Path to the Future
Chapter 20: Dance Preparations
After the accumulation of information the the group decided to wait for a week per advice from Itachi. However Blake did not stop in her pursuit of the White Fang as she still tried to dig up any information that she possibly could, and this got to the point where her team and friends. That was when team RWBY decided to address this issue in their dorm room, and with Ryoko in her father's dorm.
"You want me to do what?" Blake questioned.
"We want you to go to the dance," Ruby said.
"That's ridiculous."
"Blake we're worried about you. Your friends or worried about you and I think this investigation is starting to mess with your head," Yang said.
"Your don't sleep, you hardly eat, and honestly your grades have been suffering for the past week," Weiss stated.
"You think I care about grades!?" Blake yelled as she stood up, "People's lives are at stake!"
Yang got up and calmly sat Blake back down on her bed, "We know, and we are all trying to figure out what Torchwick and the White Fang are up to."
"Thanks to you, Sun, and Sasuke that they are operating outside of Vale and we know from Yang, Naruto, and Neptune that they have a lot more prototypes like the one we fought the other day," Ruby said.
"And the Schnee dust company was able to find out that Vale has been there primary target, for dust robberies," Weiss said.
"But there is still a lot of questions we don't know about," Blake rebuttal.
"And you can't get those answers if you can't even keep your eyes open. Which is why we want you to go to the dance," Ruby said.
"It will be fun! Yang and I will be orchestrating the whole event," Weiss said.
"What?" Blake asked.
"Team CFVY's mission is taking longer than it was planned," Yang explained.
"So which is why Yang and I are finishing from where they left off," Weiss finished.
"And now we can make sure you have the perfect night," Yang said.
"And once it's all over, we'll return to our search rested and ready."
"So what do you think?" Ruby asked hopefully.
Blake thought about it for a second, "I think this is a colossal waste of time," Blake began to get off the bed and walk to the door, "I'll be in the library."
As Blake went to open the door, Ruby called out one last time, "But what about Sasuke, he's worried about you?!" She yelled standing off of Weiss' bed.
Blake flinched at this, but then began to speak, "Sasuke understands what I'm trying to do, he hasn't once asked me to stop nor does he think I need a rest. So as far as I'm concerned he is supporting me in this."
"But how do you know that is how he feels?!" Ruby argued back. Blake once again flinched, but instead of answering she just walked right out of the room, Ruby sighed and fell back on the bed.
"Great," Yang commented sarcastically.
"What are we going to do now, she can't keep going like this and Sasuke or the guys refuses to say something," Weiss said.
"Remember what Naruto said, They are here to provide backup when it came to the investigation, so they believe it is up to us to handle this problem," Ruby said.
"Actually Naruto told me that Sasuke requested them to stay out of it," Yang said.
"But why would he want that, doesn't he care about her health?" Weiss questioned.
"It's not that he doesn't care," said a vice at the door, the group of girls turned to find Naruto and Menma there, "It's just that… they both have complicated history together," Menma said.
They all sighed as they began to think of ways to think of getting Blake to go and rest. Until Naruto started to leave, "Where are you going?" Yang said.
Naruto looked at her, "I have a date that needs my attention, Pyrrha asked me to come and help her and Jaune with something which I decided to help with."
Yang raised her eyebrow, "Aren't you forgetting something?"
Naruto chuckled, "Oh please as if I would ask anyone else but you to the dance, Yang."
Yang puffed her cheeks, "Please?" She asked with puppy eyes.
"Huh, so that is where Ryoko and Ruby got it from," Menma said.
Naruto nodded and walked to her, "Well then, Yang Xiao Long, would you please do this dragon the honor of coming to the dance with me?" Naruto said while on one knee.
Yang wasn't expecting that and blushed because of it, " I uh-of course I would love to."
Naruto kissed her on the forehead, "Great, see you on Sunday also Ryoko is with Itachi and Sasuke plus she'll be with me the whole day after so… yeah," Naruto then sped out the door.
"Wait that's not fair," but it was too late, but then she smiled and evil smile, "Hey Menma," Yang said sweetly.
Menma gulped nervously and was going to dip but saw Weiss had closed the door, "Yes Yang?"
"Could you be an Uncle and bring Ryoko to the dorm for me," she said.
"But Naruto-"
Ruby then used her special move. The adorable puppy eyes. Menma tried his hardest to resist but sighed and gave in, "Fine," he then left to get her niece.
