Authors Notes:
G'day everyone, Shul here.
Not much to say today, other than I probably should have warned you all that I would be on a vacation. Little did I know, there was zero access to internet out in the Scottish highlands – something I really should have expected, in all honesty.
But I'm here now and we're back to Jaune living out his life in Beacon. Don't worry, everything will come around and you'll see the canon events play out with him involved. For now, let the poor boy experience what he signed up for: Smash, pancakes and really awkward situations involving the opposite gender.
With all that out of the way, enjoy the chapter.
Accompanying him was nothing more than the tap of a pen on a blank notepad as he flicked through the mass of paper that was resting by the side of his hand.
Beacon's library was full with knowledge and, quite frankly, Jaune found it hard to get started on any of the assignments or essays he was given to do in class. Thankfully, their dust-mechanics professor – Professor Peach – was much more lenient on written tasks to be handed in. Rather, the woman preferred practical experience within the laboratory as opposed to researching from books. It was something that Jaune was especially grateful for.
Doctor Oobleck, however… well, from the size of the gargantuan heap of processed paper laying on Jaune's table, the boy liked to think that his thoughts on written assignments was more than evident.
Jaune himself was never great at the academics. With a resigned sigh, he turned over the page of the massive book and scanned over the miniscule text in an effort to absorb some of it.
Sure, he normally got through it thanks to the incessant nagging of Sapphire and Saffron but the Jaune was more often than not the type to procrastinate when he could. A multi-page essay about a historic battle of their choice, huh? Easier said than done.
When faced with overwhelming options, sometimes picking a single one became an impossible task. Call it first-hand experience.
Having already skimmed through the major battles he could have written about, Jaune was around halfway through the thousand-page encyclopaedia of monumental conflicts of the past. The Great War, the Faunus Rights Revolution, the Revolts of Old Vale, the Vacuan Steel Scourges. There were even a couple he remembered from middle-school, like the Cruisian-period Fires within Mistral. All of them ended with massive amounts of casualties, innocent or not – though as Jaune continued to read, his dark-blue eyes always seemed drawn to similar items no matter what battle he went through.
The 'phenomena', as the texts liked to refer to it as.
Certain skirmishes within each and every war came out with the same results. Bodies, on both sides, littering the battlefield due to an 'unknown' phenomenon.
Within the Steel Scourges, it was the official Vacuan military – term used vaguely – and the desert survivors fighting over resources covered the stormy sands of the heat-ridden wasteland. Within the Revolts of Old Vale, peasant and noble alike were slaughtered as riots and coups took place. Through, perhaps more famously, the Great War's 'phenomena' when Mistrali and Valean forces beached on the islands on the eastern coast of Sanus, the continent of Vale and Vacuo.
Each and every solider that landed there died. Nobody made it back home after deploying onto those remote islands.
Maybe it was because it was one of the oldest recorded battles in the first place, though no such 'phenomenon' ever occurred before the Great War. Jaune blew air out from closed lips in something that resembled a sigh. It was touched on during Doctor Oobleck's first lecture and, like he said in that very same lecture a couple of days ago, the King of Vale at the time apparently tamed the 'phenomena' to work in his favour for the final battle of the war.
Though his eyes were bored, Jaune continuously felt the urge to read more about it. Almost unnaturally.
From his forward slouch on the table, the boy reeled back and straightened himself as he heard the chair next to him scrape silently. What wasn't so silent were the words spoken.
"Hello again!" The cheerful voice greeted him with a great amount of joy. The same person cringed awkwardly as they received a forceful 'shhhh' from the librarian who was quite literally across the room.
Jaune widened his eyes at the bright green orbs that he was met with. "Oh, hey, Pyrrha. Hold on a sec." Putting his hand on the huge book between them, he made to pull it closer towards him though struggled with the first attempt. He tried again, and succeeded, even if it took a grunt of effort.
Giggling happily, Pyrrha nodded her thanks as she sat – hands regally in the lap of her Beacon uniform skirt – as she inclined her head towards the bare notepad and book that Jaune was failing to write on and reading through respectively. "So, Jaune, what are you up to right now?"
"Nothing much, as you can see," was his response as he gestured to the lack of writing on his notepad. As Pyrrha laughed with a hand over her mouth, the blond felt a similar urge as he scratched the back of his head.
It wasn't often that they would speak like this. While their respective teams were glued at the hip, the two never really ever got alone time to talk to one another. There was an odd feeling in the back of his head that it wasn't really do to with a lack of trying, rather strange strokes of bad luck during the times when they wanted to talk to one another.
Almost by coincidence, the reasons were almost always Yang or Ruby related; the long-maned blonde would drive Pyrrha away completely unintentionally or as the shorter sister began to rant at the speed of sound to her blonde teammate just as Pyrrha was approaching.
Despite it, Jaune never really noticed. Pyrrha did.
It was sort of annoying, but here they were now – she supposed.
Leaning forward, the crimson-haired huntress-in-training brushed a lock of hair behind her ear and examined the large book that Jaune had moved out of her way for convenience. She seemed awfully close, Jaune noticed, though the girl didn't seem to care as she instead read out loud, "The Snowbound Skirmishes? Let me guess," Pyrrha said, giving a side-eye to Jaune. "Doctor Oobleck's assignment?"
Bashfully, that's right – bashfully, Jaune couldn't handle the redhead's close gaze and subsequently shifted his head slightly to the side before answering positively. "Yeah, you got it."
"I see," she hummed, closing her eyes and returning to her original position with her hands overlapped on her lap. Invisibly, Jaune breathed a sigh of relief; he finally got some space to himself. Her emerald eyes revealed themselves to him once again as Pyrrha tilted her head and smiled. "Coincidentally, I had just finished my own essay yesterday. If you'd like, I would be happy to help you."
As embarrassing as it was to admit it, Jaune found himself sort of entranced by the girl sat next to him.
In his past, Jaune barely had any friends – let alone girlfriends, or anything of the like. The closest thing he had to female interaction was his own sisters and the lonesome male sibling refused to admit that he even saw half of them as the opposite gender due to how borderline insane some of them were at times.
It didn't help that he spent an entire year camping and travelling around with Vul – a crass, rash, drunken walking ball of explosives that could have went off at any time. Zero female interaction during any and all time spent with that man, believe him.
And he wasn't lying that night during Truth or Dare. Pyrrha was undeniably one of the gorgeous girls he had ever met in his life.
The whole reason that Jaune actually found Weiss to be attractive when he had first saw her was due to the almost queenly nature to her – holding herself to be regal and elegant. Now, when Jaune met Weiss, things were shaken up about his general opinion on her. But Pyrrha had a similar air around her, accentuated by the royal red of her hair and the bronze tiara that seemed to always rest underneath it.
Long story short, Pyrrha was beautiful and sometimes Jaune forgot that this was real life now; a life where he could have actual conversations with these kinds of people.
Jaune blinked, ridding the dryness of his eyes, and swallowed before widening his eyes and answering. "Yeah, thanks. I'd love that."
Her shoulders rose at the blond boy's response. "Grand." Pyrrha's hands fell to the seat of her chair as she moved it closer with an eager pull of her lips. "So? Have you chosen a particular conflict you would like to write about yet?"
With a nervous chuckle, Jaune reached out to grab his pen and began to idly fiddle with it. "Not yet…" he admitted. "But, uh, there's something that caught my interest."
"And what might that be?"
