"I don't want to be here for the rest of my life."

Willow looked lazily down at the top of the desk she sat at. "Weiss, you know that these decisions are between you and your father."

Weiss bit her lip. Willow and her spoke very rarely; her mother had pretty well checked out for most of her adolescence. "You know that father can be… hard to reason with sometimes."

However, she knew her mother still had the ability to change her father's mind on something, on the rare occasion she was willing to use it.

"Why is this so important to you Weiss?" Willow mused.

"Because everybody I know I only know through you and father. Every opportunity in my life I only have because of you two." A hint of desperation was beginning to creep into Weiss' voice. It was hard for her to express what she actually wanted but she knew that her insides were screaming at her not to attend college in Atlas as her parent's wished for her. She needed to step outside of the confines of the world her parents had raised her in. She needed a world of her own.

"That means that they're good opportunities Weiss, and good people to know." Willow said softly."

"Mom, please just..."

"This is between you and Father. He has put a lot of thought into these sorts of things for you."

Weiss simply gave a miserable nod, her shoulders slumping as she turned to exit the study.

"Weiss." her Mother spoke up once more just before Weiss reached the door. "Perhaps your Father would consider Beacon a suitable choice for your college. It is still close to Atlas but... you might suggest that to him."

"I don't know Blake, I just feel like that whole situation might have kinda been my fault."

Blake's apartment was a typical hangout spot for the girls after their shifts were over. It was a minimalist place but it had a certain style. Flea market furniture furnished the room and the calm scent of lavender candle floated in the air. Ruby had gone home tonight; she had class in the morning, so after the restaurant closed it was just Blake and Yang who came back to relax. For Yang that meant whatever alcoholic mixture her friend managed to come up on a given night. Blake's cocktails were legendary; always delicious and always trusted. For Blake, relaxing meant a hot mug of chamomile.

"She's the daughter of billionaires, Yang. Would it be that surprising for her to be a brat?"

Yang gave Blake a peculiar look "Since when are you so judgmental?"

"I'm not trying to be judgmental." Blake sighed. "It's not like you to let someone act like that without a fight."

"I already told you I talked to her and she apologized. And Ruby told me she texted her to apologize too."

"So what are you thinking then Yang?"

Yang's reply was hesitant. "I think we're gonna see her again tomorrow. I should talk to her, try to smooth things out. Maybe she won't be totally in work-mode. And if she's cool then uhh.." she paused before continuing sheepishly "maybe we invite her over? Give her a chance?"

Blake shrugged. "I can't imagine her being very receptive to any of that."

Yang gave her a smug grin "You weren't either when we first met."

"I wasn't like that." Blake objected. She sighed but her lips formed a small smile. Yang was as stubborn as anyone she knew. There was not going to be any changing her mind on this. Her openness and genuine care for others were some of Yang's best qualities. Her and Ruby both had a way of seeing the best in people. It was one of the reasons Blake liked them so much and she knew that their friendship wouldn't have been possible if they weren't that way. "You mean invite her to my house?" she asked, giving in.

"C'mon Blake!" Yang begged "It'll be way better than having her over at my Dad's house."

Blake brushed a hand against the furry second set of ears atop her head. "I'll have to wear a bow." she said quietly.

Yang froze. "Oh shit, Blake. I wasn't thinking. We can do something else."

Though there was no law stopping Faunus from participating in society however they liked, it wasn't always acceptable or safe for them to leave their own communities and few did. Blake didn't cover her ears at home or when she was around Yang and Ruby and their family but she did in public. Most humans weren't as open-minded. It would be necessary if they were going to invite a borderline stranger over and though she knew Yang didn't follow the politics enough to know it, that went doubly for a stranger named Schnee.

Still she shook her head. "No. It'll be fine."

Yang hesitated, not quite willing to accept that answer so easily. "If you change your mind when we see her tomorrow, I won't ask her."

Blake shook her head again. "If she's cool tomorrow then I won't change my mind." She gave Yang a smirk. "You might want to go easy on her though. She looked about ready to have an aneurysm talking to you."

Yang searched for anything she could say to argue that but after a few seconds she slumped in defeat. "Yeah. I don't know why, I'm just curious about her."

