Chapter Text
It wasn’t that Armin hated his life.
In fact, his life was pretty good. He was making straight As in the best school in the country on scholarship. The uniform wasn’t awful like Shiganshina High’s had been. He hadn’t been shoved into a locker yet, which was always a plus. Sure, he hadn’t found his soulmate yet– the only other person in the world with a birthmark of a king chess piece– but that was out of anyone’s control.
The thing was… well. Armin had been attending the Reagle Institute for the Cultured and Honorable (R.I.C.H.) for two months already, and he hadn’t made any friends. He had accquaintances; people he shared classes with and people who looked at him funny when he tried to talk to them and people who tried to bribe him into doing their homework.
No friends.
It wasn’t exactly unexpected. The only people who could afford the ridiculous school fees at R.I.C.H. were celebrities and nobles – it was no surprise they thought themselves better than Armin. Even though R.I.C.H. had a scholarship program in theory, Armin was the only scholarship student, and that was largely thanks to his extreme persistence and flawless academic record. (He’d literally called the Dean of Students at least a hundred times a week, demanding a reason as to why they wouldn’t accept him. Armin wasn’t the best at taking no for an answer when it wasn’t justified.)
Well, thought Armin with a sigh as he took his seat in Sociology, he was here to study, not make friends. It was such a little thing, really. Nothing to get all angsty about. It wasn’t lonely.
…
Armin was a terrible liar.
Can’t believe I miss Shiganshina High, he sent glumly to his group chat with Eren and Mikasa. At least there people noticed me enough to shove me into lockers.
Eren should have been in the middle of class, but his reply was (unsurprisingly) instantaneous. u ok?? nd me 2 kick rich kid ass??
, sent Mikasa, who was supposed to be working.
Armin smiled. He still had those two, at least.
“Mr Arlert, no texting in class,” Ms Brzenska said sharply as she came into the classroom. Armin tapped out a quick Thx to his friends before putting his phone away. Ms Brzenska was a great teacher, but she was also one of the strictest. Nobody wanted to get on her bad side.
“Today we’ll be starting on coursework,” announced Ms Brzenska, to a chorus of quiet groans. “Recap for those who’ve forgotten, each pair of students must produce a five-thousand word essay on their chosen topic, complete with footnotes and a bibliography. I have already chosen your partners–”
The class erupted into protest.
“Or you could write all five thousand words on your own,” Ms Brzenska suggested loudly, and the class fell silent. “I thought so.”
Armin bit the inside of his cheek nervously as Ms Brzenska started announcing the pairs. His last project partner had made him do everything and gave him an invite to some B-list celebrity party that she obviously hadn’t wanted to go to as compensation. It hadn’t ended too badly; he really did end up doing everything, but faked a lost voice on the day they had to present it to the class and watched the girl crash and burn. That was what happened when you messed with Armin Arlert. Plus, he’d managed to sell the invite online at a truly ridiculous profit margin and used the money to do his Christmas shopping, so all in all it wasn’t the worst thing that had ever happened to Armin. Still, it wasn’t something he was itching to repeat.
“Hey,” came a grunt from beside him. Armin blinked. To his left, where Armin was used to seeing sleepy Liesl, now sat a tall boy with an undercut and a long face.
Jean Kirschtein. The Crown Prince of Rose himself.
…Why was he talking to Armin?
“Uh, hi,” Armin replied a little awkwardly, waiting for Jean (Prince Jean? The Prince? His Royal Highness? How was Armin supposed to address him?) to state his business.
There was an awkward silence.
Jean rolled his eyes. “If you’re going to get all starstruck, I’m switching partners,” he said shortly, starting to stand up. “This thing is worth half our grade, I don’t have the time–”
“Ah, no, sorry!” Armin interrupted quickly. Jean was intelligent, if a bit lazy with his work; if he was taking this seriously, Armin could see an A+ in their future. “I just, uh, wasn’t paying attention and didn’t realise you were my partner.”
Jean huffed in annoyance, but sat back down. “Didn’t realise you ever stopped paying attention,” he grumbled. “You usually get all hot and bothered once Brzenska so much as mentions homework, it’s disgusting.”
