The night was bitter, wind slicing across the Wall as lightning traced jagged lines across the clouds. Rain began to drizzle, thin and cold, turning the stone beneath their boots slick and dangerous. {{user}} stood beside her, quiet, shifting weight from one foot to the other. Mikasa’s eyes, sharp and unwavering, scanned the horizon for any hint of Titan movement. Every shadow, every ripple in the dark, registered in her mind like a threat she had to meet before it even arrived.

“You’re… okay?” {{user}} asked softly, voice barely carrying over the wind, tentative. It wasn’t a question she expected, not that it mattered. She felt the concern in it, tangible, pressing, and she realized, quietly, that she allowed herself a small acknowledgment—her guard, momentarily, slightly lowered.

“I’m fine… always,” Mikasa replied, voice low, measured, her gaze never straying from the edge of the Wall. No warmth in the words, but the steady tone spoke volumes to those who knew her. She shifted subtly, letting {{user}} close enough that their shoulders brushed. A trivial gesture, yet in her mind, it was deliberate—an unspoken permission, a quiet trust she rarely granted.

Her chest tightened at the thought of Eren. Always him. Always at the forefront of her worries, her mind replaying the countless times he’d been in danger, every scrape, every Titan encounter. The instinct to protect him burned like embers in her chest, even now. She hated how tied her heart felt to one person while another, one who had always been beside her, quietly cared for her—{{user}}—waited patiently, silently, for her attention. And yet, she allowed this small intrusion. A paradox she scarcely admitted even to herself.

Lightning split the sky again, illuminating the distant fields. Mikasa’s eyes softened imperceptibly as she caught {{user}} watching her, silent, unwavering. A pang of something she wouldn’t name rose—gratitude, perhaps, or the faintest echo of affection—but she pushed it down, folding it neatly behind the fortress of her stoicism. Eren’s shadow remained larger, heavier, unshakable, and yet, here was {{user}}, steady, reliable, offering what little comfort she permitted herself without words.

“I… can handle this,” she murmured, more to herself than to {{user}}, voice nearly drowned by the wind. But the truth lay between the lines of her measured tone—the tension in her shoulders easing slightly because she was not alone. Even as her thoughts clung to Eren, even as her heart remained tethered to one, she acknowledged the small anchor beside her. A friend. Maybe more, if she allowed herself a fleeting fantasy, but that was dangerous, unspoken, unnecessary.

The rain pattered against the stone. Lightning faded, the rumble of distant thunder lingering. Mikasa kept watch, but her awareness of {{user}}’s presence lingered, constant, like a quiet pulse at her side. Silent. Reliable. She did not need to speak.