Chapter 12: Selfishness

Yang's jacket was missing a button. It wasn't hard to figure out why.

What Weiss hadn't expected was the awkwardness. The lingering, stifling, prickling air between the Yang and Jaune that, rather impressively, made their already uncomfortable living situation seem almost benign. What was a little fear of death? What was being surrounded by bloodthirsty monsters and having no escape? What was any of it… compared to how unbearably horny she was. And Weiss Schnee didn't use words like that often, if at all. That was how she knew it was bad.

But damn, if something that bad didn't sound so good.

She moistened her lips, thankfully not the ones between her legs this time, and crossed her bare foot over the other, letting the water run a warm tickle between her toes. Another warm day, not crusty hot, not lukewarm humid, but just right. Almost seemed unnatural that what was a discount paradise could exist in the middle of a horrible grimm-infested jungle, but she'd stopped questioning it by now. Now, the sheer weight of her death, a death soon to come, had cleared her head. It was so obvious.

Back at Beacon, she'd been so focused on her career. So zeroed in on the dream of becoming a Huntress, making a name for herself, then taking her father's company and restoring its once righteous, respect-demanding name. Relationships? Ridiculous. At least beyond her teammates. She had no time for anything else… at least that's what she'd told herself. It wasn't as if she never tried for anything outside of her goals… but she always treated them like tangents. Just things to keep her entertained while she built the bridge to her future.

How silly it all seemed now. When death was on your doorstep, it didn't give a grimm's rear end about your dreams. It didn't care about your name, or your aspirations, or the things you weren't able to do. It took you. It ripped everything away. That was the way it really was out here in the real world. So how did you combat it? How did you put up what defiance you could?

You gave it the middle finger, as crude as that may sound.

Weiss was in love with Jaune. That she understood now. Certainly made sense, didn't it? These feelings? Certainly they weren't new, but she had that summon of him so he'd affected her heart in some way. She couldn't stop fantasizing about him since he nearly died. That sounds so awful. And, if now was a clue, she was keen to, well… lay with him.

It had to be said, she had no idea how she was going to get there. What did she do when she had him alone? Kiss him or lift up her skirt? What did she say to him, let's make sweet love? Or I want to be knock-kneed by the time we're done?

Weiss palmed her forehead. Now her thoughts were just getting out of control. Again.

Weiss could only venture that Yang's and Jaune's little encounter had not exactly gone smoothly. Yang was quieter now, less responsive even to touch, no matter what she or Pyrrha or even Jaune tried. Now she was the one going out on hunts and walks and whatever else she needed to. Now she was doing whatever she could to get away from camp. From Jaune, no doubt.

And if that wasn't serving dinner on a silver plate, then she had no clue what was.

Why question it? Weiss didn't often remember a time where she had no clue what she wanted. She'd never understood how some people couldn't. You knew yourself better than anyone, and that had to mean you understood your feelings well too. That was logical. It made perfect scientific sense.

She wanted Jaune. Wanted him the way Yang had him. Perhaps the way Pyrrha had, once on a time. Love, it had to be. But… was it right? Could she hurt Yang that way?

It'd hurt her no worse than she probably is now. A dark thought came. And why would she be in the wrong? She'd told Yang before to let that candle go and she clearly hadn't. Was Weiss wrong for trying her chances after Yang's had been promptly crushed? No. Weiss wasn't to blame. Wouldn't be to blame. If it wasn't her, then it'd be Pyrrha, so what difference did it make? Weiss told herself this again and again and each time she found herself more motivated, ready to get up, march on up to Jaune with burning purpose and push him against the wall or something like that. She'd damn well do it.

But then she remembered what a crying Yang sounded like and like a dampened mood, wilted back down. Again. Then she'd start berating herself. She couldn't get Jaune to… do her and not hurt Yang. But of course, then she remained disruptively unquenced and that wouldn't do her any good at all. What did she have to do, ask her for permission? Hey Yang, can I get the man you love to bend me over? I'd very much appreciate it.

"Nothing can ever be easy." Weiss plucked a rock, watched it plop into the water.

"You're telling me." Yang squatted down beside her, one buttonless jacket hanging open. Made Weiss wonder. Did Yang rip it apart herself, or Jaune? She liked to think it was the latter. And if he could break that apart, what was a little white dress compared? Yang scooped some water in her hands, took a sip, then splashed her face with the rest, running her fingers through her hair as she took a breath, "Whatcha thinking about?"

