Companions to the End Chapter 1

Mid-Summer, 850 – The graduation of the 104th Cadets

It was finally time.

After three gruelling years of training, they had finally graduated. This would be their last night as cadets, since tomorrow they would be shipped out to Trost to decide which of the three Regiments that they'd be committing their lives to: Scouting Regiment, Garrison, or the Military Police.

To celebrate surviving the intensive training, they were holding a small party, where for once in the last three years, the higher ups were being somewhat lax with their rations: allowing the Cadets to drink their fill and eat their weight in food for what could be the last time in their lives before giving their lives in the fight against the Titans.

The party was happening in a small bar near the training centre where they spent the last three years, and they were having a grand old time, drinking away their sorrow at the fact that they were most likely going to die.

Or at least most of them were.

In one of the small booths in the bar, all the way in the far corner from the entrance, sat three cadets who weren't really interested in partying and drinking. There was a blonde, a brunet, and a dark haired in the trio, conversing amongst themselves.

This was the trio of Armin, Eren, and Mikasa; survivors of Shiganshina and were the best of friends.

Eren was the strong-headed one of the group, prone to acting before thinking and who acts with an overwhelming passion. Despite being very prone to bursts of anger, Eren is a caring soul at heart, even if it is hard to see underneath his berserker-like-rage. Ever since Eren lost his mother at the hands of the Smiling Titan, he swore to wipe every last one of them out, or die trying. However, he does have another reason for wanting to wipe the Titans out, and that was for his friends.

He wanted the world to be explorable to humans again, without having to live in fear. He wanted Mikasa, the person who always watched his back and made sure he was ok, even if it pissed him off to no end, to be able to live a quiet life in a cottage, just like she had before those bastard slave-traders ruined her life. Despite the fact she babied him constantly, Eren had come to accept that this was just because she cared about him, and that this was her way of expressing it. He would get annoyed at her and shout at her from time-to-time, but they have both reached a point of understanding that it doesn't actually mean anything. Eren was the 5th best Cadet in the 104th, something that he was very proud of.

Mikasa was the mother-hen of the trio, looking out for Eren and Armin to make sure that they were ok. If anyone so much as looked at them wrong, she'd be there to introduce them to the ground before they could even realise how badly they messed up. While she will never admit it, she will do this to Eren much more than Armin, not because she didn't care for Armin, but because she had been harbouring feelings for Eren ever since he offered her the red scarf that she still wears to this day: a symbol of the home that Eren had become.

She was an absolute beast, being the muscle of the group. While Eren was the one who started fights, Mikasa was the one who finished them, being able to throw people who weighed twice as much as her as if they were little more than sacks of potatoes. This, and her natural talent at seemingly everything she does, made her the best Cadet in the 104th, outperforming everyone else by a long shot.

Armin was the brains, he was able to see reason when the others were willing to throw it to the wind, preferring to use their fists. However, despite being very timid and shy, he was very capable of being as cruel and manipulative as the situation demands if it means looking after his friends. Before they became Cadets, the trio had to survive on next to no food for up to two years, and they didn't even have the essentials needed to survive half the time. If it weren't for Armin's ability to manipulate and deceive people, they might not have survived long enough to get to cadet training.

Armin is also a master of opportunity, taking advantage of events that happen on the fly, and is capable of making sure he and his companions are better off. As a matter of fact, Jean (someone that has been feuding with Eren since they became Cadets and has endlessly harassed Mikasa for a date) has been suffering from a case of disappearing rations for over a year now, while Eren and Mikasa have each been receiving an extra half-loaf of bread for about the same amount of time (which Jean has yet to realise). While he didn't make the top ten in the cadets, he was easily the smartest cadet in the 104th, clearly destined for a role as a scientist of strategist in one of the Regiments.

While these three were conversing, and reminiscing of their childhood, a few of the other cadets had begun to come over. While the Shiganshina trio had mostly stuck together throughout their cadet days, they did branch out and make new friends in the cadets.

Amongst these were the duo of Reiner and Bertholdt, a pair that stuck together much like the Shiganshina trio did. Reiner was very combat oriented, always going on about being a true 'Soldier', and he naturally hit it off with Eren. Bertholdt on the other-hand, while he was still very skilled at using the ODM (Omni-Directional-Manoeuvre) Gear, was much more comfortable with the bookwork they had to do, making him a natural friend of Armin's.

Mikasa on the other-hand, much to the surprise of the others, got along with the bottomless pits called Connie and Sasha. She found that they were useful to her as scapegoats for when Eren got into trouble, and while she may not admit it out-loud, to ANYONE (not even Eren can know), she found them genuinely funny. She was able to get them to go along with it because she'd repay them with food afterwards.

