"Did talking about it bother you that much?" Jean's voice spontaneously broke the silence, causing Armin to startle. He was fairly easy to startle tonight, for some reason. He straightened his legs out from their position tucked against his chest, acting as if Jean had caught him doing something wrong. It was well past midnight and Armin didn't anticipate other scouts being awake at this hour. Everyone in the dorm seemed to be fast asleep when he snuck outside to brood alone with his thoughts. Therefore, Jean's unexpected appearance surprised him! He continued to walk out of the door and stopped next to him.

"Talking about what?" Armin prompted, confused, as Jean joined him.

"You know? The magick stuff? About your mom being a witch." Somehow, for whatever reason, everybody seemed to love bringing it up! It was almost laughable. All of these mentions had to have a goal, right?

"This again?" Armin felt himself grow even more broody - if that were even possible. Armin pulled his knees to his chest once more and held them against him as snugly as a sealed clamshell.

"I didn't follow you out here to pester you; I can't sleep either." Jean's open posture - open chest, open heart, staring up at the star-littered sky - hid how drained he was. Armin, being near, could observe his weariness...along with a noticeable hint of displeasure on Jean's face. "You were tossing and turning and sighing for a while and it got really annoying."

Cringing, the ashamed blonde hid his face in his knees. "Ah…sorry, my bad," he mumbled, feeling self-conscious.

"As revenge, you have to put up with me until I go back to bed." Jean's actions betrayed his words as he could have found another spot to sit, or laid in bed staring at the ceiling just as easily as locating the blonde for 'revenge'. After all, Armin chose a spot far out of the way to lose himself in his thoughts without distraction. It didn't matter, though, as his presence was a temporary distraction. He lifted the weight off of Armin's shoulders.

He perked up a little. "That's a fair way to get revenge," Armin agreed.

"Though, if you want to talk about what happened, you can. I don't care either way."

"Mm, thanks." His presence - at this exact moment and exact time - made Armin curious. What did Jean get out of hearing Armin talk about his mom? Curiosity over more magick talk? Joining in to vent about Eren bringing it up in the first place?

Recalling the discussion during dinner earlier in the night, Armin mulled over Jean's questions and general curiosity. Did he believe in magick? He wanted to know. The desperation to know came out of absolutely nowhere! Knowing how blunt his friend usually was, there was no way he would hold such immature beliefs! The childish words bubbled up in his throat regardless.

And, Armin decided he couldn't fight it anymore, and finally opened his mouth. "…Jean? Do you believe in magick?"

"When I was a kid; sure. Not now, though. Now that I think about it, with everything we've gone through, and everything we've seen and experienced, there's probably way more abilities that humans can have that we don't know about," Jean considered. He turned to Armin. "You do, right?"

"Yeah. I do." The admission left no room to elaborate further. It didn't need any further clarification. It probably didn't even need to be confirmed. Even if Jean turned around and poked fun, having concrete evidence and proof of the reality of magick gave him the confidence to admit it.

The brunette hummed, putting Armin at ease. "Figures - what with all the books you read...and what you believed about your mom, of course." Jean hastily brushed past the topic of Armin's mother, not wanting to resurrect a conversation that caused his friend a great deal of grief.

"...I still..." Armin's timid voice leaked out before his mind registered his body's urge to speak. He stopped. Something inside of him longed to extend the conversation. His head turned in the corner of his eye, expecting him to finish his train of thought. Despite not wanting to appear foolish or childish in front of Jean, Armin straightened up and confessed. "I still believe it. I believe that she was magick."

The last thing Armin expected to see on Jean's face when he looked at him was a soft, sort of fond smile that barely lifted the corners of his mouth. "...I'm surprised you admitted it," Jean remarked.

"What surprises you?"

"Well...you were pretty defensive when Yaeger talked about your mom. It was light-hearted fun because I don't think he'd ever purposely upset or make you the butt of the joke like that. But your reaction made me think, 'there's no way he doesn't still believe it!' Having it exposed just made him embarrassed'," he concluded.

