The four Huntsmen sat around the bar, clinking glasses together as they received their first round of the night.
"To our good friend, Ren! Last chance to be a free man until after this upcoming mission!" Jaune announced as the toast occurred, then each man at the table knocking their drinks back for it.
"Gotta say, it's been a long time coming for you two." Neptune commented as he placed his glass down.
"I'm still surprised how calm she was when she said yes." Ren remembered to his proposal to his long-time friend and fiance going without her shrieking in delight like he imagined. They set the date for a few days from now, and all preparations were in place. The only thing in the way was a mission that all of JNPR would be going on two days before the ceremony, so they did their best to put together an impromptu bachelor's party at a recently opened bar with his chosen groomsmen.
"Yeah, kinda expected her to at least squeal or something." Jaune nodded, being a witness along with his long-time flame, the invincible girl herself, Pyrrha Nikos.
"Speaking of which, Jaune, when are you and Nikos finally gonna take yourselves off the market?" Sun spoke up.
"Yeah, she was talking with Blake and I about it last night during Nora's bachelorette party here." the barkeep said as she walked up to them from behind the counter, wiping off a dirty glass with a rag.
"We've been talking about it, Yang." Jaune admitted to the owner. "But for a humble girl like Pyrrha, she has this big illustrious idea for me to propose to her. It's apparently her family's tradition to make a big show out of it."
"You could turn your Best Man speech at my wedding into it." Ren suggested. "I'm definitely sure Nora wouldn't mind you two stealing the show for a few minutes."
"Nah, it's your day. It wouldn't be right." Jaune waved off the idea, Ren deciding to respect the decision and leave it there.
"What about the way Nora finally told Ren she 'like-liked' him?" Neptune thought of, suggesting he make a show out of it.
"Yeah! I bet Rock could help ya write another song for it!" Yang nodded, catching the attention of someone further back into the employee area.
"You say something, Yang?" Rocco called from a doorway next to the liquor shelves.
"Nothing, babe! Just used your name in a sentence is all!" the blonde called back, even though the bassist and fellow bartender of the Flamin' Frets pub was already moving in to join the conversation.
"I'd like that, but we've already done that for Ren and Nora." Jaune sighed again.
"Way to go, Ren. You and Nora're hogging all the ideas!" Sun exclaimed in false disappointment.
"I'm not the one who shot down my own suggestion." Ren replied defensively.
"Jaune, let's get one thing clear here, bud." Rocco said, bringing the knight to attention. "You love her right?"
"More than Yang loves you and her hair combined." Jaune sighed.
"That seems like a broad statement..." Yang muttered.
"The way I see it, tradition shouldn't mean shit." Rocco said, putting it bluntly. "You both love each other. I see no point in going the extra twenty miles just to make it super-illustrious."
"He's actually got a point if you think about it." Neptune agreed. "I mean, I just proposed to Weiss during a dinner at her family's place. Nothing major, just me getting down on one knee and asking her to marry me."
"But, what if she says no because of the tradition?" Jaune asked.
"Arc, man, this is the same girl who literally pinned you to a tree to make sure you two get together." Sun pointed out.
"Whatever you do, Jaune, it's not going to matter to Pyrrha. She's liked you since Initiation Day at Beacon. I doubt she'd turn you down if you proposed in the worst way possible." Ren said with an encouraging hand on his shoulder.
"Well...if you guys think so." Jaune said, still slightly unsure but trusting in his friends' judgement.
"Atta boy, Vomit Boy!" Yang smiled. "Now, whose up for round two for the real reason why you're all here?" she suggested, eyeing their empty glassware.
"I like the way you think, Yang!" Sun laughed as she refilled their shot glasses, Rocco taking one for himself as well before they toasted and threw them back while Yang watched on.
"By the way, Yang, why aren't you joining us?" Ren asked before he took his shot.
"Oh, I just found out I can't. I'm pregnant." she said nonchalantly while everyone else suddenly sputtered on their drinks, Rocco especially.
