Co-Authored by ToxicExotic
Disclaimer: All characters belong to Rooster Teeth Productions
Cute, Awkward, and Infuriating
Slowly threading her way through the familiar red trees of Forever Fall, Blake looked ahead to the rest of her team, though mainly to one member; the pretty leader that was talking to her sister up front. With the amount of fallen leaves on the ground, the girl's cape blended perfectly into the floor and gave the impression that she was simply floating through the forest. In stark contrast, the shining blonde that was laughing next to her stood out like a Grimm in a teddy bear shop; and Blake watched at the head on blonde hair turned to look at her and wink, her arm moving and the books in her hand quickly blocking of the lower section of their leaders back. Understanding what Yang was implying, she blushed as red as the leaves around her and turned to look away.
"Can you believe Professor Goodwitch is making us do this again?" Weiss said indignantly next to her. "We are supposed to be training to be huntresses, not syrup harvesters."
Not having any reply worth giving to the heiress, Blake simply gave the girl a shrug and took the spile that the girl held out to her. Stopping against one of the trees, she positioned the spike against the bark and slammed the butt of Gambol Shroud into the flat part to drive it in. Not wanting to waste any of the sap as it meant their mission would take longer, she held a jar underneath and watched as thick magenta liquid flowed freely into it.
"Aww, someone's grumpy today," Yang teased, her arms sliding around Weiss' shoulders and capturing her in a hug. "You know, if you and Neptune are arguing, me, Co, and Velvs have plenty of love left for a fourth."
"Ugh," Weiss scoffed disapprovingly and shrugged the laughing girl off of her. "Me and Neptune are fine, this is just not what we are training for."
"We are training to be Huntresses, Weiss," Ruby said happily and copied Blake's actions on a nearby tree. "We might have to protect people who do this for a living; and if we can help while we protect them, then this is good training."
"Maybe your tone would change if you knew how tough it was to get that stuff out of your hair."
Suppressing a smile as one of Yang's hands shot up to her hair and began to check for any traces of sap, she took a chance to capitalize on the blonde being distracted to sneak a glance at her leader. However, a smile broke through onto her face as she caught Ruby dipping her finger into the liquid that poured from the tree and happily sticking it into her mouth, her eyes widening comically as she realised she was being watched; a small grin on her face appearing sheepishly. Unable to do anything but shake her head in amusement at the younger girl, Blake returned to looking at the conversing pair to find that she too was being watched by Weiss.
"W-What?" She stuttered slightly.
"Nothing," Weiss replied loftily and turned to Yang who was still inspecting her hair. "Come on, Yang. Let's go and find other trees so we can get this over with quicker."
With Yang nodding in agreement, they both quickly left to go find more trees, the blonde still fretting over her hair as Weiss tutted at her for being silly as there was no chance that syrup had gotten in her hair yet, but if she kept fretting she might get it there herself.
Blake took a few glances at Ruby as she filled some jars with syrup, and randomly took a taste of another jar that she had beside her; eventually, on one of the glances,
Blake caught Ruby's eyes looking at her and blushed before looking away.
"So…" She said cautiously and shook the spile a little to get the syrup flowing again. "How... How have you been? Since our training session, I mean."
"Oh, I'm doing better now," The reaper replied as she sat down beside the filling jar. "I think the day out with Yang helped." She smiled, only for it to drop a few seconds later as her eyes widened a little. "S-Sorry, your advice did too."
"Glad I could help," Blake replied, knowing that it was likely the fact that three days ago Yang had, not so politely, told her and Weiss to get lost for a day and dragged her sister off someplace. She had no idea what the sisters spent the day doing; but when they returned, Ruby had been back to her usual smiling, happy self.
"What about you?" Ruby asked cautiously and Blake noticed the girl begin to fiddle with her laces, something she only did when she was nervous. "You seemed pretty annoyed yesterday?"
"Huh? Oh right," she sighed as the final drops of sap fell from the tapped tree, leaving the jar underneath only half full. "Just that Neon girl that Sun has started dating. She's not really someone I enjoy spending time with, is all."
Sneaking another look at the leader, Blake saw confusion write itself across the young girl's face; and feeling a little bad for speaking ill of someone in front of a girl who saw the best in everyone, she quickly explained what she meant.
"I didn't mean that she's a bad person or anything. She's just… a lot to deal with."
"Oh, that's fair," Ruby smiled, the small little gesture making Blake's stomach flip. "I think Yang feels the same about her too."
With nothing left to say on the matter, Blake twisted the spile out of the tree and moved over to another to continue her sap farming. As she worked the tap into the thick bark of the new tree, each tap sounded deafening in her ears due to the uncomfortable silence that had stretched between the two of them. Determined to break the silence and maybe actually make something of their time alone together, Blake took a deep breath and tried a new angle of conversation.