Putting his arms onto the table, a feat made slightly harder due to the restraining nature of the Beacon uniform he wore, the boy brought the fingers that poked out of his fingerless gloves and moved it over a couple of specific sections of the paper. Pyrrha got a closer look and ran her own eyes over the text as Jaune spoke, "If you remember from a couple lectures ago, Doctor Oobleck mentioned a strange 'phenomenon' that occurred during the Great War – one that seemingly wiped out entire armies indiscriminately."
Nodding, Pyrrha withdrew her head from the paper and put a hand to her chin. "Yes, I do recall something like that being mentioned… didn't Doctor Oobleck say most people speculated the cause to be Grimm?"
"You see, that's where I have a few problems," Jaune turned in his seat so that he sat with his legs facing the girl while Pyrrha remained with her legs still under the table.
One elbow on the backrest of his chair and the other on the desk, he continued to explain, "If it were Grimm, then why was the battlefield absolutely barren with activity? No Grimm, no nothing. All that was there on that remote island were the bodies of the Mistrali and Valean armies. Nothing would stop the Grimm from roaming around there if they had taken over the conflict; the lingering negative emotion would have kept them around. Instead, it was like the air there was stale of any emotion at all."
It might have been possible that both armies were wiped out so quick, they weren't able to process it.
"Right, I see… I suppose that makes sense." Her green eyes were fixated on the wood of the table as her eyebrows were ever so slightly narrowed to signify her own concentration.
"And if it were Grimm, how was the King of Vale able to use this 'phenomenon' to his advantage during the final battle in Vacuo? He didn't just win," Jaune added. "He decimated. There were near zero casualties on the Valean and Vacuan side. That can't have been done with Grimm; they're the incarnation of chaos and destruction."
Pyrrha nodded solemnly. "That is correct," she agreed. Seconds passed and that agreement shifted to a question. "So then, why do you believe that the majority of works choose to paint such phenomena as being tied to the Grimm?"
His hand came to a point. It wasn't intrusive to Pyrrha's space at all, though Jaune raised a finger as if to better tune in his verbal point. "Because it's easy," he said. "The Grimm are an easy explanation. There's so much we don't know about them so the masses that learn about these things easily accept it as the reason. The unreasonable is answered with the unreasonable and all is well – people are happy and that drives away the Grimm."
"Interesting…"
"And the thing is," Jaune leapt towards the book once more and flicked back to other pages containing different conflicts. "There have been similar occurrences dotted through time – uh, here. And here."
As the boy whizzed through the pages, Pyrrha miraculously kept up with Jaune's sporadic movements with relative ease and an elegant hum escaped her throat. "It's not every battle, though," she observed - and Pyrrha would have been correct in her observation. "It almost seems random where you've spotted these occurrences to take place."
"That's what you would think. But, if you take a look at the participants in the conflicts…" Jaune put his face closer to the paper and ran his finger across the texts in an attempt to dig up the information he wanted to show. Similarly, Pyrrha put her own face almost cheek-to-cheek with Jaune's, though both seemed too deep in thought to care. The words appeared on the text and Jaune tapped it twice.
"Here. Vale. Mistral. Mantle, Vacuo. Kingdoms. It was always between Kingdoms."
Slowly but surely, the crimson-haired girl was piecing it together too. "Between kingdoms… you mean to say such phenomena were only ever present during inter-kingdom conflict and never when Grimm was involved?" Turning her head to face her friend, Pyrrha looked for confirmation.
Jaune was happy to provide, "Exactly."
The two teenagers suddenly noticed how close their faces were and jumped back into their seats awkwardly with a slight tint to both of their faces. Following a cough, Pyrrha pushed onward with the line of thought as she turned to Jaune with a finger raised.
"Though, whatever it is, it can't be solely malicious," explained Pyrrha. "It took the side of the King of Vale during the Great War when Mantle and Mistral sought to root out individuality."
"Yeah…" Jaune folded his arms and felt the backrest slide up his back as he slumped down. His blonde brows furrowed, placing his pen onto the table with a slight clatter before speaking hesitantly. "That's where I'm sort of stumped." Why exactly did this thing seemingly erase indiscriminately sometimes and then take sides at others? "Everything has a reason," was said under a breath. "So, what's your reason?"
A veil of silence covered the two students as they seemed to think.
"It's an unexplained phenomenon that only seems to occur when kingdoms fight each other or when they fight within themselves," Pyrrha finally spoke. She seemed to be speaking exactly what she was thinking at the time in order to properly collect her thoughts. Jaune listened in with intrigue. "In other words, when people fight. Mankind. Faunuskind." Nodding along, the boy was following. "At times it seems to not discriminate between who it targets, then later seems to take sides – though it almost appears to depend on the type and scale of conflict itself. Almost like it later comes to a decision. Almost like it was…"
The cloudy sea-blue of his eyes widened at the possible realisation that Pyrrha was coming to.
It was almost unnatural how the conclusion was made in complete synchrony. Both Jaune's and Pyrrha's voices chimed together with an answer. "A person."
Though, the latter seemed to have issues as she once more narrowed her eyes. "People, perhaps. Possibly an organization that has existed for countless generations that involve themselves in kingdom-related issues. They do whatever they choose to do in correspondence with the information they eventually come to learn about those same conflicts. Perhaps they possess a Semblance to ward off the Grimm from surrounding the areas they have done their business in to make the battlefields appear stale."
Pyrrha hummed, seeming to recall something. "I do believe Ren has a Semblance along those lines, so it's not all too impossible – wouldn't you say?" Her question was met with a resounding silence from the other party, and the girl had to raise her head and turn to her friend to make sure what she said wasn't stupid.
"Oh my god, that's amazing, Pyr!"
A blush rose to her as the crimson-haired girl reeled herself back with her mouth open and in a quiver. She shut it soon enough, but a high-pitched sound reverberated from behind her lips.
"That would make so much sense!" Jaune almost floated out of his seat, but not before he slammed both hands on the table in front of him and gestured wildly (and almost randomly) with his hands. "If they had lost any of their own people, it wouldn't be hard to clean up their own bodies – and with the element of surprise, they can take down as many armies as they wanted as long as they remained near-undetectable!"
The red on her cheeks was growing to match the shade of her hair, though Pyrrha fought through the embarrassment as she felt the eyes of students in the vicinity draw their eyes slowly to the sight of Jaune's external ranting. "Jaune!" The girl whispered fiercely. "Calm down! Everyone is looking at us…"
"But that would also mean that they held extreme power; taking down entire armies from both sides would be no easy feat and I-"
"Jaune…"
"-highly doubt that any old group of people would be able to take out masses of soldiers with similar numbers and remain undetected. It's possible they were maybe a primitive form of huntsmen, since huntsmen only came into fruition after the Great War itself. How exactly would they-
"Jaune."
"-have the firepower and training to take down entire armies by themselves? Could it be Semblance, maybe? Or, even a-"
"Jaune!" Pyrrha hissed, the sound finally reaching his ears.
Turning his head innocently to meet the desperate gaze of his red-haired friend who hand a crooked smile and pleading eyebrows despite her reddened cheeks. Slowly, Jaune creeped his head around him and saw that the students that were working peacefully now had their gazes locked onto him and were less than happy about it.
Insisting, Pyrrha urged him a little more, "Would you mind…?"
The cringe on his face was laughable, though he doubted that anyone who had just heard him yell about his own crazy little conspiracy was in any mood to laugh.
