Yang and Ruby were coming back from a late breakfast, although "Closer to an early lunch" is how Weiss had described it. They were just opening their door when team JNPR's door opposite flew open and Jaune and Penny were shoved out into the corridor by a very insistent Nora. "Just come back at dinner time alright? I want some time for me and Ren to be ALONE. We haven't had any time since Atlas three months ago, so I'm kicking you both out for the entire afternoon. Oh, hi guys!" She waved to Ruby and Yang who waved back weakly, very confused by the whole situation. Nora grinned and slammed the door shut in a very final way.

Penny looked confused as well, "Can someone explain to me what just happened?"

Jaune sighed, "Well Penny, Nora and Ren are...well..." he gave up, "it's complicated."

Yang grinned and threw an arm around Penny's shoulders, "Let me explain my dear innocent Penny. You see, when a boy and a girl love each other..."

"Yang Xiao Long you are NOT to corrupt her brain with nonsense." Weiss' was standing in the doorway, having clearly heard the commotion and got up wondering what was happening, her arms crossed, and one eyebrow raised at Yang, a stern look on her face. Blake had leant round and was also looking at Yang, just less sternly.

"...they like to spend lots of time together on their own and stuff. Happy Ice Queen?" Yang pouted and crossed her arms, whilst Weiss smiled thinly in response, and Blake held back a giggle at Yang's obvious annoyance.

Spotting an opportunity, Ruby piped up "Hey Jaune and Penny, seeing as Nora's banned you both for the rest of the day, you could play Super Grimm Fight Ultimate with me and Yang if you want?"

Yang's face lit up, "Yeah, that would be awesome! Blake doesn't like playing it and Weiss doesn't like that she's terrible at it."

"Hey!"

"Sorry Weiss, but you always get in a bad mood when you lose..." Ruby's voice trailed off as she started agreeing with Yang and then faced Weiss's icy stare.

"No, I don't like that Yang always picks the easiest character to play as and cheats to win."

"I do not cheat! It's just a good strategy to use a Nevermore and the feathers to keep everyone at bay!" Yang put a hand to her mouth and leaned back, acting appalled at the very suggestion of cheating.

"Fine it's not cheating, but it's still bad sportsmanship." Weiss narrowed her eyes at Yang, hands on hips.

"Good thing I'm a sportswoman then not a man," Yang winked at Weiss, who threw her hands up in the air and walked off. Blake sat back in her bed cross legged and hid a grin behind her book. "Well you two, whaddya say? Fancy taking on the undisputed champion of Grimm Fight Ultimate?" Yang grinned, flexing her bicep at Jaune and Penny.

"Eh, what the heck. Better than walking round campus bored all day. Penny?" Jaune shrugged and turned his head to his partner.

"I am up for the challenge!" Penny smiled widely and nodded her head. The four of them went in and sat on the floor, making a semi-circle with Yang near Blake's bed, Ruby by Weiss', and with Jaune and Penny in the middle of the two. Yang was lounging, one leg stretched out in front of her, the other knee lifted up slightly. Jaune was in a similar position but both legs stretched out, whilst Penny and Ruby were both sat cross legged. Yang loaded the game up on the holo screen and directed everyone to set up their scrolls to connect and be a controller. The screen filled with the character select options, showing a dozen various Grimm. Yang immediately selected the Nevermore, and Ruby a Beowolf. Jaune flicked around before settling on an Ursa, whilst Penny hovered over a few before selecting a Lancer. Once everyone had confirmed their selections, the screen switched to show various wilderness stages and a couple of ruins.

The first match kicked off with Yang immediately taking to the air and using various moves to keep the others at bay. Ruby groaned and decided to focus on taking out Jaune, whilst Penny's Lancer...well…Ruby was a little confused by the Lancer. It flicked in each direction and used a couple of basic moves and one or two specials, but each in turn. Almost as if...nah Penny must have played before. The Lancer suddenly sped towards the Nevermore only to be immediately taken down, Yang swooping above the Lancer and charging down, slamming Penny into the ground. Ruby disengaged from Jaune and dashed to Yang's Nevermore to attack, but only got a couple of swipes off before Yang took flight again.

"That Nevermore is really overpowered." Yang's head twitched slightly, turning enough to see Blake switch positions so she was at the foot of her bed and could watch the screen, making her closer to Yang. Yang looked back at the screen in time to see Ruby's Beowolf use a special and shoot up to grapple the Nevermore in the air, Jaune's Ursa dazed on the ground. Yang grunted under her breath, she'd been distracted by Blake, and so hadn't noticed Ruby get close enough to strike. Ruby whooped as she landed and rushed over to finish Jaune off.

