A section of Trifa and Jaune fluff as I feel that I've been ignoring the two for too long, but the chapter does get back to a serious mood after all is said and done.
With that, happy reading everyone.
Cheers, Searoar.
"Alright Trifa, just connect these logs here and we should be all set." Jaune grinned at his handcrafted masterpiece. Rummaging the island for fallen twigs and broken logs, the blonde boy managed to construct a raft from nature's materials.
It was a rare day that Jaune would find himself with only Trifa to play with, but seeing that his dad and the other members of STQH had excluded themselves from today's morning and afternoon activities to discuss some grown-up stuff, while Sam and Carla took Ruby and Yang under their wings; this left Jaune and Trifa to entertain themselves as they didn't feel like baking pastries or learning how to tie knots.
"I still can't believe Carla let you keep the torn fabric of your dismantled kite." Trifa sighed. Spinning her webs around the logs to knit them together. She'd never forget the day that Hawkins had to climb a tree to rescue his son who had somehow managed to get stuck on a branch after trying to retrieve his lost kite.
"Of course Grandma let me keep it! I fought for it on the basis that it reminded me of you! See? The color of the cloth is the same color as your hair and veins!" He boasted. Not noticing his best friend falter slightly with her web-spinning.
As Jaune attached the final piece of his creation, he made a gallant pose after its completion. Pointing a finger at the sky as he beamed his usual goofy smile.
"What do you think Trifa? Pretty impressive don't you think?" Wiggling his eyebrows, he turned to his best friend for approval, but all he received was a suspicious blush and a mixed bag of emotions plastered on Trifa's face.
"Hello, Trifa you there?" Jaune flicked his friend's nose, much to her annoyance. Waving away her embarrassment, she returned to her collected attitude.
"Jaune, this contraption of yours is asking for trouble. Why don't we settle with walking around the island, I'm sure there are plenty of things to look at and explore." Trifa groaned, running a hand through her hair as Jaune's dreams were spoiled.
"Aw, I really wanted to set sail though. I even gathered a bunch of flat stones for us to skip." Jaune pointed to a small pile by the mast and drew some out from his pant pockets.
"Come on Trifa, it's a really shallow part of the lake too, if we fall in we'd be able to walk back to shore no problem," Jaune whined.
"You mean I'd be able to walk back. I'm a whole head taller than you which means my neck would be above water level. You, on the other hand, would be guzzling salty water down your nose if you tried to walk through this part of the lake." She snapped.
"Please Trifa? This is an opportunity of a lifetime! And Sora the warrior of the sea never refuses an opportunity of adventure!" Jaune declared and jumped onto his makeshift vessel. Offering his best friend an open hand, she reluctantly joined him as he cut the webs that kept his raft attached to the shore.
"Yahooo!" Jaune cheered, the winds were on his side and picking up in speed. His sail fully extended, he felt his moppy blonde hair flow to the sides of his face as he charted a course of adventure.
"Jaune slow down!" Trifa begged. Clinging to the mast with shaking hands, she was helpless as Jaune continued forward. To the Faunus' relief, the weather made an unexpected shift and petered out. Leaving a calm and collected breeze to gently caress the waves and tug the raft on a much more preferable pace.
"Aw, it was just getting exciting." Jaune pouted.
"Thank Oum that's over..." Trifa heaved in solace. However, fate had yet again played an ugly hand against the poor girl. Her eyes darting to the back of Jaune, a brown insect with long antennas with many legs trickled up and down the young boy's shirt, issuing an annoyed shake from the blonde.
The centipede thudded against the logs, to her horror, its gaze meet Trifa's and began to hesitantly approach the Faunus. Her face paling several shades, she opened her mouth to speak but found her voice lost to the whistles of nature as the multi-legged predator shrunk the distance between them. Her fingernails digging into the bark of the mast, she swallowed a thick lump in her throat.
"Jaune..." Trifa muttered under her breath, but her friend found himself too busy humming a chirpy tune to hear the whispering pleas of the trembling girl.
"Jaune..." She tried again, this time a little louder.
"Hm? What is it Trifa?" Jaune asked, his back still turned as he shoved his stick into the water for another stroke.
The centipede's being mere inches from her, Trifa let out an ear-shattering yelp.