Ruby still sighed, "Even with all of this it wouldn't matter if Blake won't go."
"Don't worry about that, she will go, trust me," Yang said.
With Naruto, Jaune, and Pyrrha they were on the roof with Jaune and Naruto in a sword standstill with Jaune actually gaining the upper hand as he pushed down on Naruto with a smirk. Naruto smile and used his dragon physical ability on his arm making it stronger to push back on Jaune. Jaune was able to hold his ground and bring up his shield quickly to block a tail attack from Naruto. Jaune smiled and so did Naruto, however Naruto was able to slither his tail to Jaune foot and sweep him making him fall on the ground, with Pyrrha and Naruto laughing, "Very good Jaune, you made me use my dragon ability and was able to block it. You came a long way with your training with Menma and Pyrrha. I'm impressed."
"Thank you Naruto, for helping in Menma's place today, I really appreciate it," Jaune said.
"No problem, glad I can help," Naruto started to the door, "Now to stop little miss Namikaze from eating all of the ramen in the fridge."
"Wait Naruto," Pyrrha called making Naruto stop and turned to her, "I was wondering something."
Naruto nodded to her, "So what's up?"
"Well I was wondering and I mean by no disrespect but who of your team is the strongest and the weakest?" Pyrrha asked.
Jaune was going to say something about his partner's question but Naruto stopped him with a raised hand, "It is okay Jaune she is just curious. Now then who of us is the strongest and the weakest. That is a difficult question," Naruto pondered for a bit, then answered her, "If I was honest none of us is the strongest or weakest honestly."
"What do you mean?" Jaune and Pyrrha asked.
Naruto raised a finger, "Let me explain," He began, "You see with us everyone here has there own strengths in a particular area and we try to raise other aspects to help with that. When it comes to power in itself, then I take the cake by a mile, however when it comes to speed then Sasuke beats all of us hands down, when it comes to endurance Menma takes the cake, and when it comes to intelligence and the execution of a plan then Itachi has us all beat pretty bad."
"So have you all ever sparred together and do you keep score if you do?"
Naruto nodded, "From what I recall the scores are 51, 50, 50, 50, with Menma leading." Jaune and Pyrrha surprised that Menma was leading. "However Menma is like Ruby in a lot of ways, in the aspect that Menma doesn't like to fight his friends a lot, but i you are ever to make him be serious he can be fierce." Naruto looked up into the sky, "And I take pride in that."
"Then can Menma something for me?" Naruto raised an eyebrow edging her on, "After our first mission given to us and for us. I want to fight him." Naruto looked at her as if asking for an explanation for the sudden interest. "I… you guys have been shown tremendous improvement and even when you all arrived you guys were a cut above everyone else, and I… I just…"
Naruto saw that Pyrrha was having a hard saying what's on her mind, but he knew what it was, "All your life you have only known victory, and not defeat. You have never had someone to compare yourself too, so you want to see how you stack against us. To see if you had become stagnant, to see if you can beat us. Am I correct?" Pyrrha nodded.
"Pyrrha," Jaune whispered finally understanding his partner.
"That Pyrrha is your fighter spirit," Pyrrha looked up at Naruto, "That's the drive to want to test your limits. To be confident in your abilities to beat anyone but yet still want to be better. To be the best," Naruto turned away from her and started walking, as he waved his hand in the air, "Message delivered."
Pyrrha smiled and Jaune just stared at her while blushing slightly.
It was the next day and the two girls, Yang and Weiss, has set everything for the party tomorrow. Ruby was down in the dumps that day with still not knowing if Blake was coming or not but Yang reassured everyone that she would. And during that night Blake was in the library on a computer as she jolt herself awake with bags under her eyes until she saw a red dot appear on the screen and began moving around, Blake slammed her fist on the desk in frustration, and began to follow it until she bumped into Yang, "Hello~"
"What?" Blake commented back.
"We need to talk," Yang then pulled Blake along to an empty classroom
"Yang if your going to tell me to stop then you should just save your breath," Blake said pacing back and forth while Yang sat on the teacher's desk in the classroom with her legs crossed.
"I don't want you to stop. I want you to slow down."
"We don't have the luxury to slow down."
"It's not a luxury, it's a necessity."
"The necessity is stopping Torchwick."