Ruby was still whooping as the screen flashed Round Two up, and the second round began. Ruby squealed and panicked as the second round started. Whilst Yang won the second round easily, having decided to not get distracted by her partner, and the third round went a similar way, giving Yang the first proper win.

Ruby looked to Penny, having noticed quite an intense look of concentration on her face during the second and third rounds. "Penny...?"

"Yes Ruby?" Penny turned to her, her eyes wide and innocent.

"Have you played this game before?" The others turned to look at Penny too, who quickly averted her eyes from Ruby's.

"Of course I have!" She smiled widely. Then hiccupped.

Jaune raised his eyebrows, clearly he also knew about Penny's particular tic when lying, "Have you actually played ANY video games before Penny?"

Penny managed to fake a shocked gasp really well, "Of course I have! I'm just being deliberately bad as it would not be as fun for you all if I was as good as I could be, as being an Android gives me an unfair advantage...hic." The last hiccup slipped out behind her mouth before Penny could stop it.

Even Weiss turned around at that, "You've never played any video games?"

"Erm. Yes. I have. Hic." Penny looked around, nervously.

Yang threw her arms around Penny, "You poor girl! We'll have to fix that for you." She buried her head in Penny's hair. "Whoa! Your hair is super soft!" She leaned back looking really surprised.

Penny reached up to her hair and brushed it slightly, "My father updated it a while back so that it looks and feels like real hair, I do prefer it like this, but washing it can be interesting at times, I have to be careful not to spend too long in a shower."

"Back to the important topic though, it's ok if you've never played a video game before." Ruby smiled softly at Penny, who finally relented.

"I...just never really had time. I always had something to be doing, whether that was in Mantle for my father, or in Atlas for General Ironwood." She looked a little awkward explaining it.

"Don't worry, like Yang said, we can help out with that, and we can start now." Jaune smiled at Penny, who beamed in response. Ruby smiled to herself, after her team Penny was her best friend, and whilst she knew Jaune would never deliberately be horrible to her, she had worried that he would take much longer to warm up and treat Penny like a friend.

The rest of the afternoon was spent playing various rounds of Super Grimm Fight Ultimate, an X-Ray and Vav game that Jaune had, as well as various other games Yang or Ruby had downloaded at some point. Weiss and Blake even joined in at various points, Weiss insisting that she would join into a multiplayer game only if she didn't have to fight against Yang, as Yang always knew how to do the best in every game where they had to go against one another.

"I reckon that's given the two lovebirds enough time alone by now, and I'll be honest, I am genuinely surprised we didn't hear anything." Yang grinned and winked at Blake, who slapped Yang on the shoulder.

"I don't fully understand, why would we hear anything from the room? We're across the hall." Penny's head tilted slightly, looking confused again.

Weiss shot daggers at Yang again, whilst Ruby and Jaune looked uncomfortable, and Blake rolled her eyes. Yang suddenly remembered the previous conversation at the beginning of the afternoon. "Erm, well...You know how loud Nora gets when she's happy or excited. So, she'd probably be very happy at spending so much time with Ren!" She finished with a grin; happy she'd managed to avoid the topic whilst still making sure the others knew exactly what she meant.

"Oh. That makes sense. I thought you meant they would be doing some kind of sexual activity." Penny deadpanned her response.

The others gasped in shock and Weiss nearly spat water all over the wall having just taken a swig of her drink.

"Wait, what?!" Weiss was clearly the most shocked of all. Yang, meanwhile, once she had got over the shock, fell over cackling with laughter.

"Of course you understand stuff. Why wouldn't you?" Yang managed to squeeze out between laughs.

"I understand that sort of stuff, my father had a talk with me before I left! I was mostly confused because I thought Ren was not interested in it." Penny's reply made everyone look up in surprise.

"What do you mean? It's kinda obvious him and Nora are together," Jaune's brow creased in confusion.

"Oh, I know they're together, but I thought Ren wasn't interested in sexual activities?" Penny looked at Jaune directly, "Did I read the situation wrong?"

"Erm. I don't really know. I mean I've seen them hold hands and give each other kisses, but..." Jaune leant back on his hands thinking, trying to run through memories in his head, trying to think of a time he'd either walked in on them doing something or about to, hands where they shouldn't be, and realised the most he'd seen them do, or even attempt to do, was give each other a kiss. "I dunno. Not really my place to talk about it with them really, it's their relationship." The others all shrugged and agreed. "Wait why were you confused Nora shoved us out earlier?"

"That was because she didn't say anything other than when she pushed us out," Penny explained, "if she had said why she wanted us out earlier, then I would have left voluntarily."

