IN WHICH ARAMINTA GOES ON HER FIRST
EXPEDITION!
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ARMS TONITE ∕ CHAPTER TEN

         IN HINDSIGHT, MAYBE ARAMINTA SHOULD HAVE KEPT HER MOUTH SHUT. But really, what was the big deal? All she had done was asked Christa if, just for this single training exercise, they could partner up. Just the one! They hadn't worked together before, and she was simply viewing it as an opportunity to get to know her fellow trainee. But of course, Christa's guard dog, Ymir, was not happy about that.

      "What kind of stunt are you trying to pull, Holm? You know Christa and I are always together, go partner with Spuds or something." She had hissed, standing in front of the small blonde protectively. Normally, Araminta might just give in and let them partner up, but the dirty look that rested on Ymir's features made her blood boil.

      "Exactly, you're always together. It's good to try new things, Ymir, partner up with someone else." Araminta retorted, narrowing her gaze at the taller girl.

      "Hey, Ymir, its okay, we can partner up next time--" Christa tried to step in, but was almost immediately cut off.

      "No, Christa, she's clearly just trying to start something."

        "God, you need to relax!" Araminta exclaimed, pointing a finger accusingly at her. By that point, a crowd had begun to form around them, waiting in anticipation for something to happen. Oh, she hadn't meant to cause a scene, but the louder Ymir got, the louder she got.

        "Get your finger out of my face!" Ymir smacked Araminta's hand away, eliciting a collective gasp from everyone around them. Araminta stared at her in shock, lips parted dramatically.

        "Did you seriously just hit me?" She shouted, and honestly she was beginning to wonder where the instructors were. Nobody was stepping in to stop them, not even Marco, which was a bit surprising.

          Ymir shrugged. "Yeah, and I'll do it again." And before Araminta even had a chance to react, a stinging sensation spread throughout her cheek.

No. Way. There was absolutely no way this girl had just slapped her.

Time stood still for a moment, as Araminta held her own palm over the place of impact, staring into Ymir's stupid, smug eyes. The crowd stood still, waiting for her to react. Congratulations to Jean, he was no longer at the top of Araminta's list of people she wanted to punch!

          The only time she'd ever fought someone else was either her sister in a playful manner, or when training with the other cadets. She'd never predicted she would end up fighting someone purely out of anger, but here she was, balling her fist together tightly as she glared at the girl in front of her. She wasn't going to do it, she really wasn't going to sock her stupid face until she heard someone whisper about how Ymir was going to kick her ass.

Like hell she would.

As if her body had been possessed by some anger filled spirit, Araminta let out a large shout, then leapt across the room. If she'd noticed the table directly behind Ymir beforehand, she probably wouldn't have done that, but she hadn't noticed it, so she wasn't able to stop the two of them from falling backwards onto it and furthermore breaking it in half under their weight.

At that moment in time, though, she didn't even stop to think about what she was going to do with a broken table, her focus instead on trying to rip out Ymir's dark hair. She'd gotten a thick chunk of it locked between her fingers, yanking it with all her strength while using her other hand to try and stop her from punching her in the face. She could feel Ymir's fingernails digging into her skin, trying to get her to let go, but managed to keep her grip strong.

"Guys, stop! This is stupid!" Christa's voice was easiest to make out over the chaos that had erupted, but the two of them chose to ignore her pleas. Ymir pulled her hand that was free from Araminta's grasp out from under her legs, and swung it towards her face. Araminta let out a hiss as Ymir's knuckles made contact with her lip, positive she'd just split it open.

"You're dead!" She declared, shifting her leg so she could swing it backwards and kick Ymir as hard as she could muster in the shin. The clawing and kicking and punching went on for some time, neither of them able to get the upper hand on the other at any point. But at the moment, Araminta felt like she was fighting for her life, shouting dramatically and making her peace with the universe in her head...

Thankfully, their fight had finally been interrupted when Keith Shadis broke into the room.

"WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON!?" His voice was like a gun being fired into the air, causing the crowd to scramble away from the scene, and for Araminta to finally release her grip on Ymir's hair. Unfortunately, it seemed she had failed her task, since the brunette's scalp was still in tact. "You two! What in God's name is this?!" He pointed down at them accusingly, then his sunken eyes widened. "You broke a fucking table? Jesus Christ, get up!"

