A/N – It's been a while since I've written anything, but I intend to get back in the game. I hope I'm not too rusty, and that you enjoy it. Set after Vol. 5 Episode 7.
Disclaimer: I do not own RWBY. It is the intellectual property of the late Monty Oum, and his team and friends at Rooster Teeth.
Never Alone
Yang was in her PJs in the living room with Ruby and Weiss, also in their sleepwear. Nora was browsing for a movie from their television's online database with Ren, who kept saying "no" to her suggestions. Yang smiled at the classic banter between the two members of JNPR.
"Ren!" Nora complained, "We need to watch something fun!"
"Romantic comedies are not fun. We need something with action, otherwise, Ruby, Jaune, Yang, and I will fall asleep."
"Is it strange to think that listening to two people argue about a movie could be so nice?" asked Weiss as she watched from a distance.
"What do you mean?" asked Ruby.
It's just… I missed all silly things that went on in school. The food fight, homework… you have no idea how unbearable Atlesian high society can be."
"Aw, I'm sorry Weiss. The caviar must have been pretty sour," teased Yang.
"The caviar, and the people," she corrected, a smirk on her face as she said it, "Honestly, there this one guy who was at a charity event I sang at. He attempted to woo me, and failed miserably."
"Was he cute at least?" asked Yang.
Weiss scowled.
"He was," she allowed, "But he was an utterly reprehensible person. Honestly, in that moment I would have taken Jaune serenading me with his guitar of his over that pig…"
"Ooo… maybe we should have Jaune play a song for us while Ren and Nora figure out a movie for us to watch."
"W-What?"
"Oh Jaune!" Yang began in a sing-song manner, "Snow Angel wants – mmph!"
Weiss had lunged at Yang with a hand over the blonde's mouth, and light blush on her cheeks.
"Quiet you!" Weiss hissed before turning to Jaune, "You will do no…. such… Jaune?"
Standing where Jaune was, was nothing. The blonde was nowhere to be seen, and even Ren and Nora stopped bickering enough to look around as well. Yang straightened up, and got onto her feet, letting Weiss plop gently on the couch they were sitting on.
"Did anyone see him leave?" asked Ruby.
"No…" stated Ren, "We thought he was getting snacks."
"Well, the snacks are there!" pointed Nora to a small table near the couch.
The table was packed with snacks, enough that Jaune would have had to take multiple trips to stack them all. Were they so engrossed in their reunion that they didn't notice? Then again, although Jaune interacted with them throughout dinner, it not to the extent that everyone else did.
"Jaune… seemed a little off, don't you think?" voiced Ruby, "He smiled and told stories, but he didn't seem like his usual self."
"I noticed as well…" began Weiss, "On the way upstairs, I saw him with his sword on the balcony just staring at the sky. When I called to him to come inside because of the cold, do you know what he said? 'In a moment, Weiss," she answerd, "Not 'Snow Angel,' not 'Ice Queen,' just 'Weiss.' It's odd, but it hurt not hearing those ridiculous nicknames."
"Yeah…" Yang said, "He was… not serious, but…"
"Wistful?" supplied Ren.
"Yeah, that's the word," said Yang.
Nora and Ren looked at one another, the former nodding to her teammate. Ren faced them with a somber expression, and sad eyes.
"Jaune doesn't talk about it much, but the loss of Pyrrha still gnaws at him," said Ren, "It's not as bad as it was before, but there are times when he is reminded of her. Nora and I are especially alert at moments like those."
"Has he… he doesn't hurt himself, does he?" asked Weiss, a touch of concern in her voice.
"Nothing… extreme. Why do you ask?"
"My mother… she drinks. She's had some episodes in the past," she responded.
"The worst that's happened was Jaune nearly snapping his sword in half on a training dummy," said Nora in a voice that mirrored Ren's tone, "The only reason it didn't was because the blade slipped from his hands. He gripped the sword so tightly, and struck so violently, the friction made his hands bleed. When Ren tried to get him to calm down…. Jaune's eyes were scary. He punched Ren so hard he was knocked out, and I had to put him in a sleeper hold."
"When we checked on him later, his eyes were bloodshot, and there were dried tears. He looked at us, and he said: 'I'm sorry, Ren, for hitting you, and I'm sorry I failed both of you as a leader."
