Pyrrha relished being the first one up.
Most people didn't understand this, they just attribruted her as borderline insane, her waking up at six every morning was as alienating as it could get, it would seem.
For perspective, even Nora raised her eyebrows at the idea.
But, little did the late-waking heathens know that it brought untold luxuries to Pyrrha. Six-thirty air was as cool and brisk as it could get in Vale for exercise, she had uncontestable dibs on the shower when she got back, and atleast an hour of simple procrastinating after, given she was on time - which she always was. It even brought the 'smuggery' rights of not being a half-dead husk when everyone else woke up, and getting to watch Jaune collapse and clamber his way out of bed was always a bonus.
But. Today was different. She had competition.
Because, it seemed JNPR's resident blonde spectacle had fallen ill. Pyrrha could tell something was up the morning before, when she was convinced Jaune had died in his sleep after he refused to get up for fifty minutes. From there, things had gotten more obvious. He had lidded eyes all day and hardly spoke at all, fell asleep at lunch and cancelled their training.
Which wasn't an issue of course. She could manage one day of not being tied to Jaune.
But it would seem she would have to manage a few more.
Because Jaune was now awake at six, hanging half of himself out of his bed and breathing like an old bicycle pump. Which, uh, funnily enough, wasn't normal.
Pyrrha would have laughed, but the longer he hanged, the longer she worried that he was going to fall right out of bed and, well, snap his neck.
…
No. That was an awful thing to think. Alive Jaune is best Jaune.
And right now, that meant badly ill but stable Jaune, and it seemed Jaune wasn't going to stabilise himself anytime soon.
The Invincible Girl would have to act. Pyrrha rolled onto her side now, her whole body facing Jaune.
Here we go.
"Jaune?" She whispered.
Nothing.
"Jauune?" She whispered longer.
She giggled, until the Jaune object didn't budge.
And didn't budge some more.
And kept hanging.
...
Was it dead? Oh heavens. Maybe he was dead. Maybe yesterday morning had been a sign. Maybe she was laughing at his dead corpse - was he even breathing anymore?
She silenced her thoughts, panicking only made things worse. Like drowning.
Yes, like drowning.
She found herself begging for the sound of his preciously coarse breaths in the night's untouched silence. Something, anything.
...
'hrrrk.'
…
'hrrrk.'
Oh thank heavens. There it was. He was alive and wheezing. Phew.
But it seemed he wasn't up for whispers, so she'd have to get his attention some way else. She'd have to be discreetly louder, which was the biggest oxymoron since...since...
Oh she didn't have time for this! Time was of the essence here, this was alive-Jaune and dead-Jaune she was talking about.
Okay...okay. Action!
"Jaune." She coughed out with a hint of urgency.
No response.
"Jaune." She croaked out, this time with a hint of desparation.
No response.
"Jaune!" She whisper-jabbed, louder than she intended.
A twitch of an arm, a stretch of a back, and...
'huuh?' Jaune croaked back, not bothering to move.
Oh thank the Gods, he was alive.
Pyrrha shifted closer, until she was on the edge of her bed.
"Are you... are you okay?" Pyrrha asked.
…
No! Stupid question Pyrrha, of course he wasn't alright, he was dangling and dying here. A good g- A good friend! would ask if he needed water, or... or help hi-
"i'm fine..." He wheezed.
Huh.
"Really?" Pyrrha giggled.
Silence.
"i don't know."
Another silence.
"are you okay?" He clumsily returned.
"Me?" Pyrrha laughed quietly. Oh Jaune. "I'm fine... it's you I'm worried about."
"you're always wowwied about me."
"Someone needs to be." She rebutted, raising her eyebrows and smiling at him, even though the room was pitch black and he wasn't looking at her.
"you're w-" Jaune paused with a loose wheeze. "thanks..."
'Thanks?' She thought, laughing to herself. Jaune clearly wasn't completely there right now, Pyrrha guessed.
How sweet.
"i'm gonna go to sleep."
"Oh, alright." She smiled. In the dark again. "I'm sorry for waking you."
Jaune laughed, one hundred percent of which was a cough.
"you didn't, don't wowwy." Jaune sniffed. "this is my twentyteenth time twying."
Pyrrha sighed in adoring pity. "Goodnight, Jaune."
...
"night."
"Is he dead?"
