Argument

" And what happens if she gets mad at you? "

" Then, I am dead meat. Whatever Yang leaves afterwards would be used for target practice by the others!"

Even the 'Adorkables' can have a rough patch.

Weiss was just putting her books back into their proper place on the shelf when her partner stormed into the room, angry tears streaming down her face. The door slamming against the wall made the bookshelf shudder.

" I never want to see that son of a bitch again! " the redhead shouted before jumping into her bunkbed and drawing the curtain closed. Muffled crying came through the cloth wall.

Confused by her partners outburst, Weiss stared at the trembling curtain. Had she just imagined hearing Ruby Rose cursing? She took a tentative step towards the beds. " Umm! Ruby?...who are you talking about? " she called quietly.

The door opened once more, revealing a worried Yang with Blake right behind her. " Did Ruby just come..?"

The curtain was pulled aside as her sister thrust her tear streaked face out. " Tyrson! I wish that bastard was dead! " The curtain was nearly torn off its fastenings as she pulled it shut again.

Blake and Weiss were stunned at the venom in the girls voice. They'd never seen her like this before. This was more like her older sister, who's temper was best observed from a distance.

The faunas girl stepped back into the hall as the blonde's hair began to glow. " Nobody makes my sister cry! " the brawler swore.

" Yang, wait! " Blake raised her hands in a warding gesture. " We don't know what happened between them!"

Lavender eyes were taking on a distinct reddish tint as she turned on her partner. One hand gently pushed the faunas girl aside. " Don't get in my way, Blake! He hurt my sister! " She began storming down the hallway.

Blake glanced back into the room. " Stay with Ruby. I'll do my best with Yang. " she told the worried heiress before running down the hallway in pursuit of her angry partner.

Weiss closed the door before turning back to the beds. Stepping carefully onto her own, she pushed a hand through the curtain and gently stroked her friend's hair. Normally she tried not to touch other people, but this was a special case. Concern for her partner warred with anger at the one who had made her cry. For once, she agreed with Yang.

" Hart! Thank goodness I found you! " the girl gasped.

Hart and Akiko turned from the dormitory doorway to see their friend Velvet dashing across the quad towards them.

" Hey girl, slow down! You'll hurt something running like that! " Hart joked. Her smile slipped away the moment she saw the look on the other faunas' face. " What's happened? "

Velvet slid to a stop next to them, bent over gasping for breath from her exertions. " Tan..and Ruby! " She gasped for a moment, unable to continue as she tried to regain her breath.

Hart grasped an arm to support the girl. " What? Did something happen to them? " she demanded.

One hand waved negative. " No. Yes! They had... an argument...big one. She left crying... Now Yang's on the warpath...worst part...he's in the gym...training room three...and he's let his Semblance out! If Yang finds him...someone's gonna die!" The girl shuddered at the thought.

Hart and Akiko stared at each other, both remembering that first, and only, time they'd witnessed the young man's Semblance. They knew how much he hated his ' gift ', and how hard he worked to avoid using it. It had taken the best fighter in Beacon to defeat it without killing him , and Pyrrha had admitted afterwards that she never wanted to do it again. Yang Xiao Long didn't have that kind of skill. If they found each other while Tan's Semblance was active, Velvet's prediction would come true in the worst possible way. One of them would die, and there was no guarantee as to who it would be.

Lowering the rabbit faunas to the ground, Hart grabbed her partners shirt and began running toward the gymnasium building. If they could somehow block the door long enough for his semblance to wear itself out, they might have a chance to save the situation.

" What the hell did they say to each other? " she asked Akiko as they galloped across the quad. Her partner shook her head.

" Whatever it was, it must have been tremendously bad for him to lose control like this. " She waved a hand . " Your legs are longer. Don't wait on me, I'll catch up. Go!"

Hart lowered her head and put on a burst of speed that left her smaller partner behind.

