It's ya boi!

I'm back once again after being a lazy fuck who couldn't find enough motivation to write anything!

Tests and all that good shit. But things should be looking all right for the end of the semester. I think I can get a few more chapters out before finals start.

I've also got a profile picture and actually wrote something on my profile for once.

But something that needs to be discussed!

Jaune's new haircut... DUN DUN DUN!

I like it. It's not a bad look, and I've discussed this on one of my other stories about my opinion on it. I'll do so here too. Some people say that they have completely butchered Jaune. I think differently.

Jaune is no longer that dork we met back in volume one. He's changed. He's more mature. (A lot more.) He's becoming a more fulfilled Huntsman. It makes him look more confident. He's becoming a full-tier CHAD like ya boi!

I'm inherently biased towards styled blonde hair because that's what I'm rocking. (If you want, I can put a picture up so you can see my douchey looking haircut.) So, I may be a bit more lenient about it. I like all of the outfit changes from Vol 6 to 7. The only thing I don't like is Weiss' new hairstyle though. That's the only thing I have to complain about. (I'm also not going to watch Vol 7 until it is all out on Crunchy roll.)

In other news, I'm bringing back To Those Who Survived The Fall. It's going to be even more depressing when it comes to Jaune's backstory. We'll see him go from a little kid into the scariest man in the world. And I know how I want to do it now.

But, onto this story!

Things are going to be turning for Jaune. We saw what happened in the last chapter. This chapter serves to cap everything off and return us to normalcy in Jaune's life. I'm also going to start introducing other character perspectives starting with this chapter. Mainly they serve to provide a contrast between what's going on Jaune's world versus their own. Also some character development and relationship stuff since these girls are what is going to keep Jaune grounded for the trials to come.

I was going to do a Weiss perspective in this chapter, but decided to save it because it would make this chapter a lot longer and I wanted to keep it short. Maybe next chapter.

If nothing else!

I'm going back to exterminating the Xenos. I'll see ya later.

I feel disgusting...

Jaune couldn't help it.

Having to drink blood from a body or bodies, in this case, wasn't something he was used to. And Jaune wouldn't be alright with it for quite some time. That's just how things were going to be from now on until he could close off his heart from it. Jaune wasn't some sociopath with a total disregard for other people after all.

However, Jaune made up his mind. Even if his choice made his father, grandparents, and every Arc up the family tree roll over in their graves. They couldn't stop him from wanting to preserve his life. Or what was left of it at least.

So, Jaune did just that. He drank from each of the men he had killed, and with that came both relief and disgust. The former, due to no longer having the thirst on the forefront of his mind. A very welcome feeling now that Jaune had time to think.

It was like taking a swig from a glass of water after working outside in the Mojave Desert all day long. In the middle of July. Multiply the need for water by a hundred, and you might get close to what Jaune felt a few minutes ago. His body no longer tried to drag him to the nearest depository of blood, unlike earlier.

The feeling of control being back in Jaune's hands was liberating. Paired with the refreshing drink he had, Jaune felt like a new man. Just with some extra baggage that came along with it.

All of this created a degree of cognitive dissonance inside of the boy. He had too many feelings to sift through and way too much information to digest at the moment. Every bit of it either contradicted what he believed or what Jaune had always known. Frankly, it left him confused.

Jaune looked down at the scene beneath his feet. To the concrete stained with a dull crimson coating. The blood pooling in a shallow layer as if it had been fresh rain. Moonlight shone against the pools creating an imperfect clone of the celestial body.

Six figures lay partially submerged in the blood. Whatever half lay on the ground was entirely coated with it. Some of them were wholly covered due to their injuries. It dripped off them slowly, adding to the ever-growing puddle Jaune stood in.

The boy in question turned his gaze upon himself, to his clothing. He was very much like his opponents strewn about on the ground in front of him. Every surface was covered in blood. His jeans had splotches running up and down the length of the denim, growing denser towards his feet. While he couldn't see any, Jaune could smell it on his sleeves. He held out his hands to find the gore trickling down his fingers, quickly drying to the surface.

I can't go home like this...

Jaune tried wiping his hands to get it off to no avail. The feeling of the blood being kneaded between his fingers was wrong. It wasn't like water. It was just different. Odd in a way that Jaune couldn't put words to. However, it was a feeling that he hated.

