Returning to their dorm room after dinner, the members of Team RWBY settled into their evening routines. Blake had finished her homework earlier in the day and after some prodding, Yang had done the same. Ruby and Weiss had been sparring earlier, so they were only now working on the assigned problems. So while one set of partners were sitting at their desks surrounded by notes and textbooks, the other pair was relaxing on their beds. The room was quiet except for the scratch of Weiss's pencil and the music that filtered through Yang's headphones.
Eventually, Weiss broke the silence.
"Ruby, you've been staring at that problem for ten minutes."
"Oh, sorry Weiss," answered the team leader, looking up from the page. "I'm just a little distracted."
"Aren't you always?" asked the heiress drily.
"Hey, lay off her," Yang warned, pausing her music and removing her headphones. "Something the matter, sis?"
"Nothing, it's dumb," mumbled Ruby. Yang hopped off her bunk and walked over to her sister's desk.
"If it's bugging you, you can tell me. I promise I won't think it's dumb."
"You may as well tell us, if only so we can get back to work," agreed Weiss. Despite the snark that was still in her voice, her face showed concern. Even Blake had closed her book and was now giving her full attention to the team leader.
"Alright," Ruby began slowly. "Yang, you remember the Silver Sword books?"
"Yeah," Yang answered with a smile. "I read those to you when we were little."
"That my favorite series when I was younger," agreed Blake. Three pairs of eyes turned to Weiss.
"What?" huffed the heiress.
"Weiss, you never read the Silver Sword?" Ruby gasped.
"She had no childhood," Yang declared, shaking her head sadly.
"Well I'm sorry I didn't have as much time for silly kids' books as you three," Weiss retorted. "Anyways, is that what was bugging you, Ruby?"
"Kind of," Ruby answered as the other three turned their gazes back on her. "You guys remember when Auria fought the White Witch in book three?"
"Yeah, that was awesome," cheered Yang. "The Witch is raining down all those ice arrows and Auria dodges all of them. And the Witch keeps shooting more and more, but she can't stop Auria."As she spoke, Yang was waving her hands in an imitation of arrows hitting the ground.
"I loved that scene," added Blake. "It showed how much stronger Auria had gotten since the first book. It also showed that she was still important to the plot even if she wasn't the one destined to wield the Silver Sword."
"Yeah," sighed Ruby, a smile on her face as she remembered the first time Yang had read that scene to her. It had been so exciting seeing Auria defeat this villain that no one thought she could. Then Ruby frowned. "The thing is, when I was sparring with Weiss, she did something that reminded me of that scene with the ice arrows."
"If this is all leading up to an Ice Queen joke, you're going to be sorry," the heiress warned.
"It's not!" insisted Ruby. "It's just that when you shot those ice shards at me, I felt like Auria fighting against the White Witch."
"That sounds awesome," said Yang.
"I thought so too at first," agreed Ruby. "But then I started thinking, and since I got to Beacon, I've seen people do most of the magic from the Silver Sword books. That magic used to be so exciting, and now I see it in real life every day." She sighed and looked at the floor. "It's weird. On the one hand, I feel like a hero from a storybook, just like I always wanted to. But in a way, it makes the books feel way less special."
Ruby looked back up at her teammates. Yang looked confused. She clearly didn't get where her sister was coming from. Despite having tried to be supportive, Weiss looked annoyed, like this was not worth interrupting her homework for. Blake, however, nodded in understanding.
"I think I see what she means. Those books had all of this amazing magic that we thought was so cool when we were kids. But now that we're Huntresses, that stuff is actually pretty mundane. After all we've seen, the Silver Sword books aren't nearly as exciting as they used to be."
"It's not just the Silver Sword!" cried Ruby. "All of the stories that Yang read to me when we were little, they all had magic that turns out to be nothing more than a typical day at Beacon!" The other three girls blinked at their team leader, surprised by her outburst.
"Well, it's not like I'm an actual witch," Weiss pointed out. "I needed Dust to do all of that."
