Chapter 3: Returning to Beacon

-On the Airship-

Yang and Blake were currently standing at one of the mini-vending machines that came stocked on the airships. Despite eating an entire bag of a dozen cookies, Ruby was still craving sweets.

"He seems to like his new arm" Blake said as Yang put change into the machine

"Yeah, I'm not surprised. He's probably going to try to upgrade the crap out of it. He watched too much Inspector Gadget as a kid so I wouldn't put it past him to try and give his hand a literal finger gun and probably a toothbrush in one of the fingers… cookie dispenser in the arm…"

Blake giggled as Yang pushed the buttons on the machine and leaned down to pick up the chocolate bar it dispensed.

"I'm still worried about him though" Yang continued and she put more change in the machine for another chocolate bar. "I'm starting to double-think him being back at Beacon. What if he gets hurt? What if he hits his head during a fight? What if-"

"Yang." Blake started as she put her hand on her girlfriends arm, "You know better than I do that when Ruby wants something, no one can stop him from getting it. I know he's your little brother and you want to protect him from getting hurt but you know he wouldn't be happy if you pulled him out of school and took him home. Since I've met him all he's talked about is becoming a huntsmen and being like the heroes in those fairy-tales. We'll all be there for him; we'll all look out for him. He won't get hurt again."

Yang took a deep breath and slowly exhaled it. "Yeah… You're right" she said as she smiled at Blake. "You always know exactly what to say!" she said as she pulled her in for a bear hug

"Yeah, yeah" she said, hugging her back. "Let's just get these sweets back to your brother"

When Blake and Yang got back to Weiss and Ruby they found Ruby asleep with his head on Weiss' lap.

"Awww! He looks so peaceful sleeping" Yang said as she looked at Ruby, but slowly her face became concerned "Almost like… he's in ANOTHER COMA." She frantically ran up to him and began shaking him "RUBY! RUBY WAKE UP!"

Ruby quickly woke up "What?! What's happening?! What happened?!"

"What in the world is wrong with you?!" Weiss yelled as she glared at Yang

"I thought he was in another coma!"

"God, Yang, you can't do that every time I fall asleep!" Ruby said as he glared at her and slowly lifted his head from Weiss' lap

"Ruby, how are you possibly sleeping after you just woke up from a week long coma?" Blake asked

"I had a big day…" Ruby replied sheepishly as Yang handed him his chocolate bars.

Shortly after, the announcement came over the speakers that the airship was about to dock. The doors opened and Blake, Weiss and Yang stepped off but shortly heard a loud BANG. They quickly turned around and saw Ruby rubbing his forehead. He saw them staring and him and quietly said "I walked into the wall"

"Ruby!" Weiss yelled "You can't afford to be such a clumsy oaf anymore!"

"Give me a break Weiss, I just woke up! I'm still out of it"

"That's no excuse! Am I going to have to buy you a helmet so that I can live peacefully without worrying about you dying because you walked into a wall?!"

"Give him a break Weiss" Yang interjected as she threw her arm over Ruby's shoulder protectively "Come on Ruby, team JNPR are going to be eager to see you again"

"But you're not staying to converse with them for too long! You and I are going to the library. I want you to be completely caught up as fast as possible" Weiss said sternly

Yang and Ruby both groaned at that.

They reached the water fountain in the courtyard where they had arranged to meet with JNPR. Just as expected they were already there, eager to see Ruby.

"RUBY! Do you remember us?!" Nora shouted as soon as they arrived

"Uhhh yeah" Ruby began and then started to point at them one by one "Nora, Ren, Pyrrha and… Joe!"

"It's Jaune!" Jaune shouted

"Gonna have to take your word on that one" Ruby joked as he punched Jaunes arm. Ruby forgot about his new robot arm and Jaune was knocked to the ground by the surprising amount strength of Ruby's new limb

"Oh shoot!" Ruby said as he ran over and helped him up. "I'm really sorry! I didn't know this thing was so strong!"

"No, no it's okay, totally fine!" Jaune said as he tried to keep up a tough persona, despite the tears he had in his eyes.

Weiss sighed "Alright, this has been a lovely reunion but Ruby and I need to go study, he has a lot of catching up to do" she said as she grabbed Ruby's hand and began pulling him away, eager to get him started on his studies. She didn't want her teams grades to drop, least she have to explain to her father why her team is no longer the 'top second years at beacon'

Yang quickly grabbed Ruby's other arm and pulled him back. "Hey, why don't you cool it Ice Queen? He JUST got back!"

"He's missing nearly an entire year of curriculum! Do you think the knowledge is just going to fall out of the sky and land in his head?!" Weiss shot back as she glared at Yang

Ruby decided to put on his leader boots and take control of the situation

"Yang, it's cool! Weiss is right, I need to catch up" He said as Weiss grinned smugly at Yang. Yang glared back but Blake grabbed her arm and began pulling her away.

