"When's the last time you ate?" Jaune asked the faunus blandly.
"When's the last time you ate?" Blake snarked back at him, her eyes refusing to close or leave the screen she was staring at despite the heavy bags underneath them. At this, Jaune blushed slightly. I mean… She had a point. He hadn't eaten food in a while, but that was because he didn't need to eat food due to the Game. Blake did not have the same excuse.
"And when's the last time you slept?" He ignored her question. "Whenever you're not in class, you're here. You aren't even training anymore outside of Miss Goodwitch's class. What are you even doing?" The library had become Blake's home since the dust bust in Vale- More specifically, the library's computers.
"I'm cross referencing the currently known White Fang dust shop and shipment raids with a map of Vale along with a list of future projected shipments by the Schnee Dust Company, courtesy of Weiss. I'm trying to find a pattern in the system of attacks to predict their next move." She continued to type away on the keyboard as she spoke.
"And how's that going?" Finally, her eyes closed as she growled in frustration and pushed away from the computer.
"Absolutely horrible! Either the attacks are completely random and off the cuff everytime or else there's a genius mastermind behind the whole operation because there's no pattern! At all!" Well, she wasn't wrong, but that wasn't exactly important right now.
"Seriously, when's the last time you ate?" Jaune pressed. Blake chose to examine the pattern of the ceiling. "Blake…" The pout she made was cute, yet she continued to be difficult as she mumbled her response. "What was that?"
"I don't remember…" The faunus confessed.
"If that's the case, this is more serious than I anticipated. Drastic action is required." The team leader realized.
"What does that- Wha-! What are you doing Jaune?! Put me down!" Said drastic action entailed grabbing the ex White Fang member by the waist and slinging her over his shoulder like a ragdoll. The girl slammed her fists on his back, but they hurt pathetically little.
"I'm taking you to the cafeteria, Blake. We're going to have some lunch."
"I don't know why you're pouting so much. You clearly needed the sustenance." Jaune pointed out. He had grabbed a simple pre-made sandwich while Blake feasted on a full course fish dinner. She ate the fish like a drowning man sucks in air, but she paused enough to glare at him.
"You didn't need to carry me. It was humiliating." The faunus explained before returning to her delightful meal.
"It was telling." Jaune corrected. "We both know you're stronger than me. In any other situation, if I tried that, you'd beat the crap out of me. The fact that you were unable to stop me shows just how much you've deteriorated over the last week. I know you want to find the White Fang, but if you continue at this pace you'll kill yourself."
"Better me than innocent civilians." Blake insisted. Jaune completely disagreed, but he decided to take a different approach to convincing her.
"And how many innocent civilians would you be able to save in your current state? You think you'd be able to stop Adam from killing people when you couldn't even stop me?" The words were harsh, and by the intense glare on her face, he thought he might have crossed the line. But soon enough, Blake looked away and sighed.
"You're right, dammit." Jaune had always viewed her as one of the strongest people he'd ever met, but right now, as something approaching tears entered the corners of her eyes, he realized that the huntress-in-training was as vulnerable as any other person. "I just… I need to stop them."
"Alright fine!" The leader of Team JWLR spoke suddenly, causing her to look back at him. "I was planning on keeping this a secret- since the less people know, the better- but you need to hear this."
"What?" Blake questioned, utterly confused by what he was talking about.
"Do you know who Neo is?"
"Roman Torchwick's sidekick? Yeah, I know her."
"Well- now don't freak out- she contacted me." Blake raised an eyebrow- not yet freaking out.
"Contacted?"
"She's the one who told me about the White Fang when we were in Vale last time. Apparently, she doesn't want to be a terrorist so she's providing me with information to foil the White Fang's plans until she can… Uhh… Stop them." Jaune corrected himself slightly with the last bit of information. Telling Blake about Neo might calm her down, but telling her about Cinder might just set her off again.
"Really? That's certainly something."
"You're more accepting of this than I thought you would be initially. You do realize that I'm working with a criminal to take down criminals here, right?" The faunus nodded. "And you don't have any problem with that?"
"Jaune." The recovering ninja said flat out. "I used to be in the White Fang. Not only does that mean that I've worked with criminals before, it also means that you've worked with criminals before when you worked with me."
"Well then." Jaune commented. "You know what this means, right?"
"What?"
"You don't have to spend your time fruitlessly investigating the White Fang anymore." The hunter revealed. Blake just shook her head again.
"Maybe you trust Neo's information, and maybe you're right to do so, but I can't say the same. I need to keep working." She explained.
"You're working yourself to death."
"If that's what it takes." He scowled at her response; they were going backwards!
"Just one chance, please." He begged suddenly.
"What do you mean?"
"Give Neo one chance to provide us information. If it turns out to be correct, then you need to stop pushing yourself so hard, and if it's false, then you can push yourself as hard as you want." The leader of Team JWLR offered. "And you can't do anymore research until then." He added.
"Fine. One chance."
With that settled, all that was left was for Neo to come through for him, which he could only hope that she did.
Oh, and to deal with Yang and Pyrrha.
I want to remind everyone of the poll to choose Jaune's pairing for the third Volume of New Game Plus. If you care about who he ends up with, please vote. Right now, only 54 people have voted, which means that any pairing still has a chance to win.
Until next time,
-RMV