Yang gulped, and Weiss gasped. Only Ruby didn't seem too surprised, and she cleared her throat to get everyone's attention.
"When we were on our way to Mistral, I saw his sleeping bag was empty. When I looked around, I heard Pyrrha's voice. Jaune was following fencing instructions from his scroll," said Ruby.
"How would you describe his mood?" asked Ren.
"Sad, and angry," Ruby replied.
"After he apologized… there was a look in his eyes. I would give it a similar description, though there was resolve behind it," continued Ren, "He said that he was going to get justice, to make it right."
"Ren and I looked at one another, and we nodded in agreement," said Nora before smirking, "I told him that if he was going, then so were we. He was surprised."
"He did punch me in the face, maybe he thought we'd leave him after that," said Ren.
"Puh-lease," dismissed Nora, "We'd never leave him, not unless he got obsessive and totally bonkers, which he hasn't."
Yang got to her feet, getting a surprise from her two teammates.
"Uh, Yang?" questioned Ruby
"I'm going to check on him," she said, "We're supposed to have fun before going hardcore training tomorrow. No way am I going to let him brood, and besides, I wanted to talk to him anyway. You guys just pick a movie for us to enjoy, ok?"
Yang left the room, and organized her thoughts as she made her way upstairs
xXxXx
The air was cold in Mistral, almost as cold as Vale now that Jaune thought about it. He sat himself in the same spot for several minutes after he entered the balcony. Downstairs Ruby was catching up with her sister, Yang, and her old partner from Beacon, Weiss. When the two girls had arrived with Qrow earlier in the evening, Ruby was speechless, and happy. Jaune had witnessed the scene fondly, but a part of him felt uncomfortable. It was a feeling he easily recognized, and he felt disgusted with himself for even thinking it: jealousy. He told the others that he needed some air, and he had stayed out ever since. He looked to his scroll, and saw a familiar red-head. His thumb hovered over the play button to listen to the familiar voice, but he just sighed and pocketed the device.
"I thought I moved on," he sighed.
"From what?"
Jaune jolted a little, and whipped around. He saw the killer figure, long blonde hair, and lilac eyes that clearly identified Yang Xiao Long. Her new arm was on her hip, with legs in a relaxed stance as she tilted her head with an expression of curiosity.
"Oh, Yang, what's up?" he asked, calming down.
"Watcha doin', broody? You'll catch a cold if you stay out here too long."
"Without your jacket, you'll catch one sooner than me."
"Maybe I'm waiting for you to be a gentleman, and offer me yours," she retorted.
Jaune rolled his eyes a little at that, "You wouldn't think that if you saw my hoodie. Given Ruby's reaction, I'd be terrified to see yours."
He caught his fellow blonde's snort, before he heard her footsteps get close to him. He heard her body plop down next to his with a smirk on her face.
"Is this spot taken?" she asked.
"Not at all," he replied, "I just decided to think about things."
"Like…?" Yang prodded.
"Private things," Jaune said.
"Private… oh. I see," she said.
Jaune looked to Yang when she didn't say anything, an uneasy feeling in his stomach. He knew Ruby's half-sister enough to know that when Yang was quiet she was either sleeping, angry, or had something evil in mind. Considering the smile she adopted, it was definitely the last one.
"I bet you were thinking of Weiss. Maybe even things you could do together… in private," she said.
"What… No! NO, I wasn't doing… that. I-" Yang laughed at his embarrassment, and Jaune groaned, "Ha, ha, very funny."
"Now there's the Jaune I remember. You've changed so much, I thought to myself, 'Who is this guy? He looks like Jaune, but he isn't a goof like Jaune.' Hell, you didn't even hit on Weiss," she said playfully.
"I bet Weiss was happy about that," said Jaune, smiling at the memory of all the time he asked her out.
"Not really. She actually seemed disappointed," said Yang.
"Really?" he asked, a little hopeful, but he suddenly saddened, thinking of all the times he ignored his old partner. Jaune sighed, "Maybe another time. When, I feel… when I feel up to it."
He noticed Yang's eyes flick to his hand, and he quickly hid the scroll and hoped she didn't see the screen.
"Pyrrha…" Yang whispered, before she looked to the ground with a slightly guilty expression, "I'm sorry. I would have given my condolences sooner, but I-"
"It's fine, Yang. You were going through a lot yourself," said Jaune, remembering when the stub that was her arm was still bleeding, "I'm… Ren and Nora have lost people they're close to. Both of them are helping me get through it, and Ruby… she helps me smile and have fun, which helps a lot."
