"Hey Armin, can I copy your homework?" Eren looked at his best friend with a pleading look in his eyes.
Armin sighed. "French, right? Professor Levi is going to kill you."
Eren groaned. "He tries to every day. But if I have my homework done today, maybe he won't."
"But you don't have your homework done."
"Armin, please! Just this once!"
"That's what you said the last time," Armin looked up and noticed Eren's desperate expression. "Ok, fine. Here." The boy held out his perfectly completed French worksheet.
"Thanks Armin. You're a lifesaver!"
Armin gave Eren a disapproving shake of his head, but Eren knew that Armin couldn't stay mad at him for very long. Armin was the nice, loyal, forgiving type. Even if Eren turned into a horrible monster or something, Armin would probably stay by his side. That's just how Armin was.
The bell then rang to start the school day, so Eren and Armin sat down in their respective seats in the classroom, waiting for the teacher to arrive.
The first class was science with Professor Hanji. As usual , class started late. Eren barely paid attention to the lecture anyway. Hanji was a good teacher and class was usually interesting, but Eren had something more important to do: his French homework. Frantically, he transcribed Armin's answers to his own paper.
By the end of class, Eren had finished. He leaned back and sighed. Thank god, Professor Levi wasn't going to kill him. Today, at least.
Right on cue, Professor Levi entered the classroom. "Jaeger, sit up!" he barked.
Eren straightened his back and looked up at the small man glaring down at him. "Yes, sir. I'm sorry."
"Of course." Levi smirked. He walked to the front of the classroom with his hands behind his back. "Everyone take out the homework that I assigned last night."
Eren pulled out the copied homework sheet and placed it in the middle of his desk, smiling eagerly.
"Jaeger!"
"Yes, sir?"
"Do you have the homework?"
"Yes! It's right here!" Eren held up the paper.
Levi snatched it out of his hands and inspected it as though he were interested in not only the answers, but the paper itself. "Well then. Perfect. How exactly did you come by these answers?"
"I studied last night."
Levi's eyebrows furrowed more than usual. "Oh, really?"
"Yes!"
"Mr. Arlert," Levi turned to face Armin.
"Yes?" Armin squeaked.
"Do you know anything about this?"
"Yeah," Armin said. "See…I, erm, well…I helped him study. Yeah! I helped him study!"
Eren groaned. Armin had always been a terrible liar. At this rate he was going to completely blow his cover. Great.
Professor Levi did not seem convinced. "Arlert, did you let Jaeger copy your homework?"
"I—no! I mean, ugh!" Armin was beginning to panic. This couldn't end well. "I'm sorry, Professor!" Armin burst out. "It won't happen again, I promise!"
The whole class went silent. Even Sasha stopped stuffing her face with potato chips to watch what would happen next.
"Very well." Levi said. "One week of detention, Mr. Arlert."
"Oh, no," Armin whispered. "My perfect record, ruined!"
"And Mr. Jaeger." Levi turned to face Eren head on.
"Yes?" Eren twiddled his pencil nervously.
"Three weeks of detention."
"Three weeks?! You can't do that to me!" Eren protested.
"All right. A month."
A whole month?! Eren in no way wanted to spend a whole month cleaning the school top to bottom under Levi's overly-critical eye. "Fine," he grumbled.
"Very well," Levi said. "With that taken care of, onto the lesson."
"No way!" Jean Kirschtein said. "Armin got a detention?!"
Armin looked down and nodded. "One week. It's going to be terrible."
"I'm so sorry, Armin!" Eren apologized again.
"Yeah, good job, Jaeger." Jean smirked. "Already on Professor Levi's bad side, and now you're dragging Armin down with you."
"It's not my fault!" Eren protested.
"Actually, technically it is." Mikasa joined the small group exiting the school. "You didn't do your homework in the first place."
"Mikasa has a good point, as always," Jean said. "So why don't you do your homework anyway?"
"Like you do your homework," Eren mumbled.
"I would if I were in Levi's class. You're avoiding my question."
Eren crossed his arms and pouted. "French just makes no sense. Even something as simple as counting is confusing as hell. I'm so not looking forward to this detention. I can't believe I got a full month!"
"Jaeger! Arlert! What do you think you're doing?" Professor Levi, even with his short height, managed to glare down at the two boys.
"C-c-cleaning the desks," Armin stuttered, holding up his soiled cloth.
"When I said clean the desks, I meant the entiredesk." Levi wiped his hand under one of the desks and studied it. "Tch. Filthy. Do them all again."
"What?" Eren asked. "We can't do that! We still have all the other classrooms to do!"
"You already have a month of detention. I wouldn't test me. Same goes for you, Arlert."
Armin looked like he was about to cry. "Yes, sir."
Levi sat down at the teacher's desk and watched the two work for a while. Finally, Eren and Armin set down their cloths. "Yes! We're done!"Eren exclaimed. "What do we do next, Professor?"
No response. "Professor?"
"Oh my gosh," Armin cried. "I think he's asleep!"
"You're kidding!" Eren said in disbelief. "All right!"
"What are we going to do?" Armin asked.
"The only thing we can do," Eren said, "Let's get out of here."
"We can't do that! Our detention is supposed to go for another hour!"
"Well I'm leaving. You can do what you want," Eren replied.
Armin looked from the sleeping Levi back to Eren. "Ok, let's go."
"Hell yeah!"
Both Eren and Armin were less than eager to go to French class the next day. Eren actually did do his homework that night, but he couldn't help being worried.
As soon as Levi entered the classroom, his gaze fell right on Eren. "You have quite a nerve to show up to class, Jaeger."
"Hm? What'd you mean?" Eren asked innocently.
"What I mean is that you skipped out of detention yesterday." The whole class went so silent that all anyone could hear was the sound of Sasha munching on yet another bag of potato chips.
"You skipped detention with Professor Levi?" Connie whispered. "Wow, that takes a lot of courage." The rest of the class began to murmur.
"It's not like that!" Eren said. "He fell asleep!"
"Jaeger! Out of my class, right now! Same with you, Arlert!" Levi pointed to the door.
Armin looked ready to burst into tears. "I'm sorry Professor! It won't happen again! I'll do anything you want! Please don't kick me out of class!"
The class began to talk, louder this time. "Professor Levi fell asleep?!" Sasha exclaimed. "Oh my gosh, I wish I could've seen that!"
"Me too!" Connie said.
"I bet he looks really funny when he sleeps!" Sasha giggled.
"Totally!"
Levi's face was contorted with anger and resent. "Everyone in this class has an extra week of detention! Two weeks, for you, Miss Braus, Mr. Springer!"
"Aw man!"
"Damnit!"
"Everyone, get out!" Levi ordered.
The students hurried out of class.
And so by the next afternoon, the whole 2nd period French class was stationed throughout the school, cleaning the place frantically, top to bottom.
"Well this is fun," Eren said.
