February 14th 1999...

Yang Branwen was not the type of person to do a whole lot of things for herself. At least not since she was seven years old and she learned that her sister existed and that she had been a bully towards her for several months at that point. Learning about her sister caused Yang to change the entire path her life was traveling up to that point.

No, Yang rarely had anything she wanted for herself in life. She lived for these last eight years for her sisters sake, to give her the kind of loving family relationship she had been denied up to that point. The fact that because of Ruby that she actually has a pretty strong relationship with her own father has surprisingly little to do with it.

So when she takes the rare chance to live for herself, she always ended up going all in. Which is why she was currently laying in the bed of her boyfriend of the last several months Neptune Vasilias resting her head against his bare chest. The fact that neither of them had clothes on was, at least in her mind also a nice perk.

The feeling she was enjoying right now was intoxicating for her. Not one she expected to feel from the young swim team captain. but here she was stroking his chest feeling utterly content with life.

"Not that I don't enjoy lounging around in bed with my girlfriend, but we are never going to make it out to dinner if we stay like this." Neptune said with a chuckle as he stroked the back of Yang's neck.

"Are you saying your down for round two then?" Yang softly muttered as the feelings of bliss lingered around her.

"I think you mean round three, but that would still require me to get up and make a run to the store." Neptune said as he shook the empty box that was on his night stand.

"Damn" Yang said. "I thought you got a box of them a week ago?" before she strated to stoke his rock solid chest.

"I actually did" Neptune said with a chuckled as his hand roamed down from her neck to the small of her back causing Yang to purr out. "Now I don't want this to come off as a complaint hon, but you have been here quite a bit lately." Neptune looked at the top of his girlfriends currently unruly mop of hair. "Is everything okay Yang?"

Yang tilted her up so her eyes could meet with hers "I guess they are." Yang said "I mean I'm laying naked in my boyfriends bed, what's not to like?"

Neptune's smile slipped a bit as he looked at his girlfriend "Yang, I know we've only been a thing for a few months, but I like to think I can tell when your trying to distract yourself from things."

Yang shook her head, she admitted to herself that at one point that, yeah, she was kinda using Neptune as a way to distract herself from her need to try and constantly be around her sister as she grew closer to Jaune. But when she realized she actually really liked Neptune it stopped being about the distraction and about claiming something for herself for the first time in years.

The fact that she was still using Neptune, but just for a different reason didn't feel to good in her mind. She pulled herself up to his face and kissed neptune. "You know me too well, I guess that's what I love about you sometimes."

Neptune chuckled "Oh, only sometimes huh?" Neptune shifted his weight so he was laying on his side as Yang maneuvered to law next to him and facing him. "I guess I'll take what I can get. But your dodging the question, what's on your mind?"

Yang sighed "Okay fine. I have concerns about Ruby's boyfriend."

"Oh yeah? That mute blonde haired guy? What did he do this time?" Neptune asked as he rubbed Yang's bare arm.

"I'm sorry you really do deserve better than to have me dump on you." Yang said.

"Hey if I didn't care I wouldn't be asking you about this. So go ahead and tell me what's going on?" Neptune said with a quiet understanding tone in his voice.

"I just haven't trusted him ever since what happened in December, I guess I don't trust any guy around my sister to be fair, but I really don't trust hm." Yang said as she snuggled up to him. "But she seems happy with him, so I don't know if I just need to let things be or not."

"I don't know hon, they do seem to be good for each other when I look at them" Neptune said to Yang hoping that he doesn't set her off.

"Unless you count that scar he left on her arm" Yang grumbled out.

Neptune figure that this was not going to be a fight worth having right now and began to sit up in the bed. Yang sat up next to him using his bed sheets for modesty reasons. "Well I don't know about you, but I recall we were planning on actually going out for dinner tonight." Neptune said as he stretched out and reached for his glasses. "Besides i'm buying remember?"

Yang smiled putting the conversation out of her head. "That's fine, but only if we make a trip to the drug store after we eat."

Neptune laughed as he reached down and passed Yang the short black dress she wore to their "date" . After that he pulled his own pants on and started to look around for his lost shirt. "I swear I don't know how to keep up with you anymore." Neptune said as he pulled on his shirt.

Yang smiled and said "Call it endurance training if you need to." as she slipped her dress back on.

Neptune picked up and passed Yang her unmentionables. "You might need these."

Yang blushed and slipped them on "I might... Where did you have in mind?"

"Nothing fancy, I was thinking the Chinese place downtown." Neptune said as he reached for his wallet and keys.

Yang picked up her purse and slipped her shoes back on "Sounds good to me" she said as she walked over and gave him a firm and hungry kiss. "Save room for desert."

Neptune half smiled as he led her out of the room.


Elsewhere in town, Blake and Weiss were out at local movie theater. As the only two single people of their group they opted to go catch a movie together. The saw that Office space was playing and Blake had at least heard it was funny as hell.