"Sure, you needed Dust, but you still did it," Ruby countered. "With enough Dust, you could do anything that the White Witch did. If you had the right Semblance, you wouldn't even need that. So does that mean magic is just doing things without Dust or a Semblance?" Ruby pouted. "If so, magic is kind of disappointing."
"No, that's not all magic is," replied Blake. She paused. "I never really thought about it before, but you're right, it's hard to call something magic when we could do the same thing with Dust or our Aura. But there are plenty of stories with magic that goes way beyond anything we could do in real life."
"Like what?" pouted Ruby.
"Well," began Blake, pausing for a moment to think. "What about the Four Maidens? The wizard in the story gave them magic powers after they helped him enjoy life again."
"Yeah, but the story doesn't say what kind of powers," countered Ruby. "For all we know he just unlocked their Auras."
"How about the Girl in the Tower?" asked Yang. "The witch was trying to become immortal. I don't think any real person is immortal."
Weiss nodded in agreement. "There have been plenty of people who claimed that their Semblances would let them live forever. All of them are dead now."
"Yeah, but that's true in the stories too," replied Ruby. "The bad guy says he can't be killed, but the heroes end up beating him anyways. Besides, I don't even know if 'being immortal' counts as magic. It's not like a spell or something."
"OK, what about time travel?" asked Blake. "Most scientists are convinced that no one can freeze time or go back to the past, even with Aura and all the Dust in the world."
"I never liked stories with time travel," muttered Ruby. "But you're right; I don't think any real person could do that. I guess it counts as magic."
"What about bringing back the dead?" asked Weiss. "No one can do that in real life."
Ruby flinched slightly at that, but nodded in agreement. It was only after seeing Yang's glare that the heiress realized what she had said wrong.
"Oh, Ruby, I'm so sorry."
"It's OK," assured the team leader. "You're right; no one can bring back the dead." The room was silent for a moment before Blake spoke up.
"What about predicting the future?"
The four teammates went on like this for close to an hour, trying to come up with things that were magic even in the world of Huntsmen and Huntresses. Anything that could be accomplished with Dust or a person's Semblance didn't count. There were a number of abilities, like illusions and shapeshifting, which were hotly debated because the girls had never seen someone with such powers, but could believe that they might exist.
Eventually, team RWBY settled on a list of things that they all still considered magic. The list included time travel, raising the dead, seeing the future, bringing objects to life, controlling Grimm, giving people good or bad luck, and anything that involved determining if a person was worthy of something. All of them sat and stared at the list for a moment, considering if there was anything else to add.
"What about changing people's personalities?" asked Blake.
"Isn't that like mind control?" Yang pointed out. "We said that sounded like a Semblance someone could have."
"I'm not talking about mind control," the Faunus clarified. "I meant changing who someone is as a person. Permanently."
"Changing them how?" asked Weiss.
"I was thinking of the story of the Shallow Sea," explained Blake. "The fairies used their magic to turn Demetrius into a kinder, more caring person. They weren't controlling his mind; they just altered it so that he wouldn't be so cruel to Helena."
"OK, yeah," agreed Ruby. "I could imagine someone with the power to take over your mind and make you do things you didn't mean to, but a Semblance couldn't change your personality forever. I guess that would be magic."
It was at that point that Weiss glanced at the clock.
"It's almost nine! Ruby, we need to get back to work."
"Oh yeah, I guess we should," the team leader agreed sheepishly. "Thanks for talking this over with me, guys. I think I feel a little better now."
"Anytime, sis," Yang said with a smile. She returned to her bunk as Blake opened her book again. Ruby and Weiss got back to their homework.
Once she was back in bed, a thought occurred to Yang. She glanced at her sister and considered how much Ruby had matured into her role as the team leader in the months since they'd arrived at Beacon. Yang glanced at Weiss and thought of how much the heiress had warmed up to the rest of the team and accepted that she didn't have to be in charge of everything. Yang couldn't see Blake from where she was lying, but she thought of how her partner had opened up and come to trust her teammates, no longer hiding everything from them.
If it takes magic to change a person, then I guess team RWBY is magic.