Glass littered the floor of the observation area when Hart arrived. ' I thought those windows couldn't be broken!' she thought as she looked through the remaining shards.

Down on the floor of the training room, devastation reigned. The softer targets were shapeless tatters on the floor. The steel ones were now best described as ' noveau art ', the twisted remains littering the walls. Drifting smoke covered the part of the room where the craters were the deepest in both walls and floor. In the depths of the gray cloud she could just make out a blue glow.

' Damn! How long does that thing last?' she wondered as he emerged into the light. His bloodied hands beat on the remains of a steel target , Aura flaring red while he wailed like a soul in hell, the sound tearing at her heart.

His empty hands were something of a blessing for her. He must have fired every round he had on him before dropping his weapons. The six extra clips he habitually carried would account for the majority of the damage here, but the rest could only come from that damned Semblance of his. She was trying to decide whether or not to try confronting him, when he collapsed in a heap, the glow fading from his eyes.

The relief she felt was short lived. The doors to the room were blown off their hinges as Yang made her entrance. " Found you, you bastard! " the blonde called triumphantly as she strode into the room. " Now you're gonna pay for making my sister cry! "

Blake paused in the wrecked doorway, having been unable to stop her partner's rampage across the campus she could only watch events unfold and hope to keep the worst from happening.

Tan clambered to his feet and thrust out a bloody fist. " This is none of your business Xiao Long! This is between your sister and me. But if you want a fight...you just bring it on! "

Yang's hair blazed as she cocked Amber Celica, the sound carrying clearly to the window.

" NO!" Hart screamed as she launched herself through the opening, landing squarely between the two. Spreading her arms, she faced her childhood friend. " Don't do it Yang! This won't solve anything!" she pleaded.

" Move Hart! He hurt Ruby and I'm not gonna let him get away with it!" Yang growled.

They both jumped backwards as a fireball exploded between them. Yang turned to the observation window and saw Akiko aiming her staff directly at her.

" Think with something other than your fists, witless fool! " the petite girl called. " Look at him! He has been hurt also! "

The brawler took her first good look at the young man standing next to Hart, finally seeing the tears streaming down his anguished face. . Why was he crying? Wasn't he the villain? This...wasn't right somehow. The fire in her died as confusion replaced anger.

Tan turned his back on them and dropped to the ground, his shoulders shaking.

Baffled by his response, she lowered her arms, suddenly unwilling to carry through with her threat of violence. She was torn with the need to defend her sister as she always had in the past, but didn't know how to deal with this turn of events.

Hart stepped closer to her and lowered her voice. " Yang. Go see to your sister. She needs you there, not here. Maybe we can figure out what happened and fix this, okay? "

Blake's hand touched the blonde's shoulder. " Yang, she's right. Ruby needs you now. She needs all of us to be there for her. "

Yang took a last look at the figure slumped on the ground and held her hand out. " Sorry Hart. I guess I lost it there. But you're right. We need to try and do something for them both. " She sighed as they shook hands. " Besides, I kinda like him. "

As the blonde and the brunette walked out, Hart returned to her friend and sat next to him while Akiko moved across the room towards them to stand silently on the opposite side. The faunas wrapped her arms around him, lending a shoulder to cry on while she tried to figure out what to do next. How had it come to this?

A week had passed and neither team was having any luck solving the mystery behind the couple's argument. Yang had managed to calm her sister that first day by climbing into bed with her and holding the girl close until she slept. The straining ropes holding the bed up hadn't bothered Weiss. She'd spent a sleepless night sitting in her chair, watching the curtains fluttering in the breeze. Her partner's temper had cooled by the morning. But after that, there had been no headway made.

Weiss's initial attempts to get Ruby to open up about the incident had resulted in another outburst.

" It's none of your damned business!" she'd shouted, bringing both to the edge of tears as the words sank home. Ruby apologized afterwards, but Weiss still felt like she was tiptoeing through a minefield. The wrong word could set off another explosion and make matters worse.