"JAUUUUUNE!" She squealed. Jaune felt his heart hammer against his ribcage as he spun around, just in time to catch a thrashing Trifa midair in an uncomfortable bridal style. His rowing stick clattering to the logs of the raft, the panicked Faunus clambered onto her savior, shifting from his shoulders to his back, then to his front again, repeating the cylce many times over.
"W-What is it Trifa?!" Jaune sputtered as he felt a knee collide against the bridge of his nose. Jaune wanted to scream in agony, but the frantic state of his best friend came first. Biting his lower lip, he clamped down his pain and smacked on a brave face of fury.
Trifa kicked wildly while in the bridal position, so much so she flicked off a shoe exposing her blue socked foot as its leather sneaker plunged into the lake.
"GET IT JAUNE! DON'T LET IT NEAR ME! KILL IT, KILL IT, KILL IIIIT!" Her squeals reaching levels Jaune could barely comprehend, he narrowed his sights on the source of his comrade's strife. A small centipede skittering on the floorboards aimlessly. Fiddling with a few ideas in his head, he felt a lightbulb ding over him as he slowly tried to put Trifa down.
"NOOO! DON'T LET ME GOOO!" Trifa flailed as she restarted her wild kicking.
The arms around Jaune's neck felt like a guillotine. Oum did Trifa have a strong grip when she was scared.
"I-I got it Trifa, just let me b-breath for a minute and this p-problem will be s-solved. Sound like a g-good deal to you?" Jaune choked. Hoping his words reached the girl's ears.
With whimpering eyes, Trifa slipped out of Jaune's embrace and scuttled behind him. Trying to shrink as she pushed him forward to meet the insect invader.
Picking up his rowing stick, Jaune led the raft towards the shore and nudged off the centipede with the tip of his shoe. Then resumed his lake adventure as if nothing had happened. Though he removed his pink collared shirt to use as a napkin for his bleeding nose. With her jittering phobias steadily dropping, Trifa went back to her seated position on the rafts' mast, but not before giving Jaune an appreciative hug. The blonde boy returned the hug, his strength surprising Trifa as she was momentarily lifted into the air during the embrace.
Minutes passed on in satisfied tranquility until Trifa decided to start a conversation in an attempt to forget all which had transpired.
"So Jaune, how often do you train with your dad? I know you go through usual routines on Fridays, but I never see you in the early mornings." Trifa asked while skipping a stone across the lake. The ripples bounced in the water as they interrupted the river's flow.
"Well, my dad forces me to study in the early hours. He says it's one of the best times to absorb new knowledge for young minds." Jaune explained. "He also makes me study a few short summaries of that day's lesson before I go to bed, along with a quiz on my tarot readings. My dad even said I'd be earning my first tarot deck before I turn seven. I'm so excited!"
Trifa rested a hand on her chin and took a seat. Her back leaned against the mast of the raft. "You have to earn your gift? That doesn't sound right to me."
The blonde boy raised a brow. "How so? My dad told me he earned his deck through blood, sweat, and countless struggles. So it's only fair that I do the same."
Grabbing a long stick, Jaune plunged it in the water to steer the raft in a new direction. He avoided all the stones with a meticulous grace, sticking his tongue out when he had to maneuver the sharp turns. He could see the end of his boating trip in the distance. The cabin that he had set off from had puffs of transparent smoke floating upward to the orange sky. With the sun tucking itself behind the horizon, Jaune made one final stroke towards the Xiao Long-Rose family home.
/-/
"So... How was the show kids?" Sam scratched his head as the atmosphere surrounding the kitchen table was anything but pleasant.
The entire time during the meal, Summer had pointed a face devoid of emotion directed solely on the magician across from her. Tai and Qrow beside her, the two shared a glance over their leader's head but could only shrug as the clinking of utensils filled the awkward silence.
"It was really cool!" Ruby, the ever saver of the day, showed a bright smile that managed to push away some of the building tension among the adults.
"Like, remember when Ideo punched that guy's shield? Right, Yang?"
"Yeah," Yang seemed to perk up after hearing her sister's enthusiasm, "I want to get his autograph when I'm old enough to go to Mistral!"
Sam grinned at the scene and his wife breathed a sigh of relief. At least the kids were happy despite the insane and emotionally stressed hurdles they've had to face. Then again...
