Ruby Rose wandered the halls, long past nightfall. The moon was extra bright tonight and the stars lit up the sky. For a reason unknown, Ruby found herself unable to sleep, and so she decided to walk. Throwing on her red hooded cape over her typical combat outfit, she ventured through the maze of hallways and corridors that were Beacon Academy. She'd been going here a year and had accomplished things that normal people couldn't dream of, but still for some reason she hadn't taken time to explore the depths of this school of her own accord. She found a certain beauty in seeing things with the absence of other human beings, because it showed the natural state of things.
That night she had a lot of silent, innocent fun. She marveled at the silence that floated gently through the air and surrounded her. In her excitement she was eager to enter all the rooms, all the lecture halls, and anywhere else she could be. She stopped into Professor Port's room and paraded herself up and down the front of it, spouting out gibberish in a pseudo-deep voice. She visited Professor- I mean DOCTOR Oobleck's room and used her semblance to dart between different aisles bombarding the imaginary audience with questions.
For the last leg of her trip, she headed down one of the hallways to the training room. That was where target dummies were set up all over and students at the academy could test out their weapons or semblances, provided it didn't destroy the room. That hardly mattered anyways; Professor Goodwitch was very capable of putting things back together with the likes of her telekinesis. Still, you could count on walking in there at any given point during the day and discover at least a couple people hard at work, either to hone their skills or even to flex their muscles in hopes of impressing a friend or significant other. However, at night, she could only assume there would actually be silence in that room.
She pushed through the large double doors into the training room, and as expected, it was mostly silent, but not entirely. Off in the distance she heard the soft "thwack" she'd heard a million times before. All too curious, she blindly walked in the direction of the sound, not focusing in the slightest as she knew the layout of the room by heart. She reached the sound and focused in on who was swinging whatever weapon they had, and was surprised to see the familiar face of Jaune Arc hard at work swinging his sword at the target dummy in front of him.
"Jaune?" she asked. It was a stupid question, but she didn't believe he of all people would be up this late training. The blonde broke his concentration and looked toward Ruby, blushing almost immediately afterwards. He broke eye contact and looked to the ground.
"Um, I should probably get going. It's pretty late." He explained, collapsing his shield and sheathing his sword. He wiped the sweat from his forehead with the back of a gloved hand and started walking with a hurried pace in the direction of the exit. Ruby jogged to catch up with him.
"What are you doing here?" she asked, and got no response or recognition in the slightest form from Jaune, and so she asked again. After a few repetitions, Ruby realized she wasn't getting anywhere with this approach, and so she grabbed his arm, stopping him.
"Jaune, what's going on?" she asked pleadingly. Jaune removed her hand from his arm but made no moves to escape the awkwardness of the situation.
"It's-it's nothing. I just come here to practice at night is all." He laughed weakly. Ruby locked eyes with him, her silver pupils seemingly staring straight into his soul, and she knew something was up.
"Why don't you come here during the day?" she asked inquisitively, knowing there was a deeper meaning to him being in here. Even extreme cases of self-esteem issues can be overcome in the training facilities so he had no escape tactic.
"I'm just not good enough, okay? Does that make sense to you?" he responded. It didn't.
"What do you mean you're not good enough? You're just as good as any of us since you're at Beacon." Did she expect a self-esteem related issue? Yes. Now it was her task to get to the real issue.
"Listen, you have to keep this a secret. The only person who knows about this is Pyrrha." He explained, and Ruby simply nodded. Patiently she waited while he mustered up the courage to speak again.
"I'm a fake." He finally blurted out. Apparent shock on Ruby's face, he continued. "I really wanted to attend Beacon so I put together some fake documents in order to get in, and now that I'm a year deep into it, I'm still nowhere near the levels of you or the others." Ruby's expression didn't change, and Jaune was worried that he had broken the trust they had. Eventually, she broke into a slight smile.
"Come on," she said, walking away and beckoning him towards her. "Let's see just how much you've learned." He followed but he was still confused.
"Wait," he said. "You're not mad at me?" She turned her head towards him and smirked.
"We can talk more later. Right now I want to see how much you've learned." Ruby continued leading Jaune to the center of the facility, stepping up onto a platform that served as a sort of dueling arena in the middle of everything. Jaune hesitated slightly upon seeing her take the step up but he followed nevertheless. Upon reaching the platform he drew his sword and shield and stood at one end.
"Where's your weapon, Ruby?" he asked seeing a plain-looking girl standing straight at the other end of the platform. She giggled before reaching under her cloak and pulling out what looked like a simple red rectangle. With the push of a button it extended and within a second she held a fully-sized combat scythe.
"Give me all you got, vomit boy," she teased. Raising his sword, he rushed forward at Ruby, swinging his sword in a downward arc. His blade collided with the back of Ruby's as the younger girl misdirected the blow and brought the handle up and caught Jaune in the cheekbone, sending him right back in the direction he came from. He turned around to see Ruby headed towards him bringing her scythe down at lightning speed. He managed to raise his shield in time to block the strike, supposedly halting her rotation as well. With a little smirk from Jaune, Ruby returned it and pulled the trigger on the handle of the scythe, effectively sending the blonde sliding backwards. He maintained on his feet, but when he managed to regain control of his body, Ruby was already on top of him, sending him flying out of the arena with a follow-up swing of her Crescent Rose.
Jaune landed on the ground probably five feet out from the platform. Groaning, he managed to sit up, resting on his elbows on his back on the cold hard ground. Before he managed to get to his feet, Ruby had a hand extended towards her friend. He accepted it but Ruby struggled to bring him to his feet. Eventually he managed to get up and the two headed towards the door.
"You've got a lot to learn, Jaune," Ruby said, smiling at him. He blushed a little bit in reply.
"You're too nice about this," he responded, which only widened Ruby's smile.
"I care about you, Jaune. I just want to be able to help." She explained. "Can you meet me here again tomorrow night?" He nodded at her. As they got to the door, Ruby turned towards Jaune. Smiling again, she grabbed the edges of his breastplate and pulled him towards her, kissing him warmly on the lips. He blushed intensely but failed to summon the willpower to deny her, as he enjoyed it just as much.
"I'm not going to let you feel alone in this, Jaune. I promise." With those statements, she left to go back to her dorm, while Jaune stayed in the training facility a little while longer, pondering what just happened.