Doubt

The quick, sharp sound of a knife hitting the cutting board kept ringing throughout the house as dad briefed the supposedly pregnant woman on her diet and habits.

The girl, Mikasa with her beady little curious eyes kept glancing at me from time to time.

No longer wishing to be a part of this ridiculous situation, I got up and sneaked out of the house only to see her coming out soon after.

'How'd she notice me going out?'

"You got something to say?" I crossed my arms and looked straight at her while saying so.

She puffed up her cheeks in a cute manner in response. "You didn't tell me what your name was. Mom said that's a rude thing to do!" The round eyes sparkled in amusement as if she had caught a thief red-handed.

'Couldn't care less missy.'

"Eren Yeager." Well, I can't be so mean to little girls, so I just gave her what she wanted. It seemed to work since she cracked up a bright smile signifying some sort of childish victory over me.

'Cute.'

Does she think she outsmarted me or something?

"So what do you usually do here for entertainment?" I asked her looking around to find something interesting.

She seemed caught off guard at that and fumbled around with her words before pointing at the tree, a few meters from us. "I climb trees!."

Silence.

Without letting out a sound, I looked at her dead straight in the eyes until she slowly turned red.

'Ha! I win.' Thinking so, I revealed the same smile she had, to rub some salt on this wound of hers.

Seeing me smile like that, her embarrassment faded just as quickly as it came as she took my hand and ran towards the tree with a pissed face. "It's really fun. Come on, I'll show you!".

Now, I know I shouldn't tease her so much but at this point, she was just asking for it. "You sure you're not saying that because you're a brute monkey?"

"HEY!" She pulled harder on me, refusing to look back.

"Your ears are red," I said in a smug tone, knowing I was successful in teasing the kid.

...

Sitting on the tree branch with Mikasa beside me, we talked about our daily lives and other random things, until it was time to go home.

My father still hadn't gotten over his weird mood yet, he seemed a bit traumatized.

.....Yea I'm going to ignore that, worst case scenario is him turning crazy.

"I want to play with eren a bit longer~ " Mikasa whined to her mother, only to be shot down instantly.

"C'mon Eren. It's getting late. Your mother would get mad at us if we don't reach home before dark." said dad.

"Well, see ya." I bid them farewell and got onto the carriage.

...

"Is something wrong dad?" I asked him in a concerned tone. His face seemed to be getting paler by the second. Occasionally he would mumble out random incoherent words.

If not for my haki telling me he was just having a mental breakdown, I would've brought him to an exorcist. Though I don't know if exorcists still exist.

Getting rid of ghosts does not seem like a very lucrative business when the world is infested with titans.

"...." He stopped for a second and looked at me as if I were an alien.

'Doubt.'

The emotion burst out from him, hitting me like a tsunami. The cold feeling of alienation washed over me, but I didn't mind that.

I wouldn't blame them if they despised me after knowing that I hijacked their unborn child's body.

The only pressing fact was how he came to know this.

I could've accepted it if he had doubted me ever since I started talking, it's not possible to impeccably imitate a child. Only a parent would know his or her child best.

However, that didn't happen. It felt like something intervened....but what?

"Da-"𝙎𝙇𝘼𝙋

The sound of him slapping me reverberated through the open plains. The burning sensation didn't even last a second but it did hurt emotionally.

I saw the hand coming from a mile away, but I couldn't get myself to move.

"You're...not....eren. You are doing nothing similar to the eren I saw."

....Wait.....brainwashing?

"This is not how things are supposed to be like."

"Dad calm down. Tell me what's happening so we can fix this together." I held him by the shoulders and shook him while saying so.

"What is happening to this iteration? Something...no....someone is different from the visions." He mumbled with red eyes and looked at me as if I was a criminal.

Shaking my hands off his body he got up and held me by the collars. "Who are you?"

I didn't know what to say at this point.

On one hand, he was right that I am not eren, on the other hand, he seems to have figured it out through some voodoo shit.

"I'm your son."

"LIES!"

His grip tightened and he stretched out his arm to punch me.

𝙏𝙝𝙪𝙙.

The small weak hands landed on my face.

"Years of hard work wasted."

𝙏𝙝𝙪𝙙.

"You changed the future."

𝙏𝙝𝙪𝙙.

"You changed history."

𝙏𝙝𝙪𝙙.

"DO YOU HAVE ANY IDEA WHAT YOU HAVE DONE, YOU FREAK!"

𝙏𝙝𝙪𝙙.

"Give him back....give me back my son." He dropped down to his knees after that.

I wanted to say something to him, but anything at this point would seem like torture to him.

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