The deer Faunus shifted his sights to a pensive Jaune. The boy hadn't spoken a single word during the entire meal, and being the responsible adult that he was, Sam decided to see what was hampering the boy.
"Jaune, is everything alright?"
Feeling the stare of everyone around him, the young blonde looked up from his plate of half-eaten potatoes and peas. He didn't seem sad mind you, but the gears in his brain were definitely grinding if his vexed visage was anything to go by.
After a few seconds, Jaune's gaze began to flick from his grandma to his dad, causing both Hawkins and Carla to curl a brow and share a look. This went on for about a minute until Jaune rapidly shook his head then cupped his chin.
"Hm... Grandma Carla?" The boy said, his head tilting to one side curiously.
While the other kids left the scene to finish the friendship bracelets they'd started a few days prior, Jaune remained seated as his uncles set to clearing the dirty utensils and plates.
"Yes, Jaune?" Carla asked calmly.
"Are you really 42 years old?"
The cow Faunus blinked then turned to Sam who looked at her with mild amusement.
"We did celebrate your birthday not too long ago, Carla," Sam said in a reassuring tone.
Jaune's cerulean eyes sparkled at this. However, his face grew pensive once more as he started mumbling to himself. He grabbed his backpack that was slung over his chair and pulled out a handful of papers. All of his meticulous notes and drawings were written in red crayon, courtesy of Ruby, and proudly presented them to his older audience.
It wasn't a bad sketch, for a six-year-old, and by the red scribbles, it appeared to be Jaune holding hands with his father and a lady who had a question mark for a head.
Hawkins didn't need further elaboration, as his unintentional eavesdropping from last night had already given him insight to his son's strife. He did, however, question what his son had in store when he pushed the paper toward his Grandma.
"Then if you're still a 'young whippersnapper like the rest of e'm,' can you help my dad send a letter to the storks and help him make a little sister for me?"
Jaune's pearly smile reflected his innocence while the reactions around him didn't quite share his enthusiasm.
Carla, who'd been blindsided like never before, coughed and hacked as her entire face was smothered by a hot blush as she fumbled to create a coherent sentence while her cow ears flapped up and down like the wings of a hummingbird.
Tai and Qrow, who'd been washing and drying the dishes, each dropped a glass but only the one belonging to Qrow actually broke.
Summer blinked over and over again until her stern visage was no more and a tad of pink had crept on her cheeks.
For Sam, as devoted as he was to the situation and understood the serious tone behind it, couldn't help but smile like an idiot while doing his best to ease his wife's flustered state. Which he failed miserably.
"J-Jaune!" Carla scolded, not out of anger, more so out of embarrassment. "Y-Your father and I, w-we can't do something like that!"
The tyke flinched at the dismissive tone. "But don't you like my dad? So it'd be okay to send for the storks right?"
Carla looked like she was about to have a heart attack. "I-I'm married, for Oum's sake! I'm married, Jaune!"
Jaune frowned. His gaze-changing targets, he hopped off his chair and walked over to a bewildered Summer.
"Then can you help, Auntie?" The boy tugged on the red reaper's sleeve while waving a picture of his ideal but imaginary family.
"You said you like my dad a lot too, so can you help him write a letter to the storks instead?"
Summer's face reached a tint that far surpassed the color of her respective flower. She already had a tendency to fumble her words when flustered, and that trait amplified when she was forced to stare at the small child before her.
"I-I'm married t-too, Jaune!" Summer squeaked as she patted Jaune's head with a tad too much emphasis.
"But you've already had a stork drop off Ruby, and she's an awesome sister for Yang. So you already know how to write a letter with Uncle Tai, so making one with my dad should be the same right?"
Jaune snapped his fingers as Summer continued to flounder like a fish out of water.
"Wait! Can you also make it so my younger sister looks like Ruby too? That way she'll be super cute! Or maybe one that looks like Yang is better so that her hair color matches my dad's..."
Qrow and Tai were nearing their limit as they'd stopped washing dishes and we're now using each other to support their wobbly frames. Tai couldn't help but have the image of a stoic Hawkins making love to his wife flash before his eyes, and he almost punched himself to get rid of the thought.
While Qrow, finding the whole ordeal absolutely hilarious, patted his partner's back in faux pity as he wiped a tear from his squinted eyes.
"I-I can't help you with that, Jaune, y-you're misinterpreting what I told you l-last night!" Summer cried in exasperation.
