"Okay, that's all we have time for today," said Professor Dill, tapping his hooves lightly against the ground. "Please turn in your feedback for MICA and LZLI at my office as usual. And remember, we're all on the same side here—not counting the Vytal Festival, that is!"

Right on cue, the bell rang, and the students in the auditorium began to stand up and file out. Down on the stage, MICA and LZLI were brushing themselves off and giving each other slaps on the back after their match. Qrow had his eye in particular on the fourth letter of the visiting MICA, a tall woman who'd piqued his interest a few classes back. He slipped past his classmates to catch her at the door. "Akane! Loved the sweep."

The Huntress-in-training turned towards Qrow. "Oh, thanks! Marina 'n' I came up with that one when our team came across a whole pack of Boarbatusks. Turns out tripwires work pretty well on humans as well." She grinned at him.

"I'll have to try it out sometime," Qrow agreed. He gave her his #3 Charismatic Smirk. "I bet there's a lot I can learn from you."

Akane leaned forward slightly, bringing her face closer to his. "You thinking about some hands-on lessons?" she teased. "Even when you've already got so much experience?"

Qrow put on an over-exaggerated look of innocence. "How else am I going to improve?" he countered, raising his eyebrows.

The older student laughed—

"Qrow. We need to talk."

"Eh?" Akane's eyes flickered away from Qrow's face to someone standing behind him.

With a mental sigh Qrow turned his head to see Tai standing a few paces away. Behind him, Raven was arguing with another classmate about something—probably the match. "What's going—"

"Shhh!" Tai interrupted. "Not here!" He glanced back over his shoulder uncomfortably, and Qrow suddenly noticed how tense his teammate looked. Especially for someone he usually thought of as perpetually relaxed.

Qrow looked back at Akane, but she had already stepped away. She waggled her Scroll at him before continuing to head back to the dorms.

"Great. Thanks a lot," he grumbled to the other Huntsman-in-training.

"Oh, whatever, you're still going to sleep with her," Tai said impatiently. "Come on."

"'Come on'?" Qrow echoed.

Frustrated, Tai grabbed him by the wrist and pulled him out into the hallway. Qrow barely had time to glance over his shoulder and catch a bewildered look from Raven. He did his best to shrug helplessly at his sister as he stumbled after Tai.

His teammate led him to a stairwell, and Qrow pulled his arm free. "Where are we going?" he asked grumpily.

"The practice rooms," Tai answered.

"You do realize they're all gonna be full right now, right?" Tai's eyes widened, and Qrow put a hand to his forehead long-sufferingly. "Look, let's just go down to the dining hall. There's probably no one there right now."

Tai's face cleared. "Yeah, you're right. Come on." Without waiting, he charged into the stairwell. Qrow sighed and followed.

There actually were a trio of students hanging out in the dining hall. Tai had stopped in the side entrance, dismayed, but Qrow kept walking to the opposite end of the room, and his teammate reluctantly followed.

Neither one of them sat down. Tai was clearly still nervous about whatever he wanted to talk about, avoiding eye contact and shifting from foot to foot. Qrow leaned against the end of the nearest table and folded his arms. "So," he said, deliberately, "what is it you need to talk to me about that's worth ripping my arm off for up there?"

Tai flushed and clutched his own left arm with his right hand. Qrow frowned. "C'mon, Tai. Spit it out. This isn't like you."

Tai took a breath. "It's about Raven."

"I see," responded Qrow. The vague worries he had started to imagine—I'm leaving the team, or Professor Daisy said to tell you you failed the final, or Summer and I know everything—suddenly dissipated, and he couldn't stop a smile from creeping onto his face. "What about her?"

There was a flicker of anger in Tai's eyes at Qrow's lighter tone. "Look, I need your help. I want to take things to the next level."

Qrow immediately raised his hands, palms out. "Whoa, what you two are or aren't doing is none of my business."

This time it was Tai who put a hand to his forehead. "Not that, you lascivious…" Qrow was mildly surprised to see that he said it without a trace of a blush.

"That's fancier than what I usually get called," he responded, smirking. "But that's good to hear. After this many dates I'd be worried if you two weren't."