They also hung out with the duo of Jean and Marco, despite the fact that they didn't really get along with Jean (Marco, on the other hand, was an absolute delight).

There was another duo that commonly hung out with the Shiganshina trio, and that was Ymir and Krista. These two weren't the most talkative people they knew, and while they did hang out occasionally, they seemed to prefer hanging out with each other, which they had no issue with.

The most surprising addition to their group was the reclusive, and extremely dangerous Annie. At first, she avoided literally everyone like they had the plague. But then Eren started training with her, admitting that she was not only the better fighter but someone he admired for their strength (this led to some coldness from Mikasa until she realised she was someone else that he, somewhat begrudgingly, admired her strength as well). While unaffected at first, she eventually started briefly interacting with the trio and actually started getting along with them. Her and Eren were always talking about different styles, her and Mikasa were actually able to mutually understand one another and talk about the stress that was dealing with dozens of egotistical, testosterone filled teenage boys harassing them.

The one she got along with the most was surprisingly Armin, despite how timid he was. She respected his drive to survive and protect those he cared about, and that even though he can't do anything physically, he still finds a way to help them (she had figured out what he had done to Jean a long time, but said nothing). That, and the fact that he was just so friendly. She had never interacted with someone who was so easy to talk to and be with, so she didn't really know what to do to reciprocate it. However, when she saw a few cadets trying to attack him when Eren and Mikasa were elsewhere, she found a way to reciprocate his kindness. So, from then on, the two were usually together.

At the party, Annie, Marco, and Bertholdt had decided to sit with the reclusive trio, with Marco and Bertholdt listening intently to the stories of Shiganshina while Annie sat very closely to Armin. Krista and Ymir had left the party a while ago, more interested in heading back to the barracks than partying. Reiner was busy trying to flirt with some of the girl cadets at the bar, Connie and Sasha were devouring everything they could get their hands on, and Jean was busy storming up to the table.

Wait a minute…

"Mikasa! Can I have a word?" Jean practically bellowed, but it didn't seem as loud as he intended with the noise of the drunk cadets drowning him out.

Now on edge, Eren stood up, ready to confront Jean. "Now listen here, Horse-Face! Talk to her like that again and I'll…" Eren began before Mikasa put her hand up.

"It's fine Eren, he just wants a word. If he tries anything, I'll simply come back." Mikasa stated in a monotone manner, which she often would do when dealing with Jean.

Eren seemed conflicted for a moment, debating whether it would be worth it trying to start an argument or not. Eventually deciding that Mikasa of all people could handle herself, and that if Jean did do anything he could jump in, he nodded to Mikasa and sat back down, continuing the story he was previously telling,

Mikasa excused herself and began to follow Jean outside the bar, not impressed with being dragged away from Eren. When they got outside, Jean turned to Mikasa with a look of exasperation on his face.

"I don't get it, I just don't get it. Why are you wasting your time when we barely have any of it left as it is?" He ground out, seeming to be genuinely confused about whatever it was he was going on about.

At this, Mikasa raised an eyebrow. "What don't you get? The drinking or the feast?"

"Eren! That egotistical twat! I don't get what someone like you, a literal goddess, sees in someone like him, a suicidal idiot!" Jean blurted out, and with those words Mikasa caught a whiff of his breath; he had been drinking, a lot.

"Why shouldn't I hang out with him? He doesn't harass me every other day." Mikasa ground out, now very agitated because of Jean.

"I don't mean hang out as a friend, but romantically. Everyone else might not see it, but I do. You practically follow him around like a dog, and he doesn't even deserve it. You should be with someone like me, we'd be the perfect couple. What does he have that I don't?" Jean spluttered, the alcohol clearly beginning to affect him.

This was when Mikasa started to get angry. "I don't know what you're talking about, but if that were the case, I'd pick him over you because he doesn't treat me like a piece of meat. While he does get angry at me, he doesn't do it to put me down, but because that's just how he is. And you may think of him as a jerk, but I happen to think he's very loyal and would stand up for me no matter what, just like he did a minute ago."

After this statement, she turned to go back to the bar, but as she went to enter, she touched her scarf, and stopped herself from entering to say one last thing.

"When we were kids, my parents were slaughtered in front of me and I was kidnapped. If they had gotten away with me, I'd be nothing more than a sex-slave right now. Eren came and saved me, and I've promised myself that I'd do whatever it takes to repay him for that. You may not like him, but he's my hero, my friend, and most importantly, my home. He deserves my attention more than you ever will."

Having gotten that off her chest, she went back into the bar to enjoy these last few peaceful moments with Eren and Armin, because she didn't know what would happen to them after tomorrow. But she could hope for the best, so with her head held by, she returned to those she held closest to her heart.