Blake and Weiss stumbled down the passageway of the airship, arms wrapped around each other and giggling like a pair of love-struck fools. Which, in a way, they were. "Love you, Blake," Weiss said, threading her fingers through Blake's thick, black hair and pulling the taller girl down for a kiss.

Ahead of them, the porter coughed gently. "Ladies, I can understand the urge to celebrate such a joyous occasion, but we're almost to your cabin. Perhaps you can wait until then?" Inwardly, he groaned. This was the fourth or fifth time they'd stopped and it wasn't that far of a walk to their cabin in the first place.

Weiss frowned as she pulled away. "Somebody's a killjoy."

Blake, on the other hand, giggled. "S'okay. Just think what we can do once we're alone."

"Ooh," Weiss said as Blake slid an arm around her waist and led her down the passageway.

Inside the cabin, Blake spun around for a moment, setting her head reeling. "This is huuuge! And, and really fancy!"

"Get used to it; I intend to treat you like the treasure you are, kitty-cat." Blake blushed as the ears on top of her head flicked. Her bow had gone astray at some point during the evening, but rather than being upset, Weiss had been enamored by her Faunus features. "So, so what now?" Weiss asked, standing in the middle of the room chewing on her lip nervously.

Blake grinned and shoved Weiss backward onto the bed, then climbed up over her, straddling her new wife. "Well, that depends, what do you want to do?" she purred.

In answer, Weiss wrapped her arms around Blake's neck and started to pull her downward, only to be interrupted by a patterned buzzing from her scroll. Weiss frowned and put a finger to Blake's lips. "Ssh, it's my father. Gotta see what he wants. Hello, Father, to what do I owe the pleasure?" she answered, then hiccuped.

"Would you care to explain the message you sent earlier?"

"Message? Ooh, thaaat message. I would think it would be self-explana-, self-explana-, obvious. I got married. I would think you'd be happy for me."

"Weiss, I do not appreciate surprises like this. You will return immediately to Atlas and-"

"Can't. I'm headed off to meet my in-laws. Blake hasn't seen them in years, but I insisted. Some sort of falling-out or something." Blake reached down and pulled the little tiara out of Weiss's hair, setting Weiss's silvery tresses free.

"Weiss, I will not allow you to continue this farce. You will end it immediately."

"Go. Fuck. Yourself," Weiss gasped out as Blake bent down and started nibbling on her ear. "It's my wedding night, and I am going to enjoy myself. I will talk to you later." She hung up and turned off her scroll, tossing it aside without really caring where it landed. "Now where were we…?"

"Weiss? Are you okay?"

Weiss shook her head. "Sorry, Blake, I just remembered more of last night."

Blake nodded. Bits and pieces of the night before had begun to filter back in for both of them, not much more than fleeting images, really. "Anything good?"

"More of the same, plus telling my father to go fuck himself when he demanded I break things off with you," Weiss answered, blushing.

Blake nodded and looked away, trying to hide the heat she could feel rising in her own face. Most of what she remembered about last night was… intimate in nature, and she wasn't sure how she felt about that. Blake had never really been interested in women before, much less Weiss of all people, but now, well… She shook her head. This really wasn't the time to be thinking about things like that. "What, what do you want to tell my parents?"

"The truth, I suppose," Weiss answered with a heavy sigh. "We're teammates at Beacon, we got a little too carried away when two of our friends got married and ended up getting drunk and getting married ourselves."

"It has the virtue of being easy to remember, if really embarrassing."

"Yes." Weiss went back to staring at the scroll laying in her hands like it was an unexploded bomb. As soon as they'd come within range of the CCT tower in Menagerie, even more messages of congratulation had started coming through, mostly from other students, although some of the Beacon faculty and staff had sent them as well. Even Goodwitch had sent a terse "Congratulations. Don't forget to update your student records."

There had been nothing from Weiss' father or his lawyers.

They had managed to reach Ruby and Yang though, who had been worried sick about them. Their teammates had, thankfully, woken up both alone and unmarried to anyone, if really, really hung over. Yang had lost when they told her what was going on, then promised to cover for them until they manage to make it back to Beacon.

What happened to Team JNPR was… interesting. Nora and Ren had woken up in a hotel together. After Nora got untied from the bed, they'd talked it over and decided to try dating. Strangely, Jaune and Pyrrha had stayed sober and spent the entire night talking, ending in Pyrrha confessing her feelings for Jaune. The blonde dork hadn't believed her, not until she grabbed him and kissed him. He'd last been seen wandering Beacon with a confused expression on his face.

Now their airship was descending toward the port in Kuo Kuana, and Blake was starting to get really nervous. Her hands kept twitching as she thought about how her parents would react to, well, everything. She hoped they'd be happy to see her, and that she'd left the White Fang, but Weiss… Weiss was another matter. Being married to the heiress to the company most notorious for exploiting Faunus was probably not going to go over well.

Without thinking about it, Weiss reached up and started scritching the base of one of Blake's cat ears. The raven-haired girl gave a rumble of pleasure and leaned into her, eyes sliding shut until she realized what was going on and they snapped open again. "Um, Weiss?"

"Yes?"

"Um, Faunus etiquette here. It's rude to touch or comment on someone's animal features without permission. My ears," Blake bit back a moan, "my ears are really sensitive."

Weiss jerked back her hand like she'd burned it. "I'm sorry," she stammered, "I didn't realize-"

"I'm not mad, just be more aware." They sat there, watching out the window as the port grew larger. "This is nice," Blake murmured."

"Yes," Weiss answered, sliding the hand she'd just jerked away around Blake's waist. "Is this, is this okay?"

