The sixth time it happened, Armin could for once say with complete certainty that it would.

Armin sat on his knees in front of one of the bookshelves, having arrived early. Sifting through the books casually, not quite invested in his work because he wanted to check with Bertholdt whether he had any ideas on how to do this more efficiently. The events of the week past still had him wondering how today's meeting would look.

As fate would have it, Eren and Reiner seemed to be building a tighter friendship. They had been for a little while now — Armin had noticed that Reiner finally picked up on Eren's admiration of him and had started focusing his attention more on Eren rather than spreading it thin across the entire group — but it was this week, on a Wednesday evening, that they'd decided to hog the end of a table together without Reiner's usual entourage of fellow cadets. Where you found Eren, you'd find Armin, and where you found Reiner, you'd find Bertholdt.

Better yet, Eren and Reiner had been too caught up in their own conversation to pay much mind to their usual companions, leaving Armin with the opportunity to strike up the elusive conversation outside the library with Bertholdt. He'd managed to finish conveying his thoughts about Tale of Allumia, even got some of Bertholdt's opinions in return, for as much quality as the conversation could have in such a noisy, public room. Bertholdt liked the story and it showed in the way he spoke, but that also meant that they were done with Tale of Allumia — or Allumia, as they'd started referring to it for brevity's sake — at least for now.

Armin's attention was pulled back to the present when the door to the library opened and Bertholdt entered the building. Ideally, Armin would've wanted to walk here together with him to make sure he really showed, but tonight, Armin was done with dinner before him and didn't feel like approaching his table to ask him to leave for the library together in case that made him look too insistent again.

"Hey," Bertholdt greeted, hovering by the side of the bookcase Armin was sorting.

"Hey! Glad you made it. You're here to help?"

"Yeah." He looked around to survey the disorder Armin had made tearing books out of their spot in the shelf. The whole library floor and the tops of the shelves were starting to pile up quite the number of books and Armin was well-aware that if any instructors found this, they'd run him into the ground for ruining the library. "So… What are we doing?"

Armin perked up, giving Bertholdt his full attention as he straightened up. "This place is a sty, no one can find anything about anything here without combing through the whole collection. I want to order books by name and by genre, but if it's me alone doing it, it'll take a while. Two pairs of hands work quicker than one, so we can find what we want faster if you help out too. Neat, right?" He hoped desperately that Bertholdt didn't feel too bummed out that his free time had been stolen to go into what was essentially extra chores.

"That is pretty neat," Bertholdt responded, laying his hands onto the bookshelf his thighs leaned against. "What do you need me to do? How are you sorting them?"

"I want to get them done all at once instead of doing double work, so it's gonna take some time and extra attention," Armin answered, standing up using the bookshelf as support. "I'm sorting them by genre and then alphabetically. There's such a mess in here because it's not easy to store them on the shelf right away, especially if I'm working area by area and I don't know how many books each genre has. I just hope that Shadis won't find out while it's still in progress…"

Bertholdt nodded sharply, an affirmative hum accompanying the gesture. "We'll just have to work fast and hope no one reports it. They may know you spend a lot of time here and are the likely culprit."

"And now that you're here, they may pin it on you as well," Armin laughed. Bertholdt apprehensively nodded, so Armin moved on from his underappreciated comment.

"I'm sure we will get done fast if you're here." Armin gestured over to the various sections and piles he'd accumulated as he spoke. "I've asked the instructors if the library has any genres, but they said that there wasn't really a system. So I've made a list of genres I want to separate by myself. First, there's fiction. Next, there's sciences, of which I want to separate life sciences, geography, numerical sciences, titan sciences, and the miscellaneous. Third, history and culture. Fourth, religion. And lastly, miscellaneous things like poetry, diaries, and anything else you can't put anywhere." Armin leaned onto the shelf, folding his arms over it and looking up at Bertholdt expectantly. "Got all that?"

"Yeah," he responded after a resolute nod, catching Armin off-guard with how quickly and how certainly he answered. There was a strong possibility he'd have to ask Armin to reiterate that list later, so he didn't stress it. When he awaited further instructions with a blank look on his face, Armin took it upon himself to push himself off the bookshelf again and continue.

"From there, I'm ordering them somewhat alphabetically. I just want to separate the genres first and have a rough idea of the alphabetic order. When that's done, we can sort them properly and put them back into the bookshelves. Of course, for now I'm just putting them back where they belong until I know how many each genre has. So…"

He tapped his fingers on the bookshelf, looking if Bertholdt was going to shoot into action or inquire some more, but the brunet just nodded and waited.

Armin cleared his throat. "So I'd like you to start on the bookshelf opposite to the one where I'm working. Sounds reasonable?"

Again, Bertholdt responded with a nod and a hum. He started his way towards his destination, however stopped halfway there.

"Yes?" Armin asked when he noted his hesitation.

Bertholdt considered his words, then carefully pointed at the lane where Armin had found him the other times. "This bookcase. It mostly has historical material. Maybe I can start there, remove the books that belong to other genres, and clear up some space?"

"Oh!" Armin exclaimed, joining his hands with a clap. "You should. You're familiar with that area anyway, it'll go faster like that."