"So uhh… Do you... remember that chat we had a while back? About people we're interested in? I learned something recently that made mine a lot more likely," she said, her throat feeling a little dry as she had no idea where she was going with the conversation.
"Oh? What's that?"
"Well… She's into girls, which just so happens to be something that I am as well. Hopefully I can work up the courage to tell her."
Looking up after telling Ruby what had been on her mind for a bit, she noticed a slight smile on the girls lips, and a visibly brighter continence in her gunmetal silver eyes. The new light not too dissimilar from when she finds a cookie at a bag that she had previously thought empty, thinking about cookies, she noticed something over the past week, Ruby didn't have any…
"Do… Do I know her?" Ruby's gentle voice broke through her thoughts and caused her breathing to labor a little.
"Y-You do," Blake stuttered a little as the words tumbled from her mouth. "Quite well, actually."
Once again, silence filled the space between them, the only sound being that of the slow dripping from Ruby's tap that the girl seemed to have forgotten. However, after what felt like five minutes of torture, in which her heart was beating so fast that she wouldn't have been surprised had it burst from her chest, she finally took a deep breath and decided to stop wasting time.
"Rub…"
"Miss Rose!" Glynda's voice interrupted her as the stern woman appeared from behind a tree, clipboard in hand. "Where are Miss Schnee and Miss Xiao Long?"
Turning to face the tree and Glynda walked toward the young leader, Blake tried her best to hide the scarlet blush that had erupted onto her face and set herself on working the last drops of sap from the tree. Once the jar was final fully she pulled the tap free and took a second to compose herself as Ruby stumbled over every other word she said to the huntress.
Heaving a deep sigh as she stepped out of the bathroom fully dressed after a relaxing shower, Ruby plopped down on Weiss' freshly made bed earning a raised eyebrow from the heiress that was sorting out some paperwork at her desk. Unfortunately, the girl said nothing and continued with what she was doing, so taking a deep breath, Ruby let out another deep sigh; this time earning an annoyed grumble from her best friends, yet the girl still did not speak. In a final attempt Ruby took one last deep breath and let it out, added a small whine for extra effect.
"I don't care, Ruby."
"But Wei…"
"But nothing!" Weiss said tiredly and tapped the papers on the table to straighten them. "I listened to it all day after we got back from Forever Fall forest and again all last night when she was at dinner, that is why I'm having to rush to sort these out before our first class. If you like Blake so much, then just ask her out already, you know she's into girls now."
"But she already said she likes someone," Ruby pouted and leaning back on the bed, receiving yet another annoyed sigh from Weiss. "And she said she only just found out, and I've never really hid it so I don't think it can be me."
"Or maybe she just never knew until now," the heiress replied shortly, clipping the document into her folder and putting it into her bag.
"I doubt it," Ruby sighed, absentmindedly pulling at a loose bit on string that hung down from the mattress above her. "It's probably Reese, she always winks whenever Blake passes by the skating area."
"Then wait until she goes back to Haven next month, or try and show her why you would be better," Weiss said and stood up to put her bag over her shoulder. "I don't care which you do, just stop pestering me with this."
Letting out a small oof as she felt her own bag land on her stomach, Ruby sat up and looked to see Weiss walking out of the door. Bouncing up from the now slightly dishevelled bed, she quickly ran after her partner.
"But I have no-one else to talk to about this," Ruby pouted, using her semblance to burst in front of the girl and walking backwards. "Yang just teases me when I talk to her."
"You've spent sixteen years around her yet still think she is capable of giving good advice?"
"Sometimes," Ruby hummed thoughtfully, keeping up her backwards walk as she followed Weiss to class. "But your my bestie, so pleeease tell me how you confessed to Neptune?"
Again, Weiss threw her a tired look and Ruby pushed the door of the dormitory open, the crisp air hitting the back of her neck and causing her to shiver a little. Giving her shoulders a shrug to shift her cloak higher, she turned around and walked beside her partner.
"I did not confess anything," Weiss replied, holding her head up high as if such a thing was beyond her. "I told him to meet for lunch, and he did."
"Whaaat?" Ruby cried and let her arms drop to her side. "I can't do that."
"Then I don't know how to help you," Weiss shrugged and picked up her pace towards one of the side buildings that was dedicated to general studies subjects such as maths and science.
"Uuuuugh!"
As she let out a small groan, the feeling of hopelessness began to overtake her again. It had been nearly a week since she had decided to try and ask Blake out, but every attempt that she made ended in her wanting to gently bang her head on the wall in hopes that the small, repeated impacts would remove the embarrassment from her memory. The most progress that had been made was their small conversation during the field trip, unfortunately that had been cut short by Glynda.
