Crossing the threshold from the hallway into science lab was like... entering an old timey movie. And not one of those fun, funny Charlie Chaplin ones, where physical comedy was the only language available, and your biggest worries were falling pianos, and crazy rotating construction sites.

No, science lab was like an avante garde black and white french movie. A still frame of a chair for 10 minutes, before a slow-mo shot of a woman smoking a cigarette. Occasionally some pretty views of the Paris skyline. But mostly that still frame of the chair.

Ruby sat on her usual bench. Hey, she loved science, okay? Science was cool, and you did cool shit. Just- science lab wasn't cool. At all. And sometimes you dissected frogs, and that was kind of cool, but also really, really gross. Sometimes you mixed up a bunch of chemicals. Most of the time you sat and listened to Professor Oobleck zip around the room and talk too fast to listen too, and too dry to absorb.

The most fun thing about science lab was just looking at Oobleck's hair every day. Yang used to joke that his hair had been slowly trying to fly away from him. Ruby thought he mostly just went home and tried to achieve hair-powered flight. Blake just wrinkled her nose and wished he would use conditioner.

Oobleck pushed his glasses up, his dress shirt in it's usual disarray- his tie lopsided, his sleeves unbuttoned and wrinkled from his constant pulling it up his forearms. Everybody streamed into class, taking their usual benches with their lab partners.

Ruby, thus far into the year, hadn't had a lab partner. There was an odd number of students in the class, so she'd basically had the luxury of having a whole bench to herself. It was fine by her, anyway- she could deal with biology alone. Oobleck was more than happy to leave her to her own devices, seeing as she performed consistently well.

"Ah, Miss Schnee!" Professor Oobleck called out as the ivory-haired girl entered the lab. "Welcome to your first science lab here at Beacon! I trust you found the room well enough on your own, I know this place gets a little confusing sometimes."

Miss Schnee. As in Weiss Schnee. The new girl Ruby practically assaulted yesterday.

Uh oh.

"Not at all, sir," Weiss said graciously.

"Ah, but where are my manners?" Oobleck chuckled to himself. He did that a lot. Tell a joke only he knew, and only he laughed at. Never got old for that guy. "I'm your teacher, Professor Oobleck. Now, this class requires you to have a lab partner."

Uh. Oh.

"And it just so happens,"

No.

"You're in luck, because,"

No way.

"We have someone who's been without a lab partner the whole year,"

Come. On.

"Miss Ruby Rose," he gestured over to Ruby's gut/teeth/fist clenched form.

Aw, Oobleck, no.

Ruby saw the discontent grow in Weiss' face as she turned to look at her, and she wanted to bury her face in her hands.

"Professor-"

"Ah! Enough talk, Miss Schnee," Professor Oobleck interrupted her, in the way he tended to do, when his lessons mattered more to him than his students. Paradoxical, maybe- but there was Professor Oobleck for you. "No progress in science ever got done by people who sat around talking logistics! And that is what we are here to do: science!" he peered at her, lowering his large, round spectacles to look at her in the eyes. "Take your seat," he said simply, and he zipped off to the front of the class, leaving Weiss with half a protest in her throat.

Ruby saw her sigh, then take a deep breath before looking at her, a cold, annoyed look on her face- like someone decided she had to take a whole class with a constant, terrible running nose. She trudged over to Ruby's bench.

Oh boy.

When she sat beside her on the stool, dropping her shoulder bag on the floor beside her, Weiss didn't give Ruby even a passing glance, angling her body away from the younger girl. Ruby could almost feel a blast of cold air coming from her side, was the window open or what?

Nope, just Weiss, giving Ruby the ultimate silent treatment she'd ever gotten from anyone, let alone from somebody she'd exchanged a grand total of 20 words to in the span of less than 20 minutes.

Yikes.

