Author's Note: Sorry, everyone. I know it's been a while since I updated this and The Golden Retriever, but I had a few new ideas that were clamoring for attention. TGR's new chapter is almost done, just need a few more scenes to add to that and edit, but for now here's something to tide you over.

This is set right after the group gets back from the Grimmlands, but before the beginning of Volume 2, in case you want a chronological marker on this.

Disclaimer and Warnings still apply from the first chapter.

That Time Blake Went Into Heat

Blake woke up feeling like shit. It wasn't anything new; she'd gone through a week or so of this once a year since she'd reached puberty. Even still, her Heat was always a thoroughly miserable affair. Doubly so now that she didn't have her usual companions to help her.

A lot of negativity could be connected to the White Fang, but at least there were protocols in place for the female members during That Time of the Year. The older Faunus women would come together and guide their juniors through the cacophony of hormones and sensations with remedies passed down through generations to aid them, and all the males were barred from the recovery wards for everyone's sake.

She tried to get up, but was unable to muscle through the damnable cramping in her lower abdomen and winced at the tiny noise of distress that escaped her lips.

"Blake?" Ruby's voice called sleepily from her bunk.

Crap, the cat Faunus cursed silently. Now they're going to want to help.

Padded footfalls made their way over to her. "Are you alright, Blake?" Ruby asked. Blake opened a bleary eye to find her leader crouched down next to her, still in her pajamas.

"M'fine," Blake mumbled, trying once more to rise. She got halfway up this time before the pain forced her back down. "Just...must've eaten something bad."

"It's all that tuna," Weiss sniffed from the vanity where she was already brushing out her hair. "I bet you've got ptomaine poisoning."

Ruby gently laid her hand on Blake's forehead to check her temperature. The touch felt so good, and Blake unconsciously leaned into Ruby's hand.

"Uh, Blake?" Ruby's voice was a little amused, but mostly concerned. Blake realized she'd been butting into Ruby's hand like a stupid cat searching for affection and reeled back, inadvertently setting off her cramping once more.

She hissed in pain and recoiled from Ruby's outstretched palm.

"Yang, what do we do?" the younger girl asked, worry coloring her tone.

"Weiss, go get some whole milk," Yang said, dropping to the ground and peering at her partner with a slight frown. "Blake, what's your favorite video game?"

"What?"

Weiss palmed her face and began to head to the door. "I'm going to the infirmary to get some actual help," she said, grumbling something about a motivational poster under her breath.

"No!" Blake rasped, eyes opening wide. If the medics came in, they'd figure out she was a Faunus within seconds, and then there would be an investigation into why she'd falsified her documents, which would lead to them discovering her past as a terrorist. And that would mean the end of her plans.

So she did the only thing she could think of in her addled state. "Get Orville."

There was a moment's silence, broached by Yang tentatively asking, "Uh, don't you kinda hate Orville?"

Blake took offense to that; she didn't hate the dog Faunus, exactly...anymore. Sure, they weren't as close as they could have been under other circumstances, but she definitely considered him a friend and liked to think he felt the same about her. Hopefully he could figure out a way to help discreetly. "He's resourceful," she said in lieu of an answer. "If there's one thing I can admire about him it's that." Not to mention that ass...NO! Bad thought!

While she wrestled her hormones into submission, her team seemed to come to an agreement. Ruby left the room, returning a few moments later with a sleepy-looking Orville. As soon as he'd entered, however, his nose twitched and his eyes shot open like he'd been injected with pure espresso. With a look of sheer, unadulterated panic he bolted back out the door, slamming it shut behind him.

"Orville, what the heck?" Ruby yelped, yanking the door open again.

"I need to get something first," the other leader's voice called faintly. When he returned, he was wearing some sort of pink cloth covering over his mouth and nose. His eyes were still round as saucers, though, and they settled quickly on Blake. Feeling the need to acknowledge him, she waved meekly while trying to ignore the masculine scent slowly spreading through the dorm.

"Are those...are those underwear?" Yang asked in disbelief as she gestured to his facial garment.

"Yep," he answered bluntly, pulling out three scraps of paper. "Now, I need you each to gather the items on these lists and bring 'em back real quick-like, understand?" He handed them a piece and began shoving them out of the room. "No questions, just go."

Weiss seemed like she was about to protest (loudly), but Ruby and Yang thankfully grabbed her by the arms and frog-marched her away, leaving Blake alone in a room with a potential mate...

Blake shook her head violently to stave off such thoughts and set off her cramps once again.

"So," Orville said awkwardly. He was waiting in the corner, close to the door. Probably for a quick getaway, she thought sourly. "That Time of the Year, huh?"

"Yeah," she grunted. "Nice thinking with the face-mask."

He scowled at her behind the underwear, or at least that's what it looked like to her. "Be thankful, I almost didn't come back."

