"I've never seen Sasha look so happy," Armin keeps his laugh quiet as you and he weave your way through the last of the trees on the hilltop. "She looked like she was going to pass out with joy." Despite his efforts to contain his laughter, he's still grinning, his soft blue eyes glimmering in the light that peeks through the gap in the trees.

"Course she did," your chuckle is low as well. "We just told her she could have our portions of soup if she managed to get us some extra bread to take with us. As exchanges go, she's coming out of this all right. I'm just glad she was willing to cover for us," you continue, your breathing coming out in pants from your trek. You glance behind you. The training compound is shrouded by the trees.

"Yeah she's pretty great," Armin smiles. "I can't imagine she feels that loyal to the Commandant's rules though considering that she's still on limited food privileges."

The two of you finally walk out of the woodland, onto a cliff overlooking an enormous lake, shining amber and gold under the horizon of sunset. The sun is halfway disappearing behind the mountains beyond the lake. The air is warm against your already heated body from the climb. The pair of you move closer to the edge and sit yourselves down with your food packs and water cannisters.

"Wow," you breathe, taking in the streaks of gold and orange overlapping over pale pink clouds that suggest a bright day tomorrow. The same kind of sunset as that day. You swallow back a wave of intense emotion as pain awakens in your chest. Your breathing hitches. For a moment you're back there again, watching that demonic red face staring over the wall, dead expression in its eyes.

You hear your name being whispered and when you side-eye Armin, he's frowning gently at you, one of his hands hovering over your shoulder. "You okay?"

You nod, even though it's a lie and return your eyes to the sunset. You should look away so you can stop feeling like this; the way you've been doing at sunset for the past two years. Never looking at the horizon for too long because you're afraid of what you might see.

"Sorry," you find your voice after a number of seconds have gone by, "but it's the first sunset I've really looked at since Shiganshina."

"It's okay," Armin assures you. "I get it. It was beautiful that day, wasn't it?"

You nod again. "It shouldn't be beautiful now. Not after everything we've lost, but it is. It's not fair."

Armin leaned back, hands planted on the ground with a soft sigh. "No, but I think that's a good thing."

"What do you mean?"

"If the world looked as bleak as it is, all the time, then no one would ever want to do anything," Armin mused, drawing your attention to him again. "No one would be inspired to keep trying for better things," he continued. You watch the way the colours of sunset pass over his face, lighting up his eyes like candles. His golden hair shone under the light and you reach up to touch it. You stop yourself before he can notice and quickly turn away from him. Don't be stupid.

How can he think like that, at our age? You wonder. How can he be this wise, this objective, when he's lost so much too?

In the floating wispy pink clouds, you think you can see them - the faces of your mother and sister as they were stopped from boarding the ferry, as they watched you being taken to safety away from them. You avert your eyes again.

"I can't think like that," you whisper, bringing your knees to your chest and hugging them. "It hurts to look at this," you confess. "Everything hurts. Training hurts. I'm so weak. Sometimes I think that someone like me shouldn't be wasting the military's time."

"You're not the only one who thinks like that," Armin pauses only for a short time before he speaks. As you look at him again, he offers you a comforting smile. "I'm not exactly cut out for all the physical stuff either," he muses. "I'm not as driven as Eren or as strong as Mikasa."

"No one's as strong as Mikasa," you mumble with a weak smile at him.

He chuckles. "Yeah that's probably true. No. It definitely is."

You both fall silent and resume looking at the sunset. It still hurts but Armin's words help to occupy your mind as you gather your thoughts, thinking over training. You and Armin are always at the back in the endurance runs. You spend most of hand-to-hand combat training picking yourself up off the floor. You're decent on horseback and you manage well enough on odm gear. The aptitude test gave you a false sense of your own overall skill, you think. Even in the classroom, you're average at best. Not like Armin whose brilliance shines through there. He grasps ideas and formations like he's drinking water; he just takes it all in.

"You're a strategist," you finally tell Armin after almost ten minutes of quiet reflection have passed. "The military needs people like that." You cross your arms across your kneecaps and lean your chin on them. "You're so clever. They need people like you."

"You think?" There's no false modesty in Armin's tone as he asks you that. He's genuinely surprised. You can hear it in the uncertain innocence he emits.

You give him a firm, smiling nod. "Of course."

"Thanks."

"And I'm not just saying that either," you add hastily. "I mean it, Armin."

"I know!" Armin's eyes blow up as he leans in insistently. "I know! You're a very honest person."

The grips of your hands on your kneecaps grows stronger. You can't help but question his words. How honest can you really consider yourself. "Am I really though? I'm honest with other people, sure," you agree. "But I'm not sure I'm being honest with myself at all, about this."

"Why do you say that?" Armin's brow furrows thoughtfully.

Your fingers drum on your knees. "Well, I-I know I'm rubbish at all this," and when you say that, you jerk your head in the direction you and Armin came from, "and yet I'm still doing it. If I haven't got a talent to offer the military, wouldn't the honest thing be to just leave? Stop wasting everyone's time? Maybe I'd do better as a medic."