Blake's smirk grew. "You're gonna kill me like that one of these days Yang." Yang snorted and Blake smiled. This was Yang at both her best and worst and Blake never had found a way to say no to her.

It felt strangely important to Weiss that today go better than the prior had but that feeling wasn't very logical. Ruby was just a classmate once this assignment was done and she probably wouldn't ever see the other two again. She honestly wasn't sure if Blake or Yang would be there tonight. That illogical part of her hoped they would though. She knew she had spent their previous meeting making things harder on herself and everyone around her and she couldn't help but feel a little guilty over her cold response to their friendliness.

Focus! She chided herself. The priority today was her history class, not assuaging her guilty conscience.

When Weiss arrived,the scene at the restaurant was entirely different than the day before. The place was packed. Almost every table in the building was occupied. In the same booth in the corner she was greeted with the familiar sight of her excitable partner waving her over, as if the two were already best friends. She made her way over and placed her things down on the table. She brought with her both her usual school bag and a second blue tote bag with snowflake embroidery. A cup of coffee was already waiting for her at her seat. She grasped her fingers, running then curiously around the mug handle.

"Yang remembered how you like it." Ruby piped up. Weiss hummed thoughtfully."You feeling better today Weiss" asked Ruby, a little uncertainty creeping into her voice.

Weiss exhaled and gave the younger girl a small smile. "Much" She took a sip of the warm drink in front of her. Ruby was right: Yang had remembered how she liked it. Not that 'black' was especially hard to remember but it was still thoughtful of her.

As if on cue, a golden blur flashed by. Yang moved seemingly at hyperspeed, jumping from table to table frantically, distributing drinks and condiments and the like from a tray. Her perfect blonde hair was tied back in a messy ponytail. Weiss found herself almost mesmerized watching her work.

"She's gonna leave us alone today. I told her not to distract us." Ruby commented.

Weiss snapped back. "Right." She drilled herself into focus, her eyes flicking towards the tote bag which contained her new approach. It was time to make her offer.

"Alright, Ruby" Weiss began firmly "It is important to me that we actually make some progress today unlike last time. So, if you manage to stay on task I have something for you." She pulled a white box out from the bag and set it on the table, flipping it open to reveal it's contents. "Fine Atlesian Chocolates. For every 10 minutes you can stay on task uninterrupted, I will give you one.

"Ha" snorted Ruby "You can't buy me off with your fake, fancy, rich person candy. Everyone knows that rich people like terrible sweets."

"Really?" asked Weiss, almost hypnotically, as she offered up a sample chocolate to Ruby. Ruby plucked the candy out of Weiss' hand skeptically, popping in in her mouth. Slowly, her eyes widened and she practically melted with joy. Weiss heard herself emit a rare giggle at the sight.

The younger girl pulled herself back together and looked nervously at Weiss. "Every 5 minutes?" she asked weakly.

"Deal" Weiss smiled.

An hour and a half of work passed quickly and in the blink of an eye the two girls had practically finished the whole project. Weiss couldn't help but be pleased with herself and her new bribery tactic Ruby, it turned out, was a very good worker, at least when correctly incentivised. Of course Weiss wasn't really surprised by that. It took a hard worker to get jumped into college as a 16 year old, obviously. Obviously Ruby had never been going to cooperate well with her intense, focused approach, nor would she accept being treated so coldly. She didn't deserve to be.

"Hey, Weiss!" Yang's sunny voice cut in and grabbed both of the girls' attention. She sauntered up to the table and wiped her brow. The restaurant had slowed considerably and most of the customers were gone. Exhaustion was evident in her eyes but she maintained a peppy smile. She paused curiously at the scene in front of her. Between Ruby's chocolate-covered face, the mountain of wrappers strewed across the table and the pages of obvious, uncharacteristic productivity, a vivid picture was painted for her. Yang gave Weiss a smirk. "Wow." She exclaimed "You are such a manipulator"

Weiss heart sank. She should have known anything she did at this point would come off badly. "Wait.. hey...it wasn't like that" she halfheartedly defended .

Yang's features softened "Hey, I was joking" she said gently.

Weiss stiffened and looked at the floor. "Oh"

There was an awkward pause before Yang took a deep breath."Blake was telling me I should apologize for messing with you so much when I don't really know you."

