Yang shook as her mind struggled to escape into consciousness. She was stuck somewhere between awake and asleep, torn between the desperate need to wake herself and her own morbid curiosity gripping her and holding her within her nightmares.
She'd been hoping that getting to Ruby might help ease some of her night terrors, having her sister nearby again and being able to remind herself of that.
As if anything could go so easily. Her issues hadn't lessened at all since her and Weiss had gotten to the house in Mistral. The opposite of what she had hoped for seemed to be the result, as now her sleep was plagued by images of her sister taking her place in front of Adam's blade, or Weiss, or even Blake, had she not gotten there when she did. It was like a curse. She'd finally reunited with people she cared about, people she loved, only for her mind to drag them into her personal torture.
Faintly, Yang thought she heard noise, something outside of her mind. If she were lucky, then whatever it was might be enough to finally rouse her so that she could find some relief.
There was a quiet moment, before Yang found herself assailed by more gruesome images and shivered in fear. Whatever had caused the first noise piped up again after this. She thought she could hear someone saying her name, but she couldn't place it.
Suddenly, there was a light pressure on her arm. The real one, and Yang's mind went blank for a blissful moment at the touch before the nightmares sought to return, sending goosebumps crawling across her body as her shivering increased.
Yang whimpered in response to this, wishing that whatever it was that had pushed away her dark dreams would come back.
As if in answer, she felt her body being pulled up, and suddenly there were two warm arms wrapping around her, quieting her rattled mind and pulling her closer to the surface.
She could hear more whispering, recognizing her name. She managed to pick out some of the other words, piecing together some sort of attempt at reassuring her. It did the trick, as her mind finally pulled itself awake. Her body stiffened as she came to fully, before letting all the tension go and sagging against whoever was holding her up. Her face was buried in their chest a little bit awkwardly, considering they'd probably pulled her up into this embrace hastily.
Her rescuer had stopped speaking now that she'd been roused, and just continued to hold her, stroking her back gently until she stopped shivering. It didn't take very long for this to lull Yang back to sleep, no matter how hard she tried to stay awake, to avoid her nightmares.
When Yang next came to, she was extremely surprised to realize that she'd been completely left alone in her sleep, waking feeling almost rested, rather than exhausted by her usual host on terrors each time she closed her eyes. She rolled over slowly, burying her face in the pillows as faint light shined through the windows.
Giving up, she slowly cracked one eye open, gazing out the window at what looked like the very beginning of sunrise, informing her that there was still some sleep left to be had before she needed to get up, if she could manage it. As her blurry vision focussed, she realized that she was peeking out at the windows from behind a shoulder.
A shoulder which was not one of hers.
Her eyes shot open as she reeled back in surprise, arm pulling itself free to support her sitting up. She only realized after that the fact that her arm had been snaked firmly around the waist of the other person in her bed, holding them nearby.
Her brain, now fully awake, began to recall how bad her dreams had been in the night, and how somebody had shown up and calmed her down, helped her get back to sleep. These thoughts went by quickly as her eyes travelled from wide shoulders, up the back of the neck and to the mop of blond hair on the person in bed with her, before they shifted to the face of a Jaune Arc who was slowly starting to wake up, obviously woken by her sudden movement.
His eyes opened slowly as her rolled on to his back, and he blinked a number of times before their gazes met.
He didn't seem half as panicked as Yang would have expected. He looked more embarrassed than anything else, a faint pink dusting on his cheeks as he looked up at her.
"You're in my bed?"
He reached up with one arm, scratching the top of his head nervously.
"I mean," he began, quietly, "You kind of gave me no choice?"
Yang failed to hide her surprise, "Yea?" she asked back, prompting him to explain. He did so after a moment, shifting to rest on one elbow as he sat up slightly.
"I thought you'd fallen back asleep, but when I went to get up and leave, you sorta just, grabbed me and dragged me in here. I tried to get free, but you didn't exactly have a light grip, and every time I started to get loose you started shivering and stuff again and I didn't want to leave you like that so I kinda, went with it?"