"Yikes," Ruby heard whispered from her left, and she turned to see Sun and Neptune, both looking at her with grimaces. She shot them a dirty look, gesturing subtly to tell them to look forward or she'd literally karate chop them to actual death. They got the message, because Ruby was actually really good at communicating complex ideas with very simple gestures. It was one of her few talents, the other being she could drink a whole gallon of milk in under 10 minutes. That was why she was going to grow up big and strong, just you watch you bunch of weird puberty boosted tall stalks of 17 year olds.

Oobleck droned on and on, animatedly whizzing around the front of the class as he expressively gestured this way and that, writing on the board with his chicken-scratch handwriting and tapping on it multiple times for emphasis like anybody could decipher what it was he was even talking about.

Ruby caught sight of Weiss' confused look growing by the minute. She felt a little bad. Science lab was a lot to take in, and especially on your second day of school. Hopefully Weiss had gotten history with Professor Goodwitch, and not Oobleck, too.

Yeah, that was bound to be a bit of a shocker, finding out Oobleck was teaching history, too. Whatever that saying it was about idle hands, he had definitely taken it to heart. Ruby was convinced the man had never been idle a moment in his life. She settled into her blank, numb state as she paid attention as best she could.

After 45 minutes of cold silence from Weiss, and the complete opposite from Oobleck, the bell rung and he quickly dismissed them before zipping out the classroom. He might as well have left a comical teacher shaped dust cloud in his wake. Weiss blinked once before gathering herself, getting off her seat and walking out the class.

Oh.

Well, that was that. All things considered, it wasn't terrible. And Weiss was gone, right? Ruby could just leave well enough alone now, and go on with her day. Her next period was with Yang and Blake, so she could rest a little bit easier now.

She spotted Weiss pulling out her class schedule, and that same confused expression on her face, even as she tried to mask it with the students streaming all around her. Ruby could see it clearly: she was lost. Ruby froze in her tracks.

Against her better instincts, knowing she had a tendency to make things worse by not keeping her mouth shut and letting things just happen, Ruby followed her out the class.

"Hey," Ruby called out, hesitant, but still determined to do something right this time. She had to at least try, right? "Hey, um, Weiss."

Weiss stopped dead in her tracks and looked back at her, the icy expression still on her face. She cocked a hip and crossed her arms as she regarded Ruby, who swallowed thickly in response.

Okay, Rubes, just give it a try.

"I- uh. I'm sorry- no I mean, I'm Ruby and I'm sorry. My name. Is Ruby Rose. I'm sorry, about the whole bumping into you thing yesterday, that wasn't intentional, but it was totally my fault-" she held her hands out in front of her as she stopped her rambling. "Can I help you? You look a little lost."

Weiss didn't give any reaction for a second or two. Ruby was more than certain she'd messed it up, and obviously, obviously she should have kept her mouth shut and let Weiss continue on her way, she wasn't lost look at her! Fancy people like that didn't get lost. They just did their things and mere mortals like Ruby just had to look on, that was all.

"No," Weiss said simply.

Okay, but hold on-

"Okay, but hold on-"

"No."

"It's a big school-"

"No."

"And you might get lost- And I just want to help you-"

Weiss shot her a severe look, but this time Ruby stood her ground.

"Please," Ruby ended.

One heartbeat, then two.

Then she uncrossed her arms and huffed a quick breath in annoyance, but it kind of seemed like this time, it was to her instead of about her. Maybe she was projecting, but okay, this was a step in the right direction, so go team Ruby.

"Fine, I could use some... help," she swallowed and stumbled over the word, but quickly caught herself. "Getting to my next class. I don't quite know the layout of this school just yet."

Very good step in the right direction. That was great!

"Oh, um, do you know what your next class is? Mind if I take a look at your class schedule?" Ruby said. Weiss fished in her shoulder bag for a little bit before giving her her class schedule.

"Oh... Uh oh," Ruby frowned.

"Uh oh? Why uh oh? What do you mean by uh oh?" Weiss' eyes grew bigger as she almost demanded an explanation from Ruby. Ruby leaned back a little, raising a quizzical brow at Weiss.