"Nora!"
"Nora."
"What?"
"Don't say things like that, he's fine."
"How do you know? You're not a doctor Ren! He could have gone up to the clouds while we were sleeping."
"He's breathing-"
"I spoke to him last night, he's fine!"
Nora glanced at Pyrrha. "Spoke? When?"
"When I woke up."
Nora's face was flooded with suspicion, until it flashed in realisation. "Ohh!" She laughed, ridding her initial assumptions. "You wake up really early. Like an alien. I remember now."
There was a silent sigh of relief in the room when Nora settled.
...
"Still, that was, what? Two and a half hours ago?"
"Nora!" Pyrrha jabbed in agitation.
"I'm just saying! You never know!" She shrugged.
"We do know, Nora, he's breathing, resting and going to be fine."
Nora slumped. A breathing man was normally a living man, so Ren was right. She was beaten.
"Your immaculate logic is no fun." She pouted.
Ren shook his head and laughed, breathing triumphantly as he had once more calmed Nora. "Alright... now that's over... we can go." He waved. "Before you break Pyrrha." He muttered under his breath.
Nora frowned as her and Ren headed for the door. Pyrrha, however, refused to budge.
Nora caught on immediately. "Oh no! No-no-no!" She dragged Pyrrha out. "You're coming with us."
Pyrrha was doubtful. "I think I should stay he-"
"No!"
"But what if he nee-"
"No!"
"What if he di-"
"No!" Nora shook her head. "You're not staying off too. Jaune will be just fine."
Pyrrha still wasn't sure. There was plenty of things that could happen. He could fall, cough his head off, choke on water, fall again whilst getting food and end up in the fridge.
He'd freeze to death!
...
i mean she guessed it would also be a really good way of building trust between them too and if pyrrha was ill one time then that would give jaune a reason to stay behind and look after her which would b-
"No!" Nora crashed through Pyrrha's thoughts. "Off we go!" She cheered, nudging Pyrrha out of the dorm.
"He'll be just fine, Pyrrha. No need to worry." Ren cleared, reaching to close the door.
And with that, the door closed, and a Jaune-less school day opened.
Yang leaned over to Ren. The question had been burning in her mind for a while now, and while she already knew the answer, having someone spell it out would be alot better.
"Sooo..." She trailed. "What exactly's up with Pyrrha today?" She asked with faux intrigue.
Pyrrha hadn't said much this lesson, instead staring at her book, seemingly intent on writing the entire essay in one lesson, which was freaky even for Pyrrha.
That was... well that was Weiss Schnee levels of freaky!
Yang had her suspicions regarding her behaviour, an absent Jaune and distant Pyrrha added up all too easily. But a confirmation in words is what she wanted, not suspicions.
Nora interrupted Ren before he even spoke, taking lead by making a vomiting motion at Yang.
Unfortunately, Yang 'didn't understand'. She tilted her head in faux confusion this time.
Ren rolled his eyes and smirked, explaining Nora's act. "Jaune's got the flu. He's alright, but Pyrrha isn't liking having her partner on the so called 'brink of death'-" he punctuated the phrase with finger quotation marks and a doubtful look, "-alone in our dorm."
Yang leaned back into her seat, blissful rightness, how brilliant it was. Yang was so right it hurt, Pyrrha was totally helpless when it came to dead-or-alive-roulette-Jaune.
Ren shrugged, continuing as he leaned in to whisper. "I can't really blame her though. If Nora was like Jaune was right now I'd be panicky too."
Nora perked up at her name. "Huh?" She only heard her name it would seem.
"Nothing, Nora." Ren replied.
'Cute.' Yang laughed to herself.
Nora leaned over to Ren and Yang from Ren's other side. By her face, Yang guessed a question was coming. "You think he's like..."
The question stopped. Nora blanked.
Ren spoke without looking up from his book. "Patient Zero?"
"Patient Zero!" She pounced, snapping her fingers. "You think he's patient zero for some cooked up virus?"
Yang looked at her with a mix of blistering amusement and profound confusion. "What?" She laughed.
Nora scoffed. "Uh, excuse me, like in the shows you watch where it's made in a lab but gets out somehow? Maybe Jaune pulled the short straw and got... got infected!" Nora grinned. "Me and Ren watched something like that, it was great."