Come on... Get off!

He continued to scrub his hands in a futile attempt to remove the blood. Jaune slowly grew more desperate as he began to vigorously scrape each of his hands together. It was far too sticky too merely be wiped off with his palms. It only transferred to the next surface.

Jaune looked around for a cloth or something wipe his hands off. The boy spotted a sheet sticking out of a container full of building supplies. As he reached for the rag, Jaune noticed something on his hand.

The blood was starting to fade?

He watched it for a moment as all of the blood vanished before his eyes. Soon both hands became clean as if he had washed them under a faucet. Yet, the blood hadn't dripped off his fingers or merely evaporate into the air like water.

Did I absorb it?

That had to be it. Just like when Jaune cut his finger open. Yet, this blood didn't seem to move on its own.

He looked down at his jeans to discover they too no longer had any blood on them. Jaune couldn't feel any it on his hoodie either. He wiped his face and found the blood around his mouth to have disappeared as well.

So, I can absorb blood through my skin too. That must be why my hoodie and jeans from yesterday weren't covered in blood. Maybe my cells brought it inside? Phagocytosis?

It was an interesting thought, to say the least. Jaune would have to learn more about it going ahead. Especially where it pertained to his regeneration. Any new information was going to help him.

He looked towards the street, noticing that even for it being late into the night, it was incredibly packed. There was plenty of people wandering about, and any one of them could see Jaune standing atop a pile of corpses.

I should get going...

Jaune didn't continue his brainstorming activity, turning into a swarm of bats and flying off in the direction of his house. He needed to make himself scarce for when someone discovered the bodies. Jaune didn't want to start his day with the police breathing down his neck.

[Arc Household]

He landed in the side yard between his and Ruby's house. A light thud emanating out from beneath Jaune's feet as he hit the ground. Surprisingly, the shock from the landing had lessened to a certain degree; no longer being so brutal on his knees like the first few times he tried this. Jaune had learned a little more about how to control his shifting, however; so he would take what he could get.

Checking his surroundings, Jaune found there was nobody in the immediate area that could see him. However, he could hear Zwei causing a ruckus inside of Ruby and Yang's house. His upgraded senses didn't pick up any people outside of the two homes next to him. The screen to his window laid out in the yard, meaning he hadn't woken anybody with his exit either, or they hadn't bothered to move the wire mesh.

It would be awkward for Jaune to hop back through his window only to find his mom sitting there, waiting for him. Something like that would happen. With Jaune's luck, so far, anything was possible.

Don't think about it, Jaune... You've already had a rough night. Best not to have an anxiety attack, right now.

Jaune bent over, grasping the wire mesh that lay flat in the yard. Holding it up, there was no damage rendering it useless. It was slightly concave from where he applied the bottom of his shoe to throw it out of the frame. However, Jaune would be able to pop it back inside after straightening it out.

With a leap into the air, Jaune transformed into the swarm of bats and flew into the open window. The screen was snapped into place in one swift motion as the remaining stragglers entered through the port. Nothing looked as though it had changed. No evidence to give Jaune's activities away.

Ok, that's done...

Jaune phased back into his human form, touching down gently onto the carpet. His movements made no noise, not even creating a squeak from the plywood hidden beneath his feet. The rest was a silent dance around the room as Jaune stripped off his hoodie and dumped it into the nearby laundry bin.

Looking around the room, Jaune's fears were washed away as there was no sign someone had come in after he left. That or they just hadn't moved anything around. Jaune would still need to come up with some sort of excuse as to why he was not in his room at this hour. Just in case he was confronted with it in the morning.

He reached over to the light switch next to the door and flicked one on. With a slight click and buzz, a few bulbs began glowing, allowing for the room to remain dim yet illuminated. Not that he needed the light to see, it was only mere instinct and habit playing out.

His eyes readjusted to the light, slightly blinding him for a moment as everything shifted from clear to obscure. Jaune moved about the room without pause, heading straight to his nightstand where his Scroll lay. The grey rectangular cube remained hidden to his sight, but not his memory from when he left it there.