The two of them were on their feet in seconds, and it was then that Araminta was finally able to assess the damage. There was a large cut down the length of her arm, which she assumed was due to the sharp, broken pieces of the table, and on top of that there were crescent shaped marks on her hand from Ymir's fingernails. She gently reached up to touch her lip, only to flinch in pain at the slight contact. Yep, definitely split. But hey, judging by the way Ymir was leaning on one leg more than the other, and the cuts down her arms as well, Araminta had done some damage to her as well.

"You want to explain what's going on?" He asked in a low tone, narrowing his eyes at the pair of them. They stood in silence for a moment, while Araminta tried to search for an explanation that wouldn't get her in trouble, until Ymir had to open her stupid mouth.

"She freaked out and pushed me into a table. I didn't even do anything!" Ymir exclaimed, then turned to look at Christa, who was still standing nearby. "Right, Christa?"

"...R-Right..."

Araminta rolled her eyes. She had no issue talking back to her commander, she did it all the time, but she was so worn out from the physical fight she'd just fought, she couldn't even be bothered to handle a verbal one at that moment in time. Instead she stood quietly, awaiting for whatever punishment to be thrown her way.

"Hmm... I expected better from you, Holm." No he didn't. "You two can stay behind today and clean this mess up. And if I catch either one of you fighting like that again, you're out of the program. You're here to fight Titans, not each other."

"No! It's really my fault, I'll stay and help!" Christa cried out, stepping towards the three of them. "I'll take Ymir's place, it's my fault this all happened, let me do the work!" She practically begged, lacing her fingers together in front of her chest.

Sadies rolled his eyes. "Fine. Ymir, go join your fellow trainees. Lenz and Holm, clean this up and then run laps until we all get back from this exercise. Understood?" Wow, Araminta was surprised he let Ymir off the hook so easily. He must have been in a good mood for once.

"Understood." The two replied in unison. She snuck a glance at Ymir, who was smirking smugly at her before turning and leaving the room.

Bitch.

Keith gave Araminta one last glare before turning to leave the room as well. She scoffed to herself once he was out of earshot, pivoting on her heel to face Christa.

          "Why did you do that? It was her fault, not yours." She inquired, folding her arms across her chest.

         "Well, Ymir has done me a lot of favors, I owed it to her... Plus, I was worried that if it was the two of you alone, you'd just fight again and it would be even worse." The blonde exclaimed, squatting down to begin gathering some of the slivers of wood.

           Araminta followed suit, though continued to eye the girl quizzically. "I don't understand your friendship. You're so kind, and she's..." A bitch, annoying, bossy, defensive, there were a lot of words she could use to describe the demon in question, but she chose to refrain from using them. On top of that, the more she was talking, the worse her lip was beginning to ache.

          "She's not bad once you get to know her... In fact, she can be incredibly selfless at times, she's helped me with a lot." Christa replied matter of factly, straightening up with an arm full of wooden pieces. "She's just... Very protective over me."

"I can tell," Araminta laughed softly to herself, jerking her eyebrows upwards.

"I might be totally off base here, but I honestly think you two are more similar than you think."

Araminta practically snorted. "What makes you think that?"

"I don't know, I just see how protective you are of your friends, like Sasha, and Eren..." She trailed off, shrugging her to herself.

"Yeah, but I'm not a bitch about it... Am I?" Araminta thought to herself for a moment, reflecting back on the time she'd defended her friends. Oh God, maybe she wasn't as bad as Ymir, but she could absolutely be a bitch sometimes. And looking back at how the fight started, she was definitely at fault as well, pushing Ymir closer and closer to the edge. She cringed at the realization.

"It doesn't matter. We all know you're kind and sweet when you want to be, that's all that matters." Christa walked with a skip in her step as they carried the pieces outside, her long hair swinging back and forth. It was rare to see someone stay so positive after everything that has happened in the last five years.

"Well... I guess so." Araminta followed her, looking down at the floor while remaining deep in thought. Then, she had a great idea.

        "Hey, Christa, what's your favorite flower?" Surely someone so kind and graceful had great taste in flora, right? She skipped a step, speeding up so she was next to the shorter girl.