Jaune nodded in agreement.

"Oh yeah, why did Goodwitch want to talk to you the other day? You never did get a chance to explain to us." Yang asked, changing the subject.

"Professor Goodwitch wanted to let us know about our mission for this year. We are on bodyguard duty!" Penny smiled broadly and nodded.

"Bodyguard duty? For who?" Blake sounded wary, there wasn't many people she could think of that needed a bodyguard.

"For Oscar of course. He's coming to Beacon in the spring."

Ruby's jaw dropped so far it nearly hit the floor, "He's coming here?! Has he woken up then?"

"No, he's still asleep, but there's not much more Atlas can do for him apparently. So, Professor Goodwitch suggested he transfer here to stay in the medical bay, as Beacon will be able to keep him alive and under observation until he does wake up. Plus, we will be here to protect him!"

Ruby leant back against her bed thinking back to their fight against Salem and shuddered. It had been horrific and absolutely nightmare worthy. They'd all been beaten down and had barely any energy left, when Ozpin took over Oscar completely, had a very awkward conversation with Salem that everyone wished they had not been there to hear, even after seeing the visions from Jinn. Then Ozpin had got Ruby to use her silver eyes as strongly as she could, which she did. The effort had knocked her out because the next thing she knew she was waking up in Atlas' medical wing, everyone around her, her team nearly crying with happiness. She'd been unconscious for five days, even longer than after Beacon had fallen.

She found out what happened after she'd fallen unconscious, and she'd been amazed. Ozpin had managed to harness the energy of her eyes, amplify it, and throw Salem into the Winter vault, then helped Penny shut the doors, sealing her in. He'd dropped to his knees, managed to say "Never. Open. Any. Vault. Again." Before he'd passed out as well. Unlike Ruby however, he hadn't woken up. One of the first things Winter had done when communication was restored was to send a message to the headmaster of Shade explaining what she could of the situation. Fortunately, they agreed to keep the vault closed. At least until the whole situation, and how Winter knew about it, could be discussed in person.

Atlas doctors managed to find out that Ozpin had expanded nearly Oscar's entire aura, and then even more aura from somewhere else, which they didn't really explain (Blake said that was because they didn't understand it and just didn't want to admit it), and his body hadn't been able to take it so he just shut down. He was still alive, but whether he would wake up again was a different matter. And what state he'd be in if he woke up would also be unknown.

If he woke up.

"When is he coming here?" Ruby brought herself back to the present as Weiss asked the question.

"They're going to keep working on him and trying different things for the next couple of months, but it'll probably be sometime in early Spring. Professor Goodwitch says it won't affect our classes at all, we'll be a little restricted on what missions we choose to do, and that during the Summer and Winter breaks until we graduate, we won't be able to go home, which is fine for our team anyway." Jaune replied shrugging, clearly not too fussed about the whole situation, "That's why we can't go to the Vytal Festival in Mistral next year. We've got to stay here to keep an eye on him."

"So instead of full professional Huntsmen and Huntresses, Goodwitch has put you four in charge of his protection?" Blake seemed surprised, "Not putting you down, but still…"

"Yeah, I get that, we were just as surprised as you, but Professor Goodwitch said we were pretty much full Huntsmen anyway, we're only back at the school to officially graduate, plus there's Penny who is technically a part of Atlas Military, is the former Protector of Mantle, and she's one of the Maidens. Kinda made a lot more sense when she put it like that." Jaune looked a little bit sheepish, "She also said she's got plans for you four later, which is why she didn't ask you to do it as well but didn't say anything else."

The others agreed that it did make sense (although privately they were wondering what those plans were) and, with Yang and Ruby swapped out for Blake and Weiss, who were both worse than the two sisters, they decided to play another couple of rounds on the game, to see if Penny had improved much, and then head down for some dinner. As it turned out, Penny had improved. Whilst she was still the first one to lose each round, she actually got a few hits in before she did lose, which everyone cheered at, making her beam with happiness.

When they headed down to the hall to get some food, they found Ren and Nora already halfway through their food, Nora chatting away at high speed, Ren listening and occasionally adding something. They all grabbed food and went to sit next to the pair, Nora looking up as they arrived and waving madly. Taking it as approval to go near them again, the group sat down and started eating. Penny had brought over a very small plate of food, and they'd learnt early on that she could eat, but preferred not to. Whilst it was possible to use food as energy for her, it usually used up more energy than she gained, and it only worked on certain foods, but she had explained that it was important to her to fit in with the others, so she usually ate a small plate of food with her team.

"So, what did you guys get up to?" Nora had switched away from her previous topic.