Well, saying that put a bad taste in his mouth. It wasn't just his crazy little conspiracy, at this point. There was someone else to thank for helping him put together the jigsaw pieces he managed to uncover.
"Thanks, Pyr. I mean it," he whispered to the girl next to him in a genuinely thankful manner. At his words, Pyrrha seemed to plume steam from atop the red of her head as the crimson that darted her face grew. "Hey, are you okay?"
What came out of her mouth was barely a whisper. "…you…" Pyrrha had her face inclined forward, attempting to hide the red colouration of her face that seemed to glow at this point.
"What was that?"
She shot her head up, lip quivering slightly as the elegant girl tried to keep her composure. "Pyr," Pyrrha repeated, barely audible despite the silence of the library. Unable to meet his slowly realising eyes, emerald directed themselves to other directions shyly. "You… you called me 'Pyr'. I-I've never had a nickname before, so…"
Oh gods. Oh, gods, what has he done.
"Oh."
What then emanated from Jaune's throat was a sound not too dissimilar to a screeching frog croak while his face remained neutral. A light pink crept up to his own features as he felt his collar get extremely warm all of a sudden – warm to the point of itching. Waving his in front of him, he attempted to resolve the situation saying, "If you're uncomfortable with it, I'm totally cool with just calling you Pyrrha. It's just, you know, you've been a real help and I feel like we really bonded over this so it just kinda slipped out. I'm so sorry-"
"It's… fine."
Putting her friend's concerns to rest, Pyrrha's emerald eyes steadily came to meet Jaune's deep sapphire, albeit after hesitation. The blush on her cheeks was dying down as she came to smile reassuringly. "Like I said, I've never been given a nickname before. A proper one, I mean." A proper one? What does that mean? He couldn't get his answer before Pyrrha's reserved yet refined gaze called for his own again. "If you're fine with it, I don't mind if you want to call me P-" Stumbling adorably on her words, she completed what she was going to say. "Pyr."
Jaune breathed in. And then out. "…Alright. 'Pyr' it is."
The two sort of stared at each other for a moment before the intensity forced them to laugh, dissipating the feeling almost instantly.
Jaune was a boy who had experienced things that no seventeen-year-old should have ever experienced. In the past year of his life, there have been events of indescribable anguish and loss that surpass that of even some graduated huntsmen. Death has bloomed in his wake and blood waters the gardens of his trail, though on this very same path – flowers bloom somewhere along the line. Red roses, dark violets, white tulips, fiery daffodils; friendships blossom from these buds but even as they do, they will never truly erase the despair that has clouded one's past and looms over their future.
But, as people, we continue to enjoy them for what they are.
And that remained true for Jaune.
"So this is where you've been, huh?" As if on cue, another voice rang between the two.
Both emerald and sapphire turned to see a certain tall blonde girl waltzing through the library with her arms behind her head. Once all eyes were on here, Yang held up a peace sign with one of her hands. "Sup," she said. The long-haired girl approached the duo and cocked a hip out, standing in front of them as they stared at the new arrival with anticipation.
"Yang," Pyrrha greeted her partner with a smile. Tilting her head, she rose an eyebrow before asking, "What are you doing here?"
"Oh, I dunno," Looking off into the distance, Yang's tone leaked a passive-aggressive scent. "Maybe looking for my partner who ditched our training session and left me hanging for, like, half an hour while she was chit-chatting with my sister's teammate." Lilac eyes came back to the two of them as she shrugged. "Something like that; like I said, I don't really know."
The hands on the clock obviously shocked the blonde's partner as she gasped lightly and looked back to Yang, bowing her head slightly as she apologised. "I didn't know it was already time for that - I apologise for keeping you waiting, Yang." Raising her head, the tiara-wearing girl pleaded, "Is there any way I can make it up to you?"
With a nonchalant wave of her hand over her face, Yang dismissed Pyrrha's apologetic attitude with a grin. "Nah. As luck would have it, the gym's still free. If you really wanna make it up to me, let's go a couple rounds, whaddya say?"
Pyrrha's voice deepened and rose like a mother would do when questioning their child. "Yang…" she inquired slowly. "Did you scare the other first years out of the gym again?"
Yang made to answer, opening her mouth only for it to freeze as she remained silent and her lilac eyes drifted into the distance – wide as plates. "…No."
Yeah, that sounds like a Yang kind of thing to do. Jaune jumped as the girl in question rotated her head to face him. Desperate to change the flow of conversation, Yang pointed a thumb in the general direction out of the library past all the tables and bookshelves that they were surrounded by. "So… Jaune. If you wanna tag along, I'm down. Nora and Ren will catch up with us too, those two are just doing… well, whatever Ren and Nora usually do."
Probably something related to Nora attempting something extremely dangerous and stupid while Ren tries his hardest to keep her alive.
Thinking about it, Jaune slowly began to weigh his options. His first week at Beacon was coming to an end and their weekday classes were over and done with.
It was a Saturday and Ruby was dragged by the hood of her cloak by Weiss to complete the former's assignments since they all knew that she wasn't going to do them. With a frustrated cry to the gods, Weiss raised her hands to the skies but soon brought them back down to grab the hem of her partner's red cloak.
So, hanging out with Ruby was out of the equation.
Blake was… somewhere. Things between them got better as the week went on, but Jaune still couldn't shake the feeling in the back of his head that he was missing something important concerning his own relationship with her. And it's not like the two partners ever really spent a lot of time with each other outside of practical exercises in the first place.
Therefore, the two options that were presented to him was either to stay in this dusty old library and complete his essay for Doctor Oobleck or go with Pyrrha and Yang to stretch his legs for a bit. The choice wasn't exactly the hardest one to make.
And as he looked to Pyrrha and saw her lightly shrug as if to say that she didn't mind herself, Jaune looked back to Yang with a shrug of his own. "Eh, sure, why not?"
/-/
It wasn't exactly a secret that Yang and Pyrrha were some of the strongest students in the year.
Hell, they might have even been able to take on some of the students in the senior years, too. The thought was brought up as Jaune watched from the side-lines, eyes examining the movements and interactions of the partners as they put hand to Aura on the large canvas of the gym.
The girl-girl partnership within Team PYRN were similar in the results delivered, though seemed to differ on the presentation.
With her own two fists, Yang tore through any and all obstacles set before her with a grin on her face and a roar of her explosive gauntlets. Pyrrha did much the same, though without the volatile tang – rather overcoming her challenges effortlessly and elegantly, keeping an air of grace despite her overwhelming skill to give her opponents a sense that she was nigh-untouchable.
Though, Jaune supposed you wouldn't really be able to say that when you were watching said girl slowly get tossed to the mat with a resounding thud that echoed around the empty hall.
"Wow," he mumbled to himself. Can't exactly say I expected that.
Jaune had changed into his combat gear; his uniform was replaced with his signature black Pumpkin Pete's hoodie, reinforced with his leather torso padding and metal bracers. Lacking his usual belts of equipment – meaning his gun and grappling hook remained within his rocket locker – Crocea Mors stood resting on the white bench he sat on.
But what he was currently in awe of was how Pyrrha was now flat on her back, arm twisted by Yang who was still standing after the blonde threw her partner in what looked to be quite the complicated procedure. Jaune wouldn't have been able to describe it even if there was a gun to his temple.
Pyrrha shook her head as her arm was let go, putting a gloved hand to her face to quell the pain. When she opened her eyes, their emerald hue was met with the palm of Yang. Taking the hand, she was hefted up and she sighed a thank you while she regained her balance from the power of her partner's pull.