        Christa side eyed her, knitting her eyebrows together and appearing to be thinking hard on the question. "Hm... I think maybe roses. They're soo pretty, and smell so good!" She remarked, sucking in a deep breath through her nose as if a rose was in front of her in that moment. Araminta scrunched up her nose.

It turned out sweet people did not have good taste in flowers.

850. THE 57TH EXPEDITION
BEYOND THE WALLS

      AS ARAMINTA WOULD LEARN, THERES MANY THINGS IN LIFE you don't realize you want so badly until you experience them for the first time. Like the first time she'd answered one of her mothers questions right during homeschooling, the pride that spread through her chest, she'd never realized how much she loved the feeling of being proud until that moment. Or the first time she'd tried a lemon tart from town, and fireworks went off in her mouth.

And now, as she leaned over her horse, with the wind entangling itself with her hair and whipping against her cheeks, the sweet, long-forgotten smell of what she could only describe as freshness, she realized how much she craved the feeling of freedom. If she wasn't a Scout, if there were no giant man eating monsters around every corner, she might spend her whole life out here, in the rolling fields, with the wind in her hair.

        Unfortunately, she was a Scout, and there were giant man eating monsters around every corner.

       The sound of a flare being launched into the air jolted her out of whatever daydream she's concocted up that time. Her eyes darted up into the sky to see a red flare up ahead has been released into the air. Which one was red again? Oh. A sick feeling overwhelmed her as she recalled that it signaled there was a Titan spotted.

        "Stick close to me, girls!" The Scout that was in charge of her--and Christa, who just her luck she had been assigned with--called out to the two of them.

No, Araminta did not hate Christa. In fact, she quite liked the girl. But every time she looked at her stupid, pretty blonde hair, and her annoying, bright and happy smile, she was reminded of all the things that she didn't have, and all the things that probably made Reiner like her so much.

        She gave the reigns a small whip, signaling for the horse to speed up. And just like it had been trained to do, it did exactly that, picking up the pace to get her closer to the older Scout whose name Araminta had already forgotten. Hey, it wasn't her fault she was so awful with names! She had lots of far more important information she needed to retain.

       "I can't believe there's already been a sighting so close! We've only been riding for fifteen minutes!" Christa called out to Araminta, riding up next to her. Araminta glanced over at the girl, before returning her focus to the terrain in front of her.

       "I mean, after the fall of Wall Maria, I'm sure this area is just crawling with loads of Titans." She spoke up, raising her voice so it could be heard over the pounding of their horses hooves against the dirt. Christa didn't respond, seemingly hyper-focused on the task at hand.

       Her grip on the leather reigns resting in her palms tightened, her knuckles become white from how tense she was. There was likely a Titan just past this cluster of cottages, the thought making her stomach do a somersault. She hadn't seen one since the Battle of Trost, and she absolutely was not looking forward to seeing another one again.

But, sure enough, once they broke through the line of cottages, a Titan--nothing big, about an eight meter--appeared to the right, a big, stupid grin taking up most of its ugly face. It stood still as they passed, it's giant eyes following them menacingly. Araminta could feel her heart jump up into her throat, though she tried to force herself to stay calm by taking deep breaths, advice that Reiner had once given her. It seemed they were in the clear, riding past the Titan with no interference.

         They shouldn't have let their guard down.

         Out of seemingly nowhere, the Titan leapt forward, and snatched the other Scout off his horse. Araminta froze, staring up at the Scout who was squirming to get his hands on his blades. It was Marina all over again, being stuffed into a titan's mouth while there was nothing she could do. Well, there was something she could do. But, based on the Scout's shaking head upon seeing her place her hands on her ODM gear, she knew it would end up doing more harm than good.

          Instead, she scrambled and dug through the bag attached to her saddle, hands shaking as she searched for the right flare. Christa was shouting something, but Araminta couldn't hear her over her horse's hooves against the ground and her own blood pumping loudly in her ears. Ah, a red one, perfect! She stuffed it into the flare gun she'd been given, then released a pillar of red smoke up into the air.

