes. The top one reads, Dear mom, I'm sorry that I let you down-" her voice getting louder as she recited the letter she had read over and over again over the last few hours.

"You don't have to continue," I said, cutting her off recognizing my letter.

"I'm sorry that you have to go through this again, I never meant to hurt you but-," she continued even louder than before.

"Stop please," I begged.

She ignored me and continued her voice raised louder than I've ever heard it as tears stung at her eyes from rage and sadness. "I'm going to see Farlan and Isabel sooner than I expected-."

"Stop, just fucking stop!" I yelled covering my ears and squatting down on the floor. I just wanted to shrink away from all this. She went dead silent at my outburst.