"Ohhh-" Yang teased, looking to Ren.
"It was called Virality." Ren interrupted. "And no, Jaune isn't a patient zero. It's the flu."
Nora still continued. "Pfft, yeah but we both know that it's always a pumped up version of a normal virus." Nora rebutted. "He could have ultra-flu!" She lightly punched Ren's arm to emphasise her sentence.
Yang was laughing and gawking at this point. "You two... I don't even..."
It seemed Yang wouldn't even forever, the conversation being tackled by the end of the lesson brought it to a close.
"Okay! You can, uh, start packing your things away now folks." The professor proclaimed, accompanied by the bell. "Just remember that I want that essay on the Mistralian war effort by next Thursday. All three-thousand words of it!" He turned to wipe the board of his notes, adding a final order. "And no excuses!"
"No excuses, Pyrrha!"
Pyrrha looked to Nora with confusion, who was skipping ahead of them through the corridor, now backpedalling to speak to Pyrrha and Ren.
"But I did it all in class."
Ren rolled his eyes again. "She's talking about Jaune."
Pyrrha sighed.
Nora continued.
"You checked on him after History, which meant you used up your only Jaune token. And, you said that he said that he was fine." Nora emphasised each pronoun by pointing her fingers in different directions. "He'll last until the end of the school day."
Pyrrha pouted in acceptance. "I know. I know." She yielded to Nora's logic this time. "I just wonder what he'd do for me. I don't want to... don't want to be a bad partner." She shrugged.
...
"Pffffftt!" Nora laughed. "Bad partner." She mocked with finger quotations. "You're a great partner! Are you kidding? We know that you're great, everyone does." Nora continued, scrambling to fix up the hole in Pyrrha's confidence. "Hell, you're... you're the clingiest partn-"
"What Nora's trying to say is you don't need to worry Pyrrha." Ren butted in again for Nora's sake. "He'll recover, and life will go on."
Nora raised her eyebrows, her face morphing into a grin.
"Ohh, life will go on." Nora mocked again, waving her hands in mock extravagance.
Ren punched her arm. "And don't bother thinking about what Jaune would do." Ren added. "I'm sure he'd manage."
Pardon? "Manage?" Pyrrha pressured, sturdying her eyes.
"Manage." Ren returned.
"Yeah, manage!" Nora added.
"Manage?"
"Manage."
"Manage?!"
"Nora!"
"No- !"
"I think you're just being ridiculous."
"Excuse me?"
"Ridiculous! Pyrrha Nikos!" Weiss insisted, jabbing her finger toward her.
'Ridiculous' What was she trying to say?
"There is no fathomable way Ruby knew that."
"I did too!"
"No! Pyrrha told you!" She inisisted to Ruby.
"I didn't. She knew it. She's completely innocent." Pyrrha grinned smugly, crossing her arms.
Ruby giggled. "You're just mad I beat you at a quiz, Weiss." Ruby swung.
"Pyrrha is lying. You cheated." Weiss deflected. "I am not mad."
"Are too!"
"I am not."
"Are too!"
"It's 'you are too'! Where's your grammar?" Weiss jabbed back.
"Don't change the subject, Weiss." Pyrrha laughed.
"Yeah! I won!" Ruby celebrated with quiet pride.
Ugh, the immaturity would kill her. Weiss slumped in the library chair, groaning. She'd lost... lost to Ruby Rose in a quiz about... about Dust! She was a Schnee! This was like Ruby's uncle losing a quiz about alcohol and... drink!
It was literally in his blood!
...
Relax, Weiss. Relax. Breathe.
Panicking wouldn't do her any good, she knew that, she had learnt that. She returned to her proper seating position, resting her pen on the table. 'Seven stages of grief, Weiss.' She told herself. 'Acceptance is the way to go.'
She groaned. "Well," She rolled her eyes, placing her chin on her hand, pretending to dismiss her loss as something insignificant. "Sudden death is a stupid idea anyway." She muttered.
She heard Ruby squeal and a high five of victory between the one-and-a-half redheads opposite her.
Ruby's victory was irrelevant. There were too many variables here to ensure Ruby had won. Besides, if Pyrrha wasn't here then Weiss was sure she could've won. She was normally with her team, with...
...
Huh.
"Where's Jaune?" Weiss turned to ask the two.