Weiss sat in her chair as Blake pushed her chair. Weiss sighed and was as least thankful this movie theater complex had set up wheelchair accessible spaces in the theaters. "So your sure this movie is any good?"

Blake smiled as she pushed her friend to the concessions counter "Hey, who's paying for this?"

"I am, or more accurately my dad is." Weiss smiled at Blake.

"Ah that famous Schnee Refuse and Recycling company money your family likes to flaunt." Blake spoke out as she pushed her up to the counter "Small popcorn and a medium Diet coke please!" Blake said to the person at the counter.

Weiss shook her head saying "Same for me!" to the theater employee. before she turned back to face Blake "Well don't knock it, I know it's weird to say that my family made it's so called 'fortunes' running a trash company. But at least it's all legal right?"

Blake grabbed the drinks and set them into the cup holders on the back of Weiss's chair as Weiss grabbed the two bags of popcorn. Once that was done they started to move towards the movie theater to find seats.

"Well I'm glad at least I didn't have to go to see this alone." Blake mused as she pushed Weiss towards the theater.

Although they still had plenty of time before the movie started. Weiss had suggested they get in early so they could find seats and so she didn't have to fight her chair through the crowd. Weiss didn't realize this would have the slightly unfortunate side effect that she would end up alone in a dimly lit movie theater with the girl she had a growing crush on.

As Weiss parked her chair in a space reserved for it, Blake reached over her to grab the drinks from the back of the chair unintentionally giving Weiss a peek down her blouse, Once Blake sat down Weiss having ran out of things to say sat in a slightly awkward silence for a few moments. As Blake got comfortable reading the ad's on the screen Weiss found herself stealing the occasional glance at Blake from her chair. One time as she glanced at Blake she noticed the black haired girl looking at her legs.

Blake noticed Weiss noticing her own staring and stammered out "Oh Jeez sorry, I know you're embarrassed by your scars."

"No it's fine. I've been slowly getting over it to be honest, I mean I can't pretend they don't exist." Weiss said with shrug.

Blake half smiled and said "Yeah I guess it's true. I mean... We all have our scars right?" As she said that she rolled up one of her sleeves and revealed a faint network of light scars on her forearm.

"What happened to cause all of that?" Weiss asked baffled.

Blake pulled her sleeve down and rubbed her neck as she spoke "Well, I guess you could say Adam happened. After he came into the picture it started slow. First it was little things such as commenting on my appearance. Telling lies that drove a wedge between my friends and I." Blake grimace as she kept talking "Once he didn't have my friends to worry about, then he stopped being subtle, he would tell me how to dress and how to act. He would also make comments to me, little underhanded insults to make me feel ugly."

Blake sighed and took a drink from her soda. "So I'm alone, friendless except for Adam. Not to mention I thought I was this ugly little thing that only my parents could love. Adam by that point was all but controlling my very thoughts and treated me like trash. Not to mention the other things he had me do when it was just us. Well as you can imagine I needed a release. A way that I could feel in control of at least some part of my body." Blake looked at the screen as some random local advert was playing as part of a slide show on the screen. "Did you know what when your hurt, your body releases a chemical in your head that makes you feel good. It's the reason some people did stuff like... Well my arm."

Weiss at that point was just quietly listening to her friend she finally started to speak "Good lord... I knew I hated the son of a bitch. How did your parents never notice anything about this?"

Blake shrugged "My parents had the form to worry about, I mean i'm not going to say that they were bad parents. Adam just taught me how to hide everything from therm... It's horrific how much control I surrendered to him. How much he made me think it was my idea to let him run my life for me." Blake smiled as she looked at Weiss "But, he's gone now thanks to the others. Honestly I haven't felt the need to do anything like that since then."

Weiss smiled and stopped trying to futility hide her legs and sat back in her chair. "Well I'm glad at least life is treating you far better now."

"Turns out I have some pretty great friends, and besides I do other things to firmly establish i'm in control now." Blake as she pulled up her shirt to show off her belly button piercing. Followed by showing off the series of piercings going up her right ear..

"Oh wow, yeah my dad would murder my if I got half as many piercings." Weiss giggled in her seat but also lightly blushing from seeing Blake's belly.

Blake looked like she wanted to say more, but the lights started to turn dim as more people came in for the movie... Not many people were at the movies today. And the few that were didn't pay the pair much mind.

As far as Weiss's was concerned the only person she cared about in this whole theater was sitting next to her.


So I'll admit that I was a little concerned about the idea of writing half of this chapter with two nude character resting in a bed. But it was needed for Yang's character arc. I didn't feel like anything in this chapter really needed.

I'm pretty glad that most of you who commented last chapter didn't really seem too put off by Jaune's hallucination, and shout to Dharshan who mentioned that it was a good thing that I didn't opt to use Jaune getting a girlfriend as an excuse to suddenly make his guilt complex vanish over night. Also to N-Lorian, yeah I know it Wasn't subtle at all. I didn't aim it to be subtle either.

But as always, I want to take the time to thank everyone again for reading, and I hope to see you all next chapter.