Fortunately, the general studies building was not too far from the dormitory so it took less than five minutes to reach it and start walking down the hallway that led to their class. Pushing the door open, she allowed Weiss to walk in first, a decision she immediately regret. Being the last two to arrive, there were only two chairs left for them to sit in, one being a seat next to the walkway, and the other being next to Blake. Without a second of hesitation, Weiss sat down in the chair next to the walkway, leaving the chair next to Blake as the only one Ruby could sit in.
Not sure what to do as her nerves instantly set on fire, Ruby simply stood there like a lost lamb trying to think of a good reason not to take her seat.
"Miss Rose," She heard Professor Peach say from behind her, the voice causing her to jump a little and spin to face the stern looking woman. "You are holding up my class. Take your seat."
"Y-Yes, Ma'am," She stuttered, the fear of being in trouble suppressing her nerves enough to make herself scurry over to her teammate and take her seat.
Trying her best not to look at the raven-haired faunus beside her, due to knowing that her face was likely bright red, Ruby quickly busied herself pulling out her books and getting ready for what would likely be the next couple of hours of boring note taking. However, as she scrambled through her bad, pulling books aside, she was unable to find her pencil case. After a couple of seconds of searching, she let out a small sigh, resigning to having to borrow one from Professor Peach and face the consequences of holding up the class again; but just as she began to raise her hand, she felt a small tap on her right shoulder and turned to see Blake holding out a pen for her.
"You okay?" The beautiful girl asked, a small hint of worry in the glowing amber eyes. "You look a little flushed today?"
"I'm f-fine," Ruby stuttered again, reaching out to take the pen. "Thank y…"
"Talking, Miss Rose!" Professor Peach barked, causing both of them to jump slightly and turn to face the teacher. "Hold up my class again and you will find your lunch break to be shorter than usual. You too Miss Belladonna."
"Sorry, Ma'am," they both chorused in return.
With a stern look at them both, Peach turned back to address the class and Ruby settled in to take notes, the fact that Blake had been watching her close enough to notice she had been flushed making a faint smile pull at her lips.
It had been a few days since Weiss had pulled Yang away from the other two during the mission in forever fall, where they had both hid behind nearby trees to listen in on the conversation between their other two teammates. She had learned from Yang a couple of days prior that Blake had taken an interest in the young leader, and since she had learned the fact, she noticed all the little clues that had up till that point had escaped her view. The way Blake would sneak glances, the way her touch would linger on Ruby for just a little longer than normal. It had been cute at first, watching the two girls dance around and work up the courage to say more than two words to each other; however, that was almost a week ago, and after a week, the charm had worn off and annoyance had begun to settle in. So sat in the library with Yang studying yet another book of notes from yet another boastful lecture, Weiss saw an opportunity to talk about the situation without the two overhearing anything, the white-haired girl spoke up.
"Are you as tired of them as I am yet?"
Originally, both Ruby and Blake was supposed to have been studying with them, but after what seemed to be the Faunus' twentieth failed attempt to confess to the brunette, Blake had decided to sulk off somewhere and Ruby was busy doing whatever it was she did instead of sulking. Weiss' guess was stuffing her face with ungodly amount of baked goods.
"Yup," the blonde beside her replied, finally dropping the book she had been feigning interest in since they had sat down. "I swear, at this point I doubt I would even be mad if I walked in on them half naked, I'd just be bloody glad they finally did something other than freak out constantly. You think we should do something about it?"
"What can we do? Other than shove them together in a closet until they confess to one another?"
"You said it, not me," Yang chuckled mischievously and placed her feet on the table. "But that's not a bad idea honestly. Or we send Rubes to go find the sulking kitty cat on the roof."
"Speaking of the sugar devil where is she, I don't want to wander into the kitchen to find a bloated Ruby that ate way too many cookies and can't fit through the door."
"Well, if you don't want to find her like that, we better go stop her from making more cookies," Yang grinned with a little sigh. "Follow me, I have a good idea of where she is."
Giving Yang a suspicious look as the blonde stood up, Weiss took a second to think as to whether it really was their place to intervene. However, as she thought, she also remembered the fact that Ruby had almost bent one of the guards of her precious Myrtensater during a nervous bumbling session and quickly stood up to join the blonde in her plan.
A/N
So just me today, Raalm. So with this chapter we want to start going into some cuter things for a while as the last couple of chapters have been more angsty, so this should continue for a little while. We also didn't want to go straight into an admission because, well, that would be boring xD so we hope you enjoyed the cute little scenes of them both being a little awkward. Blake is rather difficult to write in those scenes due to wanting to keep the calm confidence she has, but also her struggle to connect to people due to being somewhat a loner. Ruby is a little easier, though I hope she didn't feel too childish, we were going more for happy but nervous.
But yeah, sorry for the shortness of this note section today, I've got a massive headache and Toxic has had a rough day, but we do hope you enjoyed the chapter and are looking forward to the next one.