Tan had simply walked out of the room when Renee tried to get him to talk about it, the clenched fists making her wonder if he was going to repeat the scene Hart had described to her. Knowing her partner, chasing after him would only make things worse. Returning hours later, he'd thrown his arms around her and apologized. " I just don't want to talk about it, okay? " was all he would say.

The most surprising thing occurred on the third day when, out of the blue, Akiko had paused next to his chair and hugged him. Later that evening, while he showered, Hart asked her normally reserved partner about the impulsive act. " Because he needed it. " Akiko explained, as if it were obvious to anyone with half a brain.

Seeing the two of them in public was the hardest part. The way they studiously ignored each other as they passed was hard to take after seeing them so happy together in the past. Hart and Yang conspired to devise routes to classes and meals that would keep them from running into each other as much as possible, but there were still shared classes that had to be attended.

Both teams were hard pressed to keep the friends that the two shared from taking sides, especially the girls who seemed to be outraged on Ruby's behalf. Renee had finally resorted to offering Nora a sparring match while she 'explained' the situation to the petite fireball. The black eye that Valkyrie had sported afterwards worked wonders to calm everyone down.

Hart finally called a meeting of the teams in the dorm's common area, leaving the two exes back in their respective rooms.

" Okay. Let's decide how we can make these two to at least get back on talking terms! Weiss? Any progress with Ruby? "

The white ponytail bobbed slightly as she settled back further into her seat, arms crossed over her chest. " No! She won't talk about it, but she's also not eating right. She's not sleeping well, and I know her grades are going down too! "

Hart shook her head in frustration. " Same here. He won't talk, or eat, or sleep either. And he hasn't touched his guitar in days. The boy is falling apart! "

Renee rested her elbows on her knees as she looked around the group. " We need some drastic action if we want to get them to at least look at each other again. "

Yang threw her hands in the air. " Like what? Lock them in a room until they either start talking or kill each other? I thought you said fighting wasn't the answer!"

Hart looked over at her friend as the words 'room' and 'fighting' stirred something in her imagination. A memory of a young man's first fumbling attempt at asking a girl out surfaced. She held up an admonishing finger to the blonde. " No. I said that ~you~ fighting him was not the answer! I, however, now have an idea." she held out a hand to the white haired girl. " Weiss...you and I are going to see Goodwitch! "

Hart tried not to fidget as she watched the combat instructor walking across the floor of the classroom. The professor had agreed to help, but she'd warned them that if things went wrong they might end up with both Ruby and Tan not talking to any of them either. The gamble was all-or-nothing, but the present situation was rapidly becoming unbearable for everyone involved anyway.

Glynda lifted her scroll and tapped it twice. Two names appeared on the scoreboard, causing several of the students to gasp.

" Mister Tyrson? Miss Rose? You have five minutes to prepare! " Her terse announcement complete, the professor turned and walked back to her office.

It only took a moment for him to realize that this was no coincidence. Tan's face darkened in anger as he turned on his teammates. How could they do this to him? Hart's hand across his lips stopped the tirade he was about to unleash.

" I don't want to hear it! " she warned. " If your ass is not down there in five minutes, I will personally throw it over this railing! Get moving!" A glance at the rest of the team was enough to back up her threat. Neither Akiko nor Renee looked willing to take his side in the matter.

Higher pitched voices on the other side of the room indicated a similar conversation taking place.

With a wordless growl, he turned and stomped off towards the locker room. A moment later he was followed by a furious Ruby who took the time to throw a glare in Hart's direction. The faunas refused to be intimidated and responded with an imperious finger pointing the way to the door.

Renee watched the seething girl exit the room. " Hart? Are you sure this is a good idea? " The possibility that her partner could be physically injured paled beside what the mental results might be.