          Her focus finally returned to the Titan, which had apparently devoured the Scout while she hadn't been looking. Her heart dropped at the sight of blood splattered across the Titan's ugly face, staining its abnormally sized teeth. "Christa, stay close! We have to stick together!" Her voice cracked as she called out to the blonde, once again tugging on the reins.

           Soon Christa was directly besides her, her blue eyes hollow as she stared ahead of her. "He... He just died... And we did nothing..." She mumbled, the emotion drained from her body.

       "Hey! Focus!" Araminta snapped, fighting back a cry bubbling up in her throat. "We couldn't have done anything, we would have just gotten eaten, too. Right now, we just need to focus on getting the hell away from that Titan, and finding another group!" She glanced over her shoulder, seeing the titan was once again stilled behind them.

      "Right..." Christa sniffled, reaching up to swipe at her nose. "Okay. We should keep an eye out for other flares, right? So we can see where other people are?" She asked with a shaky voice, taking a deep breath. Araminta wondered if she'd gotten the same advice from Reiner, and wrinkled up her nose at the thought.

      "Yeah. Hopefully that Titan doesn't chase after us, we just... Need to get... Far away..." She deepened her own breaths, trying not to stress about the possibility of the Titan sneaking up on them the way it had before.

        "But... What if it does chase after us?" Christa inquired in a small voice.

         Araminta sighed, biting down on her bottom lip. What was she going to do? She was supposed to use her training and ODM gear to take it down, but she was still a recruit, would it be smart for her to do so without a senior Scout by her side? Had they even gone over this during preparation for this mission? They probably did, but her mind had probably been on something else at the time. Honestly, who would have expected her leader to get taken down within twenty minutes of their mission?

        "I guess... We just hope it doesn't chase us." She decided.

          For the next five minutes, they rode in silence, while Araminta repeated silent prayers to whatever god there might be that the stupid Titan would might his own business and leave them alone. God, she hasn't even bothered to learn the Scout's name, but now he was dead.

Luckily, whatever prayers she had been repeating over and over in her head like a mantra seemed to work, as once they'd made it over the hill that laid in front of them, there were no signs of the Titan. A huge sigh escaped from her lips, and her muscles began to relax. It was probably way too premature for her to let her guard down and risk getting blindsided again, but now that their small squad leader was gone, she needed to keep a level head. And stressing about something that was likely not going to happen again was not keeping a level head.

Now that they were in the clear, Araminta began to slow her horse, and in turn Christa began to do the same. If there was one thing that Araminta had observed about the petite blonde, it was that she was definitely not the leadership type. Now, Araminta wasn't necessarily sure she had the perfect personality to be a leader either, but she was sure she was more capable of leading than Christa. Which meant she needed to step up.

"Okay..." She breathed out, and began to chew the inside of her cheek. "I think we just continue ahead, and stay alert... We can't be that far from another group, right?" She reasoned, looking over to Christa for approval.

         "Yeah, I think so." She spoke plainly. Based on the horrified expression that lingered on her features, it seemed she had not fully recovered from what had just happened.

Araminta sighed, pursing her lips. "Hey. We did the..." She paused, wanting to say the right thing, but honestly she wasn't so sure it was the right thing. So, instead she opted for "the smart thing. Like I said, this was the best thing we could have done. We probably would have died if we tried to help him." She attempted to reassure her.

          "I know, I know." Christa muttered, lowering her head. "It still sucks."

            "Yeah."

            They rode in silence, having slowed their horses down in an attempt to conserve their energy. It was just the two of them, lost and alone without any sign of other people, having to remain extremely vigilant in case some Titan surprised them again. It reminded Araminta of the day she'd fought Ymir, and it had just been the two of them while everyone else was out training together. And then, for whatever reason, she thought about Eren, her training buddy. Was he alright? They'd told her he was in the left wing, the complete other side of the formation. As of now, she had no way of knowing if he was okay.

           "Araminta, look!" Before she had a chance to ponder the subject any further and probably begin imagining all kinds of horrible scenarios, Christa was pointing up to the right of them, where a black tower of smoke had been released high up into the air. Abnormal Titan spotted.

            "What the hell?" She asked, narrowing her eyes. It looked like the source was far up ahead, so for now they had nothing to worry about. But still, she couldn't help the sick feeling that arose in her stomach.