Rubbing his skull after receiving one-hundred headpats in the span of a minute, the poor boy turned to his dad. Hawkins, who'd been silent during the entire ordeal, finally spoke but his tone was not welcoming. He ordered for Jaune to drop the theatrics and to take a walk outside with him. So, without uttering a single word to anyone in the household, the magician and his son left the premises while under the moonlit sky.
For those left at the table, Sam had finally calmed Carla down and suggested the two call it a night.
"I'll see you all tomorrow," Sam whistled then guided his wife out of the kitchen and into their guest room.
"Wow, well who could've imagined that Jaune would be capable of bringing the house down like that..." Tai sighed and moved to comfort his still mumbling wife.
"I guess he gets it from his dad, though the way Hawkins goes about breaking the ice tends to be a lot more brutal." Qrow joked.
Despite the embarrassment fluttering in their hearts, the three members of STQH looked down on the papers Jaune had drawn up since last night. By chance, Qrow decided to flip one of them over and found his smile wavering to a neutral line.
Seeing this shift in mood, Summer and Tai patted down their reddened cheeks and inspected the other papers. Doing this, their flustered faces also fell.
For the same sentence had been written on each paper.
'Find a nice wife= Happy dad 100%! Also getting a younger sister as awesome as Ruby is a must.'
/-/
"Hey, Jaune and Uncle Hawkins are leaving." Ruby barely managed to peek over the windowsill from her bedroom on the second floor.
"Huh?" Yang and Trifa crowded around the little reaper whose face was regrettably smudged against the cold windowpane as a result.
"I heard a lot of yelling downstairs, maybe Jaune got into trouble?" Yang suggested.
"I don't think so," Trifa said, "if Jaune got into trouble he wouldn't be allowed to leave the house. That, or he would've brought a blanket and pillow if his dad punished him."
The girls followed the backs of the blondes until they disappeared down the shadowed hiking trails. While Ruby and Trifa could only shrug at the matter, Yang held an air of self-contemplation. Her uncle Hawkins, as frustrating and mean as he was, obviously knew things about her parent's former teammates. Things that Yang really wanted to know.
"Aaaaand done!~" Ruby let out a cheer as she completed her seventh and final friendship bracelet. She did a few twirls around the room, much to the annoyance of Yang and Trifa, but the spider Faunus happened to catch the image of sometheing flapping out of Ruby's back pocket.
Her sister's focus broken by the cute sound of the little reaper's voice, Yang pushed aside her inner turmoils so she could pay attention to her dear sibling.
As Ruby held up the yellow, red, and black bracelet toward Yang, Trifa felt an uncomfortable feeling twisting her gut.
"She kinda looks like..."
Jaune's words echoed in Trifa's mind as she mentally facepalmed. The piece of paper dangling from Ruby's pocket, was the team photo of Auntie Summer and her uncles before they met Hawkins!
Trifa's mind wound into a panic. She couldn't let Yang see that photo at all costs!
So, as the sisters got to work on a new craft fabricated from glue, plastic, and string, Trifa maneuvered her way behind Ruby and tried to snag the photo as stealthily as possible. Unfortunately, the Faunus wasn't as stealthy as she'd hoped and ended up poking Ruby in the back instead.
The little reaper jumped at the surprise contact and whirled around to meet with her attacker. Only to cutely tilt her head and ask what on earth Trifa was trying to do.
"U-Um..."
"Oh... Hehe... I get it." Yang's lilac pupils gained an ominous glint to them as the young brawler raised her arms and flexed her fingers.
"You really gonna let miss bossy get one over on ya, Rubes?"
"H-Huh?" Trifa stammered. Though she was the biggest in the room by a whole head's worth of height, she suddenly felt very small under the mischievous gazes of the sisters.
"I refuse to be defeated!" Ruby declared in the likeness of a wrestling champion.
"D-Defeated in what?" Trifa squeaked as she moved toward the closed bedroom door.
Glancing at one another, Yang and Ruby broadened their smiles.
"Hehe, the first one to beg has to forfeit tomorrow's dessert!"
"W-What?!" Trifa cried in protest. Carla and Summer had plans for custard tarts tomorrow, and that was one of Trifa's favorites!
"I don't know what you two are plotting, but you're not getting my tarts!"