What a question to ask. So many possible answers. So many of which might get her punched in the face. What was she thinking about? Whether the best way to spread her legs was standing up or on her back. Whether there was such a thing as too big. Whether her potential partner was soft and gentle as a seamstress or rough and strong like a lumberjack. Most importantly, wondering which one she'd like more. "Nothing." she said.

"Nothing?" Yang asked.

"Well, nothing important. The same spiel. How are we going to get out of here, how are we going to survive, did I leave the dorm unlocked before we left. Those things."

"Sounds like you. But considered you checked it like ten times, I'm gonna safely say it fine. I'd be more concerned about if Zwei peed on Blake's bookshelf again."

Weiss grinned. She remembered giving Zwei a treat for that. Always a good boy. How she missed him. Maybe she wouldn't be trying to sleep with her teammate if she had him to cuddle with. Gods, that sounds so wrong.

They sat in mild silence together. Birds tweeted, water trickled and rushed in different spots, foamy spray kicked up from the bedrock, and Weiss sucked in a breath of clean air as she wondered how long it'd last. More than a week since they'd found this place. About six days since Ruby and the others left. Were they okay? Were they safe and warm? No way to know until they came back. And she tried to hope that they would. But hope had failed her a lot in life, failed her even more recently, and Weiss didn't often bank on chance to save her.

"Did something happen between you and Jaune?" Weiss asked. "You've been acting strangely around him."

Yang shrugged. Shrugged. Even her face betrayed nothing, it was starkly nonchalant, like laying with the boy she had feelings for wasn't a big deal. "No, not really. At least not what I expected. Guess its your turn now, huh?"

Weiss looked up at her, her face felt warm. The sun, most likely. "I don't know what you're talking about."

"Mm-hm." Yang said as she stood up, "I'm going with Pyrrha today, so make sure Jaune doesn't get too much of a workout. He's still a ways off from being healed."

And that was it, she walked off. Weiss stared at her back like she didn't exist, like what just happened couldn't be real. Because it couldn't be. Right? Weiss scrambled to her feet, almost slipped in the dewy grass, and caught Yang by her sleeve. Yang didn't turn to her. "Yang, what happened? The reason I didn't… do anything, was because I didn't want to betray you. I won't do anything if you tell me not to. Just talk to me."

She had no idea why she wanted Yang to believe her. But it was true. If Yang told her not to do it, Weiss wouldn't. She wanted her to tell her that, but at the same time didn't. Either way, she felt like if she made the choice, she'd choose wrong. Maybe it made her a bit of a coward, but what would that matter when the Grimm came to tear her apart? At least she'd have a good memory to die with.

"Do what you want, Weiss. Is what I did really any better?"

No, perhaps not. Pyrrha was still in love with Jaune, but Yang hadn't taken her feelings into consideration. Why did that give Weiss a sort of relief? This wasn't how things were supposed to be. Friends honored each other's feelings. Respected limitations.

When had Weiss started thinking with her nethers over her head? This was what happened, wasn't it? Disappointment. Heartbreak. And yet, she still couldn't help but want it. What kind of a selfish animal did that make her?

"Is there anything I can say?" Weiss swallowed then. "Anything you want to say to me?"

Yang shrugged, Weiss even heard her chuckle a bit. "I can get with a little tickling, maybe a bit of spanking, it can be kind of hot sometimes…" her head lowered, and with it her shoulders. The sun itself seemed to get dimmer. "But take this from a place of experience, hearing another girl's name in your ear isn't a very good turn-on."

Yang walked off and Weiss had no choice but to let her go.

~x~

"Favorite color?" Pyrrha asked.

"You kidding?" Yang said, tossing the pine back to her. "Gimme a real question, P-drizzle."

It was a different sort of change, hanging out with Yang, but not an unwelcome one. You could only hunt and circle the perimeter so many times before it all became familiar. Now Pyrrha came out here with the express intent to get away… and she had a feeling it was much the same for Yang. Almost felt like a bad teen rom-com. Two girls jilted over one boy. Only instead of becoming bitterly jealous of one another for some contrived reason, they did the next most pathetic thing: suffered together.

Still, it was nice to have someone to suffer with.

"I guess that was pretty obvious." Pyrrha said, kicking her foot against the boulder she sat on. Yang was a few feet opposite her, laying upside down, her hair fanning down and fingers drumming her stomach, "Why P-drizzle?"