Yang smiled at the words, no doubt the thought of how Ruby helped him played out in her head.
"That's my sister, always going out of her way to help a friend out… Speaking of which, I wanted to thank you," said Yang, "You and your team watched over Ruby, kept her safe."
"I didn't do anything special," said Jaune, "Ruby… she's the one who led us. She's a better leader than I ever was when… when JNPR was still whole."
"Hey," Yang put a hand on his shoulder, "You know that's not true. You're a great team leader; your strategy beat that deathstalker in initiation, and your tactical planning helped your team clear the team rounds in tournament."
"Only because we had Pyrrha and Nora on the team," dismissed Jaune, "Nora killed the deathstalker, and Pyrrha carried the day throughout the tournament. Ren and I just got knocked around."
"Don't sell yourself short," growled Yang.
"It's true!" he snapped, his blue eyes shining bright.
Yang was a little surprised, and even on guard. Jaune felt awful, closed his eyes, and took a breath.
"I'm sorry Yang, I didn't mean to yell like that," he apologized with as much sincerity as he could muster, "I just… if I was that great of a leader, why didn't Pyrrha stay with us. We could have linked up with the others, or waited for reinforcements to take on Cinder. But no, she just left."
…
"And Blake ran! Sun saw her go. After he got to the city, she just… ran!"
Yang looked to the side. Jaune's words reminded her of her own when Ruby asked about the team when she woke up from the Fall of Beacon.
Blake ran away.
She was still angry and hurt by the faunus' actions. Yang had a feeling on why she left: Blake must have known who the guy the sliced her arm off was, and thus blamed herself for her injury. Like she cared about that sort of thing. Who Blake was before Beacon didn't matter to her; she was her partner, her friend, or at least that's what she thought. Now?
"I mean," Jaune continued, getting her attention, "I'm not the strongest. Out of all of us, I'm probably the weakest. No semblance, and barely any training? How could I inspire confidence in people with more experience and power than me?"
"It's because of your weakness that your team followed you," Yang said.
"Huh? Yang, that doesn't make sense," said Jaune.
"Just… hear me out," she said, and Jaune faced her, "You're right. You have no semblance, and barely any training. You're also awkward, and a little clumsy. Logically, you should have never been a team leader. But you pushed on. Despite all the odds you faced in Beacon and beyond, from Cardin to the Grimm, to the Vytal tournament you charged forward. It took courage to try to make Beacon work for you, even after you had plenty of opportunities and warnings to get out.
"No matter what was thrown at you, you stood tall and faced things head on. That's why Pyrrha, Nora, and Ren followed you. Why Ren and Nora still follow you; because you inspire them to be brave when it was so easy to lose confidence. Your team could have fallen apart after Pyrrha's death, but you held them together."
"You… you really think that?" he asked.
"I do, as does Ruby. She told Weiss and I about Kuroyuri, how she started to question her decision to go to Mistral, to look for the people responsible," said Yang, "She was so scared that she might have led you guys and Uncle Qrow into a dangerous situation. But your words comforted her, and gave her courage," she paused and looked at the ground in shame, "You were there for her, when I wasn't. All I did was mope and cry myself to sleep. Some big sister I was."
As she looked down, something snaked around her shoulder and drew her in. Jaune had wrapped an arm around her, and she flushed a little.
"Sorry," said Jaune keeping his eyes forward, "I have older sisters who would ask me to hold them when they felt afraid. You looked like you could use a hug."
"That's very sweet of you," said Yang as she leaned in further, resting her head and golden locks on his shoulder. She closed her eyes, and sighed at the warmth that was coming from the moment, "You know, it's moments like this that totally debunk what you say about yourself. Being a good leader isn't always about being the strongest. It's also about knowing how to help your people through their bad moments."
"Yang… You're a great sister," said Jaune, "You always looked after Ruby in school, supporting her and cheering her on. What happened to you… you lost things that were important to you: your arm; your partner. The loss, the trauma, it's not something that just goes away. You don't wake up, and say, 'I'll move on today.' You needed to come to terms with it, to collect yourself and pick yourself back up. Trust me on that, it takes time. I'm still trying to come to terms with my loss, and I'm sure Ruby also understands, what with her losing Penny."
