trost | AEFENGLOM IC INBOX ... fellas

[ He already knows this is a misfire. ] Wrong number, Mikasa.

[ What she's making looks pretty cute so far. ] -- Knit work?

Jean? [There's a delay as she looks again. Well this is what she got for trying to multi-task.]

Embroidery. [drly. Jean those are two very different things, if she'd been knitting with thread that fine she'd be working on it for years.] I got offered a job.

[ He knows nothing about this, let him live. Reiner did the sewing for the dudes back then. ]

Oh. At a tailor shop?

Yes. She opened up at the start of the week. It's part-time so I'll still need to pick up odd jobs off of the board.

[She couldn't wait for the day were she didn't just leak money.]

I should probably start looking for something more permanent myself. There's no guarantee the odd jobs off the board will always be there.

[ He likes stability, even if the variety those odd jobs brought with them was nice also. ]

What are you embroidering?

I've been told that they're always looking for people. [Didn't change that she'd rather have some idea of where she was month per month. It was different to the constant traveling with the scouts]

I'm supposed to be making a copy of an old tapestry. They want a copy to put on display so they can hide the original... I was given a picture to copy, but it seems so bright.

[Do people really hang this stuff up in their homes?]

I'm not very useful in the sewing department. [ He's more useful for physical labour, but he's not sure how much of that is needed in a tailoring business. ]

But yeah, those colours are ... brighter than what we normally wear.

[Mikasa was a multipurpose worker, she could sew and lug around bolts of fabric... But with monsters like turnskin around, she was outclassed at lifting. ] You'll find something. You're smart... I just like to keep moving.

They are... It's amazing some of the things they put effort into here. And what they have... If you buy a meal, you don't have to pay extra for salt.

[Salt Jean! The most minor of things here instead of a luxury. ]

That's what happens when a society is allowed to develop peacefully. [ More or less peacefully, at least. He knows the outer city has a rougher time. However it is, it's still better than home. ]

Other countries in our world ... are probably a little like this. [ The Marlayans outside the internment zone looked quite well to do, at least. ]

I told you before, they can live outside the walls here...[Still a great testament to how safe it was. That people could live out there and travel pretty freely when the scouts had been considered suicidal idiots for going out.]

Were...They were like this...[She sighs and that got from 0 to 100 on the depression scale very quickly.]

There's still time when we return. [ Thanks, Mikasa. He was doing a nice job pushing most of his worries about home away in favour of enjoying the respite Aefenglom offered them. ]

...[She might have been talking to someone else about that. How it felt like they had no time. Even if she'd spent more than six months here now, longer than the time it'd taken for their world to change all those years ago.

She wouldn't remember what she'd learnt here...]

Did it look better from the time you're from..? The walls had only just broken when I arrived...Maybe it looked worse to me then...

[If that meant much.]

The walls are gone. We took some time regrouping before deciding to go find Eren. I hadn't actually seen it -- the state of the other countries.

[ He doesn't know what they look like, but if Eren's crossed the seas, he can imagine the kind of devastation they would be in. It felt like the end of their world when the walls were breached those many years back and the titans got into their country. To the people of the other countries, it might actually be their end. ]

-- I wasted so much of our time. [ Deciding if he was for or against the cause. Doing as Floch says. He's realising now that every single minute they waited was one thousands of people would die for. They really don't have time after all. ]

[There's a pause there. It's a small hope, one that deep down she knows was useless. But couldn't dismiss.]

Didn't we all..? I should have said something when I noticed. [That he'd been crying. But then he'd thrown her off, then the party after... It had been so much unlike the rest of their lives that she thought it'd be alright.]

I guess it's a good job we can see this place...

You noticed ...? [ What Eren was apparently planning, the way his thoughts had shifted. Eren chose the option none of them even thought was an option, and Jean did not expect that he was capable of it. ]

When did you notice?

When..? [Time was on odd thing. Because now, it seemed so obvious that they'd missed it. Eren growing quieter, something she'd dismissed as him maturing.] I don't know... Before he left I found him crying.

I didn't notice anything that day. We all had a drink together.

[ There was laughing, shouting and glasses being clinked together. He even remembers getting way too up close and personal with other people than he normally would. It's one of the few times they've had fun on a survey mission. ]

It looked like he was enjoying himself too. [ So suddenly losing Eren came as a surprise to everyone. ]

[It gets a hum. But no elaboration, she wasn't going to mention the conversation they'd had before the old man had interrupted, before the others had come looking.]

Did he..? I remember laughing and hugging Armin... [And maybe an awkward huddle dance with him and Sasha where all parties had been too drunk to do much other than hug and stumble. And sleeping, she remembered curling up next to Eren. But she wasn't the best with booze so most of it was blur.]

I should get back to work...

AEFENGLOM IC INBOX ... fellas

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