"Yeah." Strangely, being close to Weiss had ended up being more relaxing than she had thought it would be. After Blake's confession that morning, the two of them had sat in a tense silence until Weiss gave in, asking Blake an innocuous question about their combat class the day before. That had led to talking about an upcoming assignment, and one of Professor—sorry, Doctor—Oobleck's lectures, and on and on. Maybe it was that Weiss now knew her secret and Blake didn't have to watch herself as closely, maybe it was Weiss being strangely attentive and kind, Blake wasn't sure. All she was sure of was that right now, she was glad that Weiss was going to be with her when she talked to her parents.

"Do you, do you want to call them? Let them know we're coming."

"I, uh, I don't remember the number," Blake admitted, embarrassed.

"Oh. Well, I'm sure they'll be glad to see you anyway."

As the airship docked and the all-clear to disembark sounded, Weiss stood, smoothing out her skirt. "Ready to go?"

Blake nodded. "The question is, are you ready for Menagerie? I know you haven't spent a lot of time around Faunus, and humans are really rare here."

"It'll be fine." A wicked thought crossed Weiss' mind, making her smile. "All I have to do is remember to not do what my father would do, and follow Ruby's Rule."

Blake nodded, taking Weiss' arm. Once Weiss had remarked on how polite and nice Ruby was to everyone she met, and Ruby's answer was, "I've got a rule about people. Treat everyone with kindness and respect until they've earned otherwise."

Weiss couldn't help but look around in wonder as they walked the streets of Kuo Kuana. There were more people here than she expected, and more types of people that she had ever dreamed of. "I never dreamed there were so many different types of Faunus," she whispered to Blake. "Are those, are those fish Faunus?"

Blake nodded. "Some of the aquatic Faunus don't have legs, so it's really hard for them. Others have trouble being too far from water. The town being right on the edge of the Shallow Sea is a big help."

Weiss nodded thoughtfully, but before she could say anything more, she found herself on the ground, staring up at the majestic antlers of the Faunus man who'd knocked her to the ground. "Problem?" he asked, glaring down at her.

"No, no problem, it's just my first time in Menagerie," the white-haired girl answered as Blake helped her to her feet.

The man nodded. "Where you from?"

"Atlas," slipped from Weiss's lips before she could think about it.

"We're newlyweds, and I brought her home to meet my parents," Blake added, trying to defuse the situation.

"Well, congratulations, but watch where you're going next time," the man said as he turned away.

"That brings up something we really should talk about," Weiss said as soon as they were out of earshot. "How do you want to handle the being married thing? Do we tell people, or not? Are we, do you want to stay married?"

Blake stopped dead in her tracks. "I, um, I don't know," she answered, her answer surprising her.

"I… I'm not sure either. On the one hand, marriage is a serious thing, not something to be taken lightly, and we did do it on a drunken whim. Plus we, we really, I didn't think we were that sort of friends. But we, we have spread the word to too many people to really sweep things under the rug. And, well, there's the fact of me telling my father off to consider." Weiss looked up at the sky, not really wanting to look Blake in the eye at the moment. "There's another thought as well.

"Blake, I, um, I was never… really interested in anyone before, if you know what I mean. I was starting to think I was asexual, just plain not interested in anyone, period. I went on dates with guys, but I always felt like I was just going through the motions. And women, well, I never met anyone that interested me there either.

"But now there's you, and this thing between us, and, and I'm not sure what I think about this, but there's something, maybe? So, so do you mind if we, um, stay married? At least for a while, to give me time to work this out. Maybe, maybe try dating? No, no sex, not if you don't want it," Weiss finished, looking down at her feet and blushing furiously.

Blake stood there for a moment, stunned by Weiss baring her soul to her like this. "Hey." She put a hand on Weiss' shoulder, and the white-haired girl looked up at her timidly. "I don't mind staying married for a while. I, um, I've got my own issues about this to work out. For now, if it comes up in conversation, you're my wife, and that's all there is to it. Now, I think it's time you met my parents. It's almost dinnertime."

"Right. Which house is theirs?"

The cat-eared girl smiled and took Weiss's hand, lifting it until it was pointing at her parents' home. "There it is, the state residence of the Chieftain of Menagerie."

"It's… it's wonderful," Weiss breathed, awestruck by the simple, honest craftsmanship shown by such an ornate structure, compared to the buildings around it. "I mean, it's smaller than my family's house, but I think I like it more. That is now officially my new favorite building in the world."

"Even better than Schnee manor?" Blake teased as they made their way down the hill.

Weiss sniffed. "There's hardly any contest at all. That feels like a mausoleum, a monument to my father's wealth and power. This, even if it is a state residence, this feels like a home, like if you had a problem with the Chieftain, you could just walk up to the front door and knock."

As they walked up to the door, Weiss saw Blake stop with her hand just short of the door knocker. "I'm with you," she whispered, sure Blake could hear her thanks to her keen hearing. Blake smiled and lifted the knocker, bringing it down firmly once, the sound echoing inside.

After a moment, the door opened, a cat-eared Faunus woman who looked more like Blake's older sister than her mother sticking her head out. "Blake?" she said softly, as if afraid her daughter's arrival was an illusion."

"Hi, mom," Blake said, and the woman rushed out, wrapping her arms around Blake. "Oh my baby girl," she said, tears in her eyes.

"Kali, who is it?" A deep voice came from inside, and a large, powerfully built man stepped into the entrance hall, stopping dead as he saw Blake.

Blake stepped back from her mother, reaching out to take Weiss's hand and pulling her forward. "Mom, dad, this is my wife, Weiss."

Kali blinked, then recovered her composure. "Well, it sounds like we have some catching up to do. I'll make tea, shall I?"

And another update! Aren't these two awkward and adorable?