"And we're going to. But first you have to sit down and listen to what I have to say." She patted on the table she was sitting on. "Ruby and I grew up in Patch, an island just off the coast of Vale. Our parents were huntsman. Our dad taught at Signal and our mom would take on missions around the kingdom. Her name was Summer Rose and she was like super mom. Baker of cookies and slayer of giant monsters. And then one day she left for a mission and never came back. It was tough, Ruby was really torn up but I think she was still too young to get what was really going on you know. And my dad just kind of shut down. It wasn't long before I known why. Summer wasn't the first love he lost. She was the second. The first was my mom."
Blake's eyes widened at the revelation. "He wouldn't tell me everything but I learned that the two had been on a team together with Summer and Qrow. And that she left me with him just after I was born. No one has seen her since, with exception of us seeing her at Konoha."
"Why did she leave you?"
Yang sighed, "That question. Why? I didn't know the answer but I was determined to find out." Yang got off the desk and walked to the chalk board and began to draw.
"It was all I thought about. I would ask anyone I could who knew about her. Then one day I found something. What I thought was a clue that could lead me to answers. Or maybe even my mother. I waited for dad to leave the house, put Ruby in a wagon and headed out. I must've walked for hours. I had cuts and bruises was totally exhausted, but I wasn't going to let anything stop me. When we finally got there, I could barely stand. But I didn't care, I had made it."
"And then I saw them. Those burning red eyes. There we were a toddler sleep in the back of a wagon and a stupid girl to exhausted to cry for help. We mind as we'll be served on a silver platter. But as luck would have it, our uncle showed up just in time. My stubbornness should have got us killed that night."
There was a moment of silence, "Yang, I'm sorry that it happened to you, and I understand what your trying to tell me but this is different. I'm not a child and this isn't just a search for answers I just…"
"I told you I'm not telling you to stop! I haven't. To this day I still want to know what happened to my mother and why she left me. But I will never let that search control me. We're going to find the answers we're looking for Blake, but if we destroy ourselves in the process then what good are we?"
"You don't understand I'm the only one who can do this!"
Yang turned around sharply to face Blake with her red eyes that was reminiscent of Naruto. "No you don't understand! If Roman Torchwick walked into the room right now, what would you do?"
"I'd fight him!"
"You'd lose!" Yang shoved Blake to the desk.
"I can stop him!" Blake tried to shove back but the attempt was too weak.
"You can't even stop me!" Yang again made her hit the desk. Blake then stood up and ready herself for a hit only to be hugged by Yang. "I'm not asking you to stop. Just please get some rest. Not just for you but for the people you care about." Yang started walking to the door, "And if you feel like coming out tomorrow. I'll save you a dance." Yang then exit the room leaving lake to think, however as she exit there was Sasuke right by the door with hm leaning on the wall, arms crossed and eyes closed. "How much did you here?"
"Everything, and I would like to say thank you."
"Why didn't you help?"
Sasuke sighed, "Blake for a lot of her life hasn't really thought for herself. She was born into the White Fang and she only saw the corruption in it when I told her about. That was when she began to form her own opinion, why she began to ask questions, but she would always take thoses who was closest to her, words to heart. I told her that I wasn't always going to be there to help her, but I did promise that I would protect her. So in case this didn't work out I did have a back-up plan."
Yang raised her eyebrow, "You did?"
Sasuke nodded, "I did not agree with what she was doing to herself so the night before the dance I was going to put her asleep myself using a technique that Itachi had, but I wanted her to see what she was doing is wrong and not take someone's upon but actually think about it."
Yang smiled at Sasuke, "You really do love her don't you?"
Sasuke sighed, "Yes I do. Whether she does feel the same or not doesn't matter right now, as we still need to deal with the White Fang first."
Yang smiled brighter and left Sasuke standing there as he waited for Blake.
Sorry for the long wait for this chapter I wanted to make sure the other story that I have, 'RWBY: The Four Kings', was done introducing the four main characters for that story which by the way is a reason why I stopped this one to raise the other but I'll tell you guys about that later.
Anyway I wanted to update the plan for this as I decided to possibly add another arc before Vol. 3
Volume 1 Arc
Konoha Arc
Trial Arc
Volume 2 Arc
Mission Arc
Academy War Arc
Volume 3 Arc
Now I know you guys maybe interested in the next two arcs and probably specifically the Academy War Arc. Well all I can tell you is that it is not actually a war with bloodshed, if I say more than it might be spoiled, but I can say there is a popular anime that did something like this.
Anyway I'll try to get back into the swing of things but I want to at least be done at Volume 3 before Anime Expo. But yeah until then take it easy.