Weiss found herself taken aback at the idea of anyone apologizing to her after the way the previous day had gone. "Oh. Um, that's okay" she answered hesitantly.

"I'm sorry. Sometimes I can't help myself."

She glanced into the blonde girls lilac eyes. There was an aura of warmth and genuinness to them; a sense of care. However, Weiss's heart sank as she fearfully imagined what kind of messages Yang was getting in return via her eyes. "It's really no big deal." she offered.

"Especially with the way you get all flustered but you still always think you have a good comeback.."

Weiss shot Yang a deadpan expression freezing the blonde's gradually widening grin. "Perhaps the help you need is more professional"

Yang laughed, her grin began to grow once again and this time Weiss couldn't help but smile."I've got to go help Blake with the mountain of dishes in the back. If you guys hang around we'll come distract you more when we're done."

Weiss rolled her eyes. "Just my luck." She had barely let her walls down at all and she was already beginning to feel alarmed at how charmed she was allowing herself to become at the group of girls. She has spent her whole childhood surrounded by powerful, wealthy associates of her family who had worked very hard to make good impressions on her. Yet she had found them all combined to be about as charming as a dentists waiting room. Happy she had made things somewhat better, relieved to be so ahead in her homework, and amused by her goofball partner, Weiss' smile refused to leave her face.

It was a smile that Ruby didn't miss.

"Hmm. You almost look like I'm not the worst partner you've ever had for an assignment then" Ruby teased.

Weiss let out a quiet giggle. "No, you still are. I was homeschooled growing up so I've never had any other partners."

Ruby frowned. "That must have been hard."

"Well, I don't really have anything to compare it to." Weiss answered matter of factly.

"Well, how different was it from college?"

Weiss shrugged. "I worked a lot then, I work a lot now. I suppose it's nice to be out of the house a bit more."

"It sounds lonely." Ruby replied, crossing her arms

"It was fine, Ruby. My family has a lot of money and we could afford the best tutors imaginable. It makes perfect sense."

"This is why you were so weird yesterday when I was asking about friends." Ruby exclaimed with an air of discovery.

"Ruby" Weiss interrupted with an irritated grunt "I haven't had a lot of friends, okay? Is that.."

"Well I'm gonna be your friend!"

Weiss narrowed her eyes "What?" She replied flatly "You don't know me at all and the only thing you do know is that I yelled at you yesterday."

"I also know that you bought me chocolate today." Ruby giggled.

"Ruby.."

The kitchen door banged open again and the boisterous blonde reappeared. "If I waited for your help to get stuff done we'd have to live here Yang." Blake's amused voice called from somewhere in the back.

Yang shook her head in faux-exasperation. "Taken for granted as usual". She muttered just loudly for everybody to hear, her lips curling into a smirk. Sweaty and drained, she made her way over to sit down and join the other two girls. Half a minute later Blake followed. "Well I guess you're even luckier than you thought" Yang remarked toward Weiss with a tired smile.

Weiss looked Yang over curiously "Were you really taking care of everything that was going on in that dining room by yourself?" she asked "That seems like far too much work for one person."

"Yeah" Yang sighed "We've been trying to hire a server assistant for months but no luck."

"Yeah, well, good help is hard to find" Weiss quipped.

Blake gave her a flat look. "I'll choose to interpret that as generously as possible" Weiss found herself startled and confused. Did that come off badly coming from her?

She paused pensively, mentally acknowledging the previously quiet girl. "Blake, I wanted to tell you that I'm sorry about yesterday. I wasn't expecting you all to be how you were and I was completely out of line."

Blake shrugged. "Honestly, I didn't think you were going to show your face around here again."

"At first I wasn't going to." Weiss admitted, glancing downward.

Blake continued unperturbed by the white-haired girl's reaction. "But then Yang told me that you had texted Ruby to apologize and that you'd be back again today. What changed?"

"Nothing, really." Weiss answered in a shy whisper. She stiffened even more so than before "I just felt like I should apologize. And that maybe today would be different."

Blake remained silent for a second, contemplating her reply. "If you're cool with Ruby and Yang, you're cool with me." She finally said.