Their victory celebration ended momentarily. "Oh, he's sick." Pyrrha answered. "I think he has the flu." Pyrrha smiled.
"Ew." Ruby added. "My dad had the flu once, he was like a ghost."
Pyrrha tilted her head. "Jaune is more like a husk."
"Husk?"
"Um, like a zombie, then."
"Ohhh."
"Well?" Weiss interrupted. "Is he okay?"
Pyrrha paused for a moment, her fun-loving side was now distracted by her screaming caring side. "I think." She muttered.
Ruby grinned at this. "Awwww." She cooed, hugging Pyrrha's side. "Pywwha's wowwied about her pawtnuh." She teased.
Pyrrha rolled her eyes, red rushing to her face.
Only a metophorical green rushed to Weiss' face. 'How sickening. An ill Jaune? How that even begins to warrant empathy is lost to me.'
"I'm sure there's no need to be worried." Weiss closed.
"Yeah!" Ruby scoffed. "Says you, Weiss." Ruby stuck her tongue out. 'How disgusting.' "If you were his partner you'd leave him to die."
"I'd take the first chance." Weiss added.
"Weiss!" Ruby and Pyrrha booed.
"He's not that bad." Pyrrha insisted.
"That's what you always say."
"It's just first impressions!" Ruby reminded her.
Weiss didn't need reminding, she still remembered her 'first impression' encounter with Jaune. And she's sure Pyrrha remembered hers. She probably held it akin to a fairy tale.
It made Weiss shiver.
"Alright. That's enough Jaune for me." Weiss dismissed. "Aslong as he isn't going to die then that's fine with me. So don't bring his medical bill to me." She ended, grabbing a book from her bag to distract herself from Ruby and Pyrrha's antics.
Ruby giggled at Weiss' act. "She's just jealous." She whispered to Pyrrha.
"You know, somehow I doubt that." Pyrrha whisper-laughed back to Ruby.
…
Where was he?
He couldn't be dead, he was in too much pain to be in heaven.
But despite his fever, guessed it wasn't hot enough for him to be in hell.
So, he was still alive. Achingly, poundingly and croakingly alive.
...
Gods. This was horrible. His everything ached. Every breath felt like he was losing more air than he was taking in. He would say something about his head, but he couldn't feel it.
...
Looking about, his only friends were a lamp, water and two blankets, it seemed.
Where was everyone?
Where was Pyrrha?
'Am I late for school or something?' He grinded the muscles in his neck to look at the clock.
'12:14 PM'
Right, it was school, which meant he was the only one here.
…
Man. This was awful. Welcome to flu season, he guessed.
He'd have to distract himself for another couple hours, or wait until he passed out again.
…
How did Blake do this? Relishing her own solitude. Sure, she'd spoken about it a few times, and Jaune had nodded a few times, but that didn't mean Jaune understood how 'peace and quiet' was fun.
This was just painfully boring, although that might have been his migraine. Nevertheless, he wanted to speak to someone. Do something.
…
He decided to let his thoughts drift for a while...
Food.
Homework.
Shower.
Comics.
That dog that Ruby introduced him to... Zwei.
His team...
Nora, Pyrrha, Ren.
Leadership.
Training... training... training...
Gods! Jaune's realisation broke him from his sleepy stupor. He was going to miss training for atleast a week.
Aw man, that was the best part of the day.
...
He wondered how Pyrrha was.
'Hope she hasn't found a new partner.' He laughed to himself.
Jaune considered himself lucky. Pyrrha was pretty special to him. He didn't really mention it, in fear that he'd freak her out, but she was something else.
She had saved him from death by lack of confidence as a leader. Saved him from death by falling. Saved him from death by not even having an unlocked aura. Saved him from death by scorpion.
She kinda saved him from a lot of things.
But not the flu. He'd have fight this one on his own.
…
What were the chances? Heh? Of all the people here, it was him whose partner was the 'Invincible Girl'.
…
Whatever that meant.
"What does that mean?"
The three of them crinkled their eyes at Yang's scroll, intimidating the cryptic set of letters emblazoned in red on the screen. They remained silent, clearly not getting anywhere with their understanding, until Yang took initiative to solve their dilemma and made the most intelligent decision possible.
"Blake?" She asked.
"Yes?" Blake replied from the end of the table.