Taking hold of the device, Jaune flipped it over in his right hand to look at the screen. It was two in the morning. The few hours before fleeing the house were still a bit of a gap in his memory. Without that missing information, Jaune would less able to keep his cover story together. For that reason, he needed to play catch up and see if he was sent anything. Be proactive about it.

Looking through his notifications, Jaune found the earliest one was from about ten at night. That must have been when he blacked out due to his urges or fell asleep. He had been feeling his exhaustion from the previous night going onto the next; however, either was likely and would remain unknown to him.

The rest of the notifications were either minor ones from mobile games or news articles. However, what interested Jaune was the messages from his friends. A series of group chats from the several they maintained.

While Jaune wasn't particularly close to everyone in his friend group, he did keep in contact outside of class. In return, they did the same. Except for Weiss at least. The most important of which were: Ruby, Nora, and Ren who were his lifeline to the others. Without them, Jaune would basically be repeating his high school life in Florida all over again. A subject matter that was unimportant at the moment.

Searching through the group chats, most were about homework, plans for this week, and random stuff. A lot of the messages were from Yang, Ren, and Nora. Blake even asked a question or two. Ruby and Pyrrha were either throwing an entire book's work of text into their messages or tossing out one-liners.

There's not much here... I may be overthinking this.

As he continued scrolling through his notifications, Jaune came upon a single missed call and voice mail from about an hour ago. It was from Ren. Why he had called him later on in the night was unknown to the boy? They didn't really have anything going on at this time, and Ren wasn't the type to call.

What if he knew? Maybe he had seen something or recognised Jaune while he was out running errands? The boy froze, staring down at the message with a cold sweat beginning to form on his brow. His hands shaking even worse than when he was standing in this very room nearly two hours ago.

Hesitantly, Jaune pressed his thumb down on the notification.

A menu popped up with Ren's number, an audio scrubber, and several other functions. A small circle appeared next to the left side of the bar, showing that the file was buffering. Jaune tensed up even further with every second as watched a small line take revolution after revolution around the circle. It slowly grew to become agonising. He had to know why.

It wasn't Jaune's fault he was paranoid. This was thrown onto him as a safety measure after learning what he had become. If Ren were calling him at any other time, he would be ok with it. However, calling between the gap when Jaune left home and got back was not something he fancied. The call itself could be for any number of things, but the coincidence with tonight's events made it less so.

Suddenly, the buffer ended, and the audio file began playing. Jaune focused in on it as to not miss a single detail.

"NORA!"

Jaune held his face back away from the Scroll, saving his ears from the incoming onslaught that was Lie Ren shouting.

"Quit your whining, Ren," the voice of Nora shouted back just as loudly. "We just got done with our homework because Jaune-Jaune wasn't here to help us! Besides, he's probably still up 'cause he's got so much homework too!" A minor struggle took place on the other side of the call. Jaune could hear a door shut and then silence.

"Jaune..." the now mousy voice of Nora continued. "When are you coming back to school? It's rough out here with just the three of us you know? I swear if you're not back here after today, I'm going to drag you to school! So, please come back..." The call ended there.

The way Nora sounded...

She was worried about Jaune. Her tone told him that much. Nora putting on the serious part of her personality wasn't something Jaune had experienced before. It was always just her near-manic bubbly persona. She was almost always happy. Not like this.

It made Jaune feel guilty.

Here was Nora, waiting for him to come back to school in a day or two, and the boy in question nearly took his own life. How would she have reacted to the initial shock if he managed to go through with it? Crying, retreating back into a shell, or maybe it wouldn't have set in so quickly?

Yet, Nora and probably several others were already worrying about Jaune even before he tried killing himself. His predictions were confirmed by the message. The knowledge of his friend's uneasiness was always known to Jaune. Adding to his conclusion from the bridge, he only reinforced the idea of what would be lost.

Jaune wasn't arrogant enough to think his friend circle hinged on his presence there. Hell, he didn't even know if him vanishing or popping up dead one day would break their merry group of friends up. However, three people close to him would be hurt by Jaune, and everyone else would feel it. So, Jaune merely had to placate those concerns. For his sake and theirs.

I have to play the part of Jaune Arc...

All he had to do was go about things business as usual. Jaune Arc was the goofy blonde that was friends with a socially awkward girl and two other weirdos. He was still reeling from getting a harshly worded rejection from a girl he had come to have strong feelings for. One he was still avoiding to save them both from the tense mood given their unfinished business.