"No, just uh. You've got history class next," Ruby said, giving a sheepish little half-smile. Now it was Weiss' turn to quirk a brow.

A perfectly trimmed, shaped white brow. For a half second, Ruby registered again that Weiss was... pretty. Like pretty, pretty. Dang.

"Why is that an uh oh?" Weiss asked, and she seemed to be almost bracing herself for the answer. Maybe Beacon was a lot to take in for someone. Ruby felt an air of sympathy for the older girl.

"It's Professor Oobleck... again."

"It's- what?"

Ruby pulled up her phone, looking at the time. "Okay, we've got like 5 minutes to get there, so we should probably get going. C'mon, I'll show you the secret shortcuts to get around this place."

"Wait, what?"

Okay, so Weiss wasn't exactly wholly on board with her 'jumping down the stairs' idea. Or the 'let's climb the fence' idea. Actually Weiss wasn't on board with any of her ideas, but they still made it to history class on time.

Like clockwork, Oobleck arrived in the class at the exact start of the period. Ruby brought Weiss in with an apologetic little smile to Professor Oobleck, going to her usual unassigned assigned seat. Yang and Blake were already waiting with very equally confused looks as they saw Weiss trailing behind Ruby.

"Hey, Rubes," Yang began with a little hesitation. She looked back to Blake, who shrugged, before turning back to Ruby. "You, uh, gonna introduce us?"

Ruby gaped, opening and closing her mouth several times as Oobleck sped off into his lecture. Hey, Ruby loved the formation of the League of Nations as much as anybody else, but she still mostly just tuned Oobleck out- which was a very common theme in his lessons, Ruby had long since realized. Weiss sat and listened attentively, or she tried as best she could. Ruby shrugged at Yang.

"I- she's mean, and I think she doesn't really like me, but I was showing her around school, and I think she's okay?" she spoke softly, then drummed her fingers on the table once. She shrugged again. "Don't worry about, sis, just roll with it."

"Okaaayy..." Yang mumbled, sharing a look with Blake. The next few minutes were spent with Oobleck's droning on. Weiss grew a little bit more visibly frustrated as the period went on.

"And that brings us to your next assignment," Professor Oobleck stopped his lecture to address his students directly, adjusting his glasses and pulling his sleeves up again. "Now, pay attention, because this counts for 30% of your final grade in this class."

Everyone suddenly perked up, predictably. Oobleck smiled in quiet satisfaction.

"Each of you will be paired up, and assigned topics to create a full five minute presentation in class," he took a sip from the thermos he pulled out of his bag. "The topics will be randomly assigned. As will the pairings."

Weiss visibly stiffened, and Ruby quirked her head a little. She thought Weiss would have preferred this, at least now she didn't have to anticipate maybe not being picked. Or maybe that was just her. No way someone wouldn't have picked Weiss. New girl or not, Weiss was like, the new, rich, pretty, high class girl. Ruby was just a normal girl with normal knees. Different worlds, she supposed.

She wondered who Weiss was going to be assigned to as her partner.

Oobleck pulled out the roll call sheet, peering at it intently, adjusting his glasses.

Hm, maybe Neptune. She could see Weiss with Neptune, he'd always been a cool guy. Like, a really cool guy. His hair was blue, and he pulled it off perfectly, that's how cool he was. Well, he was kind of dorky when he was with Sun and their group of friends, but still, really cool.

"Yang Xiao Long, Blake Belladonna," Oobleck announced curtly. The two high-fived. Wow, lucky break. Ruby was a little sad she couldn't pair up with them now, but it was fine. She was more than happy for the two lovebirds.

"Pyrrha Nikos, Jaune Arc."

Okay, odd choice, but go off Oobleck. Well, she supposed they were pretty okay friends. Weiss huffed a small breath, a slight frown on her face. Pyrrha was the first person she'd talk to at Beacon. Ruby sympathized.

"Ruby Rose, Weiss Schnee."

Oh.