As the bull-head carrying Blake was making its way back from Vale, it's lone passenger inside looked outside her window and pondered what happened earlier this morning. Jaune screamed and was going to be dealing with "something" in the near future. What that "something" was is not clear. Was it Cardin again? Not likely, though not impossible. From what she heard from Ruby, Weiss, and Pyrrha, Jaune not only saved the former bully, but also won his respect as well. But perhaps he changed his ways once again. He stopped harassing Jaune, and Velvet as well, but perhaps it was only temporary.

Another possibility she thought of was Jaune getting a message from Professor Ozpin about his grades. This, like the previous notion, was unlikely. Jaune may not be a straight-A student, but he was no slacker, either. The times she caught him reading his comics were in his down-time, or perhaps before starting his homework, and his homework, while not A+ material were still above average most times. He studied and turned in his assignments on time, so, again, it wasn't likely about his grades.

Perhaps it was a letter from home. If so, then it was a personal matter and didn't involve her in the slightest. Because of this, while it was the most likely to be the cause, she kept her nose out of it.

As the bull-head landed safely upon the landing pad by the station, Blake made her way, with her new books, across the courtyard into Beacon. She looked at the cover once again and felt a smile creep across her face. She gazed upon the beauty, the majesty, the awe-inspiring cover of Madame Noir. This was the sequel, or rather, the other side of the story of the previous novel, Monsieur Blanc. In the latter story, a young squire made his way from being a clumsy, albeit intelligent peasant to becoming a great and well-loved knight. According to the anonymous author, Madame Noir would tell the tale of his greatest ally, and love-interest, the assassin known only as Madam Noir. The cover of Monsieur Blanc was a white cover with golden accentuations, with a silver knight's helmet in the center. The book she had just purchased slightly different. Instead of white, the cover of Madam Noir was black, and had silver accentuations, not gold. A gold coin was the image in the center this time, perhaps alluding to a conflict of interests between her "highest bidder" and her desire for change?

Unfortunately, she would have to wait until after lunch because she was no longer allowed to read in the cafeteria. Her Ninjas of Love book was discovered and, when Yang took it from her, was read aloud. And not just from start to finish. No, that would have been too merciful for Yang. Instead, she read the pages that Blake cat-eared. The parts that uncultured philistines such as Yang and Professor Goodwitch viewed as "smut".

She grew furious at the thought. Yang got four weeks detention, but Blake felt the punishment should have been more severe. Invasion of privacy, theft, and public indecency; Blake could feel her rage choking her! But that was in the past, and there was no need to bring it up again. She swallowed her anger and made her way to her dorm.

As she walked to the door, she noticed a distinct smell of maple syrup in the air. She then noticed the carpet in the hall felt wet, as if it were scrubbed. She ignored these for now and decided to ask Ruby once she entered. Before doing so, she felt it "friendly" to check on Jaune, since he was clearly stressed this morning. She knocked on the door three times.

"Hello? Jaune? It's me, Blake."

"Blake?" Jaune's muffled voice answered. He then opened the door and revealed he was dressed in his usual hoodie with armor, jeans, and sneakers with whi-

His socks were pink. Pink as a cherry blossom in spring. Pink as an infant's cheeks after laughing at some nonsensical thing. Pink as page 312 in Ninjas of Love when Hoshi-

"Blake? You alright?" Jaune followed her gaze to his… predicament. "Oh. I can explain that. We had a… an issue with the laundry."

"Red fell in with the whites?" Blake guessed.

"Yeah, but it shouldn't be a problem. I mean, who pays attention to what kind of socks you're wearing?"

"I guess you're right." As Jaune shut the door behind him, Blake decided on getting back to the matter at hand. "You alright?"

"Yeah, why?"

"Well, you did scream pretty loudly this morning."

"Oh, yeah. Right."

"Anything we can help with?"

"Nah, it should be fine, just…" Jaune thought for a moment. Should he tell her? Weiss already knows, but she guessed. Blake probably has no idea. Plus, it's almost noon anyways. Might as well tell somebody, right? "My family is coming here."

"Oh." Blake was… half-expecting this. She guessed it was something to do with family, but she didn't really know. She was genuinely curious now and need to know more. "Okay, so why is that a bad thing?"

"It's not, it's just… I love my family, don't get me wrong, but it's just…"

"Jaune," Blake got his attention. "I need you to take a deep breath, think, and then tell me."

"Okay, deep breath." He inhaled, then exhaled. He did this three times, breathing more deeply than the last. Now came the hard part: thinking. How should he word it? His family was so… not normal. But the more he thought about it, more specifically Ruby and Yang and what Ruby told him, what family is normal? He took another deep breath. If it wasn't that they weren't normal, what was it? Maybe because he's lived with them for so long, they know everything about him? Every embarrassing story was just a thought away for them. But he could always ask them not to tell the stories, right? Yeah! They love him, and he loves them, too. He smiled, took one last deep breath, and finally explained.

"I guess I was worrying for nothing, but… I guess I was worried because they're my family, and it's like showing you guys the side of me that nobody but them have seen, you know?"

