Chapter Text
February 1, 853
560 Days Before the Rumbling
“You have no chance with her, dude.”
Armin looks up from his ledger, his bubble of peace disturbed by Connie practically shoving Jean into the seat next to him.
“Oh, come on,” Jean grumbles in response. “It’s not even that serious. I don’t need your commentary.”
The library of the military’s headquarters in Stohess District had been quiet, save for the occasional scratch of Armin’s pen. He had been redoing some tables related to the Scouts’ finances for the past half hour. Not because anyone had asked him to, but because the formatting was a mess and it would bother him until it was fixed. But now…
Connie sits across from Armin, sporting a wide grin. His collar is askew, and his tie hangs loose like he’d fought it and won. “Armin, do you think Jean has a chance with—” He mouths your name.
“Oh, for the love of…hush. People can hear you.” Jean puts his head in his hands. The ticking of the grandfather clock in the corner is louder than their voices, at least at present. “It was a joke, Connie, I’m not going to ask her out. I'm comfortable as a bachelor.”
Hm. Interesting. This crush must either be very new, or Armin hasn't been paying as much attention to his friends recently as he should be. Has Jean gotten over Mikasa after all this time?
Armin doesn’t look up right away. He finishes the row he was filling out and then leans back slightly in his chair. The winter sunlight filtering in through the tall, ornate windows warms his chest under his white cotton shirt.
“Ask her out to what? A duel?” Armin asks at last. Connie and Jean had poked fun at each other over their fair share of girls the past year or so, now that the lot of them see more humans than titans on a daily basis. But it was all in good fun. Never serious.
Jean groans. “Not you, too.”
“Come on, let’s strategize.” Connie rubs his hands together conspiratorially, like a fly. “Jean here is gonna need all the help he can get. This lady's high-class.”
Jean shrugs, like it isn’t a big deal, but Armin can read Jean better than any book in the library—and something about today feels different.
“First of all,” Connie says, “she’s out of your league. Second, if Sasha finds out, she's not gonna be as subtle about it as I am.”
Armin casts a quick glance around the room, but the object of Jean's affections is nowhere to be seen.
"You call this subtle?" Jean rolls his eyes, drumming his fingers on the mahogany table. “Again, it’s not that serious. I’m not gonna do it.”
Connie ignores him, eyes wide with delight. “But, there are ways to spin this. She’s a noble’s daughter, sure, but who says you can’t be her knight in shining armor?”
“Come on," Jean mutters. "Nobody cares about who's noble and who's not anymore. So what if she can spend more money on civvies? She's still a Scout." He slings an arm over the back of his chair and sighs. "And it’s not like I’m proposing. Just thinking of asking her to go with me to Mikasa’s surprise party. Which I'm still not finished planning.”
“You’ve got to turn on the charisma, make it clear that you’re into her," Connie continues. "She already hangs out with you, man. Whatever happens, it'll be fun to watch it go down."
This much is true. You’d quickly become an auxiliary member of the Jean-Sasha-Connie trio after transferring from the MPs to the Scouts ten months prior. The friendship was inevitable: Sasha had been assigned as your transfer mentor, and soon enough, another bubbly personality had joined the clamor of voices at the breakfast table every morning. Most of the ex-MPs had made the switch just after Historia's coronation (and had died at Shiganshina), or the arrival of the Volunteers two years ago, and the more recent acquisitions tended to be younger. Thus, your eager-to-learn self had integrated well into the Regiment's daily habits and drew a bit more notice from your superiors. You were running drills and learning Marleyan cursive with the Special Operations Squad after a few months.
Armin, however, hasn't paid you as much thought as he ought to grant to polite company. It isn't that he doesn't like you—you seem nice, surprisingly studious, perform your work well, and aren't as snooty as one might expect from the way Connie likes to joke about your "posh upbringing." Your easy rapport with Sasha, despite your vastly different backgrounds, was proof enough of that at the start. And your presence has been far from jarring, especially among the bustle of all three branches of the military at Stohess Fortress, far more integrated than they used to be.
But Armin has had a lot on his mind. Which is the real reason why he'd been erasing and redrawing financial graphs for the better part of an hour. It's a brief solace, simply to keep his sanity. Because when he isn't moving, isn't writing, isn't planning, all that's left to think about is living on borrowed time, the nightmares and memories that greet him every time he shuts his eyes, the way Eren has changed, the way everything's changed—
“I think you should do it,” Armin says suddenly. Jean and Connie both perk up, eyebrows raised. “If you ask her seriously, she’ll take it seriously.”
"'Serious' isn't a word I'd use to describe her," Connie protested. "She's cool. You should hang out with us all together more often, Armin. She sometimes smuggles us back champagne from those fundraisers Zachary sends her to."
Armin trudges on. "I obviously don't know her as well as you do, but she comes to a lot of briefings that she's not required to be at. She takes notes." He furrows his brow, trying to conjure a hazy mental image of the last time he'd seen you tucked in the back of a conference chamber. "I guess she might be more serious than you give her credit for. You could always just tell her how you feel. But again—I don't know her very well, so don't take my word for it."
Jean opens his mouth to speak, but Connie cuts in with, "Wait, what briefings? She goes to briefings?"
Armin shrugs. "Uh...stuff about construction at the port. And the railroad. Some negotiation strategy forums that I've had to speak at with Hange."
"Huh, she never talks about those," Connie says, with new interest. "Look at her, working overtime. Who'd have thought?"
“Anyway," Jean says with a sigh. "Back to the matter at hand—" He fiddles with a loose thread on the upholstery of his chair, not quite meeting Armin's gaze. “You really think I should just ask her? You don’t think she’s just gonna laugh in my face?”
Armin's eyes drop to the ledger again. The irony of someone with more romantic experience asking him for advice when the only mutual crush he'd ever had ended in the deaths of over one hundred civilians in Stohess...
“If you want to ask her," Armin says, "ask her. I really don’t think she’ll laugh at you. And if she does, she wasn't worth it, anyway.”
“I just don’t want to..." Jean trails off, bouncing his leg restlessly under the table. "...ruin our friendship by being weird. I'd rather just be her friend than risk it.”
Connie stands and braces himself with both hands against the table. "That attitude will get you nowhere."
"I thought you said I had no chance with her?" Jean argues.
"I did, and you don't—" Connie says, dropping his voice to a whisper. "Unless...we get more intel about how your crush feels."
“Absolutely not," Jean says at once, jabbing a finger into Connie's arm. "You are not subtle."
"Can't you ask Sasha?" Armin suggests.
"Uh-uh," Connie says. "Girl code wins out in situations like this."
Jean puts his head in his hands. "And she'd be even less subtle than Connie."
The ledger shifts back into focus, and Armin realizes that he’s been absentmindedly doodling in the corner of the page. He erases the grey square he’d drawn, and snaps the book shut. “I could try.”
“Really? You’d do that?” Jean asks. "You and her aren't really friends, so I don't know how much she'll say..."
"If anyone can figure it out," Connie adds, "it's Armin."
“It's really no trouble," Armin insists. "Come to think of it, she spends a lot of time in the library. I can definitely find an excuse to chat with her, see if she's into anyone.”
Jean nods and claps him on the shoulder. “You're the best, Armin. Just don’t be too obvious about it.”
“Wouldn’t dream of it, Jean,” he replies.
And thus, the plan is set in motion.