Armin shuffles a little closer to him and it confuses you to see that he's smiling a little. "I don't think that it's that simple. Do you want to leave and go into medical? There's no shame in dropping out and choosing something else."

You know how you feel as soon as he says the words. "No." Your answer follows instantly. "No. I've always wanted to join the military. I don't think I could sit by as a civilian. I have to be a soldier. I just know that deep down."

"My grandfather talked about that feeling," Armin recalls, stretching his legs further out ahead of him, his feels close to the edge of the cliff. "He said it was a calling."

"A calling," you muse.

"Like someone calling your name, only instead of a person, it's what you want to do, what you need to do."

Your eyes roam over the horizon again, watching the luminous golds begin to disappear as a weighty dusk begins to press down on the world quietly inch by inch. The sun sends up some defiant rays and you're reminded of outstretched arms trying to haul themselves out of titan mouths. Your stomach burns with resolve. I can't just stand by and not contribute something. It may not be much in the end but it's got to be better than not doing anything.

"I like that," you decide, smiling thinly. "Makes it sound like I actually know what I'm doing."

Armin's laugh was quiet, delicate even. Very much like the boy himself. You've always liked that about him, ever since you knew him back home. You like that he's not the rough and tumble type. You like that he reads, and you really like listening to him talk about the books that he's read. Sometimes it makes him sad, knowing that those books are all the way back in Shiganshina now, probably smushed. Your heart aches for him when you see that hurt.

"I don't think any of us really know, so don't worry," he remarks, giving you one of his bright, beautiful smiles, his words pulling you out of your musings. "And you know," he says your name softly, "it's okay to just be a soldier and do your duty with all that you have. You might not know what your talent is yet but you have it. Something shifts in his tone of voice, a kind of resigned sadness. "I've spent most of my childhood getting beat up by bullies. Eren's rushed in to help me so many times that I've lost count. Yet what have I done to balance the score? That's what I keep wondering."

You stare at your friend, amazed that he could hold that kind of admission behind such a beautiful, encouraging smile. It's almost frightening how good he's hidden it.

This time, when your hand lifts to find his, you don't hesitate before squeezing his fingers. "Friendship doesn't work like that." You try and fill your voice with as much comfort and conviction as you can. "I'm sure Eren and Mikasa don't see it that way."

"No," Armin agreed, some of the sorrow that shines in his eyes begins to vanish. "But that's my point. You don't need to stand out to make a difference here. We work together, as a unit. We can make each other stronger. Just like how Reiner helped Eren train for the aptitude test.

"Yeah," you concede. "It'd be nice to become strong like them one day." Turning your gaze towards the sunset again, you find a kind of solace in the slow meeting of light and dark, in the fading golden glows that you used to associate with that terrible day but now have in this moment with Armin and in the disappearing orange streaks of cloud. You can't change the sky any more than you can control what happens to you. It's a heavy thought, inspiring an even more sobering thought. "But if I'm not strong enough then at least I'll get to see my family again and, and it;s not like I will be really leaving anyone behind."

"Hey." The word snaps out of Armin as his hand grips yours tightly. "Don't talk like that. You'd be leaving me behind, you know?"

Startled, your eyes snap to his and shame fills your chest. You didn't mean to sound so morbid and yet you can't help but think of that. You're alone now, without all your family, the people who would grieve you. You just didn't think about Armin and you curse your own forgetfulness. You hear the words as he must have heard them and squeeze his hand. But, although you want to speak, to apologize, the words freeze in your throat and you hesitate.

"I'd really miss you," Armin continues, his eyebrows coming together to form a golden line across his brow. "I can't stand to think of you not being here so please don't say that again, okay?"

You nod, glad for the opportunity for a non-verbal response. You shuffle a little closer to him and, instinctively, lean your head on his shoulder. He stiffens beneath you but only for a second. In another second, he leans his head on yours. You smile under the warm pressure and you clasp his hand between both of yours.

"I'm sorry, Armin. I didn't mean it like that. I'd hate for you to not be here too. You're really important to me."

Even though Armin has his own circle of friends, he's always made time for you and tried to include you. You're not quite sure yourself on what's held you back. Maybe it's just not wanting to intrude on what he has with Eren and Mikasa. You were always afraid that people would think that you were trying to do that. It means a great deal that he's still included you in his life even after the hell of Shiganshina's fall, the refugee crisis and now starting military training.

"In fact," you continue, the admission slipping out automatically, "it's really selfish but I like that we both struggle with the physical stuff here. I don't know… I guess… I guess I feel less alone."

Armin's fingers lace with yours. "It's not selfish. Or if it is, I guess I'm selfish too."

You stroke the back of Armin's hand. "No, Armin," you tell him in a whisper. "You're really not."

Silence falls, once again, between you both as you watch daylight fade away, replaced gradually by a glorious blanket of stars and an enormous, silvery moon. Even as the air turns colder, you linger there under the beauty of night