Blake smiled. "Yeah, I think I do know. I would feel really nervous, too, if my friends met my parents. There are things only they know, and there are things only you guys know."

"Right!" Jaune sighed. "It feels so good to have somebody to talk to about it."

"Anytime. Oh, by the way; what happened out here?"

"What do you mean?"

"It smells like syrup out here." Jaune flinched.

"Uh, let's just say it was an unfortunate incident."

Blake chuckled. "Sure."

As she was leaving, Jaune noticed the bag she was carrying. "Hey, what's that?"

Blake lifted her bag slightly. "Oh. You mean this? I went into town and bought a book."

"What's it about?"

"Well, the author of the previous novel said this would be something like the other side to it."

"Oh, so it's like a behind-the-scenes sort of deal?"

"I guess you could say that. I can't wait to read it!"

"Who's the author?"

"Um..." Blake couldn't answer. The author only gave a nom de plume, but even that changed every once in a while. They seemed to have changed it every time she started a new story. It made finding her books incredibly confusing for her fans. The only similarity between the names was they were all female. "It says Madame Noir, but that's all that's on the cover and the spine, so I guess her name is Madame Noir, too?"

Jaune flinched, albeit only slightly. "O-oh really? That's weird!"

His reaction did not go unnoticed. "Jaune, do you-"

A loud ringing shattered the otherwise quiet air. The loud ringing was followed by a loud crashing of the door behind Blake as Yang set her foot down and grabbed Blake by the collar of her shirt.

"Come on, Blake!" The blonde shouted. "It's lunchtime!"

At that same moment, a second crash followed, this time behind Jaune. The culprit this time was Nora, who was literally drooling at the ringing bell.

"Jaune!" The armored leader suffered the same fate as the bibliophilic black-haired beauty. "It's lunchtime!"

"U-um, Nora, m-maybe you should c-calm down?"

She slurped her drool and sweetly spoke to her leader. "Jaune? Who ruined my breakfast?" He pointed to himself, too fearful to speak. "That's right! And who's going to make it up to me?" Same response. "Yup! Now, either I eat lunch…" Her sweet tone suddenly became sour. "Or I eat you! So what's it going to be, leader?" Her emphasis on the word "leader" made it clear she wasn't messing around.

"L-let's go eat lunch!"

"Attaboy, Jaune!" Nora then picked him up and carried him to the cafeteria, bridal style.

Once at their usual table, Teams RWBY and JNPR began eating their meals. A peanut butter and jelly sandwich for Ruby, salad for Weiss and Ren, a tuna sandwich for Blake, a whole cherry pie for Yang, dinosaur-shaped chicken nuggets for Jaune, onion soup for Pyrrha, and a whole roasted chicken for Nora. She threw her plate across the cafeteria to the dishes and demanded a second helping. Jaune vowed to never again lose Nora's breakfast ever again, or else it would be his legs she would chewing!

As they were eating, Jaune wouldn't stop peeking out the window, keeping an eye out for his family. Everyone but Nora noticed, but Yang decided to point it out.

"What's up, Pinkie?" Nora looked up from her chicken, currently ripping the skin off a leg with her teeth. The sight disturbed her. "N-not you; Jaune."

"Huh? Oh, um, well… Wait, "Pinkie"?"

"Your socks."

'She knows!' Jaune screamed at himself.

"I know!" Yang roared with laughter. "How did you mess that up?! You do know that you can't mix red with white when you wash them, right?"

"Yeah, I knew. Nora didn't."

All eyes were on said Valkyrie as she pulled a ribcage out of her mouth and placed in on the table. Weiss pushed away her salad with disgust.

"You didn't answer me, Jaune. Why are you looking out the window like the cops are coming to take you away any second?"

He wouldn't be against that, actually. But if his mother found out… "I'm expecting someone."

"Oh, yeah? Who?"

Now all eyes were on Jaune. He fidgeted a bit, now cutting off the heads to his dinosaurs. This was a habit done since his childhood when he was nervous at dinner. His hands were shaking and his eyes never left his plate.

"Jaune, are you okay?"

Jaune looked up to his partner. She had a look of concern on her face.

"Do you want us to tell them?"

"Tell us what?" Ruby asked.

"That his parents are coming over." All eyes were on Weiss this time, with Jaune's set being the biggest of them all. "What? If I didn't tell them, you never would have either."

"Uh-" Jaune croaked.

"Oh, so momma and poppa Arc are coming to town?" Yang teased. "This will be quite family-ar for you, huh? I'm sure this will be quite the tale to tell your kids! Or should I say, the "Arc"? Right? Right?"

Jaune was frozen.

"Right? Yo! Vomit Boy? Anyone home?" She looked around the table, and found they were following Jaune's gaze. Joining the crowd, Yang turned her head to look through the window…

…And saw a bright yellow bull-head flying over the courtyard.

"They're here," Jaune whispered.

Nora raised threw her plate with less vigor this time and asked the cooks.

"Could I get my chicken to go?"