"Don't beat yourself up about it, Pyrrha," Yang said with a smirk. Walking over to the side of the ring, she leaned on the roles that surrounded the mat and took a load off somewhat cockily. "What does that make it, then? Three to one?"
"I believe so," answered the crimson-haired girl. The two were clad in their own combat attires and Pyrrha made her way over to where Yang was with her hands sophisticatedly drawn and overlapping one another at her front. "It was a best of five, so it would appear that you win."
Closing her eyes in a pleased manner, Yang rose her head. "That I did."
"Though, I have to say, if it weren't for that fact that we were training our hand-to-hand – the results perhaps might have been… slightly different."
"Yeah, well," Yang pushed herself off the ropes with a 'hup' as she began to stride across to the side that Jaune was sitting on while replying. "Hand-to-hand is what we agreed on today and I totally won so that's a point for me." Behind her, Jaune could see Pyrrha rolling her eyes but quickly refocussed onto Yang who leaned over the ropes. "What about you, Jaune? Wanna have a shot? No worries, I won't mess you up too badly; Ruby wouldn't let me hear the end of it."
Laughing off her challenge, the boy came to a stand while shaking her head. Jaune felt her lilac gaze stick on his form while he ducked under the set of ropes. "We'll see," he said as he stood in one of the ring's corner's and started to stretch out his arms and torso.
Here for a reason, Jaune was hardly about to turn down an offer like that. Even if it was more of a dare than anything else.
He felt the knots come loose in his shoulder and sighed at the sensation before moving onto his opposite one. Though, Jaune stopped when he felt a hand lightly touch his shoulder to grab his attention.
There Pyrrha was, stood to his side. Drawing her hand back, she seemed to rise on the balls of her feet as she reminded him, "You shouldn't forget about your legs, Jaune."
"Yeah," Jaune said. "I was going to get to that."
Leg cramps really sucked. Whenever Jaune hadn't properly stretched before a long hike throughout the swamps and forests of Mistral, he'd suffer a painful tug within his muscles halfway through and really mess up the pace of wherever he and Vul were headed. If that wasn't enough to remind him to stretch, then the intense pain and sensation of something spasming and squirming under your skin most definitely was. Leg cramps hurt like a bitch.
"Alright, then," Pyrrha smiled as she walked behind Jaune and pushed him gently to sit on the ground. "Let me help you."
With no resistance, Jaune complied physically but he was still sort of confused as he verbally hesitated, "Uh, I – arrrgh!" Jaune's face twisted – teeth grit and eyes asymmetrically wide as Pyrrha pushed onto his back with his legs spread in front of him.
His hamstrings! Gods, the hamstrings! Pain – much and many pain!
And why was Pyrrha pushing so hard?! His face was basically touching the canvas of the ring at this point, back parallel to the ground as his midsection now occupied the space between his stretched legs. "Gods!" Jaune yelled in unadulterated agony. "Oh, gods, it hurts! Why have you forsaken me, Pyrrha?!"
The expression on her face was criminally tranquil as she seemed to put more force onto Jaune's leather-padded back. Ignoring the screams of the dammed from on front of her, Pyrrha instead smiled serenely – informing with that jovial waver that was almost synonymous with her personality, "If it hurts, then we're doing it correctly!"
Jaune's panicked breathing quickened as the girl behind him added pressure.
Groaning, Jaune cried, "Uncle! Uncle, I give – I give!" while slamming his hands onto the mat. What followed was another groan, though one of massive reprieve as Pyrrha laid off him and allowed his back to come back up. Panting, he stared at the girl who had just tortured him as she retreated back to the side-lines by ducking under the rope. "Why?" he squeaked quietly.
"You'll thank me later!" Pyrrha took a seat on the bench he was watching from earlier, next to Crocea Mors.
With a violent sigh, the blond stumbled to his feet only to see Yang leaning casually in the opposite corner.
"You done?" The other blonde pushed herself off the corner ropes and run a thumb under her nose before lowering herself slightly and clenching her hands into fists as they came to cover her smirk. One foot in front of the other, it seemed that the fiery girl was raring to go. "I don't know if you're into that sort of thing, Jaune, it'll be super weird if you start acting up during the spar – okay?"
Jaune rolled his shoulders lightly, followed by his legs (mostly to get rid of the lingering pain of the Pyrrha-enhanced stretch) and took a more open and loose stance in contrast to Yang's well-trained and compact form. If Yang and Pyrrha's session earlier was anything to go by, then the loss would be determined by a convincing and complete knock down to the mat. That meant face or back on the canvas, not if they came to a knee or anything similar.
In any case, he still grimaced at her implications before finally lowering himself. "I'll try not to."
"Oh, and while you're at it, try not to end this one in an explosion."
"Like I said, I'll try my best."
"You sure as hell will have to."
Man… In this own internal palace, Jaune could only roll his eyes. Yang sure had a mouth on her. It sort of reminded him of Vul in a way. Taking the verbal resemblance into account, it also didn't help that if squinted his eyes, he got a very different image of the girl opposite to him. The very thought gave him shivers.
Slowly, the two combatants inched closer to one another. Some might of said he was out of his depths here; he was without Crocea Mors, without his gadgets and other such gizmos.
However, what he still had was his head.
Predicting Yang's movements would have been impossible due to the extreme lack of experience he had against her so Jaune would have to rely on his own instincts to help him react in time to her explosive attacks. And react Jaune had to as Yang suddenly took off, the canvas shaking at the force of her hopping forward into action.
Yang's fists were tight around her face and her arms were tight around torso. A kind of boxer's stance, Jaune knew, that emphasised getting in close and slipping through punches. Keeping on the defensive, Ruby's older sister decided to flash forward and weave around despite the lack of attacks on his end in order to throw Jaune off on her movement.
"Tsk-!" was the sound as Jaune clicked his teeth in a mixture of frustration and surprise.
It worked, to an extent, as her jabs flickered like lightning that seemed to curve. The moment of impact seemed like only fractions of a second on his guard – though it was enough for his hands to buck back due to the power behind them.
Forced to move, Jaune chose to instead dip around rather than strictly backward due to being in a ring. Narrowly ducking under a jab, Yang's fist brushed against his dirty blonde locks and the next one made a gust of wind that was felt by the back of his neck as he barely evaded another punch.
But the high of scraping away from the jaws of Death (or, in this case, from getting a socked in the schnoz) Jaune could only widen his dark gaze as he saw Yang's gloved knuckles closing in onto his face past his guard while he was still in the action of ducking around the second jab.
It was a one-two uppercut made with zero hesitation between segments within the sequence, like the other was fully expecting him to dodge both preceding attacks in the way that he did. Really, it was a wonder why Jaune hadn't expected this – Yang was appeared almost prodigal when it came to hand-to-hand, even against someone like Pyrrha.
Time seemed to slow down as the impact was made, though quickly hastened once more as the hit connected cleanly. There was nothing Jaune could do as the boy took a twisting uppercut straight to the face, the punch rocketing straight past his guard and knocking his head up to the sky while one of his eyes was scrunched closed in pain – ruining his visual.
His boots stumbled backward and Jaune threw out a straight right to where he thought Yang to be in relation to where she was before.
He was right on the money. Unfortunately, Yang didn't make easy as she rolled around the linear punch with a gale of air, tucking Jaune's extended arm over her shoulder while her head approached his right. However, that was the least of his worries as her own right arm detonated forward and over his arm, which still stuck between her right shoulder and neck. Unable to move his right arm at all, Jaune opened his left fist and tore it to the side of his face where Yang's punch was undoubtedly aiming for.