"Go on you two" Blake said "We'll see you at lunch"

And with that Ruby and Weiss waved their goodbyes and left for the library. Once Ruby and Weiss were out of ear shot Pyrrha spoke up

"So, how's he doing?"

Yang sighed, "He's not doing bad. But not very good. His memory is really weird and he's struggling to keep his grip on new information. The doctor also told us that anymore hard blows to the head and it could be fatal"

"But he's optimistic" Blake added "He's still his normal happy self. His mood clearly hasn't been affected by this"

As they continued talking Yang began to become concerned by her own thoughts. She knew she was going to have to find some alone time with her brother to make sure he was actually doing okay and wasn't just putting on a façade for his team so they wouldn't worry. He did that too often, internalizing his own grief and negative emotions because he didn't want to bring anyone down.

Blake couldn't help but notice Yang lost in her thought and held her hand to try and ease whatever was troubling her girlfriend. She knew this whole Ruby situation had taken a serious toll on Yang and decided she would try and take her mind off of it.

"Hey, Yang?" Blake said

"Hmm?"

"Wanna play that ridiculous card game?"

"Wow, really?! But I thought you hated it?!"

"Eh, I don't mind it. Do you guys want to join us?" Blake asked looking to JNPR

"Sure!" Jaune replied

-The Library-

Weiss was drilling facts into Ruby's brain which seemed to go in one ear and right out the other. She tried to remain patient, she knew that for once, it wasn't Ruby's fault that he couldn't retain the information she was giving him.

"Alright Ruben, I'm going to write out a mini-test on the information I've just given you. I know this is hard for you but try your best, okay?" she said as she smiled at Ruby

Ruby blushed a little. It wasn't often that Weiss spoke so gently to him. As she began to work on the test he decided he wanted to get her to smile again.

"Hey, Weiss? Do you like jokes?"

"No." she replied without missing a beat as she continued to write out his test

"Why did the bike fall down?"

"…"

"Cause it was two-tired."

"…"

"…Cause it was two-tired."

"I heard you."

Ruby stayed quiet for a second and Weiss thought it would stay that way… Until…

"I have a cat joke."

"Stop."

"Just kitten"

Ruby laughed at his own joke as Weiss sighed and pinched the bridge of her nose.

"Here." She said as she handed him a page with questions. "Work on that while I write up some more questions." She hoped this would earn her some silence while she focused on the rest of his questions.

Ruby decided to take his loss and start writing his test. Weiss glanced over at him and noticed he had written his name at the top corner but signed it 'Ruby'

"Ruben. You can't sign your test papers as 'Ruby' you need to write your full name."

"Ahhh, yeah" Ruby smiled as he erased his name and re-wrote it. "I forget that Ruby is short for Ru-" Before he could continue his thought he began softly laughing but it quickly turned into a louder and more hysterical laughter.

"What's so funny?" Weiss asked as she looked at him with one eyebrow raised

"My.. My name is" Ruby tried to say but kept being interrupted by laughter. He rubbed the tears out of his eyes, "Oh my god, Weiss, I thought of something really funny to say to you" he said between laughter "but… for the first time in my life, I thought about what I was gonna say before I said it.. and now I'm laughing" he said practically crying as Weiss stared at him with a straight face

After about a minute he slowly calmed down and took several deep breaths

"Okay, okay, my joke… my joke is… My name is Ruby, it's short for Ruben and it's long for Roo" He said and he began laughing just as hysterically as before.

Weiss tried not to laugh, she really did. But she couldn't help the snort that escaped her as she smiled and covered her mouth attempting to hide the fact that she genuinely thought what he said was funny but soon enough the laughter escaped her lips.

Ruby mentally patted himself on the back for being able to make Weiss smile AND laugh.

"That's a terrible joke, Ruby" Weiss said as soon as she managed to control herself

"But you love it" Ruby said as he smiled at her

Weiss shook her head and continued to write the questions as Ruby went back to work on his answers. He found that he really didn't remember any of the information Weiss had just spent the past 30 minutes pounding into his head. He wasn't sure if it was the amnesia or the fact that the entire time Weiss was tutoring him, he couldn't stop staring at her face and admiring how pretty she was. He then realized that there might be a serious chance of him failing his classes and disappointing his team if he couldn't focus on anything besides his tutors pretty face.

He sighed and asked Weiss if she would mind explaining the information to him one more time before he tried to run through the questions. Weiss knew she had to be patient with Ruby and was grateful that he was at least genuinely trying, so she agreed to run through it one more time. Although, she couldn't figure out why Ruby refused to look at her direction while she explained it to him again.

Just wanna say a huge thank-you to the faves/follows and views. They mean a lot to me :)

And also a huge thank you to the person who reviewed my first story and encouraged me to continue writing. I don't think I've properly thanked you yet :$

Oh, shout out to those couple people viewing this story from Chile! Chilean Pride! (My spanish is terrible so please don't try to speak it to me, though ^_^')

And shout outs to anyone who recognizes where the name joke came from.

See you all on the next chapter!