"Why not? I can't use the same material over and over. It'd ruin my comedic integrity!" Yang chirped.

"That might imply you were funny in the first place."

"Oh, my heart!" Yang fake cried, "You are a Champion. Of breaking hearts!"

As Jaune was stubborn on reminding her. "What do you think of the Ozpin situation, that Jaune talked about?"

Yang rubbed her neck. "I don't know. Who knows what Ozpin's thinking. And… maybe what Jaune said isn't fully true."

"What do you mean?"

"We'd have heard about it, right?" Yang said. "The Champion getting mixed up in a bank attack like that… even if Ozpin was covering everything up, like he said, even he can't have that much reach. There were loads of witnesses. And would paying them off really silence them all? Especially the little boy's mom?"

"Ozpin seems like he could pull it off."

Yang looked dour. "If I had a kid, i don't think any amount of money would keep me quiet."

Pyrrha blinked. Odd thing to say now of all times, but Yang smiled sadly and Pyrrha tried to get back on topic. "But Jaune told us what happened, I'm sure we can trust him."

"Yeah he did. He told us what he believes happened."

Pyrrha did not like the sound of that. "Believes?"

"Jaune said he was dealing with insomnia at the time. My dad had that for a while. He'd see things sometimes, and I'd have to tell him they weren't real even though he was sure they were." Yang rolled the pine in her hand, "Can't say I know what it feels like. But, if its like a dream, I bet it can convince anyone with common sense that its real."

"So what, Jaune is… delusional?" But could it just be insomnia that did it? Sure, they only had Jaune's word, and maybe it wasn't the most reliable right now. But who was to say they could trust the Headmaster? "You really think that?"

"He could be. Probably a bad case of it, considering all he saw was you when he was on top of me."

Dead silence creeped up Pyrrha's spine, crawled through her skin, extended out into the forest and demanded it shut up. The whole world even. All Pyrrha could do was stare at Yang, who was calm as could be, as if she hadn't just said the most shocking thing ever conceived. "You and he…?"

"Fucked? Yeah."

Something burned inside Pyrrha. Something powerful. Oh how it wanted to come out, how it wanted to say something, do something. "That's… good."

"Good?" Yang said, "How? Didn't you hear what I said?"

"W-well," Alright it wasn't good. And in fact, didn't make Pyrrha any happier. "Sorry, I just meant—"

"I know what you meant, don't worry. Not like I'm mad at you or anything." Yang said.

"You're not?"

"I mean, I want to hit you for pushing me Jaune's way if you knew he had feelings for you."

"I didn't." Pyrrha said, then sighed. "At least not until that night. And after that, its not like I could just come back to you and take it all back. I… I didn't want to take that from you."

"I'd rather that than…" Yang frowned deeply, then threw the pine aside. "Just nevermind."

Pyrrha didn't want it to stop there though. She hopped to her feet and joined Yang on her boulder, the girl having drawn her legs up like she was about to hug herself. She could see tears in the corners of her eyes, demanding to be set free, but Yang's face wrinkled with fight, refused to give in. "If you want to punch me, you can." Pyrrha offered.

"A-and ruin that pretty face of yours? I'm not that cruel." Yang tried to joke, but her voice cracked, and Pyrrha felt that note stab her in the heart. Rip it open. Sounded exceedingly familiar. The deepest kind of pain, the kind that can only heal given time. Lots of it. Sometimes not even then. "Hey, Pyrrha?"

Pyrrha was barely ready when Yang clutched her tight, so tight that it hurt. It wasn't as if they'd never hugged before, but she'd never been close enough to Yang that it mattered. Now, this warrior, this girl who seemed so incredibly strong most of the time, was a train wreck in her arms. Pyrrha hugged her back, pulled her as close as she could manage, and then more.

"Am I an idiot?" Yang asked.

"No." Pyrrha shook her head, "You're a human being. We make mistakes."

"I wish I'd never done it. I wish I'd gotten over it." Yang sobbed, "I knew I should have. And then focusing on my feelings when we're all stuck out here? I feel like a brat. All I cared about the last few days was myself. I should have focused on the others, like Ruby and Jaune were."