"...And then it just turned into everyone talking about that until we got so hammered, we couldn't remember what we were talking about." Jaune recapped as his team walked along the natural path through the overgrown hillside.
"Sounds like quite the bachelor party." Pyrrha chuckled as she walked alongside him, Milo in it's rifle form as its wielder scanned the treeline around them for any Grimm that may be lurking. There were few and far encounters during their scouting mission, but so far nothing that Team JNPR couldn't handle.
"I'm just surprised she didn't tell us the night before during my party!" Nora exclaimed. "I'm offended! Betrayed! And sorta hungry, but that's not her fault." the hammer-wielder glared at her fiance.
"Nora, I'm sorry, but time is of the essence, and stopping to cook pancakes isn't going to help with that." Ren deadpanned.
"It'd help my stomach to stop it from growling like an Ursa!" Nora complained.
"You guys can stop if you want. Pyrrha and I can handle this." Jaune suggested.
"Oh, are you sure, Jaune?" Ren asked, while Nora, on the other hand, was already in a sitting position as she unpacked the camping stove and a canteen of pancake batter marked "In Case of Emergency".
"It's only a climb to the top of this hill and sending a picture to the military." Jaune explained, repeating the nature of the mission in order to survey a suggested site for reclamation by humanity. Also, unbeknownst to the ladies of the group, both boys had an idea of what Jaune was planning. It was near sunset, and even though they were in uncharted territory outside of Vale, the top of the hill must have some sort of amazing view. "I think Pyrrha and I can handle it while you two rest up."
"Just don't spend too much tome smooching up there." Nora teased as she poured out some of the batter into a pan Ren supplied for them.
"Funny. I was going to suggest the same to you, Nora." Pyrrha fired back, eliciting a strong blush from the hammer-wielder. "Jaune? Shall we be off?"
With a nod, Jaune turned to give one final look to his fellow teammates. Ren seemed to give him a nod and a very rare smile from the martial artist before he readied his weapon and rejoined his Spartan warrior of a partner as the two began the rest of the climb.
It was quite the few minutes before the summit began to get closer through the maze of evergreen trees and overgrown weeds. The two continued through the path in collective silence. They'd been together for a long time. Maybe not as long as their other two teammates, but even in the span of the seven years they'd knew each other, their relationship, first as friends before discovering their feelings for one another, but they had reached a point where the two could understand what each other were thinking. A simple knowing glance was all they needed to convey their thoughts.
"That must be the top up ahead!" Pyrrha noticed as the blinding light of the setting sun began to shine through the spaces between the trees up ahead of them.
"Should be. I don't see anymore land further up." Jaune nodded, following his lover as they made it out on top of the hill. He let out a relieved sigh as he discovered his hypothesis was true. The view on top of the hill was breath-taking. They could see for miles into the forest that stretched between them and the mountain range Mountain Glenn was nestled into, Vale far off into the distance on their left while the sun was setting behind the mountains to their right. A few Nevermore way off among them, far out of their range and the aviary Grimms' lines of sight, flew around them as their silhouettes were caught in the colorful backdrop of the sunset sky.
"Oh my goodness..." Pyrrha mouthed as she took in the view, not even able to focus on anything as Jaune stood beside her, taking the snapshot with his Scroll for the sake of the mission.
"I know. It's almost like we're watching a show Mother Nature put on TV just for us." Jaune agreed, eliciting a giggle from his warrior girlfriend.
"That's an odd way of putting it, but I agree." she nodded, the simile not registering the implication of what her lover was saying immediately.
"Then I guess it fits the requirements." Jaune chuckled nervously as he reached for something in his pocket. Pyrrha could only turn her gaze from the beautiful view in front of her to him, raising an eyebrow in confusion.
"What requirements?" she asked.