"I thought you just said it was none of your business!" Tai burst out indignantly. Now his ears started reddening, and Qrow mentally awarded himself a check mark for Wednesday.

"All right, then what is it?" he said, resisting the urge to tease his teammate further.

Tai struggled for a moment. "I just don't want to mess this up," he said finally.

Qrow sighed. "You're not gonna mess things up, Tai," he said, waving a hand. "Seriously, where is this coming from? From what I hear your dates are going fine."

Tai gave him a look. "I'm going to ignore that 'from what I hear'," he said dryly, but his annoyance quickly gave way to anxiety once more. He actually began pacing, and Qrow couldn't help but roll his eyes. "That's what I'm talking about, though. It's just dates."

Qrow inclined his head slightly. "Does it bother you that she's still gone on dates with other people?" he suggested.

"It's not like we're exclusive," Tai muttered, not looking up.

"Come on, Tai." Qrow rolled his eyes again. "When, in your life, have you ever not been exclusive?"

The other Huntsman blushed again, but he also stopped pacing. "Look, I couldn't care less what we call it. And I get that things are different where you grew up. I can deal with that. It's that…Raven's important to me. And I want to be important to her too. I want to be there for her. She inspires me, frankly." He sighed. "I don't know if this is something that's going to last forever…but I feel like it might be. It's different from being teammates, and I think it's worth pursuing that." The short speech seemed to exhaust the young man, and he hung his head slightly. "I just want her to know that."

"Well, maybe you should tell her directly," a voice came from around the side of the table.

Tai jumped, and only long experience with his sister kept Qrow from doing the same. "What kind of storybook romance nonsense—?" he complained, throwing his hands in the air. "We were having a private conversation! And how the hell did you sneak up on us?"

Raven preened; there was no other word for it. "A girl's got to have her secrets," she said offhandedly, then walked past Qrow to pat Tai on the shoulder. "Close your mouth, dear."

Tai shut his jaw with a snap.

Qrow held out a hand, palm up. "She called you 'dear'. Everything's fine. And look on the bright side: now you don't have to psych yourself up, find my sister, and say, all serious-like…" He cleared his throat and tried to imitate Tai's accent. "'We need to talk.'"

"Okay, okay," said Tai, but he was staring at Raven as he said it, a silly smile having crawled onto his face while Qrow spoke.

Qrow smiled too, then frowned. "Actually, there is one other thing."

"Hm?" Tai said, distracted.

Qrow glanced pointedly at Raven, who rolled her eyes and walked back around to the far end of the table. Not actually out of earshot, but it's the gesture that counts. He turned back to Tai.

"What about Summer?" he asked quietly.

For the first time in the conversation Tai looked uncomfortable. Not the apprehensive nervousness he'd shown before; actually uncomfortable.

"Summer is great," he said at last. "I can see how we could have ended up together. If things had gone differently, I mean." Tai's eyes flicked over to Qrow's sister, clearly just as aware as Qrow that she would be listening regardless. "That's not a slight against Raven, by the way. I mean, you just heard me say how I feel about her."

Qrow felt a childish urge to make a gagging sound and suppressed it. "Of course," he said instead. "But you know this is going to be hard on her."

"Yeah." Tai ran a hand his through his hair. "But she and Raven talked it out. They're partners, after all. And we're all still on a team together."

Qrow blinked. "Of course they did," he said, feeling like a fool.

"Of course we did," Raven echoed from her spot several feet away. "You men are useless without us."

Qrow rolled his eyes. "Private…conversation!" he called without turning around, and pictured Raven rolling her own eyes in turn. He shook his head. "All right, on your heads be it. And…I'm happy for you two."

He heard Raven make a gagging sound, and Tai laughed, holding out his hand. "Thank you, Qrow."

Qrow took the hand, and was surprised when his teammate pulled him into a hug. But it was only a moment before he hugged back.

A/N: I didn't originally plan to have things go this way, but then Raven popped up in my head and told me there was no way on Remnant she wasn't going to follow Qrow and Tai after their very conspicuous exit upstairs. I told her how tropey it was and she just blew me off. At least she got to sneak up on them. I'm not sure how she did it either; that dining hall is pretty open.