She stared at him, starting to see maybe just a bit of what Ruby saw in him as a friend, and what Pyrrha must have seen in him. If it had been Ruby to come in during the night after hearing her having a nightmare, that made sense, she was Yang's sister, of course she'd try to comfort Yang, the same as Yang would do for Ruby, but Jaune? They barely even spoke at Beacon, even when their teams were together all the time. He had no real reason to bother trying to get her out of her nightmares, let alone go so far out of his way to make sure she didn't have to deal with them, especially considering it could have come at the cost of his own sleep.
If she'd heard of Jaune doing something like this back at Beacon, she'd have probably thought it was creepy, sleeping next to someone you didn't know too well to stop their nightmares just because you don't want them to suffer, but Yang was not the same person she'd been then, and she wasn't so quick to judge or criticize.
"Why?" she asked finally, curiosity burning its way past any other emotions.
Jaune just shrugged, "We're friends, and you don't deserve to suffer, none of us do. So we gotta look out for one another, even when we aren't on the battlefield."
"Besides," he added on, "What kind of person would I be if I just ignored somebody else in pain? That'd just make me no better than the people we're fighting."
Yang swallowed back any instinctive responses before they could be voiced, preferring to enjoy the silence between them while it lasted. She closed her eyes after a few moments, letting out a soft sigh. This seemed to give Jaune the wrong idea, as she heard him starting to shuffle around. She opened an eye to look down and see what he was doing. He paused when he saw her looking at him, starting to speak.
"I'll leave now, I mean, this is probably really uncomfortable for you and I probably shouldn't be here anyways, or your uncle might kill me or Ruby might kill me even though I just slept here but you're fine now so it – "
She grabbed his wrist as he made to shift off the bed, holding him where he was. When he looked back over his shoulder at her, she offered a faint smile. "Stay, it's fine."
His eyes widened before he looked down, scratching his head again as she released his arm. "Are you sure? I mean it's not like my room is far away."
She rolled her eyes, starting to grin, "We're gonna have to get up in a few hours anyways, no point in moving now. Your bed will be all cold." She said, "Besides, if you leave, who's going to be my knight in shining armour, fending off all the big bad things while I sleep?"
The teasing managed to put a smile on his face, and he relented, laying back down on the bed, pulling the covers back up. Yang did the same, shifting to face him across the pillows.
She studied his face for a moment before a thought came to her, "Jaune?" she asked. His head perked up, eyes coming to meet hers to show she had his attention.
She pursed her lips before asking, "Why were you up so late, anyways? We all need all the sleep we can get."
A frown crossed his face, marring his expression for a few seconds before it slipped away into a half smile.
"You're not the only one who can't sleep at night, Yang." He told her softly.
On impulse, Yang reached out with her arm, pulling Jaune closer. He startled at her actions, but quickly opted to once again go with it, so long as it helped his friend. Slowly, he let one arm go around her, brushing up against her own arm. He used his other hand to pull the blankets up over them before settling in, risking a glance down at the top of Yang's head.
Things were quiet for a few minutes, long enough that Jaune wondered if Yang had fallen back asleep. Before he could decide, she shifted in his arms slightly.
"Jaune?" she asked, voice quiet. He hummed to indicate he was listening, and felt her hand clench into a fist behind his back before releasing again, fingers splaying out over his spine.
"Thank you." She granted, giving a light squeeze. He smiled, returning the gesture, "No problem, Yang."
"And if you're ever having trouble sleeping again, feel free to come hang out with me, even if I'm not."
Jaune smiled at the bold offer, knowing that if his fellow blonde was saying that, she meant it.
And when they woke up again a few hours later, no words were needed as they got up, and shared a long hug at the door before Jaune went back to his room for clothes, and they both prepared to go about their day, now knowing that their nights wouldn't necessarily be as dark as they had been, anymore.
After all, what were friends for?