Jaune wanted to live his high school life out in contentment. He wished to distinguish himself for his work. Everything he was assigned was done to the best of his abilities. Only slacking off to relieve stress.

To put it quite simply, Jaune Arc was an utterly boring man. A facsimile just as many others who played the same masquerade. A life that perhaps hundreds or thousands had already lived through.

To think anything extraordinary happening in his life was just laughable. To even suggest Jaune was a vampire with access to supernatural abilities was a jest. The boy was another human being. The same as the other billions on this planet.

Jaune Arc was just like any other teenager attending Beacon Academy.

[The Next Morning: Ruby]

Ruby awoke to the sound of her alarm clock blaring into her left ear. With her face still buried into her pillow, she reached over and smacked her hand down onto the snooze button. A muffled grown emanated from within the foam mat as she withdrew from her lethargic state.

The feeling of waking up this morning was not a great one. Ruby was sore all over, her neck was stiff, and she felt like crap. Like the time Yang practically forced the girl to lift weights. She felt like death. Or whatever this was close to.

Last night wasn't what could be considered a good time. As was yesterday. Jaune ditching school and then not responding to any messages Ruby sent him was the reason for that. She was fretting over him the whole night and could barely restrain herself from walking over to his house and demand he talk to her.

"Ugghh..."

Ruby sat up in her bed, letting her legs dangle over the edge, but not touching the floor. A breath left her lips as she rubbed one of her eyes. Some of aches and pains gathered from last few hours worked themselves out.

A soft rubbing sound came from the entrance of her room. Ruby looked up to see Zwei pushing the door open with his snout. The corgi created an opening large enough to fit through and dashed over to where Ruby sat.

With a leap, Zwei hefted himself onto Ruby's lap and nuzzled his nose against her. The girl pet the top of his head lightly several times before withdrawing the hand. In response, the corgi looked up at her, cocking his head to the side.

"You know, both of you are real pieces of work, right," Ruby said to the dog in a critical tone. "Why did you start barking last night? I was trying to sleep..."

The dog said nothing back to her, only grunting and smacking his jaws together. Ruby could tell Zwei was only barking because he had a reason for it. However, being roughly woken up at two in the morning was probably the most significant contributor to her 'grogginess.'

"At least you're easy to talk to," Ruby sighed, taking on a more sombre tone. "And I know what you're thinking..."

Jaune, on the other hand, was not. He was not as bad as Ruby in regards to being socially awkward, but he was close, which is what made him easy to become friends with. Thing's were simple when chatting about whatever the two were interested or just hanging out. But things became complicated very quickly when her other friend entered the picture. Jaune's feelings for her as well.

After what happened with Weiss, Jaune wasn't really the same. He hasn't even bounced back from it yet like everything else this semester. The boy was still distant and unwilling to talk about what happened. Or even begin to share his feelings. He only discussed some things on the surface level with Velvet and Ruby.

She could only guess how much it hurt him. Ruby even had a hand in creating the disaster which befell the three of them. It stung just as much for her as it did Weiss and Jaune. But there was nothing she could really do to fix the problem. Nothing that wasn't extreme and way out of her abilities at least.

Which is why Ruby wasn't mad at Jaune for anything he had done yet. Same for Weiss, aside from when they first met and after what happened between the other two-thirds of the trio. However, skipping school, ditching his friends, and then not texting anybody back was unacceptable. Jaune was going to pay the blood price for that.

...

Shutting the front door behind her, Ruby turned around to look out onto the street. It was still early morning, and the sun had just begun cresting over the horizon. With it came a warm breeze creeping across her pale skin. Nobody else out on the street or any cars driving by allowed her to enjoy this partially good-morning in peace.

Which lasted only a moment because Ruby was all alone out here. Something she didn't enjoy. It was missing several people and the mood they managed to conjure up with them.

I wonder if Jaune's up yet...

Beginning to head down the street and on her way to school, Ruby slowed herself down, passing by her friend's house. A part of her was nervous to see him again after what happened yesterday morning. Yet, she didn't expect him to come to school today either.