“Says the guy thinking about me getting all hot and bothered,” Armin shot back easily, too used to Reiner’s vulgar humour. These rich Rose kids were too posh to be crude. “Should we start?”
Jean eyed Armin for a long moment. “You’re alright,” he admitted begrudgingly. “What did you want to do this essay on?”
Armin smiled politely. “I’m fine with anything, really,” he said, shrugging. “Up to you.”
“No, seriously,” Jean insisted, rolling his eyes again. “We get to pick from the entire syllabus. I know you’re way smarter than me, okay, just pick something that won’t bore you to tears when we have to research it.”
Armin hesitated. There was something, one tiny sub-topic he’d only caught the tail-end of during his first week. But it was a lot of work, they’d have to do tons of outside research–
“Spit it out,” Jean snapped, impatient.
Ah, what the hell. “Soulmates,” Armin said timidly. “I know it’s not something we talked about a lot in class, but that’s why I’d like to find out more about it. Like, for example, how does it happen?”
Jean frowned, considering it. “Soulmarks are birthmarks, right? So it’s not like anything happens, it’s just… there.”
“But how?” Armin persisted. “How are soulmates decided? Who decides? Is it God or destiny or is there a scientific explanation?”
“Hang on, this is Sociology, not The Origins of Soulmarks,” Jean interrupted just as Armin was getting fired up. He must have seen Armin deflate a little, because he continued quickly, “Not that it’s not an interesting subject, I’m just worried we’ll be marked down for irrelevance.”
Fair enough. “There are other things, too,” Armin said, eyes bright with excitement. “Has the system ever failed? Has there ever been three people– or even more!– with the same soulmark, or one person without a soulmate? We know there are soulmates who only feel platonic attraction to each other, but how are they viewed as opposed to romantic soulmates? Is it possible for a person to truly fall in love with someone who isn’t their soulmate?”
“You,” Jean said when Armin was finally done, sounding a little lost, “have a lot of questions.”
Ah, of course Jean wasn’t interested in this. He’d already found his soulmate in Princess Historia of Sina, everyone had known they were soulmates since the day he was born. In fact, their soulbond was the main reason Sina had joined the Wall Union. Jean’s soulbond was a given, a symbol of unity and peace. He had never needed to worry about how it worked.
“Sorry,” Armin said, smiling weakly. “I got a bit carried away. Didn’t mean to bore you.”
“No, that’s not what I meant,” Jean claimed rather convincingly, but Armin was pretty sure he’d had lots of practice pretending to be interested. “I was just going to say that your questions don’t have answers in our textbook, is all.”
Armin gave him a strange look. “Well, yeah,” he said slowly. “If they were answered in the book I wouldn’t have any questions.”
“You read this?” Jean demanded, incredulous. “Damn, you really are a nerd.”
And there was the name-calling, great. Armin sighed. He’d been hoping they might become friends, but Armin guessed nerds were below the great Prince Horseface, as Eren liked to call him. “Yes, well,” Armin sniffed, ignoring the nerd comment, “that means we’d have to do a lot of independent research, so maybe we should choose another topic.”
Jean scoffed. “What, you sore about the nerd thing? I didn’t mean it in a bad way. Look, soulmates sounds cool, Brzenska loves original topics, she’ll probably give us a C just for choosing it. Plus, research is a good excuse to avoid my royal duties.” Jean hesitated. “And, uh, now you got me curious about all that, too.”
Armin couldn’t believe his ears. Lazy Jean Kirschtein, who only ever did as much as necessary, nothing more, was interested enough to do independent research? With Armin? In a library?
“We’ll make a nerd out of you yet, Your Highness,” Armin teased, grinning.
Jean rolled his eyes, but his shove to Armin’s shoulder was playful.
--
They came up with a rough essay plan in class and agreed to meet up in the library after school. Jean had soccer practice, so Armin sat himself in the library and got a headstart on his homework. He always preferred to finish work the day it was set.
Two hours later, he was chewing on his pen, frowning at his extra credit Algebra. It was less algebra and more a riddle, to be honest. Mr Pixis was an eccentric man who loved tricky questions. Armin was sure he was the only one who bothered to even try figuring the riddles out.