With a clap of leather, his lively sparring partner's fist was caught within his larger palm and the two opposing hands struggled against each other and Yang's toothy smile was quite obvious, especially due to the close proximity of their faces.
"Not too shabby!" She complimented. There was an undertone of strain as she had yet to let up the strength behind their power struggle. "You're better than you look, Jaune!"
Frankly speaking, he took the words to heart. Vul had taught him fragments of a couple essential martial arts and fighting styles to cover his hand-to-hand training and the fact that he was even lasting a minute under Yang's assault was pretty much a miracle in itself.
And while she said she would hold back, it sure as hell didn't feel like it. The uppercut had flashed his Aura upon impact and Jaune had an inner feeling that it took quite a considerable chunk out of him despite the fact it was a single punch.
Their fight so far had been pretty clean and the first blood had been drawn by Yang. Unfortunately for her, Jaune hadn't exactly been trained to be the cleanest of fighters.
Without even a word of response, Jaune instead threw his forehead forward – taking advantage of the closeness of their faces to deliver a head-butt straight onto Yang's forehead. It seemed that the other was expecting a witty comeback of some kind, in turn with hers, though Jaune hoped by failing to meet her expectations he could scrape some kind of advantage in this painstakingly one-sided spar.
Golden-white and bright yellow flickered as Yang's head flew back. Jaune felt the power behind the fist in his hand lessen and the pressure that was being applied by her neck to his arm loosen.
It appeared as though Jaune was finally back in control of his arms.
Tearing his right arm away from the crook of her neck, the boy twisted on the sole of his feet and drove a right elbow into Yang's midsection and it up with left hook that came with a significant windup. It had only landed because wind was knocked out of Yang, stunning her for long enough and allowing Jaune's hook to connect.
Anything but clean, Jaune at least knew that he was doing damage as the bright yellow flash around Yang's person crackled and flared on impact.
His next punch was seemingly dodged out of pure instinct and Yang's expression turned fierce; her fanged smirk now a grimace that blazed with intensity and heat. There was a determination under the light surface of her lilac eyes and if even if Jaune wasn't able to see it – he sure as hell was able to feel at as he felt the heavy impact of Yang's leg on the brunt of his metal-covered forearms.
Kicks? Was she bringing in kicks now?
You wouldn't exactly take her for the type but when those legs of hers built enough momentum, Jaune swore it could take the head off a Grimm. Kicks were naturally stronger than punches – though it seemed that Yang's natural strength made that difference almost exponential.
The same leg that blasted against his dual-armed block was brought around into a roundhouse that Jaune was forced to feel the full effect of as he narrowly managed to avoid his own head being knocked off his shoulders with a single-armed block to his left that forced him flex his bicep and tuck his cheek in to soften the blow.
As Yang's leather-booted leg rebounded, Jaune's right blurred forward only for it to be batted to the side by twirling Yang – who continued to spin back around in the direction of her rebound to make her movement more fluid. Her fist came forward, catching the white of his own Aura on his cheek as it blurred past.
Jaune moved in, closing the distance to deliver an uppercut of his own. It was swiftly caught by Yang as she overlapped her hands at her midsection, stopping the attack before it even the proper amount of time to build up power. Not letting the failure faze him, the boy drew back his hand and dropped to the canvas floor. Palms on the mat, Jaune's leg came around in a full sweep that managed to catch the girl's footing thanks to the fact that it was his first low-attack of the spar.
Yang fell forward, appearing helpless, though she instead managed to twist herself to the side and roll along Jaune's back in an impressive display of bodily control. He felt the weight shift and transfer from the top of his neck to the middle of his spine before his opponent fell into a crouch and instantly threw a punch a millisecond after landing. He did the same.
Striking each other at the exact same time, it seemed that Jaune had pre-emptively turned himself around in order catch Yang with a back-handed fist while she recovered and rose to her feet. He managed to accomplish part of that goal and the two combatants simultaneously recoiled and took steps back as Aura flickered and flashed in response to each other's attacks.
And then, before either of them knew it, they were already throwing themselves back at each other.
Yang's swift combinations flowed like twisting rapids – some of which Jaune had to sway back completely in order to get out of Yang's immediate range, though he tried to keep in her face for as long as possible while feeling her legs and fists tap explosively on his wrists.
In attempts to mess up the girl's rhythm, Jaune threw out straights that were met with only air; Yang slipped in, around and between his attacks – not letting him get any more solid hits in. With one such punch thrown out, all Jaune could see was a mess of ruffled yellow hair as his opponent dipped diagonally down – straight into his blind-spot.
Oh fuck. Jaune cursed as, from the corner of his eye, he saw the confident smirk return to Yang's face. Her leg coursed with raw power and straightened from its bent position – the limb spring-loaded with building-busting strength – before Jaune felt something absolutely destroy the guard he had torn up haphazardly after realising what was coming.
A gazelle hook blew up in Jaune's face, blowing apart his guard and sending his arms flapping away worthlessly in the wind that came up to follow half a second after her attack. The blue of his eyes struck from left to right as Yang dipped down and under once more.
And then came the hurt.
Left hook, right cheek; right hook, left cheek – over and over again. Every punch was met with the flash of golden-white Aura as Jaune could barely keep his eyes open to be aware of where Yang was. At least he knew she wasn't going to be stepping back any time soon as his head shot left and right in response to Yang's fists. In fact, he was forced to take steps back but Yang kept the actual distance between them as her hooks kept exploding onto Jaune's face.
The stumbling ceased as the black leather of his boots planted themselves onto the canvas, struggling to stay still as the blond was still skidding backwards thanks to the force. Jaune tightened his upper body, curling it in on itself while bringing his arms forearm-to-forearm over his face and tucking his head in.
Of course, it did nothing to stop the curved hooks that continued to slam into the side of his head. The power behind the punches never lessened and Jaune was still set to weather a storm.
But weather it he would.
Yes, Vul taught him that dodging was paramount to living itself, but that was only to make his survivability out in the field even more insane. In truth, his Aura reserves were unnaturally large and the blunt force from Yang's hooks were almost completely drowned out by the spark of his Aura on impact.
If it was anyone else, their reserves would have already run dry and they would be sent hurtling back with a finishing touch by the blonde brawler before him – but Jaune stood strong as he felt the intervals between punches get more rhythmic.
One, two. One, two. Left, right. Left, right. Left-
Right!
Pulling apart his guard, Jaune leaned back and watched Yang's destructive right hook whizz past. While there was a pained grimace on his face, Yang's lilac orbs were wide with surprise as she opened her mouth. "What-?"
Undoubtedly, Yang grew complacent with the rhythm she built. Without Jaune to combat it in any way, her pattern became more regular. Comfortable.
Thereby, predictable.
Jaune shot forward once again, grabbing Yang's over-extended right wrist to keep her in place as he pulled back his left. Like a shotgun, his left arm bucked forward and back and the tension in his shoulder acted as confirmation that the punch had connected into the girl's exposed right side. True enough to his prediction, Yang took a few steps back – clutching her right ribs with her right hand tightly while visibly tensing.
Right, this – right that; there was a lot of right going around. Why would that be? There was a specific organ on a person's right that was only partially covered by the bones of their ribs.
The liver.