Nodding a final time, Bertholdt went to the far left lane of the library instead, sitting down on the floor to get started. Soon, both of them were hard at work examining book titles and searching for any indication which genre they had in their hands before placing them in the appropriate location. In silence, Armin noted as they'd been at work for a little while. How dull, like he'd assigned Bertholdt a chore as punishment! For Armin it was satisfying to do this kind of work, but Bertholdt probably wasn't too keen on it. This wasn't the way to entice the taller cadet into coming over more often.

"Hey, Bertholdt," Armin started, breaking the thick silence hanging between them only ever interrupted by the turning of a page or the gentle thud of one book being stacked onto another.

"Hm?"

"I'd almost forgotten because of how long it's been and because of Allumia, but I did end up finishing Maria. Rose. Sina."

"Oh," Bertholdt simply answered. With a delay, as if he realised a little late that he should probably follow up on that, he tacked on a "What did you think?"

"You struck gold finding that," Armin mused as he opened another book to read its title; they really should start standardising printing the name and author on the spine as half of them were only printed on the first page. "It was everything I could've possibly wanted out of a history book. If only it were more modern, it would be the best thing in this entire library. So much information I have read in smaller books and I've heard from my parents, but all collected in one large book! Imagine what would be in it if updated for the current year."

"You could write a whole other book about the past two years," came from the other side of the bookshelf. "There is one here about just that. The Fall, I believe its name was. I came across it just a little while ago, if you want it?"

Gods, that would be excellent. "Please?"

Bertholdt didn't say anything for a while, the soothing sound of books being sifted through filling the room. Then, a book emerged, slid his way over the top of the shelf. Armin accepted it and marvelled at its size. At least 150 pages. This must be a new addition in the library since a few months. It would make for a great read in his spare time.

"Thanks!" Armin cheered as he placed the book back on top of the bookshelf to find it again later.

"You're welcome," Bertholdt responded. "So… Being from the city, do you think it's accurate? The part about Wall Maria. Or anything else you know about the other walls." He paused, then added, "It's not the type of information so readily available to the mountainside. And with all the propaganda and censorship… I was curious."

So he'd figured out the heavy censorship as well. That could prove to be a useful icebreaker if another one of their conversations stranded. "It's accurate, from what I can tell. Shiganshina was a city that functioned as a titan lure, as you know, so being part of Wall Maria, we didn't exactly live in luxury. But from what I've read, it's fairly accurate. The information about the other walls lines up with what I've been told too."

"I see."

The sound of books and paper filled the room once more as Bertholdt resumed. Armin returned his focus to the work ahead of him as well, thinking about whether he should tell the taller cadet about his theories on the outside world.

"Did you read it all?" Armin asked instead.

"Hm?"

"The book. Did you read all of it or did you skim or skip parts? It took me a month, I was surprised that you finished it in a week." Especially considering he'd passed it along to Annie halfway through, but Armin kept that detail to himself. He wasn't going to question the nature of that arrangement.

"Um," came after a hefty pause.

Armin had the verification that Bertholdt finished at least some of his books — he knew too much about Allumia to have skimmed it — but he'd been fascinated with his reading speed for Maria. Rose. Sina. to the point of disbelief. Judging by Bertholdt's long silence, he'd lied about reading the book properly. What had Armin put in all that effort for?

(As if he wouldn't voluntarily read the full history of the walls for himself and himself alone.)

"I just want to know which parts you did read to talk about. Maybe I can even give you a run-down for the parts you didn't have time for?"

"Ah…" Bertholdt sighed. "I, um… I mostly read the parts about Sina, a little bit about Rose. Very little about Maria. Sorry."

"What for?"

"For being dishonest."

Armin smirked to himself. "I suspected it, you know."

Bertholdt hummed, as he tended to do when he didn't intend to continue the conversation. Armin gave him the time to answer, skimming through every book he held in his hands to discover their genre. He was near the end of the top row of his bookshelf and finished it, moving on to the one below.

"I just want a safe position. Sina's wall cities are more secure than Rose's are, but I want the safest possible position in case another attack happens."

"You're trying to get work with the Military Police in Mitras?"

"Yeah," Bertholdt spoke, almost sounding ashamed. "I was looking up information to increase our chances of being accepted there."

"Yours and Reiner's?"

"Mhm."

It made perfect sense. Bertholdt was a self-admitted coward, but that didn't mean he was necessarily happy declaring it at every possible turn. The further away from the action, the better if he wanted to live a long and fulfilling life, even if he was hiding from humanity's threats. They'd have to break two walls before they got him, and if the titans managed to get that far, all of humanity would perish with him anyway, nothing he could change about that. Armin wasn't going to try to change his mind on that.

"I hope you make it," Armin wished him. "No, I'm sure you'll make it. You're skilled and observant and they need such talent there. And you have a good heart, something that the police are in shortage of these days. That applies to Reiner as well. You'll get there."

"You think?"

"Yeah!"

A book landed a little harder than it usually would on the other side of the bookshelf. "Thank you, Armin."