"Pyrrha, I don't mean to criticize, but for a humble girl like yourself, you really have an overly-extravagant idea of how you wanted me to propose to you." Jaune admitted as the gears started turning in Pyrrha's head. She immediately began blushing as her eyes began to water. She cupped a hand over her mouth to muffle a squeal of excitement as Jaune continued. "I don't have the know-how to pull of a big show or a flash mob to tell you I want to be with you forever, but after I learned what this mission's details, I had an idea. We had to rush through it a bit to make it here in time for sunset, but I'm just glad at this point we had the perfect view for it." He finished his explanation as he dropped down to one knee, and produced what he had pulled from his pocket prior to his confession: a small velvet-lined box with both their symbols on the top of the lid, Pyrrha's spear streaking across the Arc family crest. Upon opening it was a ring that accented Pyrrha's colors perfectly. The metal, which was woven into a thicker band than most engagement rings, was a gleaming bronze with a string of gold running through the center in a line that only split off around the top as it bordered the gem mounts. A pattern of small garnets and emeralds surrounded a perfectly square diamond. "Which is why I gotta ask..." Jaune finally started as he got toward his point. "Pyrrha Nikos, will you marry me?"
"SAY YES ALREADY!"
Both of the two, who originally thought they were by their lonesome, turned to see a blur of orange suddenly dip back into a bush behind them. "Nora, what are you doing here?" Jaune asked in a harsh tone as the grenadier gave up her hiding position, her fiance walking out from behind some trees, more focused on catching his breath than explaining their intrusion.
"I'm sorry, Jaune...I tried to stop her..." Ren panted as he tried to catch his breath.
Their leader was ready to respond before he suddenly saw their shadows growing longer. His gaze refocused on the setting sun as it finally descended behind the mountains. "Well, nevermind it...The moment's ruined anyway." he groaned, closing the ring box and beginning to move it back to his pocket before a firm grip stopped him. He looked back up to face Pyrrha. Her eyes were glinting with tears as a blush of happiness was plastered across her face. "Pyrrha..."
"Jaune, when I told you about how proposals work in my family, I never said it was mandatory." she admitted. "And the moment isn't ruined at all. The view is still amazing. Look." she pointed as the team looked out again. Even as the sky darkened and the sunlight finally faded away, it was replaced by the rising moon, the shattered orb in the sky being joined by a collection of stars throughout the sky. "And if you still want to follow the tradition, we have an audience now, so I guess it is a show."
Jaune looked back over to Nora and Ren, the redhead bouncing up and down with excitement as Pyrrha took both Jaune's hands in hers and pecked him on the cheek.
"Of course I'll marry you, Jaune." she whispered happily as the blonde broke into a big smile and hugged his now-fiance tight.
Alright, hope you all enjoyed that. Just a few things really quick before I go.
You may notice Yang is paired up with my OC, Rocco, in this. None of my one-shots really follow a canonical timeline except for a small few exceptions such as Neo's flashback to the day she lost her voice or JNPR babysitting Jaune's nephew, as both of those have been showcased in my two major fics so far. I actually have a bunch of different names for Team STRM members being paired with our eight favorite Huntsmen and Huntresses in training. I call Yang x Rocco 'Flaming Frets' for example, hence the name of the bar she runs in this timeline at least five years after everybody graduates from Beacon.
Also, alot of Arkos one-shots have been coming from me. Honestly, I can't really help it. They're probably the only canon-character pairing I 100% agree with, not saying that pairings like White Rose, Bumble Bee, Monochrome and all the others aren't great as well, but the standard in most of my works has been that Arkos is canon in my headcanons. Sorry, Rose Arc shippers :/
Finally, with myself only about 30 shots in on my 100 themes one-shot challenge, I'm still going to finish it even past the deadline which I gave myself the day I posted the first of them. Will they be all RWBY? Hopefully. I'd like to challenge myself to stay on this fandom throughout the challenge, and I have a few ideas coming up for more. The next one I'd like to do would be one of CFVY and STRM during their first couple days at Beacon Academy as freshman. What that will detail is up to you and your imagination for now. With that said, I'll see you lads and lasses next time.