"I wasn't embarrassed, and I'm still not embarrassed," Armin defended because he truly was not embarrassed! He didn't know how to feel! He did not have the luxury of time to process or intellectualise these new feelings of his.

Tonight simply revealed an equation of coincidence: memories of his mother, an influx of strange magickal energy, plus Eren's timing equalled a fairly paranoid and confused Armin. After every event, after hesitantly gathering himself between dinner time and now, Armin could only conclude that something indicated it would be the right time to grant someone a wish, and that time would be extremely soon.

"You are! You're blushing!" Jean pointed at his face, and for some illogical, biological reason, the accusation made Armin blush, despite not previously doing so. He whipped his head away to hide his face. By now, Armin knew he'd have a hard time convincing Jean embarrassment was the last thing he felt! "And I don't care that you're embarrassed - it's normal to feel that way over what others might consider childish beliefs."

Armin pressed the back of his hand, practically frozen from the night's air, against his burning cheek. "I was just…mortified that Eren and Mikasa remembered something from that we spoke about once from when we were kids."

"That sounds an awful lot like embarrassment. I'd probably feel that way if I was in your position." He shrugged, leaning backwards to gaze up at the sky again. "Or maybe you're magick as well and you're acting this way to keep your secret."

Armin couldn't help but be a touch amused by the throwaway comment. It was hilarious how Jean unintentionally hit the nail on the head! He'd laugh out loud if Jean didn't think him insane. He couldn't leave the joke alone. Something inside him couldn't. The words he longed to say simmered inside him, resembling rapidly boiling water. His hesitance acted as the lid. Why him? Why Jean of all the people in his life? He always assumed his wish would go to a close friend, lover, or future partner of his. Fear suddenly took hold of him; was this a sign that his wish needed to be granted before he was killed? Would his probable death be his sacrifice?

The thought calmed Armin a little and also forced him to give himself a reality check. He had no way of knowing what Jean's wish would be - if he decided to take up Armin's offer. This was the path he was meant to follow…right? His mother's words, you'll know, circled his mind and made him dizzy. He…still wasn't sure if he knew, but everything seemed to point to this moment.

Armin decided he had nothing to lose, rolled with Jean's joke, and took a breath.

"...what would you say if you were right? That I was magick, too," Armin hypothesised, testing the waters with him. "And I also had a single wish I could give to anybody?"

Jean's attention was piqued in an instant. "So, the wish is hereditary?"

Armin casually averted his eyes and paused, pretending to think. "Hypothetically."

"Alright…hypothetically, I'd say you're full of shit, there's no such thing as magick, and that's the stupidest thing you've ever said to me. Unfortunately, I'm not a gullible child like you were," Jean replied immediately. For whatever reason, his harsh reaction didn't deter Armin. No! A small part of Armin became fired up as though determined to make Jean eat his words!

Armin found himself obsessed with keeping track of every single one of Jean's reactions. "What if I could prove it to you?"

"Then, I might feel differently," he decided. The seriousness plastered on Armin's face bothered Jean. Armin could see it in the way he rubbed his chin and furrowed his brow. He turned to him, inspired to dig a little deeper. "...let's say you were magick...how could you prove it? And why only one wish? To me, that seems a little dull. What if you regretted it afterwards? Or what if somebody else had an even better wish you wanted to grant, but you couldn't because you wasted the wish on a shitty one?"

"I'm not sure why it's only one wish. That's what my mom said when she told me about her magick. The wish is in the shape of an orb. It's blue if you have a wish, and grey if you've granted it," Armin described, half forgetting that while he spoke the truth, Jean's mind assumed speculations and imaginative information. "Wish granting isn't something you can decide to do on a whim or something you can choose to do spontaneously. Something tells you when it's right. Mom explained like a higher form of intuition, but people don't always listen to their intuition. Your questions are irrelevant because the 'magickal force' will let you know when the wish you're going to grant is the 'right' one."

