Rainy days were not a favourite amongst the members of Levi's newest squad. Rainy days meant being locked indoors in close quarters with people hoping to use you to satisfy their boredom. Thus, when Levi had asked for people to step forward for perimeter duty, Jean had been the first to volunteer to get out of there.
He had learned not shortly after moving into their cabin in the woods that it was better to face the elements of nature than to face the 'elements of surprise' brought about by Connie and Sasha. He'd had more than enough experience with their antics, both on the participating end and the receiving end. Neither had ever ended well. Eren, the idiot that he was, still had yet to understand the hazards of staying inside in such weather and often fell victim to such elements, a fact that made Jean happy. Now if only Mikasa would realize the danger as well so that he wouldn't have to walk around alone...
To Jean's surprise though, he actually wasn't left walking around alone this time, as Armin Arlert had volunteered as well, which was an even bigger surprise. While Jean knew that Armin was in no way a slacker, he also knew that perimeter duty was in no way a strong point for him. It involved walking around outside for hours and since the terrain outside was uneven it often involved a lot of climbing. Bad weather only made it worse. That, combined with the guns they had to lug around and the constant pace they had to keep up with to stay on schedule, often left even the most fit soldiers wishing for a break after a few hours.
So as the two of them headed out of the building together, into what Jean could only describe as 'a really shitty looking day', he was left wondering just what had motivated Armin enough to want to go outside in this.
So, being Jean, he did the only logical thing to do; ask him. "Why'd you want to come out in this crappy weather?"
"I don't think the weather's crappy at all. I think it's nice out." Armin answered flatly, staring up into the grey sky above and wincing as a raindrop fell directly into his eye.
The kid couldn't even handle a raindrop and he seriously thought this was good weather? "You being serious?"
"Yes."
Jean didn't know why he asked the question. Of course he was serious. For all his knowledge, Armin had no idea how to discern a genuine question from a rhetorical one or from a joke, and always answered all three with a straight face and an honest answer.
The question reappeared, directed at the brunet this time. "What about you, Jean? Why'd you volunteer?"
"I wanted to get out of there before Connie and Sasha decided to try to drag me into another prank on Eren. As much as I love pissing off Eren, I'm still paying the captain for the last time."
Armin nodded knowingly.
"So what's so nice about this weather?" Jean asked, still not understanding how anyone could see this as 'nice'.
"I read once that all the water that falls from the sky comes from the ocean. It all gathers up into these huge bodies of water then floats up into the sky and turns into clouds until it gets too heavy to stay up there anymore."
Jean didn't really understand what Armin was saying but nodded along anyway, adding in an occasional encouraging word here and there to let him know he was listening. He knew Armin well enough to know that once the topic of the ocean came up that he would be talking for a long time. It was one of the rare few topics where Armin repeated things he had already said before. The brunet wasn't completely positive why that was, but he suspected that it was because the blond got so excited over the topic that he failed to keep track of what he had said and what he hadn't. While Jean didn't want to go so far as to call that cute, he couldn't deny that he found it slightly amusing.
Eventually their conversation died off and the two of them had been left walking silently single-file along the narrow pathway on the cliffside, spending their time observing the area and looking for any signs of suspicion, as was their job.
Jean walked ahead of the blond, surveying the path that lay in front of them. Puddles littered the way, making the walk tedious. They couldn't go at the normal pace required for fear of slipping in the mud. One wrong step and they'd be wishing they had their 3DMG with them.
The puddles weren't really that bad though. For once, Jean was thankful that the military mandated such high boots, as they allowed him to walk through the water without worry of his feet getting wet. However, it still didn't help the situation with the mud, which the captain would surely kill them for later if they dared to track it into 'his house'. Not that there was much either of them could do about it at this point; after over an hour of walking through muddy pathways in the rain they'd be lucky if the captain even allowed them back into the house, with or without boots.
Splish.
The sound of a loud splash of water caught Jean's attention and he turned around, half-expecting to find Armin lying on the ground in a puddle, if not halfway down the cliffside after having slipped.
...Instead he just found himself staring face to face with the boy, whose expression could only be described as deadpan at best.
"What happened?"
"Nothing happened."