"Uh, what does..." She looked back to her scroll. "...INFJ mean?"
Blake sighed and moved the book from in front of her face. "Are you three doing a personality 'test'?"
"Yes." Yang, Nora and Pyrrha replied in unison.
Blake groaned, closing her eyes and rubbing her head. "It means 'Protector', put simply." Blake answered. "It should explain more into detail if you scrolled down." She emphasised. "Now stop disturbing me, please, I'm reading." And with that, she rested her feet on the library table and returned the book to it's rightful place.
Ah, Blake, the walking-talking encyclopedia. "Thanks Blakey." Yang chirped.
"So..." Nora trailed, signalling with her hands urgently. "What does it say?"
"I'm getting to it." Yang explained, waving her hand at Nora. "Uhhh." Yang scrolled down. "Huh." She muttered. "It says, 'Kind, complex and conscientious, inituitive. Notably creative. Instinctively caring and nurturing'."
"Oo, topical." Nora added.
Yang smirked. "Um, there's a load of other stuff, like 'deep faith in instincts', 'struggles to build close relationships' and all, but I think that gives a general idea." She glanced to Pyrrha. "Well, that's you, Pyrrha. 'The Protector.'"
Yang grinned this time, shifting her sight towards the reading faunas in the corner.
"Blake?"
Yang only received an agitated growl and a twitching of ears in response. That was enough, it meant she was listening.
"Uh, who do you think, out of us three, is INFJ?" Yang a-
"Pyrrha." Came the immediate response.
"Wow." Pyrrha muttered.
"She's good." Nora commented, nodding.
Yang shrugged. "She guessed Ruby's birthday once, kinda freaky but we're used to it." She whispered, leaning over to the two.
She raised her voice again, returning to look at Blake. "Say, Blake. How'd you guess that?"
Blake remained silent.
Yang rolled her eyes. "Blake?"
A quick groan sounded, a reply hot on it's heels. "Because Pyrrha told me she wanted to play nurse with Jaune." She jabbed. "Now stop disturbing me, and I'm not psychic, I knew Ruby's birthday because she circled the day in four different colours on her calendar with 'BIRTHDAY' above it."
Yang sunk, so much for her theory that Blake was a sorcerer descended from a cult of faunas wizards. "Aww. Spoilsport." She turned to the others. "She's pretty grouchy when she's reading. Cute."
Pyrrha sunk too. 'Wow, thanks for making me look like the freak, Blake.'
Yang sniggered when she saw Pyrrha deep in thought. "Thinking of playing nurse?" She looked at Pyrrha.
Nora punched Pyrrha lightly to add injury to injury. "You didn't tell me you wanted to do that, Pyrrha!" Nora said in light irritation.
Pyrrha only went red from embarrassment. "Because I didn't say that!" She insisted. "It's... it's hyperbole - she's grouchy, Yang said so. Blake asked what was up, so I only told her I was worried, that's all."
Yang nodded in faux belief. "Ohhh, sure... sure."
Pyrrha frowned. "Don't get any ideas, Yang."
Nora jumped ship and was now suddenly on Pyrrha's side. "Yeah! I bet she'd crush you in a fight!" Nora chirped, only throwing petrol onto Pyrrha's burning embarrassment.
Pyrrha choked. "When did fighting come into this?"
Yang ignored Pyrrha's pacifism. "Pfft. I'd like to see that happen."
"Oh yeah? She's the Invincible Girl!"
"So? That doesn't mean anything."
"It's really alright guys, let's maybe not fight." Pyrrha muttered, laughing nervously, remembering what often happened when fire and thunder clashed.
Death, destruction... more death.
They ignored her. The argument was no longer about Pyrrha against Yang in a fight, but had now devolved into whether Yang or Nora was right.
"It means everything." Nora insisted, conveying the idea by drawing a circle with her hands
Yang only gave her a doubtful look. "It's a name." She squinted her eyes in passive-aggressive rationality at Nora.
"Well... she's the Mistral Champion." Nora challenged. "That's a title!"
Yang swallowed, she couldn't lose this. "S-So?" Think of something, Yang! "I've never been to Mistral." Brilliant response.
"I bet Pyrrha could send you there in one throw."
Yang scoffed, Nora was arguing fantasy, which meant Yang was winning. "That's ridiculous. It's... what? Two thousand miles away?"