Weiss let out a small, relieved sigh and her shoulders relaxed noticeably.

"Aww, Blake look." Yang cooed "She was scared you were gonna ban her from being friends with us." Blake rolled her eyes. So much for Yang going easy on her.

"I already told Weiss she could be my friend!" Ruby babbled "Blake will never come between us, Weiss!"

"I wouldn't dream of it." Blake giggled quietly while Yang cocked her head sideways. Was Ruby stealing her thunder?

Meanwhile Weiss's shoulders had immediately stiffened once again at the return of this topic. She looked back and forth between the three girls before finally letting out an exasperated sigh. "What is with you guys?"

Blake frowned. Here came the aneurysm she had predicted. She found herself pleasantly surprised as Weiss took a deep breath.

"I just mean that… I don't even know you. And you don't even know me." she awkwardly attempted to clarify.

Yang turned to Weiss. "Well," she hesitantly suggested "we could change that.." She glanced unsurely over at Blake and received a subtle, affirmative nod. "I was going to ask you later but I was thinking we could maybe all use a fresh start together. And I was thinking that maybe we could all hang out this Saturday? At Blake's place. I don't know if you drink, but we could have drinks, or just hang out, whatever. What do you think?"

Weiss was completely taken aback. Seeing new places, meeting new people; she supposed this was exactly why she had wanted to get out of Atlas. Whatever she had been envisioning, these were definitely new and different people. Something about this felt like a rock was sinking to the pit of her stomach though. "Wow" she stammered "What on earth makes you two want to befriend me so badly" She inhaled and found the sharpness her voice ought to carry. "I would hate to see how someone you consider an enemy behaves."

With a warm smile, Blake interjected slowly "For the record, If you need a friend, I can't think of anybody better than either Ruby or Yang."

Weiss paused for a second, then glanced back up at Yang. She couldn't shake the feeling that this might actually be nice. She bit her lip. "I'm not sure that Saturday works Yang. But I will definitely let you know."

This absolutely can not be the best use of your time. You are supposed to be qualifying yourself for leadership in one of the most important companies in the world.

Weiss found it hard to express what she actually wanted to do. There were so many arguments against accepting Yang's invitation circling in her mind. She was certain that if she were to sit down and write a list of pros and cons, the latter would dwarf the former

You never go to things like this. You don't spend time around people like this. You couldn't spend two days around then without making an ass of yourself.

She knew by the ache in her stomach though, from the moment Yang asked her, that she was going to do everything she could to be there. It was the same ache that had driven her to attend college anywhere but Atlas. The ache that told her that, as much as she trusted her parents to set her on the path to success she couldn't trust them completely.

They must be trying to get something out of you! No one would go out of their way to have you over after the way you treated them.

Honestly, they weren't the first people who had reached out to Weiss at Beacon. Fencing teammates inviting her on their outings, classmates starting up friendly conversation; she had dismissed them all repeatedly with enough venom that none tried twice. She had higher aspirations which took priority. It hurt every time.

The door to her father's study loomed over her. She rapped her knuckles cautiously against oakwood. With a creak the door opened and Jacques Schnee emerged, his lip curling into a slight sneer at the sight of his daughter. "I trust this is important, Weiss?"

She took a deep breath. "The fencing team has an event on Saturday.. an overnight for 'team bonding'. I just wanted to be sure that a ride could be arranged? And to let you know where I'd be."

He paused in consideration, for just long enough to make Weiss nervous. A weight lifted from her shoulders when he finally replied "I will let Lawrence know." Then he turned away in disinterest and shut his door again.

Weiss let out a sigh but a small smile tugged at the corners of her mouth. That conversation has been surprisingly easy. Maybe not so surprisingly; her father had been pretty checked out of her life since she had started college. He seemed content to let her affairs pass on autopilot. Whatever. What mattered is that she had gotten what she wanted or at least she would be able to find out if she actually wanted it or not.

Author's Note

This chapter took forever to get right and I'm glad to finally have an update out. I think it came out pretty good in the end but, hey, we're all perfectionists right? The next chapter is going smoothly and should not take so long. I'll be trying to update about every two weeks. If anyone is actually reading this story, comments/reviews are very much appreciated: they keep me motivated.