"No." Pyrrha pulled her back, made her look at her. Eyes red-rimmed, tears painting her flushed cheeks, hair a tangled mess. "You don't need to be like Ruby or Jaune. Maybe this isn't the best time to think about ourselves, but if anyone wants to blame you for that, I'll kick their teeth in."

"But—"

"No!" Pyrrha snapped, spooking Yang to silence. She hated that it made her so angry. The idea of selflessness was passed around and put on a pedestal like it was the only thing that mattered. There was no such thing as selflessness for the sake of it. Pyrrha wanted to think her destiny was selfless, that it was bestowed on her by other people and it was her solemn duty to uphold it. "If I hadn't learned to care about what I wanted, I never would have gotten better. So how can you sit here and tell me you're wrong for following your heart?"

Yang didn't say anything, but her tears picked up. Pyrrha drew her in again, felt her own eyes warm and fill. "I'm sorry, Yang. I wish you didn't have to get hurt. But never, ever, say that its wrong to care about your feelings. Never say its wrong to be selfish. It may not be right, either. It just is, alright? And I won't blame you for that.

"You don't hate me for what I did?" Yang looked at her, cheeks tear-rimmed.

Pyrrha shook her head. Parts of her were hurt, the selfish parts that had wanted Jaune all to herself and picked at Pyrrha's head that Yang was a betrayer. But she pushed those thoughts down. Yang had acted on her feelings and made a mistake. Who was Pyrrha to fault her for that? How could she beg for forgiveness if she wasn't willing to give it out?

"There's nothing to hate you for. And nothing to forgive."

"Can we stay like this?" Yang asked, crooking her cheek in Pyrrha's shoulder. "Just for a little longer?"

Pyrrha rubbed her shoulders. Maybe she needed the hug too. "As long as you want."

~x~

"Jaune, can we talk?"

Damn him, he was rubbing his arms. His muscled arms. His bare back, scarred, muscled back was turned to her and Weiss felt all the smaller by comparison. So hungrily smaller. He could crush her under his weight and no mistake about that. She wanted to be crushed. What the hell was wrong with her?

"I don't feel like it." Jaune sucked his teeth, fingers clawing at his bicep like it had taken a stab wound.

He was healing, but slowly, and he was nothing if not impatient. It smelled sweaty in the cave, the musk of a man at hard exercise, the musk of a man at intense work, or passionate love-making. Weiss shook her head, palmed her forehead once, then walked over and sat down in front of him. "I'll rephrase: Jaune, we are talking, whether you want to or not. Am I clear?"

Jaune's eyes narrow and frowned, like he was testing her, trying to gauge if he could scare her off with a silent threat. Impressively icy. Weiss liked to think he learned it from her. But there was the trouble—he'd need far more practice to surpass the master. "Yeah, I… guess." he eventually gave up.

"You're being an idiot, doing all this exercise. And its annoying me. I don't like helping you change your shirt all the time." She, in fact, did, but now was not the time for that.

"Then I've fixed your problem, haven't I? No shirt!" Jaune spread his arms. Oh now he was just torturing her.

"That's not all." Weiss took command of her hormones, though it was a considerable effort, and got back on topic. "What happened between you and Yang?"

A pause. "I don't think you want to know."

"I wouldn't ask if I didn't."

Jaune looked at the wall, glared hard at it like he knew it wouldn't work on her anymore and chose a weaker opponent. "We had sex, that's what happened."

"I figured that much. What else?"

"She found out…" Jaune sighed, "That she's not the one I want to… have sex with. Again."

"Who do you want to… sleep with?" Someone more demure? Smaller? Men tended to like more power in most cases, and while Weiss was certainly no one to be topped, the bedroom sounded like an exception for her.

"Professor Port, okay? I have a hard-on for Professor Port. Who does it matter?" Jaune growled, turning away. "Point is, things happened that shouldn't have happened and now… Yang won't talk to me."

I wouldn't exactly be enthused to talk to you either if you said another girl's name in my ear like that. But she wasn't here to punish him for that, he was doing a damn fine job punishing himself. But then he'd always been like that. Always assuming it was his fault before anyone else's. "Then why did you do it? Why if you knew you didn't want her that way?"

"I tried to tell her. She…" Jaune palmed his forehead, let his back press into the cave wall. "I don't know. At some point, I just gave up. I guess I wanted a distraction, too. And I know that sounds bad, because it is. I treated Yang like a distraction."