Blake sighed, nodding as she accepted that. "I am grateful," she muttered. "This is the first time I've entered a Heat without another Faunus woman to help me. I thought I had a few more days to prepare."

"Shoulda prepped before you even came here," said Orville. "You knew it was coming, right? My mom used to be able to tell, like, a week before it happened usually."

"I think it's the different environment," Blake theorized. "Or something in the food, or a hundred other things. The point is, I'm Heated and now I need your help."

"Don't worry, I've got your back," Orville assured her. "You should just count yourself lucky that we still have a few days 'til school starts back up."

Blake nodded in agreement, adding, "Or that this didn't happen in the Grimmlands." Both shuddered at the thought of the bullet they'd dodged there.

They lapsed into a silence that pressed uncomfortably upon Blake's ears. She considered bringing up the subject of books, but the only ones she knew for certain they shared a love for were the Melody of Snow and Ash series, and they'd gone over those many times in the Grimmlands already. The books he'd had on display at his apartment were all foreign to her, and she doubted he read any of the romance novels she was partial to.

"This is worse than when Guren and Granny Mei were trapped in the Damp Cavern with Karakuri," she lamented to herself, forgetting for just a moment that she wasn't alone.

"You read Ninjas?" Blake's eyes snapped to Orville, who was shaking his head. "Never mind; of course you read Ninjas. Why am I even surprised?"

"Wait...you know about the Ninjas series?" Blake asked in a shrill voice, feeling her eyebrows disappear into her bangs before her eyes narrowed. "This isn't some sort of trick, is it?" she demanded suspiciously. "I swear, if Yang put you up to this..."

"No, I swear," Orville vowed, holding up his hand. "Smuggler's honor."

Blake still wasn't convinced, so she decided to test him. "What do you think of Shinobi's defection from Mokugakure?"

"He's a fucking moron, obviously," Orville scoffed, slumping against the wall as he waved his hand vaguely. "His true love is in the damn village and yet he still wants to go out and act like a power-hungry dickhead. I mean, granted that curse mark is playing havoc with his already questionable sanity, not to mention what we later learn about that wacky family of his, but still..." He muttered darkly to himself while Blake tried to hide her shock at finding someone she could actually talk to about her favorite books.

Then a thought occurred to her. "Hold on," she back-tracked. "Who do you think his true love is?"

"Uh, Surimi, obviously," he replied as if it were plain as daylight. Which, of course, it wasn't.

"Surimi," she repeated flatly, and he bobbed his head cheerfully. "As in Surimi the main character."

"Technically he's the deuteragonist," Orville corrected self-importantly. "Alongside his love interest, Shinobi. I mean, they even shared their first kiss together."

"That was an accident!" Blake snapped, hissing in pain as her cramps acted up again. "And Shinobi hates Surimi besides that."

"Are you reading the same thing I am?" he gave her a skeptical look. "Shinobi even says outright that Surimi's his best friend. And it's not hate, it's belligerent sexual tension."

"And what about Guren, hm?" Blake pointed out obstinately. "Or Kana?"

"Yeah, the useless fan-girl and the masochistic stalker," snorted Orville in mock-acceptance. "Because that's definitely a basis for a proper love interest. That's like saying that I should go up to friggin' Cinder and ask for her hand in marriage."

Blake sat up furiously (outright ignoring the cramps) as she pulled the stack of Ninjas of Love volumes out from under her mattress. There was no way that she was going to allow someone to badmouth her OT3.

Blake almost missed the door opening as she searched out the passage she'd based her argument on. "Look, it's right here, you philistine!" she said triumphantly, pointing it out to Orville, who had by then migrated to her bed.

"Circumstantial at best," Orville shot back dismissively as his eyes skimmed the page. "That could just be a hold-over from over-extending himself in the fight against Hebihime."

"What are we interrupting here?" Ruby asked cautiously. Blake looked up to see her teammates walking into the room laden with bags of the items Orville had requested. All of them had varying degrees of confusion on their faces at the scene they'd walked in on. Out of context, Blake supposed she could see what they were so surprised about.

"I'm trying to show this idiot that she's been reading Ninjas of Love completely wrong," Orville explained as he stood up and grabbed the bags from them before heading to one of the desks and pulling everything out.

"You mean Blakey's smut?" Yang wondered, a half-smirk pulling at her lips.

"It's called erotica," Orville replied loftily as he began to drop different herbs into a mortar bowl, "and it's art."

The other three members of RWBY traded bewildered glances before crowding around Orville while he worked.

"So, ignoring that, are you going to tell us why it was necessary to bring all of this?" Weiss spoke up after a moment of watching as Orville ground up the ingredients with the pestle which came with the mortar.