Jean's wide-eyed frown spoke volumes after he concluded his tangent. It was clear that he hadn't anticipated such a thorough and considerate response. "That's, uh, a lot. So, hypothetically, if she was magick, she would've shown you her…" he traced a circle in the air with his hands, searching for the word through his confusion and shock. "…orb?"

"Yes."

"And if you were magick, you'd prove it to me by showing me your orb, but it would be blue?" Arms crossed, Jean shot him a pointed look. "Hypothetically."

"Yes. Hypothetically."

"And how would you show me this orb of yours?"

"I'd just have to think about pushing it out of the palm of my hands," Armin cupped his hands together as a demonstration, "and it would appear for you."

After allowing everything Armin had said to sit and absorb, Jean slowly shook his head in disbelief and chuckled. "...man, you must've had a really active imagination when you were younger! If I'm being honest, this is getting a little deep to be hypothetical!" It was clear from Jean's strained expression that he was consciously trying to maintain the hypothetical nature of their discussion.

Armin had an out. Jean had given him one, and practically pleaded for one, to end it. But something told him not to, and he knew that everything he'd agonised over the past few days was leading up to this moment.

"What if it wasn't hypothetical?"

He faltered. "…excuse me?"

Armin sat on his knees, hands hovering and ready. "Don't freak out. Please?"

"...what the hell?" Jean leaned back slightly, scowling in suspicion and body tensing, prepared to fight as though the blonde was a dangerous threat in front of him. "Armin-"

"-just watch, okay?" Armin advised, signalling for Jean's complete attention towards his cupped bare palms. Armin summoned the blue orb deep within him and projected it for his friend, finding himself deeply relieved that his magick worked despite how anxious he was to show it off. He was fairly rusty as it had been a few years since he'd summoned it, of course. Jean reacted way worse than Armin expected him to. He flinched violently as though the orb electrocuted him! Jean's back hit the pole behind him. He put as much space as he could between them. He'd never seen Jean so frightened before! Without the barrier, he probably would've escaped. Armin almost expected him to flee back into the dorms or the streets somewhere!

"What the fuck, Armin!? This is a fucking joke, right?" Jean suddenly lashed out, eyes wide and wildly darting around for a torch or some sort of incredible piece of technology to make someone's hands do that. He made the orb vanish to calm him...and a little out of insecurity.

"Shh!" He frantically raised and lowered his hands, willing his friend's outburst to be more silent.

He didn't even care that it was the middle of the night and that they were outside of the dorms where the rest of the scouts were asleep. "How the fuck did you do that?!"

"...I told you; it's magick."

"That's freaky! No wonder you didn't show anybody! Make it come back; I wanna see it again!" Jean demanded, voice turning from frightened to fired up, coming back closer to watch him.

"Jean, you're being too loud!"

"I'll be quiet if you make it come back!" His whisper was still on the louder side, but it was way better than accidentally waking somebody up, or leading to Jean accidentally exposing Armin's power. But Armin didn't move to satisfy his request. As he stared at Armin's self-conscious grimace, Jean suddenly seemed to regret his rollercoaster of over-the-top reactions. "I didn't mean to insult you or your...magick. I've never experienced this sort of thing before. Cut me some slack. Please? I'll be calmer from now on."

Armin relaxed a little, dropping his hands to his lap. "It's okay…I can empathise with you. When my mom first showed me her abilities, I was scared, too. I don't blame you."

"Well…what does it feel like to summon it? Is it hard work?" Jean asked

"Not really. There's a lot of visualisation involved. It's easier now that I'm older." He recalled sneaking to the bathroom (for added privacy) a few times at night to summon the orb in the middle of the night. It acted as a source of comfort after his parents never returned. In retrospect, Armin was glad to have had the practice or else he may have made a fool of himself! "It's not something I can describe to someone who can't use magick."