There was a reason that it was known as a vital area in combat sport. A blow to the liver was immensely painful, even with Aura, and Jaune had never met anyone who could ever stand after taking a direct shot to theirs. Not even Vul, whose liver was barely functioning to begin with.
Jaune knew from experience that taking a low-hook to the liver was so incredibly painful that he would be rolling around like a baby for the next couple of minutes just to stay alive.
So imagine his surprise as Yang stopped stepping back and remained to stand, still clutching her side stiffly with her head down.
What the hell was this girl?
"Hey, Yang," he said – parting his raised fists slightly to speak through them. "You good?" Surprisingly, Jaune found himself to be sincerely concerned for Yang's health as she seemed to tremble on the spot.
Sure, they didn't have the best start – what with the wanting to probably murder him part – but they managed to put that behind them for the future friendship that they would undoubtedly share as quite literal sister teams. Speaking of sisters, Ruby was a really good friend and his team leader so if Yang got badly hurt because of him – there would be a small segment of his conscious that would feel guilty about him.
Though, thankfully, that it seemed that wouldn't be the case. However, seconds would pass and Jaune slowly grew less thankful, as he slowly began to realise the real reason behind Yang's noticeable tremble.
She wasn't trembling due to pain. Yang was trembling with rage.
There was a blur of yellow and the girl had closed the distance between them in less than a second. The entirety of her arm was drawn back as the blonde was suspended in mid-air from the single leap that brought her from her original position to in front of Jaune.
But he couldn't bring himself to focus on that as the boy's deep-sea eyes widened, staring into the glowing crimson pit that formed and swirled around the once lilac orbs of Yang's own eyes.
"Rrraaagh!" A scream filled with anger suddenly came to his ears.
It echoed off the walls of the empty gym – the sound of fury incarnate, while the figure itself took the form of a five foot eight girl with flaming red eyes. The yellow of Yang's hair suddenly erupted into a burning gold that blinded him and her fist blazed, aiming to hit anything that was even vaguely related to Jaune.
The thought of using his own Semblance didn't even cross his mind as the punch connected – looking as though it was alight with flame - and Jaune tumbled back in a mess. His body flew over the ropes of the ring, twisting and turning uselessly before he crashed into the heavy metal weights that decorated a distant rack.
A cloud of dust seemed to kick up from the impact and Jaune groaned at the feeling of several kilograms of steel taking refuge on his chest and gut. They clattered to the side as he struggled to pull himself up.
"Jaune!" Pyrrha stood up abruptly from the bench on the other side of the gym and jogged on over to check on him.
Behind her, Yang's scowl dissipated and the red of her eyes faded back into their regular lilac hue as she went along with her partner to check on the person she might as well have punched a hole into. "Ah, crap-baskets…"
Seeing them get closer, Jaune propped his arms up behind him but used one of them to dig out his scroll from the depths of his trouser pockets. The device made a few noises before the screen projected itself with his Aura level. He felt his eyes widen slightly at what was displayed. Only a third of his Aura was left, though he didn't much time to linger on the thought as both red and yellow came to his aid.
A gloved hand was offered to him and Jaune took it gratefully. Yang brought that same hand to the back of her head when he was pulled up while she spoke apologetically. "Sorry about that," she said. "Force of habit… sorta. Are you alright? You don't look too bad."
"Yep… I'm good." Brushing the dust off his trouser legs and arms, his voice sounded slightly strained on account of being punched across the entirety of the gym. "As good as ever."
"Okay, that's great and all – really happy about that," Yang said before bringing her hands forward into finger guns and mimicked shooting them as she added with a half-squint, "But I totally won, right?"
"Yang…" Turning to her partner, Pyrrha's emerald eyes looked to Yang in a very motherly fashion – though it appeared the blonde didn't mind too much as she kept shooting from the hip with those finger guns of hers.
Jaune shrugged, closing his eyes and tilting his head in agreement. "I guess so, Yang. But, at the same time, I guess that I wasn't the one who ended it in an explosion this time."
The blonde seemed to cease fire, processing what was just said, before resigning with a hand to her head and an amused smile to her person. "Yeah," she laughed. "Guess you're right."
A yowl screeched across the empty walls of the gym, creating some sort of feedback loop that got louder and higher-pitched with every passing second. The pure eldritch nature of its sound was enough to turn the heads of the three people who currently resided within the gym. Instead of a new species of Grimm, they were instead met with a familiar face and even more so familiar shade of hair.
"That. Was. Awesome!"
Nora's explosive yell came from the double doors that acted as the entrance to the gym. She rose her hands in an explosive cheer while bending her knees, an action that looked quite comical considering the distance between her and the gathered group. Soon enough, she vanished from the doors and reappeared next to the trio of students.
A second figure caught up to where she was before, confused as to where the orange-haired girl had disappeared to before giving up and leaning on the doorframe in an exhausted heap.
She seemed to zip around like an orange and white striped bumblebee, saying, "I saw you guys fighting from the second floor windows and remembered that we were having a training session, so I grabbed Ren – the forgetful guy that he is-" A very apparent groan from the other side of the gym seemed to want to contest that. "-and came all the way here!"
"Why did everyone forget? I'm pretty sure I left a notice in the room…" Yang whispered to herself, lilac eyes squinting in thought.
Pyrrha could only shrug apologetically.
"Then, when I open the door, I see Yang go-" If Jaune had to guess, Nora was making a sound that was supposed to emulate some sort of grandiose explosion but it ended up sounding like an amalgamation of whistling and violent squelching with a 'boom' thrown into the mix somewhere. "-right into Jaune and before sending him flying! What, even was that?! Your Semblance?"
"Yup." Yang casually flexed an arm with roguish smile. "A pretty handy one, I say."
Yeah, Jaune would agree. 'Handy' was one way to describe it. He still couldn't really feel the joints in his shoulders or the entirety of his back after taking that punch straight to the… everywhere.
Everywhere hurt, so he supposed that Yang got him in the everywhere.
While Nora conversed sporadically with the other two members of her team, Jaune re-adjusted the metal bracers on his arms – tightening the straps under his arms to fix them from his crash landing straight into the zone of shelved dumbbells. From the corner of his vision, as the girl in question was laughing along with her orange-haired teammate, he swore that her lilac eyes flashed red yet again. He shook his head again, eager to get the resemblance out of his head.
Quite the resemble- Semblance – indeed.
It seemed like a situational power-up type with a few flashy (and very painful) additions. While he could speculate all day, Jaune instead chose to lower his arms as he finished his armour's readjustment. The blond started to walk around and past the three teammates, heading towards the exit on the other side of the room.
Pyrrha was seemingly the only one who noticed as she turned around when the boy passed her. "Where are you going, Jaune?" After she spoke, it seemed that the other two girls halted their conversation and poked their heads in the same direction.
Turning on a heel, the blond continued to walk backwards – swiping Crocea Mors who was still resting peacefully on the ringside bench as he moved. "I don't think I'll be able to go another round after Yang put me through the ringer," he waved from a distance. "I was thinking of grabbing something from the cafeteria and getting on with Oobleck's assignment."
"Oh, okay!" Team PYRN's leader gave a small wave in response. Even if Jaune didn't audibly pick up on it, she sounded somewhat disappointed as she gave her own farewell. "I suppose that we'll see you later!"
Yang cupper her fingerless-gloved hand to her mouth and shouted to add, "And if you're still mad that I kicked your butt, I'm here for the next four years; feel free to make an appointment whenever!"
