Pretty Little Liar (Aruani Element Shifter AU) ✔️

Part Two: Forty Two

"Don't come any closer. Hey, Armin, get up!" Annie yelled. I could hear the crackling of fire before I stood up. The whole area was covered in flames by this point. Annie's hands were shrouded in fire as she faced the darkness in front of her. As I looked away from Annie, I saw it walking forward into the light of the fire. 

The first thing I noticed were her eyes. They were three different colours, bright green, deep blue and a cold white. I recognised her instantly, and so did Annie.

Mikasa.

She was staring angrily at Annie's flames, but didn't move any further. 

Annie looked at me. "Armin, go and get the others," she said calmly, then turned back to Mikasa who was glaring angrily. 

I teleported just as I saw Mikasa move the earth underneath Annie, who jumped out of the way and shot flames at her. She looked up at the flames and shot air out of her hands. 

I emerged in Mike's flat full of shock at what I had just seen. 

"Armin? What is it?" said Mike, running out of his bedroom. 

"The weapon," I started, as everybody else turned up around me. "It's Mikasa," I said, looking at Eren. "The council; they've done something to her; I just saw her earth and air shift."

"What? But she's a water shifter-"

"Annie's there with her now. She sent me to get you guys. We have to go now!" I said. Reiner walked up to me and within a second he had teleported everybody to the forest. Annie was surrounded by boulders while Mikasa was screaming as her feet were being burnt. 

"Annie!" Reiner started. 

"She can shift three of the elements," was all Annie said, as Reiner lifted the earth underneath her and she jumped out from the circle of boulders. "She doesn't have fire shifting abilities, though," she said. Then Mikasa growled loudly and shot powerful shots of air that shot Reiner back. He hit the ground hard and the earth cracked, but Mikasa just jumped up and avoided falling into the hole, then posed to attack him again, until Annie shot some blue flames at her and she fell to the floor. 

"She doesn't seem to get too harmed," started Annie. "Her water shifting can heal my burns really quickly." 

I shot a spell at Mikasa that kept a strong current of air on top of her, forcing her to stay down, but her skills were superior and she only had to kick for the air to disappear. She stood to her feet. Where there should have been a huge burn on her stomach was nothing but a scratch. 

Then before any of us could attack her again, a voice came from behind Mikasa, and Levi emerged on a horse, followed by his squad and a small group of soldiers.

"Well, well, you learn fast," he said to Annie. "Very impressive. So you've had a little play with our new pet."

Annie ignored him, and effortlessly jumped up and landed on a tree branch high up, then shot powerful flames that set the soldiers spreading out to dodge here attacks. Levi's horse kicked its front legs, and made a loud, scared noise as Levi stared at Annie angrily. He got off the horse and took out a long sword. 

"Enough. I've been waiting for this rematch, dirty fire shifter."

Annie jumped down from the branch and turned to me and Eren. 

"You two, take the soldiers. They can't leave the circle," she said, then moved away to attack Levi. We teleported a few feet away to the soldiers and saw that Annie had made a circle of flames around them, so they couldn't move out of it. Bertholdt and Reiner started attacking Levi's squad.

I looked back and saw Annie dodging Mikasa's attacks effortlessly, while shooting attacks at Levi at the same time. 

"Armin, she'll be fine. Come on!" said Eren, who then started rumbling the earth underneath the soldiers. Someone aimed a pistol at Eren and I shot a strong gust of wind towards him and the pistol flew far away. 

"Thanks," said Eren. 

Eren lifted the earth in front of us, creating a wall between us and the soldiers. I jumped up and shot some more air at them, and some more weapons went flying out of the circle of flames. But some of the soldiers had a strap on their guns, which were looped around their arms, so when I attacked them their weapons stayed, but were still pushed behind them and out of their hands so that I had enough time to retreat behind the wall. 

When I came back, Mike was standing next to Eren, having just arrived to deliver some news. 

"Mike?" I started. 

"Me and Ymir are with Sasha and Connie. The labs are empty right now, and they've managed to get in and are destroying the place as we speak. So no other thing like that can be made again," he said, nodding his head at Mikasa. But as he did so his eyes went blank. 

"What's wrong?" I asked, looking to where he was looking. 

Mikasa was water shifting. I didn't notice anything, but whatever it was had upset Mike a great deal. 

"That stance. She's... she's..."

Levi turned and noticed Mike staring and smirked evily. 

"Ah, have you noticed? We used your lovely wife's shifting abilities and transferred them all to her."

I watched Annie, busy throwing large shots of fire towards Mikasa, who then moved the earth underneath her and hit her with a harsh shot of air. Annie landed on her feet, but looked distressed, as though Mikasa was actually posing a threat to her. I chewed my lip, especially as I watched Annie get up and the necklace had moved from under her clothing and was visible.

"Armin! Mike, please, get out of here, don't let Levi manipulate you," Mike was staring in anger at Levi, but ignored Eren and walked over to Levi. 

Eren was about to follow him when I grabbed his arm. 

"Wait, Eren, come on," I said, pointing at the soldiers who were aiming their pistols and their swords at us. Eren sighed, and turned back to the soldiers. As we emerged behind the wall they started firing, but I made a quick wall of wind between us and none of the bullets hit us. They hit the wall and fell to the ground. 

Eren lifted his arms and the earth underneath them started to crack and a huge deep hole formed underneath them. The soldiers started shooting up at us and tried climbing out, but Reiner's rumbling next to us stopped them from doing so. I blew air at some more people holding weapons and some more fell out of their hands. 

I turned and looked at Annie. Half of the forest was on fire, and Annie was jumping from tree to tree, emotionless, as Mikasa tried to hit her with an attack. As powerful as Mikasa was, Annie was faster and could avoid her attacks. 

"Woah, Jesus Christ!" I heard Bertholdt gasped impressively as he looked over at Mike. His anger had gotten the better of him, he was panting angrily and had his arm up in front of him, with Levi floating in a dome of water, drowning, in front of him. 

"You'll pay for what you did," Mike muttered, and we all watched as Levi stopped moving. 

I turned and shot a strong attack down at the soldiers, keeping them downed unable to move. When I looked up, Eren had ran over to help Reiner and Bertholdt. Someone had managed to gash Reiner in the arm, but he had most of Levi's squad unconscious and surrounded by boulders. I stayed in front of the soldiers and kept my arms concentrating on the keeping the wall up. 

As I watched Annie jump down and hit Mikasa with blue flames, Mikasa fell, but was up again straight away. I wanted to help her, but I couldn't. 

I couldn't help but feel like there were a lack of soldiers around. I knew Annie had managed to kill a lot of them when she set the council on fire, but things seemed too easy. 

And as I watched Annie, she looked up for a slight moment at me and we caught eyes for a split second, right before somebody shot me in the back.