Penny's face grew into a massive smile "I learnt how to play video games. It was immensely enjoyable!" Nora was clearly happy at that response and gave Penny a massive hug. Ruby had noticed that the excitable ginger girl with more strength than most had taken the excitable ginger girl with much more strength than most under her wing, showing her various things, praising, and helping her out where she could. It had clearly made Penny feel much more comfortable as whilst she nearly always tried to appear happy, she definitely hadn't been happy when she'd come to her for advice over a month ago. Jaune had clearly warmed up to her more and was feeling better about the situation on the surface at least, Nora was genuinely happy to have Penny around, and Ren...well most people struggled to know what Ren was thinking so who knows, but he'd never actually said anything mean about her. Although Ruby didn't think she'd ever heard him be mean about anyone, so she wasn't sure, but he went along with Nora on most things, so he was probably alright with Penny if nothing else.

Whilst Penny explained to Nora about the games she'd played, and Nora gave her some 'tips', although Yang discounted over half of them as either cheats or things that just straight up didn't work, the others ate their dinner. Right up until Penny asked, "So what did you and Ren get up to?"

Everyone other than Nora and Ren looked at each other out the corner of their eyes, waiting to hear the response.

Nora didn't even blink, "We went Grimm hunting and took down a dozen Beringels all on our own!"

"I read a book and Nora laid next to me listening to music." Ren's deadpan response was the one they believed, even Penny had come to realise after a month that anytime Nora said she did something, and Ren said it was something else entirely, Ren was the one to believe.

"Aww that's adorable!" Weiss raised an eyebrow at Yang's outburst, "What? It is. It's really nice to just spend time with your other half doing absolutely nothing, just enjoying each other's presence..." Her voice got a little quieter to the end and trailed off a little.

"It's not that I disagree, I just didn't realise you had such a romantic inclination." Weiss was being honest, whilst she knew Yang had a much more complicated character than it first appeared to most people, she hadn't realised Yang had a romantic streak.

"Thank you, Yang." Ren nodded at her.

Nobody mentioned Penny's assertion earlier that Ren wasn't interested in sexual activities, although upon hearing that the two of them had just relaxed together, they all now seemed to agree with it, and they made small talk as they finished dinner and headed back to their rooms.

Later that week team RWBY walked into combat class with the rest of their year and noticed that there were quite a lot of younger students sat in the seats in the auditorium section. That...was interesting. And unexpected. From the looks on everyone else's face they weren't expecting it either. Once everyone had lined up in front of Professor Goodwitch, she started the lesson.

"Today is going to be solely based around one on one fights against each other. The time limit is five minutes per fight and highest aura wins, or below 20% aura, whichever happens first. Weapons and semblances are allowed; however, it goes without saying that you are to control them both properly and NOT go for any seriously damaging moves." As usual she skipped any pleasantries and got down to business, "I will decide who the fighters will be. And yes, these fights will be marked." She paused to let it all sink in before continuing, "As some of you have no doubt noticed, the students you see sat to your right are some of our first years. They will be observing one of your combat lessons each week until the Beacon tournament starts in the Spring. This is to give them an advantage over you, as you have all had two years more combat experience than they have. The second years will have the same arrangement with the fourth years."

She ran her eyes over each of the third-year students in turn. "What they will not have access to, but you will, is the video recordings for each of your fights in these observed sessions." Everyone noticed that statement, usually it was just the fourth years who were allowed access to fight recordings outside of sparring and the practice they had set up themselves, as anyone who had done sparring could access their own recordings. However, sparring was never allowed with weapons unless a teacher was present, which was rare, so getting videos of fights where they could actually use their weapons was worth the first years getting knowledge on them. "This, coupled with your extra combat experience, will help level the playing field for all. Now, Blake Belladonna and Lie Ren, you will be the first two to fight."

Blake nodded to her team, Yang put her hand on her shoulder briefly, and they walked off to sit in the lower rows of the seats on the left, opposite the first years. Jaune did the same to Ren, Nora squeezed his hand before skipping off, and Penny smiled and said, "Best of luck Ren!" Before following her team. Ren walked to face Blake and blinked slowly, calming his nerves and breathing, holding his weapon Stormflower in each hand. Opposite him Blake also split her weapon in two, slipped the scabbard on her back first, and set the rest of Gambol Shroud into the pistol mode.

"Start!"

Author's Note

So this chapter came about from the idea that, despite being an android, Penny was just diabolically bad at video games. I also wanted a way to explain why Oscar hasn't shown up yet, and give an indication of when he will. Plus, the comment about Goodwitch having plans will definitely come into play, just not for a few chapters yet.