Dark curls swayed as her team leader's head shook. " No. But it's the only thing I could come up with short of banging their heads together." She reached over to grip the bigger girl's arm. " I've never known Ruby to give up on a friend, no matter what. I'm hoping Tan is the same way, but if I'm wrong this could get really ugly. "

" I don't think you're wrong. But I've never seen him hurt like this before either. " Renee admitted. " I just don't know what's going through his head right now, and that worries me."

The two stared at each other across the classroom floor. The normally smiling faces were pale and drawn as they squared off. The weapons that would normally be brought out with a flourish had been revealed in a more mechanical way. Everyone that was watching could tell that something was seriously wrong with this sparring match.

Tan raised both Gunfa's to shoulder height and let the clips of ammunition drop to the floor, a swift kick sending them skittering off to the wall. A flip of the wrists sent the barrels under his forearms, the grips held tightly as he assumed a boxing stance.

Hart closed her eyes in resignation. " Don't tell me he's going all noble on us now! She'll chop right through those things!"

Renee leaned over and whispered in her ear. " Nope. He upgraded the barrels not long ago when he brought back that recipe for the new rounds. Even Crescent Rose can't cut through them now. But it's still a stupid move on his part!" she lamented.

Akiko smiled at the two of them. " It is not a stupid move. " she assured them, her eyes glittering. " He will fight because he must, but I don't think he wants to hurt her. "

Hart hoped that Ruby might see it the same way. If she was wrong about her friend, then her teammate was about to become a casualty.

Both teams held their breath in anticipation until the red clip dropped to the floor, a kick sending it to rest against the wall next to the others. Without it, Crescent Rose was only slightly less lethal but the gesture had been made.

' Maybe, just maybe!' Hart hoped. ' But then, again.' The long blade snapped into its extended position, whirling into a razor-edged blur as the girl charged across the floor, shrieking like a hawk stooping on a rabbit.

Sparks flew when the blade scraped across the barrel as Tan raised one arm to block. His second weapon flipped in a circle, sliding between the girl's hands and trapping the shaft. A sudden twist followed by a kick to the abdomen forced her backwards, breaking her grip and leaving him in possession of Crescent Rose. Her hands clenched into fists as she glared at him from where she had slid to a halt. On top of everything else that had happened between them, now he'd taken her baby from her!

Renee was sure she couldn't be any more surprised, until Tan dropped his weapons and caught the scythe before it could fall. Bending at the waist, he gently laid it on the ground and stepped over it to approach Ruby, stopping just in front of her with empty hands at his side.

The slap echoed across the silent classroom, the force staggering him. Regaining his balance, he took a moment to gaze at the trembling girl before dropping to one knee .

" I'm sorry Ruby. I said something I shouldn't have. Do whatever you want to me, I won't stop you."

Her hand dropped as her own knees gave way. Squatting in front of him, she grasped his shoulders for support. " No, it was my fault. If I hadn't teased you so badly, you never would have said it. I'm sorry Tan. I...got stupid. "

He reached up and gently wiped a tear off her cheek. " Can we start over again?" he pleaded. His hand covered hers and gently squeezed as he looked into those silver eyes. " Ruby Rose...would you go out to dinner with me this evening? "

Her first smile in a week lit up his heart. " Yes. I'd like that."

Goodwitch strode out of her office, tapping on her scroll. The scoreboard lit up with a tally of one point each, the word ' Draw' emblazoned across the front.

" Class is dismissed!' she announced to the seated students before turning to the pair in front of her.

" You two! Get off my floor and don't let this happen again!" Warning complete, she turned and headed back to her office. Once the door had closed she collapsed into her chair and rubbed her temples.

She wondered again, for the umpteenth time, why she had chosen to become a teacher. Sometimes she just couldn't believe the things that her students managed to come up with!

Two simple lines in a conversation between characters in a previous story, ' The Visitor'. That's all it took to start the gears of the imagination turning. To make things worse, I hadn't even finished chapter eighteen yet when this idea came along!

Keep writing!

Vin