"Blake didn't tell you?" Orville shot Blake a curious look, but she just pursed her lips. "She's in Heat," he explained, scraping the resultant paste into a paper cup and pouring mineral water over it. He peeled a lemon with impressive swiftness and, after squeezing some juice into the concoction, turned and gave it to Blake. "Drink up."

While Blake sniffed the mixture, the others shared another look. "Wait," Ruby held up a hand as if this were one of Oobleck's classes. "Faunus go into Heat? What happened to the whole 'Faunus aren't animals' thing?"

"In this case, that rule doesn't apply," Blake sighed, tossing back the drink quickly. To her pleasant surprise, it didn't taste half as horrible as some of the stuff her White Fang sisters had given to her. "I get like this once a year for close to a week, and this is the first time I've not been around other Faunus women to help me through it."

"So you had us bring you a hunk of man-meat to satiate your animalistic needs?" Yang raised an unimpressed eyebrow. "You're not entering the bone zone in here before I do, Blakey." Blake heard the unspoken, 'especially not with Orville' behind her partner's words and fought back a grimace. Like she would even consider doing that with someone who thought Surimi and Shinobi were meant to be together...

"Nobody is entering 'the bone zone' in this room if I have anything to say about it," Weiss warned ominously.

Orville, who had been scribbling on a piece of paper, straightened up and handed it to Weiss. "These are a few of the recipes my mom used," he said, tapping the sheet. "That's the one I just made, and it's the easiest one to mix up, but this one is the most potent and should knock her on her ass for a few hours."

"And why would we want to use that?" Weiss wondered, raising a delicate eyebrow.

"Trust me, you'll know," Orville shivered at some remembered terror. He reached back and pulled several smooth flat pebbles of Sunstone from his belt and held them out to Blake. "Those are for if your cramps get too bad despite the remedies. Don't put too much Aura into them or the heat'll be too uncomfortable." He frowned, then nodded. "That's it, I think. Good luck!"

That done, he gave them a jaunty wave and started toward the door, but Yang called out to him. "Hold on, I have a question." When he cocked his head to the side curiously, she let out a slightly confused chuckle and asked, "What's with the underwear?"

"The smell masks the scent Blake is giving off," he shrugged. "My nose is sensitive, and Heat pheromones are no joke."

The others made noises of understanding, but Yang grinned. "I didn't take you for a briefs kinda guy, Rock Hound."

"Oh, I don't wear undershorts," Orville huffed in amusement. "What about me makes you think I'd be anything but a free-baller?"

"True enough," Yang conceded. "Wait, so who's panties are those then, Nora's?" She frowned. "Can't be P-Money, she seems like a plain white cotton sorta girl to me..."

"They're PJ's, actually," Orville admitted, looking faintly embarrassed. "It was the first thing in the laundry hamper, okay?"

Already feeling much better thanks to the medicinal drink, Blake snorted in amusement as Yang and Ruby giggled at the revelation.

"So...give me a chime if you need anything else, I guess," Orville finished lamely.

"This is probably for the best, you know?" Weiss mused before he could leave. "I mean, it's better that you have some contingency plans for when Ginni starts hers." Blake had never seen a person's face lose its color so quickly.

"Oh, fuck!" he cursed, turning around and heading out the door with his scroll already out and dialing. "Gin's gonna kill me!"

Blake watched him go with a bit more fascination than was strictly needed, and unfortunately Yang noticed.

"So..." the blonde drawled, plopping herself down on the edge of Blake's mattress. She gave Blake a flat, unimpressed stare. "Only one thing you can admire about him, huh?"

After-Action Report: Yes, yes, I know. The by-now cliched trope of a Faunus going into heat. I think I was drunk when I wrote the first part of this, but I can't remember (which makes that a lot more likely), so I suppose this time you can blame it on the a-a-a-a-a-alcohol.

When I was watching the new RWBY Chibi yesterday I couldn't help but laugh at the 'Sick Weiss' skit, even if I was disappointed that they didn't have "Yang in there, Kitty" on the poster. So there's a little shout-out to that early on in the chapter. God, Taiyang, what the hell kind of parent are you man?

Concerning the Ninjas of Love thing: The route I went here is basically what would happen if Naruto was a series of light novels instead of a manga/anime and written by Jiraiya. So here's a list of Bland Name Product equivalents if you didn't understand them.

Guren= Sakura
Granny Mei= Granny Chiyo
Karakuri= Sasori
Shinobi= Sasuke
Surimi= Naruto
Mokugakure no Sato= Konohagakure no Sato
Kana= Karin
Hebihime= Orochimaru (because we all know that Jiraiya would definitely go there)

So yeah, that's basically it. Thanks to everyone who reviewed, favorited, and followed this little side-tail comendium. I'll try to get the new Golden Retreiver out by probably next week (though don't hold me to it), and I hope everyone has a great day!