Well Yang had too in some way… and Weiss was about to treat Jaune the same way too, wasn't she? When would that cycle end? When was it okay for friends to use each other this way? Had this forest really pushed them this far? Weiss wanted to think she was above that. She had to be above that. "Anything else?"

Jaune looked at her through the corner of his eyes, then away again. "We weren't… careful."

Weiss closed her eyes. That… well, that was just a truckload of shit, wasn't it? And Weiss Schnee didn't use words like that often. "There's no guarantee anything will come from it."

"No guarantee anything won't, either."

True enough. Weiss sighed. "You know you're an idiot, right?"

"Not the first time I've been told."

Weiss smiled a little, rubbed at her knee. "I bet its not the first time you've heard I wanted to sleep with you."

Jaune's jaw worked. If he was surprised, he hid it well. "Why?"

"I thought that what I was feeling was love. I thought I had feelings for you. Can you believe that?" Weiss shook her head, almost laughed. She wished it was funny, but it scary to think of just how easily she'd fooled herself. How easily Jaune and Yang were able to trick themselves. Back home, it was easy to have self control. There were other ways to be distracted. But not here, not when all she had were her friends in everything. They were her entertainment, her protection, her whole damn world right now.

"But, I was wrong. I was just fed up and wanted a distraction and you were the available option." Weiss said. And she was ashamed that it had taken Yang making a mistake for her to realize it. She'd been so afraid of her death, so afraid of the end, that she was desperate for one moment of pleasure, one moment of escape to tide it over, so to speak. There'd have been no meaning. None of it would have mattered to her. Not done that way, "I just didn't want my death to be meaningless."

Jaune didn't look at her, but his voice had grown deep. Serious. "I'm not letting any of you die."

"You can't save us all, Jaune."

"I have to try."

Weiss couldn't debate him on that, she didn't want to take that from him. The sooner he was strong again, the safer she'd feel, but she scooted closer and pinched his bicep and he snatched away like she'd commited the most serious offense. "Fine then, hero. But right now, you are too weak to do anything. So stop making your condition worse, it's only making our lives harder, you know."

Jaune held her gaze for a moment, then sighed. "That's all anyone tells me now."

"Well now you've heard it from me. You can be sure I'm not coddling your feelings."

Jaune chuckled. He had a really handsome laugh now that she'd noticed. "I might like you more if you did."

"Oh no," Weiss grinned, "I've seen where that leads. Thankfully, there are no more tournaments for us to enter."

She wasn't sure why it surprised her, but Jaune burst out laughing, and even more surprising, she was laughing with him. It was the first time since he'd come back that she'd heard such a big, loud, genuine laugh. And she'd brought it out of him. And Ruby said she didn't have a sense of humor. Take that. "You're wrong for that, you know." Jaune said.

"Or I am so very very right. Dealer's choice."

Jaune looked at her then, seemed a bit lighter, but his voice calmed to the low tone once again. "Do you know how I can make it up to her?"

"Apologize, that's all there is to it. Get everything on the table." Weiss said, "And I need you to pull yourself out of that slump at least a little. My future career depends on it. Understand?"

Jaune lowered his head, then grinned. "You don't leave much room for argument."

"I'm the daughter of a CEO. Its in my bloo—hey!" Weiss felt herself be jerked toward him, her face buried in his pectorals. He stank. But he stank so good. Still, what would it look like if she didn't voice her discontent? "Let me go, you brute! You smell awful!"

"Nah."

Weiss tried to wriggle away, which of course meant, she purposely did a very bad job of it so that Jaune would only pull her closer. "Okay, Jaune. I get it. That's enough." It most certainly was not enough.

"A little longer."

"Jaune!"

But he wasn't listening, or he was, depending on how you looked at it. And Weiss had to sit there awkwardly, letting him hold her. He was warm. Very much so. But she didn't feel that need anymore. It felt like she was seeing him again. The inspiration behind her summon and nothing more. No, he was more. A friend, that's all. Maybe she wasn't in love with him, after all. But she did like how warm he was. Strangest thing, this was the first time she'd ever hugged Jaune, now that she thought about it.

Maybe she'd hug him again when they were on an airship back home.

No more horny.

Also, I've reposted my original story on Royal road, Scribblehub, and Fictionpress. Called Where the Dragons Went and under this same penname. If you're interested, give it a read and follow, PM me and I'll try to get you a link. But you can also just look it up.

Alright later.

ISA