There was a roll of his eyes and a double hand waved as the boy came to the double doors and patted the back of the doubled over figure of Ren solemnly. "Go get 'em, tiger," he whispered playfully.
Jaune would have liked to say that Ren laughed at his encouragement but that would have been a lie. Ren did shake his head though, still facing the floor while panting – a ghost of a smile pulling his lips. The raven-haired boy eventually came to rise his head and nodded respectfully to his only male friend, the two parted ways as Jaune disappeared with echoing steps down the hallways of Beacon.
/-/
"Are you sure this is going to work? We don't even know where he is."
"You worry too much, Vel. Loosen up."
"…"
"…"
"Also, do you think really think that stealing Yatsu's wallet to buy these hidden earpieces was a good idea?"
Coco Adel pressed a finger to her ear with a roll of the wrist and replied with an exaggerated slow rise of the eyebrows. "Yeah. It's not like Yats will get mad at us or anything – he's Yats, bun-bun." She leaned casually on a wall near the Academy's indoor courtyard, covered by shadows and surrounded by waist-high, well-maintained shrubbery. It meant nobody could see her amazing outfit but that was sort of the point anyway.
While Beacon had the main outdoor courtyard, there did exist small instances of green space within the walls themselves.
With no roof over the garden, it was a neatly trimmed area with obvious stone pathways and benches that decorated the sides. Sunlight beamed from above and there was a strange abundance of small wildlife in the form of birds and the rare squirrel or two despite the 'indoor' aspect of it all. The courtyard was surrounded by open archways that acted as conjunctions to the campus' main corridors, allowing for easy access both in and around.
It gave stressed students the ability to get a breath of fresh air once in a while without having to actually leave campus at all.
Though if you were like Coco and preferred a little bit of the cityscape, you'd still need to take a Bullhead to Vale every once in a while to walk the busy market streets of the capital.
From beneath her shades, Coco widened her eyes and returned a hand to her ear as her teammate spoke up again. "I don't know, Coco… why would Jaune be suspicious of me in the first place?" The rabbit faunus from beyond the earpiece stumbled on her words and just ended up sighing. "I mean - it just doesn't make sense."
"Do you really want me to explain all of this again, Vel?"
"…"
In the silence, Velvet made an attempt to speak but ended up just squeaking a little on the other side of the earpiece. Coco looked over to the girl who was sitting on the bench to see her hunched over and looking down onto the floor with a complicated expression.
What I do for you, Vel…
Bringing her hand down from the bridge of her nose, the beret-wearing brunette brushed away a stray bang that fell down onto her face and folded her arms back to how they were before and leaned back on the wall she was waiting on. "Professor Ozpin says this Jaune kid is probably a pretty big sceptic and a logical one at that."
"Okay…"
"Now, assuming he isn't the social type, you're basically the only faunus he's ever really seen 'round the grounds," Coco continued. "Combine that with the fact that you've been… uh, 'victimized' by that Winchester brat in the year below, you're probably one of the highest people on his current list of 'could be' White Fang members. Because, you know – you were so absolutely traumatized by getting bullied that you'd resort to joining the White Fang to get revenge, or change the social structure, or whatever."
She said that, but the Cardin kid hadn't been taking the bait recently. It was both a relief and a worry at the same time, since it meant that the only chance they had to get Jaune's attention was that singular instance earlier in the week.
Radio silence proceeded the next couple of seconds. "…It still sounds like a stretch. Also, I wouldn't do that at all! That sounds horrible."
Well, he doesn't know that, does he?
"I'm trying here, Vel, I really am." With a sigh, Coco turned her head left and right to look for that Jaune kid. It shouldn't have been too hard; a tall, blonde, decently built guy with a nice choice in accessories should have been a piece of cake to find. Nope, not here. Not yet, anyway. "Plus," she added idly. "We're sort of acting on the assumption that he's looking for one anyway. That makes this entire thing ten times easier."
"I suppose you're right," the rabbit faunus resigned.
And if there was any day for someone to investigate, it would be the weekends when classes were over and done with and the majority of the students had free time on their hands.
The dark sunglasses on her face dropped as Coco's auburn eyes spotted an unruly set of blonde hair approaching from the distance. "Speak of the devil," she whispered. Pulling her hand to her ear, the older girl pushed up her shades with the other with a soft tone. "Target's here, bun-bun. Eyes on the prize."
At her command, Velvet took the scroll in her hand and conspicuously began to type away at it.
Velvet had the ability to play the part of the naïve maiden that could have easily been taken advantage of by a malicious organization like the White Fang. While her actual personality was anything but, she certainly seemed like the type to an outside eye – and this Arc kid sure as hell fit the bill as an 'outside eye'.
It was a distance away, though Jaune's expression was quite the casual one. It was hard to tell due fact the blond was in the shade – much like herself – but he didn't even seem like he aware of what was going on around him; his face as peaceful as a kid going through the daily motions of life.
She wouldn't buy it.
Coco's hand hadn't left her ear as she pressed onto the earpiece again. "Alright, Vel – phase two."
Once again, following her team leader's cues, the rabbit faunus got up and started snapping photos of the courtyard with her scroll in a very non-descript way. Nothing more than a second-year student admiring the scenery. Take a couple of pics to filter and upload to your C-Nerey account like any old highschool girl.
But it appeared as though little old Jaune here thought there was more to it as he hinted at his first sign of interest, flashing his eyes down from the open roof to watch Velvet for a split-second before slowly drifting elsewhere. Oh, yeah… you like that Jaune? Got your interest now, haven't we? If Coco had to hazard a guess, he was probably thinking that those pictures were going to be used for some nefarious purpose like possible bombsites or for analysing the structural integrity of Beacon.
Really, Velvet just liked to take photos sometimes. Even if most of her photos containing people weren't always focused on… well, the people.
"You got talent, Vel," Coco spoke into her earpiece. "Let's move onto phase three and see if our friend here picks up your trail."
Velvet's faunus ears perked up and down before she smiled happily, probably genuinely satisfied with how some of her photos came out. Before long, she was already on the courtyard's pathway and headed into the open archways that connected the area to the main corridors. The girl disappeared, tapping away at her scroll as she left, and Jaune was swift to follow when she was out of sight.
All according to plan.
"First left, bun-bun. He's pretty far from you; let's see if he can keep up."
As the blond boy moved on the path, Coco followed from the shadows of the wall. Jaune passed the archway that Velvet had, the boy now out of sight and Coco picked up the pace under the thought of losing visual on him.
Going through the exact same archway, she was greeted with a straightaway containing multiple turns to both the right and left dotted along the long corridor. As she put it: 'First left, bun-bun', so that was where she had to go… but as the brunette scanned the corridor from behind the material of her dark shades – Jaune was nowhere to be seen.
Quietly, Coco bit her tongue and pressed onto her earpiece as her pace quickened, getting closer to the left she had told Velvet to take earlier. "Lost eyes, Vel. I'm going to get closer; I might have – ah!"
Taking a sharp turn, the girl was met with the feeling of cold leather on her face as she crashed into something that was decidedly sturdy and firm. The impact knocked off her shades, the pair landing with a clatter on the corridor floor, while her bottom was put to a similar fate. Coco had her eyes scrunched closed and a hand to her head, though saw a large inviting hand when she reopened them.
"Coco?" Jaune asked, bending down to help the girl he had knocked to the floor unknowingly. It wasn't the question he was supposed to be asking, though the boy fixed it quickly enough. "Sorry, are you okay?"