The Faunus puffed out her chest, put her hands on her hips, and replaced her nervous visage for the scornful face she'd usually show Jaune when she was upset with him.
"A tickle fight it is!" Yang declared.
"Cootchie cootchie coo!" Ruby chanted.
"How childish can you get... H-Hey, w-wait..." Trifa bit her lip as the hairs on her skin began to quiver.
What was once confidence had begun to recede back to the prior panic that filled the young girl's heart. Trifa already knew that she was terribly ticklish, and the two tykes before her seemed exceptionally keen on exploiting it.
Without warning, the two girls pounced upon the young Faunus and soon the room was filled with uncontrollable laughter. All of it belonging to Trifa.
"S-Stahahap!" Trifa squealed as Ruby's fingers skittered across her stomach and ribs.
The spider Faunus' voice hit a higher octave when Yang managed to snake her hands beneath her armpits and wiggled them mercilessly to the point that Trifa could no longer breathe.
Reduced to a panting mess, Trifa lay curled on the floor, her arms wrapped feebly around her torso in a final act of defiance to maintain her already lost dignity. The one-sided war lasted up to fifteen seconds.
Ruby continued to poke the poor girl's cheek, asking if it really was okay to have one of her tarts tomorrow, but as for Yang, she snuck behind her sister and snagged the paper that Trifa had tried to snatch away prior to the tickle fight.
"W-What is this?" Yang asked in shock.
There wasn't anything odd about the photo, except for the fact that the image of the mean lady who her uncle Hawkins had fought off yesterday had decided to make a second appearance. Except, the way the lady smiled in this picture was warm, and held no malice at all.
The longer Yang stared, the more pain, anger, and despair bundled in the pit of the young brawler's stomach as she failed to keep her composure.
"U-Um, what's wrong, Yang?" Ruby stopped poking Trifa's cheek and tilted her head when she saw tears in her sibling's eyes.
"..."
Ruby peeked at the photo as the piece of film seemed to hold all of Yang's attention.
"Oh, yeah I wanted to show you the cool weapon that lady is holding, it's awesome right?"
"..."
"T-There's even a cool map on the back that's supposed to lead to a super cool hideout. Maybe we can ask Uncle Hawkins to find the way there when he gets back?" Ruby said in an attempt to break the awkward silence.
"Rubes..." Yang said slowly, her angered visage causing a squeak to leave her little sister's mouth.
"Don't tell anyone about this, sister promise, okay?"
"H-Huh?" The little reaper pursed her lips. "W-Why not?"
"Sister promise?" Yang leaned forward, her bigger frame making Ruby feel extra small.
The little reaper turned her head to Trifa for assistance, but the older girl had passed out once she caught her breath.
The emotional pressure too unbearable, Ruby promised, albeit very reluctantly.
/-/
That night, Yang found it very difficult to fall asleep unlike her snoring sister Ruby and quiet Trifa. Wriggling beneath her bedsheets, Yang felt her hold on her pillow loosen and tighten in perplexed confusion. She was Summer's daughter... right? Yet this fact seemed to blur more so every month whenever her uncle Hawkins decided to visit.
Slinking out of her bedsheets, Yang tiptoed across the room to her dresser. Opening the wooden compartment, she retrieved the secret photo she'd kept hidden, making sure to move it under a new location whenever her parents did her laundry. Positioning herself and the photo before the window, the moonlight revealed a past memory shared between her mother, father, uncle Qrow, and another woman who bore a strikingly odd resemblance to Yang. Long black hair, bloody red eyes, she even had the siganture ahoge Yang had come to be proud of. This fourth stranger also happened to be the same woman who attacked her Uncle Hawkins not too long ago...
Fearing the worst, Yang clutched the picture and held it snuggly against her chest. She had to know... No... She had the right to know... Flipping the photo around, the messy and faded scrawlings of a map marked with an X spoke volumes to her. Wiping away her tears, Yang threw off her pajamas and switched to a set of outdoor clothing. Losing her common sense, the bewildered child waited for the noise in the household to die down. Then, she would embark on her long and dangerous journey.
"Mmm... Yang? What are you doing?" Ruby asked groggily. Unaware of her older sibling's plans.
"Shh... Don't worry Rubes, just go back to sleep," Yang whispered softly.
Yes, Yang would pursue the truth behind her true mother, but not alone...