Armin smiled to himself. There were other ways to be useful to mankind than to try to find what's out there and to cull the titan threat. Humanity would need a place to return home to once they'd overcome their enemy, and that home would need its morally upstanding guardians like Bertholdt and Reiner if it ever hoped to thrive among current corruption. Armin couldn't feasibly see Bertholdt turn into the self-serving caricature that existed of the Military Police.

"So… About daily life in Wall Maria's cities. Can you tell me? It's more pleasant to hear about these things than to just read about them in a book," Bertholdt followed up.

Armin perked up, excited at the explicit interest to hear him talk. "I can!" He dropped the book he was holding onto to his lap, placing a finger on his chin. "There's so much to say. I was born in Shiganshina so I've lived there for almost eleven years. It's not the same as Trost while it was filled with refugees. It was busy, but not nearly as busy as Trost was. You've never been to Shiganshina, right?"

"That's right," came from the other side.

"It's nothing like Trost." Armin waved his free hand around as he spoke, as if Bertholdt could see his gestures. "Trost is richer and has taller buildings, while Shiganshina was more like a traditional village similar to the ones you'd find in the countryside, with the only exception that there was no space and we were surrounded by walls everywhere so things were crammed. If anything needed space, it was built by the inner wall, so our farmland was all out there. I suppose that the buildings would also be just a little taller to preserve space. Like all wall cities, a river ran centrally through it, and Eren and I–"

Justin Huhn. His eyes widened as he recognised the name of the book he had just pulled out of the shelf after putting aside the one on his lap, and his words cut out immediately to gasp noiselessly instead. Tale of Calamity, the seventh book in the series, lay in his lap. So there were more in the library!

"You and Eren… what?" Bertholdt asked tentatively, notably ceasing all movement as well.

Armin stood up, pain shooting through his knees from the sudden activity, and shoved the book forward once he got a glimpse of Bertholdt's confused face over the bookcase, barely reaching far enough on his tip-toes. "Look what I just found!" he proudly announced, almost bragging he was the one to find it.

With how long his arms were, Bertholdt didn't even have to get up to grab the book (good gods, how tall the other cadet had gotten in just a few months, Armin realised consciously for the first time). He bent down onto the disarranged books strewn across the top of the bookshelf to lean in closer, watching as Bertholdt recognised the book and looked up at him again.

"Which one is this?"

"Seventh!"

"Seventh," Bertholdt repeated. "That means that more of the series is probably here as well," he mused as he opened it to the title page, then to the second page.

"At least up until seventh, hopefully all the way to the end."

"It's an 840 print."

Armin crossed his arms as he spoke. "So they weren't bought in one go. But I don't see why anyone would skip a book, right?"

"Right. Unless one got stolen, they're probably all here." Bertholdt closed the book again, extending it to Armin again, as if to entrust him to keep it safe.

"I doubt anyone would have the guts to take such a risk just to steal a book. Theft would be a stain on their records."

Accepting it and placing it aside, Armin went back to work. Putting Calamity on the backburner for now, they continued talking about all the intricacies and hidden gems in Shiganshina; things that one would never find in Maria. Rose. Sina. because of the academic writing style, but that he supposed Bertholdt, as a fellow aspiring insider, would appreciate to know nonetheless. There were things he kept to himself, like his banned book about the outside world (just in case Bertholdt were too lawful to be at ease receiving such illegal knowledge), but throughout his talk of Shiganshina and how the city operated, he sprinkled in quite a few details about his home life. About his parents, about his upbringing, about his tribulations with bullies and how he'd met Eren and Mikasa.

Armin talked, Bertholdt listened, almost sounding too hesitant to give much of his thoughts about what he was hearing or relate it back to his own experiences back home. He sounded polite the few times he did respond. Armin didn't mind, happy to talk about his life and his knowledge before the military to such a willing listener.

"What about Sundays?" Bertholdt asked, walking by Armin's side on the way back to the barracks a little while before curfew. Both were underdressed for the cold that had been dominating the dark evenings as of late, but only Armin was shivering, gripping tighter onto the second book in the series — Tale of War — they'd found near the end of their evening.

"During our free afternoon?"

"Mhm. More time, and it'll be lighter for longer so we won't need a lantern and we won't be as cold."

When he wasn't off reading on his own in the barracks, most of Armin's Sunday afternoons were spent with Eren and Mikasa. He'd need to give it consideration if he were to change his day so drastically, especially if it was going to be weekly. They simply didn't have enough free time, so for Armin to dedicate half of the only day he had enough time to spend with his closest friends to someone he'd just met instead, it would have to be real quality time.

Who was being the no-show now?

Bertholdt noted Armin's silence and backed down on his words. "I mean, we don't have to stay the whole afternoon, but it's better than a couple of hours after dinner in case you do want to stay for longer. We won't be as tired. But you don't have to, Friday is fine too," he trailed off, like he'd stepped out of bounds.

"There might be other people with us if we change things up to a time where everyone has a free afternoon," Armin said. "I don't mind, but you might."

Bertholdt simply shrugged. "The barracks never bothered me either."

Armin looked up at the dark sky above them, pleased. "Alright. Sunday, then. Sunday sounds nice."