The look on his face yesterday just didn't look like "Jaune." All the colour was drained from his skin and eyes. His expression seemed to be more akin to a walking corpse than a living person. It was like he'd seen a ghost or some sort of indescribable monster that scared him to his core. Jaune might have gotten sick seeing Weiss again, or his body might have finally decided it was done feeling well today.

It was odd because Jaune looked fine only a few minutes before. Ruby didn't understand how something like that could change a person's condition in such a short period. But Ruby never suffered from a broken heart, so such a concept was foreign to her.

Maybe she needed to be more considerate when going to sit with Weiss during lunch or talk to her in the halls? If Jaune couldn't be around her, then Ruby didn't want to unintentionally hurt her friend by not thinking things through; but Jaune said to not worry about what was going on between him and Weiss. So, she was stuck.

Compared to what Jaune was going through, Weiss' problems were about as confusing. Ruby didn't even know where to begin with her. It was a wonder how these things didn't show up earlier in the year.

"Hey, Ruby," a masculine voice called out to her. His nervous-sounding tone told Ruby the identity of the person standing to her side.

The girl in question realised she had been staring at the ground for an indeterminate amount of time. A slight blush crept up her cheeks due to the embarrassment of having been caught unaware by Jaune. Especially when she was lost in her head.

Looking up at the boy, Ruby noticed that he was in a much better condition than he had been yesterday. The colour had returned to his face and seemed to be more saturated than it had ever been. His composure was more laid back than it usually was as well. He was undoubtedly feeling better from her perspective. A light smile capped it all off, cementing her conclusion.

Before anything words flew from the boy, Ruby cocked back her arm back, slugging him several times in the shoulder. Every blow came with all of her strength packed behind it. Each thud and slap from their meeting point confirmed that her punishment was being carried out.

"Owwhowhow," Jaune whined with every blow to his shoulder, he brought an arm up to block one but instead found Ruby's fist connecting with the limb without hesitation. "Hey, what gives?!"

"What gives," Ruby repeated his question in an angered tone, withdrawing her arms back to their sides. She clenched his fists hard before staring back up at the boy. "That's supposed to be my line, you know?! And what's the big idea, leaving school yesterday without telling anybody?! You ignored me too when I sent you like a bajillion texts asking what was wrong?!"

Jaune's expression shifted from a confused to a more nervous/guilty one. He seemed to realised what he did and was trying to think of something to say. Whatever it was, better have been good or she would rip into him again. A move that Weiss would have definitely been proud of a few weeks back.

"Uhh, what's going on here," another voice called out from behind them in a quizzical tone. Ruby turned around to see Yang standing there with her bookbag slung over her shoulder. She looked equally confused as Jaune had when Ruby started laying into him. "Never mind; actually, it looks like a lot of 'not my problem.'" With that, the older blonde started heading down the street, leaving the two friends to duke it out alone.

"Yang, help me," Jaune shouted for her as the blonde strode past. "This is an abusive relationship! She's beating me!"

"Sorry, Lover-Boy," Yang yelled back, rolling her eyes. "You dug yourself a grave. I don't want to get thrown in there with you."

Good...

Ruby waited for Yang to be out of earshot before she turned back to Jaune. "Now, Mister," she began, poking him in the chest. "What do you have to say for yourself?!"

"Uhhh, I'm not really sure..."

"Maybe a 'Sorry, for not saying anything,' would be a good start," Ruby interrupted him in a firm tone. "Because leaving school without saying anything to your friends made all of us worry about you!"

Now she needed to pound this lesson into his thick skull on the way to school. Maybe it would stick if Ruby found one of the other girls to help her out with it? Weiss was obviously off the table right now. But Ren and Nora were also fretting over the boy as well. So, they might have something to say to him. She could get help from them.

"You're right," Jaune confessed hastily, rubbing the back of his neck nervously. "I'm sorry! I should have texted you guys when I left..." He glanced off to his right, avoiding her gaze.

"Good, at least you are owning it," Ruby continued her inquisition, turning to begin walking down the street. "But are you feeling better now?!"

Even though he looked fine, Ruby wasn't sure if Jaune was fine. Appearances could be deceiving after all. The girl did have some insight into how Jaune was doing, but nothing beyond superficial observations.

"Is this about Weiss, or me getting sick," Jaune asked in response, not sounding like he wanted to talk about either. Ruby would understand if he did not feel like talking about it. Weiss was the same when it came to that topic.