          "There might be another squad up there... But we shouldn't go towards a black smoke signal, right?" Christa looked over to her, raising an eyebrow quizzically.

           "Um--no. Probably not a good idea. Let's just take it slow, and see what happens." She responded, straightening up. Her gaze drifted to the left of them, and once again she began to wonder about Eren. What if Captain Levi had a moment where the demon possessing him came out, and he killed Eren? No, Levi wasn't a demon, she'd already figured that out. But still.

           "Do you think Er--I mean--the left wing, is alright? We haven't heard anything from that side yet." The question slipped from her lips before she could stop herself. Ugh, she probably sounded so stupid right now, she couldn't help the redness that flooded her cheeks out of pure embarrassment.

           "Uh... I think so. Ymir is in that wing, y'know." Christa spoke hesitantly, her eyes widening. "God, I hope they're okay. I mean, we would have seen some kind of signal from over there if they weren't okay, right?"

           "Yeah. You're right. It's fine." She shook her head, trying to shake those stupid thoughts out while she was at it. At least with Sasha, she knew she was close by, so she didn't have to worry too much about her friend. But Eren was so far away, she couldn't help but worry about her old training partner.

          "Can I ask you something?" Christa asked randomly, a question that made Araminta narrow her eyes.

         "Um... Sure."

          "Do you like Reiner?"

          Araminta almost choked.

          "What?! Why would you even say that? I don't--"

          "I saw how you kept looking over when we were riding together on the way to headquarters." Uh oh. "At first I thought you were mad at me, but I could also see the way you were looking at him. You like him, don't you?"

          Araminta scrunched up her nose, growing annoyed that Christa was pressing her about this. "Why are you even asking me about it right now?"

         "I don't know, it's just easier to talk about stupid stuff like boys than it is to think about the fact our squad leader just died, and we have no idea how our friends are. If you don't want to talk about it, I understand, I just wanted a distraction." She mumbled the last part, lowering her head. Araminta really didn't want to discuss her dumb crush on Reiner right now, but she could also agree it was a good distraction.

          "...Fine. Yes. I do. But you can't tell him." She pointed a finger at Christa, and at first she laughed innocently at the gesture, but stopped when Araminta narrowed her eyebrows. "I'm serious."

          "Don't worry, I'm not going to tell him. And you should know, I don't like him. Not like that."

          "Yeah, I thought so." Araminta mumbled, shifting her body to face forward again. "But he likes you."

           "I think he just thinks he likes me. A lot of people think I'm this perfect... Goddess or something--including him. I think... If he actually took the time to know me, he wouldn't be so in love with this idea of me."

Huh, Araminta had never heard Christa talk like this before. Truthfully she was also one of those people who thought Christa was a perfect goddess, since that was what she presented herself to be. But in that moment, she saw the girl as what she really was: human. Just like her.

"Also... I think if he knew you liked him, it would change his perspective on everything. He would probably really like you, too, but he's too blind to see it." She smiled.

            "Ahh... I doubt that. I'm not sure I'm his type." Araminta shrugged, and extended her back in an attempt to stretch it out.

             Christa frowned. "Hey, don't sell yourself short. You're smart, brave, not to mention very kind... When you want to be. He'd have to be crazy for you not to be his type."

              Araminta laughed, shaking her head. Okay, now Christa was just straight up lying to her. She new better than anyone that she was definitely not all of those things. She was prepared to start a tangent about all the reasons Christa was so very wrong, and Reiner could never be into someone like her, but something else stole her attention before she got the chance.

It was a clicking--no, clacking sound, coming from her left. She furrowed her brows together, slowing her horse down to a stop and looking over to see the source of the sound. "What...?" She could see something in the distance, and squinted her eyes in hopes of getting a better view.

"Are those..." Christa stopped next to her, holding her hand over her forehead to shield her eyes.

"Horses."

omg finally updated 😍 this is one of
my least favorite chapters i've written
so far but you know what i don't care
anymore yessss 👍👍 i am just trying
to get to the interesting stuff!!

so cute arachrista bonding we love to
see it!!! but let me tell you the chapter
after the next things are picking up i'm
so excited for that

anyways luv u all thx for reading 💋