Chasing Ghosts

Shiganshina is an imitation of itself. With the streets scrubbed of blood and the buildings reconfigured into a "more suitable" modern design, its reconstruction feels more like an erasure of its history. Armin's eidetic memory picks at the details: the houses flanking the entrance are a story shorter, the road is paved a darker shade of grey, and the map on the wall nearest him is an unfamiliar spider web of infrastructure.

He walks through the roads, tracing the steps of ghosts with each step. He's a wisp of a person following vague muscle memory through mostly empty streets. He runs his fingers along the walls of buildings and closes his eyes, allowing himself to be taken back to a time that nostalgia paints in simple, broad strokes.

His biggest threats used to be school yard bullies.

How many of the people who tormented him for so long made it through the first breach?

How many people who he caught glimpses of on the street died meters away from where he stands?

All those simple numbers announced in reports and scribbled in files don't do the bloodshed justice.

--

hi!!! this is my first time posting on Wattpad. I hope you all enjoy! Shoutout to one of my very best girlfriends for helping with ideas for some of the scenes <333

i have a longer hs-au fic (with a fun twist) that i'm working on, so if you're interested, feel free to be on the look-out for that.