"Both..."

Ruby felt like she was treading on thin ice here. If Jaune didn't feel like talking about it, then she wouldn't press further. He would share it with her when the time came.

Jaune let out a long exhale, seemingly gathering his thoughts. "Look, Ruby," he began, carefully picking his words. "What happened between Weiss and I really upset me. She's not my favourite person right now, and I would like to keep some distance between us." He paused for a moment, running a hand through his hair. "When I saw her yesterday... I froze and couldn't move. It felt like I was going to repeat her rejecting me all over again. Then I started having a bad headache, because my rotten luck, of course. So, I left and didn't talk to any of you guys because I wasn't feeling up to it..." Jaune drew in a long breath. "There, I'm done monologuing. But I'm feeling better than I was yesterday, just please don't pry into it."

Ruby was glad he got that off his chest. Jaune at least admitted that Weiss rejecting his feelings for her hurt him. He hadn't ever confessed that part, only Ruby, Velvet, and pretty much every other person at Beacon could see it on his face. He wasn't lying about how he felt like he had once before.

"Well, that's good," Ruby said in a more solemn tone. She looked back up to him before continuing. "But you really can't skip school like that anymore! Your grades are already slipping! And don't make me get Pyrrha to talk some sense into you. She's known you for longer, and she'll make it stick." Her words turned the heavy mood into a more bearable one.

Ruby knew Pyrrha could break the will of any knuckleheaded friend who refused to comply. If not through force than through words. Jaune would have no choice but to accept.

"Oh, no," Jaune cowered in fear comically. "Please don't sic Pyrrha on me! She's too polite; it's almost painful!"

"Nope," Ruby said with a devilish smile. "You need to accept your punishment!"

[Beacon Courtyard: Jaune]

Jaune couldn't ask for things to get any better then they had this morning. He knew Ruby was going to tear into him, but accepted it, allowing her to get a few slugs in as well as the lecture. After her inquisition ended, things lightened up and went back to how they used to be between the two. Telling each other bad jokes, talking about video games, and best of all... comic books.

Frankly, his mask was doing its thing. Ruby didn't seem to notice anything wrong. The girl was good at seeing through any falsities and would say something if she had. Not to mention that Ruby hated liars.

He only lied once to Ruby so far. Anything connected to him being a vampire would have to be. Jaune would have to twist the truth to suit his needs. Being forthright about nonrelated subjects would get his friends off his back and more receptive to his facade.

But it was a necessary evil. One that Jaune was going to burden. Something that couldn't be rationalised away by saying it was to protect others. He wouldn't dream about doing that for a second, even it was the reason for every act. It was wrong.

However, a single day wasn't going to let Jaune grow into this new role he conjured up. He felt nervous as all hell talking to his friend when he should have been relaxed and calm. 'Growing pains' if a term could be applied. A few stumbles here and there were expected.

While these thoughts sifted through his mind, Jaune took several glances at the scenery around him. Just like yesterday, today was playing out in the same way. Every day before the last was seemingly unchanging and nostalgic. The most significant change Jaune could see was to him.

He would have preferred this content repetition over the new feeling of walking up to school with Ruby. One that was almost foreboding. Jaune had never experienced this constant dread. This fear of what was to come. Last night that feeling had been pretty clear to him, emerging for the first time in his recent memory.

I shouldn't be thinking about things too hard, it'll just wear me out. Just play it by ear... You want things to go back to normal anyway.

As Jaune tossed the thoughts to the back of his head, he heard a rapid series of footsteps coming up from behind him. Somehow he hadn't heard them sneaking about and was caught by surprise. Jaune couldn't turn around before whoever was running had collided into him.

The mystery person slung their arms around his neck and hefted their entire body onto the boy. Jaune had to steady himself as the remaining momentum nearly toppled the two over onto his front. As he planted his feet, a chin, neck, and upper chest of a woman rested against the back of his head. The point of the jaw, digging slightly into his skull.

"JAUNE YOU'RE BACK," the person shouted into his ear in a sing-song tone, causing him to wince and clench his teeth together.

After regaining his senses, Jaune noticed the smell wafting off this woman was a mildly sugary one. Maple syrup primarily coming off her breath. Anything else was a rather pleasant and familiar one. Jaune didn't need very much to figure out who this woman was.