"You just made it look effortless, that's all." He shuffled forward a little more, returning to their previous closeness and then some. "Could you please bring it back? I take back everything I said about magick being bullshit and about it being the stupidest thing I've ever heard."

Armin couldn't resist such a request even if he wanted to. Chuckling with relief, now relaxed in the presence of his excited friend, he brought the orb back to existence for the second time. Jean - in his calmer state - now took his sweet time in studying the orb. Studying its shape. The perfect circumference. The feathery edges. The soft light. Jean admired all of it, all of him, and Armin couldn't help but feel so exposed, suppressing his nervous trembling as much as he could. "It kinda looks like a small moon. Don't you think so?"

"Yeah. I never thought of it like that." The added commentary could only mean Jean accepted this hidden part of him, making him relax. Thank God!

"Is it solid? It looks like I can see through it, like glass or crystal…"

"Want to touch it?" Without even waiting for permission to start, Jean immediately stuck a flat hand through the orb and left it stationary. He breathed a quiet 'woah' of amazement. Armin didn't watch his hand's movements through the orb, but his amazed face, illuminated by the pale blue light. The way the light hit the highest parts of Jean's features made his heart flutter. It was such an endearing sight, one Armin was glad he got to see and make happen! "What does it feel like?" Armin asked, mirroring his friend's curiosity.

"Pleasant, actually. Like...I'm putting my hand in a lantern without getting burned. And it's like...wriggling. Or rotating. Can you feel it? It's not attached to you but can you feel anything I'm doing?" Jean asked as he guided his hand in and out of the orb as his fascination grew. Armin never felt so connected to his mother until this moment; had she felt terrified before revealing her wish? How did she tell his father? How did he react?

"I can't feel my own. My mom let me feel hers, so I sort of know what you're talking about. Her's felt lonely because she already used her wish."

Jean hummed thoughtfully, hand still gliding through the orb. "What does loneliness feel like?"

"Empty. And lukewarm." Armin couldn't even attempt to describe his experience. He could never be as accurate as he wanted to be. The second he touched his mother's orb, he could feel a subtle ache in his chest as though he'd lost an extremely important part of himself. It must've been empathy - how his mother's wish felt after being granted. Armin realised he would never, and most likely could never describe the process nor the feeling of magick to Jean. Comparing magick to a mortal experience would be next to impossible.

"Mikasa mentioned your mom granted her wish to your dad - is that true?" Armin nodded. "What did he wish for?"

"I'm not exactly certain, but I believe he wanted to explore outside of the walls, so her wish made it happen. Her magick probably helped build the vehicle that helped them leave."

"Huh…" Jean's eyes flickered up to him. "…do you think they thought there was a chance they wouldn't come back?"

"I think they knew they wouldn't make it very far past the walls," he agreed. For the first time, Armin wasn't becoming overly emotional when talking about his parents. It was amazing how at ease he felt after getting everything off his chest. Jean's willing acceptance helped a lot!

"Really? Why?"

"Each wish has a sacrifice."

"What does that mean?" Jean was still listening, despite his almost childish preoccupation with the hovering orb.

"I'm not sure," he explained. "It's something my mom said. In return for granting the wish, we sacrifice something about ourselves."

The information took a bit of time to process within Jean's mind before his face opened with horror. He jerked his hand back as though the orb burnt him. "...you're not going to die if you grant a wish, right?"

"No, I don't think so."

"But...your parents?" Jean awkwardly attempted to infer, avoiding stating what they were both thinking.

Armin nodded. "That was probably my mom's sacrifice. She probably knew she'd die. We can show people the outcomes before we grant the wish. I have a hunch she showed my dad's outcome, and it revealed both of them would die. And I think she still agreed to grant the wish despite that."

"It must've been hard to keep everything a secret."

"Not really. I kind of pushed everything to the back of my mind when my parents died. For the longest time, I assumed I'd made it up. I only started to think about my mom, my magick, and the wish recently." He gazed up vulnerably. "...that's also why Eren suddenly bringing it up freaked me out. My thoughts and memories, and the randomness of Eren's conversation earlier tonight, seemed to be more than coincidental."