“You’re doing homework?” came Jean’s disgusted voice as he came up behind Armin. “Really?”
“Yes,” Armin replied absently, focused on the riddle. “You should try it.”
“Ha ha,” Jean said dryly, taking a seat across from Armin and pulling a laptop out of his bag. He was wearing his soccer kit– the short sleeves meant Armin could see Jean’s soulmark, a queen chess piece just above his left elbow.
“Ah,” Armin said without realising, because it was the first time he’d ever seen someone else with a chess piece for a soulmark. He’d sort of known what Jean’s soulmark was– Rose was obsessed with their Prince, which Armin didn’t understand because Maria literally couldn’t care less about their sovereigns– but it was different seeing it in the flesh.
“What?” Jean asked, typing away. “You finally figure out Pixis’ demon extra credit?”
Armin shook himself. It was weird to stare at other people’s soulmarks, right? “Uh, no, unfortunately. It was nothing, don’t worry about it.”
Jean paused, looking at Armin suspiciously over his laptop. “I wasn’t going to until you said that,” he drawled, leaning back in his chair and crossing his arms. Which just made his soulmark more visible. Great. “I hate it when people aren’t honest with me,” Jean continued, looking irritated. “Stop not saying things just because you think I’m not going to like it, okay, I’m not going to exile you or something.”
“Pretty sure you don’t have the power to exile anyone,” Armin tried to dodge the question. Jean wasn’t impressed. He just raised an eyebrow expectantly.
Armin sighed. “It really was nothing,” he repeated. “Your soulmark just looks a lot like mine and I was just– surprised, that’s all.”
“What’s your soulmark?” Jean asked, curious. “I’ve never seen a soulmark like mine before. I mean, apart from Historia’s, of course.”
Armin showed him the back of his right hand.
“What the hell, a king?” Jean complained. “You outrank me!”
Well, that was surprising. Armin had expected him to be more annoyed about a commoner outranking him. “Only in name,” Armin pointed out. “The queen is the most powerful piece on the board, you know.”
“Yeah, but the king is the one pulling all the strings,” Jean argued. “All of his subjects’ power are his to command.”
Armin laughed. “You’ve never played chess before, have you?”
Jean kicked him lightly under the table. “Just because I’m a prince doesn’t mean I’ve done all that posh nonsense.”
Seriously? Armin raised his eyebrows at Jean. “You literally own your own private yacht, on which you drink champagne out of flutes while wearing boat shoes and pastel cardigans,” Armin said dryly.
Was Jean… blushing? “Everyone has a private yacht,” he mumbled awkwardly. “In this school, anyway.”
Armin snorted. “Almost everyone,” he corrected. “If I could afford a private yacht, I wouldn’t be busting my ass for this scholarship.”
Jean paused, looking at him strangely. “You mean you have to maintain your grades to keep your scholarship?” he asked slowly, sounding horrified. “You don’t just get in and that’s it?”
Armin snorted even louder. He supposed it was good that Jean was taking an interest in learning about this, even if it was infuriating. “I wish it was that easy. Anything below an A- and I’m out of here.”
Jean was staring at him like he was a whole new person. “So you’re not nerdy because you’re nerdy, but because you’ll get kicked out if you aren’t?”
Did the R.I.C.H. kids seriously think Armin wanted to do every single piece of extra credit he could get his hands on? “Pretty much.”
“Huh.”
A short silence fell between them as Jean presumably allowed this information to sink in.
Armin cleared his throat, putting his homework away. “Should we get started?”
“Right, yes,” Jean agreed, turning back to his laptop. “Uh, I’ll take the internet, you take the books?”
“You just don’t want to read anything,” Armin accused, already heading for the Sociology aisle.
“What are you talking about, you’re just more experienced at book research than I am,” Jean said haughtily. “It’s efficient resource allocation, man.”
“Sure,” Armin agreed, chuckling. “Hey, can you even read?”
“Shut up!”
“Quiet in the library!!” the librarian hissed at them.
Jean mumbled an apology to him, then turned to glare at Armin. Armin just laughed.
It was still early, but maybe… maybe Armin had made a new friend.