The words were so straight forward that it erased any suspicion Jean may have held. As he had said before, if there was one thing he knew about Armin it was that he stated information as facts, and always replied to questions with a straight answer - even if the asker hadn't been looking for one. It was a different type of honesty than Jean, who spoke the truth to make sure he was never misjudged. Armin was just weird, likely a result of growing up with Yeager. Either way, if he said nothing had happened then it was probably true. It was raining after all, of course he was going to hear water noises. It was for that reason that Jean turned back around, sure that he had merely been hearing things.
The male took a few more steps forward, look-
Splash.
Jean turned around this time, positive that his ears had not played a trick on him.
The blank face of Armin stared back at him.
...It was actually kind of creepy. Was Armin usually this expressionless?
"What was that noise?"
"What noise?"
Okay, something was definitely off here... Jean would admit that there were a lot of things that he did not yet know about Armin, but he knew for certain that Armin never answered a question with another question.
"Right..." Jean turned back around, deciding that it would be best for now if they continued on with their goal. If something dangerous was going on he trusted that Armin would be right-in-the-head enough to tell him. So Jean walked forward, being careful to walk around the huge puddle that had formed itself on their normal walking trail. One wrong slip in that and they'd have to spend an extra hour just trying to get back to this path.
Jean turned around, intent on telling Armin to watch his step, as he knew the boy wasn't the best with balance, or well, anything physical. "Hey, Armin, wat-"
Splash.
Jean watched as water flew up into the air around the blond boy, whose feet were now planted firmly in the middle of the giant puddle that Jean was about to tell him to avoid. Before Armin even looked up Jean could see the traces of a large smile on his face, and as his face rose Jean noticed life in his eyes that he hadn't seen from anyone within the Survey Corps in months.
Is this what the noise had been?
"What are you doing?" Jean asked, even though he already knew the answer.
The smile disappeared. "I was uh- jumping into the puddles," was the response, proving once more to Jean that Armin had to answer everything literally. He already knew he was jumping into puddles, he wanted to know why.
Jean stared at Armin's face. The smile he had held a moment ago was no longer visible on his face, but this time his deadpan expression was accompanied by a light red blush around his cheeks, likely from having been caught.
Had he seriously been getting this much enjoyment... from jumping into puddles? Was that why he had volunteered to come out in the rain in the first place?
...There was no way he was allowed to be that fucking cute.
"Sorry, I'll pay more attention to our surroundings now." The voice spoke monotonously, and Jean realized that he had to do his best to fix this situation before one of them asked to pretend this had never happened.
"N-no! It's okay, really. I mean, we usually only have one person out here doing this anyway. I can handle it."
"Oh... I see. I guess I should go back then." This time the voice carried a bit of emotion, which Jean placed as disappointment.
Oh great now he thinks you just called him useless. Damn it, Jean, just say something right.
"No! I'm not saying there's anything wrong with what you're doing you're doing just fine I mean we're both doing good very good no bad things were seen I mean-" Jean cut himself off, realizing that he was making little sense. He could feel his face flushing from the embarrassment. At least he hoped it was from the embarrassment.
"Listen, you didn't do anything wrong." Jean reached forward and dug his hand into Armin's hair, ruffling it as he spoke. "Just... keep on doing what you were doing, okay?"
Jean pulled his hand back and looked at Armin whose hair was now completely disheveled. Stray strands hung in front of face, weighted down by the heft of the water. He looked like a mix between a boy and a mop. Or rather, he looked like he had just come out of one of the puddles.
Still, after a pause, the smile came back onto his face and with a leap the boy was now ahead of him, leaping from puddle to puddle, and leaving Jean to stand and stare.
He could feel his face warm up even more, and this time he knew it wasn't from embarrassment.
This is the first time I have ever written something so cute. Originally I was writing this as a 200-500 word drabble for an anon prompt on tumblr and was planning on making it serious and perhaps even depressing, but the idea of Armin loving the rain and jumping into puddles was just too much for me to resist. I like to imagine that he loves all forms of water, especially if they are related to the ocean.
If you made it this far then thanks! I'd love it if you left me a review. You can catch me on tumblr as Aespren.