"I'm glad to see you too, Nora," Jaune said dryly, acting as if he was slightly annoyed by her entrance. He really wasn't.

Nora Valkyrie. The other half of the other pair among Jaune's closer group of friends. A bubbly and almost boundless girl whom Jaune met on the same day after running into Ruby. Becoming friends with the ginger was practically required when she volunteered herself and Ren to show Jaune and Ruby around Beacon.

"Of course you are," Nora ecstatically reinforced the idea without batting an eye. "It's been ages since we last saw each other! Oh, how we've missed you!" She squeezed him a little tighter, almost how one would to a dog after coming home from a vacation.

Jaune snorted at Nora's unending enthusiasm. He would share the feeling if he had an ounce of her insanity sprinkled onto him. Then again, it probably wouldn't be enough to match her energy.

"Ok, Nora," Ren said, coming in from Jaune's left side. "I'm sure Jaune doesn't mind carrying you around, but you should probably get off of Jaune before Ms Goodwitch throws a fit."

Lie Ren. The perfect foil to Nora's madness. He was pretty much along for the ride with whatever she came up with. How the boy managed not to become insane in the mere presence of Nora was beyond Jaune's comprehension. Luckily, Ren and Nora shared many of the same interests with Jaune and Ruby, so their friendship came easy.

The other, less crazy, part of pair threw a slight nod towards Jaune. He could see the entertainment in his eyes while watching the scene play out. Had they not been at school, Jaune knew Ren would let this continue until Nora inevitably became bored or Jaune couldn't carry her anymore.

"Awww," Nora whined. "You're no fun, Ren!" She hopped off and threw on her most adorable pout. "How can I be the queen if I can't ride my steed into battle?"

Ren had no response, rolling his eyes in an almost comical manner. "But it is good to see you back, Jaune," he said, turning to face him.

"Yeah, and don't worry about Weiss," Nora added on. "If she tries anything today, I'll break her legs!" She emphasised this by slamming her right fist into her left hand. Several of her knuckles cracked and popped rather loudly.

Ohh, no...

"Please don't," Jaune said, meekly raising his hands to show emphasis. "I don't want to drag you into my problems..."

I also don't want any attention drawn to me. Nora, getting expelled is also a bad thing.

"Jeez, it's not like I'm mad at her or anything," Nora said with an almost sadistic undertone. "It's just when one of my best boy-friends runs into the girl who snapped his heart in two and then leaves, saying he's sick. I have to think she's done something to hurt him, so I'll just return the favour..." She was about to wander off to go hunting, but Ren grabbed her wrist, preventing her from causing any chaos.

And she knows about that too... Nevermind, this day blows.

"You guys heard about that," Jaune replied, rubbing the back of his head nervously. "I'm guessing like half the school know's now?"

Not that Jaune really cared at this point. Frankly, anything wasn't really a concern beyond concealing his vampirism. But the side of him still connected to his old life felt that embarrassment. It also made him feel really self-conscious about his appearance.

"Who cares," Nora scoffed at the idea. "Ruby told us in Dr Oobleck's class, but I don't think anybody else knows."

Jaune turned to Ruby who seemingly found an object off in the distance very interesting. Before he could say anything, the dam broke.

"I'm sorry," she confessed with a deep exhale. "Nora asked where you were, and I told them what happened."

Jaune wasn't angry at her for that. Not by any means. It was better that she relay the news and take the responsibility of his shoulders. More than likely, Ruby had told Yang about what happened too, but

"Eh, it's fine," Jaune said, waving it off. "Nora would force me to say it anyway." Ruby seemed to relax at Jaune's forgiveness.

"Jaune's girl problems aside," Nora interjected once again. She turned and poked him in the chest. "I think someone has some catching up to do because he decided to ditch class and us."

Jaune felt a cold chill climb up his spine. He couldn't move to run away as Nora grabbed him and started dragging him inside the school. The Vampire offered no resistance, glancing back once to see an oddly satisfied looking Ren and a giggling Ruby in tow.

Ending this chapter on a lighter note. That's what I was going for. Also, slightly Tsundere Ruby, but we can't have Weiss holding that role all on her own.