"You think so?" asked Yang.
"If you want to help someone, be sure you're able to help yourself. Could you honestly say that in the state you were in that you could have helped Ruby, and given her the support she needed? I know I wasn't, it took months for me to get myself back onto my feet, to think I could be… useful again.
Yang was quiet, Jaune's distaste for the word "useful" showing.
"For the longest time, I told myself, 'I could have made a difference.' If Pyrrha let me follow her into the tower, what little I could have contributed would have somehow saved her. But now, looking at where I was then and where I am now, I would have died almost instantly against someone like Cinder. That would have thrown Pyrrha off even more. That, or she would have died having to defend me, and that would have been even worse. I guess what I'm trying to say is that I get it: the feeling of feeling like you've let prople down, including yourself. What's important is that you find something, anything to hold onto, and not let go. You found something, didn't you?"
"Yeah, my sister," said Yang confidently.
"Then keep holding on, and when all is said and done, what you went through the past few months will just be a bad time in your life."
"What about you?" she asked, "What did you find?"
"I found my friends, the people who believe in me. I needed to get stronger for them, that way, I can be someone who can actually save them from danger, instead of the goof in the tree or the locker as people fight for their lives. Seeing Ruby with you and Weiss again, seeing all of us together, I don't want to see any more tears."
"None of us do. But don't forget Jaune, while it's good to train to get stronger, it's also good to spend time with the people that matter to us. Even small moments like watching a crappy movie together can make us a lot stronger," Yang said before she gently removed his arm, missing the comfort it provided as the cool air began to seep into her body. She got up, and was about to leave when she turned around by the door.
"You coming?"
Jaune looked at his scroll, and flicked to the image of Pyrrha. He put it away after some effort, and pocketed the device into his pants before going over to her. The two walked together to the living room when Yang spoke up.
"You know, Jaune, you aren't alone… as someone who also lost her partner, if you… wanna talk about it, come by anytime."
"Yang…" Jaune sighed, "You didn't lose your partner, not like me anyway. You at least have opportunities to talk to Blake, should you wish to do so. That being said… thanks for the offer. I'll think about it."
Yang nodded just before making their entrance to the living room together.
xXxXx
"So, did you guys finally decide on a movie?" asked Jaune.
"No!" complained Nora, "Ren, won't let me have my rom-com with zombies!"
Jaune quirked an eyebrow before looking at his fellow man.
"I wanted to watch the Mistral classic The Eight Huntsmen," said Ren.
Jaune chuckled a little, before he laughed whole heartedly. All of his friends looked to him with strange looks.
"S-Sorry," he said, "It's just you guys are always fighting when it's movie night. Do I have to pick the movie again, just like in school?"
The two remaining members of JNPR looked to one another with sheepish grins.
"I guess so, team leader," said Ren
"Yeah, pick something awesome!" crowed Nora.
Jaune felt something in his heart: joy, delight, pride. He thought again of Pyrrha, but with Yang's words as well as Weiss, Ruby, and his two teammates also. None of them would want to see him down, and he didn't want to let them down again.
He got the remote, scrolled over the list, and settled on one with a smile on his face.
"This one," Jaune declared.
"Try Hard 2?" asked Ren.
"Yep! The sequel to the greatest action film of all time," said Jaune, "In fact, I was going to take Weiss on a date to see it, but you can imagine how that went."
He heard Weiss scoff behind him.
"As if I would ever watch something like this."
"Too late!" said Nora before running to the floor in front of the couch.
Ren joined his partner, Ruby sat next to hers, but Yang scooted away from Weiss. The heiress realized where Jaune would sit, but before she could get up, Ruby wrapped an arm around Weiss' and Yang patted the empty space between them. Jaune sat down getting a nudge from Yang. He turned to Weiss, who stared straight at the screen.
"Enjoy this while you can, Arc. This is the closest you will ever be to taking me to the movies," she said.
"All my friends are here," said Jaune happily, "There's no way I won't enjoy it, Snow Angel."
He delighted in the blush Weiss had, before he pressed the play button on the remote.
A/N: A rather hastily written story in my opinion, but I was working with a self-imposed deadline. Not that it matters, since the next episode comes out tomorrow. Let me know what you think.