Coco took it and felt herself get hauled back to her feet. "Yeah, I'm fine," she replied. While the fashionista examined herself, pulling out the folds and wrinkles of her outfit, the older girl nodded her head in appreciation as the blond held out her shades that had fallen off her face. Sliding them back around her ears and pushing the glasses up her nose with ease, Coco was back to her usual look. "Thanks. Say, you wouldn't have happened to see Velvet around here, would you… uh…"
"Jau-"
"Jaune?" She completed for both of them.
Leaning forward by the hip, Coco had a hand to her chin as if he really did struggle with remembering the boy. When you had as much charisma as her, acting sort of became a cinch.
Fake it 'till you make it was good advice, kids – especially when your name was Coco Adel.
"Yeah," he answered. "I saw her back that way, just go right and you'll find her. You could probably catch up to her now."
It was a good answer. Good delivery, too. Very natural. Coco would have believed him if she didn't just watch the boy stalk her friend down this corridor in the first place. In the end, the brunette decided to give him a friendly ass-slap as she walked by – calling over shoulder with a dismissive wave. "Cheers, kid. See you around."
Jaune jumped when contact was made and could only turn around slowly while rubbing his backside idly; the expression on his face coated in bewilderment as if to ask: 'Does she do that with everyone?'.
The answer was yes, honey. Coco hoped the poor kid didn't get his hopes up because under those eye-concealing shades of hers, the girl was hiding a bead of sweat at how close of a save that was.
Seriously, the things she did sometimes…
/-/
What a concerningly narrow save.
What was he supposed to say? The excuse of 'stalking your teammate because I think she's part of the White Fang since she's a faunus' only went so far. Jaune supposed that he and Vul had done much more with much less, though. Like that one time they went followed that faunus into a bar, then actually finding out he was a red-mask. Yeah, actually, he'd rather not remember that. He only thanked the gods that he noticed someone was tailing him after taking that turn.
After barely scraping it out of the barrel, a change of pace was needed for the blond.
So far, Jaune's day consisted of getting beaten to a pulp by Ruby's older sister, becoming a borderline conspirator with Pyrrha and almost getting caught stalking an upperclassman. With that all said, maybe a change of pace was the least he could do for himself.
Walking into the cafeteria, Jaune was greeted with a mixture of idle chit-chat, loud jeers, some eyebrow-raising statements and the smell of countless dishes being served from Beacon's kitchen team. All the meals made here were freshly, nutritiously and with the best ingredients that money could buy. But, he supposed you wouldn't guess that with the copious amounts of pancakes that were distributed by the school on a daily basis.
Students from Beacon, no matter the year, were welcome to enjoy whatever foods they wanted to whenever they wanted – though what was actually being served differed from the time of day.
A hand popped out from the crowd and practically vibrated – rose petals accompanying the motion with every movement back and forth. The boy could smile amusedly; it didn't take a genius to figure out who that belonged to. "Jaune! Over here! Gah-!" His smile vanished and was replaced with a confused look as a second hand grabbed the wrist of the first, pulling it down violently, causing Ruby to gasp in shock.
"Stop that, you idiot!" Weiss reprimanded harshly under the bodies of the students that separated Jaune from the two other members of his team.
"What? No-one's looking at us and it's Jaune! I'm his leader – I can call him over if I want!"
"Not that," the white-haired girl strained. Jaune squeezed between the sitting crowds, muttering apologies as Crocea Mors made manoeuvring around in tight places sort of a hassle at times. He ignored the complaints of someone as the hilt of his weapon bonked someone upside the head. "It's rather that you keep getting distracted at every little thing that passes by. I swear, you'll be have memorised the flight pattern of a fly on the other side of the window before you even complete this paragraph."
"Ugh…" Approaching the two partners, Jaune was greeted with a deflated Ruby draped onto the table. "But it's so boring. I don't get how you can study for so long, Weiss."
"It's called self-discipline." Folding her arms, Weiss's expression became more positive as she chose to add, "Eventually, you come to realise the value of knowledge and the joys in obtaining and retaining it." The same positive expression fell as she opened a single eye to stare down her partner. "Though, maybe not – in your case."
"Joys my left boot…" Ruby grumbled in audibly.
"Hey, guys," Jaune greeted. Still wearing his partial combat gear, he sat down next to Weiss – facing Ruby – and saw that the two were still in their uniforms.
Beacon's rules stated that you had to wear your uniforms on the weekdays, though weekends were free game. Some preferred casual attire, others their combat gear and some chose to wear their uniform on their off-time anyway to help them get into a more 'studious mood' – whatever that meant. However, Ruby didn't exactly get a choice this weekend as Weiss forcibly dragged her into her uniform to help her concentrate.
And while it wasn't exactly working, it was evidence that the Schnee heiress did have a little warmth to her after all.
"Hello, Jaune," Weiss responded politely as he sat down and rested his forearms on the table. There were multiple historical textbooks that filled the space between her and Ruby with a parchment of lined paper that was around half-way filled that was closer to her partner than Weiss herself.
Ruby garbled something similar, face still crushed on the wood of the table.
"Oobleck's assignment?" He asked idly, spotting something concerning 'war' in the titles of one of the closed books.
"Mmm…" moaned Ruby.
"I'm going to assume that's a yes?" Jaune said, quirking an eyebrow and invisibly moving his gaze to ask Weiss.
She sighed before providing a nod.
Keeping his eyes on the white-haired girl, the boy furthered raised his blonde brow. "…And how far have you gotten?"
There was a soft plat as Weiss' hand met her face.
"That bad, huh? Welp," Jaune breathed in deep before releasing his built up air in a sigh. Maybe this was the change of pace he needed? If not, well – the pain to come will have taught him something at least. "You're in luck. I just so happen to be free and can totally help you out with your essay, Ruby. You're welcome." No response from the girl on the other side of the table.
A second passed before Jaune spoke again. "I'll buy that scope you were talking about for you."
Ruby's silver eyes flashed like diamonds, sparkling like stars as she slammed her hands on the table and shot her face in front of Jaune's – squealing, "Really?!"
Ah, little sisters. They were all the same.
"Really. Now come on, let's get this done," the blond reminded while nodding to the assortment of books between the three teammates.
"Bribery…" Weiss whispered quietly, arms folded across one another with a hand to her chin in contemplation. "Why didn't I think of that?" It seemed that the girl would be thankful that Jaune managed to get Ruby back on track but part of him thought that the sentiment would fade with due time.
He didn't exactly have an allowance to… well, spend when he made that promise.
Eh, it would be fine. Weiss was pretty well off, right?
Ending Notes:
That's that.
Jaune is going through the motions of Beacon, though similarly trying to fulfil the wishes of the headmaster in outing a White Fang spy that is totally there and not a ruse whatsoever.
Also, confidants earned in the form of Pyrrha and Yang? I guess? At least now he has a conspiracy partner and a proctologist but definitely not the way in the way that it sounds. Or… maybe it is? I don't know, I'm tired. I just got back and proofed this.
For this thinking stuff has slowed down – you're right. Give it some more time.
Oh, and some other news – I'm working on a new story! It's still in its planning stages and I'd want to draft out 5 or so chapters before I even think about posting it but I can say that it will involve two things: Atlas and questionable fatherly choices.
PMs are always open and so are reviews. Please, don't hesitate to tell me any qualms you may have with the story so far. I might even answer some of your concerns if it seems appropriate.
Thank you for reading!