The friendly dispute between Nora and Yang eventually blurred out from Pyrrha's hearing, thankfully only silence and her thoughts accompanied her now. Looking to the ceiling, she reclined into her chair and sighed with exhaustion.
It was only lunch, Gods help her.
The JNPR dormitory door crashed open with a slow whirl of red and gold.
Finally, it was over. Arguably the most exhausting school day yet was over. It turns out Pyrrha would not catch a break after lunch, as lessons after lunch had only gotten worse. Ms Goodwitch had elected Pyrrha to exhibit tactics to combat multiple opponents, which had consisted of her fighting the entire lesson.
And then they had Professor Port last, which facilitated Nora and Ruby sharing their own stories to themselves and Pyrrha, on top of the Professor's own laborious tales.
Needless to say the last two hours had been unspeakable.
But Pyrrha guessed the most exhausting thing was the churning whirlpool in the pit of her stomach: her worry. Worrying about her partner all day had expended the majority of her energy, and while Pyrrha couldn't help but worry about Jaune for, reasons, in retrospect she wished she'd had some common sense and reassured herself he would be fine.
Because opening the dormitory door with exhausted dread, only to see Jaune sound asleep was both the most heart-warming and heart-sinking sight possible.
She had worried all day, all for nothing.
...
Well, Pyrrha supposed it was just a part of life, and there was nothing she could do now but be happy he was alright.
It was bad to worry and be wrong, but she guessed infinitely worse to worry and be right.
...
If Jaune was fine. Then Pyrrha could sleep. She had wanted to care for him, but that was this morning, and this morning she wasn't about to collapse. Exhaustion and the single drip of selfishness in her mind had ousted her desire to look after Jaune, replacing it with the desire to sleep.
So sleep she would. Jaune could wait, no matter how much it hurt.
She dropped onto her bed. Soft duvets, pillows and blankets awaited her. Just what she needed.
...
But, alas, the Gods had other plans, because Pyrrha instead landed onto the side of 6 foot of flesh and bone, her face impacting with a shoulder. Because Pyrrha Nikos had just fallen on top of Jaune Arc. Funnily enough, this wasn't her bed.
She felt the burn in her stomach and face to jump up and apologise, flooding embarrassment rushed up her throat, her heart jumped in her chest.
And then...
She didn't give one. Because Pyrrha Nikos was tired, and embarrassment could wait. Social humiliation would have to wait for the Invincible Girl.
Her thoughts were broken as she felt a sickly Jaune start to shift underneath her.
'morning Pyrrha.' He croaked.
'morning.' She sighed.
'you tired?' He asked.
'yeah.'
'you sound like it.'
There was a gentle silence between the two.
'could you, move over slightly, please?' She weakly begged.
Jaune laughed coarsely.
'sure.'
His body rolled to the left, and Pyrrha fell into the warm space where he had been, landing into the cup of his chest and left arm, her face inches from his neck.
'thanks.'
They remained silent for a while, only coarse and tender breaths filled the air for that time. Pyrrha couldn't be happier at this point, wrapped up in Jaune's side. Jaune was too sick to care, she was too tired to care, they just wanted to sleep, and sleep they would.
Jaune spoke again. 'I've got the flu, y'know.'
Pyrrha chuckled. 'I know.'
There was another pause.
'aight, sleep well.'
'thanks... you too.'
Pyrrha knew he had the flu. She knew she could get it if she stuck around, but she wasn't exactly drinking his sweat and they certainly weren't... weren't kissing or anything, and Jaune's symptoms had even fallen since this morning. But if she did catch something? So what, she needed a day off, or even a few - life was too stressful, school was too stressful.
The Invincible Girl could do with a break.
Yes, it was irresponsible and irrational, but as bad as this cursed illness was, Pyrrha had been through it before and been through worse, she knew how to care for herself. The only possible factor missing in her equation would be Jaune.
And he was right here, sniffling and wheezing, but here.
So her equation to paradise was complete.
Because as much as she relished being the first one up with only herself...
...being the last one up with Jaune didn't sound so bad.
That was Lovesick. Arkos needed some love I guess.
Unsure about what INFJ pins down to because every 'personality test' website says different things, so sorry if it's inaccurate.
Anyways, I hope you enjoyed reading it as I did writing it, and thank you for reading.
Bye.