Jean's long, drawn-out 'ahh' indicated all the puzzle pieces had fallen into place within his mind. "What do you…think it means, then?"

"I think means that it's time to grant someone my wish." His arms were beginning to ache from being stuck in the same position, so he suppressed the orb again. Jean didn't put up much of a fight, too engrossed in dissecting his words.

"Damn…who do you think? Who else will you show it to?" Their eyes met. Armin didn't even have to confirm for Jean to come to the realisation. His eyebrows raised, his hand sitting in the middle of his chest. "Me? Seriously? Me?"

"Yes. Having the nerve to tell you after having so many opportunities to tell others…I don't think this is a coincidence at all." He gazed down towards his hands. "I just…I think if I wasn't meant to use the wish on you, then I would've been reluctant to show you. I have been reluctant for years. My mom always said that I'd know when to use my wish."

"How?"

"Because this is the first time I've felt sure of myself."

"How do you know that I'm the right one, though?"

"I just do."

"How?" Every single word Armin said seemed to exasperate Jean further.

Armin wasn't sure if he'd be able to explain himself correctly at all! "How do you know you're feeling confused? Or excited? Maybe your intuition is hinting that something is going to end terribly. You feel it in different parts of your body or your mind. This is kind of what I'm feeling. You'll have to take my word for it."

"…should I be thanking you or something?"

Armin smiled, exhaling with a laugh, and waved his hand with a nonchalant flick. "No! No, nothing like that." He watched the disbelief melt from his face like snow under hot rays of sunlight.

"Okay…" he appeared a lot more stressed than Armin expected him to be!

"Don't think too hard right now; I can sense that you're still wrapping your head around everything." Armin could kind of sympathise with him. Multiple revelations - the confirmation of his mother's magick, the orb, and the wish belonging to Jean and Jean alone - weighed heavy on the brunette just as it did for Armin as a child, after all. "It's just an offer. You don't have to accept."

"Well…before I decide or not, I guess I'd like to know if there are any rules about what I can and can't wish for?"

"Not that I'm aware of. It's yours to do whatever you want. I don't think there's any restraints…" Armin trailed off, considering his personal values and amended his answer. "I would prefer to not grant a wish that influences others for your benefit, though. I draw the line there."

Jean scoffed. "I wouldn't do something like that! I'm not that much of an asshole!"

"I know," he reassured with a gentle smile. "You'll make a good choice."

Jean's eyes slowly gazed off to the side, head gradually moving to stare out into the distance. Could he be thinking of a wish right then and there? Perhaps a wish intuitively came to his mind throughout their discussion and he was thinking how to word it. Either way, watching Jean deep in thought got Armin a little riled up with anticipation.

Seeing the process for the first time would be spectacular! Armin felt his heart rate increase at the prospect. Thinking in silence for a few long seconds proved to be too much, however, as Jean's face paled. Seeing Armin's magick in action would probably have to wait for a little while longer…

"…I think I'm going to go to bed," he announced and rigidly stood from the ground. It would be fruitless to ask if he was alright. The expression on his face screamed information overload and gross disbelief - a complete contrast to how he reacted earlier. Anybody would think Armin had asked him to do something horrifying!

His reaction amused Armin, nonetheless. "Sure…good night." Armin put his hands in his lap as his eyes returned to the sky; as he originally was before Jean encroached on his space. Unlike before, his mind had calmed. And surprisingly, despite what seemed like Jean's sudden need to escape from him as fast as possible, he didn't regret telling him.

"Yeah. Night…" He hovered by the doorway. "I won't breathe a word of this to anybody, obviously."

"I know. Nobody would believe you anyway."

Jean seemed to want to argue with his words. They were not a criticism, but a statement. Jean seemed to understand that being that he didn't believe Armin mere minutes ago, and turned to walk inside. "…yeah."